Wednesday 22 April 2015

Numenera: The Scry Hawk Chronicles - Halfway Summary

For those of you that joined in with me on Twitch, thank you very much. I'm still getting used to all this live stream nonsense and trying to put on a good production while also GM'ing is a little on the difficult side but I'll get there eventually.

For those of you that haven't caught the streams, here's a little update.


Falco: The Village of Stone - Next Broadcast Friday 24th 18:00 UTC

After launching an asteroid in the general direction of the village they eventually found their way to Ebon Along the way they found plant life that had turned to stone and a group of Griffalo defending a Griffalo statue. After a tough fight they found that the statue used to be a living Griffallo who only a few inches left of its internal structure still flesh while the outer part of the creature had turned to stone.

The village of Ebon was deserted, although a lot worse from surviving the shockwave from the asteroid impact near the area. Statues of two guards were found in a rickety lookout tower but found nothing more so they pressed on. The empty village only held one person, a young girl found crying in the Elder's hut. She told them that the Elder had told them to find shelter, her mother had gone to go find her father who was a village guard and she had been left alone.  Around the village they found cracks in the ground and more statues. One of the group took a tumble and as he tried to steady himself during a quake and a gas cloud from one of these cracks turned his hand to stone.

They tried to climb the guard tower, only for it to collapse but found the statues inside had vanished. This phenomena was found across the village, statues which once were there had moved or disappeared and others they had found were smashed. The young girl gave no more clues apart from a beast living under the ground which the Elder was afraid of. They returned back to the hut to put the girl somewhere safe and found the  statue of the Elder trying to scribe something. It was a note to save him and his village, they needed flesh to be whole again and warned them about the beast; the girl. She vanished with an artefact that the group had beneath a locked domed bunker hatch inside one of the huts, leaving the group to deal with the hungering statues.

Lanius: The Shadow Excavation - Next Broadcast Saturday 25th 16:00 UTC

The squadron made their way across blighted ground towards the mountain range known as the Black Raige. They found broken hounds half dead and decided to investigate. The hounds leapt at the group which they bravely fought back. They found that the hound's eyes poured fourth dark black smoke which could not be explained. With one of the group injured they found what seemed to be the guards of the excavation and tried to plead for help only to end up knocking out the guards. However they discovered that like the hounds before, the guards and three out of the four of the group now showed the signs of the pouring smoke, however none of them could see it on themselves.

They entered the excavation site with one of them taking the face and uniform of one of the guards outside. He along with the two that had the smoky eyes were accepted as support for the excavation. However the last member was seen as a fraud and immediately taken by number assigned guards to a holding cell. He was accompanied by the imposter guard to make sure he had back up. The other two were taken to task by the head of the archaeological dig, given excavation tools, chained up to weary slaves and sent down to dig. The prisoner tried to escape with the help of his undercover teammate which was interrupted by the chain gang.

They were soon all freed with the guards now dead or unconscious, one of whom seemed to have died from the shadows in his eyes dispelling from his body. There were shouts down below for help as another digger had somehow been suspended in the air by a shadowy force. The group managed to pull him up to the top of a pillar during which another member was suspended by this same force. They found a consol and deactivated whatever  was in play but activated a crystal disk in the centre of the pillared chamber. One member went to investigate and found themselves stuck on the crystal, with the rescued excavator now lumbering forward towards them. The excavator fell onto the crystal and shadows dissipated from his eyes, which were sucked underneath the crystal and  he died. With frantic efforts they managed to turn off the device and free their comrade. They investigated another room, turned on the crystal plate, only to find more shadows bubbling up through the crystal which started to fill the room, latching onto any form of intelligence. They ran back to the previous chamber and with all their effort closed the doors to stop the invasion of the shadows but as the door closed, the space in between fused with crystal.


Vultur: The Grand Orators Tome - Next Broadcast Sunday 26 17:00 UTC
Just over fifty miles along the Black Raige northwards, the squadron came face to face with the raw mountains. They had combed the area for an easy route to where they believed the Oraea monks had gone to but found no trace of a trail. They instead opted to use what looked like a vast storm drain channel cared into the mountain side, which lead up beyond the clouds. They were however presented with multiple problems. The first being that the access to the route was a sheer vertical cliff face, the second once they had gotten up, was a storm emanating from the top of the mountain range itself.

As they reached a third of the way up they found a place to pause, a large ledge that held a sinister artefact. Upon investigating a copper looking stain, they found that a recent land slide had covered up a perfectly severed arm. There was no sign of struggle or the body attached  but the material was the same as the Order's robes. Within moments they were surrounded by Pallones, disk like creatures with razer sharp edges that floated in the air almost invisible like jellyfish. They seemed to never end as after some were slain and more were revealed in the lightning of the storm overhead but all we slain by an explosive which warped the face of one of the group. Rain now started to fall and along with it, shards of metal, some shins, but most jagged fragments of larger metal objects. The channel they were climbing had filled with water and was gushing down the mountain impeding their travels. The darkness however highlighted a pale flickering light in a cavern above.

They decided not to enter before resting and all ended up in a dream state. A happy village with pure skies, laughing children. The town itself stood still while the villagers seemed to move at lightning speed, leaving a pale trail of their movements. They entered the tavern and saw shades that were inhuman, with arms and claws that reached to the ground which slashed into the villagers splashing red across the floor. The group tried to call out but heard a sound to hush them before everything fell into silence and they awoke. Inside the cave was a Oraea monk, barely holding on to life. He was stemming the blood loss and infection from a severed arm. He told them they avoided the village that held a religious right over the bridge they were heading to. The villagers were violent towards  those who wanted access to the bridge and recent merchants had brought back tales of the Night Shusher, a nightmare creature whole stole children from the village but no cries could be heard from the screaming children. They were said to have been taken to the bridge. The monk told them he had been left by his fellow monks who had possibly gone up to the bridge without him but they had left him before he had awoken. As the storm raged outside the squadron could see a group of pale figures with abnormally long arms watching them from far up in the distance, on the way up the mountains.

Elanus: The Dodona's Twin - Next Broadcast Tuesday 28th 16:00 UTC

On the Old Road Amphos the squadron literally stumbled into an invisible man. The crash caused his cloaking belt to break and soon an argument broke out between him and the squad. He seemed in a hurry to leave and it became apparent he was carrying a satchel and documents from the Aeon Priests. He said that the leader of the priests in the swamp had told him to send for reinforcements and was headed to the city but when he was asked to come with them he outright refused saying that Master Wrenn did not care for his life. This was suspicious and was only compounded when they wrestled the papers off of him, one of which that had names crossed off along with other vital and no doubt secret documents. The man fled for safety leaving what he had with them.

The group pressed on and encountered a warrior whose suit of armor, sword and shield were all made of the same grey material with glowing blue lines etched into them. She was a formidable foe who demanded that they handed over the documents but they managed to eventually wear her down and knock her out. When she came to, they demanded answers, finding out that she might have been protecting the man they had just encountered rather than trying to hunt him down. She refused to follow them into the swamp, causing a Cypher to explode creating a nanosecond of intense gravity that forced them to the floor, knocking one of them out. They decided she was too much trouble and although they did not unbind her from her restraints, they showed her a piece of paper which she interpreted as  the group were new recruits for her organisation and left them in peace. She threatened her return or sending others after them if she could not get the restrains off easily. 

They arrived at the swamp and the fog from the swamp had started to thicken. They found a dimly lit encampment with an old man near the central fire looking over documents and another digging a large hole. One of the group went to investigate but the fog obscured him just a little and although he panicked the digger, he was dismissed by Master Wrenn as a figment that were plaguing the researchers. The artificial intelligence went in and pretended to be someone sent from the Aeon Priests from Auspar and was condemned to being a  faulty AI as they did not know current events. Another entered, who pretended to be one of the researchers, which fooled Master Wrenn and convinced the digger he had taken a Cypher to change his appearance. However, he questioned why they out there and was deemed mentally unstable and was told to wait for medical assistance. He escaped and returned to Master Wrenn who told him who he was and although the digger questioned Master Wrenn's acceptance of who he was in light of what he himself had been told.

Strix: Kaledon's Reprise - Next Broadcast Sunday 3rd May 16:00 UTC

The squadron found themselves mid morning in the Grey Market of Auspar. Although they weren't local to the area or the floor of the city, the citizens didn't notice. Partially due to the rebuilding of the market itself but also of the discovery of a dead body. It had been left in a dumpster behind a restaurant. It turned out to be a man called Braxx, the leader of the Guldspar in Auspar. He had not been seen in quite some time and the fact he seemed to have been murdered by multiple blunt force injuries deemed it a murder. The group tried to gather information but the crowd, baying for someone to blame, turned on one of the group. The Guldspar of the squadron turned the tables on the woman accuser and soon the crowd turned on her for her lack of even circumstantial evidence.  The body was secured, the investigating Guldspar departed and the woman was escorted away by another guard with a metal eye, who shouted at her for disobeying the kings orders, his orders. In hushed tones however he told her to never breathe a word of what he had said to the priests who were coming for her.

The group eventually found their way to Ample's boutique and their contact Elvira. She forced them to hand over their Silver Coins in exchange for more fitting clothes of the current fashion to blend in and told them they needed to head to the Papal Spire. People were getting sick, perhaps a contagion, only affecting people who had mechanical implants. She had called in the Scry Hawks as she had illegally augmented one of her own guards which was also against the tenants of the Silver Palm. The man in question, Hotch, burst into the room from guarding outside and slew his fellow guard for insulting royalty before turning on the group. They eventually subdued him but not before the Guldspar came into contact with Hotch's mechanical arm and his golden veins turned purple with a voice telling him to kneel. They were interrupted before the killing blow by Elvira, her other guards and two Aeon priests, they were there to take Hotch away to the Papal Spire and to Holva's Ward.


They followed the Priests inside the Papal Spire and used the Guldspar's new condition to try to get them into restricted medical areas. They found that the ward housing the patients suffering from the new infliction were heavily guarded. Luckily, after taking a vial of Gate to the Forking Paths, the Guldspar was wheel-chaired to a nearby secure ward which already housed a patient; Zevran Narrkonis, Lord Narrkonis' third born son. While outside, one of the group was crashed into by a cart carrying medical vials and was accidentally injected with a substance which created a crystalline cast over his wounds. He tried to seek help from a nurse, who after signing him in and away from the group and the general staff and public, violently interrogated him for information on the King and the Scry Hawk's involvement, before knocking him unconscious. The Guldspar, while unconscious, had dreams of being a cobbler in a small shop. It then turned into a room filled with banners, high backed seats and a very unique staff. As he awoke he saw the staff on one of the screens on Zevran's skin and soon found out via the Datasphere Zevran was next to the Kaldon's tomb when the seal was broken. The Guldspar wanted out but the doctors and guards wouldn't let him in case he infected other Guldspar and moments later, Zevran asked him for help.


Do you like what you've read so far, or perhaps caught a glimpse of the live-players over on Twitch? You can support me, my writing, live-streaming and soon podcasting via Patreon.

Tuesday 7 April 2015

The Scry Hawk Chronicles Stream Dates, Details and Times

This Friday marks the first session of The Scry Hawk Chronicles over on my Twitch channel. 


Below are the stream  times and a mission statements for each session.



Falco: Friday 10th/24th April, 19:00 UTC+1 - The Village of Stone
Unnatural tremors have been reported heading towards an unprotected village with the rumour of the intention to destroy   it.

Lanius: Saturday 11th/25th April, 17:00 UTC+1  - The Shadow Excavation
Regent Chancellor Pheylor has funded an archaeological dig with taxpayers money, which has started to blight the land around it.

Vultur: Sunday 12th/26th April, 18:00 UTC+1  - The Grand Orators Tome
An expedition team from the First Oraea of the Vessel have gone missing in the Black Raige searching for a potentially cataclysmic prophesy.

Elanus: Tuesday 14th/28th  April, 17:00 UTC+1 - The Dodona's Twin
Aeon Priests from the Papal Spire in Auspar are searching for a cure to the Untethering and have discovered a swamp of sentient flora.

Strix: Sunday 19th April/3rd May, 17:00 UTC+1  - Kaledon's Reprise
The seal on the long dead king Kaldon's tomb has been defiled  and a request of help has been sent by the criminal organisation, the Silver Palm




Monday 6 April 2015

Numenera: Interview with Andreas Walters - Author of Ninth World Assassins

    D: Can you tell us a little about your background in Table Top RPGs?

    A: Started playing in middle school with D&D third edition, played that and 3.5 until about high school until our GM became "too cool to be geek." From there I took over GMing, I remained playing predominately playing D&D (Occasionally playing Star Wars Saga and Mutants & Masterminds) until until Monte Cook kickstarted Numenera, which was where the real change happened.


    D: What has been your favourite to play?

    A: Although I have relatively limited gaming diversity experience, I would say I have had a lot of fun with D&D 3.5 and Star Wars Saga, despite its broken mechanics (which I personally fixed).


    D: Do you have a moment that you will always remember from a game?

    A: two session mega-battle against Asmodeus, where the players Mephistopheles asked for the players help to free Levistus and help him take down the Lord of Hell. Mephistopheles took the crown as Lord of Hell and the players got the 7th layer (Levistus got the 8th).


    D: What have been your inspirations?

    A: Computer: Warcraft 2 & 3, Heroes III of Might & Magic, Elderscrolls Series (Morrowind, Oblivion, Skyrim)

    Videography: Firefly Series, Ghost In the Shell, all Miazaki Movies, Stargate, and Star Wars  

    RPG: 3.0 Forgotten Realms Handbook

    Books: Redwall series, Michael Criton books, Dragon Lance series.


    D: Can you tell us a little about Metal Weave Games?

    A: We're small company making big things. Originally we were Knowlege of the Ninth, as some of you may remember from the Ninth World Hub days. I started out by learning how to PDF peoples content in a professional manner. And from there when the Numenera Limited License was announced, I made Ninth World Assassins, and continued creating.


    D: What attracted you to the Cypher System?

    A: Well, I was just getting into twitter, and this whole thing about Numenera was blowing up my feed thought it was spammy like the rest of the kickstarters I saw, but it seemed to get quite a bit more attention, so I checked it out and liked the concept. 


    D: What was the concept behind Ninth World Assassins  and how did it come about?

    A: Initially it was just going to be a short supplement of poisons (since the book had listed poison as both cypher and equipment). In addition, if I was to make a poison, there wasn't really any guidance on such matters. I thought doing some foci would be good too, and I just kept adding to it until it felt like a real supplement.


    D: Can you give a brief overview on the creation process?

    A: So a lot of it comes down to recording all your ideas somewhere and then developing them. I have a lot of ideas, lots of them, its just a matter of making 

    For example, Organization Membership, the corebook lists quite a few organizations and I saw that their membership perks were really weak. Yeah you could probably do more with roleplay, but the problem is that if the player dosen't know what options are available to him, he may never use them to the potential he could have. So I created a guild system that would allow the guild to take a more active role in campaigns without making the guild everything that's going on.


    D: Is there anything you are particularly proud of in Ninth World Assassins ?

    A: I'm actually quite proud of this book, poisons are the poster child, however I do want to give a shout-out to the foci and guild system


    D: Is there anything of your own you would recommend if they like Ninth World Assassins ?

    A: I like to create diverse works, so the content of everything that I have produced so far have been quite different from each other. Naval Encounters was done in a similar manner to ninth world assassins but put a greater focus on the weird vessels of the ninth world. 


    D: What else have you developed for the Cypher System?

    A: I published the Mechanical Bards Ninth World Tales, Naval Encounters and Naval Perils; Cloak and Dagger (The Strange) and Southern Sorrows (Numenera Module) will release soon too.


    D: Is there anything you are working on at the minute?

    A: Lots of things, currently the Baby Bestiary, Scavengers, Non-Player Cards, and our cypher licenses, Cloak and Dagger and Southern Sorrows.


    D: Are you writing for other systems? If so what?

    A: Creating new systems is some of the things we do, for instance Scavengers which just got funded on kickstarter. We're also looking into doing some writing for Savage Worlds.


    D: Any plans for the future?

    A: We have lots of plans, unfortunately we cannot discuss any of our cypher-system plans until they come under license. All I can say is to keep an eye on us, we're very busy working on new games, game supplements and systemless game aids. 


    D: I just want to say thank-you for being an inspiration and being core to my Numenera Universe. (Any further comments?)

    A: You were pretty thorough, thanks for the interview.



    Wednesday 1 April 2015

    Numenera: 100th Blog Post, GeeklyInc, Scry Hawk Chronicles Project and Patreon



    Iadace internet,

    First and foremost I just want to say thank-you for all the support I have had over the past 8 months. Every single one of you have been instrumental in how the core campaign has shaped up and has inspired me to go a lot further than just the blog. I  also want to celebrate that that as of the 1/04/2015 (yes the date is a little suspect) I have reached my 100th blog post on my core City of Needles novel. It's currently  totalling one novel and couple of chapters in to the second. I have never written so much in my life and I have enjoyed every second of it, which has to be a testament to Numenera itself as a story-teller's dream.

    Halfway through March, I applied to to be a writer for GeeklyInc and luckily landed myself a position for their Table Top section. As most of you know I've never played another system, in fact I've only managed to play half a game of Numenera as a player. With the Numenera system and setting, along with my Master of Arts Degree in Literature and Creative Writing I've managed to create systems and spreadsheets to help me through the baby steps of GM'ing with narrative design at the forefront. I'll be taking everything I've learned and will be writing up a new series on there, exclusively talking about Numenera. This will include how I fell in love with game as a writer and how its systems, settings and rules help create a game where narrative driven content can be an inspiring and freeing experience for both the GM and the players.

    On the back of my 100th post for the core campaign novel; next week I will be launching The Scry Hawk Chronicles over on Twitch. Starting from the week of the 6th of April, I will be running 5, two part adventures, set in the Needles Universe. The adventures all stem from from the organisation known as the Scry Hawks, a black-ops style order of the Hawk-Eye. You can find more information on the campaign itself and my 22 community players over at Scry Hawk Wikia.

    The first game and adventure titles are:

    Falco: Firday 10th/24th April, 19:00 BST - The Village of Stone
    Lanius: Saturday 11th/25th April, 17:00 BST - The Shadow Excavation
    Vultur: Sunday 12th/26th April, 18:00 BST - The Grand Orators Tome
    Elanus: Tuesday 14th/28th  April, 17:00 BST - The Dodona's Twin
    Strix: Sunday 19th April/3rd May, 17:00 BST - Kaledon's Reprise



    If you've been reading my core campaign and the stuff on here, there has been quite a lot of work put into it so far. By my best estimate I have over 120k  words for the novel and a diverse range of topics on here. I've decided to set up a Patreon to help further both the blogs and the livestreams. The money will be going towards production costs, time needed to write the blogs and hopefully in the future more productions such as podcasting with your support. The Numenera community has been the foundation for a passion that has been nurtured and grown by you. I don't think I would be in the position today where I could say I've written a novel and a half, GM'd and played my first ever TT-RPG, and now confident, inspired, and perhaps a little insane enough to GM 5 more games.   If you like what you've read so far and want to support me further I would greatly appreciate it.

    To close, I just want to say a thank-you to +Monte Cook+Shanna Germain, the Numenera Community, the G+ Table Top Roleplayers, my core campaign players, my 22 Scry Hawks and everyone else in between. You've changed my life.

    /Drew - Tesla