Fucking Star Wars
May. 24th, 2005 01:35 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
terryclothJeff came back, although Ed was still out, so we met to start a new campaign, since Jeff seemed all fired up to play Star Wars d20 instead of Darksun. I was seduced by the existance of an extremely adorable race of bunny rabbits with cheesy stat mods...
But I suspect that Star Wars is going to drive me to quit this group in a week or two, based on how this first session went and my previous experience with individual awards that left me feeling the same way.
Four [space is being left for Ed] young padwans were stolen off by their masters -- the gentle and wise Li Kao, and the strict and arbitrary Vi'dow -- to some backwater planet to study jedi lore in secrecy. After six years of intensive training, during which unbeknownst to them the Clone Wars happened and all the other jedi were slaughtered, Li Kao left mysteriously in the night and never came back. Vi'dow acted unconcerned at this, telling the padwans that their training was almost complete anyway and that he could finish it.
The Miroloku (a blind race that saw using the force) Consular something-Kai -- let's call him Kai -- used farseeing to get a vision of the missing master, and saw her meditating peacefully in what looked like a starship cabin. So, she'd left willingly, if disturbingly quickly, at least.
Eventually, Vi'dow started going to town on mysterious business, leaving the students to their own devices but coming back every night to check up on them. One night he didn't come back, so Kai and Kuu (a Kushibal -- aka bunny rabbit -- Guardian) decided to go to town with Itsudo their non-jedi caretaker (and former pilot) to see if they could find out what had happened to him, if anything, while Dodger (a student and a Squibb -- weird monkey-cat race) decided to stick around the camp completely alone and break into Itsudo's house.
In the house, she found a broken R2 unit that had been missing, and managed to get it powered up despite a complete lack of repair skill, then got stinking drunk and passed out.
In town, there was rioting and looting. Kuu charmed a looter and asked him what was going on, and was invited to join the looting. Unsure that that was legal, he found a deputy and asked, and was told that while it wasn't legal, they weren't allowed to arrest anyone without contacting the capitol since the jail was full, and all contact with the capitol had been cut six hours ago -- thus the looting.
But even though even the police were looting (as the deputy went back to looting after talking with them) looting would be Wrong, so instead they helped Itsudo buy some grain, then went to the starport to try to find word of Vi'dow.
For some reason, the droids were viciously unhelpful at the starport, but they managed to trick one into taking them to its human manager, on whom force powers could be used. Before that, though, they did get him to bring up the passenger list they were looking for on his monitor, and Kuu snuck around to take a peek. But it wasn't in basic! So Kuu looked around for something to take notes on, and found a seemingly discarded datapad in a drawer, and downloaded the information onto it so they could go ask around to find someone who spoke Rodian. He almost got caught getting out of the room, but Kai tricked the manager into not noticing with a jedi mind trick.
And they both got a dark side point for 'stealing' the datapad, because apparently it was insanely valuable. Insert argument with GM here, concerning such subjects as "What the fuck, I'm borrowing it for a second and going to give it back," "I didn't know it was even worth anything," and "Why the hell does stealing give a dark-side point anyway when it has nothing to do with emotion?" Out of pissiness that the GM decided that even giving it back wouldn't remove the dark side point, Kuu decided to keep it.
Anyway, at that point everything was rendered moot as an army (well, air force) of starfighters swooped in and started killing everyone. The young jedi tried to think of some way to help the populace, but they couldn't actually protect anyone from the starfighters, so instead they just ran away back home.
There, they found the passed-out Dodger, who was awoken by the application of much cold water, and Itsubal started firing up the ship using the repaired R2 droid. But... it would take an hour, and the starfighters seemed to already be searching the area for them, so they were told to go hide in the caves.
Deep in the caves -- staying near the entrance would get them spotted by sensors -- they stumbled across a worked corridor that they'd been told not to go into until they were sure they were ready. They weren't sure, but this was obviously the last chance, so they headed inside to see if there was anything valuable they could preserve from these murderous pirates.
They found an abandoned complex of some sort, with force-charged jewels -- one was an emerald holocron that hypnotized Dodger, another was a ruby prison that nearly trapped Kuu, the third was a pearl that did absolutely nothing to Kai because it was harmless, and obviously the key to a locked corridor they'd found earlier. After hearing telepathically from Vi'dow that he was coming and that they should run, they took the exit the pearl unlocked (the holocron told them it was an exit) and cut their way through the roots and dirt that had covered the opening at the base of a cliff on the wrong side of the mountains.
Oh no! Enemies were nearby! They were spotted, but Kuu created an illusion of a man running off to distract the guards. It kept them from noticing that they'd seen Kai, but they didn't follow it, as they'd also seen the tunnel carved into the hillside. Four went into the tunnel, while two stood guard.
At that point, Dodger leapt out from hiding and cut down one of the guards.
Kuu, failing to disarm the enemy with a crappy roll: "Dodger? Why did you do that?"
Kai, threatening the guard with death if he didn't surrender, which the GM had succeed without a roll: "What the hell are you doing? Have you gone dark side on us? You can't just kill innocent people!"
GM: "You get a light side point for that, Kai!"
Me (Kuu): "What the hell? Is this just totally arbitrary?"
GM: "Yes. Yes it is."
Me: "How are we supposed to play with this system if the light side and dark side points are given out randomly with no rhyme or reason?"
GM: "It's about role playing. He was showing concern that his friend might be dark side."
Because of course, angrily screaming at your companions after threatening an enemy's life is the epitome of the jedi code.
Anyway, the trio escaped in the ship, which magically came down to rescue them just as Vi'Dow was magically saving them from three unbeatable opponents, but oh no! One of the enemies was leaping at the hatch! Fortunately, the GM told Kai that if he used this one power that he hadn't taken, but could be used untrained, it would automatically screw up the enemy's jump no matter how crappy he rolled, and the day was saved.
next session
Right now I'm feeling exactly like I did after the first session of Palladium Fantasy where the worst GM ever screwed me over on XP by using individual awards to reward everything I didn't do. Last time, I then tried to do the things he claimed to be asking for, only for him to ignore it in favor of giving all the XP to his friend's wife who he was obviously trying to hit on.
Maybe this time I just shouldn't even try, it might piss me off less.
But I suspect that Star Wars is going to drive me to quit this group in a week or two, based on how this first session went and my previous experience with individual awards that left me feeling the same way.
Four [space is being left for Ed] young padwans were stolen off by their masters -- the gentle and wise Li Kao, and the strict and arbitrary Vi'dow -- to some backwater planet to study jedi lore in secrecy. After six years of intensive training, during which unbeknownst to them the Clone Wars happened and all the other jedi were slaughtered, Li Kao left mysteriously in the night and never came back. Vi'dow acted unconcerned at this, telling the padwans that their training was almost complete anyway and that he could finish it.
The Miroloku (a blind race that saw using the force) Consular something-Kai -- let's call him Kai -- used farseeing to get a vision of the missing master, and saw her meditating peacefully in what looked like a starship cabin. So, she'd left willingly, if disturbingly quickly, at least.
Eventually, Vi'dow started going to town on mysterious business, leaving the students to their own devices but coming back every night to check up on them. One night he didn't come back, so Kai and Kuu (a Kushibal -- aka bunny rabbit -- Guardian) decided to go to town with Itsudo their non-jedi caretaker (and former pilot) to see if they could find out what had happened to him, if anything, while Dodger (a student and a Squibb -- weird monkey-cat race) decided to stick around the camp completely alone and break into Itsudo's house.
In the house, she found a broken R2 unit that had been missing, and managed to get it powered up despite a complete lack of repair skill, then got stinking drunk and passed out.
In town, there was rioting and looting. Kuu charmed a looter and asked him what was going on, and was invited to join the looting. Unsure that that was legal, he found a deputy and asked, and was told that while it wasn't legal, they weren't allowed to arrest anyone without contacting the capitol since the jail was full, and all contact with the capitol had been cut six hours ago -- thus the looting.
But even though even the police were looting (as the deputy went back to looting after talking with them) looting would be Wrong, so instead they helped Itsudo buy some grain, then went to the starport to try to find word of Vi'dow.
For some reason, the droids were viciously unhelpful at the starport, but they managed to trick one into taking them to its human manager, on whom force powers could be used. Before that, though, they did get him to bring up the passenger list they were looking for on his monitor, and Kuu snuck around to take a peek. But it wasn't in basic! So Kuu looked around for something to take notes on, and found a seemingly discarded datapad in a drawer, and downloaded the information onto it so they could go ask around to find someone who spoke Rodian. He almost got caught getting out of the room, but Kai tricked the manager into not noticing with a jedi mind trick.
And they both got a dark side point for 'stealing' the datapad, because apparently it was insanely valuable. Insert argument with GM here, concerning such subjects as "What the fuck, I'm borrowing it for a second and going to give it back," "I didn't know it was even worth anything," and "Why the hell does stealing give a dark-side point anyway when it has nothing to do with emotion?" Out of pissiness that the GM decided that even giving it back wouldn't remove the dark side point, Kuu decided to keep it.
Anyway, at that point everything was rendered moot as an army (well, air force) of starfighters swooped in and started killing everyone. The young jedi tried to think of some way to help the populace, but they couldn't actually protect anyone from the starfighters, so instead they just ran away back home.
There, they found the passed-out Dodger, who was awoken by the application of much cold water, and Itsubal started firing up the ship using the repaired R2 droid. But... it would take an hour, and the starfighters seemed to already be searching the area for them, so they were told to go hide in the caves.
Deep in the caves -- staying near the entrance would get them spotted by sensors -- they stumbled across a worked corridor that they'd been told not to go into until they were sure they were ready. They weren't sure, but this was obviously the last chance, so they headed inside to see if there was anything valuable they could preserve from these murderous pirates.
They found an abandoned complex of some sort, with force-charged jewels -- one was an emerald holocron that hypnotized Dodger, another was a ruby prison that nearly trapped Kuu, the third was a pearl that did absolutely nothing to Kai because it was harmless, and obviously the key to a locked corridor they'd found earlier. After hearing telepathically from Vi'dow that he was coming and that they should run, they took the exit the pearl unlocked (the holocron told them it was an exit) and cut their way through the roots and dirt that had covered the opening at the base of a cliff on the wrong side of the mountains.
Oh no! Enemies were nearby! They were spotted, but Kuu created an illusion of a man running off to distract the guards. It kept them from noticing that they'd seen Kai, but they didn't follow it, as they'd also seen the tunnel carved into the hillside. Four went into the tunnel, while two stood guard.
At that point, Dodger leapt out from hiding and cut down one of the guards.
Kuu, failing to disarm the enemy with a crappy roll: "Dodger? Why did you do that?"
Kai, threatening the guard with death if he didn't surrender, which the GM had succeed without a roll: "What the hell are you doing? Have you gone dark side on us? You can't just kill innocent people!"
GM: "You get a light side point for that, Kai!"
Me (Kuu): "What the hell? Is this just totally arbitrary?"
GM: "Yes. Yes it is."
Me: "How are we supposed to play with this system if the light side and dark side points are given out randomly with no rhyme or reason?"
GM: "It's about role playing. He was showing concern that his friend might be dark side."
Because of course, angrily screaming at your companions after threatening an enemy's life is the epitome of the jedi code.
Anyway, the trio escaped in the ship, which magically came down to rescue them just as Vi'Dow was magically saving them from three unbeatable opponents, but oh no! One of the enemies was leaping at the hatch! Fortunately, the GM told Kai that if he used this one power that he hadn't taken, but could be used untrained, it would automatically screw up the enemy's jump no matter how crappy he rolled, and the day was saved.
next session
Right now I'm feeling exactly like I did after the first session of Palladium Fantasy where the worst GM ever screwed me over on XP by using individual awards to reward everything I didn't do. Last time, I then tried to do the things he claimed to be asking for, only for him to ignore it in favor of giving all the XP to his friend's wife who he was obviously trying to hit on.
Maybe this time I just shouldn't even try, it might piss me off less.
