Witchcraft Demo

The Witchcraft demo was fun, if atypical for what I consider a demo to be. That is, I gather that Derek Guder, the GM, streamlined the rules. I may be wrong. I know he blended backgrounds, using ideas, but not, I think, mechanics, from Whispering Vault, which is cool by me.

Witchcraft is set in the present, but Derek used a 19th century setting. A railroad town had some bizarre sections of tracks, and folks from various benevolent secret societies were drawn to investigate. Some were pre-generated PCs, while others were quickly created from xeroxed templates. There were eight people, I think, and Derek was willing to try to accommodate them.

By the time the adventure was going in full swing, we were down to six players. One had been waiting to get worked into the adventure and I think the other was her husband. She was playing one of the rail workers who was also an exiled member of some mystical martial arts society. He was playing the second in command of the Rosicrucians (I think) who were investigating. Both PCs were designed for the adventure by the GM. The rail worker was dropped, but the 2nd in command was handed to one of the players (at his request) who had created a PC from a template. Said PC had not yet appeared in the game, while the 2nd in command had, so this made good sense.

In addition to the leader and 2nd, there was a bodyguard who started off female, but after the player examined the sheet, she decided the PC was too musclebound to be a woman, and she changed the gender to male and the name to Martin.

If I'm correct about these three PCs being Rosicrucians, then their ally was a Templar. It might've been the other way around, but this is what I'll assume. The leader was convinced everything would be a disaster and the 2nd was young, untried, and overconfident.

There was also a bast, a cat that can turn into a human. The bast wasn't officially part of the group, but deigned to grace it with her presence. I played the bast. At first, I felt a bit guilty about that. This was one of the few games that did have a prize, one I wanted. Playing a cat is easy, and calls for the kind of broad roleplaying that is more likely to get the award for roleplaying. But I did a good job, and the rest of the group was fine too, so it wasn't a case where meowing won because it was the only sign of roleplaying to be found. Besides, I didn't meow that much, as Derek ruled that the bast could talk to humans even in cat form.

The last person in the group used the Wicce template, and it was decided that a 19th century American Wicce would probably be a Native American. She lived in the woods nearby, and was concerned about the twisted Essence. Essence is the magical energy of Witchcraft, not too dissimilar to mana, chi, or the force. It was as bizaarly twisted as the tracks, and all of the PCs knew the tracks and the essence were related.

The PCs, except for the Wicce, took a train into town, discussing strategy. Sort of.

Leader: Everyone in this town is doomed.

Cat (who has necromancy, hopefully): Talk to dead people?

Leader: Oh yes, there'll be lots of dead people!

At some point, someone suggested we come up with a plan.

Cat: Why don't you say you want to invest money in the railroad?

Leader: Why would I want to do that?

Templar: I hate to say this, but I think the cat's right.

Leader: But why would I want to invest in railroads?

Cat: You pretend.

Leader (oblivious): Everyone in this town is going to die!

Cat: Yes, but they don't know that--

Leader: Obviously! That's why they're struggling to live their futile lives!

(Cat gives up, buries her face in her arms, and howls, even if howling is supposed to be a dog thing.)

It occurs to me that this is a rare example of what Paul Mason advocated to offset my habit of appointing myself group organizer. As the cat, I had no status per se, and I was not formally affiliated with the group. Since the leader didn't automatically fall in with my suggestion, the lack of social status was actually effective. Since everyone was roleplaying and doing things, rather than dithering (which is what usually motivates me to take control), I was not frustrated.

The out of towners got rooms in a bar/boarding house run by a guy with a gun collection. The cat roamed around, trying to track the Essence, while the Templar went to the cemetery. The leader and his second decided to try the cat's plan and went to the railroad office. Martin listened patiently to the owner's long, boring gun stories. The Wicce tried to pump the owner's son for information.

The cat had no luck following the tangled Essence, so she headed to the cemetery. There, she learned, as the Templar already had, that the dead folks here were no fun. The tracks made a perfect circle around the cemetery, and this somehow kept the dead quiescent.

The Templar spoke to the priest in the nearby church, who talked about sin in a way that was both reasonably devout and seemed to hint at what was going on. The Templar caught up with the cat, who informed him that the dead people were no fun. The priest overheard the cat talking and was even more nonplussed.

The leader and 2nd almost botched getting information from the station house, thanks to the leaders sparkling personality. The 2nd used empathic magic to make the guy at the station house want to direct them to the tracks where there were workers, and I think it only worked because it got rid of them.

The Wicce tried to pump the owner's son for information. She agreed to drink his homebrew, but only if he drank too. She explained it was an Indian custom. She didn't drink at all, hoping to get him drunk. Alas, the guy had a high tolerance and wasn't stupid. He noticed she wasn't drinking, despite her claim, "Yes I was. You weren't paying attention."

The Wicce hooked up with Martin after the latter had suffered through all of the owner's gun stories. They decided to split up to look for clues. The Wicce managed to get folks to talk to her by pretending she was an Indian who really wanted to learn to be civilized. She noticed that the townsfolk had odd mood swings based on odd Essence spikes.

Someone, I forget whom, used his gift to spot odd people and found a man walking very oddly, apparently hunched over in pain. The man ignored his questions and hobbled off to a quarry. Thc PCs all converged there for some reason I forget.

The cat bristled at the man, who tried to kick her away. Then he gave up on evasion and shed his skin, revealing his true shape as a gross icky too large to comfortably fit inside the skin, hence the odd gait and posture.

The PCs fought the critter with varying degrees of effectiveness, and it tried to run away. One of the PCs created an illusionary wall, and the beast jumped high enough to vault it. This was when it was destroyed by a pair of odd NPCs.

The timing here was good. The PCs had had their moment to confront the monster. They had been reasonably effective, but could not finish the monster on their own. Thus, I perceived the NPCs as neither a GM-ex-machina to save the PCs' bacon, nor extraneous.

Everyone met in the saloon / boarding house to exchange information. The owner's son whispered something about the Wicce to the 2 NPCs. I'd guess he said that she was a cocktease. The cat was in human form. One of the players asked how she was dressed, and I figured she'd look like and dress like a 19th century lady of the evening.

The NPCs were essentially Whispering Vault characters. I'm not familiar with the game, but I gather they can fight tainted critters. They might have had a chance against the evil mastermind of the scenario, but assured the PCs that the PCs did not. What the PCs could, and did do, was to exterminate the critter's offspring.

For some reason, the PCs decided to visit the priest. The Templar thought he had a Clue. Strictly out of character, I thought he might be the evil mastermind. Alas, he proved to have been eaten by the young critters.

I don't remember much of the battle. The Bast was largely useless. In cat form, she followed one critter to the upper level, then turned human to grab at the thing it had been searching for. This proved to be its people-skin, full of blood and Essence. Someone killed the critter, and the Bast was left with half the skin which leaked fluids all over her.

Derek explained that the creature who was the hidden mastermind was fascinated by Essence and Taint, and had manipulated the town and the railroad so that it could study the interplay between the two forces. This was something that the PCs never learned.

The scenario over, we had to vote on best roleplayer. I asked if it were one vote each, no voting for oneself. Derek confirmed the former, and said that one could vote for oneself if one really thought one had been the best. I voted for the guy who played the team leader. He and I both got two votes. Two other players got one vote each. I suggested flipping a coin or rolling a die to break the tie. Derek told us to play rock-paper-scissors, and I won.

Derek said he'd had fun grossing out the players as well as the PCs. He said it had been one of his best gaming experiences, which is flattering, but also a bit sad to me. It was a good, solid game, but I wouldn't call it one of the best I experienced.