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Googlism as campaign helper

Yet another mailinglist goody:

Googlism who is

Top 30 Googlism’s
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…. and I have yet another idea for a scenario … this is not quite as ‘done’ as the other I posted some days ago.

This involves my idea of a band and a charismatic singer who might be a high-level avatar of [?] as well as some kind of weird fans turned Infomancers/Iconomancers who have to be at every concert. They draw their power from her and she from them …. or something else. And since something about dipsomancers came across the list these days as well of course the whole thing should involve some kind of mystic vessel as well.

This is just a a note so I don’t forget this little thing.

And here’s my post to the mailnglist I made from the other idea … it clarifies and details my original idea some more:

I just had this idea this morning on my way to work. Of course this is not done but maybe someone will like it, have more ideas how to make it work or tell me it was already done a dozen times.

In a part of the city which I drive through each morning some houses are
painted in pastel colors. So what if there was a color scheme? Where does the scheme come from? One local cabal of let’s say TNI guys finds out about three houses in the city which are all painted alike and somehow these houses seem to be of some mystic significance. They report it and are told to move in and occupy those houses. Group 2 might be some other cabal maybe an adept or two and their ‘friends’. They discover the TNI groups aim and then they find out the TNI guys got it all wrong. They occpupied the wrong houses all along. Since it seems important enough to get attention from TNI the adepts occupy the three houses they think are important. In the meantime the TNI guys have acquired some documents about the history of the houses and find out about some [rituals|murders|your choice] committed in each house by always the same person …. Now group three maybe some duke using mundanes or Mak Attax or whoever and at the same time your players discover some ancient document or legend about the three houses. They are looking for the houses and discover that TNI has moved in the city and they have taken up residence in three houses that might have been the three, of course the players and group three quickly discover that TNI is off by a long way. Group three finds the first house which is surely not any of the houses discovered by group two which is up to now unknown to any of the other groups. …..

So there are three times three houses and once they are all occupied something nasty or good might happen. Since these are houses maybe it has to do with the HoR. Maybe originally someone tried to use the houses to ascend or gain other power. The ascension might have worked (or not) and left behind ‘mystic’ residue which is now being used by the three+players groups to enact a huge ritual they do not even know about. One of the most interesting points could be when the players have discovered what they have gotten into.

The complete ritual might for example create a huge ‘entrance’ to the house of renunciation or …. It might also call demons/ghosts or avatars of the type in question …. and for some extra taste have the players powerbase be located (just accidentally) in one of the houses they might discover only what is going on when someone else is trying to take over their house. Of course the person who started it all might still be alive or a ghost that can be called or ….

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333 or On my way to work ….

I drive across a bridge spanning the Karlsruhe: Zoo. Today was the second time I have seen those guys in the diving suites there. (Of course the mundane explanation is that they are cleaning the boats on the little lake and river). The explanation I came up with changes each time I see them. The first time I was mainly thinking that they were killers out to get somebody, now I am pretty sure they are more likely to hunt an escaped alligator monster which either really is in that lake or which was created by a Cliomancer spell.

Anyhow thinking about UA I had this other idea which I must write down before it escapes me. It is of course about 3-3-3. What else.

The houses in that part of the city I bike through after the Zoo are painted well some of them are. So maybe there is a color scheme …. like the London Highway thing. But of course the color scheme is not a simple pentagramm type thingy it is more complex. A long time ago there was someone trying to ascend as [choose archetype preferrably something horrifying or violent ‘Dark Stalker’, ‘Executioner’]. Well he committed three times three [crimes|rituals|etc.] in those houses. The color scheme encompasses three times three houses. In three houses he used the basement, in three the first floor and in three the roof or so. The groups are painted alike so modern cabals can find out about it. Of course the ascension somehow went awry probably because he failed to complete a final ritual.

I don’t know yet wether the 9 houses are related in any other way … but in modern times a first cabal found the story of this guy and decides to try again. Since the story is incomplete they only find out about 3 houses. They occupy those houses and are trying to find the final ritual at this point. A second cabal finds another part of the story and finds that the first cabal is off slightly with their choice of houses … they occupy the second batch.

Now comes the part for the players. The players and a third cabal find out about the story and the ritual as well and the third cabal makes a move to occupy one of the houses of the third batch.

Now the scenario should unfold like this: the players might try to occupy one of the houses or are even living in one of them to involve them more directly. They might first find out about the second and or the first group and they might notice that something weird is going on, there are three groups and accidentally each is a bit off. The finale looks like this: the players finally discover that should all nine houses be occupied and the rituals enacted plus the final one which at least one of the groups will try to do, something horrible will happen …. your choice.

Since there are a lot of choices in this, it is of course just a small idea what one could do, but maybe this is the first start of a new campaign. I’ll post again as I think about it.

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Bad Omens

Just came across some beautiful ‘omens’ which I cannot resist to post here, it started all with a post on the UA list.

WSOCTV.com – Local News – Predator Kills Bald Eagle At National Zoo:
WASHINGTON — A bald eagle, the living symbol of the United States, died at the National Zoo on the Fourth of July, apparently after being attacked by a large cat.

The discussion about this on the following to Blogs is just great (read the comments):

Counterspin Central: The unofficial “FIRST AMENDMENT ZONE.”

Whiskey Bar: Omens

I especially like the part where someone considers sacrificing the leader burning in a wicker doll to see if the economy improves – as the country goes down the king goes down to renew the country.

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Graspop Festival

This week-end we spent in Belgium at GRASPOP 2003 festival. Since the camping was only open Friday through Sunday we decided to drive up there and spend one night near Maastricht so we would have to drive only one hour in the morning to get to Dessel where the Festival was at. We even managed to find a nice camping site in Valkenburg (which actually is the center of the hollansk bodirflösser – uhm tourism). We nearly finished the beer we had bought since no glass was to be brought onto the festival site.

The next day started out rather chaotic since we were waiting for a call from Alex who was supposed to organize how we would meet him and the Luxembourg group at the festival. He didn’t call until too late of course so we came – despite an awful route description – to Dessel when just about everybody arrived. At Graspop the cars cannot be parked on the campsite (yeah I love Wacken) so we had to carry all our stuff first from the parking to the entry (about 3km) of the Graspop camping. There was a huge ‘line’ (rather a mob) of people waiting to be let in. We were expecting they’d control all our bags so there would be no ‘glas,wapens,cameras’. Of course Rolland had his camera, I had my huge knife (geez it’s for eating steaks) and we didn’t even know we had glass with us until we found out on sunday morning we had a glass of nutella.

Luckily we managed to get through that waiting mob by going right to the left of it all and we had to wait only one hour. Inside we were greeted by Alex, Roland and Kim. They had reserverd some space for us next to their tents – or so they said. When we came there somehow there was no more space. Oh well. The next open space wasn’t that far away and we started putting up the tents and of course the barbecue. What’s a festival without tons of steaks?

The first bands were already playing but what the hell the first ‘really important’ bands weren’t due until later in the day. After some rest we went to the festival grounds where we met pouting Alex – there was no mead sold anywhere!

I’ll not write about all the bands or so, since I liked some better and some less. I’ll write about what I liked most of course.

This was the second time I have seen O P E T H. Their show is the same “We are Opeth, and this is Deliverance” but that’s okay and even somewhat unique. I also liked the part “I guess we played our songs too fast so here is an extra one”. The sound was good, and this time I even knew half the songs they were playing.

APOCALYPTICA is cool no doubt. I had never heard much of their music before only what people told me so I was curious and I was not disappointed, quite the opposite. The people were even singing along some of the covers they played (Nothing else matters for one). I did not see much from back where I was but what I saw was good, but you could also call it ‘Mistreatment of a Cello by a long haired guy jumping up and down’

Well with a couple times being at “Das Fest” and twice at Wacken this has to be my best concert so far: Within Temptation. So I knew only one CD and that not by heart but this was the band I went to Graspop to see. And I loved every second of that concert which is the first time neither my knees nor my back started hurting half way through it all. On their homepage they call themselves ‘Gothic Metal Gods’ – I agree, though around here noone knew them before Graspop and I only knew them because I downloaded one of their songs once! Maybe I’ll write more later about this most memorable part of Graspop.

I guess it is good to have seen Iron Maiden play. They are good but I was still high from the Within Temptation show and a little bit stressed out because I had lost Rolland and the others. So I heard it all and saw all but ….

Other bands that played were Stratovarius which I liked half and half didn’t. Lacuna Coil was right after Within Temptation and so I didn’t quite notice them which is too bad since their sound was better this time than at Wacken 2001. I missed out on Alice Cooper because I had lost the others and gone back to the tents. I also missed Six Feet Under and Type O Negative because my knee hurt a lot and I could not stand anymore. Anthrax we listened to while sitting farther back. To me that’s mostly noise. Same for Sepultura. Which somehow reminds me of when I was younger ….

…. as far as I know Within Temptation is playing at the Summerbreeze festival again which is nearby so we could just go there for a day to see them again ….

Update: They are also playing at the Mera Luna festival which features a lot more cool bands (from my perspective) than the Summerbreeze so we are going there.

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Nightelves

Yes I am back to Warcraft III. Still have not finished the last mission: ‘Götterdämmerung’ in the Nightelf Campaign. I guess I will never see the final movie. Oh well and I am losing against the AI all the time. Maybe I should choose another favorite race instead of the elves.

WarCraftIII.Net – The Unofficial Warcraft III Site

And while we are away in Belgium at the
Graspop Festival the first expansion ‘Frozen Throne’ is coming out, I cannot buy it, I cannot consume.