The Complex: Episode 6

It's over! This week's episode wraps up Season 1 of The Complex. It's been a hell of a ride, and a great experience with a great group of players. Part of me is glad (relieved?) it's over, though, because it does take a fair amount of work to prep a session properly.


Night-time, in the Penthouse's roof garden. There's the sound of helicopters, and spotlights playing from above. Black nylon ropes unfurl, and paramilitary troops in black gear, armed with sub-machineguns, rappel down - to be met by a hail of bullets from Takeshi's pistols. He dives behind the bar as the full-length windows shatter in slow motion, and resurfaces with an assault rifle. He fires a grenade at one of the helicopters, and it crashes in a flaming heap into the roof-garden.

Meanwhile, Sheila's cave is dark and empty. Tony calls for her but she doesn't answer. He follows his heart to a spot in the middle of the floor, and digs down a little way to reveal part of an ancient skeleton. He senses the approach of a powerful entity, and prepares for spiritual warfare.

In the foyer, Aki's using her force field to prevent a squad of armed troops from entering the front doors. Suddenly, Tony runs in and yells "Stop! Your power's going to go out of control! You'll destroy the building!" Before she can react to this, Takeshi comes bounding down the stairs and shoots Tony!


THE COMPLEX
Episode 6: Metamorphosis

Starring (in alphabetical order):

• +Lloyd Gyan as Aki Enoki, graduate student of biological anthropology on a gap year.
• +David Miessler-Kubanek as Tony Pearson, the apartment's maintenance man, and an ex-hacker from California.
• +Steve Moore as Takeshi Sekiguchi, a retired hit-man trying to keep a low profile.

Produced and Directed by Craig Judd

Special Thanks to Sarah Kaplan for introducing Odyssey Tech into the game.

TWELVE HOURS EARLIER...

Tony takes the elevator to the Penthouse, and lets Takeshi know he survived the collapse of Odyssey Tech's outback compound (see Episode 5 - Ed). He also asks if Takeshi would be willing to sign the building over to him, or become partners, because Tony's found his calling as guardian of the sacred site.  The door opens and Sheila enters, leading Aki by the hand. Sheila tells them that they are all her Guardians. She has to go to sleep for a little while, and she needs them all to make sure she's safe.

Sheila disappears again as Aki and Tony start to argue. Since he promised to tell her things after they got back, Tony tells Aki a bit more about the powers and spirits. Aki thinks that putting people in cells locks away their power, but you don't need to keep the person locked up once the spirit's incarcerated. She's also worried that her force field powers might be because of a prisoner possessing her, and wants to test it out by having Tony put her in a cell to see what happens.

As they leave to go downstairs, Takeshi's phone rings. Blake tries to hire him to kill Tony, and threatens Brett's life to ensure his co-operation. He wants the job done by tonight. Takeshi says he'll consider it.

Down in the prison, Aki knows each cell is for a specific prisoner, and tries to find out which is "hers." Tony doesn't know of one that's free for her, so he uses his power to steal her genius and points her at a random cell. While she bumbles about, Tony asks Takeshi to help him "dispose of" somebody - he wants Takeshi's help to get rid of "Tony Pearson," because he wants to cast off his secret identity and stop running. Tony returns Aki's intelligence; she decides to study the prison and move some of her gear down here.

Tony starts work on a 3D replica of himself, or at least his skin, so they'll be able to fake his death somehow.

In the penthouse, Zoe's almost recovered from her ordeal. Takeshi tries to talk to her, but she's terrified of him. He tells her he's a reformed man, but she says she knows about the "jobs" he used to do for Martin. In all honesty, he can't tell her that he's stopped taking those kinds of jobs.

Aki lets Tony know that Zoe is recovering in Takeshi's apartment, so Tony goes up to see her. Zoe says that she's been so confused for so long. She now remembers clearly, the person she saw being sacrificed in England was herself! She was "sacrificed" to an entity in an Odyssey ritual, but Tony has broken that bond. They share a touching moment, and Tony helps her down to his apartment where she'll be more at ease.

Aki shows Aomo around the prison complex, and Aomo stumbles across the passage into Sheila's cave. Aki is amazed by the cave art on the walls and ceiling, which culminates in a radiant woman attended by dolphins. She also finds footprints and signs of someone leaving the cave, but not of anyone else entering it.

After Zoe and Tony leave, Takeshi heads into his garden to meditate and try to gain a precognitive vision that will help him locate Brett. 

Takeshi rides a motorbike into a warehouse guarded by half a dozen corporate goons; he takes them out in style, and rescues Brett who's tied to a chair in the middle of the floor. As they hurry to leave, Brett says Tony was there, and taunted him that he'd never discover Tony's true identity now! Takeshi gets a precognitive flash that something bad's about to happen on top of the apartment building, and that he should get his arsenal ready.

After dark, Takeshi defends the rooftop from rappelling assailants. As the helicopter crashes into the garden though, it and the dead bodies shimmer and melt away - an illusion! Takeshi glimpses someone near the Penthouse's front door, and pursues them. As he enters the hallway, he sees the elevator doors closing. Inside, Blake smirks at him, and his appearance changes to Tony just as the doors shut and it departs for the ground floor. Takeshi curses under his breath and takes the stairs...

In Sheila's darkened cave, Tony sets up for a battle with the approaching spirit. He unlocks the spirits of the prisoners and binds them to his will, using them as a weapon to try and corrupt and shut down the hostile entity. He also feels the other Guardians' powers activate, and links himself to them telepathically.

At the front of the building, the mercenaries shoot out the glass but can't get through Aki's force field. "Tony" runs in and tells her to stop, but Takeshi arrives via the stairs and shoots him in the head. Aki is taken aback, and is about to push Takeshi back with her force field, but Tony's voice in her head makes her stop. She looks again, and sees that the body is actually Blake.

The soldiers take this opportunity to try and get inside, but Aki pushes them back out again. The troops pull back, and there's the ominous revving of an engine. An assault vehicle tries to ram the door, but Aki uses her force construct power to disassemble it from the inside. The van disintegrates, its ram sliding to a halt harmlessly just in front of the door.

Tony senses that the entity has arrived, and Aki hears the slow step of hard-soled boots approaching in the sudden silence. Martin Houndsly steps into the light and tries to simply walk through Aki's wall of force, but she wraps it around him and holds him in place. Tony realises that the hostile entity he felt is not attached to Martin, but is in fact Martin himself! His body is host to a powerful spirit, and any trace of humanity has long since been burned away.

Since the front entrance is blocked, the troops try to get in via a back entrance. Takeshi calls the police and then tries to stop them, but gets pinned down in a small room. Tony wins the spiritual battle with Aki's help; Martin's entity is extracted by spirit-prisoners and dragged down to the cave, leaving his human body a drooling vegetable. Tony wants to crucify the entity and make an example of it for all who would do harm to the site, but Sheila reappears - not as a girl but as a young woman. She calms his vengeful impulse, and he realises he was about to become as bad as those he is fighting. She takes the spirit and tells him she'll make sure this one goes back where it belongs, before walking away through the wall.

Aki confronts the troops, holding Martin's body in a force bubble. She suggests they might want to leave before the police arrive, and with sirens wailing in the distance they call a retreat.

Tony and Takeshi dress up Blake's body in Tony's replica skin, and put the gun in Martin's hand. Tony hides while Takeshi and Brett deal with the police.

Tag Scenes

The next day, Aki passes Takeshi in the foyer. She stops and asks why he had to kill Blake instead of just disabling him. He admits that old habits die hard; in the end, he gives her his other pistol and asks him to destroy it. If he still has it, he knows he's going to be tempted to use it.

Aki continues downstairs to visit Tony, and discovers the door ajar. She knocks and enters, to find him clean-shaven and with a new hairstyle and smart clothing. He introduces himself as Carl Webber, and says he's not sure where his work as Sheila's Guardian will take him. She wishes him good luck. He praises her newfound mastery of her powers, and says she has demonstrated control and self-confidence. As a gift, he gives her a wi-fi router to use while researching the underground complex.

That evening, Carl and Takeshi meet up at Shogun Karaoke for drinks, and discuss the future.

ROLL CREDITS

And that's a wrap!

I think the whole "twelve hours earlier" thing worked out okay. it's not the sort of thing I would attempt in most games, but Smallville gives the GM the right of hard scene framing, and it helps to have the right group who'll collaborate where necessary to reach a certain outcome. For taking liberties with their characters like that, I also gave everyone an extra Plot Point.

That said, I think some of the connectivity was a little tenuous. I started with the desire to have Takeshi shoot Tony at the end of the flash-forward, and had to work backwards from there to create a logical reason for him to actually want to do that in the story when the time arrived.

The middle of the session was a little bit loose; I spent a lot of prep-time figuring out how to get from the start to the flash-forward, and only managed to give Takeshi a solid storyline to follow. The other two I sort of left to their own devices, and I think it showed - we didn't actually have any PC vs PC Contests in this episode at all. And although Martin put up a decent resistance, against two PCs he was unable to hold his own or inflict any consequences or Stress.

The final was really about resolving outstanding storylines and external threats. I tried really hard to come up with a way to force Tony and Takeshi into conflict, but apart from asking one to kill the other (which I didn't really expect him to do), I couldn't come up with anything. They are just too agreeable! Their Relationship statements aren't really conducive to drama, and I couldn't even come up with a good conflict based on the established fiction.

Anyway, it's all a learning experience, and I'm sure I'll be able to bring more to the table next time I'm involved in a Cortex Plus Drama game.


All up, it's been a very cool and enjoyable campaign, and I'm glad I've been able to give a few people a chance to try the Smallville RPG.


Thanks for reading!

The Complex: Episode 5

Today's session was a blast - I had a loose plan, but the players really took things in an interesting direction for what is the penultimate episode of this season of The Complex. We'll be heading to some sort of resolution in the next episode.

Please note, although I've done a little research on Aboriginal mythology, the spiritual elements depicted in this Actual Play have been warped through the lens of TV logic, and bear little resemblance to actual mythology or beliefs.


THE COMPLEX
Episode 5: Outback Odyssey

Starring (in alphabetical order):

• +Lloyd Gyan as Aki Enoki, graduate student of biological anthropology on a gap year.
• +David Miessler-Kubanek as Tony Pearson, the apartment's maintenance man, and an ex-hacker from California.
• +Steve Moore as Takeshi Sekiguchi, a retired hit-man trying to keep a low profile.

Produced and Directed by Craig Judd

On the top of Uluru - Ayers Rock - a naked, dusty, and slightly sunburned Tony struggles to get his bearings. He senses the presence of a powerful spirit entity within the rock itself, similar to Sheila but different, and tries to make contact with it. He starts chanting and singing, and feels the spirit of the rock awake and acknowledge him. As he stands triumphant, he sees a figure sprawled on the ground near the base of the rock - Zoe! 

Tony scrambles down off the massive rock, but before he can get to Zoe he sees two Odyssey Tech vehicles approaching her. An Aboriginal man in tribal gear appears from behind a rock and says, "This way! Hurry!" Tony leaves Zoe, and follows the man.

*     *     *

The previous night, Aki and Takeshi free the Lizard from his cell in the old Prison, and take him upstairs to the foyer. They question him about what he remembers, and he claims to be a graffiti artist who uses the tag Zone, not Lizard. He can't remember much of what's happened for the past couple of days, but Aki turns out to have recently studied hypnotism, so she puts him in a trance and extracts the full story. He was tagging the back of the building when he felt a strange force enter him; he gained the ability to climb walls, but when he used it to tag an inaccessible location he wrote the tag Lizard instead. After that, he became trapped in his own mind as the Lizard took over. The Lizard wanted to leave this place, but it needed the Warden to free it. It felt it had done its time, and just wanted to be free. At the end, Aki implanted some hypnotic instructions not to tag, and to get a job, and brought him back. Takeshi offered to call him a cab, but apparently he lives upstairs.

Aki starts to question Takeshi about her behaviour in the struggle over the Lizard; she suspects she's used some sort of force field power, but hasn't admitted it to herself. Takeshi denies it (badly), but before they can get into a full argument Bob arrives in a panic and tells them that Tony and Zoe have literally vanished from the pub! He's really worried, but Aki says good riddance, so Bob gets annoyed and leaves. Takeshi follows him and asks to see where it happened, and Aki comes along too. There's not much physical evidence, but Takeshi thinks to check the security footage. They see Tony and Zoe struggling to flee from something and then disappearing, but the footage is interspersed by bursts of static and they can't see the entity that Bob described. Takeshi has a premonition of where to find Tony, and hands Bob a wad of cash to get a plane ready...

*     *     *

Back at Uluru, Tony is led into a cave with ancient rock art on the walls of people, animals, and a great spirit-man with yellow lines radiating from his head. There's a circle of men around a fire, and a white-bearded elder with blind white eyes. He welcomes Tony, and motions for him to sit. The others file out of the cave, and the elder explains to Tony their shared roles as Guardians of the spirits. Zoe is similar but different - her great spirit has been torn from the land and bound to her by Odyssey, and they are trying to find a way to do the same to the spirit of Uluru and probably the Complex as well. The only way the Elder knows of to unbind a spirit is to kill the Guardian, but Tony wants to find another way to free Zoe. The elder wishes him luck; after all, people should be bound to the spirits, not the other way around.

Takeshi wakes Aki as their light plane comes in to land at a remote airstrip. There's nothing but flat, red, scrub desert all around, with the bulk of Uluru standing in the distance. They take a trail bike parked against a tin shed, and roar off towards the Rock.

Having finally gotten some clothes, Tony is being guided to the Odyssey Tech compound by a couple of Aboriginal guys, who have likewise changed into everyday clothes. A dust-cloud approaches from the North, and he spots the trail-bike. Everyone meets up. Tony greets them with a smile, and announces that he's glad they're here - he needs their help to destroy Odyssey!

Aki demands to know exactly what's going on, but the others ignore her. Tony tells Takeshi that he might not be coming back from this one. Aki puts her foot down and demands to be told about everything, but Tony says he'll tell her after it's all over. She thinks it's a stupid plan, because they don't really have one, but she eventually decides to come along so she can make sure they don't kill anyone. 

They take a brief look at the fenced compound during the day, and Takeshi assesses their security. There are some guards on patrol, and a couple of prefab buildings. There's a garage of jeeps, and a helicopter parked on open ground. There's a breach in the fence where animals have dug underneath.

They return after dark, evade guard patrols and security cameras, and slip through the breach in the fence. They find a conveniently unlocked and unguarded back door on a shed, and go inside. It's mostly being used for storage, but they find some maintenance coveralls in a locker and disguise themselves as personnel before riding a freight elevator down into the heart of the facility. Tony reaches out with his mind and senses Zoe's entity deep underground, and they head down to try and find her.

On Floor 17, Tony hacks a computer terminal and locates a map of the facility. He pinpoints Zoe's location in a holding cell, but also alerts security to the breach in their computer security. He manages, though, to convince them that the alert is for another floor. The group splits up - Tony tells Takeshi where to find Zoe, and says he's going for the main lab. Aki decides to go with Tony, because she trusts him least!

Takeshi arrives at the holding cell. Through the outer door, he sees Martin Houndsly, an Odyssey executive with whom he has had prior dealings. Martin is watching Zoe through a one-way mirror; she's sitting sullenly at a table in the room beyond. Takeshi enters and tells Martin that he's taking Zoe with him. Martin doesn't try to stop him, but does warn him that she's confused and unstable, and needs Odyssey's help. He can't say what might happen if she leaves. Takeshi enters the room to rescue her, but she resists him, summoning the glowing entity to push him back. Takeshi struggles against it, and coerces Martin to persuade her to leave. After her frantic exertion, though, she collapses and Takeshi carries her out.

The main lab is a large open room of brushed steel and white plastic, but with a large circle recessed into the floor inlaid with silver tracery, creating some sort of mystical symbol. In the centre, there are four sets of cuffs on retractable chains. Aki takes photos, and Tony asks her to chain him to the circle so he can form a spiritual connection to Odyssey, free the bound spirits, and destroy the base. She's a bit weirded out, but does as he asks. She then starts hacking a computer but is distracted when  the mystical circle starts glowing and Sheila visibly manifests above Tony. Sheila tells Tony this is a bad place, and he tells her he wants to destroy it. The ground starts shaking, and the spirit of a tall, older Aboriginal man with a radiant aura around his head appears beside Sheila. 

Takeshi turns up, with Zoe over one shoulder and a gun in Martin's back. The whole base starts to shake, and they set off an evacuation alarm. Aki tries to persuade Tony to leave, but he needs to stay to act as a conduit for the vengeful spirits. He tells her it's her responsibility to make sure everyone else makes it out safely. She starts to leave, but then returns and punches him squarely in the face. "You'd better not die!" she admonishes him, before taking one of the computers and leaving with the others.

Martin leads them to an executive elevator that will take them straight to the surface, but Aki needs to make sure everyone will get out alive. Most of the staff are leaving quickly and efficiently, but there are some people trapped in a nearby room by a fallen support beam. Aki summons her concentration (visualising Tony's face blocking the doorway) and uses her force field powers to blast the obstruction across the room, opening the way.

On the surface, they use Martin to access the helicopter and take off. They see people streaming out of the compound and running across the shaking ground, before the earth opens up and the compound collapses into a dusty hole. Aki and Takeshi look down from the chopper, its blades whooshing in slow motion, as they spare a thought for Tony buried in the wreckage...

Tag Scenes

Back in Takeshi's penthouse, Zoe is recovering in his bed. Takeshi and Aki discuss what to do going forward. Aki leaves, and Takeshi returns to look after Zoe.

Takeshi didn't Challenge anything this episode, so his Statements remain the same.


Aki heads down to her room, and starts uploading the photos of Odyssey's lab to her blog - but not publishing them yet.
Lloyd changed Aki's Truth to "Seek out the TRUTH," her Relationship with Tony to "TONY may be a fanatic, but he means well," and as we completed the final step of Pathways he had the opportunity to shuffle some stuff around. As he'd never used it, he swapped Aki's Relationship with Zoe to one with The Complex at d10, with the statement "There's something more to THE COMPLEX, and I'm going to find it."


Tony slowly returns to consciousness, with a feeling of being somewhere warm and secure. He feels Sheila is there with him. When he opens his eyes, he finds himself lying in a high-vaulted sandstone cave with rock art on the walls, but a different cave than the one under Uluru. The whole place is suffused with a warm golden light, and Sheila is floating in the air, looking more solid than he's ever seen her. She tells him that he did good today, and she's glad to have him as her Guardian. She gestures at a natural stone stairway that's blocked off by an old stone wall. The wall is crumbly and Tony easily pushes it away, revealing the old prison beneath the apartment complex. He takes Sheila's hand and steps through the threshold. He puts his arm around her shoulder, and she smiles up at him.

ROLL CREDITS

Webilogue

The previous day, while everyone was out...

Brett Leeding returns to his apartment, opening the door to find a man standing in the loungeroom, looking out the balcony window. Blake Thompson turns around. "Mr. Leeding. I believe you're eager to learn about Odyssey Tech! I think it's about time we indulged you..."

Brett tries to hurry back out the door, but it's blocked by a pair of Odyssey heavies in suits. One brandishes a stun-gun and Brett's shoulders slump as he admits defeat. As the goons lead him away, Blake smiles humourlessly.

"Excellent."


Wow, this session was intense and action-packed! I'll really have to step it up to deliver a satisfying finale next time, but I know I have a great group who can really bring the dramatic moments when it matters.

I had a pretty loose running-sheet this time, and while I did hit most of the points in the end, many of them didn't happen the way I'd envisioned. Which is great, of course. I was not expecting Takeshi to access the security cameras, or fly to central Australia, so it took the story in an unexpected direction with wonderful results. Since I wasn't hide-bound to a prepped series of events (apart from a couple of opening scenes), I was fairly easily able to adjust to the developing situation, and let this be a really player-led episode. Even though some things came out of left field, I never felt lost or unsure how to proceed.

I did have vague plans that Aki would fall into Sheila's cave if they spent any extra time in the prison, but revealing the cave at the end as Tony's place of return gave this episode a nice symmetry. I had thought he might appear naked in the Penthouse garden, but Steve and Aki decided to start their tag scenes there. So, flexible to the very end.

Stay tuned for the final episode!

>>>Episode 6

The Complex: Episode 4

It's been a month between sessions, because we didn't want to have yet another game with only two players showing up. So, for the first time since Episode 1, we had the whole group together! Due to Daylight Savings starting in the Northern hemisphere while ending in the Southern, the session started two hours earlier than previously for me; I had to get up pretty early, but at least the game didn't run through my lunch time!

My schedule helped us to once more finish the session on time. It's basically just a list with "real world" times listed down the side, and cues to make sure certain meta-game events happen by certain times - when I expect to start the Opening Scenes, when we'll get to the Middle Bit, when to start heading towards a Climax and resolution, and when to call a halt so we have enough time to complete Tag Scenes before finishing on time.


THE COMPLEX
Episode 4: Crime and Punishment

Starring (in alphabetical order):

• +Lloyd Gyan as Aki Enoki, graduate student of biological anthropology on a gap year.
• +David Miessler-Kubanek as Tony Pearson, the apartment's maintenance man, and an ex-hacker from California.
• +Steve Moore as Takeshi Sekiguchi, a retired hit-man trying to keep a low profile.

Produced and Directed by Craig Judd


Takeshi returns from his business trip. He has just enough time to get inside, take off his shoes and loosen his tie, and start pouring a glass of scotch, when Aki knocks on his door. She's come to return the stolen whalebone statue, and tries to leave straight away, but he invites her in to see if they can clear the air between them. She resists, but in the end consents.

In a lower-floor hallway, Tony walks past Zoe on his way to a repair job. He tries to ignore her, but she apologises for the other night and asks if she could buy him a drink tonight at Casey's Pub. He agrees to meet her there at nine.

Just as they are about to part ways, the elevator door opens in front of them, and a man carrying several cases gets out and introduces himself as Brett, a new resident. Zoe departs as Tony helps Brett to his apartment. Brett subtly questions Tony about his origins. Tony becomes flustered as some inquiries cut a bit too close to home, and accidentally confirms that he's from California. He leaves in a hurry before he incriminates himself any further.

Sitting at opposite ends of his couch, Takeshi questions Aki about her obvious discomfort. She's reluctant to address the issue directly, but eventually admits it's because he carries guns. He claims that way of life is behind him, but she points out the hidden gun cabinet that Aomo told her about. However, she also tells him about Tony keeping people in the old prison, and that she thinks he's crazy-dangerous, and that she probably distrusts Tony more than she dislikes Takeshi. Takeshi agrees to talk to Tony about the situation, and Aki leaves.

While repairing a window, Tony hears the sound of spray-painting outside. He looks out, to see a guy in an olive raincoat "crouched" sideways on the sheer wall, spray-painting a Lizard tag. He ducks his head back inside, ignoring the call of "Warden!" from the guy. Instead, he heads up to Aki's balcony, where he manages to reach out and grab the guy's arm. The Lizard tells him that he'll stop painting if Tony lets him leave this place, but Tony tries to drag him inside. They struggle, and the Lizard drops his paint can and backpack to the concrete below.

Aki turns up to see Tony teetering on the edge of her balcony. She rushes over, and helps him drag the Lizard to "safety." Tony then pulls a wrench off his belt and attempts to knock the Lizard out, but the Lizard's tough skin and Aki's force-field prevent him from being hurt. In the struggle though, Tony is pushed back against the concrete wall and bangs his head.

Guided by a premonition that Aki's in danger, Takeshi makes an appearance too! He tries to nonviolently subdue the Lizard with Tony's assistance, but Aki's still using her force field to try and free the Lizard and stop the fighting. Takeshi uses his precognition to great effect, predicting his opponent's moves. Aki becomes worn out from prolonged use of her force field powers, and she passes out from the strain. The other two finally get the Lizard under control.


According to my episode outline, the Lizard was supposed to taunt a couple of people before returning at the end as a climactic chase and capture, followed by everyone arguing about what to do with him. However, we ended up having that climactic struggle in the middle of the episode! I should have made sure he was too far away from Tony to be grabbed, but I went with "be a fan of the PCs, make them look cool." Once he was embroiled in a Contest, there was no easy way for him to escape without Stressing Tony out, but his dice weren't good enough for that. It worked out OK in the end, though, and getting the fight out of the way earlier on left more time for dealing with moral quandaries.


While Aki's passed out, Tony and Takeshi discuss what to do with the Lizard. Takeshi wants to call the police, but Tony tells him about the prison. The Lizard has obvious "powers," and a green scaly skin, marking him as an escaped convict. Takeshi agrees to let Tony take the Lizard down to the sub-basement while he makes sure Aki is OK. 

Down in the prison, Tony throws the Lizard into his cell. He notices the word "Lizard" etched into the old stonework. As the guy tumbles into the cell, it looks as though a blur of light spills out of him and dissipates into the cell with a frustrated sigh. Afterwards, the guy in the raincoat loses his scaly appearance. Tony locks him in with a newly repaired latch, and considers using his 3D printer to make a replacement for the missing cell number tag. It's also about time for him to get ready for his meeting with Zoe.

Takeshi considers calling an ambulance for Aki, but she wakes up as he applies a damp cloth to her forehead. He tells her that Tony has run off to chase down the Lizard. Aki wants to show Takeshi the prison while Tony's out, but Takeshi does his best to distract and redirect her. They go downstairs and check out the dropped backpack and paint cans, not finding anything particularly interesting. Aki insists that now is the best time to show Takeshi the prison, but Takeshi resists; it's late, he's tired, it's been a long day, he has responsibilities as the building's owner not to violate people's privacy...

The two are at an impasse when Brett Leeding shows up and lets them both know he's moved in because everything seems to be happening around this building. Since he's Takeshi's friend and Aki's investigator, he tells the both of them that Zoe Elliott is a current Odyssey Tech employee, so you know... he thought they should know that. He then heads off to the pub, and Takeshi says he'll catch up with him later.

At Casey's Pub, Tony nonchalantly says hi to Bob and cruises over to Zoe's table, because it's totally not a date. Again. She apologises for running out on their dinner, but that things are so complicated... Tony says something touching and reassuring, and she smiles and touches his hand with hers. Tony calls a toast, but Zoe's hand begins to tremble and she drops her glass, pressing her hand to her head and crying out, "No! Not now!" Tony senses a spiritual presence growing, similar to Sheila but filled with dread and malevolence. He scoops Zoe up and begins to carry her out of the bar, but a glowing ball of miasma emerges from the wall and attacks him! With a burst of hatred and spiritual energy, it knocks him down. Just as he blacks out, he sees Zoe trying to hold the thing back...

Tag Scenes

Aki leads Takeshi down through Tony's "Dungeon" and into the prison. On the way, they reassess their opinions of each other. They arrive in front of the Lizard's cell, finding the guy still comatose on the floor, and Takeshi begins to realise the truth about Tony.

Lloyd changed Aki's Duty to "DUTY to those who have earned my respect," her Justice to "Show them that JUSTICE prevails," and her Relationship with Takeshi to "I should reconsider how I feel about TAKESHI, he's not such a bad guy after all."

Steve changed Takeshi's Justice to "I am the dispenser of JUSTICE," his Truth to "TRUTH is a valuable commodity to be dispensed sparingly," and his Relationship with Aki to "Aki needs protection from the horrors of the world."


Meanwhile, Tony regained consciousness, his eyes opening to bright sunshine. He struggled to his feet, red rock all around. The camera pans back, to show him on the very top of Ayers Rock, right in the heart of central Australia...

David didn't Challenge any of Tony's Values or Relationships, so he only had one Growth dice from Stress.

ROLL CREDITS

Webilogue

Firelight plays across the red-rock walls of an ancient cave. Paintings of animals, people, and spirits cover the walls. The air is filled with the thrum of didgeridoo and the clack of rhythm-sticks. A circle of men sit around the fire, their dark skin streaked with white ochre. At the head of the circle sits a white-bearded elder, deep in meditation.

His blind white eyes snap open as the music stops, and he speaks.

"Two have come. We must hurry."


Since the players frame their own tag scenes, Tony's finale was all on David! I just asked him where he wanted to wake up. It's a great plot development, and it's already sparking off ideas for next time. It looks like it will be "filmed" in two separate locations though, with not much chance for Tony to interact with the other two Leads. Time will tell whether he gets back to the Complex quickly, or just in time for the end of the episode.

>>> Episode 5

The Complex: Episode 3

Only two players again for yesterday's session - +Steve had scheduling issues, so Takeshi was apparently suddenly called away on a business trip or something.

This time around, I wrote up a basic time-table to remind myself when we needed to start heading towards the climax, and we actually managed to finish on time! I tried to keep my prep-work fairly minimal, but ended up extrapolating a few extra potential plot devices. In the end, one was only just introduced, and another didn't get a look-in at all. I'll definitely be looking to bring both of those to the fore in the next Episode (as foreshadowed in the Webilogue).


THE COMPLEX
Episode 3: Going Deeper

Starring (in alphabetical order):

• +Lloyd Gyan as Aki Enoki, graduate student of biological anthropology on a gap year.
• +David Miessler-Kubanek as Tony Pearson, the apartment's maintenance man, and an ex-hacker from California.

Produced and Directed by Craig Judd


Aki receives a call from Blake Thompson, Odyssey Tech company man. He has the stolen whalebone statue to return to her, but wants her to give him something else first. She puts him on the back-foot by refusing, but they negotiate and he agrees to return the statue if she can find out the state of the prison site that lies underneath the building. That way, she doesn't actually have to steal anything.

Tony finds out that the building's been sold to the Yamamoto Historical Foundation, but that he still has his job and that it will continue to operate as an apartment building. He uses Aki's wi-fi balcony and his hacking skills to research the foundation, and discovers that while Michiru Hasegawa is the director, Takeshi is their major financial backer.


Normally this would have entailed a Contest against Takeshi, but as his player was absent and the investigation was being performed against an Extra by a former class-A hacker, I just ran it as a Test against the Trouble pool.


Tony visits Zoe, to check she's OK and hasn't had any more trouble with thugs. She tells him that she used to work for Odyssey Tech in the UK, but witnessed them performing a strange ritual which may have involved human sacrifice! She fled but has been trying to figure out what they're after in Australia so she can stop them from getting it. This completely endears her to Tony, and he tells her a little about Sheila and how special the complex is. Zoe asks if she could meet Sheila, and Tony asks how open she is to the supernatural. She claims to have had her share of experiences, so Tony invites her to dinner at his place this evening, which is totally not a date.

Aki visits Tony in the Dungeon while he's cleaning the place and preparing for dinner. It takes a few tries to get his attention, as he has a "Do Not Disturb" sign up - in the end, she has to call him "Warden" to get him to open the door. Aki asks Tony to show her the sub-basement. He refuses because he's busy, because it's dangerous and she could get hurt, and because it's not her 'jurisdiction' - but she's very insistent and wears down his morale. In the end, he tells her she needs to prove she can 'play with the big boys' by finding out what Michiru Hasegawa's intentions are with the building. If she can do so by 10am the next day, he'll take her into the sub-basement.

Aki immediately dashes off to investigate, recruiting Aomo to help with research. Aki finds out that Michiru is the director of the Yamamoto Historical Foundation which now owns the building, but Aomo manages to also uncover Takeshi's connection to the Foundation. Aki gets Aomo to drive her down to the Foundation's offices so she can grill Michiru.

Zoe arrives for dinner at The Dungeon, and is amazed at how neat and tidy Tony keeps the place! She seems a little taken aback by the meal that's been laid out, but Tony's set a third place for Sheila, with no food on the plate but a glass of wine poured. Once Zoe's taken a seat he turns off the music and puts the old TV onto a static station, asking Sheila if she'd like to meet Zoe. He feels some reluctance, but manages to coax her out. She actually manifests as an apparition, standing on the far side of Tony so she's hiding from Zoe, who's watching intently but anxiously. Sheila doesn't like Zoe, saying she's tainted, and connected to one of the 'bad ones.' At this, Zoe gets up and leaves the Dungeon.

Before Tony can question Sheila further, Aki turns up, catching the door before it swings shut. Tony invites her to sit down and share dinner with him, and they chat and de-stress each other. Tony tells Aki about Sheila. Aki tells Tony what she's found out about Michiru Hasegawa - that she doesn't really have any plans for the building, because she's a front for Takeshi. 

The next morning at 10am, Tony introduces Aki to Sheila. While she doesn't show herself this time, Aki senses her spiritual presence. Thankfully, Sheila takes a liking to Aki, so Tony consents to show her the sub-basement, with Sheila tagging along in spirit. They explore a maze of access tunnels, until they find a hatch in the wall secured by a colonial-era padlock. Tony manages to open the lock without breaking it, revealing a sandy floored hallway lined with old sandstone blocks. Aki starts taking pictures for research, but also mentions Odyssey. Tony's incredulous that he brought her this far when she's working for Odyssey, but she assures him the photos are for her personal research and she won't be passing on physical evidence. Tony confiscates her camera-phone, and makes sure to take the padlock with him as well. Further discussion is cut short by strange thudding noises and muffled sounds coming from inside the hatch, so they press on to investigate.

They found a series of tunnels, many of which have been sealed by concrete poured into the foundations, or by rock-falls. The floor is made of sand-covered flagstones. As they get closer to the sounds, Aki presses ahead. She rounds a corner and kicks a wooden cell number marker on the floor, quickly pocketing it before Tony arrives. It's a long corridor with cell doors lining the walls. An eerie sobbing comes from one of the far cells; Tony wants to leave whatever it is in the cell because it deserves to be there, but Aki thinks he's crazy to leave someone down here. They scuffle; Tony drops Aki's phone, but Aki drops the cell number tag and breaks her flashlight. In the confusion, Tony loses track of Aki, who grabs her phone and goes to the cell door. She discovers Alex Miller, the thief who dropped through the floor in Tony's workshop, trapped in the cell. He's exhausted and weakened, and has lost his ability to phase through solid objects. Aki manages to bust the cell door open and help him out of the basement (picking up the cell tag on the way). Tony closes the cell door behind them, and Sheila nods at the empty cell, saying "You stay in there!"

Tag Scenes

After getting Alex to a safe place, Aki returns to the prison and confronts Tony about trying to keep people locked up in this place. She thinks he's being crazy and irresponsible, and storms off after giving him a piece of her mind.

Lloyd changed Aki's Duty to "DUTY to those who have respect", her Power to "POWER is coming. I have to find out where", and her Relationship with Tony to "TONY is freaking crazy, watch for him".

Tony finds the Warden's office. Standing in the middle of the room, he opens his mind and hears the raucous yelling and banging of the convict souls still housed in the prison. He senses some are missing, and that others may soon break free...

David changed Tony's Truth to "You can't handle the TRUTH!" He also kept his Duty stepped down to d6, and stepped up his Justice to d8.

ROLL CREDITS

Webilogue

Crickets chirp in the heat. Business shoes crunch over a drying lawn. Brett Leeding, in a sweat-stained business shirt and braces, trenchcoat over one arm, looks up at the back of the apartment complex.

VOICE-OVER: "This building. It all leads here. Everything's coming together..."

He walks across the lawn and the camera pans up. Halfway up the building, on this sheer straight side, "The Lizard" has been scrawled in giant spray-painted letters.


Another good episode, although I'm looking forward to having all three players together soon. The meta-plot is advancing nicely.

I've noticed that Distinction Triggers aren't kicking in very often. I think there are probably too many of them, and you need to really know them well and keep them in mind. I don't think I've given out a Plot Point for an Earn trigger in two sessions. David did use his Shoulder To Cry On trigger to help erase his own Stress, though, and people are getting the hang of using Ability Special Effects.


>>> Episode 4

The Complex: Episode 2

We only had two Leads for yesterday's Episode, making for a very focussed and intimate - and at times intense - game. +David was attending a games convention this weekend. His Lead, Tony, was busy fixing up the building's plumbing this time around, with Rashida's reluctant help.

We had a little paperwork to clear up from the last session - both attending Leads had to pick new Extras. Takeshi gained Aomo, and Aki gained Brett Leeding. As both players consented in both cases, these two Extras immediately became Features.

I tried to do a bit less prep-work for this Session, but we still ended up going overtime.


THE COMPLEX
Episode 2: A Japanese Story

Starring (in alphabetical order):

• +Lloyd Gyan as Aki Enoki, graduate student of biological anthropology on a gap year.
• +Steve Moore as Takeshi Sekiguchi, a retired hit-man trying to keep a low profile.

Produced and Directed by Craig Judd


Takeshi meets Brett Leeding in a private room of the Shogun Karaoke Restaurant. Brett tells him that, while investigating Odyssey Tech for various clients, he's discovered that the've also put in an offer on the apartment building Takeshi lives in and wants to buy himself.

The next morning in the lobby of a fancy hotel, Aomo introduces Aki to Blake Thompson, an Odyssey Tech representative whom Aomo's already done a little freelance work for. Blake is charming, and Aki's thrilled to be recruited by a major company to help them with their archaeological research. They have an interest in the apartment building, as it was built on the site of a colonial-era prison.

Takeshi gets a call from Alan Moss, to let him know the apartment building is going up for auction in a couple of days. Near the end of the call, Rashida wanders past and Takeshi's mobile reception is disrupted.

Aki's working at Coffee Cigarettes & Cake when Takeshi comes in to buy cigarettes and a cappuccino. She freezes up because her opinion of him has completely changed - he's not just "the nice old man upstairs" any more. Takeshi tries to talk to her about the building sale, but she just wants him to leave. He asks what's wrong, but she just wants him to go - to the point of using her force field to push him back, also knocking some stuff off the counter and making a mess. In the end, Takeshi eventually just turns and leaves.


This was a massive Contest, over five or six rounds, each one escalating until we reached a total of 24. Takeshi failed a roll and got Stressed Out of the scene. It was pretty much just repeated "Tell me what's wrong so I can help!" "No, just go away!" but the escalating dice mechanic really raised the tension.


Aki visits Brett Leeding to get some information, and discovers that Odyssey plans to buy the apartment building. She's worried about what this will mean for the residents if they decide to do a full archaeological dig, and whether they will still need her services if they acquire the building.

Aomo's tending the Penthouse garden when Takeshi wanders out and asks if he can think of any reason Aki would be upset. 

In a flashback, we see Aki telling Aomo about Takeshi's gun, and Aomo telling her he's already found Takeshi's secret gun cupboard, which he thinks is really cool.

Aomo says he can't think of anything, but Takeshi detects a certain nervousness and pressures him further. Aomo breaks down and confesses stealing a whalebone statue from the Penthouse garden and giving it to Blake Thompson. Takeshi questions him, and says that he'd better figure out how to get it back. After Aomo leaves, Takeshi calls Brett Leeding to get some information on Blake.

Aki calls Blake to get some assurance that, if Odyssey buys the apartment building, they won't knock it down or evict all the residents. He assures her he'll do everything in his power to keep the apartment running as it is, and that even if they manage to buy the building they'll still want Aki to do some work for them.

Aki meets Aomo in the stairway when she's heading up to apologise to Takeshi. He's obviously upset, so she calms him down and he tells her how he betrayed Takeshi's trust and stole the whalebone statue for Blake. Aki calls Blake and organises another meeting at his hotel.  She goes upstairs to apologise to Takeshi, but he's just left in his private elevator. They get out the front just in time to see him drive off.

Takeshi bursts into Blake's hotel room and threatens him at gunpoint, requesting he return the statue. Blake knows him by reputation and plays it cool, saying he might be able to get the statue back in a couple of days. Takeshi threatens to kill him if Odyssey doesn't withdraw from the auction, but Blake tells him he's past his prime and doesn't have it in him. He should leave things to those younger and more capable. Blake's assessment cuts a bit too close to home, and Takeshi leaves in great frustration.

Aki meets Takeshi in the hallway. She apologises for her earlier behaviour, but suggests it would be best for everyone if they agree to stay away from each other. 

Aki and Aomo go on to visit Blake, and she also demands the return of the statue. In return, Blake asks her to interfere with Takeshi's attempt to buy the apartment. Aki refuses; if Odyssey buys the apatment they'll have full access anyway, and if they lose the auction she'll get some other artefact to swap for the statue.

The Auction

The morning of the auction arrives! An excited crowd gathers on the patio, both to bid and to watch. Blake isn't present, but there's a fairly obvious businessman on a mobile phone passing on bids on Odyssey's behalf. Takeshi has arranged for his bid to be handled by a representative of a historical preservation trust he happens to own. Aki is watching from her balcony, but doesn't see any reason to help or interfere - whoever ends up owning the building, it will benefit her one way or another.


It was a bit of a shame that Lloyd ended up in this situation; with 7 Plot Points going begging, he figured that the best way to affect the situation was to do nothing, so he unfortunately spent the climactic auction scene as a spectator.


Seeing Rashida in the crowd, Takeshi persuaded her to go stand next to the guy calling in the phone bids for Odyssey, to interfere with his reception.

Takeshi started on the back foot as the full might of Odyssey's financial weight was brought to bear right out of the gate. He felt his anger rising as Blake obviously hadn't withdrawn from the bidding, and it looked like Odyssey might win.

However, Takeshi's resources stayed the course, while Odyssey's began to falter. In the second half of the bidding, Odyssey hit their limit and were forced to drop out. By a narrow margin, Takeshi's team won the auction and bought the apartment complex!

Tag Scenes

Blake returned to his hotel room late one night to discover the lights weren't working. He opened the curtains, the moonlight revealing Takeshi sitting on the couch with a pistol on his lap. Having demonstrated his ability to get to Blake no matter the situation, Takeshi tells him that next time he won't be so lucky, and leaves. Blake simply smirks to himself.

Takeshi changed his Justice to "JUSTICE can be achieved by peaceful means," and his Truth to "Some TRUTHS need to be shared."

Aki sits on her balcony and fills in another blog entry. Now that Takeshi indirectly owns the building, she has some freelance research work to do for Odyssey...

Aki changed her Duty to "To be useful in DUTY means to be useful to those that deserve it," and her Relationship with Takeshi to "Me and TAKESHI have an agreement, he stays away, and so do I."

ROLL CREDITS

Webilogue

The camera pans low across a carpeted floor as we hear a woman talking on the phone. "Yes, sir, it is unfortunate... No, everything else is still in place..." White curtains waft in the breeze. "Yes, I'm confident that our plans will come to fruition. Just leave it to me..."

The camera slowly pulls up, and we see the back of a woman's legs in stockings and a business skirt, standing on a balcony. The camera glides past her, and looks over the edge at the Complex's patio and pool area...


This time I only prepped one and a half plot elements (the auction, and Aomo's work for Odyssey), and we only had two players, but the game still went for an hour longer than it was meant to! At least I didn't over-prepare this time, and now I know I only have to come up with one really good idea for each Lead and they'll take care of the rest themselves. I just need to keep a more mindful eye on the clock.

My idea to exacerbate the conflict between Takeshi and Aki by putting them on opposite sides of a big issue worked pretty well, although Lloyd's starting to feel like Aki's working for the bad guys now, and he feels kind of bad for acting in direct opposition to another player's character. He's happy with having arguments between friends, and with confronting characters face-to-face, but doesn't feel good about outmanoeuvring other characters behind their backs.

We talked about it a bit after the session, and Steve was fine with everything Lloyd had done. I think even if Aki does end up working for the "bad guys" I need to make sure they're relatable and have justifiable reasons for their approach. Since David wasn't here this time, we decided to hold off on the Modus Operandi Pathways step until next Episode, so that will be a good theme as people figure out how they are most comfortable dealing with each other.

 I've noticed a couple of things when Extras become Features. Firstly, it makes Aid dice slightly harder to come by. You can't just say "I'm using this Extra as inspiration, or for assistance, or something I set up with them earlier" - you actually have to persuade the Feature to Aid you if you want to get a bonus die from them. In hindsight, I probably should have had Brett Leeding's investigation into Odyssey allow him to Aid Takeshi in the auction, rather than just giving Takeshi an excuse to buy a d6 Useful Detail to represent that information. Of course, I hadn't had time to write up a Feature sheet for Brett either...

Secondly, a lack of Extras tends to sideline the Trouble pool. Two Extras who were going to be involved in the Episode turned into Features right at the start, and even though there were a couple of minor GM Extras, none of them ended up in opposition to a Lead. I didn't make a single Trouble Pool roll for the whole Episode, although it did build up a nice collection of d6 and d8!

>>> Episode 3

The Complex: Preparing Episode 2

Since Episode 2 was only going to have two players, and because I'd prepped too much content for our first session, I cut back pretty dramatically on the amount of prep this time around. Even so, the players grabbed the plot and ran with it, and we still went overtime by an hour! It seems I'll have to learn to watch the clock more closely.

I started by listing out the Relationships and Values between the two participating Leads: Aki and Takeshi. Notes on potential conflicts are in italics.

RELATIONSHIPS

TAKESHI: AKI is a pretty girl, the granddaughter I never had.
AKI might become closer to an estranged relative... She might even be getting into something dangerous.

AKI: TAKESHI has a good voice, he must be a good man.
This will be Challenged as soon as they have a Contest! No idea what it will become at end of episode, but there’s the opportunity for multiple Challenges.


VALUES

DUTY
AKI Everyone has a DUTY to be useful to their family and friends d12
TAKESHI My only Duty is to myself d4

GLORY
AKI Keep to the shadows, GLORY brings trouble d4
TAKESHI I am too old to be a GLORY hound d6

JUSTICE
AKI Grant JUSTICE where it’s needed d8
TAKESHI JUSTICE by any means d10

LOVE
AKI There is no time for LOVE in my life d4
TAKESHI Some people are worthy of LOVE, but not me d6

POWER
AKI My POWER comes from others d6 - What about when she’s being self-powered?
TAKESHI Money is useful but it doesn’t buy happiness d6

TRUTH
AKI I must find my own TRUTH d8
TAKESHI The TRUTH is dangerous d10


PLOT IDEAS & REVELATIONS

• BRETT LEEDING has been investigating ODYSSEY, which brings him to the apartment and TAKESHI. He reveals that ODYSSEY is manoeuvring to buy the building.
• AKI is introduced to ODYSSEY representative BLAKE THOMPSON by AOMO, who has done a little field work for them at THE COMPLEX already by stealing the whalebone statue from the roof garden.
• The owner decides to go for a sale by auction.
• RASHIDA's Magnetism could interfere with phone bids. Have an early scene where she interferes with a Lead's reception (probably AKI - actually ended up being TAKESHI).

So I went into it with not much more than that. I had two or three definite scenes at the start where the basic premise was established (Odyssey and Takeshi both want to buy the building, Aki's recruited by Odyssey, the building is to be sold by auction). 

A few other Revelations could be scattered in wherever they seemed appropriate (Rashida interfering with phone reception, Aomo's theft for Odyssey). In the middle, I'd mostly let the players request specific scenes to let their Leads manoeuvre around the situation.

At the end, the climax would come in the form of the auction, based on a Contest between Takeshi and Blake Thompson.

>>> Episode 2

The Complex: Episode 1

I burned my brain out yesterday running the first session of Smallville: The Complex (after creating characters during Pathways a couple of weeks ago). After a big night's sleep, I am finally ready to start thinking about writing an actual play post. The session went for five hours all up, although I had some technical hitches with Hangout for the first half hour (and needed to install Chrome instead of using Safari), and +Lloyd's connection started playing up in the last hour. I think about the last 45 minutes was wrapping things up, Tag Scenes and Growth, and discussing the session.

I was worried my prep was a bit vague and wouldn't take up the scheduled three to four hours, but on top of our technical hitches there was a lot of rules-explaining and carefully walking through procedures for Contests and the like. Sarah was a no-show, so I had to re-work a couple of plot elements involving Zoe. As we started running low on time, I had to cut out a few things I was planning to introduce, but it's fine - I can re-work them for a later Episode.


THE COMPLEX
Episode 1: Priorities

Starring (in alphabetical order):

• +Lloyd Gyan as Aki Enoki, a Japanese grad student on a gap year in Australia.
• +David Miessler-Kubanek as Tony Pearson, the apartment's maintenance man, and an ex-hacker from California.
• +Steve Moore as Takeshi Sekiguchi, a retired Japanese hitman whose Penthouse apartment takes up the entire top floor.

Produced and Directed by Craig Judd.

At the Shogun Japanese Karaoke Restaurant, Aki and Aomo are out for a night of singing. Aki gets harassed by a drunk; Aomo is useless, but luckily Takeshi is standing at the bar. He grabs the drunk's shoulder and wheels him around, sitting him down and giving him a beer to distract him. Aki and Takeshi strike up a conversation, with Aomo (who knows both of them) acting as a social intermediary. Takeshi has a sudden niggling premonition of flowing water...

Late at night on the way home from Casey's Pub, Tony sees Zoe, who is scared she's being followed by a couple of thugs in suits. Tony calms her and escorts her home, then goes out to find the stalkers - but they have disappeared. 

Takeshi returns home to discover the Penthouse is flooding from a burst pipe in the kitchen. He puts in a call to Tony, the maintenance man.

When Tony gets back home he senses the ancient yet childlike presence of The Complex entity, which he has named Sheila. She tells him that "something's missing..." and wanders away again. Before he can follow and ask her what's missing, he gets that phone-call from Takeshi and has to organise his plumbing tools.

Aki's writing a blog post on her balcony when she hears a loud argument from the apartment next door. Although she doesn't like to cause a scene, she steels herself to go knock on their door. As she enters the hall, Tony belts up the stairs with his tools. She asks him for help, but he's torn between duties and thinks Aki's just being useless. In the end he quickly bangs on the door and tells them to keep it down, then runs upstairs again. Aki manages to duck back inside before the argumentative door is opened.

After a couple of Tests against Extras, this was our first actual Contest between Leads. Aki asked for help, and Tony said she should deal with it herself. Aki Challenged her "It's my DUTY to be useful to friends and family d12" because she was actually trying to impose her sense of duty on someone else. Against a slew of d12's, Tony didn't have much chance; he became Insecure d12, but Lloyd chose not to Stress him Out of the scene.

It underscored early on that Smallville's core mechanics get involved right in the thick of the roleplaying. What would normally be an in-character conversation in most other games is punctuated by dice-rolling. As I said at the end of the session, a game like Savage Worlds is all about skirmish combat - it has lots of rules for combat, measurements and miniatures and so on, so most of the dice rolling happens during combat. Smallville is about arguments, so there are rules for resolving arguments, and you mostly roll dice during disagreements. Instead of considering tactical options, you have to think about internal motivations and beliefs. It can be a bit of a stumbling block, especially for players used to a more character-immersive style of play, but I hope once the group gets used to the idea the dice will flow as freely as words.

In the Penthouse, Tony discovers that the pipe was apparently forcibly pulled apart or sheared through. Takeshi lets drop that he's put in an offer to buy the building. After that, the complex settled down for the night.

*     *     *

In the morning Tony is stopped by Bruce Longridge, one of the couple who were arguing last night. He's a large, muscular gorilla of a man, with darkly tanned skin and hairy shoulders. He complains that their shower head has broken and is spraying water. Tony sends a message to all residents, and shuts the water off before heading out to buy plumbing supplies.

Aki's working a shift at "Coffee Cigarettes & Cake" (CCC). Takeshi buys some cigarettes and a coffee, and takes a table. Tessa Longridge, one of Aki's arguing neighbours, comes in to buy cigarettes. She's wearing sunglasses, but can't hide a large black eye. Aki sells her the cigarettes cheaply, and Takeshi tries to take her aside to talk... but she protests, and her husband Bruce comes in and sees them together. Bruce takes Tessa outside and Takeshi follows, confronting Bruce and decking him with one punch. However, Tessa doesn't appear grateful, and tries to help Bruce. Takeshi goes back inside to finish his coffee.

Tony arrives back at the apartments and runs into Bob, who's come to see if he wants to buy some jewellery he got off a guy at the pub. He ribs Toy about his "interest" in Zoe, but Tony declines his offer and suggests he try Aki, since Bob likes her. Bob agrees, and heads off to CCC.

Back at CCC, Aki innocently asks Takeshi what his job is. He's caught off-guard and awkwardly explains that he's a retired businessman, which she would have readily accepted... except that she caught a glimpse of one of the pistols inside his jacket. She immediately walked off and ended her shift.


This was an interesting Contest, which Lloyd didn't originally intend to be a Contest, but we talked him into it. Aki was just making conversation, and asked Takeshi what he did for a living. She would have been perfectly happy to buy whatever answer she gave him. Steve and I recognised it as a potential Contest because Takeshi was likely to become stressed by having to come up with a cover story.

While most Contests are initiated by the Lead telegraphing an intent ("Tell me who you really are!"), this was a more subtle and meta-level Contest that was fundamentally initiated by the player. Aki as a character had no idea she was inadvertently subjecting Takeshi to an awkward moment; a Complication on his part led to Aki seeing his handgun. The Contest in this case allowed us to play up the dramatic irony of Aki unwittingly hitting on a dangerous truth. Given that at least two of the Leads have secret identities, I think this sort of Contest is valid and important to allow those characters to show the audience who they are.

Tony investigated the plumbing in a couple of problem apartments. In one, he was watched indifferently by a teenage girl of Arabic extraction who was home alone, and he discovered that a pipe under the bathtub had been pulled out of its fitting even though the floor around it hadn't been disturbed.

As he entered the Longridge apartment to fix their shower head, Tony interrupted a burglar who tried to flee further into the apartment. Tony hit him in the leg with a flung length of metal pipe, but when he chased after the guy he'd apparently vanished into thin air! Tony began to suspect that the burglar had a power that allowed him to travel through water pipes.

Slightly freaked out, Aki was on her way back to the apartment when she ran into Bob in the street. She tried to brush him off, but short Japanese girl vs. lanky Aboriginal man meant he easily kept up with her. He showed her the jewellery, and she immediately recognised it as her own! Bob gave it to her, and said he bought it off a guy in the pub. Aki jumped to the conclusion that Tony must have used his maintenance access key to enter her apartment and take it!

Tony returned to The Dungeon to discuss things with Sheila, who cryptically revealed that since something was missing, some of the prisoners were starting to leak out. Before he could find out more, Aki knocked on his door, demanding an explanation about her stolen items. Tony realised that the burglar he saw must have stolen them, but as he had no proof, he invited her in to discuss the situation. She refused, threatening to go to the police. Before anyone could do anything, however, there was a bang as something in The Dungeon fell over. They ran to Tony's workshop, where the burglar was attempting to bandage his leg with a first-aid kit. He had knocked over a stack of tools. Tony tackled him, and Aki threw something at his head, but the criminal simply phased through the solid concrete floor and disappeared! He left his backpack behind, in which Tony found some other stolen goods, and Aki's laptop.

Takeshi was riding up to the Penthouse in the elevator when he felt the "whump" of a small explosion. He stopped the car and prised the doors open, hearing a door banging and stomping footsteps before he climbed into the hallway. The door to the Longridge apartment was open, with a trail of footprints burned into the hall carpet, leading downstairs. Takeshi discovered the charred body of Bruce Longridge inside the flat, and pursued the arsonist with his guns drawn. He heard a manly voice yelling "WARDEN! WHERE ARE YOU?" - although it sounded like it was spoken by a woman. Leaping down the stairs, he startled the Arabic girl that had been watching Tony earlier, although she looked fairly startled to begin with. Takeshi's age caught up with him, and he didn't manage to catch up with the murderer before they reached the foyer.

Hearing the ruckus and the calls for the Warden, Tony and Aki came up from the Dungeon. In the foyer, they saw Tessa Longridge transformed - her skin was black, charred and cracked, but inside the cracks they saw not blood but a fiery glow. Upon seeing Tony, she unleashed a stream of fire from her mouth. Takeshi finally arrived, aiding Tony by spraying Tessa with bullets. Aki deflected the flaming blast with her force field power, and Tony used a pipe to lever one of the mains pipes off the wall. He was struggling, but then the pipe just sheared through. He saw the Arabic girl hiding in the stairwell, and she'd gestured towards the pipe just as it twisted free. Tessa was engulfed in a deluge of water, apparently exorcising the fiery entity and returning her to her unconscious but normal self. As the water subsided, everyone just kind of looked at each other. The Arabic girl quietly disappeared upstairs.

TAG SCENES

Tony and Takeshi bonded by disposing of Bruce's body in the building's incinerator, so Tessa wouldn't get in trouble. Tessa was devastated, but Takeshi gave her some financial aid so she could start a new life far, far away.

Takeshi changed his Challenged Value to "JUSTICE by any means."

Aki was pretty shaken up by the whole thing, but she finally has something interesting to write about on her blog that nobody reads. Sitting on her balcony, she decides to get to the bottom of all the weird stuff that's been happening. As she publishes her first post, she stares off into the distance and smiles...


Aki rewrote her Challenged Value to "Everyone has a DUTY to be useful to their family and friends."

ROLL CREDITS

Webilogue

Pan down through the foyer, and the Dungeon, and lower still, through concrete and earth, to a sandstone cell beneath the foundations. In the dim light of a mobile phone, the burglar pushes himself desperately against the cold walls, but to no avail. "Why won't it work?!" he wails. "Help! HEEELP!" The camera pulls back, the room a tiny island of light in the middle of a sea of darkness. 

Cut to black.

Next Episode...

David won't be able to join us in a fortnight's time, so I'll be planning an episode that focusses on the fractured relationship between Takeshi and Aki. I'm also planning to involve some connections from beyond The Complex itself, since the building is largely Tony's (David's) domain.

The first session was a blast, and I really enjoyed running it. I'll know next time to not prepare so much stuff! It looks like I can rely on these players to pick up the ball and run with it; they're more than capable of generating their own content.

As the players become more comfortable with the system, I'll be easing off a bit on suggesting when a Contest might be appropriate. It's technically the players' responsibility to call for a Contest, but it's easy to forget in the heat of the moment when you're used to resolving disputes by talking through them in character, with no dice involved.

>>> Preparing Episode 2
>>> Episode 2

The Complex: Preparing Episode 1

Since a lot of people are curious about what goes into preparing and running Smallville, I'd like to talk a bit more about Pathways, and how I've approached the prep-work for the first session.

I think the very premise is key to creating a tightly knit group. After Pathways, our Leads have a shared space (the apartment building) and a shared experience (their newfound powers), but they have no history together. This has been a trend in my two games so far, so I can only theorise, but I think if the PCs had a deeper connection and an established history together, it might be easier for the GM to see the "status quo" and figure out ways to push it out of shape. When the status quo hasn't been established yet, it's harder to see where to push, because we only have vague or first-impression Statements. Maybe in this case I should be concentrating more on Value Statements instead...

I made sure that everyone had a character concept ahead of time, but I think it may be useful to go one step further before hitting Pathways. If everyone also has a solid idea of the Extras and Locations everyone's bringing to the table, then they can tie their characters together in more intimate ways. For example, rather than Odyssey Tech emerging piecemeal through Pathways, we'd know to begin with that the company is an element in play, allowing other players to think of connections ahead of time rather than making random connections on the fly. If someone says "I want my character to be an ex-Odysey employee, hunted by the company", then another player could say "In that case, how about I work for Odyssey Tech?"

General advice for players - in a small group, you pretty much want to aim for having one other Lead be an ally, and one be an antagonist. The roles may change over time, but if you only have allies you won't get involved in many arguments, and if you only have enemies you wont have anyone to help out with Stress recovery.

*     *     *

Okay, so on to actual prep work. I started out by drawing an Episode Map with just the Leads on it, wrote on their current Relationship Statements, and summarised them with a keyword reflecting their opinions. I was a little hampered by having two of Zoe's Statements missing. What I've gleaned so far is a general respect for Takeshi, and general suspicion aimed at Tony. Aki currently has one "affection," one "dismissal," and one "interest" opinion, so she may form the core of something that challenges the standing attitudes.

I also drew up a spreadsheet to summarise the group's conflicting Values. I used larger font sizes for higher dice values, and used a red-orange-blue-green colour code to reflect negative to positive attitudes. So far Truth is the most important shared Value, followed by Justice. These are probably the Values I should aim to provoke Challenges for. While it might be good to Challenge and rewrite a d4 Value, you don't get much in the way of Growth, and you can't actually increase its rating without stepping back a higher Value first.

Since we're going to be fast-tracking the second half of Pathways, one step after each Episode, I should also keep in mind that the loose theme of the Episode should be "Priority" - what is most important to these characters? Perhaps I should consider testing the Leads' highest Value statements - is it more important to Takeshi to keep a dangerous TRUTH concealed, or to administer JUSTICE at the end of a gun? Will Aki choose DUTY to her family and friends over finding her own TRUTH? Can I find a situation that will force Tony to pick between a TRUTH that is not just what he makes it, or admitting that not everyone has a DUTY to pull their own weight?

For a while, I kept trying to knot together a very personal and involved story, but it became increasingly uncertain whether Zoe's player was still participating. Her character sheet still remains unfinished. In the end, rather than stress about it and try to come up with multiple contingencies, I decided to develop a more flexible plot structure. To test priorities, justice, and truth, I came up with a small collection of individual power-users who would cause chaos around the building and give the Leads something to deal with and argue about.

I won't go into specifics since some of their details have yet to be revealed, but my basic process was to come up with a list of things these characters would do, and the order in which they should occur. Once I'd come up with individual lists, I knitted them together into a schedule of likely scenes, and gave some thought to which Leads were required. I sorted the scenes into an order which was not only chronological, but which alternated between Leads to make sure everyone got a fair amount of screen time. The actual situations and Leads required some flexibility of application during the actual game, as I had to adapt to changing circumstances, but for the most part such a schedule acts as a checklist to make sure you haven't forgotten to drop in something important.

Once that was done, I just needed to write some details for the Extras (Rating and Specialties) and Features. I used the Quick and Dirty Features guidelines from The Watchtower Report to stat out a one-shot antagonist, and made some rough notes for The Complex Feature; I'll make sure she adds up nicely at a later date.

Normally I'd make a little reminder list of the conflicts I'm trying to push in a particular episode, but this one ended up being more general. So long as I was pushing for people to question their Justice and Truth, that was pretty much it. Putting people in situations where they had to choose between one thing or another was also desirable.

>>> Episode 1

The Complex Episode 0: Pathways

I've been persuaded to run a Smallville game online, using Google Hangouts! Over the last couple of weeks we've been using a private Community on Google+ to discuss character concepts and the basic structure of the game, and yesterday we ran through Pathways!

This was my first time participating in a Hangout with more than one other person, and it turned out my tablet was not up to the challenge. I ended up having to use Hangout on my Mac, but without a webcam I was limited to audio only. It worked out OK in the end, but I'll definitely be investing in a webcam and a proper headset before Episode 1.

The setting is modern day. On Australia's Gold Coast, there is an apartment complex which is gathering people with strange powers... or perhaps, the building is a catalyst causing these powers to manifest. It does appear that The Complex itself is an entity of some sort, with its own agenda. The game will run fortnightly for about four sessions, and then we'll see whether we want to continue or wrap it up.

We ended up with four Leads:

• Sarah plays Zoe Elliott, a former researcher for Odyssey Tech in Britain, who fled the company after discovering they were performing strange occult rituals. She's hiding from them while investigating their Australian operations.
• +Lloyd plays Aki Enoki, a graduate student of Biological Anthropology from Japan. She decided to take a gap year after spending her whole life living up to other people's expectations, and a friend suggested she visit Australia.
• +Steve plays Takeshi Kitano, an ageing, retired hitman with a heart of gold who used to do freelance work for the Yakuza and others. He's trying to lie low, but his big heart may drag him back into the fray as he finds people worthy of his protection.
• +David plays Tony Pearson, the maintenance man at The Complex, who shares an almost symbiotic relationship with it. He's a former hacker from California, who's hiding out Down Under with an assumed identity.

With one former Pathway session under my belt, things went relatively smoothly (once my technical issues were sorted). We used a shared folder on Google Drive, using spreadsheets as Pathways worksheets and character sheets, a drawing for the Pathways Map, and documents for character concepts, rules and expectations, and a summary of the connections from the Pathway Map.

Unfortunately, there's a lot going on during Pathways, and I failed to realise that Zoe's Extras and Locations were more like antagonists for her than resources to call upon - her former boss from Odyssey Tech who wants her found, an outback facility she doesn't have official access to, and a mysterious glowing entity she's scared of. They're all great story elements, but they don't fill the role of Resources. Normally you'd end up with these sorts of antagonistic connections if one of the other Leads was employed by the company and made these things as their Resources, and you decide that their company is at odds with your Lead.

I've suggested that Sarah reposition Zoe slightly; maybe she's still employed by Odyssey, but has started to realise that things are not quite right. That way she can call on company resources while investigating them from within. Perhaps the glowing entity has been forced upon her as a sort of guardian, so even if she doesn't want it or understand it, it might turn up and help her sometimes.

Episode 1 will be in a couple of weeks, so I have a while to sort out final details with the players and wait for some plot possibilities to percolate through my brain. Running Pathways again was a blast, if somewhat draining, and I have a great group who all showed up on time and demonstrated enthusiasm and engagement with the game. Thanks guys!

I'm not one to act as a corporate shill, but from conception to recruitment, discussion, actual play, and even blogging about it, this entire game has utilised Google's amazing suite of free web products. While it would have been possible to organise otherwise, using all of Google's interconnected products certainly made it much simpler and more convenient!

>>> Preparing Episode 1

>>> Episode 1