Category: Dresden Files

Dresden Files Fool Moon Ch19 – 20

  11/23/2015       Farla      32 Comments

The book is 34 chapters total, so we’re now past the halfway point. What do we know?

There’s multiple versions of werewolves in existence, and multiple ones currently around.

Someone is killing people as a wolf. The wolfsoulpeople didn’t do it, the cursewolf couldn’t have done it.

It would make total sense for it to be Tera if this was proper noir, but so far the closest we got to an actual femme fatale was Monica who was motivated by being a good mommy and was totally passive after asking Harry for help. Tera obviously isn’t trying to get her husband killed because she can turn into a giant people-eating wolf and do it herself any time she likes, and I don’t think this is a series that can handle the shades of grey in Tera doing something evil for the sake of love, especially when it’s been going out of its way to prevent her from killing anybody currently.

It would also make total sense for this to be some chessmaster gambit by Marcone, the guy’s evil and he knows magic but not too much, so he could easily set something off that’s more dangerous than he realizes, but Marcone is the best father figure ever so I assume he’s just an innocent victim.

With those two ruled out, I think you can resolve this using a little more outside information – so far we’re missing only one werewolf type, so they must be around too. All other werewolf types don’t fit the killings. Therefore, there’s spellwolves and, given we’re out of werewolves, they’re also the killers. But you’re really not supposed to solve detective stories by using the knowledge the author is a hack.

Now, where were we.

From out in the hallway, there came a scream that no human throat could have made, a sound of such fury and insane anger that it made my stomach roil and my guts shake. Gunfire erupted, not in a rattling series of individual detonations, but in a roar of furious thunder. Bullets shot through the wall, somewhere near me, and smashed out a couple of windows in the special investigations office.

Right! Harry’s in danger, but sadly everyone else is in more danger. (more…)

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Dresden Files Fool Moon Ch21

  11/24/2015       Farla      16 Comments

“Are you sure there’s someone following us?”
Tera glanced back at the traffic behind us. “Two cars back. And three cars behind that one. Two vehicles are following us.”
“How can you tell?” I asked.
Tera turned those odd amber eyes back to me. “They move like predators. They move well.

Yeah noooooooo. Cars move like cars. We easily personify them as predators because they’re big and fast, but if these cars are moving noticeably different than the rest they shouldn’t manage to stay several cars back. Cars being in the middle of a stream of traffic just move like the stream of traffic.

I’m also not convinced being a beast-soul ragemonster would let you move “well” in cars compared to regular drivers. (more…)

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Dresden Files Fool Moon Ch23-24

  11/26/2015       Farla      12 Comments

I clenched my teeth and kicked my legs. The duct tape around my ankles gave way, but it was too late to do me any good.

Okay so the central point last chapter was his legs were still tied therefore he had to go through lots of effort to fake still being tied up completely and was so desperate to get the guy to leave so he’d have time to free himself that he tried Plan Anger The Ragemonster and repeatedly said it was a great idea. But never mind, he could’ve gotten free any time and instead waited until even that wasn’t enough to escape. (more…)

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Dresden Files Fool Moon Ch25

  12/01/2015       Farla      39 Comments

The wolf’s fur was speckled with drops of blood that had beaded on it like rain. The gravel in the alley shone in the half-light from the distant street lamps. The wolf’s muzzle, a little shorter and broader than I had seen on Wild Kingdom, was drawn back, black lips from fangs striped white and red like peppermint…

Harry is really into wolves, isn’t he. I think he’d be the type of furry who wasn’t into the fucking or even maybe bothering with a fursona but just wanted to get eaten by other people. Thank god he’s never seen the internet. (more…)

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The Paranet Papers, Part 1 (Introduction, Presentation, Las Vegas)

  12/07/2015       illhousen      15 Comments

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

So, the third volume of Dresden Files RPG. The premise here is that a number of Paranet (about it later) reports written after the events of Changes were turned into setting expansions, giving us four potential playable locations structured similarly to Baltimore chapter from the first volume. There are also some expansions on magic system due to “facts” the devs learned over Harry’s continuing adventures and some information on Nevernever.

The book actually looks promising at a first glance. The biggest problem with Dresden Files RPG always was the fact it’s a Dresden Files RPG. When it followed the deeply flawed lore of the books, the result was the inconsistent mess of the Laws of Magic and the like. More generic material not tied to the peculiarities of the books was mostly at least OK or outright good.

As such, expanding the game into other locations not directly connected to canon and doing its own thing has potential.

Let’s see if my hopes are justified.

(There are going to be some spoilers for the events in the later books, included Changes ending. You’ve been warned.)

(more…)

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The Paranet Papers, Part 2 (Russia)

  12/08/2015       illhousen      16 Comments

The Glorious Revolution is upon us, comrades! Join Red Army today to die tomorrow!

OK, truth be told, as much as I enjoy playing up the image of a dirty commie sometimes, I’m not really one. The truth of the matter is that communism doesn’t work. It’s a distant utopia that requires either unlimited resources or perfect people to function (and if you have either, nearly any social order would work fine). And the attempt to make it work has resulted in some really, really horrible things.

So, kids, don’t try communism at home.

But, as with many other historical horrors, it makes for a great game of make-believe. The time of Russian Revolution is fascinating. It was a time of ideals clashing against reality, producing nearly unprecedented human brutality. You had reds driven by unreachable ideals and personal ambitions imposing their vision of the world on common people, you had whites clinging to the old order which time was gone or attempting to find a more moderate solution to Russia’s problems, you had blacks using the chaos of war and the fact Russia is fuckhuge to seize control over some territories and try to live the ideal of anarchy, you had greens fighting for common people and ultimately being crushed and forgotten between two giants. And, of course, you had the common people themselves, just trying to survive and being pushed beyond their limits.

There is a lot of material for potential games on every level: a game of survival, political intrigue, war action, spy games, Kafkian nightmares due to the secret police gaining power and influence, assassination plots, etc., etc.

And adding supernatural component to the conflict expands the possibilities even farther. I was actually tangentially involved in a Russian TRPG project about the Revolution called the Red Lands, in which the civil war was interrupted by the sudden appearance of magic, which prolonged the war for a few years as the participants suddenly gained unexpected advantages, and turned the whole conflict from a mundane war into a direct battle of ideals, with the winner potentially gaining power of Revolution to reshape the world into their image.

As such, I’m curious how this game handled the issue. It’s only one chapter rather than the whole game dedicated to the period, so I don’t expect it to be very detailed, but let’s see how well it does thematically.

(more…)

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Dresden Files Fool Moon Ch26

  12/09/2015       Farla      18 Comments

Harry and Tera start walking and reach Susan eventually.

She hurried over to me, and then I felt Susan’s warmth against me as she slid one of my arms over her shoulder and pressed up against my side. She was wearing jeans that showed off her long legs, and a dark red jacket that complemented her dark skin. Her hair was tied back into a ponytail, and it made her neck look slender and vulnerable. Susan felt soft and warm beyond belief, and smelled clean and delightfully feminine

Harry never stops.

“Your face looks like a sack of purple potatoes,” Susan said, her dark eyes studying me, the lines in her face deepening.
“You say the sweetest things,” I mumbled.

Even when you’d expect it.

It’s easy to forget – Harry certainly seems to manage it – but supposedly Harry was brutalized repeatedly, THEN threw himself out of a moving car, THEN was beaten into a meat puddle to the point that his captors went through the trouble of an IV and blood bag just to keep him from checking out too soon. (more…)

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Dresden Files Fool Moon Ch27-28

  12/10/2015       Farla      27 Comments

Welp, Harry heads off to Susan again for more blather about her being his feminine girlfriend.

a white T-shirt blazoned with the words, EAT IT? I WOULDN’T SIT ON IT; It was one of mine.

Anyone else know what that means?

Anyway, she’s been crying because she girl, he man.

Harry recaps that they soulgazed that time and she fainted, BUT does say some positive stuff now about what he saw.

I’d seen passion, like I’d rarely known in people other than myself.

Maybe about calling women bitches, Harry, but not so much otherwise. (more…)

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The Paranet Papers, Part 3 (The Neverglades)

  12/14/2015       illhousen      9 Comments

The third chapter describes a small town of Okeeokalee Bay, Florida, with something strange in the water causing about a third of population to have various minor and major magical powers. As a consequence, everyone here knows about the supernatural and accepts it as a part of life because this book hates me.However, my issues with the concept of secrecy aside, I’m inclined to like the setting because it’s a small town built around a tourist trap with weirdness abound. So, you know…

Bill is actually a good candidate for the role of subHarry. In absence of any other options, I’ll go with him fucking around Harry’s mind.

And yeah, I know that a small town with big secrets is an older trope than either DF or GF, I still can hope.

Well, let’s see how much my hopes are misplaced.

(more…)

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Dresden Files Fool Moon Ch29

  12/15/2015       Farla      39 Comments

Harry opens this chapter insisting that the fact the babywolf pack and Tera haven’t shown up already means he’s definitely totally all on his own, which is how it always is for wizards because they’re so special, but this time it’s horrible because he’s horribly crippled and actually needs the help.

Wizards of my level of skill and strength (well, my usual levels) are few and far between-maybe no more than two dozen in the United States, with a slightly higher concentration of them in Europe, Africa, and Asia.

This actually sounds somewhat progressive until you think a split second too long and remember the relative populations of each. Also, apparently the entire rest of the Americas has no wizards of note/in the Harry Dresden universe the US annexed everybody and now spans two continents. (more…)

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The Paranet Papers, Part 5 (The Ways Between)

  12/19/2015       illhousen      1 Comment
If there is one purely good thing I can say about this book, it’s that it tries new things. While the chapter on Las Vegas was a pretty standard urban fantasy setup, the chapter on Russia went into historical fantasy territory and tried to deal with a rarely used yet interesting period. The third chapter gave us a small community that abolished the secrecy, changing the standard dynamic the setting since on the one hand you don’t need to worry about hiding your powers, but on the other everyone knows what you are, which may be good or bad depending on your actions. The fourth chapter dealt with a massive continent-wide conflict attracting a lot of warring factions.And this chapter deals with travels and road trips rather than anchoring the game to one location.

Let’s see how well it does.

Also, neat picture:

(more…)

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The Paranet Papers, Part 6 (Spellcasting)

  12/20/2015       illhousen      6 Comments

The theme of this chapter is to bring magic closer to canon due to new stuff being introduced in the books published after the game was created. Those of you who read my reviews of the first volume may recognize it as absolutely terrible idea. The rules of magic were the best when they were dealing with relatively generic stuff, like the evocation of five elements (though even there we had spirit covering everything the other four didn’t) or general thaumaturgic rituals. When it comes to DF-specific lore, like soulgaze or hexing, it was generally flawed at best. Most clearly it could be seen in the section on Laws of Magic, which attempted to define in mechanical terms something the books never bothered to properly codify, creating a horrible mess stitched together with a lot of “up to the GM” handwaves.So, let’s see how well it went this time.

(more…)

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