2019.06.26 Hearts of Wulin (Part 2 of 2)

WEBVTT 1 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:03.640 Hey everybody, and welcome to just played. This is the podcast where I 2 00:00:03.680 --> 00:00:08.919 recap the tabletop RPG's I've recently participated in as a player or game master. 3 00:00:09.000 --> 00:00:13.400 I'm Jim Crocker and today I'll be talking about hearts of Woolyn. This is 4 00:00:13.439 --> 00:00:17.679 the second half of that two part series, the first half of which I 5 00:00:17.719 --> 00:00:22.239 talked about last week. Hearts of will in is a game of Romantic whoosha 6 00:00:22.399 --> 00:00:27.920 melodrama. It is powered by the apocalypse and it is written by Lol Francis 7 00:00:27.960 --> 00:00:30.920 and Agatha Chang. So, as I said, this was part two of 8 00:00:30.960 --> 00:00:35.439 a two session feature. One of the things I talked about last session was 9 00:00:35.640 --> 00:00:40.960 how well hearts of WOOLN is set up to do a two session game that 10 00:00:41.039 --> 00:00:45.719 feels like the arc of a feature film, of a feature who shaw film, 11 00:00:45.799 --> 00:00:48.799 something like Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. So I wanted to make sure 12 00:00:48.880 --> 00:00:52.320 that I talked about part two because this is the meat of our story and 13 00:00:52.799 --> 00:00:56.039 very much drove us in the direction of something that felt like a feature length 14 00:00:56.039 --> 00:00:59.799 who shaft film. So we played on Gauntlet hangouts, which I've talked about 15 00:00:59.799 --> 00:01:02.679 a lot before. This was facilitated, of course, by Shane Leibling, 16 00:01:03.119 --> 00:01:07.319 who was our MC for so, going back over our players and characters, 17 00:01:07.359 --> 00:01:11.400 same as last week, we had Sara Fina. She was playing dancing smoke, 18 00:01:11.439 --> 00:01:17.319 who was using the Bravo playbook with the gallivant role. We had Eli 19 00:01:17.319 --> 00:01:23.599 playing Yan and she was a student using the younger sibling role. We had 20 00:01:23.719 --> 00:01:27.439 Dan playing Dang, also known as acid lute, and he was playing the 21 00:01:27.519 --> 00:01:33.200 aware with the traveling seafood roll, and I played inspector shun, who was 22 00:01:33.239 --> 00:01:37.640 a loyal with the official roll and if you call from last week, he's 23 00:01:37.719 --> 00:01:41.640 basically detective D as much as I can play him within the bounds of this 24 00:01:41.680 --> 00:01:45.920 particular game. So session starting state we are all together gathered at the pre 25 00:01:46.000 --> 00:01:52.640 wedding festivities for leaping Sun, who is the cousin to dancing smoke and a 26 00:01:52.680 --> 00:01:57.159 member of the Peach Blossom Island clan, and limpid flute, who is Dang 27 00:01:57.319 --> 00:02:02.400 sister, a member of the green bamboo sect and someone who I have a 28 00:02:02.560 --> 00:02:07.840 mutual, unrequited love for. She's their head Librarian. And we established in 29 00:02:07.879 --> 00:02:13.199 flashback kind of at the beginning of the session through it's asking some questions, 30 00:02:13.280 --> 00:02:17.240 that I was involved in a case where I was investigating a stolen scroll from 31 00:02:17.240 --> 00:02:21.520 her library and we kind of had a meat cute and have had an unrequited 32 00:02:21.560 --> 00:02:23.080 love for each other ever since. Now, of course, we can't act 33 00:02:23.199 --> 00:02:27.840 on that because we're both getting married to different people, so that complicates things 34 00:02:27.919 --> 00:02:30.400 even further as far as the plot goes. As we opened the game, 35 00:02:30.840 --> 00:02:37.120 Yan was conflicted by her role in her attempt to steal the Star Kissed Branch 36 00:02:37.199 --> 00:02:40.039 from last game. Now that is a mystical sword that is supposed to be 37 00:02:40.080 --> 00:02:46.560 the wedding gift from Peach Blossom Island faction to green bamboo sect to kind of 38 00:02:46.680 --> 00:02:52.759 seal this alliance between the two sects. So she managed to maintain her calm. 39 00:02:52.759 --> 00:02:57.120 But as limpid flute was making the rounds, Shun let slip his feelings 40 00:02:57.199 --> 00:03:01.000 for her in the presence of Jianghang, who is dancing smokes father. So 41 00:03:01.280 --> 00:03:05.280 he's pissed off about this. He goes stalking off in a rage to find 42 00:03:05.360 --> 00:03:09.199 dancing smoke and confront her with this what he thinks as a revelation, but 43 00:03:09.680 --> 00:03:15.039 she just takes it in strategy. Is Very Sanguine about the fact that we 44 00:03:15.039 --> 00:03:16.680 are getting married as part of an alliance and that our hearts are going to 45 00:03:16.680 --> 00:03:21.080 go where hearts are going to go, but that this alliance is important and 46 00:03:21.120 --> 00:03:23.759 we are both going to follow through on it. So this kind of UNMOORS 47 00:03:23.879 --> 00:03:28.599 Janghang. He is not expecting this reaction from his daughter at all. So 48 00:03:28.719 --> 00:03:31.280 to remove himself from the room, he goes to check on the branch and 49 00:03:31.319 --> 00:03:37.520 make sure it's safe, only to discover that the outlaw Winter Fox, who 50 00:03:37.599 --> 00:03:42.800 we learned last session is secretly the master to Yan, training her in secret 51 00:03:42.840 --> 00:03:46.360 to learn martial arts, has broken into the estate to steal it. So 52 00:03:46.439 --> 00:03:53.319 janghang manages to grab the branch and draw it, but is cut down by 53 00:03:53.360 --> 00:03:57.520 Winter Fox before he can even strike a blow. Yan comes upon this as 54 00:03:57.520 --> 00:04:01.400 it's happening and she screams, drawing everyone to the scene. Shun puts his 55 00:04:01.439 --> 00:04:06.520 head down and investigates, putting him on the trail of Winter Fox, the 56 00:04:06.599 --> 00:04:12.599 villain, who he leaps off to pursue, followed in fairly short order by 57 00:04:12.680 --> 00:04:15.040 dancing smoke. As soon as Dang, who is on the scene there, 58 00:04:15.120 --> 00:04:20.720 confirms that he can use his seafood knowledge to save her father. Meanwhile, 59 00:04:20.800 --> 00:04:27.720 Yan is breaking down from the chaos and she flees Dang in pursuit after her. 60 00:04:27.759 --> 00:04:30.680 So Shun and dancing smoke arrive at the hideout of Winter Fox and, 61 00:04:30.879 --> 00:04:35.439 infiltrated, she goes through the hidden backdoor that they discover, and he just 62 00:04:35.519 --> 00:04:43.279 marches right in through the front and Confronts Winter Fox's gang, but then allows 63 00:04:43.319 --> 00:04:46.199 them to believe that they have defeated him so that they will take him directly 64 00:04:46.240 --> 00:04:50.000 to their boss, the old let the Moose capture you and bring it to 65 00:04:50.040 --> 00:04:55.800 their boss Gambit, and at work like a charm. Meanwhile, Dang Finds 66 00:04:55.879 --> 00:04:59.519 Yan and convinces her that what she really needs to do is to go and 67 00:04:59.560 --> 00:05:02.160 help her brothers shun and that, whatever else is transpired, that's the most 68 00:05:02.160 --> 00:05:05.920 important thing that can happen right now. And they had for the cave as 69 00:05:06.000 --> 00:05:11.759 well, but not before they're overheard by Dan sister, limpid flute, who 70 00:05:11.800 --> 00:05:15.279 then follows them in secret without their knowledge. So, with the big confrontation 71 00:05:15.360 --> 00:05:19.439 between shun and Winter Fox under way, they're kind of staring each other down. 72 00:05:19.680 --> 00:05:25.600 Yan runs into the cave where shun is laying out the clues he put 73 00:05:25.639 --> 00:05:30.040 together to figure out who Winter Fox truly was, but Winter Fox, upon 74 00:05:30.120 --> 00:05:35.920 seeing her, mocks her naivete forever following him in the first place, and 75 00:05:36.279 --> 00:05:43.240 she hurls herself at him, but he easily defeats her. However, that 76 00:05:43.560 --> 00:05:47.759 feudal effort creates an opening for dancing smoke to leap from the shadows and attack 77 00:05:47.839 --> 00:05:53.839 him, forcing him to take up the star kissed branch to defend himself. 78 00:05:53.839 --> 00:05:57.639 Now he is, in game terms, higher scale than she is, but 79 00:05:58.000 --> 00:06:01.160 with the star kissed branch the outcome is not in doubt at all. So 80 00:06:01.439 --> 00:06:08.480 he defeats her, but she knocks aside his mask to confirm to everyone that 81 00:06:08.560 --> 00:06:14.920 he is in fact shuns murdered brother. Autumn Drum, alive all this time, 82 00:06:15.800 --> 00:06:18.079 and shun kind of was putting the pieces together on that and knew that, 83 00:06:18.120 --> 00:06:23.600 but that just confirms it for everybody. Dang arrives just in time to 84 00:06:23.680 --> 00:06:28.639 use his blowgun to poison the bandits that are holding shun, freeing him to 85 00:06:28.720 --> 00:06:32.800 step in so that he can take up arms before Winter Fox is able to 86 00:06:32.839 --> 00:06:40.759 actually kill dancing smoke, allowing shun to use the broken sword that once belonged 87 00:06:40.839 --> 00:06:46.000 to his brother to knock him out and take him into custody. Everyone is 88 00:06:46.040 --> 00:06:50.480 breathing a sigh of relief when they realize that one of Dang's poisoned darts hit 89 00:06:50.519 --> 00:06:57.560 a concealed limpid flute which has gravely injured her, perhaps even killed her. 90 00:06:57.600 --> 00:07:00.480 and that's where we faded out, with the villain defeated, but this other 91 00:07:00.560 --> 00:07:02.120 tragedy that we had to deal with. So, since this was the end 92 00:07:02.160 --> 00:07:06.800 of our feature, are ending fictional state was epilogs, epilogs for everybody. 93 00:07:08.000 --> 00:07:13.040 Dang was able to save his sister, but has completely lost her trust and 94 00:07:13.240 --> 00:07:15.519 the trust of the rest of the sect and returns to his life as a 95 00:07:15.519 --> 00:07:21.720 wandering seafood and doesn't even end up attending her wedding. Yan Repents and uses 96 00:07:21.720 --> 00:07:26.720 her Marshall Training to join the city guard, mentored by shun. And finally 97 00:07:26.759 --> 00:07:30.639 shun and smoke appear in the pagoda where their chest game from last session sits, 98 00:07:30.720 --> 00:07:34.839 that game where they make one move a night against each other and each 99 00:07:34.839 --> 00:07:41.639 smiles at the other as they tip over their respective kings and walk into the 100 00:07:41.639 --> 00:07:44.439 house together. And that was the end of our feature. So as far 101 00:07:44.439 --> 00:07:48.160 as my favorite other player moment went, Dan, poor Dan, in only 102 00:07:48.199 --> 00:07:55.720 his second gauntlet game, embracing us just a terrible string of MSS on the 103 00:07:55.759 --> 00:08:01.519 dice to really find the pathos of what turned out to be a really hard 104 00:08:01.600 --> 00:08:05.800 luck character, this hard luck wandering seafood that he was playing. It was 105 00:08:05.800 --> 00:08:09.879 a pretty epic run of six or less rolls and he leaned right in and 106 00:08:09.920 --> 00:08:15.120 made amazing fiction, including being the one who offered the suggestion that one of 107 00:08:15.160 --> 00:08:20.000 his arrant darts hit his sister and created that sad epilog for his own character. 108 00:08:20.160 --> 00:08:24.120 It was just some great playing. To lose that really tied a bow 109 00:08:24.160 --> 00:08:28.800 on his character in a way that was just great. My favorite chimming moment. 110 00:08:28.920 --> 00:08:31.879 Shane, who I love to play with, runs consistently engaging games and 111 00:08:31.919 --> 00:08:37.200 I kind of loved that for this session. He asked us up front just 112 00:08:37.240 --> 00:08:41.080 straight up, does anybody need to have a big boss fight? Should I 113 00:08:41.080 --> 00:08:43.799 prep that for you? And we all politely demurred. No, not necessary. 114 00:08:43.879 --> 00:08:46.120 Where the game takes us, we want to do a whole lot of 115 00:08:46.279 --> 00:08:52.360 inter character stuff and everything. Then, as players, we all proceeded within 116 00:08:52.440 --> 00:08:56.799 about ninety minutes to drive the game right in the direction of a big boss 117 00:08:56.840 --> 00:09:01.679 fight. That's clearly where we were all going, and Shane, very calmly 118 00:09:01.879 --> 00:09:05.279 and smoothly, just rolled right with it. He was good enough at reading 119 00:09:05.320 --> 00:09:09.799 the room to shift gears and figure out that's where the game was taking us, 120 00:09:09.840 --> 00:09:13.559 even though we hadn't been begging for it or anything at the start or 121 00:09:13.639 --> 00:09:18.399 even necessarily thinking that's where it was going to go. Shifted on his feet 122 00:09:18.440 --> 00:09:20.120 to give us that because that's clearly where we were going with it. Missed 123 00:09:20.120 --> 00:09:26.039 opportunity. We never got to see dancing smoke actually dance. Saraf any even 124 00:09:26.120 --> 00:09:31.240 chose the move that lets your character practice their art, to express themselves, 125 00:09:31.279 --> 00:09:33.360 but she never got to roll it. It was kind of cool because her 126 00:09:33.399 --> 00:09:39.159 fighting very clearly reflected that grace note when she did duels, but I do 127 00:09:39.240 --> 00:09:41.960 wish we had had the opportunity for her to roll that move and see fictionally 128 00:09:43.039 --> 00:09:45.639 what it meant for her to be good at it. And I'm sure that 129 00:09:45.679 --> 00:09:48.519 if we've been playing an actual series, she would have got to do it 130 00:09:48.559 --> 00:09:50.559 and got to do it plenty and we would have got to see that. 131 00:09:50.720 --> 00:09:52.080 But it's kind of a shame that the feature didn't really take us in that 132 00:09:52.120 --> 00:09:56.039 direction. Finally, a thing I noticed when I talked about the first session 133 00:09:56.080 --> 00:10:01.200 of this two session feature that we played. My thing I noticed was really 134 00:10:01.279 --> 00:10:07.200 no kidding just how well two good, solid sessions replicate the arc of a 135 00:10:07.240 --> 00:10:09.840 really good feature film, like a Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon or House of 136 00:10:09.919 --> 00:10:15.440 Flying Daggers. This session absolutely underlined that and prove that that's the case. 137 00:10:15.759 --> 00:10:20.799 But one thing about hearts of Wilynn. I've never been quite sure how to 138 00:10:20.840 --> 00:10:26.559 handle a big boss fight like that, multiple characters attack a higher scale foe. 139 00:10:26.679 --> 00:10:28.279 I wasn't quite sure who should roll in and stuff like this and how 140 00:10:28.320 --> 00:10:33.320 you do it and how you help. But this game crystallized it for me, 141 00:10:33.360 --> 00:10:37.759 and it was Shane who did that by just saying, okay, it'll 142 00:10:37.759 --> 00:10:43.679 take two of you agreeing to be defeated to knock him down to your scale. 143 00:10:43.759 --> 00:10:48.600 So we got something that was like characters attacking in succession a big, 144 00:10:48.639 --> 00:10:54.159 tough boss but wearing him down. So as players we had a quick conversation 145 00:10:54.600 --> 00:10:58.519 and just went from there. And we use the dice to dictate who got 146 00:10:58.639 --> 00:11:03.480 narration rights for the various stages of the duel. And then in between all 147 00:11:03.480 --> 00:11:09.240 of that we had dang tackle the Moos to free me so that I could 148 00:11:09.320 --> 00:11:11.399 jump in on the last round of the duel. It was elegant, it 149 00:11:11.440 --> 00:11:16.879 made sense and I'm pretty sure it was fully within the spirit of the rules, 150 00:11:16.919 --> 00:11:20.879 if not necessarily exactly the letter of it. Now, if I wanted 151 00:11:20.919 --> 00:11:24.600 to additionally mechanize it and introduce some further uncertainty, what I would do is 152 00:11:24.639 --> 00:11:28.639 just tweak the new technique secondary move, which is a move that lets you 153 00:11:28.919 --> 00:11:33.320 go away learn a new technique. Can come back, but there's a die 154 00:11:33.440 --> 00:11:37.679 roll associated with that. So I would just cludge that and allow it to 155 00:11:37.720 --> 00:11:43.200 be rolled by each subsequent combatant as they watched how their friend was defeated and 156 00:11:43.639 --> 00:11:48.159 make the role for plus one. For the first one, they defeats, 157 00:11:48.320 --> 00:11:50.639 plus two for the second one, they defeat. For the third one they 158 00:11:50.720 --> 00:11:54.840 defeat and once they hit one of those rolls that gives them the technique they 159 00:11:54.879 --> 00:12:00.000 need to defeat that foe and then they can jump in and roll against them 160 00:12:00.120 --> 00:12:03.000 at their scale. This technique makes a ton of sense for the two session 161 00:12:03.039 --> 00:12:07.960 feature we were doing, but of course if it were series we could just 162 00:12:07.080 --> 00:12:11.600 go back home and come back in the later episode. So it's a tweak 163 00:12:11.679 --> 00:12:15.600 that's totally unnecessary if you're playing a long series that's meant to emulate one of 164 00:12:15.600 --> 00:12:20.279 those TV series, those Wusha TV series, but I am definitely stealing it 165 00:12:20.279 --> 00:12:22.840 for the two session features of this that I'm going to run at conventions, 166 00:12:22.879 --> 00:12:28.159 including in just a couple of weeks at DEXCON, and hopefully I'll be able 167 00:12:28.200 --> 00:12:33.080 to tell you all about that playing in a convention setting two nights right in 168 00:12:33.120 --> 00:12:35.159 a row, right next to each other. The last time I did that 169 00:12:35.200 --> 00:12:37.960 it ran great and I'm looking forward to doing that again and I'm certain I'll 170 00:12:37.960 --> 00:12:41.679 be able to talk about it on just played. So that's it for this 171 00:12:41.720 --> 00:12:43.799 episode. Thanks very much, as always, for listening. If you're enjoying 172 00:12:43.799 --> 00:12:48.320 the show, please rate and review it wherever you have found it. Check 173 00:12:48.320 --> 00:12:50.840 out the show notes for a video of this session. Of One's available. 174 00:12:50.840 --> 00:12:52.960 I'm not sure whether Shane was going to post that or not, but if 175 00:12:52.000 --> 00:12:54.600 we do see that, I'll put it up there, as well as where 176 00:12:54.679 --> 00:12:58.519 to find the game we played, which is right now. It's got a 177 00:12:58.519 --> 00:13:01.320 completed kickstarter. I think you may be able to pre order through back or 178 00:13:01.399 --> 00:13:03.879 kit. I'll list that up there and certainly wants available, I'm absolutely going 179 00:13:03.879 --> 00:13:07.840 to have it available in my store. As always. You can follow me 180 00:13:07.879 --> 00:13:11.399 on twitter at Gim Likes Games and buy Games from me at my website. 181 00:13:11.480 --> 00:13:15.480 Jim Likes Gamescom or at a convention I attend, is a vendor and that 182 00:13:15.600 --> 00:13:18.679 is absolutely the best way to support the show is to buy games from me 183 00:13:18.720 --> 00:13:22.600 and help me support these game designers whose games I am playing and loving now. 184 00:13:22.639 --> 00:13:26.799 If you will excuse me, I think I'm going to go play another game.