Blade of the Iron Throne campaign element map

Now I have to make sense of this dump of subconsciousness.
This is all added by the players. I only added about three elements. I have no real idea what most of this means, but I will. That's my job. BTW, Will and John are the PCs.

Examples of maneuvers in Blade of the Iron Throne

Blade of the Iron Throne has a very detailed and realistic combat system based on actual historical sources.
This lovely video shows quite a number of techniques from Liberi's Firo di Battaglia, a manual written around 1400 c.e.
I will notate the techniques to let you know what how they would be done in BOIT rules.

2:10 cut to Location 4
2:14 same cut, parry, thrust to Location 13
2:15 half sword, 1H longsword grip thrust to location 11
2:16 same thrust, counter, thrust to location 13
2:21 parry, thrust location 13
2:22 thrust to location 11
2:23 parry, cut to location 7
2:25 parry, cut to location 4
2:27 counter with thrust to location 13
2:29 parry, bind & strike.

• The rules do not describe a barehanded bind&strike, but the historical sources are full of them. So I will house rule that you can do them right after you parry a weapon. If the weapon has a shaft, like a spear, you are in no danger of injuring your hand. If the weapon is sharp like a sword, you compare 1.5 time the defensive successes against the successes of the bind. If this causes an injury, then it is a slash to the arm location. Resolve the damage and then move on to the next exchange with the attacker having initiative (the binder).
• Example: Green cuts with 4 successes, Black parries with 5 successes. Green cannot use his sword on the next exchange, and he loses 1MP (5-4=1). Now, since the bind was with a bare hand against a sword, multiply Green's successes x 1.5 (=6) and compare. 6 is one better than 5, so apply a QoS 1 cutting attack to Black's grabbing arm. Apply damage and shock and such as normal. Next exchange, Green is down 1MP (for the bind), cannot use his sword, and it is Black's attack. Black may have taken some shock from the less than perfect bind.

2:30 see 2;29

2:33 parry, offensive grapple

2:38 parry, bind and strike

2:40 expulsion, bind&strike (with his foot!), cut

2:42 parry, offensive grapple, throw

2:44 feint (failed), evasive strike

2:46 parry, grapple, throw

2:50 parry, thrust

2:53 parry, bind & strike, bash (kick) causing knock down, cut

2:56 parry, bash (kick)

2:59 same as 2:56 but kick is defended with defensive grapple, throw

3:40 parry, thrust

3:54 parry, failed grapple, other guy grapples, throw, DAGGER!

Creepy dolls are creepy

This is going to take some setup, so just roll with it.

The players are looking for one of their sisters. They have found a supernatural being called the Face Merchant who has a doll shop in an otherspace (pocket dimension). The face merchant swapped the sister's identity with a dolls identity, as the Face Merchant doesn't see a difference between people and dolls. The PC's needed info to find the sister, and the Face Merchant agreed to provide that info if they retrieved some dolls from a client.

The client was an old daft woman named Judith who lived in a retirement home. She had dolls of her daughter Karen and her son-in-law David. She would talk to the dolls instead of her real children. She hated that Karen had married David because she is a miserable racist. She kept calling David a Mexican landscaper, when he is actually a Native-American dentist. She also routinely threw David doll in the garbage and generally abused it.

The PC's went to meet the actual David and Karen, and found they were lethargic and that David often fell and hurt himself. They figured out there was some sort of voodoo doll stuff going on here and that the lethargy was from the fact that the dolls at the old folks home were somehow stealing the vigor from the actual people, and that the abuse of the David doll was harming the real David.

The PC's decided to steal the dolls and, in order to protect the real world people from the effects, cast a ritual to protect the real Karen and David.

< That PC doesn't actually know how to do rituals. He, Davey, has a German shepherd named Goliath who talks to him in a clipped German accent and tells him how to do things.>

The next day when they went to get the dolls, a PC found Judith dead. She had been strangled and someone had drug her corpse under the bed. That PC heard something small moving through the air vents and, with a mirror, was able to see the dolls escaping.

<Davey asked Goliath if his ritual was responsible for Judith's death, and Goliath responded, "I vass chuss followink orders.">

He tried to stop them, but they escaped. Davey, the sheriff of the town, visited real David and Karen, and found they were now chipper and healthy. He sent them to the hospital to claim the mother's body, and got permission to search their house for clues.

While in their house, he heard something moving in the kitchen. He saw the cabinet door under the sink close, and heard something moving around. He duct-taped the doors closed to prevent escape and called the rest of the PCs.

When the rest of the PCs arrived, the sheriff tried to talk to the dolls through the door. He heard movement that finally stopped with the sound of something falling against the door. When they opened the door, the Karen doll fell out, motionless, holding the cap to a bleach bottle like a cup.

<Player interjection, "Oh, right, this is a horror game.">

When the sheriff looked further under the sink, he found that the David doll had hung himself.

They collected the dolls and returned them to the Face Merchant, who wept like her own children had died.

Unknown Armies is weird, yo.

Unknown Armies 3 Playtest Session 2

Session Events

John, the Sheriff of Elko county NV, is called to a disturbance, maybe a riot at the Starfire hotel/Casino in Elko.
April’s sister (The Avatar of "The Beauty") calls to tell her someone is following her. She is at the Starfire, room 333.
John goes to the Starfire and is chased by zoned-out tweakers (zombies). He tries to flee and is forced to shoot one. He fails his violence check and flees to the station house.
April (Avatar ofg "
The Librarian"), Will (Repairman), Saul (Jedi magic adept), and DK (Sociomancer obsessed with the NRA) goes to the hotel. Will distracts the news reporter while they watch the ambulance load the shot guy in. Saul, DK, and April go to the room and see the tweakers running from the Shark-Eyed Man. The SEM is trying to get into the sister’s room, and Saul approaches and confronts him with his lightsaber replica.

Saul lifts his lightsaber to a guard and says, “Leave this place.”
The SEM looks him over and replies, “I don’t have time for fools.”
“Well, make some.”

DK tells the SEM to leave, and April asks what he is doing. The SEM tries to attack DK and hurts him badly. DK fails his unnatural check because the SEM has claws and decides to fight. He is packing a small pistol.
Saul ignites his saber and attacks the SEM. April succeeds at her Unnatural check but can’t maneuver pas the SEM to the room. The SEM and Saul exchange wounds and the SEM flees. DK goes to the hospital via ambulance, Saul takes first aid from April. A highway patrolman investigates DKs gunshot, but Saul sends him away “These aren’t the droids you are looking for.”
He gets an intuition that the sister had left the room through the crowd who did not see her (AoB channel).
John and April follow her to a bar and on the video see that she entered the restroom with a the face merchant and never exited. April was able to track everyone who entered and left the restroom and saw an extra woman leave the restroom, but they could not get a clear look at her.
Saul got discharged the next day from the hospital and DK has to stay longer.

The healing rules need to add healing time while staying in the hospital. They only have surgery rules.

Avatar of the Librarian

Librarians are powerful symbols of organization of knowledge and art. A Librarian may not know about a subject, but they can certainly find out.

Symbols: Books, Scrolls, Cabinets, Shelves, Glasses, Sculpture, Portraits

Behaviors: Librarians catalog ideas, organize spaces, and do not judge others as long as those others do not disturb anyone. Librarians encourage quiet enjoyment and scholarship. Librarians encourage the pursuits of others by organizing events or media for consumption. Librarians are subdued and avoid fame.
Taboos: Librarians may never allow knowledge or art to be destroyed or mislaid. They must lend knowledge to anyone who asks without judgment. They must chastise any who steal or corrupt knowledge. Seeing fame or reward for one’s actions over the accomplishments of another is taboo for a librarian.

Channels:

1-50%: The librarian can help you prepare for a task. If you know what you are trying to accomplish in specific terms, and the librarian helps you find out information about it, you may re-roll or flip-flop one roll to accomplish that task similar to if it were a passion. The librarian can only have one such “loan” out at a time. She may cancel the “loan” at will.
51-70%: You can sense when someone is missing something important and give them a hint of where to look. You can suggest to a stumped person where to look to find a clue that will be helpful and they will find it if they follow your instructions even though the connection between their task and the location and nature of the clue may make no sense. On a successful Avatar: Librarian roll, you can link the benefits of the previous channel to their successful discovery of the clue and they will be able to re-roll of flip flop all rolls when looking for or following up on the clue as if they were obsessed.
71-90%: With an Avatar:Librarian roll, the Librarian can change a fact as long as the change does not contradict known history. The gun was always unloaded, the car was always full of gas, Bill’s cancer diagnosis was always a a false positive. Facts that have been verified with witnesses or that are well-known by several people (the location of a hideout or home, mapped geographic features, anything beyond fairly specific loopholes in law) or important, game-breaking secrets are off limits. If it is reasonably possible that everyone was mistaken, they were.
91%+: The Librarian can find information that should not be available. Secrets, data, codes, etc, are not beyond her as long as it is written down or otherwise stored on media somewhere. This does not decode encrypted materials.

School of the Jedi

There is no emotion, there is peace.
There is no ignorance, there is knowledge.
There is no passion, there is serenity.
There is no chaos, there is harmony.
There is no death, there is the Force.

Jedi mages, (aka nerds, BTW, you may be the only one) have obsessive star wars collections. You must commune with your collection to charge. You know it is fiction, and that is what makes it so real. All your items must have been acquired lawfully.


Minor charge: Spend 1 hour admiring and arranging your collection. This can be at your home or by watching one of the films on a mobile device, but it is an uninterrupted hour, or

Potentially embarrass yourself or cause yourself other trouble trying a non-physical Jedi power in public that you know will fail. (e.g. "Officer, you do not need to give me a parking ticket.")


Significant charge: Actually try to do one of the extreme physical feats performed by Jedi in the films without using your magic such as outrunning a car, leaping from a great height, etc (trying to make it really real). Realize that this crazy stunt will never actually succeed.
Make an appropriate ability check. If you fail, you take damage equal to the sum of the digits on the dice (57 = 12 pts) as you headplant during your last minute flinch while trying to survive the attempt. You cannot use magic to help you and it should be something that is beyond human ability. The roll is just to see if you got hurt. You still get the charge, or

Add to your collection a very valuable and accurate item of memorabilia (e.g. complete suit of Mandalorian Armor)


Major Charge: Add a unique and original item from the original productions of episodes 4-6 that was seen in the film during original theatrical release. It must be in pristine condition. Things such as Luke's original lightsaber or Leia's slender blaster from the fist movie,or

Get a major cast member from one of the films to tour your collection. This does not work if the actor is Ahmed Best.


Taboo: Your collection must always be intact. No one may view it without your company and permission and they must touch NOTHING!. Nothing may ever be removed from it. You may not trade your items for others. If you move your collection, your charges are on hold until your collection is set up in another good place. The location must be one designed for display. A dusty storage unit is no good, but a spare bedroom with shelves is fine.

Ω = +1

Random Magic Domain: Luck, perception, emotions, telekinesis


Minor:
These aren’t the Droids You are Looking For
Minor compulsion. Do what I say or face a Rank 4 self check because you think it is your idea. Minor 2

Force Push/Throw
Minor blast, knock them down or hit with a telekinetically flung heavy object. Minor 1

Distract
Target sees or hears something that confuses and distracts them perhaps causing them to go investigate. They do not have to know you are there. Minor 2

Force Defense
Roll before opponent rolls their attack. They miss. Minor 2.

Intuition
Get some useful information, a form of mild telepathy. Minor 2

Force Pull
Perform minor feats of telekineses, like flipping switches or drawing small distant objects to your hand. Minor 2

Force Movement
Substitute Jedi magic roll for one physical roll. Minor 1




Significant:

An Elegant Weapon
Your pristine collectible lightsaber ignites. You may use it as a melee weapon rolling your Jedi identity doing damage +9 for the duration of one fight (up to the GM). It can also cut through stuff. Any kills are treated as maiming attacks. Light Side Represent!
Significant 2

May The Force be With You
Allow a friend to use Force Movement. They may hold it for days equal to the sum of your roll before triggering. Significant 3

Force Trance
Get a bonus of +10% x the ones digit on your next roll and remove all penalties. Significant 2

Force Jump
Roll your magic skill to run up to your skill in mph or leap vertically or horizontally that distance in feet. Significant 3

There is No Try
Lift a very heavy object equal to teh sum of your dice in tons.
Significant 2

Search Your Feelings
Target suffers a Self check of rank equal to the sum of your dice (max 10). Significant 1

Go To Dagobah
Send an urgent message in the form of a vision or urge to a known companion regardless of distance.
Significant 1

Unknown Armies 3 Playtest Session 1

This session we went through the cooperative world building and character creation. Some of that is happened by email between me and the players between then and next this Saturday's session.
So far we have a world that contains:

• A mayor who is probably a mummy.
• A missing avatar of Beauty
• A hidden gateway that might be the backdoor to an old folks home
• cold spots
• dark acolytes who might be vampires
• a shark-eyed man
• a place that cannot be thought of
• the face merchant
• zombies
• an old folks home
• Elko, NV.

We have PCs who:

• Has a talking magical dog
• is an avatar of the librarian
• might be a Jedi (he's waffling)
• a refrigerator repairman who somehow pissed off the Union of Supernatural Repairman Local 42.

It's my job to figure out how all that fits together.
More info to come.

Due to real life events in Paris, the game is on indefinite hold.

I was told the plot line was too depressing.

All French Groceries Include Baguetes Night Black Agents: Night Wings Session 3

Henry hacked the police database to keep their bomb investigation away from the team. While Darby relaxed in the hospital, recovering from the beating that Asenaini gave him, Joe Ross joined the team, bringing his world class hacking skills. The news reported several violent killings at the refugee camp the PCs had visited before.
Joe hacked the driving schedule of a local grocery delivery service to put himself on the schedule so he could get onto Asenaini's property. When he arrived, he found the whole place swarming with cops. He was having trouble getting past the cops when Henry hacked the police radio to fake an armed robbery to draw them away.
When Joe got on the property he placed taps on the surveillance's cameras, and Miles managed to find that the office and the computers had burned sometime after the explosion from the previous session.
Miles created a cover as a cop and walked into the office and demanded the hard drive from the computer, and Henry got Asenaini's files.
They found  that she was waiting for a shipment to the National Archeology Museum and found solid evidence that she had bought her weapons from Sylvia Argent, and known arms dealer.
Miles agreed to do a favor for Sylvia to earn her trust, because knowing an arms dealer could be useful, but the favor turned out to be a trick. She asked him to go visit a man in the hospital under police guard, and then tipped off the cops. Miles had to do some running, but got away.
Other documents showed that Asenaini had planned an attack on the local hospital to kidnap pregnant mothers and babies and then blow up the place to cover the details. Also, it seemed she was spending a lot of time writing about Mesopotamians demon myths,specifically Astarte/Ishtar/Lilith.

Miles decided to put Sylvia in her place, and invited her to coffee. He laid out his evidence and demanded guns and armor to prevent calling the cops. The rest of the team surveiled the meet and noticed thousands of ravens flocking and watching the meet. Henry paid some local kids to throw rocks at the birds, but the birds swarmed the kids and pecked them to bloody flight. Stabiliy checks were made.
Miles, Joe,and Henry worked together to check to see who the inside man was at the hospital who was supposed to let the terrorists in, and found Francois and saw that he was in debt and bugged his computer.
There was little in the way of violence, and the heat moved back to 6.