Dust
2010-03-15, 03:07 PM
So settle in for a ridiculous story. By the end of it you'll be wishing you could partake of this; the most amazing tabletop game ever conceieved. Either that or you'll feel your brain bubbling away. Hopefully the former.
It's been a pretty serious few months for our local group. We had just lost to the BEEG in a year-long campaign, failed miserably at Werewolf: the Apocalypse, and spent a few weeks playing the Call of Cthulhu and Descent board games. (If you don't know the latter, it's extremely player-versus-player, often frustratingly so.)
So when one of the players who rarely runs anything pitched a short Monsters and other Childish Things (http://www.arcdream.com/monsters/) game, we thought we knew what we were getting into.
We created grade-two children with horiffic monster pals (including a sentient energy field capable of possessing technology, a flaming nightmare steed that 'hides' in plain sight as a My Little Pony doll, an ancient aztec diety and others) and settled in for the game.
It opened simply enough, with our lovable teacher (http://www.freewebs.com/invadercee//Zim%20Cast%20Pics/msbitters.jpg) informing us that it was Field Trip day. Everything has a rather creepy edge to it, and we board the smoke-spewing bus hesitantly. Turns out we're going to The Museum, which is boasting a new exhibit that none of us bother to learn about. The signs show an expedition has recovered an ancient tome that is now on display, and the museum is giving off a quietly sinister vibe.
Pretty standard stuff so far.
We begin to notice things, but not the usual pre-horror visitations that we're all expecting. Owls - possibly animatronic - fill the rafters, and we spot at least one museum security guard wearing a red football jersy and a nametag that said 'TATE'. Briefly we catch sight of a cat, but it's more than three feet long and seems to almost slither around a corner. We fail to notice the sound of wheels and the displacement of air as something invisible moves past us.
Our party has split up at this point, slowly moving towards the new exhibit, and our GM starts queing up sound files on the computer. And all hell breaks loose when my nerdy, video-game obssessed character finally takes a minute to read exactly what the new exhibit is. The picture of the black-bound grimoire was telling enough, but what we didn't expect was the title on the book.
The Nomnomicon.
It happened simaltaneously. The ground begins to shake and a loud, boistrous voice roars out "LEEEEEEERRRRRRRRRROY JENNNNNKINS!!!!" as a man clad in fullplate and being pursued by hundreds - no, THOUSANDS - of tiny flapping dragons explodes from around the museum corner. Another party member hears loud, thumping techno music followed by an enormous, bare-chested, blonde-haired viking of a man appearing, dancing powerfully to the beat.
Another character comes face to face with an enormous dragonoid creature with wings, a giant beefy arm coming out of the back of its neck, angry eyebrows, lines of majesty, burning up everything in sight.
"So tell me," our GM said with a grin as he ended the first session, "...do you liek mudkipz?"
It's been a pretty serious few months for our local group. We had just lost to the BEEG in a year-long campaign, failed miserably at Werewolf: the Apocalypse, and spent a few weeks playing the Call of Cthulhu and Descent board games. (If you don't know the latter, it's extremely player-versus-player, often frustratingly so.)
So when one of the players who rarely runs anything pitched a short Monsters and other Childish Things (http://www.arcdream.com/monsters/) game, we thought we knew what we were getting into.
We created grade-two children with horiffic monster pals (including a sentient energy field capable of possessing technology, a flaming nightmare steed that 'hides' in plain sight as a My Little Pony doll, an ancient aztec diety and others) and settled in for the game.
It opened simply enough, with our lovable teacher (http://www.freewebs.com/invadercee//Zim%20Cast%20Pics/msbitters.jpg) informing us that it was Field Trip day. Everything has a rather creepy edge to it, and we board the smoke-spewing bus hesitantly. Turns out we're going to The Museum, which is boasting a new exhibit that none of us bother to learn about. The signs show an expedition has recovered an ancient tome that is now on display, and the museum is giving off a quietly sinister vibe.
Pretty standard stuff so far.
We begin to notice things, but not the usual pre-horror visitations that we're all expecting. Owls - possibly animatronic - fill the rafters, and we spot at least one museum security guard wearing a red football jersy and a nametag that said 'TATE'. Briefly we catch sight of a cat, but it's more than three feet long and seems to almost slither around a corner. We fail to notice the sound of wheels and the displacement of air as something invisible moves past us.
Our party has split up at this point, slowly moving towards the new exhibit, and our GM starts queing up sound files on the computer. And all hell breaks loose when my nerdy, video-game obssessed character finally takes a minute to read exactly what the new exhibit is. The picture of the black-bound grimoire was telling enough, but what we didn't expect was the title on the book.
The Nomnomicon.
It happened simaltaneously. The ground begins to shake and a loud, boistrous voice roars out "LEEEEEEERRRRRRRRRROY JENNNNNKINS!!!!" as a man clad in fullplate and being pursued by hundreds - no, THOUSANDS - of tiny flapping dragons explodes from around the museum corner. Another party member hears loud, thumping techno music followed by an enormous, bare-chested, blonde-haired viking of a man appearing, dancing powerfully to the beat.
Another character comes face to face with an enormous dragonoid creature with wings, a giant beefy arm coming out of the back of its neck, angry eyebrows, lines of majesty, burning up everything in sight.
"So tell me," our GM said with a grin as he ended the first session, "...do you liek mudkipz?"