[James McMurray]

The second part of Conflicting Interests is up, in which the team steps away from the kidnapping game for a bit and insteads takes on the mob. With, um... consequences.

Oh yeah, and another fixer hires them to take out anything and everything associated with the kidnappers.

[Canticle]

Still lovin' it. Keep it up.

[James McMurray]

Part 3 is up. Unfortunately the fight took longer than I expected, so there will be a part 4 as well.

[James McMurray]

The last part of Conflicting Interests is up. It's been a funky week, so I skimmed through the final fight instead of going blow-by-blow like I usually do. It went so fast I may end up doing that for all of the fights for now.

[Talmor]

This is an amazing site and resource.  I'm loving reading about your groups adventures!

How do you keep such meticulous notes?  Are you recording sessions?  Is there a dedicated notetaker for the party?  Are you keeping these notes AND running the game?

For "Ready, Set, Gogh!" how did you make your maps?  Are these available online, and you just drew the routes on them, or did you make them yourself?

Do you keep your notes?  I would love to see your notes for some of the adventures, and then compare them to what actually went down. 

Please keep the site updated!

[James McMurray]

Glad you like it! :-)

I take the notes while running, jotting down actions in combat or rough summaries of noncombat stuff. Its all in a spiral notebook though, so sharing would be difficult. :-)

The maps are cut and pasted from either Seattle 2072 or the third edition New Seattle book, can't remember which. The routes were figured out using google maps and then drawn on with paint.

[Xzylvador]

Just a thing I noticed:

I screwed up and didn't realize there were thresholds for noticing spellcasting. A stealthed caster who wreaked havoc on the group should have been much easier to see. This is a reminder to myself not to forget again.

I'm not sure how he was "stealthed"... but if it was him standing in the shadows or something where you'd need a perception vs. infiltration test to see him, I wouldn't worry about it.
I don't think the rules for "noticing spellcasting" apply to hidden persons. That rule's there to see if a person you can clearly see is casting a spell; not for a hidden person.
Spellcasting isn't a hand-gesturing arm-waving latin-speaking thing, it can be as simple as eyes squinting slightly, and that could be all there is to notice.

[Talmor]

Hey,

is this game still going?  I love reading about your campaign!

[James McMurray]

It's not. I was having a hard time getting into running an SR game because it was turning out to be way too mission-based and not enough story-based. The one aspect I wanted to ramp up story wise was the kid magicians and Project Icarus, but magic was the players' least favorite aspect of the system. We finished out the first run in the artifacts series and then put the campaign on indefinite hiatus.

We switched to Exalted, where the PCs are so powerful they're almost forced to drive their own stories, and the system doesn't reward a "kill it and take its stuff" mentality. You can read the 8 sessions we've done so far here if you're interested. The first one "Embryo" is their rise from mere mortals to Solars (i.e. super badass kings of creation if you're unfamiliar with the setting).

[Mason]

I believe the rules describe mana actually crackling and gathering near a person with spells at a high Force, the Force levels where casting is easy to notice. Like, Force 5+.

But I am not going to go dig through the books and find that

[Zilfer]

The perception test to notice magic is (6 - F) So F6 and higher is easily noticable by anyone looking. The mana physically starts to manifest near you in an aura or rushing of wind. (the way I picture it).  A flash of light or you know something that obviously gives away that your casting. If you cast a F1 spell good luck trying to spot it with a perception test of 5 hits. xD

[Mason]

I work it as a (Magic minus Force) threshold. Makes powerful mages hold back better and unskilled mages fumbling and noticeable. A variant could be 6 plus spellcasting minus Force.