[Casefile four, Page one: 4/15] Dresden Files - Those Swamp Wizards

jdarksun

This is a thing that's happening, that I am now running! Or will be soon.

Barebones OP. We're still figuring this out. Characters are gonna be Refresh 7.

City? Orlando, Florida

City-Wide Themes and Threats
Theme 1
Idea: The World's Imagination, Bought and Sold
Aspect: Everything's Fake. Everything's Real.
The Faces
Mickey Mouse - It's always been Mickey Mouse
The Universal Studios Globe - Monster Peddler
(our major courts, essentially)

Threat 1
Idea: Vampire Courts Feeding off the Tourists
Aspect:
The Faces
Juan Ponce de León

Theme 2
Idea: Old vs. New

The Balance of Power

In the Dark / Rock the Boat - Locals trying to make Orlando less tacky and ridiculous

In the Know / Status Quo - Orlando Police Chief, can't do anything about it for some reason
In the Known / both - The Mickey, subtly leveraging the local political environment to try and put some of his supernatural competitors out of business.

Locations

jdarksun wrote: »

Name: SeaWorld
Description: Sinking aquatic theme park
Theme or Threat: Threat
The Idea: Publicity problems imperiling profit
The Aspect: The black fish knows
The Face: Old Man Marsh, cantankerous cetacean caretaker

OptimusZed wrote: »

Name: Loco Manuel's ATV Rodeo
Description: Biggest ATV park in the greater Orlando area. It got national attention for a few days last year when the family of a customer who got eaten by a gator was denied any sort of death payout due to the now-famous "Ride or Die" clause in the park's injury waiver.
Theme or Threat: Theme
The Idea: A huge course of ATV trails and stunts where just about everybody comes to blow off some steam with sick jumps. There's enough space out here that just about anything could be going down on the sly.
The Aspect: WOOOOOOOOOOOOO
The Face: Manuel Gutierrez. Knows everybody, might be a weregator. Frickin' loves ATVs, man.

jdarksun wrote: »

Location
Name: Cinderella Castle
Description: The symbolic seat of Mickey's power
Theme or Threat: Threat
The Idea: This Castle Controls Entertainment
The Aspect: The House of Mouse
The Face: Crispin Arts, one of Mickey

OptimusZed wrote: »

Location
Name: Blackbeard's Buccaneer Buffet Bonanza
Description: Tacky pirate themed restaraunt made from planks of the cursed ship its immortal staff used to crew.
Theme or Threat: Both?
The Idea: Blackbeard doesn't allow supernatural throwdowns in his place, but he's happy to run guns and drugs out of the back.
The Aspect: Perilous Parleys Protected by Pirates
The Face: Blackbeard, in full pirate costume with fake hook

Ardent wrote: »

Name: The Orlando Fire Museum
Description: Retired brick firehouse that may be the oldest standing building in Orlando thanks to several fires it helped fight.
Threat: Inhabited by a fire elemental
The Idea: The Elemental occasionally burns down parts of Orlando, often at the behest of others or simply because it believes that's what people want.
The Aspect: Renewal by Fire
The Face: OFD Lieutenant Pete Grimm, retired, who is the primary tour guide (and possibly a vessel for the elemental)

Ardent wrote: »

Name: The Leu Gardens
Description: One of the most beautiful botanical gardens in a city and state famed for such, Leu Gardens sits right up on Lake Rowena.
Theme: Orlando's Accords-bound safe haven
The Idea: There's a meeting space and lounge accessible beneath the Floral Clock and the entire park is neutral ground.
The Aspect: A Bit of Peace in the Middle of Chaos
The Face: Danielle Johnson, curator emeritus, a wizard of minor skill

OptimusZed wrote: »

Location
Name: Rainy Day Loans
Description: Payday loan outfit run by a low-mid-level White Court Vampire from out of town that just can't catch a break with the local families.
Theme or Threat: Threat. Mickey is basically a wannabe mobster determined to make his mark and get in good with the family.
The Idea: The Irish family feeds on the despair coming off the locals who use their services while perpetuating a cycle of poverty and hopelessness they use to afford mid-range luxury vehicles.
The Aspect: Lack of Luck of the Irish
The Face: Mickey Irish, an overweight carpetbagger White Court Vampire with aspirations of a payday loan franchise.

OptimusZed wrote: »

Location
Name: Orlando Police Headquarters
Description: Shiny new police building built with political donations
Theme or Threat: Theme
The Idea: Chief Williams is under a lot of pressure, both public and private, to curtail the local influence of the theme park industry and keep it from expanding any further. Through whatever means available to her.
The Aspect: Orlando is For Normals
The Face: Chief Rene Williams, fresh-faced possibly-clued-in authority figure with a rolodex full of powerful and popular locals.

OptimusZed wrote: »

Location
Name: Amway Center
Description: Local sports arena and after-hours bloodsports attraction that probably isn't built on a secret temple dedicated to dark, ancient powers and definitely isn't feeding on the weird number of deaths that have occurred inside.
Theme or Threat: Threat, probably
The Idea: Come for the sports, stay for the mystical pyramid powered by the souls of the dead. Because it won't let you leave.
The Aspect: A Pyramid (Scheme) of Skulls
The Face: Samael Smith, CEO of the Amway Center and totally not an earthly vessel for something unspeakable

Things we talked about (will have to post the audio) -
Characters (Were-Orca, Florida Man, Retiree Wizard, Zombie Animatronic Maintenance Personnel, veteran investigator?)


Thread largely for coordination and shenanigans.

DevoutlyApathetic

Hmm....kinda want to call myself ZAMP.

OptimusZed

DevoutlyApathetic wrote: »

Hmm....kinda want to call myself ZAMP.

Because that's the acronym on the work coveralls that you're still wearing, and you can't remember your real name.

OptimusZed

My concept may have changed a bit. To Aquaman.

And by Aquaman, I mean Ocean Thor.

OptimusZed

I hate that Physique and Fight aren't skills in this version of Fate.

OptimusZed

Since this is apparently my solo brainstorm thread now;

I'm bouncing back and forth between a were-orca prince that is mystically locked in human form after an ocean coup dethroned and nearly wiped out his pod

or;

A violent career criminal who suddenly and unexpectedly inherits the monster hunting resources of his great uncle along with dozens of old grudges with fangs.

On the one hand, ORCA SMASH. On the other, Big Bag O'Guns. It's a tough call.

Grunt's Ghosts

The idea that I got is a NYPD Detective who was on the force for years, married, had a daughter, and for his 20th anniversary, he and his wife when to Orlando. While there, his wife disappeared without a trace. So he took an early retirement, moved to Florida and for the last few years has been searching for his wife, all the while diving deeper and deeper into the strange goings on of the city.

And before the question get "Does he know about the Supernatural?" Any good police officer knows, in some way or another. Good cops find ways to cover it up. Zombie eats faces? Drug trip goes terribly wrong. People drained of blood? Stupid kids and those damn vampire romance novels thinking they are vampires. He might not know the differences between a White Court Vampire from Black Court, but he knows.

Oats

To break this combo:

Frank McCoy (né Franzibald vonFaustenberg)
High concept: Old man golf wizard who used to be somebody
Trouble: Can't remember all the shit I've stolen

Skills: Conviction (+4), Discipline (+4)
Scholarship (+3), Lore (+3)
Endurance (+2), Presence (+2)
Burglary (+1), Altertness (+1), Investigation (+1), Resources (+1), Contacts (+1)

Powers: Evocation (-3, spirit specialization), Thaumaturgy (-3, 'kleptomancy' specialization), Wizard's Constitution (0)

Focus items: 9-iron (+1 def con, spirit), 3-wood (+1 offense con, spirit)

OptimusZed

If I can make a jaded, purely mechanical observation; Even scores in Endurance (+2 or +4) are generally considered to be sub-optimal. +1 gets you 3 Stress boxes, +3 gets you 4. Unless you're anticipating using the skill itself (and Endurance is, in my experience, one of the least used skills in most games), you're probably better off just trading it for one of your +1 skills you want to focus more on.

Edit: Same sorta goes for Presence and Conviction, but those are likely to get used more on their own terms.

OptimusZed

Here's the outline for the not-Were-Orca

High Concept: Fugitive Former Prince of the Were-Orcas
Trouble: Uncle Tahiri won’t stop until I’m dead (alt:Now I’m Human and the Ocean Hates Me OR Mom Made Me Human To Keep Me From Being Eaten By My Uncle)
Potential Story Aspects: Socially Orca-ward, Tohunga Rohe’s Strongest Son, Fish Out Of Water That Eats Other Fish, Former Future King of the Atlantic, I Liked Humans Better When They Were Food, You Can Take the Were Out of the Orca But You Can’t Take the Orca Out of the Were


Powers (7 Refresh/2 remaining):
-4 Supernatural Strength
-2 Inhuman Toughness
-2 Inhuman Recovery
+3 Catch: Bones, fangs and claws.


Skills (25 points)


+4 Athletics, Fists
+3 Endurance, Might
+2 Empathy, Intimidation, Presence
+1 Alertness, Conviction, Lore, Rapport, Survival

I might flip some stuff out for Hulking Size and/or a magical trident that casts water spells + weapons training. Since we've got a couple of really tough dudes on the roster as of last night, I went for smashiness. I do fear that I might have just produced AquaDuxa, though.

Edit: I might even go for some speed, since Orcas can do like 35. And are chase predators.

Grunt's Ghosts

Jacob McKnight
High Concept: Retired Detective Looking For Missing Wife
Trouble: Wife's Disappearance Being Blamed On Him

Refresh: 9

Skills: Investigation (+4), Guns (+4)
Intimidation (+3), Empathy (+3)
Alertness (+2), Rapport (+2), Fists (+2)
Stealth (+1), Contacts (+1), Driving (+1), Deceit (+1), Endurance (+1)

Stunts:
Will Come up with some Later

OptimusZed

For a Pure Mortal, your actual Refresh is going to be 9 before you start spending on feats.

Unless you grab some powers, anyway.

OptimusZed

Here is the thoroughly un-Duxa alternate concept I'm kicking around now.

High Concept: Middle Aged Made Man Monster Hunter
Trouble: If it ain’t Cops or Cubans it’s Vampires
Story: Bada Bing Bada Boom, Business is Booming, Orlando’d Be A Cakewalk They Said, You Get Whatcha Pay For, It Never Hurts To Look Good, Start With Bullets And Work Up From There, I Represent Some Very Interested Parties, I Scratch Your Back You Scratch Mine, My Bosses Expect Results

Stunts (Refresh 9 pure mortal/3 Remaining)

Let Me Tell Ya ‘Bout Dese Mooks: +2 to Lore if you accompany the roll with a story about the last time your crew had to deal with this type of supernatural creature or threat.
Palms Thoroughly Greased: +2 to Resources when using it to ease the wheels of progress into better position for your enterprise, above board or below.
Personal Magnetism: +2 to use Presence to passively make an impression.
Strategic Resources: When you use Resources to create a scene aspect like Top of the Line Gear or Custom-Built Vampire Hunting Equipment you can invoke it for free one additional time.
Throwing Money Around: Use Resources to make friends and influence people as long as they’re interested and you’re offering to buy.
Weight of Reputation: Use Presence instead of Intimidate to manipulate people who know your reputation or that of those you represent and would be impressed by it.

Skills (25 pts)

+4: Guns, Presence
+3: Athletics, Resources
+2: Contacts, Lore, Weapons
+1: Alertness, Conviction, Deceit, Empathy, Investigation

jdarksun

Man we still need locations and stuff lol

Grunt's Ghosts

Locations and Stuff works great when we are together as a group and bounce off stuff naturally. Getting the basic concepts of your characters can be done here without too much fuss.

OptimusZed

Quick question regarding timeline; post-Changes?

jdarksun

Grunt's Ghosts wrote: »

Locations and Stuff works great when we are together as a group and bounce off stuff naturally. Getting the basic concepts of your characters can be done here without too much fuss.

Disagree. Establishing location and tone informs character creation.

OptimusZed wrote: »

Quick question regarding timeline; post-Changes?

Should probably put that to a vote, since it potentially involves spoiling people.

DevoutlyApathetic

I vote I have absolutely no idea what your oh so significantly capitalized Changes means.

Don't much care on spoilers so don't worry on my account.

Grunt's Ghosts

Pre-Changes. I think some people might read the books and that one was a major twist in the story.

OptimusZed

DevoutlyApathetic wrote: »

I vote I have absolutely no idea what your oh so significantly capitalized Changes means.

Don't much care on spoilers so don't worry on my account.

Changes is a book in the series. There are some events in it that could have implications for our game. I think at least one of us is behind bit planning on reading it, so I'm fine with setting the game pre - Changes.

I'm also on concept 4 for the Orcavenger, but I'm pretty happy with this one. It will fit in better with a team of Florida Man and snowbird kraut wizard better than fugitive aquaman, I think.

Oats

Our most famous party member was in the news again:

http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/breaking-news/os-truck-runs-over-driver-orange-20161025-story.html

OptimusZed

Ok, here's what I think is for the most part the final version of the Orca-Venger.

Jack "The Champ" DuChamp

DevoutlyApathetic

Think you typo'ed life where you meant wife though I suppose the way it is kinda works.

OptimusZed

Nice catch. True, though.

His life left a while ago.

OptimusZed

BTW, you're showing up to me as "Annonymous Wolverine".

So I'm imagining the Guy Fawks mask surrounded by crazy, upswept hair.

DevoutlyApathetic

OptimusZed wrote: »

BTW, you're showing up to me as "Annonymous Wolverine".

So I'm imagining the Guy Fawks mask surrounded by crazy, upswept hair.

Nobody knows it was me, Bub.

Alright so I'm still all waffling on the concept here though I really find the idea of voudou spirits using animatronic attractions in place of people as possession vessels as just the right kind of crazy creepy for what's happening so far. My knowledge of this was heavily influenced by when Shadowrun incorporated them a bit and I have zero idea how to make this work in system.

I'm backing away a bit from being literally dead/zombied but some variant of having been magically enslaved with little to no memory and now suddenly thrust in the middle of supernatural central seems like fun. The animatronic repair man seems to be lacking a reason to get involved with the rest of the crazy folks.

My thought is that whoever did that to me ran some sort of social place, complete with massive animatronics natch, that was enforced and agreed to as "neutral ground" by most of the supernatural denizens of the city. Boss man left while commanding me to "Take care of the place" or something similarly vague as the last order. I'm desperately trying to keep it running, figure out who the hell I was and who I am now and all while hoping like hell that none of these magical monsters around me realize that whoever was protecting this place has gone missing.

Still ruminating on these ideas though.

OptimusZed

Well, it sounds like your boss might have been a freeholding lord of some description. I'll leave it to the reader to google that to prevent unwanted spoilers to our lagging consumers.

Bottom line is that they tend to be heavy hitters on at least not-stab-on-sight terms with the rest of the stuff that goes bump in the night in their general location. It seems possible that your boss established a supernatural peace zone, probably at a theme park of some description. Which this town is lousy with.

We should make up some kind of crazy theme for the park. Something completely ridiculous. And have Jack cut a promo for it.

Edit: Your boss definitely sounds like a Law Breaker (specifically the 4th Law), so they probably weren't playing nice with the White Council, which would make Freeholding tough to set up. The various Vampire courts have abilities to crush wills into working for them, and they tend to be relatively sociable as well. Maybe it was a vampire.

OptimusZed

Making a note her for myself to look into fitting in stealth somehow. And a weapons workbench.

OptimusZed

Orlando Location Ideas

Donny Irish's Payday Loans: Known for their generous interest rates, they offer "counselling" for any hard luck case that comes in. And feed off their cycle of despair.

Crazy Jimmy's Used Cars: The most famous used car dealer in the greater Orlando area, Jimmy regularly runs specials that seem impossibly cheap with the only catch being strange terms that are sealed with a handshake and nobody bothers following through with anyway.

Madam Hansou's House of Misfit Toys: An institution among the local afficianados of the weird, Madam Hansou has operated her bizarre attraction for decades. Seemingly a combination of junkyard and social commentary, the park is full of discarded animatronics from the big name parks around town. Her holiday displays are especially popular, though she never seems to hold them on an actual holiday.

Amway Center: Home to local professional sports teams of all calibers, this stadium is a center of Orlando life for many citizens. Rumor has it that, on nights there aren't scheduled games, elaborate competitions take place in the bowels of the arena to entertain a certain class of Orlandonian.

OptimusZed

Reworked Jack a bit. He's less shooty and more "hurls beer cans at people with lethal accuracy" now.

DevoutlyApathetic

Hey remember that whole "Uh, what we're playing Dresden Files now? Do I have the books for Dresden Files?"

Apparently Humble Bundle heard.

Also has The Laundry stuff included in it which I've wanted to grab for awhile now too.

OptimusZed

That's great. I'm not sure I've got PDFs of the books. I bought Epubs for some reason.

OptimusZed

The ghost of Orlando Reeves should definitely be a thing.

Especially if it turns out he never existed.

Oats

I think Wikipedia is going to be a gold mine.

There were no reported skirmishes with Seminoles in the area. The closest was at Hatcheelustee, on what is now Walt Disney World property several miles south of the city.

OptimusZed

Apparently another possibility is Orlando Savage Rees, a local rancher who sabotaged a peace treaty because he was a selfish dick.

I think we all know how this has to go;

But with a cowboy hat.

Grunt's Ghosts

Florida Man was in the news again.

https://youtu.be/mq0kYdIgcew

Ardent

"I live in the news."

OptimusZed

If "Hold My Beer" isn't an Aspect for you, I'll be very disappointed.

Edit:

Trouble: Grass On The Field Play Ball

Ardent

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ZkvCy3ehWjGsGJgfEFtc8INE1p8mX78aAvaLAlu4LfE/edit?usp=sharing

THUS FAR

Ardent

Who is Florida Man?

Dustin Turnbull as a matter of fact. Although to be fair Dustin isn’t sure how he got the name. If it was his originally or given to him by someone else. Frankly, things haven’t been better than hazy for Dustin in a long, long time. What Dustin can relate is that his ancestor -- or he -- was involved in the original dislocation of the Miccosuke peoples and, as a result, enjoyed a truly excellent curse from them. His wife, a Miccosuke woman, bore him a dozen children, who each went on to have a dozen children of their own. On it continued while Dustin, or the firstborn male of his line, inherited the true burden of the curse: all of the bad luck that would otherwise be that of the descendents belonged instead to Dustin.

The descendents include nearly 50% of the population of Florida these days; most native Floridians have a bit o’ Turnbull in them. As such, Dustin spends much of his time careening from one disaster to another. In the midst of all of this, Dustin lost himself for a while. It wasn’t until someone showed him that ‘Florida Man’ -- apparently him -- was an internet legend that he started to regain some semblance of functioning self-consciousness. In the last decade Dustin has crawled out of the gutters and into a tiny house on an overgrown cul-de-sac, a beat up Ford F-100, and a steady job as an attendant at a local 7-Eleven.

Dusty, as he goes by mostly, is a tall, moderately handsome man of six three with hair just beginning to thin and ludicrously bad facial hair that changes week to week. It is never what you’d consider “well-groomed,” and often a handlebar “‘porn ‘stache.” He’s heavily tanned and if he takes his sunglasses off has obviously blue eyes. His hair is light brown. Most often he’s in an old t-shirt (‘vintage’ as the kids might say) and cargo shorts, or track pants, or board shorts. Sometimes just tightie whities. He prefers aqua socks for his footwear.

Dusty’s been hiding a big secret, of course, and that doesn’t even include the whole Native curse bit. Dusty’s damn near immortal, as far as he can tell. And ‘damn near’ is a doozy; Dusty has died on several occasions, only to sit back up a few minutes later fit as a fiddle. He’s been electrocuted, shot, stabbed, clubbed to death, defenestrated, keelhauled, and drowned. Dusty hates drowning the most, though, because whatever it is that keeps bringing him back has trouble with water. He doesn’t recover until his body surfaces, which can puts gaps of days into his life. Fortunately the manager at his 7-Eleven just thinks Dusty is a meth head.

jdarksun

Google Event invite out. Let's finish up city creation in the next few days, and hash out whatever we still need to with the characters. I'll post an update with what we need later.