A sensational session is a hard thing to accomplish. I think it always takes a little bit of a fortunate event to push it over the edge of greatness. In today’s post I’ll write about one of each – a sensational session I GMed, and one I played in.
Mage: the Ascension – The Italian Pavilion
I covered the first one already in the most recently played prompt. As a GM I am very pleased with the idea and the execution of the session. And both times I was lucky to stumble into a really good player group who played through the session in two different ways. If I had to pick, the other session was ever so slightly better; but I blame it on the usage of music which wasn’t an option in the first run.
Ten Candles
First a warning, here be
Five years ago I played my first session of Ten Candles, and it was one of the best sessions I have ever played. The next morning I did a spoiler free write-up. But today I’ll dig into a few juicy details.
I won’t talk about Ten Candles, read up on it or not. But play it. Play it because it is one of the best, tightest RPG experiences you will ever witness. On to my sensational session.
We played the scenario where the characters start on a cruise ship. The game tells you to play in the dark, and we had a large basement with dark curtains to eat the extra light of the candles. The GM opens the game with the recording of our last messages so smoothly no one thinks twice about it. Surely a mood setting gimmick.
As we play we have one or two comedic moments. Perfectly timed to ease up the tension, so when it started pulling back it was even worse. Bumping into a kleptomaniac carrying everything he could carry was priceless. Running away with him in tow, clinking and clanking was dangerous. Leaving him on the bad side of the hatch a necessity of survival.
The spookiest moment came around candles two or one. By this time it was uncomfortably dark. A friend played a blind man, and was squinting most of the session, holding a non-existent white cane in his hands so much I would swear he had it. In the terror of his last moments, the light dying around us, his squinting eyes looked like they were filled with small, needle like teeth. Send shivers down my spine.
The last character to die was called to darkness by something. Something calling to him. Want to scare me and the rest of the players? Get us to a dark place and say “Jeb, my man.“.
Darkness engulfs the room. You can feel the pressure of the moment, you can hear no breaths. As instructed by the rules the GM, in absolute darkness, plays our last messages. Half way in the battery dies and the voice disappears into nothing.
If anyone dared there would have been screams. We fled to more silence.
Sensational in every way.