Here they’re playing #cityofjudas!
Originally shared by G. Dzi
So this is a report of our last session of COJ (and the fist!).
First of all, the casting :
– we had the veteran, Azim Ben Arrabas a follower of the book of Q who fought during the crusades (against the crusaders) and stayed at Jerusalem afterwards with a wish of redeeming himself through combat for some things (which stayed a mystery for now) he’s done during the siege of the holy city. That’s why he joined the Iron Fist.
– then there was Zeno the raider, a local from Jerusalem who was, alongside with his men, a bandit and made the most of the crusades to raid and plunder the poor soulswho managed to escape the war. Then when things calmed down he had no choice but to join the brotherhood to avoid getting revenge from those he stole from (especially a noble family from whom he killed a member). NOTE : the player didn’t chose the leader move so he was considered by his gang as a founding and important member but no more. He came up with several names for other important members of his gangs and we discussed a bit about their relatioships between one another. Turned out that the former leader of the gang (Tobias) led it to a bad situation (which has to be defined) and disappeared during it. Was he left for dead? Did he run away? The gang’s opinion on that matter is divided between the two.
As suggested in the book, I chose to run a focused mission for this first game, so here it was : The characters were sent by the Magister Geoffrey (from Anglia and looking a lot alike with Liam Neeson) to bring a package (of opium) to the port of Ashdod (roughly half a day of Jerusalem) for the benefit of the Judaists. They’ll have first, to pick up the package at a Judaist priest’s place, brother Timeus located in the Essenian district. (I came up with the name after seeing an older map of Jerusalem and made it like a maze like place with many small alleys and a potential nest for thieves). The brother Timeus will then tell them on what vessel they’ll have to drop the opium.
Before dropping them into action, I presented couple more Blood Brothers (as I didn’t see another way to name them, I called them Fraeters to stick with the Magister and Caesar nomenclature (not even sure if it makes sense!). Then they were on their own…
The plot roughly was that a Venitian merchant had some connection inside of the Iron Fist’s fortress and was told about the package and therefore will try to snatch it for himself. His plan was simple : to bribe some guards (as a matter of fact christians) to get the opium shipment as soon as the players will get it and if it doesn’t work he’ll have a gang of mercenaries at the port.
Azim the veteran deicded to check if they were followed as soon as they left the fortress and as he succeeded his perception move, I oltd him that effectively they were. They tried to ambush whoever was following them when they reached the Essenian district but failed. I made a move and decided that the spies managed to avoid the ambush and to follow them again more cautiously (if they had got a 7-9 rather than a 6-, I’d probably stated that they scared the spies and that they wouldn’t have been able to be on their tail again).
By the end of the day, as darkness fell upon the city of Judas, they reached a small plaza where a priest of Judas was giving a hateful speech against the christians at a small crowd and where a young woman was giving water to the old and the weak from a nearby well. She then turned to the PCs and asked them if they were thirsty telling them that Christ gave water to Judas as Judas quenched the thirst of blood of the people of Jerusalem. (I was hoping to introduce differences between Judaists and Christians here and build up the fiction. Not really sure if it worked but well).
They finally managed to talk to the priest who was delivering his spiteful speech. They’d found brother Timeus. He led them through some houses (some of which were occupied by families who looked at him with radiant smiles and respect even if he was accompagnied by a band of bloodthirsty cutthroats. They had a little chat during which he told them the name of the vessel they were supposed to deliver the package (le Fol Ventoux from Frankia) insisting on the fact that the captain of the ship was in a hurry and if they didn’t get a hold on him by mid-day (that is to say the next day) he’ll leave and they’d have failed the mission. Time wasn’t their ally… He then showed them the package : two sturdy barrels placed on each side of a mean looking mule. He gave to Azim some carrots and a stick when screams started to be heard from nearby…
End of the first part. I apologize in advance for the grammar and vocabulary as I can’t really review it right now (I’m as well in a kind of a hurry!^^). At this point they didn’t really make lots of move and the fact that the spies were still tailing them meant that I advanced my front to one step which will lead to what happens in the next episode.
Anyway hope you enjoyed it and if you want to know more about this adventure, I’ll try to post the rest of it asap. Cheers!