Doors Session #1: The Last Express

It all begins through an online play-by-post scene with Gary Dodd trying to escape the Mirror Realm and being herded by the Angel Faced Killer into the National Railway Museum.  Gary Dodd uses his stone to open a Door and it crumbles between his fingers.  As it does so, an onyx train chuffs silently to the platform and a skeletal hand reaches out and beckons him onboard.

.....

A few days later, the LARP session begins with all of the players waiting outside the front door in the dark.  Gary Dodd's "Train Summoning" has likewise summoned several of the vampires to his presence though he doesn't realise they're there until after they enter.  As he steps onboard, I signal for the Conductor NPC to come and speak with him and he does so, striding enthusiastically and making demands in a very loud and officious voice while carrying a clipboard.  Initially he had on Novichkov's moustache (prop from another character) but it fell off so he spent the rest of it without moustache.  He read out the thirteen rules quite loudly and then called for the Maid to provide him with his tokens.

The Maid came rushing down, waving a hand vigorously as she went to catch his attention.  She carried one of those poker chip cases with her and then stood to one side in the corridor, drawing the tokens out one at a time with wonderful flourishes and dropping them into Dodd's outstretched hand before letting him move further in while she awaited the next "guest".

I stayed out-of-character, describing what he saw in terms of sleeping car compartment doors, and he ended up first in the Bar Car where he ordered a drink from the bartender.  Our venue thankfully has one of those wide counters (all-in-one living / kitchen / dining area) which worked a treat for this with four chairs pressed up against it.  While he chatted to the bartender, I dropped into character and came rushing down the corridor to berate the Conductor for reading out the rules to each individual.

Since we all had one Rival that we had to undermine (the Cast, that is), I was waved away by the Maid as I, the Doctor, was her Rival.  My own Rival was the Oracle and I made a point to describe him as a Charlatan here and there.  I did that so often that some people started to think that was his name and started calling him the Charlatan.

The Cast were fantastic.  I told them to really go to town with their characterisations and gave them all quite brief summaries of who they were and their motivations so they built on it quite a bit.  The officious Conductor took the first line directly beneath the header and really ran with it:

THE RULES

All may be disobeyed.  You have free will.  Disobedience is ill-advised.

So he kept making up new rules to suit himself and the situation.  Only three people in any one of the compartments at once - which was good because the compartments were separate rooms and it made it more interesting to keep them moving and force them to negotiate who could remain.

The Oracle shifted his position a few times until he ended up in the Dining Car, running his Secret for a Secret games in a quiet corner.  I'd given him a large Halloween porcelain pumpkin full of optional questions he could ask as well as a few sheets with PC names listed on top that held up to 7 secrets they could gather by giving him a few of their own.  Funnily enough people generally respected the privacy of that car and it was mostly the Cast who occasionally tried to listen in.

I had a large Doctor's Bag with me that had a few ink blots and some of the Dr. Kaupfmann puzzles (Dead or Sleeping? and Pairings) from Silent Hill: Shattered Memories.  I only really got to use one (Pairings) before the Maid convinced someone to throw the doctor's trunk (and my fetter) out the window into the bleak abyss as part of our rivalry.  She didn't know my fetter was inside (we weren't playing for that kind of high stakes ICly) but luckily I got chosen at the end so got to survive.

At least Gary Dodd gave me some interesting hints into his psychology from the Pairings angle, so that's something.  Without my Doctor's Bag I basically just went around trying to convince people to use up their Stones, explaining that there's no real catch to the resurrection of people into mortals, and also trying to get suitable characters to bed her.  At one point, Prince Saeed used her as a foot stool and I happily got on all fours for five minutes before the player felt so bad he insisted I get up and rejoin the others.

The Conductor soon came around to each of the Riders to convince us to lie (again, a Cast Member decision and a good one) but my NPC wasn't too sure of trying her hand at that.  Instead she would deflect certain questions or encourage people to seek out the Conductor for the truth.

The Bartender lit people's marijuana joints on fire, set the table when the Dinner Bell rang and gave a listening ear to those who wished to drink.  He did really well at spending most of his time behind the counter so I applaud him for his patience.

Finally there was the unnamed Skull NPC who was literally a floating skull.  Naturally we had a Cast Member who was responsible for carrying the Skull around and talking for it.  Funnily enough it became very easy indeed to ignore the person in favour of talking to the skull who gestured, and flirted, and tried to prostitute the Maid (who fainted dramatically at the very idea!).

Eventually the Skull got the name Skully and people advised him to seek out Mulder for a dynamic duo.

Session #5: Consequences

Gary Dodd is still missing so the vampires re-convene the following night at the Boozecan.  His ghoul, Dorothy Rosenburg, meets them at the door and allows Yzador to examine the egg found at the scene.  She's quite worried but doesn't show it.

Prince Harry Saeed and the Primogen Seamus O'Baoill spend much of their time in a back room, occasionally inviting in Peter Walsh (NPC played by Dodd's player), Professor Jasmine Hadley and Michael Novichkov for back rooms deals and punishments.  At one point, Siobhan O'Baoill had to enter to discuss the situation with her "claimed" human, Bennett, where the prince kindly offered the man's life were he to be blood bound and kept in check.  As a Masquerade breach, and a violent one, he'd normally be killed and she punished.

At one point, while Harry Saeed and Primogen Seamus O'Baoill were in a back room, the rest of the vampires (barring Jonathon Williams and Sheriff FatherMother) went to the service station where Gary Dodd disappeared and started investigating the toilet.  The guy behind the counter figured they were going in there for a gangbang.  His theory wasn't helped when Novichkov banged on the walls to see if there were a hidden passage.

Yzador made the connection to the Bloody Mary mythology of serial killers and mirrors and so repeated Bennett's name thrice, but nothing happened.  It had to be one of his survivors so Siobhan O'Baoill did it.  The first time she mentioned his name thrice, nothing happened but Yzador turned the light out.  The second time she did it, there was an answering knock from the walls.  The third time she did it, he appeared in the reflection behind her.

Novichkov reached out and touched the mirror and secret things happened.  On top of the secret things, the lights shattered and the power went out for several blocks as the substation was affected by a massive back surge of electricity.

After that point, they returned to the Boozecan where Sheriff FatherMother kept arguing that Bennett should die and Siobhan O'Baoill kept arguing that he shouldn't.  In the end they decided to summon "Elsa", the True Fae in blue whom they'd given a nickname since she hadn't given them a name.  Once Talitha Salvatore won the card game required to summon her, she arrived drinking a can of Mother and explained that Gary Dodd has already left the Mirror Realm for another one upon using his stone.  She also explained that she could lure the Angel Faced Killer out of the Mirror Realm in exchange for the man's heart should the vampires gathered in the room kill him.  Sheriff FatherMother made that deal and so she left shortly before prince and primogen returned to the room.

After a few more decisions were made, Bennett appeared out of the reflection in a mirror, bat in hand and covered in a flammable substance, looking anxious and stressed.  Siobhan tried talking him down, relieved when he answered back, but then shocked when he told them that they should all kill him because he wasn't real and would doubtless try to kill again.  He figured a room full of vampires should be able to take him down, though he couldn't promise not to take one or two out beforehand.  It's not he'd have much of a choice.

He explained that he'd heard some kind of "call" and that he'd seen a female silhouette of light lure Gary Dodd further into the Port Adelaide Train Museum.  He was pretty damn sure they should kill him but a mixture of Saeed's support for a possible way out (backed up by Majesty) and Siobhan O'Baoill's pleas that there was another way (that wasn't undermined by any other courtier) meant they got a roll using Saeed's Awe-backed Presence and Siobhan's "Good Cop" specialty Persuasion.

During all of this, one particular character noticed something strange about Bennett and explained a theory in a whisper to the right people that he would die if blood bound or ghouled.

While this was going on an exceptional success talked him down and he went into a side room with Prince Saeed, Siobhan O'Baoill and Seamus O'Baoill (with Thomas McAllister in Obfuscate in the corner).  They discussed putting him under sedation and keeping him in lock down until they could figure out a way to pull the Thing out of him.  He also explained a little about what he knew about his condition, which wasn't a lot.

Finally Prince Saeed took the Ordo Dracul aside so that they could all go out to rescue Dodd from the Mirror Realm.

Session #4: The Boozecan

Due to a variety of reasons, only six players were able to attend.  This worked out quite well as the group were quite able to entertain themselves and I (as Lead GM) had plenty of time to portray the two NPCs dragged along to game.

The premise was that Gary Dodd, notorious Nosferatu Smuggler, was hosting a small party at his dodgy pub, the Boozecan in North Haven, a residential suburb near Outer Harbor in Adelaide.

I set up a card table and four chairs in the book room though it went unused because in a game of six PCs you don't really need to split up.  The spare bedroom was decked out with mirrors, fake bowl of condom and a leopard print blanket top to give it that really dodgy vibe.  The bedroom was used once by Jonathon Williams and Professor Jasmine Hadley, who both had the Wanton condition and decided to get rid of it by jumping into the sack together.  Naturally Gary Dodd and FatherMother tried to bust in once or twice, as everyone was drunk as a skunk by that point.

I'm getting ahead of myself ... Gary Dodd had made a deal to get four bottles of Lacrima (basically vampire wine) and had even set up salted beer nuts and marijuana joints (rolled up pieces of card for the latter).  FatherMother arrived with four bottles of Lacrima and five Flowers of Demeter (allows a vampire to eat, drink and get drunk like a human) that were carried in by her hippy looking ghoul, Daryl.  It took her awhile to sell them, but she managed to sell all the Flowers for a Minor Boon apiece.

Jonathon Williams drank ... a lot.  And I mean, a lot.  Bottle of vodka and gin, two bottles of some other liquor.  Two bottles of Lacrima.  If he were a human, he'd be dead.  As it was he was very unsteady on his feet and became really obsessed with finding and bashing down Bill because Bill's a dick.  I really loved watching his random fixation occasionally rise up again and again, as it seemed the kind of thing an aggressive drunk would do.

Why was Bill though to be such a dick?

Well Siobhan O'Baoill had brought a regular human along to the party that everyone recognised as the Angel Faced Killer.  He claimed to be the killer's twin brother.  No one bought that, but no one cared.  At one point in the conversation, Siobhan told the guy that she'd had to claim him and he jokingly complained that there hadn't been a cat fight between Siobhan and Talitha over that (since they both had history with him).

His exactly line after that was: "Wait, does that mean I'm Sookie Stackhouse?  If that's the case, which one of you's Eric?  And which one's Bill?"

Naturally Gary Dodd had to be walking past and demanded an explanation for it.  The room dropped into an awkward silence as the Angel Faced Killer really didn't want to describe the analogy but in the end enough got out that Jonathon Williams overheard that there were two vampires (who he thought were in town) called Bill and Eric and that Bill was a dick.  Jonathon Williams immediately went outside to find these two vampires and invite them in, then wandered back in ten minutes later with a cane he had 'liberated' from some poor human guy at a bus shelter.

Later, Daryl (FatherMother's ghoul) offered a round of M&Ms that he said was ecstasy mixed with a dash of LSD but which were just LSD coated on chocolate.  Siobhan O'Baoill, Talitha Salvatore, Jonathon Williams and Gary Dodd each took one.  Gary Dodd then pressured the Angel Faced Killer into having one, watching as he put it in his mouth, then encouraging him to swallow it.  Professor Jasmine Hadley may, or may not, have taken one.  I can't really remember.

We had a Youtube Playlist going and soon after this point, "Rubber Johnny" by Aphex Twin came on and everyone who'd taken an M&M took it as a shared hallucination.  Gary Dodd threw a chair at it.  Siobhan O'Baoill hid under a cushion.  The Angel Faced Killer pulled his baseball bat (brand name - Excalibat) which basically proved who he was.  Jonathon Williams (a Khaibit) used his shadow magic to try to impale the things.  Talitha Salvatore just watched in curiosity.  FatherMother just watched the whole thing, amused at everyone else's reactions but unable to see anything.

After a game of Poker, much conspiring and information sharing, Siobhan O'Baoill decided that everyone should go and deal with the bee vampires.  The Angel Faced Killer concurred.  FatherMother and Professor Jasmine Hadley thought everyone was too drunk and high to do anything dangerous.

At one point, Professor Jasmine Hadley literally scolded Siobhan O'Baoill and told her to sit down.  And she did.  Grumpily.

Instead of going demon hunting Gary Dodd mentioned that he had the mobile phone of a guy that he'd tried to feed from in an alley.  The guy had shrugged him off, blocked the flow of blood to the wound, and seen through Gary's obfuscate.  He also didn't seem to realise it wasn't just a mugging, so Gary did mug him and took his phone.  Going through his details, they found that he was looking for gigs and was the lead singer in a band.  They played some of his music (I used Three Days Grace).

They then sent an email to him stating that he could come to the Boozecan to audition for a gig.  Being a desperate musician, he rocks up half an hour later but as soon as he enters the place, he's uneasy and glares at Talitha and Siobhan who sit together at one table.  He sings "I Hate Everything About You" (also by Three Days Grace), flipping off the two women at appropriate moments in the song.  I lip synced all of this since I can't sing well at all.  Bennett, expecting trouble, had snuck out the back to change into his armour, just in case he'd need to defend Nix.

There was finally a big conversation with the fellow being rather obstinate about not wanting to give them what they wanted, a few little secrets got out, and then when he went to leave the Sheriff slammed his face into the bar counter, breaking his nose.  Everything escalated from that point onward when he dropped his little charred egg that erupted into a Size 4 flaming figure that started attacking FatherMother while he blasted Jonathon Williams with heat that kept setting his clothing on fire.  Jonathon Williams, in turn, tried to lassoo him with shadow stuff.

In the end, Talitha Salvatore leapt between them, grabbed Nix and carried him off to safety, leaving the charred egg behind.  Her sire followed after her but didn't manage to catch up.

At this point Bennett entered the fray, walked over to FatherMother, and smashed her in the head. Turns out he'd triggered into his Angel Face Killer at this point due to his worries about Nix.  Ironic, really, since he'd have killed Nix if the man had been there.  The joy of a Slasher Trigger!

So he slams FatherMother again, nearly torporing her with eight successes, and Jonathon Williams grabs her and legs it.  Gary Dodd uses Obfuscate to drop out of sight and follows Bennett as he walks steadily out of the Boozecan and into a nearby service station.  He walked into the toilet, touched a mirror, and opened a doorway into another place (the Mirror City).  Gary Dodd, never one to be left out, reaches out and touches the mirror, going with him.

And that's where we ended the session.

Masks of Nyarlathotep Murder Mystery Event

EVENT DESCRIPTION

This is a complex murder mystery adapted from the New York chapter of the Award winning Masks of Nyarlathotep roleplaying campaign published by Chaosium.  Each participant will reprise the role of a character found within the campaign book or the Masks of Nyarlathotep Companion as they attempt to uncover the mystery, gather (or conceal!) the evidence and perhaps even bump off the opposition. 

In keeping with the theme of the event, tea and coffee, sparkling water, fruit, biscuits and scones, are all included within the ticket price and will be available throughout the event.  Please advise us if you have any food allergies or dietary restrictions.  You'd be surprised by what we can accommodate these days so please don't be shy in letting us know.

You can purchase tickets over here and enter the draw to win a free ticket by sharing the pinned post on the Adelaide Roleplaying Community Inc. Facebook Page.

 PREMISE

The Carlyle Expedition to Africa disappeared several years ago only to be declared dead after a short and lazy investigation by colonial forces.  Just last year in 1924, the intrepid journalist and cult investigator, Jackson Elias, decided to pick up the trail and determine what really happened to famous playboy millionaire, Roger Carlyle, and his fellow expedition members.  His trail blazed across Africa, England, even Australia, before returning to New York only to be brutally murdered in his own hotel room.

Erica Carlyle, sister to Roger Carlyle and sole heir of Carlyle Industries, has invited you all to her estate so that she can finally get to the bottom of this mess of conspiracy and horrors.  Some of you have connived to get an invitation through means both foul and fair.  Others have been explicitly invited either because they knew the principal expedition members or were part of those who were present at Jackson Elias' crime scene.

But wait, there's more!  Perhaps to bait the hook and ensure the culprit's attendance at the event, Erica Carlyle has declared her intention to auction Roger Carlyle's mysterious collection of occult tomes partway through the night. 

Carlyle Expedition News Reel #1

Carlyle Expedition News Reel #2

Character Roles

Erica Carlyle (Heiress)
Joe Corey (Bodyguard)
Dr. Brian Fischer (Harlem Doctor / Conjure Man)
Lieutenant Martin Poole (Police Officer)
Constable Zach Allemby (Harlem Police Officer)
Simon or Simone Exton (Autopsy Technician)
Miriam Atwright (Librarian)
Professor Anthony Cowles (Archaeologist)
Ewa Cowles (Anthropology Major)
Raoul Pinera (Sociology Major)
Hon. Major George Randall (Big Game Hunter)
Mukunga M'Dari (Harlem Leader)
Maybelle Hopkins (Harlem Pub Owner)
Walter Kimble (Entrepreneur)
Claire or Keith Simpson (Psychiatric Nurse)
Neil Young (Valet)
Arthur Emerson (Importer)
Coleman or Cara Preston Lloyd (Alcoholic Dilletante)
Gregory or Georgina Wilks (Harlem Taxi Driver)
Deputy Ranger Robert Scott Bennie (Texas Ranger)
Joe or Jane Hall (Harlem Private Eye) 
Ambrose Mogens (Rich industrialist)
Eugene Vander Klei (Biochemist)
Dr. Zhou Changying or Zhengsheng (Anatomist)
Alice Mogens (Biological Researcher)
Adrian Ferris (Medical Affairs Board secretary)

Character Roles Requiring Public Speaking and Speeches

Bradley Grey (Lawyer)

Jonah or Julia Kensington (Publishing Editor)

Arman or Anahita Tehrani (Auctioneer / Antiquarian)

Rev. Lawrence T. O'Dell, Jr. (Priest)

Session #3: Establishment of Order

Prince Harry Saeed surveys his subjects.

Floor GM: Yours Truly.

Assistant GMs: A.L. and T.B.

The third session was a social soiree as the new Prince Harry Saeed hosted at his café and declared himself.  Siobhan O'Baoill and Talitha Salvatore revealed their prize that they had earned through an online RtR (run much like a play-by-post).  A weird vampire who could control bee swarms and whom they had beaten into torpor.

Oh, I forgot to mention that just before everyone went to the café, Prince Harry Saeed met up with FatherMother and Jonathon Williams to poke the gloom with Jonathon Williams' Obtenebration.  Jonathon Williams caught some little shadowflies for his trouble that swarmed his Obtenebration.  He put them in an emptied Milo tin for safe keeping.

Prince Harry Saeed bid them to bring the vampire inside and they tied her down to a chair and spread out a tarp underneath her.  They roused her with blood from XXX and found that she wouldn't be speak directly to them, only through the bees that she summoned from her lungs which required Animalism for communication.  When she was backhanded back into torpor, the bees fell into a desiccated state themselves.

While the PCs had initially thought she was a Melissidae, this strange turn of events changed their mind.  They searched her body and found nodes around the base of the neck.  Gary Dodd did some, ahem, exploratory surgery with a knife and dug them out, finding them to be a gak-like substance that moved further in.  He pulled on them, pulling out tendril after tendril, that started waving toward him but Prince Harry Saeed sapped their will with one of his powers (Numbing Touch) and they ceased to move.

Finally they chatted to her some more, put her back into torpor, then carefully Prince Harry Saeed assisted by Doctor Jonathon Taylor surgically removed the main node from her heart and placed that in another jar, cleaning the rest of the bits from her system.  She was on five aggravated damage from her capture, so they had to be cautious.  Finally they put a splinted of wood in her heart to prevent her from waking up.  She was then transferred into Gary Dodd's care.

Other than that, Siobhan O'Baoill, Seamus O'Baoill, Talitha Salvatore and Thomas McAllister went to visit a guy in a nearby pub for general conversation (and some justifiable swearing on Siobhan's part).  FatherMother revealed that she could get people some Lacrima.  Jonathon Williams pointed out that he knows where Duchess Alicia Brown's caches are (at least some of them).  And everybody chatted about the things they had learned and what to do next.

Session #2: Investigative Burglary

What is the Kogaian plotting now?

Floor GM: Yours Truly.

Assistant GMs: A.L. and T.B.

This session was a smaller than usual one because the heat kept several players indoors and the date just didn't worked out for a few of them as well.  That ended up working out great, though, as it meant that those who were there were freed to investigate a number of leads.  It did make the game more of a multi-form than a true LARP, but we used the space enough to keep it interesting.

Firstly we used the main space to represent the Ordo Dracul haven as they meeted, greeted and mingled.  A few aspirations were met.  A few goals were put forward.  Some of the information from earlier downtimes including Siobhan O'Baoill's police report on the missing folks from Delphin Island (prop) and Thomas McAllister's investigations into the missing Invictus Duchess Alicia Brown was shared around. 

Folks decided to chase up on the break-and-entry into one of Duchess Alicia Brown's old  properties, figuring it might also be a lead to a missing Ordo Dracul and the old human confessor.  They all piled into Professor Jasmine Hadley's fancy large van and headed straight for the location which was an old house used as storage facilities for a Historical Society.

McAllister and Talitha Salvatore busted in by themselves (other players sat around the table to chat in the van) by avoiding the few sensor lights and creeping in through the roof.  Once inside they found a stuffed eagle with a heartbeat (actually a recording that can be automatically heard by vampires even if it's too quiet for humans to notice) and a note written in dried blood.  They also found a safe. 

McAllister temporarily disabled the security systems and everyone else came inside.  Acute Senses deduced which four numbers held the code: 1, 2, 7, 9.  Doctor Jonathon Taylor correctly guessed it was 1927, representing the year before his Other Version went insane.  Inside the large and very thick safe sat a magpie feather, small rose quartz, little device and two autopsy reports on a pair of deaths that occurred over the past few months.  I had props for all of these things, using one of those little puzzles where you have to pull a little steel doodad from a plastic casing just the right way.  I didn't have a prop for the safe or the bird, obviously.  They gathered these up and left.

They chilled out for awhile, reading the props and looking the items over.  Dr. Jonathon Taylor got the doodad out and found that the shorter point always pushed in the direction of the nearest section of gloom, kind of like a weird compass.  The gloom being like a darker overlay on certain sections of the city.  They now had a map to compare it too (also a prop) which Guilherma de Miramont had put together during the downtime period.

Conversation then turned toward a known werewolf pack who work out of the Inferno Nightclub (which they own).  They decided to head down there and leave Seamus O'Baoill outside because he's too valuable (and because I needed the A.L. who plays him and is my aGM to play an NPC).

I quickly re-set the room while they lurked in the corridor and made their plans.  I shoved the round table out of the way and put chairs up against the counter in a make-shift bar.  I also put out a single chair which A.L. covered in a red sheet to represent a kind of creepy throne thing.  I acted out the bouncer as they arrived, forcing Taylor to dump his loose blue shirt which was deemed too unfashionable, and Siobhan O'Baoill flashed her badge with a demand to see the owners.

While Siobhan O'Baoill and Michael Norvichkov went to meet Jeremy Dartmoor (played by A.L. who had quickly changed his outfit and was sitting on the red chair), the other four went to the counter to talk to another werewolf called Andy Curin who was currently tending the bar.  Thomas McAllister remained in Obfuscate, whispering tidbits to Dr. Taylor, Professor Hadley and Talitha Salvatore so that they could ask the werewolf.

They learned some things but then on the way out they were confronted by Sariah Dartmoor, who demanded they return to the VIP room for further discussions.  There was some kowtowing on behalf of a few vampires, some posturing by a few others, and then they finally left. 

Siobhan lingered to ask Sariah a few more questions, and when she followed the others, a fourth werewolf who was about to enter instead lunged at her, got her in a pin, and demanded to know where Samantha Ehrenstein (their missing human confessor) was.  Siobhan frenzied, there was a standoff, but Talitha's dominate and Seamus' demands caused the werewolf to release Siobhan and chat in their van.

Finally they all got to leave and chat together.  A few PCs remained to talk while the other players headed off in a final meeting, and all in all, it was a good session.

Session #1: Freedom From Darkness

The discussions took many worrying turns.

Floor GM: Yours Truly.

Assistant GMs: A.L. and T.B.

The players began in the rather long corridor, clutching their prop stones that were used to vote for the God Machine or the Ghost (or for themselves if they chose not to vote) during the one shot.  As they slowly came through the corridor, they discussed their circumstances among themselves and used Obfuscate where necessary to cover any blood stains.  Once they left the corridor, they were described as entering North Terrace from the front doors of the SA Art Gallery.  They also realised when they checked their mobile phones that three months had passed since they were last out and about.  It was now the Autumn Equinox while their last memories were of the Summer Solstice.

There they stood in the central game space, discussing where to go now, and they decided to go to Amity Fine's nightclub.  I'd already chatted with Amity Fine's player about The Velvet Nightclub as it seemed a likely option and I'd dressed the main game space accordingly.  I'd also set up a playlist for their arrival.

However I wanted to give the PCs a chance to gossip among themselves and witness the strange darkening shadows that pressed around certain sections of the city (namely a chunk of the ring road around the Adelaide CBD) so I set up Amity Fine's player (whose PC had her car parked nearby in a parking garage with massive fines) and two new players whose characters weren't present thus far to describe what they saw en route.  We used the two side rooms and the main game space to represent the cars and I set up the chairs accordingly.

The two new players were also to play taxi drivers.  One was meant to be an overly exuberant ranty driver who liked to honk the horn, and the other was slightly creepy.  Finally one of the players decided his PC would walk to the destination, because that's just how he rolled.  He got to stand in the kitchen for a bit before being paired with the taxi driver player (once the others had been dropped off) who now played the role of a random drunk here to harass him.

The taxi cab including Seamus O'Baoill (Gangrel Ordo Dracul and Kogaian), Siobhan O'Baoill (his childe) and Yzador (very old Mekhet from the Circle of the Crone) was certainly amusing.  The cab driver could only see Siobhan because the other two were using various obfuscating powers to be ignored in the back seat.  At one point Siobhan whispers to the back seat that she has no money and the cab driver near flips out until Yzador hands her a fifty.  The taxi driver gets given the whole note.  So yeah, it certainly worked out to give the players a chance to define their characters all the more.

Finally they head into Amity Fine's nightclub, music goes on, and her player describes the club and the VIP section to people.  We assign one room as a private meeting area within the VIP area and the other room counts as "Everywhere Else" outside the club.  Having three rooms really works out brilliantly as it's great to split people up though since we use a private house the main area is just large enough to accommodate everyone.

I, as Lead GM, portray Amity Fine's simpering ghoul for a bit and do a little bit of fetching here and there.  One of the taxi driver players enters the game pretty quickly after their arrival as her actual PC, Guilherma de Miramont, is a local vampire who just happened to not be sucked off into the One Shot session.  The other taxi driver player had to wait a bit, but not too long, as his PC was getting picked up from the docks by Gary Dodd (a PC currently in the game).  I sent them into the "Everywhere Else" room for ten minutes to represent the car ride and give them a chance to chat en route.

There was a third PC to be introduced in game but he wasn't ready to join in as a player until about halfway through the game.  That worked out well enough, though, as just as the game was starting to slow down I got to dress up as a fave NPC from the first campaign arc called Peter Walsh and haul in a staked vampire that he'd fetched from inter-state.  Staked vampires from other cities certainly cause a bit of a splash and there was some searching of his pockets and later some interrogations in a side room. 

Walsh ended up owing a boon to Amity Fine for just dragging in a random staked vampire unannounced.  He ended up owing another one when the staked vampire (called Thomas McAllister) drank half a bottle of Lacrima without asking (vampire wine, costs around $1000 due to rarity).  There were words exchanged between McAllister and Amity Fine, and finally he was kicked from her club.  That could have been an awkward moment but Amity Fine's player needed to head off early so it ended up being a very convenient excuse to leave.

Amity Fine ended up in the harpy role that session, too.  Vampires and their love of boons.

It's been a couple of months but the other major events that happened included:

*  Siobhan O'Baoill got drunk on Lacrima after realising that she dumped her fiancé to protect him after her Embrace (she has amnesia over the past couple years) and despite the other fledglings trying to distract her, she slipped out and was followed by Talitha Salvatore.  She got spotted by a cop (she has a police cover identity, night shifts, long story) who pulled up onto the sidewalk and then they almost went out through one of the Shadow Walls together in his car when a ghostly image of her sire, Seamus, flashed before the car and she grabbed the wheel to swerve them out of the way.  They then went to bust into the old Women's & Children's Hospital where Talitha and Siobhan had once been held hostage but their antics were stopped at the door by Seamus' arrival.

*  Jonathon Williams has no sire.  In fact his creation just after his possession by a Strix has left him a creepy Khaibit and with BP 2.  His accidentally manifested some shadows on a few occasions, creeping out the court.

*  Attempts to call out to other vampires and contacts in the court met with mixed success.  I traded notes with FatherMother to represent a texting palooza.  Some folks just got Message Bank.

*  Many discussions from those with history in the city (i.e. from the first campaign), those who attended the one shot and knew about the votes, and those who had newly arrived.

It was a pretty quiet first session (compared to the others) but it worked out pretty nicely and gave people a good launching point.