Balazar: Guidelines for play

I've written here about the Balazar campaign nearly weekly for the past couple of months. The campaign's wiki is up and the game will start soon, so new info about it will go on the wiki from now on. The last thing I wanted to mention here on the blog is that I wrote up a "Guidelines for play" article on the wiki, available here.

This is the executive summary:

It's important to understand that this campaign is NOT about having fun with friends and creating memorable stories together. It's about the DM controlling and intimidating his friends in a way that he couldn't otherwise do. It's about chest-thumping and fulfillment of "control freak" impulses through the safety of the Internet.

Retaliatory DMing is to be expected. The players should always be worried about doing what the DM wants them to do, otherwise he'll make something up on the spot to screw over their characters.

Furthermore, the DM shall demonstrate his brilliance and creativity in such a way that his friends should be ashamed of the pathetic games and campaigns that they usually waste time on. This is the one true way. The players should be honored that the DM is delaying the writing of his novel to run this campaign for them.

Let it be known that the DM slyly made Tunnels & Trolls the campaign's rules system and is forcing the players to use it. He only plays RPGs from the 1970s and he rebels against mainstream things such as D&D. When everyone sees how awesome T&T is, they'll realize how awesome the DM is.

Lastly, the DM will get angry if the players don't participate regularly. He feels the campaign should be their top priority. When the DM sends a note to a player inquiring about their laziness, it should not be thought of as a friendly reminder. He's calling the player out and trying to make them look bad.

The Legion of the Incarnate Destiny of the Red Moon Goddess

The expedition of Lewis & Clark was called the Corps of Discovery, so I tried to come up with something similar for the title of the Balazar expedition and the campaign wiki. Various combinations of the synonyms of "corps" and "discovery" failed to produce anything that sounded good to me. So then I riffed off of the idea of "Manifest Destiny" to come up with the Emperor's official title for the expedition:

The Legion of the Incarnate Destiny of the Red Moon Goddess

The Lunar military has a more utilitarian name for it: The East Legion. This shorter name also works better for the URL of the wiki:

The East Legion

I put links on the wiki to the posts on this blog that concern the campaign. In the near future I'll add a section about "what the characters know" to provide more context for helping the players decide the expedition's mission plan. Then I'll add a section where PC info can be placed.

More than anything, I just wanted to post this painting. It synthesizes perfectly the mood and themes of the campaign's inspirations: gritty and austere, yet colorful and wondrous.