Difference between revisions of "Category:Tight Rope on a Spiders Web"

Region	South Central Region
Domain	TX-070-D - Houston, TX
VSS Type	Brand New
Venue Storyteller	Tight Rope on a Spiders Web VST	Click here to edit
Venue Storyteller's Email	[mailto:Tight Rope on a Spiders Web VST Email Tight Rope on a Spiders Web VST Email]	Click here to edit
Assistant Venue Storyteller(s)	Tight Rope on a Spiders Web AVST(s)	Click here to edit

VSS: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1tHn6dqIoL2n9lVdixrZGB77AqhTVX6bfRqnADUQdD94/edit?usp=sharing

Tight Rope on a Spider’s Web

Sept Type: None
Territory Boundaries: City of Houston (Beltway 8)
Theme: Walking a dangerous balance
Mood: Moral quandaries, pushing boundaries, paranoia
Theme Song: https://youtu.be/l_7SxoQW11g
Shard Caern Level: 0
Caern Totem: None

Traditional Setting Elements:

0 -Never Present, 1 -Rarely Present, 2 -Sometimes Present, 3 -Often Present, 4 -Usually Present, 5 -Always Present

Action (Combat and challenges): 4
Combat will happen very often. While your character doesn’t necessarily need to be combat-specced, it’s important for your own fun to have something you can contribute to a combat situation. This includes party buffs, antagonist debuffs, distractions, and escape plans.

Character Development (Personal dilemmas and choices): 5
This chronicle presents a significant number of moral quandaries that don’t have obvious or “correct” answers. Characters will be presented with hard choices that players may find challenging. Players are encouraged to complete the character development questionnaire so they can play true to the character and differentiate the character from themselves. (This will also assist in avoiding bleed.)

Darkness (PC Corruption): 2
While choices will be difficult, Garou and other shifters are expected to be focused on the greater good rather than personal gain.

Death (PC Death): 3
With the high level of danger in this chronicle, players should expect that their characters will die at some point during the chronicle. Remember that character death does NOT mean you have lost the game. A glorious death can often be the best ending for a character arc, and Galliards will sing of those sacrifices for many years.

Drama (Ceremony and grand story): 3
Gaia’s shifters are creatures of both earth and spirit. The spirit world is close, accessible, and important to characters’ daily lives. Spirits can provide significant assistance if propitiated through the appropriate rites and rituals. If not, they can become insurmountable barriers.

Intrigue (Politics and negotiation): 2
Players are encouraged to design characters that fit the setting created for this chronicle. While each character may have different ideas about how to achieve the overall goal of the local shifters, they should, at least publicly, be seen to agree with that goal.

Manners (Social etiquette and peer pressure): 2
One of the defining characteristics of Werewolf is that it is a largely cooperative game. Social disagreements should be resolved quickly with the use of the Staredown mechanic or by roleplaying the respect of the pack structure.

Mystery (Enigmas and investigation): 4
There will be ample opportunity for sneaksy characters to sneak. In a setting where our protagonists are fighting a war on two fronts, the ability to gather intel or end fights before they begin will be crucial.

Chronicle Teaser:
You've got to be closer to the edge than ever to win. That means sometimes you go over the edge, and I don't mean driving, either.
~Dale Earnhardt

VSS Description:

The song of the Weaver was on the rise, and the Glasswalkers of Houston were divided into two camps on how to deal with the rise of the Spider’s influence on the world. Most were still deeply tied to the Weaver’s Web, but a small contingent had begun to seek new ways to infuse technology with the energy of the Wyld instead of the Weaver.

In the Summer of 2012, they were vindicated in the most horrible way: the Weaver Sang and the world watched the majority of Glasswalkers and Kinfolk fall to the Spider’s call. They lost family, kin and shifter alike.

The years that followed saw a growing war on two fronts across the city of Houston. The Weaver launched attacks on the caern with waves of drones, and forces of the Wyrm took advantage of this chaos to press their advantage as well. With a large part of their members lost, the Sept of Dark Waters made the hard choice to uproot its shard seed and send it to somewhere it could be better protected, while those who could stayed to continue the fight.

It has been a long, wearying war for the scattered Gaians. The underground fighting has dragged on for control of the city: slowly, methodically, painstakingly pushing back the influences and forces of Weaver and Wyrm. The first major break in the local war was a massive ice storm in early 2021 that weakened the Weaver’s hold. Combined with attacks by Garou and their allies, the Shifters of Houston planted the seed that would grow into the need for expanded Green Tech - wind, solar, and hydro power, among other things.

It is only now that this scattered coalition have found the space to breathe, finally seeing the tide of that war turn ever so slightly and finding hope that it is a fight they might be able to win. Garou and Fera alike have lost loved ones in this war and it has brought them together in a way that would surprise many.

Characters on the Houston VSS at the beginning of our story - Feb 4, 2023 - have taken part in over a decade of guerrilla warfare against the Weaver and the Wyrm. A wiley Elder Bastet has managed to coordinate hundreds of physical attacks, sabotage, corporate espionage, carefully managed influences, and information wars from his personal territory in the city, and has a reputation for vanishing from sight and memory in a moment.

Members of the Gaian community in Houston form temporary war packs to accomplish short term goals, then vanish. They are tired, but battle-hardened. They have had to stay under the radar for ten long years while trying to quietly retake their city. The stream of visiting allies is constant, but the demands of this fighting style aren’t for everyone, and many disappear as quickly as they come. However, there is a kind of desperate hope that has sprung up since the destruction of the Weaver-controlled power grid of Texas. The multi-year campaign may have culminated during the 2021 ice storm, but the effects have taken the past two years to materialize in the form of what’s now a Wyld-controlled power grid. The time has come to take a new step forward.

Sept Laws:

Having lost their Caern, the shifters do not currently maintain a sept. They are only loosely organized into small, guerrilla fighting packs that dissolve and reform as the needs of the war change.

VSS Timeline

Storyteller Notes

Players in Houston should be respectful of our domain’s Cultural Norms:

1. Play like a storyteller. Do the thing that makes the best story rather than playing to "win."
2. Behave like an adult. This means: a) tell someone if they hurt your feelings; b) ask for help if you're lost or lonely; c) always act in the best interest of the group.
3. Effort in = awesome out. Personal effort and participation are both encouraged and rewarded. Make your cheat sheets. Fill out those backgrounds. Spend time on costuming. Ask for character ties. Be brave and enthusiastic and conscientious.
4. Share! Take on responsibilities. Spread the plot. Let specialists do their thing, and appreciate them for it. Be impressed by other characters!

VSS Specific Rules

Glasswalkers and Kinfolk have been written in the NSS to be particularly rare. If you want to play one of these concepts, you will need to justify why they weren’t lost to the Weaver over the past eleven years.

Players are highly encouraged to fill out the Character Development Questionnaire before playing their character.

Live Play/Virtual Play

This game will occur at live games at 1:00 PM on the first Saturday of each month at Midtown Bar & Grill.

CvC/PvP

The Sept of the Wyld Shift is fairly unified in its fight against the Weaver, but there will be a wide range of ideas about how to effect that fight, and how far the battle should be taken. These disagreements should be discussed and settled in character and may lead to staredowns and challenges. That being said, players should respect the desired play-style of their fellow players.

Proxies

Proxy actions should be cleared with the VST at least 2 days in advance (preferably more), including dates and methods of travel, aliases, and other relevant information. Proxying out of the domain is generally approved, though should not be used as a way to attempt to escape PvP or PvE in-character consequences.

CCR

This section defines Houston’s policy on Character Conflict Resolution (formerly known as Killboxes).

CCR and other aggressive proxies to this domain are unlikely to be approved by the VST. Similarly, summoning characters from this Venue in order to kill them is highly discouraged unless there has been a proper and, hopefully, voluntary lead-up to such an event. However, local players will not be protected against fallout from their own aggressive or negative actions.

Mass Combat

Mass combat will be played through rounds until the outcome becomes clear, and then mediated with appropriate consequences offered and accepted. Players are expected to be familiar with their sheets so that combat rounds move quickly and smoothly. Cheat sheets with descriptors of gifts and their mechanics are highly encouraged for each player.

One Minute Rule

-(Optional)- NOPE If the VST has a question about a rule, she’ll ask. If she makes a call you don’t agree with from a mechanical standpoint, you’ll need to just roll with it. This game is more about the role-play than the rules, and your participation in-character will count for more than how well you are playing to the dots.