Touched by Darkness - GenCon 2025

Role: The Prisoner
GenCon 2025, Saturday Afternoon

The premise of the game is that it takes place in a fantasy town under seige by the forces of darkness, cutting them off from the outside. We must maintain our suppliers and perform arcane rituals to fight off the dark, while traitors among our midst work against us for the Dark One.

My first time as a solo role ever!

I started the game in Doompit prison. I knew I was the rightful heir to the empire, and my prescribed ambitions were to gain power and gather allies. Shout out to Kraig and Kris, the shadetouched wardens of thr prison, who were wonderful wardens and repeatedly asked if there was anything they could do to make my lot easier.

I got multiple visits from other players, including a shady cult, the alchemists guild, and the leader of the druids. They and the town criers - who were one of the best media teams I've ever seen in my games - all wanted to know my story, and they also wanted to know how they could help me.

I was summoned to the council on the first day and explained my cause, presenting my signet ring to lend credence to my cause. Mechanically, the signet ring is a card that i could use to get access to the council and force a vote for if i should be given a voting seat. That's it.

The next day, I was brought before the council again, but my signet ring was confiscated before they finally released me, and the motion for my entry to the council tabled.

This theft of the ring would derail a significant chunk of the game for several players.

Freed, I began making in-roads with the druids, the alchemists, and the luminaries (light priests) as much as possible. Most of the luminaries liked me except for their leader, who distrusted me and the leader of the druids. The leader of the druids ESPECIALLY wanted to enable anything I wanted to do.

This was because the leader of the druids was a traitor, btw. He thought I was one too, since I was causing so much political unrest, and wanted to enable it. I am, if anything, a stooge.

Things were looking good, but I still didn't know where my ring was, and this theft was reported on by the news. One of the journalists initiated an inquest to it that he provide updates on over several nights.

Unknown to me, the ring had been given to the sherrif by the regent, who assumed it was a dark artifact. The regent told him to "make it disappear", and the sherrif hid it in his wine cellar.

I was approached by the mayor of the wealthiest neighborhood in the city, Cleavesburg. The Mayor disliked the regent, and wanted to raise me up as a religious figurehead as the new regent, by utilizing my heritage and his own dirty schemes. I accepted his plan, willing to use any means necessary to get power.

The mayor removed key anti-Me members from the council during voting, and his councilman forced through a No Confidence vote in the current Regent, who ran the council minigame as a player. An interim regent was named (not me!).

Meanwhile, somewhere around this time he ring continued to be a subject of gossip, and it was stolen from the cellar of the sherrif by the Peddler, another solo role without a team who primarily functioned as a traveling trader. Apparently, this was at the behest of the alchemists?

I asked the GMs if I could perform an blood ritual to locate the ring, and they said yes: but only if I find a mage willing to help.

The sherrif, for his part, provided the investigative journalist with a fake ring for inspection. This journalist and others have been constantly talking with me, at least once or twice a round!

Again, the ring has NO real power beyond allowing me to force the vote of giving me power on the council. Thats it.

Dinner break!

After dinner, working with the mayor, my friends the druids, and the alchemists, we staged a fake "holy benediction" to support my bid for power.

While flashy, this ended up getting debunked pretty quickly by... someone? And I'm pretty sure it torpedoes my bid for the council. Select other players of the game insist on referring to me as the "true regent" or "emperor" for the rest of the game.

By the way, this ENTIRE time: there are nigh constant attacks by supernatural forces coming down onto the city, other teams buzzing around trying to maintain their supplies of food and their defenses, and so, so many other schemes.

I ran afoul of one of these schemes when I have my druid "friend" perform the ritual to locate my lost, basically useless ring. As he is being taken away by a GM to tell him what the ritual tells him, the local military arrives to arrest him upon suspicion of his (very real) treachery. The druid leader tells me the truth before he had to fight off the attackers: that it was in the wine cellar barrels. (Again, he thought I was a traitor, and he thinks the ring is important. Oops!)

The mayor who supported my bid is also arrested, and without him, his town (already low on morale thanks to our fuckery) comes dangerously close to being destroyed, and needs prodigious amounts of supplies to avoid being destroyed in the last roll of the game. I ask the media team to help broadcast their needs, and the entire game comes together to get them what they need. The mayor is eventually released as well - not sure how that happened.

The ring, by the way, is found finally by the efforts of the town criers who confirm its validity - but the military seizes it, and the ring is finally taken off the board, much to the relief of the criers.

The leader of the druids and two other suspected traitors are brought to trial in the court while I run around begging for water. I reject my imperial heritage, and accept the town criers' kind offer to join them in the game's epilogue. The druid leader chooses trial by combat against his nemesis - who I've never met or talked to.

The ring is still useless.

One of the best gaming experiences I've ever had.

- Josh Good

Touched by Darkness - GenCon 2025

Role: Warden of Doompit Prison
GenCon 2025, Saturday Afternoon

I was not prepared for the riots at all. I had been sending out the prison labor to help bring in food & water and the resource hunt was occupying my time as no one seemed close to coming to the prison based on the jail flow so I was in a little bit of a lull for the location itself. In my personal what should I have done differently I should have at least interacted with the regency, sheriff, and Obsidians just to keep abreast of potential issues, I didn't interact with those people at all. Oh and on top of that one of the guardhouses was down due to a riot a couple rounds previous due to my terrible rolls (I rolled terribly all game).

And then all of the sudden a bunch of people started showing up and I was trying to figure out who was being jailed by who and who should be there and who should be out.

And right about when I felt like I was getting my footing on the situation Chris put a riot down. And not long after that he put another one down.

Friends, I would like to come here and say that my mind rationally and quickly worked through the situation but that would be a bald face lie. I went "oh shit oh fuck" and blanked for a second and then tried to figure out how to work the problem. I had no knights to clear the riots. I didn't see my teammate for the first little bit, certainly possible he was at the table and I just missed him.

Another riot came down and I was getting really worried. In my head I thought if I could calm down the player prisoners I could calm down the riots but I also didn't feel like I could do two things at once. Someone, no idea who, showed up with a knight which I placed on a riot but couldn't clear it. A random infantry token appeared (after everyone had gone I realized I should have asked if they could be used on the riots). Two more knights appeared from the Obsidians? I finally roll OK and clear one riot. Ritual happen which I was not in on causing damage to the prison. Last riot (I think) comes out and I got nothing left. At this point I figure my only play was to calm the player prisoners down since there was literally nothing left to do at that point. I figure out that they had not been tried yet and I confirmation that they would still receive a trial and not just be sent to the prison forever which seemed to work? Or at least everyone had sympathy on me and let it work. And then everyone left my prison and I sat down and just caught my breath. And all of that was like 3 minutes? 4?

10/10 first time player experience and I’m looking forward to doing these again next year.

- Kraig