Cygnia

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We were SUPPOSED to fight a Big Bad last night. I say "supposed to" as 2 weeks ago (real time) we arrived in a little village under a curse. For eighteen years, the townsfolk can't leave the village/cross a certain border, else a monstrous wolf creature will hunt them down -- and if anyone successfully escapes out of the forest, said wolf will kill 3 villagers per escapee. So, the village is now made up of more elderly folk who would not be able to cross the border in time (GM Hubby: "No, you don't have enough room to just put them all in your cart" *sighs*). 2 of the PCs earlier met a ghost who had been killed by said wolf creature and would like to be put to his final rest. Plus, this town might have a lead about some ruins the Explorers are supposed to be looking for in the form of the very odd statue in the middle of town that's older than the village itself. Leads! Plot hooks! Advancement galore, right?! Jack of all trades PC instead wants to hear all the life stories of these villagers! And set traps for small game to help gather food. Nevermind the fact the villagers have been doing this for nearly 20 years themselves. Noble PC wants to bunk up and read the Stupid Book (aka the Book that's more important than the 3 murdered NPCs). Nevermind the fact that the page that has Info has been sliced out already -- and she knows this. I at least convince her to take rubbings of the inscription of the statue. Bodyguard PC wants to set up defenses around the town. Again, Nevermind the fact the villagers have been doing this for nearly 20 years themselves. I search the residence where the ghost stayed before his final hunt, find a locket left behind, then ask what if anything the villagers know about this dead man -- who tell me which direction he headed off to way back when. Hubby's frustration is seething. I decide to go in said direction in order to find clues and Bodyguard PC deigns to come with me. Other 2 PCs insist upon staying, so we can only really blaze a trail for a while rather than set up for The Fight (because the hubby wants us all there). Last night! Noble, Bodyguard and me are ready to head back into this bog! Jack of all trades AGAIN wants to STAY IN TOWN to listen to all the villager stories, all the while not so subtly goading Hubby GM into activating his Hubris in order to go with the rest of us. And then insists on bringing the Stupid Book with him. Even AFTER GM has point blank said "There's nothing useful in it -- What you need is in the missing page Scoundrel NPC took." Going through this crummy bog, Jack loses the Stupid Book in the mud after a poor roll and it falls out. It takes him a while to realize this. Meanwhile, the rest of us find an interesting dead tree that's the final resting place of the ghost and-- Jack INSISTS on wandering off to FIND the Stupid Book. Nevermind the muck and bugs and wet and ick! He throws all his drama dice into FINDING THE BOOK. OK, the rest of us are at the tree, find the dead guy's remains, GM begins to have the ghost speak-- Only to be cut off by the Noble PC who is complaining about how she doesn't understand her knacks and skillsets and how useless they seem to be and-- I am FEELING the tension in my husband. And it's in me too by now as my PC is trying to hear the ghost's advice on how to hopefully kill the wolf monster and has been tasked in returning the locket to his lost love and-- More OOC comments and irrelevant questions and Jack channeling Arnold from Predator with all the damn mud. The Stupid Book is now caked and saturated by the mud, rendering it practically unreadable. (And afterwards, I warn hubby that the rest of the PCs would probably look forward to returning this destroyed book to the guy they don't like regardless of the consequences/throw all the shiny math rocks they can into mitigating any potential reputation damage. He says there's no way that's gonna happen). By now it's 20 minutes to our closing time, so I suggest we at least set up some fires to help see in the dark and to at least try to set up some assemblance of an attack plan before logging off for the night? It takes all 20 minutes to agree on where to put the fires. Hubby is mentally checking out at this point. He's promising to at least deal with my backstory in the coming weeks, but he's just giving the rest of the group the barest minimum. 😕

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