NWO Grand Tribunal

[westernind]

What was Nodjmet up to?
I started by writing a few paragraphs about what it felt like, then re-read them and deleted because it looked so damn pretentious. I hate pretentious, and the thing is, I don't do creative writing so it's difficult to get over what I mean without heading there. Usually easier to stick to factual accounts and save the telling of stories for face to face, when people can read all the other channels apart from the words, and see that you mean it instead of putting on a mask. I can't write that way because my mind works in parallel, and mostly in feelings and images. In order to get that down on paper it needs stuffing into a funnel so a single stream comes out, then translating into language. There's plenty of language to choose from but it seems so restrictive when by touching someone you can get so much more.

I'll try to stick to facts.

I Had A Little List
First time I read the 29 page character brief, with about 55 footnotes, written in a style that was.. shall we say, less than transparent, I went into semi-shock as scarylady can attest. However, after some considerable effort and a heap of questions to Pete Wright, I eventually understood the main game plan.

1. Back in the dawn of time there was a Bad Sorceror called Malygris


2. He had been responsible, in successive incarnations, every time a civilisation fell


3. This ancient Nephilim's back, he's bad, and this time he's split himself into eight parts which are hidden in the souls of magi


4. He's calling the Hellstar - the Black Sun - straight towards us.


5. My task: identify the soul fragments, stick them back together, and throw him out of existence before this Apocalypse happened, or any of the other ones his soul-fragment hosts were planning.

I've missed out a lot of complications:

• the system of Great Wards that seal the world against the outer magics (and the Black Sun), in the shape of the constellation of Osiris (Orion), had been damaged by Philip the Black when he dammed the Nile, and subsequently broken by the Templars giving Christian burial to Ababwa, the Voice of the Nile


• trying to make sure that suspect magi weren't executed or otherwise offed before I got a chance to do the ritual (I was spitting when Narsis went down).


• all the reasoning as to how and why the magic worked; it's a tribute to the writers but especially Pete Wright that the theoretical edifice was pretty much bulletproof. It has to be in order for players to be able to extend and extrapolate.
  
• there were maybe 120 magi, most with hidden secrets, I had to nominate 8, and it had to be mostly right.


• apart from the True Name ('Malygris' - borne by the Monitor Internal) there was nothing concrete to go on. Only hints and tropes, signs, portents and tendencies. Red things, snakes, serpents, crawling things, phrases that might or might not be applicable ("a cold, crystalline intelligence", "a meddling malevolence")


• and no second chances. Only enough vis for one go (I used ninety pawns in the end!), and no way of telling beforehand whether my Little List had the right names on it.

In hindsight, you kick yourself for not spotting what is now obvious. Urizen, for instance; how could I have not realised he was up to extreme naughtiness? (Possibly, because I didn't see him around before Saturday afternoon and by then I'd already cycled through the roster of magi a couple of times. He just slipped through the net.) And poor old Vetessian the Black. He got fingered because he displayed so many of the attributes I was searching for, including an attraction to Sarsis and an uncanny resemblance to Ming the Merciless) despite the fact that the snake tattoo on the back of his neck was on the player not the character.

However, some people I just knew had to be on the Little List, on no evidence apart from intuition. And - I feel that I'm probably boring you by now - it all worked out very well in the end, if somewhat confusingly for those who hadn't been involved.

Some things I remember
Lyssa constantly prodding me into action - she hunted in my pride.
Stratocanthus asking my advice. (Not that I had any to give at that point.)
Snarling at Philip the Black from inside his own ritual circle until he very politely asked me to face the centre.
Healing the little bugger after Tybalt blew him up. But only because I had seen his soul - he wasn't evil, he just suffered from Lack of Self-Esteem.
Recognising the stressed look on Iago's face, as the one that had been on Jarane's.
Discussing cross-dimensional magical theory with Sidi.
Being right about Katherin the Veiled - that one doesn't die easily. BTW I still don't know how she met her final end.
Declaring Wizard War on Martayne of Kent - by accident
Telling Isengaart that he was on my list because I could think of no-one else, and his quiet acceptance of possible death or loss of his heartbeast, in a higher cause.
Hearing of Rederis reporting his own murder to Jarane. J: "Who was murdered?" R: "Me." J: "That'll be Divis Mal's responsibility."
Penan being (ir)responsible - again
Luca's sad look, borne down by the weight of responsibility
al Ma'Sir's book, after time-out; "stop biting cats stop biting cats stop biting cats"
Remigius, a very nice man whose ankles I wanted to furrily weave around.
Rrrrrrhodrrrri and Aneurin, portal-fixers and pride members.
Being right about Ferrault, even though I didn't know why.
Wanting to lump Sheikh Ali for his impenetrable pigheaded certainty about the divine. Not as much as I wanted to claw Michael Kanainainos though - couldn't even face talking to that one.
The pipes, the pipes! waaaaaaaiiiil!
A weeping Urizen appearing at my feet, totally unexpectedly
Getting a motion passed at Tribunal - virtually unanimously - that Jarane would have thoroughly approved of
Being believed. Not easy as a Criamon. It helped to have Pictures and Diagrams.
After the danger was mostly passed and even though she was self-appointed, Nodjmet got to be the Cat in the Prima's Hat.

I love playing Criamon magi, and Nodjmet was wonderful.