Onto a slow start with Ultraviolet Grasslands 2e.
Following on from the RPG Intro and Char Gen.
UVG solo - intro | start | partway | finish | all season 3 | all rolling solo
Disclosure - I'm a DriveThru RPG affiliate
Starting with Ultraviolet Grasslands
ultraviolet intro | solo tools | chars | threads & extras
Adding to initial intro of Ultraviolet Grasslands.
So UVG is a hard game to get into, in the same way as solo rpgs are hard to get into. There are many ways to play it and there's no real road map to follow.
The rules and systems for UVG are scattered all around the book. It's fairly easy to find the individual elements such as chargen, equipment, monsters and starting caravans.
It's just putting them together that isn't so easy.
Quite often the second part of my Rolling Solo experiences are figuring out how things work and go together, especially with games such as Ironsworn, Apothecaria, Electric Bastionland and Scum & Villainy.
UVG has been the most challenging so far, not helped by distractions of Dolmenwood and Stonehell! I'm fine with the space-fantasy part (from Troika or Electric Bastionland) and UVG as described as an Oregon Trail game, so I had to look up what that was.
I managed to get the ball rolling, went through a cycle of the Inner Cover Flowchart and things got clearer. Figured out that it's straightforward d20 game and that my game will (most probably) revolve around Jai trying to find his big game monster.
I'm also trying to find some resources and advice for running UVG, especially solo.
Solo Tools - A Mix
ultraviolet intro | solo tools | chars | threads & extras
Following on from Solo Tools notes.
I haven't got to playing that much so haven't needed many solo tools yet!
I rolled on a random starter situation (from my own table), got, "family argument in a port", then picked a "port" for them and ended up at Glass Bridge. Then I followed the flowchart at the start of the book for a week at a destination.
Now I hope to get to make my deck of strange cards! But not much more to report.
Adventures of the Tomato Trading Trust
ultraviolet intro | solo tools | chars | threads & extras
The viewpoint character is Jai Ping-Noon.
Scene 1 - Another Bridge
We met in the visitor camps around the Spectrum Palace, and somehow our patron put us together to form the Tomato Trading Trust. Muria per Cupa is a hard worker and I'd trust her if I needed a bio-mechanic. Ouestin is a lazy aristocrat out for wine, women and himself. His mechanic friend is solid though. We've somehow made it a few weeks to Glass Bridge and Three Sticks Lake, stopping at Red Bear Village. And we're nearer to the great beast I hunt, and the dreams grow stronger...
Jai, Muria and Oestin are in basic accommodation in Red Bear Village, watching a family argument rage around them.
It resolves itself as the family who run their "hostel" agree to buy all of the wine from the Tomato Trading Trust (TTT). In return they want the group to take a box to Skybridge via a ferry. The family promise the rest of the payment when the group are ready to leave.
The group accept the proposal. Jai is keen to see Skybridge and Oestin loves dealing in wines.
They learn that the ferry is an old aquatic golem made of iron. They agree among themselves to stay in fairly cheap lodgings for a week here.
Scene 2 - A Week in Red Bear Village
I didn't tell my companions directly, but I'm especially keen to go to Skybridge. Some nights I'm having visions of the great worm of writhing metal that I hunt. In one of these it wrapped itself around a bridge in the sky. I grow closer to it.
The group pass a week in Red Bear Village, before the trials that lay ahead.
(I went through the flowchart on the inside cover of my book. It covers what to do each week in Ultraviolet Grasslands in Camp, Journey and Wilderness)
Ouestin goes carousing after borrowing a little from Muria. He quickly runs out of money but somehow makes a success of it, accepted by the locals and adopted by the Clan of Public Relations. They love his wine and give him a tour of the skyscraper. (XP)
Jai spends most of the week in the markets, selling beets of the groups for good money, then buying back beets later in the week at a lower price.
Muria talks among travellers and locals, hearing about the Blue Gate, a metal edifice of ancient times. She goes to have a look at it on her own, oblivious and untouched to any dangers. She admires the old structure atop a red a green mountain and gets talking to a ghost. Muria listens to everyone, and the ghost tells her of journeys from far away, but specifically of a plain of High Horse Steppes, which she visits for the last couple days at the village.
Toward the end of the week all three go out to Glass Bridge to have a look at it, paying the nomads their tolls.
The Clan of Public Relations gathers to see them off on the Skybridge Golem Ferry. Their money for the wines awaits them too.
(Extra Days - Extra Days - 1 +3 for Golem Trip)
Next Expected Scene - Positive Event on Skybridge Golem Ferry
Character and Notes
Jai Ping-Noon
A tall hunter from a powerful family, driven to find the creature that haunts her dreams.
Exiled bluelander noble big game hunter (f) - compulsion after meeting a seer. Nemesis - Ranalo Xerive, owed €20 by Muria.
STR 0, END 0, AGI 3, CHA 2, AUR 0, THO 2, Life 8, level 1 (400 xp), DEF 15/17
Skills - shooting +6, leadership +3
Gear - €11, ivory set of Zu Complex ignition tables, ballistic linen suit (AR 2, light), steplander composite bow (d8, medium+ range), spear (1d6/1d8), shield.
Muria per Cupa
A determined healer who bears the sign of the Shield. She and her cult seek allies for a revolution...
Secret azure cult bio-mechanic (f), seeking allies for a revolution, bears a sign of the Fast Stars - A Shield that glows when exposed to radiation.
STR 0, END 2, AGI 1, CHA 0, AUR 3, THO 1, Life 8, level 1 (575 xp), DEF 11
Skills - healing +6, stir up a crowd +3
Gear - €20, yellow cape of pure steel silk, medikit, knife (1d4)
Ouestin Haus
An opportunist from old money who studied surgery at a famous college. Attracts people but cares little for them, instead seeking gratification and fortune.
Redland vintner aristocrat surgeon (m), sheer industrial greed, loyal friend (taciturn mechanic who fixes nearly anything)
STR 0, END 0, AGI 1, CHA 3, AUR 1, THO 2, Life 8, level 1 (550 xp), DEF 14
Skills - surgeon +3, carousing +3, wines +3.
Gear - €0, four brassy cogs from a soul mill, pro-hiker kit, crossbow (1d8, reload 20), scale shirt
Caravan (Tomato Trading Trust)
- 3 two-wheeled carts
- 2 donkeys (Greeny - begs for food, Ruby - red-tailed donkey), 2 mules (Reddy - can bark like a dog, Bluey - has a rag doll), 1 goatelope (Jet - longbearded goatelope), 1 loper bird (Puce - loves apples)
- 6 sacks of supplies
- Trade goods - marrow-beets (2 sacks), second-hand pulp literature from the Rainbowlands (3 sacks), vampire wines (3 sacks)
- A debt owed to Banner (their Patron)
- Symbol of three tomatoes.
Threads and Extras
ultraviolet intro | solo tools | chars | threads & extras
Updated from original thread and extras.
Threads
- Hunt the monster Jai saw in a vision - A metallic wormlike vech - ☑☐☐☐
- Avoid Ranalo Xerive
- What is the revolution Muria seeks allies for?
- What is the opportunity that brings Ouestin out here?
- Pay back debt of €6000 in a year to patron
Extras
- Azure Cult - Muria is a member
- Banner - patron of TTT caravan. Academic high priest, wants to create a dynasty, part of a collective temple hive, opposed by occultist imperialists, turns into a felinoid in sunlight. Actually backed by Oranjist biomantic-pharmaceutical conglomerate hoping to benefit from useful and efficient food sources, who can send along help.
- Occultist Imperialists - foes of Banner.
- Ranalo Xerive - nemesis of Jai, very talented musician - absolute ass
- Torron Valpin (mechanic) friend of Ouestin, fixes nearly anything, taciturn
- The Clan of Public Relations of Red Bear Village - adopted Ouestin.
Finishing Up
Let's see if they survive their first escapade. And if their rival turns up...
