I still have a conclusion to submit from our Shiver adventure that we played some time ago. This was the first quest I made up for Shiver myself, the previous sessions I ran were with official adventures. For me there were also a few new insights as a game master.
Game master:
Kyoshiro Kami
Players:
- Stefan as Friedrich von Wallheim, noble hunter
- PeBaJu as Goderich, sniper
- Patriks as Ulrich the Eager, priest
- Scarab as Walther von der Ulme, tinkerer
After my printed tome finally found its way to me, of course I had to read it again. And that’s exactly where I got a lot of ideas for adventures. During the weapons chapter I had scenes from Van Helsing in mind and I wanted my adventure to be in that style. I looked for a few suitable opponents from the book and adapted them, and prepared four characters.
The adventure led the four “heroes” to the Bohemian Forest in the 18th century, where a baron had stopped paying taxes for a long time. Since his relative is an important member of the Church, the investigation had to be done discreetly and our group was dispatched. I initially led the players on the wrong track and one or the other must have thought that werewolves were haunting the forest. Instead, the baron used his small town for magical experiments and was ultimately hunted down by our heroes.
The session was a lot of fun and the majority liked the system very much. Some weren’t quite sure yet, but when it came to the fun of the game, everyone agreed. There was also a lot of use made of special skills and the strengths and weaknesses of the characters, which I found very good. I also have to commend my group for their eye (or actually ear) for the detail, because they paid very close attention to the clues and then asked the right questions. For example, I described damage to the wall of a house and they concluded that the monster had not broken into a house, but that the damage had come from the inside.
However, I also saw during the adventure that my time management wasn’t ideal. It took us quite a long time to introduce the characters and the system. There were a lot of questions (mainly out of interest) and as a result the time at the end of the adventure was a bit tight. After an initial confrontation, we actually got straight to the final; I had a couple of other battles and monsters prepared. That was a pity. I’ll have to prepare a little better next time. Nevertheless, it’s nice to see that I can learn something as a game master again.
I really like Shiver and because of the flexibility, you can experience a lot of different adventures and worlds with it. As for archetypes, I would like to see a bit more abilities to select, but that’s whining at a very high level and soon the Kickstarter for Shiver’s first expansion, where you can play monsters as archetypes, will start. I’m really looking forward to it.
Dice Adventurer 