Project Freedom DVD Commentary (?)

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Shock
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Re: Project Freedom DVD Commentary (?)

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Chapter 12 featured what I believe what was easily our biggest battle. It was just an outright brawl. It was also one of the more gruesome battles, with Charlie getting a face full of acid, Robin getting chewed and then tearing out Tsfardeia's tongue.

It was also the start of Robin's (new) troubles with the law, oddly to avoid the same thing she would have begged for only a few weeks of game time earlier. It was all about loss of control. In hindsight, it's obvious the meta-plot was to have her become the civilian contractor but living in the moment I didn't pick up on it. Picking up subtext is not one of my strengths. Looking back, I appreciate the effort and forethought required to do it though.

I particularly liked Mr Infamy's smarmy superiority. There was never a hint that he was anything but in complete control, even when he was turned down. Which led to one of Robin's lowest moments, when she caved and called him back. I never could figure out if Wainwright knew that or not but otherwise that's a secret I don't think Robin ever revealed.
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Arkrite
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Re: Project Freedom DVD Commentary (?)

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I remember thinking to myself: What's the most messed up and weird response Zane could have to seeing Mr Infamy?

"Dad? What are you doing here?"
The second option was to hint that Zane's powers could have been a result of Mr Infamy.

Neither were good options, but I was amused either way.
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Davies
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Re: Project Freedom DVD Commentary (?)

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Arkrite wrote: Sun Apr 16, 2017 6:27 am -The MGB continues to be both terrifying and depressing. Terrifying in that they keep trying to kill us (and are only held back by bad rolls) and depressing in hearing their stories and the fallout from their past. Still not sure who hired their assassin brethren, but I'd assume that since Robin was a target it was Mentor... though they did want Donnie too so who knows?
It was Midas, Mentor had no issues with Robin then as she hadn't met her yet.

:twisted:
Arkrite wrote: Sun Apr 16, 2017 6:27 am -The run in with our Time Traveling assistants. I remember being amused that some poor girl got stuck learning from Zane. I recall that Rachel had "fainted" after running into them and just going "wait, what?"
To this day I have no idea if that was planned that they had intentionally knocked out Rachel, or if the original idea was that she had fainted. Either way I just kind of loved watching Rachel interacting with her father.
It was a little of both, Elly knocked her out psychically but it was made easier by her shock at seeing Morphogenesis there.
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Davies
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Re: Project Freedom DVD Commentary (?)

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Chapter 13

June 21, 2010 to July 13, 2010

This was the "Annual" or "Summer Special" for Project Freedom, which explained all the crossovers. The biggest one was one that I didn't plan on -- ClassDunce had an unexpected absence, so I decided to have Charlie get taken out of this story in order to appear in a putative "Ultima" special that I outlined to CD by private message. So Charlie spent the morning of this day taking care of Ultiman children with the Golden Age Lady Liberty while the Ultiman adults were fighting Kreuzritter (the Silver Age Sentinels villain, not the guy who posts all those character conversions) and the ghost of Doctor Destroyer. Meanwhile, all of you were wondering what had happened to her. Well, now you know.

All of that was the prelude to the bowling alley expedition. Again, I relied on ClassDunce to design the area you would all be active in, and he came up with a pretty good one that didn't require a lot of extra NPCs. (If he'd gone with the earlier notion that this place had go-go dancers, I might have worked myself into a breakdown much sooner trying to come up with their backstories.) I wanted to bring as many people that Charlie might invite or show up on their own into it, so we had Seven, Johnny Rocket, Doctor Metropolis and (surprise, Zane!) Changeling, as well as Hercules and Ultimaid.

I think I handled Hercules' conversation with Robin about his family a bit ham-handedly. But I had the feeling she was tired of 'don't be so quick to grow up' speeches, so I gave her a 'do you really want to be me' one instead. The conversation with Zalman worked out pretty much like I planned, though. Meanwhile, Changeling was allowed to show off that she's not just little miss sweetness and light. (For those curious, she wasn't motivated by jealousy at all -- that's another thing, like property, that she doesn't really understand.) I also featured the cast of Freedom Panic in a 'counting chickens before they hatch' crossover.

The karaoke worked out way better that I expected, all of you took a turn and it was brilliant. Oh. Almost all. I don't remember a single post that Arthur Eld made during all of this. :roll:

Oh, right. Before all of that, I gave Donnie a lot of focus in dealing with Duncan Summers, the first time I'd ever featured him as himself, and later with Keller and Toxic.
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Shock
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Re: Project Freedom DVD Commentary (?)

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Another fun chapter. I loved how Donnie went right back at Summers in their meeting. Probably half of the conversations at the party were telepathic. it was an epidemic by this point. The karaoke was fun. For the second chapter in a row, everyone mostly got along, aside from Zalman and Hercules. I liked Seven's and Changeling's appearances, especially the interplay between Changeling and Toxic. Zane probably still has heartburn from that conversation.

Aside from the duet with Hercules, not much went Robin's way. Wainwright refused to elaborate on whatever Robin's father was talking about with his preemptive denial in the previous chapter. My guess was it was something about his relationship with William Gannon being more than just business. The party itself, more along the lines of a family get together than her idea of a party, was yet another reminder that her life was never going back to the way it was. Plus she had to watch Charlie and the Commander get drunk while she stayed sober and had Hercules give her a "scared straight" kind of speech.

And looking back, it blows my mind that all this happened in the space of 3 weeks.
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Davies
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Re: Project Freedom DVD Commentary (?)

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Shock wrote: Mon Apr 17, 2017 2:50 pm Wainwright refused to elaborate on whatever Robin's father was talking about with his preemptive denial in the previous chapter. My guess was it was something about his relationship with William Gannon being more than just business.
That's what I was going for, and, on further reflection, I really should have come up with a better name for the guy. On the other hand, if I'd been a bit more on the ball, I'd have rolled with the initial misunderstanding and foreshadowed the hints about Robin's ex-boyfriend in a later chapter here; "what she said about Billy and me was lies" would have had a very different meaning.
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Davies
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Re: Project Freedom DVD Commentary (?)

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Chapter 14

July 19, 2010 to January 7, 2011

Six months. <long, loud exhalation> This, I think, is where things started to go seriously wrong. There's a joke about films inspired by the American Civil War, that they often attempt to present it in real time ... I'm not sure exactly how frequently I was posting, but a spot check reveals several times where there were days between posts, days when you were all left to your own devices. That, as much as anything, may explain why something that represented only a couple of days of game time took up so much real time.

I'd dropped hints about this adventure back during the VIPER attack, and had been waiting for the right opportunity to present it. The experience taught me the valuable lesson that you should never write your predictions of the PCs future activities into the past of the setting. I honestly tried to give Tuo-Fa a big fight scene like Charlie's, but he and Songbird evaded the set-up for it.

In case you're wondering what happened to the vampire, you also missed the opportunities to encounter him. I shouldn't have made that plot beat dependent on Charlie and Robin's successful Perception check. If they'd succeeded, they'd have noticed Mrs. Todd stealing away from the building, and if they'd followed her they'd have encountered the vampire as a distraction. In retrospect, I should have had him pass by the building during their surveillance and given them a second chance to detect that there was something odd about the fellow with no body temperature.

But there was a lot going on in this adventure already, with the Vigilance Committee and Balthasar and the Todds, and all of you dealing with the excellently executed visions of your past that you'd crafted. I can only hope I didn't play Zalman as too overbearing during Jalinth's temporary absence. I had fun implying a mild time paradox caused by Robin's singing America the Beautiful long before it was composed.

My biggest regret, though, is that I wasn't able to get you all to be present for the Gettysburg Address. (Ever since I saw a similar scene in the Time Beavers comic -- which I'm convinced existed, even though I can disturbingly find no evidence therof -- I've decided that something like that should feature in any time travel story.)
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Jalinth
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Re: Project Freedom DVD Commentary (?)

Post by Jalinth »

Being busy with Easter and various other things means I'm way behind on giving some commentary. I'll try to talk a little bit about some stuff once I get caught up.
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Arkrite
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Re: Project Freedom DVD Commentary (?)

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Davies wrote: Sun Apr 16, 2017 4:07 am Chapter 12
I'm... not catching up ;~)

I'll never be able to forget Charlie's reaction to the rather horrifying imagery in my description of the Terminus that I'd recycled from both previous "openings of the gate". It was unpredictable and yet totally in character for her
It just killed me. Zane goes down to face off against something he hated and dreaded to protect Charlie, that's how much he liked her, only for her to becompletely enamored with the portal.
And then Wainwright taunts him afterwards in the office to "lift his spirits" and totally not because it was just fun to watch him go into a tizzy ;~)
Yes, Zane, all you had to do was put everybody in radiation suits and the problem would have become completely trivial. (Also, this radiation was the cause of Wainwright's cancer.)
Well, that can't be right. Radiation gives superpowers, not cancer!
I brought back Agent Ritter to demonstrate the consequences of his choices during your last encounter and to lead you into one of the adventures that I'd teased in my World of Freedom 2.5 thread.
I always felt bad for Ritter. I mean, it seemed like his whole life was falling apart.
Also I wasn't sure if he'd been mind controlled, he was just falling the heck apart, or had completely lost his ever loving mind. I always meant to figure out what was going on with that but it got overshadowed by the events at the end of the session.

Also hope that catching all but one of the G'Tach helped his career. It certainly did little for his love life.


Also, so many oppertunities for Princess Bride quotes.
I was kind of surprised at McBride's last name, thinking it was a little shoehorned in. Imagine my surprise in learning that, no, it's a real last name that people have.
Silly, foolish me.
I apologize for not anticipating that some of you would find Tsfardeia sympathetic when you found out his backstory.


I was wondering if we were supposed to rescue him, especially after the revelation about the C and D teams.
It was pretty obvious that he wasn't amicable to that, though.

In another amusing note: Roommates!
Donnie and Zane, the only people who own nothing but paper and pens! ;~)


(Donnie would thus probably have ended up the new civilian head of Team B thanks to Wainwright's pardon.)


That might have been real interesting.

Considering the other fallout... I'm okay with how it turned out.

One thing that surprised me is that, even after being officially kicked out a leadership position, everybody kept turning to Zane.
I was sure everybody would turn back to Charlie.
I was shocked I didn't have Zane try to backpeddle away from the position of leadership... until I saw him fall apart at the very end. I didn't remember how badly that fight had been going for a few rounds, and how hurt people were during the fight. You can't keep people alive by running away.

In other news, we have a new Charlie doll: Vest Clubbing Charlie!

And now to try to catch up on the next chapter.
Shock
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Re: Project Freedom DVD Commentary (?)

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Arkrite wrote: Tue Apr 18, 2017 1:36 am ne thing that surprised me is that, even after being officially kicked out a leadership position, everybody kept turning to Zane.
I was sure everybody would turn back to Charlie.
Regardless of Bartleby's nonsense, Zane was still the leader by default since nobody had been named in his place. Good thing that was going to be rectified soon ;}
Shock
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Re: Project Freedom DVD Commentary (?)

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Davies wrote: Tue Apr 18, 2017 12:01 am Chapter 14

Six months. <long, loud exhalation> This, I think, is where things started to go seriously wrong.
I guess that depends on your idea of going wrong. We definitely slowed down and the adventure seemed a little disjointed. There seemed to be a lot of running around sort of aimlessly. Songbird and Wuxia made a lap around the city without accomplishing anything. Of course, I couldn't know at the time that we'd missed one chance at some action and circumvented another. At the time, it certainly didn't seem like an indication that anything was wrong with the game in general. I think you just tried to have too many balls in the air at a time.

I remember being confused that Robin's avoiding combat at the bridge somehow seemed to be a disappointment but I didn't know you had set that up for Tuo-Fa. I did like the bit about her somehow inspiring it's composing. And running into the young Francis Beaumont. I loved the conversation between Robin and Charlie on the roof. Just a classic, rambling back and forth. And the fight with the zombies was fun, since we had to be creative. One thing I think I would have liked was a little more emphasis on trying to hide our powers and get by in other ways.

I would have loved to get to witness the Gettysburg Address but I don't see how that would have happened with us going to Freedom City. It would have required us spending a lot more time in the past than we did. Which would have been OK if it was part of a bigger arc like the Belarus story but too much for a single adventure.
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Davies
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Re: Project Freedom DVD Commentary (?)

Post by Davies »

Apologies for no warning about last night's no-show; my building lost its wireless connection yesterday afternoon, and the problem has persisted. I'll hopefully find a way to make a post this evening, but I can't offer any guarantees.

In other news, W00t! There will be rules for halfling PCs in a forthcoming Adventurer, Conqueror, King rulebook!
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Shock
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Re: Project Freedom DVD Commentary (?)

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Davies wrote: Wed Apr 19, 2017 5:10 pm Apologies for no warning about last night's no-show; my building lost its wireless connection yesterday afternoon, and the problem has persisted. I'll hopefully find a way to make a post this evening, but I can't offer any guarantees.

In other news, W00t! There will be rules for halfling PCs in a forthcoming Adventurer, Conqueror, King rulebook!
No worries. I suspect at least a couple of us are happy for a chance to catch up a bit.
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Davies
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Re: Project Freedom DVD Commentary (?)

Post by Davies »

Okay, in that case, and considering how much there is to catch up ...

Let's see what happens.
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Arkrite
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Re: Project Freedom DVD Commentary (?)

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Davies wrote: Mon Apr 17, 2017 2:46 am Chapter 13
This is another one I remember fondly. While there wasn't much conflict going on, it was a great for character development.
Plus how many games can you think of that can get by on an entire session which is basically just a field trip where no combat happens?
I loved it!
Meanwhile, all of you were wondering what had happened to her. Well, now you know.
Upon rereading it I recall being infuriated by the wall that was set up and desiring greatly to tear it down.
I think finding nothing would have been better than finding that wall saying "buzz off", but then I don't think most of the team had any interest in the Ultiman besides Charlie, and she'd forgive almost anything.
I wanted to bring as many people that Charlie might invite or show up on their own into it, so we had Seven, Johnny Rocket, Doctor Metropolis and (surprise, Zane!) Changeling, as well as Hercules and Ultimaid.
I will admit I was surprised by Changeling's inclusion as I never expected her to make an appearance in the game.
The conversation with Zalman worked out pretty much like I planned, though.


Kind of glad Zalman handled that one, I think it would have turned out worse if it was Zane.
In fact I'm sure Zane would have goaded Herc into something.

Meanwhile, Changeling was allowed to show off that she's not just little miss sweetness and light.
(For those curious, she wasn't motivated by jealousy at all -- that's another thing, like property, that she doesn't really understand.)
Which is good. Zane loved Changeling, but he wasn't in love with her.
I never got a jealous vibe, but then I can only imagine what people who weren't privy to their silent conversations might have thought.

Then again I have to laugh at how often the entire team must of been just standing around silently in what must have seemed an awkward fashion to outsiders.
I was kind of surprised Joyce in the last one didn't comment on how quiet they were and how nobody was talking or making plans. I assumed Ritter had let her in on the psychic nonsense.

Speaking of Psychic Nonsense, after hearing the song including the line about being a vetern in the Psychic Wars I always wanted to refference that their might have been a missing year, at some point, where something like that happened and was "expunged" from history (and memory) after the events happened. Barring a few veterans of said war.
Sadly I never found a medium to use that idea.

I also featured the cast of Freedom Panic in a 'counting chickens before they hatch' crossover.
Oh, is that what that was. I was kind of waiting for the reveal on that later down the line... and then forgot about it ;~)
The karaoke worked out way better that I expected, all of you took a turn and it was brilliant.


Lots of good songs, I still laugh at Metropolis singing "Built this city".
Toxic got to sing one of my favorite songs (with one of my favorite music videos), and I totally stole somebody's idea for Bad Reputation.
I have no regrets ;~)
Well, one regret, and that's the fact I haven't gotten around to finding and listening to all the songs that were used in this session.
I don't remember a single post that Arthur Eld made during all of this.
He was there, and he did make some posts, but I don't recall him really interacting with anybody. I think he played pool with Savant and Donnie.
... And I JUST finished reading this section.
Hrm... I think he was the one who was following Savant?
He really faded in to the background.
Oh, right. Before all of that, I gave Donnie a lot of focus in dealing with Duncan Summers, the first time I'd ever featured him as himself, and later with Keller and Toxic.
That was a fun interaction between him and Duncan Summers. With Donnie not wanting to put up with Duncan's attitude, and Duncan being very black and white and Batman-esc.

Shock wrote: Tue Apr 18, 2017 1:48 amRegardless of Bartleby's nonsense, Zane was still the leader by default since nobody had been named in his place.
Which is to say that while everybody would have preferred Charlie, she didn't want the job either ;~)

You know, I forgot that Donnie was messing with Charlie's bowling game for laughs. That was funny.
Shock wrote: Mon Apr 17, 2017 2:50 pmI liked Seven's and Changeling's appearances, especially the interplay between Changeling and Toxic. Zane probably still has heartburn from that conversation.
Nothing like the two people you love the most in the world hating each other ;~)
I get the feeling that Rachel was a little concerned about her place in Zane's life upon meeting Changeling, though that quickly changed to just feeling like she wasn't liked very much.
Though she didn't fall back on her usual responses to people doing that, weather that was just Rachel growing as a person and not wanting to fight people over it, or just that she was trying not to make waves with Zane's friend...

I did like that Zane wasn't able to change Changeling's mind, but was able to talk her into giving Rachael a chance. How much of a chance, I don't know...

Was kind of surprised that Robin didn't drag Herc into a back room somewhere... *innocent whistle*

Upon rereading up to this point I've finally managed to figure out how I'd define Zane and Charlie. Their relationship reminds me of siblings. Often getting on each other's nerves, driving each other nuts, yelling and screaming... and then the next day running amuck with each other like nothing happened.
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