When everything falls into place...

Lads,
This campaign has influenced every one of us in ways that are difficult to explain. I think for a lot of you your characters are in a way going through what you as individuals are going through in the outside world. I was chatting to Nurit today and realised that strangely, or maybe not so strangely, the case is the same with me.
Remember how bad DeLight felt before the raid on Armand's mansion? I was feeling the same way this week. Some of you noticed that DeLight was removed from the storyline just at the same time when Eli started the 'guidance' debate and we decided to 'reduce the degree of guidance'. No more guiding light.
The truth is I'm going through the same thing DeLight is going through. He has tapped into some force, something all-encompasing, and he gets visions of what's to come. He has a feeling about how things are going to come together in the end. But being the industrious person he is, he finds it hard to believe in the Light. He feels that he has to make his visions come true and he rarely trusts anyone or anything to do it for him. He doesn't trust the Light. Right now this has gotten him stuck firmly in the ground with no way out. All he can do is sit it out and think about it.
I'm much the same. I have visions of how the campaign would resolve, of how things come together in the end. I have certain insights about it I can't explain. But the problem so far was that like DeLight, I didn't trust anyone but myself to take us there. As this campaign became more and more important something in me began to fear the possibility it won't come out right and so I tried to do everything in my power to make it happen the way I've seen it in these visions.
Now I see I misinterpreted these visions. It's time for me, and DeLight, to start believing more deeply in this force that puts everything into place - and to trust you. I see now there is not one storyteller but four storytellers, four players, who are weaving this story. You play your characters; I play the World. But there is something greater than the sum of us four, some sort of synergy that is driving us forward, towards the unknown destiny that we see only in dreams.

- The Storyteller.

Confused about how to proceed...

The last meeting was a bit confusing for me. I tried to make the adventure as open to change as possible and during the game I tried to avoid from manipulating or guiding your actions and choices. From what I understand most of you enjoyed the game, no? Well, there were a few points that bothered me. First, I felt a lot of the time you were running around in circles without a lead. Second, I felt that a lot of the campaign built-up potential was blown out all at once on scenes that potentially could be more fun or more dramatic. As a result of some of these 'premature ejaculations' my overview of the campaign is a bit messed up.
I'm in a dillema about how to continue with the campaign:
On one hand I feel like some of the best climaxes are a result of storyplanning and direction.
On the other hand I realise you enjoy this freedom. I also know that in a way we cannot go back to what it was before. However I'm not sure I can make the story come out as great as it did (in my eyes) until now... but I suppose the only thing better than perfect is... free :-)
Looking forward to you comments (Hebrew or English, doesn't matter).

Issue #1: The Shanty House

Black Bill (under the Watcher's guidance) investigates a missing persons case; Tom, altering himself to look like a federal agent, also appears at the missing teenager's house; Bill follows Tom into an alley, where they interfere with a CoT ritual; they meet Declan DeLight, who mistakes Solidream for the baddie; later they discover the leader of the ritual was initiated by Jericho Jackson; Richard Hughes hears thugs intimidating a shopkeeper to give them info about DeLight; he meets Melody Paine, a teenager who works in the shop and is into CoT; later he follows DeLight in the Tangle and they exchange words; DeLight invites the Bill and Tom to his loft and Hughes crashes the party; DeLight wants them to handle some of the mystical crime and occurrences which he doesn't get around to; they investigate CoT revealing a cop called Douglas McKee who is holding the procedures about the missing teenagers; The Watcher discovers McKee is a part of the Brotherhood, a group of corrupted cops he has a grudge for, and gives him a serious scare; through Bill's field work and Hughes' magic bug on Melody they discover there is a 'test' for the CoT teenager initiates that night in an abandoned train station; they three tackle the well-prepared teenagers in the station and eventually stop them from killing themselves, although the building is ruined, Hughes is severely wounded, and most of the kids flee after successfully lighting a green circle of fire on the clock tower.

Weaving the threads

Last but not least I had to put together the storylines which the heroes will deal with. They had to be ongoing and long so that there would be foreshadowing, investigations, climax and hopefully a vengeful return. The initial team consisted of Circle of Thorns, a storyline I partially ripped off the computer game City of Heroes about a cult which is actually a front for spirits who want to posses the cultists; Armand Ahmagi, a dangerous Persian-French master conjurer, alchemist, and spirit-binder who is has an illegal operation for acquiring more and more objects of mystical power; a collateral phenomenon sweeping over the city and causing a wave of unexplained various outbreaks and explosions of different descriptions, dreadfully nicknamed The Riot; a board of obscure mega-influential players who seem to be much more powerful than the heroes and advance an unknown agenda called The Truth; and a comic relief in the form of Tezcatlipoca, a failed Aztec God of Wrath who keeps coming up with another ridiculous plot to bring the world to an end. A long list of shorter storylines then followed, including the NPC's and villains the characters would meet.

Leading the heroes throughout most of the campaign is the character for which the campaign was originally created - Declan DeLight. DeLight is an archaeologist, a curator and Armand's archnemesis. He doesn't know much about mystics but he is the bearer of an indescribably important force - The Light - a green protective luminance that shines out from him in times of need. Connected to this light is a book DeLight obtained when he received his powers, an ancient manuscript of an unknown origin and culture, simply referred to as the Tome - an artifact Armand gravely desires.

That was it. The campaign was created. It was time to bring it all together…

Building the mystical world view

During the creation of Richard Hughes it became evident that if the player, Yiftach, is to play Hughes properly, he needs to understand how mysticism and the spirit world worked in our campaign. A good setting needs a backbone, and instead of a hodgepodge of mystical theories there had to be a hidden universal truth at work behind all those forces. Like in a comic book, eventually these things will be revealed but for now they created a part of the mystery.

Mysticism is the belief in realities beyond sensory perception, in forces that we do not perceive. In CoM these forces were called Spirits - essences of powers we see every day such as lust, disappointment, fire, ingenuity, ocean, fauna. These spirits exist in the spirit world, called the Otherworld but was given a different name by each ancient culture that explored it. This Otherworld is removed from our world and access to it is limited by the Myst - a barrier which obscures the effects of the spirits on our existence. In fact, our 'mundane' world is a result not of lack of spirit, but a densification of the Myst. As a result the effects of the spirits are less visible and life appears… grey. In CoM, this Myst is beginning to clear, allowing more primal, concentrated power into the world, creating superheroes, supervillians and super-phenomena. Ancient schools of mysticism are practiced once again; the lore of how to bind spiritual forces or how to manipulate the Myst is rediscovered. Individuals are born into the world who are not entirely human anymore, but incredible reincarnations of long forgotten mythical creatures such as the Fire Salamander. Life's forces are returning to the world - and they're starting at City of Myst.

Creating a City of Myst

After having established the style of the adventures we needed a city. Since we were using Hero System to represent the characters I acquired a copy of Vibora Bay - a Hero Games source book depicting an east-coast metropolis with a flare for the mystical. The book was mostly useful in saving me the actual city-planning work; almost none of its other contents were used. The technology level in the campaign was set to that of a typical superhero comic-book: extreme material engineering, energy barriers and magnetic field generators are all common, though they are only employed by those with a lot of money. As for the level of publicity the mystic end of things received it was agreed that it was sort of a modern society taboo - every citizen of Vibora Bay has witnessed a preternatural occurrence, most of them believe in realities beyond our senses, but very few discuss it openly. The fringe subcultures who do are treated just the way new-age followers are treated in modern society today.

Choosing how to tell this story

For the storyteller, there were a few things to work out before we could play.

First, the unique feel of the campaign - this strange superhero-mystical fusion - had to be implemented in some way. I found it very easy to stray into a horror\mystery genre game so I felt it was important to strengthen the comic-book atmosphere. The decision was made to create the adventures in 'magazine' form - each adventure spanning a few days in the city in which several storylines progress simultaneously. Typically, every adventure would include major progress in one storyline intermitted by multiply events from the other storylines. The characters move around in the city and have dedicated time for their personal lives and dealings. Of course some crossovers and major climaxes are always a treat. Before every meeting a teaser is sent to the players in the form of the comic book cover of this issue (i.e meeting). At the beginning of every game the players receive a copy of the VB Observer - the campaign city leading newspaper which includes reports about occurrences to investigate, major events in the city (later to become involved in the adventure), or the effects previous adventures had on the city.