This session is scheduled for 3 hours. It will be recorded with the consent of all players involved.
We’ll be playing Comrades, a game about revolution, taking place in a science fiction setting I’ve built. There’ll be a few tweaks to the base game to accommodate psychic powers and magical storytelling traditions that are important to the setting. Being able to attend each session is highly encouraged but not required. You must RSVP to each session you wish to attend.
We’ll be using the X-Card and Lines and Veils for safety, and the Gauntlet Inclusivity Policy will be in full effect.
CONTENT WARNING: Violence, discrimination (species-ism?), police brutality, and the sorts of things you’d expect in a revolution violently opposed or suppressed
2019-08-02T00:00:00Z → 2019-08-02T03:00:00ZSession 1
2019-08-09T00:00:00Z → 2019-08-09T03:00:00ZSession 2
2019-08-16T00:00:00Z → 2019-08-16T03:00:00ZSession 3
2019-08-23T00:00:00Z → 2019-08-23T03:00:00ZSession 4
2019-08-30T00:00:00Z → 2019-08-30T03:00:00ZSession 5
Setting Summary
Play takes place in the Federal Imperial Republic of Volstatt, a great interplanetary empire founded on noble ideals ignored and grand promises unfulfilled. The Republic is based on a strange mix of individual liberties, commercial obsession, and strategic abandonment that leaves four-fifths of its population in poverty, while most of the remaining fifth is used to defend the vast fortunes of the ultrawealthy.
The Republic is a nation filled with contradictions and divisions. It defends personal liberties to a fault but refuses to provide food for the hungry. It preaches meritocracy but has a tiered citizenship system that denies most people the right to vote. It rejects class but actively discourages intermarrying between citizenship tiers. It abhors laziness but has an incredibly powerful class of idle rentiers that’ve never worked a day in their lives.
But most significant of its divisions is between species. Centuries ago, humanity conquered this region of space from the Athi, a powerful alien species capable of hybridizing itself with other forms of life. When the Athi were defeated, they agreed to assimilate into human society and hybridized themselves with the human genome. Human/Athi hybrids, known as Semis, form the largest demographic segment of the Republic and act as a vast underclass at the bottom of the social ladder. The Republic uses inter-species tensions between the pure human Passives and the Semis to divide the working class and reduce their capacity to fight back.
But the people of the Republic have had enough. Unrest is mounting. New ideas are starting to spread like wildfire. Passive and Semi communities are beginning to realize they have more in common with each-other than with their corporate overlords. Even the Permanent citizens in the middle class are starting to realize they’ve been screwed over. The Republic rests on a mountain of gunpowder. All that’s needed is a spark.
The game will take place on a particular planet in the Republic called Campera. It’s an unusual place that experiences intense winters at the apoapsis of its eccentric orbit. It’s a more socially radical planet than most, with a higher percentage of Semis than the Republic at large. If the coming Revolution is to succeed anywhere, it will be on Campera. Yet the risk posed by the Apoaptic Night is immense. Could a society torn apart by conflict survive the months-long freeze that is fast approaching?