#ndl omake

[itsbenedict]

No Driver’s License: Omake 33.1

No Driver’s License is a Madoka Magica game I’m running for five players, using a homebrew of Yaruki Zero’s Magical Burst system. It follows five magical girls as they deal with an upheaval in the world’s magic system caused by some strange new three-eyed Incubators. They have to figure out what’s going on, who to trust, and how to put a stop to the cycle of despair.

I post session logs and omakes weekly sporadically, both as a reference for the players and for anyone who wants to follow along with the party’s misadventures.

[adventure log- read from the beginning]

[session 33]

Last time on No Driver’s License, the team got the big boss cannibal to witch out, which may or may not be a good thing. Plus, they defeated Sakura’s witch and revived her. Now with a tenuous alliance with Emiko, they’re ready to take on the witch Kagutsuchi. First, though, they’ve got to get their bearings, do some prep work, and confront the hazards of its barrier. And before they can do that, they need to deal with some Emotions.

So 33.1 (Sakura, Yukari, Ibara) is really just some of the players playing past the end of the last session and talking to each other about what just happened. Gonna be honest: this is my first time closely reading said omake, while I recap it, because I was busy at the time- apparently during the subsequent session, some stuff happened that contradicted the omake? We’ll see how that goes.

Sakura gets up to speed on the recent events re:witching, but has a pressing question about the girl who is presently crying in a corner.

(I think I failed to get it across in narration, but Nobody wasn’t so much A-OK as not saying anything out of general frozen panic re:how out of hand that got.)

Yukari’s answer to Ibara’s objection is, maybe, not exactly what Ibara wanted to hear.

Sakura comes down on Ibara’s side re: psychologically attacking people until they witch, ever again.

The argument proceeds until Yukari is forced to make herself sound like the most anime villain who ever anime villained:

Yukari continues to defend her decision to force-witch Honoka, which leads to a diversion in which it comes to light that Ibara is convinced that tsuchinoko real. Uh, I mean, sorry, it comes to light that Yukari has been hallucinating Oriori. Also the other thing, but that is just slightly less important.

Sakura’s skepticism here is warranted, because no, that’s not what Honoka did. Honoka took Yukari’s own memories of herself being kind and good at leadership and having a conscience and stuff, and shuffled things around so they were memories of Oriori- someone who didn’t exist- doing all that stuff. And then Kimiko told her that, which Yukari creatively misinterpreted for maximum feeling-sorry-for-herself.

Fun fact: magical auto-healing will heal actual damage, but unless you go out of your way to magically clean them, tar in your lungs will stay right where it is until it actually causes cancer for the magic to heal off. Gross!

She really, really is. She points out that they all really need therapists, which- y’know, fair point.

Yukari claims that Hekima confirmed all this- which, again, is Yukari’s creative misinterpretation of the facts- while Ibara tries to distract her by offering her a cigarette. No, Yukari! Resist the peer pressure!

Thankfully- though a bit late, as Sakura gives up on talking to these two delinquents- Yukari concludes that smoking is disgusting and throws the cigarette out the window, where Kagutsuchi’s rays flash-fry it in an instant.

And then... they get onto the subject of dating, and how it’s weird and confusing and bears further investigation. Ibara sort of casually-noncommittally offers to take her out to dinner.

With that Heart roll, Ibara manages to actually stick the landing, and... now it’s a date! Wow.

Sakura gets back just too late to squee over the romantic developments, and Ibara, failing to pick up on certain cues, offers Sakura a cigarette. It’s her last one!

Gomu Sakura: Protector of Sobriety and Decency, Somehow.

Anyway, to fulfill her duty of killing the mood deader than all of her family and friends, Yukari voices an idea:

Yes, definitely say that in expectation of your friends thinking that’s a good and clever idea.

After backing off on that plan- and talking about how many of their friends and allies need therapists (which is to say, all of them), particularly Tama-chan and Reiko, the tension is broken, and...

Well, there’s still some more catching up and planning and stuff to do next time, before they venture out into the sun. 

[itsbenedict]

No Driver’s License: Omakes 29.4-29.6

No Driver’s License is a Madoka Magica game I’m running for five players, using a homebrew of Yaruki Zero’s Magical Burst system. It follows five magical girls as they deal with an upheaval in the world’s magic system caused by some strange new three-eyed Incubators. They have to figure out what’s going on, who to trust, and how to put a stop to the cycle of despair.

I post session logs and omakes weekly sporadically, both as a reference for the players and for anyone who wants to follow along with the party’s misadventures.

[adventure log- read from the beginning]

[session 29]

Quick heads up- things are gonna be kind of wonky from here on out, on account of weird scheduling issues have made regular sessions infrequent, and omake side-sessions more frequent and plot-important. On top of that, the omakes kind of jump around the timeline, so... here, the omakes that were played later come chronologically before the ones played earlier, and those earlier ones are sort of big game-changers, so they’ll get their own post later.

Last time on No Driver’s License, the team defused a thorny situation at Denny’s, obtained a new ally, and were attacked by a mob of angry cats. This time... in 29.4, Sakura spies on the cannibals to get some intel about their powersets. In 29.5, nothing happens. Don’t worry about it. In 29.6, Ibara brings some food to Reiko, and finds an unexpected glimmer of hope.

29.4 (Sakura, Kimiko, Emiko)

So, Sakura wants some hard intel. They’ve got access to infinite mana to craft the magic items they’ll need to stop the cannibals, but in order to tailor their arsenal to the foe they’re facing, they need to know some more about what their enemy can do. To get that info, Sakura takes one of Makoto’s stealth amulets, and follows the cannibals after school.

Now- the Amulets of Somebody Else’s Problem only have their full effect when you are somebody else’s problem, and Sakura- as a member of the team that kidnapped Yoshe- isn’t somebody else’s problem. That said- both cannibals fail to roll high enough to notice her following them.

Sakura makes and passes some additional rolls to get in close without being noticed, thanks to Maurice, her familiar. She’s able to overhear what they’re talking about.

Sakura has no trouble taffying any witch familiars that make themselves a problem. From there, she’s able to get a decent view of Emiko as she fights the witch. The way this works is- she rolls Magic to get a sense for what Emiko’s abilities are doing. On an 11+, she succeeds and gets the exact ability description copy-pasted from the character sheet. On a 10 or less, she sees the ability in action, but doesn’t necessarily know all the specifics.

Farn helpfully compiled a google doc of everything Sakura learned from this fight:

After all this, Emiko finally manages to take down the witch... and Fumi-chan is there, to revive Kimiko.

Sakura... is having a lot of trouble keeping herself from just attacking right now, while they’re comparatively vulnerable. But... comparatively is comparatively, and if she tried anything, it’d probably go badly. She manages to hold back.

Kimiko’s back, and then... it’s Emiko’s turn to witch.

The witch this time is pretty standard- just a big giant knight in shining armor in the middle of a battlefield, for Kimiko to beat on. Here’s what Sakura manages to get on her from this fight:

And then... Emiko’s a seed, and Sakura has one more shot.

...Not feeling good, huh.

29.5 (???)

So... something happened, even though it didn���t. What didn’t happen... was probably the least fun thing that’s happened so far in No Driver’s License. Someone attempted to talk to someone else, but played the situation... exactly incorrectly, such that there was no realistic way that the person in question could’ve responded well to it. It was kind of a catastrophic social situation that was no fun for anyone at all.

Thankfully, it didn’t happen. No one even remembers it happening. The consequence of the thing happening was that it didn’t even happen, and in fact, who did it even happen to? No one knows! Because as far as anyone can tell, it didn’t actually ever happen, so, hey, don’t worry about it.

29.6 (Ibara, Reiko)

Ibara lugs the food down to the bunker, where she’s unexpectedly tackled by Takamine Mitsuki, who thought she was Seina- the only one of the group allowed in the bunker. Thankfully, she rolls well enough to avoid being knocked over and dropping the food.

Nails is there, too, and she’s skeptical of the idea of Ibara cooking. Fear of Mystery Food X wells up within her, and Ibara’s only partially successful at allaying those fears.

From there, Ibara heads to one of the furniture barricades that separates Reiko’s part of the complex from the rented-out rooms. Reiko’s about to blow her top at one of the team being there unauthorized, but Ibara leads with apologizing and offering food, so Reiko doesn’t get a full head of steam going.

Ibara assures Reiko her gem’s not in danger- but Reiko can’t exactly say the same. Hers is in dangerous condition since the bounced check incident, but she’s stable for now. She offers to buy any Grief Seeds the party might find for money, though.

Ibara lets her know that the cannibals are almost dealt with, and the families aren’t going to need to stay too much longer. Reiko... seems happy about this news, but Ibara can tell she’s sort of in a bad mood anyway? She rolls +Heart to try and get something more specific, but rolls snake eyes- the Power of Love.

Reiko really likes the food, though, so she opens up enough to... ask Ibara for help on her math homework. And... Ibara fails her real roll, because come on, Ibara hasn’t been to school in over a month, and she wasn’t exactly a model student before, either.

Ibara goes into Yukari’s whole insider trading fiasco, and they commiserate over the cops being useless. Apparently, Reiko’s mom was recently arrested- but she’s taken out predatory loans to buy lawyers to try and get her off. Again. And... Ibara puts two and two together.

Ibara produces the knife, which she indeed pocketed when Yukari wasn’t looking.

It’s about then that Reiko... realizes she isn’t angry. That she’s happy, that even though Ibara’s in her house and she’s failing math, she isn’t blowing up. Because of friendship, or something? She finds this... incredible. She barely has words.

Then Ibara heads off to deliver some food to the rest of the people in the bunker.

Ibara- getting a little spooked- tries to reassure them that cooking was her own idea, and she wanted to do it for fun, and that they wouldn’t be burdening her by eating it- just the opposite.

It’s around this point that Ibara gets a text from Homura, who is indicating that Ibara’s “variance is spiking”, meaning that something happening here has the potential to heavily affect the odds of Madoka existing.

It’s time to... examine Ibara’s wish, a little.

Well... I guess we’ll find out, huh? Because it’s around this time that Yukari calls the team together for an emergency meeting. What sort of emergency meeting? A meeting to deal with the consequences of Omakes 29.1-29.3, the contents of which we’ll explore next time.

[itsbenedict]

No Driver’s License: Omake 28.1

No Driver’s License is a Madoka Magica game I’m running for five players, using a homebrew of Yaruki Zero’s Magical Burst system. It follows five magical girls as they deal with an upheaval in the world’s magic system caused by some strange new three-eyed Incubators. They have to figure out what’s going on, who to trust, and how to put a stop to the cycle of despair.

I post session logs and omakes weekly sporadically, both as a reference for the players and for anyone who wants to follow along with the party’s misadventures.

[adventure log- read from the beginning]

[session 28]

So, last time on No Driver’s License... well, it doesn’t matter what happened last time, because there’s only this one omake, and it’s a flashback to just before session 27, so don’t worry about it. Definitely no disasters happened.

This time, it’s just Ibara and Yukari, on a perfectly innocent grocery shopping trip. It’s so domestic! And nobody gets knifed!

So, Ibara feels like she’s pigeonholing herself with this whole “always be punching, only break things, max DPS nothing else” approach, and wants to diversify into some less destructive hobbies. As such, she’d like to try cooking, and she’d like Yukari to teach her. Or- she’d like to try something, and Yukari suggest cooking, and Ibara’s like...

They decide to make chicken tikka masala at Ibara’s house, but then discover- hey, cooking is hard!

Plus, they don’t have everything they need to make it- so it’s a trip to the supermarket for them. At first, everything’s fine...

And now... the most intense standoff in the history of the campaign.

ha ha ha ha ha ha no Ibara is not

A series of Fury rolls ensue, as the two of them pull at the yogurt. They’re all too close to be decisive, for a while...

And- as the rolls continue, the lady for some reason removes one hand from the yogurt, giving Ibara a chance to roll much higher and claim victory in the ring of yogurt-brawling.

...Which she doesn’t do. Instead, at that moment, she decides to back off, and let go of the yogurt, because this isn’t worth it.

And the lady falls backwards, pulling too hard, and the yogurt goes flying out of her hands.

The lady tries to deflect- acting like Ibara pulled the knife, and yelling about how she was attacked. Unfortunately... the security people in the back of the supermarket have cameras, and they aren’t fooled for a second. The lady is hauled away, yelling curses and how they’re going to hear from her lawyers.

So- with the competition disqualified, Ibara is able to claim the yogurt, and she and Yukari return home to Ibara’s house.

Yukari rolls Heart and doesn’t completely fail her roll, so she does- if not a great job- an okay job that doesn’t invite disaster. And while she’s cleaning, she looks around for anything of interest.

Yukari asks about it, and Ibara shares some childhood stories- like the one time some guy was taking creepshots and she smashed his camera with a baseball bat and she got kicked off the baseball team for it. Stuff like that. Eventually, the subject turns to Yukari’s childhood.

From there... things get heavy. Because- as a magical girl, she was actually happier because she had a team, had friends. She wasn’t distant from everyone anymore. This despite her parents’ death, though- which was weird, a source of guilt for her.

She changes the topic shares some more fun stories about her time with her team, the Nakatsu Hero Club- Oriori, Nozomi, Chinami, Ruka, Ayusa- and, uh...

If that ain’t symbolic, I dunno what is.

Yukari moves on to talking about Nozomi, her old party’s healer. She was a classic Sayaka- making her wish for someone else, but it didn’t make her happy. She got healing magic out of her wish, but it didn’t fit her- and no one noticed until she blew up crying about it.

They talk through some options for expanding powersets, but don’t really hit on anything concrete, and then eventually get back to the topic at hand.

Next time on No Driver’s License: the aftermath of the Catharsis Overdrive witch fight. And then, some time after that: the aftermath of cooking chicken tikka masala.

[itsbenedict]

No Driver’s License: Omake 28.2

No Driver’s License is a Madoka Magica game I’m running for five players, using a homebrew of Yaruki Zero’s Magical Burst system. It follows five magical girls as they deal with an upheaval in the world’s magic system caused by some strange new three-eyed Incubators. They have to figure out what’s going on, who to trust, and how to put a stop to the cycle of despair.

I post session logs and omakes weekly sporadically, both as a reference for the players and for anyone who wants to follow along with the party’s misadventures.

[adventure log- read from the beginning]

Whoops, missed an omake earlier. (Forgot there was a two-week gap between sessions, didn’t check the later timestamps.) Here’s a quick one with Makoto and Cho- it’s short, so I’ll just copy and paste the entire thing:

Benedict (GM)

So- there's an area by the harbor where Yukari and Ibara scouted out a new spot for Yoshe, after the greenhouse's security was compromised.

There's a bunch of abandoned shipping containers- some company went out of business, and didn't even have the money to clean up their mess.

For your team, though, it's perfect. Ibara was able to break the lock on an empty one, and according to Yukari's prophecy, the cannibals aren't going to be checking there any time soon.

So, you've spent some time guarding Yoshe, who has... mostly been pointedly ignoring you in favor of playing with her 3DS.

There's a knock on the door. It's loud, thanks to the echoey interior.

Tsutsui Makoto

Makoto gets up and opens the door. She's transformed and has a sword in hand just in case.

Benedict (GM)

And it's... Chigusa Cho. Not transformed. She's wearing a plain white t-shirt over some sort of full body robe that goes down to her feet.

"I..."

"...I'm here to relieve you of your guard shift," she says.

Oh, uh- actually, the robe would be familiar to you.

Most of the cultists wore it.

Hers is undecorated, which is unusual, though.

Tsutsui Makoto

Makoto looks visibly uncomfortable by the sight of the robe. "Praying this morning?" she asks awkwardly as she detransforms and makes the sword vanish.

She steps aside so Cho can walk in.

"Yoshe's been pretty quiet today. Mostly playing 3DS games."

Benedict (GM)

She... doesn't walk in immediately.

"I... there's no more need to pray. I've been granted the privilege of speaking with her."

"You... I need to know."

"What is your plan?"

Tsutsui Makoto

"Plan?"

Benedict (GM)

"What you're... rrgh...!"

"I- I don't know what to believe. You're..."

Tsutsui Makoto

"...oh. You still think I'm here trying to replace her or something."

Benedict (GM)

"There's this story you want me to believe, where... where you were a victim, where you just happened to be- where you got wrapped up in...!"

"The one where it's just a tragedy."

Tsutsui Makoto

"And then there's the one the Community told you, where I'm just some deceiver trying to lead everybody astray."

Benedict (GM)

She looks at the ground. "I- you- I want to believe your version. I- it'd hurt, knowing what you did was just an act of pain, that they died for no reason. But... I could move past that."

"But- but you have to understand, I can't- I can't just believe that, right? It's- if you are a deceiver, an agent of the world, if that's- obviously, I can't believe you!"

"I- I can't tell the difference!"

"And She wants me to believe you, but- but I don't even know if I can trust Her to know the difference!"

Tsutsui Makoto

"..." Makoto sighs. "I really want somebody who was there to believe me. Truth is I'm still just a scared little girl. I'm just a magical girl. Like you, Yukari, Yoshe, everybody."

Benedict (GM)

She groans. "I know that! Or- I mean, I know that's what you want me to think! And- and what do I do? If I guess wrong..."

"If I guess wrong, and you're the deceiver, I'm allowing the deceiver to keep contact with Her, and pervert Her purpose..."

“And if I guess wrong, and you're innocent? I... make the pain you're suffering worse."

"I- can't you- can't I figure out which one it is?"

Tsutsui Makoto

"I don't know how to prove to you that I'm not lying. I just... I'm just mortal. I bleed." Makoto lifts up the eye patch to show her the terrarium inside. "If I was really a deceiver, wouldn't I do a better job of protecting myself from these things? I'm not Ikebana no Uzume. What kind of deceiver openly admits to not being Her?"

Benedict (GM)

She pulls on her hair. "The kind that- the kind that started out by pretending she was Her, and only admitted it when I started testing her!"

"I- that's why I wanted to ask what your plan was. If- if the jig is up, or- if it were up, then what would you be... trying to do?"

Tsutsui Makoto

"I was scared, Cho. I didn't know what to do. I was scared you'd attack me."

"I don't have a plan, I just don't want to die. That's all."

Benedict (GM)

She sighs.

"Okay. Makoto, then. The one who isn't a deceiver. You- how can I... I mean, I see... I'm trying to talk to you. That you."

"I can- I can, um... accept that- that if you are telling the truth, then... then what happened was horrible. And I'm sorry. That's what I can say to you."

Tsutsui Makoto

"...doesn't stop me from being the idiot who killed the people you loved."

Benedict (GM)

She hears that, and what she was about to say catches in her throat.

She sobs a little.

Tsutsui Makoto

Makoto drops down to her knees and bows deeply to her. "There's nothing I can do to make up for what I did. I'm sorry."

"I-I wish I could undo it, I wish I could fix all this but I can't, because I'm still just a stupid, powerless, scared girl."

Benedict (GM)

There's a sound- some kind of wail of anguish. "You- augh! You see what I- this is why I want to believe you!"

"I'm seeing- there's two things in front of me!"

"There's the you who's hurting and I want to apologize to, and reassure, and..."

"And I'm also seeing the deceiver being good at making me sad!"

Tsutsui Makoto

Makoto gets back to her feet. "...Cho, please. Can we just... try? Please?"

"I- I can't imagine you'll ever want to be my friend or anything. Just- can we try?"

"If I'm really just the deceiver like they said... then you're welcome to go ahead and end me then and there."

Benedict (GM)

In a flash, she's transformed. "You... augh."

"'Try,' huh?"

"I... so..."

"So... we... I can try to... treat Makoto decently."

"I don't know about... forgiving, yet, but I can be... close."

"Friends close, and enemies closer, right?"

"If I have to protect Her from you... then it doesn't help to just push you away."

"And if I don't... then..."

"Maybe... eventually, we can forgive each other?"

Tsutsui Makoto

Makoto nods. "I-I'd like that." She sniffles quietly. "I should probably get going."

"Um. Cho?"

"...thank you."

Benedict (GM)

She sniffles a little, wiping away years.

"You might be welcome."

[itsbenedict]

No Driver’s License: Index and Recap

No Driver’s License was a Madoka Magica game I ran for five players, using a homebrew of Yaruki Zero’s Magical Burst system. It followed five magical girls as they dealt with an upheaval in the world’s magic system caused by some strange new three-eyed Incubators. They figured out what was going on, who they could trust, and how to put a stop to the cycle of despair.

This is a masterpost of all the recap posts documenting the campaign. Past the index, under the readmore, you’ll find an overarching recap of the whole story, if you want a peek into what happened without reading through 42+ sessions of notes and screencaps.

(Note: Omakes became progressively more important to the plot as the campaign progressed, so if you want the whole story you should probably read those too.)

Session 0

Session 1

Session 2

Session 3

Session 4

Session 5

Omakes 5.1-2

Session 6

Omakes 6.1-2

Session 7

Omakes 7.1-2

Session 8

Session 9

Session 10

Omakes 9.1 and 10.1-3

Session 11

Session 12

Session 13

Omakes 11.1-3 and 13.1-2

Session 14

Omakes 14.1-7  

Session 15

Omakes 15.1-4 and bonus

Session 16

Session 17a and Session 17b

Omakes 17.1-2

Session 18

Session 19

Session 20

Session 21

Session 22

Session 23

Omakes 23.1-5

Session 24

Omakes 24.1-3

Session 25

Omakes 25.1-2

Session 26

Session 27

Session 28

Omake 28.1 and Omake 28.2

Session 29

Omakes 29.4-6

Session 29½ (or Omakes 29.1-3) 

Session 30

Omakes 30.1-3

Session 31

Session 32

Session 33

Omake 33.1

Session 34

Session 35

The most important NDL post

Session 36

Session 37

Session 38

Session 39

Session 40

Session 41

Session 42 (Epilogue)

0-1: So, okay, what happened in this campaign? Well, a tragic loner veteran, an exuberant trans girl, a justice delinquent, and a cult victim walk into a bar, and by a bar I mean they contract with Incubators for various reasons. Then, sometime later, they all get together to form a super-team at the behest of one of those Incubators. The good one, not the evil one that summons monsters. That one, they fight against. And then they finish that fight, and kill it, but a) new player Seina decides to contract during the fight, and b) it turns out it can survive the death of its body and it’ll be back soon to cause more trouble.

2: Right after that fight, though, the cult victim, Makoto, falls unconscious because of some kind of magic thing, and so the team carries her body to the nearest safe place they can think of- the trans girl, Sakura, has an aunt and that aunt has an apartment. Unfortunately, someone very spooky shows up at the apartment, and the good incubator, Tama-chan, urges them to run the fuck away. They do so more or less successfully, but have to clue the aunt in on the subject of magic. Also, the evil incubator, Nishi-chan, shows up and... uh. Helps them escape, and heals Makoto, which is suspiciously non-evil of her.

3-5: Also suspiciously non-evil of Nishi-chan is her telling them that there’s a safehouse they can stay at, which they go to investigate. Problem there is that there’s a witch, who they have to fight. Ibara fails to get mind-controlled and they win, but then the very spooky girl shows up again and shoots a giant ghost shark at them. They escape into the safehouse, but the safehouse belongs to someone. After Sakura trashes the place for reasons, Nishi-chan convinces them that the witch they fought is the owner, and if they hand over the Grief Seed, she can revive her. They argue over this but then do it, and Reiko revives! Woo! Except she’s mad about Sakura trashing the place, which Sakura tries to solve with hugs. Doesn’t quite work, and after staying the night in a spare room, they get kicked out.

6: After that, Tama-chan shows up, and some exposition happens. Apparently, yeah, you can revive magical girls after they witch now! But unfortunately, you can still use the seeds, and that kills them for good and also forces you to take on the victim’s remaining personal problems. And that’s what the very spooky girl, Yoshe, does, along with their friends. Tama-chan warns them not to fight the cannibals, but they’re all like, hell no! Also, the justice delinquent, Ibara, drops some backstory. Then they go home.

7-8: Later, they go to school and oops there’s a witch there. They fight it, with the help of a new MG named Emiko and a rude incubator named Fumi-chan, and revive Orino from the seed. Afterwards, they get some friends up to speed, and then after school decide to try making some magic items. That’s interrupted, though, when they have to rescue a new magical girl (Anzu) from a crazy monster cannibal (Sokoko). After they do that, Tama-chan shows up and tells them how the cannibalism works, which is so distressing that, uh... uh-oh.

9-10: Makoto witches out, and they have to go to space and fight aliens and UFOs to save her. It’s rad. After, Tama-chan exposits more, and then there’s a beach episode. 

11-13: Then, they decide to go witch-hunting to get some old-fashioned non-resurrectable Grief Seeds to control their Trauma accumulation and prevent another Makoto from happening. Unfortunately, what they find is Emiko, who turns out to be a supercannibal in cahoots with Yoshe and... well, she calls herself Kimiko, but the tragic loner veteran (Yukari) recognizes her as Honoka, a big scary murderer from her backstory. They get in a fight, and Ibara witches, oops. The fight is super crazy, especially when there is a twist and they have to fight two witches actually. But they manage to survive, and take one of the cannibals hostage.

14-15: As a followup, they, uh... round up all their families and other loved ones and cram them into Reiko’s underground bunker so the cannibals can’t use them as leverage to psychologically fuck with them, which was the plan and the basis for like the whole campaign I had planned. Also, they interrogate their prisoner, Yoshe, and find out that if you witch enough times you become an Incubator. Yikes. Also, they play Candyland and it gets out of hand? And by out of hand, I mean Sakura witches and they have to fight her. There’s some fallout from that.

16-17: Then they go to the hospital for... some reason? I forget. Completely can’t remember why they were even there. They meet Kimiko-Honoka there, though, and they’re about to get in a fight when suddenly someone shows up. It’s a survivor (Cho) of the cult that abused Makoto, begging forgiveness but also still being a cultist and being super uncomfortable to be around. Makoto witches again, and Kimiko-Honoka helps because they took Yoshe hostage and having them die would be bad. Then they do some weird science to the corpses of Incubators, and then there is a heartwarming Christmas special.

18-20: Then they go to space. Nishi-chan tells them there’s important space shit up there, which turns out to be a secret orbital Incubator base. Nishi-chan, who’s not evil, reveals that she and Tama-chan are magical girls who hacked the Hell Engine (read: evil thing that powers magic with suffering) that they keep in this base, and she needs their help to try again and make magic suck less. They go inside and fight a demon as part of a ritual to fix magic, but it gets fucked up when Ibara witches and merges with the demon. They fight it, but in the chaos the Hell Engine sort of breaks and falls out of the sky and crashes into Tokyo Bay, which Sakura and Makoto have to use some crazy supermagic to keep from being apocalyptic.

21-24: They save some people from the space rock and prank Emiko, and- while Yukari is busy getting arrested for financial crimes, Sakura and Seina check out inside the Hell Engine and meet a real Incubator, which they have a tense conversation with resulting in Seina witching. They fight it, which results in the Incubator going insane and vanishing for reasons, and then deal with the emotional fallout. And go through a lot of trouble just to pay rent. And then there’s emotional fallout from that, too.

25-27: Then, for absolutely no reason, they magically engineer a giant rocket space pelican and go to the moon. They bring along Orino and the imprisoned Yoshe, which goes poorly when they forget Yoshe (not in magical form) needs to breathe. Also, Orino runs away to live on the moon. BUT THAT’S NOT EVEN THE CRAZY PART. The crazy part is that, uh, Yukari and Ibara corner the Devil herself, and kinda-sorta-befriend her and take on a quest from her. She lays down some exposition, and everyone kind of panics about this. Good news is, though, the Hell Engine is a source of infinite magic, which they can use to craft overpowered magic items. 

28-29: Then there’s a fun guest-star witch that they hunt. During that whole thing, they meet an elusive NPC who hates incubators, and manage to sorta befriend her (and her useful mind-reading powers.) Then, Yukari and Ibara go shopping and don’t get knifed, and Makoto tries to reconcile with Cho. Sakura goes and spies on the cannibals, who pose a threat to their fun new Devil plan, and Ibara befriends the landlord. 

29½-30: Also, their prisoner escapes, which is bad but not that bad because Makoto power-of-friendshipped her into taking a neutral stance. Yukari reacts poorly to this, and also takes advantage of their mind-reading friend’s powers to uncover a shocking twist to her own backstory, which she also reacts poorly to. Other people also react poorly to the news. In response, Makoto tries to run damage control, and everyone more or less manages to calm down.

31-33: Calm down enough to GO TO THE FUCKING MOON FOR NO REASON AGAIN!!! Or- not no reason, they notice Orino’s up there doing some crazy terraforming and are concerned. And maybe it’s for the best, because Kimiko and Emiko also noticed that stuff, and also went there, which leads to a Big Fight. During said big fight, oops, Sakura witches. Which was sort of the plan, to trap the cannibals in Sakura’s barrier and take them down that way, but this was a lot more impromptu than planned. Both Sakura’s witch and the party gang up on the cannibals, and they get the upper hand right up until a mysterious person shows up to break up the fight. Things go south, and Kimiko witches, after which the team finishes off Sakura’s witch and revives her to help deal with the new witch.

34-37: They work on the barrier here, which belongs to Honoka’s witch, not Kimiko’s- this being a symbolic purification of Honoka, who was a very bad influence, from Kimiko, who wasn’t a saint to begin with. Then they finish the fight and rather cathartically destroy Honoka, but oops, Emiko isn’t letting them have the seed. Some negotiations take place, and they head back to Earth. Sakura makes plans for the future, and Makoto goes to negotiate further with the cannibals, getting them to agree to attend a peace conference now that Kimiko’s no longer kinda-possessed by a homicidal maniac.

38-41: The peace conference is held, and it’s pretty successful! The Devil intimidates them with eldritch horror magic, and that plus good arguments and emotionally-savvy conflict resolution gets them to agree to the Devil’s plan to instantiate Madoka in exchange for ending grief magic. Afterwards, they release their families from the bunker, and Makoto ties up a loose end in the form of Anzu’s abusive dad. Also, the whole team gets together to tie up another loose end in the form of Sokoko still being all fucked up on souls. After they fix that, they meet at Sakura’s aunt’s apartment to discuss strategy.

42: Then they save the world and it’s the end.

[itsbenedict]

groceries

+1 opal walk animation

don’t tase me, bro!

NDL omake recap

[itsbenedict]

plain-dealing-villain replied to your post: plan out exact logistics of WTCC murder NDL omake...

does it have a name yet?

it does! i and various others agonized over the perfect magic/wizards pun but couldn’t find one that was both good and descriptive of the game, so i just settled for the latter and went with Star Seeker and the Secret of the Sorcerous Standoff

wrt what still has to be done: i’ve gotta do placeholder art and scripting for the final cutscene, which is about halfway done; i need to do a handful of extra character animations; i’ve got to go through the script and insert music cues; i’ve got to design and clean up the main menu; and i’ve got to get all the finished art from the main artists and replace the developer art.

then there’s various tasks for actually getting the thing shippable- i need to do a credits sequence, i need to refurbish the input system to allow for gamepad controls and remapping, and i need to do QA/bugfixing while working on marketing and publishing

[itsbenedict]

ndl omake

TPC session

mushroom convo, whatever could it be?

reposition characters at beginning of end cutscene

updated evidence card

exercise

[itsbenedict]

detailed visual descriptions for evidence

okay i GOTTA record a take of that misspelled trollmance post

NDL recap (just a couple flashback omakes tho, real short)

redo the beeps for the background NPCs bc they sound bad oops

WTCC science show

[itsbenedict]

finish the wrong answers from yesterday

+1 question of wrong answers

augh fine zero i’ll play Open Sorcery already

ndl omake recaps

[itsbenedict]

No Driver’s License: Omakes 30.1-30.3

No Driver’s License is a Madoka Magica game I’m running for five players, using a homebrew of Yaruki Zero’s Magical Burst system. It follows five magical girls as they deal with an upheaval in the world’s magic system caused by some strange new three-eyed Incubators. They have to figure out what’s going on, who to trust, and how to put a stop to the cycle of despair.

I post session logs and omakes weekly sporadically, both as a reference for the players and for anyone who wants to follow along with the party’s misadventures.

[adventure log- read from the beginning]

[session 30]

Last time on No Driver’s License, the girls react to the news of their escaped prisoner, and made some plans to deal with the situation. Plans involved making prophecies, crafting new magic items, and spying on the cannibals. And after spying on the cannibals once, Makoto decided it was extremely important to talk to one of them, because of some troubling things she learned while spying. 

In 30.1, Makoto goes and has a chat with her friend. In 30.2, she tells Yukari and the others about how that chat went, to which Yukari does not react in the absolute most reasonable way. And in 30.3, Tama-chan has a meeting with her new boss.

30.1 (Makoto, Yoshe)

So, Makoto knows where Yoshe lives, and shows up at her door. Yoshe’s dad, Yugoro, answers it- and is immediately suspicious of Makoto’s claims to be one of Yoshe’s friends. Apparently, he’s been coached on this situation.

She goes down the hall to Yoshe’s room, where she finds... a creepy voice saying “come in”, and the room decorated like the world’s least subtle horror movie.

So, obviously, she’s one of the dolls, right? Makoto goes and checks, and indeed, sees one that looks exactly like her. And pokes it.

Yoshe’s very pleased that her prank worked, and Makoto is good-humored enough to laugh about it. After Yoshe excitedly explains the setup, and how much work she put in to get it just right, Makoto gets to the point of her visit. She wants to ask Yoshe if she’s okay. Yoshe... insists she’s fine, and what’s with all this friendly friend stuff anyway?

Makoto knows something’s wrong- thanks to the spying- and pushes a little harder, asking if something’s wrong with the other two cannibals. Yoshe accuses her of trying to fish for ammunition- after all, when it’s magical girls, emotional instability is a weakness.

Yoshe confesses that she talked to Kimiko about the plan, but that Kimiko wasn’t on board, and that she’s probably right now planning to kill them all. Just as a heads up.

Then... Yoshe tries to ask Makoto a favor. She can’t quite bring herself to say it- she wants her to do... something, if the team happens to beat Kimiko when she attacks. 

Kind of a weird request, yeah. The reason for this, as she explains, is that- what happened is, Honoka ate Kimiko, but Kimiko’s wish magic intervened. Kimiko wished to never lose herself, like what happened to Fumi-chan, and so her personality and Trauma Tracks survive being eaten. Because Kimiko’s personality was the one that understood how to cope with the rest of her acquired tracks, it dominated over Honoka’s personality- but now that’s starting to fall apart. Kimiko/Honoka has been clearing her tracks and exchanging them for power, since Yoshe’s been a hostage and the cannibals were prevented from hunting, and they didn’t have much else to do. With fewer Trauma Tracks, though, Honoka’s original personality is starting to come through- and with the Homura plan, Kimiko and Honoka are no longer on the same page about what has to be done to save the world. 

So... Yoshe thinks it’s best if someone eats her, clears Honoka’s trauma track, and gets rid of that influence completely. The cost being, of course, that Yoshe wants whoever eats her... to become Kimiko.

Makoto and Yoshe try to exchange contact information, but- oh, right, they confiscated and destroyed her phone when they captured her, so... Makoto just asks her to call her when she gets a new phone.

10.2 (Makoto, Yukari, Sakura, Ibara)

From there, Makoto heads back to the hotel room, where the others are staying. Seina’s out at the bunker, Ibara’s in the kitchen cooking, and Sakura’s asleep- so the first person she tells about what she just learned is Yukari.

Yukari’s reaction is...

Yukari raises the obvious first set of objections- that it must’ve been a lie, a trick.

Makoto explains that Ibara was there with her, and goes over the details of the situation.

(btw, Yukari’s in the bathroom, but they're talking telepathically.) Makoto tells Yukari about what might happen if Kimiko is revived again- that Honoka might be what comes back.

Makoto gets worried about Yukari, and asks to be let in, which Yukari nervously allows.

Makoto looks around suspiciously, but there’s no evidence anything shady has been going on in there. Which... probably means Yukari has been crazy-talking to mind-Oriori in the mirror. That’s... probably fine! She’s probably fine. Yukari’s fine.

Makoto explains some more, carefully dancing around the fact that she got some of this information from Yoshe- trying to spin it all as purely from spying.

Yukari suggests going to Hekima and having Makoto’s memories checked- she still doesn’t want to believe this. Makoto keeps coming up with reasons not to do that- because obviously her lie would be exposed- but she ends up failing to dodge the questions, and confesses that she heard it from Yoshe herself. And then she agrees to have Hekima check.

What does Yukari think about this?

Oh, of course, a totally reasonable idea.

Wait, is Makoto secretly a lizard person?

...Well, anyway, Yukari insists on going to Hekima, telling Makoto about how she can detect modified memories, and how she even offered to fix her own modified-

The yelling wakes Sakura, who groggily stumbles into the bathroom to get her glasses, and walks in on... this. They try to explain.

It’s around that point that Ibara finishes cooking her eel.

Why? No, Sakura, not because they’re taking turns in the shower. I’m not going to tell your head to get out of the gutter because I know that’s its permanent residence, but...

While Yukari interrogates Ibara about the specifics of the spying, Makoto gets Hekima’s contact information from Sakura- no longer to check her own memories, but to ask her about Yukari, who’s refusing to answer anything about her own modified memories.

Oh, also everyone acknowledges that Ibara did an excellent job with the eel. Score one for plan “build constructive skills”! 

So- now they’re doing some more brainstorming on how to kill and/or save Honoka and/or Kimiko.

Yukari tells them about Honoka’s psychology- she suspects a need to be the strongest is critical, and Ibara’s account of Kimiko’s breakdown earlier only confirms her suspicions. Makoto... suggests that if this is the plan, they might be able to get Yoshe to help. And from there... Yukari accuses her of doing this for Yoshe’s sake, which Makoto... just admits to. Like, duh?

Sakura excuses herself from the discussion- she’s got too many bad feelings surrounding Yoshe to stick around and talk about her. Makoto goes after her, to see how she’s doing, while Yukari and Ibara discuss Makoto and Ibara’s plans to have a good old-fashioned unpowered fistfight to settle their beef. (That’s a thing that’ll be apparently happening, by the way, despite Yukari’s valid objections to the effect of “what, no! that’s dumb!”)

After Sakura tells Makoto about her feelings about Yoshe, she asks- why? Why help her, why treat her like a friend, after everything?

Makoto points out that they both have blood on their hands, and Sakura tries to reassure her- though it breaks down a little.

Makoto’s response is a long pause, and then a “no, never, until now it never occurred to me”, more or less...

They go back to the group, and start discussing the logistics of the impending fistfight. It is assumed that Sakura would prefer naked mud-wrestling, which she vehemently denies, pointing out that clearly they need to dress up as manga delinquents.

Ibara and Makoto start to get changed for their fight, prompting Sakura to go red and flee the room. Yukari... also takes her leave.

10.3 (Tama-chan and the Devil)

This one... just a full transcript, I think.

She had, at least, a lead. For all they'd told her, they hadn't said much about how to get in contact with their supposed benefactor. But... well, there was an obvious place to start.

She moved her focus sideways, picked a destination, and began running. Running was one word for it, anyway- it was more like riding, using his movement reflexes to cross distance without much in the way of conscious input. Always very direct, sometimes abrupt and unexpected in the paths he'd choose to take. 

Those moments of unexpected creativity were a little worrying- but she knew better than to be particularly alarmed by them. He wasn't coming back.

And so- after checking in with the ex-Naomi, it didn't take her long to reach the target.

The potential for this one was strange- it looked like one of the "borrower" cases, unstable, prone to vanish if not claimed in the right frame of mind. If it could be claimed, the bounty would presumably be enormous, but she wasn't going to risk it just yet.

Her very approach, though, ought to get the attention of the real object of her search. Joshuya Junko was headed to the restroom, while her boyfriend waited in line at the food court. Crowded mall, but Tama-chan knew the appropriate blind spots.

And... there it was. 

The Engine pinged, familiar despite the accumulating distortion. Unknown alarm bells ringing in disused subsections. She didn't know what half of them meant, but they were the very same bells that went off when she bound the greater demon.

...And there she was. For a moment. That writhing black shape, its wings outstretched, hovered in the air for a moment as it coalesced into physicality. The first time she'd faced what she now knew to be the Devil, she'd been armed with a convoluted array of traps and Engine macros designed to ward off demons. Even with every safeguard in place, the Devil had come dangerously close to bypassing her defenses and killing her. 

Now, she was unarmed, comparatively, with just her old powers to fall back on. The emergency recall system was better-shielded than ever, but the odds of this encounter ending abruptly with her back in her body were worrying. 

She took a deep breath. She didn't need to- there was no respiratory system in play- but going through the motions was calming anyway.

The blackness... settled, into an unfamiliar shape. It didn't just strike out with a hundred different impossible disaster magics at once, like it had before. Now... it looked human. The figure tilted her head at an odd angle, running a hand through her hair.

"...You're not fooling me," she said.

That's the point, Tama-chan replied.

She'd been trying some doublethink exercises, both intending to contract Junko and not contract Junko, an elaborate mental ritual she'd designed before on the off chance that Kyubey had been reading her mind. Conflicting intentions, impossible to read. Now, it served another purpose- drawing the Devil's attention without making herself an unambiguous threat. 

The Devil nodded. "It worked."

Tama-chan wasn't calmed by the lack of hostility. She still wasn't sure how to tread, with this thing.

"You're why this all started going wrong, you know," the Devil said.

I know, Tama-chan replied. I know it's wrong. I know the universe is depending on us. I know their needs outweigh ours. I'm doing the wrong thing.

She couldn't not do the wrong thing. Those countless aliens who depended on them for power- they were far away. They weren't human. And it was wrong, it was the wrong thing to do, to discount them just because of that- chauvinistic, to care only for her and hers, only the human species. But... she couldn't do otherwise.

"That's not what I mean," the Devil said. "I don't care about them any more than you do. There's only one thing I care about, and you're the reason it all started going wrong."

...what?

"You get close, but he usually figures you out. Almost every time, there's a moment where you slip up, and he should realize you meant to betray him. You're not usually a problem. Usually, it goes wrong later."

Her mind raced, trying to put together the pieces of what the disaster girls had told her. Trying to ensure someone's existence, resetting the universe... of course, this wasn't the first go around. Had- had she really been that close to failure? So close that it was a near-inevitability? Her success, a freak accident that only came to pass after countless do-overs?

No- he was fooled. He was completely fooled, right up until the end. How had she- her performance was flawless, he never saw any of it coming.

...I don't believe that, Tama-chan said. To herself, mainly.

The Devil shrugged. "You don't need to. It's not even fair to blame you, exactly. It's me who must've done something wrong- slipped up, woke, didn't do things exactly right. Some tiny gesture, a hair out of place, butterflied out into a Kyubey who was just a little too distracted at the crucial moment."

I don't understand. You... don't want this either, right? You have to know it's monstrous- with the power you wield, you could- you could do SOMETHING else, I don't know what, but you have eternity to figure it out.

The Devil... laughed? Just a quiet "heh". "Do you really not understand?

"You 'know' what you're doing is wrong. That's what you say, anyway. Your wish- I remember it. You wished to understand why this was necessary, and you learned what you thought was the answer. You learned... why it was necessary. Why trying to stop it would be wrong."

I know, Tama-chan said. But you- you agreed to end it, to help them, and you- at least, you LOOK human. I can't believe you seriously care about the Incubators' civilization, either.

"I don't. Isn't your wish helping? You wished to understand, and even after I've told you... you say you don't understand? I'd think you, of all people, would get it right away."

What... was she saying?

"You know what you're doing is wrong, but you have to do it anyway. It's not in your nature to do the right thing, just because it's right. I know what I'm doing is wrong, but I have to do it anyway. It's not in my nature to do the right thing, just because it's right.

"It's necessary for me to find her again. Everything in me that could prioritize anything else has been burned away by the lifetimes of countless universes."

That... that couldn't be.

You- no, this is- I'm doing this for all of humanity, but you- it's just for one girl? That's- that's not a fair comparison! If I'm a monster, you're billions of times the monster I am!

The Devil's laughter was inaudible- she was doubled over, shaking, but barely a sound came out. Finally, she spoke. "That's- ehehe, that's why I'm the Devil, isn't it? I'm no ordinary monster."

Tama-chan's thoughts were frozen, a traffic jam of too many objections to move.

"You don't need to worry," the Devil said. "If you and your girls help me, this can all end once and for all. We don't need to point fingers, if we're all on the same side.

"The beautiful thing about my sin... is that once I finally get what I need, all that sin can be wiped away. When I find her, and she forgives me, it all stops."

A lone vehicle took an offramp, escaping the traffic jam. The thought "holy shit, she's completely crazy" managed to cross Tama-chan's mind. 

It was followed by a few others, which followed its example. "We need to be very careful with her", "this is going to go horribly wrong"- a whole caravan of anxiety.

...So, Tama-chan finally answered, interrupting the Devil's silent amusement. What, exactly, is your plan? I... really, really want everything to go off without a hitch.