New Rory's Story Cubes: MIX sets

I've known these were coming for quite a while, but just heard that they were purchasable during the UK Games Expo recently. So, has anyone seen them elsewhere?

From the official description:

Each Rory’s Story Cubes MIX set contains 3 cubes with a particular theme. They are designed to extend the play of Rory’s Story Cubes. The first three sets in the series are Rory’s Story Cubes: Enchanted, Rory’s Story Cubes: Clues and Rory’s Story Cubes: Prehistoria. Simply mix them up with other Rory’s Story Cubes to conjure up fantastic fairytales, craft tales of cracking crime or weave tales of primeval predators.

WANT!

"And a Bottle of Rum" releases

You probably already know this, but yesterday, Ed released his long-teased pirate game full of THW Reaction Test solo fun, And a Bottle of Rum.

From the description:

Some like their Pirates from history, you know, Blackbeard, the Spanish Main and such. But some like their Pirates a little more open-ended. In “And a Bottle of Rum” we do both. Inside you'll find... Rules for small land Encounters from Carousing to Smuggling. Rules for Big Land Battles for sacking cities. Rules for ship to ship combat with boarding actions. Rules for Big Sea Battles with multiple ships per player.

And, Ed's got more! For $5, there's a PDF of 70+ ships in color and to scale with Wind Markers, Broadside Smoke Markers, Two Turning Templates, and Campaign Area Maps!

Get more info HERE.

Infection: Humanity's Last Gasp

Oooo...one-player goodness...this looks interesting...

From the official description:

In Infection: Humanity's Last Gasp, by designer John Gibson, you are the director of the Department of Plague Control (DPC) field office in New York City. You make the decisions about what parts of the virus to study, which personnel to hire and what equipment to purchase. You’ll soon discover you are working with an eccentric group of scientists who don’t always work well together—and one very resourceful lab rat named Marvin. As the casualties increase, so does the stress and mistakes made, as you try to complete your vaccine before time runs out for all of mankind!

Get all the info from Victory Point Games HERE.

L'amore tra i mostri: Session 7, Q7-9

Continued from HERE.

7. Where can the heroic motivation be most effectively redeemed? 

Be the PCs first: 
Encounter: defiance & combat
Place: Subterranean Cove, Northern Wilds, same time
After snooping around the cove in squirrel form, Gino returns to the others and tells them about the distorted monstrous image around which a circle of colorful beads and gems is being arranged. The image flickers as space and time around it contort, giving it, perhaps, a "dancing" characteristic. The Dark Adept who is commanding the Port Aghi ruffians to deliver and arrange the beads and gems is clearly trying to summon something horrific from another plane. Orsini, Don Pantaloni, and Liliana agree with Gino that this unnatural thing must not come into their world. On the count of three, they charge into the cove!

Be the GM next:
Story Cube: potion
The dozen ruffians are surprised, dropping their crates, and most are unarmed, so they flee, but the Dark Adept throws a vial on the floor which bursts with arcane light, and the ruffians are transformed almost instantly into zombies! Three are commanded to protect the Dark Adept, while the rest are sent to kill the heroes.

Be the PCs once more: 
Orsini tries to slice his way to the Dark Adept, but there are just too many zombies in his way, and two are able to strike him hard. One stays up with its zombie fortitude [power] and hits him again! Liliana gets close to Orsini and is able to use her backstabbing ability to great effect. Don Pantaloni fires arrows at the zombies protecting the Dark Adept, and then becomes a target of the servant of evil, taking a painful injury from his Inflict Wounds Spell. In return, the elf sends his final Magic Missile spell straight at the Dark Adept. With Gino cleaning up the rest of the zombies with his great club, Orsini is able to reach the Dark Adept, demanding that he surrender. The Dark Adept refuses and attacks, forcing Orsini to kill him. [Both Orsini and Don Pantaloni were nearly killed in this fight.]


8. Where does the final showdown between the heroes and the enemy take place in relation to the results of Q7? 

Be the GM first:
Story Cube: ladder
Encounter: enemy nears completion of its goals
Place: Subterranean Cove, Northern Wilds, same time
Deeper within the cove, the colorful lights get brighter. Sounds begin to emanate from the room - the sounds of something trying to climb into this reality.

Be the PCs next:
Gino leads the others to the monstrous image. There, they see the hideously large, grossly inhuman thing still distorted, but now able to reach a terrible claw into the physical world. Don Pantaloni calls it "ugly," curses at it in the fey language, and then casts Mage Hand to push away some of the beads and gems on the ground, breaking the circle.
  
Be the GM once more:
The monster screams, its image folds in on itself and disappears, and the arm that was reaching through the planes falls to the ground, severed from its body. The fingers twitch a bit, and then the entire appendage melts away into a puddle of puss.


9. Where does the world stand after the results of Q7 and Q8?

Be the GM first:
Story Cube: scales [taking it as a measure, not justice]
One of the Five Dancing Demon Kings has been defeated, but four others remain.

Be the PCs next:
• There are small boats and a subterranean river. Guess what's next?
• Too much skulking about for decent XP, but Level 4 is close.

L'amore tra i mostri: Session 7, Q4-6

Continued from HERE.

4. How can the fight be brought to the enemy, gaining ground for the heroic motivation? 

Be the PCs first: 
Encounter: infiltration
Place: Northern Wilds, same time
After The Spring's apparent betrayal of the group, the mad orc lies covered in webbing. Liliana takes the figurine The Spring had snatched from her, examines it,  and [successful INT check for being a spy] realizes that the orc was running TO something with it. She surmises that it is a key and, at a nearby outcropping of rock that would have been directly where The Spring was headed, she tests her theory.

Be the GM next:
Story Cube: falling star
There is, in fact, a noticeable place to insert the figurine. When Liliana does so, the rock outcropping falls into the ground, revealing a downward passageway that leads into darkness. An unearthly, sinister air comes from within.

Be the PCs once more:
Don Pantaloni casts Light, and the heroes descend into the depths.


5. How can any heroic gains from the results of Q4 suddenly be undermined as new information about the true face/scheme/power of the enemy becomes known?

Be the GM first:
Story Cube: waves
Encounter: revelation
Place: Subterranean Cove, Northern Wilds, same time
As the group goes deeper into the underground, they hear the sounds of lapping water and men at work. From their height and from what they can make out with their eyes, they are able to guess that they must be nearing some sort of subterranean cove created by the river they'd followed for the last few days.

Be the PCs next: 
Don Pantaloni extinguishes his Light spell, and Liliana spies ahead.

Be the GM once more:
Liliana sees a large number of ruffians - presumably from Port Aghi - working under the supervision of another Dark Adept. They are carrying crates from a watery area to a place deeper into the interior of the cove out of her sight. There may actually be a boat somewhere within this underground opening...


6. How can the adverse results from Q4 and Q5 be further intensified, forcing the heroes to commit to a do-or-die course of action in accordance with the heroic motivation? 

Be the GM first:
Story Cube: rainbow
Encounter: intrigue
Place: Subterranean Cove, Northern Wilds, same time
From deep within the cove's interior, colorful lights begin to radiate. The ruffians doing the hauling suddenly halt and appear scared. The Dark Adept commands them to continue their work.

Be the PCs next:
Gino turns himself into a squirrel and scouts ahead, hoping to remain unnoticed [skill test succeeds].

Be the GM once more:
Indeed, to the east, Gino-squirrel can see two small boats aground within the cove. Beyond them is a dark, subterranean river tunnel that might very well head all the way to the coastline. To the west, the druid sees the cavern from which the colorful lights are emerging. Getting closer, he finds [Story Cubes: abacus/germ/crying] that the source of the lights is the soundless, distorted image of a hideous, unidentifiable form - a monster in suffering as the space around it folds and bends. The ruffians reluctantly continue to bring the crates toward the bizarre spectacle, dumping their contents - shiny stones, beads, and gems - all around the perverse image. With each new batch of shiny stones, the image begins to stabilize...