About a year ago I was introduced to Circle of Hands at Lincon, and I wanted to explore this game more. I tried running it at Arcon in Oslo last June, I set up the same con-scenario for some colleagues and during the autumn my regular group switched from Stonetop to Circle of Hands. My regular group, however, is not so… regular. For several months I’ve been planning a new group of players, asking around and finally being so lucky as to have three old friends promise me space in their calendars for around 10 sessions of Circle of Hands. We’ve played games such as Monsterhearts, Alien, Scum and Villainy and Monster of the Week in recent years. However, I’ve never played with this precise combination of players.

This is my hope for a “real Circle campaign” where we actually all meet up each session and are able to follow each knight’s development over time. I’ve learned the rules, re-read the text, corrected mistakes from my previous groups, read other posts here about the game and I am ready.

Character creation
This was our first session, and we all prepared two characters – eight Circle Knights in total. I hadn’t actually expected the players to make the investment and take the time to make characters on their own before meeting up – but they all did. And all but one even had a Key Event!

Creating the first venture
For the venture I rolled a white 4, black 5 and a red 6. This meant only one venture component (Knowledge), in Rolke, and a very bad situation with extreme desperation at the location.

I imagined Ebeberg, a remote mountain village where a massive avalance combined with harsh winter and bitter clan feuding had hit the people hard. The knowledge was a unique collection of sayings and stories from priests, written down on parchment. The village had once supported an order of priests, but recent events left only one priest living. When knowledge is the only component in a venture the rulebook says it should be easily visible in the community. I interpreted this to mean that the sayings of the old priests were extremely well-known here. In fact the locals didn’t really care about the parchment – everyone had heard the stories a thousand times anyway!

The clan feud had ended with the Ebeberg clan farms being hit extremely hard by the avalanche, and the Lutge clan taking advantage to kill the survivors they could find. The conflict disrupted food production and the winter was very hard. Lutge clanspeople ate Ebebergers (and others who died) to survive.

The three named characters were:

• Irmtrud – the last remaining priest. Wanted desperately to spread the knowledge of the priestly order. She had moved the parchment to her house and was considering traveling out of Ebeberg with it. She was one of the last survivors of the Ebeberg clan.
• Heike – weaver, matriarch of the Lutge clan. Wanted desperately for there to be peace in the area after years of bloodshed – and for the legendary priest Irmtrud to support her clan and help calm everyone down after the massacre of the Ebeberg clan.
• Herbert – gentry, last living male of higher status in the Ebeberg clan. Wanted desperately to somehow regain control of Ebeberg and rebuild the clan, and considered the priest Irmtrud and the scrolls to be owned by him.

Choosing Circle Knights
The three Circle knights chosen were:

• Karla – female scholar and high entertainer from Spurr. Survivor of a caravan devastated by white magic. Played by Rune.
• Inguna – female low martial from Rolke. Invited to the circle after showing extreme martial prowess. Played by Bjørn.
• Gustav – male low martial from Rolke. People in his home village turned to wolves at night, and he fought them in wolf-from and slaughtered them the following day when they returned to human form. Played by Alex.

Playing the Venture
For the starting scenes I chose to skip any narration of travel and say that they had been there for about a month. This was their first time playing Circle of Hands, and I didn’t want the confusion of a travel narrative or to make them feel they had to “wait” for me before they could “take their turn”. I’ve had trouble with the start in the other groups I’ve played with, and changed it this time around. It worked.

They were housed at or around the largest clan Lutge farms, near a lake in an exceptionally beautiful valley high in the mountains. They had already met Heike here, but no one had mentioned Herbert or Irmtrud to the knights.

The Lutge people get suspicious and afraid
We played some very short scenes leading up to a point where the locals assessed their trust in the knights. 

• Inguna was housed with some of the close kin of the Lutge head of family and was here and now accepted as doing men’s work – hauling heavy stones to repair buildings. The crisis in Edeberg was severe enough that everyone was pitching in and doing mostly everything. In the evenings, howere, the women were cautiously curious about her. At one point after some women returned from the ruined Edeberg clan farms carrying firewood, one of them asked if Inguna ever had eaten human flesh. It was unclear to Inguna if the question was asked because she was a magic-user, some kind of joke or an insult. She answered a blunt “no”. I called for a Charm roll, and as Inguna failed I interpreted this as the village women feeling judged and shameful. They were instantly quiet and did not speak to Inguna further.
• Gustaf was housed close to Inguna, and was part of the men’s work hunting and hauling. While out one day, one of the younger men bravely asked him about his own clan. Who were they, and did he not miss them? Gustaf answered briefly but honestly that he missed them and his home. The men wondered why he had left, and I called for a Charm roll. He failed, and the curiosity turned to ridicule as one of the older men started quoting stories from the locally well-known collection of priest sayings – purposefuly saying only snippets that everyone but Gustaf understood the meaning of. We as players had a short “Darmok and Jalad at Tanagra” moment. Gustaf was almost immediately socially isolated.
• Karla was housed at the largest farm where the head of family also lived. She had been telling stories and trying to find out more about the parchment rolls. At one point, as some people arrived with fish from downvalley, Heike was wondering what to tell Karla. She was especially wondering if she could be an ally in bringing the priest and support to the Lutge clan. As she asked some very vague and careful questions, I called for a Charm roll. Karla failed, and Heike silently marked her as more of a threat then an ally.

All of them had failed their rolls. The Lutge clan now feared them, suspected them of planning to harm the village and they would come to hate the knights.

The knights leave the Lutge farms
nguna cast Perfection to listen to their whispers and heard how they spun ever more terrible tales of what the Circle Knights would do to punish them for using the wrong religous quotes, for the winters’ cannibalism or for any small provocation.

I told the players that the knights understood that it only was a matter of time before this suspicion would erupt into violence. At this point, Alex asked about the Circle Knights motivations for being there. Alex is an experienced player and one who likes a more open style of play, but the player was unsure of how far he needed to strech the knight Gustaf’s motivations to keep staying in Ebegberg. I think this is a good question and I’ve had players ask it before. The immediate and (for me) obvious answer is: you decide. We know the knight chose to travel here, so they must have had some reason. I offered that companionship with other knights might be more than enough for some – and Karla wanted to go here to find out about the scrolls. Also, at this point Gustaf might be motivated simply to survive the suscpicion of and possible violence from the villagers. Alex thought about it and said that Gustaf really liked Inguna. Inguna seemed to want to gift the scrolls to the young king in Rolke. And so Gustaf was in Ebeberg.

The knights meet Herbert Ebeberg
Karla decided to hurry up and travel up in the mountains in search of the scrolls. There they met Herbert, the last male gentry of the Ebeberg clan. To their surprise they learned that a few Ebeberg clansmembers were still alive. Here I made what I think was a rules mistake. Inguna (female freeman) was allowed to roll two dice of Charm to decide Herberts reaction. I think I should have kept it at one die, as they had not set up any interaction with this group of people. Bjørn succeeded in Inguna’s roll and Herbert saw them as potential help in rebuilding his family or at least getting revenge.

Herbert took them to his small farm of walled stone houses in the mountain (almost a fort) and tried to recruit them against  the “traitors” in the valley below. The knights did not give any clear promises, but were keen to find the parchment. Herbert agreed to lead them to the texts the following morning.

The knights offend the priest
After a night among starved, exhausted and desperate Ebebergers the knights went to see the last living priest. They had no idea about the order of priests or what had happened, and never found out. They met Irmtrud the priest living among old stone houses at a plateau at the top of the mountains. The view was amazing, they could see Tamaryon in the distance on one side and the beautiful Ebeberg valley and mountainous Rolke on the other.

As the knights approached the priest, I think I remembered to call for only one die of Charm this time. I think it was Karla who rolled and failed. Irmtrud was offended by magic-wielders showing up and demanding access to the texts. She  did however not have any real power to stop the knights from taking the parchment rolls from her stone house. When she realised they would take what they wanted anyway she fled to the valley below.

The knights agree to travel with Herbert
The knights followed Herbert back and realised they had to pass through a whole valley of angry Lutge clanspeople to get to the young king to deliver the texts. Herbert was more than willing to help them “escort” the text, knowing that his enemies would be furious to see the knights with him and hoping for a confrontation. The Ebebergers spent the night preparing for one last fight, and in the morning left as a collection of women and children led by the emaciated Herbert.

As they traveled down valley, Irmtrud approached the group and begged them to turn back, fearing even more unneccessary bloodshed and especially fearing magic use. The group ignored her and she fled again, this time leaving the valley for good.

A bloody confrontation
By a rocky path across a wide stream the knights met the Lutge chief and the clansmen he had been able to summon on short notice. After a few shouts trying to get the other side to give up, Herbert and the knights charged. Herbert was immediately caught by a spear in the chest and fell, reduced to 1 Brawn. Karla cast Kill and the Lutge chief immediately dropped dead from the Rbaja energies. Another fell from Ingunas spear through the throat. The Lutge people wavered, and after a few more losses they fled in panic from the black magic of the knights.

Inguna the knight forces a new chief upon the valley
Herbert was heavily wounded and as he was being tended to by his family, the knights decided to bring everyone onwards to the biggest Lutge farm to confront Heike. As the cold spring rain started pouring down, the Lutge clanspeople fled into the surrounding valleysides trying to hide from the knights. Using Perfection Inguna sensed where Heike was hiding. Inguna led the knighs and the Ebeberg women and children to the stone hut, and caught the Lutge matriarch before she could flee again. Inguna declared that the strongest Ebeberg woman would take over as chief of the valley (“ascending” Ulrika who had fought with them earlier that day). Inguna conjured an Amboriyon Blade in Ulrikas hand as a symbol of her power (though declining to commit the Brawn to make it permanent).

The knights leave with their gift
I felt that the venture was over, and asked “and then you leave with the parchment?”. The players wanted to tie up a few loose ends and we had a short epilogue round. The only thing I remember from this round was that Gustaf looked for and did not find the priest. The knights then left together and gifting the parchment to the young king.

After the session
We talked for a short while about the game, and I thought that it went very well. I was afraid that the players would not “get it” and that they would spend too much time figuring out how to play the game. But I think they got it, and they said they had fun. I had that good, intense feeling in my body after the session and I could not stop thinking about the game the next few days.