Friends at the Table: Marielda re-listen

[kate_nepveu]

Yes, still more Friends at the Table posts. The first one for tonight is about re-listening to Marielda, the arc I started with, in its proper release order. This was a lot of fun, both for spotting things (references to the first season, setup for this arc) and because the system they were using (Blades in the Dark) really does move in a way that makes the arc proper really fast and fun (and makes COUNTER/Weight's opening seem even slower in retrospect). On the other hand, listening to it as an introduction really gave me a different relationship to the ending than I would have had in chronological order, and I think on the whole I prefer the one I got. Based on my listen to the next season, Winter in Hieron (more on that next rock), I still recommend this as a starting point, even though it's a bit dense at times.

SPOILERS.

The Quiet Year was more fun this time because of spotting all the things that get set up, though I do think that occasionally the players fell into thinking that the catastrophe was a lot further away in time than it was, which I realize now was the source of mild disorientation the first time around.

When they moved to Blades in the Dark, I spotted two things during character creation that made me chortle. First, Austin flat-out tells Ali that her character type in this system means, you died and someone stuffed your ghost into something; hello, Charter Castille! And second, Jack spends multiple minutes using "they" for Hitchcock. Starting the heist and then ending that episode with, "Because the last piece of my character creation, is that I'm going to be playing a pair of identical twins," is really just fun.

(The train job itself still isn't quite optimal as a listening experience, given its literal deus ex ending; I thought knowing that Samothes would want them again later might help, but it didn't. Everything up to that point is really good, and then it's a little deflating. Just a little.)

My experience of the University job was about the same; knowing about Silas and the Fairplay twins made them very satisfying this time around.

And then the final arc. Fancy-dress party, take two sips! My notes had a shit-ton of questions about the mask and Samot and the mages here, which have since been clarified. Minor characters: well, now I know why the players reacted so strongly to Sige meeting that really huge person, hi there Kindrali! Sorry we didn't get to talk to you before you got eaten pre-Autumn! And I love Primo very very much. Also Charter/Maelgwyn is—probably not the most doomed ship, but definitely has quite a lot of doom.

Finally, if I'd known that Samothes was alive during Autumn I would have had an extremely different reaction to this arc, and on the whole I like not having that preconception.