Touched by Darkness: a megagame

In July, I travelled down to Patriot Games in Sheffield to play my second megagame, Touched by Darkness.

Touched by Darkness

Touched by Darkness is a megagame for up to 47 players designed by Ben Kanelos and run by Paddy Rose and three helpers. I think we had around 40 players, most of whom had never played a megagame before.

Here’s the pitch:

The Dark One's eclipse has blotted out the sun. Darkness has swallowed the Empire and is coming for your outpost next! You and your teammates must gather resources, perform arcane rituals, and attempt to survive. But beware! The shadows that attack your outpost are not the only threat. The Dark One may have corrupted the mind of a teammate, meaning you can no longer trust them. Can you hold this last bastion of humanity together and banish the Dark One?

Pennine Megagames run three games a year, usually one in Leeds, one in Sheffield and one in Manchester. I went to Fae’s Anatomy last year in Leeds (read about it here).

Logistics

I went with Megan, who hadn’t played a megagame before. We drove down to Meadowhall and took the train to Sheffield station, where we walked to Patriot Games (about a 10-minute walk). We got there just after Patriot Games opened, which gave us time to browse the store and have a cup of tea and cake in the café, before joining the other megagame players.

(Patriot Games is really lovely. Possibly the nicest games store I’ve been to – large, airy, with a café and plenty of tables for playing games.)

Luminarians - Temple of Light

Megan and I were playing Luminarians. Our faith was the primary religion of the Empire, and our clerics purged the Dark One during the last Eclipse.

The Luminarians had two subfactions – Mistfalls and the Temple of Light. Megan was a steward in Mistfalls, while I was the Chaplain (a healer) in the Temple of Light. As my boss failed to turn up, I promoted myself to Chief Physician.

We were the main healers in the game. Some other factions had some limited healing, but we could heal more people at once. (Or at least, we could once I had trained enough clerics. My first few turns involved training clerics.

Action time at our faction board - some players wore costumes.

Other factions

Other factions included the Stonegrip Clan (the source of ore), the Rosethorns (irritating druids), the Alchemists Guild (the only source of crystals, needed for the magic rituals to banish the Dark One).

Oh, and there were an unknown number of traitors, working for the Dark One to foil our rituals.

Turns and phases

Turns were roughly 30 minutes long. They started slightly longer, and as the game progressed and we knew what we were doing, they all got a little shorter. I’m not sure how many turns we had during the game overall, but we played from 11 am to about 4:30 pm with a short break for lunch.

Each turn was broken into four phases.

Action time

The longest phase, where everyone can move between locations, activate their boards, trade and negotiate with everyone else, and perform rituals to banish the dark. The council sits during action time, and a Shadow attack can happen during this phase (at which point those with military powers move to the battle board while everyone else returns to their table).

Faction time

A short few minutes at your faction table to discuss what happened during the previous phase and to plan for future phases. (Often a good time to take a comfort break.)

News

Megagames include heralds, players whose job it is to find out what’s going on and report that to everyone during news phases. At the end of the phase, Control awards bonuses to various factions based on the reported outcomes.

(I like this – it’s something that freeforms could probably learn from. Players often dislike being reporters – but reporters become more interesting when they have a mechanical effect on the game.)

Resolution

An upkeep phase. Reset your workers and make your morale check. And if morale slips too far, start making riot rolls.

Morale checks are modified by events such as Shadow attacks or damage to your boards, and more significantly if you fail to feed or water your people. (Trading water and food is a big part of Action time.)

And then it all goes around again.

Freeform actions

All that sounds like a gloriously complicated board game. What makes a megagame different are the freeform actions that people can take. Which are literally anything. In ours, the druids began to grow a sacred tree while the Stonegrip clan held a morale-boosting rock concert and the alchemists seceded from the Empire. We started creating paladin cavalry units to help defend against Shadow attacks.

How the game went

The game was busy. During the first few sessions, I built up my team of clerics. I started with one and a couple of workers, and could train a worker each turn. Then, after the first shadow attack (where we had a lot of casualties), I could help heal them.

Megan, meanwhile, was negotiating and trading madly to get us the food and crystals she needed. She would berate me when I was too generous with first aid, telling me to drive a harder bargain. (That really didn’t work. I’m not as ruthless as she is.)

As the game progressed, I had no problem keeping the Temple of Light’s morale up, but we were losing ground to the druids in the battle of the faith. We discovered they had converted almost everyone else, and we couldn’t convert anyone back.

We had a second shadow attack, which we fought off more successfully. Towards the end of the game, I had expected a third attack, which never materialised. (Control ran out of time – too many other things going on.) That was a shame, as I was poised to assist for a battle that never arrived.

Start of a shadow attack

But apart from waiting for a battle that never arrived, Megan and I had a great time. The day was busy, and we met loads of lovely people. Lots of people had clearly signed up in groups, or had started plotting and scheming beforehand. (We signed up about 10 days in advance, when I realised that the weekend was going to be free after all.)

I think I was probably the oldest player – I would guess most players were in the twenties or thirties.

Did we win?

Honestly, I don’t know how we did. As a faction, not so great. All of the other factions converted to the druidic faith (they were very convincing with their sacred tree – we should have countered with a burning bush, or something).

And I’m not entirely sure whether we beat off the dark. Not that it mattered – we had lots of fun trying, which was the main thing.

Overall

Anyway, Touched by Darkness was a lot of fun, and both Megan and I would play a megagame again.

Next time, I will try and think about potential freeform actions before the game. I know I’m unlikely to imagine them during the chaos, but perhaps I can think of something beforehand.

The next Pennine Megagame is Henry VI Part 1 in Manchester in October. I’m not sure if I can go yet.