This blog contains an archive of live streaming games from the Battlestorm Online campaign GM’d by Ted Burgess and originally streamed on Twitch. It’s also an introduction to the Heroes of Battlestorm Online Valhalla — C’rra, Indignatio, Katsunori, Morgen Schnee, Umarekawatta, and Valkirie. Ted and I are co-GMing games for two separate Battlestorm Online campaigns. Ted’s game follows the main story arc and occurs weekly on Thursday nights between 9:30 PM and midnight EST. The game I’m running, called Ragnarok and dealing with a follow-on but equally important storyline, will run on Friday nights once per month. I’ll post a second and separate archive of Ragnarök’s streaming games along with character profiles here on the Scribbler’s Fantastical Workshop blog.
Adventure Opening Story
Our heroes log into Battlestorm Online only to find that they are trapped! Their Ghost Gear is rigged to emit rapid flashes of light that trigger brain aneurisms for those wearing this deadly gear if they die in-game, if they try to log out, or if someone tampers with their headgear. All gamers are thus trapped and forced to defeat the challenges laid out in the virtual fantasy world of Valhalla. If their avatars die while fighting monsters in Valhalla or exploring its hazardous environment, the Ghost Gear sends out its vicious strobe and kills their real bodies.
The players are not initially aware of their predicament until a few hundred unfortunates who attempt to log out or have their avatars slain by monsters are instantly killed. The game’s psychotic-genius creator then makes an announcement to every player, explaining their situation and the stakes involved. From that point forward, adventures in Valhalla take on a dire edge.
Character Profiles
What follows are the character profiles for C’rra, Indignatio, Katsunori, Morgen, Umare, and Valkyrie. Presently these heroes are all level four. The party is a bit further along than the video archive would indicate — as before starting our livestream, we completed about 4 campaign sessions. For your continuity, I’ve provided a brief synopsis of the campaign’s events in the Episodes section below. It’s also worth noting that this group developed a strong sense of player camaraderie as most of the present members played through Ted’s Dark Plots campaign prior to Battlestorm over the course of about seven years.
C’rra is a Tiefling Celestial Warlock in-game. Run and conceived by Lovis, C’rra focuses on heavy ranged attacks (Eldritch Blast) and party support through healing. C’rra’s spells are often well-chosen and devastating. She’s also not afraid to move to the front and lash foes who hit her with Hellish Rebuke and Armor of Agathys.
IRL Background and character concept pending.
Indignatio is a Fire Genasi Circle of the Moon Druid in-game. Nano’s original creation, Indignatio is clearly hot with a capital Haaa, he also lays down some serious smack in his wolf and bear forms. Indie typically wades into combat with abandon — tearing big holes through enemy formations in battle as a bear or leveraging his wolf form to set up trip attack bites while attacking with a flank-buddy. Also an off-healer, he’s brought back the party from a number of sticky situations already.
IRL, the person behind Indignatio is Wesley Elaschuk. Small in stature at 5’2″, he’s been a gamer for most of his 36 years. His vocation is electronics sales. He’s a hard worker and a hard player — spending his extra hard earned cash on gaming and dedicating much of his free time to these made worlds. As a loner who keeps a tight circle of friends, Wesley has quite a lot of free time. So his gaming background is quite extensive. VR development, in particular, has long been an interest. But Wesley didn’t take the leap until BSO. The full-dive Dungeons and Dragons game ignited a keen interest and Wesley took a full two weeks off to experience it. In game, he wanted to be the confident person he never got to be IRL and he’s carried this personality style through to his gameplay successfully in BSO. Wesley as Indy has taken a kind of wild west approach to Pking — not holding back if Pkers come after him and treating them like monsters despite the fact that in game death for Pkers would result in IRL death.
Katsunori is an Elf Soul Knife Rogue in-game. Run by Tyrex, he’s the party’s badass archer. A specialist in ranged death he can employ his superior mobility, ability to hide, various poisons and sneak attack to rain death on foes. A versatile combatant with surprising party enablement, Katsunori brings a combination of serious ranged heat, amazing group communication, and a lot of sneaky tricks.
IRL, the person behind Katsunori is Tatsuo. He was born to Mark (later called Makito) and Natsuko Imura. Mark, now deceased, was a Japanese-American Marine JAG officer. He retired after serving at the U.S naval base in Okinawa — overseeing disciplinary cases where U.S. personnel clashed with local law. Stern of demeanor, Mark was known to be strict but fair. As a father, he could make his disappointment more savage than any amount of anger. Mark met Natsuko while serving in Japan. At the time, she worked as a translator between the U.S. military and the largest ISP on Okinawa. Once they married, Natsuko took a promotion as a multi-media localization expert for the gaming industry. Tatsuo’s early love of computer games stemmed from the many titles she kept at home — as she worked to translate them for publication in the West (or, for Western titles, in Japan).
Mark was never particularly thrilled with Tatsuo’s gaming hobby, but he tolerated it so long as grades were good and chores were done. Throughout high school, Tatsuo prepped for a college program that would lead to game development. Something shifted after his father passed away. He attended the University of Tokyo, and did study Computer Science. However, he then went on to pursue a Master’s degree at the prestigious Keio Law School. Gaming was still a part of his life, but he had also taken up his late father’s passion for the legal world. Tatsuo now works as an intellectual property and patent lawyer for Rikkeisoft (a blockchain development firm). Driven by his own sense of ethics, he also seems to be chasing his father’s posthumous approval. That program code and legal systems both have similar loop holes, contradictions, and unexpected interactions is a continued source of intrigue and challenge. When Tatsuo can leverage these “glitches” to the benefit of his employers he does. However, deep down, he believes strongly in the spirit of the law over the letter.
For Tatsuo, gaming has become a way to cut loose — to harmlessly abandon his ethics and principles. A way to engage in escapist fun, poking insecurities and triggering overreactions. If the letter of rules might be exploited to further his ends, fantastic (especially if it further enrages the gamers he’s griefed). If poorly written game code has produced something unintended (but not explicitly against the rules) that can be exploited, even better. All his discipline, maturity, and drive to have his father’s approval –forgotten for a few hours while crushing others without scruple. Their rage on the forums, the vitriolic in-game messages, cries of anger over voice chat — all fodder for the gleeful feeding of Tatsuo’s adolescent demons. It is this childish delight in griefing that inspired his now-infamous account name in numerous games over the years. Shino Shin’iri… “death of the noob”.
Tatsuo logged into the new megadungeon of Battlestorm with similar intentions. He created his account, knowing its much-hated reputation. One he crafted and nurtured over so many years. That was part of the fun! His first character name was deliberately, excessively innocuous: Shujinkō… “protagonist”. Over the years, he’d used dozens of such character names to join parties: Īyatsu… “good guy”, Shinraidekiru… “trusted”, Mikata… “ally”, etc. After the grief was delivered and his account name revealed, the anger of his victims was all the sweeter. Then, everything changed in a blink for Tatsuo
The realization that people were really dying, that this was not a game, cut to his core. His playground ruined — a place of horror. His joy in griefing — gone in an instant of terrible realization. But also something more. Perhaps a haunting sense of guilt. Perhaps a strange dismay when others like him did not adjust to their terrible new circumstance. It was time to set out a marker. To fix his own shift in intention. For the first time in all his years of gaming, he’s used precious currency for an extra name change: taking on the moniker Katsunori... “victory through the law.”
Morgen Schnee is an Aasimar Paladin of Vengeance. Run by yours truly, Morgen’s in-game avatar is a melee-focused dexterity build that relies more on mobility and positioning in combat than direct brute force. Able to nimbly flank and deliver punishing smites to the big bads, Morgen also doesn’t hesitate to use her positioning to aid her companions, distract foes, or deliver heals when her companions go down.
Morgen uses her IRL name in-game. She’s a reluctant-celebrity gamer (background) whose play style attracted attention through various gamer media streams. She’s also ardently passionate about the heroic nature of gaming itself. Her defining quote is “Real life sucks because the dark side is hidden. In games, it comes out — even in the players. When it does, you can fight it. That’s badass.” She’s college age — taking courses in both the humanities and game design.
Her parents are corporate executives. Her mother (Hansha Schnee) works for a financial firm in Tokyo; her father (Mark Dragas) for a well known search engine giant in California. They are separated and Morgen, though she identifies better with her father, has taken her mother’s name (Schnee) for her own.
Her mother strongly disapproves of Morgen’s gaming interests, viewing most gamers as social deviants. This is, at least in part, due to the fact that Hansha is half Gaijin and had to fight for recognition in conservative Japanese business culture. Morgen has bargained a path forward so long as she continues to make top grades and forge success for herself. In the gaming community Morgen is well known. Gamer media writes about her frequently and camera motes often follow her in-game. She uses her IRL name as her in-game name. This draws further attention to her Celebrity Gamer stream.
Morgen could care less. She didn’t seek the attention when gaming. For her, gaming was a way to externalize her in-born desire to overcome evil. In games, this turned into a passion for direct action, a tendency to help others — particularly newbs — and a fulfillment of her desire to strive for justice. This attracted a lot of troll attention early on when Morgen started to become a serious gamer in middle school. Morgen took it on the nose by challenging PKers and griefers directly, by finding the best guilds for newbs, and by eprinting newb player guides complete with maps and warnings in various games. Morgen was particularly passionate about taking on griefers — “You don’t know how your malice as play affects people in real life,” she would say. “And when you play maliciously, you’re building up some serious bad habits. It’s like practicing evil in a mind-training exercise. Sure, there are exceptions. People who think it’s all a joke. But getting high on inflicting negative emotions like rage on others is seriously messed up.” This altruism, combined with her unintentional flare for the dramatic in game, became a magnet for game media.
In Battlestorm Online, Morgen has chosen Aasimar as her race. This enabled gamer media types to use her helper spirit Nuri as both her deva advisor and as a camera mote. The guide would typically communicate heroic visions to Morgen. But this one happens to act more like an annoying reporter half the time — providing suggestions that are more helpful for outsiders seeking to sow ‘interesting’ drama into the game than as an actual assist to game play.
Morgen’s avatar is agility (dex) and charisma based. She tends to focus on melee speed builds and she’s going to try this with a dex based paladin in BSO. Her build at level 1 is not that optimal. But it has some serious potential as it levels. At start of game, she does her best to help new players that get into trouble. Swiftly learning about the game’s inherent lethality, Morgen is even more determined to save less experienced players from very real death.
Umarekawatta is a Minotaur Champion Fighter. Run by Cody, this dual-wielding juggernaut toting a massive battle axe in each hand takes to combat in BSO with a wild abandon and reckless joy that disappeared for most when the game became lethal. Umarekawatta is probably the toughest member of our group of heroes. He can be counted on to go straight for the enemy jugular — drawing aggro while his allies set up for kill shots.
IRL, Umare’s name is Date Taizō. He is presently 22 years of age and suffers from the terminal illness — Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia.
Taizō lives in Ginza,Tokyo. Coming from a fairly prominent family in the fashion industry, he was in line to take over the family business. However, just before graduating high school tragedy struck. Still only a teenager, Taizō was diagnosed with Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia. A severe tragedy that brought his normal life, hopes, and aspirations to a screeching halt.
The past few years of Taizō’s life have been spent in a grueling series of difficult treatments and stints in the hospital. Over time, his condition has only grown worse. The terrible physical toll and rising hopelessness caused Taizō to spiral into depression. Permanent confinement in the hospital was the next step in the spiral for Urame. A place that has been his permanent home now for nigh on a year.
As a last bid to help get him out of depression his family bought him a copy of BSO. They hoped it would at least liberate his mind and spirit — allowing him to experience something outside of the four sterile walls of his room and a grinding countdown to death.
Valkyrie is a Human Paladin of the Ancients in-game. A great weapon wielder run by Keerith, she delivers severe punishment to her foes through heavy hits and radiant smites. Often, her explosive melee attacks leave enemy forces reeling in shock. Valkyrie expertly combines her shock-trooper style attacks with friendly magical buffs from highly effective spells such as Bless. She is also often ready to help her allies when they go down through off-healing.
Valkyrie’s IRL name is Klaudia Holberg. Klaudia came to Tokyo some years ago as a college exchange student and immediately fell in love with the city. Once she received her BA, she transferred to a Tokyo University for postgraduate studies and has never looked back.
In Tokyo, she worked as an interpreter for several companies while pursuing her further education. She eventually joined the Foreign Studies faculty and, as a younger professor, she quickly gained a reputation for an easy-going style. She’s often both patient and mild-mannered when teaching her subject matter. Outside of class, though, she can take on a more brash and outspoken demeanor.
Klaudia’s also engaged in athletics. Often arriving on campus early most mornings — sponsoring and advising for various school clubs. Only her closest friends know how much she enjoys relaxing with video games after a long day of athletic activities, herding students, and grading papers. Her roommate was in on the secret and got her hooked on MMOs. Ever since, she’s always played as part of a group — enjoying the comradery and team play.
Klaudia found her preference for jolly cooperation and sharing the fun of exploration over things like PvP or competitive raiding. Her gaming group has been playing a lot of sci-fi games lately, so she was particularly excited for BSO’s world of swords. Both Klaudia and her roommate shared a love of old samurai movies. Klaudia felt there was something especially majestic about the romantic fantasy of the warrior wandering jianghu — carrying a sword in their hand and justice in their heart.
In most games, Klaudia typically goes by “Valkyrie.” If someone beat her to the name, she’ll typically pic random name of one — like the “Valkyrie Thrud” tag she used in her last major game. Luckily, Klaudia got first dibs on her favorite moniker in BSO.
Episodes
For episodes 1-4, our party of heroes ventured into the deadly virtual fantasy world of Valhalla. Immediately taking on a force of half-ogres, the group didn’t realize how close they came to death until the game creators made their fateful announcement in a Home-Town arena. Rather than succumb to fear and paralysis, the party decided to venture north out of Mio Elysse on a quest to retrieve the idol key of Neb-ankh. On the road, the party took out a goblin settlement then nearly perished fighting a group of Yuan Ti kidnappers. However, they were able to survive and free a number of fellow gamers triggering a hidden quest award.
Returning to Mio Elysse, our heroes decided to officially join together as a party and start a guild — Stella Requiem or In Memory of Stars. In their guild hall they keep a list of all those lost to the deadly game. Before they rest, members of Stella Requiem light a candle of remembrance for all the fallen.
Picking up the threat of their quest to retrieve the key of Neb-ankh, our heroes journey at last to a dungeon north of town rumored to house the key. Fighting through a hoard of undead and troglodytes, the party at last retrieves the key — only returning to town to discover that their quest giver is corrupt. When returning the key, the party is refused their reward even as they are ambushed by a Lamia, her cultist followers, and a number of vicious Jackleweres… which catches us up to our live streaming episodes.
Battlestorm Online 5 — Ambushed by a Lamia in which our heroes encounter a treacherous Lamia who first sends them on a quest and then attempts to kill them.
Battlestorm Online 6 — Sailing on a Ship of Ghouls in which our heroes Morgen, Val, Katsunori, Umare, Indie, and C’rra confront a hoard of ghouls inhabiting a wrecked ship on the coast of Midgard.
Battlestorm Online 7 — “They mostly come at night… mostly…” in which our heroes venture to a region north of Ashkelon where a Necromancer’s Tower spews forth foul undead to terrorize the lands.
Battlestorm Online 8 — Stella Requiem ventures further into the Necromancer’s Tower. Morgen and C’rra take a nasty tumble.
Battlestorm Online 9 — Stella Requiem confronts the Shadow Demon, then discovers something troubling about the game’s AI NPCs.
Battlestorm Online 10: Stella Requiem prepares to confront a Stone Gaint. Some rapid character building ensues as the party expands to deal with a very dangerous monster.
Battlestorm Online 11: The battle against the Stone Giant commences. Meanwhile, residents of a town near Lake Mimisbrunnr are poisoned.
Battlestorm Online 12: Stella Requiem enters the roots of Yggdrasil to confront hordes of monsters — mainly kobolds.
Battlestorm Online 13 — Stella Requiem continues to delve deeper into the dungeon beneath Yggdrasil’s roots.
Battlestorm Online 14 — Stella Requiem gets cornered and decides to beat a hasty retreat.
Battlestorm Online 15 — Stella Requiem returns for some sweet kobold revenge.
Battlestorm Online 16 — As Stella Requiem delves deeper into Yggdrasil’s roots they discover that the kobolds are still everywhere.
Battlestorm Online 17 — Stella Requiem continues to battle hordes of kobolds.
Battlestorm Online 18 — Stella Requiem delves deeper into Yggdrasil’s roots.
Battlestorm Online 19 — Stella Requiem gets a much needed level up, then returns to enact furious vengeance upon their kobold foes.
Battlestorm Online 20 — Stella Requiem encounters an unexpected twist.
Battlestorm Online 21 — Are two parties really better than one?
Last Notes
For now, we conclude our gaming archive and related character profiles for Battlestorm Online — Valhalla. Return for updates and new video archives occurring about once a week. Also, I’ll be updating our character profiles when the situation warrants. Thank you for stopping by!
If you’re interested in using our campaign materials for your own games take a look at the Battlestorm Online Player’s Guide and our twelve original Battlestorm Online Backgrounds. I’ll be posting Game Master materials for this campaign over the coming weeks which you’ll be able to find in the Gaming Studio.
Final note — I’ve fixed the screen resolution issue on twitch, so it shouldn’t be an issue for upcoming games in the stream or in the archive.
Scribbler’s Fantastical Workshop 
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