Advice for running "A Fire in the Darkness"?

[Beoferret]

Hi all! I ran "A Rough Landing" for a couple of friends about a month ago and we're finally about ready to meet up again for the next installment of the Starter Set adventures, "A Fire in the Darkness." The party consists of pre-gens Yanioth, Vishi Dunn, Aranda of Nochet, and Mago the Fierce. I planned on starting things off with some quick Glorantha-showcasing side activities (e.g., worship ceremonies to recover rune points, Yanioth being asked to help with a young girl's initiation into adulthood, etc.), while setting the stage for AFitD by letting them now about a sudden spate of fires (getting them ready to finally deal with one, maybe after leaving an interview with a potential quest giver.) So...... for anyone who's either GM'd or played this adventure, do any of you have any suggestions and advice for running things smooth, yet engaging way? Did you run into any particular problems or pitfalls in making the adventure work?

I've already tagged this thread as "contains spoilers," so spoil away!

[Brian Duguid]

Beer With Teeth have a couple of write-ups of running this adventure, courtesy of @Diana Probst, which may be worth a read. Not tips directly, but some clues as to how a group may deal with the scenario:

https://beer-with-teeth.games/starter-set-adventure-iia/

https://beer-with-teeth.games/starter-adventure-iib/

[Oracle]

"A Fire in the Darkness" is also covered in Session 5 and Session 6 of the RuneQuest Starter Set stream.

Session 4 covers mainly the downtime between "A Rough Landing" and "A Fire in the Darkness", but also sets up the scenery for the latter adventure (roughly from 1:30:00).

[Beoferret]

Thanks for the links, folks. The ways the two groups went through the adventure were very, very different. The kicker is that after reading Diana's experience and watching the stream session and spending several hours reading through the adventure a second time, as well as taking notes and brainstorming ideas ... my players decided to leave Jonstown before the fires started (Mago especially wanted to "leave this shithole town.") But they're on to Clearwine, while escorting a small caravan of goods to Apple Lane on behalf of Joh Mith. Rainbow Mounds, here we come!

 

As a quick aside, what we did end up doing before they set out for Clearwine was:

1) Mago met a few other Uroxi and ended up paying to use the rent-a-shrine for a worship ceremony on Orlanth's seasonal holy day. Owner of rent-a-shrine was "encouraged" (not by Mago) to offer the assembled berserks a deal. A piece of krarshtkid (taken as a trophy in previous adventure) was burned in sacrifice. Biker frat party ensues (with the sounds of an angry bull echoing in Mago's head, when he recouped rune points)! Mago's player is channeling Amos Burton (mostly), from The Expanse, when considering how to play the character. The rest of the session, Mago drank and fornicated his way through Jonstown. Meanwhile ....

2) Yanioth and Aranda were asked if they would like to assist with the adulthood initiation of twin girls who had come into menarche on the same day. Yanioth assisted in awakening the first girl's fertility (rolling a critical vs. the Fertility rune) and possibly set her on the path to Ernalda's priesthood. Aranda got to give the first girl Esrolian advice on dealing with men and was later drawn into a scene that revealed the second twin was possibly on the path to Babs Gor. Aranda tested the second twin using Death rune (and swinging axe)-enhanced intimidation. The girl took one step back, but then quickly moved forward to face her down. At the end of the initiation, Aranda gave the girl one of her axes and a recommendation to travel to Esrolia to study the Babeester Gor way and an offer to stay with Aranda's family. 

     *I wasn't sure if this initiation scene was going to be too much for the players (too much setting, too much railroading, too much nudity), but Yanioth and Aranda's players (both women under the age of 30) loved it. Aranda's player even said later that she'd love to eventually take the second twin under her wing; acting as a mentor/adoptive mother, since she figured Aranda would never have her own bio-kids.

3) Vishi was asked to help deal with the spirit of a jealous husband. The guy had left his wife in Jonstown to join Kallyr for a year or so - abandoning her with three kids - and then died during the liberation of Jonstown. Widow married a neighbor who had been helping her during husband's absence and now hubby's spirit was pissed. Vishi tried to appeal to him to accept things for his family's sake, then threatened to bind him into a shoe, but eventually had to defeat him in spirit combat and drive him off. While all this happened in a poor, 2nd floor apartment, Cousin Monkey entertained the kids outside (including climbing up the side of a building with a five year old boy on his back.)

4) Yanioth and Aranda got their rune points back at a worship ceremony during Ernalda's seasonal holy day (Dark Season). They've made some connections.

Overall good times.