PWM: Amon, the Thousand-Year-Old Vampire Session 0
Amon, The Vampire
Content Warnings: assault, blood, intended for mature audiences
Here I start my journey into the solo-journaling game created by Tim Hutchins, Thousand-Year-Old Vampire.
This will be a write-up of a brand new playthrough of this wonderful game.
First, I do want to share some Content Warnings. This is from the game book itself:
…you will encounter themes of death, selfishness and predation. Your character may be injured, victimized, trapped or killed. Your character will murder and victimize people of all sorts, possibly including children, animals, loved ones, marginalized people or themselves. You might find yourself exploring themes of imperialism, colonialism or oppression. Characters might engage in self-harm or drug abuse. Illness, debilitation, and body horror may come into play. Your character may have their memories altered, they will certainly forget important things. Some of this will emerge from the Prompts, some will emerge from the choices you make as a player. (p. ii)
This is a dark game, no doubt about it. I promise to do my best to put in content warnings before each chapter. If I miss some or make a mistake, please let me know so I can fix it.
Playing this game requires extensive googling of history time periods, which is great fun! But it also means I will get things wrong. In a game that stretches a thousand years, I simply cannot promise that I’ll get everything historically accurate. I’ll try my best, as I do love learning about history, but I could spend my entire game time researching rather than getting on with it.
When you begin, you come up with a name, three skills, three resources, and three mortal NPC’s you have a connection with. You also create the immortal NPC that turned you into a vampire as well as a Mark that you carry as a sign of your condition.
Now, I started a poll before break, asking for input if readers had preferences over what time period and setting they’d be interested in. While I didn’t get much engagement, I did finally get a vote!
I’m going to honor that reader and their idea. Let’s begin during the Roman conquest of Egypt which occurred during the Ptolemaic Kingdom, when Egypt was, essentially, an Ancient Greek state after Alexander the Great had conquered it centuries before.
After some research…I decide on my character. I am Amon, a Priest of Osiris, who performs rituals in a temple in Alexandria. I decide my skills lie in performing rituals (obviously), literacy(reading and writing), and diplomacy(a priest must speak to many different people). For resources, I write down a modest home, a small gold statue, and religious scrolls. For my NPCs, I decide I have connections to Chione, a female servant, Amr, the high priest of the temple and my neighbor, Jabari. The Immortal that turned my character into a vampire, I decide is a supernatural creature claiming to be the Egyptian god, Osiris and is leading a secret cult. My Mark is that I have hole in my chest the size of a heart that doesn’t bleed but doesn’t heal.
Name: Amon, Priest of Osiris
Skills: Performing rituals, Literacy, Diplomacy
Resources: A modest home, small gold statue of Osiris, ritual scrolls
NPCs
Mortals
Chione, a female servant in the temple,
Amr, the high priest of the temple
Jabari, my brother, a scribe
Immortals
Leader of a secret cult, claiming to be Osiris, god of the dead
Marks
A heart-sized hole my chest that doesn’t bleed but doesn’t heal
In this game, you roll 1d10 and subtract 1d6, which forces you to slowly make your way through the book, addressing prompts. For each prompt, you create an Experience that goes with a Memory. A Memory simply holds Experiences that go together with some kind of through-line. You can have 5 Memories, each with 3 experiences. These fill up fast, and you might wonder, what happens when they’re full? Well, then you, as the vampire, start forgetting things and you, as the player, start striking memories out to replace with new ones. You can get a Diary to hold a certain number of experiences but this can also be lost.
To start off, you create a few memories and experiences, one that’s about your origins and then ones that connect an NPC with a Skill or a Resource. The game presents two ways to play. You can write a journal entry for each experience, or write a sentence that captures the memory. I’ll be doing a mix of both. At the end of each post, I’ll show the character sheet with any changes, including the experiences as single sentence notes or phrases.
30 BC, Alexandria
I am Amon, a simple priest of Osiris, tending to the temple in Alexandria, performing daily rituals. Tensions have grown within the city as the war between the Ptolemaic Kingdom and Rome continues. Emperor Octavian approaches Alexandria with his army.
I have searched for answers and supernatural powers. My search has led me into a secret cult of Osiris. Osiris, the god, is the leader, or so they claim. As far as I can tell, he is a man, always cloaked in shadows, only met at night. Even though I am wary, it is clear he has supernatural powers. I am intrigued.
I’ve noticed a woman at the temple, Chione, lithe and beautiful. We have met and spoken many times. I enjoyed her company. I showed her ritual texts and read them to her.
The High Priest of the temple, Amr, honored me and gave me a small gold statue of Osiris. Amr had always been gracious and shown kindness to me. I am grateful and prominently display the statue in my home.
I had dinner with my brother, Jabari, in my home. We discussed the coming army and what will happen when it arrives. Jabari was worried. I told him we must trust the gods. He scoffed and shook his head.
…
Something has happened. Osiris told me I was ready. He would grant me eternal life if I swore to serve him in this life and the next. I did so. He brought me to a chamber deep underground, lit by torches, with masked figures chanting. I laid on a stone tabletop. The chanting grew louder. Osiris plunged his hands deep into my chest. I screamed in pain. He ripped something out of me, something that pumped and thumped. Osiris bit into my still-beating heart. I thought I would die but Osiris bid me drink from a golden cup. It tasted of blood. I passed out and awoke in my home, a bloody hole in my chest. I am changed.
Memory 1
30 BC: Publicly, I am Amon, priest of Osiris, responsible for performing rituals at a temple in Alexandria, privately I am part of a secret cult led by a figure claiming to be Osiris.
Memory 2
30 BC: Chione and I begin a secretive romantic partnership, I show her some of my scrolls and read to her.
Memory 3
30 BC: Amr honors me with a small, golden statue of Osiris, I am grateful and display it in my house.
Memory 4
30 BC: Jabari has dinner with me in my home and we discuss our worries about the war and what will happen between Rome and Egypt as Octavian’s army approaches the city.
Memory 5
30 BC: Osiris performed a dark ritual, pulling my heart out of my chest, consuming it, and having me drink his blood, I have changed into a Vampire.
We are done with the set up and ready to play! Moving forward and during play, I will show the dice results and the prompt number. Occasionally, I’ll share a prompt but I don’t want to give away too much of what makes this book so amazing. The prompts are so great.
I will write the resulting experiences and the ‘diary’ entries. At the end of a chapter, I’ll show the updated ‘Character sheet’ with any changes that have occurred. Some prompts have you ‘check off’ a skill, so you need to use that skill in your response to the prompt. Others have you lose and/or gain skills and resources.
If you enjoyed this and want to keep up with it, subscribe. If you think others might be interested in this solo-journaling actual-play, please share.
If you have any questions or thoughts, feel free to comment. I’m curious to hear other’s thoughts, questions and experiences on Thousand-Year-Old Vampire and other journaling games.
Thanks for reading.
Next Chapter → Chapter 1: Amon becomes a monster
Great start! Looking forward to the next episode.