Edit: This post was imported from Point of Play, my gaming blog, which I’ve collapsed into this one.

We played the first episode of Oasis just two days after the pilot. That should tell you how much fun we were having. We had a better grasp on the mechanics and how everything interacts so it all went a lot more smoothly. We covered nine scenes and we probably would have kept going if we hadn’t run out of time. We used every single one of the Next Week On snippets and we ended up with a really powerful setup for the next episode. I also took notes, which slowed us down a little but allowed for better coverage. Next game I’m going to try to record using my digital camera, then just transcribe from the video.

We had an audience this time around: Ryan’s brother Aaron sat in with us. We started him off with a couple of fanmail to spend, briefly explained what the show is about, and told him that he could speak up anytime he had an idea, and that if anybody said or did anything that he especially liked, he should say so. We’d explain how he could spend his fanmail when that became an option.

In the interest of not wearing my fingers off typing it all, I’m going to skip the camerawork descriptions and the intricate details. Hope you don’t mind.

As Producer, I had the first scene. I neglected to prep anything at all, so I wasted a few minutes racking my brain to come up with something. Eventually I hit on an idea and ran with it. The casino owner, Nguyen, walked through the casino floor trailed by a couple of assistants and half a dozen dealers. He was whispering to pit bosses and replacing dealers. A brief zoom on a whisper revealed him saying something about “these dealers are Our Guys.” Andrew is one of the dealers replaced. He gets inquisitive with the pit boss, who snarls at him and tells him to just take his night off with pay and be happy with it. I half expected Jake to press the issue and try to get more information or something, but he let it go. No conflict in this scene.

It was Deirdra’s turn to call the next scene and she asked for Thompson to grab Andrew and insist on following up on the “unscheduled dealer change.” The scene started off with a hilarious exchange where Thompson strong-arms Andrew and demands to know what’s going on, then pays virtually no attention when Andrew mumbles something about having no idea. We get a small conflict with Andrew wanting to go home to spend time with his daughter while Thompson wants to take Andrew with him when he goes to get some answers from Nguyen. End result: Thompson drags Andrew along.

Next up was Rob’s turn to call and he wanted to work in his Next Week On snippet. He puts the scene in the casino lounge and wants Kitty to overhear him. We move on to Holloway at the bar in the lounge, talking on his cell phone. For some reason we pass William Shatner making a cameo as a bar patron a few seats down. Kitty comes in just in time to hear Holloway yell “I don’t care what the fuck you have to do, just take care of her!” and slam shut his phone. She sits down, decides it’s not a time to pry, and buys him a drink. With a nice little “time passes” camerawork, we skip ahead. Holloway’s had several drinks, and now it’s time to pry. We have a confict over whether Holloway blows his top and whether Kitty gets some dirt. He doesn’t, but neither does she, and we move on to the next scene.

Bonita wants to see what happens with Thompson, Andrew, and Nguyen, so we find the two protagonists just as they stop Nguyen and his assistants heading up the elevators. Rob steps in to play Mr. Nguyen for this scene and decides that he’s got a terrible accent, something we apparently overlooked until now. Thompson’s railing at Nguyen and demanding proper paperwork and documentation on the dealer changes, while Andrew is attempting to edge away so that the casino owner doesn’t associate him with this maniac. Somehow every scene with Thompson so far has been comedic. I’m blaming Ryan for going along with everybody’s ideas. We get a conflict over whether Nguyen can provide paperwork for the dealer change-over, and we decide that either the paperwork is going to be falsified somehow or it’s going to be nonexistent. Either way, something’s shady. Ryan wins, so the paperwork is faked. We should have thrown in another challenge to see if Thompson forgets about Andrew or hauls him along, but neglected to think of it and Andrew just slips away as Thompson goes back with Nguyen to his office.

Ryan calls the next scene and I think he had some trouble coming up with something. We had a bunch of folks make suggestions, and eventually we worked out something he liked. We cut to Holloway coming from an elevator and sniffing, obviously having just snorted some coke. He spots the roulette dealer who replaced Andrew palming the roulette ball and replacing it with another. We see Rae carrying a tray of drinks and watching as Holloway dashes over to intervene, get into an argument with the pit boss and then the short, chubby bald guy from the pilot (still played by Matt Pinfield) steps out of the crowd and talks Holloway down. We (and Rae) can see he’s furious, but he walks away. Rae’s attention is wholly focused on the action rather than where she’s going and as a result she walks straight into…William Shatner.

Drinks go all over Bill, and as he and Rae are trying to get themselves sorted out, Holloway comes in like a raging bull, ready to throw Shatner out on his ear for accosting casino personnel. Rae claims responsibility, Shatner exits hurriedly, and Rae jumps on this opportunity to ask Holloway what went on with the dealer who was that bald man? We get an excellent challenge on whether Rae gets a good answer out of Holloway. If Deirdra wins, Holloway fumbles and tells her something actually true about the guy, though he tries to cover it up (and fails). If she loses, he makes up a decent cover story. Deirdra wins the conflict, I win Narration. Everybody’s tossing out ideas fast and furious, but Inspiration hits me. Holloway plays it off: “Ah, that’s Mr. Girardi. He’s, uh. He’s from the Gaming Commission.” I think one of my favorite things about this game is when somebody says something and everybody just gasps and there’s a moment of silence while everybody thinks about the ramifications.

Jake calls for the next scene and wants to use a Next Week On snippet. Rae and Thompson compare notes. Rae relates what went on with Holloway, then Thompson passes over the paperwork that Nguyen gave him, saying something seems odd about it. Kitty, typing at her laptop at a table nearby manages to snap a picture of the pass. An older gentleman swoops in, kisses Kitty on the cheek, and sits down at her table, asking how her story is going. We know who he is, but the audience has no idea yet. No conflict this scene.

We’ve gone around the circle of players once (skipping Aaron, so we could show him how it’s done), so we’re back to my turn to call a scene. I go back through my notes to see what I want to cover and spot a dangling thread. I set Holloway in the Security Office getting a radio call from his security guards out front of the casino. There’s a situation. He heads out to find a cab, a cabdriver, and a Latino woman in a beautiful dress with exceptionally coiffed hair and exquisitely manicured nails going completely apeshit on a pair of security guards. At first I offer the character to Bonita, but Deirdra steps in to steal the scene with a shrieking, wailing, cursing, kicking Juanita, here to collect on money that she claims Holloway owes her. We learn that the cabbie was on the other end of Holloway’s “just take care of her” phone call, though we don’t learn who he is. We learn that Juanita is Holloway’s ex-wife (not to mention Nemesis), and we learn that Holloway’s short fuse has burned all the way down when he draws his gun on her to try to get her to calm down. She calls his bluff, knowing he won’t shoot her, and threatens that if she doesn’t get her money, she’s going to start telling people about his “new friends.” Oooooooh, there’s that collective gasp again, and here’s our conflict. Does Holloway keep his head, and shovel Juanita into the cab to get her out of there before she starts talking? Or does he lose it and knock her unconscious with his pistol to shut her up? Tons of fanmail flew in on this one. Even Rob was tempted to throw fanmail toward me because he wanted to see Holloway go further down that tube.

I dump a lot of budget into this one and with my fanmail, it’s no contest. We lay out the cards and I win by a landslide. Holloway snaps, the pistol crashes into the side of Juanita’s head, and he catches her as she falls. He dumps her in the cab and tells the cabbie to take care of her. The cabbie drives off. Silence. Holloway glances around at the onlookers, then turns to go back into the casino and stops short, nose to nose with Thompson. Oooooh.

I realize that is is a great time to use that Thompson/guards Next Week On snippet. Holloway shoves past Thompson and heads back inside. Thompson scans the scene, then buttonholes the guards, telling them “I saw the whole thing. If you see anything, come to me first.”

We gave Aaron the opportunity to call the next scene. He wanted to follow up on Kitty and the guy at her table, and I had an idea for how to handle it. He gave me the go-ahead and I ran with it.

Kitty and The Guy climb into a limo and have a chat where we discover that this is Bruce Conway, Kitty’s father. Bruce is a big-time newspaperman and Kitty’s living in his shadow, trying to make a name for herself. Bruce is cheery and paternal and condescending, suggesting that there’s nothing to the story she’s chasing and that she’d be better suited to going back to human interest stories rather than trying to break big news. He tells her that she’s free to use the limo for as long as she needs and gets dropped off at a big red-carpet, balloons-and-streamers gala affair. Just as he’s about to shut the limo door, Kitty drops a tough one. “How’d you know I was at the Oasis, Daddy?” Conflict! This one was another example of the “he fumbles the answer/he gives a smooth answer” conflict, something that I felt we did far too much in this episode and something I’m going to try to avoid for the rest of the season. I lost, and Bruce paused just a moment too long before coming up with “A good reporter never reveals his sources, dear.” What a dick. The limo drives off with Kitty and we see Bruce turn to accept a glass of champagne from…Nguyen! To drive home the notion that they’re in cahoots, Bruce says to Nguyen, “I don’t think we have anything to worry about.”

Only time for one more scene and it’s Deir’s to call, but we all pitched in with ideas. We’ve hardly hit Andrew at all this episode and the next one is his spotlight, so he’s obviously going to be involved. We’ve got one more Next Week On snippet to use, so it’s easy to lay this one out.

Holloway’s outside the employee entrance with Malone, the dirty cop (after some discussion, we determined that ‘Maloon’ didn’t test well in the pilot and got renamed). It’s late and they’re in the middle of a conversation. Malone tells Holloway that Holloway’s lucky that he got assigned to follow up on the Juanita incident, and that their “mutual friends” aren’t happy that she’s threatening to talk. How’d she know about them, anyway? We haven’t found out yet. Anyway, Malone tells Holloway to send her on a cruise or something to keep her out of the way and hands over a stack of cash, using up our last Next Week On snippet.

Here’s where it gets good. At that moment, Andrew comes out of the casino’s employee entrance carrying a brightly wrapped gift box and sees the exchange. Holloway pockets the money as he rounds on Andrew, demanding to see some identification and generally scaring the living crap out of him. Here’s our last conflict. Can Andrew keep his cool and calm down Holloway, or does he handle himself badly and come across as a threat? Nearly everybody wants to see Andrew get out of this okay, so Jake gets lots of fanmail spent in his favor, but the cards fall heavily for me. Andrew stutters and stammers, trying to explain that he came back to pick up a gift for his daughter that he forgot here, but it doesn’t help. Holloway slaps the present out of Andrew’s hands and we hear a tinkle of glass as the box hits the pavement. Malone takes the opportunity to leave as Andrew finally comes up with his employee ID card. Holloway glances briefly at it, then heads into the casino.

The camera focuses into the background and we see Andrew’s car out in the empty parking lot. The door opens and Caroline gets out, runs past her father, and sits down in the alley to open the present. It’s a picture of their family before Andrew’s wife died, but the glass in the frame is shattered and the frame itself is splintered and broken. She cradles the present in her lap and cries while Andrew stands paralyzed in the cone of illumination from the security spotlight over the door, humiliated in front of his daughter, burning with shame and rage. Fade out.

Next Time on Oasis:
Deirdra: Rae is on a phone, her face illuminated by a computer screen. “There’s a problem with this list. I ran the socials. Thompson, they’re all dead.”
Jake: Andrew knocks on Thompson’s office door. “Mr. Thompson, I have some information you may be interested in.”
Rob: Holloway knocks on a door. “Juanita, I have something for you.” The camera pans down to a gun in his hand.
Bonita: Kitty is eavesdropping on her father and gets threatened.
Ryan: Andrew’s car pulls into the parking lot of his apartment and there are police cars there with lights flashing.