[OOC] Death & Taxes

Getting prepared for the next adventure! Feel free to start using this OOC thread instead of the other one as you decide how to spend your XP and cash.

I'll probably take a little longer to use the XP, but I'd try gambling a bit just to check out it works :D

Is the new component casting talent ok to take? I was thinking this could tie with some gambling material like a deck of cards, dice or even money that the cleric bets on the spell ;)
So that would be 5XP
+1 divine: 10XP
+1 charm: 10XP
Lucky Strike lv2: +10xp Just double checking, Willpower is a characteristic so if I choose it I can add 4 damage to my spells by using one story point right?

Ok, have taken a Duration increase to my Heroic Ability for my Ability Point.

XP wise I've spent it as follows:

15 xp Talent: T3 Natural (Arcana, Knowledge (Forbidden)) (160)
15 xp Skill Increase-Arcana 2-3 (175)
5 xp Talent: T1 Knack for It (Knowledge (Forbidden)) (180)
Banking 5 xp

Thinking I might start dabbling in Mask spells from the EPG but not really interested in Predict at the moment (thinking that would be more in Nekurr's wheel house if anything)

So I've been thinking Hildar would start looking into crafting another Wand but wanted to run through it first (it's also probably out of his budget at the moment). Book price for a Hazel Wand would be 600 (400 for the wand and 200 for it being made from Hazel) with a Rarity of 8 - based on the Rarity it would be a Daunting Mechanics check (difficulty half the Rarity) and would take 5 days to make in addition to time spent locating suitable materials which would cost 300 if I'm reading things right. The book also mentions needing tools to do it but leaves things somewhat vague as to costs etc so I'm thinking his first task at the moment would be to locate those in the downtime we've got unless there are some suitable tools lying around HQ

Appreciate the check-ins regarding XP and silver spent. Please keep it coming!

I'll check over everything so far tomorrow or the next day. I'm flying home tomorrow, but we have a sick kiddo, so things are a bit hectic.

Turns out I have 10xp leftover, but I'll hold onto it for now, maybe get a tier 3 talent. also in 5xp I get another heroic upgrade.

I think I should buy some Dwarvern leather armor for extra protection (2x 50 price, +2 rarity for a total of 5), would that equal only 100 or would there be extra cost associated?

Should also sale my padded armor (35 silver).

Happy New Year!

Please bear with me a bit longer as I deal with a sick kid who's gotten the rest of the family sick. Hopefully I'll get y'all an update before day's end.

Just a note that it looks like you are all 5 XP short of a second Ability Point to spend on your Heroic Abilities. (You all should have already received one Ability Point for an upgrade, which I know at least one of you banked.) That means I think Hildar has to wait a bit longer for that Duration upgrade. On the plus side, shouldn't be longer than February 1 before you all get that extra upgrade!

See above. I think we're just 5 XP short of the next upgrade.
Looks good. You technically have access to the two new spells, since magic is so free-form. But, yeah, Mask should be fun!
So, are you reading the cost of Hazel as adding to the overall cost? I think it's a simple multiplier, meaning that a hazel wand should cost 200 silver, full stop. Materials would cost 100 in this case. But with your earnings, you could just try to get our best Negotiator to find you an already-made wand and avoid the crafting.

If you still want to go the crafting route, the tools are likely to be fairly simple for a wand; maybe just a whittling knife, which we can say is already at HQ.

To be honest, I'm a bit wary of Component Casting, since it seems to add an element of bean-counting that I'd rather avoid. But I do like the idea that Nekurr might draw cards while casting, sort of like Gambit and and Tarot-card reader rolled into one! You want to roll with that?

Maybe we treat it like Genesys treats ammunition in other settings. If you roll enough Threat on the spell, it means you've run out of cards and have to buy more next time you find a shop. That way we avoid having to keep a detailed log of how many cards you have and what they are.

Let's say a deck of card costs 25 silver and has a Rarity of 2, making it on par with an extra clip for a gun in other settings.

Regarding Lucky Strike: Yes, that's right. With Willpower 4, you'd do +4 damage to your combat check. Note that attack spells are combat checks, so you can use the talent with Divine.

Sounds right: Dwarven Leather would be 100 silver for +1 Hard Point and +1 Encumbrance required (of course this is brought to 0 when worn). However, it won't make the armor any better otherwise (no extra Defense or Soak).

Elven craftsmanship would also cost 100 silver (total) for leather, and let you remove 1 Setback from Stealth checks. No extra Defense or Soak, though.

Note that I do want folks to roll to see if a particular item they want is in stock. Nornholt is at the crossroads leading to several major cities, so the Rarity Modifier is -1 (making things a bit easier to find).

Finding items is a Negotiation check versus the Rarity. As Nornholt residents, you all add a boost die to these checks. Nekurr and Tronus both have YGG in Negotiation, so either can roll for these things for the party if they wish. With the reduction, rolls are only necessary for items of Rarity 3 or more. The roll covers both finding the item and haggling for the price. So far, folks have asked for:

Deck of Cards (25 silver, Effective Rarity 1): No roll.
Hazel Wand (200 silver, Effective Rarity 7): Hard (PPP).
Padded Armor (selling, Effective Rarity 1): Just make a Simple roll (no difficulty) to see how much of the original price you can get.

Somebox might want better armor, but let's wait till we decide on Dwarven or Elvish or something else.

That's for my first Ability Point (I've not used one yet)
Yeah I am otherwise using Oak that adds no beneficial qualities to the wand would end up costing more than others such as Hazel which do add additional beneficial qualities

You get one for every 50 XP earned in game, how you spend them is detailed on page 79 of the Terrinoth book

I think you indicated you'd be keeping your first Ability Point, since you wanted an upgrade that requires 2 of them. (The one that lets you use the ability twice per session, I think.)

Gambling thread is unlocked now! Sorry about that.

That is odd. I dug around and found that it's apparently been errata'd so that hazel now costs 1.5 times the original cost. For the wand, then, it's 600 for a Hazel wand then. You're welcome to sit on your loot this time and see if the next mission puts you over the top, but you can also try to find materials if you prefer. That's still 300 silver, though.

Huh, I swear dwarvern gave an extra point of soak, but in this case I'm likely wrong. In that case I'll probably switch to elven (which has +1 rarity over dwarvern I think?) as I don't think any of the armor mods are very interesting. Regardless I'll look over my book when I get home tonight.

Well I guess I shall end up going with Elven, same price (100). Hoping for some negotiation rolls (or maybe Nera could use deception?)

Sorry, no Deception for buying and selling. I don't want to devalue Negotiation, as that's one of its key benefits. Streetwise does the job for illegal goods, of course.

Current list of what folks are looking for (remember: Add a boost for familiarity with Nornholt, and a second boost if a pair of you go out to look for stuff):

Deck of Cards (25 silver, Effective Rarity 1): No roll.
Padded Armor (selling, Effective Rarity 1): Just make a Simple roll (no difficulty) to see how much of the original price you can get.
Elven Leather Armor (100 silver; Effective Rarity 5): Average roll (PP).

I’ll have to check interesting items besides the deck of cards, but I can RP that on the gambling thread once I get to use my well earned coins, right?

I'd rather not roleplay the buying and selling too much. We can abstract out the mundane shopping with the Negotiation checks.

Ok, I'll be looking to pick up the following:

Backpack, Rarity 3, Price 50
Bedroll, Rarity 1, Price 15
Trail Rations, Rarity 10, Price 2 each, want 10

Given the locale do I need to roll for any of that? What would I be looking at for a small tent as well?

Going to hold fire on the wand for now and just save what cash I have

I should also get a bedroll and 10 rations (should be 25 silver, I can use the stipend?), I'll leave the actual negotiation roll for the armor to someone who has skills in it. Unless you want Nera to do that personally, works too.

yeah... this is one of those PbP problems... I'm not sure if two different approaches are valid or not and it takes like 10h for the GM to wake up from where I play ;) I rolled just in case it may be acceptable. I totally understand if it is ignored :D

I like the idea of everyone just using the stipend to get a bedroll, 10 rations, and a waterskin. Why don't we say you all do that, as you will be traveling, assuming you accept this adventure hook. ;P

I'd suggest Nekurr and Tronus do the shopping, as they're the best Negotiators. Maybe the two of them split up, each taking a buddy to help. Lets you roll YGGBB versus the various difficulties I've listed above. We can continue to do this if folks come up with stuff they want to buy.

I'll try to buy a sling with some stone bullet for diversity :D
Is there an online reference for items to look for? I didn't see any dwarven/elven mentioned in the plink provided :(

Nekurr finds someone to buy Nera's padded armor for the cost s he payed for it, 35 silver. However, he's unable to locate an Elven armorer with any leather suits on offer at the moment. Somebox, does Nera want to sell? Or hold off for now?

Somebox, any idea what 2 advantage might mean there? Would Nera be willing to accept just regular-old leather? Same stats as your padded, but you get a hard point to play with.

Or you get a lead on a smith somewhere en route to Buzzards' Ford (allowing for a second, but more difficult roll when on the road)?

CESN, I linked the "Equipment Encyclopedia," didn't I? There are stats for a sling in there. For reference, it costs 20 silver, does 4 damage, crits on 4 advantage, uses the Ranged skill, and can Disorient the target for 2 rounds (giving them a black die) for 2 advantage. It has the Prepare 1 quality, meaning you have to spend a maneuver to put a rock in it to use it each turn. A single Threat can cause it to run out of ammo, but getting more stones isn't that hard.

You did :) But I couldn't find the stats for the dwarven/elven items somebox is looking for :(

I don't think they're in the encyclopedia, I recall having to check the Terrinoth book.

Yeah, that's not in there. For reference:

Ancient: Cost x 20, Rarity 10. For armor, Soak and Defense go up by 1. Armor is Reinforced (can't be damaged), but it has 1 fewer Hard Point.
For weapons, the damage goes up by 1 and the crit reduces by 1. Weapon is Reinforced (can't be damaged), but it has 1 fewer Hard Point (for customization).

Dwarven: Cost x 2, Rarity +2
Armor has Encumbrance +1 and Hard Point +1.
Weapon has Encumbrance +1 and Damage +1.

Elven: Cost x 2, Rarity +3
Armor has Encumbrance -2 and wearer removes 1 Setback from Stealth checks.
Weapon has Damage -1 but also Crit rating goes down 1.

I'll allow another roll en route to Buzzards' Ford to find an Elven smith for Nera. We'll assume she holds onto her padded armor for now, then.

Buying the Elven Zanagan Leather Armor. Selling padded for 35.

Roger that.

hey guys. sorry for not being too active at the moment. I was travelling and couldn't post anything.
I'll try to post something today or tomorrow, but I'll be away next week as well, so I was considering if Nekurr could go to the big city check what the clerics know while you guess move on (just to take him out of picture for a week or so, I should be back fully around the 10th).

Thanks for the heads up. There's no need to send Nekurr off, I think; a week in the real world may be mere minutes in-game at PbP speeds. The only exception might be if we get into a combat. If that happens, is it OK for me to just have Nekurr stay to the back, casting buff spells (heals and enhances) or slinging rocks until you return? It may not even happen, but just wanted to ask before you are away!

Safe travels!

Team Chat: No one start a bar fight or draw aggro; healer's afk.

No worries mate.

sure :)

I'll update things in a bit. In the meantime, happy February! Everyone gets +5 XP for their monthly award. Let me know if you spend it, or feel free to bank it.

W00t! Going to bank mine

Remember they might have beef with catfolk.

I think the information you got on them was that they were unlikely to be familiar with Catfolk or Orcs. They definitely don't like Dwarves, Elves, and Humans, though.

I think we should send out two max, Nera being one of them. A charming individual as the second?

Guess I'll aid Hildar in walking since he probably looks like he has a hangover although he doesn't.

I'm assuming both :)

OK, so I'm happy to proceed with more swamp exploration, but I do want to note that we are way off book here. The original adventure plan was going to start in media res, with you arriving at the village, your mission to find the tax collector already accepted. I decided to walk things back to Nornholt to give you some opportunities to do a bit of background research and possibly go in with some useful intel. The whole Lizardfolk angle was all the result of random Triumphs y'all rolled and never intended to be the adventure itself.

That said, I believe in player agency, and I'm happy to continue improvising Lizardfolk stuff is that's what you want to pursue (and as long as we eventually get to Buzzards' Ford, where the real adventure lies). So far, I've tried to give you opportunities to take the "back door" to the village (with the hunters), but you seemed not too happy with that plan. Then you said you might want to make contact with some Lizardfolk to get information from them, and I told you it would be hard, but doable, and that's where we're at now.

But if the plan is to continue forward to the Lizardfolk village (where this guy is was cast out from), it raises a few problems. First, what are you planning to do with the horse cart and the horses? I don't want to continue into what will be an involved swamp sub-adventure if half or more of the players are forced to hang back and guard the horses. So I think you need to decide if you're going to abandon them and just apologize profusely to Lady Argus down the road? Or take the extra time it will take to return to the Cailn Crossroads and leave them with Tronus's friend (paying her for her services)? But trying to take the swamp and rivers into the village means the horses don't come with you unless you can come up with some plan to move large animals through the swamp.

Second, if we're going to try to get to the Lizardfolk village, I want everyone to participate. So if you deal with the horse problem somehow, we can go that route with everyone along for the ride. But by doing that, you'll have to figure out how to get into the village's good graces when you're 1) foreigners and "civilized people" they won't like, and 2) hanging out with someone they've cast out from their village. Maybe the wine will be enough? Maybe it won't. It's also a big detour that will cost you a couple days of travel.

To be clear, I'm not trying to dissuade you from any course of action. I just want to make sure that the downside of further swamp exploration is crystal clear. I'll do my best to make sure it pays off somehow, but the adventure was never designed to involve Lizardfolk at all. This is all improv at this point. :)

I am squarely interested in getting out of lizardfolk territory asap, as I don't want any unfortunate incidents to occur.

Well I just called on tronus to join us so that one is sorted 👍

Also, I think the idea is to get that promised "surprising the villagers" bonus so I don’t think we’re looking for the lizard village at the moment. We found our guide, so now we can learn more about what is going on around here and at buzzard’s as we go through the swamp (I admit I failed to read the "by the regular roads" part :(

Should we start a thread that has all the info we do know about the situation? Or what we've extrapolated.

Not a bad idea. You're welcome to do so.

Also LOL at this whole scene.

Welcome to March! Please take another +5 XP. Feel free to spend it immediately or bank for later use. Just let me know either way.

(We're also nearing the end of a session, which will be worth another +15 XP, if that helps you make a decision on what you'd like to do.)

I'll be banking again and wait for those 15! what's the total XP you guys have? I think I got the values switched as my total is lower than the used ... :(

90 Total
+05XP Aug XP Monthly Allotment
+05XP Sep XP Monthly Allotment
+20XP Completion of Session 1
+05XP Oct XP Monthly Allotment
+05XP Nov XP Monthly Allotment
+05XP Dec XP Monthly Allotment
+30 xp end of mission
+05XP Jan XP Monthly Allotment
+05XP Feb XP Monthly Allotment
+05XP Mar XP Monthly Allotment

that includes the initial XP? I have had 205 written on the used XP...

Each race starts with a different amount of starting XP, so it's possible point totals will vary slightly from PC to PC.

ah right! I'll check the race then :D

ah right! I'll check the race then :D so that's 100(110)XP per cat plus 90... I think the total is 190 for me then... I need to review how much I actually spent. Looks like I may have read the some XP post twice at some point :(

banking the 5 for the moment, will decide what to spend it on once we get the additional 15

OK, +15 XP everyone for the end of Session 1. (5 for doing your background research, 5 for your actions at Cailn Crossroads, and 5 for getting to the village).

As usual, give me a head's up on what new things you're buying with it. Several of you should be due an upgrade on your Heroic Ability, too, if you haven't achieved one already. It's a new upgrade for every 50 earned XP.

In fact, I have you at 105 earned XP, which is worth two upgrades. (Some upgrades require two "Ability Points," and I think some of you were banking for that -- now's your chance!)

I passed the 200XP now so if "earned XP" includes the starting XP, that would be me upgrading :)
I guess, since we also earned 105 XP since the beginning... that would be me either way :D

Yeah, it's only earned XP for the upgrades. I think you were thinking about the Frequency upgrade (2 Ability Points, or 100 earned XP), which lets you use your Foretelling twice per session. (Yikes.)

For our hero abilities it's off of earned XP from campaigning. I haven't found where I spent the first 50 xp upgrade so I'll review that and update here.

Using 20 for (banking 5)
Apothacary T1 -5xp
Inspiring Rheoteric Impr T3 -15XP

Update: using on to take Story upgrade and banking the other since I need 2 two purchase.

Total xp: 35

Talent: Skills:
Ranged 2->3 (15xp)
Cool 0->1 (5xp)

Heroic Upgrade:
Diminish - While the ability is active, enemies within short range add setback die to their skill checks.

FYI should be interesting in combat comes up now since I can maneuver people (cost them 1 strain to make a move out of their turn) and give boost die and heal strain. Granted we're going diplomatic with Buzzard's Ford.

So I get more uses of the heroic ability and a new one for free on top of spending XP regularly?
I still have to check my numbers and i’m A bit busy at work, so this may take some time :(

Just one heroic ability but you have two ability points to spend for now that expands on it, frequency cost 2.

Ok I'm at 105 in game XP so I've taken the Story upgrade for my Heroic Ability (can activate it for 1 SP now instead of 2). I was at 30 spare XP which I've spent as follows:

10 xp Talent: T2 Brilliant Casting (190)
15 xp Talent: T3 Natural (Arcana, Knowledge (Forbidden) (205)
5 xp Skill Increase-Knowledge (Adventuring) 0-1 (210)

Yes I'm playing favorites with the Catfolk.

I think I'm gonna take Dodge rank 2 with our recent windfall, need to take a peek at Heroic Ability upgrades tho... Don't think I ever took my first one...

@EM2 p79 of RoT

Sounds good. We're moving into a portion of the game with lots of potential for social interaction, too, so folks shouldn't neglect that aspect of the game. (Comment not directed at anyone in particular, just a head's up.)

*heats up the snide comment salvo*

right... so now that I have once again reviewed levelling up (too many different systems -_- )
I may buy bob's worse nightmare: You owe me one (15XP)... bad habit was a close second given the name :D

Given this one also costs story points, I may actually buy STORY Cost to make the heroic ability cheaper...

---

OK, so You Owe Me One refers to "favors," which are a system from the Android setting that we're not really using here. We could fudge something, but it might just be better to choose something else. Especially for this adventure -- if we establish that you all know people in the village, it takes away from the desired atmosphere of being strangers. The adventure is very much intended to make you outsiders, which is to say that you'll have to earn your friends here. I'm reluctant to outright ban the talent, but I do have reservations about anything that uses the "favor" system, since we're not really employing it in this game.

As for Laugh It Off, you're right: It basically means that if an NPC tries to target you with a social check, you can use their rolled Threat or Despair against them to harm their strain threshold instead. It basically acts as a "social parry" by letting you reduce the harm of incoming social checks against you.

Not sure how often a NPC will get 3 threats or 1 despair, but Laugh It Off could neat for the next bit...
Discipline is YYGG, Cool YYG and Vigilance GGGG so it's not bad at all ;)

In addition, it can be used with Clever Retort to add 2 threats and push the NPC over to the joke side :)

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Bad habit (like making decisions based on a coin toss) will heal 2 strain per turn which is basically free spells... The cost is a "permanent" at setback from being disoriented... which makes a lot of in game sense ;)
Plus, those free spells may happen to be an augment or two, which would compensate with an extra G.

ok. I have T2: Probing Question already to deal 3 extra social damage, so I may skip Laugh It Off of now and you with Bad habit :D that's 2 strain healing per turn for one setback on all rolls. That's nice for a spell caster... I feel like Laugh It Off + Clever Retort + Probing Question is too deadly a social combo for now :D

That works! Laught It Off is definitely more defensive in nature. Bad Habit can be fun. What's your thinking about how that manifests for Nekurr? I like the "make decisions based on a coin toss" thing, but how does that disorient him?

well... Nekurr decision making is a bit random... and he trusts Fortuna to guide him. This is why he has been coin tossing. Of course, this means he is easily him mostly undecided which would be reflected in his disorientation. Also, we could imagine that he may be getting some conflicting signs: maybe heads on a coins tells him to be move on, but the tarot card he picked is shouting danger? Or maybe he relies too much on "reading his luck" and just the way an NPC shadow is distorted could make him rethink?

"His conviction that it is Luck, not Fate, Purpose or Skill, that drives the world", so he may have developed the bad habit to rely more on luck than skill

I was going to go with she gets to the top and starts to climb down and hears a cracking sound of wood XD

You're not far off! :D

Ah right, that makes sense! When I read the description it looked like threats would first result in "losing the talent". To be fair, I wrote that descriptions so it could be totally wrong ;)

Oh, there are lots of fun side-effects for Threats on magic use. One I considered is that every magic-user within ten miles becomes aware of your character. }:D But I think the cards make good sense in this case. ;)

Somebox, you just got yourself a human pet :D

No pressure Tronus! ;)

LOL. His Knack for It talent will remove two of the setbacks. He also has the Influential Heroic Ability, which lets him add automatic successes if he wants. :)

Yeah, that's what I have been doing. If you suspect someone's lying, you can roll Vigilance versus their Deception skill. But, as you note, even then, it signals the players that the NPC is at least a good bullshitter, if not outright duplicitous, by way of their high Deception pool.

The other wrinkle in this is that the player-facing option—if you think they're lying, you roll Vigilance—eliminates the NPCs' ability to do "damage" in social combat with Deception.

So I'm not sure how best to handle a Deception-focused NPC in a social "combat" encounter. I need to review the rules on those (and the suggestions in the Expanded Player's Guide). But as I see it, the rules seem to imply a system where one PC or NPC makes a social check targeting one other PC or NPC, doing strain damage on a success. But what if an NPC is lying to/coercing/charming/commanding an entire group of PCs or vice-versa? Do all of the targets take the strain damage? Do you designate a "leader" for each group, and when they surpass strain threshold, their side loses? Like I said, I need to reread those rules and make sure I'm not missing something. But I'm wondering if it might make sense to treat social combats as united fronts, with the PCs and NPCs targeting a pool of the other side's strain rather than each individual character.

Cat lady would you break this poor child's heart and not sleep in the lovely barn? 😹

Don't worry, we'll just adopt him and get him out of this backwater village and Nera can teach him some real skills. >:)

By the way, happy April! +5 XP to all of you. Feel free to bank it, but please let me know what you spend it on if you do.

Tough choices... Heightened Awareness or Counteroffer... *strokes beard*

Oop! I'll be banking it I believe... this reminds me...

I should take the knack for it shouldn't I? But I have so many T1s already ...

T1s and T2s... Those things are just so easy to buy up... so much to do with them.

It's a handy talent, and probably worth a rank or two if the GM is doing their job adding setbacks to checks when warranted. One rank gets you -2 setbacks on one skill, two ranks gets you -2 setbacks on three skills. But you can always try to brute-force those setbacks by using your Augment spell more profligately; that adds more potential successes and advantages to counteract the setbacks with magically enhanced ability. Up to you, really!

Facing a writing deadline today, and have to prep something for tomorrow. Sorry for the delay; I should be able to update things sometime tomorrow, or Wednesday latest.

No worries man don't stress take your time.

Bringing the wine to the festival is a great idea if you want to impress the village folk! I didn't want to step on your toes if you had intended to sell it or something. We can suggest that you left it with the farmer to bring with him in the evening. Your horses are at the mayor's barn, not far from the Galbernost farm.

I believe you and Bruv are teaming up to go to the trading post, and he's got his cestus, which basically looks like big, metal-studded gloves, so you two should be fine. If Tronus is going to the manor, he can probably keep his weapons with him. Nera, too, with her bow. Those are the two most obvious weapons that would merit the setbacks, aside from Nekurr's dagger.

Sorry, if the party is all together at the mansion, we can keep that post for latter. I though we were splitting already.

You'll break off shortly. But until the manor, the path was the same.

All that knowledge and insight :D

Lol, his lack of 'book learnin' in this regard seems to have let Hildar down....although on that roll swapping a couple of Green dice for Yellows probably wouldn't have altered the result overly :)

Sounds like a plan... So far it all fits and Isle was trying to steal the liquor, but there could still have been something inducing him to do so... particularly with magic dolls and hallucinogens being used around here and this strange fertility that just smells like magic :D

Background info on him as being heavily in debt due to gambling or being crap at it but still doubling down and needed to clean up his act before he got back from this business trip or his marriage was over should be considered. Disgruntled guy walking in like he owns the place and opting to snag alcohol due to a state of depression which isn't within his rights and getting into an altercation does fit the douche stereotype. Need a few more facts before I'd say we have an accurate timeline and possibly the truth. Since we've also found out there's this guy named Isle working for the Baron who's clean shaven no nonsense and has his stuff together... vs the disheveled sleep deprived alcoholic divorcee I was expecting to find with a log on his shoulder about how his life is poopy.

right, I obviously only remembered the liquid that could be some sort of liquid :D

Seems like we've lost Remnant and Mcneils5 (hopefully only temporarily). Remnant's been quiet in my other Genesys game, too.

Since they're instrumental in reading the documents in the mayor's house, let's give them a bit more time. If I haven't heard from them by Monday, we can assume their characters read over the two documents Nera found and go from there. But hopefully they find their ways back!

In the meantime, I'm happy to let Bruv and Nekurr keep hitting the gravel around the village. We're in no rush, but it's good to maintain a bit of forward momentum.

That cat will just flirt with all the ladies around and spend all his money until they return :D

LOL. Flirting is a valid investigatory tactic. :)

I forgot to add: Somebox, feel free to have Nera poke around in another part of the manor if you wish. We can assume she alerts Tronus and Hildar to the books she found, so no need for you to be paralyzed waiting for that line of inquiry to progress.

Okay, I'll try to have a post done tomorrow.

Hi, sorry still here - this week has been.....taxing. Will read through the latest posts in a bit and stick a post up for Hildar

Happy May! +5 XP all around. Let me know what you spend it on if you do, otherwise feel free to bank it.

bank this time :)

Have spent mine (and a bit of banked XP as follows:

5 xp Talent: T1 Toughened (R1) (200)
10 xp Talent: Tier 2: Knack for It (Knowledge (Lore), Knowledge (Adventuring)) (210)

Let's think about wrapping up the pre-feast explorations, shall we? Maybe one more location for each group?

I know Nekurr and Bruv have several potential locations they could investigate: the abandoned place near the mayor's, the ruined church, the ferryman. You two could presumably split up, but that's a lot of GM labor to run another separate search, so I'd ask you only do that if one of you plans to visit a location that won't entail social interaction (like the ruined church or abandoned building).

The folks in the house have left several rooms unexplored, too. The house group could presumably look at multiple locations, but remember that your hosts are due any minute now and may have questions if you're, say, poking around in a bedroom or something.

IC developments would point to the ferryman I think. There doesn't seem to be much talk about the abandoned buildings, besides the children thinking one of them is haunted...

I guess once the party is together we can assume the spider cult drove off whatever church was here before and that the haunted house may hold new clues about it, so even OOC I'd say leave those for later.

Lets see what emsquared thinks :D

Yea, haunted house is fine.

Em, you saying Bruv will check the abandoned house while Nekurr talks to the ferryman?

Oh, musta misread. Ferryman is fine.

Hey, folks! So this is a natural place to wrap up the pre-festival investigations and, with them, the session. We've accomplished a lot since you arrived at the back door of Buzzard's Ford, so everyone gets 20 XP. Do let me know what you spend it on, unless you choose to bank it.

That said, feel free to wrap up your current scenes however you see fit. Bruv and Nekurr may have more questions for the ferryman, for instance.

In the meantime, you should also come up with a game plan for the festival. Are all of you going to go? Or will one or two of you use the opportunity to snoop around the village while others are occupied? (Your absence will be noticed, of course, but how people react to your absence is an open question).

Will you be staying the night at the manor? Or the Galbernost barn? Or in your own tents somewhere?

Will you be bringing your weapons to the festival, even though it's likely to spook people? (Only Tronus and Nera have weapons that would be conspicuous, really.)

Anything else?

No more questions, just wanted to check what the ferryman would say about Isle. They all have the same story :D

As it stands, Nekuur will join the festival with no weapons, but may crash at Galbernost's. I'm curious about that haunted place and it may be easier to sneak out of a barn :D

I guess there is the possibility that someone "wasn't feeling well", maybe due to the swamp/mosquitos and snoop around without raising much questions

Yea, nah, I'm good. I'm sure I'll be spending XP but not sure on what yet...

15 Second Wind, rank 3
20 Enduring

Sick! I'm all for sticking together tonight, nothing like a mysterious festival to reveal terrifying rituals I'm sure.

15 xp- Precise Archery Tier 3 - no more upgraded archery checks when enemies are engaged with companions.
10 xp: Deceptions 1 -> 2

Think I should hold off on combat stuff for a bit now.

I'm still here! Adjusting to a new schedule which has left me with a bit of writers block, I should be back to normal by the end of this week.

Thanks for checking in! This is Nera's big chance to show off with her marksmanship, so let us know if she wants to do the knife-throwing contest, or to make a play to get her bow back. :)

I'll post more shenanigans soon. In the meantime, it's June 3. Everyone gets 5 XP to spend or bank as you please. Let me know what you buy if you do buy something.

right! I probably should but something now with all the banked XP. let me see...

I've banked the 5XP for now

ok... so I was at 225 XP spent with 255 XP total:
* T3 laugh it off talent -> 240 XP spent
* raise charm to lv3 -> 255 XP spent

That should sort it :D

Inspiring Rhetoric Supreme, back to all spent.

Apologies for not posting in a while on here - have had a pretty rough week with work and a few other things. Will get caught up and try to post something IC later

Thanks for checking in. Feel free to narrate yourself wherever sounds most intriguing to Hildar. I've been assuming you're with Nekurr up at the razorwing races, but there's no reason you couldn't be with Tronus by the hog or with Bruv with the two pageant contestants (or elsewhere).

Mcneils5, based on what you've been able to determine, these folks' worship of Aris is highly unusual. So far your spider-god knowledge is fairly circumstantial (a single book from the mayor's shelf). To determine whether Arachne is actually being worshipped here (knowingly or otherwise) will take some sleuthing.

You can try further Lore checks (on the lady's rhyme, say), but I'll say that this approach is only likely to reaffirm what you already know, that this village's view of Aris is idiosyncratic (though not anathema to how the goddess is venerated elsewhere).

You can try Forbidden checks to cross reference these Aris rites and ceremonies against what you can remember about Arachne or Harridan, the two Zanagan gods associated with the book from the mayor's shelf. Any such check is going to be Formidable (PPPPP + K) with the setback for the isolation of this village (since its customs are all so weird anyway). This is steep, I know, but the clergy of the two Zanagan gods you're thinking of are highly secretive, so knowing what their rites are or are not is a tough proposition without access to research materials.

Finally, determining any particular villager's sincerity is a simple Vigilance check versus their Deception (whether they are actively lying or not). This shopkeeper woman is a decent BSer, so Vigilance versus her is RRP.

There may be other avenues, as well (including magic). These are merely suggestions.

Man... that felt good. lol

That little misogynistic Malfoy-looking punk 😂

Hey Bob, when I first devised the idea, it seemed like a pretty benign thing to do. Not actually targeting/manipulating anyone, or damaging anything, etc.

But as I've had time to reflect on it, like, if it's generally known to be frowned upon in the world to use magic within city limits, it was probably a little out of character for him to have done that... Although his weaknesses is anger/having a short fuse.

I'm prepared to accept the consequences, but just wanted to say, if that's gonna be disruptive I'll accept those consequences without disrupting the story further. Sorry 😬

LOL. Yeah, I thought it was a bit drastic, but apparently the teenage boy struck a nerve. :) I'm going to have Jacey make a Fear check to avoid being freaked out -- she's now trapped in a bramble with someone she doesn't know well. Based on what happens there, we can decide how she reacts (and how the teenage boy reacts.) Even if things go sour, there are still some big events coming up that can draw attention away (the pig wrassling, the razorwing race).

Well... you did say I had to "neutralize this guy"...

I was like, "I can do that."

😖

Tronus is up.

In the meantime, it's July! Here's your +5 XP monthly award. Feel free to bank it, but let me know what you spend it on if you do.

I'll be banking this time

Banking since I've no idea what to work towards currently.

Also banking.

I guess I'll join the bandwagon and say banking for now.

Hey all, wanted to give ya heads up, I'm gonna be gone for the next week or so on vacation.

Will probably have reduced activity levels, see ya on the flip side!

Thanks for the heads up, Emsquared. Enjoy the vacation! If you can check in, that's gravy. You'll probably just miss the pageant if anything.

Yeah also a heads up me and the fam will be going away for a few days from Thursday through to the end of the weekend so my posting will be down quite a bit too

I suppose we could say one of was wasn't feeling well due to the spider thing and have to leave. This was it is not as obvious if the others stay, right? It is unlikely that everyone was indisposed at the same time. This is also just brainstorming here, Nekurr can be easily persuaded on this subject :D

It would probably make sense for Hildar to stay at the pageant given what happened with the bird effigy

Tronus doesn't see why we have to stay, it's not related to Tax collection via the Mayor.

Nekurr would probably argue that is it fun and you can ... "guess" who will win... but I believe in the end tronus will just drag him by the tail

To be sure, it's strictly social pressure to stay. You're a novelty here for many, and (if your suspicions are right that there's something dastardly going on), a potential threat to at least some. Leaving would upset both camps. :)

bound to happen 😂

So, at the moment, it sounds like Nekurr and Hildar stay here, while Nera and Tronus leave under some excuse (illness, etc.)? Or is the plan for Nera and Tronus to insist on investigating the hog situation despite the mayor telling them to drop it?

Emsquared's on vacation, so we can by default leave Bruv at the festival unless em gets a chance to say otherwise.

Nera's a master liar, so she may have different plans. ;P Somebox?

Yeah in that case Nera will go with grumpy Tronus, she'll let him go off for a second before interjecting that it's his bed time. Perfect cover up.

Hey, folks! Just a head's up that I'll be on vacation this coming week (Saturday to Saturday). I'm not sure what the Internet situation is going to be yet, so my posting may be reduced.

Hopefully I'll get a post in before I leave tomorrow morning.

Hey, everyone! Let's give Somebox until this evening to try to get Nera to avoid a scuffle.

In the meantime, it's August! +5 XP to everyone. Let me know if you buy anything new.

That puts me on 15 spare XP so I'm taking the following talent:

Tier 3: Heroic Will (Intellect, Willpower)

Apologies for taking so long! I was going to make a post but got tied up again and now I need to go to bed! I don't mind if we have to deal with the consequences of Tronus playing to his character, makes for interesting situations.

I'm going to bed, too. :P If you get a chance, you can try the Deception check. Otherwise, it's going to be initiative for Tronus and Nera (probably Cool for Tronus, Vigilance for Nera).

I'm bank for now. I have too many T1 talents, so I probably should get a T2, but I'll have to think about it :D

I'll put me at 10 floating, I'll bank until I look though my list for my build.

Banking, here.

Moving discussion here, as it's gotten lengthy:

I haven't gotten the impression that Nekurr or Hildar is as cautious about the villagers as Bruv seems to be. So far, the spiders are associated with three things: The pig, the owner of the pig (the weaver), and a book on the mayor's shelf that was not as dusty as other books found there. You have no idea if the mayor has even read it; maybe he invited the weaver over for tea, and she stuck it there and said "hey read this later." (Just saying that y'all have jumped to some conclusions that may not bear out. Or they may. That's the fun of an investigation. :) )

If you think Nekurr would respond to Bruv's warning, though, he could drop his current augment and put up a Barrier. It'd be Hard (PPP) for one that covers all three of you, Formidable (PPPPP) if you want to add the Sanctuary effect (so that anyone antithetical to your faith gets repelled). Or Hard (PPP) for a repel spell that only affects Nekurr. All of these would get +3 setbacks if you try to cast without speech or gesture.

But a word of caution: Theoretically, let's say you put up a divine barrier and suddenly, all the villagers are repelled from you as worshippers of a dark god. What do you do? Slaughter the whole lot of them, men, women, and children? They'll suddenly know you're a magic-user who is actively opposing the biggest event of their calendar, and they likely won't take kindly to that fact. (All this is theoretical. Y'all don't have enough information to conclude that anyone here is actively evil or following a dark god, even if you might suspect it.)

What you absolutely know at this point is that there is a sleep-inducing substance in some of the food and drink that Hildar and Nekurr have consumed, so it's not a spoiler to say that a Resilience check is coming up. If you drop the Augment, that check becomes harder.

At the end of the day, do what you think your PCs would do. Would they go along for the ride and try to glean more information about the villagers and their religious beliefs? Or would they go on the offensive based on what clues they've gathered so far and disrupt a public festival? No judgment, just wanted to lay out the possible ramifications of each approach.

Tl;dr: Cautious approach would be for one or more of you to put up a Counterspell maneuver to gum up a theoretical spell coming your way. Let the pageant participants recite their lines, then analyze what they say with Knowledge (Lore) or Knowledge (Forbidden). Nuclear option would be to try to put a Barrier-reflect against theoretical bad guys, possibly repelling them, and causing a huge scene.

I'm playing Hildar's current disposition based on his reaction to the Mayors social checks so he's pretty much thinking the Mayor is a decent guy at the moment and he's sure hes not involved in anything too nefarious......

His current standing is he's not going to cast anything straight out but he would be ready. Who knows, the ritual could cast a spell that protects the village from the spiders and the Weaver is trying to disrupt it for some reason (i.e. they are the only spider cultist) so us countering it could play into her hands

We can probably wrap up this session at this point. Everybody gets +15 XP for surviving the festival! But a couple of questions for you all:

1) I don't want to deprive Nera of a chance to sneak around. Somebox, with Nera aware that the festival is likely nearing its completion, what were you planning to have her do? Maybe we can let her do some minor roguishness while the others walk back to bed.

2) Everyone else: Where are you sleeping? Tronus seems to have conked out in the barn. Are the rest of you doing the same? Assume that the mayor is walking back from the festival with you, and he will try to talk you into using his spare rooms, as you're distinguished guests. He might see it as an indication that you don't trust him if you stay in the barn. (And you may not trust him. But sleeping in the barn will tip your hand that you don't trust him.) Just let me know, as I'll need to know where you are when we pick up the final chapter of the adventure.

I think Nekurr will just sleep where they point him. Given he failed the roll so badly, it could even be under a tree on the festival grounds if the villagers forget about him :D

it looks like I have 25 XP banked now, so that's 15XP for a lv 3 skill + 10 for a T2 talent.
I was thinking level up divine to 3 and add a signature spell:
* Augment seems like useful particularly with easier additional targets, but it is PPP for 2 targets and already PPPPP for 3
* Healing (wounds and strain!), which I never used, scales much better with 3 PCs healed for just PP, with an extra P to add range :D

Tronus is closing his eyes to give someone an opportunity to do stuff without actually being seen. I can't be concerned to hold their hand if they're off to 'use the bathroom in the night'.

Should've read this first. My plan was to head back to the hog-lady, see if there was anything to discover at this hour.

I shall update my character, will look through my options.

I believe this is true for everyone. You all should be due for another Heroic Ability upgrade. Let me know if anyone needs a refresher on the options.

Check the IC. We can abstract the recon run somewhat. It's pretty dangerous, but you're up to the challenge, right? :)

Okay, I suppose I shouldn't buy everything until after the session is "over".

Well after having such a hot streak of rolls I think a stealth upgrade is due:

XP to spend: 35

Stealth 2->3 (15xp)

Talent: Natural (Tier 3) - Stealth/PerceptionSave the 5xp, should save for a rank of discipline or cool.

I have 2 upgrade points I'll spend on upgrading paragon to the improved version.

I think I'll go with Dodge for -15XP I'm still banking 4

Excellent. Emsquared's out of town for the weekend, so no rush on moving into "action" IC yet. But please feel free to continue discussing the case so far. Hildar has some information to share, I recall.

Just realized I hadn't registered the end of season XP yet... 15 gives me 25. I... think I'm taking Dedication (Cunning)! Cool beans.

did we recover all strain? I still have 3 marked. Also, when do I get to heal wounds (i can't remember it anymore) ?

CESN, everyone should be back to full strain now, yes. If enough time passes, it makes sense to just reset it, although some GMs will ask you to roll every time. For Wounds, you heal one after a full night's sleep, but there's always magical healing (you and Bruv's doing) or health elixirs (which someone in the party may have?). Health elixirs heal 5 wounds on the first use in a day, then 4, then 3, etc.

Emsquared, does Bruv have two ranks of Dodge (Tier 3 and Tier 4)? Just checking over your pyramid and trying to visualize it.

ETA: I also think we may have gotten wires crossed somewhere on XP. I just revisited my calculations in this thread, and I think you should still be about 15 XP short of a Tier-5 talent. It's possible I gave you the wrong XP amount when you started, since you came in after 3/4 of a session had been played. But everyone should be at 160 earned XP. Getting a Tier 5 takes 175 XP, assuming you haven't spent anything on skill ranks.

Make sense?

I've tracked where I've spent all the XP on my character sheet at the bottom in the notes if you ever want to check. It's not readable in "tree-order", but an easy way to count Tiers (5:5 XP, 4:10 XP, so on...). And I spent 20 chargen XP on Talents, and 20 earned XP on skill ranks, so yea, at 175 earned I'll hit the Tier 5. Don't know how or when I ended up with +15 earned tho.

I've corrected my character sheet.

If you talk to Tronus in the morning and have some nice dwarven tea aka dirt water you can heal 2 a day. Legit not messing with you.

It's September! Everyone can add +5 XP. Please let me know if you buy anything with it.

I'll be away for the week. I'll try to keep up, but feel free to skip me if I'm not around

OK, thanks for letting us know. We're entering an encounter where you Catfolk are potentially going to be crucial (Fleet of Paw during a footrace), so if you do check in, that's great. But no worries!

Looks good. At first, I was thinking about using the "cold night" excuse for some temporary fatigue (like one of them is brething with difficulty and needs to catch his breath), but I wasn't sure if there would be enough advantages after the setbacks :D

Nekurr feels so inspired after Tronus rage-blaming :D

In the unlikely event Nekurr's in the thick of it Tronus does have his back. Afterwards he'll complain about the thin catman not being able to carry his own weight and Tronus is too old to be raising kids... but then slide him some supplements if he's injured while grumbling about not being able to take an ax to the shoulder... XD

Belated October +5 XP coming your way! Mea culpa for letting the month pass without noticing. Deadlines are terrible right now.

Just waiting on Tronus's Coerction check to see if the one remaining weirdo responds to a more forceful approach after his friends have been beaten and all have been disarmed.

Seeing as the one left is batters and it's still a rough roll I'm more inclined to plant him head first through a violent thrashing.

Banking the XP.

Oh that's enough for Enduring T4

I'll bank now as well

I'll spend 10xp for a second rank of discipline.

I'd say we go and check it out, but defenitly not with Zymph leading. That's asking for a trap given my vigilance roll. It will have to be the villager that is afraid of dying. I mean, look at Tronus and he will know fear :DI was thinking about tying them properly at the mayor's, since he is probably with the spider lady doing something to the little girl, so he won't mind. But waking up Galbernost is tempting, I think we got his trust and he is not totally confortable with the missing tax man situation if I remember correctly. He could heal them and guard the others.True, I agree with McNeils and I think we need to get the level of detail just right:
1) Are the creeper and the spider pig related?
2) Is the winner girl in danger?
3) Was the tax man caught up in this creep stuff
4) Are they ready just going out for a night drink in a dark, suspicious cave?
5) Are those dark god involved in this celebration?

I think we will need to go to the spot also

I definitely think we need the vials/herbs in can we also get whammied by poisoned blades.

Zymph besides giving the location has worn out the slack on his rope. Galbernost being told to watch people tied up that threatened suicide and might be part of a group sacrifice by outsiders at most I think would remain neutral until he say something either way.

Now suspect: If 'everyone' is suppose to be breathing in this junk and having nice dreams it's suspect people are out and about doing shady stuff that.

I'm ok with throwing out we have the suspicion of Dark Magics being used which is a napalm option to tell the higher ups.

Even in a drunk state they opted for immediate threat of suicide when caught which doesn't sit right with the story stated of just being goofballs doing goofy things. Once we have an antidote that works, maybe check on one of the sleepers (that attacked us they aren't innocent civilians) we should use on Nekurr to get him back to his normal level of being him, once we know the location we can always stab Zymph with a laced sickle to shut him up (Tronus will volunteer since it's not very neighborly of a thing to do).

OK, so is it fair to say the consensus at the moment goes something like this?

1) Bring the three costumed figures to the mayor's manor and secure them.
2) Grab the medical items from the pantry.
3) Fetch Farmer Galbernost to keep watch over the trio, explaining to him the events of the evening and the suspicions you've developed. (But Tronus and Bruv would remember that the young pageant loser, Melchic Grimbly, is at the Galbernost house, too.)
4) Head to the hootenanny/potential dark ceremony with the guard as your guide.

Just a couple of thoughts: Unless the guard is in on all of this, Zymph and his associates are your only source of information for where the party is being held. Thus, even if you don't take Zymph as your guide, you're still likely walking into some sort of trap, since the guard is clueless. Again, unless the guard is lying and is secretly allied with Zymph and the other Night Creepers.

Second, the poison has been established to be a strong soporific. So they didn't try to commit suicide so much as they played possum by putting themselves to sleep.

If I'm outlining the nascent plan correctly, any of those Fortuna questions might be able to clarify your plans; you can always get more specific, but at a risk. E.g., "Is anyone in danger at this night party?" is a different question from "Is the pageant winner in danger at this night party?"

Emquared and Somebox seem to be away at the moment, but let's hear from mcneils5 and hopefully refine the plan today. Then we can do the prep stuff as more of a montage rather than playing it though blow by blow.

I don't think we should involve any other townsfolk (like Galbernost).

They're more likely to turn on us/help they're own than help us.

I'd say take Skeeter to the shin dig. Maybe swing by Jacey's on the way? Turn the other two over to the guard to do with what he will. We know where they all live, as it were...

That rundown looks good from Hildar's perspective but I do agree with emsquared, leave the others with the guard and get Zymph to lead us to the meeting/party/foul ritual

sounds like a plan :D
I think the question should be...



Is there a dangerous secret about this founder's night the villagers are hidding?
(give or take)

Hey, folks! I've got a writing deadline this Monday, along with a bunch of job applications due then. Advancing to the next bit of story may have to wait until Tuesday. We'll see how things go. Sorry!

As some of you might know I've become very busy over the last year which has been affecting my participation. At this point I'm thinking it might be better if I drop out, I'm having trouble keeping up with any of the posts.

Sorry to see you go if you do. Who will be the one to walk in the gray areas of the law while Tronus looks the other way conveniently? Don't point at Nekurr I'm just glad he can walk someplace without misfortunes randomly happening to or around him. *Rubs bridge of nose*

Well obviously you need to do what ever is best for you but hopefully things will level off for you soon and you can come back!

So, I survived the first of the month! Happy November: +5 XP to all.

Second, Somebox, I'd hate to see you leave, but I do appreciate your letting us know. So many people ghost on PbP, it's always refreshing when someone bows out with class. But if you need to make this a temporary exit, I'd be happy to honor that. You're a delight to GM for, so let me know if you think you really need to cut completely.

Finally, I'll update the game very soon. We're headed for the final part of the adventure, so things should be interesting!

Huzzah! I'm banking my XP at the moment.

Friendly genre reminder: Remember that we're mashing up fantasy and mystery, and mystery stories tend to require interrogations (or at least parleys) with POIs. So talking to the woman may be risky (she can lie to you, try to get you to do things, etc.). But she's also a source of potentially useful information. (Why is she in a cage? Why were Skeeter Zymph and his crew out and about? Whom was Melchic Grimbly fleeing? Why did he flee to the Galbernost farmstead?)

The alternative is to treat this as a standard dungeon crawl and try to avoid any potential dangers (like the woman), storm or sneak through this house in the hopes of finding physical clues, and try to determine what's going on that way. That's valid, too, but the answers you get may not be as helpful, and there's no opportunity to ask follow-up questions of, say, a piece of physical evidence.

Third option, I suppose, is to storm through, find the hootenanny, kill everyone, and sort it out afterward. That way will likely have consequences from your boss, though. :P

I don't think we're "storming through", so much as trying to perform under perceived pressures.

We know (or, at least, I think):

1. We intercepted 3 cultists from coming here, and took their place.

2. We can reasonably expect the rest of the Hootenanny is probably expecting those 3. Time pressure.

3. We were told that anyone here likely knows we're here now, cuz of the noise we made. Increased time pressure. And an awareness pressure/an expectation from anyone here to perform as the 3 missing cultists would.

4. Presumably that expectation is to return to the Hootenanny. Now we know maybe/probably with the boy.

So, hanging around out here, questioning Anzila, could seem odd to those waiting. Cuz:

1. It's taking too long.

2. Why would 3 cultists who know what's going on need to sit and talk with the prisoner?

3. It's extremely risky, because our ignorance would almost surely tip off Anzila that were intruders.

4. Who knows what else is going on? They could have Jacey on an altar ready to sacrifice. They could be performing a ritual to summon some unfriendly force as a part of the Hootenanny.

It doesn't seem, to Bruv, like there's any room for investigation at the moment...

Fair enough. I was joking with the suggestion of steam-rolling through and picking up the pieces later, by the way. ;) . It is good to hear how things are being perceived from the players' point of view. I'm a firm believer in providing alternative avenues to gain information, I just wanted to make sure we weren't having a disconnect on the idea that talking to folks is a viable strategy if you want to pursue it.

There are four/five of us and they expect three, so that could be an issue 🤔 Nera could get off scene an "get the boy" (or find o what he was running from )

Bruv proposed 2 of us stay with Anzila/to watch our backs, while 3 go through the door.

I don't think splitting up so far as/distant from each other to go get Melchic is wise at this point.

My $0.02

Remnant has been pretty quiet, and Somebox says she's unable to contribute very regularly. We can assume those two are staying in the room with the weaver if you three want to move on to other parts of the house.

Or... temporarily "remove them" from the scene. That would give us the "don’t tell me you didn’t get the boy" lame evil minion troupe to use ;)

Hopefully Remnant will be back soon. Somebox mentioned needing to scale back, so her absence (though sad) was expected. But, yeah -- you could also leave them outside to keep an eye on Zymph. The weaver's in a cage, after all. Just let me know what room(s) you're headed to.

Also, I'll note that NOT responding to the weaver about the boy is going to set off her alarm bells. Whether she can do anything about it in her present state is another question.

I think it makes sense from a narrative perspective to leave them with her and the rest of us investigate the remainder of the house, keeps the characters close by if the players come back. The only slight wrinkle in things is if Hildar moves longer than short range from Tronus (and Bruv for that matter) that the Mask will drop off of them but I'm assuming most of the house would class as being pretty short range ish unless it's a lot bigger than I'm thinking

I'm here not needed to assist in the current roll so I've been quiet.

Meta: Weaver being in the cage for any reason either the screw up of being related with the pig spider incident or something else isn't something we 'have' to know or figure out. She's not an innocent though so if we're keeping someone here so she doesn't start alerting others from her cage I'm just as soon to knock her out either through blunt force or poison. Speculation on what we don't know is just that though until we see something to verify. Oddly enough we have jurisdiction to wage war in my opinion on the possibility of use of forbidden or dark magic. Religious freedom excuse for sacrificing people for a good reason also gets a dwarf fist to the face. If they want to squabble legally after the fact I think it'd be interesting since that doesn't seem part of the MO for a 'normal' village.

Short version: Disable Weaver's Consciousness lets press on

Yes, that could be done. I had the feeling somebox would be away longer-ish, so removing Nera while answering the weaver's question about the kid seemed a good way to go.

Now, putting her to sleep is a good way, specially since we have the point. We can make it look like she overdosed. There is the risk someone comes in and doesn't buy it, which could be a problem (specially with the mayor later on when he finds out).

I agree we have to open the door and find out what is happenign on the other side. However, we have to keep in mind that Zymph was ok wirth teeling about this place, so there are some chances nothing is going on here (we may have been played).

Additionally, I just though that 3 could go in (because we are replacing a party of 3) and one could pretent to be on the weaver's side and gain her trust.

I'm fine with staying back with Nera[afk].

OK, so I'm hearing:

1) Put the weaver to sleep somehow. (If this is the plan, please all roll Cool for initiative and we'll resolve.)
2) Leave Tronus and Nera in the room with her as lookouts.
3) Check out the rest of the house. (It's a small farmhouse, so no worries about keeping Tronus and Hildar within short range of one another.) So, which room first? Junk room, crawlspace, or door opposite the entrance?

So all the normal combat rules applying to magic makes it seem like spells could be Dodged, Parried and/or Blocked? That accurate?

For spells using the Attack action, yes. I think the default assumption is something like magic missile or a fireball, all of which could conceivably be dodged, blocked, or soaked. For something more esoteric, Curse would be more appropriate, or Conjure of something that attacks in non-standard ways.

In light of how absurdly hard it is to NOT kill someone in this system/setting, I guess we probably should have just went for Wounds and flipped a Story Point to have her not die...

We literally have no way to not kill her besides me, I'm assuming? Or does anyone have Stun weapons?

Is it too late to retcon my spell to not be Non-lethal, Bob? I don't care about the extra Difficulty die. Take the roll as is, but just have it do Wounds?

I don't think it's all that dire yet. You've still got Nekurr and Nera's go. Nekurr could do Curse + Despair, which would reduce her Strain and Wound Thresholds by Nekurr's ranks in Knowledge (Lore). Or he could just bash her with a blunt object, declaring it to be stun damage. Likewise, Nera can bash or shoot something blunt with her bow. Then, next round, she can't take actions, so Bruv can do another non-lethal attack spell.

At this point, bringing her down below strain threshold is inevitable. It's the despairs and threats you roll in the process that you have to watch out for!

Ok, didn't know if that was an option or if the weapon would have to have a Stun quality..

Sorry, clarification: unarmed attacks by default can be declared to be inflicting stun. Melee weapons have to have Stun Damage quality to do this, though. Punch and kick away!

Not sure I understood. Shouldn't it be if above half strain?

Actually, you're right! Sometimes I fall into the D&D mindset of envisioning a pool of strain or HP that gets depleted, whereas this game does the opposite. You start at 0/X Strain and Wounds and then accumulate toward your max. With Desperate Recovery, you have to be past the halfway point toward your threshold before it kicks in.

ahah true :D far too many system being played simultaneously on GP.

Here's where I'm coming from with the legalese:

1. Our job/authority is to find the taxes and the taxman.

2. We found the Taxman murdered, may or may not yet find the taxes.

3. Immediate priority becomes securing all suspects in the murder, so that someone with authority to try suspects for murder can do that. Basically, we need to take suspects back to the Baron, right? Which our suspects for murderer and accomplices are the cultists and anyone who knows about this place; Skeeter, the two townsfolk who were with him, Anzilla, and now clearly the Mayor, who knew she was imprisoned here and is likely somehow involved in all this.

4. Once all suspects are secured, we gather more evidence, interrogate, whatever.

It's not our job to sort all this out, and carry out a trial here, UNLESS anyone is unwilling to cooperate with our legal authority (which is again, to find the taxes, and now to secure suspects), in which case it seems like we're good to forcibly secure them, and even kill them if they fight back.

That's where I'm at.

Our authority is to find Isle and the money. I'm not sure investigating in the name of the Baron and bringing suspect to justice is part of it, but that is a good question actually. This was a sort of secret low profile mission because the lady that gave it to was screwed up and was trying to cover her track right? Are we actually working for the barony or just have a document saying that?

Well the way Hildar is operating at the moment it boils down to the following

1) the mayor seems trustworthy due to previous checks so Hildar is willing to at the very least just give him the benefit of the doubt.
2) the weaver is obviously guilty of something hence why she is locked up but whether that something is directly related to our investigations/the fate of the taxman remains to be seen (seem likely that she is spider-momma though)
3) unless we find something concrete linking the mayor to the murder of the taxman he still has the legal authority to decide what happens to the townsfolk here abouts and we would be on very dicey ground even detaining people for questioning without his permission.
4) if we can prove who killed the taxman we should be able to press the case that we can take them back with us to answer to the baron. Beyond that we can at least take the account of his fate back and report in and leave it to the baron to decide and enact any punitive measures.

To be fair we don't even have the authority of the baron here. One of his staff sent us to investigate on the quiet as (from the way I read it) she didn't want it to be known she had sent the taxman here to collect a large amount of taxes that he seemingly absconded with as she would probably be on the hook for it. I doubt the baron even knows we are here....or who we are at all for that matter.

Yea, I had lost sight of the on-the-down-low part.

Well, as far as the impending fight goes, we'd already put Skeeter (and the other Creepers) out in the course of our investigation, so if/since they're attacking us for something we've already done, Bruv's gonna defend himself.

Question: does a Crit inflicted while doing Strain damage still kill, specifically a Minion? :P

Or is it just considered a knockout?

If it's Brawl and designated as Strain damage, then, yeah, it's a knockout.

Oh, I see where you're coming from. Yeah, that's a matter for legal interpretation (i.e., conflict with the mayor of some sort)!

Hey, folks! I'll respond to the recent posts in the IC soon. I'm staying with relatives with terribly slow Internet, but I should be able to get a faster connection tomorrow. I'm not upset with any of you if it came across that I was. But I will respond more thoroughly, hopefully sometime tomorrow.

Hey, folks. Finally got a spare moment to try to catch up with some of the questions and comments y'all have been posing. So I'll address things in several parts:

1) Did the mayor and his Night Creepers hear Bruv call out about the animated scarecrows? Have they heard the fighting between Bruv and the other Night Creepers out front?

I was operating under the assumption that they did not hear the warning called out, as they were just coming in the door and being surprised at finding the lot of you inside. However, Tronus and the other inquisitors would have heard it, as they were already inside and not adjusting to a completely surprising situation.

Then, judging by the narrative emsquared gave, Bruv was using fisticuffs to put the Night Creepers down, so I was assuming muted noises from that altercation that the mayor probably wouldn't have noticed due to being presented with the body of Kellis Isle -- a much more important development for him than some fighting outside. (Important to note here is that Skeeter was not left on the porch, but rather "near the porch," so close or far enough for the fighting to be heard (or not) depending on narrative necessity).

From a meta-gaming perspective, I was trying to leave the door open to you to parley with the mayor some if you wanted to. I've been trying to give you opportunities to interrogate folks to get more information on what's going on, so I didn't want to foreclose that possibility prematurely. But this leads to...

2) What does the evidence point to (or not point to ) so far?

So, you have all ascertained that there's a secret meeting going on behind this old house. You have determined that the way this village worships the goddess Aris (a nature goddess represented by a dove) is strange. However, idiosyncratic worship practices are not unheard of in isolated backwaters like this, so on its face, it means nothing that they think of Aris as a blackbird or crow. Nevertheless, you have also determined that black birds and the dark side of nature are associated with a dark goddess called Harridan. So maybe there's Harridan worship being hidden under Aris worship. If that's the case, it's possible that only the folks at this gathering know of the truth.

You know that Harridan is sometimes allied with a spider goddess called Arachne.

You know that the pig had spiders in it, the mayor was upset about it, the weaver was put under house arrest afterward, the local spirits indicate there's an internal rift happening among the people who meet at this house, and that at some point Anzila was brought to this house, where the mayor plans to execute her. You assume she killed your man, Kellis Isle, but you don't know whether the mayor knew that or not. He claims to have not known.

So now he comes in with some Night Creepers brandishing weapons. Tronus takes that as a provocation to fight. However (and perhaps I didn't explain this well narratively), those weapons were not necessarily meant for you. They were legitimately surprised to find you in the house. They sensed y'all doing magic (due to a despair) and assumed Anzila had gotten free. So to find y'all instead was actually something of a relief. So, let's not be mistaken - the mayor is not pleased you're up, around, and snooping. He made it clear you were to sleep through the night, and he'd pay your your back taxes in the morning. But finding you in the house instead of a freed, magic-using weaver, he has extended an olive branch (albeit one that you perhaps don't want) and asked for your help bringing the weaver to justice (albeit as they are defining justice).

Now, it sounds like Tronus's aggression was due to misreading the weapons as being intended for you, coupled with Wayland's anger at seeing you out and about. I perhaps didn't make it clear enough that he was asking for help (whether sincerely or not) and not attacking you. That was intended as an opportunity for you to, potentially, play along to get a better understanding of what you're up against. Does he have more people somewhere? Is anyone else in danger? What is the beef between him and Anzila? That's why I asked for a Coercion check -- to see if you could cow him into backing away from executing Anzila, at least enough to reveal more of his plans.

It's possible you would still want to attack him and try to get into a position where you could interrogate him after a fight, though. And that's fine.

3) Are you doing something wrong? Am I doing something wrong as GM?

Short answer: no, but our expectations may not be aligning completely. That's fine, but it's also not a bad idea to bring the misalignment to light.

Meta-rumination: Y'all have a tendency to punch first and ask questions later (or not to ask questions at all). I'm not sure if that's just the fact that you all prefer to lean into the fantasy, sword-and-sorcery bits more than the investigation bits that interest me more. But there have now been several points in the story when you could have tried to get a clearer picture of what's going on but instead chose to avoid talking to people. Perhaps this tendency is due to a sense that talking can be dangerous. Well, yes, it can be. But on the other hand, being in the dark brings its own dangers. And as a fantasy-Cthulhu mashup, the interpersonal bits are just as important as the magic-and-blades bits, or I've intended for them to be.

Narrative-wise, you're broadly right that a dark cult is at work in this village. But there's a lot more to it, and I don't want it to seem like a "punishment" if, for instance, we do a big scenario-ending fight here with the mayor and then you learn that something really bad has happened because you didn't try to get a bit more information before you attacked him.

That said, we can still make it work, and make it feel satisfying, I think. We can totally fight the mayor here. So if that's the plan, let's get those remaining initiative rolls. Ultimately, it's your story, so it's my job to give you what will hopefully be a satisfying conclusion!

Thanks for clarifying things. From a personal perspective I've been holding off having Hildar go into more social engagements because he's not very well suited to them so I've been playing it that he hangs back a touch and prefers to let some of the more talky types lead on those kind of things. I've a line that I've been mulling over trying to go down but I've not had much time this last week or so to get on here....will try to put something up in a bit

Yeah, Nekurr is more of a charms cat, so coercion only with smiles :D

Yea, I think 1. and 2. all jives pretty much with my take on the situation.

The only difference might be in the meta-rumination part.

I kind of fall where Remnant did: there's clearly something dark and evil going on here, the more we obey the procedure and laws of "polite society" (which the dark and evil things clearly do not) the more we're putting ourselves and others at risk.

We could have just went to sleep, gotten the taxes the next day, and walked away with or mission technically accomplished. That's where following the letter of the law, and just doing out job, would have taken us.

But I don't think that's particularly fun or interesting in this case. So where we're at is, to use a term of your own Bob, we have to be the Big Damn Heroes if we really want to do GOOD here. And that means doing what it takes to make sure no one else gets hurt.

I feel like we've done a ton of investigation, and gotten all the information we need to know that something far beyond a dry legal tax situation is going on here. So if we continue to try to pretend like we're just addressing a dry legal tax situation, we're seriously endangering or ability to prevent the dark and evil stuff from continuing to disappear people.

If this ends with the cabal of Creepers dead, and Bruv imprisoned because he didn't follow the law when preventing dark, evil cultists from continuing to look people? I'm ok with that.

Remnant, it seems you're taking my comments personally, like I'm upset with you. I'm not! I enjoy having you as a player. I appreciate all of you and don't have a problem with how you're playing except in one dimension.

This one thing boils down to this: To get a clear idea of what's going on, you have to talk to dangerous people.

That's really it. Everything else is just details.

You are all right to suspect something really bad is happening. But it's more complicated than "mayor's up to no good." You're at the part of the Bond movie where the villain spills his evil plan. But you have to get him talking to get him to do that.

My intention with this conversation was simply to clear the air, not to chastise you as players. (You're all great.) Let's get to the fight. It should be fun, so let's get to it!

ETA: Still lots of ways you can still "talk to dangerous people" if you fight the mayor, so we can preserve the option to "win" the adventure even if you take him out. E.g., keep him alive so you can talk to him afterward (actually quite genre appropriate), resuscitate Anzila to interrogate her, keep one of his cronies alive so you can interrogate them, resuscitate Zymph so you can interrogate him after the fight, send Nera off to scout the larger area, use your narrative symbols to learn more about what's going on (triumps, etc.)... Just throwing out possibilities.

I'm under impression we're just not going in the direction that you think is best to get an answer/clue/result. Mind you we've stumbled through a lot so to speak as a party in the last adventure. Tronus for example always blamed Nekurr now... but if he's making sense well hold up now he's got a point makes for something interesting. This kid dropped a mausoleum coffin lid on my foot and stood there wondering what to do. *shakes fist*

To get a clear idea I'd counter we need to get what we can and come to a conclusion with all the evidence gathered we might be wrong since we missed something and that might bit us in the end but we can only get what we get through gut feelings, blatant things, and clue we actually find through rolls that may or may not be actually helpful. depending on who says it multiple people can say that other person is the bad guy and/or at fault it's not me.

But I'd say we can talk things out ICly with a cup of tea later when Bruv at least is in a safe place and before Nekurr drops something else important in a poop patty.

Mentioning Harridan definitely gets his attention! But I think in tandem with Tronus's ultimatum, we're still facing combat unless a social check can be made to get him talking. The difficulty is as I outlined in the IC, but you'll get boosts for bringing up Harridan. So roll versus RRP with 4 boosts (Tronus + Nekurr + Tronus), and 2 for bringing up Harridan. 6 setbacks for his motivations.

Otherwise, we can go into combat. (Again, I'm not miffed at anyone!) In that case, consider using narrative symbols to get him to spill more information about his plan if you'd like. Or keep him alive to interrogate after the fight. :)

Finally, Happy New Year! I realize I completely let December pass by without XP, so please take +10 for the New Year.

Well I threw one last roll out there and got a lot better than I was hoping for on it. Was thinking Leadership on the check because Hildar is trying to use the Authority of the Barron to take charge of the situation without any overt threats but like I said on the IC post he's at 2 x greens on every Social skill so I'll leave it to your discretion as to what skill is best from a narrative perspective. Definitely wanting him to monologue a bit if the success warrants it.

For no particular reason before we kick things off Hildar is dropping 20 XP to pick up the T4 Talent 'Teleport' from the EPG lol

Oh and happy new year to everyone too! Hope you've all had a good one!

I'd ask that you hold off on Teleport for the time being -- I'm not sure that one will be permissible. I'll review it and get back to you; still trying to get back on my feet after the holidays!

So, the roll, as I see it, needs to reflect the things that have been said:

Tronus: You're doing dark and forbidden things, so stop or we'll stop you by force.
Nekurr: Better listen to him.
Hildar: We insist you let the baron's courts handle this. And what's up with this Harridan worship?

Maybe the best thing to do is to let the roll stand as is -- technically Tronus could have improved Hildar's roll by contrbuting Presence 3 and Leadership 2, but the Dwarf's approach was more threatening, so I'm inclined to consider it worth a boost, but not a full skilled assist. (There's stuff in the Expanded Player's Guide about what to do when PCs use conflicting social approaches on the same target in the same encounter—I need to check that again, but let's go with this for now.)

Yeah no probs, I’ve noted it down but I’ll hold off doing anything with it until you’ve had chance to weigh in on it. I agree it’s pretty strong but it is a T4 talent so I think at that level they’re all pretty beefy.

If there's a lot of spell casters Counterspell seems good for use if with Surpreme Inspiring Rhetoric. That said scathing Tirade I think now is looking good. But still saving for first T5 talent.

is the talent tome gone? :o

depends on if someone paid their storage sub on dropbox I guess...

The guy updates it when new books come out, so I think the previous link was outdated. Try here.

mcneils5: I reread Teleportation, and I think it should be OK. It's very powerful, but also very, very dangerous, especially if Hildar wants to bring friends along. I think I'll ask you to assume a Story Point upgrade anytime it's used.

How convinient! Has Nekurr's name all over it... but I'm not sure if there are many devices in this setting :)

Otherwise, I'll boost the talents I usually forget about to get T3: Natural (vigilance/charm) and T4:Can’t we talk about this for 15+20XP right?

Did we get anything for December?

did we get a new Heroic points by the way?

Thx bud. That should put us at 155 so yes, I'm Frequency also since I had one saved before as well.

Did he close the door? I guess I'm not entirely getting what happened :(

It looks to me like he ran and dropped a snake outside, to Nekurr you just go out, expose himself to an attack and cast a spell. If the door is closed, then it's probably wiser to re-group, kill the scarecrows and release bruv, and then run after him. We have the witch and the boat man who can explain what is going on

Yeah, sorry if it's not clear what's happened. Over his past two turns, he ran outside the house, closed the door, cast a conjure spell to summon a monster, and then ran as far as he could north of the house. His goal is obviously to get away from you and to slow down pursuit, as even with the scarecrows around, he's a sitting duck in a straight-up fight with you.

Again, you can get a shot off at him, but you'll need to get outside to do so, and that requires dealing with the monster he dropped there, which is guarding the door.

In a previous turn, it looks like CESN tried to move through the door after the mayor, but he didn't have enough maneuvers to do so. I let him get his shot off anyway, as the mayor was just on the other side of the door, so narratively I said the door was still swinging shut. (This was when the overhang fell on him.)

So, by this point, the door is closed, and the mayor has moved halfway to long range (still technically medium range, but now through a closed door and with a monster summoned just behind the door). So for Nekurr or anyone to get another shot at him, they have to engage the door (maneuver), open the door (maneuver), and fire. But now there's a monster in the way. That fact should affect the roll in some way to my mind.

That said, I'm not trying to cheat or to be frustrating here. My goal is to give you a thrilling encounter, and just wailing on the mayor seemed like it might be boring. So what if we let Nekurr get his spell off, but it's automatically upgraded?

Yeah, so GM fail. Again, I didn't anticipate you going aggro on him in the house, so when this turned to combat, he was really not going to be much of a threat. My goal was simply to get the combat to a more interesting area. But now he's down!

I have wayland cast ensnaring spell and 2 moves one turn with a strain burn I guess, another cast and a move or double move after Nekurr's attack which did something to him. So if he closed a door (was never stated him doing just it's closed or it's cover if the attack succeeded though it it's not really an issue I figure to get through now) that'd be an action in there as well and he's two to three moves away from Nekurr which get to I figure since he magicked through doorway or a closer door already.

Field Commander maneuver to get through door and then move and attack or move twice to be close enough to see if he had any gum in his pocket then spend an action to lick his face or something more dangerous.

If we have a new house rule now a spell summon can lead block out of turn that's ok but that's also something we can do from now one I figure if they block line of sight mind you I can get that but that's for a stationary target casting and not moving before casting no?

A thrilling encounter is good and desirable, but OOC and IC we have no idea what he's doing or where he's going.

If I was him, I know I would go for help. That's what I/Bruv assumed he's doing. If he was just moving the fight to a different "arena", maybe with more cultists or something, where this could be concluded with more challenge but without changing the "color" of "the victory"? I'm fine with that sort of thing, and I think there's tools to do that and make it clear that's the intent of his flight (explicit expositive narrative and Story Points). "The Mayor is running away from town into the fields and swamp. Like the prey he's become, he's heading for his last hope and final stand. Yada yada..." In which case I wouldn't necessarily be so dead set on stopping his immediate escape immediately.

But entangling more, and potentially more innocent, people in this does not equate to thrilling for me. That starts getting painful.

We started by talking. He made a power-play out of it to take control of the situation, we made a power-play back. He didn't like it (granted within the bounds of law), and he chose to engage us in combat. Between everything that we've learned and the fact that the Mayor knew what's going on here and resisted our power-play, I/Bruv would rather do GOOD here (so much as we've been able to discern it) than follow the law, and I/Bruv have no troubles seeing that turn off events as he's clearly the bad guy now, and responsible for his own death and those of the Cultists.

If he was innocent he could have easily been more accommodating to our attempt to attain an understanding.

Getting more townsfolk and the guard involved, who may not actually know or be responsible for what's going on here? I/Bruv do not want at any cost. Because then we have to start killing innocents, and that's not fun or thrilling for me.

That's all highly meta obviously, and is a level of discussion that wasn't going on (probably because that level of discussion can dampen the thrill too) and so in retrospect may have little value, but where we end up at without that is where we are: we still just want control of the situation like we tried to get in the first place by talking.

For the record, I have found it all very thrilling anyway. When a pbp game gets your blood pumping irl, you know it's a good game, IMO. And that's what this story has done, even without being pushed to our very limits with combat.

Think of it this way: You open a door, and there's someone standing right behind it, blocking the way. It's essentially a second door for purposes of movement and line of sight. I think adding a couple of setbacks might be another way of handling it (shooting a ranged attack through the person blocking the doorway). The "Penalties when Casting Spells" table suggests that an upgrade is in keeping with the rules for this sort of thing, too, so I think we can leave it at that.

And incidentally, yeah, if y'all are ever in a situation where you want to block someone from entering or exiting through a door, Conjure is a good way to do that. In fact, plain Conjure could theoretically summon an actual wall! In this case, Divine doesn't allow summoning, but the mayor had a special ability that let him summon scarecrow monsters.

Sorry, didn’t notice the door :(

Yeah, that was the intent. I thought I telegraphed as much when he said something along the lines that "the ritual" would be completed this evening with or without the weaver. But I could have had him reiterate that through dialogue as he fled.
Yeah, I totally understand that and didn't mean to imply any of that was wrong.
Thanks for letting me know it's been thrilling! That's a relief. Again, I didn't mean to shame you all for killing him. I merely wanted to give you a satisfying showdown. And even with the mayor down, it's not over yet!

No worries! it's very easy to miss things in PbP :D I'k ok with attacking the mosnter behind the door.

So, Nekurr runs to the door, carefully opens it and then cires like "a little girl" (casting) when he sees the scarecrow, and then turns into an bad big tiger man :D

Oof, I definitely missed that. I've had a lot of home-owner drama tho ever since Xmas (broken pipe, water in the basement, asbestos discovered! 😩) and so probably haven't been reading every post as diligently as I might otherwise. Sorry!

No worries at all. Thanks for everyone being transparent and constructive in their feedback. It's a good reminder that PbP requires more frequent reminders than in-person play. In a real-world game, I'd ask a player to recap things at the start of a session to make sure they hadn't missed or forgotten any important plot points, but in PbP sessions drag on so long, those reminders need to be more frequent.

So... Nekurr is a raging killing beast of destruction(well... brawl 3... ) He just can't really cast spells anymore...
I guess Bruv is our only hope to help the mayor get back to his feet (so Tronus can beat him down with the "non-lethal" power of the law)

I would heal him... but at this point I'd charge the village... plus we still got a ritual to stop/break up possibly.

yeah, Nekurr is smelling it no worries :D

I guess that's a dead mayor.
Not as low profile as the quest giver was thinking 😂

Bruv was bound - the most he could have done was broken free of his Ensnare and wouldn't have had another action anyway, he never could have rescued the Mayor. Not a chance. He was inside the kitchen, blocked by a scarecrow, and a wall, and didn't even know (much less care) that the Mayor went down. The Mayor brought on his own death upon himself when he refused to cooperate with our investigation.

Plus...

As we know, the victors of a war get to write the history of it's battlers, so... I think we're good.

Well Nekurr can't magic at the moment and his knowledge is at G, so I think he will just run after any red dot :)

I'd be 2G, we technically don't even have a plan yet. XD

Almost forgot: It's February! +5 XP to all.

Yes, It is basically like D&D raging: hit harder, not spells, but still you as far as I can tell


Although this being an horror game I was thinking more of some scary bestial/hunter form. He would still know who is who, but instead of trying to get out of trouble, he lends more to a hunt and kill mood (his brawl/agility are still a crappy 3 -_-)

Brawl and Agility 3 are good scores in this system—solidly above average, anyway. :)

So, I'm hearing that one or two of you will sneak up directly behind Jacey Tabbins, then Nekurr comes out claiming to be some sort of swamp god. Then the folks behind Tabbins nab her in the ensuing chaos?

For 4 advantage you can move two people behind the girl. Then Nekurr reveals himself. That leaves at least one other person on the high ground in the case a fight breaks out. Hildar and/or Bruv probably make sense, since they can cast ranged spells and take advantage of the elevation.

Am I understanding the plan right?

His claims will be something like "*grrr* *raaa* *growl*" :)

So thinking Hildar could put a Mask on Nekurr to make them look more the part.

Base difficulty would be Easy (1xP) with a Size and Realism additional effects (2xP) would make it a Sil 2 image and look more convincing - would Hildar get any boosts or anything due to his studies of these strange foreign gods?

I think that makes sense. If you want to keep Nekurr looking like a feline, you could try a Knowledge (Forbidden) check first to determine what the right scary feline god might be? Daunting (PPPP), but with a couple of boosts for previous knowledge.

The other idea would be to make him look like a giant bird or a giant spider, depending on what kind of reaction you want (awe or terror). In that case, no Forbidden check is needed, and I'm happy to grant a couple of boosts for previous knowledge to the Arcana check.

Isn't he a feline already? :o
I assumed simple bluffing would work at the moment. something like someone shout: "It's the messanger of [insert bad god here]" and they would be primed to it :D

Good point; with no spell at all, Nekurr already looks ferocious (and feline). The question is whether there's any role for a feline god in their cosmology (which would be the Knowledge (Forbidden) check). If not, they would probably just assume Nekurr's a monster and either run or fight.

If the idea is to awe them into worshipful submission, masking Nekurr to look like a giant buzzard is probably more appropriate.

Giant buzzard it is then! Everyone ok with the plan before Hildar starts casting?

I say go for it! This should be fun. :)

Hahahaha!