Tavern OOC

Ok so I wold like to clarify some things in Character creation: You can only choose from a Knight serving in one of the leaders in your Houses thread? so there are no other classes to choose from? Also, no other races to chose from other than humans?

I'm assuming we're playing a Vassal House not just one person but everyone in that family plus the hired help.

Exactly! We're "playing kingdoms" so the idea is to narrate the fates of the noble houses as the story progresses. You can be telling the tales of how a human knight from house blues braves his way through the forest to negotiate with a dragon in one post and then turn to the allied orc shaman who is crushing green house's armies. The focus is on the shared creative writing.
If you look at the cards (Challenges -> spoiler:Values), you can see I basically split the "game's units" between the values. So you will be meeting (and possibly adding to your house) heroes from other races.

That said, having all houses being human, will simplify the starting point as everyone settles into the setting.
Regarding the more specific terms. You can create heroes on the fly and they can be any suitable class. I'd start with knights, wizards, clerics, even diplomats! because those are the most human-like.

Regarding the "starting hero" is basically to determine your starting scenario. Your house will be a loyal vassal of that Hero at the start.

So, just to make sure that I understand things correctly:

We pick a hero, that hero is our liege and we all are part of the same Empire?

Emperor->the Hero->Our House?

Emperor->Lord Kraeger->Our House
Emperor->Lord Gallavant->Our House
Emperor->Morglin/King Ragnar->Our House

Or am I getting it wrong?

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Each of us will have our own Scenarios, for example, Intruders at the borders, which our house is tasked to deal with. We sent our "troops" and draw challenges, 8 of Spades, we describe how the undead are getting in the way and in order to resolve it our "troops" must find an artifact that raised the dead. Then we draw the next challenge that will get in our way of resolving the Scenario until the Joker is drawn.

Am I picturing the flow correctly?

Yeah that’s the gist of it. Picking up on the "class reference" from @mormegil, you could specify something like a small group lead by a cleric named Mr H Shine and the ritual he needs to cast. And you just got a named cleric hero! (In the game you literally buy as many as you want…)

Of note, you don’t have to describe the entire adventure in one post. You can build up the story overlapping between heroes and challenges (though this may get complicated if there are too many cards on the table…). Say you only describe the undead problem. Then you pick a card and continue with how the cleric is searching for the source of undead, but your knight sir Ar Mure is ambushed by that 3 of clubs while that happens. There’s a lot of flexibility for the narrative.
That was the idea yes. Jokers are 2 challenges so you’d fight to get control of both. Let’s say you got a red joker in a scenario you need to defeat rebelling lords. So we say the joker means you will need to roll to control the mines and secure an alliance with the local dwarves, simultaneous. Your enemy can oppose you and these "jokers" may change hands (fight for the mines, influence different dwarven factions, etc.) Only by controlling both can you cripple the rebels enough to crush them ;)
Because this game’s expansion is not part of the canonical story, they mention are many kings and kingdoms. Since the Empire is not defined, I’m thinking of it ruled by a King of kings, maybe even a bit like an elective monarchy like the German HRE. Anyway… just trying to tie stuff so it can smoothly lead into the first game if we continue :)
As far as it is defined (other relationships can be added as the story progresses)
Emperor -> Lord kraeger -> player
Emperor -> lord Alberon -> lord gallavant -> player
Emperor -> lord Ragnar -> lord morglin -> player

So… I just reread this and it looks like exponentially increasing workload for the players if you are telling the story of how one hero deals with undead and then another one is ambushed and a third one is a ninja and so on… that’s a deal breakers for sure :)

It works if the posts are generally short, but that limits the writing freedom and the depth of the depth of the story, so we’ll limit it. Maybe something like 3 cards max per scenario (one draw per "turn") to keep it simple.

What do you guys think? This is supposed to be fun, it definitely should become a chore :)

Would we take advantage of the split time/flash time where it goes between players.

Like:
Player one's story A
Player two's Story B (Player one is thinking on the next story)

Or:
Player one's Story A p1 (I'm stuck guys)
Player two's Story B (I got you fam, jump back in with the p2 when you got it)

How does it work for a versus?
Also a stickied post/thread about a dumbed down turn would be great I think to reference starting out.
Also how would it work for Emperor->Morglin/King Ragnar->Our House vs Same House or would that not even happen?

Yeah. that's why I was thinking it may be too much to keep drawing cards until there is a Joker. It would be best if you guys get to interest and work together (even if against each other xD).

Even to avoid being stuck, it will be easier to break the "challenges" in smaller parts actually. These rules will need to be fine tuned to PbP.
You both would have to describe what you're doing and then have the winner (highest roll) decide the result. But again, the smaller and simpler the posts, the more opportunities to interact and work together in PbP
Indeed :D I was leaving that to the first scenarios. We'll take it easy, get some hands-on experience, and see what needs to be adapted to work in multiplayer PbP. @MagnificentFly's example is a good starting point.
Everyone will pick sides at the start of the scenario, so I can't really see the difference to a regular conflict.

But... if you mean your house vs your house? That could result from a regular challenge, for example some traitor from within. It's your house, it's your story to tell. If you mean Morglin vs Ragnar, then it's like a civil war or rebellion, which is not the same house and... A rebellion is kind of the campaign idea. If you mean Morglin's vassal vs you house, it will be something in-between. There is a traitor or there is some petty infighting. Technically, it's the same a before but a "feudal level down".

I'd say we set a certain amount of challenges per scenario and keep the Jokers as two challenges, which would end the scenarios sooner.

The way I see it is like a boardgame, we have our resources and have to complete challenges to end the scenario and reap the rewards/penalties (due to failure of completing the challenges), while weaving it into a story with heroes and villains and so on.

That is a good point. We could (hypothetically) run this without any story and just abstract it as a battle royal, which is basically a board game.

ahah no worries :) good to see you guys are motivated :D
Weekends are but slow (by the way, I'll be on holidays soon ;( ) but I'll get something started today or tomorrow. Your nice posts feel like this needs a proper map :D

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We just got an application from a new player, @Snowcrash and I decided to take an extra player, since this is PbP and attrition is high :D
@mormegil, @raven_179 and @Snowcrash let us know if you have any questions about GP. @Remnant is a veteran here and both me and
@MagnificentFly have been hanging around for some time.
Right, what's the link you used?

Okay I have some questions:
1.Where are we gonna post our game related replies? is it the same as the UPRISING thead?
2. Aren't we gonna draw cards or roll dice for our resources and troops etc. or is that done already?
3. I'm quite confused at the map in the uprising thread. is there some way to know what does icons represent? I know my house and another ally is in it but what about the others?

Yes, there is one game thread for your scenario (Uprising in your cases yes). I decided to do it like this so it's easier to find the posts we need later.
You are going to yes and it has not been done yet. You are completely right. This first post is like a warm up to get you into the scenario. You guys can all draw a card with your post actually (let me know if you don't see the option on advanced post). This way we have the next part already done :D
Ah right, the other ones were populated automatically by the map generator. It just shows there are other houses around and it will be basically where I set the next scenarios.If you want, you can use them for inspiration, for example, say that the unruly lords are the yellow/red and black/white banners. But it's really just the result of me messing up with the generator

I''m using battle maps on the fly so I'll moving your icons and adding the little cross-swords and the red arrows.

well, I'll have some questions about the mechanics but maybe later. When I read it, seems rather understandable but I suppose some practical problems are going to show after 1 or 2 posts :)

That looks great :D I think there is a lot of information, so I opened some threads for you guy to keep the notes about your houses (who is who, relevant events, etc.). You can also use it to save notes to yourself for later if you want.

It will help you remember things but also help the other players understand better your house:
* House Novaro (MagnificentFly)
* House Erim (mormegil)
* Clan Ishiyari (Remnant)
* House Blackwall (raven_179)
* House Kohola'uhane (Snowcrash)

I also made one to keep track of locations

By the way Remnant…

that sounds good Remnant. I think we will leave it for next post and wait for the other to "settle in" :D

So I updated the locations and moved it to the archives. This thread will have not only all the maps, but it will work as a index for the game (linking to the houses and scenarios)