Caw Caw Ravenclaw (OOC Area)

Alright Ravenclaw folk, check in here please. :) If you're Hufflepuff and you can still see this, let me know that I screwed up.

Checking in.

PS, @Dipper, I'm going to make some changes to what I sent you based on the house rules.

Good morning. Checking in

Hello all checking in. @Dipper I thought I remembered this qustion coming up in the recruitment thread but can’t find it now, are we starting out with a feat? Or just variant human?

The way I understood it, if you start variant human, you get +1 to two stats, one extra proficiency, and one feat. I took a feat. If we have to change, so be it :).

Morning all!

I have my character in mind. Plan to do the paperwork tonight :)

Hi everybody! Relieved to see you've all checked in, and nobody here has posted over in Hufflepuff land so I must've done something right there. ;)

Yeah, just the feat for Variant Humans, no general starting feat. (Avraham, it has become kind of a popular house rule for everyone to start with one feat and humans to get an additional one, which is why they asked. I've traditionally chosen not to allow it because then I'd have to go back over ten years of worldbuilding and give all significant villains and NPCs a feat to balance it out, and I've been lazy about that sort of thing. I suspect I'm going to regret it when conversion time comes.)

Hey, I'm an OSR/AD&D1ed purist at heart, so I didn't even realize that was a thing. For the record, I only took one feat as per RaW Human Variant. But you'll be getting the character sheet as soon as you as for it :)

I've got my charter in mind, started the questionnaire but not done yet ;)

Got one quick addition for y'all to do: I need you to pick a birthdate. :)

For reference, the campaign starts on B20N1184. This thread includes the information on how the calendar works. Don't worry about extrapolating day of the week, that's not the easiest thing if you're not me. :)

Uhm.
In summer I think.

So uhm let's do
?11Q1168 if my understanding is correct.

@Dipper, the JSON you posted for the custom calendar is cut off. Can you enclose it in a code or note box so that it fully renders, please?

Put the birthday in and almost done with spending my gold, ;)

Excited to play with everyone

{
	"year_len": 252,
	"events": 1,
	"n_months": 14,
	"months": [
		"IchMa",
		"DuxMa",
		"TrihMa",
		"QualMa",
		"CetMa",
		"HejjMa",
		"Internum of Life",
		"OchiadMa",
		"NewliMa",
		"SiediiMa",
		"VodiiMa",
		"XoldiiMa",
		"MaaedMa",
		"Internum of Renewal"
	],
	"month_len": {
		"IchMa": 20,
		"DuxMa": 20,
		"TrihMa": 20,
		"QualMa": 20,
		"CetMa": 20,
		"HejjMa": 20,
		"Internum of Life": 6,
		"OchiadMa": 20,
		"NewliMa": 20,
		"SiediiMa": 20,
		"VodiiMa": 20,
		"XoldiiMa": 20,
		"MaaedMa": 20,
		"Internum of Renewal": 6
	},
	"week_len": 7,
	"weekdays": [
		"kri-Ahn",
		"kri-Beht",
		"kri-Ciuu",
		"kri-Docht",
		"kri-eRoc",
		"kri-Fiquy",
		"Galadosh"
	],
	"n_moons": 2,
	"moons": [
		"Goed",
		"Kwaad"
	],
	"lunar_cyc": {
		"Goed": 20,
		"Kwaad": 34
	},
	"lunar_shf": {
		"Goed": 0,
		"Kwaad": 20
	},
	"year": 1167,
	"first_day": 4,
	"notes": {}
}

And you complained that my combat flow was too complicated :D :D :D :D :D :D :D

Seriously, thank you.

Likewise. I haven't played PbP before, and it has been a long time since I was at a table, so I would appreciate constructive criticism and feedback as to my participation. I know we're all different, and that makes this all the more fun, but if I am violating any accepted norms or otherwise doing something which is a drag on the group, please reach out to me here. Thank you!

I have played here for 5 years or so. This mean that I have some experience with the site, but not that my every word is gospel. I can mess up as well, and don't know whats the best way to do thing here - but I know a way :)

It actually IS in code tags, but still doesn't word wrap anyway. I didn't want to do what rune did because that site used to be very picky about no spaces or carriage returns for the code to work. But I just tried rune's version and it worked, so I guess they fixed it. ;)

Two quick notes, the calendar starts on 1167 and the current year is 1184 - don't let that confuse you, and do let that inform you on how long my campaign world has been running. :) The other thing is that the site is programmed to generate "events" like shooting stars, comets and meteor showers, that are different every time someone loads it up. When I first made it, I made canonical notes of the events as they apply to my world; the ones that you see are virtually guaranteed to not be accurate. But everything else is.

Well there ladies and gentlemen (and those of you who are not so gentle). With you all gathered, I can make a proper entrance. A pleasure to meet you all.

OK, done, and in the character details section of my character sheet. Would you please confirm if you see it there?

The pleasure is mutual. Looking forward to many enjoyable sessions of story-building together.

1166 that is, not 1168

I need to get a proficiency in math

Tante Lude is NOT posting her birthday; if the GM needs it it will be in a private tag. ;-)

A ladies perogative. Haha;)
And I finally got my gold spent/ recorded so I'm good to go!

Here's a fun little tool for all of you, in case you're curious about how the height comparisons play out between you:
https://www.heightcomparison.com/?share=aYd9BaL5z0c



Rune, I'm missing height and weight for you, I'll add you when I get that.

https://www.heightcomparison.com/?share=Ab2BEYJvh08


Sheet updated

I copied you and edited Nyx's pic into that first post. I forgot it and you reminded me!

Wow, quite the fire out of the gate. It's nice to see that everyone is so enthused, but I feel like I need to set a couple of expectations here:

The Rule of Three - This is an etiquette thing that we have in my old PbP home that I should not have assumed was universal. Basically, after you post, you should wait for at least three other people to post before you post again. The point of this is to deliberately slow things down so that people don't feel like they're being left behind or have an entire novel to catch up on reading before they post. The advertised posting rate here was 3 posts per week, and I think some people may have joined with that speed very much in the forefront of their minds. Which, speaking of...

What 3/week Means from a DM Standpoint - If YOU want to post more often than the standard three times a week, you are welcome to, so long as you follow the Rule of Three as stated above. But I will NEVER* post more often than that, and it is not appropriate for anyone to consider my lack of response before my next posting day to mean anything concerning NPCs ignoring you or passively letting you get away with stuff. If your post demands a response from me, then don't post again until I do, it's that simple. And as a reminder, I post on Monday, Thursday and Saturday.

*Except, of course, on the rare instances when I do, because I'm complicated and I contain multitudes. But no one should ever expect it.

There is something funny about the thread now. @Arrcher101, could you perhaps check your post of Aug 3, 2024 8:30 pm and see if there are any unclosed tags, please?

@Avraham I looked but couldn't see any un closed ones? What's wrong?

Maybe it isn't you, but starting from that post the formatting is all awry and the boxes don't line up. Maybe it's my browser, but it's working for all other threads.

@Arrcher101 you have some messed up bb code in your post. Can you edit it by any chance?

Wow yeah, I'm not saeing anything like that on my side but there's not any brackets in that text. That was just an at. I suppose I can delete the at and see what happens. Did it work?

note spoiler /note /spoiler can really mess up the forum

FYI I asked Keleth to check out the problem.
And he fixed it as we all can see

Thank you, @runekyndig and @Keleth.

I actually never saw the break. Which I bring up solely for troubleshooting purposes, because I imagine that's an important tidbit to know.

It’s OK, boss, we are still going to make your life miserable. In the nicest possible way, of course.

You wouldn't be true D&D players if you didn't. ;) Today's torture is feeling like I'm so behind on character reviews and background mining, but feeling somewhat unmotivated to dive into it. I was about eight out of twelve characters into doing it with the old group at my former PbP home when things went south, that turned out to be... not necessarily wasted time, because I can just use those characters as NPCs in this game world, but a lot of baby plot ideas got ruined. I had three - THREE - players who made their characters have NPC twin siblings, and two other PCs were written in a way that I could make them secretly twins with each other, separated at birth, and it fit their narratives nicely. I started to have this whole idea around a dark ritual that required the blood of twins to make it work, and I was sparking with ways to make that ritual meet the requirements for my medium-tier Big Bad... and then the dream died on the vine.

I guess I didn't realize how much I needed to properly mourn that before I could get into starting over again.

One thing I really miss about my old home is it had this concept called "RPXP" where you could hit a little button in the top right of a post you really liked and award someone reputation points for it. :) This was definitely worthy.

@Avraham, if I'm going to play my character he is going to be suspicious of Kyle Thomlin skulking around as he has. And now he introduces himself with a false name (Rupert McClintock).
Is he going to be trusted by the group at some point, or is he going lone wolf all the way?

@runekyndig, think about it. First, your character has no idea what my character's name is. Second, the bar was full of people. My character was not wearing the brooch—I took it off before I entered (read my first post). Are you suspicious of the clerk you nearly killed when you tripped over your halberd? He was in the bar and not wearing the brooch either.

I spoke about this with @Dipper before we started, but you are exhibiting exactly what I was afraid of. If players are unable to separate what they know as players from what their characters know, then it is impossible for them not to metagame. If proper separation is impossible, I'm afraid I will have to completely rethink my character. @Dipper, I will wait on a ruling from you, as DM, but under the circumstances, I'm not sure this character idea can continue if runekyndig cannot separate what he knows from what Hal Rook knows.

And this is why I encourage the ability to keep things secret from players as well as characters. ;) But diving in:

Avraham, runekyndig isn't bringing this up because he's looking to do anything metagamey. He's seeing what he views as a potential problem (signs of another player putting something higher in value than party unity) and, since he doesn't know you, he's trying to provide kind of a soft warning of, "Hey, this might not be the best way to go about doing things as a group." It's a fair thing to point out, and I commend him for both having the conviction to bring it up and the manner in which he approached it.

Now, that said, runekyndig, Avraham's points regarding why he would somehow stand out at this juncture while nobody else in the tavern does are well made. As indicated, he has cleared with me his intentions and how they might manifest. I won't share the details of that because they're not mine to share, but I will note that I've asked for Deception checks from him regarding anything that might be untoward or dishonest in his approach. You are welcome - nay, encouraged - to make insight checks regarding any parts of his presentation that stick out to you. I will compare your insight roll to his deception roll, make my own private adjudication regarding whether your suspicions have merit, and I will inform you accordingly.

Avraham, I don't want to allude generally to what does and doesn't warrant suspicion, but I would point out that eventually, the Baron's going to come and you're going to wind up revealing your marker (or, I suppose, just not joining the group and making me run a solo game for you in town. :) Wouldn't be the first time.) At that juncture, I think a little retroactive wariness on Hal's part would be more than justified. You may have tipped your hand a bit early here. ;)

---

Edit: Aaaaand I just caught up on the IC thread, and I guess that revelation happened already, followed by a fairly blunt confrontation. Spicy. :)

Well, I stand by what I said, a little wariness at this point is fair. Though I would definitely cry foul if anyone immediately jumped to, "You lied about your name, then, didn't you!" That would be quite the leap.

He did put the pin on before coming over to the table.
I think Hal is just suspicious that he didn’t come over right away? Right?

Maybe? I dunno, I was going to bring the baron in on tomorrow's post but maybe I'll just do a post for the tavern NPCs and make myself some popcorn while you guys work this out. ;)

(Just kidding.)

(Probably.)

In that case, I owe you an apology, @runekyndig, for jumping to conclusions. I am not planning on murdering everyone in their sleep. Just yet. Rolls Deception.
Thank you, @Arrcher101, for noticing. I am trying my best to represent my thoughts and actions as best my character would have them. If I mess up, please let me know.

@runekundig, I am more than happy to let things fall out as they may. This kind of intrigue adds spice, so long as it's handled well by all. I'm also hoping that the way the story develops, you the player AND Hal the character will understand why I did what I did and how I the player am playing Kyle the character as I do. And I will welcome the suspicion, but endeavor not to act on it until my character perceives it (if he ever does).

Eminently possible. Although, that would slow down the thread quite a bit (which may not be a bad idea) since @Dipper will have to adjudicate every contested roll, and we know he only posts on Mondays, Thursdays, and Saturdays :).

In support to @runekyndig I believe it is most believable any PC should have been paying attention to each character entering the tavern and if they are wearing the brooch, because Provos instructed "be sure that you were wearing it when walking into this place". It wouldn't be hard do notice 3 other character who have brooch and notice than no other character with brooch entered tavern... until one appear to have it suddenly.
I see no meta gaming on that part.

Oooo. Fallout. Is the roll to see if the bartender did Somthing cheeky to "Ruperts" drink for talking so much smack about them! Hehehe.

Rupert did not get a drink. Nor did Rolant. I’m hitting F5 like a kid.

Double post. My iPad is old, I guess.

Oh but they will bring it now, specially for him.

Nature check for poisons??

Probably wouldn’t hurt…. much.

Roll a paralyzation, poison, death magic save. Oh, sorry, wrong edition. Roll a CON save :)

Got a private question from someone where a public answer seems appropriate:

Provos is a human male of approximately 45 years of age. He's basically a teamster, he has a three wagon caravan that runs the circuit between Esternesse, Zhanniqua and Seasparrow, buying and selling items where he can get the best markup possible.

You all are free to take whatever kind of artistic license you'd like in developing a history around your relationships with Provos, but it should be appropriate scaled as the thing that got you from Level 1 to Level 2... so, y'know, no undead beholders or anything. ;)

Sometimes I use my "post in progress" template to hold my spot so that nobody posts while I'm posting, because I've historically missed their post that way and it has led to not addressing their stuff. When I do that, I make sure to post in the OOC area that the thread is released as soon as I'm done, so that people know it's unlocked and ready to go again.

I'm done. ;) The thread is unlocked and ready to go again.

Read the theft on the gryphon yesterday. Today I saw this one

I appreciate everyone looking at Eirika regarding the stolen items mystery. And to be perfectly honest, I get it from an IC point of view.
Just a fair heads up: as a player I am quite bad at mysteries like these.

So a quote like this
Miss Wintersun? Or Eirika if I may? What did you think of the Baron's story? I noted some absences in the description.

Maybe Eirika might have noticed things. But I certainly did not :) :)

I'm with you, when I play with my tabletop group (well, Zoom group the last few years), they plan for hours and live for puzzles. I get bored and fall asleep, literally in a few cases.

Lude, of course, is a genius and can figure anything out ... with the right dice rolls. :-)

Then answer as best you think Eirika would have. One approach may be to (privately) roll Investigation/Perception/Insight as needed in the IC forum and ask @Dipper if you noticed anything. Another may be to play her as a bit of a savant, brilliant in the arcane and not so elsewhere, even with a ridiculous INT :). She’s your creation; we will conform to how you play her.

Yeah, I was afraid of that. As you can imagine, spending the entire adventure in a civilized town means combat encounters are pretty minimal for this adventure. I do intend to make up for it with more of a dungeon delve for the second, although that will depend largely on what you guys decide to do.

When in doubt, I follow the great teachers of yore.

Considering the last combat encounter we had (admittedly possibly the most extreme case) took over 3 days of talking about it (13.5 hours) for a final decision of teleport in and see what happens then losing the fight and teleporting out. I think your adventure will be a welcome relief. I am a fast poster but not a deep thinker; but others may be and sometimes I get it right anyway.

It's not that I find puzzles boring. It's just that I am by far not as good as them as Eirika probably would probably be especially pure logic puzzles. :)

If the mystery is indeed matching gaps in stories and memorizing small details then Eirika is well equipped to solve those.
But as a player, I probably won't :)

I agree - this is strange that in RPG you are solving puzzles as a player not as a PC. It could happen that the player best at puzzle solving is playing a barbarian both int and wis scores below 7 ... but then again he may just be very lucky, not smart.

Neither I have ever solved a puzzle in RPG, but I just don't give up. Even if I can't solve it - my PC can help by collecting hints/information to help players do. And remember - there are 6 players and only one will solve it, so even if we all have the same solving skills, there would be little chance for you to solve it before others do.

C'mon Grey, have some confidence. There are 6 players and only one will solve it, so . . . it's only a 50% or less chance that it will be you.

@Dipper what do you expect, how would you prefer players to post their player actions before your next post? I mean time-frame:
do we go OOC and pick 3/4 locations; do we pick just one location and describe in details what character does before seeing the description of the location? Do we only pick single location before posting our actions at the location (after we read location description)?
Or maybe I can describe what is my PC talking to random people he meets on the street as he walks out of the The Smart Sahaugin to even make a decision of the location.

Would you like us to do the note to everyone in our group when posting now? Who is for sure in which groups?

Can you even do a note to more than one player? I presumed that the main group was "public" and only the solos were "out of sight".

Private boxes highly preferred, but I know it can be a bit challenging, especially at first.

Right now it's everyone except GreyWord in a group: that's avraham, runekyndig, arrcher101, badbaron and Shorty. If you look at the little notepad thing right to the left of OOC, it's actually pretty easy to just check off everyone and then hit Private. Don't worry about including me, I see everything anyway.

Thanks, @Dipper. May I trouble you for some generic examples of "rolly" type actions for which we should be rolling? Am I misremembering that regarding perception in particular, you didn’t want rolls but more textual descriptions? Which explains some of my private statements to you, as opposed to the CHA check which I did roll :).

@badbaron Kyle most definitely did not ignore Tante Lude. There are only three women in our group: you, Nyx, and Erika. :):):).

I'm sorry my solo move is causing technical inconvenience. I can promise my PC will not use the knowledge I'me getting as a player by reading party activities.
Alternatively - given the small city size - perhaps we could assume my PC could meet party and exchange info/findings/progress few times through the day without major impact on their schedule.

Nothing to be sorry about, GreyWord. As a matter of fact, not being around the table and having access to private messages and notes adds a level of richness and complexity that I am certain @Dipper is going to consider. I don't even know him (?) well yet and already I'm impressed with his? deviousness. :)

When we regroup, I'm sure you'll have plenty of stories to tell us, and my character may continue to pester you in Elvish.

We need emojis.

You need emoji 🤔? Well there is no ➡️ or 📄 to 🖐 1️⃣, but you can paste any emoji here

P.S. You don't even realize my PC hate the dialect of High Elves your PC is using 🤭

I know I can paste, but that requires another open window, etc. and I am lazy!

Also, Kyle (currently known as Rupert or Rolant) will do his utmost best to forget what you just said since in character, all he knows is that Sylvanor has never answered him in the same, and not why 🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺

:starwars

Ok, that didn't work.



That didn't work either.

How do you paste an emogi?

When I use my phone I think it let's me do them😉😂😑😯

Either use a device that has them built in or literally copy and paste the image from a different window.

Tried that and you saw the result. Or . . . I can not use emojis. :-)

That is a punishment for not picking up on Kyle’s flirtation with you. Maybe Tante should pay attention to young men when they waggle their eyebrows at her 8-P 8-P

@Avraham it was a joke about dialect. I think unless DM introduces dialects there is none. We will have plenty of time to role-play PC internal relations.

P.S. My PC behavior were based on my as player culture/ethic (and I've just relised in may or may not be universal, so let me share mine). Latvian is one of the languages I speak and so do my family, but not all of my friends/colleagues. At the table with friends/relatives/colleagues I find it ethically inappropriate to use Latvian if there is even a single person who does not know the language.

@GreyWord No worries and no need to explain; no offense was even considered, let alone taken. While I am a native English speaker, I do speak another language and so I am aware of different conventions about foreign languages in public. Regardless, one of the beauties of role play is that one can play one's character very different from one's own natural behavior, and part of the creativity comes from the (chaotic) interactions of how players have their characters interpret others. Lastly, keep in mind that Kyle is basically a teenager who gets by on wit and charm, but is very inexperienced and, to be frank, foolish. The inexperience and foolishness combined with an inflated sense of self combines to be a bit of a pain at times. My kids are all out of their teens now, but I remember :) :) :) My own teen years are too many decades ago, sadly :}.