GM Omelas's Destiny of the Sands (Inactive)

Game Master panegyric

these are lovely, Waylund. Really helpful to stir the imagination indeed. Thanks =)

@All: new post is up. I spoilered the answers to the questions you had asked the other day only so the post wasn't extremely long, but you can all open it.

@Badhru: if you still had questions for the sage, post them in the beginning of your next post.

Just to note, I forgot to put 'Darkvision 60ft' on Theshen's tagline. It was in his sheet, if not as obviously. He has a strange relationship with darkness...

Sorry, this weekend was extremely time-consuming on my end. I'd meant to post at night, but then pesky sleep intervened. :-\

Milestone-based XP is fine by me, and GM, I'll spoiler any questions I still have in the Gameplay thread.

No problem, Badhru. Hope you weren't bothered by us moving the action forward.

I'm trying to avoid needlessly rolling Perception checks, as it makes "Perception is the most-rolled skill in the game" a self-fulfilling prophesy, as everyone pre-emptively rolls a check even when there's nothing to be accomplished by it.

This is a good point, as I'm slowly understanding a bit better why many PbP GMs don't allow their players to roll perception and sense motive. To avoid needless rolls from now on (and if you're ok with it), I'd like to try doing just that. I'll roll general perception checks whenever necessary (spotting someone sneaking around, etc), plus whenever your posts calls for it and there is something to be perceived (say, Theshen says he goes to the margin of the river and looks for crocodile tracks or Badhru mentions looking for hidden enemies in the bushes). The same goes for sense motive: if someone is bluffing, lying or just if there's some sort of dodgy thing/hidden intentions going on (say, if our damsel in distress is actually a lamia luring you to your deaths), I'll roll it for you and give the information in case you succeed.

No problem, Badhru. Hope you weren't bothered by us moving the action forward.

Not at all. Nothing that couldn't be caught up this morning.

This weekend was a bit of an outlier. Normally I should be good for a post or two over the weekend, even if they're not of great length.

This weekend was a bit of an outlier.

Hope your son is doing better. Sick kids throw everything into disarray. And on top of it, you've got someone who is feeling really, really bad to deal with. Parenting is tough some days

Oh, The Boy is fine by now (both strep samples turned out negative, so hooray); thanks for the concern, though. This was just the normal weekend whirlwind of 2 kids' worth of swim lessons, Little League, and all the little attendant stuff (by 8pm last night, the sum total of time I'd spent in my house, and awake, came to about an hour and a half for the day).

Why torches are terrible and why candles are great

That may work for SCA, but in game, a candle has a 5 ft radius, and a torch has a 20 ft radius, plus another 20 feet of dim light.

Essentially the difference between lighting your own feet (if you don't hold it more than 5 feet above the ground) and lighting the area for everyone.

It's a pair of funny and educational videos tangentially relevant to the current context- not an argument on the minutiae of light levels.

Asmani, Shu-kri and Badhru, I plan to move forward in about an hour or two. If you don't post anything either here or at gameplay till then, I'll assume you have chosen to delay your actions.

@Badhru: nice to hear your son is feeling better. Now, just need to take care of those murderous lego bricks ;)

Yeah, I don't think I have anything to catch up on. Theshen and I are on the same page with our part, and I'm ready for whatever happens with Asmani at the riverbank. I think I'm good?

And yes, The Boy is fine for now, but I think I may have just guaranteed some kind of Murphy's Law-style event by planning to play hooky from work Friday to go see Infinity War. The very act of buying the ticket probably guaranteed he'll get outrageously sick, Lassa fever or something equally implausible.

Is Waylund aware of Asmani and Badhru?

@Waylund: yes, he is

With Noble out of arms reach and the poor lighting, Waylund gets no perception or SM bonuses. He's back to -2 on both.

I'll wait on whether Theshen can extricate himself from the peasant woman's embrace.

@Theshen: we keep ninja'ing each other ;) check the gameplay thread

Ahahaha! :D

Edit: I don't see Theshen on that initiative order.

Ah, sorry, had doubled Asmani's name. Fixed it now, you're #8

Cheers. :)

dotting in
Having some internet connectivity issues. Since Rawiya goes last, she'll wait to post her move until after everyone else has posted.

If you need to bot, I'll move to help restrain the girl if I don't post something different before you resolve this round.

Is discussing tactics here too meta?

It probably is. Our characters haven't done much in the way of ground work when it comes to planning combat tactics. Which might have to change after this incident!

Agree with Theshen. I'm fine with you discussing general tactics here when you're out of combat as doing it IC can take a lot of time, but right now it would be way too meta indeed. also, it makes sense that 6 people entirely unfamiliar with each other are completely uncoordinated the first time they have to work together.

Was having the girl call Waylund a rich boy and a noble an intentional clue given that he is dressed as a peasant?

I'm confused about the initiative order.

1. ???

2. Woman
3. Badhru
4. ???
5. Waylund
6. Asmani
7. Shu-kri
8. Theshen
9. Rawiya

So far I see

So it looks like no one is between the crocodile and Waylund? And we're back at the top of the initiative order?

Badhru, Croc, Waylund, etc?

Lovely song, Rawiya. Thanks for taking the time to enrich our game.

My Read is:
??? (Is probably at the camp and thus “Off Screen”)
Woman (Ready Action: Cast color Spray)
Badhru (heads back to camp}
??? [crocodile] (Swims toward Woman)
Waylund (uses skill: spellcraft)
Asmani (Heads to camp)
Shu-kri (skips turn/Never got to use readied action)
Theshen (moving toward camp)
woman (uses readied color spray)
Rawiya (starts Inspire Courage)

Round 2
??? (Still doing whatever ??? Do)
Woman (Skipped?)
Badhru (Skipped/Still moving to camp?)
[crocodile] (Eats Woman)
Waylund (Ready action depending on what others do)
Asmani (awaiting Post)
Shu-kri (awaiting post)
Theshen (moving toward camp)
Rawiya (awaiting post)

Sorry, guys, GM messed up skipping the woman's turn. It's harder to keep track of 9 actions than I expected – it's quite different doing this on PbP, where attention happens in isolated bursts and causes details slip through the cracks. Will try to improve on it for the next rounds and future encounters (creating a spreadsheet for this as we speak).

Waylund got it right, in any case. Currently:
#1 (???) is out of the scene;
#2 (woman) skipped her turn due to me being an idiot;
#3 Badhru: to avoid waiting for one person's post before moving forward, I posted the crocodile's action before his;
#4 crocodile ate woman;
#5 waylund: readied action;
#6 asmani: waiting on post;
#7 shu-kri: waiting on post;
#8 theshen: moving to camp;
#9 rawiya: waiting on post.

Apologies again for the confusion. I know I've made quite a few mistakes so far, but hope it's still proving somewhat enjoyable?

Was having the girl call Waylund a rich boy and a noble an intentional clue given that he is dressed as a peasant?

I wouldn't read too much into it. From her perspective, the whole group seems rich enough (particularly Nenet) and Waylund addressed her and people around her in a very proper manner (e.g. Lady Kaba), which caused her to assume you were a noble. I doubt she would have said anything much different had she been speaking to Theshen, for instance.

Hey, I'm waiting to arrive at the camp since that's where I'm running. Is there anything I should be detailing until then?

Quote:

Was having the girl call Waylund a rich boy and a noble an intentional clue given that he is dressed as a peasant?

I wouldn't read too much into it. From her perspective, the whole group seems rich enough (particularly Nenet) and Waylund addressed her and people around her in a very proper manner (e.g. Lady Kaba), which caused her to assume you were a noble. I doubt she would have said anything much different had she been speaking to Theshen, for instance.

Ok. Between that and that she said "the food and money at camp" and not "your food and money" made me suspicious that the Sage's household had a spy in it. Reasonable, given we're going to meet a spy master. I doubted Nenet was waving around the sack of 10K gold.

I'm sad she got eaten. I was hoping to talk her down, maybe offer a letter of recommendation to the Sage as a second apprentice or something.

Lovely song, Rawiya. Thanks for taking the time to enrich our game.

Thank you. I have to confess, the lyrics are not mine, but freely "borrowed" from a band.

And to verify positions:
Shu-kri is still at the riverbank, and we're waiting to see what she does this round.
Threshen has made at least a full move, and perhaps a double move (20 or 40 ft) so he is well past my position and may already be at the camp.

I also approve of your song selection, being familiar with the album in question. :)

Theshen has darkvision so he could have run, albeit in medium armour.

I also approve of your song selection, being familiar with the album in question. :)

Theshen has darkvision so he could have run, albeit in medium armour.

Doh! I forgot about light levels and movement.

So, before I make my post and do anything wrong again, my current understanding of the situation is that everyone is rushing towards the camp, except Asmani and Badhru, who are trying to flank and stealth the thief/thieves, correct?

Actually, Rawiya is not rushing.

She's still wary about the crocodile, but also aware that crocs can put on a burst of speed that overtakes a human. And she's also worried about whatever caused the uproar at camp.

I'll go post a bit about what she's doing. Was waiting for Badhru to post.

Since Badhru hasn't said otherwise, I assume he continues doing the action from before (flank the camp with Asmani).

Given the different times at which each one of you departed and the different speeds (some being stealthy, some wearing armour, etc), I'm having everyone reaching the camp at the same time, for the sake of simplicity.

Also, thanks for the post, Rawiya.

Que Camel Chase Scene! Can you add Noble to the initiative order?

Waylund, the way I usually do it is by having familiars/summons/eidolons acting on the same turn as the person who summoned them. Feel free to post as Noble on the gameplay thread and I'll resolve its action as if it happened shortly after Asmani's for this turn.

Also, yes, camel chase! Though it will be a short one, what with the guy on a greased saddle.

Has Theshen's movement to Nenet and subsequent examination/healing from a few posts ago occurred yet? Or is that later this turn? I'm unsure if I need to post more instructions or not.

Not yet, as I wanted to move things along a bit (especially after Waylund's spell and Asmani's intimidate which seemed particularly relevant for the others's actions). I see everyone besides Badhru has posted now, so I will now resolve Theshen's examination and go to the next round.

That's fine, just checking.

Nile Crocodile At 3:30 a shaman play wrestles an adult croc. At 9:00 a mother and daughter recount an attack. At 11:30 how crocs hunt is described in detail.

It's a good thing Shu-Kri is braver than me.

Can we see the Crocodile's location?

Would precise shot allow Rawiya to shoot the crocodile currently?

Precise Shot removes the -4 penalty that is incurred when a target is engaged in melee. That's already accounted for in my attack roll, since the croc could be considered to be 'engaged in melee' with the woman.

It doesn't allow you to shoot through a creature that is blocking your line of attack.

When I set up the shot, I moved so there was a clear, straight line between my position and the crocodile, and then fired. (Move action, standard action). I also shouted for people not to get between me and the target.

I don't have any way to move and I cannot shoot when someone is between me and the target.

Just confirming.

I think the sorceress' husband wasn't interested in clearing lines of fire clear.