GM Rednal's Godbound (Inactive)

Game Master Rednal

I had saved 2 at character creation, so that I could afford the new Word straight away.

Ah, ok then.

+1 Attack
+5 HP
+1 Effort, +1 Influence
-1 All Saves

New Fact : Reputation: Jebat’s loyal, former crew spreads the legendary stories of the mighty Storm Captain

Save 1 point & add Command: A Thousand Loyal Troops (Action) Commit Effort. A visible NPC immediately becomes cooperative toward you, doing for you all they’d do for a superior or employer. Those who are worthy foes get a Spirit save to resist this effect. The cooperativeness lasts even after the Effort is reclaimed, provided the compliance is not abused or wholly improbable.

Free Word : Apotheosis - Receive the Incense of Faith

So, what story do you want to tell?

Quite honestly I was pretty attached to the "end slavery in this country" plan. I don't think it was beyond our abilities, I outlined a simple plan that should get us there with only a little effort and the opportunity for a number of twists thrown in by Rednal on the way, and would give me a chance to use at least one of the abilities I took but have yet to have the chance to use. Which is "all of them except The World Against You and the almost constantly useless so far Walking Ghost". Things seemed to be going that way, until everyone suddenly decided they wanted to sail off somewhere and kill monsters. I would also have been fine with finding those assassins which I thought we were waiting on an answer from your contact about until we...sailed off to fight monsters without ever getting an answer.

This isn't really any new desire, it was my stated goal from almost my first post in recruitment: Be the behind-the-scenes-string-puller manipulating various country heads from the shadows. The "end slavery" idea would be a relatively small scale test run for that kind of power, influencing national policy in an indirect sense.

Additional minor thing, it annoys me being told I wasn't proposing other ideas when I proposed one idea, it was shot down, and then said I was fine with another idea, and that was summarily dropped, and finally acquiesced to the third proposed idea just so the game would get moving again, but that's not your fault.

I wasn't really going to say anything else on the subject initially but I started leveling up Khatef and realized I had no clue for another Fact to add because I don't feel like I've done anything of significance in the 9 months we've been playing. We've had some great character moments, I like the clashes between Beatrice and Khatef's morals, but I can't think of anything tangible I've done that adds to the character based on what we've done so far.

Any ideas?

Use tthat as your fact. The fact that Khatef feels lost in his new godhood?

You know, that's pretty good. "Khatef feels as though he has no more control over his life than even when he was completely powerless on the streets of his home pyramid".

I can definitely see the potential for development from that. ^^ Of course, Facts are also meant to be useful... may I suggest trying to come up with a few different scenarios for how you could benefit from it?

If you're going to pick up another word next level, you could use that as part of it? Since he feels lost, he seeks about for a way to further differentiate himself from the other godbound? Picking something they have no skill at (IE: Picking up a word the others don't have)?

I had forgotten to add that taking up Time raises my Wisdom to 16, to no other effect. Jebat looks all-right.

Do we want to try to gain influence in Raktine or elsewhere, possibly carving a fiefdom of our own, rather than hunting, since we now have Apotheosis? I'd like to get the Howlers to abandon their violent ways, but that's for another time.

We're going to need a base of operations. I suggest a stronghold that's defensible, but allows us access to other areas. A mountainous area to start with for example, easy to defend, hard to invade.

Hello. Is this game still active?

I'd hope so, but I thought we were still waiting on someone to level, and nobody was talking...

I was waiting for the GM to post. I leveled up, not sure who we're waiting on.

Khatef, right?

Looks like it. I'm ready to go.

I was waffling on what to do with Khatef (I had initially during Recruitment planned his character and ability development to be intertwined with a path laid out going forward), but figured people would keep posting while I mulled it over. Apologies.

With Rednal's permission, I would like his new Fact to allow me to retrain some abilities to better suit this more combat oriented game path. I would:

-Lose the Luck Word (and World Against You)
+Gain the Death Word (and Scythe Hand)
-Lose the Passion Word (and Follow the Threads)
+Gain the Knowledge Word (and Best-Laid Plans)
-Lose Walking Ghost (Deception)
+Gain No Release (Death)

Level Up:

+The Best Course (Knowledge)
+White Bone Harvest (Death)

Gives me the same raw combat ability as before against normal foes, more against Undead, and allows us to more efficiently plan our campaigns of war and conquest (and eventually slavery ending if we're allowed to come back to that).

Luck is such a subtle word that it doesn't require a ton of justification to replace, and I can spin Scythe Hand and the loss of Walking Ghost with the same explanation: Khatef has decided to stop hiding so much, he's powerful now and doesn't need to shrink away from every conflict. Passion is even easier; I never used ANY of the abilities associated with Passion, and they're redundant with Beatrice anyway.

I feel like saying you're "allowed" to come back to something suggests you have less control over your destinies here than you really do. If that's what the group wants to do, we can do it. About the only true limitation is your level and what you can conceivably accomplish with the power you have.

Also, that change is fine. o wo/ And since it sounds like we're all ready to continue... *Goes to post*

Poor choice of wording; Allowed as in "Are able/can make the time once we start progressing here" (since founding a new country takes a lot of oversight) rather than meta-allowed.

I'm on a biz trip. Need couple of days to post.

Thanks

Listrana gathers up her troops. "Alright now, when we dock, you are to guard the ship against theft and attack. Split up, two per watch, three watches a day. I'll know if anyone attacks you and return as needed." Once that is worked out, she turns to her fellow gods.

I am not sure where this thread that Listrana is ordering around Jebat's crew came from, but it's incorrect (see the bolded bit above)

Listrana did *not* give orders to Jebat's crew. She gave orders to her soldiers.

I didn't take it that way. Jebat just didn't give any orders when arriving into port.

Whoops. XD Well, let's just say the crew was reassuring their captain anyway...

I believe that splitting makes sense, after all we can all look after ourselves.

We have enough money to buy meals and such, is my understanding, day to day living, but nothing beyond that unless the crab had some gold in it's belly. :)

I'm considering saving up to add the Wealth word to Listrana, to represent that preparedness breeds prosperity.

Yeah, don't worry about having the funds for casual day-to-day purchases unless not having them is part of your concept. XD You can just assume you've got the money for that. Now, anything legitimately expensive may require a bit more work...

Maybe I am confused about how the power works? Or maybe I picked the one 'worthy opponent' in town and he auto succeeded on a spirit check? I thought using my power and committing effort had the NPC treating me like an employer, not negotiating or dismissing me out of hand...

For reference, the full text:

"Commit Effort. A visible NPC immediately becomes cooperative toward you, doing for you all they’d do for a superior or employer. Those who are worthy foes get a Spirit save to resist this effect. The cooperativeness lasts even after the Effort is reclaimed, provided the compliance is not abused or wholly improbable."

I'm a bit torn on how to interpret this one myself. Primarily because "You gonna pay me?" is a perfectly valid question for an employer. On the other hand, it could be interpreted as making him act as though you'd already hired and paid him, circumventing the need.

Given this game system's theme I personally would err toward the stronger interpretation, and maybe have him ask that question after the first job has been completed (because it's pretty improbable for a mercenary company to work for free without even PROMISE of payment, but not wholly farfetched that they would assume payment is coming AFTER the job instead of up front for an extant employer).

I took it as he acts like he's a loyal follower as long as you don't abuse it. As in, it's actually modifying his world view. As long as she doesn't abuse that relationship, it continues. The entire reason I took it was it seemed like a good way to add followers to our cause, particularly soldiers, which we'll need. As long as they have a pay off eventually, and we take care of their daily needs (which we can do I believe) they should be satisfied with their new command structure.

Basically, she's not trying to hire a mercenary group. She's trying to become the new commander of the mercenary group. If the current leader basically begins to obey her orders, the rest of the mercenary group should mostly fall in line (due to the Command word) is what I thought.

The fellow you're talking to is very much a mercenary individual - employers and superiors alike are expected to provide pay.

...

Also, I may have been under the impression you didn't want to mind-control him into total unquestioning obedience in front of companions of his not similarly affected, because that's the sort of thing that would make them freak out and attack you.

I took the power to be more subtle than that. I thought he would just nod and continue as if it was something he expected and agreed with, not get slack jawed and drool and intone in a hypnotized voice.

How about this, before I post any more, can you, as the GM, please provide your guideance on how you want to adjudicate these powers? Otherwise we're shooting in the dark on how this stuff works. And that just generates hard feelings all around.

Slack-jawed, no - that feels more like a Beatrice thing anyway - but he's in front of people who have been with him for quite a long time and know him well. If he suddenly starts acting in a way too far off from what they expect, they would be suspicious. Among other things, they're actively wary of stuff like Wizards trying to suborn them, since they live in an area where such things occasionally happen.

Anyway, a fair bit depends on the way you want powers to be adjudicated. I mean, it's not like a given power will be allowed to do something it expressly doesn't... but this system has plenty of room for flexibility, and that's intentional. As a good rule of thumb, it's best to clearly explain exactly what you're trying to accomplish, and what you hope the result will be, with a given use of your powers.

(Alternatively, you could try shooting in the dark on purpose - your characters are relatively new to their powers, after all, and learning how they work in situations less direct than blasting enemies could provide some interesting opportunities for roleplaying.)

Yep, I'm fine with her not knowing how the power works. I just want to be sure we're both on the same page. :)

What she's wanting to do is basically use her power to talk herself into being the new commander of the mercenary group. What she's promising is basically that if they'll come work for her, she'll get them better jobs, and get them through the work safer. She's also promising the leader to be part of something bigger than just fighting monsters, she wants to get rid of ALL the monsters, all the internicine warring, and get rid of the black wizards once and for all. She wants to bring peace and stability and the ability for one to rise as far as one can on one's own merits, not on what is one's blood line. So she's not going for hiring them once and done, she's not looking to rip them off, she's literally giving them the chance to be part of something world changing.

How she does that, I'm more than willing to work with you on. If she feels that a demonstration of her supernatural abilities would help, she's perfectly fine doing that as well, up to and including letting her sword talk, or even expending an effort for a miracle (I'm betting they can tell the difference between magic and divine intervention, otherwise they are not very good monster hunters).

In general, when I use this power, what I'm looking for based on her mindset is that her target feels like she is an honest, competent, natural leader, and feels safe and fully comfortable following her commands. They should also feel that her leadership is better than theirs (which it likely is due to her divine nature). Basically, she automatically becomes someone they trust with their lives, and the lives of their subordinates, and trusts that they will be properly rewarded eventually, even if it takes awhile. So long as she doesn't betray that trust, they should continue trusting her ongoing. Things that would cause it to go away would be things like throwing away the lives of followers unnecessarily (that does not mean losing followers, people die while fighting, unnecessary would be things like pit fighting, or sending archers up against cavalry or something else stupid).

Does that work for you?

It does - just note that it's important to be clear in your posts, as well. (This will pretty much always work in your favor.)

Yep, sorry if I wasn't clear before, I'll attempt to be more clear in the future.

On a different note, apologies if I come off sharp or argumentative, not intentional. Just a personality trait that shows up a lot more in text than in person. I'm a very visual person, so I use a lot of facial expressions and hand gestures when talking, and so I tend to come off in written text as cold/angry sometimes. Not intentional, just a brain that thinks a little oddly and learned traits that don't translate well to text medium. INTJ personality doesn't always get things across in a written format correctly. :) All my learned social cues to alleviate the 'see problem, fix problem, next problem' mentality in the minimum amount of effort don't work in text, so I usually come off as abrupt and rude. Every once in awhile I have to type something like this to make sure I'm understood.

No worries. ^^ We're all here to have fun, after all.

The odd thing is, I can play a character that understands social stuff, I just have trouble applying that to me. :)

Listrana's followers For the GM's approval (and everyone else's curiosity). I thought it might help with RP if they were fleshed out. Eventually, I expect everyone but Gar will end up in command of a field unit or whole army. Gar will probably end up being Listrana's personal bodyguard/keeper (mainly due to the lack of speaking thing).

Any feedback on the followers?

All the crickets here are giving me the heebie jeebie's. :)

Great pictures. Where'd you get them?

We're on vacation this week, so my computer time is limited.

images.google.com :)

The more I look at it, the more I love Ya Yong's image, I'm going to have to make her as a character some day.

The followers look very good! Great job!

FYI to all my games :

I live in Texas (Austin), and one of the options Harvey has is to wander up and over Austin and laze around and drop a couple of feet of water on us. So if I don't post this week it's because we lost power, internet, or both. Should be fine for anything else, we live on a hill so if we have water flooding our living room, the entire Mississippi river valley is under 80 ft of water from New Orleans to St. Louis. :) So we'd have a lot more problems than flooding at that point.

That's fine. I'm also going to (almost certainly) be away from the internet for a few days while we wait for connection stuff to arrive at our new house. ^^ So, uh, please don't feel too rushed at the moment.

I think Jebat and I are in 'hold' mode until the other two are done. Not trying to rush them, just saying not much we can do until they get back.

If Beatrice and Khatef plan to take awhile, I'm sure I could find something to occupy your time... either way works, honestly, so that's up to them. XD

I don't have much left to do, other than setting up an impromptu opera tourneé. Which will be rather unnecessary once we get known as saviors and all.

I'm ready to move on whenever.

May be unable to post this weekend though, depends on if I have power or not.

I've a business trip next week, so I won't be able to make a complex posts. Please bot me if you wait.

thanks