Tavern Tales

Game Master ButchersBrew

So far, so good.

PbP is so slow, that it makes sense to accomplish as much as possible within the scope of a single post.

Yeah PbP is slow when you don't have scheduled mass posting nights haha. But this one is faster than the last one we were in. Even though this intro fight was insane it gives this world a pretty cool feel. Danger, danger everywhere

Hmm I just realized I may have been able to use Place of Power to summon the Patron. I'd imagined setting a fire so that the shadow stretches out really long when using Place of Power to let people contact the Patron.

I added a section on government to the campaign world page.

Creative license for you all: What kind of family rules this area of the Back? Be as specific or as vague as you want and I'll fill in the rest.

I was waiting for Bale but looks like we will go ahead right now.

As for the rulers of this area I'd think it would be cool to have the leader of the area have a younger brother who is a successful and dangerous Reaver. As he isn't the ruler he uses his magical talents to hunt monsters and seek adventure.

I like it! That could be a cool idea for a PC too.

Some things to consider going forward!

Should this campaign have a central storyline, or is it driven by your player character's goals?

You are willing to fight for the other members of the party and as such you probably trust them with your life. Why? Are you a trusting person? Did they earn this trust and if so, how? Or do they have yet to earn it?

How powerful are you? How quickly will you gain power during the story?

To answer your questions:

I like player-driven sandboxes, but I don't mind if there's an event which requires PC attention. eg: Frodo didn't really have a choice about delivering that ring.

I trust these PCs despite the fact that their presence is distasteful (Dark Patron and Aura of Death).
My trust is borne of experience. They're extremely effective when it comes to defeating monsters and collecting blood.
Brothers in battle.

My power level is well above commoners, but well below proper sorcerers. I'm a middling magician. A guru and charlatan who relies on tricks to woo customers. I imagine my power level will increase fairly quickly when I'm fighting monsters. Tricks won't be good enough.

Oh instead of younger brother it should be younger sister imo.

Mm I'm fine with either option for goals. We could be unlikely "heroes" or get swept up in something having to do with the characters.

Personally I'd say Lin trusts these people when it comes to monster hunting but not much else yet.

Lin is kinda powerful if we count the Patron but summoning like that is gonna be rare hopefully. Besides that I want him to be badass but not a top dog. A badass reaver who can take on several armed men or solo hunt a variety of dangerous monsters. Oh yeah, you gonna pick the bane BB?

Just sent a PM regarding the bane.

Cool, I replied. I hope OldGod is still with us. It has been almost a week

I'm still here, just been a little busy, and I don't think bale had much to contribute to some of the scenes...

to answer bb's question:
Bale likes Abd, he trusts him to use his quick wick or quick talk to get bale out of trouble and in return he acts as the muscle....
I don't know why bale travels with lin.....you have any ideas Gamesrgreat?

hope you guys are all doing well!

Try to post even if you don't have much to say, even to say just that. Describe how your character feels, or what they are thinking. If you don't know, ask questions about the situation.

I've been drawing a lot of inspiration from this webcomic if anyone is interested.

http://killsixbilliondemons.com/

Also, on the subject of the rulers of this area.

The idea that I've been toying with is that the area is ruled by a powerful dragon-blooded royal family. Maybe they have fire powers, horns, a love of gold, a dangerous sense of pride, maybe wings?

Gamesrgreat suggested for the leader of the area to have a younger sister who is a successful and dangerous Reaver. As she isn't the ruler she uses her magical talents to hunt monsters and seek adventure.

I had an idea that because they are a dragon-blooded family she could be a rare dragon-rider. Perhaps this is a traditional position in their family or in society or maybe it's totally unheard of.

Maybe dragonrider is too cheesy for you guys but I'm a sucker for (what I consider to be) "The Classics."

Anyway, what do you guys think? Any other ideas or should I fill in the rest?

I'm not sure where Abd would run to. Depends on a couple of factors:
1. Can I see any of my companions, or did I see where they went?
2. How unruly is the crowd exactly? Are they likely to give chase with pitchforks?

If the mob has pitchforks, I'd probably run back to the Gotama's house and urge him to hurry us out to the mountains.

If one of my companions is nearby, I might run toward them for assistance.

If it's just a misunderstanding, and the mob isn't that unruly at all, I might just run to the nearest pub.

It's just a misunderstanding. The mob is essentially disgruntled and somewhat wary of you and your companions. About half of the mob may still think you're a hero.

Did Bale just roll a double crit? I guess it was bound to happen sometime with a 3d20 system, but still.

_OldGod_1, I think you forgot to take creative license to define a part of the boy's character. You can post it in discussion if you like.

I also wanted to thank you guys for keeping up the posting even during Thanksgiving. Keep up the good work!

Somebody post something!

I Think the kid i picked up (should i name or you bb?) is reckless, foolhardy, sarcastic, should i write him as a character and give him stats? should when i level up take the companion trait? how should i deal with him? should I write his actions and roll for them? is there anything more i should write about him bb? how he looks or acts? just a little confused about the purview of my creative license, I'll work him out a little more a bit later.......

also lin and Abd, what should our course of action be are we going to go look for the thieves?

hope you guys had a great thanksgiving!

also should i write out the ideas and rituals of my cult bb? would that be ok?

I believe the plan for searching for the thieves was to leave the next morning with the old, one-armed Sherpa, Gotama.

I would actually love it if you wrote out the details and rituals of your cult! I was actually just wondering about how the transfer of blood to Nethos worked for you guys. The more world-building you want to do the better.

You don't need to take the companion trait. I'm going to try not to force you to take specific traits at any point.

I'll control the boy so you don't have to worry about his stats, but I wanted you to have some input in his character. Reckless and foolhardy is great, but if it's okay with you I'd rather skip the sarcastic. I don't really know how I would go about writing a former child slave with a sense of humor, you know?

Otherwise, this is great! If you wanted to write more you could. It's totally up to you!

My general rule for creative license is try not to step on anyone's toes, but otherwise go nuts.

sounds good bb. Ill work on the cult stuff and the kid and post it soon.

Cool. I'm excited to hear about your cult.

That would be a strange thing to say to someone in a different context.

Transformation is up! looks cool for combat and spies! what do you guys think?

It is pretty dope. There are some traits I'd definitely consider on this character and some that would be really cool on a new one. The most interesting part was noticing how it caused a Lil shuffle of traits with Occultism and another theme and caused a rework of Prosthetic Limb.

Transformation does look really cool. Definitely the most varied theme I've seen so far, which makes a lot of sense.

Questions came up in gameplay:

Where is Narkissos spoken?

(I might need a map. I'm having trouble keeping track of Geography. Can we travel all the way around the body? Does the body ever move? If it touches it's knee to it's chest, can we take a shortcut? Since we're on a body, I don't know if we use North, South, East, West. Maybe we should use Anatomical Terms of Location.)

I'll take a stab at it... feel free to change anything that doesn't fit your vision.

The belly of Nethos is very similar to Earth's Mediterranean region.

Narkissos is spoken in a country known as Chrys, similar to Earth's Ancient Greece, located on the ventral, superior edge of the midsection. Just above the ocean in Nethos' navel.

I'm from the inferior edge of the belly (below the navel). I traveled through Chrys many times as a merchant and trader.

What constellation did I see?

I saw the Burning Man, an Ifrit, from the City of Brass. Unusual to see it this far up on the back. Maybe Nethos is moving. It usually represents danger and opportunity in equal measure. Superstitious people believe it's wise to pass up opportunities under the light of the Burning Man. Opportunists like Abd think it means less competition.

Nice work! I totally love all of this. Your constellation works really well with the culture of the Seven Cities of Gold that I've been working on. I'm definitely going to work in The Burning Man somehow.

I've been working on a map of the back for a while actually. I could post some in progress pictures if you'd like.

I actually thought about the North South East West thing. I considered using Headward and Footward but I don't know if I really like how that sounds.

If It touched Its knee to Its chest a whole lot of people would die, plus gravity would do some crazy s+#*.

I like the idea of using Anatomical Terms of Location.

Many legends refer to events surrounding times when Nethos has moved. According to folklore any movement causes the terrain that covers Nethos' true body to split and fracture which releases torrents of violent and powerful magic from inside of It.

No normal person has ever witnessed any movement from Nethos, and there is no way to confirm any legends that reference these incidents.

The constellation Bale sees is the downward facing sword of Detarx, founder of his cult, the sword is orientate yet well used and worn, It represents Justice and Judgment, Contemplation, Understanding and Tactics, Wisdom and caution.

I've got 11 life. I need at least two days rest before I go anywhere.
Should we fast forward through that?

Lin sees Rhonaut's Blade. There is a not uncommon folk belief that Rhonaut and Nethos were close once, perhaps brothers, and that when Rhonaut severed Nethos's arm and slew him he threw his blade away in a fit of passion. Nethos's blood trails the blade,three stardrops leading to the five starred blade. Many use this constellation to navigate their way in the wilds. Rhonaut's Blade usually represents victory and regret.

I really like these constellations.

Abd, we can totally fast forward if you'd like. I think that you've all done about all there is to do in this town. If anyone wants to do anything they can make a post.

Lin, you don't have to roll to recall it because you successfully rolled to memorize it. You don't even have to roll to memorize if you don't want to. Anyone else can roll mind to try to recognize it.

Cool. I'll wait to see what the others post. If nothing comes up, let's fast forward till we're all back to full health.

Well we should discuss the interaction stuff a bit then fast forward. Like Bale and Lin can share what they investigated and see what the others think real quick

Sounds good

um.... i think bales good, he spends any time he can over the time skip training rook.

When the kid joins the order he gets a new name and bale gets to pick it, so whomever he was before he's rook now.

is there anything you think we should go over Lin?

it'd be easier to have our characters interact if we had a topic....

Hope everyone is well!

I doubt they know about the other items unless they creative license it so I'm good. I just wanted to check out the symbol and also tell the other characters a little about my interaction trait. I'm good to fast forward but I was hoping Abd would roll mind for the symbol.

ButchersBrew, what do we know about the symbol? Is it a picture or a letter? Does it look like it might come from any particular culture?

As a traveler, I might be able to tell the difference between Scandinavian runes and Arabic letters.

I posted in gameplay. You know what language it is and what type of meaning it has, but you don't (yet) know what it means exactly.

so what now? a time skip? Should Abd try and figure out what that symbol means? if so how?

That is up to you three. If Abd wants to continue to try, he can.

Either way I think we've established how you all want to spend the next two days before you leave so now you just need a place to sleep. The town leader Mukesh, Gotama, and the merchant from earlier all seem likely to offer a roof over your heads.

Besides that I think a time skip would be optimal.

Sorry I'm taking so long to post. I have my first final in the morning lol.

No problem here. Finals are vastly more important than roleplaying.
Good luck!

Yeah it's no problem! Thanks for letting us know.

Good luck!

Also, it seems to me like you three are ready to set out into the wilderness. Anything else anyone needs to do?

Bale, what are you doing or Rook's training? How is he doing at it? Are you training him while you travel?

Im training rook, sparring with him, running him threw sword styles, he doing great, thought i dont think he fights like me, i think he's quicker, no shield.

sorry been a little buys with finals and papers and one of my sweet mates flipping out over nothing. Hope your all doing well.

Here's my thinking with the jackwolves, or any topic, for that matter...

If someone leaves out details, they transfer creative license to whoever posts next.

I have no preconceived ideas what a jackwolf is. Feel free to make it up.

I definitely support that idea.

I think that experimenting with creative license is something I am very interested in, because I don't see it often in RPGs for some reason and I like hearing what other players are thinking about.