I'm back now, just posted into the game thread.
Sasha - there's still time to make a fashionably late entry into Round 1! :-)
EDIT: the spoilers are for ease of reference rather than secrecy - feel free to read what the others are up to (especially those who are in the same room!).
Sorry, guys. Busy weekend. I'll try to get a post up soon, although I work tonight from 5 to midnight.
@Sasha - ick, that sounds like a punishing schedule! I liked the post though, worth the wait :-)
@Nariel - given that some of the others have spent money on courtier outfits and so on, I don't want to just handwave it and say it doesn't matter. With that said, I have seen that in the later APs, the 'noble born' trait gives you a noble outfit and a signet ring.
Therefore, unless any of the other players have a strenuous objection, I'm going to do the same thing here: the noble born trait gives you a free noble outfit and a signet ring. Problem solved, I think.
EDIT: I see both Aivar and Arianna took the noble born trait. For Aivar this doesn't pose any problems - he evidently came to the ball well-dressed. For Arianna, maybe her outfit would tie her too closely to the family she's run away from? That would explain why she isnt' wearing it.
Let me know what you think.
Reading everyone's actions and RP is a ton of fun.
@Wandering Minstrel: I'm fine with the elf having a nice set of clothes, but I'd think that Aivar doesn't rock a noble outfit. A courtier's outfit at best, but I'm fine with what he has right now :)
I can agree that it makes sense for Nariel to have very nice clothes. Arianna doesn't have that kind of prestige. My only hesitation is that those Noble clothes are worth a lot of gold. I'll be fine as long as the clothes can't be sold, not that you seem the type to try that.
I'm not opposed to it.
Does it comes with 100 gp worth of jewelry though?
No, but you can buy fake jewelery easily enough and it will pass muster for most events.
OK, so that is everyone on Round 2 apart from Tristan.
Okay, well that is settled then. Don't worry, Nariel won't sell it. Just to keep it on the up and up, the dress belongs to her mother and isn't hers to sell.
At least I'm not the only one with low rolls. :)
I'm really liking this intrigue portion of the adventure, had a lot of fun writing that last post. Inuviel's challenge to Nariel had even me thinking, why is Nariel going on this adventure? So I decided the only thing that made sense was youthful impetuousness, followed by contrition in the face of error. Hope that came off in what I had written. Great game so far Wastrel!
@Raquel - yes, I'm going to have to do something about that; but my hands are tied for the moment.
@Nariel - glad you liked it :-) Thanks for taking it an running with it!
Three rolls, two three's. What can I say? The dice roller loves me.
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I should have been a priest of Desna. Lady Luck is not on my side. Oy.
GM, do the two rolls only apply to this social round or for the rest of the night?
Asking for a friend. ;)
Just wanted to give you all the heads up that I will be out of town for the next two days in cottage country with no internet access, meaning tonight will be my last until Saturday.
Ugh, forums have been completely haywire. This is my first successful log in for 24+ hours.
@Raquel - two rolls, take the best one. Applies for the rest of the evening.
@Nariel - have fun! See you Saturday. Thanks for the heads up.
OK, between my intervention in Round 4 and the forums dying, I just want to make sure we're all clear where we are.
Everyone has now posted at least 3 social rounds.
Round 4 is effectively a set-piece where you don't need to make a roll.
We are now into round 5, where you can pick a room and make a roll (2 dice, pick the best one, remember).
Quick summary:
Aivar - roll needed for round 5
Arianna - library, rolled 30
Nariel - ballroom, rolled 21
Raquel - taproom, rolled 16
Sasha - roll needed for round 5 (can also post conversation from preceding rounds with NPC if desired)
Tristan - roll needed for round 5 (can also post conversation from preceding rounds with NPC if desired)
Any questions, let me know. I will post Round 5 for Arianna, Nariel, Raquel (and anyone else who posts) later today.
Hope that gets us back on track!
EDIT: Remember that if you have unfinished business with a previously-encountered NPC you can find them in 1 social round of looking.
Woo, the website is working once more!
Sorry, the website's been crazy the past couple of days.
"crazy" is very, very, polite. I was running out of swear words by the time it came back online!
Sorry for the delay - nothing to do with the website, just me.
Waiting on Sasha for Round 5, everyone else can go on to Round 6.
Ah, I may have misunderstood the actions. Does moving to another room take the whole round?
@Tristan - yes. You all got a 'freebie' going from the set piece of round 4 into round 5, but moving after that takes a round. But I'll use your roll for the next round, so it's not wasted.
@everyone - I'm traveling today so may not be able to post much.
Alright. I always assume the weekends to be a bit slower, what with people spending their (assumed) free time on fun things ;)
Thank you for the fun RP opportunities so far. I think you're doing a great job.
I'm back, I'll catch up and post later this evening. Just a heads up though, I'm off again tomorrow for a day... busy long weekend! Returns to normal after that though.
Just to echo my fellow players, I'm loving the game so far. Really excited to see where this goes!
Same here!
FYI, I'm unavailable to post until tomorrow evening.
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Thanks - really glad you're enjoying it! I am too, your responses so far have been great and this is very much a collaborative effort :-)
I have - finally! - unearthed my notes on nobility and social status so I thought I'd list them below. This is utter trivia for those who are interested - my assumption will be that your characters will be familiar with this system pretty much from birth and will know what title to use for someone.
COMMONERS
These come in two ranks: Indentured and Freeborn
Indentured (also known as villeins, churls, peasants, varlets, etc) are tied to their work and lack the freedom to move to another location or employer. E.g., an Indentured farmer can only farm the land they assigned and may not move to another estate. An Indentured servant can only serve the family they are assigned to. In addition, an Indentured cannot own property: an Indentured farmer pays rent on the land they farm (plus taxes...) while an Indentured blacksmith would pay rent on the smithy they use (plus taxes). Indentured are forbidden to do anything that is not specifically permitted - this includes getting married and taking religious holidays.
Indentured is a hereditary position: if your parents are Indentured, you will be too.
Freeborn are, as the word suggests, free to move employment and from one location to another. So if, for example, a lord raises his rent and/or taxes to unreasonable levels, a Freeborn farmer can move elsewhere where the rent is more reasonable. Freeborn can also own property (but not land) so a Freeborn blacksmith can own the smithy they work in. Freeborn are permitted to do anything that is not specifically prohibited.
Freeborn is a hereditary position. If you are free, your children will be too. This applies even if the other parent is Indentured.
It is a MORTAL (duel-to-the-death, shunned-by-all-civilised-company) insult to suggest a Freeborn is Indentured. Because of this, a commoner will always be assumed to be a Freeborn unless there known to be Indentured. Of course, the punishment for an Indentured pretending to be a Freeborn is...severe (it starts at branding and moves up from there).
NOBILITY
All nobility can own land, although their rank determines how much.
Knight is the most common title, and can be given to any Freeborn in recognition of services. It permits ownership of up to 1 square mile of land (i.e. enough to build a manor house and some farmland to support it). Knights are addressed as Master or Mistress.
Knight is not a hereditary position, although anyone of noble birth is automatically a knight if they don't have a higher title (note that this does NOT include bastards! If a bastard is not acknowledged, they could even be Indentured, although the implications of that are... unpleasant and we will not dwell on them).
Margrave is the next most common and can be given to any Freeborn who performs exceptional service. It permits ownership of up to 10 square miles of land. Margraves are addressed as Ser (male or female).
Margrave is not a hereditary position, although most children of noble birth will be awarded the title when they reach their majority, assuming that they are in good standing with their family.
Graf is an old title that is now almost never used. It permits ownership of any amount of land, but is not hereditary. A Graf is addressed as Ser, like a Margrave.
The next step up is Lord or Lady. A Lord may own as much land as they can get their hands on. Lordship is hereditary - the oldest son or daughter will inherit the title, while younger children will be at least a Knight and more usually a Margrave.
A Lord may knight people, and may also nominate a certain number of people per year, based on the Lord's rank, for the title of Margrave (the crown makes the final decision).
Lordship comes in ranks, awarded by the crown: Baron, Count, Duke, Archduke.
My guess, for what it's worth from reading your backgrounds, is that all of you are Freeborn, with the possible exception of Nariel and Aivar (who could be Knights) and Arianna (who could be Indentured, if she wants to make life difficult for herself (seriously though, if you take this option, make really bloody sure nobody finds out!)).
Forgot to add: using "Lord" or "My Lord" or "My Lady" is not an indicator of nobility; it's a (slightly extravagant) courtesy.
Actual Lords or Ladies are addressed as "Your Grace" or by their title, e.g. "Countess"
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I'm not here to make Arianna's life easy, I'm here to make it interesting. But as fun as that sounds, I'm not sure if it's really feasible since Arianna has told people her real name and told her family what she was doing.
Now I'm curious, cause I love this world building, would it ever be possible for a peasant to become free?
Yes, it is: a Lord (i.e. full noble with hereditary title) can petition the crown to make an Indentured into a Freeborn.
It doesn't happen often - becoming Freeborn in effect deprives the 'owning' family of an entire lineage of future servants - but every Indentured knows that if they do well, perform some exceptional service, then, one day, maybe, they can win the lottery...
Except the odds are way, way worse than any lottery.
The other problem would be that rewarding a runaway Indentured sets a really terrible precedent.
You would essentially need (1) to be pardoned for running away and (2) a friendly noble to petition the crown for your freedom.
Bearing in mind that knowingly sheltering a runaway Indentured is also a punishable offence (although this is hard to prove, because the default assumption is that any commoner is Freeborn unless proven otherwise - the typical defence is just to say "I assumed he/she was Freeborn" and this works 99% of the time), this may be a decision that the rest of the group gets to have a say on.
Of course, once you are out of Brevoy, Brevan law no longer applies.
EDIT: Indentured aren't slaves, though nobody would suggest it's a fun life. There are some really important differences:
Indentured can't be bought or sold, and you can't break up a family, sending one parent one place, the other somewhere else and the children somewhere else again. Once children are 16, it's another matter.
Indentured earn money and are paid: a farmer sells their crops and a smith sells their wares. They may not have much money to live on after rent, taxes, etc but it's theirs.
Indentured have a right to a livelihood: if a noble builds a manor house on the farm of an Indentured, they are supposed to provide a living elsewhere. If a family decides it doesn't need so many servants, it's supposed to assign the redundant servants to another family. The Indentured don't get a say in this, but they aren't supposed to be reduced to begging status.
Tristan would definitely be freeborn, though maybe it would be fun to have one of his grandparents possible be indentured - perhaps his grandfather paid her 'master' (what do you call the 'owner' of an indentured servant? The master? the liege?) to free her and take her as a wife. Is that a sort of thing that happens? You mentioned that the son of a freeborn person and an indentured person would be freeborn, but I assume that only applies if the pairing is licit in the eyes of society.
Does bastardy apply to non-nobility as well? As in, is the child of a non-married couple need to be acknowledged, or is that only a concern in the upper classes where titles are concerned?
@Tristan - an Indentured would need permission to marry, although if they married a Freeborn, all the children would be Freeborn.
Indentured are - technically - Indentured to the crown, although in practice where the crown has ceded land to a noble, the Indentured of that land are then Indentured to that family. So all of the Indentured in the Grand Duchy of House Lebeda belong to House Lebeda, unless House Lebeda has passed them on to the various Barons, Counts, Dukes etc of the noble families that live within the Grand Duchy.
In addition, for example, a Baron may award his daughter the Indentured servants she grew up with as part of the daughter's dowry when she gets married.
To answer your other question, bastardy only really matters (as such) for nobles (where titles/lineage are relevant) and Indentured (where Indentured status may hinge on proving who the other parent was). Freeborn bastards are commoners like anyone else.
I can't imagine a Noble would be very up for allowing their indenture to marry a freeborn.
Anyways, as fun as that all sounds for a piece of prose, I don't want to make those kinds of issues for the party as a whole. Arianna is freeborn.
In a Milani-esque party, it could've been a fun background, but I don't think we'll be creating an anarchy free state anytime soon :D
Fair enough - that's probably the sensible decision (there's a lot going on already in this campaign) but I'll probably wonder 'what if' for a while :-)
A noble might permit their indenture to marry if they were offered an inducement, or as part of a larger arrangement, or even (hey, it could happen!) out of the goodness of their heart.
How much longer until Raquel gets laughed out of the party? :(
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Your rolls cause me actual physical discomfort.
Oh, Raquel. At least it's not a combat, so nobody will die this time.
@Tristan - I probably should have been clearer, but Audrey is the girl from your background (maybe go reread it?)!
Oh, Raquel. At least it's not a combat, so nobody will die this time.
I might die from humiliation.
Oh, Raquel. At least it's not a combat, so nobody will die this time.I might die from humiliation.
That must be some add-on to the Ultimate Intrigue rules that I'm not aware of: "In the event that you critically fail an Influence check during a social round, you take d4 hit points damage from social stigma. This is a Cutting humiliation that bypasses all forms of DR."
I envisioned Sasha as the daughter of a minor noble, which I think would make her a Margrave?
I'll be right behind you dying of humiliation, because I just mixed up two NPC's. Le derp, and shame on me. GM Wastrel, I'd like to post an entirely new response and have the old one discarded, if I may. I'll make entirely new rolls as well (though giving up on that nat 20 is painful). Simply wasn't paying enough attention.
@Sasha - I missed that, you didn't take noble born as a trait (or a feat) and your background didn't jump out at me as your family being noble. It sounds to me like the Yezhovs are Freeborn, with close ties to the noble family of Lebeda. Maybe your father distinguished himself to them somehow and was knighted, but that isn't hereditary so wouldn't pass to Sasha.
Feel free to disagree - it's your background after all, and I may have missed something. (Also, I think I still need a post from you in the gameplay thread?)
@Tristan - that's absolutely fine, mistakes happen. Feel free to go ahead and repost :)
I will do a list of NPCs very soon, so hopefully we don't mix things up again!
EDIT Quick update on where we are, round-wise
Aivar - Round 7 complete, need your action and rolls for Round 8
Arianna - Round 8 complete, waiting for rest of party before further GM post
Nariel - Round 7 complete, need your action and rolls for Round 8
Raquel - Round 8 complete, waiting for rest of party before further GM post
Sasha - Round 6 complete, need your action and rolls for Round 7
Tristan - Round 7 complete, about to re-do Round 8
@Sasha - I missed that, you didn't take noble born as a trait (or a feat) and your background didn't jump out at me as your family being noble. It sounds to me like the Yezhovs are Freeborn, with close ties to the noble family of Lebeda. Maybe your father distinguished himself to them somehow and was knighted, but that isn't hereditary so wouldn't pass to Sasha.
That works for me.
I'm working on catching up right now.
Great.
I've put a link to the NPC roster up at the top, next to a copy of your charter.
Let me know if I've missed anything.
Back again; I'll post later this evening after I've had a chance to catch up on the posts! Looks like some good stuff.