It’s pretty late at night as I am writing this. I’ve been through a significant amount of struggles through the past two years (actually through the past 41 but especially the past 2). I’ve had worse stretches of time before but I believe that these past struggles were due to my own lack of maturity and self-awareness at the time those events took place.
Likely those events were necessary for me to experience to survive the events of the past two years and get through them as well as I have. Physical ailments, getting older and requiring more sleep, bankruptcy, and ultimately divorce. You know life is not going swimmingly when going to work feels like a vacation.
Regardless, when I first started getting involved in PbP on the boards it was a chance to play, finally! I’d been DMing for the bulk of the time that I’ve played table top that I was enjoying being able to be a player for once. Then with so many damn flaky GM’s I just started running games and well, things snow balled from there.
Life was fairly stable at the time the normal ups and downs. Then about two years ago, I started getting into PbP as a way to escape reality. Sort of the same ways drugs were casual and enjoyable for me as a teen and ultimately led me as close to suicide as I ever want to get again.
I am not saying that PbP has made me suicidal but I am saying that I recognize that I was using PbP as a coping mechanism to avoid a bad marriage. PbP did NOT lead to the failure of my marriage but it did contribute to my ability to tune it out.
I make a decent living but between bankruptcy and divorce I’ve little to show for it (well except for this killer book and RPG collection ). I could point the finger at my soon to be ex-wife but when you point one finger at a person, three more point back at you. I could have prevented things from becoming this bad and I chose not to. I did it, ironically, because I believed that if I had the marriage would have ended and ended badly, so much for best intentions. I am not going to second guess myself, what happened happened. As divorces go, this one has been rather amicable as we have put our daughter first and ourselves second.
Being married to someone who makes as much if not more money then you (depending on sales that year) places one in a position to “take it easy” when it comes to being aggressive about making money (well it placed me in such a position anyhow perhaps because making money does not move me).
Early on in my career I had an opportunity to become a premiere M&A Financial Services Tax Attorney in a Big 4 Firm. It’s a big deal and potentially a lot of money but I did not really want it because I knew I would be working a lot and traveling a lot. My ex agreed that I should turn it down as she did not want to be married to a workaholic and that was not who I wanted to be anyway. Nor do I want to be that person now. (In yet another twist of irony, she has become a workaholic, funny how things turn out).
I do not regret the decision though I do lament the loss of income that such a decision would have brought to me.
All of this rambling nonsense is leading to the point of this post, I need to work more. Not at my current job nor do I want to get a new job, I actually like being there as odd as that sounds (to me). I need to get a second and perhaps a third job, side gigs. At 41 about to turn 42 with no retirement and no savings for my daughters college, I can no longer hope that the ex’s business will come through as an investment plan. Even if it does, I will not be the beneficiary of that largesse. I need to make up for 11 years of being “comfortable” simply working.
Thus, it is with heavy heart that I am announcing that I will need to close down a number of the threads I run and withdraw from a number of the games I am a PC in.
I suppose this decision will not be a surprise to many of you as my posting rates have been abysmal since these events took a turn for the worse (in some respects the better to be honest) since Thanksgiving of 2017.
I am not generally a person that feels remorse or guilt but I do feel a level of disappointment with having to make this decision. I apologize for disappointing many of you who put work into PCs relying on my consistency as a GM/DM over the course of the past several years.
My plan had always been to run a hardcore dose of RPG’s until my daughter was a teenager and then, spend my free time writing the novel I had been working on since before she was born. I had hoped that over the next 9 years or so I could wrap up most of these campaigns and the few that remained would be more manageable.
Life has not worked out that way.
The good news is that I will still run several games but the current load is too much for me to handle in this transition. The further good news is that I believe this will allow for those games to move along much more quickly.
By tomorrow I will have made my decision as to which games I will keep and which I will shut down.
Thank you all for taking the journeys with me despite the lack of length or resolution of so many of them.
I will still be around just in a diminished capacity so this is not goodbye just a “be seeing less of you”.
Thank you for letting use know, and Shadow, should you need someone to talk to I am always here to talk. You are a great fellow player and a killer GM! I wish you nothing but the best my friend, I really do!
Thank you Shadow for updating us, and please, you don't need to apologies. You are a great GM, take the time and make the decisions you need to, in order to make things right with where you are at.
Take your time Shadow and make yourself the priority. It's been a great campaign, but nobody wants to continue if it's going to be at a personal cost to you.
We love you, Shadow. Thanks for GMing so much and being great at it. As much as I am sad to hear your presence will diminish on the threads, I'm just as glad that you're setting healthy boundaries for yourself and growing as a person.
I've only played with you for a short while but I always appreciated your commitment and desire to do right by us
Do the right thing by yourself now.
Thank you all very much for the support.
Unfortunately, this is one of the games that I will need to close.
As this is an AP, you may be able to find a replacement DM, I will be happy to give a synopsis for any DM who could potentially take over with respect to the side twists I placed here.
Good luck and good gaming all.
I understand Shadow, take care of yourself!
If you all wish to try to find another GM I am up for it.
No worries Shadow.
@ Zeldana: Sure, I'd like to keep it going if we can find someone.
No problem Shadow, look after yourself.
I'm happy keeping this going if we can find someone
Does anyone else want to make a GM finding thread? I don't mind doing so but I haven't been with the game for very long :).
I don't think it matters how long you've been with the game for. You're totally within your right to make one!
She does for her shop. She has profession fortune teller for the Fortune's Flower shop and does have Apprise, but that is it.
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"I'm here today for a... business meeting... with an old acquaintance. I thought I might take the opportunity to look in on the current Bearer of the Fifth. I've been away for some little while, so I didn't think it would be Zeldana Eutropia any more. Still, you can imagine my surprise when the cards showed me you'd be here today. Coincidence is the secret thread that binds the world together."
Coincidence, indeed. "I've been away for some little while" ... well, there's always a price.
Tiel and Irisa got away without a problem, Sholti fought her way out, Hiranno killed her way out, and Zeldana almost got killed! Zel was saved by Dalth and sent to follow the other ladies who had gotten to the edge of the roit. The ladies in a group come upon a group of Dottari beating a man in an alley way. They attack the Dottari, and save the man who they later know as Rexas. He invites them to Crissali’s Fine Tomes where he tells them who he is and that he believes they would be perfect for a rebelion! All agree, and Zel does inform the group about Dalth who many agree may be a good thing as if she gets close enough she might be able to use him for information and possibly turning him to their side.
Rexas takes them to the Fair Fortune Livery to see if there is anything left over from the Silver Ravens, Irisa is able to calm the dogs inside and even keeps the biggest naming him Silver. The clean the place out and find the silver raven items and each take one as well as finding coded notes which Rexas takes.
He then took them all to the coffee house where they met Laria Longroad and are asked by her to find her missing friend. They go down into the basement of her coffee house to find where her friend was supposedly hiding. They find his body, a dire corby, and a group of tengu! The tengu explain what happened and ask the group to kill the corby. They do so and the group agrees to help them. They returned to Laria and explained what happen and she agreed to let them stay.
They all return home, Sholti lies to her parents that she's in a relationship with Rexas. Dalth comes to the Blooming Butterfly and buys some flowers as away to ask if he can walk Zeldana home, only to find out she was already home and lives up above the shops. The following morning Zeldana gets two visitors seeking a tailor for new clothes though she over hears their conversation and offers to give them some clothes in exchange for information. Dalth shows up and takes her on a date to oddly enough, the coffee house they've been using. Everyone else had found their way there just before that.
Outside of the Longroad Coffee House Sera and Irisa have to deal with some Dorttari that are harrassing Irisa because their leader has a thing for her. Sera comes to her defense as does Zel and Dalth when they get closer. The group is able to get them to go away and all enter the coffee house. They talk, drink coffee, and Sholti passes off a note to Zel about how she feel towards Dalth.
The all go their seperate ways and Laria says she'll visit Zel at her shop. Sholti speaks with Rexas about keeping up this lie that he and her are dating for her parent's sake and he agrees. Laria visits Zel and meets the men she's hidden and gotten info from about Forvian Crowe and Zel reads Sholti's note and gets upset.
Laira gets Zel to come and talk about it with the group. She does, though Sholti is absent with Rexas at her parent's having dinner. The dinner doesn't go very well as her parents tell her to either break up with Rexas or find a different teacher. Zel speaks to Irisa and Tiel who both side with Zel over Sholti, so Sholti puts rules in place. Zel agrees after heckling back and forth a bit.
The group agree to deal with the Salt Works the following night, during that time Sera goes to a local tavern and finds a tiny dragon like creature named Vendalfek and have him joined us. Tiel and Zel go looking for Hiranno only to get ambushed by thugs. They win and leave to try and speak with Hiranno the following day, they do and meet Stricia and bring her into the resistance. Kadwyn in brought in by a third party and joins us.
The group hit the Salt works with two teams Sera leads a group with the tengu while Zel, Sholti, and Kadwyn take Stricia as a "prisoner" to the Salt works. Sera is able to get their job to go off without much trouble and get the mercenaries out to a waiting boat, while the main group ends up having to fight. They do end up winning after a battle and they tied up the people and threaten them to be silent about what happened but do not kill them. They leave the Salt Works and head to the outter area to allow the Mercenaries to hide out in the hills and they stay out camping thought the night before returning to town the following morning. They are met by Dalth who escorts them to Zel's shops and telling them that he had to kill a few mercenaries who where spreading rummors about people that look like them breaking in and releasing prisioners. The once they get at the shop he lets them know in more fancy words that he knows they did it and if they are going to keep this up he wants them to be more quiet about it.
Sholti is very angry at this and storms out while Zeldana explains everything to the others. They understand and Zeldana offers to house them if they don't mind helping her out around the shops. They agree. The following night they all gather at the Longroad once more to figure out what to do, and Sholti says she's leaving the group. They have no choice but to accept this and set upon what to do next. They settle upon checking out the burnt out husk of The Silver Star. They don't find much but they do meet Kestrel for the first time. They return to base with a coffer to show for it, and the next day Zeldana and Stricia go shopping for clothes for Stricia and Sera as they don't have much.
I tried to make it as small as possible...
Yes I did. Okay, mechanically our options are advance as a bard with that one level dip of vigilante; retrain to straight bard with the masked persona; or stay in vigilante. Correct?
I'm good with any of these, so it's really a question of what sort of character you want to play. Skimming the gameplay thread, you've been playing her as cautious to the point of paranoia, which is just fine; possibly the psychological stress of getting involved in a rebellion is fragmenting her personality a little bit.
We haven't heard from the other bard PC yet, so it's not clear if doubling up on the bard spell list is going to be an issue. That said, the bard has a lot of archetypes, and you can customize it pretty hard. An archeologist might work here, as could a daredevil or a court bard.
So, tell me where you want to go with this and we'll work out a path.
I'll move this here since we've switched over from recruitment now. It also might be something the other players want to give some input on if any substantial changes to Sholti's build would take place. Sorry if it gets kind of long.
I'll run through the choices and give the pros and cons I see.
Vigilante 1 / Dawnflower Bard 19:
Pros: Good melee striker on close to par with full BAB but less damage. Very solid secret identity. Some small CHA bonuses within a defined territory.
Cons: Limited party buffing by spells only. Loss of spell advancement. Could hurt BAB and Saves unless Fractional Base Bonuses allowed.
Vigilante:
Pros: If Avenger, great full BAB martial with good skills and very good social stuff. But requires changing ability scores for strength damage. Stalker works with current ability scores but not good unless using the Teisatsu archetype, which is very ninja-like.
Cons: Loss of spell casting. Big hit to skills.
Dawnflower Bard 20 with Masked Persona:
Pros: Most seamless way to get secret identity. No loss of spellcasting or bard abilities.
Cons: Depending on the DC of disguise checks it's not viable until later levels with more skill points invested in disguise. DM dependent for this reason. Otherwise none unless you hate bards.
Or, if I'm doing some rebuilding I could change bard archetype. Depending on whether or not Kadwyn is still with us, we may no longer have a buffer bard. Do you guys want to keep buffs? There are a few archetypes that look good like Chelish Diva and Duettist. There are also a couple of archetypes created for the AP, Argent Voice and Silver Balladeer but I'm not sure how good they are.
Wow, thanks Zeldana!
Depends on what you really want to do Sholti.
In general, I don't see us /requiring/ a lot of buff spells. Remember that Sera isn't really built for damage, but rather endurance (although I can shift my build around if we wanted to change priorities) which means that a buff spell, on her for instance, doesn't get a lot of value. I'd prefer damage > buff so that we don't get caught short on actually dealing damage, although if we really want to focus on buffing I could switch Sera around as required.
I figured I'd mention the selfish vs buffer bard thing in case anyone really wanted to make sure we had a buffer in the group. Chelish Diva looks fun, tanky like an arcane duelist, but a prissy mean girl with sonic attacks.
I'd rather just have Kadwyn back though. Hopefully she'll be in touch.
If you have something in mind for using Masked Persona I'm all for it. I'll just stick with straight Dawnflower Dervish Bard all the way.
You mentioned Archaeologist, which is just about my favorite archetype for my favorite class. Unless we want an archer (I personally think they're best as archers) Sera has our rogue needs covered. Dawnflower Dervish is about equal to Archaeologist as a combat bard.
I'm currently working toward intimidation in combat with scimitar and enforcer for a little extra batgirl in the mix.
Do I get to know what your plan is, or do I wait for a surprise?
Like I said, the bard has so, so many archetypes. -- So basically the main thing you need to make Masked Persona work is a hefty Disguise bonus. Yes?
Yep. With 2 skill points invested I have +8 Disguise. That's what I meant about Masked Persona depending on what Disguise DCs will be like to be successful.
Sholti is half-elf so I could buy back skill focus by getting rid of dual minded to bring it up to +11, but that's the only option to increase it at 2nd level.
Yes, Sholti's parents are alive, well, and living in town. They're a wealthy family and live in the same part of town as Longroads Coffee Shop. Fairly close by actually. The recent family history is sketched out on Sholti's backstory:
The demands of work left little time for Khatijah to consider marriage in those early years, and Sholti was the result of a short affair with an Elven man during that time. When she was established later Khatijah did arrange to marry Ferran, a man from an allied family in Absalom. Khatijah and Ferran never produced any children of their own, and Sholti is quite close to her step-father.
At the age of 14 Sholti left Kintargo to attend a private school in Absalom. Khatijah sent her to the far-away city for a number of reasons. Not only was the school a finer one than was available locally, and free of diabolic taint, but she wished for her daughter to connect with her larger family. As a junior branch of the Amalasand House, it was important for Sholti to establish personal connections with senior members of the family. A family connection alone would not guarantee influence, or the ability to access financial support for further business expansions in the future like personal connections would. Sholti duly got her education, made good impressions with the right family members, and beyond that connected with her Kelish roots. With so few Kelish residents in Kintargo, Sholti's earlier life had been very much a Chelaxian one outside her home.
Sholti's interest in religion was bolstered by her experiences in Absalom, where the church is prominent. She trained in dance at the Sarenite Temple, and made a commitment to herself to work to expand Sarerae's influence back home when she returned. Upon reaching majority Sholti returned to Kintargo. Aside from seeing her family again after her long absence, she is very anxious to make the acquaintance of Shensen. Shensen is well known as a star performer even in Absalom. The fact the she is also a Half-Elf and a prominent worshipper of Sarenrae makes her even more intriguing to Sholti.
Sholti arrived back home in Kintargo barely more than a week before the Night of Ashes.
Sholti has been very carful to keep her parents in the dark about what she's been up to. Living at home and the curfew has made that difficult though. She figured the best way to get easier freedom of movement would be to tell her parents she had met someone, and that she would be spending some night at her boyfriend's place. They insisted on meeting him, which Sholti wasn't expecting, so she recruited Rexus to play the part and come to dinner. That dinner is their only in-person appearance so far I believe. You can find it here:
The dinner accomplished Sholti's objectives, but left her very angry with her parents. The main tension between them is Sholti considering herself fully adult, while her parents aren't quite there yet. She's only been back home briefly a couple of times since the night of the dinner to collect some things and let them know she was mostly moving out to live with Rexus. It will all get smoothed over in time, it always does.
One thing to keep in mind is Kelish are matrilineal, so her mother is head of household and property owner. Sholti will inherit directly from her. A big part of her motivation to leave the group and return under a secret identity is to keep her parents safe.
Also you're welcome! Hope I got everything, pretty sure I did, but I am human so... there is that! XD
GM you and I posted at the exact same time, did you see it?
Lol! I know! XD
You do know that I'll likely not roll that well for the rest of this scene!
Not at the moment, mostly because I haven't been able to sit down and read what they have in the player's book for a while.
Well, how much do the rules add to the game's story? And is it worth slowing down the game for them in your estimation DM?
It's listed as an active campaign on my list, even with the name change. So no disaster!
Same! So it's all good!
I'm willing to give it a try!
Yes, I'd like to try it. Maybe some type of rules light, or paperwork reduction act version?
I don't mind much either way, I'm just bad at bookkeeping.
Alright, I'm fine with giving the rebellion a try as well. We can always fall back to straight adventuring if it doesn't work out.
I believe 20 point build is the original recruitment. I wouldn't mind rebuilding according to whatever your preference is DM_DM.
I wouldn't mind recruiting either, or sticking with four for now.
@DMDM: Are we jumping back to before the dinner at Sholti's house? Her parents met Rexus a couple of weeks back or so and loved the guy...
I did a recalculation and it' actually a 25 point buy.
We got an extra trait for 3 and could take a drawback for 4. We also had a trait for the opening scene only but it applied only during the protest so it's moot now.