Just got home from work - yeah I was going to post the other day but then saw that there seemed to be a Beorn-Hama conversation taking priority, so I stopped my own posting to wait for that hehe. Ah well that's funny how that goes sometimes!
Still waiting on Kas. I think he had indicated he' was staying with the prisoners all night.
Did he? I thought he was talking about taking a watch near dawn, and sleeping just before (and also helping to get them settled in). I saw no mention of any all night vigils from anyone.
And tormenting the prisoners is what Beorn was going to be speaking to you about, so you are jumping the gun. I really do not wish to spoil your fun Racingdork but there is no way Beorn will put up with any further tormenting of the prisoners. You already stripped them naked in the cold.
Our PCs are going to have to come to some understanding or things are going to come to a head. I predict Beorn will leave the group as he will simply not put up with such behavior. I am open to ideas but at the moment he is willing to physically prevent you from harassing the prisoners. These are condemned men. It's evil, at least in my view, to do what you are doing.
Jump the gun? Racingdork? lol. Was that an accidental typo or did you actually mean to start calling me names?
I wouldn't worry about it too much, dude. Hama hates bandits. Simple as that. This is just her getting some pay back for what they once did to her (which, by the way, was much worse than what she is doing to them now). Once the bandits leave Oleg's outpost, it becomes a total non-issue. That is, unless you choose to make it one out of game.
Besides, Hama hasn't really done anything to get herself caught (she certainly wouldn't do something like that if she knew someone was watching). The only way your character would even know anything is up is if you were both actively spying on Hama AND beating her opposed skill checks. And let's face it, there's no reason for your character to be doing anything like that unless you were deliberately intending to force a confrontation of some kind. In short, there's no understanding that needs coming to, at least not yet.
These scenes aren't meant to cause inter-party strife. They're meant to make you chuckle, to be funny--in much the same way that the bumbling burglars do in the Home Alone movies. Was that kid evil for defending his home in the way he did? Certainly not! Though he was more than a little malicious.
And as I said in my previous post, I didn't realize it was winter when I posted about taking their clothes. It was just meant to be a funny image to make you guys smile. Do you really think we would let them freeze to death? If I'm posting about us providing bread, light, and chamber pots, you can be pretty certain we also left them with a few blankets before as well.
Your character is a paladin, not a hammer, and Hama isn't a nail to be slammed down. She hasn't done anything inherently evil this entire game. So stop looking for evil where there isn't any. It could even be argued that she's caused far less harm to others then your character has. Beorn has killed people. Not once have I seen him choose to take the nonlethal option. All Hama has done this entire time is attempt to scare them straight. Prison guards do it to juveniles in real life all the time. It's meant to save their lives; it's not done out of malice, or to have any lasting harm. Let's face it, talk is rarely enough. You need to not only convince people that what they are doing is wrong, you need to leave a lasting impression of how bad life can get if they keep going down such a ruinous path. Trust me, it will be better for them in the long run. Better than your sword or the lawman's noose at least. If you do confront Hama about her actions (the ones you're not supposed to know about in-game), then this is what she would tell you.
I guess you could argue its a neutral act, since it's not exactly teddy bears and rainbows, but that's totally fine with me. Hama is Neutral, and this is how I'm choosing to portray it.
Just don't force the issue and the bandits will soon be carted away by the proper authorities and we can get on with the story.
Just got home from work - yeah I was going to post the other day but then saw that there seemed to be a Beorn-Hama conversation taking priority, so I stopped my own posting to wait for that hehe. Ah well that's funny how that goes sometimes!
I apologize if I misread your posts and took your watch. It would appear the conversation was always meant for you as well. Just ignore Hama's reply to Beorn I guess.
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I apologize if I misread your posts and took your watch. It would appear the conversation was always meant for you as well. Just ignore Hama's reply to Beorn I guess.
Nah! Totally fine Ravingdork, totally fine. I mean that's just what happens when we do these scenes and some players take the scene in a different direction is all - that's part of the fun to take what's written and then play off of that in a way that keeps the story flowing and makes sense, preferably in a way that adds to what came before it. Sometimes its just a bit chaotic and messy to figure out, but that's part of the fun.
So for talking to Beorn I just "assumed" there was some time in there somewhere after getting to Oleg's and before Hama's first watch that we would have that little chat. Nothing major, so I flex-tagged it (that's what I call it but referencing the time and place and who involved so it's not jarring to read with other things going on in the scene), and I think that works pretty well.
Generally speaking I'll always try to stay in the current timeframe and scene with Kas, and use flex-tags to go 'back in time' if I really have to for something interactive.
By the way, very SUPER-CREEPY-COOL post w/ Hama and her watch! Wow! I mean Kas would despise that obviously, but the way you wrote it means to me that it happened and everyone else was either asleep or elsewhere doing tasks. Hehe, Hama's got a lot of issues, but lack-of-creativity isn't one of them!
Glad you enjoyed the read. That was kind of the whole point. Here are some additional visualizations.
Ok. Lets see if we can get through this and at least make sure we understand each other.
First, I enjoyed the read as well. And I think I understand the motivation. But...
It would totally undermine my character for Beorn to allow such treatment. He really would fight to prevent it if he had to. Lets try to avoid that. Also Hama's previous actions makes Beorn suspicious of her intent towards the prisoners. She has already shown she is willing to torment them. That is set in stone. So I think Beorn is acting reasonable when he would deny her the ability to be alone with the prisoners. That was my planned topic of discussion with Hama, but you posted before Kas did so things got out of order.
And the main point I want to make is when you re on watch in Olegs you would be on the walls and not locked in a shed with bound prisoners.
So, it seems you slipped in and tormented condemned men while Beorn was talking with Kas. If they call out Beorn or Kas or someone is going to hear. Its unlikely it could go on very long before you are discovered, especially since Beorn was coming looking for you right after a relatively short discussion with Kas.
Aside from Hama's first watch, could you cite some examples of prior torment, particularly if it could be perceived in-game as evil?
Insofar as I can recall, all she's done is take their clothes (which could be an understandable precaution again magical articles). Everything else she's done to them (again, prior to her first watch) is generally what you would expect people to do to potentially dangerous prisoners.
I certainly don't mean to undermine anyone's character, but Hama is going to very quickly become a rather boring character if she isn't allowed to use her skills and abilities or flesh out her background motivations.
I don't mind the scenario being short-lived. If the GM has them call out for help, and you arrive and remove Hama from duty under suspicion of...something, it will still play out much as I described, only the scene will be shorter.
If you confront her about tormenting them, she will deny it, saying they probably had some sort of nightmare. If you somehow catch her using magic, she will claim she was trying to help them avoid a darker fate, though she would be far more concerned for her own fate. This would result in her backing down from any sort of confrontation immediately, being more frightened at the notion that a dangerous man with a sword now knows her darkest secret and may arrest or kill her for it, than she would be of covering up any perceived wrong-doing.
In a sense, you have the advantage here. I've already declared that I will not resort to PvP under any circumstances. You, on the other hand, have said your character will act to physically stop Hama if need be. Play your character how you like, but I will ask that you not use that advantage, that threat of PvP, to bully me. Playing a paladin is never an excuse to dictate everyone else's play style.
GMs should generally talk to paladin players about what their code means in their games, and paladin players should talk to other players to avoid conflicts such as this ahead of time. Sadly we didn't do that before issues arrived, but I see no reason we can't do that now. The way I see it, there are a few ways we can do this whole thing cooperatively without compromising our characters.
1) Hama doesn't get caught. If your character remains unaware of Hama's actions, there won't be any character conflicts. Since bandits only take up a small portion of this campaign story (insofar as I'm aware), future conflicts of this nature are unlikely to arise. It's easy enough to turn a blind eye as a player, while keeping your character's sanctity with some clever narrative writing.
2) Your character senses that something is off with Hama, and seeks to help her, rather than harm her. In the spirit of this option, you could still condemn her actions, even acting to put a stop to them (simply demanding without violence will be enough), while also recognizing that she's damaged goods--someone who needs help and healing. This could make for interesting roleplay that ultimately leads to the public revelation of Hama's powers, and her realization that she won't automatically be condemned for having them (but rather, in how she chooses to use them in the future).
3) We could simply agree that Hama never took first watch, never attempted to scare the prisoners straight. I don't personally like this option as I think it wastes some good narrative and destroys some potential for fun roleplaying. Still, since you claim I jumped too far ahead, I'm willing to do it if that's what everyone wants.
I'm sure there are other options/compromises out there, but these are what I came up with off the top of my head.
Evil act - stripping tied men of their clothing while they are tied up in a cold barn in the winter or very early spring.
While Beorn would never use lethal force against Hama, I note that Hama is quite willing to use the powers of her character build against other PCs. There is little difference there at one level. You are clearly ok manipulating Beorn.
Look. I can just convert over to a fighter if that his what I need to do. He will constantly come on to you though. :) I fully believe that Hama's open actions show that she hates bandits and enjoys tormenting them. OOC I do not care what Hama does to the bandits but I say that her actions are already enough so that Beorn does not trust her to treat the prisoners fairly.
Bjorn was on his way to attempt you option 2 above but you jumped ahead.
For now I am just gonna say the Beorn was unaware of where Hama was and went looking for her on the wall, which is where we should be stand watch. Since she was not there he stayed and stood watch.
I am keenly aware of what is happening here but I'm trying to let you guys handle this. However I feel it is time I stepped in and at least offered my thoughts.
I am still operating under the thought that we are all figuring each other out and that there is always going to be some conflict that happens between players.
I did feel like Hama's action where pushing the line between neutral and evil, as what she did amounted to Psychological Torture, however I am not going give her an "evil point" for it either, I find that to be a silly form of punishment that rarely has any effect except to garner hostility nor do I feel like her actions truly deserved it.
In Hama's own way it made sense as she tried to help break down the will of the bandits.
We are all still learning our characters, motivations and how they fit together in this campaign.
I would urge you guys to find common ground.
Trying. Even offering to change characters.
Yeah sorry I had been sitting on my post for a while, ended up posting without having seen yours first.
I'm far less concerned about earning "an evil point" and more concerned about one of us having to give up some level of fun for the other.
We're all talking about it calmly, like rational adults. That's a good start. Hopefully we will be able to quickly find a solution that won't involve someone giving something up.
Evil act - stripping tied men of their clothing while they are tied up in a cold barn in the winter or very early spring.
Would you consider this evil even if they were provided blankets or replacement clothes? If you recall, the point was to get disguises, not to humiliate or harm the prisoners.
And I by no means was holding that as a threat, like I implied I am not a fan of the alignment system and how it works.
I am pretty confident we can hopefully look past this incident without anyone having to make changes.
Perhaps Hama took it too far and perhaps Beorn is being a tad overzealous. But that's okay, ya know? Sometimes people act extremely.
A personal anecdote from my real life game of Rise of the Runelords last night; We are well into book 6, bout half way through and we just concluded a fight where-in my bard was able to convince one of the bad guys to help us free his enslaved people and in turn he'd help us fight our way to the BBEG. Just as the the bad guy-about-to-be-turned-into-a-good-guy was going to agree to help us our dwarven gunslinger announced he was going to shoot the guy in the face, killing him.
I'd asked him, "Really?" and shrugging he said "My character hates that type of [Generic Creature Type],"
I was pretty frustrated and angry, but by the end of the night--well next morning I had forgiven him. I thought it was a pretty shitty thing to do but in the end, I didn't want to let it ruin my fun.
I however have the benefit of being friends with the guy now for 3-4 years, while we don't have that particular level of relationship here in this game, I hope and believe that one day we will.
Yeah, something like that would perturb me in the short term too. This is just a game though, so I can't fathom holding a grudge or anything so petty as that. I like to think that everyone can get along well enough to have fun in the long term.
If something like your example happened several times though, and was more a trend then an isolated incident, then I would seriously consider asking for change, or leave the play group altogether for another that respected me and my play style.
(This is solely in regards to your given example, please don't think I'm alluding to anything in this play group here.)
On a different note, have any of you guys done Dragon's Demand the module, I was thinking of lifting a couple of encounters from it for Kingmaker.
I have not.
Can't say that I have.
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On a different note, have any of you guys done Dragon's Demand the module, I was thinking of lifting a couple of encounters from it for Kingmaker.
Hehe it's funny you mentioned it, as I've run the near-entirety of it in my monthly tabletop group game for the past seven sessions or so...should be wrapping it up by February. It's been a great module to DM, but I miscalculated and thought it would only take 3-4 sessions to run, not 8!
Good. I guess that means there will be a lot of additional material then. :D
So long as we're appropriately awarded for the additional encounters, and we get to the second Kingmaker module and get our kingdom building underway before too long, I'll be quite happy.
Yeah absolutely, that is why I wanted to have experience tracking so that I can throw in extra encounters without worry about you guys falling behind.
However if only one person has done it I don't want to rob you guys that havent of the experience, its really a great module.
I'll be working on moving both groups forward. I'll probably do it in spoilers just for the sake of adventure and mystery.
I just want to take some time to prepare what essentially is two good posts.
I am in a real life game tonight, I had wanted to get the post up before hand but it didn't happen. Hopefully later tonight
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My live games are Tuesdays and Thursdays.
Mine are every other Saturday. At best.
Might we move this along a bit*? I'm all for NPC interactions and roleplaying, but I don't want every single interaction to drag out for real life weeks. One real life week per encounter I think would be a much better pace (regardless if its NPC interaction or combat).
If we can strike a balance between roleplaying and combat (perhaps 50/50) I think I'd enjoy that a little more as well. I like learning about everyone's characters with in-depth roleplay, but what we're doing now is starting to feel like a snail's crawl to me.
Later, when we get into kingdom building, perhaps we can strive for a 33/33/33 split between combat, roleplaying, and downtime activities.
What do you guys think?
I am good with that. I believe we intent to go mite hunting? I recommend we explore the hexes on the way to the mite place as well. Heck I'd even recommend we explore out in a spiral. How many hexes have we explored so far? Have we even completely explored the hex containing the trading post?
I'd rather go after the banditos first, as I'm concerned they will be stronger if we wait, but if you guys insist on going after the mites first, I'm down with that too.
Part of my hesitation is that we are still first level and are quite poorly equipped. While I have never peeked inside the AP, from past experience I believe the write expects to be a couple levels higher to deal with the stag lord. I suspect it is meant for the final challenge at the end of book 1. Not sure as I have never finished book 1 in previous plays through.
Metagaming notwithstanding, I'm inclined to agree in that case.
I would very much advise against heading straight for the Stag Lord as well. I would consider him and his keep beyond your current level and while players can always seem to surprise, I think this would be a slaughter rather than surprise.
Thanks for the warning. :) There is a lot out there to explore yet. And Beorn feels much better about exploring it now that Oleg has some guards.
Due to some creative differences, Ravingdork and I have chosen to part ways for this campaign. Hama will be accompanying the guards and other bandits back to Restov to find adventure elsewhere finding the temptation to slip back into her bandit ways too great here in the Stolen Lands.
I hope that we can continue this game as I’ve had a great deal of fun so far with you guys. I know there hasn’t been any posts since Sunday, I hope that we can get back on track and adventuring soon.
Hey, I am not going anywhere. I am sorry to see RD drop though. I though he and I had finally found a way to make things work out.
But, tomorrow I leave for a week + of skiing. Its quite a bit of traveling and my days will be pretty filled. I hope to have internet but am not sure about quality or time availability. I'll post as time allows but please do not wait on me. I'll be back home on Sunday the 19th.
I'm okay with exploring. I made my last suggestion to scout the Stag Lord's fort before reading the GM's warning. We should just touch base with Oleg every day or two.
I wish Ravingdork happy trails. I did not have any major concerns about Hama, but her tendency to take actions in secret, if repeated, could lead to problems and set us up for pvp conflicts.
Saniana loves exploring the wilderness, so let's hit the mite lair and then begin to investigate the local forest and other nearby hexes.
Also, this past week I've been prevented from posting as much as I'd like by RL issues, but I think things are settling down.
Instead of making a b-line for the mites are you good with exploring along the way? And if we plan to return to check on Oleg regularly then I like my spiral idea even more. We are exploring hexes so here is my proposal
1) Explore Oleg's hex. This might already be done. \
2) Explore the hexes 1 hex out from Oleg's. (Adjacent Hexes) in a spiral pattern.
Explore the hexes 2 hexes out from Oleg's in a spiral pattern.
I am unsure how far the mite hex is. And I am unsure how far we can explore in a day on horseback. I think its partially dependent on terrain type.
From Horse back it takes 1 day to fully explore a plains hex or forest hex.
So reasonably you guys could stay close to Oleg's, exploring the nearby Hexs and staying close while you wait for Fred and Olivia to return from Restov.
Good call there. I like it.
Heyas All - had to defer PbP to the ole RL work fun, but I'll get some time here to post and get back into the swing of things!
No worries! Real life comes up, we aren't all just digital avatars :)
I have a an old West End Games Star Wars RPG on Sunday so I'll be out for much of that day.
I'll post this afternoon.
Sorry guys, life's been crazy. I'll be moving us along today.
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Hey all. Sorry for my lack of posting. People doing work in the yard cut our cable in three places Thursday. Just now getting internet back. I thought I had posted on my phone to let you know but I do not see the post here. Anyway, life is back to normal and I can post again!
Sorry, but I haven't been able to post as soon as I thought I would. I've got a nasty sore throat and head cold that is taking a lot out o me and I haven't been able to get the energy to work on PBP. I'll try to get something up tomorrow.
Yep I've been bad about that as well this week, so I'm going to redouble my efforts to be more consistent and present for my fellow players here!
I thought I'd be much better by now, but my sore throat is still with me and I'm mostly spending time when I'm not working sleeping. I hope I'll be back to normal soon.
Get well soon. Its amazing how many people I know are down with colds, or worse.
I am headed to a small con in Memphis and will be off line from noon tomorrow until Monday. Please bot me as needed.
I'm hoping to get posts up on Friday, once I've had a good night's rest and some breakfast. Feeling somewhat better, finally.
Once again, I must beg patience as I go a while without posting. Should be the last week where this will be a problem. I hope I'll have something up no later than Friday. Then my schedule shifts back to 2 classes, Monday through Thursday, from about 8 to 3 PM. Should mean daily posts again.
In the meantime, please 'bot me as needed.
Drattitall...I hate it when I flub my alias in the posting. Sorry about that. Codanous if you want to set the 'DM Vord' alias to inactive NPC or such in the character listing that'd be fine by me.
Ah no worries, it happens to all of us!