GM Umineko's Carrion Crown

Game Master Umineko

I'm sure you all know the drill behind one of these. OOC chatter, questions, comments, complaints, etc. go here and not in the game thread.

Rather than reiterate the basics of the discussion thread, though, I have a question for you guys; how would you like to roll for saves, skill checks, etc.? Would you prefer to roll your own when they come up, or would you rather that I roll them all for you so as not to keep stalling the pace to have to wait for everyone to roll their saves/checks?

I'll also be linking the Roll20 spot later today after I actually set it up. As I stated in the recruitment thread, I will be using Roll20 for combat maps as necessary. I might not use it for all combats, though, unless you guys would rather have a visual aid for all combats, simple or complex. Would you guys rather keep the complex battles to the Roll20 maps, or should I just use them for every combat, even where movement and position matter very little?

I'm so thrilled to have been picked to be a part of this game! Thank you, GM Umineko!

Personally, I like rolling for my own saves; I feel that it gives me a sense of agency about what happens to my character, if that makes any sense. The same goes for what I would consider "active" skill checks (Acrobatics, Diplomacy, Escape Artist, Swimming, etc.), but I'm definitely in favor of the GM rolling for many things for expediency's sake, such as Initiative, Knowledge, Perception, Sense Motive, AoOs... Most things, really. I'm also okay with using theater of the mind for simple combats.

Hi! Thanks for the invite, very happy to be here. :)

Like Inessa, I'm fine with the GM rolling stuff such as Initiative and other passive rolls. Going a step further, though, I'm also fine with the GM rolling even Saves many times that I'd have to control over. In any case, the maximum that might happen is we need a retcon here and there for stuff that is too specific for the character that the GM could have missed (crazy circumstantial boni on saves or skills etc.).

I'm fine with theater of the mind for the simplest combats as well. Anything that can keep a PbP moving at a good pace!

Greetings! Thank you for having me, GM. I am excited to be here! =)

I am fine with the GM rolling to keep things moving, though I'm happy to make my own rolls.

Maps I'm fine with simple combats not being mapped so long as we have good descriptions to work from (especially if things like position for flanking come up), but I don't mind maps for everything even if only a reference point to make sure we all understand what the description looks like the same way. (I've had that come up in games before, where the players couldn't visualize the room from the description).

EDIT: I just realized I think I'm the only human in the group! Lol!

EDIT: I just realized I think I'm the only human in the group! Lol!

That you are, though most of the party can pass as human, or human enough, so long people don't give close inspections. Except for Toad Tongue. There's no hiding a goblin being a goblin. Trust me, I've tried.

Also, I've decided just now that I'll be keeping track of experience for you guys. You can keep track yourself, just to double check me if you want, but I'll let you guys know when you level up as you rest and such. You're following the medium track, so you'll get there, it'll just take a while.

Just waiting on Mathias, Toad Tongue, and Viare to pop their heads in, then I'll get things underway.

Hello everyone! Thanks for having me.

I've fine with whatever you choose. As previously mentioned, I'm new to this world, so I don't really have an opinion either way yet.

Hello all, thanks for choosing me.

I'm voting for Rolling of saves and whatnot by the DM as pacing is one of the biggest killers to PbP and good with combat however is easiest for the DM to handle.

As it's about time for me to head to bed and I just can't hold back my excitement to get this started, I've gone ahead and made the first post. Since each of you have had a long journey, some of which would be in the wilds, it's safe to assume you all show up in your adventuring gear, complete with armor and weapons, if you feel that would make the most logical sense for your characters to do. Feel free to play up the journey there, giving some insight as to the troubles or events leading up to making it to Ravengro, as well as how some of the few villagers mulling about the road towards the Restlands might react to your characters.

Here's hoping we can get this off to a great start!

Dangit. I accidentally posted in the Gameplay thread as my main name first instead of just the character.

GM is there a way to remove ignuspyre as a player? If not, I understand, but I'm not sure how to myself.

There probably isn't, but you can always just edit it and change the alias that posted it as long as you catch it in time. I have to do that all the time.

Just got out of a long day of work and excited to see the message inviting me to the game.

Speed of play is huge in PBP, so I am all for you rolling Init, Saves, and Skills (when prompted by you).

I would recommend Roll20 only for big encounters.

So, a human, a half-vampire, a witch-born, an angel-blessed, a demon-cursed, and a road...were goblin... walk into a town...

Think that makes 2 monster hunters, and 4 monsters.

All night long, I thought the site was down because I couldn't get it to load on my tablet. This morning, I tried to access it on my phone, with the WiFi off, and it loads perfectly. Long story short, I'm posting from my phone while I try to sort out why my ISP suddenly doesn't like Paizo, so please forgive any typos I've overlooked.

As a side note, going off of Gothic Horror archetypes or tropes, I tried to model Inessa after the Ingenue. If she lives that long, I do plan on having some character development go on (because you just can't be a doe-eyed darling forever when you're trying to foil BBEGs), but if it gets to the point where it's eye-rollingly obnoxious, feel free to say so. I've been on the other end of that before, so, yeah. PM is fine. =)

Anyway, I'm glad the game is underway! Looking forward to all the interactions between this very strange group of people.

I'm pretty sure Paizo was down for everyone. I couldn't get anything to load at all this morning, and it only really came back up after I got home, as I tried to access it at work when I could. It might not be your ISP.

Yeah, the problem is, I posted as ignuspyre, then thought if I posted as Zhu Jin it would remove ignuspyre. It did not. It added both. Sigh.

And yes the site was down for so long. It was very annoying.

Yeah, I just learned that a few people in my other games experienced it, too. Since I wasn't getting the little goblin graphic Paizo usually shows when they're down and I could access it through my phone, I thought it was just my ISP. Glad it's not the case. Too bad I didn't figure it out before I reset everything.

The post didn't show up for me, so I think Paizo ate it. Just to make sure, here is the Roll20 link for later use. Just waiting on Arthorius before moving along.

Just wanting to make sure it's not just me, but Paizo's been down a lot lately, hasn't it? Seems every time I'm trying to check on things, I have to wait an hour just for the page to load. It's starting to get a little annoying.

If this keeps being a problem for everyone, would anyone be opposed to just moving the entirety of the game to Roll20? As far as I can tell, it seems to be a more stable site. I'm not all that familiar with it yet, in all honesty, but if it allows us to be more consistent in the ability to update and play the game, then I don't see why we couldn't work it out there. I'm just still excited to run the game again, and I'd rather not have site issues kill anyone's drive to play it out with me.

I would prefer to keep it on Paizo, but that's because I am not familiar with Roll20 at all.

I'd like to stick to Paizo as well, but I'd be willing to give Roll20 a try if that's what the group wants. But honestly, I don't think a day or two more of this (which is hopefully all the time they'll need to resolve it for good) will kill anyone's drive to play. Some of us have been anticipating this game for a month now.

Speaking of Roll20, I've tried the links at the top and in your last post, but they just redirect me to the last game I've been in. Do you have another link?

I do have another link. I think I was using the wrong one. Like I said, I'm not very knowledgeable with Roll20 at the moment, so I didn't see there was another link on the side. As far as the worry of killing the drive, though, you can just chalk that up to my nerves; I'm still kind of feeling rush being a pbp GM, so I'm just trying to cover all the bases. Once things get rolling, I'm sure all my worries will pass. Just trying to get it right the first time and all that.

I was able to join using that link, thanks! I understand about the excitement and wanting to get it right the first time. I can't (\won't\shouldn't) speak for the others, but I will say that for as long as you feel excited about running this game, you can count on at least one person showing up to the table.

Paizo has likely been doing some updates to their system, thus causing the couple interruptions. I see a small pop of these roughly every six months, not a big deal. I would prefer to stay on here because Roll20 is blocked at work for me.

Today I didn't have any trouble with the site, so I think it's getting back to normal.

Hi,

I'm posting this on all my PbPs, as player or GM - I had a family emergency last Monday, due to an accident, and had not been able to post or even communicate of my absence. In parallel, as a consequence of the situation not improving, my undivided attention on such matter will be required on the months to follow and, therefore, I'm stepping out of most of my activity online. I apologize for the inconveniences it might cause and I wish you all the best, and fun on your games. Thanks all for the understanding and for the opportunity to play with you.

The Chess / adsapiens

I am sorry to hear of your troubles. Family will always be your first priority , and the thoughts and prayers of The Gaming Community are with you. Hopefully, in time, things will begin to improve and we will see you then.

It's a shame to see you go, but I understand completely. If the situation dies down, you're free to come back. I chose six for the very reason of potential dropping out. I do hope you the best in this situation.

Also, long post, but I just couldn't stop myself from writing until it was too late. It also makes up for the fact that I'll be gone for the weekend, returning late evening on Sunday. I'm going to be at a convention, and there'll be little time for me to update the game. I'll be responding to the game almost as soon as I get back and settled in on Sunday evening, though.

I apologize for my interruption into your discussion thread, but on behalf of FreakyFlyingElf21 (my coworker), it appears that the site itself is completely unreachable only during the entire 8-12 hour chunk of time that we are available to post, while they deal with whatever issues they are having getting the site to work right.

I might have been overly optimistic before about my timetable on them having this little issue fixed, but I'm glad everything is finally operational now. Here's hoping it stays that way and we can get this story going again.

I also hope you enjoyed your convention, GM. If it was the sort of convention one goes to for enjoyment, that is.

Ah. My post did make it on the site. I was so mad when it started going down again just as I was trying to submit the post...I even forgot to roll the Diplomacy check and now can't edit my post. Sigh.

GM, do you want me to roll it here or post again with the roll?

Yeah, the site has been less-than-operational this entire month so far. It's really becoming a hassle to deal with. It's not like I can really say anything about it, as I wouldn't know how to fix whatever the problem is, though.

The convention was for fun, and it was indeed fun. It was a cosplay/anime sort of convention, and I walked around the place as Sheogorath, Daedric Prince of Madness. Or was it biscuits? ...No, wait, definitely madness. It was fun being in character as him, and people noticed, that's for sure.

You can go ahead and roll in here, that's fine.

Diplomacy: 1d20 + 3 ⇒ (13) + 3 = 16

I was toying with doing the will and testament reading all in that post, as well, but I didn't want to make it so enormously huge. Also, it's a good spot for the characters to actually talk and get to know each other. You guys can do that for as long as you think you need; I'm actually going to be busy tomorrow and Saturday again, though unfortunately not with as much fun as last weekend. Just have your characters do as they will, and I'll have the will reading happen when I feel it's appropriate, most likely sometime on Sunday.

It's been pretty quiet lately. Is everyone doing alright?

It's been up and down for me all last week, but I'm fine. I was just waiting to see if anyone else wanted to have some character chatter before moving things along, myself. I was gonna wait until Wednesday, but if everyone just wants me to keep things moving along without much time for such things, then I can update earlier than that.

I'm sorry to hear that, but I'm glad you're doing fine. I hope things start looking up from here on out. I personally wouldn't mind a little more character interactions, but I leave it up to the group to decide whether we're ready to move on.

Well, it has definitely been slow-going for posting, and some of the characters aren't responding to some of the others, but I will post here shortly.

Ugh. I know the reasoning behind it, but I hate that you can't edit a post after only a little while. I was tired and crashed, and this morning see I messed up the formatting in my post and can't fix it. Sigh.

Yeah, I know the frustration. I must check my posts for typos and things like five times after I submit them. Nothing's more irritating than when I still find a mistake an hour and some minutes after I posted. ><

Anyway, I'm sorry to keep everyone waiting. My allergies have been acting up these past few days, leaving me an incoherent, stuffy-headed mess. But I'm feeling better now (for as long as it stops raining down here) and ready to move on if everyone else is.

I just want to apologize for not updating when I should be. I've been very sick the past couple of weeks. I'll post a follow-up as soon as I can, but thinking has been rather hard lately.

Sorry to hear you've been under the weather, hopefully you're feeling better now

I feel your pain. I've been feeling a little out of sorts myself lately. Rest up as much as you can and I hope you feel better soon!

Has this group been quiet for weeks or has my games page not been updating properly?

Sadly, it has been quiet. the GM posted a few weeks ago that he had been unwell. Last gameplay post by the GM was on July 11.

Hopefully that changes soon. I was looking forward to playing this character.

I'm sorry for the delay, everyone. It's just been rough goings for me lately. I'm afraid to say delays like these might be more common than I'd like to them be; I have a chronic illness that I don't like to talk about, and it can affect me whenever it feels like it. I'm going to do what I can to minimize it, but if you aren't comfortable with these happening, I do apologize and understand.

I'm glad you are feeling better or at least well enough to post.

And as far as I'm concerned, No details are necessary about your affliction other than it exists and we can expect to wait from time to time as you take care of yourself.

I appreciate your confiding in us about your illness and I understand completely. Like I said before, as long as you're interested in running this, I'm interested in playing it. I hope you're feeling​ well again soon.

Our thoughts and hopes are with you. I am also still up for moving forward.

I'm sorry to hear it, though I understand it all too well. Take your time and feel better.

For some reason I thought I was waiting on the next GM post. D'oh! My apologies!