I actually deleted my latest response as I changed my mind on feeling it needed to be discussed. I was specifically referring to Zakaz's comment that it could be decreed this relic defied my cosmic decree. I was just saying there's nothing inherently that allows that (short of a cosmic decree itself) but if we wanted to allow Boon to exempt relics I felt we should talk about it as a group.
Part of my problem was that without information like it can't store things indefinitely it felt like an attempt to weasel past the decree I made when I came in. In this case I feel like I agree that it isn't necessarily defying my decree but would definitely make Azrael angry. However, I feel like I would have preferred we discussed the creation of such a relic beforehand to smooth out these details. I know it might have been a spur of the moment decision or you just didn't think about it--and either way is fine, that's perfectly reasonable--I just feel like with better communication we could have avoided this issue. If you want to keep this effect I'm fine with it now, honestly.
Fair warning, Azrael will probably try and steal it from you in a fight; if not at this moment, at some point in the future (assuming you keep the effect).
You are right. I should have discussed with you. That is my bad again. I will definitely communicate more in the future.
The relic was an item that he and I discussed before your arrival, actually, and I didn't think to bring it up for discussion when you made your decree. We've been talking about this event for a bit and that detail skipped by me. Apologies.
This game is about communicating, you're absolutely right. More so than most others. You were right to call us on it. I didn't mean to cross you I just failed to see your perspective on it beforehand.
That's perfectly fine! I know I haven't been in the game that long, so that having that kind of thing slip past isn't exactly unexpected. Given this discussion I'm totally cool with this going on and existing and all that, now that we've talked about it here. Is there anything in Shess's domain that keeps me from knowing Zakaz is there? As I said, Azrael told him the first time he heard of anything pertaining to this 'secret god' I would let him know, and since this is being done and he doesn't know who did it... he'd probably seek him out.
I'm cool with it if we want to say that I either can't find him in your sanctum or that it would just take a while for me to locate him, though. If not, however, Azrael will definitely show up; whether or not he continues this fight or tries to adjudicate is up in the air, though.
I guess I would ask the question, how would you know where Zakaz is?
Well, I don't know. Whether we know where another god is and how we know it has been pretty nebulous so far in this game, and I'm not sure how to quantify it. The game has no real rules about knowing where other gods are at any given time, and it looking back I see no real consensus on how this works. If I can't find him at all, this obviously causes problems with my showing up, so that solves the problem entirely.
OK, so caught up. Shess, I specifically asked you to talk this kinda thing through. Please do not keep stuff like this secret from me.
I would really prefer no deicide, as that's sort of against the intent of the game.
Relics do not overrule a decree. You would need to spend an addition 3AP on the item specifically to allow it duplicate a boon.
I would say gods can get a vague sense of each other, as we have been playing it as we can just sorta pop in to any scene.
Yes, it was my mistake as well to not bring told to the whole table. Shess and I worked this out over PM and we probably shouldn't have. Lessons learned.
As for finding me, the place where I am now is shielded from divination and teleportation effects by a god who specializes in such things, so finding me is going to be difficult.
I will lay out our plan here as soon as I can so everyone can get on the same page and we can see if there are any other hiccups we missed. Going into the hour 10 to hour 15 part of my working day now so it may take a while
Azrael has found the hole you dug to get down to Shess's domain, although since I can't just teleport to you it would probably take me a while to get there, if I showed up in time for the fight at all. At the moment, Shess outmatches me in a 1v1 fight by a fairly large margin so if Zakaz goes down he'd probably just bide his time while he consolidates his power and then go down and cause a ruckus.
You guys don't need to fully discuss all of this out in the open, ie in this thread. However, give me, as the main GM, at least a heads up of what's going on, so I'm not in the dark, and don't need to make rulings/etc on the fly.
That's completely reasonable.
I got my alias done. Sorry work had been sucking up my time and it was all I could do to get my first few posts out.
Oh man, finally caught up.
I've got so many evil and chaotic gods to oppose now! Yay!
Questions:
1) Who's joined the vault pantheon?
2) Can people put alignments and creations on their profiles? It's important to Atheos, as the god of arguing, to know what other people's beliefs are.
All my stuff should be listed out already.
All my deeds should be listed.
Yeah, there's just three other deities whose alignments I'm unsure of. Arathoth was helpful in declaring chaos, so he'll get the first proper curse.
updated with this week's actions
Quick clarification. It's every real world week that we get AP, right?
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Yes. Every Saturday at noon EST (GMT-5)
@Arathoth Yes
@Azrael So after much thought and conferring with some friends (possible bias I suppose), my issue is not with Shess being found, but the speed by which you had decided it took. Up to the point in which I created the dagger (attracted your attention), I had spent around 12 AP to keep myself hidden, that mostly excludes the AP spent to gain the Secrecy domain. Zakaz spent multiple posts of in-game time and 3 AP to find my lair. You practically declared that you found me with a short post spending no AP. That is the basis of my issue.
Just to get into the math specifically:
6 AP to keep my actions hidden
1 AP for the memory Mushrooms
2 AP for the labyrinth
3 AP for the Secrecy domain
5 AP for One with Shadows
5 AP for Monument of secrecy
=
22 AP total, which is multiple weeks of AP saving.
Azrael hasn't found you at all, really. He found where Zakaz burrowed into the ground to look for you, by virtue of practically already being there. I assumed that I could not find Zakaz nor would he know you were down there, although given Zakaz's previous words about hunting for a sevret god it felt reasonable to assume wherever he was he was looking for you. Also, that giant hole in the ground wasn't there last time he was at the Vault. Is it not natural to be intrigued by that? Who looks at a giant hole in the ground in the Vault of the Gods and isn't at least a little curious?
More importantly, why should I have to spend AP to find you if someone else already has? He left a giant hole in the ground where he burrowed down to you! Should I ignore that and pretend that isn't there? Setting aside the fact that I'm at a huge disadvantage by being new, it makes no sense that I would spend AP to find a hole and think it MIGHT lead to you or something about you. It wasn't as if I showed up instantly to start a fight; I found a hole and said that maybe Zakaz had found the trail. I didn't show up to ruin your moment or anything. I wasn't even sure that I would reasonably be able to FIND Zakaz down there if I went looking. The thing is huge, right? Finding an entrance he made and declaring I show up and whack you across the head are two very different things. Why did you automatically assume one led to another?
Again my bad as I missed the idea that Zakaz created a giant hole in the ground. I did not extrapolate that at first but after reading it again I can see that there could be.
Giant is a strong word, but ya, I did burrow pretty aggressively. Whether he could find you even with that clue is still an open question. I chalked it up to my predatory senses.
It is fine. It is a reasonable explaination. Input yourself wherever you see fit Azrael. Though I'd prefer at least a round or two more between Zakaz and Shess to account for the time.
A big concern I have is that Azrael didn't seem to actually spend time or effort(not AP necessarily) to find Zakaz/the hole. Heck, it doesn't even seem like he actually went to the Vault. He just sorta saw the hole, but didn't describe going there, or anything. It almost reads that he saw the hole from his realm, but contradicts that by saying he's examining it from above.
I think if Azrael wrote up a more detailed post trying to locate Zak, and then the hole, and then dove down to possibly find Shess, that would be better.
I have been in the Vault since I created Necromancy, I never left after I made it. If anything, it's easy to assume I could have watched Zakaz burrow into the ground and not even have to find him. I forgot that, so now I didn't which is fine, but I never left so traveling there isn't exactly an option. I hadn't even decided I was definitely going to fight him. I didn't even go down the hole. I'm literally standing at the top musing thst maybe Zakaz found his secret god.
I've now decided I'm not going down, so it's all a moot point anyway. I'll stay up here and talk with Atheos and Arathoth and leave the hole alone.
Up to you Azrael. You have made valid points in my book. Thank you as well for pointing out the many things I seem to have missed in my reading.
I'll just stay above ground. It's just less of a hassle, I'll talk with the other people who have shown up with me and wait for the weekly rollover so I can work on other stuff.
After doing some reading inspired by Azrael I have a ruling question about how One with Shadows works.
"No God can automatically know about any AP you spend unless that AP affects them or their creations directly even then they won't know it was you who affected their creations, just that a god did."
My question is that, with the rule Azrael brought up earlier, the rule covers actions within a domain but One with Shadows says just actions directly affecting a god or their creation. Does this mean that AP spending within a domain that doesn't directly affect a god is still hidden?
I missed it too.
Since all deities can be in more than one place, can we please post an OOC comment at the start of a post(akin to what Atheos is doing) that says where you are? Especially if interacting with, or going to interact with, other gods?
Right now, I believe Atheos and Arathoth are actually in the Shallows, which is fine, because Azrael can be there, and at the hole. I think fledglings can be in two places at once.
"real Atheos" is derping around underground. He's got a copy in the Shallows.
@Arathoth: Err, a scourge is just any action that significantly affects a whole society (and it doesn't have to be all negative; the action is "scourge/boon". Getting a divinely-installed monarchy to overthrow itself seemed like something that should require the extra AP.
And Atheos's portfolio is Law (Physics). He believes very strongly that the world should work in a predictable way, but isn't going to care about things like honesty or human laws. Forcing order onto a society for the sake of order is probably going to make him upset, and he's been around long enough to know that it's probably a good idea to derail anything a CE god plans, even if it seems lawful on the surface.
That said, those were *in-character* arguments he made, not out-of-character ones.
Please hold this discussion, as I am talking to people via PM right now.
Sorry all for the lack of posting. I have been moving across the country from Michigan to Washington state. Be available in the next couple days.
Hey all, this upcoming week is my final week of classes for my senior year of college, so posting may be a little sparse (or non-existant, really) until Saturday or so. I will do my best to keep posting and I will at the very least be reading what happens, so I'll be caught up, but I may not be too active. If I find free time (unlikely) I will post in when I can. Otherwise, expect to not see me unless I'm lucky.
I have just started a new job, so have been suffering from a lot of stress headaches recently. I actually had to take the night off because of one, but I am still around.
I've been talking to some people via PM, and they have brought a glaring weakness to my attention:
New gods will forever be way far behind on AP.
Now, while I get that part of that is the inherent nature of the game being based on real life time spent as a PC, it is also rather sucky, and super un-fun. Not only for them, but for us 'older' players as well.
It will only get worse if/when other newer players join, especially if this game last a long enough time. Right now, I earn 6 AP a week, so about 24 a month. Let's say for whatever reason, I do not ascend to the next rank(thus earning even more AP), in 6 months time, I'll 144 AP, on top of what I earned as a fledgling+starting AP.
That's a pretty massive gap to a new player/god who joins six months down the road, who only gets the starting AP.
Thus, I am implementing, effective immediately, and fully retroactive, that all new gods(including our most recent additions) get *half* the AP you would earn in game, as a fledgling, without a pantheon. Ie, 4 AP per week.
Assuming my math is correct(and it's often not, so somebody please double check it for me), that means Lort, Azrael, Arathoth, and Therien all get 24 AP.
I totally forgot to add a portfolio to my Elements domain. It will be Unity, ie the elements working together either as all 4, or a mix.
Assuming my math is correct(and it's often not, so somebody please double check it for me), that means Lort, Azrael, Arathoth, and Therien all get 24 AP.
That will certainly ease the burden of being a newborn. Thanks.
EDIT:Looks like the game started on 3/18, which means 6 weekly upgrades at 4 each week would be 24, and half of that would be 12.
Told ya my math is awful, lol. Also, I was like half asleep when I posted that, but I wanted to get it up before going to bed.
Well, I guess we were never gonna be friends, Tissari, but ...
Just a suggestion; maybe do 3/4 AP rather than half? Realistically, down the line most if not all gods in that game will be Lesser/Intermediate Deities and in a pantheon, which comes out 7-8 AP a week. I'd suggest gaining 3 as opposed to 2, to make it a little more balanced. A god coming in later is obviously going to be somewhat less powerful, but I fear that later on if someone were to join in the game would still be kind of unbalanced. In your own example of 144 AP a month, that makes a difference between approximately 52 AP and 78 AP. They're still a fair ways back from where you are but it's less drastic and allows them to really invest in picking up new domains and doing new things. Obviously older gods are using more of their AP to make stuff that isn't directly relating to increasing their power or whatever; we're making races and continents and moons and stars and planets. They have less of a blank slate to work with so having less is not as huge of a barrier, but I feel 3 as opposed to 2 makes for slightly better balance.
Either way, however, I think it's a nice solution to the problem.
I have a suggestion going forward on how we can handle curses and the like. I suggest we leave the true effect of the curse up to the cursed. For example:
-Someone creates shoes. Zakaz is offended.
-Zakaz spends one AP and says, "I curse their eyes so they cannot make shoes!"
-other god decides that this curse takes the form of severe far-sightedness and spends 2 ap to technically reverse the curse via the invention of precision eyewear.
The point is Zakaz didn't decide how his curse manifested. He simply informed the other player that they must now add this misfortune to their narrative. This lets the creator of the race maintain narrative control over their creation. However, there must be a universal understanding that when a god acts agaist you, you cannot handwave it in your narrative.
An example of handwaving is from me. Shess spent ap to censure my Crested in Quarrel's End. I simply brought in two more. Plausible, yes. Fair to Shess? No. I should have made it harder on myself than that.
Thoughts?
Admittedly, it was my goal to prevent the Cull from being able to parley with humans or other races at Quarrel's End.
Also, I have a slightly unrelated question.
Apedemak and I have discussed that we both want to go in on spending AP to create reincarnation, as we're both looking to pick up the Life Domain. However, he's currently busy and can't get on to post much. Some of my plans for later rely on instating reincarnation is a concept beforehand but I don't want to screw him out of our plans to make it together so that we're both on our way toward the domain or make him change his plans to accommodate for me going ahead on it. Would it be alright with people if I spent my AP toward that now and have him pop in to say he's cool with helping me make it and we instead write up the full IC thing later?
If not, I'll just put a hold on that until he shows up and do some other stuff for now, but I figured I'd ask. Azrael is looking to spend some AP later to make a Demigod out of a soul who has constantly asked to be reincarnated again and again; he begets him as The Everborn, and becomes something of a herald of Azrael and gathers followers/creates a society around the Obelisk that he's currently crafting. I can't really do anything with this until I make reincarnation, however.
I believe the plan at the moment is for me to spend 2 AP and for him to spend 3. I'm sure I can get him to jump on here for a minute and post in to say he's agreed to this beforehand.
Is this alright with everyone? Given the whole "time dilation" thing, we'd probably set it back some in our timeline of the world so that stuff can happen with that.
Right. And I completely negated that. Plausible, yes. Fair to you. No. I should have taken your clear intent and put forth effort of my own to counter you or otherwise included that in my narrative. Perhaps the first large scale inter-species was would have started. Who knows? But I shouldn't have just brought two more in and basically ignored your effort.
I somewhat disagree on the subject of having the recipient be able to choose the effects you use. Even though you can't handwave it in your favor, people will still favor themselves whenever possible and will unconsciously choose effects that aren't as bad as they could be, depending. I more think the trick is to, again, talk about things more; you don't just drop a plague without talking about it or something, I guess is my point. If you're gonna curse someone's stuff or whatever, just talk with them about it and how you feel it furthers what you guys are doing and stuff like that. I think better discussion is paramount over removing the agency of whatever player actually spends the AP.
Also, yet another unrelated question. Zakaz, I know you created predatory life on land and all that, but have you made sea life at all yet? If you have, what have you made?
I'm also a big advocate of talking more. Most of the issues that have come up relate directly to not communicating about them beforehand, especially when they are not beneficial or even hostile.
Re: What I've created
I have used the Create life and Create monstrous life actions literally millions of times, canonicaly. If you need some species of animal or beast to be there you can assume it is. If you really want to create a specific species, you can. Except for Orcas. I did specifically make those. And maybe sharks, but I can't remember.
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Just, exactly what are you looking to accomplish as a player, Tis? It's fairly obvious Tissari wants to redeem Therien.
Since that's not going to happen, what is your goal for the narrative?
Because I'm willing to reduce it to one post: "millennia pass, Tissari fails."
I have 0 interest in playing a mortal in a god game for weeks.
I don't think anyone else in my generation would like one of you older kids to beat us into a similar position.
Please take a look at what the results of other lost battles have been in this campaign and reconsider.
Or maybe you can tell me what we'll accomplish by doing things this way, and I'll like it and go with it. Or maybe "Tissari fails."
Removal of player agency is sometimes worse than death in an RPG. This is pretty much "Godmodding" as warned against in the ruleset.
*sigh*
Okay, you know what? I'm just done.
I submitted a character because this game sounded like fun. Azrael is a friend of mine and he was talking about how it was about creating a world and forming a pantheon and all that kind of stuff. That sounded like something that I would really enjoy. I read the gameplay thread and it read like a creation myth from a good fantasy book. I thought that it would be interesting to play if nothing else.
But it seems that I was mistaken. There's no player communication. People seem to be more interested in making other players do things their way than working together (or at least working things out) or having fun, and it's basically been either constant disappointment or constant arguments since I started playing. I don't even feel like I can play the character concept I was interested in without someone who disagrees with me stepping on me for daring to not do things their way. This is the opposite of fun and I want no part in it any longer.
I would like to request that everything Arathoth did (what little of it there was) be retconned out of the game so that I can be as removed from this as possible. Thank you for what little time I had here, even if I didn't enjoy it very much.