Welcome everybody to our very own discussion thread. It's useful for out of character discussion or just general tomfoolery. (Didn't think I'd be using that word today.)
Please post here once you've seen your character's been chosen and lets get started.
Cool. I'll run over the crunch and practice writing speech without articles. Thanks for the consideration!
Hello everyone! I am Emily from Texas (Central Standard Time is GMT-6 until March 9), and I'm very excited to be playing with you all!
I'd like to say I've never been in a group this big before, but the Kingmaker PbP I'm in started with 9. We're down to 7 now, but I enjoy playing with lots of people :)
To our GM: do you mind if I "dot" the Campaign thread, so it will show up in my Campaigns list?
Congrats, everyone. Also, Ilya, more congrats on your very own personal bodyguard who promises not to let you die like the last one. Almost certainly. Probably.
@Vanya: Sounds terrifying. But ok :)
D/FW metroplex here :)
Ilya, your hair isn't white in your profile picture. That bothers me.
Huh, really? Cause your face isn't a c!#+ in your profile picture and that bothers me.
Kyrianna and I are in another PbP together, she was bating that response. I'm Elais by the way, hi.
A party of eight? This should prove interesting. Thank you for the invite, GM - I'll get an alias for Ehren together ASAP.
Yeah sure Kyrianna, go ahead.
Welcome everybody. There's food and drink on the bar to your right.
A few things: I'll need everybody's glorified spreadsheets filled out soon. We'll spend the next few days getting to know each other's characters and I'll explain how I'll be running this thing for the most part.
I'm on Eastern Standard time in New York, but my posting habits aren't habitual in the slightest, so you'll see me around early and late in the day.
Once everybody's filed in, and if you guys want, we could all do a kind of "slice of life" sequence of posts around Heldren, giving a sense of daily life there and allowing you guys to stretch your roleplaying muscles before we begin in earnest.
Oh, and one other thing. Ilya and Marina both have the same profile picture so I'm gonna have to ask one of you people to change yours for the sake of clarity.
One, two, three, NOT IT!
I dotted it. My post isn't showing up, but the campaign still added itself to my campaign page- fine by me!
I'll have my sheet done by tomorrow night. Time zones don't always make a huge impact on postings, but I think it's interesting to see where our weary adventurers were thought up :) I'm on board for the slice of life posts!
The profile picture thing reminds me of an IRL group I'm in. A guy named Aaron dropped out and I joined as a replacement, naming my character Erin as a joke. Then he ended up coming back, so now we have Aaron and Erin at the table. My DM isn't amused anymore :p
I'm here -- was just setting up an OP account (per the directions). I'm thinking that (crunch-wise), I may need to redo Kaelifax's gear, but other than that I think the alias is ready to go.
Why not try the other changeling photos? They all look pretty similar. I chose this one because the strong jaw looks most like a man's. But you're right, you are actually a changeling and if you want to use this avatar I can find something else.
I think this avatar will work out just fine. He may be wintry on the inside, but he's still fiery on the outside.
Remember, I chose the people who I though would entail the most interesting interactions. :p
Good, looks like we've got a full complement.
Alright, so I'll start going over some of the methods we'll be using as we play tonight.
Going to be changing Ilya's background schtick to wine-making as opposed to beer brewing. It seems like it would be the more likely profession in southern Taldor. Am I safe in assuming Vanya grows grapes in his garden?
I don't see why not.
Gods that be, this turned out to be a damn long post. So as to comfort you while you read, here's a lovely selection of music to listen to: Enjoy
So here's a short, non-exhaustive list of what kind of things I hope to be doing in our game once we get started.
First off Here's a link to an amazing guide to roleplaying in the PbP format. Even if you're a veteran here, it's still a pretty good read.
* Firstly, I know I mentioned it before in the recruitment thread, but what I'd like to do is run certain combats as "Psuedocomat" in what's called story time. These are the combats that work within the adventure path's framework, but don't exactly have that epic quality or narrative importance enough to warrant the whole initiative debacle. I don't want weeks spent fighting a skeleton that happens to wander through the woods.
Essentially, when these kind of combats happen, the player who posts first gets to act. They'll chop at you. You'll chop at them. Usually, if somebody opens a door, and Great Cthulhu hanging out on the other side, it'll be the poor sod who opened the door who'll get attacked first. These combats also won't use a map. Foot placement will be a general idea and burst and cone effects will be considered in a "general idea" sense. It helps move the story along so we're not waiting on that guy (we all know that guy. I've been that guy) who takes forever to get their turn up.
* Next, lets talk about decision making. It's important to figure out a system for this since I've seen too many PbP's bogged down for weeks by the choice of whether to open a door or not. There are numerous philosophies that look at how a group can make a decision in the PbP format, and I don't exactly know which one will agree most with you guys, so here's a few choices:
- I stole this from the previously mentioned PbP guide. Painlord's PbP Rule of Two: Designed to reduce dithering, this rule suggests that after one character has suggested an action (or course of action) and it is seconded, that's what the party does and the GM should go along those lines. The other players are still welcome to post other actions, but the GM may assume that the seconded action is where/what the party is going/doing. This helps keep momentum moving AND reduces the stress on the GM on knowing when to proceed.
- Follow the Leader: We elect one or two of our group to be the representative. The person or people we choose get to take into account other people's decisions and make the choice themselves. It's often quick, but we'd really have to trust the guy making all the choices.
- Majority Rules: This is the slowest of the choices, but also the most democratic. Everybody casts their vote. The choice with the majority rule wins. Ties are a bit of a problem, but usually it'll be decided by a coin flip.
* As for loot, I run divying it up like so: Gold is divided equally. I'll always round down for the sake of equality. When an especially powerful item looks like more than one person wants it, we'll gather everyone around and roll a die. Whoever wins gets it and nobody gets upset. It's a system I'll have to strictly monitor and if somebody seems to be getting more than their fair share I will come down like the wrath of god and scoop those precious items away and hand them out equally.
* I spoke about XP in the recruitment thread. Forget about XP. I don't like XP. Levels will come at suitable points in the story and not a moment before. As for good roleplaying rewards and the results of interesting decisions, I'll be giving out rewards that both make sense in the story and act as a more substantial gift.
* Character vs. Character Conflict has always been a point of extreme contention at tables since the dawn of roleplaying. But here's the thing. When you watch a movie or read a book, do the characters always get along? Do personalities never clash?
A good story is centered around conflict and inter-party conflict can be some of the most rich. I'm allowing inter-party conflict on one major condition: Both players must take a step back to the discussion thread and talk about it. Both players must agree that their characters would have a disagreement here and decide that it'd be interesting to start some kind of row. I will then approve of the inter-party conflict and it may proceed. Do not start a fight without first consulting the opposing player or players. If no consensus can be reached, the deal is off and you do not start any conflict.
I want this system to work and that means I need to trust you guys. I have no reason as of yet to distrust any of you, but please, if you think you're character's being pulled in a wrong direction, talk about it beforehand. You'll be amazed at what talking can do to ease a situation.
* As a wise man once said, "always question the man." I like rules only so far as they help the story. Once a rule becomes a hindrance to proper roleplaying I will annihilate it.
* As far as combats go I'll role everybody's initiatives. Initiatives will be separated into groups. Say four of you roll a 4 for your initiative. 4 more of you roll a 27 and the enemy rolls around a 10. That will mean the 4 of you that rolled high will go first, then all of the enemy then the 4 that rolled low. The enemy's initiative will be rolled with the highest of their initiative values and all other enemies will use that initiative result except in instances I deem unfair. It'll really be a case by case basis and I'll sort out turn order every time we initiate combat.
* For the most part maps will be posted to the ObsidianPortal site if they're not involved in combat. For combats where placement matters, I'll upload the maps to google docs with your pictures as tiles. It's a lot of work to make these things and I'd really appreciate if everybody stayed on the level when editing your character's placement.
God this thing was long winded. Please, if you guys have any questions, let me know. And as far as these house rules / mandates go, these are not the 10 commandments and I am not god. I'm open to suggestions and criticism and if you've got an idea for a houserule lay it on me. You're all smart folks I can tell just from your characters and I'd love to hear your ideas.
Added my story stuff to the profile so it's accessible for other players.
I'm sure there are grapes in the garden as well. No reason for there not to be.
Do you guys want a shared chatroom or something? I'm a fan of having a group google hangout.
Also concerning inter-party conflict. Do your rules just apply to physical confrontations or do they extend to all types (like bickering)?
Fine with the rules. Are there any specific stats you'd like us to keep in our class bars for easy perusal?
Just let us know when to start and I'll have an in character post up ASAP. Looking forward to playing Vanya.
Looks reasonable -- I'm thinking it might be worth a small modification and shift the rule of 2 to the rule of 3 while there's still 8 of us.
Other than that, I'm good with the small caveat of I'll need to ask someone else to move my token on the google map since my mobile device doesn't let me do it myself. I will, however, always be clear about where I'm going.
In terms of inter-party conflict, to be honest, I think it's far more realistic and interesting to have some -- as long as it's all IC interactions, of course.
I like the rules. Rule of 3 sounds good.
I enjoy inter-character conflict when it's done respectfully. It challenges me to try and really get into my character's head- is the paladin offended by the notion of extramarital sex, or is she amused by the guy who thinks he's Cayden's gift to women?
The rules sound good by me. As far as the decision making goes, I figure that it might well vary depending on how fast the posting goes. In general, I'm all for the Rule of Two. Or as Kaelifax suggested, the Rule of Three.
Inter-party conflict is always going to be a thing - our characters all have their own beliefs and whatnot, after all. Verbal jousting is just fine, but I somehow doubt that it will come down to us blowing each other into pieces or something. To be honest, if it's something simple like arguing, I don't think going to the discussion would be all that necessary. In the end we all have story progression in mind, so it'd all just be fluff.
Regarding the combat, I appreciate you rolling the initiative for us. Will you be doing the same for saves as well?
Also, just to address everybody, I feel that I should point out that Ehren isn't terribly suited for combat, at least for the time being... Unfortunately, the divine spellcasting list is a little short on blasting spells at spell level 1.
No worries, I'll save you!
I usually stick to casters, so Kyrianna is a bit outside my norm. I might have a question or two along the way, but she seems pretty straightforward (until I get the feat that lets her turn in mid-charge, har har har).
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All of those rules sound tops. I agree with the Rule of Three!
And thank god we can bicker. Nothing is better than playing the cast of Firefly, all at odds with eachother all the time but protective of our own because even though we hate eachother we're stuck with eachother.
I'm interested to see Marina's semihypocritical Erastilite philosophies clash with party members.
Then who wants to be a representative? I'll be happy to shamelessly take one of the slots. Though I would also add that I think we should just do 2 for now and see if that works. We can add a 3rd representative if the two are particularly slow. With 8 we can split the party two ways and even change out who leads what group if the situation ever calls for it. I'm thinking of cases where martials might want to enter a shack and draw the bandits out while ranged or spellcasting characters wait for clear shots.
Also I'm glad we're mostly in agreement about the freedom to bicker without hashing it out OOC.
Well, with the Rule of Two/Three, the first two/three people to have a say would be what he goes on. But since it was kind of brought up...
What are your feelings on the party splitting up in certain situations, GM?
Yes, sorry, I thought we were doing the rule of two (three) -- not the leaders thing.
Also, a question for the GM: As Kaelifax gains levels and gets access to the Versatile Performance - will he be allowed to retrain skill points that he put into skills he no longer needs? (At the moment, I avoided taking Diplomacy and Sense Motive at level 1 because of the L2 Versatile, but I'm less likely to hold off on useful skills until levels 6 and 10...)
Maybe I misunderstood? I'll go with the rule of two. I was thinking follow the leader.
Those were three options on how to play- follow the leader, rule of two, or majority rules :)
Regarding the combat, I appreciate you rolling the initiative for us. Will you be doing the same for saves as well?
I don't think I will unless you guys'd like me too. I'm not too fond of taking away your character's personal reactions to events.
What are your feelings on the party splitting up in certain situations, GM?
Hell, this is play by post. If it's just two groups setting apart from each other, it shouldn't be too much of an issue. Play by post is nice in that I'm not taking time away from others at the table by focusing for a second on someone else. I'd just rather not have to manage eight different situations at once, so I'll limit these things.
Also, a question for the GM: As Kaelifax gains levels and gets access to the Versatile Performance - will he be allowed to retrain skill points that he put into skills he no longer needs? (At the moment, I avoided taking Diplomacy and Sense Motive at level 1 because of the L2 Versatile, but I'm less likely to hold off on useful skills until levels 6 and 10...)
I always add a header to my combat post that looks like this:
Quote:Round 1, Initiative 20
hp 10/10; AC 16/13T/13FF; +2F/+5R/+2WSA: Attack - Musket vs. Target 1d20 + 4 ⇒ (3) + 4 = 7
That's a great idea. I'll use the same thing to illustrate initiative order and a link to the map every turn. Should be useful.
I like the combat rules. I've been running my games without maps, which can cause some confusion but it is easier to clarify something than to deal with the hassle of maps.
My real life group haven't used maps in our games for years now. I used to agonize over them and spend hours wiling away only to come out with an insufficient map half finished. The party'd inevitably wander away from the maps anyway, so they became essentially useless. The adventure path has these nice easy maps handy anyway, so it's not too much of a hassle.
Also concerning inter-party conflict. Do your rules just apply to physical confrontations or do they extend to all types (like bickering)?
Ah, okay. The consensus seems to be we're all mature enough here and don't need to be babysat. Yeah, sorry. I'll agree with you guys and say that inter-party conflict is a thing you guys can work out on your own.
I was just writing this as a reaction to a really bad experience I had in another PbP months back where an irate guy took an in-character insult as rationale for butchering my eidolon right in my face. Suffice it to say I didn't stick around long in that one.
Bickering's just bickering and is just a natural result of a group of people being around one another. I don't exactly expect any of you to try and butcher each other, but if it, for any reason, does end up occurring, lets just talk about it beforehand, dig?
* Another consensus; rule of three is in. Cool. That'll be our modus operandi from here on out.
Sorry I didn't mention this before. I'm going to be out for most of the day today until very late in my day so I won't be available to answer questions until then.
I'm hoping to start this on either Sunday or Monday.
Also, sorry Kaelifax for that question I didn't answer. Isn't it fun when the sight goes down on you right when you've finished editing a post!
I was hoping to give some time between levels to justify the leveling up process and perhaps some downtime in other places as well. I'll allow retraining with the downtime rules but for skills it ends up being 1 skill point per intelligence bonus every five days. Bards can also retrain one type of Perform skill associated with your versatile performance class feature.
Ok, thanks for the clarification -- I just wanted to confirm because one campaign I was in, I was basically told that I'd lost all those skillpoints, which wasn't so cool.
Also, in downgrading to be able to fit into a 15 point buy, Kaelifax had lost the ability to carry his gear -- so I've rebalanced the stats a little. May revisit them again, but at the moment, it's a "done" and ready character.
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So I should express my expectations here. I applied for this game because Malefactor seems to have a similar concept of what PBP should be to what I feel. I feel that I should explain and get everyone to buy in.
I run two games here on the boards. One is Skull and Shackles (which has been going since January 2013) and the other is Kingmaker (which has been going since January 2011). My Kingmaker game has just one of the original players (though a few characters present in the initial party were inherited by new players) and myself, but we've kept it going. I am very, very proud of both games. My Kingmaker campaign is closing in on 5000 posts, and Skull & Shackles just passed 1000. Most of these posts are lengthy, meaty pieces of quality writing. Here's an example from the middle of Skull & Shackles, to show that it continues throughout the campaign. It takes a fair amount of time and effort, but PBP is a format that really allows a character to grow and for a story to take shape.
Don't forget that a Masterwork Backpack increases your Strength by 1 for the purposes of calculating Carrying Capacity :) it's only 50 gp.
I'm all set to get started- the very last thing I need to do is get a Teamwork feat squared away. Simple enough!
Dr. Monty: I agree that PbP is excellent for being able to hash out more complete ideas for a character. You're not in danger of hogging the spotlight like in an IRL game, and everyone has plenty of time to work out what exactly they want to do. Personally, though, I'm not a huge fan of internal monologues. It's too meta, in a sense: as a player, I know every thought in your head, but since you're not showing those thoughts or acting on them, my character knows nothing. Inner monologues can be useful, but they need to be supplemented with actions of some kind- looks of distaste, sarcastic yawns, a Bluff to keep a straight face when affronted, who knows.
I think my character's ready, I need to find more equipment to blow money on but for the most part he's good to go.
Dr. Monty: You'll get substance from my posts, but no inner monologues. I try to be descriptive, particularly with facial expressions or gestures, to key people in on what's going on and generally adjust my posting habits for the games I'm in.
In the two other PbPs that I'm in, one is literally one combat after another so I have a grunting low-charisma archer that barely merits more than a line or two each time I post. The other game is more character driven and we had to create a flex-time RP thread just to keep the story moving, freed from our constant squabbling.
I'll set up the tally of who's ready. Once everybody's set I'll post the first post in the gameplay thread and we'll start from there. I was thinking we'd begin with just a round of posts detailing life in Heldren before the drama started, if everyone's cool with that.
Ilya: Ready
Kyrianna: Ready
Kaelifax: Ready
Montgomery: Ready
Erron: ...
Marina: ...
Neela: ...
Vanya: ...
Montgomery, gotta say I really admire those threads and all that work that's gone into them. I can only hope we'll be able to match that quality of storytelling.
I chose the people who's character writing, attention to detail and depth of character I thought would work well with what I'm going for. I can't mandate a certain writing style. All I can look for is depth of and interesting interactions. I hope nobody here is afraid to challenge me. Characters should act with purpose and not just stick to a railroad.
I won't ask for terribly long posts, though I'm going along with Montgomery here in that they should be (with that wonderful word) meaty. I do ask for a commitment to the story and to presenting your place in that story in a meaningful manner. If that doesn't include an internal monologue, that's fine, but if it does, that's also perfectly acceptable. I'm sure we'd all agree that we're here to craft a story together. As long as you're furthering that goal, then we're in the same boat.