Hello and welcome to the OOC Discussion thread for our savaged Curse of the Crimson Throne PBP game.
As we are using the Savage Worlds rules and I have a pack of Adventure Cards knocking about, I will assign each player one Adventure Card per rank (so at novice you get one, seasoned = 2, etc) per adventure. These cards can be played on yourself or on any other PC.
CAEDRIC: SECOND WIND (Once during Edge of Anarchy, you may play this Adventure Card to remove ALL wounds sustained during the current combat from one character - they are also unshaken)
I've been throwing character ideas back and forth but now I'm definitly done. I will finish the character and have a post in tye gamethread when I get home. I'll have the post up in a couple of hours.
Finished! And I've made a pilot post in the game thread. I eventually settled for a ex city watch woman now gone vigilante. You can check the build here.
Is her "Quirk (weakness to alchol)" enough for a minor hindrance?
Yes, that is a fine hindrance. Your adventure card...
MIRIAN: SPILL THE BEANS (the target of your questioning tells you EVERYTHING you want to know, either by persuasion, intimidation or the threat of force)
Each player also starts with three Bennies. You can use these to reroll a failed roll or remove the shaken condition (but more about that when you get into combat). The exception to this rule is if you ever roll snake-eyes, which results in a Critical Failure. The good news is that if this does ever happen to you, you get another benny. The bad news is that something truly unfortunate is about to befall your character, as a direct result of what you were trying to do when you made the roll that resulted in the Critical Failure.
Test post for your new NPC sidekick.
Aww, he looks so sad :/
Yes, cheer up you miserable bastard! :p
I just noticed that Mirian also likes the odd tipple, she would no doubt recognize that Grau is exhibiting all the signs of self-destructive alcoholism.
In the adventure as written, you don't encounter Grau until a little later on, but I felt it would be good for you to have an NPC to interact with now and potentially redeem in the fullness of time.
Or use as a meat shield, it's entirely up to you. :p
Adventure Cards for...
STELA: PAYBACK (Play on an opposing Wild Card, your attacks and damage are at +2 for the remained of the scene/combat encounter)
and
KIMIKO: REVELATION (When conducting research/investigation, your character discovers CRITICAL information that would not otherwise have been available)
Cool that's a nice card.
I will just post my question here again just in case you missed it.
One thing I'd like to ask, I would like to take noble instead of rich however I don't really want the Charisma boost as someone else in the group is good at that. I don't want to tread on their toes. Is it alright if we change the skill boost from Charisma into Intimidate and Taunt. Thus being an imposing kind of noble instead of truly diplomatic? Considering creatures from Tian I doubt would be looked at as friendly this far away from home.
Also I've renamed a rapier (Wakizashi) and a chain hauberk is oyori lamellar armour (traditional samurai armour).
Ah, sorry. I did read the question and was pondering my response, then got distracted by something shiny and completely forgot all about it.
Anyway...
Go ahead, considering your unique/intimidating appearance, that is not an unreasonable change.
If you are into the whole oriental setting, I recommend a Savage Setting book called Iron Dynasty (by Reality Blurs). :D
A quick word on character death. I can see that you have all put a lot of thought/effort into your characters and that feeling of investment will only increase as play continues. If it does come to pass that your character is 'mechanically' dead (3+ wounds and a failed Vigor roll on the Incapacitation table), I will give you the choice to either roll up a replacement character, or survive with some sort of lasting injury. Playing by post means that the time between a character dying and the opportunity to introduce a replacement can be quite long, so I'll strive to keep this period of downtime to a minimum by having a number of NPCs around that you can assume control of until you can bring your new character into the action. This is the first time I've run a game in this format, so I am trying to anticipate problems that might arise before they rear their ugly heads and take me by surprise. :D
If anyone has past experience of how they/other GM's have handled character death (or any other issues that don't translate well from the tabletop to the forum), please let me know. :D
With regards to death it really depends on the players. Giving the option for both outcomes (Death and wounding) seems like a good compromise.
Initiative is another problem but you've sorted that one.
Another one is interrupts or immediate actions. For me since I have one every turn just assume the first guy that enters my reach you can roll my fighting and damage if the attack hits. It's often good for such things like that, that the players suggest their most used scenarios but I don't think we'll get too many other types of interrupts up until seasoned so no worries for now. ^^
At work at the moment then I have a RL game. Will post some thoughts (and a gameplay post) when I get home.
With regards to death it really depends on the players. Giving the option for both outcomes (Death and wounding) seems like a good compromise.
Initiative is another problem but you've sorted that one.
Another one is interrupts or immediate actions. For me since I have one every turn just assume the first guy that enters my reach you can roll my fighting and damage if the attack hits. It's often good for such things like that, that the players suggest their most used scenarios but I don't think we'll get too many other types of interrupts up until seasoned so no worries for now. ^^
For First Strike, I was thinking along the same lines. :D
Had a look at Iron Dynasties, quite a cool book. Might eventually work my way into elemental ki fighting as that looks fun. More spirit is never a bad thing either. Hrm even thought of a bit of backstory how to get it. Let me finish actually writing down Kimiko's first.
Kimiko, you just became the proud new owner of a Cloak of Clairvoyance! Whenever a Joker is drawn from the deck, you must make an immediate Spirit roll (regardless of what you're doing at the time).
Failure: You are Shaken but cannot piece together a clear image from the fragmented vision that assails your mind.
Success: You are Shaken, but experience a prophetic vision of something that may come to pass in the future.
Raise: As above, but you are not Shaken and the vision may be less muddled than would otherwise be the case.
The modifier on this Spirit roll may change (-2/0) dependent on the force of the vision you experience.
Once per month, you may spend a Benny to make a voluntary Spirit roll, enabling you peer into the future and try to discern some piece of information that would otherwise be hidden to you.
Character death is hard to handle in any game and I think your method seems like a good one. Another pro with that approach is that if one of us die in a "replacement inconvinient spot", the character can live on with a lasting injury and then turn into a NPC when a opportunity arises when the new character can be introduced to the story (if the player decides to bring in a new character in place of the "dead" one, that is).
The GM in a RotRL-game I participated in on these forum had a nice way of handling initiative that I was fond of. He would roll all the initiatives and then divide us into different groups, split on the opponents initiatives. First would those who beat the monsters initiative go and take their actions, resolving the actions in posting order instead of the actual order. Then the opponents would take their actions, followed by any players that had a lower initiative. Basically it's kind of a group initiative. Initiative between the players doesn't matter.
A group of five players (player A to player E) is fighting a group of goblins. Player A to C all beats the goblins initative, but player D and E gets a lower initiative. The round would play out like this:
1) Player A, B and C post their actions and resolve them in the order they posted. So if Player A beat Player B's initiative, but Player B posts before Player A does, then Player B's actions are resolved before Player A's action.
2) The DM takes the goblins initiative
3) Player D and Player E post their action and resolve them in the order they post.
It worked really well for PbP with Pathfinder, don't know if it would do the same with Savage Worlds. The main perk was that everyone had all of the previous actions resolved when they posted their turn. There was no need for "If X happens I do Y, otherwise I do Z". Let me know if the explanation and the example doesn't make any sense.
I'm also thinking about when it's appropriate for the GM to make the players rolls. I think you should go ahead and make the rolls when the result needs to be resolved before the action can move forward (like with the First Strike edge, or if a character notices an ambush). I also think that you should make the trait rolls for avoiding the effects of powers and similar things.
Other than that I don't have any suggestions right now. I'm kind of excited to see how Savage Worlds plays out in a PbP myself.
Huh, okay I'm going to take that cloak off as soon as I don't need to worry about being spotted. As if an enemy draws a joker that just sets me up to get killed.
Ok, scrub that. Instead of happening every time you draw a Joker, the visions occur at a time of my choosing, when I have need to relay information to the party without being too heavy handed about it. This will rarely (if ever) occur during conflict or a chase encounter. Is that more agreeable?
Yea that sounds fine. I was going to take it off in combat as I was worried that if I or any ally (including myself) draws a joker I suddenly lose my turn or hope for an ace (weee?), so turn awesome becomes turn of nothing, or if an enemy gets it I'm shaken to be easily wounded. The visions can come on snake eyes during investigations or something?
I'm eager to use the cards, as they are so integral to the Savage Worlds experience. How about I periodically ask you to make a Spirit roll, and for each success and raise, I draw a card from the deck. Any time you get a face card, you have a vision, the nature of which is dependent on the suit the card is from. If it is a club, the vision may be misleading. If it is a joker, the vision is very clear and helpful.
Also, I am at the UK Games Expo in Birmingham this weekend, so after midnight tonight, I will be unable to post anything until Sunday evening. Please play nice in my absence. :p
Yea I think that's a good solution to it there. Is that MCM or am I getting those mixed up?
What is MCM?
MCM expo, it's another games expo happening this weekend. I think it's in London though? Not sure, a housemate of mine is heading down for it.
Can Second Wind be used on any character or is it just for pesonal use?
Any character.
Ah, The one I'm off to is in Birmingham.
On a minivacation,posting will be unlikely til Tuesday or so. Feel free to DMPC my character as needed.
Having read what Wikipedia has to say about infrared vision, I will allow it to be used to establish whether or not an area is occupied due to the temperature of the room, but not to see exactly how many people occupy the room, or what they are doing. Is this acceptable?
Yea that's cool, I was only expecting it to do as much.
With regards to Wild attack, am I not even allowed to use it for the two weapon fighting line of edges?
I only really did rapid attack here as the drop negated the penalties so I thought why not? Usually though throwing 3 dice and 1 wild dice will be flurry of misses! But I'm cool with your houserule, just still wondering for two weapon fighting.
hmmm... the rules state: "Wild attacks can be used with multiple attacks, such as from the Frenzy or Sweep Edges, or with two weapons", so really, I should allow it. I only bring it up because I had a falling out with another group (who I play with in RL) over this issue as they were all making multiple wild attacks EVERY round of EVERY fight - and while this isn't forbidden by the rules, it wasn't a lot of fun (especially as they would then moan about their PR being affected). Obviously, you guys are not those guys, so maybe I am being too harsh. Ok, I'll revoke that house rule for the time being and see how we get on. :D
(You can keep the bennies.) :D
Also, are you happy with me narrating the effects of your attacks, or would you prefer me to post the PR/TN of what you're fighting so you can write the gory descriptions of dismemberment yourselves?
Also, in regards to initiative. I think the best way to do it is to draw cards and then anyone with better initiative than the monsters act in posting order, then the monsters act, then whoever is left acts in posting order. Rinse and repeat, sound good?
I'm fine with it not applying to Rapid attack, I mean that is after all -2/+2 damage on three attacks which is very powerful.
Two weapons is the only part I want it revoked on as you pay for it with like 3 edges to make it effective! Must have some pay off :P
I think PR/TN would be cool to know so we can narrate how we fail or succeed.
I'm okay with the initiative thing but since it's PbP when I have time to post, I'll just post a turn for when my turn comes up in initiative. If monsters are acting before me I'll write a bunch of if statements. Such as roll my shaken for me if I get shaken, if I don't get unshaken I will spend a benny. etc. Speeds up play imo. :)
In that case....
Westpier Thugs: PR: 5 / TN: 6
It is unlikely that I will ever spend bennies on mooks.
It turns out that, between dialysis and work, I don't have time to keep up my play by posts. I'm going to have to drop out. I'm really sorry, I was enjoying the games a lot.
I am sorry to hear that as well. I'll ghost you along for a bit and then retire Caedric quietly, in case you are able to resume playing in the future.
Bummer :/
Re: the game thread. I just want to make sure that we're at the end of the round and not waiting for my action.
Yeah, end of the round, I will post new initiative & map this evening.
Still waiting for a map update so I can do my delayed turn.
Thy will be done!
Apologies if my posting rate has been a bit slow these last few days, my wife has been in hospital and I have additional childcare responsibilities. I will catch up with everything tonight. Thanks for your patience. :D
I've lost track where we are in initiative. Don't know if I have a action to perform this round or if my move to the walkway took place during this round.
Apologies if my posting rate has been a bit slow these last few days, my wife has been in hospital and I have additional childcare responsibilities. I will catch up with everything tonight. Thanks for your patience. :D
Ouch, hope it's nothing serious.
Sorry I really should put my rounds at the top. I just did my Round 5! Also I've only just realized when looking at my stats my background got ate. Paizo site has such strict time tokens on posting, leave it open a little too long it all gets deleted. Rewriting it now.
Ha, yea. I know that all too well, sadly!
Mirian still has an action, although any roll will be at -2 as she has already moved more than the standard 6". I will post the next initiative for after you have acted.
Commenting on your earlier posts, yea, MCM Expo is in London and Birmingham twice a year.
I've been to the London once before, but it was pretty much an overpriced letdown, sadly. I've been to far greater events at places like Capcom and Sony HQ. Even 2K games, but then I do games journalism and before that I ran a lot of community events, so I guess I have some real life perks. :p
It seems that myself, Fujiwara and you Mike, are all English. Makes a change and probably means our posting times will be similar!
Two things left from me now:
1. Where's my card? :p
2. Lucky I read some of what happened beforehand, as I thought the guy with glass in his face was an enemy (not a PC - Caedric!), and was possibly going to steal any items that might have been helpful from him. I'm glad I didn't, realising that!
You drew the Jack of Spades, about halfway down the initiative order.
Ah, I meant special cards like spill the beans for example. :-P
Oh right, I will post that up as soon as I have access to the Adventure Deck. :D
Heh, I am in England though I am not English. I am here for studies, finishing off a PhD here before going off to a different part of the world. :D