The wait, it is killing me.
Excellent, a chance to demonstrate Discworld Magic.
: Spell is cast normally
Of course, its a boring "Spell works as planned" roll. Oh well.
Excellent personifications of the Thieves Guild and Assassin's guilds. It looks like the background cut off though, after "usually". And, no animal targets?
** spoiler omitted **
Nooo!!!!!!!! Didn't take my last edit. This is sooooo frustrating. Going to rewrite it.
EDITED: Done, background complete for real.
Now that's a back story, very good work. You will need to tweak the gunpowder part though, it was only discovered a few months ago. Learning alchemy at the assassin's guild is a good tie in, but it will need to be complemented with that somehow getting you signed on with the gunpowder project. You can hold off on the tie in for now, there will be more information in the discussion thread of the quest when it starts.
Thanks Shadowtail. I polished the whole thing by writing down a strategy, a really short personality and physical description as well as his alignment.
I'm still waiting on some pending characters before I set everything in motion. However, I am going to post part of the opening below to give you an idea of how your character was brought onto the project.
The second celebration in as many months was in full swing. The former manor house that was serving as the work station had food and refreshments in many of its various hosting room, though the rooms where the work had been done was cordoned off. After years of work, two celebrations in two months meant it was a great time to be doing the work.
It had started with discoveries of several weapons, firearms as some ancient texts they had found called them. The weapons were fascinating, but also completely useless. At least, useless until Reggie had started looking them over. Reggie had set up a target, laid the gun on a table, put a little metal ball inside, and summoned a wizard. “Can you direct a force that pushes the ball through the opening?” The wizard nodded and after a few tries managed to send the ball flying out of the gun and into the target.
“So we have to have a wizard every time we want to use this?” one of the others had asked.
“No, we have to find a way to generate that force?” Reggie, who had trained with the Guild of Alchemist’s for a time before leaving, smiled. “The Alchemists cause explosions all the time, we just need one we can concentrate and create on command.”
They had dismissed the wizard then, and set to work on creating a substance that could fire the gun. Reggie was in charge, but they brought in licensed Guild Alchemists to make sure everything was official. Last month they had finally discovered gunpowder, which should meet all the criteria they needed to use the weapon. And just hours ago they had made several successful tests shots with the guns. It was time to celebrate indeed.
I assume Risbeth's alchemical concoctions won't be using the magic variance rules, given her's are mixing up alchemical reactions, rather than actual spell casting?
Correct, alchemy is not considered under the magic variance. Divine, Arcane and their SLAs do count.
So, just waiting on the official list of people who made the cut. :)
Oh, and a related question.
Supernatural abilities (Su) don't count either yes? Even if they are utilizing a spell as the basis (there's a few that 'act like spell' but are supernatural, not spell like).
I would probably say that SU should be immune from the variance even though i often allow them like SLAs for the purposes of feats. I can't think of a good example of precedent in Discworld, except maybe that sapient wood always retains its magical properties, so let's just say they are immune from magical variance.
Well, Death is a pretty good example of (Su) powers always working. He never worries about his abilities not working exactly the same way. Same for Death of Rats. Binky is probably another good example, his ability to fly and teleport never have variance, they always work exactly as advertised, every time.
The only characters that I ever remember messing up spells are Rincewind and Eric (who funnily enough summoned Rincewind).
Anyone has exemples or others wizzards casting the wrong thing?
Most of the Unseen University Wizards spent their time avoiding spells because they didn't want them to go wrong. And they always had trouble getting magical devices to work right (like the scrying globe and the magical computer).
The witches were always avoiding casting spells for anything that wasn't important because they didn't want the spells to get twisted, but crouched it as 'respecting the magic'.
I really need to reread those books...
I really am sorry for the delay. I'll have everything up for your perusal later tonight if it is not too late. Unfortunately I can not do much at the moment, but I will have plenty of time to work on things a bit later today.
Get it up when you can. There is a quick character finalization and RP setting between 6 pm tonight and the start of the quest so you'll have a little time to catch up buold wise
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I really need to reread those books...
Also, when Vimes and foe are sent back in time in the library. Slightly different, but still shows high magic variance
The Witches books are high on my to-read list after I finish the Watch books. I have all of them except Feet of Clay, Fifth Elephant, and Snuff.
Death's books are on the list after them, along with the Tiffany Aching series. The Wizards and Rincewind don't interest me quite as much. >_>
Wiki has a good section on the Discworld magic. It's not so much that magic is inherently unstable in and of itself. The spell is pretty much going to work if you do it right. The big problem is that what you're really doing is destabilizing reality. Magic is just the absence of Reality. So, if you cast a spell, you're erasing a bit of reality and substituting a different bit of reality. (Kind of like on Mythbusters).
When you poke a hole in reality, you get side effects. The bigger the hole (the stronger the spell) the more reality altering side effects. Those side effects can even distort the new reality, since they occur immediately after your spell. So the magical variance rules are really just a way of saying that poking holes in reality can lead to bad things. Even negating the spell you just cast (which worked perfectly every time), but you perceive it as failing because the magical side effect altered the reality where it worked into one where it blew up and scorched your eyebrows.
Rincewind's book are quite different. In my opinion, they are the best ones, because they have the most awesome hero (Rincewind). They also are the least serious.
The one shots like Small gods and Pyramids were really good too. Small gods is just hilarious. Although, they do differ from the Watch books quite a bit.
As for the library: I do not believe it to be a good example of how magic is hard to cast but rather of how strange magic radiations are.
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In my opinion, they are the best ones, because they have the most awesome hero (Rincewind).
Ah, see, to me, that position is already held by Vimes =)
@mdt: So it is conceivable that creatures born with supernatural abilities are actually not doing magic (not altering reality), they just have a really strange way of interacting with it?
@Orthos: He is awesome, just not in the same way. I understand your position though.
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Rincewind is one of the better characyers, but i like the refined watch and industrial revolutuon series. In Rincewind, Pratchett seems to punch you in thr face wuth the humor/parody/silliness/craziness. In the watch and beyond he sneaks up behind you, the your shoes together, drops your pants, and then sneaks away. You take a step, realize your pants are dropped, and have a laugh. Then you take a larger step and fall on your face because your shoes are tied.
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I'd say that the Supernatural abilities are probably either strange ways of interacting with it, or else they're (more likely) non-reality that's been used so much and become so widely believed that it's become a subset of reality and thus can work without disrupting things. Remember, a huge amount of Discworld magic is Belief. If enough people believe something, it becomes reality. And if you're using reality, you're not poking holes in it. It's kind of a wonky thing, in that it's something that used to be Magyk but now is Reality because enough people believe in it to make it Reality. But that's sort of how Discworld works (see Small Gods).
I do love that we can have this conversation.
Nobody I know offline reads Discworld =( Or any Pratchett for that matter. I went as Crowley from Good Omens for Halloween a few years ago and nobody got it, and I got tired of explaining it after the fourth or fifth time.
Alright guys, here we go.
Everyone who applied has made it
This includes Captain Fremont, Simony Garfunkel and an offline friend who is putting together a dwarf rogue (trapsmith).
Follow up post coming as soon as I finish writing it.
You're running two groups, correct? Should we check in at different locations?
Correct, two groups.
Tanz the Troll- Troll Magus and Igor - Igor and Sword - Terbutje
Risbeth Von ... - Vampire Alchemist and Igorina - Igorina
Raul Ulric - Werewolf Inquistor and Werewolf - Beast Form
Trop PidgeonSlayer - Gnome Rogue (Flyer) and Gordo - Pidgeon
Mystery Guest - Dwarf Rogue (Trapsmith)
Check in at This Thread's Discussion Page
Johann Brubacher - Human Oracle (Dark Tapestry)
Fionna Handoverhammder - Dwarf Barbarian (Armored Hulk)
Benris Carr - Human Gunslinger (Pistolero)
Gypsumay - Troll Gunslinger (Musketeer)
Phrenic - Faun Oracle/Sorceror
Captain Fremont - Human Rogue
Check in at This Thread's Discussion Page
If you want, I can go into the depth of the party seleciton process but I think my favorite is the Cohort Rivalry
Igor faux serves a Troll.
Igorina serves a respected Doctor Vampire.
That's opposite end of the spectrum right there.
It's nice to have a pbp that accepts all who submitted.
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@Orthos: hope you get your fill of Pratchett's conversation!