Caiten probably did not go out of his way to meet anyone, but would have met people who were involved in crafting and selling goods. And if you make any effort to be friendly, Caiten will definitely accept that.
Thanks for the feedback, Fern! I will be whipping up a more detailed background ASAP.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I'm dotting for interest!
I would love to play an elven wizard
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
*UPDATE TO RECRUITMENT CUTOFF*
I mentioned right off the bat I was new to this, and I got a lot of interest faster than I thought I would! So I'm not going to leave recruitment open for another week and a half. Several people have already put a lot of thought into their characters, and I don't want to make them wait around and wonder if they are getting in the game while I 'shop around', so without further ado, the following folks will be joining me in Breachill and going on an adventure:
- Dario Zuz
- Caiten and Sulee
- Oren Strelov
- Lisitsei Nagorát
- Yasami Rysva
- Hornet
- Joran Bravestone
All seven of you have been very communicative and have returned to the thread multiple times, and I'm enjoying your character concepts and looking forward to meeting them! Welcome aboard!
If Archpaladin Zousha is still interested in submitting, I'd be willing to bring them in since I'm moving the finish line. It'll be a big party but I know these games can suffer from attrition, and the more the merrier. Apologies to the newcomers that just posted yesterday for changing my mind, I'd edit the initial post if I could.
For clarity, recruitment is now closed.
Sometime today I'll post some details and stuff in the discussion thread, at work presently so might take me some time.
Wow, ruling out people who just saw the recruitment thread abd responded? Oh well.
Sorry, only because the party's pretty full already. Like I said, I underestimated the response time I'd need. Noob mistake! I'd edit the post if I could.
You might want to give Ventiine a chance as they are in several APs, which shows that they are in it for the long haul, plus table diversity is good--and it doesn't take that much to comb through 10-15 applications. You never know!
Like I said, oh well.
Yeah ouch, I was working on this character for much of the weekend but hadn't had the opportunity to post.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Ok, seems I have committed a greater faux pas than I realized. I didn't think things through and got overexcited. I saw half a dozen of you being all active and figured boom, there's my party!
Since my discussion thread is borked anyway and won't let me post and I'm going to have to figure out how to fix it anyway before taking anything any further, I will leave recruitment open until this Friday 2/25/2022 for people who saw the thread and made characters. That being said, I'm not going to renege on the 7 folks who I already said were in, so there will be one more spot open, and I'm going to cap things at 8 people. End of the day Friday I'll select one from the newer applications.
I apologize for upsetting or confusing folks, was not my intention. Just got overhyped!
I am totally cool with that and I am totally fine if my place is taken by someone with a better story or is a better fit.
We all make mistakes and it is good that you're correcting it DM Fern. We'll all wait and see what will come to be on the 25. <3
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
You can always do a lottery, if you have trouble making a pick. To make it fair for all.
Or a promise of a direct invitation, in case someone drops out.
It's nice to have multiple choices within categories (Arcane, Divine/Primal, Skilled, Melee)--but it isn't a requirement to have all those categories. Choosing 8 people is nice if you then have people fall away to 4, but you might want to keep 4 in reserve. I know some groups love 5 or 6 players, but it can bog down play by post unless you bot people after 24-48 hours. Of course, some games move verrrrry slowly and everyone is happy with that!
(and my longer background will be up tonight...had to work during work hours for some terrible reason!)
ok, here's a 10 minute background for Lisitsei.
Recent Impressions
The young goblin can’t stop shaking, even when Lisitsei applies the healing plaster to the long tear in their their side. ”Me need–fire–need to cauterize it,” they say. Lisi is rather impressed the goblin can say cauterize in Taldane. ”It’s ok, Kluvenk. We don’t do cautery. This will heal. Just breathe,” says the druid, efficiently patting the plaster into place with tanned hands. Poor kid, whatever did this had venom in its saliva. A few more hours and they would be burning with fever, maybe worse. And their family can’t pay, and I really need funds for the next grove purchase… He puts his worries away and focuses on soothing the goblin kit. Eventually Kluvenk stops shuddering in pain and rests next to his worried parents.
***
Lisi stands in contemplation, sunset limning his features in the Crimson Tide Wood. Before him is a gigantic furry creature, frozen, ready to attack or flee–a giant shrew, of all things. ”Hello, friend. Haven’t seen you before,” he says gently. ”I think you got hungry and came close to the goblin lands, didn’t you.” The shrew, of course, doesn’t answer, but makes a low angry churring sound deep in its throat.
Lisitsei clears his throat. ”These woods keep getting raked over, friend, like dying coals. I’m so sorry. Let me give you directions to where there is better hunting. More grubs for you to find.” He focuses and gives an impression to the shrew. For a long moment, the half-elf and the enormous beast lock eyes. Then, like the flowing back of a tide, the animal turns slightly and lopes away.
***
Lisi stands in front of the Call To Heroes gonfalon and sighs. He thinks about the poisoned streams leading off of the Conerica, and the invasive weeds choking the near reaches of the Crimson Tide Wood and he examines his shrunken coin purse. ”The annual. Call. To Heroes.” he reads aloud. ”I just want to sit in a mushroom ring, in an untainted forest, climb a hill and not see more smoke and tailings in the lakes,” he grumbles to himself. However, adventuring will do what his largely pro-bono legal and medical work–and habitat restoration, usually him laboring long into the evening–won’t, namely, earn money, which will then pay for his…legal, medical, and habitat work. For a moment he curses the circumstances of Isger’s plundered, poverty-stricken state…and then he marks the time for gathering for the Call, and notes it in his ledger.
Goals:
Lisitsei wants to restore previously destroyed parts of the Crimson Tide Wood. While not as thick as the Chitterwood, the trees there provided shade and shelter and food to humanoids and beasts alike. He has been engaging in a skillful debate with Narine Howerdell–they disagree, but they also seem to disagree while getting cozy in a booth at Cayden’s Keg. Lisi brings up the selective cutting that Druma does, Narine scoffs at those Kalistocracy nonces, and they parry and thrust over another round of ales, and so it goes. It’s a lesser goal than what he had hoped for, holding sway in the courts of Elidir…but Narine is pleasant company. Most of the time.
Lisi spends time, when he is in town, meditating in Monument Circle. The Conerica River is certainly fouled with mining tailings from Dustspawn, but he can’t figure out the wells and how the water is fresh. At some point he intends to check the impurities in all of the rivers in Isger to see if there are poisons that people are missing in the groundwater. This is a distant goal and more of a conundrum to him, compared to helping out the woodlands, but it affects him nonetheless. Sometimes he sits and loses track of time and plans entirely, due to a combination of woolgathering and bitterness.
NPCs:
Pesha, Lisi’s teacher. A patient, stoic, oread druid, found wandering at the end of the Five Kings Mountains, from the warm scrubby foothills to the pine-covered vales, and occasionally, the treeless windy heights where none save fearsome beasts and fearless dwarves shall tread.
Valdi, Lisi’s “classmate” during his tutelage with Pesha. A very eager dwarf who wished to serve Torag, but wound up a druid instead. Valdi has gone back to the dwarven mountain kingdoms but occasionally reappears in Breachill or the woods where Lisitsei makes his retreat.
Princeps Dromonion. Hallus Dromonion considers Lisi to be a thoroughly vexing thorn in his side, Lisitsei having successfully argued twice in court, using established Chelaxian law, that certain groves being sacred, needed preservation for an indefinite period. The Princeps has not enjoyed sending these reports back to Infernal Cheliax. Hallus keeps a tightly ordered barracks near Breachill and often sends missives back to Cheliax about retaking Citadel Altaerein and ‘cleanse the vermin therein’. He has thus far been ignored.
Memories
”This will be good for you, Lisi,” says Suline, embracing her half-brother. ”I know…I’ll miss all of you,” says Lisitsei, glancing their father folding his arms in the darkness of the doorway behind her and then looking hurriedly at the ground. ”We’ll be here, and so will Tep and Slip,” says Suline, laughing as her kids come around to give their uncle hugs. After a moment, he walks away from the family homestead, waving, off into the woodland and toward where he has heard the druids can be found.
***
Lisi sits alone in the damp shade of enormous boulders at the beginnings of the slope of the Five Kings. Once, trees came all the way up to these rocks, sometimes gardened by the Isgeri, but never clear cut and burnt the way they have been now for centuries. And yet, the whorls of fungal hyphae beneath the ground remember the shapes of trees that were once here. Lisi listens and breathes, and waits, and as the sun begins to drop, a little green and orange shape clambers down from a boulder above him–a slender, bright humanoid with eyes so dark green they are almost black. It looks at him and then tiptoes over to him and sits on his lap.
”Guba,” he says, wonderingly. ”I think you are called Guba.”
Guba, as if confirming this, gets comfortable and curls up like any cat or dog would.
***
Lisitsei stands in the bailiff’s box, trying not to sweat in the warm Elidiran courtroom. It had taken some time to get up here to the capital and argue his case, but it would all be worth it. The judge is an older woman, with a world-weary face and glinting spectacles. She shoots a piercing gaze at the druid. ”Your use of dryad rights in Serenity’s Copse and…bee highways in Druma as precedent in the case of Groves XII, XII, and IV…was unorthodox,” she says sternly. ”However, they were correct. The court rules in favor of ‘...Assembled Lesser Fey Tribunals of Near-Crimson Tide Woods, et al…’ in the case against Wolford Consortium. Wolford and its parental organizations shall henceforth remain clear of any named groves under pain of further penalty.” She slams her gavel and the court erupts in chatter, dismay, and from the ground-seats, piping cries of fey jubilation. Lisi beams. I could start a law office, he thinks. This is the beginning of great things.
It was not the beginning of great things. After Ravounel was formed, Cheliax withdrew garrison after garrison, leading to even more banditry and depredation in the countryside. The writs of a druid-barrister went unread, and Lisi found himself back at square one.
had to work during work hours for some terrible reason!
I know, right! Silly customers breaking things and wanting me to fix them. I keep telling my manager that both of our jobs would be a lot easier if we just didn't have any customers.
Makes it easier on everyone! Abolish work!
I will politely withdraw as to not add additional stress. I'm super excited for you GM Fern, and I wish you and your table happy gaming :)
On the topic of party size - and while this is absolutely up to you, GM - I would advise against having more than 6 people. As far as I can tell, APs are made for 4-people parties, and while I have heard that this adventure in particular can be hard, you might end up needing to adjust encounters often. If you add the free archetype rule, it shifts the balance even further.
But as I said, it is entirely up to you as the game master, I just wish to offer advice to prevent GM strain. There's no point doing it, if you're not enjoying it.
I really appreciate the advice! I am new to PBP but not to GMing in general. I run my school's TTRPG club and often juggle bigger groups -- as well as dealing with player attrition, which I imagine is about as common here as it would be in my club setting, or really any time you aren't just gaming with a good group of friends.
I was initially aiming for 6, but I can deal with 8, and would rather deal with the party being overpowered than underpowered, if people do drift away. Especially since, far as I can tell, the other usual disadvantage of big groups -- combat taking longer than it would with fewer people rolling -- doesn't apply to PBP games. Anyway, thanks for looking out! ^_^
Fair.
Alright, folks. I will check back on Friday for the final cut. Good luck, everyone!
Next PBP Noob question: How does rolling dice work?
I see the dice tag here, but I expect that it will only change the color of the text - not actually do any text parsing and RNG. That would be a lot to ask of forum software.
Hmm... It appears that I was wrong and that it does parse and RNG the dice expression. Let's see if the 5 result changes on post edit...
Well, I am thoroughly impressed. And that answers my question.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
you can actually hit "preview", and it will keep the same dice rolls when you go to post. like if i want to roll
nice! i got a 16, and i don't even have to edit this description in.
OK. Cool.
I'm guessing that there are things that will break the parser, but it is easy enough to avoid those. And there is probably still an element of honor system involved since you are able to see what your dice result is before you finish posting what you do with it.
Professional curiosity makes me want to investigate it, but I'm at least not going to do that in a visible location.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I don't think it changes after it's seeded. A preview is good for describing the stuff you want, and implementing that roll in the description.
Such as this
Warning. Dirty language. Sort of.
Yasami, the idea of The Phantom Menace as a poorly run Star Wars RPG campaign tickled my funny bone years ago. I think they did that for all the movies.
Yes, you can "cheat" by rolling, then seeing that it's low, and saying you do two things and using the crummy thing for the low roll and then the thing you actually want to do for the next roll.
Not very sporting.
Yes, you can "cheat" by rolling, then seeing that it's low, and saying you do two things and using the crummy thing for the low roll and then the thing you actually want to do for the next roll.
Not very sporting.
Indeed. Not something I would do. I have fun playing out bad rolls too.
I really appreciate the advice! I am new to PBP but not to GMing in general. I run my school's TTRPG club and often juggle bigger groups -- as well as dealing with player attrition, which I imagine is about as common here as it would be in my club setting, or really any time you aren't just gaming with a good group of friends.
I was initially aiming for 6, but I can deal with 8, and would rather deal with the party being overpowered than underpowered, if people do drift away. Especially since, far as I can tell, the other usual disadvantage of big groups -- combat taking longer than it would with fewer people rolling -- doesn't apply to PBP games. Anyway, thanks for looking out! ^_^
Yes, you are quite correct. Attrition here is extremely common. There is no arguing that one. :P
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Ok, I've made a profile, bare bones as it is.
I have a feeling most of these characters will know each other--not a big town and there are only so many taverns and lumberyards. :)
Hey, Yasami. I think you are missing an ability score boost. You might want to double check those. Unless you have a voluntary flaw, the bonus total should add up to +9.
Nope. All is well. Should it add up to 10? Perhaps with racials?
Oh. Yes, everything looks right now. My eyes must be playing tricks on me. I would have sworn that your Strength was listed at only 10. Sorry to bother you for no reason then. I'll just update my notes here.
Thank you so much. See you around town, yes?
Sulee, are you getting into trouble again?
Me? Of course not. Why would you think that? I mean, I haven't gotten us into trouble in ... at least a couple weeks now.
Say, how do poppet familiars gain Speech? Sorry to be the dash of cold water here! I don't think they gain that automatically, though.
Correct, it is not automatic. A Witch normally has 3 familiar ability slots to fill at level 1. I paid one of them to change to a Poppet familiar, which leaves me with 2 open slots left, which I can configure each day using the normal familiar abilities.
So if I want to allow Sulee to talk, I have to pay one of those two ability slots to give her the Speech familiar ability. And pressures of adventuring may mean that I have to choose other abilities instead, causing Sulee to be unable to speak that day.
I believe you are a Leaf Druid, yes? Which means that you have a Leshy familiar.
Gotcha! I was a little unclear on the Familiar abilities. My Leshy gets two of 'em; nice to realize that they can change daily.
Yes. With both prepared spellcasting and a familiar, there are quite a few choices to be made each morning during Daily Preparations.
Wait - you can switch those around? I need to look this up and tell it to our witch player.
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
Anyone still planning to submit a character, I'll take a look at what we have later tonight, and I'll post tomorrow morning with the final cast of characters =)
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Wait - you can switch those around? I need to look this up and tell it to our witch player.
Yes. That is a perk of all familiars.
At least, that is how I have always understood it.
Each day, you channel your magic into two abilities, which can be either familiar or master abilities.
I wish all of you luck, albeit not as much luck as me though! :P
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Recruitment is now closed for realsies.
Welcome to the party:
Dario Zuz, the human gunslinger
Caiten the android witch and Sulee, his familair
Oren Strelov, the human barbarian
Lisitsei Nagorát, the half elf druid
Yasami Rysva, the human swashbuckler
Hornet, the gnoll inventor
Joran Bravestone, the very different human barbarian
and now introducing Cevendyl, the half elf cleric!
Thanks for having patience with me as I fumbled through recruitment. Welcome to the game!
Huzzah! Let's get started!
woo!