That's a great point. Thanks for pointing it out.
I can say that I do not like trying to twist things against the PCs. For example, on the question, 'Where's the artifact now?,' I would uncomfortable answering, "Korvosa," or some asinine thing like that. Of course, we can also compare Contact other Plane with Commune, especially in juxtaposition with a comparison of Wish and Miracle. So, ....for that question I would have to consider who Sabella is asking (an Elemental Lord, Solar, ArchDevil, etc) and try to be fair with an answer. .... A big part of me is hoping Sabella will ask someone I can use later in the campaign -- planting seeds & roleplay continuity and such. But we shall see. But overall I'm not a fan of twisting words from Wish spells or the like.
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That's the logic trap game of wishcursing and I agree, in general (ie not explicitly a genie trying to play to the trope) avoid it. Still, even a simple answer of Korvosa can be informative if you pick a slightly different tongue for it with say a knowledge geography or linguistics roll, since you could claim that meant some older form of the city which excludes ~that part of the map~. Food for thought.
Divination spells are essentially an excuse for the GM to provide a clear signpost pointing -this way- without it feeling like an OOC hint. Why did the elder goddess of ice send us by way of the snowcone booth? IDK, maybe she likes snowcones is still an in character question about the motives of some in universe entity to strange for mortal ken, instead of "really jane, why is it always the snowcone booths?"
This applies even moreso to stuff like create treasure map. The NPC you had from the module probably didn't have an elaborate backstory, so you get to pick somewhere in the city to be the most valuable place he's visited. Maybe it's topical to our plot, maybe it's not. Either way it gives you some steering that doesn't break immersion. You can even just give us a future encounter map and stay mum until our characters recognize it (either through skills or some other means of seeing the place including being there), but I don't know how well that translates to pbp.
Anyways, I've enjoyed the game so far, and I hope we all stay invested.
Sorry I didn't post yesterday, I had a terrible earache/pain pretty much all night, and it kinda killed my ability to do anything useful.
Feeling better today, so I should be able to get something up tonight.
It is okay for everyone in the group to attempt a Diplomacy check with Commander Jute. I will take either the PC with the highest bonus as the base, with everyone else assisting, or, if it's close (a couple PCs with about the same bonus), whichever PC goes the extra mile in Gameplay with Cmdr Jute. Obviously the amount of information in addition to what he's given will depend on the questions you ask and the result of your group Diplomacy check. .... For example, there may be a limit on how much info he's willing to provide on what specifically his Korvosan Guard is doing, just as a matter of professionalism since you aren't exactly Korvosans. And if you start asking about Magistrates or Nobles, well, again, there is a limit to what he'll answer. But The Aspis Consortium or other things that aren't exactly key elements of the city of Korvosa, well, there your Diplomacy can soar. It's also up to you how much you want to share from what you've learned so far (but he at least knows about the Undead and how you brought him two Aspis spies).
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Oh yeah, if it doesn't come up naturally in Gameplay, I think I've decided that Mishanter has gone to his home in Kaer Maga to track down a lead regarding the nature of the Devilish Relic for Sheila Heidmarch. (Metagame: Since Kaer Maga isn't planning on making an appearance in this campaign you can rightly guess that the lead is a red herring. But your PCs may ask.) I'll try to invent some nonsense that Sheila Heidmarch could have heard that might have made her think it's possible that the Relic has a Kaer Maga connection and since that's where Mishanter is from, she sends him home to check it out.
Getting to Eiseth later -- wanna make sure I can give an accurate response, must therefore think a bit.
Whatever we do with Cmdr Jute, let us do it quickly. If we get out to Breakwater Pier... I was able to find his trail 4 days old; just last night...
Val can definitely talk to the man if you wish. She is very diplomatic. And her looks would help here.
If there is anything you want to ask of Commander Jute, or if you want to roll a Diplomacy check to see if he'll give you more info, go ahead and post by Monday night -- I'll go ahead and move on to The Lamplighter on Tuesday if there's nothing you want from The Korvosan Guard.
Or you can go to Breakwater Pier first to follow up on the murder of Raif (Of course, diplomatically asking Cmdr Jute where Breakwater Pier is may help.).
Ok, I'm supposed to be the strong silent type here, and I have no ranks in diplomacy and a charisma penalty. All that said, if no one else is going to talk to Cmdr Jute, I'm going to...
If we need a vote about sharing info with Jute, I say yes...
Edit: And that went as well as expected...
ill do it
This weekend did not go as hoped, as my tinnitus was really bad yesterday, and I spent Saturday night mostly away from games to just chill. Which was much needed.
I am sorry that I'm quite behind, and I'll see what I can do to both catch up and cast my Contact Other Plane spell.
Ray, do you want me to post it here under spoilers? Or in game(also under spoilers)? Since I'm so far behind.
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Sorry to hear about that ringing in your ears; there won't be any issue in just lurking in Gameplay for now, if you're unwell. We have a large group of experienced players to keep the investigation moving forward, and I can bot Lady Sabella if necessary.
When it comes to posting here or there, I think by now we've established a good feel for posting roleplay content in Gameplay and metagame and out-of-game content in Discussion. Thus, with everyone's being in the groove of keeping Gameplay a readable story (as much as possible), and hiding rolls in Spoilers, you can decide what is best for where you post. Ultimately, we just want to keep Gameplay as readable as possible and can use Discussion for all the disjointed posts.
Right I need more blunt to the point diplomacy, its the lizard folk way
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Relax ladies, I've got us covered. Valeira is far too stuck up for her own good :P
Mort? Whose that? Or do you mean the mortuary, to burn the undead? I figured that was going to be handled off screen(or already was), unless there's an actual reason to RP that scene out?
For posterity -- if you look at your map of The Styes (Campaign Info tab) and you see Bridgefront in red: the far left portion of Bridgefront, about one inch, is Flotsam. A mud dump leftover from a tidal wave. (In red, around the area of Arkona St).
The Alchemists' Quarter is the section of Garrison Hill above it, in yellow, from roughly O14 and to the left.
Breakwater Pier is at the farthest left. It used to jut out into Conqueror's Bay, but now it is a ruined structure that partly blocks the waterway called The Alika Narrows (or The Saint Alika Narrows).
Dang, I almost doubled the Valeria's roll, and Jute apparently just flat out ignored Sabella?!? Ouch!!
He also thought I am not concerned about the victims!
How dare he!
Let me explain, I was concerned that having missed getting back here for a couple days may have slowed things down too much and was nervous that I needed to ramp-up the investigation. I thought maybe y'all would be rip-raring to get to the action at Breakwater Pier and get past more NPC talk, talk, talk.
Captain Cora Crandon is assuredly contacting Raif's next of kin on behalf of the Korvosan Guard. Jute would have indicated that.
Lady Sabella's 42 Diplomacy was as good as it gets and Cmdr Jute (I thought) was nice. Professional, courteous, moving on from K'Tak.
Originally I had intended for Cmdr Jute to provide extra info based on Diplomacy but I just got nervous about pacing. Thus I had him give out all the info he could, confident y'all's Diplomacy would be sufficient. It was.
My intention for his 'I care about the people' line was 100% to show that he's a good guy. On the Good Team. Not to necessarily infer that y'all are just mercenaries. Of course, I do see how that came across. But honest, it's just me trying to put examples of Cmdr Jute being NG.(Korvosa being so full of powerful Evil NPCs, I gotta show some Good ones too.)
All in all you can be confident that Cmdr Jute trusts you. The big regret I have is not roleplaying any banter between Jute and Lady Sabella. Opportunity missed. (for now)
Post Script:
I just reread Cmdr Jute's post and yeah, I'm really disappointed at how flat it fell. So much roleplay opportunity missed just to get to the action. Apologies, guys. (Hopefully the upcoming action makes up for it.)
I'm not sure about the others, but I am 10,000% here for long, descriptive, awesome RP 'encounters'. I would much rather wait a few days for a worthy reply, than have you rush one you're not super happy with.
In fact, I would be totally okay if you wanted to go back, and re-do that scene. And not just for my sake, since Val had a solid roll as well.
Its fine, I sometimes type things and lose some of my comedic inflections.
As for the long RP, I am definitely for that. I flourish with a Shelynite Paladin in RP.
I'll just make sure Cmdr Jute, in the future encounters, is better in roleplay. Ultimately, while the dialogue would have been great, there wasn't much left to keep the plot moving. And I will do better in the future.
Pär meanwhile is just happy to assist in diplomacy, intimidation is where he is actually good at socially. And he basically cant fail to roll diplomatic assists.
Question though, is it metagamey if I assist the highest roll?
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I feel like rp without plot progression/purpose can be one of the ways to death spiral pbp games so never feel bad for moving on from scenes to the next to keep plot moving. I like fluffy rp a lot, perhaps even too much, but I think we all want to make it to the abyss not stall out in tea parties with middle management.
Par, I'll answer your question IC once I get an answer from GM Ray... I will be happy to take a protection from evil though.
Is it metagamey if I assist the highest roll?
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In my homegames the PC with the highest Diplomacy is the default primary roll; others can assist. Obviously certain instances happen during the course of a campaign where we can not have a generic 'Group' Diplomacy and a specific PC, whether or not that PC has the highest bonus, must attempt the check.
I see a few differences in PbP, but in general when there is effectively a 'Group' Diplomacy roll, I'll take the PC with the highest bonus and others can assist.
But what do y'all think?
Also, I not only wasted a 19 die roll, but two freakin spells that I'm now out for later. Boosting Sabella's Cha isn't *that* helpful, should combat arise. Heroism lasts 80 minutes, so maybe it'll come be beneficial, but Eagle's Splendor is only 8 minutes.
Definitely would have chosen to prepare different spells, if I knew the GM was gonna just ignore my post...
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Also, I not only wasted a 19 die roll, but two freakin spells that I'm now out for later. Boosting Sabella's Cha isn't *that* helpful, should combat arise. Heroism lasts 80 minutes, so maybe it'll come be beneficial, but Eagle's Splendor is only 8 minutes.
Definitely would have chosen to prepare different spells, if I knew the GM was gonna just ignore my post...
This last bit is tending towards sour grapes and it's valid to feel but also not helpful. I think everyone is sorry the GM ignored your post. I think we also all know that it happens in pbp sometimes, it's not fun, and I am certain we hope you make further posts in the future and that they are more carefully read and responded to positively/negatively as occurs. The GM has admitted the mistake, and also noted that the character you're interacting with already dumped all of his information on us and is being more than usually helpful.
In effect, your excellent roll can be considered what moved him from indifferent to helpful, and the GM didn't acknowledge it in the text, just the subtext/discussion. Worth the two spells I think.
Just my take, and again your feeling of being ignored is valid, seen, and fine to talk about. In fact, it's why I'm replying instead of just leaving your grumble alone. I do want to read more of sabella! She seems really neat.
Yes, I am rather salty, and I would be a lot less so(perhaps not at all) if there was any sort of acknowledgement of my post and attempt at diplomacy.
K'Tak got called out twice. Sabella and Val not at all. That's super frustrating.
And sure, I suppose those spells maybe did move him from indifferent to helpful, but they still feel wasted, because nothing more came from my post.
A suggestion? Maybe from now on, Ray can ask us if we would rather move us forward, or keep the roleplay going? Instead of just skipping to the next important scene.
That's a fair point and a good suggestion. I think metagame dialog in Discussion can only help. Especially in PbP games where we can't really get a feel for the mood of the players at the table, the more we communicate in Discussion the better.
From now on I'll ask here if we're ready to move on.
And again, I only skipped in ahead in Gameplay because I was worried that, since I hadn't posted in Gameplay for a few days, y'all might be more than ready to get back to the action -- especially considering that most of my posting recently had just been NPCs giving you walls of text, rather than you investigating. I figured you'd be ready to get to the next place and I had preemptively given all of Cmdr Jute's info (though, I am giving him more depth so that in future encounters he can be more helpful).
Just make it clear to me the choice: Are y'all going through the virulent mud just in case you find a clue? Or are y'all going to The Soiled Sow via the boardwalk? .... In case I wasn't clear, you can visibly see the trail through the mud of Flotsam from Breakwater Pier to the pilings holding the Boardwalk at The Soiled Sow.
Only The Lantern Man's trail is in the virulent mud, indicating that The Korvosan Guard (and other potential investigators) did not follow the the obvious tracks through Flotsam but rather would have just walked the Boardwalk to The Soiled Sow. (unless they used Fly or something to investigate without having to get in the mud)
As an Earth Wizard, Muziel has a glaring flaw--can't memorize Fly without using up two spell slots. I've got a Fly scroll to burn, though, if folks think it's worth it.
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That reminds me, if we get a lull during or at the end of the investigation our party should sit down and swap notes and coordinate scribe scroll/spellbooks. Artemisia could easily memorize fly. (Her forbidden schools are necromancy/enchantment). In the interim it’s not awful using 2 slots on one fly for when we need to get someone into the air.
A post for our next night of rest.
Why do I even bother posting?!? First the GM ignores me, then K'Tak does. Like, I get tracking is his schtick, but I was trying to keep the group from having to go into the sickly mud. Especially when it seemed everybody else was heading to the Sow.
There's literally no way my post turns up something that K'Tak misses, unless the GM takes pity on me, which isn't exactly a good thing.
Why do I even bother posting?!? First the GM ignores me, then K'Tak does. Like, I get tracking is his schtick, but I was trying to keep the group from having to go into the sickly mud. Especially when it seemed everybody else was heading to the Sow.
There's literally no way my post turns up something that K'Tak misses, unless the GM takes pity on me, which isn't exactly a good thing.
Apologies, but we ninja'ed each other. When I started that post, yours was not up yet...
Weird, it shows mine being up almost 20 minutes before yours...
I see mine 1hr, 24 minutes ago, and yours 1hr, 6 minutes ago.
It's just super frustrating, cuz I'm feeling rather useless right now.
I have the highest diplomacy, by 5, and that got me nowhere.
I memorized spells I thought would be helpful, and when I try to 'keep the party safe' via one of them, K'Tak just wades out into the mud anyways.
I'm not saying I'm gonna quit, but jeebus heck this has been an incredibly crappy 24hr or so.
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I feel I need to explain, and put into some context my incredible frustration regarding my above aggravation:
Over the last little while, almost every single game I've been in, or was making a character for has imploded, been cancelled or otherwise is no longer active:
A badass tristalt game a buddy of mine was going to run had to be shelved cuz he suddenly got a job offer(that he was initially turned down for) that requires him to move out of the US.
A GM had some sort of personal issue with me, and kicked me out of his game. He refused to really explain what the problem was, aside from I was 'treating him like garbage', which nobody else understood either.
Another GM kicked out a friend from a game I was also playing due to a clash of styles. There's some more to it, but suffice to say, I pretty much quit that game due to how the GM treated my fellow player.
That same GM also cancelled a recruitment/planned game I was really looking forward to, and had done a ton of research for.
This was basically the only game that was still going good, that was sort of a chill, 'safe haven'. Thus, my recent issues with the GM and K'Tak ignoring Sabella, and rendering her attempts to do anything worthwhile moot, have come across(unknowingly to the them) as kicking me while I'm already down.
As I said above, I'm not quitting, as I really like this game a lot, and I love my PC concept. I just needed to vent, and explain a little, so hopefully you all understand where some of my frustration and aggravation is coming from.
And now, I shall nap, as my tinnitus is bothering the heck outta me right now.
Sometimes one just has to vent a little.
If you want some vicarious fun, in our homegame tonight we're fighting Graz'zt! Final session of a LOOONG campaign, in Azzagrat, everyone gone except the PCs and Graz'zt. We're rolling Initiative in about two hours and we'll see what happens when the dust settles. (As you can imagine, I'm not exactly concentrating on anything else for now except this fight, so excited, been waiting a while to get here!)
Anyone wanna vote on if the seven 20th Level PCs with gross magical equipment ($1 million including some homebrew equipment-shenanigans) & a few Mythic-Like boons can take out Graz'zt?!?
20th Level:
Barbarian
Paladin / Warlock
Wizard (Evocation)
Ranger: Archer (she almost always rolls a nat 20 -- it's gross)
Oracle of Buffs & De-Buffs
Cleric of Armor Class
Mesmerist with Enchantment-Gone-Wild
VS
The PCs might come close to defeating Big Daddy Darkness, but then Mommy Witchcraft shows up and saves him, lol
They then proceed to roflstomp the PCs together, once more proving that love(no matter how dark, twisted, and messed it might be) always wins, LOLOLOL
Depends on whom Graz'zt managed to dominate, assuming his skill set is mostly aligned with Nocticulas.
Dominate the Mesmerist for a domination chain! Thats at least what Aunti Noctie would do.
8 Rounds
Used four Wish spells
No PC deaths (thanks to Wish & uber-healing; Bbn came close a couple times)
Victory to the PCs!
And now back to our regularly scheduled Play-by-Post!
(I have some time to prep for the next campaign -- 1st Level -- starting in Korvosa, of course.)
My impression is that, there is a big divide between demon lords.
Do you have mythic time stop or do you not?
Also, Nocticula DC 43-Dominating 2 PCs per round after stripping some immunities away certainly makes things more interesting.
Hope everyone had a great three-day weekend -- at least as good as mine!
After a great Friday night game and a great Sunday game (we're almost finished with that campaign), Monday I went out in the Gulf, nice to get on a boat with friends and party a dozen miles out in the Gulf of Mexico. I'm a little sun-stroked and dehydrated today, but it was worth it.
Now back to our regularly scheduled Play-by-Post!
For playing in the virulent mud, K'Tak gets a Boon: The Feat, 'Smells Worse Than a Rotting Otyugh', on his character sheet. .... Muziel's Skunk is not pleased at the Dwarf's joke!
;)
Pär meanwhile jost hopes to get profession: Murderviking recogniced, on account of his crappy wis he isnt really going to invist any skillpoints in it:).
I kind of like the "old couple" thing he has going on with his copilot.
For playing in the virulent mud, K'Tak gets a Boon: The Feat, 'Smells Worse Than a Rotting Otyugh', on his character sheet. .... Muziel's Skunk is not pleased at the Dwarf's joke!
;)
Full text if you please... Remember that I can shape a giant skunk if I need to..