Alright, discuss the game here.
I think the current party is something like this:
* Siete: smuggler
* Marika Ungstern: hunter
* Gretchen Wagner: advisor
* Gerson Sharpeye: investigator (dwarf)
* Aristea Keyserling: witch
We also had an artist rolled but I don't think I saw further development of that character.
The majority of that crew is solidly brass tier...a bunch of poor scrubs. Absent some pre-existing character relations, no one would know Aristea as a witch (see also: death sentence). So for the moment those that don't know her should think of her as 'random poor schmo from somewhere rural'.
The Advisor is probably the hardest fit with this crew in terms of why you are hanging around with all the scrubs.
GM, do we have a prompt for how this campaign is beginning?
Not quite, still reading through the rules. I should be ready by tomorrow. :)
Is anyone interested in cooperation on our backgrounds? That wouldn't necessarily imply that your character would know about Aristea being a witch.
If anyone isn't certain what I mean by that, a witch is simply an unsanctioned user of the Winds of Magic. All sanctioned users of the Winds are from the Colleges of Magic (the Wizard career). A witch faces a variety of threats if discovered, from being executed by a mob or witch hunter to being forced into the Colleges of Magic.
So it's a complicated career to cooperate with. Even if we don't cooperate on backgrounds, the party would sooner or later have to deal with what they think about a rogue magic user among their comrades. Even if everyone is 'fine' with it in-game, there's also the possibility of causing a Mishap down the road, and there's no telling what that would result in. (I wouldn't blame our GM if they didn't want to deal with it, though Wizards have that same problem)
It does not at all mean the character is evil. Continuing down the Career will sooner or later mean that the warlock is flirting knowingly with the Dark Powers at a minimum though. I'm not thinking I'd want to go that path.
Cooperation on your backgrounds could make it easier.
Assuming the default more rural-witch upbringing for Aristea Marika could have grown up with Aristea?
Sounds good to me. I guess before I talk too much on coordinating background, I should have something available to coordinate with. The scribbles aren't all filled in yet, but I was thinking of something like this:
Aristea grew up on the edge of a mining camp in the foothills of the Grey Mountains. Her mother was one of several women that would repair clothes, cook & do other odd jobs for the miners in the camp, mostly like camp followers for an army. Aristea is the youngest of five daughters.
When she was nearly of age (fourteen maybe), the local camp chief accused a person in camp of being a witch. Being on the edges of civilization in the first place, the mining camp went through a traditional mob execution. Aristea went to witness the miners burn the witch, caught up in the same terror-fueled fervor as the mob. That all ended when the witch looked into the eyes of the young girl. Suddenly Aristea knew: the person was indeed a witch, and so was she.
Terrified and disgusted with herself, Aristea tried to bury her new realization, but found her formative magical talents impossible to suppress. Even without meaning to, things would happen...strange things she couldn't explain any other way. She fled home before others could learn the truth and eventually was brought in by a hedge witch named Dieter Hartmann who taught her just enough so that she likely wouldn't kill herself too quickly before sending her away.
I have an idea that the camp chief mentioned above became a zealot and left to become a Witch Hunter. He may have suspicions about Aristea (or maybe just anyone) and isn't the type to let legalities get in the way of his righteous cause.
One thing I really want but don't have a good answer for yet is a reason why Aristea doesn't just turn herself into the Colleges of Magic immediately. I considered having her long-term be opposed to that future but frankly the downsides of witchery are just really extreme & I'll probably have to either go Wizard or abandon magical traditions altogether. I don't think this is the sort of campaign to be hiding from the Church of Sigmar on an ongoing basis. But when the safest & obvious solution to her plight is to enter the Colleges, why doesn't she? Why can't she? One potential answer I'm playing with is that she suspects her mother and possibly her sisters might also be witches—being found out might cast suspicion on them even if they aren't. I'm not sure how I'd resolve that without planning for some tragedies down the line, though.
For her Motivation, one thing I keep swinging back to is Glory. That seems mostly counterproductive for a Witch, but having a Motivation at cross-purposes with your current needs sounds kind of fun.
The warhammer Old Word is a place rife with superstition and the colleges of magic are also known for hunting down witch's, so I don't think it'd be unfair that simple fear of discovery could keep you from seeking out the Colleges, especially as someone growing up in a small community - they probably barely distinguish between wizards and witch's anyway.
Maybe once you spend more time in cities and should we spend any time in Altdorf, you could come around and turn yourself in for assessment and training?
I've not given much thought to background's too much so far, but could easily tie to yours.
Marika grew up in a small community of farmers and hunters in the borders of the Empire, she learned her parent's trade, hunting, trapping. Until one day the goblins came down the mountain. Marike had always been good at hiding, and in a panic she fled to the woods and watched her village burn. Her ears still ringing with the sounds of her village's screams she slipped away come dawn when the goblins fell back to the mountains.
A few days later Dieter Hartmann found the dazed girl, half starved and still ranting. For whatever reason he took pity on her and brought her back to some semblance of sanity and health. She repaid him as a servant, using her skills to gather and hunt in the forest and whatever he needed.
Marika was hardly smart and had no magical talent whatsoever, but had reached an understanding with the witch.
When Aristea turned up, with skills Dieter actually had interest in, Marika was at first jealous but formed a friendship with her and when Dieter told Aristea to leave Marika joined her.
Both look good. Hope you can refine them before we are ready to start.
She fled home before others could learn the truth and eventually was brought in by a hedge witch named Dieter Hartmann who taught her just enough so that she likely wouldn't kill herself too quickly before sending her away.
A smuggler with a rather sophisticated tobacco spitting technique, might have heroically transported the evil misunderstood witch to her destination.
Having Siete smuggle us out of town makes sense to me. Perhaps a Witch Hunter came to the area. Even if he wasn't specifically looking for them, the Hedge Witches tend to make themselves scarce at such times.
Getting back to Aristea's background, I'd like to make some edits:
* drop the idea of having Aristea suspect her family of witchcraft. That doesn't mean they aren't actually witches of course, just that she doesn't suspect them of being so. No reason to have something dragging us back to an unnamed mining camp unless the GM wants to have it.
* I speculated that the camp captain might have left the area to pursue Witch Hunting. I'm thinking he isn't hunting for Aristea right now, having completely forgotten about her. That again leaves it up to our GM whether he ever pursues Aristea. He's probably the sort that would get suspicious of her if he ever saw her outside of the mining camp. She did leave a short while after his first ever execution, after all, and Sigmar doesn't believe in coincidences (according to him).
Aristea's mother: Gisela Keyserling
Aristea's sisters: Adelhelma, Sieglinde, Hermione, Charlotte
Camp Captain: Horst Krehl
Executed Witch: Eloise Landsberg
Hedge Witch mentor: Dieter Hartmann
Aristea grew up on the fringes of a mining camp in the foothills of the Grey Mountains. The camp was a cooperative venture with a small group of dwarves from Karak Azgaraz, exploring the area for further development if sufficient mineral wealth could be found. Her family mended clothes, cooked camp meals & performed other small jobs--whatever they could do to make some money.
When Aristea was halfway through her fourteenth year, the camp captain Horst Krehl accused one of the women in the camp of being a witch. The woman was Eloise Landsberg, a middle-aged woman and a friend of Aristea's mother. Before nightfall, Eloise had been tied up above a makeshift pyre as the community prepared to burn her alive. Disobeying her mother, Aristea went to the execution to watch the woman be burned. She felt herself caught up in the panicked fervor of the crowd. "Witch! Burn her before she kills us all! Slay the Enemy Within!" they shouted.
Eloise protested her innocence, but Horst Krehl was nothing if not a showman. He worked the crowd, urging them to shout over her more and more. As the preparations finished and Horst lit the flames that would consume his victim, Eloise stared into the darkness straight at where Aristea was watching deep in the shadows. Their eyes locked.
The young girl trembled uncontrollably and fell off the low branch she had been sitting on. She gasped for air on the ground as the horrible truth she had seen in Eloise Landsberg's eyes sank into her bones. Eloise was indeed a witch, and so was Aristea. While the bloodthirsty crowd slew the witch before them, another was born in the dark.
Terrified and revolted, Aristea refused to eat for two days before hunger pains drove her back to activity. She moped about the camp, doing little of the work assigned to her as her mind ran over the events of that horrible night and her fears for the future.
A week after the execution Aristea was ordered, sternly, to retrieve some tools from a locked closet in a communal area. As she reached out to place the key in the lock, she felt a surge from deep inside her and the bolt slid open of its own accord. As the door swung open by itself, Aristea realized she had used magic. She spun around to learn if anyone had seen the strange event and saw a pair of women talking in the distance. Unnervingly, she could hear their conversation clearly as though she was standing alongside them. Panicking at the strange events, she fled into the woods.
Her sister Charlotte found her a few hours later, sobbing miserably. As the girl led Aristea back home, she told her that the dim light of the forest made her eyes seems strange as though they had changed color. After they arrived home, Aristea claimed that she would come in after she washed up but instead went to examine her reflection in a bucket of water. Her eye color had indeed changed, from a light green to pale blue. Fearing that she wouldn't be able to hide her witchcraft (even though unintentional) any longer, Aristea fled into the night and left her home behind her.
For the next two months, the girl drifted. Aimless for the most part, but always further from home. She begged when she could and stole when she had to. Though infrequent, she continued to notice unnatural events around her and kept to herself whenever possible. As hunger drove the girl to desperation she began trying to use her powers intentionally. As she spun ever more quickly toward self-destruction, Aristea was caught by a woman who clearly saw her performing witchcraft.
Terrified of being burned alive, Aristea desperately tried to escape the woman's grasp. Weakened by hunger and deprivation, she found herself completely unable to get free. But Ranald smiled on the young girl this time. Instead of calling for help the woman calmed Aristea, calling her a 'blessed child'. Explaining little, the woman fed and washed Aristea before taking her to a small home two villages over on the outskirts of the forest.
There she was introduced to Dieter Hartmann.
I thought your suggestion was that Siete smuggled us out when leaving Dieter's place, so I didn't include your character earlier than that. I don't mind writing it up differently though. It doesn't even take much of a change. Maybe when Aristea got caught using magic it was a lot less intentional and more public, in a larger city. A witch hunt was brewing and leaving the city normally was out of the question.
Siete was hired to ferry her out, no questions asked. Did he know about the witch hunt? Did he care?
Because it gives an easy opportunity to get the party together it's probably still a solid idea to have you smuggle the girls when leaving Dieter's place. A Witch Hunter is in town...time to leave. That event is probably at least a few months (but maybe as much as two years) later. It would be the second time Siete was asked to smuggle this young girl (plus a new one). What does he think of that? Is it a coincidence? Maybe he suspects Marika of being a witch now, too!
The adventure isn't really a tale of being antagonistic toward the Church of Sigmar & Witch Hunters (at least long-term), so I'd caution against going down that road heavily...which is odd to say since my acceptance of the Witch career is prompting a lot of those angles.
He cares about money. He cares about food. Occasionally, he cares about a whore. Siete really doesn't care about whether she's a witch or not.
So, Before or after?
The NPC Dieter seems to have some political power (well known). I believe he could be a focal point for the group as a whole. So she would seem to be safer with him now than before him.
I'd like to think of the pair of characters as an 'Arya Stark and The Hound'... working their way to Dieter.
Aristea's village could just have been on Siete's route. Maybe she stowed away the first time as Siete delivered some choice contraband to the miners (I'm assuming he had a boat at one point), and managed to convince him not to just dump her in the river and they became... maybe not friends but some kind of respect between them.
Maybe now he's down on his luck (no boat) so took on escorting a couple of young women out of the area to earn some coin, even better that it's someone he kinda gets on with.
I'm not sure how well known Dieter would be, guessing he's a kept secret among the local villages since he can provide a few cures and other things, but if he ever went too far they'd still turn on him because y'know Empire.
Maybe that's why he's getting rid of Aristea, decided having an apprentice is drawing too much attention?
Seems reasonable
Well, did everyone speak up about their backgrounds?
I'm pretty happy with Aristea's background. I'll probably give it another brush-over before placing it in her profile.
The background concludes with Aristea being kicked out of Deiter Hartmann's place. Do we know how the adventure opens? I still need a short-term ambition.
I'm relatively happy, it's a bit second fiddle to Aristea but that's not a problem for me.
I'm pretty happy with Aristea's background. I'll probably give it another brush-over before placing it in her profile.
The background concludes with Aristea being kicked out of Deiter Hartmann's place. Do we know how the adventure opens? I still need a short-term ambition.
** spoiler omitted **
Yes. Though you all will need to pay for the coach, somehow.
It's probably fine to say what I know about the opening, then. The scenario has us catching a coach on a journey toward Altdorf, the capital of the Empire. The origin location might be Ubersreik, though that could have been different due to the game I played before. I'm not sure how much the coach fees are, but the poor Brass-tier scrubs probably need to do something to make money before we can catch a ride.
My prior group ran an adventure or two before we got to this point and had enough means that getting started wasn't much of a problem.
Aristea doesn't have a strong reason to head to Altdorf currently, though I could come up with something I'm sure. Maybe Marika should be the one leading us in that direction though? Is there something she needs to do or someone she needs to meet in the big city?
For passage money, the easy thing to do would be to waive it...like Dieter gave us enough money to get to Altdorf. Just making Income tests could work, although Aristea and Marika wouldn't be contributing much without quite a few Income rolls. We could also have a small pre-adventure. Could be something criminal!
Background is how I'd run it, if the carriage isn't full could also have traded some fresh caught game in lieu of/supplementary to coin?
"Hey, alot of coach passengers who manoovers to a bar. Gets drunk. and somehow is never heard from again. then we's slip on in, newly bundled, and get some seats." the smuggler recommends.
Good idea.
I will.
Whoops! Didn't realize the game had started. Is Mr. Sharpeye in the game? If so I'll get the alias created and join in.
Yes, Mr. Sharpeye is in the game.
Gerson grew up burying dwarves... and others who had the money to pay. His parents were embalmers... and as the only child it was only natural that he pick up their craft. One problem though. The dead creeped him out, and the fear of ghosts even more so. When he was a child a corpse sit up in a coffin when he went downstairs to pick up a toy he left down there and he still has nightmares about it. (Old man who died sitting up and the Rigor Mortis kept him in that position even in death).
Disowned and disappointing he made his way to Altdorf to make his living. He was good at finding things, so he became a private investigator, though without a reputation he found the pickings slim.
He had heard rumors of a cursed mule in the town of Ubersreik so had spent the last week there. Now it was time to return home and report that the cursed mule was in fact a donkey.
Gerson could have ran across the others during his investigation, and perhaps Siete has occasionally been a paid informer / contact for his investigations?
Are we waiting for something or someone? Just not seeing much activity
Come on guys, you can reply to my post or introduce yourselves.
Are we still waiting on Gretchen and Siete to post in Gameplay? I was kinda waiting for everyone to tag in?
Are we still waiting on Gretchen and Siete to post in Gameplay? I was kinda waiting for everyone to tag in?
That's who I was waiting on.
As a heads-up, I've been talking with our GM and some other folks to round up players for those that haven't checked in. Hopefully we'll be able to start before long.
Here's my idea for Aristea's reason to go to Altdorf:
* Dieter Hartmann assigned her to deliver a message to someone in Altdorf, probably another Hedge Witch although Aristea can't read and isn't aware of the message's contents. If Marikda wants to piggyback off this, the message could be coded with one of them carrying the letter and the other carrying the cipher.
* Separately, Aristea wants to get a look at the Colleges of Magic for herself, if only to confront her fears about being sent there
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Are we taking a coach to Altdorf? I think you mentioned we needed to come up with some money first.
Yes, you will be taking a coach to Altdorf. :)
so far, it seems good. still have to figure out how the money to buy a coach ride to Altdorf ended up in your hands.
That works.
For Aristea & probably Marika, the funds could have come from Dieter Hartmann. That would be the easy solution anyway.
Still have a few formatting changes to make plus may buy a few trinkets
Neat.
I'm hoping to let you all roleplay for a bit longer before you find a dead body.
I have a medical emergency in the family so I'm gonna need a day or two.
Gotcha. Take care of your medical emergency!
Can we continue? OR do you all need more time?