Cygnus learned Play Dead. Much gold was had.
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Hey now, I was loyal, too! I've stuck around until we can 'get back to Kotelia'. :) Anywho, you guys have fun in your travels. :)
See you on other threads, Kittiface. :)
Don't forget, when you merge the tables, that I'm stepping out as well. I like AMdog, but am finding that I'm utterly horrible at online + sandbox combined. My indecision grows significantly when I combine 'people I don't know' with 'decisions lasting months on a small scale, decades on a larger one'.
Yup! But there was still a disconnect there. :) Lots of ways to gather intelligence, not just by lying to folks. Just an expectations thing.
Also, previously, you referred to them as the 'Intelligence' Division, not the 'Espionage' Division. Which may be why there was a disconnect between 'We don't have anything on our maps, go find stuff out' and us simply exploring and explaining who we were and what we wanted. The fact that they flipped out and tried to kill us before we said anything the first time (a conflict related to two groups outside the walls), flipped out and tried to kill us before we said anything the second time (a conflict related to random armed people approaching his family), and flipped out and tried to kill us the third time as soon as we said who we were (a conflict related to apparently hating and fearing our settlement) hadn't really given us an index of 'why everyone flips out and tries to kill us at first sight'. Until now. :) We've been pretty much just left to presume, in character, that everyone flips out and tries to kill everyone outside. Except kobolds. Who flip out over Kotelia.
Well, at least now we know that everyone hates the city out here, reliably so, which is something we didn't know for sure. :P I'm not sure why they hate us, though. We're a big, self-sufficient city that won't let them in, probably, sure. But it's not like we're taking their resources, and we are often offering trade or the like. Oh well. Once we're back in town, and the tables are together, everyone can work out how better to handle 'the world outside still hates us and that's not something we can address, so let's just find out what we can and ignore that everyone wants us dead'.
"No, don-" Cygnus begins, then shakes his head. "I have no idea how to recover from this. I'm horrible at this job." He huffs again. "Just go, they're unlikely to be able to catch us with all that armor." he waits for the others to leave before continuing to depart, himself.
So Pasternack is officially gone?
Cygnus huffs. "Is everyone we meet going to want us dead..?" he says as he turns to leave. "It's going to be very unfun to inform the brass that everyone out here hates us. Period."
Cygnus had originally blinked away as the little draconic creatures appeared from hiding and hunkered low. As they lowered their waapons, he moved to his haunches, tilting his head with interest at the sounds they were making, but ultimately had little to say beyond "I haven't got a clue what's going on." In something very much not draconic. His tail thumps slowly as he watches.
"I would think so. It looks like a really simple road. The better question, I think, is why you would build a road to nothing." he says, tail thumping. "Perhaps it's simply an unfinished bridge? Whoever's building it likely lives on the other side of the path, should we investigate that?"
"The stream should lead us most of the way back to Kotelia, if the maps weren't flawed. I would definitely rather head back with the information we have. We're more likely to find a larger threat down river, but we're more likely to find useful resources upstream, I think. Besides, there's always the possibility of returning this way with a magic boat or something, to make travel in this direction more ideal."
Cygnus shakes his head and chuffs. "We shouldn't go into the mountains, most of us don't have fur, and even having fur may not help much. We also didn't bring any climbing gear, really. We wouldn't have to worry about cold nights thanks to the campfire bead but everything else.." Cygnus says, before scratching at his neck. "I think we should head east. There should be a river near, we can follow it until it splits and then follow it most of the way back to Kotelia. It seems likely that if our enemies aren't using the rivers, we can do so rather successfully to expand our defenses outwards."
On the topic of 'Poke Poke'... I'm not really feeling this game. I've been finding more and more that Sandbox just isn't really my thing, especially on PbP. I'm really into character interactions and narratives and stuff like that. Spending months (out of game) on finding the solution to how to deal with one NPC on a mountain isn't really... something I'm into, you know? I could see that going a lot better and certainly a lot faster, but posting rates have also been rather... lackluster. Between all of those things, I've never been able to grow any form of bond with this game. I really like Amdog, and the novelty of playing a blinkdog, but I've not really enjoyed any of the character interactions. It's just really janky and disjointed for me and... I dunno. Heck, sandbox relies on character interactions and decisionmaking to work to me. Monster of the Week can work well at a table, but on here, it's more like monster of the six-months. I try to interact and make decisions with the other players, but that tends to just slow things down. A lot :(. And then for character interactions (and this may make me a horrible person), I haven't found a reason to be interested in other people's characters. That's likely entirely on me, though. I haven't fleshed out Amdog in the ways that I've fleshed out some of my other characters. I dunno. My current plan was to wait until we got back to town to decide whether to stay or not, because the pacing, story, character interactions (which a game like this rely upon) could all get better. People could start posting more and be more interesting (I'm not saying I'm doing better, nor being accusatory) and all that good stuff, but unless they do (or did), it'd just be going through the motions to me. And I've got very little muse for 'just going through the motions' of late. Sorry :( With all that said, I still vote we turn east, and again, that requires the knowledge that it doesn't hurt anything behind the scenes; we never wanted to go into the mountains, did not gear for it, and are not at all prepared for it. If you want us to stick to the other group's course, then sure, but otherwise I don't really have an opinion at this time. Sorry, Kittiface. :(
"Hm. Well... I suppose I could just leave a package nearby. If you can't write something like 'gift from Kotelia' on it, then it loses most of its meaning. And it isn't as though I'm ignoring our injuries... or the fact that they keep attacking us." he chuffs, "But I'm quite worried that we're going to come here and take his land, just because it has height advantages or something of the ilk, and then we'e no better than the ones who wish to take Kotelia from us. So... the goal is to broker some sort of small peace so they don't try to kill people on sight, so that the people they try to kill on sight don't return the favor in kind."
"Right. So... uh, delicate question, Mork and Gork. Are you literate?" Cygnus asks, tail thumping.
"I'm willing to try my way if you'd like. Either way, I'd suggest we move on after a bit of rest." Cygnus offers.
"Alrighty, Paster, if you're willing, go ahead and sneak some food and booze up to them. If you're not, I'll teleport it to them and give them a bit of time to realize it's a gift from the friendly neighborhood exploration committee." Cygnus says, bobbing his head in agreement with the general consensus, but unwilling to fully volunteer Pasternack for an idea that was his own.
"So... do we continue to move up stealthily, or do we return for the food and drink and then 'deliver' it? I could drop it off nonchalantly, then back away slowly, before teleporting again... then wait a bit and repeat it with another gift. Or... you could anonymously leave both, if you prefer, Paster."
"Then perhaps we should try ale and food? That would surely allow us a bit more friendliness with them!" Cygnus chuffs quietly.
"Then, we're all set upon heading back up later tonight, absconding with his weapon, and then returning with ale?" Cygnus asks, tail thumping.
To be honest, I really don't know. I'm most interested in trying Mork and Gork's way. Offer ale, be friendly. It's not like we ever attacked him... :P
"I'm uncertain of how to remove the crossbow from his person, short of him throwing it away once more. You could perhaps try to steal it... but that seems unlikely to work, and dangerous as well. If you believe you can, by all means. So, just to be clear, do you believe we must displace the cyclops, to simply disarm him, or do you feel we should at least try to talk him down, as it were?"
"Perhaps the dragons thought that of us?" Cygnus asks, tilting his head so that it's nearly upside down as he asks the question. "When they attacked our home?" he says, turning his head right side up before shaking himself. "I do not mean to say that they are innocent, or misguided, but that it seems ill-fated to treat others with that thought process... lest we come to expect others to treat us in kind."
Cygnus bobs his head. "Can't hurt - any more than it already did - to try. Would you like to come at it from a different angle, Pasternack? I can likely hop up with relative ease, as well, if things go south. Worst case scenario, it doesn't accept our offer of friendship."
From an OOC point of view, Mork and Gork speak giant! So we -could- try diplomacy. Though it'd be the sort of diplomacy that has the same objectively high survival rate as a snowball in a hot place. We can go back and try the fight again (though he'll likely have changed something up) with a bit more sneakiness. We can also simply go with moving on -around- cyclops mountain. We don't really lose anything for going around, we just get to see more of the countryside. Which is a boon, unless part of the countryside has a dragon or something. :P So: A: Diplomacy.
My order of preference is ACB. What is everyone else's? A hinges on Mork and Gork wanting to try the diplomacy route, though! :)
"After we get healed up, I think the new question is, do we head back that way? Try to catch him off-guard? Or do we adjust our route to avoid him for now? Since no one can really talk to him, our options are limited."
It's fine, Kitty McKittyface. If it's possible to ready my quickened Dimension Door, I think we should be able to abscond without any more damage taken. If I ready for 'I teleport when he shoots at me', and make myself a more simple target than the folks running off down the mountain, we should be good. I can totally understand not letting me ready the quickened DD, though.
"We should withdraw for now, mend our wounds, then come back. Two of us are heavily injured, and I'm not taking casualties." Cygnus says as he flicks his head towards the way they'd come. "We've got a few moments while he retrieves his crossbow and reloads it unless he comes down to us. Now go!"
"I don't suppose someone speaks his language? Think he speaks giant?" Cygnus asks as his magic reverberates around them, he then calls out in Sylvan, "We come in peace! Drop the crossbow and we'll stop attacking!" After the previous misunderstanding (which was surely explained by now), Cygnus was less willing to simply dive into a fight without questioning it.
I figured it had a power. :) I just wanted to make sure it wasn't a mistake, and don't check stat blocks unless the DM says I should. :)
Cygnus looks up to the top of the hill, wondering briefly if it were wise for the enemy to announce itself, before leaning back on his haunches and howling, the magic of his voice reverberating in his ally's weapons and taking on their preferred aspects.
"Can anyone else pick up the trail? I... can't seem to spot anything." Cygnus admits. "We could keep going in roughly the same direction, and hope we don't run into any ravines or the like... but it should be pretty clear which direction Mork and Gork came from, initially."
Cygnus begins to snuffle around near the ground... and promptly grows confused. "I'm not entirely certain." he obliges, trying to spot anything that would give away the trail he's clearly forgotten.
"I think that would be for the best. That is, weather permitting, we don't want to lose the trail." Cygnus agrees, tail thumping. "One moment..." he says as he vanishes from view, several leaves falling to the ground in a tree overhead.
"It's strange how far they traveled... I would have expected to find more of their people by now, and now it's worrisome to progress. We can't really know how far we are from their civilization. If we press forward, we might find their home mere minutes away... which would be bad. But if we don't, they may find ours while we're resting." he pants for a moment, before turning his attention to his wound, once more, preferring to mend his wound before they bed down or press the advantage.
"... alright." Cygnus says after a brief pause, "But we should be careful about how we approach... I can't take much more of that. Ciaran and Pasternack, you move forward and stay spread out to either flank. Kaynick and I will follow to either side of Mork and Gork. Rozzev, bring up the rear, I know you can't really keep pace if you're hiding."
"It's risk versus reward. You likely won't spot a single mouse in your home, but it's in trouble if you do... while you'll almost certainly spot multiple mice in your house, but can't affect them all. If we go as a group, there's no sense in sneaking, as we'll simply be moving more slowly and almost definitely be spotted... unless we're hoping to use our least sneaky members to lure them in, as a good pack would..." he pauses, "But they may have more of those spears, as well..."
Cygnus yelps as Kayniik tugs out the spear, but otherwise seems more preoccupied with looking for the enemy. He makes a chuffing noise at the suggestion of being carried. "I don't really need to walk. But... we should go. Why did no one attack them when they attacked me?"
"Please... but after you take out the spear. I didn't see if it was barbed..." Cygnus responds, still quickly sweeping his vision across the woods to either side.
"Why would we wait for them to come back? They're clearly hostile, and there are likely a lot more of them on the way." he says, looking to the spear, once more. "He had already hurled a spear into me before we'd even had time to react to who they were."
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