HP: 38/38 AC 17/12/15 AP 6/6 Spells: Magus X/5/3 Bard X/5/3 (B=Y) Eldritch Pool: 8/8 Bardic Performance: 17/17
Kelendia walks down the road coming from the north, and finds herself before the large front of the theater, and pauses a moment to take in the grandeur of the building in the early morning light. The throb from last night's 'medicine' had already faded, and the early grey morning seemed cheery somehow, a feeling that Kelendia absorbed on her way around the building to the door. Secret knock delivered, Kelendia enters and moves to the newspapers, and begins reading.
It was a good sign that her companions were up early. There were many who would gladly stay up late, but those who rose with the sun were few, and disciplined.
HP: 38/38 AC 17/12/15 AP 6/6 Spells: Magus X/5/3 Bard X/5/3 (B=Y) Eldritch Pool: 8/8 Bardic Performance: 17/17
Kelendia opens the door, and stumbles in, soaking wet and covered in seaweed. She grabs a crab that had locked a claw on her posterior, yanks it off, and throws it out the door.
"Do not get drunk in Port Peril. Ever."
OOC: Sorry about the dissapearance. My second job decided to fire four people for reasons unknown, and we went from two employees for one shift to two shifts for one employee. I also found a Skull and Shackles game on another site that I dropped Kelendia into, and it went poorly....very poorly.
Is there a chance I could get back into the action here? I would need to update my character a bit it looks like.
HP: 38/38 AC 17/12/15 AP 6/6 Spells: Magus X/5/3 Bard X/5/3 (B=Y) Eldritch Pool: 8/8 Bardic Performance: 17/17
So, since we have the party picked out now, would it be a good time tonight talk about content preferences? Things like gore and sex can upset some players, so I wanted to get everyone's opinions about these, as well as anything else that can upset players.
Personally, sex and gore don't bother me. The Paizo boards will be on the tame side of places I have PBP'd, I expect. While I don't expect anything graphic sexually, we are chasing a serial killer. GM, what level of gore did you anticipate in this campaign? Are crime scenes ghastly nightmares that we will CSI through? Will it be more tame?
And on the subject of sex, I was expecting a party of males and females, but I am not opposed to any female-female romance. My character is currently attracted to one male, but love can bloom on the battlefield crime scene.
What is everyone else's feelings on the subject? And sorry if I am being blunt about something you are sensitive to. I want to clear the air now so nobody quits later.
HP: 38/38 AC 17/12/15 AP 6/6 Spells: Magus X/5/3 Bard X/5/3 (B=Y) Eldritch Pool: 8/8 Bardic Performance: 17/17
I'm down for a little smackdown. It's what Lady K does best! As well as be beautiful, order people around, and throw money at people selling expensive wine.
Dotting, also with an Undine in mind. Mine would be a monk/magus though. A trident wielding water mage that drags the unlucky under the seas. A shipboard marine first and foremost, but loves a fine wine and a good song or roll in the hammock in the evenings. She had a rather liberated mother, and perhaps some of that nature rubbed off on her as well. A murderous water wench to keep your crew in line, no matter what it takes!
HP: 38/38 AC 17/12/15 AP 6/6 Spells: Magus X/5/3 Bard X/5/3 (B=Y) Eldritch Pool: 8/8 Bardic Performance: 17/17
Kelendia turns and faces Einar as he asks her a direct question.
"The law is rather clear on vigilante justice, I'm afraid. The person we are pursuing is guilty of killing without justice, and we would be the same if we took his life. However, there would be some hope. Many nobles and politicians would seek to gain from his defeat, and we may be able to obtain a pardon from some of the Lords of the houses."
"However, our situation doesn't need to come to that. If we take him alive, we can avoid all that, and let the city guard and the magistrates decide his fate. We would need to worry about staying on the good side of the city guard, and that would be easy enough with some cooperation. I also know several of the captains, having worked with them for the past little while. We would need to be sure we had the right person, as well. We do not want to throw an innocent into prison while the killer or killers remain at large. And that's another concern."
"What are our plans if this turns out to be the work of a whole assassin's guild? The killer has so far evaded authorities, and they may have had secondary associates who shelter and hide him or her. Do we have plans for a time when we are suddenly outnumbered?"
Kelendia turns to the table at large, waiting for anyone to speak.
HP: 38/38 AC 17/12/15 AP 6/6 Spells: Magus X/5/3 Bard X/5/3 (B=Y) Eldritch Pool: 8/8 Bardic Performance: 17/17
Kelendia nods in time with the music, and smiles at the songs, the jar, and the confusion brought about by Vir's request to the barkeep. When the maid returns with the wines, Kelendia motions around the table, and the wine is poured.
Kelendia nods at Qat's suggestion. She pipes in her own two cents as well. "We can discuss an approach to catching the killer tonight for sure, and if we decided upon a general idea or strategy, we can make the appropriate purchases tonight and be well equipped and underway by tomorrow morning. For example, would we want to take the killer and turn them over to the city guard alive or dead. Alive, it will take a different magic than dead, different tools. Is anyone here skilled with nets? I know a little of mancatching from my work with the city guard, but I don't know everything."
Kelendia takes another mouthful of wine, looking over the glass to see what is thought around the table.
HP: 38/38 AC 17/12/15 AP 6/6 Spells: Magus X/5/3 Bard X/5/3 (B=Y) Eldritch Pool: 8/8 Bardic Performance: 17/17
Kelendia takes a graceful seat, and when all the others are seated, she turns to the one who answered her question earlier. When the song starts, she closes her eyes and listens attentively, fingers gently rapping a rhythm on the table. When a maid passes by, Kelendia slips a handful of coins out and asks for three bottles of the finest wines in the house, and cups for the table. Turning back to the table, she listens as a second song takes wing from the lips of another.
To clarify, Kelendia has the Overwhelming Beauty, Extremely Fashionable, and Charming Traits, and the Voice of the Sibyl feat. So, very nice to see and hear! Sorry I didn't have these down pat earlier.
Einar Connection to Lady K: 1d100 ⇒ 79
Veterans of a skirmish or war - Given your request for a boring last 4 months, I'm going to go with no contact, you might have witnessed a brawl, or been the cause of one! And/or I might have heard the songs: Knowledge Local, Lady K: 1d20 + 8 ⇒ (5) + 8 = 13 Going with: Nope, all the references will be over my head.
Lady K has been attached to the city guard. She may have been on patrol when you got into a little drunk scuffle or somesuch. Nothing exciting like a full blown bar fight or anything. This would be good, because it puts both of them in roughly the same boat: the rough-around-the-edges type, with varying gold amounts in the heart.
Some of these may not work with K. For about 4 months she's had a nearly terminal case of boring, and since that's something nobody in the gossip circles wants to catch, there has been very little to hear since the scandal. She also been shut in with her aunt for most of that time, too.
You could have met her before the scandal, since she was a academy cadet attached to the city guard. Enemies may have taken a magic missile to the gut in a raid or something. As far as friends go, you could be one of her new criminal friends, or someone with unusual talents she has started looking for. Kelendia's here to save her image, yes, but if she comes out the other side with a few new friends then all the better.
HP: 38/38 AC 17/12/15 AP 6/6 Spells: Magus X/5/3 Bard X/5/3 (B=Y) Eldritch Pool: 8/8 Bardic Performance: 17/17
Lady Kelendia looks over the assembled.....things. Various states of intoxication, a wide variety of styles, and looking at the apparel, she's probably way overdressed. But, that's okay. She has to start somewhere.
"My name is Kelendia. May I join you?"
She places a leather-gloved hand on the back of another chair, hopeful.
And then someone made a "honey" comment. So much for not putting anyone on the list tonight.
I saw all the rolling in the "supposedly not ready" thread and got a little bit of cold feet. Seemed like a lot of people were ready for specific rolls, whereas my sense motive and stuff is not set in stone yet. I'll just post and ignore numbers for now. Cheers for finally getting in! I don't know where my original intro post went, but I guess it's for the best. You didn't want to read about noblewoman fashion when there is a murder on, right?
HP: 38/38 AC 17/12/15 AP 6/6 Spells: Magus X/5/3 Bard X/5/3 (B=Y) Eldritch Pool: 8/8 Bardic Performance: 17/17
A tall blonde human woman enters, her stride a curious mix of military measured marching and a noble lady's grace. Her face and proportions are nearly perfect, and there is just a tiny wiggle to the hips with each step. Economy of motion, a poet would call it. Her fine clothes and tasteful jewelry are offset by a chain shirt partially hidden under blue and white silks and a bit more metal than noblewomen usually wear. The boots and gloves have seen more training yard than ballroom, despite their quality. A clever blend of military and noble, as much as the woman herself is. Her right hand bears a signet ring, the family symbol defaced until it is unrecognizable. Her left wrist bears a cuff from a set of manacles, the city guard etched on the metal twice, on opposite facings. A criminal?
She strides confident, a paper in hand. A poster taken from the wall outside about the citizen's meeting and the murderer. She stops a pace from the group.
"Would this be the right place if I was hunting a murderer?" She asks to the group at large.
Well, the Internet let my big character post in the recruitment thread through, but ate the one here. *sigh* This will have to do for now. Anyways, post responses to a beautiful, rich, trained soldier!
So I was getting some writer's block about my character's backstory, so I turned to the random tables on the PFSRD (found here), and I think I may have had a little too much fun. It is a great resource for anyone that is struggling with backstory like I was at a few points. I have some great ideas about what my character's past can contain, now. However, it does play a lot with the nobility and setting, and makes assumptions about laws and things. I used a lot of the ideas, and I smoothed out some space with my own extrapolations as well. I'll give you a rundown. Prepare for wall of text: Instead I used spoiler blocks. Yay formatting!
Family and Status:
So, Lady K (thanks for the moniker, Lady F! :) ) is the daughter of a Countess (who is a widow), she's got an older half-sister (half as in another father, not half-race), and older sister, and a younger brother. She is the third of four children, and the second in line for her mother's position. The family is well-to-do and relatively powerful.
Major Life Events:
Major life events:
Academy Training: She was sent to a prestigious academy to train as a magus (being the second child in line she was given combat training to defend her siblings and her house honor and property, as is tradition) She did well, approaching the top of her class and earning her family honor and impressing many influential people (Everybody wants an excellent magus on their side, after all) She made friends and enemies with the other girls from the other families (the school was segregated by gender).
Troubled First Love: While at the academy, she became friends with the valedictorian of her year, one of the princesses of the royal family. Through this connection, she was introduced to the princess's brother, a prince. A brief adolescent romance later, and things were going well, although they knew they would have to push things through with their families first. And then it all blew up.
It all blew up:
Imprisoned: She wasn't the only one who wanted that boy. Not by a long shot. Other girls wanted the option, and she was able to rebuff most of them. One, however, started to make her life miserable. A daughter of another countess, wizard by training, she was a jealous rival for the prince's affections. The competition got super-heated, and one day they crossed paths in the marketplace. A mere handful of sharp words later, and both girls were full on aggravated assault-ing each other in the street. Numerous hands from both families were involved in the fight as well. The city guard broke it up, but not before some hideous fighting and scratching and two wardrobe malfunctions (Lady K's was not so severe, just a torn off skirt, but the other girl lost her blouse well and good) along with a ridiculous amount of property damage. The city guard arrested everyone involved, and Lady K's mother thought it a good idea to leave Kelendia in prison for a while. It was better than the other girl, who was basically banished from London to some far away family estate, never to be seen again.
Aggravated Assault (with unauthorized use of magic), Property Damage (several stalls, lots of produce, numerous cages of poultry, a cart of goats, and one incredibly clever circus orangutan that escaped captivity and remains at large to this day), Lost Wages (several dozen merchants were essentially ruined), Disturbance of the King's Public (it was a festival day), the criminal record went on. Yikes. On top of that, London is basically ten million bards rolled up into a city. Do you know what that is like? "The ballad of milk and honey" (Lady K's own yellow panties, and her opponent's white skin), "Do you hear the day owls?" (K and the other girl were wordlessly screeching by the end of the fight), and the entirely unsubtle "I saw noble ladies' undergarments! Twice! And it got better!" (I don't need to explain that one) were among the most popular songs, plays, poems, bawdy tales, and other reputation-apocalypse heard around London for the next seventeen days, until some duke or other was caught with a barmaid. (It's Bardic London. Scandals aplenty! :P )
From the Ashes:
It was actually the time in prison that did Lady K some good. Circumstances were humble. A personal cell, not separated from other criminals except by wrought iron bars, a bookshelf with books, a toiletry area with actual closing door, daily renditions of the newest shameful bard-work from the other prisoners, and a single mattress with cushion for sleeping. Her prison name was Honey. She does not like that name. Her mother had also stripped her of her claim to the family name and fortune (hence it's just Lady K, with no family name) until "she has proven herself worth keeping" in the eyes of her mother. Her aunt, a much more lenient woman, took Lady K under the wing, and that started with tutoring visits in prison. (When you are noble enough, even prison is different) Kelendia, for the first time, got training in subterfuge and deceit. Her Aunt (not nearly so upstanding as her Countess mother) saw to it that Kelendia could take up the arts of subtlety, something that her straightforward combat training as a magi had neglected in the extreme. Her Aunt also loans out clothes and other small bribes to get Kelendia to carry on with the new lessons, and to keep the girl out of rags.
Her first work was in prison, talking and manipulating the other prisoners, making connections. Her Aunt, with a little "elbow grease" (read: bribes) got Kelendia out of prison on parole after 3 months, and Kelendia was glad to be out. Her Aunt continued the wheel-and-deal education, and Kelendia was always a good student. Her Aunt kept her combat training up as well, but this time with less reputable teachers, in alleyways instead of courtyards. The societal functions are a step down now, but that comes part and parcel with being a disgrace to the family. She has learned to control her temper wonderfully, as well.
Lady Kelendia today:
This is where we find Kelendia today, skilled and ambitious and controlled, but humbled and mocked and mistrusted by the nobility. She has gone several months without blowing it, and she still dreams of her prince, even though he might as well be on the moon. The odds of just getting back in her mother's good graces seems slim ("I cannot believe you had a shot at a prince! And! You! Failed!"), never mind the royal family's. On a plus note, it seems like she will make it through her parole intact, which would be good. She does get out and do community service, and she has gotten along with the city guards who check her parole. The easygoing, friendly Lady Kelendia is thought better of now, although the hard part will be building back up her reputation, and keeping her cool every time someone asks her "So, does the carpet still match the drapes?" (She's a natural blonde, and it's becoming less frequent)
So, GM, did I run all over the setting? I did do some research on yester-centuries London, and I think I dodged the anachronistic bullet. If this is too much, I can trim or fill in or whatever.
So, players? What would you know of Kelendia? You've heard the songs no doubt. Were you another noble at the magic academy? Were you a criminal in prison with her? Did you catch a glimpse of the honey when it happened? I am going to how on over to the RP thread and post an entrance, so read up and then respond here and over there, please!
And as an aside, does anyone know how I would go about getting the face of the Magus from the class page on the D20pfsrd onto the avatar options here? That image was one of the things that sold me on the magus class, elven pointy ears aside. Let's just pretend those aren't there.
