Homebrew system thread II, part 2

[Kaelan]

On hearing the sounds of combat drifting in from the tower, Dirt addresses Larric.
"'A' minor I think...."

[Eleventh Century Remnant]

I'm back; and it is such a relief, you don't know what you've got until it goes away.
Cause of the problem was, quite literally, bugs- the biological kind; a colony of ants in the junction box. Thing's been replaced, landline's working again now, and I am back in the internet again, until the next cockup.
Just don't mention Kindle to me, that was a farce. Mobile computing may not be my thing.


Anyhap and anyhow, Aburon did say 'if we need help, we'll scream.' Maybe not literally, but there is certainly enough noise coming from the circle to attract attention- sounds like a storm in there. I'm going to give Alfred that one, because it's funny and may possibly be disastrous further down the line. (and seriously; you don't know every line in Shichinin no Samurai off by heart already?)

That does leave Larric holding up one end of a door full of glass jars, and Alfred dashing into the circle without any protection other than his own innate resistance. Situations like this being exactly what it's for, fine. Moment to put down safely and run, though.

I had assumed- because, again, that is exactly what it's for- Dale was using the magic sword, and there are a couple of rule things to be aware of. Really wierd things don't take damage the same way as normal things do; lumps of bone and flesh, minor undead, yes, but this, no. It's not going to be diminished by its' injuries until it finally comes apart, and it is quite possible that the more badly hurt it is, the more it will bluff and bluster and pretend it isn't.

Counter taunting it has one very beneficial effect; it makes it mad. For a wizard or the undead remains of one, not being able to think straight is a serious disadvantage.
It lashes out, trying to do nothing more sophisticated than splash waves of magic into Dale; for a moment he feels trapped between two water- hammers, and rather hopes that creaking noise was just a rib, but it passes- and he steps forward into the attack and cracks the thing in the chest with the edge of the shield. It reels back against the iron post, grey and white vapours boiling off it's bones. Still existing, though.

When Alfred (with Dirt and Larric probably yelling at him) enters the chamber, he sees one of the skeletons apparently about to take mist form, one dissolving- far from certain that what the druid is doing is entirely reverent but it seems to be working- and one prodding streamers of electric fire at the mesh suspended over the circle, fighting for control.

Actions?

[Fiji_Fury]

Dale is too fixated on his battle to even realize Sir Alfred is present. He'll carry on, discarding his normal sword and pulling out the magic murder blade. Time to end this. If there is further time for action, he'll hammer the remains of the skeleton between the shield and the iron post, while bringing the sword up to strike at the mist or an outstretched limb (depending upon what is there when the strike falls).

[Simon_Jester]

Larric has had to set down Fifi. Cursing as he struggles with the weight of the shield, he attempts to gauge the weight. Very heavy. Can he, in his opinion, hold up his end without injuring himself? If not, he cries "I can't carry this!" and eases it to the ground. If he can manage it, he'll try to sidle farther away from the tower along with Dirt.

[Kaelan]

Great, looks like it's up to Dirt to play tray carrier.
Setting down his arms and pack, Dirt carefully picks up the shield
"Help with balance"
and starts to slowly carry it outside.

[Eleventh Century Remnant]

While Dale changes weapons, the skeleton tries to regenerate- and then thinks better of it, and decides to backstab the third one, the one that's wrestling for the circle. reaches out to it and draws energy from it, there is a brief struggle but surprise wins the day; the third one is weakened but not finished, the one Dale was fighting has become stronger.

Prepare to be irritated as the skeleton counterattacks with a wave of kinetic force and essentially grabs the shield, twists; Dale lashes out at the skeleton forcing it to let go before getting itself cut in half- it's afraid of the blade, you can tell that much. Afraid and angry.

Alfred strides in, and Aburon looks at him, 'Have you- oh, crap. Right, you sort this one out.' The skeleton he was facing off with has collapsed in a small heap of chalk dust and iron filings; he runs out to find Larric trying to let the door down without spilling anything. It's a feat to keep the thing up, for Larric; can just- just- do it, but not far and not for long- and he has enough sense to know how high the cost of a slip, a mistake could be.

'Right, you get that corner, I'll get this- carefully, in step, Dirt keep that end, and remember we've got shorter legs than you. More of it than I thought, this is going to be tricky. Steady as we go.'


While that's happening, back in the circle- the numbers are not with you, the thing is building out of control and it's fighting in a typhoon now- Alfred manages to resist the blinding flashes of thaumaturgical light and the elemental presure surges, the washes of heat and cold, and swing for the skeleton, but it's gained in strength, moves aside. Blocks and parries Dale's attacks, but doesn't strike- it's waiting for conditions to weaken you and give it an edge, maybe?

The winds of chance were not with you there, not at all. Which makes it especially annoying because you're actually doing the right things, and they're just not coming off- the environment is fighting you too.

Changes in the next round?

[Simon_Jester]

IC:

Fueling his maximum-effort burst of moderate-capacity musculature by sheer determination- I am NOT letting lab safety break down today!- Larric lets down the door much more slowly than he would if it were covered with anything other than horrible, horrible poison.

Lower with the knees, not with the back!

OOC:

[rubs lower back, wincing in memory]

Anything else can be worked out after I get that thing on the ground and secure as possible. Question, is Rohal available to help us?

[Eleventh Century Remnant]

At which point the druid tries not to scream, saying 'No, not down, shuffle to your left- not with the entire thing- you get that bit, i'll get this bit. You support that corner, I'll get this corner, Dirt you get the other end; everybody, calm. Together. Right? let's get this out of here. Are we all doing the same thing?'

Basically his plan is to do it as a three man job- the two humans on one end and Dirt on the other. Rohal was outside- but may help, now that I think of it. 'We're not going to get far with it anyway, just outside the blast radius should be enough, we can work on plan B from there.' Aburon says. Fine- three humans and an ogre. Should be enough. Any dissenters?

[Simon_Jester]

Larric is totally on board with that- I'm imagining Aburon shouting this as he rushes to help, because there was no way Larric would try anything but putting it down once he realized just how damn heavy the thing was. He'd be happy to move it farther; he just can't do the job in Alfred's place.


Rohal, as I recall, is fairly strong. Assuming Aburon's about average in that respect, I imagine the three human-sized figures could get the door moving a pretty good distance, probably faster than Sir Alfred could handle it alone.

If Rohal comes up, Larric tries to shuffle a bit more and give him the 'end' of the door, moving so that he's stabilizing the corner and side; presumably Aburon would do the same on the opposite side unless he's quite a bit stronger than I'd expect.

Anyway, yeah, just get the thing reasonably clear and leave it at that. Larric will grunt and jerk his head to suggest that they park it behind a rock or in a hollow, if any such thing is available- safer that way.

[Panzersharkcat]

He goes for its spinal column.

[Eleventh Century Remnant]

Just that, nothing fancy? Well...

That was nearly disastrous. Nearly. What actually happens is that Alfred draws back for a swing at the thing and waves his hammerhead through a concentrated stream of elemental fire energy. It runs down the hammer towards him, and for a couple of seconds he gets to be on fire. The skeleton looks at this critical failure, feels rather smug about it, and counts Alfred out.

Too soon. There's a reason knights are trained to resist hostile magic, and it's chiefly because they had to put things like this down; evidently it was trapped here before having to face anyone in shining armour, and thinks it's won- Alfred defies and shakes off the flux of power clinging to him and swongs for the thing. It turns back just too late, and hammerhead meets spine, just below the ribcage, with a most impressive crunch.

The other skeleton takes advantage of this to take most of the power that one stole back, incidentally, and blasts a beam of black light into the webwork of wires suspended over the circle. Several of them melt, and both skeletons seem to grow slightly larger, stronger.

Dale?

[Panzersharkcat]

(OOC: No need for fancy. Anyway, what was the size of a Byzantine cataphract or was there no set number for its size? It's for the neo-Byzantine empire I'm writing. Mentioned in the rough draft that the current emperor used to command the 5th Cataphract during the conquest of Sicily. Might have to change the number depending on how large a cataphract is supposed to be.)

[Fiji_Fury]

Okay... confirmation first:

Alfred and I are swinging at the same skeleton, the one Auburon was fighting is destroyed and the third one is making with the hokey-pokey on the circle. Alfred just smashed the one we're dealing with. Is it done, or just very badly hurt?

If it's finished... I transition to the other skeleton to stop it. If our first target is injured but still writhing, I'll bring the sword down and finish it it off. The other one is becoming a greater concern, but I'm not inclined to leave a vengeful spirit at my back.

[Simon_Jester]

OOC:

Panzer, in real life a "cataphract" was a Byzantine heavy cavalryman- solid armor protection, lance, and bow.

When ECR speaks of, say, the Twentieth Cataphract, that is in the same sense that we might talk about the Third Armored Division. He's referring to a unit which is intended to fight like cataphracts (heavy cavalry with bows), and so has "cataphract" in its name and definition. As such, your question sounds a lot like asking, "what was the size of an American tank," where 'tank' is meant to be an armored unit.

From what I know, cataphracts were organized as units based on perceived need and strategy. A general fighting in a major conquest might be assigned a lot of heavy cavalrymen, whereas an untrusted commander or one holding a lightly threatened area would be assigned fewer. So estimate the manpower requirements, and that tells you how many cataphracts. There is no unit called a "cataphract" of some fixed size, or even non-fixed size, in real life.

[Eleventh Century Remnant]

On the Byzantine thing, as my mate Vic says- nasal sex. The Late Roman army isn't really my thing, and the Byzantine army evolved out of that. Vegetius might be able to give you a start there, but I think the system did a lot of evolving after that to changing circumstances, and their best days were really in the early period, before they and the Persians basically hammered each other into the ground and the Arabs took advantage. Mass butterfly infestations of the kind needed to change history to that degree mean 'supposed' doesn't amount to very much.

The Twentieth Regiment of Cataphracts (Striking Phoenix) are a really bad example to copy, I'm using the term because it's appropriate but the organisation is mostly their own.


Dale and Alfed are swinging at the same skeleton, yes, the one Aburon was- well there was very little apparent violence, they just glared at each other then it crumbled. It is gone, though. The first target is injured but still writhing, indeed; an overhead shot, swinging at it- it tries to blade- trap, catch the sword between the palms- or the bones anyway- of its' hands; actually succeeds, but the magic in the blade flares and the thing's hands crumble to dust, the blade bites into it's skull which splinters.

As it ceases to exist the circle splashes, flares again- waves of power that Dale has to angle behind the shield to cover himself with and Alfred is luckier- the worst of it doesn't touch him. I should point out that fighting in the circle is neither safe nor wise and may get you spontaneously dissolved. Lucky, that time.

The last skeleton is still blasting black lightning at the web; turns to you.

Actions, now?

[Simon_Jester]

Once we get the door put down, Larric trots toward the buried tower, flexing his arms and praying they don't seize up just yet from the bicep-cracking effort. He takes up his crossbow, left on the ground near the entrance to the mound, along the way.

Disgusted at what he finds- writhing horrible skeleton-wizard-monster!- he moves around the outside of the circle, angling for a clear shot that runs through a patch he can recognize- elemental magics seem the order of the day, so he's looking for lightnings or waters.

Then put a lightning arrow through and into the skeleton, see if it picks up strength from the unstable power.

This may make a clear shot nearly impossible, in which case he loses that action. Sometimes a good plan later is worse than a mediocre plan now. Larric's trying for the former, or thinks he is.

[Panzersharkcat]

(OOC: Well, the only thing I knew of was the equites cataphractarii, and they kind of had fixed unit sizes in that a lot of them were organized in comitatenses. I was not aware the Byzantines didn't do the same, though. Oh, well. That frees me up to make things up a bit, I suppose. But yeah, no real need for lots of butterflies. It's an organization basing themselves on the Byzantines after the nukes went flying. It's how you get cataphracts in power armor, including their horses, carrying missile launchers and machine guns trying to fill the role of tanks. That, admittedly, was more because it sounded cool rather than because it was practical. Well, there might be some practicality to it in that it's easier to raise a horse than to build a tank but that doesn't really fly when they're also building iron-clad fusion-powered dromons.)

He backs up a bit and tries to circle behind its rear and hit its hip.

[Simon_Jester]

OOC:

So, yeah, just make up whatever you like. If you want to use Roman unit names make them roughly correspond, so a 'century' or its equivalent would be roughly company strength. But that's just to avoid looking dumb.

IC:

Waiting for some kind of resolution of our own actions outside; other than that, not much to do. Though I don't know if Kaelan's cooperating with the whole 'put down door' scheme, I assume he would.

[Eleventh Century Remnant]

My brain went 'boing' at least three times reading that. Power armoured horses? The wastage rate in training is going to be sky high and you're going to end up with an awful lot of broken animals. The Eastern Roman Empire weren't exactly the happiest and best adjusted bunch around, anyway- do you really want endless bureaucracy, rampant fratricidal backstabbing, and far, far too much etiquette?


Anyway-

it's going to take a few moments at least to get the door out of the mound and clear, long enough for some combat- couple of rounds, depending how they go- to take place inside the tower.

Long enough for Alfred to have to defend himself against one strange attack; the skeleton uses motion not to attack directly, but to rip one of the (weakened) parts of the control runework down from the ceiling- and drop it on him. The attack is well done, and metal makes contact with flesh- and as the skeleton was expecting it diverts the mountain's attention away from it, and towards Alfred.

Helped by the fact that he has no idea what the shouted impulses in his mind actually mean, the most sensible thing to do is resist- any specifics on how?

[Panzersharkcat]

(OOC: The last one, yes. These guys are a bit better about the fratricidal backstabbing and bureaucracy, though. They're still on their first dynasty, at least, even if they sort of made up the bit about being the Palaiologos family and continued the numbering from Constantine XI. The main purpose was to create an anti-Caesar's Legion, which base themselves on the Romans, down to having contubernium led by a decanus and the existence of the frumentarii. The Legion is much more mustache-twirling evil and anti-technology than the real Romans, though, so in the same way that the Legion isn't totally faithful to the historical Romans, the neo-Byzantines simply use a lot of Byzantine things but adapt them for a post-apocalyptic world. Also, the idea of power armored horses came from the cover of Fallout: Equestria.)

He mentally raises an eyebrow and continues trying to flank the skeleton.

[Simon_Jester]

OOC:

I hope this isn't out of line, Panzer, but...

Uh, I think he might be looking for a bit more than that. Vast alien intelligences' magic is trying to converterize your brain; some detail in how your character resists might actually be good for bonus points.

[Panzersharkcat]

(OOC: It's not. Uhh... Hmm. Let's see how this works. Scratch the previous post. Also, gave up trying to make up an exotic name and went with 2nd Cataphract Squadron. Probably will do the same for infantry units below a chiliarchy.)

He steps back out of the fight, clutching his head. He may not not understand what the bleeding hell the voices are saying but he attempts to drown them out with marching songs and dirty jokes. Anything to keep his mind rooted in reality.

[Fiji_Fury]

While Alfred is staggering, Dale leaps out of the circle and around its edge. The shield is held at the ready between his own body and the skeleton. That black lightning looks like it would sting.

Dale locks his gaze upon the final skeleton and advances. "Only you remaining. Your stolen power will not save you. Your corrupted form will not hold. You will perish."

He'll take a full-on run at the creature, using the shield to smash it. Follow-up sword stroke.

OOC: Motion allows for manipulating objects without physical contact!? Interesting...

[Eleventh Century Remnant]

Yes, Motion does allow that- it's quite a lot to do with what it's mostly used for.

For Alfred; hm, skills that might be good as a primary for that kind of defence are Culture, any kind of Sing or Perform, Acting...ah. This could be tricky, then.

Fortunately the contact is only fleeting, physically backing away made a lot of difference, and shouting loudly- well, singingish- if anything distracts the night from trying to learn anything about the power at the other end of the mesh.
Alfred caught a fleeting impression, as if he was looking out of the crystal ball at the entity at the other end controlling it, trying to regain power over the circle. Not calm; surprising amounts of hate and fear and panic, and lots of corners- lost of sharp definitions, if/then loops.

Dale steps out of the circle, battered, damp, muddy, and smouldering slightly. And charges. The skeleton does something complicated, a multipart casting that it would be a good thing to cut the verbials short and get it before it completes- the shield bash actually succeeds too well; it may be a skeleton but Dale was expecting more solid resistance than that- crashes into it, chipping bone and sending sprays of white into the circle, and puts him out of position for the sword stroke- manages the attack, though, but can only catch a limb, a foot. Slices through the thing's shin, though.

Next round?

[Fiji_Fury]

In Shadowspeak attempt to taunt the remaining skeleton and disrupt its concentration (in conjunction with some good old hack n' slash).

Round on the skeleton and appoach it more carefully this time, bringing a sword stroke from high right to low left (shield is in the left hand so it remains relatively between myself and the skeleton until the sword strike is delivered).

"Your end is now. Feeble as your attempts to resist have been, we have no more time for you."