Homebrew tabletop game system thread the II

[Panzersharkcat]

Alfred is relieved William backed down as he really does not want it to seem as if he needs his lackeys to do things for him.

[Feralgnoll]

"I guess thats how it would translate. The biggest wolf in the pack." And Chuckles a bit at Larric's dog joke.

[Simon_Jester]

OOC:



Kaelan, William was ignoring the social side of the situation. There are literally dozens of people of knightly rank around this castle- most of them at least crudely proficient in weapons of some kind. Oliver is not the problem, not by himself. The problem is that every single objective we're fighting for, everything we could possibly want to accomplish, revolves around our relationship with those people.

And by trying to pick a fight with a knight, from his own position as a mere man-at-arms, William's just managed to alienate everyone in the building in one fell tone-deaf swoop. Not good.

You've lost track of who holds the balance of physical power here. The party cannot fight all the knights in the castle, and trying to kill this one random knight in order to look OMG REALLY SCARY to all the others is a stupid idea, especially if we go about it the way William just did by essentially playing the clown and jumping into a tense confrontation between two men of equal rank by turning it into a clash between a random punk and a respected member of the community.

You aren't humiliating Oliver, because you're basically threatening to kill him and he's totally within his rights to fight back without disgracing himself. Even if he loses, he loses to a crazed, foaming-at-the-mouth ruffian, and all sympathy and law will be on his side. Not ours.

Instead, you're humiliating Alfred, by at once acting as though he's your boss and acting as though you're an unrestrained loony. Because if he is your boss, it is his responsibility to restrain you and prevent you from doing things that reflect dishonor upon him. And he has obviously failed to do so, so he's in essentially the same position as if his dog had just pissed all over someone else's foot. The dog is now an unwelcome intruder in the community, but he becomes an unwelcome intruder by virtue of having brought an obnoxious idiot into the community in the first place.

[Simon_Jester]

GHETTO EDIT:

Of course, now Alfred has restrained you, or tried to, but he still looks like a fool by virtue of being associated with William did, and I think we just lost some political capital on account of what William did.

[Eleventh Century Remnant]

First of all, Simon, there is no way in hell I'm going to let you claim a Galaxy- class starship as a magic item, no matter what I happen to think about treknobabble. (And there are just enough hints about how subspace really works scattered here and there to be internally consistent and potentially much more interesting than the drivel we got- oh, well, an argument for another thread.)

Oliver nods, says 'An hour and a half, then.' and stalks off.

Andrea looks to Alfred. 'I hope you're as good as he'- meaning William- 'says you are. I wouldn't class Oliver as a brilliant warrior in general, too cold blooded, but he's a good duellist and a damn' good technical swordsman. You did a good job of winding him up.' she adds the last bit to William. 'You'll have most of the people here out for your blood if you do it again, though.'

[Simon_Jester]

OOC:

Oh, pooh. I had no intention of doing any such thing. The guilty DM bans where no one pursueth...

Can I claim the act of sinking my head into my hands at the stupid as... not a magic item, but perhaps a signature gesture? I get the feeling I'm going to need to do that many more times.



Anyway, good to see that resolved, or at least 'resolved' in the sense that we're not immediately screwed and won't be for at least ninety minutes. Time to start thinking about how to influence the odds in that duel...

What's possible? Sir Alfred needs to armor up and everything, so the question is what can be done. In a setting like this, people are aware enough of magic that hamhanded attempts to interfere in the duel would likely be disastrous; someone is going to be looking for active interference, and Oliver's resistance is probably good enough that he'll know if someone's screwing with him.

Then again, I doubt magic items are forbidden as such, so playing around with Alfred's equipment might actually be possible. Hm. [thinks, wishes he knew the context better]

[Panzersharkcat]

(OOC: Aww. Can he claim a Batmobile? Say, the one used by Dick Grayson? There's nothing that distinguishes it from other Batmobiles, other than it flies. Oh, OK, there's that. But it's not like we can fit the whole party inside, like we could with the one from The Dark Knight Returns, which is basically a tank with rubber bullet-firing machine guns.)

Alfred stalks off to equip his armor and his maul.

[White Haven]

Verone Tanner

Verone has a fantastically broad base of magical knowledge, and is deeply interested in the hows and whys and suchlike of sorcery, far more so than the whats. Of course, magic has a habit of not actually making any sense, which leads to substantial exposure to the raw elemental force of frustration, which in turn leads to hair loss, which leads into his other noteworthy fondness: extravagant hats. As to the rest of his background, well, that’s all wrapped up in a huge big ball of disadvantages. If I detail it here, you lot will have entirely too much to go on when you decide whether or not to start picking at it...

Attributes and Skills:

-(10-1) Strength
12 Athletics
6 Brawl

-11 Agility
Dodge 8
Rapier 11
Riding 10

-(10-1) Endurance
9 Survival
9 Resist Injury

-10 Temper
11 Resist Magic
8 Determination

-(13-1) Fellowship
9 Culture (Kuquani)
11 Human Perception
10 Politics

-12 Charm
9 Banter
9 Courtliness
12 Persuasion

-14 Logic
11 Perception
11 Rites and Rituals
14 Runes

-12 Creativity
8 Composition
16 Thaumaturgy

-14 Education
10 Culture (Elvish)
12 Cypher
10 History
12 Legends and Lore

Cypher is being deliberately interpreted as "higher mathematics," not "cryptology." If you didn't want us to do it, you should have given us a longer skill list.

----------

3 attribute points unspent
5pt Exile
4pt Secret
3pt Enemy
2pt Phobia
All tied up into one not-so-little ball of unpleasantness.

Magic:

Spirit: 8
-Fire: 8
-Water: 8

Conjunctions: 2
-Shadow: 4

Wits: 6
-Air: 12

Ponderances: 3
-Void: 6

Forces: 6
-Earth: 9
-Death: 3

Talents: 9
-Life: 9
-Motion: 9

[Simon_Jester]

OOC:

Hey, WH! Good to see you! Larric could use a good mathematician. Just remember, electromagnetism and chemical-knowledge-based magic are my schtick. The rest, go ahead. Enjoy.

IC:

Larric will... hm. He needs advice, context-setting, he knows basically nothing about knightly duels except what he's read in chronicles and possibly seen at a tourney (if that's part of the Kuquanese entertainment circuit). He needs someone who is of but not fully 'with' the knightly order and old guard of the castle, someone who at heart is a practical and decent person who's at least somewhat at odds with the old guard. Not hopelessly honor-before-reason, either.

He goes looking for Lady Tamarin.

Somewhere private-ish, preferably- where no one who's likely to matter is likely to overhear, including Radulf if possible, but he's not too worried about the yeomanry. He speaks in a low voice.

In a few minutes, he explains what's just happened to Tamarin, mentions along the way his experiences since Coroghan with the knight- including in that some of his own contributions, just to make it clear that he's a magic-user of sorts though not really a war wizard at heart. At the end of it, he says- "It's a shame that they're setting Sir Alfred up so, he's a good man-" and this last, said while looking significantly at Tamarin- "I wish I could help him. I'm... not sure, though."
At the end of it, he

[Eleventh Century Remnant]

Anybody doing anything sneaky- or otherwise- in the next hour and a half, then?

On the bright side, that outrageous display has got you out of one thing- Alfred and the party are no longer the logical choice for taking point when the more aggressive of the locals try to attack the Countess, someone else is going to get that particular suicide job.

On the downside, yes, you did lose a lot of political capital- most of the social credit you came in from Caer Edric with; farewell heroism, farewell credibility. Back to Square One, almost. If a delegation of angry elves turned up now and demanded you be handed over to answer charges of murder, well, they'd at least consider it.

People aren't quite as eager to talk to you now, it's just as well you've already done a lot of information gathering because right now you'd be looking at a wall of clams, metaphorically speaking.


Where's Eliska, what's she in particular up to?

Oh, right, did you leave something off the end of that post Simon? Hm.

Tamarin's opinion on the whole subject is that 'There are several styles of duel, but they're all fairly straightforward because how it goes, what is and isn't admissible, depends on why it's being fought.
If I understand what happened, it was likely to be a trial of point, fought unarmoured, without ranged weapons and to first wound; the loser loses, well, the point at issue, why it's called that. That was what Oliver sought by the sounds of it, and he would be trying not necessarily to kill but to put Alfred out of circulation for as long as it took to get Ridebert, Andrea and the others tried. Any help would be a disqualification.

The act of disrespect would probably have made it mortal- turned it into a trial of honour, where essentially you are allowed to bring anything except your friends; "in a state as of battle", is the traditional wording, anything that you would normally fight for your life with including prayers, enchantments, magic weapons, hounds, steeds- I fear for your friend.

Anything you physically can do to help him, you may, but once in the field he's on his own- and Oliver is not merely a duellist. If he was, he could hardly be a knight in good standing and welcome at court, he would appear rather in the aspect of a cannibal. The source of his honour is that he is a hunter of monsters- he has all those things.'

[White Haven]

Referee. Not exactly what I had in mind when I took this position, nor what I had in mind when I woke up this morning, but telling your patron 'no' is about as wise as trying to explain in detail why your patron's chain of office, should it be licked, would unaccountably taste of melons.

Ah well.

A man in otherwise fairly unremarkable court clothes and an amazingly remarkable, flamboyant hat slipped into the room as quietly and subtly as someone wearing a brilliant red wide-brimmed hat with a tie-dyed feather long enough to require an artfully-concealed support brace can expect to, which is to say not very. He appeared in his mid-thirties, reasonably fit in the manner of someone who's kept in shape, but out of habit rather than any regular physical labor. He looks, well, more than a little lost, not so much uncomfortable at court, but a touch out of his comfort zone being asked to regulate, inspect, and referee a duel between one of the locals and a traveler of some sort.

"Excuse me," he spoke up, to no one in particular, "If someone could direct me to the parties who will be attempting to stab one another shortly, I would be most grateful."

[Eleventh Century Remnant]

I didn't say you had to stay employed to him, after all- Sir Alfred is in chambers in the temple, in Chelet's wing, putting his armour on- Oliver is presumably in his lodgings in the keep doing the same. Which one first?

One of those days-I need to be up at 4.30. More tomorrow.

[Kaelan]

My money's on our knight Alfred. Do you want a magic stone?

Any how, not really caring how the inbreads think (not a long term solution I know) William will try to see what radulf's take on the situation before getting a good view on the upcoming fight - it is to the death is it not!

[Simon_Jester]

OOC:

Anybody doing anything sneaky- or otherwise- in the next hour and a half, then?

I already was. Just a little more time to think, OOC.

On the downside, yes, you did lose a lot of political capital- most of the social credit you came in from Caer Edric with; farewell heroism, farewell credibility. Back to Square One, almost. If a delegation of angry elves turned up now and demanded you be handed over to answer charges of murder, well, they'd at least consider it.

People aren't quite as eager to talk to you now, it's just as well you've already done a lot of information gathering because right now you'd be looking at a wall of clams, metaphorically speaking.

DAMMIT, WILLIAM!

[glares angrily]

I foresee joybuzzers in his future...

Oh, right, did you leave something off the end of that post Simon? Hm.

No, actually, that was a typo I couldn't fix because I was typing from a laptop with a perverse sense of what it will and won't let me do on SDN.

IC:

Tamarin's opinion on the whole subject is that 'There are several styles of duel, but they're all fairly straightforward because how it goes, what is and isn't admissible, depends on why it's being fought.
If I understand what happened, it was likely to be a trial of point, fought unarmoured, without ranged weapons and to first wound; the loser loses, well, the point at issue, why it's called that. That was what Oliver sought by the sounds of it, and he would be trying not necessarily to kill but to put Alfred out of circulation for as long as it took to get Ridebert, Andrea and the others tried. Any help would be a disqualification.

The act of disrespect would probably have made it mortal- turned it into a trial of honour, where essentially you are allowed to bring anything except your friends; "in a state as of battle", is the traditional wording, anything that you would normally fight for your life with including prayers, enchantments, magic weapons, hounds, steeds- I fear for your friend.

Anything you physically can do to help him, you may, but once in the field he's on his own- and Oliver is not merely a duellist. If he was, he could hardly be a knight in good standing and welcome at court, he would appear rather in the aspect of a cannibal. The source of his honour is that he is a hunter of monsters- he has all those things.'

"I see... thank you for the warning, milady. If you'll excuse me, I've got some work to do. And if you see Eliska, could you please ask her to come help Alfred? I don't know where she's got to, and I think he'll need me too much for me to go looking.

He heads over to Alfred. Given the limits of Alfred's kit, our knight's going to have to fight on foot, armored and with his maul; Old Paint Bucket is not a warhorse. That's a two-handed weapon, so no shield, which disappoints Larric because he's thought of some interesting tricks to play with metal shield-bosses, rims, and facings.

One thing he can fall back on is that plasma hammer trick he used the night before last. Again, the concept is to sheathe the hammerhead in ball lightning, a mobile yet confined electrical charge that can be delivered to whatever it strikes- hopefully through armor.

Now, though, he needs to do it in advance- can't be visibly supporting Alfred during the fight, so he needs to set the charge ahead of time. He's thinking runes to store the charge, hopefully keep the weapon on 'safe' until some kind of activation. He's thinking how to get them onto the hammer, mark on the surface- inscribe somehow? Damn it, of all the times to stow his alchemical kit over at the boatyard! If there's anything there, it'd take a while to run over and retrieve it. Maybe not too decisively long, but still a long time.

It only needs to last two hours, though- a temporary enchantment, not a permanent one. So the question is: can he do it?

If that can be made to work, without Larric exhausting himself, he'll start trying to think of something else. If it can be made to work with Larric exhausting himself, he'll do it anyway unless someone's got a better idea. If it can't be made to work at all, he'll think of something else.

[Kaelan]

DAMMIT, WILLIAM!

[glares angrily]

I foresee joybuzzers in his future...

Well, you don't want life easy and boring do you?

Anyhow, responding with words was better than the initial response, which would be to lump oliver with the back of his axe as soon as he said the word fool. I guess that would not have gone down to well with the crowd either.

As for what we are trying to to, I was under the impression that we had done it. Radulf is here and we're just killing time until the trial, then off to find the Baron and other high advenures!

On a small side note:

you are allowed to bring anything except your friends; "in a state as of battle", is the traditional wording, anything that you would normally fight for your life with including prayers, enchantments, magic weapons, hounds, steeds- I fear for your friend.

So, Mr snuggles can come along to play as well? Would he come under the enchanted hound section....

[Feralgnoll]

So, Mr snuggles can come along to play as well? Would he come under the enchanted hound section....

"I cannot play that role currently. I am bipedal at the moment." Making sure to whisper it into William's ear to avoid revealing a potentially fatal slip.

[Simon_Jester]

DAMMIT, WILLIAM!

[glares angrily]

I foresee joybuzzers in his future...

Well, you don't want life easy and boring do you?

I want to be able to have allies. I want to make allies. I want a game where I can actually use my understanding of the situation to influence the course of events, rather than have the course of events determined by random actions from people whose grasp of the situation is actively delusional.

I want to be able to make progress toward a goal for more than twelve in-game hours at a time without having it pissed on by a Chaotic Stupid loony.

As for what we are trying to to, I was under the impression that we had done it. Radulf is here and we're just killing time until the trial, then off to find the Baron and other high advenures!

Since Larric has goals other than fighting a random selection of big dangerous creatures for the rest of his life, he wouldn't agree. Although your actions start to make more sense if you don't care about anything other than whether your character gets into a lot of fights.

Me? I want to do things for reasons, not have things done to me for reasons.

[White Haven]

Lesson One: When you're absent-minded or just plain ignorant, make it look as if it were an affectation. That way, people will be faintly amused and possibly even play along, thus answering questions that otherwise would go unheeded. Thus provided with a pair of reasonably-accurate locations, Verone began meandering in the vague direction of the midpoint between both of them as the corridor runs, the architectural equivalent of the last point of choice.

"Alfred and Oliver, alphabetically Alfred, but that's what would be expected, but the inverse could..." His muttered musing was cut short when, upon arriving at the midpoint, he was presented with one corridor half-blocked by servants frantically cleaning up spilled supplies, and the corridor leading towards where he'd been told Oliver was arming himself. With a shrug and a half-hidden smile, he turned down away from the impromptu cake-mixing contest and towards the keep.

[Panzersharkcat]

DAMMIT, WILLIAM!

[glares angrily]

I foresee joybuzzers in his future...

Well, you don't want life easy and boring do you?

I want to be able to have allies. I want to make allies. I want a game where I can actually use my understanding of the situation to influence the course of events, rather than have the course of events determined by random actions from people whose grasp of the situation is actively delusional.

I want to be able to make progress toward a goal for more than twelve in-game hours at a time without having it pissed on by a Chaotic Stupid loony.

(OOC: I foresee a hammer to the face by a very angry knight. You really put Alfred in a bad spot implying he took on Dleam by himself when Alfred very well knows, despite his desires to tackle the Striking Phoenix at a point where it's equivalent to fighting somebody at ten times his level with equipment that makes his look like a pointy stick, it required everybody in the party and then some to do it. Then some includes the death of one of our party members and somebody Alfred grudgingly respected and suspected he could have liked in time.)

[Simon_Jester]

OOC:

Hammers to the face: Er, do you mean Larric, or William?

And frankly, what puts Alfred in a bad spot is that William's behavior has made what was to be a duel to "first blood" (more or less) into a duel to the death against an arguably superior opponent. Which means that Alfred risks being killed by William's jackass ways. He's now in a fight to the death or maiming, instead of a fight where the only way anyone's likely to die is by accident.

Having an inflated reputation doesn't hurt you. Getting stabbed in the neck by Sir Oliver does.



Anyway, what I want to emphasize is that this kind of behavior is incredibly unwelcome to basically everyone in the game world, and that if Willam can't learn to restrain his tongue in front of large crowds of armed men, he pretty much deserves to have it removed.

[White Haven]

Verone's been experimenting with a procedure that would allow the tongue to be removed and held in a sort of stasis in the event that anyone actually wants to reattach it later...

[Panzersharkcat]

(OOC: I meant William. I thought I typed William in there at some point. Note to self: When quoting, make sure to clearly address who you're addressing.

I think I have some idea of how to take on a mounted warrior alone, even if Larric doesn't manage to enchant Alfred's hammer in time. I would hate to take out poor horsey's legs but it's that or having to roll up James Hagen or some other character.)

[Kaelan]

OOC
If it's easier all round I will 'retire' William and draw up a new character. I'll let ECR call this one, along with the retirement method should he so choose.

[Panzersharkcat]

(OOC: No, just make sure William has learned his lesson.)

[Simon_Jester]

OOC:

Kaelan, what matters is the attitude of the player- the character isn't going to act insanely or foolishly unless the player is willing to let him.

So the question is, are you willing to avoid having your character provoke NPCs? To be sensitive to the situation, instead of acting as though the armor of PC-dom entitles you to treat them however you please, regardless of in-game questions of rank or activity?

I mean, a little bit of needling is fine, and things like "when do I get paid?" have their place, but bursting into the middle of a challenge to a duel and making all manner of boastful threats makes your character look like a shit-flinging chimpanzee. It's just a bad idea, regardless of the circumstances.

Can you avoid that in the future, or not? It may mean your character simply doesn't get as involved in 'sociable' settings featuring high society. Which is okay; having your man keep his mouth shut while among people who outrank him is a survival strategy for someone who offends people a lot.

So maybe William should be like Rohal and stick to practical 'street-level' stuff, while the court politics problems are left to Alfred (who has rank), Larric (who has circumspection and respects others' rank, so even if he messes up he'll do so with a bit of grace), and Verone (who appears to be able to navigate social situations tolerably well, on our short acquaintance with the man).

After all, William was doing fine with the ordinary guys around the castle- it was when he treated a court problem like a tavern brawl that he disgraced us.