Random religious reference for the title of the thread it is!

...I really am scraping the bottom of the barrel. Well, at least I already know what I'll be using for the eleventh OOC thread if we ever get to it, and I don't think we'll see a twelfth... although, with how incredible a bunch of players you are, who knows, we might! ^_^

Until then, feel free to keep discussing your plans in here - I'm really curious to see what ideas you'll come up with. :)
This message was last edited by the GM at 18:54, Thu 07 May 2015.

Hmm, I'm not getting the reference.  Then again I'm not religious.  Curious about it though :)

Eleventh might be "Eleventh Hour"? :)

Twelfth could be "Twelfth Night"?

Thirteenth is probably pushing it a bit, and I can't think of one for that yet.  I'll come up with something though :)

Indu religion, there's a principle referred to as "nine jewels".

Up until now, I did my best to refer to concepts that use their number as "something extra" (ie, eight marvel of the world is not somethng that exist, but a figure of speech to indicate something that's in the same class; similarly, the "fifth column" terms refers to the fact that, to surround a city you need four columns, so there should be no fifth - but the terms refers to having forces of saboteurs within the besieged city, so while not an actual "column" of soldiers, is does the works as the others, and so on).

This time, however, I'm inventing an expression that doesn't exist, using it only for the mental association... hence, my comment on scraping the bottom of the barrel. :)

In that case, maybe the thirteenth one (if we get that far) could be "Thirteenth Hour".
Based on "Labyrinth", where the clocks in the Goblin Kingdom all go up to 13 instead of 12 :)

Anyways, waiting to see if someone has a plan here.  All I can think of is sneaking around, but not too sure which is the best way to go.
Guessing the citadel door is on the opposite side to us.  But also guessing it'll be very heavily-guarded and we don't want to go that way...

Clearly by the logic of the naming then it hasn't to be 12th hour, because we will be most likely too late to save people, and then 13th night, implying we've been around too long in a this fantasy world :)

No such thing as "too long"! ;)

Ok, while we might need to be big darn heroes and allow the prisoners the chance of freedom, ten year old prisoners may well be in no condition to be a distraction. Not unless we've all decided to be chaotic evil and use them as a cannon fodder style distraction :p

Just in case I wasn't clear, I do meant "people who have been in prison for ten years", not "people who are ten years old in age". Most of these prisoners were either captured during the battle of the gnaag wars, or else kidnapped during some giak raid, so you can be sure there arent any childhren among the prisoners, at least - the giak would have eaten them first if they'd caught any.

And also, a second clarification, these are prisoners of the fortress Nadziran's leader, not of the Drakkarim - they've established themselves as a force here only very recently, and are mostly to be considered as an "occupying force" than local soldiers, even if this is an occupation that was reache by an agreement between the ruling Nadziran and Vyctar (with Zahira's mediation, for any who's interested in understanding how the mechanics of it worked).

I knew you mean prisoners for ten years, I'm just assuming that means they will be physically in no shape to help in a battle. Maybe?

Still, if the Nadziran are seen as an 'occupying force' then maybe we can start planting suspicion against the Nadziranim and have the Drakkar looking ot the mages as much as us...

The Drakkarim, not the Nadziran's soldiers, are considered the occupying force. This is a Darkland fortress, and if you were to ask the local leadership (Xagash, Helghast, Vordaks, Gourgaz, and whatever else) they'd tell you that the humans have no business setting shop here. NO matter how much the human's leader (Vyctar) might have managed to worm himself into the grace of the Nadziran who currently commands the place.

And I can safely confirm that there's plenty of bad blood among the two groups - it's not like the Drakkarim soldiers are happy of being here either, they're just following their Baron's orders, while the Hammers are just following along their leader, with little care for where he'll lead them other thn "to greater glory".

That said, if you can think of how to persuade a bunch of lowly giaks to take arms against a disciplined, heavy-armoured and more numerous force of occuping Drakkar soldiers, you're my guest, and welcomed to try. As for manipulating the not-human leaders, you really think they'd care less for the drakkar than they do for you, their sworn enemy of generations?

Still, you've surprised me so far a great number of times; if you want to try to do so once more, I'll watch with great interest! ^_^

Hi guys, back to my place, again. I've been logging in (erratically, most of the time) but didn't have really time to post (plus it's a pain for me to type on my phone :) ).

As a side note: thanks for all the tips you had given me! (@Swift: visited the Counting House in Glasgow - really nice place; @Snake: the south bank of the Thames is a beautiful place to have a walk through, indeed).

Diving back into the game: Shadow, just to check - when you say Nadziran, you mean one main sorcerer (that commands more Nadziranim that are subordinated to him), don't you?
I'll post IC tommorrow morning, but there's not really much info coming from Hornet. At least, at this moment.

I use Nadziran as the singular of Nadziranim. I can't confirm or deny any supposition as to the number of such that are currently present within Gazad Helkona.

Also, happy to have you back, Hornet. :)

Welcome back, glad you enjoyed yourself - hope the weather didn't turn on you too much

By the way, after some consideration, I decided that, considering today is Saturday here where I am, I've decided to give you all time until the end of Mondayto present ech other your infiltration plans and allow for some brainstorming - only once that term has passed will I start conting down the time until somebdy discovers theat your side door is missing its guards.

I hope that's helpful! ^_^

Pity we didn't catch a higher ranked soldier. We could have spun it that we were here taking advantage of odd behaviour - that we should have been attacked in coming close by those beasts, but clearly the Nadziranim had for some reason kept them all back.

Similarly, conjecture that the storm that hit the gate that we took advantage of might not be natural.

After all, if Vyctar is going off alone, then he won't notice what's happening to his soldiers all around...


Then let the Drakkar warrior run away to warn people and start setting them against each other. Not sure, no matter how well controlled a soldier might be, that a single one could raise enough interest.

In terms of whatever they are breeding down there, if they will attack anything without discriminating then releasing a few might be a good idea to thin the Heard as well as give us a good distraction

Plus a nadzirans labratory usually contains goodies :)

Was lucky in that regard (got only completely drenched in Glasgow).

Good, no confusion there, then, as I understand it the same way. :)


Are you thinking what I'm thinking...? ;)
I can see that Sabre does ^_^ So, yeah, releasing the Doomwolves could create a decent amount of chaos.

Snake, are you saying we should try to spread out disinformation through the captured Drakkar? That's an interesting idea.

So far - I have no plan, to be honest. I think we have opportunities to start creating confusion inside the fortress (as we did in front of the walls), but the question is whether we really want it or rather want it now?
This message was last edited by the player at 18:49, Sun 10 May 2015.

No trip to Scotland is complete without sampling the traditional Scottish weather, hehe  :)


That seems to be a recurring theme in Giak, they add "im" to the end of words to make them plural.  I've been seeing it that way too.

I'm always up for unleashing a bit of widespread chaos and destruction! :D

It was just a thought regarding misinformation Hornet - if we go 'yeah, none of that magic stuff is us, we just used it to sneak in...how odd that no creatures were in the forest to catch us, it's like all the creatures were pulled back here...." and then creatures got let loose, maybe the Drakkar would think it a Nadziran plot to get rid of them and have Vyctar's schemes for themselves.

Like I said, a more high level Drakkar would have helped. Not sure what a low level Drakkar could do, even if Snake can push what he does or doesn't reveal if we let him go...

Well, like any other asset you have, it'll mostly be a matter of how you choose to utilize him. :)

Even if he just distracts them in one direction so we can skewer them from behind it will help! After all Snake can sweet talk him into it :)

I can't make him do anything combat related, and I might not be able to do anything long range. But yes, he could distract someone before we attack from behind - but we may have to skewer him afterwards :(

Indeed, he can. :)

Aren't you all going to come up with a plan now? I wasn't joking when I said that, starting from tomorrow, your time to plot without being discovered will be small.

Here, I'll make it explicit: strting from tomorrow (I'll count from the moment I log in), every post you make in the IC thread will count toward the total of 35 you have before you are discovered by a passing patrol. Each new day, I will lower the amount of remaining posts by 5; this means that, if you have made 3 posts in total tomorrow, your remaining total will be 32 until I log in the day after - once that happens, the number of remaining posts you have before acting becomes 27. And so on with each day that goes by.

When the counter reaches 0, the missing soldiers will be discovered, with all the consequences that depend on that... and if you are still there, you will be found, too.

So, you might want to cme up with a plan of action, and then put it into practice, very soon... no pressure! ^_^

Chaos and destruction and skewering people.  I like where this is going! :D

You would. :)

I won't have time to post until the evening, but I want to (and will) re-read what info we have scraped so far.
And then it's planning time! (And according-to-plan-proceeding time!) ^_^
(Not that there's anything fancy to be expected. ;) )

Release the monsters seems to be the general idea so far? Anyway, see what Water Hornet says.

Sorry, got completely snowed under. I think, you're right, Snake. Let's just define our first step and then move from that. Will concoct an IC post in the evening.

I doubt Swift will have much to add here.
She's kind of looking to Sun Snake as the group strategist on this one :)  If she was here alone, she'd probably feel more confident about poking around, but having a lot of folks (some of whom don't have Invisibility) to look out for has brought back her phobia of leadership!

That said though, her sneaky stabby skills are at everyone's disposal :)

I mean obviously there's a player / character divide. Your character might want to do things, but if as a player you can suggest stuff and ways we might persuade your character to do them? Like climbing up a wall of death, you know, fun things to get Swift Fox near death and save us from risking anything :p


Maybe we should split up, the fighters moving to a safe spot ready to fight stragglers, the sneakers go release the monsters?

I believe we're on 25 posts before discovery? 24 once WH posts.

Actually, you're at 30; I have an helpful counter in my biography line to help you all keep track of things. :)

Hmm, I'd have thought Sun Snake would have worked out how to persuade Swift Fox to do anything by now...  ;)

(Perhaps even remove that last barrier to gaining her trust, hehe)
This message was last edited by the player at 19:15, Wed 13 May 2015.

Who knows, Swift Fox might have done some damage to Sun Snake's hopes when she was all 'we're still never going to be allies' :p

Well, that was partly due to a few little things that had built up in her mind that kind of broke down her trust in him (although the situation was improved a lot by their little chat back in the cave at the Maakengorge, otherwise she might have been even less willing to trust him after his rather hasty comment to her there).

And partly due to her over-reaction to something he did that probably wasn't intentional.  That'll only be revealed if it comes up in conversation between them though.  And I think even Swift is starting to regret that more as time passes and she comes to terms with certain things.

Suffice to say, her somewhat unstable emotions have cooled off quite a lot since she revealed her story to the team and realised they weren't going to hate her or reject her as she'd feared they would.

There's still a couple of little things getting in the way though.

She really doesn't hate him though, and perhaps even regrets that she doesn't feel like she can find enough common ground between them.  He could probably pick up on that easily enough during those times she lowers her psychic defences, even if she's not open about it :)

But yeah, let's see if we both get out of here alive first...  ;)

OK, I pushed things forwards a bit forcibly, perhaps, but we're running out of time, aren't we? :)

Snake, I'm elaborating on you idea to spread disinformation: if the Drakkar agrees to help us, then we 'ask' him to lead the search for intruders along the false trail. If he doesn't agree - or we sense that he's being dishonest (!) - we give him a false trail.

In any case, ideally if we manage to manipulate the search party near Doomwolves kennels, we could release the beasts and let the fight of man vs. wolf erupt. Next step would be adding the beasts intended for the forest to the mix and then releasing some of the prisoners - hopefully, alarm and fighting creates enough chaos to cover our approach to the citadel. And in an 'emergency situation' like that it might be easier to avoid 'proper processes' - like telling correct passwords and such.

Well, not an actual solid plan - we'll have to think it through more thoroughly, but at least we make a first step, currently, and know where we stand regarding the Drakkar 'prisoner'.

The Drakkar is tricky and won't likely keep us a secret if he goes too far. So I'd either have to have Sun Snake go with him hidden or we have to put up with that knowledge. Maybe even use that to our advantage.

I like the idea of making it seem the Nadziran are making their move to get rid of the Drakkar though... see what the Dreakkar says then I'll see what Snake can do to influence him in the direction we want.

Exactly. I assume we'll be able to tell whether the Drakkar is being honest with his answer (through Sixth Sense).

Thus, if he says he'll play along and genuinely mean it, we'll tell him what information to spread further.
If he says he'll play along, but is lying, we pretend to believe him and deliberately feed him false information.
If he says he won't be helping us in any way, then we just leave him tied up/unconscious somewhere. (Again, we can pretend to discuss our plans in front of him.)

In fact, I hope he decides not to cooperate - be it stated openly or covertly. Then we can be sure of his status. If he agrees to help us, then we can run into problem when his Drakkarim officers don't believe him/interrogate him for the true information, thus stopping to believe anything he says (i.e. not believe any lies we tell the Drakkar). :)

We'll see.

When did hornet get so scary 0.0 and foxy of course will go along with this :)

Speaking of scary, Water Hornet, you might not have picked this up in your read through, but basically Sun Snake has the Drakkar as a meat puppet right now. A lot of the speechifying has been so the Drakkar does not know he is being controlled and has some mental excuses for his own reactions.

That control is keeping Sun Snake from doing anything else right now, and also won't have lasting effects, but right now I'm sure Sun Snake can exert enough mental pressures to ensure the Drakkar cannot lie.

He has the best tutors... ;)

Snake, yeah, I noticed Snake was trying some psychic shenanigans on the Drakkar, but didn't know how strong those were. Anyway, good to know.

I should be able to post tonight, the Drakkar doesn't need to reply :)

Although he will, if you want him to. Just ask for it. :)

Intriguing... :)

I was thinking more about the way to sneak into the citadel and here are my thoughts:
I doubt we will find an 'unguarded' entrance - like a forgotten underground tunnel. Even though the Drakkar is (likely) speaking the truth about underground levels outside and inside the citadel not being connected, he might not know everything. But, it does make sense that Nadziranim (and whoever built the fortress) would leave no backdoor into the citadel.

I don't deny we could attempt to create an entrance of our own - like digging a tunnel or breaking through a wall - at an appropriate place, that is.

But I was thinking along different lines: let's make use of the fact that Nadziranim and Drakkarim forces are somewhat separated (actually, even Drakkarim could be split up into two groups - Vyctar's men and those of the Drakkarim baron). Once the commotion starts, we could try to approach one of citadel's standard entrances and pretend we're Nadziranim servants. I suspect the guards will be Drakkarim, so with the fuss around it would be easier to explain our lack of knowledge of proper passwords and demand to be allowed inside.
If we run into true Nadziranim servants, we will have to fight them, but that seems more preferrable option, because I see their forces less organized than the Drakkarim (though, that might be just my false impression).

Long story short: while finding a discreet way of infiltration into the citadel (like digging a tunnel, climbing in through a window etc.) might be better, under current circumstances I lean towards the simple way of creating a distraction and then demanding the access into the citadel under cheeky pretence of being Nadziranim important servants.

Thoughts...?

EDIT:
Snake (Swift, Sabre), up to you, if you want the Drakkar to speak up.

Even better if we can somehow make it appear as if the Drakkarim killed them ;)

Cool, the Drakkar should be able to relay our story!

So, time to figure out that whole letting loose all the critters plan (or trying to use our senses again to spot a potential weak area of the keep to tunnel under!)

You better figure things out fairly quickly - your time is sort of running down...

True that. Looking at the countdown, we have to move out before (real time) tomorrow. o_O

That means last round of IC posts where we declare leaving the walls tunnel and we hopefully disappear right as the absence of guards is noticed.

Yep, that's the idea, hopefully... the soldier already agreed to do your bidding, so you can dismiss him without further input on my part - now it's just a matter of you getting all your ducks in a row and then pushing them onward before tomorrow comes.

Ok, end the Drakkar away and proposed a 'plan' IC - any tweaks we want or something else we might have at our disposal?

Everything seems good to me; as far as other resources are concerned, Sun Fox still has the smoke at hand, and she can also raise a new sandstorm inside the fortress if you want it - this time, she won't need the help of anybody to do it, since the area is much smaller than the plain outside was.

I will also need to know the exact road you're taking, reflected to the map - this is OOC information, so here is fine, but I need to know which building you're standing close to, which you are avoiding, and your directions at each fork in the road, since that's what I'll be using to determine the DC.

In particular, be very specifc in telling me where you're moving to: are you making a beeline to the Kennels? Are you stopping at builing 3? Are you trying to run along the wall and sneak by the Gate? Let me kno, it's very important!

And I shall be 100% clear - slow tracts of stealth will require lower DC, but obviously one roll for each tract, while crossing the entire fortress in a single go will be only one roll, but... somewhat more difficult, let's put it like that.

:)
This message was last edited by the GM at 16:45, Sun 17 May 2015.

Don't know if Swift has the scent suppression improvement.
Also can she conceal others or just herself?

Sun Snake can use Trailblazing+Invisibility to lead the group along a stealthy path.

Also no, Swift Fox, as you can check in your character sheet, you don't have either SUppress Body Scent nor Fake Scent improvements, so those abilties are out of your ability to use. :)

Funnily that was the first one I took at character creation - just seemed to tipify sun Snake being so internal that he didn't even register as being there.  Dind't think it would come in so useful :D

Can Swift Fox and Sun Snake working together reduce the difficulty of concealing the group significantly, or is Swift Fox's WP / skills better suited to doing something else then?

After all, once we've done this we've still got to work out our next move, make Swift Fox you can find us a new trap to exploit or figure out the best way to the citadel?

I can think of ways the two of you together might work up some combo that'd help. I'm not going to suggest these combo for you, though - you should come up with the solution to your problems on your own, after all! I ill just say that there are possibilties, but you do need to find them first, bevore you can make use of them. :)

Well Swift was designed as a solo infiltrator/stealth assassin type.
Probably a bit of a bad idea for this game, since it involves a lot of face-to-face combat that forces her to come out of the shadows and fight :)
This message was last edited by the player at 18:02, Sun 17 May 2015.

You mean to say to me that your hiding skills weren't at all useful in this game, Swift Fox? Because I seem to remember differently. :)

There's a captured meat puppet we sent to disrupt things that was only captured by your combination of skills!

Well she was going to kill him, then changed her mind.
Wonder if Sun Snake knows why...? ;)

I'm presuming it was one of those really annoying sneezes that doens't seem to want to happen,and that was distracting her from the murder

I wasn't sure what exact path we wanted to take, so I wanted to play it safe and at least say that we're moving out of the tunnel and to the nearest building.

If we do know where to go (e.g. Snake, you know exactly along which path you're leading us), then feel free to say something like "Just follow me and don't stop!" and Hornet will follow. But since nobody said anything like that, Hornet will move the group at least to the first 'waypoint'.
This message was last edited by the player at 15:38, Mon 18 May 2015.

Indeed.

I actually considered you all to have already moved out - I'm just waiting for whomever takes the lead to post your first stop along the way. As I said, while you most certainly can just run in a straight line toward the kennels, which would involve only a single roll, I do strongly encurage you to make several stops along the path, since, while each stop = one roll, those will be much easier roll to make.

And as before, Snake, your use of Trailblaze could help but is not indispensible - it merely lowers the DC for everybody who's following you by 5, so it's usefulness is relative. I'm specifcying this because if you make a segmented run (ie, making several stops), then you'd need a Trailblazing use for each, and that might get expensive on your side - hence my remark that using it, while helpful, isn't at all a forced choice on you. I dislike forced choices.

Having said all that... you lot still have to give me your stops. If you're fine with Hornet's suggestion of just moving to the stables for now, that's fine by me as well - just confirms it, and I'll give you the necessary DC.

Oh, and remember to tell me if SUn Fox ought to raise another sandstorm inside the walls, or not - that, too, will affect the DC somewhatm, as you can imagine! ^_^
This message was last edited by the GM at 15:48, Mon 18 May 2015.

Swift definitely won't take the lead!
Why, it's almost as if you don't trust her to be walking close behind you carrying sharp stabby implements...  ;)

Dunno if I can use my camoflage to help Sun Snake at all.  Although I'm trying to conserve WP from here on, since I have a feeling I'll need it when we get to Vyctar!

Well I guess I will ask if the first trailblaze/Invisibility use can also also help to determine the best stops?

Anyway will go roll now and decuect 4WP.
This message was last edited by the player at 17:14, Mon 18 May 2015.

Everybody, I really need you to tell me if you want Sun Fox to spend WP on crafting a new sandstorm, or not. It's quite important.

I'd say have Sun Fox use the sandstorm now to make a reasonably painless trek to the stables, and then have Sun Snake use trailblazing to get us to a new way point with a high DC next.

Hmmm, at first, I thought it would be better if Sun Fox saved some WP. But on the second thought I tend to lean towards Snake's proposal to let Sun Fox raise a sand storm for our cover. (So, it's a yes from me.)

That's two, you're four, I need at least another vote to finalize the action - alhough a consensus would be preferred, of course. :)

Anything that stops us getting killed is a good thing, although we might need Sun Fox with high WP later on...

Still, not much good if we get killed at this bit, so go for it :)

If it matters I'll say sun fox to use the sandstorm.

You all forget that there is another killing foxy around ;)

Can't speak for the others, but I most surely haven't - I have a series of plot beats and dramatic moments to further up your character's arc ready and everything. Hopefully you won't hate me too much for them! :)

Mum down this weekend, so I should be able to post ok.

not sure where to go next, presumeably the Invisibilitty bonus stays for this section? I can roll for trailblazing for the next one if we want to be adventurous and try to get passed the Drakkar quickly.

Yeah, I think I can allow anybody who is going to use their bonus to either Camouflage or Invisibility to have it apply to, let's say... five consecutive rolls for this stealth section; the turn you pay me the 1 WP and inform me that you're using the ability is the turn I will start to count from - which of coure means that anybody who already used their bonus for the last roll can apply it to the next four.

Just tell me which hiding places you're going to aim forward and hich path you want to follow, and then I'll give you a Dc for it; after which, you're free to decide if you want to try that route or not.

To avoid you checking all the routes, though, you've only ten total path you can ask me about right now -  any more than that, and I'll assume you've dallied too much in front of the watchtower and enemies have just exited it to walk stright into you.

Ask your questions, let me know your decision, and good luck to you all! ^_^

Given the sinister stuff that went on in Swift's backstory, I'm a little nervous in case you haven't finished with her yet... ;)  hehe.

If we're using Invisibility to shield someone else (like I'm doing with Raven and Snake is doing with Dawn), does that cost 2WP or only 1?

You can't use Invisibility to shield someone else - not without some special ability and some creative use of Disciplines. Silver Raven can use his own Camouflage bonus though, if you want him to.

And of course, if you can come up with a way to help him hiding himself, ask along and I'll tell you if it can work or not. :)

Ahh ok, so I was rolling for his Camouflage ability before?

Hmm, depends on how I'm making myself go unseen, if I could use the same method to draw attention away from him too...  I dunno though.

Getting to the side pointing down of 2b is a Camouflage roll with DC 3; getting to the side pointing down of 2a is a DC 7 - this is because all of the 2 buildings have their door opening on the left side, so to get to 2a you'd need to pass directy in front of the guards standing at 2b's door.

This may change depending on Hornet's roll for the horses and what he actually horders them to do - notice that until you check inside the stables, you can't know if the horse are tied up or how they're secured, so just making them go crazy might not suffice to release them. Just a fair warning. :)

Warning taken into account ^_^ - I edited (expanded) my last IC post accordingly.

Let's see what it looks like inside the stable, before doing anything else, then.

Well, I guess I really shouldn't be surprised. We probably better prepare that anything we encounter in the fortress, won't be as easy as we'd wish. ^_^

Anyway, Shadow, I'm considering several options - could you please tell what each would entail (as usually: don't expect to hear if it will work, but rather what resources need to be spent to try whether they will work ;-) )

1) If the horses are agitated/scared strongly enough, could they kick out wooden doors to their paddocks? (I understand they can't destroy the metal locking bars, but the doors keeping them in place are wooden, right?)

2) How hard and time consuming would it be to use the Starfield warammer to destroy the locks? I can imagine Hornet running along paddocks, smashing locks with the warhammer, but probably it won't be that easy...? :)

1) Not really - the bars are put horizontally across the door's lenght, so the horses woulcn't be able to smash the doors aside without breaking the bars first, which they obviously can't.

2) I can't see anything wrong with this plan, so it will work easily, except that it'd take you a bit of time. Each lock is CS 24 and END 6, while each metal bar is CS 42 and END 60.

Note that you can't die "fighting" an inanimate item, but you do take damage - it is a representation of the effort you're pouring into the job.
This message was last edited by the GM at 16:47, Sat 23 May 2015.

Interesting... And regarding the 'fight' with the lock: lost END is lost due to fatigue, right? Plus, would every broken lock lower Hornet's CS by 1, like (almost) every combat does?

Guys and gals, right now I'm considering I'd free only one of the horses and let it run near to the guards of |2b| - hopefully they get distracted by that, plus send someone to investigate the stable. And at that moment we slip by.

Any alternative suggestions would be welcome.
I'm just somewhat hesitant to "waste" time and CS (plus, potentially, WP if Starfield Warhammer's special effect would be used) for breaking locks. Even better might be the option of using Mind over Matter for lockpicking - although that's also time-consuming.

EDIT: Ah, just saw you edited your post. :)
This message was last edited by the player at 17:00, Sat 23 May 2015.

I'm not going to make you pay 24 CS to break a bunch of locks! It'd be considred all a single battle - so you'd only lose 1 CS at dthe end of it. Although 24 are a good number of rounds, so something might happen on other fronts.

Also remember, you can fight more than one enemy at a time (up to a Group of five can be taken on at once) but if you do, each target gains a +2 CS for each of the other targets you'd be attacking.
This message was last edited by the GM at 17:06, Sat 23 May 2015.

Remember Sun Snake can trailblaze, so he can try to beat a DC and lower it for the rest by 5 I think it was? So DC7 is about 90% to succeed and that gives everyone else an 80% chance before applying Camouflage bonus.

I'm not sure what resources Sabre using Vigilant costs, but he could shear a single bar easily?

Sabre susing Vigilance could cut throgh anything immediately, unless it was something specifically treated with magic to be indistructible, like the Sommerswerd is. He could cut a tunnel through the citadel's walls with that, if he wanted to - although that'd require several uses. Needless to say, that's a very costly ability.

As for trailblazing, yes, you could do that for the DC 7 - or you could all make the atempt at the DC 3. Also, the resence fof the horses, if you can free them, will cause confusion and thus lower all the DC some more.

Psi-surge is a costly ability too, and I don't believe natively either Sun Fox or Sun Snake have the ability to shatter material anyway :(

I know Swift Fox is trying to conserve WP, can Silver Raven use his craftsmanship to perhaps spot any weaknesses in the locks and so reduce the CS or speed up the amount of attacks that can be made?

I think you're all missing the forest for the threes here, but then, you're the players. :)
Craftsmanshiop wouldn't help much against the locks, because there's nothing to know about them - they're very simple devices made of steel, without any magic or other particularity to them.

Can Water Hornet get the horses to attack the locks? Or at least direct their attacks to the door at exactly the right spot?

Or are the hooks the padlocks attached to easier to hit?
This message was last edited by the player at 18:13, Sat 23 May 2015.

As much as I like the idea of going smashing stuff with the warhammer... ;) ...looking at the numbers it just doesn't seem like an effective way. With my CS I could get to a Combat Ration of -5 (-4 perhaps, if using a shield and such things would still grant bonuses in this specific fight). Thus, I'd have some 50% chance of success in one round (thanks to the Warhammer's damage bonus). But I risk loosing some END, 1 CS and possibly alerting the guards. And if I take on multiple opponents, it will save time, but will lower the chance of quickly ending the fight (and thus preserving Hornet's END and WP).

So, last questions :)
Shadow, how hard (and time-consuming) would it be to pick the lock with Mind over Matter?

Anyone has a Night Vision, by the way? I have a feeling the key to horses' paddocks is hanging on the far wall. :D

EDIT: Snake, I asked about horses helping free themselves (msg #78-79)- that's not going to work.
This message was last edited by the player at 18:16, Sat 23 May 2015.

Picking a lock with Mind over Matter would take about the same time as smashing one with the warhammer; the DC to open a single lock is 2, and you can open multiple locks at once, since they're all equal, by adding 1 to the DC for each additional lock you're opening.

As for the Keys, you can't see them anywhere nearby - there's rope and riding stuff like saddles and such as well as hay laying around, but not the key - your character would guess that they are probably kept in the watchtower, since it's just in front of the stables and it's usually much more sensible for that kind of Keys to be kept by whomever is in charge of the stables rather than be left laying about the place. Nice idea though. :)
.

Swift seems pretty comfortable in the dark - For future reference :)

Very well, edited the last IC post - tried Mind-over-Matter approach..and it worked! :)

Seems like we have three horses at our disposal, now. Not many, but better than none.

I think I told you already, Hornet - you need to beat a DC 4 Animal Kinship roll to command the horses. Assuming you do beat it, then your post is fine.

Using the horses the way you stated will reduce the DC of the race for 2a by two, and the DC for reaching 2b by one - for the final camouflage DC of 5 and 2, respectively.

You now just need to collectively tell me where you're going, which abilities youre using to make your job easier (if any), and then make your rolls. :)

Yes, you did. I just wanted to wait for others to decide where we want to go and how we want to proceed, as you've just written. I'll make the roll, then (if it's OK this way).

So, I think we should head towards the citadel; but maybe reach south wall of 2b and circle around it on the east (getting near the building 3)...?

sorry i was under the impression hornet was in the stables solo on his attempt! once we get running i can add something ;)

I was, but I popped out (and afterwards disappeared back in again) :)
Plus, we can/should decide OOC, where to head next to.

I can burn WP to make a hard DC attempt easier, but only once.

Are we screwing ourselves over by moving only to the DC2 area? Should we just have Sun Snake lower the DC 5 to DC 0 and be done with it and go for the tougher move with no risk? And does that actually get uis to the doomwolves? Sorry, just got back from a long weekend so haven't checked up on the map to see how far we still are.

How close to your destination will be after moving really depends on where you plan to go, Sun Snake, so you should check the map and decide from that. Take your time, we're not in any particular hurry and you did say at week start you had to spend time with family - that's a perfectly acceptable reason not to have followed the thread along.

I can say that the lower DC for one of the building is because that building is closer and because to reach the other one you'd need to run in front of the peopl warding this first building; I'm always giving you the DC for the most direct routes from your position to your targeted location since you've yet to specify any special path you'd like better, so the lower DC here merely means a shorter and less exposed route, that's all.

Uh, there was not a post throughout the whole of Wednesday... is something wrong, that nobody wants to play anymore? Is there some UK based Holiday these weeks, are real life troubles keeping you, or is just something about the game? Because the first would explain things, the second I can understand, sympathze with and make allowances for, but if it's the third, I really, really need to know so I can fix things.

This was supposed to be a tense infiltration section, but I'm not sure Ive nailed it if half the players don't seems involved... so if there's anything (about either this section or the whole game in genral) that you're disliking or annoyed by, please, let me know. I can't make things better if I don't know what the problems are.

Is there anything that's keeping you from posting?

I'm still recovering from the weekend so was in bed by 9.30 last night.

I still have to look up the map but I think sun Snake using his trailblaze to get everyone safely to 2b allows less risk than two trips.

Ah sorry, just had an insanely busy week there, hoping next one will be a bit quieter.

I don't think there's much Swift can do right now, except camouflage attempts whenever we move, but if anyone thinks of anything they might need her to help out with, feel free to call on her IC :)

In reply to Sun Snake (msg # 98):

Snake, I did said that you taking your time was understandable - the other players do are able to make a decision on a path to follow without your help, if you're too ndisposed to give it. rest if you have to, and d't worry overly much, - if I say I understand, then I do, and you should have known I wasn't adressing you in particular, since you had already warned has you would have a valid reason not to post for a bit.

Swift Fox, how about you make a suggestion on which option is better of those two that were checked for, or make a plan of your own? You don't need to make it in character - suggesting it here in the OOC thread and discussing it with Sabre and Hornet would be a good start. It'd also allow Snake to rest, since he needs it.
This message was last edited by the GM at 12:24, Thu 28 May 2015.

I actually felt bad suggesting that latest plan of Foxy's :/ but it's a good shout personally

Ruthless but practical :D

Poor horses :(

See now if it has been seagulls then Foxy would have taken pleasure :)

Yeah, though I have been posting recently I did have a quieter time before. Aside the load at work, I just had trouble coming up with ideas that at least sounded doable. (Shadow, you just designed Gazad Helkona and its defenses perfectly ^_^) But then I realized that any idea is better than none; plus if the player can't think of anything clever, then so doesn't the character - but the character can't just stop, (s)he has to be moving forward even when uncertain what to

Tl;dr :) Let's get going again!

Sabre, the idea with horses might not be that brutal - after all, I guess Doomwolves' masters must've been aware of their ferocity and hopefully made their kennels sturdy enough to withstand the fury of an enraged beast. We'll see...

Indeed. And I agree with Hornet - you should suggest the ideas you come up with, even if they seem unlikely, there might be way to make them work.

For example, Sabre Fox, with the sandstorm waxing about the fortress, commanding the breeze to bring the horse's smell to the knnels (who are on the opposite side of the fortress from where you are) would be very hard; however, if all you're doing is pushing the air around the horses themselves to make their smell much more easy to pick up, while atth same time Hornet directs them in a circuit around the fortress so that eventually they'll get close to the kennels, that might work. That's another thing you all should keep in mind - teamwork is really important to succeed here, it's the one thing you have that enemies will have the greater difficulty matching.
Having said all that, I still need to know your destination.
This message was last edited by the GM at 09:22, Fri 29 May 2015.

2a is the DC 5 move? Go that way.

Despite having to pass in front of the soldiers guarding 2b's door? That's brave. :)

I'll wait everybody's opinion before asking for rolls.

That's where the trailblaze comes in handy, right? :)

Yes - but, if the others feels like sparing you the WP cost of ensuring success by gambling on the DC 2 option, it is their right to get the chance of saying so. ^_^

Realistically, if we release the horses to distract the guards attention that should lower the dc?

I believe the DC has gone down from 7/3 to 5/2 for 2a/b with the horses released

You believe correctly, Sun Snake. :)

I'm happy to go for the (formerly) DC 5 section then :)

As long as you can cover us with invisibility that will be fine too ;)

Swift Fox, there's no "formerly DC 5" option - there's either "formerly DC 7" or "currently DC 5". Well, alongside "formerly DC 3" and "currently DC 2".

If you go for the DC 5 option, SUn Snake is offering to reduce the C to 0 with Trailblazing, but that will cost him a good deal of WP, hence why I'm giving a chance to everybody to give their opinion on the matter.

Also, Sabre Fox, I'm not sure what you're voting for - could you clarify?
This message was last edited by the GM at 11:31, Sat 30 May 2015.

The dc 5 option that Snake can make zero with his enhanced effects

Incidentally, I have Hildun stored for extra WP ;)

Well, I think Snake should better save WP for later, perhaps...? Hence, I'd go for the southern wall of 2b (= brave the DC of 2 ^_^)
(With the intention to circle around 2b from the east - i.e. close to building 3 - afterwards.)
This message was last edited by the player at 12:22, Sat 30 May 2015.

WP is good, but we'll run out at some point anyway so there's no point in getting revealed and needing to use it up in combat anyway without advancing. Not that between trailblazing and the doomwolf freeing Sun Snake will have 0WP though, just two free Divination-based discipline uses.


Would it be possible to get an updated map? I'm getting confused with what is where. I thoguht the Doomwolves were in 7 not 5 for some reason.

Maybe you should ask for that Hildun then Snake!

Missed your second line before, sorry - doesn't that need food?

Edit: Nm, it's the 2WP potion. Cool, so noted if its needed!
This message was last edited by the player at 14:40, Sat 30 May 2015.

I did say I would not update the map... but maybe I can move the k representing you. I will think it over, but nevertheless, I'd still reccommend that you keep and update the map on your own - it eems like it woul be more appropriate to the situation.

Anyway, I think that's a three to one vote for going Sun Snake's path, so that means that you are free to pay, Sun Snake, and describe how you'll move after the horses and guide the rest of the Group; I will update the situation with everyone being behind you afterwards.

You're right about that, I have to admit. :)

Well, Hornet also has Tortwich salt - that gives WP (+3) when combined with a meal. Also Larnuma Oil (+1END, +1WP); and Gnalia leaves (+4END, +1WP) for making a tea (boiling water needed).

You have that much WP restoring stuff remaining? Hm. I wonder if I can change that... ;D
This message was last edited by the GM at 18:09, Sat 30 May 2015.

What? You mean up to now you have only been preparing to start draining our WP? :-P
:-D

Who knows? Other than me, I mean. ^_^

This is why you lot shouldn't talk. You give the evil GM ideas :(

Stop right there, mister, our GM isn't evil! [Private to GM: So are we agreed that Hornet leads the whole group to their death, but you let him survive and escape?
^_^

By the way, folks, here's the map, copied from my ScratchPad (as Shadow previously advised) and updated according to my information. Please, give a shout if something doesn't seem right (see below).

************************************************************************

MAP OF GAZAD HELKONA

                 ______________________________________________
                / s___________________G_________s_____________ \
               / / /\          ____      /\      ______  /\   \s\
              / /  \/         I    I     \/     I______I \/    \ \
             / /              I    I                            \ \
            / /          o    I  1 I                   o         \ \
           / /         o      I____I                     o      /\\ \
          / //\      o                                     o    \/ \s\
         / / \/    o                                         o   __ \ \
        /s/ __                                                  /  \ \ \
       / / /  \                       8                         \   \ \ \
      / / /   /                                                  \   \ \ \
     / / /   /                                                    \ 1 \ \s\
    / / /  1/                                                      \__/  \ \
   / /  \__/       ________                       ________                \ \
  / //\           I        I   /\  _______  /\   I        I   <> <> <>     \ \
 / / \/     o     I        I   \/ /       \ \/   I        I  <> <> <> <> /\ \s\
 I I       o o     \  4a  /      /         \      \  4b  /               \/ I I
 IsI        o       \____/      /           \      \____/                   I I
 I I   _     _______     _     I             I   /\         I I I I I I     IsI
 I I  I_I   /       \   I_I    I      C      I  / /         I I I5I I I     I I
 I I       I     7   I         I             I / /    /\    I_I_I_I_I_I     I I
 I I       I         I          \           / /6/    / /                    IsI
 IsI /\     \_______/       o    \         / / /    / /   ____              I I
 I I \/           ____     o o    \_______/ / /    / /   I    I          /\ I I
 \ \    __       I    I                    / /    /6/    I  2aI       __ \/ /s/
  \ \  /  \      I 2a Ik           __      \/    / /     I____I      /  \  / /
   \ \ \   \     I____I           /  \          / /                 /   / / /
    \ \ \ 1 \                    /    \         \/                 / 1 / / /
     \ \ \   \     o            /      \         ____      o      /   / /s/
      \ \ \__/           ____   \   3  /        I    I            \__/ / /
       \ \      _       I    I   \    /         I  2aI                / /
        \s\    I=I      I  2bI    \__/          I____I               / /
         \ \   I=I      I____I                            /\     /\ / /
          \ \                             ____            \/     \// /
           \ \  /\           o           I    I  o          /_/_/ / /
            \ \ \/                       I    I            /_/_/ /s/
             \ \   _____           /\    I  1 I       /\  /_/_/ / /
              \s\ I_____I          \/    I____I       \/ /_/_/ / /
               \ \____________________________________________/ /
                \______s_______________G_____________s_________/

<Seagreen>
G = main gate
s = side door
k = the Kai team position
C = inner citadel (the Sommerswerd is deep underground at the center of this building)
/\
\/ = Guard tower
 _
I_I = ?
 _
I=I
I=I = stairway underground
/_/ = open air cages with beasts for the forest
 ______
I______I = Horse stable
o = Kraan spires
<> = ?
1 = barracks
2 = ?
3 = ?
4 = ?
5 = Doomwolves kennels
6 = ?
7 = ?
8 = training area / parade plaza
---
Please, be careful - if you make a mistake in your interpretation, I'm not going to correct you on it unless it is really something that your character would find self-evident, so any wrong step made here could really turn up lethal.

************************************************************************
This message was last edited by the GM at 16:38, Tue 02 June 2015.

Thanks WH. Also I already removed the trailblaze at the start of the encounter and hadn't noticed, so I actually have 5WP free (2 set aside for Doomwolf freeing).

Studying map and weighing options - will post shortly.

Well, it is dark and there is a sandstorm imperversing across the courtyard, but it would seem doomwolf, since it's dark with grey stripes, like doomwolves fur often is. Of course, the tent was made with more than jus one pelt - it's, as i said, a very large entrance it was made to cover.

Also, I moved the k on the map, so you know where you are exactly - hopefully that'll make it easier for you to decide where to move to next.
This message was last edited by the GM at 16:38, Tue 02 June 2015.

Can I tell anything about what the one like this near us might be for?
 _
I_I

That's the one room building made with huge, heavy slabs of stone. It has no other identifying feature that might help you tell what it is for.

Go raiding, especially if we can draw out some doomwolves :)


I think the DC 9 check might be worth the risk, I have a reroll and a +6 bonus. Especially if you guys keep a psychic eye on Sun Snake and can try to mitigate a failure?

That would only work if they can justify how they would be helping you go unnoticed - you alreay have the doomwolves howling and the sandstorm helping you, remember - but if your fellow players can figure a way to use their powers to your advantage, Sun Snake, I will have nothing against that giving you some more bonuses to the roll.

To note: the DC is that high becuase you'd have to run right in front of the door to building 3 and then in between the two 6 buildings. If you can think of a less open route, you're free to suggest it and I'll give you a D relating how likely you are to be discovered following that different route.

Could the sandstorm be manipulated slightly (perhaps through the use of Swift's wind scarf) to blow a few small pebbles or something against the far side of the citadel to trigger one of the traps on that side, hopefully attracting some attention? :)

If silver Raven can monitor for someone detecting Sun Snake, Swift Fox's idea of them manipulating the wind to the traps might be fun.

Especially if the doomwolves launch soon after a trap exploding just to confuse matters :D

While that might cause some chaos, it will also cause the soldiers to check the citadel's walls, an your Group will be easier to see from there. Still, if you feel like it, you can do that and then roll for luck, Swift Fox - if it's good luck it'll help your efforts, if it's bad luck it'll hinder them.

I hope that's fair? :)

I'm not sure if it could be any helpful in this particular case, but this feels like a fun thing to try: can Water Hornet use Animal Control to project "animal emotions" (thoughts adjusted to animal minds) over Sun Snake's mind to cover it with them (perhaps with the help of Hornet's Psi-screen and Snake's own abilities)? The goal would be to hide Snake's mind from any psychic sensitive creatures who would be alerted by presence of a human mind (but would pay no attention to an 'animal' in the courtyard).

Maybe that's a silly idea, e.g. because Snake can hide his psychic presence completely himself...but if it lowers DC and saves Snake a couple WPs it might be worth a try.

Yeah, to do something like you're suggesting you would need at least Mindfort, Hornet, and Sun Snake do is better at Psy-Screen than you are. And also, it wouldn't matter in this case - Sun Snake isn't hiding from psyhic probes, only by being spotte ase runs past by any Drakkar or Giak. A much more visual than psychic trouble, so psychic shielding isn't going to help much on this matter. I'm sorry.

Maybe you can come up with some other idea, better suited to provide a visual form of camouflage? :)
This message was last edited by the GM at 19:41, Tue 02 June 2015.

Hmmm, ok.  Anyone want to trust all our lives to my luck? ;)  hehe

An even/odd coin flip seems scary, I agree (not necessarily disparaging your luck :D  )


Perhaps the idea still has merit, with Swift Fox's eye for a target but Sabre/Hornet providing the direction with Nexus?


This is all assuming Snake blows the roll, of course, If he succeeds, your talents are all better suited to being PCs and looting everything not nailed down! For the nailed down things, use Nexus first to loosen the nails :p

What Fox said could be another distraction. If it is a smithy or lab, there are things to find as explosive or set fire to for another distraction?

Ooh, sounds fun! Can Sun Snake sense any minds in the smithy? If not, then it might be clear to go to. Timing it with Sun Snake releasing the doomwolves may well be enough to split the Drakkar up significantly? Even try to storm in to one of the traps to create three distractions. Four counting the horses, and five with the storm itself.

lol, hopefully the Drakkar soldier has done his job and told some high ranking officer about tyhe Nadziranim plot, then we might have some real chaos :D

If you want to cause some proper kickass explosion in the smithy, you'll need to have somebody with Craftsmastery along, Sabre Fox. As long as you have that, it is definitely something doable.

ooo, ooo, pick me!  pick me! :D

Been too long since I last blew something up!
This message was last edited by the player at 21:09, Tue 02 June 2015.

Well then it looks like we have a witches cauldron to brew :)

So did we make a plan? Sun Snake goes solo, everyone else goes insane on smithy?

I'm happy to wait to see if our idea brainstormer WH can figure out any more detection mitigation stuff for Snake of course :)

Otherwise, I can go post then roll and cross my fingers!

i thought we were all going to the smithy to create a large explosion to draw attention?

Do that first then go free the doomwolves?

See, I thought we were splitting up to cause havoc in two areas at the same time...

I is confuzzled!  (O.o)

I just throw around silly ideas in the hope someone melts them into something usable ^_^
I agree with the plan - if the smithy is empty, I think that's definitely a chance to take advantage of.

And I also agree Snake shouldn't be left completely alone: either split up the team or we all go into smithy and afterwards free doomwolves (although the horses will likely be caught by that time).
This message was last edited by the player at 20:58, Mon 22 June 2015.

As I said in the main thread though, keep in mind that freeing the Doomwolves will be a metter of a few minutes at most; sabotaging the furnaces is fgonna take much longer, in the order of at least half an hour if not more. It's perfectly doable - nobody is going to check there without reason after all - but I do think the time differential is somethng you should keep in mind as you plan along.

OK, I think it's been decided. :)

Yep. Snake and Swift, remember that you're in charge of rolling camouflage for Silver Raven and Dawn Sword as well. :)

4 for Dawn Sword!

8 for Silver Raven.

Stole a good roll from me there :(  hehe.

Well I had thought we would be checking out the rooms before snake arrived but my delay meant that didn't happen. I'll just assume Fox was in the other room for Sun Fox's remark ;)

Hornet, I easily admit that it's my fault for not being clear about this, but the boxes are of different sizes - some are longer than you are but somewhat narrow, others are about the size of a three years old kid, the majority are about halfway within the two, and only a few are smaller - which in this case means about the size of a small electrical hoven or such. And each one of the smaller boxes would still be quite heavy; you can carry around two small boxes only if you're willing to reduce your CS by 1, and as for the larger boxes, you can't carry more than ones at a time - and the taller, narrower one wouln't fit the door.
I'd expected you to open the boxes into the other room, if I must be honest - it didn't occured to me you'd try t move them around. Since you did, though, I ought to tell you that each one makes a metallic, tinglig sound (if only a very soft one) when it's moved.

Also, an hammer and scalpel from the anvil room will suffice to force open any box you want to check the content of.
This message was last edited by the GM at 19:24, Wed 10 June 2015.

Ah, okay. I edited my IC post.

I will not spend CS on moving the boxes and will follow your line of thoughts - i.e. try to open the boxes inside the storing room. :)
This message was last edited by the player at 20:12, Wed 10 June 2015.

Spend it! Do the hard labour!

When did you all joined club evil? I want in too! ^_^


Hornet, I need you to also tell me which size of box you are opening... or are you opening them all? Because there's a couple dozen of each type, so, opening them all might take a little bit.

And you can't really blow up yourself that many times, now can you? ;D

I think you've just joined that club. ;) :D

I'll open the smallest box, that has crossed warhammers painted on it.

Check again the main thread - I think I mistyped the Private Line. Should be in Sun Fox's post.

Got it, remind me however Swift, did you return the climbing gear? Or kept it? Or perhaps left it?

She returned it to you under the tunnel, when Sun Snake was interrogating the captured Drakkar.

Yep.  In-character I meant to return it.
Out of character, I totally forgot!  hehe.

The first rule of evil club: don't talk about evil club.
The second rule of evil club: always bring your own drinks (people poison the club's drinks)

And the first rule of lending out shinies is always assume they'll be stolen by 'forgetful' PCs :D

Just a future note: I'll be away from 4-Jul till 11-Jul and almost completely off-grid in terms of Internet connection. I might get a chance to follow game's progress, but not post anything.

Noted, Hornet - and thanks for letting us know. :)

Yeah, I hope it won't slow down the game too much. (Especially now, that matters are getting more and more tense.) :)

And speaking of moving forward - sorry for many questions in the last post, but we should perhaps plan our next move. The main question is probably how do we enter the citadel. With doomwolves on the loose and furnace on fire, that seems a decent amount of distractions, yet adding something more would seem a good thing. Then we could come up with some believable story (and the way how to present it) and try pushing our way into the citadel with demands and threatening.

On the other hand, time is working against us, so perhaps rushing things forward now might pay off later.

Or if anyone has ideas of an alternative way into the citadel...?

For reference, in post 123 of the current thread, Swift Fox gave you a full description of the Citadel's defenses and entry points.

Thanks for pointing that out, Shadow.

Hmmm, hmmm.

We could try accessing the citadel via air - i.e. classic way of stealing several Kraans and landing at the top of the building. If the smoke of the burning forge is thick enough we could manipulate it to hide our group from flying patrols. A risky approach (e.g. navigating through smoke ourselves will be hazardous), but it could be an alternative... *ponders*

Hark! Foxy has to do the explosion??!! 0.0 avast!

BIG BADDA BOOM!

************************************************************************

MAP OF GAZAD HELKONA

                 ______________________________________________
                / s___________________G_________s_____________ \
               / / /\          ____      /\      ______  /\   \s\
              / /  \/         I    I     \/     I______I \/    \ \
             / /              I    I                            \ \
            / /          o    I  1 I                   o         \ \
           / /         o      I____I                     o      /\\ \
          / //\      o                                     o    \/ \s\
         / / \/    o                                         o   __ \ \
        /s/ __                                                  /  \ \ \
       / / /  \                       8                         \   \ \ \
      / / /   /                                                  \   \ \ \
     / / /   /                                                    \ 1 \ \s\
    / / /  1/                                                      \__/  \ \
   / /  \__/       ________                       ________                \ \
  / //\           I        I   /\  _______  /\   I        I   <> <> <>     \ \
 / / \/     o     I        I   \/ /       \ \/   I        I  <> <> <> <> /\ \s\
 I I       o o     \  4a  /      /         \      \  4b  /               \/ I I
 IsI        o       \____/      /           \      \____/                   I I
 I I   _     _______     _     I             I   /\         I I I I I I     IsI
 I I  I_I   /       \   I_I    I      C      I  / /         I I I5I I I     I I
 I I       I     7   I         I             I / /    /\    I_I_I_I_I_I     I I
 I I       I         I          \           / /6/    / /                    IsI
 IsI /\     \_______/k      o    \         / / /    / /   ____              I I
 I I \/           ____     o o    \_______/ / /    / /   I    I          /\ I I
 \ \    __       I    I                    / /    /6/    I  2aI       __ \/ /s/
  \ \  /  \      I 2a I            __      \/    / /     I____I      /  \  / /
   \ \ \   \     I____I           /  \          / /                 /   / / /
    \ \ \ 1 \                    /    \         \/                 / 1 / / /
     \ \ \   \     o            /      \         ____      o      /   / /s/
      \ \ \__/           ____   \   3  /        I    I            \__/ / /
       \ \      _       I    I   \    /         I  2aI                / /
        \s\    I=I      I  2bI    \__/          I____I               / /
         \ \   I=I      I____I                            /\     /\ / /
          \ \                             ____            \/     \// /
           \ \  /\           o           I    I  o          /_/_/ / /
            \ \ \/                       I    I            /_/_/ /s/
             \ \   _____           /\    I  1 I       /\  /_/_/ / /
              \s\ I_____I          \/    I____I       \/ /_/_/ / /
               \ \____________________________________________/ /
                \______s_______________G_____________s_________/

<Seagreen>
G = main gate
s = side door
k = the Kai team position (I'm not sure about this - Shadow, could you please correct me?)
C = inner citadel (the Sommerswerd is deep underground at the center of this building)
/\
\/ = Guard tower
 _
I_I = ?
 _
I=I
I=I = stairway underground
/_/ = open air cages with beasts for the forest
 ______
I______I = Horse stable
o = Kraan spires
<> = ?
1 = barracks
2 = ?
3 = ?
4 = ?
5 = Doomwolves kennels
6 = ?
7 = forge
8 = training area / parade plaza
---
Please, be careful - if you make a mistake in your interpretation, I'm not going to correct you on it unless it is really something that your character would find self-evident, so any wrong step made here could really turn up lethal.

************************************************************************

OK, guys, here's the map, again. We're at building 7. Since Xaghash and elite Drakkarim unit are circling the citadel from south, we naturally need to go north. Plus that's the place where we suspect the citadel's entrance is.

Thinking about it now, it does look like a trap, doesn't it? In any case, we need to investigate, I think.

Considering the route: the best way is likely to circle along 4a. We should just remember 'o' are Kraan spires and I_I is a one-room building with its northern wall missing.
So if we circle 4a from west, we'll have to deal with Kraans and possibly sentinels in the 'o' spires; and then move next to entrance to 4a (which seems to be on the northern side of 4a ...?). If we go east of 4a, we'll have to come close to I_I and afterwards the watchtower near the citadel.

What do you think?

Circle west from 4a, and figure out ways to concentrate on distracting kraan and high up observers.

The Hunting DC I gave you was for rushing straight from 7 to 8 by running to the right side of 4a (whom door is to the North, yes, and guarded by two drakkarim) and the left side of the watchtower.

If you go the other way around 4a, circling the left side of it, you'll need to give me a DC 7 Camouflage roll instead.
This message was last edited by the GM at 21:45, Mon 22 June 2015.

Presumably Sun Snake could use Psi-surge on the Drakker?

And trailblazing to lower the camoflage DC for others on the west route would still work?

Yes to both of those - although I should point out that, even if you knock out the drakkarim guards, that on its own won't lower the DC any since you're still passing in front of one of the barracks.

Ah, ok. So really either snake can help the group with the camouflage rolls going west, or else we rush east but someone needs to help the group lower that Hunting DC.

More or less, yes; and obviously, if you can find another way to avoid the Xagash, you're free to try it out. I'm sure there's many option that I'm just not seeing - the ability to find them is up to you all! ^_^

So, out of curiosity: Gazad Helkona team, have you decided what you want to do next? You sort of need to give me a plan (and the adequate rolls!) before we can proceed the game further. :)

I vote west with a reduced camouflage DC, and if anyone has any ways to make it easier for everyone that might be cool.

Don't have any off the wall ideas otherwise - let's just go figure out what's scaring that giak :D

Yeah, I agree. Circle 4a from the west and find out what's happening at the citadel\s entrance.

I don't know if I can manage to lower the DC, but Hornet could agitate Kraans in the spires by suggesting there's some danger in the air (so Kraans in the spires think something is wrong in the air above and the focus of Kraans in the air is drawn to their kin in the towers)...?

Seems like a good idea, especially as that might focus any of the more humanoid observers to the skies too?

GM permitting... ;)

Shadow, would that be doable? (maybe you need to hear how Hornet would go about it, first...?)

Sabre, Swift, what do you say: circle 4a from west, mess with Kraans' minds (WH) and Drakkarim guards (SS)? Sounds like a good idea?

Still, I am a bit worried about DC 7 Camouflage check, though. Let's see if trick with Kraans will help any.

Well normally I'd be wary of walking into what I suspect is a trap.  But I can't really think of another way in, so may as well :)

Burning a WP can get me past the Camo check.  Can I use Invisibility on Silver Raven too though, or do I have to stick with normal Camouflage for him?

I believe Sun Snake wanted to take advantage of his Trailblazing to make the Camouflage roll easier for the rest of you - that's why he suggested stealth over just running.

And no, Raven cannot use your Invisibility bonus, Swift, but with Snake's Trailblazing, I don't expect he'll need to.

You can distract the kraans if you want, Hornet, but that won't change the DC since Sun Fox's sandstorm is hiding you from their sight already. That said, you can still do it if you want, if you can think of any other advantage it'd give you - just tell me what advantage you're looking for.
This message was last edited by the GM at 14:38, Thu 25 June 2015.

Snake's Trailblazing bonus would be really handy. But if it costs too much WP, then we can discuss if it should be used.

Since the main danger comes from the barracks nearby (i.e. too many eyes in the vicinity), I thought agitating Kraans in the spires could draw the attention of anyone nearby to them and raise our chances of getting by unnoticed.
Although I don't know how I'd go about it (making Kraans do something that would draw attention), yet.
Then again, maybe the sandstorm prevents those on the ground to see Kraans up above (perched in spires), so this whole idea is not going to work...?
This message had punctuation tweaked by the player at 14:54, Thu 25 June 2015.

Yeah, the sandstorm hides you from the kraans and the kraans from you, although of course you can still tell their position by Animal Control. It's also the reason the DC to sneak past the guards is 7 rather than 13. :)

:)

OK, last idea: what if Hornet made one of the Kraans fly closer (if they are not chained/caged in the spires) and then Snake or Sun Fox mindblasted the beast (with Psy-surge) and made it fall from the sky. That could be noticeable...
Perhaps too costly (WP-wise), though, wouldn't it be?

You'd need to either give an AC suggestion (DC 8) or order the kraan down; after that, a psychich stun should be enough to make it crash. Seems perfectly doable to me.

Yeah, I was suggesting using Trailblazing from Snake to lower the Dc  for your guys, but sheer paranoia also meant I wondered if we could make even the lower DCs for the rest of you more certain to be passed.

Psi-surge is costly and Snake wants to use it and some other skills on the giak/around the door, so maybe Sun Fox could do the honiurs this time on a stun?

She probably can, yes - just ask her for it in character.

I'd agree with the stealth too, unless there's a psychic stun we can try as suggested ;)

How close is the barracks to the fire? I would also throw in if possible for another round of fire dominion to try and momentarily blind them with the fires light?

They're all on the map, Sabre Fox - the furnace you exploded is at 7, the barracks at 1. And you can indeed keep your Fire Dominion going if you want to, sure... although it might mean taking a Camouflage penality, depending on what you would want to use it for.

Since Sun Snake passed his roll, now you all have to beat a difficulty five points lower due to following the path he's leading you on - that means you have to beat only a DC 2 with your Camouflage attempt. Seems like Dawn Sword already passed it... so, what about the rest of you all? :)

That means no need to shoot Kraans from the skies...? Great, why hurt innocent beasties, right? :)

Rolled an 8!

8 for me too! No need for the fire dominion! Tho I'll keep that on standby for people's rolls

It's amusing to see your reactions to the giak guarding the door, I must admit. What kind of terrifying trap is hidden behind such a strangely sloppy guard? :)

Exactly! And since we've known our GM for some time, now, we learnt to better be cautious at all times.

Or maybe this is exactly the game we hoped to play with Vyctar: basically make him fear his own shadow (or Shadow...? :D)

Could be anything. We know Vyctar might be a Darklord by now. Valador can teleport on a whim. Shining Peaock is a master of stealth. There are probably other enemies we don't know about. There could be evil traps. The citadel itself could be a creture and we're about to enter its mouth.

Guessing a Disruption attempt on the door would require me to touch it?

You've guessed right - but you're wearing the korlinium gloves, so you could do it if you wanted to. Why would you want to disrupt it, though? You're planning to use it to keep the Xagash and his Gourgaz cohorts outside - and as long as you don't touch it with exposed flesh, you'll be fine.

Wait, can we do some form of fun inversion on it to swap the effect from burning flesh to burning scale?

Again, a meta-game side note: I also realized I'll be away later in summer. To recap, my absence: 4^th-11^th July; 18^th-19^th July.

Back to the game itself: are you guys also a bit surprised we didn't get attacked while entering the citadel? OK, I know we've just made a few steps and those statues look really ominously...but at least we made it past the door, didn't we? :)

(And another x-thousandth post milestone is coming close...who'll snatch it this time? ^_^)
This message was last edited by the player at 21:48, Fri 26 June 2015.

Well we did a lot of explosions and stuff to make it easier to get to the citadel. I suppose the walls are supposed to keep people out, and inside who'd be stupid enough to try and go inside :D

Yes, your distractions worked quite well. :)

And remember, if you hadn't caused enough chaos to cause the door to be opened, you'd now be facing a door that disintegrates flesh when it's touched... plus, the thing with that door's lock is that, one it's engaged (ie, the key has been turned to seal it), it adds another spell on the door, one that I think would have made opening it extremely hard.

In fact, here's for you to consider, since you're not going to be facing it again: when the door is looked, it is surrounded by an invisible forcefield that will repel anything not made of the very specific materia combination the key is made of with a big flash of golden light and a sound like a gong. Incidentally, this field would seal all air away from the door, locking it under an effective void bubble.

How would you have bypassed that kind of defense, if I may ask? I'm curious to hear what you have to say! ^_^

And by the way, Sun Snake, what did you meant when you asked Abou swapping the trap to scales?

Realistically, the citadel isn't unguarded, as the statues and doors are there, we simply were clever enough to draw a lot of the defences away ;)

Any suggestions? I'm all battle orientated and no substance lol

Youi said the door dissolved flesh, presumeably the gourgaz/xagash were immune because of scales or just being evil. so I wondered if there was a way to reverse the enchantment of the door so when it was touched, it would actually harm those who thought they'd be immune :D

Well, Swift Fox said that smashing the gem will open the door and awaken the statues; that seems battle oriented enough to me, Sabre Fox. On the other hand, if you want to do something else, well, that's up to you, isn't it? ^_^

Ah, and I see your point, Sun Snake. Unfortunately, as I alreay explaine Swit fFox, while disrupting the magic inside an item its easy, modifying/adding more to it is a ng and involved crafting process - smething that can take ours or maybe even days, so it can't be done on a whim. Sory about that.

Speaking of the outer door, Hornet, I think Silver Raven wanted you to let him borrow the water chalice for a bit. :)

Yes, he's definitely free to use it - Hornet agreed to hand the Chalice to Raven right after entering the citadel (message #276), in order not to be disturbed by anyone outside :)

As for breaking the gem... Sabre, I think there will be many opportunities for battle-oriented solutions ahead, how about waiting for a moment longer...? ;) (Shadow, any luck with Hornet's Tracking analysis?)

Congrats on the 23,000 get WH :)

Yes, Hornet - assuming your roll succeeds, that is; I was calculating the DCs and such, since this is a Tracking roll with three degrees of success.

DC 5 - Standard information on what you asked about, mostly lacking details

DC 8 - Advanced information. Everything you asked about, plus a good deal of juicy details and leads/guesses over what you can't perceive clearly

DC 11 - Full and complete information on everything.

Also, congratulations on making the 23'000th post! Everybody gets 1 FP as my thanks for being awesome and sticking with the game this long - you really are the most amazing players any GM could ever ask for. :)
This message was last edited by the GM at 09:20, Sat 27 June 2015.

It's easy to stick with this kind of a game! ;)

And yay for FP! I have a feeling they're be very valuable inside the Gazad Helkona's citadel.

I rolled a 6 for Tracking - don't know if Pathsmanship +4 bonus applies (since it wasn't a pursuing roll, strictly speaking), but if it does, looking forward to the juicy details (and pity for being just one point short of full info disclosure ^_^).

Rolled low, I'm hoping the 1WP itself would justify nudging you up to an 11? :)

You would be correct in assuming so, Water Hornet, yes.

And no, Sun Snake, I'm not letting you combine your findings - the nature of Pathsmanship is such that a less skilled practitioner will only find things the more expert already noticed. Also, the information i'd have to give you for an 11 is a lot and would make your job much much easier than what you'd get dof an 8, so you'll actually need to make the full "beyond the humans limits" result (remember, a normal human can't get any higher than 9) on a single roll to have those info.

You're getting a lot of stuff here, really, but if you're not satisfied, I guess you could nudge Swift fox into trying her hand at it too - maybe she'll have more luck than you two did.

Lots of Pathsmaster in this team, isn't it? ^_^
This message was last edited by the GM at 12:41, Sat 27 June 2015.

As stated in IC thread, I think that if we want to defeat the group of 15 Vordak+the mysterious leader we need to think of something that will dramatically reduce their number.

If blasting the gem when everyone is in the room makes the statues attack both Kai and Darkspawn alike, that'd be a good way of dealing with the enemy. Could Swift and Raven ascertain such detail regarding the trap?

Otherwise, I think we better not fight the group, but lure them out and slip by (which is of course easier said than done).

---

Also, Shadow, you asked how we'd go about getting into the citadel if the entrance door was shut close. Hmmm, that's a good question. :) I suppose the airless bubble around the door is to prevent use of Nexus, right? :)
Anyway, my first idea(/question) would be if we could make the Giak sentinel open it from inside (using our resident psychics; funny thing is that I thought about using this trick before the current situation where Hornet basically suggests to do that now - make Vordak open the door from inside).

Hmm, not too sure actually.  Depends on how careless the person (or thing) who enchanted them was...

*peers at Shadow curiously*

The giak normally stays outside of the door, not inside - it doesn't have the key. Although if you want to use the creature in any other manner, you did dragged it along, so, do with him as you will.

I'm not sure that I follow: the quote suggests that we already know that the only thing the statues do is they emit a shriek that should attack people in the room psychically...? Where did we learn that - from Swift/Raven? (Or maybe I just misunderstood what Sun Fox has just said.)

Sun Fox said that the Vordaks, not the statues, are very well known for having a favoured long range attack - one that wouldn't work on you. She's just saying that maybe, since the Vordaks already have a long-range attack in their shriek, they wouldn't worry about packing any different ones, and since you're immune, that'd give you some room to maneuver against them.

Also, the door do is airtight, considering it doesn't even have a keyhole. having said that, I can at least appease you that the smoke will stp the Vordaks' sight just as well as it would impede your own. Basically, the Vordaks see better the less light here is: their "eyes" produce the only light they can perceive, so the normal sunlight makes their vision muddier, but a physiscal obstacle reflects the light back just the same way it would normal light.

I hope that makes things clearer! ^_^
This message was last edited by the GM at 14:26, Mon 29 June 2015.

Yes, now I understand. :) Thanks for clearing that up. (And I like the mechanism of Vordaks' vison ^_^)

Sorry, extremely busy work half-week. Will post in the evening.

I'm not sure if you all have finalized a plan of action or not, Helkona Team - I do remember that this month Hornet will be missing for most of it, so I guess we'd likely have to wait either way, but it'd be nice if you had something more-or-less ready to go for when he can come back.

Dunno if I can help much.  Strategy isn't really my strong point...
Call on me if you want someone stealth-murdered ;)

Any ideas on hiding two groups of Kai at the sides of the door and making the giak / iced door look odd enough to draw Vordaks to it would be welcome. Or any idea on how to quickly spring the traps with the least effort / danger to ourselves.

Sounds a reasonable idea, as we could pincer attack them as the exit. Both sun and sabre could not doubt take down a good few, swifty can stealth murder ;)

Well I can stealth-murder one of them before I need to go get my dagger back (probably carving a path through a couple more in the process!) :)

The first kill Swift made in this game was a Vordak stealth-murder too.  Happy memories :)

Yeah, I'm leaving for a week tomorrow.

As for the plan: I think if we remain undetected, then the iced entrance door (possibly with the sight of an unconscious Giak in front of it) will be enough to draw Vordaks in. Or I might be mistaken and they will do the contrary: pull back and hold on the defensive.

Do we all have access to mind-shielding abilities (like Psy-screen)? Plus we can use the smoke (Sun Fox's ace), although Vordaks might be hesitant to enter the room filled with smoke.

We could also try the old bait trick - leave one of us in the middle of a room who would draw enemy's attention and then seemingly flee up one of the staircases (with the hope Vordaks follow him...or her ;) ); it would have to be not too obvious, though.

EDIT:
Shadow, is it possible to know the DC for hiding at the side of the door (the one leading deeper into the citadel) without any additional sophisticated hiding method?
This message was last edited by the player at 22:02, Fri 03 July 2015.

The door would open toward you, so the DC for hiding behind it is 0, so long as you're fine not having any visual feed on what goes on to the other side of it.

I shall point out, though, that for the door to open, you either need to break the gem (which wakes up the gargoyles, and those will see you from their perched position for certain, as the room lacks hiding places), break the door (which will trigger the tentacle trap and most certainly alert the vordaks on the other side), or somehow magic up the gem-key that opens the door. You haven't given me any other way you could open it, at least.

As for fooling the Vordak into entering the room, that'll depend very heavily on how you opened the door - some trick will work oin certain cases, but not in others, so I can't give you any precise DC now.

That, by the way, is why i said that you don't yet have any plan - you've some ideas on what to do once the door is open, but no clear pway you want to open the dor yet. You only have half a plan - the second half. It can't be implemented until you have the first half down.

You all have Psy-Screen except for Raven and Dawn Sword, who have Mindblast instead. Mindblast is enough to neutralize a Vordak's shriek though, so against them you're all relatively safe.
This message was last edited by the GM at 23:57, Fri 03 July 2015.

I thought that if we could make it sound as if the giak were yelling a warning about something magical trying to enter, the vordaks from the other side could open the door safefy?

The idea was to have the giak at least look to a cursory glance still be awake, and just pushing against the door or something as if so scared they thought they could hold the door closed. Seemed like combined with he frost it would be an odd enough sight to pull people forwards - then we could split those coming through and those staying behind with a set of Nexus pushed, bullrush in to the other room, and slam the door closed whilst setting off the traps. Keeps one set busy iclosed in that room while we deal with the other Vordak (and leader if they aren't trapped)


So you're saying the Vordak can't come through the door?


Shame its so expensive to Mindfort, this is basically why you'd take it :( At least everyone is protected already one way or another.

So you're planning on calling te Vordaks to the entry room, and have them open the door from the inside? I must have missed that. The giak should have been outside the fortress door, so this will both require the Vordak to actually check the Giak's warning, as well as believe there's a good reason he's now inside rather than outside. I think I can peg that as a Camouflage check with DC 11 - if you can succeed at that, the Vordaks will open the door for you.

So, how are you going to persuade the vordaks to come check on him, specifically? The giak is alive still, if unconscious, but he's unlikely to help you against his masters, so you'll need to think of a way to make it look like he's calling for help to the vordaks without his willing cooperation.

I hoped the fact the giak had closed the door and was speaking about something outside frosting the door, combined with the visual of the giak seemingly scared enough to hold open a door and the door being frosted might be weird enough and worrisome to pull the vordaks forwards.

I also hoped at since we have Inviisbility / Pathsmanship we would be able to imitate a Giak's frantic yells well enough to not need it co-operative and speaking, we could take that part.

The idea was to keep the giak unconscious, and just pose it so we'd more just need to control it with MoM or even something more mundane to keep it upright long enough to fool the Vordaks.

Can use of Invisibility too, or trying to read the giak's mind first, help reduce that DC any? If Sun Snake makes the camouflage attempt, I have some FPs to mitigate luck, but still, best to ask, right?

Yeah, the DC 11 is to make your voices giak-like enough, and the message persuading enough, to make the vordaks open the door for you. As always, if you write a persuading enogh text in you post, that might grant bonuses to the roll - it'll depend on how good your roleplaying is, since the DC also includes the persuasiveness.

Manipulating the giak's body with Mind over Matter is doable, though it'll take two rolls to make it believable - one Mind Over Matter and one Camouflage, from the same person, and with a DC of 7 each. The roll can come from different people if the one rolling camouflage can justify giving accurate directions on how to make te telekinetic body manipulation effective without speaking (as that'd gve away the ruse).

What do you think of this?

Seems reasonable if everyone is agreeable to the plan!

May as well give it a go.  Nothing to lose, except our lives and all our magical shinies! :)  hehe.

If you die, you won't need the shinies anymore anyway, isn't it? :)

Well I suppose my ghost could haunt whoever takes my stuff...  :)
This message was last edited by the player at 14:35, Sat 04 July 2015.

Ah, the Ghost of Anskaven, of course! Now that makes sense.

It's so obvious!

Well I'm more than happy for the plan if it's our best option!

Which means we just have to wait for Hornet so that you can decide who gets to roll what - although if you want to start discussing that, you're free to.

In the meanwhile, is there anything you want me to do, or answer? Since we're not going to get IC posts for the next few days, I'd like for the game to at least keep up activity with the OOC thread. :)

Can you hint at the non-Vordak beyond the door? :D Should we know who / what it is?

Nah, it's a new type of darkspawn; I'm including several that you don't know, that way I can keep things fresh and you lot guessing.

Speaking of which, I just finished watching Guardians of the Galxy for the... third time, I think? So I now need you all to persuade me that basing a darkspawn around Groot's power is a terrible idea, and that I really shouldn't do it.

Can you? :)

I've never seen it, so wouldn't know...  But I get the feeling this is a Very Bad Thing^tm
This message had punctuation tweaked by the player at 21:53, Mon 06 July 2015.

Well, if you haven't seen it I'm most definitely not going to spoil it for you. I'm a bit surprised - the film is from last year, and if it just arrived on TV here where I live, I would guess the UK to have had it easily accessible for some time now, considering how vastly better your nation is than my own - but then again, I guess superheroes aren't your favorite thing, Swift Fox?
This message was last edited by the GM at 22:02, Mon 06 July 2015.

Been a bit out of touch with the mainstream lately...

:) That's fair; I mostly am, too, I just like superhero films so I keep abreast of the most recent ones. Not criticizing or anything, just surprise, is all.

The film is a fun thing, as far as these kind of films go, and I really liked it - hence why I made the comment.

It was good indeed. However, do you really want the Darkspawn to have to try and communicate in three words? It will do your head in!

Why should it? Most darkspawn only communicate with the Language of slashing claws and acid spitting, they need no words at all! ^_^

And besides, I already said that I wouldn't want to spoil the film for Swift Fox if she ever wants to watch it, so that means I won't be suing it as inspiration.

Although, of course, if I did, she wouldn't notice unless you said something... hm. Must think about that for a little bit. ;P

Well I created a couple of characters who don't speak at all.
If you can communicate with other players with a mute character, having three words at your disposal makes you a bit of a chatterbox in comparison, hehe :)

Well, it all depends on the way you use your resources, doesn't it? :)

Also, this story already features at least two characters who can't speak - there's a mute Magnakai I put in the game at some point, and Brook has yet to articulate any spoken word, as I'm sure Dusk Rat could confirm for me. :)

Don't think I've met that one yet...
Anyone Swift would know?

One of my non-speaking characters was a Kai too.  Winter Rain, intended as a replacement for Swift's "stealth infiltrator" role in my own story :)

This one?



She does seems interesting, and exactly the kind of character you'd be able to make really interesting. I'm fraid that my non-speaking roles are nowhere near this well made.

Yep, that one :)
I thought I'd closed that game though...  Did it get archived somewhere?
This message was last edited by the player at 08:07, Wed 08 July 2015.

I honestly don't know - normally it takes some times for the games here to get deleted, but I didn't keep the game in my list once you said you were deleting it, so it's likely that it was deleted.

I just saved the NPC roster because I found them all very interesting, so I wanted to have the characters at hand, as a reference. I really did found the preparatory work you did for that game quite fascinating. :)

Of course, I can delete them if you want. And it shouldn't be hard to check if the game is still around - just input your username in the "search" function of the site, and if it's yet to be deleted, it will pop up.
This message was last edited by the GM at 08:35, Wed 08 July 2015.

Nah, it's ok :)  I don't mind.

Just wondered if it was still there, and not showing up in my list for some reason.

I definitely plan on running with that idea at some point.
Just that with various computer breakdowns over the past year, I've lost most of my storyline notes and other stuff I'd done on it.
Should be able to get them back if I can save up for parts to build myself a better computer to work on, and get the hardware to transfer all my files off the old hard drives.  But due to financial difficulties, that won't be happening anytime soon.

You're welcome to use the characters as NPCs or something if you like though :)

You're very kind to say so, but I wouldn't want to steal your characters - you're bound to use them better than I would. :)

And I understand everything about financial difficulties, as you call them, so you have all my sympathy and I wish you the best of luck in resolving your problems soon.

Well not so much stealing them.  More like a cameo appearance, that sort of thing :)

I'm not using them at all right now, though I tend to recreate them as characters I play in LW games.  So if I ever play any others, they might pop up there, sometimes a little different than they would be in my own story.

If you want more details on any of them, or their personalities and abilities and stuff, to recreate them as NPCs, feel free to ask :)
I've still got my character info backed up on a working disk.

If you feel like sending me a PM with the information, I'll most certainly appreciate the read; I'll likely have a Shapphire Rose cameo anyway, since that was planned to happen since you introduce her to me. :)

As for the rest, I'll consider them if I need somebody to fill the ranks a bit - while I do have a list of names for all 68 Magnakai in the Monastery, most names are just placeholders, so replacing them with actual personalities might be unf. But I don't think most of them will have a speaking part, which is why I wouldn't want to put them in - that' be like stealing the name without makig use of the excellent personalities you came up with.

In the meantime to do with other games, since Rain Feathers and Laughing Sharks players went absent, I'll be restarting Legacy when this game ends. At least that way everyone can play if they wish without being overloaded on other games :)

The game hasn't been deleted yet, I still have it on my deleted games list

I suppose that's a good thing? :)

Hi everyone! I'm back. *waves hand*

I agree with the proposed plan regarding Vordaks (and the new Darkspawn-thingy ;)). So, as Shadow said, who rolls what? :)

Welcome back :)

Welcome back!


You roll everything, we'll be hiding behind you :p

Really, you're leaving everything to Hornet?

Well, Hornet, I guess that's the type of "welcome back" you had to expect... nice to have you here again anyway! ^_^

Well, I have to admit that I almost forgot what a merry bunch of selfless characters we are. Almost. ;)
Glad to be a part of the team. ^_^

And I could roll everything...but then just hiding behind my back wouldn't provide any big advantage anyway ;)

Yep - especially considering that, for the plan to work, you need to roll 7 twice.

But then, maybe you'll just be exceptionally lucky! ^_^

Lucky sevens?  :)

Only way I'd be most likely to get two sevens in a row would be if I was using a d20!

Well, one of thos 7 Hornet need will be n Camouflage - I think that's not out of your normal roll range, Swift Fox, seeing as you do  have a +6 on Invisibility. :)

But of course, you can only roll for him if you can figure out a way to communicate what needs to be done before speaking.

And besides, before Hornet makes those rolls, somebody needs to make the DC 11 Camouflage one to get the Vordaks to open the door in the first place. Shouldn't be too hard! ^_^

So just to reiterate the plan as I see it:

 - we prop the unconsicous giak up near/against the door (don't want his flesh to be flayed) as if trying to hold it closed. And if the door doens't look sufficiently frosted already, Silver Raven should make it far more obvious. If there's a way to have it frosted as the door opens, that would be good. I suppose if no one has any obvious means of doing that, one or more of the Nexus users might need to hold the giak up?

 - Sun Snake / Swift Fox I guess hide a group on either side of the door as close as possible to the wall to minimise being seen.

 - Sun Snake goes ahead and pretends to be the giak, yelling that 'wizards are attacking the tower! door is being too solid! i locked the masters outside' or some such thing in terror.

 - This ruse works so well the door is opened and some Vordak come through the door.

 - as one, the three Nexus users create some air pushed - the first at the door to create a greater split of the group through and behind the door, then the other two push at each of those groups to push on towards the outer door, and the other group back in the other room

 - Swift Fox does something clever to set off the trap to free the statues (or Sabre can just smash things)

 - We all rush in to the room and slam the door behind us

 - Sun Snake psychcially blasts the weird leader of the group if possible once we see who they are (presuming they didn't go in to the first room) to stun them, and then we engage in jolly battle in the new room whilst hopefully shutting the door to let the vordaks be killed in the previous room

 - ???

 - profit

Seems like a more or less workable idea; won't say how good it is or isn't, but it is something that can be put into practice, for sure.

I think I've spotted a slight flaw in your cunning plan. :)

I did allow for the fallback of Sabre hitting things, that can always be relied upon :D

I completely agree with the plan and will just throw in a couple of details in case something goes too wrong:

- Silver Raven has Acid Ring - if the door cannot be closed (once we're in the next room), he could create a wall from acid net (it'll mean Raven has to focus on that all the time and burn WP, but perhaps better than fight all present Vordaks)

- I have a Ruby Ring that can cast fire darts/small fireballs - perhaps that could be used to set off statues

- I also have the Starfield Warhammer - it does damage to structures & other inanimate objects - could be used to smash the gem (although the ceiling is probably too high) or door or whatever

We should now probably post the plan in the IC thread...? It is already there (kind of) ^_^
So...if we all agree with the plan, first thing is for Snake to roll for Camouflage...?
This message was last edited by the player at 16:31, Sat 11 July 2015.

Yeah, that's what should happen next. As I alredy said, DC 11, with bonuses to the roll depending on how roleplayed.

Not much can happen until that is sorted out.

Not too sure if I have anything that'll be useful for smashing the stone (assuming it's out of reach of a normal weapon attack?)

I'd rather keep back my insta-kill ranged attack for taking down whatever is leading the Vordaks if I can.
Also Swift wouldn't risk using the Kagonite Arrow in circumstances like this, considering we'll have to leave the room in a hurry and she might not have a chance to recover it.

As I mentioned, I have the Starfield Warhammer - although it'd probably had to be thrown at the gem...? Even if it'd be possible, we'd lose the item; but if we have no other option, then that'd be the least painful loss, I guess.
This message was last edited by the player at 17:35, Tue 14 July 2015.

Hornet, you can't throw the hammer, you don't ave the improvement for it.

Having said that, if you ciuld throw the hammer, after it struck the gem inthe wall, it would fall to the ground, so why would it be lost to you?

And besides, Raven can just use Lightingin Hand to blast the gem apart if you want him to - just ask for it.

Ahh, one more time when I've wished I'd taken Kai-Alchemy ;)
Then again, I can't really see Swift being comfortable with Mind Charming people...

You think the abilities you picked so far weren't useful, Swift Fox? :)

Yeah, I didn't really thought it would be Hornet who would be doing the throw (Sabre seems better suited, although I don't know if he has the needed improvement, too). And I thought the positioning would make it hard to retrieve the warhammer afterwards (with a group of Vordak already in the room and us being at the entrance or already in the other room - but that'd depend on the current positioning and timing).

Lightning Hand does definitely sound like a better choice. Just one question: would the use of a left-handed spell be more noticeable throughout the fortress? I mean: apart from light and sound of the lightning, could some magic-sensitive creatures detect the use of the spell because it is left-handed magic? (Providing our characters would know such thing, of course.)

EDIT:
Really, Swift? I personally always liked Battle Magic more (not from the usefulness point of view - just it seemed "more cool" to me :) ).
This message was last edited by the player at 18:07, Tue 14 July 2015.

Well, the skill set I have now is definitely useful for the stealth-murderings.
Though in situations where I can't hide, I'm probably less useful...

Yeah, I think Battle Magic is more of a "fighter" thing, than an actual "magic user" thing.
Not sure why, it just seems more geared to battle.  Hence the name I suppose.

If Battle Magic is a sledgehammer, Kai-Alchemy is more like a Swiss army knife :)

Sorry, I thought we were still awaiting an agreement on who was holding the giak up before Sun Snake called down the Vordak?

for the sake of speed I'll go post just now , presumeing Sun Snake doesn't do it until the giak is hoisted buy someone.

@Swift: As you say, I think that was the very intention - make Battle Magic a magic that is powerful regarding combat, while Kai-alchemy make a more universal 'tool'.

Snake, Hornet will hold the Giak up at the frozen door.

If you're going puppetmaster, hornet, you'll need to give me the Mind over Matter roll.

Also, who is going to make the Camouflage roll? I need that one too before I can update. :)

Ah, didn't realize that.
Rolled a 5 (hope that'll be enough o_O)

Also, Snake has just made a Camouflage roll - is that the one, or one more is needed?

I alredy told you that the DC is 7, Hornet - so, unless you can figure out a way to get some bonuses, 5 will not suffice.

Snake's roll was the camouflage (DC 11)  to make the Vordaks on the other side open the door; the two rolls you have to do are for ma ipulating the Gia's body properly (DC 7 MoM, which you seems to have failed), and to make it seem like the giak is doing something in line with Sun Snake's suggestion (DC 7 camouflage).

Technically, somebody else can roll the camouflage for you, but the person who did so would also need to figure out a way to direct your movements with Mind over Matter without speaking, but still fast enugh to keep up the ruse.

Does that clarifies everything, or are there more questions I need to answer? :)

Yep, clear now, thx. :) The only thing left is to figure out how to beat the two DC (with one roll already failed).

The only thing I can think of is to let Raven freeze Giak's hands to the door; then Hornet could let the body just slump down (with hands still frozen to the door) - the aim is to give the impression that Giak was affected by any magic that froze the door.

Would that help with any of the two DCs?

OK, so I went ahead and am asking Raven for help. Not sure if it will help but it will at least move things forward. And as Shadow says: there are no wrong decisions - it is only about being ready to face the consequences; and sometimes you just have to go on with the bad rolls. :)

*runs away*

Shadow, I will make the second roll (for Camouflage),  let's just see if anyone has an idea how to help Hornet in this endeavour. Plus, does freezing the Giak to the door (in case Raven complies, but he might have another idea, after all) change the situation in any way?
This message was last edited by the player at 11:46, Wed 15 July 2015.

Swift could perhaps help with Camouflage, though I don't think she can use it on others.  Not sure if there's some discipline combination that'll help there or not...

Well, if there is, it's up to you to figure it out, Swift Fox! :)

So, Helkona Team, I guess you're just going to let the diversion fail, and see what happens? Is that right?

What's exactly happened? I thought the rolls were success?

One roll was successful, the second failed (the third has yet to be rolled).

Busy with mother down all weekend, didn't think Snake could do anything because he was speaking at the time?

Edit: OH, I see, Swift, if you don't help Water Hornet the Vordak will know something is wrong and will attack us - I think you need to actually help somehow wit hthe giak visual distraction rather than fall back to the door and hide.
This message was last edited by the player at 17:23, Thu 16 July 2015.

But hoooooow? (;~;)

You know...with...stuff...and...things?

But when we run into trouble, I only know to do hidey stuff and stabby things...  :(

Throw a dagger at the giak? But in an undetectable way? :D

If we still had that invisible sword, maybe we could pin him to the door :)

Snake, can you launch a low-level, area-wide mind attack? The idea is to let Vordak sense the psychic attack took place, Hornet would then just let the Giak slump to the ground. Or maybe Sun Fox can do such thing? I think something as "light" as a Mindblast would suffice, so it doesn't drain too much WP. Or maybe Divination would do the trick of "disturbing the psychic aether"...?

If not, then I suggest Sun Fox releases the smoke sphere and we at least hide from plain sight.

I'll let Shadow answer that one, though I'll have to react to it later, I have just ran out of free time :(

Snake could probably kill several Vordaks with his psychic powers alone, although he'd have to go at it one Vordak at a time. He could most certainly make it seem like the giak was felled by a psychic attack - particularly if he actually, you know, used a psychic attack to make it collapse.

What that wouldn't do is persuade the vordaks that there are no enemies in the room trying to lure them out.

Hmmm. Well, if we can't convince Vordaks that there is no enemy in the room, how about trying to convince them that the enemy has taken one of the staircases? That could lure them into a pursuit, couldn't it?
Anyone has any ideas regarding this plan?

Otherwise, I say let's just fill the room with the smoke and at least don't reveal our position right away.

If you can figure a way to do that, it's surely possible. How would you go about it?

That's a damn good question to which I don't have an answer, yet :D

One thing that I can think of is use someone as a bait. Someone who can move swiftly and/or quietly... *wink, wink* ^_^

For example: Swift moves to the side of the room, shoots the Giak with a plain arrow and heads towards one of the staircases (running up a few stairs, possibly). If played right (adding a couple of other minor ruses), Vordak group could go into pursuit. Sun Fox then fills the room with smoke and this allows Swift to return to our position (by the inner door). We then all push into the other room as per original plan.

Now, it doesn't have to be Swift, of course. It's just an idea. Ideally, if we could create an illusion, we wouldn't need to send anyone at all. But I have no idea how to pull that off, that's why I'm speaking about a real person.

I realize that'd be very dangerous for any (N)PC who would be trying that, so depends if others sees that as a viable idea.
Saying this, I'm toying with the idea of making Hornet play the bait - in that case, though, I think we'd have to separate; because slipping past a group of Vordaks back seems too risky. In that case, though, I think Hornet (or anyone else left separated!) would have a really hard time surviving in Gazad Helkona on their own. It might be fun, but that'd likely be a short-lived fun. o_O

*glances around, wondering who he means...* (o.o)

Well, wether you decide to do it or not, you should really give me an answer on it soon - if you want the game to continue, that is. If it's boring you all, do say so, i don't want to force anybody into playing something that they're no longer having fun with.

As for your plan as you presented it, Hornet, here are some DCs to give you an idea of its feasibility:

Making a fast run to the stairs before the door finishes opening: Hunting DC 6 (you'll need to pick which staircase to move to).

Hitting a static target with a bow shot from the stairs - anything other than 1 works.

Making the body fall in such a way as to make the most noise possible: MoM DC 4 (you have this already beaten)

Making enough chaos to make it seems that somebody is climbing the stairs: camouflage DC 3 (however, a result lower than 9 means attracting attention also from whomever is at the upper floor of the choosen stairway).

Sneaking back past the Vordaks once they're on the stairs: camouflage DC 15 unless the person sneaking out can make themselves impossible to see (unleashing Sun Fox's smoke would lower the DC to 10, for example).

Of coruse, once the vordaks are all on the stairs, if the person at the top can hold their own, the rest will be unable to bring their full force to bear on people attacking them from the lower level, making them that much easier to dispatch. That's a valid alternative to the sneaking attempt.

I hope this was an informative post! ^_^

If one of you Invisibility users runs to the status to attract their attention and make them run through the door after you, both sabre and Sun could back attack them the moment they passed through.

However that requires courage and skill! ;)

Might be best Snake doing it. That way if they launch a psychic attack he will be protected and by this point he will be out of melee range

Probably have to be someone good at fighting, in case they get cornered on the stairs by the Vordaks (who can probably also activate the statues!)
Not to mention the possibility of getting set on by something coming from upstairs too...

Well, those are the disadvantages of a plan to use a distraction to attract the enemy's attention - that it can also attract the attention of other enemies in addition to the ones you wanted to distract. :)

Remember up the stairs is a potent mix of lots of high up critters including Xagash and other Vordak.

Can Sun Snake feel if any are close to either of the stairs?

Also Gourgaz, Sun Snake, do not forget the Gourgaz.

Apparently we won't get instantly flooded with critters. Still, Sun Snake is no tank. I hadn't appreciate that his psychic attack could be powerful enough to actually take out a few of them, so if that's true I guess he could go up the stairs then blast them?

Of course, what we'll most likely have is snake vodak rest Vordak in a weird sandwich. If we can't even pull them in to the room right now, I'm not sure if this new diversion is really going to pull all fifteen plus leader all up the stairwell

If it doesn't, you are trapping the group between two loads of Vordak, with us unable to flip the trap, so our only advantage becomes one round where you might surprise a small amount of vordak with an attack, and say maybe half the vordak are trapped on the stairs not able to get in to a position.


Anyway, I will trust the group, I'll roll more camouflage and deduct WP if Snake needs to go be a decoy :p Just let me know, still distracted with things until Tuesday.

We're doomed!  (O.o)'

Back after a weekend's 'outage'. Just to summarize the situation:

Hornet's attempt to hold the Giak with MoM as if the Giak was holding the (frozen) entrance door failed; his attempt to move the Giak body in accordance to what Sun Snake said in Giak voice has yet to be rolled, but I'm not sure if there's any point to that. Hence why I proposed trying an alternative plan.

Shadow, is the second roll still necessary (and what would it change)? Or if we agree to implement another plan, we will roll new/different things?


Regarding the current plan, it seems like our best man would be...actually a woman: Sun Fox. She has Invisibility, Huntmastery and is a good fighter. I understand we'd be using our biggest gun (OK, Sabre, one of the two biggest guns :)), but right now it seems SF is the best bet.
Plus, Sun Fox has Wind Blast - so I say: let her pull Vordaks to the stairs, knock them down, leap over them, run to us and into the next room while Raven blasts the gem with the Lightning Hand and closes the door. (Sun Fox doesn't have a bow, but it can be substituted with Weapon Throw, I assume.)
What do you think - sounds like a plan?

(The stats for Raven and Sun Fox can be found in the thread OOC: ninth symphony, msg #828)

Sun Fox doesn't has Invisibility, Water Hornet - she has Weaponsmastery, Huntmastery, Battle Magic, Nexus, Psy Surge, and Psy-Screen.

She does, however, happens to have a bow on her person - the Silver Bow of Duadon.

Swift Fox, however, does has both Invisibility and Huntmastery, if she cares to use them. She also has a bow, which she crafted into a magical item on your journey here.

As for rolling, I gave you a set of DC for the plan you offered me; if you feel like following that one, you know what you need to roll. If you want a different plan, then you need to tell me which plan that is, and I will give you a different set of rolls to make and DC to beat.

You roll of 5 will carry for any attempt to use Mind over matter on the Giak. but you can't apply it to anything else.

If you roll for camouflage (the second roll) that means you are committing to that first plan, and the results will depend on the combined rolls (the MoM you already fled, and the Camouflage one you have yet to roll).
This message was last edited by the GM at 15:05, Mon 20 July 2015.