The result of this experiment has been moved to 3203 - Star Wars Saga Edition Character Record Sheet in new Section 3200.
This message was last edited by the GM at 00:27, Mon 24 June 2019.

It's been bugging me for a while:  what are the operative differences between private lines and secret lines in in-game messages?

Just to see if I can illustrate:



I'd greatly appreciate it if anyone who sees this would tell me what they see.
This message was last edited by the GM at 23:33, Sun 18 Aug 2019.

I see this:


It's been bugging me for a while:  what are the operative differences between private lines and secret lines in in-game messages?

Just to see if I can illustrate:
Nothing to see here - just testing.


I'd greatly appreciate it if anyone who sees this would tell me what they see.

In reply to Dabbler (msg # 38):

Thank you!

Aha!  So secret lines don't have anything to distinguish them from regular text when viewed by the Recipient!  That could have interesting uses for the enterprising GM.

(The phrase, "Nothing to see here - just testing." was sent to you as a secret line.)

You did not see the private line I sent to Homunculus, my NPC assistant character.  Just for funsies, I've re-addressed it to you:
This message was last edited by the GM at 05:42, Mon 19 Aug 2019.

Did the Secret Line generate a blank line for unincluded players, so that they suspect something was written there? For me, you'll notice there was a blank line following the message directed to me. This could just be your spacing but, obviously, if the hidden message is a paragraph rather than a line, any space it occupies will be more evident.

I'm not sure whether 'suspicious spaces' are a function of Private Lines, Secret Lines, both, or neither. Maybe we can check that?

I'm under the impression that a Secret Line can be written mid-paragraph without alerting other readers that anything is going on.

Well... from my point of view as GM here I can't really tell...



The private message to Homunculus did, indeed occupy a one-line paragraph between the secret message to you and what followed.  If I just ran it together at the end of one or the beginning of another paragraph, none should have been the wiser.



Send Homunculus a secret line such as you describe (it's one of the reasons I keep the little guy around -- well, that and he's a master of tea ceremony!) ;^)

Yes, I think this is just a matter of checking the formatting of what we write, to see whether any of these private or Secret messages leave tell-tale clues.
The problem is, even if I send Homunculus a Secret Line, [Sect to Homunculus: like this one]you will still be able to read it as the GM, so you won't be able to figure out what it's doing - as you've already figured when you asked for a players-eye view of your own post.
Now if I were to send a Secret Line to Homunculus [Sect to Homunculus: like this new one] putting a space before and after the message, I'm guessing that a double space will give the game away to the other players. Although a double space could just be a typo.

Anyway, here's a selection of Private and Secret messages covering a few words, a line, and a paragraph, to see if we can see what's what. :)

Edit: Ah. Another problem. When I tried to post this, I got an error message that only GMs can post secret messages. So I've mis-spelled 'Secret' in the messages to force it to send. If you respell them before sending it back to me, we should be able to continue the experiment as intended.

I had to enter Homunculus by hand here - not available from the Secret to: menu.  Let's see if it works.

Now if I were to send a Secret Line to Homunculus  putting a space before and after the message, I'm guessing that a double space will give the game away to the other players. Although a double space could just be a typo.

It would figure.  Let's see what happens.
This message was last edited by the GM at 06:19, Thu 22 Aug 2019.

Now you've placed quotes into your copy-back, so it's not showing up exactly as I wrote it, and I can't see what happened with the private paragraph:

---

Dabbler:
Yes, I think this is just a matter of checking the formatting of what we write, to see whether any of these private or Secret messages leave tell-tale clues.

The problem is, even if I send Homunculus a Secret Line, you will still be able to read it as the GM, so you won't be able to figure out what it's doing - as you've already figured when you asked for a players-eye view of your own post.


I had to enter Homunculus by hand here - not available from the Secret to: menu.  Let's see if it works.

quote:
Now if I were to send a Secret Line to Homunculus  putting a space before and after the message, I'm guessing that a double space will give the game away to the other players. Although a double space could just be a typo.


It would figure.  Let's see what happens.

---

However, we can see that the private line does leave a blank line for other readers, the secret line is completely secret provided you put a space before or after the brackets but not both and not neither. Otherwise you do indeed get a telltale double space or a lack of space.

If you just copy my above message as it displays, rather than using the quote function (just highlight and copy from the screen) it may show us what a Private Paragraph does. I suspect it will leave multiple blank lines.

Yup, the double space shows up, and I don't see the message (or did you simulate that, being what you saw - that would make more sense...).

So, basically, secret messages are a bit more sly than private lines?

<quote Dabbler>
Now you've placed quotes into your copy-back, so it's not showing up exactly as I wrote it, and I can't see what happened with the private paragraph:

---

Sorry.  Fixed this in  the post to which you are referring.  (Quotes removed).

Can you copy the whole of my msg 42 and send it back, so I can see the overall layout? Thanks. :)

In reply to Dabbler (msg # 47):

Message copied without quote markup; hopefully this will help.

Um... did you also need for me to fix spelling errors in "Secret" lines?

COPIED MESSAGE FOLLOWS:

Yes, I think this is just a matter of checking the formatting of what we write, to see whether any of these private or Secret messages leave tell-tale clues.

The problem is, even if I send Homunculus a Secret Line, [Sect to Homunculus: like this one]you will still be able to read it as the GM, so you won't be able to figure out what it's doing - as you've already figured when you asked for a players-eye view of your own post.

Now if I were to send a Secret Line to Homunculus [Sect to Homunculus: like this new one] putting a space before and after the message, I'm guessing that a double space will give the game away to the other players. Although a double space could just be a typo.

Anyway, here's a selection of Private and Secret messages covering a few words, a line, and a paragraph, to see if we can see what's what. :)

Edit: Ah. Another problem. When I tried to post this, I got an error message that only GMs can post secret messages. So I've mis-spelled 'Secret' in the messages to force it to send. If you respell them before sending it back to me, we should be able to continue the experiment as intended.

END COPIED MESSAGE

Thanks. No, we've already checked what the Secret Lines do. They're fine.

I wanted to see whether the Private lines left blank lines, or multiple blank lines, but it seems they don't. The blank line after "tell-tale clues" is just a normal paragraph break, and there is anther normal paragraph break after "of your own post", rather than a three or four line break.

We can assume that they would leave a clue (paragraph break?) if used in the middle of a paragraph, hence the need for the Secret Line.

I've noticed in games that sometimes there is a large blank space at the end of a post, and I wondered if that indicated the insertion of a Private Line, but it seems not, it must just be a spacing issue of Rpol.

Useful experiment. Thanks. :)

I've been dabbling with language groups in one of my games, but since I set it up, nobody has 'spoken' in a foreign language, so I haven't figured how they work yet.

You're welcome!  If you like, we can set up a couple of language groups here and give it a go.  I had like 12 language groups in my Firefly game, but no one ever used them, either.  Go figure.

Sure, we can give it a try.

Dabbler seems to be keeping me busy these days by coming up with interesting experiments. Thank you, Dabbler!

I'm going to set up two language groups, let's call them Francais and Nihongo (two languages with which I have some facility in reality).  If you want others let me know.  (Yes, I know the c in Francais needs a cedille, but thought that might break the Private Line Group Editor...)

I get:

Dabbler seems to be keeping me busy these days by coming up with interesting experiments. Thank you, Dabbler!

I'm going to set up two language groups, let's call them Francais and Nihongo (two languages with which I have some facility in reality).  If you want others let me know.  (Yes, I know the c in Francais needs a cedille, but thought that might break the Private Line Group Editor...)

Kore tegami wa himitsu desu!  (This message is a secret!)

Edit: Actually, there is a slight difference. In your message, the French, and its bracketed translation, is in italics, which are lost on my returned message, but that's probably a factor of the copy and paste.
This message was last edited by the player at 03:43, Sat 24 Aug 2019.

In reply to Dabbler (msg # 53):

And the reason that the secret message is not italicized is that the secret line editor specifies untagged message text.  (Yes... ironic, isn't it?)

On 11 Sep 2019, new options for dropping ones were added to the dice roller for the responsive site.  This took place as a result of discussion in this RPoL Development thread:  Adding adv/disadv and rerolls to the manual/embed die roller

The dice roller option to reroll ones now has three options, one of which may be selected on any given roll.  These options, as stated in the dice roller, are :  No, All or First.

The link syntax for these has not been given yet (undocumented feature?).

Trying:

12d6, re-rolling all ones on the first or subsequent cast
[dice=12d6 ones=all text="12d6, re-rolling all ones on the first or subsequent cast"]
12d6, re-rolling no ones
[dice=12d6 ones=no text="12d6, re-rolling no ones"]
12d6, re-rolling ones on the first cast only
[dice=12d6 ones=first text="12d6, re-rolling ones on the first cast only"]

has no effect on this selection.

I will post more as my experiments bear fruit or I receive more information about these new features.
This message was last edited by the GM at 21:59, Fri 20 Dec 2019.

Testing, testing ...

Roll 12d6
[dice=12d6 ones=yes memo="12d6, re-rolling all ones on the first or subsequent cast"]
Roll 12d6
[dice=12d6 memo="12d6, re-rolling no ones"]
Roll 12d6
[dice=12d6 ones=once memo="12d6, re-rolling ones on the first cast only"]


EDIT: And the winner is ...

I think we might have cracked the code, if someone can confirm that the re-roll ones option is selecting correctly for you too !  :>

I viewed Page Source on the die roller which had the following code which gave the '' (ie blank, so I just omitted that argument), yes and once values.  And it seems case is important - yes and once work, Yes and Once don't.

Re-roll <select name='ones' class='sm'>
<option value=''>No</option>
<option value="yes">All</option><option value="once">First</option> </select> Ones


NB: Responsive site only - the new re-roll ones options not available on the old site.
This message was last edited by the player at 05:59, Sat 21 Dec 2019.

In reply to Skald (msg # 56):

Thank you!  Every now and then it helps to have an inside track! ;-)

As requested, this is my in-game post to see which post (this one, or the PM that will come in a few minutes) has the timestamp that wins for Last Post.

just posting to  get a time stamp

Testing, just to be sure the dropdown menu isn't lying to me.