I feel like the WOTFCT conversation should be a new thread.

This thread has a lot of side conversations / open questions that might distract from answering the questions as we create the story of our first adventure.

I'm comfortable with both of those changes. I think it'd be cool for Spectre to suspect Vicky's father so he's got Ghost keeping an eye open for evidence to either confirm or deny.

Does Markus have a job him and James could have come across each other at?

Since I'm going with the playful demeanor I'll hand out influence to Darius since we'll have worked together before and Susanna because Ghost wants to see her succeed at joining the Mask's world like he has.
This message was last edited by the player at 13:21, Tue 14 Feb 2023.

I agree with starting a new thread for when we can together. Makes it easier to parse through if it's separate.

I have no problem with Ghost being the one who knew me as a civilian before this
 If it's due to my job, I 've gotta change that though. Which I was considering anyway
 Markus' job is currently tech support. Since it would make sense for him with a job he can do mostly over the phone. Plus the potential fun of him having to do it while in the middle of a fight. But I'm thinking that he could work as a delivery person instead. It's a job with leeway as long as he delivers the packages, and it would mean he moves around town a lot, which would help him with scoring out places to patrol later on for trouble. So he could have. Met James while delivering things to him several times, or something.

I also like the weirdness of the idea that he kinda trusts Darius, due to relating to the whole shitty parents and trying to be better thing, while having had the absolute shit kicked out of him by his mom in the past. Like, Payback went into a warehouse expecting to bust some gangbangers, and it turned out to be that night Darius' mom was there on a routine inspection. Resulting in cracked ribs and the like at best for poor Payback.
The juxtaposition of him liking Darius, but also really, really wanting to punch his mom in the face. :P

Don't change it up on my account. Trying to moonlight as tech support while you're on patrol or whatever sounds amazing. Maybe an extracurricular activity where our schools would have mingled?

Maybe James has/had some involvement with CLAP? He doesn't even need to be a member (unless you want to). He could be involved peripherally, possibly.

That makes it easy. James can be one of the representitives from his boarding school to CLAP.
This message was last edited by the player at 14:35, Tue 14 Feb 2023.

Alrighty, then we know each other from CLAP, and my job stays the same.

Works for me!

Markus and Vicky are both in CLAP, right? What's the time frame on them getting their abilities? Maybe Ghost was a notably flakey member of CLAP then when the other two come into their powers and start struggling to make meetings a realization about James' situation clicks for them?

Dunno why it made that a PM instead of posting here. Must've typed wrong since I'm writing on a phone.
This message was last edited by the player at 15:15, Tue 14 Feb 2023.

In reply to System (msg # 40):

That would leave Susanna only one connection, I think. She would lose the connection with Vicky since that came out of Susanna’s connection with Markus which has now been changed.

Shit, it does, doesn't it?...

Hmm, Aight, I'm just gonna not touch anything for now, let ya'll hash it out. Both Indigo and Ghost works for me, so I'll go with what you guys figure out.

Obviously I'm too quick to change things around.

If Alex is willing, it might be easiest to move Ghost to that connection and put Susanna back into the other two connections? We haven’t worked out too many details of the ‘something terrible’ yet.

I don’t mind keeping Victoria’s relationship connections as-is.

It calls to mind one of my favorite quotes:

“A good plan violently executed now is better than a perfect plan executed next week.”
—General George S. Patton

I ... think I'm just going to wait for everyone else to work out what they're doing, because there's way too much flying about right now for me to get a handle on where things are going.

Once you begin crafting a reply in a thread, there is an option at the bottom of the page to make the post a private message instead (and the resultant PM then gets sent to whomever gets checked).

It might be that one of these boxes got accidentally checked while you were crafting the post on your phone.

In reply to Ultion (msg # 53):

So you would leave the jealousy connection with Susanna, and we would assume that she and Markus got to be friends after the team formed, and that’s why Vicky is unhappy? I’d be good with that.

Yeah. My playbook just says that the Joined character is jealous of a relationship that the partner playbook has and that they keep trying to interject themselves.

The part about it needing  that person to also be the person who the Janus knew from their civilian life was just extra fluff from me.

It doesn’t bother me one bit to keep my Joined relationships answers the same, whether or not another playbook is planning on adjusting their answers.
This message was last edited by the player at 17:08, Tue 14 Feb 2023.

If it's not too much to ask (and things are indeed sorted) could someone possibly post an update of the big Relationships table?

I'd do it but I'm not especially sure about where everything's ended up.

Anyone feel free to correct me if I’m wrong but I think we’ve all updated our relationships on our character sheets in that thread to be accurate. The only two missing are Vicky and Darius and they look like this:





If I’m right Susanna still has two connections. The civilian life angle Vicky was going for on her connection gets messed up but I think the relation of Susanna wanting to prove herself to Markus and Vicky being jealous of their relationship is really interesting the way it shook out. If we’re all happy with where our relationships fell, and I am with mine, I think we’re good to go.
This message was last edited by the player at 03:33, Fri 17 Feb 2023.

That sounds about right to me.

I do also love the thought of how nonsensical Victoria's jealousy might seem. I mean, with Susanna wanting to prove herself to Markus, and him not thinking much of her at first, I imagine they're gonna bicker something fierce. Why would anyone be jealous of that?
Ah, teenage angst at it's finest x)

This is where I see us at. I think everyone has two connections, and I think it gives us a good set of complications.

If this doesn't match someone else's record or memory or wishes, please let me know.

Alex (aka Barghest, the Reformed)

• I’ve earned the trust of Darius, and I follow their example of what a hero should be.
• I did something terrible to Susanna once. I hope they can forgive me one day

Susanna (aka Indigo, the Beacon)

• James is awesome, and you take every chance you get to hang out with them.
• You've got to prove yourself to Markus before you feel like a real hero.

Markus (aka Payback, the Janus)

• James knew you from your civilian life first.
• You refused to tell Alex your secret identity when they asked.

James (aka Ghost, the Protege)

• You and Darius teamed up a few times from before the rest of you came together.
• Your mentor is cautious; they asked you to keep an eye on Victoria.

Victoria (aka Ultion, the Joined)

• When you have problems with your other half, you talk to Alex.
• You are jealous of the relationship between your other half and Susanna, and you keep trying to interject yourself.

Darius (aka Night Spawn, the Scion)

• Victoria is the only one who understands what I’m going through; I told them which part of me I wished was more like my parent.
• My parent once fought and thrashed Markus; I’ve got to find a way to make it up to them.

This message was last edited by the GM at 17:56, Fri 17 Feb 2023.

Throwing this out there for your perusal/review, Susanna, as it’s what’s been bouncing around my head in some form for a while now:

What I’ve been leaning towards is the idea that at some point in Alex’s early villain tenure she and one or two of the other future Outcasts robbed some kind of store, with her job being to corral and contain any patrons with her powers to make sure they didn’t get involved or raise the alarm. Susanna’s brother just so happened to be on-site – alone or otherwise – and manage to stay out of sight initially, but that just mean he was in for a horror movie-esque experience of being hunted by a thing radiating terror as Alex methodically cleared the premises.

Eventually she cornered him and (for frustration or just plain malice) didn’t bother holding back with her powers. Gave him a brief spell in a waking nightmare.

The long-term impact of that … I leave that up to you.

---

Feels like a scenario that allows Susanna to have her own grudge with Alex, and the Outcasts by association, while putting Alex in a position where she absolutely did the wrong thing and recognises it in hindsight but can still vaguely justify her actions (in the context of just doing a job) and provide her own mitigating factors (naivety, pressure from her own group, high-stress scenario) in the event that I end up playing her as less than wholly repentant.

Thoughts?

Ah, yes, that's good, and fits in nicely with the idea of making the brother deeply suspicious of Masks -- the fear power is perfect for making that happen, and that invisible damage can be harder to face.  And that also gives Susanna another reason for wanting to pursue the Outcasts, aside from whatever larger schemes they might be tangled up in.  Yes, I like that idea.

@Susanna, did Indigo ever assign Influence yet?  If she did, I missed it.

I thought I mentioned it somewhere but I can't find it now.  Ghost, Payback, and you.