Yah, that elephant has been in the room for a while. I enjoyed those games of yours though! I am confident another nice solid bone will show up. ;)

Sorry to see you go Autarch, but if the time has passed then so be it.  You'll certainly always be welcome in my games if you decide to come back sometime.

just checking in

Hi there!
I'm still at RPOL, busy with 2 games. Amber and a variant of it.

Hey there, glad to see you guys dong well! :)

Still present!  Busy, but present.

The itch returns.

For DCC specifically, or gaming in general?

I'm probably on board either way.

In general. Maybe not so much DCC. I'm not sure I want to invest the energy to get back up to speed. Lots I liked about it though.

And not a tactics heavy version of D&D that would require tiles and endless states/buffs/banes. Too much labor.

So probably a classic AD&D module like we did with Castle Amber. I shall ponder.

I find gaming's just one of the few ways to stop thinking about my clients, you know.

Maybe a fresh DCC game starting at level 1? I've been wanting to play a DCC Wizard (w. patron) for a long time now. :)

For some variety you could allow the new classes introduced in great supplements like Hubris, or the recently released DCC Annual, would help attract more players (though a DCC game would attract plenty players IMO as there are no games going on here currently)

Hey, V.  No issue really with player attraction. I've got a couple of other friends who are up for anything.

I could see returning to DCC but I think I want to run an AD&D mod first. But maybe running Keep as DCC would work.

If you want light effort as far as maps etc, Dungeon World is always a fine alternative.  Though I know PbtA doesn't really work for everyone.

Now that I'm thinking about it, J, DCC is a modern revamping of AD&D (extracting it from the tactical morass it has become) (though I have not played 5.0). So the attraction to AD&D would be the nostalgia-infused old modules. But now that I'm thinking about past times, Sailors under a Starless Sky and Fate's Fell Hand were … blood brilliant modules. They had that prog rock and King in Yellow vibe I relish. I mean I don't really like prog rock but I like the idea of it. I digress.

Whatever you go with Autarch (and I hope its DCC!) I'm all for a mapless theater of the mind. DCC works great that way IMO. Just start at level 1 rather than a funnel, or higher if you wish.

If you want to run non-DCC modules you can always convert the AD&D ones you like.

OK. Before I (re)commit to RPOL, I wanted to revisit my decision in Sept of 16 to abandon ship.

At the time, I said I was tired of RPOL. I guess so. It was start of another semester and I might have been teaching 1-2 ESL classes in addition to my regular 3. Plenty of take home work. Daughter was a very unhappy teenager.

I would also add now that player participation at the time wasn't so great, down to just a few regular players. And neither was the module--weaker than the SotSS and FFH.

But now I work as an unlicensed social worker. No takehome work. More emotionally than mentally draining. Daughter is vastly happier as a 2nd year animation student at CalArts. She even painted a mural at my social services agency over the break.

So let's do it. I have a couple of new players (people I know) and I want them to experience the funnel.

So Creep, Scrag, Creep! -- the Halloween 19 horror module.

Josh, V, Ricky and Sarah. And another TBD.

Sweet, I'm in!  How many characters per player, are we using any modifications to standard rules, and should we aim for themed groups like last time?  (At least, I think I remember that being the idea - I don't know why else I would have done the cast of Red Dwarfas my starting PCs).

In reply to Josh (msg # 61):

That... might have been just you. I don't remember. Feel free to have your 3 be members of the same family, orphanage, or mime troupe.

No mods to standard rules that I know of. Any supplements you like. If something doesn't seem to be working, we'll weed it out.

Plan is to get the game running in the next week or two. Two of the new players are husband/wife with a new baby expected any day. So who knows.

So what you're saying is that I went above and beyond, and deserve bonus xp for my efforts?  I definitely agree :D

For the purposes of this adventure, you all are "the poor citizens of the isolated island of Alviz" who have bought passage on the Star of Nostro to travel to the coastal city of Lyr to pick grapes to work in the copper mines.

Great! Would have preferred we skip the meatgrinder err I mean the funnel but it's DCC and run by Autarch so it automatically means I'm in!

We who are about to die salute you.

I opened up the new players' sheets for editing.

We should be able to start this weekend. I'll need the time to study the mod and peruse DDC, 7th printing. But as two of you may recall, I tend to rely on the players to do the heavy rules lifting.

3x vassals each.

See OOC #64. Also, I think the names in this region have a French/Caribbean flavor.

I'll modify my characters' names accordingly.

My redshirts are ready for review!

Please use Quad's or Josh's character sheets for ease of my skimming.