Thanks for that DM Mike. I made an action post and then I edited the original poker post where I got my cards. I hope I did it right.

Yup, that's fine!

Hang on, let me be sure I follow this.
Ardo bet 1gp.
I put in 1gp to meet his bet and then raised 1gp so the total bet is 2gp.
Durken puts in 1gp.

Is he trying to cheat or did he just not notice that I raised?

I meant he met your bet.  I'll adjust the post when I can.

Swamped with RL stuff.  I will get on to post in-game ASAP.

Sorry for the delay.

XPs for December have been posted.

I will get on over the weekend and post at least once, if not twice.

Sorry to slow the game, especially during the poker game!

Eh, it's okay DM Mike. We'll get over it. As long as you don't vanish completely anyway. Although I'm still not sure I believe that the fact that you've slowed down posting means that the rest of us get extra XP. On the other hand, YAY! More XP! <giggling>

I give out the extra XPs as thanks for sticking with me and the region.

Loyalty should be rewarded!

Now, on to the game within a game!

I'll be out of town from the 22nd to the 27th or the 28th to celebrate the holidays with my family, and won't be able to post here while I'm away.

Gosh Mike, I'm sorry I said, "Hey it's okay" and "we'll get over it". I assumed that when you took responsibility for the slow down that there was something going on that needed your response in game, possibly Shaeria was waiting on a PM from you or something.

Anyway, I apologize. Sorry about that.

Have a look at the Community Chat in the OOC - Shaeria (played by DM Windwalker) is out of commission for a day or so due to the girls getting sick, and will be back as soon as possible.

I saw that after I'd posted here.

I hope she'll have some quiet peaceful time soon.  Her life seems topsy-turvy in none-too-fun ways.

And thanks for the holiday update.

Sorry, the girls are better so I am back.

Thanks for NPCing me, Mike, that's what I would have done anyway so you acted superbly as usual.  :)

What...?  Sorry, I didn't catch that.  I was busy polishing my Oscars, Tonies, and Emmies.

:P

The card game is taking too long, since I can not get on and post too often.

It would be worlds of fun to do this in real time, but PbP and my slowness to post make it a grind to the game, so...

Once all players in the card game have gotten their new cards from Krissa, last bets are placed and cards are revealed after those bets.

We should get done by the new year that way.

SHEESH!

Sorry this went so slow, folks.

Oh well. It was a really good idea Mike. Lots and lots of potential for interesting RPing on multiple levels; RPing the actual card game, RPing bluffs and cheating or trying to catch people bluffing or cheating, RPing the talk at the table and seeing both PC and NPC emotions swing as hands are won and lost. I even had this idea that maybe we could make bets for information instead of cash.

And I don't think you need to take all the blame for slowness. I think we've all been guilty of slow replies lately.

So anyway, the card game is a great idea. Try it again sometime when you aren't DMing 42 games at the same time.

Ah, it's not all THAT bad.

Only 38 and counting!  (and we still may need to find a DM for the Underdark region...)

It was a really good idea.  Especially since I love poker.  :)

We should have an RoA convention sometime and rp and play poker for real.  Then I could meet everybody for real.  :p

That's not a bad idea.

DM HackDoc's house, everyone!

Home again, but I'm sick, and I probably won't be posting again until I'm feeling at least a bit better.

Thanks, Mike.  If I had a bigger house I'd offer to host, I am a central location for those of us located in the States, and not too awful far from DC and Kindred, but everybody else is far, far away.

Get better soon, Elodeir.

Oh, damn, it's my turn, isn't it?  :-(  I'll have a post up in a moment, promise.

I'm still here, alive, but not really kicking.

Work's been hectic, and I have been a bit too addicted to Neverwinter Nights.

I'll give NWN the heave-ho for at least the week, and get posting going again.

Sorry for the delay, and to try to make up for it, once I post I will give a nice bonus for you all for waiting.

Sorry, and look for a post in-game soon.

Well, it's been a week without Neverwinter Nights, but also a week without much RPoL or RoA time...

Work, work on the car, family time, shopping...

Look, I hate like Hell to do this, but we're going to end the card game.  Maybe I can think of another way to pull something like that off later in a game, but for now, it will move things along much better if we cut the game short, then move on to the adventure at-hand.

The card game was more or less meant to do a few different things:

1.) Allow for a new style of game play (a slower opost-by-post method of game play, it seems, which I can not really do much with since my posting times are so infrequent now)

2.) Allow for some fun RPing (I hope to get some good RPing in the "normal" game posts, though)

3.) Let you win (or lose) some money

4.) Get some vital clues to the adventure at-hand.

===========================

So here is what happens out-of-game.

Look for in-game results in the game thread.

You each get 150 XPs for the game, RPing/posting and waiting.  (I will add these to the XPs thread.

You play a few hands.  The only person to lose their pots entirely is Ardo, and we will show the results of that in the game thread.

The rest of you come out pretty evenly.  No bit losses, no big gains to the money situation.

Ardo, Krissa, and Durken exchange some meaningful taunts and spiteful comments that illuminate things a bit, and we'll see those in the game thread.

Again, I am VERY sorry this experiment did not work out as I wanted it to.  If I could get on almost every day like I used to at my old job, it would have worked and been fun.

I used to teach, and in my office I could pop online several times a day, post, and that was it.  I could do all my regions in RoA easily that way.  Now that I get online once or twice a week, it is harder to keep games going well.

But I am going to do all I can to keep our region going strong!!  You all deserve that!

DM Mike, when you say you're going to move things along you don't kid around! That's a lot to consider all at once. <puts on thinking cap>

---

I doubt this will be a popular idea but I want to put it out for discussion. Would the players in this region be better served by putting the whole game on Pause for awhile and wait for a less-overworked DM to become available? I have heard that a few DMs have recently had to vacate their positions and I'm sure that isn't making your job any easier Mike.

In this region I think we only have 3 active players. I know I have other characters to play and I get the impression that the other players might as well. I personally choose to wait patiently for a quality game rather than pressing ahead stubbornly while our DM does his best to provide for 38 games at the same time. Mike, in all honesty, I know you're doing the best you can but there's nobody in the world who could manage what you're attempting unless this was their full time job...and maybe not even then. I think we should cut you some slack by letting you out of this particular region.

Who has an opinion about this?

I can wait, as I have been done since I joined originally (only original member left).  No activity doesn't strain my time, so it is no problem just to check in from time to time to see if we can up an go.