JM spent the last year of the war in Egypt, Palestine, Lebanon and Syria, there's no reason he wouldn't love it as well.

What innuendo? Ahmed just loves his baklava.

Tony

In reply to The Keeper (msg #121):

Ok, but only under circumstances will he admit he likes such overly sweet things.  Maybe that Black Coffee would be just the thing to balance it out?

In reply to John-Marc Falcon (msg #122):

Lee,

Oh yeah, plus the year or so he spent in Iraq. As part of their mandate in Mesopotamia the British were granted control. The RAF, seeking to consolidate their postwar usefulness and relevancy as a service, proposed they could do most of the work of maintaining that control cost-effectively via the air. Something that then could be applied across a world-spanning Empire. I think this lasted over a decade, not quite sure if it was a success or not.

At any rate, I love Baklava but won't always have it depending on circumstance, so there you go. Remember, this is not actually a night out on the town, JM has other things on his mind!

Thinking the Unthinkable:

One thing that's happened in other games is that players drop out without warning and sometimes this grinds the story to a halt while everyone waits for some kind of resolution. This is unfortunate but sometimes unavoidable. If at all possible I really appreciate some kind of notice if anyone drops out, a PM will do.

If there is an absence of posting for a couple days then I'll NPC investigators as needed. Rest assured I will make the best decisions I can under the circumstances. After a week without notice I'll assume the worst and take steps to either write the investigator out of the story or offer it up to one of the people who have sent RTJs and are waiting for an opening.

Tony
This message was last edited by the GM at 22:51, Fri 14 Oct 2011.

Group,

The club was originally posted as having only 1 story. However, I'm happy to oblige! (It just requires a little "tuning" like Dark City.) However, it appears the upper story is merely cramped flats.

During the day, Imran would have seen a set of somewhat rickety exterior stairs in the back alley, empty clothes lines overhead. Darlington would have observed immigrant family members coming and going at various non-suspicious times. Arriving at night, anyone looking would have seen lights on behind the curtains when you saw the club.

All access to the upper floor that you know of seems to be limited to the one exterior wooden stairwell in the rear. Overall building construction is brick exterior, wood frame, floors and beams. When it comes time for the cleansing fire, it'll be a bloody massacre!

Tony
This message was last edited by the GM at 10:18, Sun 16 Oct 2011.

I'm wondering if I should buy this for my children:
http://io9.com/5847879/what-if...-the-call-of-cthulhu

Sure, for children old enough to read the original Lovecraft works.  For younger than, it'll either go way over their heads, warp them into something we probably recognize, or just give em nightmares.  One of the results is pretty acceptable, so what the hey?

You're right. I should give it to my brother's children.

I think it's pretty cool! My wife got a "My First Cthulhu" doll, aka Baby Cthulhu.

Take the "What Kind of Gamer Are You?" Quiz:

http://quizfarm.com/quizzes/do...racter-type-are-you/

Fun for the whole family!

In game, it's about 11:30 now. About a half-hour until the back-alley meeting with Aiyesha the Belly Dancer and her "teacher". Slight correction, others and not just Darlington are invited to go.

Tony

[Private to Cynthia Jane Holloway: Also, do you have enough information to proceed with Cynthia's investigation at this time?]

Perfect gift for nephews and nieces!


I scored as a "Storyteller".  It might mean I am boring?

I remember when the first Cthulu stuffie came out, we had to have it, I believe my ex wife still has it, not that I will contact her to confirm it.

Been away from the internet all weekend. I shall catch up with things either tonight or tomorrow morning. Thanks for being patient!

I got 'character player', with 'story teller' a close second. It's tough though, there's so many roles I ENJOY playing. You just have to adapt your playstyle to the game.

[Private to GM: Oh yes. What I need is 'another character with lockpicking' :P I just don't post very much on weekends.]

In reply to Albert Darlington (msg #130):

No worries! Weekends are slow posting for some, quicker for others. This is a big adventure, miles to go before we sleep, so I might try and push the plot along some times and my apologies if anyone feels they haven't been given opportunity.

I got a 3-way tie between 80% Character Player - 80% Tactician - 80% Storyteller.

That reminds me, some players took over old characters, or at least characters they didn't create themselves. (My thanks to them.) I'm happy to consider a degree of customisation in shifting points around. Please PM me if you have any suggestions!

Apropos of oddball children's books an artist had an urge to make an illustrated book based on the song "Space Oddity" by David Bowie. As the lyrics are copyrighted he released the book free in .pdf form. It's perhaps the saddest children's book I can recall. Versions combining the book and music can be found on Youtube:

Article:

http://www.wired.com/underwire...dity-childrens-book/

Video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BSxIBTO1gBU

Tony

Also Character Player/Storyteller 95% each, with Tactician third at 70%.

Group,

I'm going to push the narrative forward to midnight, then. I hope everyone's gotten their fill of snooping around!

Tony

Group,

I am assuming Darlington and JM are with Howard and Dr. Weston (somewhat chuffed at his newly-found ability as an investigator) is there as well.

Should any of the above parties decline, then simply post them returning back down the alley to the taxi. I will hold off on another narrative post until Weston/Darlington/John-Marc have had a post.

The tactical idea is that Darlington and Howard are interfacing with Aiyesha and her "teacher", JM is covering the rear door to the Blue Pyramid, Imran is watching the side alley both ways and Dr. Weston is a passive observer. There are other doors in the alley and of course someone could come down the stairs from above the club but the main avenues of approach are covered.

Tony

Unless anyone else has other ideas I suggest we fast forward to a meeting at the Park Lane hotel suite the next morning?

Keeper: could you please rename the 'London' thread to 'London: Park Lane Hotel' please? It would make it less confusing for me.

Paul,

I'll wait a day or so for others to post but I think you're basically done with the "clue dump". Lots of ground yet to cover!

Having tried it a little, I find I don't particularly like "location" threads. I gave it an honest try, guys!

In my other games threads are all narrative/time-based. Once you guys are done with Soho, I think we'll just keep the game on the London thread until it comes time to change. Not run concurrent threads until I think it's necessary. It may seem confusing at first but it ultimately means everyone just checks one thread most of the time, and are therefore on the same page.

Note: I assume you gave Aiyesha or Mohammad some kind of contact information and vice versa? At the least they would get ahold of Darlington via Barrington and the group at the Park Lane Hotel.

Tony

OK, I'll go along with time-based rather than location based threads. The CoC Modern game I GM on here uses a chronological thread for each day rather than locations, so I don't know why it confuses me.

Yes, Darlington did give his contact details, i hinted at it by telling Aiyesha to call me if she was in trouble, but didn't expicitly state the action..

Lampton did not provide any contact information to the pair.

Paul,

Sweet! I figured that was a given. I was more interested in what the other players will do.

Okay, no contact with the Park Lane. The guys in the alley have the matchbook, anyways. So SOMEONE knows where you are staying!

Question: Do you think you could you ring telephone kiosks in London at one time? I know you can't do that any more here due to the drug trade but you could at one time. I don't see why not, at this point in time not everyone had private telephones and so public phones were more important.

Fun fact: Police call-boxes weren't deployed in London until 1926-27. They were pre-fabricated from concrete and bloody cold! The first London K1 telephone kiosks were also made from concrete and painted white and red.

Regarding the Luger '08: I ran the CoC adventure "No Man's Land" and it was written around the famous "Lost Battalion" incident in the Argonne forest (re-set to 2nd Ypres with Canadians instead of Americans). P08 Lugers were highly sought-after by the PCs!

Tony
This message was last edited by the GM at 12:06, Thu 20 Oct 2011.

Group,

Make whatever toast you want and closing comments for the night. Any other business can probably wait until morning when Darlington shows up for his meeting.

Tony

Group,

Regarding Darlington, I guess Lampton is the point of contact. He did invite him to come around the hotel, and even if he didn't catch the name it would take all of about 30 seconds to nail down where the large party of Americans who recently checked in are staying.

Will you be meeting in one of the rooms (probably the ground floor Drawing Room, tucked in behind the Silver Room through the Ballroom Entrance off Piccadilly)? Or in the sitting area of Howard's suite? (I would wager the latter.)

Tony

Howard's suite seems more private.

In reply to Howard Lampton (msg #143):

Bueno. Breakfast is served!

I'm going to switch to Paul's suggestion of daily threads. This is along the lines of what I normally do.

Also, "Masks" is infamous for the amount of possible TPKs. They suggest that one investigator be made the recipient of copies of information and documents, reports from the field, etc. from the main group. This is in case everyone is wiped out, a new group of investigators can be formed and briefed without losing too much ground. Probably Ralph or Storm could serve this purpose, although Jonah is mainly the conduit at the moment.

Tony

Simmons will always know where Howard's notes are.