Yes initiative is once-per combat.

I am not asking you to post to the initiative groups.  Nothing changes for you..  You're a player at a table, and you can read what the other players write...

There is nothing whatsoever to stop you from reading echo others' posts and/or talking to each other to work out coordinated actions.  Just as there is nothing to stop this at a live gaming table.

I see using this only for building the scene in the locked combat-tracking thread.    It's a simple edit to remove the group-marks after-the scene is built.  At which point, all the opposing-guys actions have already been laid out and it's not a
secret nor surprise anymore.

I thought it would just be more clutter, but it was actually useful.




Make sense?

Yes.

My concern is twofold.

First, it slows down combat even more, as it makes those with high initiative reliant on those with lower initiative to post first in the OOC Combat Thread about what their intentions are.

Add to that, if you're going first then you are the one defining the battleground, because you act first.  Take the fight we just had.  Caster ran away, right?  Why would Cara acting first prevent him from running away, as she thought he was going to keep fighting, and was trying to bully him into surrendering.  Why would higher initiative give her prescient knowledge of what he was intending to do?  If she had wanted to make sure he stayed put, she should have taken some action to make sure he stays put.

1. Caster turned and ran into the rear of the warehouse.  Is that into the same room Etz just went into, or the other one at the rear.  (The map is gone again, or I would refer to zone numbers.  And maybe I'm forgetting about the arrangement and which direction is 'back.')

Yes it's the "room" Etzagith emerged from.

The front room, with Migram, Brollox, Manaolama and Yvon is considered "the front".  Everything else is "the back"

I tried to paint it in earlier mentions that the building is huge.  and filled with a veritable labyrinth of corridors of stacked materials--most of which were going to fill the holds of soon-to-be-outgoing ships.  You want specific?  Okay.  how about... roughly the size of a baseball field.  Approximately 300 feet by 220 feet.

You wanted to be familiar with the layout of the original build and I gave it to you back then for the story, but, really... the original build would have been one very very big roof on top of several sturdy posts.  It's just a rain-shelter under which the wooden structure of a ship was being built.  Now, however, it's been converted to a very big storage space.  with lots and lots of twists and turns.

2. You start one note with "Pushing deeper into the warehouse, the light came from the side-door... it's boards had been carefully removed by someone, and though there was a magical circle aglow around it, it streamed with light, a glaring contrast to the darkness within." but it isn't clear to me who is doing the pushing deeper and seeing all this. 

I'm guessing that whoever decides to actually go into the rear space of the Blue Sails Warehouse will be the ones who "push through".

See message 60 in the Combat Discussion thread where I asked you to tell me what you're doing .  You haven't defined where you're going or what you're doing yet.  So... I don't know, does that include Etzagith?  You tell me!

So far, it looks like Cara is the only one who's chosen to go through there, and is currently engaging with the crowd.



3. Is "to load onto the Blackthorn" something that Etz knows what it means?  I know that I don't, but it could be that I missed something earlier.  If it is supposed to be mysterious to the PCs, that's fine, I just wanted to be sure I didn't miss something.

You tell me.  is "to load onto the Blackthorn" something that means anything to Etzagith?  One might infer that since you're in a dockside warehouse, perhaps "the Blackthorn" is a ship?

You can always open up your browser, expand the IC thread and search for "blackthorn" to see if there's been any mention of it before.  I do this regularly to keep myself consistent with everyon's  various actions throughout the game...

I did already say that I was headed into the room that Hollis had been headed into to call to Bardan.  I'll continue that way.

First, it slows down combat even more, as it makes those with high initiative reliant on those with lower initiative to post first in the OOC Combat Thread about what their intentions are.

I don't see the reliance on high initiative-actors on low-initiative-actors posts.  I don't see how my making NPC actions visible to higher-initiative-actors doesn't change any of this.  How does this slow things down even more from how it was done in the previous combat sequences?

Mind you, player-actions will also remain visible, because you'd all written them elsewhere...


Take the fight we just had.  Caster ran away, right?  Why would Cara acting first prevent him from running away, as she thought he was going to keep fighting, and was trying to bully him into surrendering.


Huh?  Why?  if she'd gone first, Caster would have had to defend against Cara's Provoke action, and might have failed which would have led things to a different outcome.   Maybe she'd have chosen a different action if she'd felt he was about to flee.  And that feeling would have been justified by the scene-build.  She'd just need to give it the narrative front-end.

In the end,  you wrote in-character text that couldn't have happened.  And that's real suck-ass part of this kind of medium.   I twisted the narrative to make use of your in-character text, because your in-character text was cool.   However, in the mechanics, The Caster still went first.


Why would higher initiative give her prescient knowledge of what he was intending to do?

Your opponent has balled his fist, shifted his weight and his eyes flicked to your jaw. These are the kinds of things that would signal that a guy two steps down the initiative ladder is about to punch you.  It isn't prescience.  It's combat awareness.

I'm not going to write out all the precursors that might lead to an intended action for every NPC.  It's easier just to state what the action he's intending to take is, and hide the text in such a way that those lower down the initiative chain can't see it.  This set-up also allows the higher-initiative-actor to write in Mwhy he acted the way he did, writing elements of the NPCs into their story.

In our just-completed combat...  Arui was higher up the initiative ladder.   If she had seen that Caster had intended to flee, she might've been able to act before I'd written the scene out to stop him.
This message was last edited by the GM at 01:13, Sun 12 July 2020.

All right. I've taken your comments into consideration.

We'll go back to the previous way of doing it...

You won't be able to see any of the NPC action/intentions in a combat-exchange.

Does Cara still see Etz, or has he disappeared?

Here is a roll if it is needed.

14:22, Today: Cara rolled -2 using 4 Fudge dice.

Notice is +2, so that's a total of +0

Narrator:
Just outside the doors, there were a dozen people, all of them cloaked...

Etzagith:
Etzagith continued deeper into the warehouse, looking for Barden, the boys, or whatever is going on in the back.  As always when feeling confused and out of place, the rogue kept to the shadows and moved as silently as a cat. 

Cara:
Cara barked something out the the harsh language of her people, striding into the room with blades drawn and her Mantle almost visibly pulsating with power.


So, from this, I'm getting the following:

The group of cloaked people are out in an open space at the side of the Blue Sails Warehouse--outside the door they'd just emerged from.   Arui is now out there, too, as is Garland.

Cara is, apparently, not outside with the group, but in the room, on the inside of the door?  Is she steading on or in the lit-up magical circle?   It is probably disabled now, and the man with the fried face may have something to do with that.

Etzagith chose to leave Hollis and chase after the Caster, so he's somewhere in the Blue sails.

Given all that, I'm not sure that Etzagith is even in Cara's sight range.

Okay.  I'll post a map shortly.

• The Blue Circle is where most of you are now:
  Garland, the cloaked group
  I am assuming that if you're interacting with the cloaked group, you are also in this area.  (Cara, Arui, Nathan)
• The Red oval
  Is deeper in the Blue Sails Warehouse (the blue building).  The Caster fled there.   Etzagith left Hollis to follow him.
• The Purple Oval is the Harpy's Last Note
• The Green circle is the Healer's cluster, where Arui took Mikel...

Cara - please calrify... as you've itneracted with the cloaked group who were listed as standing outside the side doors, where does that put Cara?  inside? outside?

@Cara
Cara knelt down beside the man whom she had felled, looking to the wounds she had inflicted.  She kept her left knife pointed squarely at his chest, but sheathed the right and moved to open the man's shirt.

Man, I just don't feel like I'm communicating well or understanding anything right now.

I am really really confused.

Please tell me where Cara is.  This will tell me where I can place Nathan.

I'd thought you were in Zone 3, on the north side of the building, just inside the north side door, addressing the cloaked group and Arui.

Did Cara go back to zone-1 to triage daggers?



I'm afraid I've lost all sense of continuity here.

And now I've had to draw up three maps today (one for another game).  BLARGH!
This message was last edited by the GM at 10:04, Mon 13 July 2020.

In reply to Control (msg # 80):

I had followed Arui in, and I thought that was where Cara was too

In reply to Nathan (msg # 82):


Yeah, I got that from the exchange the three of you had with the cloaked figures who had already left the building...   But we're apparently not all on the same page.  So, we need to hold up until we are.

I'm gonna put Nathan back there.  You wanna be inside (Zone 3) or outside (Zone 5)?





It's not a combat situation.  Unless one of the PCs make it so... So, my use of "zones" is simply for ease of understanding.

Also--VERY IMPORTANT--This map is not to scale.  In fact, even the dimensions are way off.  The main warehouse room should be much much longer.

The length of the entire warehouse room, from West side (front) to East side (rear) is about the size of a little-league field... so about 200 feet from end to end.  The front room where Migram usually is is extra.

That means that from Hollis to Bardan is maybe thirty or forty feet...  I didn't think it really mattered, but now, I'm not so sure.
This message was last edited by the GM at 11:26, Mon 13 July 2020.

Where you've placed him is fine, in Zone 3

It was Bardan whom I was interested in.  Cara had said that she was dealing with Caster, and running him off was more than enough.  (Just to make sure) It was Bardan whom Hollis told to "get the boys out of here," right?  That's whom I was hoping to deceive and then, when I didn't hear a reploy, to sneak up on.

So I guess it was I, among others, who saw the group outside.  (That was why I asked.)  A crowd like that would drive Etz even more cautiously into shadows.

Cara would have spoken to Nathan and Arui, asked them to keep everyone in one place, and then gone back to attend to Acton Hale (Daggers).

She doesn't want him dying.

I can edit the post to make this more clear once you un-invisible it.
This message was last edited by the player at 20:11, Mon 13 July 2020.

@Etzagith
I'm not sure how I got that he was going after the Caster.

Okay. deleted those associated posts.

I suppose this his what comes from working on three games at once...

Bardan--according to one of the cloaked children--is teh unconscious man at the doorway.  It looks like he triggered the magical circle you'd avoided triggering earlier.

So I guess it was I, among others, who saw the group outside.  (That was why I asked.)  A crowd like that would drive Etz even more cautiously into shadows.

So, Etz is still hiding.  Okay.

Is Bardan still alive? (edit)Ok, I guess he's alive

and if so, is he in immediate danger from his wounds?
This message was last edited by the player at 22:33, Mon 13 July 2020.

Edited and fixed.

@Cara

<Purple>Cara would have spoken to Nathan and Arui, asked them to keep everyone in one place, and then gone back to attend to Acton Hale (Daggers).</Purple>

Heh.  I'm sure that'll go over well with Nathan...  a Khunic diplomat giving orders to a Sigiled Fist after that Khunic diplomat was accused of trespassing...

If only there was some way to figure out you're on the same side...  without opening it up to everyone!

She doesn't want him dying.
He's conceded.  So, mechanically, he's not going to die, but granted, your character doesn't know that.


I can edit the post to make this more clear once you un-invisible it.
The post was made invisible by making it a privae message to you.  You are well within your rights to edit it as you see fit, including removing the private-message attribution.

Please advise if, for some reason, that message is locked.  I don't think rpol does that unless you're a moderator on a public forum...  But I've been wrong before, obviously.


Damn, you guys are so close!...

So the cultists outside, did they go out from inside, or did they arrive here from somewhere else.  (Or maybe I don't know.)

Did Etz hear anything when Bardan triggered the magical circle?

Etz is still convinced that Bardan had the twins with him, and he was attempting to take them somewhere.  If I know that the people outside arrived from somewhere else, he will search inside for them.  If those people were inside and went out, or even if he just doesn't know, then his first priority will be to get a good look at all the children that are a part of that group.  The assumption is that if they are still inside, then there will still be time to find them.

How solid are the walls of the warehouse?  If they have lots of knotholes or cracks, then he'll use those to investigate.  Otherwise either he'll have to find a different way out that doesn't involve going all the way around, or he'll have to come out into the open.

@Etzagith

So the cultists outside, did they go out from inside, or did they arrive here from somewhere else.  (Or maybe I don't know.) 
From what the little girl said, she (and therefore the cloaked figures) witnessed Bardan attempting to disable the circle before opening the doors.  I suggest that, yes, that positions them inside before the doors opened.

Did Etz hear anything when Bardan triggered the magical circle?
You heard the wind whistling around the front (West end) of the warehouse.  You heard the ground shaking and things crashing from off the shelves.   You heard Cara and Nathan and Hollis... and even people shouting, you heard people crying out:





How solid are the walls of the warehouse?  If they have lots of knotholes or cracks, then he'll use those to investigate. 
I haven't defined it.  You're welcome to roll Notice to define this narrative feature.  Though I'm not clear how investigating the cracks and knotholes in the walls of the warehouse will make any difference, so my responses may not actually help at all.  so I'd need you to make it very clear in your investigation nararative how you think this will help meet your objective, should you choose to go there.


Otherwise either he'll have to find a different way out that doesn't involve going all the way around, or he'll have to come out into the open.
As the one with all the answers that Cara and the others have been asking, it is vaguely ironic that Etzagith has skipped out on them and is unavailable.
This message was last edited by the GM at 20:17, Tue 14 July 2020.

Bedtime here, but plenty to respond to in my morning

Sorry!

They are in the zone.  It is my understanding that everybody is in zone 3 right now.

I still can't place them until I know where in the zone they are.

The only one I felt comfortable placing is Arui, based on her tending to Bardan.

Give me a grid-reference, please.


Etzagith just pointed at Hollis and Bardan.

Since it seems to matter...  Each grid space is a 5 foot by 5 foot measure.  The door is a 10-foot across door (the better to get crap in and out when necessary).

Therefore, Hollis' body is approximately 60 feet away from Arui & Bardan.
This message was last edited by the GM at 01:13, Wed 15 July 2020.

E5?

Everyone is in the same zone right now (unless you tell me otherwise).

The only one I felt comfortable placing is Arui, based on her tending to Bardan.

Give me a grid-reference, please.  (thanks Nathan).



Etzagith just pointed at Hollis and Bardan.

Since it seems to matter...  Each grid space is a 5 foot by 5 foot measure.  The door is a 10-foot across door (the better to get crap in and out when necessary).

Therefore, Hollis' body is approximately 60 feet away from Arui & Bardan.

If everyone is in Zone-3, then they're all inside.  All the cloaked figures are outside.   Some are already starting to wander off...
This message was last edited by the GM at 05:11, Wed 15 July 2020.