Yes, I was going with Carmen in the pilgrim group, and I did suggest Nothing to join us as his mute childhood friend, but it was shot down for some reason, I believe? Don't recall.

In reply to Carver Merling (msg # 899):

I don't think it was shot down, that I can recall; probably was part of a discussion and somebody raised a possible objection, but that doesn't mean that the idea can't work.

Anyway, that's now three votes out of five for Nothing to join Carmen's group; I'll give Lilah a bit more to reply, and then move things forwards unless something unexpected comes up.

In reply to Adrika (msg # 898):

There's plenty of conditions of birth that healing magic can't cure for one reason or another; it's perfectly acceptable for Nothing to claim muteness as a birth defect. It's not a problem to go with that justification, healing is not all powerful and there are things (such as, for example, the Branderscar mark that all of you have on your arm) that are nearly impossible to cure, even with magic.

In fact, Adrika, you have such a wound featured in your own backstory (the one you inflicted to your captor when he lost his eye, remember?), so you really shouldn't be surprised by this. Nothing being mute from birth is fine with me, if it wasn't I would have said so long before now. It's a character's choice, no need to belabor it.
This message was last edited by the GM at 15:19, Sun 13 June 2021.

Yeah, i'm confident that if it wouldn't have worked, you'd have warned us about it, so no worries there.

In the end, it's Nothing's character, therefore it's Nothing's choice :)

Yeah I prefer the natural-muteness thing for reasons such as that which Nothing has presented, for example if something happened which might naturally cause a person to involuntarily cry out (even something as boring and straightforward as having a heavy object dropped on their foot, for example), their lack of doing such might be suspicious unless they were convincing enough in their apparently self-control to not make a sound. Might as well not leave ourselves any possible openings to get caught, I figure, and since Nothing is literally incapable of making any kind of vocalisations, we may as well use that in itself as the cover story - only the reason for the muteness is different. It is, after all, geneally advised to only change a few details here and there when creating a cover story so that there are fewer details to remember and it's easier to talk about it convincingly and come up with minor details that a full lie might not account for. Actual real-life secret agents/spies etc do this so if it works for them, maybe it'll work for an extraplanar being made of shadow-made-physical who has no understandable biology at all :D.

I had tooth removed today, so I will be taking it easy. I'll post tomorrow!

In reply to Nothing (msg # 902):

Speaking of secret agents...

...James Bond is the worst spy ever. He always places himself at the center of attention, and leaves a clear trail of death and destruction in the wake of every single one of his missions. :P

I always figured James Bond wasn't a spy in the traditional sense of collecting information; he's more of a wrecking ball than anything subtle. In my mind, MI6 doesn't send James Bond out when it needs something done quietly or deniably - rather, it sends James Bond when it wants something taken care of in a manner that very clearly say "don't piss off the UK next time", or when the mission is so important that failure would mean global catastrophe.

Anyway, I think Lilah gave us her vote in the IC thread, and it's for having Nothing go with Carmen, so I'm going with the majority consensus - I'll have the next big IC post up sometime in the next few hours.
This message was last edited by the GM at 18:04, Mon 14 June 2021.

They asked the actual MI6 chief if he'd hire James Bond, and he replied Bond wouldn't even make it through the recruitment process. Though, amusingly, there is a theory floating about that he's supposed to be who he is, though for (slightly) different reasons:

https://www.digitalspy.com/mov...-theory-007-bad-spy/
This message was last edited by the player at 17:51, Mon 14 June 2021.

Well, first posts are underway it seems...

Adrika, you make me wonder if you're a bot sometimes - you make more posts with images, gifs and links than the rest of everybody else here combined. I guess that's just me being weird though.

Anyway, since the main thread will be focused on Carmen, Nothing and Carver for the next little while, I was wondering if the other three of you (Ashaia, Adrika and Lilah) want to do anything else in the meanwhile?

I mean, technically Adrika and Lilah's private thread is still up yet (although the last post there was way more than two days ago - despite my very clearly made point that I wanted the posting speed of "at least one post within two days of the last one" was to be retained in the side thread and main thread both, independently of each other), so you could actually continue that discussion if you're bored, but with that said, if any of you want something else to keep them occupied during this time where the others have center stage on the main thread, be sure to let me know - including in PM if you prefer.

Speaking of the others on the main thread, while I don't want to nag anybody until two days have passed from the last post made in the main thread, I do would like it if you tried your best to make your posts a bit faster there, to propel it forward faster and thus keeping the other players waiting for a shorted period of time.

I hope that's not too much of a bother - I specifically made this a public post, instead of three or four PM, because I didn't want to target anybody in particular with the message, I just wanted everybody to be aware of it, and perhaps to get an OOC discussion going on how to handle these troubles as a group in case anybody had suggestions to make. :)

In reply to Security Feature (msg # 908):

Yeah, you know how some people think in pictures and others in words, right? i myself fall firmly into the first category, so i tend to have a firm collection of images (and ways to find more) at my disposal.

The image links i can by now type without paying attention, honestly :P

I think I'm probably more of a written word person myself; although there are occasional images I find interesting, I tend to have less reaction to them than most people. In fact, I've never been very clear about the interest people have in paintings, and the one time I visited the Louvre I spend about five minute in the art gallery before spending the next two hours in the area with the statues and armors, which spoke more to me. Don't misunderstand, I do like art here and there, but generally I need either a narrative or music to go along with it for it to really affect me.

But I do understand that's a difference between people; at one point, I had a partner who had Stendhal syndrome - paintings generally left them in a hyperemotional state in general and there were a few images that affected them extremely hard (for example, Munch's "the scream" would leave them shaking for a few minutes), who also chased after that rush. It lead to interesting conversations when I didn't "get" how any of it worked. So, yeah, I get it that people have different points of focus. It's just a strange thing to me personally because I don't really get it much, that's all. :)

And there's nothing inherently wrong with that.

Whether one thinks in pictures or words has to do with how the brain is wired, there's some interesting theories on the how and why by the way: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ltYGVobKX0U

In the end, as long as the two can come together and have a good understanding conversation on the same topics, then... nothing is really lost in translation, is there? :)

Post and stuff tomorrow, been mentally exhausted these last few days and need a recharge.

Remember when I said tomorrow? Tooth extraction aftermath was not as fun as I expected, and all the time I've been afforded to do stuff has gone to work. It's much better now, no more pain or stuff.

I will, however, post tomorrow for realzies. Promise!

In reply to Ashaia (msg # 913):

...no need for you to be in a rush, Ashaia; unlike everybody else, you're only in a private thread with just me, which means even if you need to delay a bit, you're not holding things up for the other players, which is the thing I care most about. I can wait when it's just myself, I just don't want the others to be made to wait, because that holds up the whole game.

In any case, I'm glad you're feeling better! ^_^

GM?

Your D&D may be slipping through, Pathfinder doesn't have a Gather Information skill. Did you mean Diplomacy, or Perception if it was about things overheard? :P

In reply to Adrika (msg # 915):

Gather information is a possible use of Diplomacy; I'm not so stuck up on terminology that I have problems using them interchangeably.

https://www.d20pfsrd.com/skills/diplomacy

I'm just waiving the 1d4 hours of canvassing in the present situation, because these are just the rumors that can be picked up from simply walking around - actually looking for information would yield different information. I have a lot of it available for you to find, in fact - I don't expect you'll be able to collect it all without a very focused effort to do so.

Ahh right, I went to the IC thread before I came to this one so I already queried it there. Since we're just overhearing stuff rather than actively asking, though, shouldn't it be Perception? That's the "noticing stuff" skill, after all, which includes hearing things. Diplomacy is more for like, asking/persuading people of stuff, isn't it?

In reply to Nothing (msg # 917):

Yes, but I'm already bending rules as it is by letting you collect information without spending the required time to do so, I'm not inclined to let you use a skill all three of you have maxed in place of the proper one, which none of you is especially good at.

And that is indeed why i asked. I knew Diplomacy was the 'official' Gather Information skill, but the way it was phrased implied Perception:

 

Overall though, it doesn't matter, aside from knowing what skill to roll when we make our entry as well. Ashaia, when Narrator gives the signal, want to go first or should i?

You might want to consider the possibility that, thanks to the information the current team might collect (or fail to), your plans might need adjustment, especially since part of the plan is to let some serious time (as in, along the lines of half/a whole day) pass between arrival, since if you all arrive within one hour of each other, that would defeat the point of splitting up (Cetaen will be very vocal about this if you need an IC reason to be aware of it).
This message was last edited by the GM at 18:22, Fri 18 June 2021.

Yes, hence the "When Narrator gives the signal" part.

It's tempting to rush into the thread, i know, but i can resist :P

In reply to Adrika (msg # 921):

The last thing I'll ever be annoyed by will be overeagerness, don't worry. :)

I was just making sure you knew what the current plan was, and also that you were ready to adapt it should new information be discovered that warranted doing so.

/17
Quiz 3

6/18
Quiz 4
Politics:
• Wrap It Up FED Ch 3
• Wrap It Up FED Ch 13
• Wrap It Up Texas Ch 8
• Focus Activities FED Ch 13
• Watch and Consider FED Ch 13

6/20
Quiz 5
Practice Test 3

6/21
Test 3
EXAM 2 Politics


. . . why did I sign up for this D:

In all seriousness, Ill post when I can, but its 9pm my time and Ive veen working since 10 and Im NOT DONE YET