As soon as I figure out how to do the Character sheet I will post it.

If any of you have any questions for the group, or public questions for the GM, feel free to post them here.
This message was last edited by the GM at 06:49, Wed 10 June 2020.

Hello, all! Not sure where things are at yet, or if we should be working on something?

In reply to mesneaky (msg # 2):

I am happy with all of the proposed Character Concepts so far. There is space for up to 4 more, but with 5 we can start.

I am frantically trying to get a good Adobe product to make transcription easier, but I will have a Character Sheet up by Saturday.

For now, Character Creation should be the current step. I will answer questions in this thread or through PM, if prefered.

Old Torg was Much, MUCH, more focused on Template creation. If you can, pick a template that works best. If you need to, you can tweek the Attributes (minor tweeking, please) as long as the sum doesn't change. Other tweeks should be run past me first. ... If no Template you can find is going to work, I can suggest a few; and if even that won't work, the Storm Knight's Guide... has creation rules that Will work. Note: those rules take over 7 chapters, so....

Heya stormers:)

For now I should be playing a transformer aysle barbarian beauty !

One of you has requested a name change. Another has their suggested name in their RTJ. Does anyone else have a name ready for me to Change your game-name to be?

Mine should be Jalia please :)

I have one quick question -- in moving us back to the old TORG system, are we also moving the setting back to the like... 1980s/'90s, when the original game was set?  Or are we updating to the more modern setting and figuring out what that means as and when it comes up?

Good morning everyone. Delighted to play with you all

With regards to the question of 'when is it set' I'm neutral. I like the present (because I live in the present so will make fewer mistakes), but the 1980s/1990s were interesting. I might have to tweak my character description if we are in the past though! I think the issues of computer privacy were less important

I'm going to mildly differ with Apeiros on the templates. I've played a Torg campaign for years, and played in maybe ten torg games ran by other GMs (we really liked it). I've never seen anyone use a template: not once. I think the templates are great as ways of showing the results of the character creation, and great as a tool for describing the game, but I've not seen them used in play because they are 'pre-gens', and the player group I was with didn't do those. Most games have pre-gens and for a 'con game' or a one of they are super. They take 10 minutes to understand and play, but 'you' are not in the character, it's a pre-gen made by someone else.

Torg character generation is perhaps 1/20th the effort of a M&M character. I have to use a paid for tool to do that (Herolabs) and I've just done one taking perhaps 10 hours. Torg I can do in one hour, perhaps a second hour for review and thinking about her. I get the GMs comment about 7 chapters, but it's still simple

All that said I like playing con games. In con games I sometimes get pre-gen's that turn out to be awesome and then I make the character my own. I still have one pre-gen from a Conan game that turned from being a con game to a regular game and she's great. I don't think the character creation makes 'better' characters, simply ones that are closer to your vision of what you want to play, and if the template looks good: go with it.

In reply to Utsukushi (msg # 7):

ST actually covered this in the intro, we are back in the 1990's.

In reply to Apeiros (msg # 3):

Spoiler, the group's introduction will include the day lasting 28 hours.

And yes, I see this as late 1990.
Con: Current events and items (cell phones?) haven't happened yet (except possibly in Japan/France)
Pro: We don't have to guess at what the "Near Now" is going to look like.

Also: All special abilities are available. Psychic powers are available even though Space Gods have not landed, but before you think about changing your concept...we already have one person requesting to play a psychic.

Due to splitting XP:PP, every character will start with 5 of each instead of 10 Possibilities.

There are 3 options for PCgen: Straight Template, all you need to do after picking it is Skills, (Spells/Miracles/Powers/Psionics) and spend any of the XP if you want; Tweeking, start with a template and change any→all background (including equipment) to fit, play with the attributes a bit (1 to 1 of course), then do skills, specials, and XP as desired; and Scratch which follows the tSKGttPW protocall. I was not impressed with the "Revised" rulebook at all, and least by the creation system therein--might as well be playing Heroes (decent enough game, but it's not TORG).

I have every OT book, so any template you want to use is available, except the ones that aren't "here" yet. No Tharkoldu, no Akashans, no Ravagons (here, but still loyal to the Gaunt Man), and, sadly, the Revised Realm Runner (Delphi Council) doesn't work yet either (Though if someone were building a Realm Runner and wanted their Tag to be Reality instead of Land vehicles, that would be fine. I also know most of the templates, so if you want a suggestion of where to look for inspiration, I am happy to help

Thank you. late 1990 it is! The internet exists but not that many people use it. Still have AOL! I remember borrowing a mobile phone (a 'car phone') it was the size of a brick and the spare battery was huge.

Good thing the Tharkoldu aren't a character option! In our game that book came out a few years after we had playing. We had a character death and someone rerolled as one of those. He was a starter and as good as a character that had been playing for years (which was fine in that game)

The others seem pretty balanced. Or rather all slightly unbalanced in their own area of awesomeness which is even better.

I have to admit I am always torn at this stage. There are so many uber character options. I have a soft spot for the Nile Empire. The Wierd Scientists and the Mystery Men are both great. The Orrorsh werewolfs and that magic system is scary and powerful: as a player you can cast 'wish'... like 'wow!'. But it's so scary. There's the obvious major win from RP of being a core earther as well. I think it would be hard to be a lizard man, but that has RP goodness too...

Still I have settled on Sapphire now. Looking forwards to playing her

Can I ask what everyone else is playing?

You can see from my description I'm an Aylse priestess type. Everyone in Aylse has magic (it's a world law) so I have a little bit too. When it comes to combat I think I am mostly a melee combat type. I suspect I am more a glass jawed ninja than a tank, so I'm glad of the GMs optional rule for that.

Could you please give me the complete Barbarian archetype profile, so I can use and tweak it a bit ? :)

And as a transformed Aysle girl, Jalia won't have any magic, Sapphire :p

I was planning on playing a Realm Runner. Apparently I'm missing out on all the magic and special stuff to min max my character though. =)

Well you get a decent tech rating. So you can use guns and heavy weapons and things. So as an elf I'm pretty much restricted for ranged damage to a bow, instead of an assault rifle. I (if I had the spell) buff my bow, but I could just as easy buff your rifle. A buffed rifle is a lot better than a buffed bow.

What's interesting is that if you spend xp on cool stuff like magic, your combat skills like trick, manuver, and so on, will probably be quite low. The game system rewards those. So Realm Runners typically do well there.

Another really good thing that you could do (that I can't) is get martial arts. Martial arts are Great! with a capital G. And as you get higher level they get better. You need a decent social axiom to get them, and Aylse doesn't have them.

As the game progresses you could get Faith or Focus. After all you will have proof that the God's exist. Core Earth faith spells are pretty good. You can also learn psionics: especially if there is another psionic in the party to learn from...

If you want to be a jack of all trades character I think it works quite well. Especially if the other players buff you: you will have a better starting point than they do because they need to spend attributes/skills on things you don't

Summary:
* Get lots of high damage weapons!
* Get a friendly mage / cleric to buff you
* Learn Martial Arts
* Put points into the skills other people don't bother with that actually work really well
* The upgrade path into esoterica is pretty good: minor magics, psionics, faith/focus

Well my next character will be a Ronin from Nippon Tech, lol!

Well go with what feels fun to play!

I am playing a cyberpapacy talker/buffer. Both magical and miracle buffs.

I'll be playing an ex-paratrooper that had latent psychic powers which awaken with the invasion. Ben is a Core-Earther and has a strong motivation to kick the Pharaoh back to Terra.

Sapphire: Aylse. MagicUser/Cleric
Be. Altman:      Core Earther. Paratrooper with Psi
Grognard:        Cyberpapacy talker/buffer
Jason Keller:    Realm Runner
Jalia            Aylse Barbarian
Utsukushi:       unknown

Looks a good combination so far! Can any of us do any healing at the moment (I am selecting miracles/spells).
This message was last edited by the player at 16:41, Sat 13 June 2020.

You forgot Jalia the Aylse barbarian

Thanks :) One day I will learn how to count.

You don't need to count when you can cast spells to count for you :)

I need to count how much damage the spells do to me...

In reply to Sapphire (msg # 20):

My guy can heal, but is not very good at it.

Uhh Jason is a Realm Runner. I'd pick a better name for someone from Nippon Tech cosm.

I misread this. I thought you were changing. Good!

In reply to Sapphire (msg # 27):

Yea, no, lol. I meant if/when Jason dies, and by then who knows what I'll want to play next. But I've been on a samurai movie watching kick lately.

Since I've only ever played TORG once and that was decades ago, I am going with something simple. No magic, no psionics, Core Earth.

I don't know if i'd call a Realm Runner simple, especially in oTORG.. I mean, if any of us are going to end up wielding a gizmo in one hand and magic in the other while running a megacorporation that worships Lanala, that'll be Jason.

But I guess they start simple. grin

uhhh.....wait, can you LEARN magic later on? I'm not looking to, at least not now, but just curious.

Yes you can. Especially if you have a teacher (preens). But it is a little expensive (it's expensive at character creation time too :) A great spell is bullet, another is floater. Bullet will fire a coin or piece of metal at high speed towards a target. Floater will lift a platform and you can fly, or carry objects around. Those spells work in core earth. The second is a really usefull utility spell. The first is great when you can't carry a gun (guns are better)

What you need is someone like me to make you a magic wand, and then all you need is to have the skill apportation to use it. That would cost you 5xp to get level one, at which point you could use those two wands.... It might cost me a couple of possibilities to make the wands (it's hard but that's what possibilities are for).

You could also do the same with buffing spells: again I can make the wand, and you can use it. That would be the alteration skill. Buffing spells don't work unless the magical axiom is 10, but that's quite a lot of places...

(It doesn't have to be a wand: rings/broaches/...anything suitable)

You can also learn miracles, and some of the core earth ones are pretty good. Faith is a skill that everyone wants (even athiests) because it is a defensive skill like toughness. So a few xp get you focus. You would get a miracle free, and then you can get more through xp

My advice to you strongly is to start with Martial Arts. It's 'Great' with a capital G. It will mean that you will shine in combat in a way that people without will struggle. It is a tiny cost: you loose 1 skill add... but as I say it is Great.

Oh... you can also learn psionics... especially with a psionic in the party to teach you


...


So if we get say 20xp, there is no reason you can't be flying in through the window on a spell you cast yourself, calling down the wrath of god with a miracle, while blasting away with a blaster rifle.
This message was last edited by the player at 20:28, Sat 13 June 2020.

Neither Faith/Focus nor Martial Arts are on the Realm Runner template.

Well that's easily fixed: talk to the GM and say 'can I have martial arts'.

Yeah, Torg: Eternity has a lot of limits (though they're softening them a bit) on cross-Cosm contamination in a single character.  Old Torg... really didn't, and Realm Runners are the best at it, over time.  To be fair to the new dev team, Eternity made that choice because it led to a lot of silliness.

Though I think you lose 2 Skill Points to take Martial Arts - the first add costs 3 points.

If you haven't noticed; Character Sheets are uploaded.

I am going through RTJ threads checking for Character Names I have missed. If I haven't correctly updated you, please let me know.

I'd argue martial arts is a core earth thing too. It's not like psionics or miracles or spells.

I do martial arts in the real world core earth. It's great: It's good for my mind and body. I teach it and have lots of friends through that teaching. There really are martial art secrets: turns out if you spend  thousands of hours practicing this stuff, and have really good teachers, you can do quite a lot of the things that described in the martial arts rules.

Not the cinematic stuff of course, just things like 'simultaneous block and strike' and 'you hurt yourself if you try and hit me and fail' and 'more damage than you would expect'. My main teacher (lives in Hong Kong, so I have to go there every year, and he comes to the UK once a year) is a non-stereotypical chinese man in his 60s. He hits like a truck. He's spent about 50 years learning from other awesome teachers how to coordinate mind and body. He practices martial arts between 30 and 40 hours every week for the last 20 years, and maybe20 to 30 a week for many years before that.  He has hardly any muscle (very low strength... maybe 6/7 on Torg) because muscle slows you down and his way of doing damage is about coordinating body weight with hand/foot movement and speed of delivery. As an example he can't use Escrima sticks any more because they break every time he hits things with them.


@Character Sheets
Thank you they look good: especially with the die reminder at the bottom.

Can you give us permission to edit them? You can do it for everyone at one go using the following:

• GM Menu
• Edit Character Descriptions
• Lastly, you can toggle whether the character sheets are editable (click the highlighted text)
• Down at the bottom (you need to scroll) is
• Alternatively, you can set them: All ON or All OFF

If someone else joins you would need to do it for them: this doesn't change defaults, just does it all in one go

After a chat with GM I have changed back stories. I've updated the portrait and description in line with the new story.

Thank you.

If there are any other technical tricks to this site's GMing, please share.

I wish I knew others :) That one is just useful though

I am almost complete. Name, backstory,  allegiences... How about the rest of you?

Do we have an ETA for when we want to start?

And do we already have a relationship in anyway? Are we going to be thrown together by the Winds of Fate, or is there an organisation that is going to direct us to do Great And Heroic thing?

I didn't get any feedback on my character's stats yet. But I think i'm rady.
It would be easy to build a relationship between our characters, since Jalia is now an Ayslian girl ! :)

Another Alyse person is good! That means all my buffs things will work. I might not be much good in combat but I hope to be able to make you better

I hope we have compatible religions: I am a priestess of God of Honour. That allows rather cool goodness to occur if you are (my miracles will work without any conflict).

I'm currently working in a close alliance with House Tancred. (That's the politically correct way of describing the situation in which 'they say frog and I jump'). If you have any links with them, we would probably have met as Storm Knights are quite rare

Since Jalia is a trasnformed Ayslian Barbarian, she has not any faith (yet).

In reply to Jalia (msg # 42):

People will be loosely connected based on their backstories. I am still waiting on some information from some characters, but the stories are mostly coming together.

Does someone have Lock Picking?

I don't. Mind you in Aylse we have medieval locks, so you can pick them with your dagger...

I think it could easily be a very useful skill if you had a point in it.

Sappphire, btww the realm name spelling is AYSLE. :p

!LOL ):

One of the changes in R&E that I didn't like was in the Starting Skills. Non-Tag skills are not capped at 2, and the Tag skill is not free...your 16 skill adds does need to include at least 1 add Reality and 3 adds in your Tag skill.

I had forgotten this changed in R&E or I would have clarified before. Sorry about that.

Congratulations!

We are at 9 player requests and the game is closed¹.

I am awaiting 3 character profiles, but have already figured out how many of you came to be together. If I haven't discussed this with you yet, I will be reaching out to you soon.

Anyone who has at least a concept and name approved by 20JUN20² will begin RP "introductions" at that time while we finish up any loose creation ends. The group has been working together for a few weeks at that point, shortly before the adventure begins. Anyone who needs more time will be able to join once their character is ready...there are multiple excelent insertion points, depending on the character in question.

Questions are always welcome³. I can't promise that all 10 of us will 100% agree on every issue. I won't promise to bow to majority rule on any given issue. I do promise I will give consideration to any question, concern, or disagreement as long as arguments are only arguments in the technical term. (Those who have raised concerns so far have been polite and hopefully have found my replies to be in kind.) I am well aware that I am neither Omniscient nor Infalable and will not punish anyone for pointing out a mistake I made, even if there is some hidden reason it wasn't a mistake after all.

TORG was my gaming soulmate. This is the game I left my first-love (AD&D) over. To be fair that relationship had already soured (2nd ED) and we were only together for the children, but still TORG was the embodiment of gaming beauty in my eyes. I am hoping to provide all of us with some of that Joy and Beauty here.



1. For now...if this works the way I hope, I could add more and have different groups running simultaneously. Not an infinivers type; everyone would be on the same world just results from each group's adventures would impact the course of the same war and characters could occasionally switch, combine, or split groups

2. We can start sooner if and when everyone not yet ready agrees to join mid adventure (hint: if any of the 3 wants to play an Edeinos, each of the first 3 scenes have perfect places for that character to join, though it would also be fine to have them along from the beginning).

3. One of my RL tag lines is, "I promise an answer to any question, any question at all. I make no guarantees to the accuracy of my answers."

neat ! :)

So is Jalia's character sheet and background validated ? So I can upate the Description SHeet.

Looking forwards to starting!

Hey everybody!

I'm looking forward to this as well.  It's been a while since I played Classic Torg.

Aperios, I have a few questions about the meshed rules... i.e. using the new decks with the classic rules.

1. Are we using Cosm Cards?
2. Are you pulling any cards from the Destiny Deck or changing rules on some?  Coup De Grace for example.  Hmm... I guess that's the only example.
3. Since we're using the new decks, I suppose there are no Subplot Card rules, right?

Anyway, I'm psyched.

Yes, I have not codified all of the corrections required, but this forum will allow for spot rulings to be preserved for consistancy.



Conflicting cards, like CdG, will adopt the Original TORG card text



The carried over Subplot Cards (Romance, Mistaken Identity...) will function like the OTORG Subplots, which brings up a point: Adventure Costs for powers/enhancement packages and such will be paid from Possibilites, thus Possibilities are definately Individual; I am on the fence about Group XP. How do you all feel about Group vs Individual XP?

I really don't like individual xp. I think it turns the game into a competition instead of cooperative. If the GM does it ... sure ... it's their game and everything. But I much prefer group xp.

Individual Xp rates issues came from the Super Cards imho. Personally I'm ok for both group or individual XP, as long as the Super Card effect issue is adressed.

No real opinion on group vs individual xp.

I think that if we work as a group than we should gain exp as a group, if there are solo threads or solo complication that affect a single character they should gain exp for it individually.

@XP/cards
Hopefuly xp isn't random. I would hope the cards give possibilities instead of xp.

I always hated the idea of group XP... then Torg Eternity was the first game I actually played/ran that uses it and now I am a big fan.

That's a long way of saying that I'm fine either way.

Does this mean:

• XP is shared and people spend from a common pool
• We all get the same XP

I thought it meant the second. If it meant the first... hell no. Not ever. Not even maybe.
This message was last edited by the player at 15:19, Fri 19 June 2020.

I've never even heard of the first.  Where did you come up with that?  It's an interesting thought, actually, but wow that would need the right group!

Anyway, yeah, I really like group XP.  I think it's more fun when everybody is advancing together.

If by "group xp" you mean awarding everyone the same amount of xp at the same time? Yeah I'm fine with that. I'm used to 'milestone' experience in D&D and whatnot, or the exp in Savage Worlds and such, where everyone is handing xp at the same time for things usually.

@Koharu
You are right of course. Yes it would need the right group.

I just looked at the 'Group XP' and the conversations about 'first time I used it', and then realised the Group XP could have multiple meanings. I have seen that style of XP. It didn't work well . But you are right with the correct group it could be effective

It's bad enough having people fight over magic loot.  I couldn't imagine people fighting over XP.

I never heard of a group XP pool before.  It would be a "fun" social experiment.

Yes, the Group XP proposed is "Everyone gets the same amount."

I believe I played with an Ars Magica system that used a varient of the other choice... definitely not for TORG.

Cards will give Possibilities almost exclusively...Glory (now that I have seen the only in Dramatic scenes rule) will give both to the entire group. Well supported Subplots will provide XP as well as Possibilities...ie, if Ben Plays Romance on a Lithuanian farmgirl, and both Sapphire and Matthew get Jealous AND group play is appropriate to increase the enjoyment of the group, the group will get XP, though Ben would get the Possibilities.

In reply to Apeiros (msg # 66):

And just to avoid confusion... Subplot cards don't count towards hand size, right?

Hello, all! I just wanted to introduce myself and let everyone know I was here. I'm very excited to start a game of oTorg. I've been involved with TorgE since shortly after it came out, but it's going to be fun to now revisit the prior version for the first time in, oh, at least twenty years or so.

Most of the time my characters are from the Aysle/Nile/Cyberpapacy neck of the woods, so I thought I'd stretch myself this time and try something different. I've updated my character description in "The Cast", if anyone wants to check it out. Apeiros says that my character Sita has already met Jason Keller while she was investigating the edeinos, but I'm sure all our characters will get to meet each other soon.

I'm really looking forward to getting to know everyone, and to having fun playing.

In reply to Matthew Matherson (msg # 67):

Excellent question! Now, are there any other questions?

Actually...a player may choose to hold a S-P card in their hand, in which case it will count towards hand size but will not trigger unless played. Alternatively, the player may place the S-P card in play, regardless of it's availability (ie Romance when there are no NPCs around); the card will not be replaced but will not count towards hand size, and will be available for me to Trigger at my first/best opportunity (Remembering this is a PG13 game for now, per RPOL rules for non-mature, non-adult games. I want the widest possible player pool...but is that Ravagon looking at you funny?)

Thirdly, the player may choose to discard a subplot for a replacement card and one Possibilitiy...or if I am 100% certain that S-P cannot trigger in the current adventure when it is put into play, this will also occur.

Side, side note: I don't hate Tharkold, however I find it is not within the PG13 rating I am going for, so it may not make landfall this game; though I reserve the right to change to a Mature setting if we have no conflict among players.

Clearly Tharkold is an Adult setting, for it contains BDSM elements and things like Progenies, and other sexual elements.

Since he's pretty friendly and open, most who have known him a bit will know Jason was an orphan (sort of), grew up on a farm but also worked at different times as a firefighter and mechanic. He is 'adventuring' since his aunt and uncle were taken during the Invasion (not sure that Apeiros has determined who/what took them).

Now I want to summon a BDSM Elemental.

Um.  But you all just nevermind that.

Hello, Dr. Chandrasakar!  Can we call your usual set Aysle/Nile/Witch Trial, Cyber-Style? (Old TORG is set in the '80s - we can even do finger guns when we say it. grin)

lol Saito !

I don't think our ST would allow that, nor the use of Domination Laws :p But they exist in old Torg Tharkold.

A couple of questions,

1. How long after the start of the invasion are we?
2. Can we have a thread for known event, persons etc also would be nice to have what other knows about each other. After all we've been working some time together.

@Saito: Far be it from me to dissuade anyone from any cheesy 80’s goodness. Go ahead!

General question:
Pierre has three Folk 'slots'. Do we want to use one of them (at least for the moment) to let everyone understand each other via the Tower of Babel spell?

In reply to Pierre De Gaulle (msg # 76):

Since our characters all speak English, that may not be too necessary. It may even be good practice for those characters who aren't native speakers. Sounds like it will be very helpful if we run into edeinos or something, though.

I don't think we have many native English speaker in our little group, even the Core earthers are from non English speaking countries :)

In all the published scenarios there is an assumption that all the cosms speak english.

There is no language clash between the people of Aylse and the people of English. Between the Orrorsh and the neighbours. The people of Marketplace and Japan. The players in the scenario can all talk pidgin to the Jakarts (probably Pidgin because of the social axiom: language is a social). And when the heros go to the Nile Empire everyone there speaks english.

If we go down this route... we only have 12 skill points that  are under our control each (3 are because of the TAG rule, 1 is for reality). What percentage of that 12 skill points do you want to spend on things that you won't be very good at? 50% of those skill points would allow you to talk to the Alyse, the Nile Empire, the Orrorshain Victorians, the Jakarts, The Nippon Tech people. That leaves you with about 5 or 6 skills points to do things with...

In the fiction the darkness device makes everyone speak english as the Cosm's are connected.  I think that's the simplest approach.

Jason's from the United States.

Matthew is a native English speaker... I'm just not sure where yet.  So, if nobody asks, nobody can place his slightly English sounding accent.

I think the point stands. grin

Language... I hadn't even thought about language, and certainly should have.  That's always such a mess in games.  I don't know if Old Torg had the assumption that everyone speaks English, though I generally agree with Sapphire -- language feels vaguely fun to play with, but in practice it's just too much.

On the other hand, it has been a while but if we all have that Babel spell placed on us, doesn't that incidentally also protect us from potential hostile Folk type spells like Weakness, Slow, and The Entire Orrorsh Spell List?

I feel like many RPGs TORG was written by American for American, their treatment of other countries is lacking at best.

I think the best thing is to leave language vague, it is all a matter of fun to RP. It can be fun to play the guy no one understand because he can't speak English but it can grow tiresome at times.

I feel that if this was an assembled team language barriers was one point that was taken into account and it is safe to assume all members share one common language at a descent level (English, Swahili whatever).

This is my take of course,

You absolutely have to say "for it's time," but for it's time, TORG's handling of other countries is amazing.  The industry still hasn't caught up with it in terms of racial and gender inclusion.  Still problematic in many ways, some of which were even recognizable at the time (I remember talking about Nippon Tech's treatment of the whole "they're buying California!" scare), but... even by today's standards, it actually shows a real effort.

And at least based on my intro, I don't see anything about us being an assembled team.  But Eternity has formally established that everyone speaks English, which, I mean, since we're on the subject^*, is awfully Eurocentric of them, but it's definitely a convenient thing that would be easy to import if Apeiros wants to.

I'm good either way.  It occurs to me that he also started us all with 5 XP, so in theory he could let those of us who need to drop 1-3 of those into 1 or 2 ranks of Language (English), if we want, if he'd rather do that and stick closer to the original rules without making anyone refigure their skills.


^{*-- OK, fine, since I'm on the subject.}

@Language ... And I will add this to House Rules Thread.

I don't like the idea "Points in Lang. SKILL = Fluency in particular Language." At least not in TORG. Some of you may have seen my posts on this in the old Eternity forums.

If you want to put points in the Language Skill, this will allow a check to attempt communication with anyone, regardless of the languages which are nominally in play. There would be difficulty modifiers, but the result tells us how well you were able to talk to each other. Just like in the movies...if it's not plot-important that there is non-communication, assume a common language.

@Time Line
The adventure will start at almost exactly 3 months into the invasion.
The Group was completed about "Two weeks ago" at that point.

@Sharing Thread
The Game Thread is open for RP sharing among people who "just met" and people who traveled together as well. When the adventure starts, it will be as if it were just a continuation of the introduction Role Playing.

@Ben Altman - I'm not certain, but it seems like there is a lot of uncolored dialogue in your last post, but the very bottom dialogue is colored so wasn't sure which was intentional and the norm.

For the Cards on the Table thread, can I suggest that we do something like:



So all the players can see how many cards are in each other's hands?

I like the idea. But... and it's a big but...

Feels a lot of complexity. The more we do the harder it is to keep everything straight. I am a big fan of the KISS principle. I know it's going to be hard enough as it is to keep the cards straight. (I like the cards a lot, so this is just a comment on the 'Hands(4)')

I've tried time and time and time again to get players to do simple things in combat post. Like 'put your initiative first, then tell me your tohit, and if you hit how much damage you did'. I have had limited to no success... I think of it as herding cats. And when herding cats you just keep everything as simple as possible
This message was last edited by the player at 12:52, Mon 22 June 2020.

In reply to Sapphire (msg # 88):

That's a good point.

I can't post for a couple of hours. Is it OK if we delay continuing the (nice) conversation in IC until I have a chance to comment?

Edit my bad. Go ahead.
This message was last edited by the player at 16:06, Mon 22 June 2020.

My solution was simple, I took all the rolling bit from my players.

My players don't roll the dice, they post their action what they are trying to do and I deal with the mechanic at the back.

The only issue is that it is a bit more book keeping for me but since the players don't know how much HP they have, they are a lot more careful about combat.

Ben has both sent thoughts and empathy and he is still not fully trained, so some of his thought may leak out. This is why I've been posting bits of his inner thinking.

Please feel free to either ignore, or use parts or all of it.

I post inner thoughts because almost every piece of fiction does. The ones where you just see what the person does things and what they say are a special genre and usually (for me) very dull. I want characters that feel real, that engage. For instance I am loving Ben and Sitas right now. (I like other people's just saying that the characters who have feels and emotions that are expressed are more like the normal fiction I read)


The price of that is that I have to be careful, and have to accept people reacting to it

I've tried the other way: no emotions, no internal stuff, and even I didn't love my character

Mind you in movies we don't need it. Movies have a much higher bandwidth

@ben
Tried that. About 1/3 of the players love it, 1/3 put up with it and 1/3 hate it. It's s all about the player group you are with

Mine don't want free-form. They want die. When they write the post they want to know what they are writing

I don't want to write 'I tried to hit him' three in a row. If I know the defence, roll the die, work out the damage then I can put far more I to the post. For big bads those numbers are hidden but for minions I let them go wild

The story reads far better if the person rolls 31 on their torg die, works out it was 20 result points of damage against an Ord and says what happens. Compared to 'I tried to hit him'. Same when you roll a 2 and miss, and then spend a possibility. Or don't spend it

So I do a hybrid. Anyone can roll die. If they don't I do it for them

@general
Deleted previous post. I shouldn't try and put brakes on a nice rp conversation

Just because the GM make the rolls doesn't make the game diceless.

The game I am running is a D20 version and it is not diceless or freeform but the players are focused on the action not the mechanics.

I let all player post their intended action (initiative is irrelevant at the time) and then make a summary post detailing the order and outcome of all actions.

So far it's been working well for both me and the players but I haven't tried it with a RL group sitting next to me.

I think you didn't see (or at least didn't comment on)the bit about 'knowing what to write. I did get your not diceleas, but the writing reads the same. When you can't work out the results of your intention you can only write your intention. Thus the writers posts have much less variety

But if it works for you and your players go with it. I play in one games that have been running 6 years on rpol now, so very stable, and the posts are one liners. We all enjoy the game. So it would absolutely work there
This message was last edited by the player at 17:04, Mon 22 June 2020.

This is just an unrelated tangent and has nothing whatsoever to do with your metaphor, Sapphire, but does anyone else remember when the Mythbusters tried herding cats?  They decided that indeed, it's really hard, but I thought they just needed to get to know the cats.  Like, we have three cats, and I can get them all in a room in just a couple minutes.  (I tried it, just to see.)  One of them will actually come when we call his name.  He won't hurry.  He's actually the reason it takes a couple minutes.  But he will wander over.  The other two like to play -- if I crumble up a piece of paper and chuck it in one takes off like a rocket and will follow that paper pretty much anywhere, and the other will follow if I pick up their string-on-a-stick type toy and start waving it around.

Herding cats is totally doable, you just have to treat them as individuals.


I also wanted to say that I agree with this, but also agreed with your earlier post... I can't keep up with our current pace.  It's not a problem for me - Koharu is quiet, so I don't really need to.  And I know games here often start out with everyone super excited and posting all day long and almost always settle down to something more reasonable after a few weeks, so as long as we do that eventually, I'll be fine.

But posting rates can be an important thing on RPoL so it probably is fair to note that if most of us want to keep going at a multiple-posts-a-day-each rate I would probably do better to step out before I drag things down.  (Which, I'm sad to say, I've seen happen.  I didn't mean to, of course!  But once things get into like combat or something, or a scene that actually focuses on that character, one slow player can seriously disrupt the flow of a fast-moving game and I don't want to do that again.)

In reply to Koharu Saito (msg # 96):

I think the posting rate will settle down. As for my own character, the conversation just happened to take a turn to get me to speak up about a few things. Dying sister motivation? Check. Hints of dark secrets? Check. After that . . . Eh. Yeah, I’m pretty much good after that. :)

What Sita said.

Once per day is a good rate for me, I can try more but most of the days it would be hard.

Another question for the GM,

We are three months into the invasion, how much is known about Cosms axioms, stella's and the effect of removing them?

Is it common knowledge what in the core rule book about realities, mix, pure and dominant zones?

And that's it for me. All the introductory exposition my character should need for a very, very long time. The posting rate should cool down substantially for me, from here on out. :)

I expect approximately 1 post per day.

In reply to Apeiros (msg # 101):

And as soon as I finish handing out cards, and Gavin has a chance to post, I will do final checks  on character sheets and we'll be off!

BtB, If a character is noted as a quiet type, I will not expect constant updates.

In general, in Rounds I will expect more frequent (hopefully not more than 2 days between each player's action). Outside of rounds, I am happy to let RP go on as long as it is entertaining everyone. I don't see a need to put time limits on those posts.

When Matthew is not talking he is very obviously thinking.  Sometimes putting lots of thought into what to say.  He's a big listener too.

My goal is to post no less than once per day.

I have been informed that at least one of our members is ill.

I do not expect most people to post when unwell. For me, that is when I have the most opportunity (like today), but I understand not everyone has my mindset.

I hope everyone feels better soon.

Me too.

Pierre raised an interesting point: didn't want to clutter up the thread with the subplots

We could do this sort of thing by PM, but it's nice to have threads so that other people can join in. Could we have a thread for chatting about magic if that's possible? That way we can just RP in that discussion. Other people that don't do magic, but might want to learn what it is and so on can take part. It doesn't get in the way of the main action I don't think
This message was last edited by the player at 08:35, Wed 24 June 2020.

I agree with not cluttering up the main thread with subplots.

As for Sita's sister: with characters having mentioned what they may have done to line up help, like Saito's plane or Pierre's cures, I think that should be enough for Apeiros to decide what to do with any of it or not later. We can assume that Sita and those characters are talking over any options while off-screen.

I would love for Sita to talk over magic with Sapphire, and maybe learn some proper magic from her. Even if there's not a separate thread for it, we can assume off-screen that Sita is talking to Sapphire about it as much as possible, if Sapphire is willing.

If so, I think it might help make Sita more useful. I don't think her medical skill will be all that necessary to the group, given that someone else already has healing magic; and I don't think her Occult skill will be all that helpful either, not with easy-cast magic available. Occult magic takes a really long time to use; you have to jump through a lot of difficult hoops throughout the process; and then after all that you end up endangering your soul on top of everything else. Being able to just whip out a lightning bolt on something would be a relief! (And probably more helpful) :)

I tell people 'occult is the most powerful skill in the game, but also almost the hardest to use'. I can see if we are going against an Evil Big Bad, that spending a couple of scenes preparing for it could be good. I'd be all for that.

I'd be happy to talk magic and teach. Come and join me in the tree house and we can chat about it :)

Matthew too would be into discussing magic.

And I also consider Occult to be one of the most powerful skills in the game.  And the most dangerous to the wielder.  I never got the chance to play it though.  Nor run a game with a character with it.

Sorry, all. I will try to catch up. Work has been really busy the last couple of days, some tabletop-real-life stuff happened on Sunday that's been causing lots of discussion and crap, so I'm behind.

Plus you all posted a lot and I kind of gave up on keeping up while other things were going on, lol.

How much do we know about the whole meta-mechanic behind TORG? the stellas and the fact people get transformed or disconnected?

We are at day 90 to the invasion and my understanding that those thing were pretty much unknown at the time?

That's a good question Ben. My rationale for what I said is


I doubt if we know anything about Stellae or the mechanics or the invasion, or how to save the transformed... unless we have been briefed. I was going with just the 'obvious in your face' stuff. People spontaneously combusting or changing into dwarves is pretty 'in your face'.

Oh... and I don't think you freaked Sapphire out. I wrote:


I think that's the opposite of freaking out
This message was last edited by the player at 19:42, Thu 25 June 2020.

Thanks :)

If I recall correctly, for people to vanish they need to be drained and then the stella need to be removed.

I don't think this early in the war there was any successful stella removal (except the Russian but I am not sure if it counts as it was pre-emplacement as far as I recall.

As for freaking Sap, I know Ben wasn't the cause but Ben was not sure it wasn't what he said, yes she made a whole explanation about Pierre weaponized arm but still Ben feel he had a share in that (incorrectly of course).

In reply to Ben Altman (msg # 114):

All it takes for a Reality Death is for a drained (Transformed) person to transform again without being refilled. Enough evacuees have exploded for the effect to be common knowledge. The actual reality mechanics behind it are still mostly unknown. However, Earth's Resident Expert, Dr. Hatchi-Mara-Two, was palling around with Tolwyn; and Ardinay still has some of Uthorion's memories on this subject and Drakakanis is still trying to get her to, "come to the dark side."  And Tolwyn & Ardinay did send Sapphire (against her will, I believe) here, so she has been breifed on some of the basics...if she chooses to share.

I did re-read the book again on this after your comment. Thanks by the way: it's very hard to know if 'something you know and play is a house rule or a real rule'.

The way 'we play it' (i.e. in the games of the small community of players I am part of), we have the fiery explosions immediately. (We didn't know this was a 'house rule'). I think (having re-read the rules) 'as written' it takes some time for the person to transform again. They will become disconnected very quickly, but then transform using the same tables as normal.

Personally I still like the 'immediate fiery death' because it forces the governments to tell the invaded places 'don't flee'. They have had bus loads of refugees explode, and they don't want that again! This answers my players questions 'why don't we just evacuate everyone we care about'.

I like what the GM said too. The Gaunt Man would especially like the constant fear of rescued people wondering 'is it today I explode'?

@Against her will
Only until my Queen ordered me to volunteer! At that point of course I volunteered.

In reply to Sapphire (msg # 116):

---

Spoiler text: (Highlight or hover over the text to view)
Eventually much more information becomes available. The GOWLOTUS* sends out people to remove resistance communities "With Extreme Predjudice" because they are providing the energy the high lords want, and a few thousand people dying is just not as important as stopping that flow.

---

Eventually, The Five Realms RPG will come out. This is one of the things people complained about and were happy to see removed from Eternity. Those people are...well, not "dead to me", but....

*Government Of What's Left Of The United States

Personally I think it is a bit early for this kind of information to be available, three months into the invasion 50% of people in Pure area and only 11% of people in Dominant area  are transformed. These number are high but considering most transformed are not looking to run because this is now their reality and it made sense. Add to that the fact that they need to transform again to suffer reality vanishing, I'd guess that at three month marker very few people vanished.

I'd guess with the war raging reports of people vanishing will be common, many people are missing many have lost contact with friends and families. IMO the catastrophic effect of double transforming is still unknown. Add to that that most of Core Earth are Dominant zone not Pure I'd guess it would take months for the full effect of vanishing to be understood.

I'd even hazard to guess that at this stage in the war, people are not even aware about the the fact there is transformation effect and not even about the impact of Axioms but this is just me :)

In the fiction (which is all very early days) it became clear early in the first book about the transformations. They are a major part of the story, and extremely 'in your face' and blatent.  And frankly terrifying.

In a population of 100m people (around the Alyse population I think... I'm probably underestimating, but then again a lot died) we are going to have around 15 million people tranformed. That's quite a lot of people! At the numbers you are talking about, everyone knows at least ten people that have transformed and are terrified that they are going to be next.

As for the people dying... That's probably going to be known too.  Lots of people will have fled. And in the words of the rule book: the results will often be fiery. If you 'only' have 100,000 people having fiery deaths even .. or perhaps especially ... in time of war that gets people's attention. Most of them will be blowing up in managed refugee camps.  Indonesia is a much bigger population (around six times as big), as is North Africa, and both have easy ways for people to flee

I wasn't going to 'know' about the transformations blowing up IC, but I'm happy to have been briefed. It makes it easier.

The other stuff about 'this is how the High Lords get their power'... I think that's up to the story. As The GM says there are powerful NPCs that have interacted personally with the High Lords (and survived) and come away with intelligence.

I think we will have to agree to disagree :)

I think that most of the high hit areas have a significant loss of communication from within the region. There are millions of people lost, dead missing and no clear civil authority to organize it (we are talking day 90).

I am going to hazard a guess that there are thousands if not ten thousands or more casualties every day. From exposure, hunger and disease, the US has been hit hard its ability to mobilize support was severely hampered. Most of the refugees would be people who are afraid the war is going to reach them soon, i.e. never been transformed, add to the fact that only a minor part of the transformed die (the chances of double transformation at day 90 are very low). I'd say at this time it should be a myth.

I mean the world suddenly have dragons, werewolves, pulp hero actions and cyberpunk priests there is an influx of rumors of weird happens and a the notion of people disappearing (fiery or not) is just one extra rumor hidden by a massive reports of death and destruction and weird occurrence.

Hmm, Pierre makes a study of this [Scholar(Reality) at +1] but I am currently working on 'he is aware that there can be a danger but not the extent of it'. The DGSE's main study population are French refugeeing into Germany or Spain (both pure zones) so yeah, fiery explosions are a thing. It is however the transformed (who usually have cyber) who blow up so they currently consider it a cyber thing. Moving from this to 'whole populations dying' has not yet (imao) happened.

And yes, he heaved a quiet sigh of relief when he failed to personally blow up when leaving France.

Disagree on which bit?

On the transformations occuring... read the fiction... read the published scenarios. The picture you paint isn't the picture in Alyse. Perhaps it is in the USA of course, but Sapphire is from Alyse.

On the exploding people. I think Pierre said it well. I only know about it because I've been briefed: it's not nearly as 'in your face' as people transforming.

On the 'powerful NPCs have told powerful government officials' that's part of the story. The NPCs the GM named are in the fiction. And I suspect we don't know IC or OOC yet.

I do genuinely get your point about the chaos and the transformations Ben: If I was GMing a game, I might run it that way. (I don't actually because in my game the exploding fireballs happen the second you cross into another cosm, so it is far far more obvious... and thanks again for making me aware it was a house rule). In this game though, we've been briefed (or at least some of us have).

@Pierre
Too right! Sapphire too! There was a reason she had to be voluntold, and that was half of the reason.

And your point about the cyber would be valid if it was just france. It's Alyse too, and every other Cosm. That wouldn't stop people putting two and two together and getting 22.

Disagree on how obvious it was and how common it was.

This is Apeiros game and his word is binding, I'll accept whatever he dicate.

However, the whole treatment of the fallout of the invasion IMO show how immature the game designer were. It is very easy to say million of people are refuges but it has consequences, if you want to look at a minor example from our world, look at the civil war in Syria and how it affect the country and the death rate (most of which didn't die in the fighting).

As for Aysle, my understanding was that the invasion was a bit different there. Uthorion was the Gaunt man servant and under Orrorsh reality. Since he wanted a Darkening device of his own he had to invade another reality and take it's device, so the invasion was very minimal (in term of reality alteration). The whole taking the body of the queen trick was to avoid transforming the Aysle reality but still working under its rules.

So I think there was a lot less transformation and reality storm when Aysle was taken.

I think I agree on the topic of the invasion and what would happen (and the naivety) And your point on Ultherion is valid too. But it's OK: the fiction is good. The game is good. A bit of suspension of disbelief (don't look too closely) and it's all fine.

@Alyse particularly smooth
I think the Nile Empire invasion went pretty smoothly too. Also Nippon Tech (incredibly smooth and stealthy as you would expect... infact is there an invasion at all?). The USA though ... that was a brutal invasion, as was Orrorsh. The Cyberpapacy... it kind of got derailed in mid invasion. And the reality there is crazy right now. Reality Storms everywhere


@How I feel about it
The first time I ran Torg I did 'it was a stealth invasion' and the governments were unaware. The players were preventing the invasion, rather than reacting to it. We had a lot of fun, and the invaders were repelled. We used the rules, and the settings, but there wasn't the need to do 'how would core earth respond' because it was all secret

This time I'm doing it much more 'NATO has been invaded, how would it respond'. I'm picking NATO because the USA, France, Belgium, Norway, Spain, UK... are all NATO.. and they all have been invaded. So the players are now NATO operatives (even the Orrorsh and Nile Empire operatives). I've made the timeline much tighter (1 month after start, not three months).. the world is reeling, unsure of what is happening. There is full militarisation, martial law, chaos outside the transformed regions. Most of the invasions have all stalled right now (from the events in the fiction) and core earth is able to react. The generals I've met have all been seriously impressive people (not like fiction / Hollywood at all), and I think in times of a war like this they would respond sensibly. (Goodbye democracy of course)

But I'm also doing the transformations much quicker: most people have already transformed... I did that because when they are transformed they accept the new world as the normal. That means that there isn't as much chaos in the conquered places: I didn't think I could write the chaos around a real war of this scale successfully. (That's why I ran the first one in stealth mode). Plus the fun of Torg is going to the conquered worlds who run a different society. With the transformations happening quickly, I can do that.

The downside to my approach is that everyone is part of a military structure and some people don't like that. But given the nature of 'Taskforce Storm' (an joint operation between Queen Ardinay and NATO) that's probably going to work out. Oh... and I will be knighting all the members of Taskforce Storm, and making them members of 'The Royal Order of the Storm' so they will in fact be Storm Knights.

All non-standard of course. I'm doing it this way because I don't have the skills needed to run it the way you describe (your comment about Syria for example)
This message was last edited by the player at 10:48, Fri 26 June 2020.

@Pierre

No bias here! Totally stating the facts as they are!

I think I’ll hold off on posting in the Magic and Myth thread until Apeiros weighs in on how much we know about transformation, Glories, stelae, etc. Have we been briefed on anything by whoever got us together? I’m still not quite sure if we’re working for the Delphi Council, or ad box for the US government, or for someone else. Or no one.

Are the days getting longer is it something I missed? or is it something on a need to know basis? :)

I would also suggest that our OOC differences of opinion here easily mirror IC differences of opinion.  And yes, I would absolutely say there's a high degree of "opinion" involved here, even though the topic at hand is a matter of facts.  Look at the current COVID-19 pandemic; its death rate is actually pretty comparable to the transformation table at 3 months, and we have some people arguing that it's all a conspiracy theory, others that it's the end of the world, others saying we haven't figured out all the details yet, and dozens of other very strong opinions about this perfectly real thing.

On top of having been told at least some of it, Sapphire also comes from Aysle, where accepting things at face value is the norm.  Ben has a much more complicated worldview.  So it makes perfect sense to me that Sapphire sees or hears about it once and decides, "Yep, this is a thing that happens," while Ben remains guarded against panicked rumors in the midst of a really weird invasion so if he's heard about someone just vanishing six weeks after being brought out as a savage, he'd likely figure, "Sure, they probably went back."  Because people don't just vanish, right?


Probably likewise on the days getting longer thing -- the GM did mention that it's happening, but I believe we're still at the "it's subtle" stage so some people might have noticed and many might not.  Especially out on a farm at the edge of the Living Land where tracking days gets fuzzy anyway.

First off, wow!  I thought I missed a week of this thread or something, but there's a lot of chatter from last night.



The way I always viewed is was that when crossing over a boarder, you may be affected by the boarder storm.  If you're a transformed Ord and the Reality Storm "attacks" the Ord, then POOF... they're gone.  If they make it through the storm, then I would apply the transformation rate table to them.

And no matter how much we agree or disagree, I'm so happy to have these conversations.  Discussing Reality Mechanics is so much fun!

Also, on the note of realism on how Core Earth reacts and refugees and death.  I don't think it was naivete necessarily.  One, it is a lot of work to figure out a global response to something.  Two, they touted Torg as a fun game where you're in an action movie that travels from genre setting to genre setting.  The darkness of the reality of an event like this doesn't fit into anything fun and adventurous.  Not that I wouldn't love to play a game like that... it's just not Torg.

Quick question that kind of relates because I'm getting different impressions from different people -- we are in the Living Land, right?  It was my understanding that that's how this whole farm works, taking advantage of the way things grow there to produce lots of food quickly and cheaply, while violating all kinds of local principals to think about things like crops and stuff, right?

So for instance, to use her laptop I'm assuming either we've set up a generator that periodically has to be replaced or that Koharu has been importing spare power supplies.  Or both.  But if I remember right, while a lot about transformation was harsher than it is in Eternity, in oTORG it was much easier to leave something alone for five minutes and still come back to it.  Am I remembering that right?  Or is that just wishful thinking because Koharu wants her laptop?  If I need to edit that to be a hand-written spreadsheet on far too many pieces of paper I can do that.

In reply to Koharu Saito (msg # 130):

Your laptop can transform or your pencils and paper can rot.  Either way.  :D

But yeah, I'm too lazy to look at my books, but I remember leaving things around taking longer to transform in Torg compared to Torg Eternity.  But then again, I could have just been running it wrong.

And yeah... The Living Land.  I forgot about that... I probably can't even see the sun directly if we're in the Living Land.  Hopefully the mist is light enough that I can pinpoint the sun's location.  :S

You can only pinpoint the quadrant that the sun is coming from, when in the deep mist. And not always

But we aren't there at the moment (I checked in a PM) we are still in core earth. The GM told me in a PM "until the adventure actually starts, you are in CE"

The time from sunset to sunrise you should be able to measure though: assuming we have a clock that works, and we have the social axioms good enough to use both the clock and the idea of being able to time things... Oh wait... we might not have... Good things we are Storm Knights

Thanks, Sapphire!  In CE, Koharu's post stands easily, and she's certainly much happier being on that side of the line.



Oh, dear.  That's a very good point.

...Koharu quits.  Good luck in there, all!


(Just to be clear, I'm kidding; I'm not really quitting rather than go in the Living Land!  But wow, it wouldn't be her first choice.  She might honestly prefer Orrorsh.)
This message was last edited by the player at 16:50, Fri 26 June 2020.

I refused point blank to go to the living land until I was Voluntold! And then of course I enthusiastically volunteered.

• IC I am frankly terrified of it. There is no magic. None. Not one little bit. So Elves get wasting disease and die
• OOC I am looking forwards to it a lot! I want to see how an Elf with lots of Life magic stacks up against the Edeinos and Dinosaurs :) Don't expect subtlety is all I can say ...

@Orrorsh
Hmm... er... hmm... I might need to be voluntold even harder... Like really harder...

Pft.  "Elves get wasting disease and die."

Where are your priorities?  My phone won't work!!!

:Soft whistling:

So my first expectations for the Mathematician being asked, in early to mid June, about days getting longer, was "Solstice is approaching." But, no, the actual number of hours in a day has been increasing. Like the mythical boiled frog, it has been a slow increase and y'all have been busy so it didn't register, but sometime in the next week, shortly before you drive into the LL to bring relief to the Farm communities and get food to bring out to feed refugees, the Earth will have stopped completely. The sun will be stuck over one spot in the Atlantic ocean. The Workbook describes what this will mean if someone doesn't fix it...

In reply to Apeiros (msg # 136):

I hope I didn't jump the gun too much :S

In reply to Matthew Matherson (msg # 137):

No, it was Great. I had spent 6 hours home early from work yesterday refreshing and hoping for posts in any of my online games, finally going to bed. Then first chance I get to look today and there was a postplosion! It was great, but I hadn't read your IC post before reacting to the OOC posts.

---

Spoiler text: (Highlight or hover over the text to view)
Seriously, the following is deep level stuff; stuff many High Lord's don't even know, and even the Gaunt Man sees this as Mythology;
In the beginning there was only Eternity and The Void; and between them grew The Maelstrom, seething, constant creation and destruction, spinning endlessly with nothing escaping... untill two things did escape. Two ultimate beings of pure purpose. The Nameless One is Destruction personified, and Apeiros is the Avatar of Creation. Apeiros has taken a special and specific hand in this Cosm, which is extremely dangerous for it as the only goal a Darkness Device has is to destroy enough Possibilities to find Apeiros so The Nameless One can find it. Apeiros itself is behind this group forming in this place, at this time.

---

So I've been rereading TORG revised and I have a question to all the TORG veterans out there.

How often rolls over 60 are? and how often Glory happens?

How often did the groups you were part off uprooted stella's (assuming you used the rules as are)?

Not often by default, but when we were 'lifting' we put effort into it.

You kind of need to have a natural 20/10 followed by a 10 or 20, then you play a card and a possibilty

So that's 1/100 rolls but there are a few of us. Perhaps 1/10 rounds of play. You could do it every few combats if you (as pierre said) were putting effort in

In reply to Ben Altman (msg # 139):

Yeah, as the others said, they were rare and required effort. And you only put the effort in for the 60+ if you had a possible Glory. And the possibility for a Glory was more rare because (1) you could only play Glory in a dramatic scene and (2) it was harder to get your hands on Glory card because of the game mechanics (only having one deck as opposed to Eternity’s separates Drama and Destiny decks).

I recall having 1 in my years of running. But we maybe had two?

We never went for uprooting stelae. But that’s more my fault as a young GM. Torg was my first GMing game.

So..... yeah.  A little embarrassing.  Sapphire sent me a PM gently pointing out my mistake when I had Matthew say that the trip around the sun was slowing down and that what would really be happening is that the Earth's spin has slowed down.

I feel rather stupid, but also find it hilarious.  So, thank you to Sapphire for pointing out to me politely and in private.  But I wanted to open it up to the public so everybody has a chance to make fun of me and taunt me for the rest the game.  :)

I'm going to edit that post because while I'm daft enough to make that mistake, Matthew is not.

I noticed but I wasn’t going to say anything. We all know what you meant. :)

And there was me doing it to keep you from being embarressed :)

Mind you I have senior moment myself. When I was trying to work out what I thought would happen, I had to give up trying to work it out in my hand and get a torch (my phone) and a coffee cup..

Back to that 'naivety' comment that was made earlier... if the world actually stopped rotating (slowly) all the water would flow to the poles which would be under about 30km of water. Basically the 'centrifugal force' (in quotes because there isn't any such thing) that keeps the water where it is would go. The equator would be one big continent at least as far north as big parts of europe. I couldn't work out if the UK would be under water when the steady state happened, but it would probably be under a few kilometers of water during some of the transitional time. The giant tsunami (with tens of kilometer high 'waves') and chaotic weather conditions would cause an extinction event that would make the 'end of the dinosaurs' look like a firecracker. Maybe if you lived in the Alps or the Himalayas you might survive the innundation.... but I wouldn't bet money on it

If it stopped suddenly... it's a lot worse.

But since this is weird science / occult / reality magics we don't have any of that! Just a little bit warmer during the day

This message was last updated by the GM at 03:38, Mon 29 June 2020.

So...I rolled, not sure I did it right. =)

Btw, I don't see whatever picture you were trying to post there, DM.
This message was last edited by the player at 03:17, Mon 29 June 2020.

In reply to Jason Keller (msg # 147):

I can't get my Dropbox images to display :-(

If I right-click on it and click open image in new tab, I can see it.

"They're on the run!" it looks like? I could see it more clearly earlier. Now it's blurry.

In reply to Jason Keller (msg # 149):

I am playing with images for initiatives...this one is obviously not the next card, which is why I am using it. See if



works better.

It doesn't work better: I can't see it

If I copy the url I can open it in a separate window

In reply to Apeiros (msg # 150):

Can't see it in this thread. Is not blurry the way the previous one was in direct view.

Thank you,

I guess I know how I have to post Initiative when it comes up.

I use imageshack and it works OK.

I am quite puzzled why drop box is giving you problems

@Apeiros, does this count as day 1 of the adventure?  i.e. Exactly 3 months in?  I am asking for my Planet Chart.

Just a reminder to people about cards.

It feels a little like round by round play at the moment, so I've moved two cards from my hand to the pool, I hope that's OK. If not just let me know

In reply to Sapphire (msg # 156):

I think think some of that was pre-battle action... the "playing cards into pool" is dictated by flipping of the initiative card.

Also, just to point this out, the character has to do something (or try to do something) worthwhile to pool a card (unlike Torg Eternity).  So Matthew can't just sit there doing nothing and pool a card.

So, are there active animated plant targets?  If so, how many?

Well there are probably a lot of meadow flowers and small grass :) I cleared most of the stuff to clear the sight lines.

But being serious I couldn't have impacted any trees or anything like that with the spell I used. I was leaning against a tree for instance

Thanks Mathias: What you said sounded sensible. I'll edit to just one in the hand.

Yeah, we gots visible enemy?

Think I’ll wait for clarification about any visible targets or not before declaring actions.

I am a bit confused, some people posted their actions prior to the initiative card.

Are we now in round time?

Do we have a pre-initiative action? when can we move cards to our hand? before the conflict start or only afterwards?

and what the other asked, do we see anything to shoot at or are these just moving plants? (or both)

The round by round happens when he plays a card as far as I know (see Mathew's helpful comment above correcting me).

 The last post is the Gm initiating round by round combat.

The posts that might be confusing you happened before the combat began (no initiative card in play)

Hope that helps :)

Yeah. I'm not certain, but I think the breakdown of events so far has gone like this:

All occurring outside of combat rounds:
Tire blows
Sapphire casts plant-shaping spell
Pierre assists with fixing tire
Jason gets partway through fixing tire
Fraulein Breathless shows up
Plants around us start animating in a hostile way

Combat rounds begin. Round 1, so far:
Sapphire casts a sense life spell, which will take both of her Flurry actions. She pools a card.
Pierre casts his buff, taking up the first of his Flurry actions, and pools a card.

I see it slightly differently

Post 57
We hear noises. Sapphire starts casting sense life.pierre casts his spell. Most people react and do something
Post 61
Gm tells sapphire the result of the spell, the woman finishes running, talks a bit in German and hugs pierre then talks in English

The Gm initiates combat at the end of the speech

We all have a Flurry round and two options

If this is the case, than perhaps it would have been better to wait for all people to post actions before moving to Post 61?

Ah it is a easy to get carried away as a Gm. It's exciting and we've been building up to this for ages. I make this mistake all the time. After I make it, a few months later I will slip and make it again.

Just post what you did in the round before combat started, and then in the round itself

RPoL isn't tabletop. There is no solution to this problem that doesn't cause some problems so we all just have to be accepting and work together to make the story great and the game fun
This message was last edited by the player at 15:41, Tue 30 June 2020.

@Sapphire: Oh, yeah. That's probably the right breakdown. I got confused when you said you were pooling a card, so I thought you were doing it in rounds.

Sita wouldn't have been doing anything before the card flip except maybe cursorily examining the fraulein for injuries, which I'm assuming she doesn't have, so I'm all good for now.

In reply to Matthew Matherson (msg # 155):

Yes...as we discussed, not Your 3 months... ....

Msg 61 is the start of rounds. And Heroes have Flurry.

Things were happening on both sides prior to engagement: the thing animating the plants is a 2 round cast, for example. OOC, the badees have an advantage, they can see 40m but you can only see 10m, so you will have to move away from the truck to engage...and it is obvious that the plants are attempting to grapple if you want to use one action for Active Defense. Sadly, this miracle was planned prior to encountering Sapphire's defensive perimeter and I fear it ruins her effect as the "dense" foliage in vision range has been turned into a 20m area of grasping grabbing plants...as the effect is Spirit, not Magic, it doesn't dispell the effect, just overlaps.   There are reasons Sapphire did not want to come here

For worried players, in this adventure, unless the characters do something monumentally ill-considered, there will be no other Edeinos battels.

Runs off to do something monumentally ill-considered

Point of order... when Flurry is in effect for the heores each person on the hero side takes a single turn, then there is another round of hero turns.

Ah one person's ruined is another person's happiness.

A couple of questions for you

• As you say it overlaps. Does that means it is still a tough impassible barrier, but it also is very unpleasant for us to go near it?
• On the map of dense green and light green, the light green is grass and wild flowers, is that relatively safe for us? i.e. what is the range of the reaching grasping plants?

And a few more - I think the thing we are all confused about is:

• What is the immediate threat?
• What can we see to hit?
• If the picture is as per map are any of us within range of the grasping vegetation?

@Mathew
I think it's too hard. That is for tabletop play. If it really matters sure... but why not just post your two rounds? Combat already takes forever in RPOL we don't really need to do things to make it longer
This message was last edited by the player at 20:22, Tue 30 June 2020.

@Apeiros, I'm wanting to cast Weakness on the plants, but I'm not sure that it makes sense.  Is it more swarm-like and not a worthy target for Weakness.

@Sapphire - I actually think it becomes more important in a PbP game.  It will cause a single round to take longer to resolve, but it could also cause someone stuck afk to not "miss out" before everything gets wiped off the table.  But, of course, I leave this up to @Apeiros for how he wants to run it.

My feeling is that PBP usually works like this.

• The bad guys go
• We go
• The GM resolves what happens at the end of the round

If someone is stuck AFK... then it's up to the GM when they 'resolves what happens'. It makes no difference whether we post once or twice, other than in the time it takes. And combat in RPOL is sss...lll...ooo....www

@Pierre, what Arcane Knowledge does your spell use?  I'd like to cast Strength on Julia but it's not worth it if yours is a Folk spell.

It's a folk (already asked)

In reply to Sapphire (msg # 177):

Cool, thanks.

For what it's worth, I totally get Sapphire's point, but I lean toward Matthew's here.  In games that have a complete character-by-character initiative order, making everyone post in that order is a quick way to murder a PbP game because one round will take weeks while everyone waits for the person ahead of them to log in before they can do anything.

But TORG is already All PCs then All Enemies, or vice-versa, so we're already not doing that.  And Flurry doesn't come up that often, and mechanically is exactly like when the Heroes go second in one turn and then first on the next.  I don't think having us take one round, and then take our other round, is going to slow things down that much, whereas I absolutely see that a bunch of people going twice will often leave anyone after them irrelevant.

But I don't think it's going to be game (or fun) breaking either way, so that's just my vote, with the total understanding that this isn't a democracy.  If it were a democracy, Apeiros would have to do what the majority of us voted for, when in fact, he'd just bloody well better do as I say. glare


...er, I mean, rule fairly as the GM.

.....huh. Okay. So....not gonna lie. There was a LOT in this OOC thread and I'm not familiar enough with TORG to have caught all of it. I have some reading to do apparently. Luckily, Jason has no magic or fancy shtuff to worry about, so if there's no thing to see currently, it won't matter much yet.


Edit: So can we SEE plants actually moving towards us to attack us? And if so, how far away are they? Sorry if this is stated somewhere and I missed it.
This message was last edited by the player at 23:04, Tue 30 June 2020.

Yeah, let me say that I do see Sapphire's point.  But I vote with me too!

And yeah, no matter what way Apeiros runs it, I'm still going to have fun.

And kudos to Jason... "shtuff" is one of my favorite words but I don't think I have EVER written nor typed it.

In reply to Jason Keller (msg # 180):



SO...at the moment, it's more of a feeling than seeing them move...you can see them pulling away from Sapphire's control, but they won't actually attack until the villains turn. Only one of you has any idea where they are, as they are significantly outside of your visibility radius because of the mist. By now, you would have learned that some of the Lizards have spells (Actually Miracles) that allow them to see through the mist. You can hear them chanting and moving around in the momentary lulls in your area, so if some of you wanted to go out the 'Safe' passages taking your first action to run and a standard move on your second, you would be able to encounter at least one of them, though there are only 2½ of you for whom that idiom truly makes sense; though, you are in the Living Land....

You do know they are coming in, so anyone who wants to use one of their actions for Active Defense would probably be making a valid choice.

So...for an Active Defense I would....state that's what I'm doing and roll Dodge? Is that right?

And can I draw a weapon too? Sorry, finding it hard to find things tonight in the PDF.
Edit: Ah. Simple Action.
This message was last edited by the player at 05:36, Wed 01 July 2020.

Drawing a gun is a simple action. It doesn't need a die roll (unlike hitting someone). You can  you can do a simple action at the same time as a complex action (active defence)

Also, I was typing up my post and posted it before I read Sita's post. Oh man. I may have to change my post.

@Jason  Yes, you would roll a bonus die, minimum +1 result, and add it to all your defenses.

I think you can do the Active Defense on either your first or your second action, if there's anything else you'd like to do first.

I do like to keep things interesting. :)

Oh right. Flurry. Hmmm. Pewp. I may need to think about this.

Edit: I've edited my post. Yeah. That's not going to go well, laugh.
This message was last edited by the player at 05:47, Wed 01 July 2020.

More Swarm like, sorry.

I want to make sure that I get this right @Pierre.



Matthew has a Dex of 9 so I take you 16, subtract my 9, and get 7 and find that 7 brings me +3 on the Power Push table.  I do this for each of the four attributes you listed.

If your total was successful but less than someone's attribute then it would be +0.

Do I have that all correct?

The effect was 16

• Suppose your attribute was 17 (more than), you would have no bonus
• Suppose your attribute was 16 (equal), you would have +1

The equation by the way is 'effect - attribute' divide by 3 round down, then add 1. It obviously doesn't subtract :)

@Matthew- Correct.

I made a mistake, I thought you use the same roll for both Psi manipulation and resistance skills. However, unless Ben take multi actions he can only passively resist. So his Resist psi skill was at 13 so that is 1 point of damage.
Unless Pierre magic boosted Ben Mind.

Sorry, no. It is a combat boost.

Pierre doesn't recognize Mind as a combat stat?  From what I've seen of this whole team so far, we need to sit down and talk priorities... grin

(Seriously, though, that's an awfully cool spell.)

LOL. Yes indeed. Mind, Perception and Spirit are my main combat stats...

but as you say that is an awfully cool spell.

Information you may be needing.

I am away from my LC for the weekend (Possibly through Tuesday night, here) and I did not foresee this Possibilitiy when I set up my deck shuffler. I can either delay new cards for those that are due them and initiative for next round... effectively delaying next round until I get back, or I can proceed from memory, possibly Effectively rerandomizing the Destiny deck for your cards (I only have 3 Initiative cards imaged, so I am fairly certain which is next).

Either way, my posts should...SHOULD be slower than usual as I am visiting extended family.

Discuss amongst yourselves.

In reply to Apeiros (msg # 197):

I'm want to play but am willing to wait.  It might even be best to wait.  Most people are probably going to be delayed this weekend due to the holiday anyway.  (Not me, I have no life).

There... did I dodge the vote successfully?

There's a holiday this weekend? Really? Where? *checks calenday*. Nope. No holiday within about 4,000 miles anyway.

Personally I'd prefer to RP. There's a thread... come join us in that Matthew. We don't have to stay on science/magic discussion, just talk about anything.

In reply to Sapphire (msg # 199):

Yeah, that's a good point... we could pause the combat and flashback to conversations on tech and magic.

Do it in the ICOC thread. We are already there talking about tech and magic and then we don't interfere with the main thread

I'd prefer to play, but am willing to wait. (I won't be doing anything for the holidays either.)

It's taken us days just to do one turn's worth of actions, and we still have yet another turn of actions to do after that, even before the current round ends. Then, maybe a while longer, while the villains go this turn; especially if any of them hit, and we need to wait for someone to soak.

If Apeiros remembers what the next initiative card will be without needing access to the deck, then that would let us do one more round after that, without needing to fool with the deck. Given our current pace, I doubt we'd be through all of a second round before he got back.

The only sticking point would be when someone earning cards, but I'm willing to "hold off" on receiving whatever cards I earn, and just be surprised by whatever they turn out to be when Apeiros gets back. We all already have 3-4 cards in hand that we could pool until then, until we know what the new cards are.

But again, I'm also willing to wait. And no matter what, I hope Apeiros and everyone else has a safe and happy holiday!

This is honestly moving at nigh-breakneck-speed for the medium.  A couple of days here and there isn't really going to make much of a difference to me either way, so whatever works!  Have fun with this so-called "extended family".

I totally want a retractable family.  That sounds so useful.

Sorry all. This week has been short but very packed work-wise and kind of...overwhelming and a bit awful. I'll try to catch up on the threads and PMs.

@Koharu
I wouldn't say 'breakneck speed'. I've run and played in multiple games with over 100 posts a day maintained for over three months. That's exciting, immersive, addictive... and really hard work. But I take your point: it's running at a nice speed

@Dr Sita
I think Apeiros was joking with us about the cards. I certainly laughed at the tease.

I share you view on the speed. Combat in RPOL is SSSLLLOOOWWW. Anything that reduces the speed even further is a bad idea. I mentioned it before, and I think now you are seeing the impact of what happens if we do decide to stretch a single combat round to twice the normal length... it takes four or five days per combat round instead of one or two.

If it's practical to move the story onwards I would like to do so. Mostly because I mildly  prefer being in non combat time to combat time. In non combat time we can RP, talk, engage, chat, build our characters.... It's only mildly because combat time can be exciting in a different way too! Like right now I am nervous: did I mess up creating a barrier to stop us being attacked by dinosaurs and lizard men? I don't know so I keen to see how it works out!

@Jason
Hope the 'overwhelming' was good overwhelming, or if it wasn't that it is over
This message was last edited by the player at 01:41, Fri 03 July 2020.

Clarification posted here for questions: Active Defense adds to all defenses that round. So, Jalia has a 14 Defense against Melee attacks and a 12 vs Ranged AND 1 better Defense vs any other form of attack until the end of the round. Note: you can declare an Active Defense at any time in a round as long as you haven't used your action that round. For example, if the Villains had gone first, you still could have announced AD before they made their attacks. This is a very powerful tool, and costly...it takes an entire action and cannot be combined in a One on Many way.

Question - with Awareness I get to know the direction of the coming attack but due to the fog Ben can't see the attackers yet. So essentially he is firing blind.

Could Ben use his second action to Aim toward the direction he sense the attack is coming and once some lizard man shows its face fire at it?

Summary: Yes but you take a -3 on your action.

In reference to @Apeiros's count of 2 for my actions, I am assuming he means my Mathematics roll being one and then my Divination roll being another.  I believe these are supposed to be in the same action.

I reread the the Mathematics spell casting section (well... only until I found something that supports or nullifies my stance).



At first I'm thinking "it says it right there," configuring the planets takes at least one round.  But then the next paragraph suggests (to me at least) that the spell is cast immediately.

This seems a bit open to interpretation, so as always, if @Apeiros disagrees then I will bow to his dominance.
This message was last edited by the player at 12:06, Fri 03 July 2020.

I used to play a mathmatician. (it's great by the way)

The die rolling rules are really straightforwards. You only roll one die a round.

• Aligning the planets is a complex action (needs a die roll)
• Casting a spell is a complex action (needs a die roll)

You can do multiple actions in a round using the one on many rules. So you can align the planets as an action (first action) and cast the spell as an action (second action). Or you can do it in multiple rounds

It's the same for Egyptian religion

@apeiros- do you want both actions before the villains go, or are you going to interleave?

He's already answered. We go first. Both actions. And then he will do the villains.

Answers are here:

• link to a message in this game Here is explains that he has no problem sequencing the order of the actions
• link to a message in this game Here he is showing that some people have 2 actions, and some 1 and some 0

There are a number of posts in this thread (and the rules themselves) that explain in a flurry round the side with the flurry go twice on their go.

And I used to GM for a mathematician.  It IS so much fun and that's why I chose this character :)



I don't think they are straightforward... in fact, I spoke to a friend who has presented a THIRD interpretation.  And I think this one might actually be it.  Reading the wording again:



So now I see it as this:

• Roll to get a bonus number to align the planets
• Apply the Roll Bonus to your Mathematics skill and apply any modifiers (like multi-action)
• Find how many planets are configured, if it meets the minimum requirements of the spell, then find the bonus number from the Planet Chart
• Take the Planet Chart bonus and apply THAT to the Magic Skill used to cast the spell and compare to the DN

@Maths
I also like the RP around it 'the world is made of numbers' which you are doing nicely

@multiple actions
Looks spot on

• The DN for maths is increased by 2
• the DN for the spell is increased by 4, but you modify it by the planet chart bonus
• he effect reduced by 2, but  you modify it by the planet chart bonus

If you don't get the maths bonus number to the effect... it's just a nett loss (you are almost always better off without the maths) ... and that doesn't feel right.

Same for Egyptian religion

In reply to Matthew Matherson (msg # 213):

I like the third interpretation.

Notes:
Egyptian Magic should feel more complicated than Ayslish Magic in casting, because it is.
Egyptian Magic should have the Possibilitiy of being more powerful than Ayslish because it is more complicated,
Egyptian Magic should not default to being more powerful than Ayslish because it is not "The Cosm of Magic" the way Aysle is.

Thus, the mathamagician has 2 options; take his time, do the calculations as one roll and apply them in the next action, or rush it, combining the math and the magic in a OoM way (multi action) as Sapphire pointed it out, -2 to Math -4ro Magic, but with Math Bonus on top of Die bonus...

I am off to go swimming now, so I will let you edit your post as you see fit, then adjust the Action Count as needed.

Regarding Pierre's haste spell, I had a few questions.
1. Does it require line of sight to affect the targets?
2. If not, what's the range at which it affects targets?
3. Will it even have an effect during a round in which there's already a Flurry?

Just asking, to see if and how this affects Sita and Jason, who are off on their own right now.

P.S. Apeiros needn't have worried; there's no way we're going to even get through the first round before he gets back. :)

In reply to Apeiros (msg # 215):

So, I have been studying Mathmatics, Engineering, and Egyptian Religion (I'll take gaming phrases that sound normal on University campus for 200, Alex) and they are all unique. This is one of the areas where Eternity fans have a point, a point that I disagree with: Old TORG is complicated. New gamers seem to want things that can be button holed and learned easily; all magic, miracles, phycics...they work exactly the same in Eternity. Not in Old TORG, and I, for one, adore the complexity!

Engineering spells work exactly like Aysle spells, except Engineering is weits own complementary Knowledge.

All Egyptian Religion miracles are Rituals; the fastest (Snake Staff) is 2 rounds. There is no reason to not make them multiple Actions requiring Multiple rolls.

Mathmatics is a Simple Complex Action (√-1 2³ Σ π). It just works differently from Normal Magic. Like with Combat, the Roll determines how well you Hit the Math, and the Result of that determines how Effective it was.

I have to apologise to anyone who didn't know what kind of complicated Math whirlwind they were getting into with this game, but I hope you all find it worthwhile.

4|\||) `/35, !|) 5|*34|< 1337.

In reply to Apeiros (msg # 217):

I am on your side... it is complex and that's why I love it so much.  One of my biggest heartbreaks with Eternity is how Magic, Miracles, and Psionics are the same thing in a different wrapper.  Related to this is my other big heart break, the loss of Focus and how miracles worked with that.

But anyway, with all this confusion with Mathematics.  Would you be willing to explain, step by step, what should have happened (and maybe what now did happen) with Matthew's roll?

Here are the details:



I just want to make certain we are both on the same page and I don't make more mistakes.

Thanks!

@Mathew
Yes: it's like 'you can go anywhere in the world, but there is a shopping mall and a macdonalds when you get there'.

I very much like the significant differences between Magic, Psi and Miracles in this game

Sita and Jason are finished with the current round’s actions, unless Pierre’s haste spell has any effect on them. Still not sure if it included them,  without knowing its range, or if the spell has any effect during a Flurry round.

I am waiting on more data on that, too.

In reply to Dr. Sita Chandrasakar (msg # 216):

Sorry Sita, range is not going to reach you and Jason. It is intended for a formation, not a bunch of PC's doing the normal fireworks display. It does stack with a flurry, but does not take effect until the end of the round (cast time), so will not grant an extra action in this round. If another flurry turns up, sure.

In reply to Pierre (msg # 222):

That’s okay. Thank you anyway! Your other spell has been very helpful.

I guess the rest of you only hear ONE shotgun blast coming from where we ran off to, then. :)

Just how massive is Gavin?

Between two and three time as usual. So make that 15'.. 18'. That's quite seriously large

In reply to Sapphire (msg # 225):

I am waiting on more details from the player, but I am imagening Gavin at 5'9" to start, so this brings him to 17'3" tall, and the proportions stay the same.

@Aperios, are the vines and stuff prohibiting me from doing a Mathematics roll?  I would think they are making it a bit difficult :)

My God, man! We're in the middle of a fight! This is no time to do Mathemathics! Count later! LOL!

Oh, man, and now I have an image in my head of one day Matthew saying something like, "Damnit, Jason, I'm a mathematician, not a doctor!"

Hahaha.  I have to figure out how we're splitting the check.  I'll be damned if I get stuck paying more than everyone else again!

Speaking of which... Matthew seems like the type of guy who figures out the tip on the untaxed total.  (That's the kind of guy I want to be!)

You've seen it before:

• Kung fu Soccer (Shaolin Soccer)
• Kung fu Roller Blading (Ramna 1 1/2)
• Kung fu Cooking (Ramna 1 1/2)

And now presented by our amazing Mathew

• Kung fu Maths (The World is Began to End)

Actually, rereading the note from Optant...



I'll assume that I have a -4 penalty to Mathematics rolls unless Apeiros says otherwise.  The rationale being that the description for Mathematics says I consult charts and write the equations down.

Kung Fu Figure Skating
Kung Fu Gymnastics
Kung Fu Tea Ceremony
I love Ranma½

I read that Sapphire took another action, does that mean we started a new round? is trying to break free from the plant a full action?

We are in round 2.

I chatted with the GM to confirm it as well

And we keep the same initiative as before? or is a new card is drawn?

The card is https://www.dropbox.com/s/bteioimdewzbdrs/Init92.png.

We are in a S round so it's "S: H -  V -" meaning we go first.

Got it,

Sorry it is all very confusing, I missed it.

In reply to Ben Altman (msg # 237):

I understand. If you are used to a "Roll initiative" system, this is new and befuddling. I am still new to RoPL and Dropbox (and don't have another service) and am not sure how to approach the offers of others for Imaging purposes.

If I may suggest a method that for me at least would make thing more clearer.

At the start and end of each round the GM post a resolution of all actions and the order of the new round.

The mechanic bit is cool but it is less important IMO than the fluff, the what is happening what are we seeing and what are we experiencing.

In reply to Ben Altman (msg # 233):

Trying to break free is a full Action, however, you can attempt One on Many to do it and something else (not Active Defense...that can't be combined; though you can attempt Active Defense without breaking free)

In reply to Apeiros (msg # 240):

I promised my wife to be asleep 47 minutes ago.

I will attempt the recap for end of Round 2.

How about Taunt while trying to break free? is that One on Many action?

Just to be clear,

Due to Pierre magic we have:

• Two actions for this round
• +3 to Str, Dex, Tou and Spi

This message was last edited by the player at 07:51, Thu 09 July 2020.

@Taunt/break free

Yes totally.

@Ben I find it actually amusing rather than disturbing that if you had had faith you would have been freed.

I don't see it happening, just because someone tell you to accept some faith it won't make you a believer. Especially when you don't know anything on the religion or the god.

Faith is powerful but it demand belief which is harder than just a magical boost.

Ah you don't have to have faith.

The game mechanics are 'I provide the faith for you'. It's my faith. That's why there are two outcomes in the post.

You just have to not reject the blessing. It's like me casting a spell on you: if you 'reject' the spell you can often fight it off / resist. Same here. If you want to 'fight' and reject the miracle you can, and it will automatically fail because it's a beneficial miracle

Imagine a priest saying 'bless you my son'. You can reject it and say in your heart 'I would rather eat a dead rat than accept your blessing you wierd person' or you can just accept it. Kind of up to you

If you are an athiest - needs Faith(Athiesm) - you automatically fight/reject miracles.

The game mechanic read that you have to accept the miracle (it also indicate that the beneficiary party is the one providing the faith).

From the game perspective, Ben just met Sapphire and having him accept an unknown faith just because it might help him is not logical. Faith and belief are something that is built over time, with trust and rapport not because some shouts at you in the middle of combat accept my god to be saved, this IMO would actually do the opposite.

• The game mechanics also say that if you don't have faith the invoker provides the faith. That's why I listed the two options
• The GM stated that we have worked together before, and we've been together for weeks

But sure. Reject away.

We've been working together for a couple of weeks, which is not really a long time most of it Ben and Sapphire weren't even together (she was in the tree house thingy and he was in the camp).

and it reflect by how coordinate we are during combat :)

So for the time being it would need a bit more than just a shout accept my gods to have him accept her gods.

Just a reminder for people that don't want to reject a blessing from the god of honour.

In Torg you almost never roll more than one die per round (Flurry rounds are an exception)

So with miracles the same bonus is used to invoke and to work out how effective. You don't need to roll a die. Read the OOC in my post for details

Example if you had a faith total of 13, you get +3.you don't roll a die

As for spiritual conflict after a chat with the GM it looks like polytheists and 'accepting' religions won't need to (unless it makes sense).

In reply to Sapphire (msg # 250):

Another interesting thing about Miracles is that when doing a beneficial miracle the recipient may be able to spend a possibility on the roll (and the Focus character sometimes may not be able to!).



And for the with little faith (actually I mean no faith adds) if you accept a miracle there is a chance you may convert.



Oh my god, I love it so much.

Absolutely. Quite a fun system!

 In this case I had to spend one invoking it, so you can't spend one boosting it. I should have made that clear

I didn't get spectacular... But with luck I will in the future

In reply to Sapphire (msg # 252):

What I am unclear on is how it works when there are multiple Faith characters.  I guess any one of them could spend the possibility?

In reply to Matthew Matherson (msg # 253):

If the miracle succeeds without a Poss, the Focus character CANNOT spend it. If the roll would fail, the Focus character may spend 1.



If you have Faith, you may refuse to provide it to a miracle, which will make a Helper fail. If you don't have Faith...its like you are sitting around a fire pit with coals; if you have a bottle of lighter fluid, you may choose whether or not to squirt it in, if you don't have a bottle then it is not up to you if the fire explodes. Ben is buffed, Sorry-not-sorry. If you have Faith(Atheism) you must oppose the miracle. Faith(Secular Dwarvenism) MAY oppose miracles.

Further corrections:

I had misread Pierre's OODA Loop spell when I approved it. No spell in the TORG universe provides extra actions, at least none that I can find.

We have been discussing it, and I was hoping for confirmation before people needed the information; but I believe the affect has been determined.

Subtract your Mind from the Effect total (in this case 17[coincidental]) and read the Result Points on the Power Push Table [my thanks to Sapphire for the image]. The bonus you get will apply to offset any One-on-Many penalites for 1 minute (10 rounds, effectively).

For example: Bubba's Mind is 7, if he were in this spell, 17-7 is 10, 10 yields +4, for ten rounds Bubba ignores up to 4 points of OoM penalties.


Anyone who has taken an action and wants to edit with this in mind may do so.

In reply to Apeiros (msg # 255):

What a great way to implement that spell.  Push table to reduce One on Many penalty.

Did I mention that I love Torg?

That's an interesting spell. Very cool. Very powerful but in line with others. It's one of the nice Torg features that 'the better you already are, the less if affect you' and 'rolling better is almost always good'.

Does it impact the 'Difficulty Number'  or the Effect. I'm using the following to make the question clearer

Example:
I do four actions.

• First: DN+2
• Second: DN +4
• Third/Fourth: DBN+6
• The effect of all of them is reduced by 3

If we had (using your example) +4, would that +4 do the following?

• First: DN + 0
• Second: DN +0
• Third/Fourth: DBN+2
• The effect of all of them is reduced by 0

Yes, The spell is basically adding actions through the Math of reducing penalties; so up to your Bonus, those actions "don't count". Odd benefits ruin the analogy, but apply the same way.

Sadly, the Cp explicitly denies the validity of all other faiths (the Law of the One True god) so I am required to oppose Sapphire's Bless.

Sap, what was your Faith total? Also, how many people did you affect (gives me ersatz 'armor' to my Faith to resist the spiritual damage).

As I understand it, it works like this:

If you accept:

• I roll faith total, I do damage do you equal to ( sapphire's faith die roll vs your faith value (attribute + adds)
• You roll faith total, you do damage to sapphire equal to (your faith die roll vs sapphire's  faith value (attribute + adds)

I only do that though when the miracle has been accepted, so I don't know the numbers until we need them

Sapphire an Alyse elven priestess. Her spirit attribute is above human limits, her skills are capped on faith, and she's spectacularly blessed right now. I really really wouldn't accept the blessing if I was you. I predict heavy wounds and loss of faith/focus skills.

On that I'll say friendly miracle is not so friendly :)

Far as I understand it, if Pierre accepts it or not makes no nevermind. You auto do damage to me, and I to you, accepted or not accepted. What is your Faith total and OoMany please.

There is only damage if you use your faith, and your faith says 'This isn't right'.

• So if you have no faith in anything: no damage
• If you have faith in a religion that is compatible
• If you have faith in a religion that is diametrically opposed (The True Faith denies the existance of any other) AND you say 'I want that blessing' then you take damage

As Ben has demonstrated you can say 'I don't want the blessing'. In his case because he for some reason doesn't trust Sapphire. In your case the reasons would be sound: Your God denies the existance of any other.

If I was you Pierre I would just not accept the blessing

This only applies to Atheism. Secular Dwarvenism may choose to oppose any miracle near them.

Faith(Cyberpapacy) assumes other miracles will fail as their gods aren't real, the Struggle only happens if the C.Papist tries to "assisit" the herasy by providing the Faith for the miracle.

This is....getting strange. lol

In reply to Jason Keller (msg # 265):

I did post in house rules about faith.  Please feel free to ask questios.

Also, I have uploaded a map.

Also, Ben has drawn a card for his Taunt Total of 8.

That's probably enough Also's for now.

@Strange

Yes this is trying to model bigotry and faith clash. it does a very good job I think. It's trying to answer the questions just like in game 'what happens if a Hindu priest blesses a devout Catholic', 'what happens if the recipient is an atheist'...

Step1: Priest invokes Miracle
Step2: Receipiant chooses to accept miracle or not
Step3: Faith is used. The Priests if the recipient hasn't got any, otherwise the recipients
Step4: If there is spiritual conflict we resolve it as spiritual damage


In the example of the blessing IC, here is one way you can RP what happens. There are other ways you can describe the game play: rather like the classic story of blind people trying to describe an elephant that they have felt one part of


This message was last edited by the player at 05:43, Sat 11 July 2020.

In reply to Sapphire (msg # 267):

I have considered a chart/graph/hypercubic-parallelateardrop-flowimage that provides a modified Spiritual Struggle based upon Acceptance. So Catholic v Anglican would both subtract 12 from their faith totals rendering a spritual struggle basically moot, while a Cyberpapacy v Ketta Kallas might have a +2 to their faith totals. The complexity of this chart makes me happy this group doesn't need it.

But surely you could just use the chart that already exists in 'The Law Of the One True God', and then create a new one for each religion!

Actually I think the rules are pretty cool as they are.

They model multiple faiths well. They model agnosticism in a world in which the gods are actually real. They model the clash between faiths well. They also model atheism well: it's hard to be an atheist when there are priests who can do miracles as reliably as the atheist can shoot a gun at an enemy, but if you want to doubt the evidence of your senses you can (it just hurts)

Even though there were a lot of options in the chart, it comes down to :
* roll focus
* work out faith
* see if there is any spiritual conflict

In reply to Apeiros (msg # 264):

Tx Ap.

If there is a lesson from this is that miracles are a two edge sword that can cause more trouble than aid when cast on non believer of proper faith.

A second lesson is that the first opportunity Ben has, I will purchase him Faith, either Judaism or Atheism, still debating on it.

In any case this has been such a mechanical bog that we've been spending days debating this instead of RPing.

Miracles next to Atheists tend to fail more even when not targeting the Atheist. As there are many other mystical way to produce miracles effect I see it as a valid way to view the world of TORG (at least at some cosms where it is true). I also read somewhere that in TORG atheism is the rejection of the meddling of divine being for good or bad.

OOC is not about RPing. IC is about RPing. OOC is for talking about the game, and talking about stuff.

There's a thread open that you could RP in right now if you want to: It's the ICOC. That would be nice: RPing is one of the reasons we play the game. Combat threads (in my experience, yours may differ) have about 1% RP, 99% crunch


@two edge sword
Yes it's just like any other tool.

If you shoot a friend with a gun, it's probably a bad idea. If a friend offers you a helping hand, then it might be a good idea to accept it. Both are tools.

if a friend has a gluten intolerance handing him a loaf of bread is a bad idea
This message was last edited by the player at 07:17, Sat 11 July 2020.

Al true Sapphire but when all the focus is on the mechanic and discussing it the RP evaporate.

My experience with combat is a lot more RP, in essence combat is just few people generating random numbers following arbitrary rules. It get boring (to me) pretty fast if we don't add the descriptive element, the feel of the scene, what the character is feeling and thinking.

As far as I can tell, Faith is more like throwing a grenade to help a friend, it may help him but it has a good chance of hurting him in the process.

Worse, IMO the fact that Faith had a chance to radically alter someone else RP, not because of RP and game decision/actions but because someone rolled higher. It is a very dangerous tool, I have a certain image of Ben, I don't want him to become follower of another religion just because someone rolled very high.

You keep repeating the offered hand example, I think we'd have to agree to disagree about this. Accepting a faith into your heart is a lot more fundamental than taking someone hand. It basically mean (for Monotheistic faiths) that you accept that your whole view of reality is flawed. It is a lot harder than just saying yes I accept. In game, of course Ben accept Sapphire aid, he has no reason to doubt her at this time but there is a HUGE gap between accepting her help and embracing her faith or even believing in her ability to pray and get results.

In reply to Ben Altman (msg # 273):

I don’t think we should point a finger at Miracles for slowing anything down, we did the same thing with Mathematics. The “issue” (for want of a better term) is that it’s a new group of players, playing an old system that some have played and some have not. And even those who have played may not have played in a long time. And to further complicate it, there is a new version that some of the old players are playing which confuses things more.

But mainly, it’s the first combat for the group I mentioned above. There’s going to be questions that need to be worked out. And that takes time in a forum like this. But as time goes on, it will get smoother.

As for worry of being converted, I get the impression from you, Ben (sorry, don’t know your real name), that you are viewing forced conversion in the game to forced conversion in real life. One is a game mechanic the other is a highly offensive thing. Maybe I’m applying more weight to you words than there are but that’s my read.

I see your point on having a specific view for your character that you don’t want changed, but if you were converted you can self convert to another faith by reducing your adds on Faith (even to 0) and that could be to Atheist or any religion. Secondly, it’s Torg... your character could transform to another reality completely. One of the core concepts of the game is that your character can radically change.

(Message typed while still in bed in the morning, on my phone, with VERY small text. Expect weird autocorrects fo occur!)

I agree Mathew, it is not the miracle by itself, perhaps old TORG is a lot more crunch heavy than I am used to. Perhaps things that would have been great thirty years ago when I was a teenager are not working for me.

There is a huge difference between transformation and conversion. Transformation keep the character basic personality, goals etc and  alters them to the new world. Conversion take the basic of the character and turn it without control of the player. In my mind this is removal of player authority that is unacceptable.

I also chatted with the GM about forced conversion. He and I both feel exactly the same on the topic, which is why there is now a clarification on the topic.

There is no forced conversion of PC religion in this game. Because it's 'wrong'. We all feel that. I don't personally have a problem with a temporary 'flash' which is the GMs view (my suggestion was 'just doesn't work on PCs'). In fact I really like his mechanism: it's better than mine.

The miracle has caused 0 slow down. The only slowdown is because people haven't posted their combat posts: that happens all the time in RPOL. It's part of the genre.  The post I put in the OOC on the first post was correct, and is still correct. We've been chatting about it because it is an interesting game mechanism, while we are waiting for people to post

As I say: if you want to RP and progress your character during combat (combat is always, always, always a speed bump in RPOL) just post in the ICOC.

In reply to Sapphire (msg # 276):
In reply to Matthew Matherson (msg # 274):
In reply to Ben Altman (msg # 273):

I firmly agree that one character's good roll should not control another player's character concept. Thus my ruling that PC forced conversions are not permanent...unless the Player wants them to be. Under RAW, the expenditure of resources would be permanent even if you dropped the Add; My rule avoids that.

Note: the choice to take or not take skills is a complex one, for all skills. This combat has/will bring up things the group should talk about...but they are things none of your characters could have known about prior to this. On your next vehicular transportation you will have plenty of time to discuss...but there's this and one more combat before that point.

In reply to Ben Altman (msg # 275):

On the Torg Eternity boards lots of people were praising the fact that they got rid of a lot of the crunch from Torg.  Personally, I love crunchy systems but I ABSOLUTELY understand why people wouldn't.

The funny thing is when people would praise it I would always think to myself, "what are you talking about?  Torg was not a crunchy system."  Getting to play again, I am realizing I completely forgot how crunchy it really is!  But it's also probably one of the reasons I love it.

As for changing one's character, I get that.  That makes sense to me.  I personally don't mind it and actually enjoy it.  But that's me.

After reading back and realizing my recollection of Helping rules has been tainted by Eternity, I may have to write a House Rule for it. But that's for later.

Has everyone figured out how to see the Group 0 map?

It took me a while to figure it out.

I think so - but....your directions are really off. I mean you can't have East on the top AND the bottom of the map, and normally you only put like 1 E to indicate a direction.
This message was last edited by the player at 19:49, Sun 12 July 2020.

*laughs* The one bit of RPOL that sucks is the maps. They also don't update well: so when the GM changes them, it takes ages for people to see them... It's a shame because maps are such a useful tool.

@Jason
I think E is Eidenos not East. I think that is showing where the lizard men are (although remember the visibility is 10m at the moment). The red S is me. The J is you... that sort of thing.

Sita is being spookily scary and isn't visible on the map.

In reply to Sapphire (msg # 282):

Jason isn't on the map, either.

the J is Jalia, though she has indicatd a melee atack on an Edeinos, so I believe she is moving along one of the paths

I thought it was funny, Jason.

In reply to Koharu Saito (msg # 284):

Thank you! I'm glad someone appreciates my dumb humor. =)

Given how frustratingly intentional it is to get lost in oTorg’s LL, I wouldn’t be surprised at all for an LL map to be labeled that way.

Player: “You’re telling me every direction is East?”
Gm: “That’s what your compass says, anyway.”
Player: “. . . Aarrgh!”
Gm: “That’s the spirit! Here, have an extra Possibility for appropriate role play in the Living Land.”
(Sound of gm being strangled)

Trying to solve what is totally a mental problem by launching an all-out bare-handed attack against the perceived source?  Also totally appropriate for the Living Land!  I don't see how any reasonable GM in that situation could press charges.

(Though I really want to explore more deeply this compass that points towards East.)

In reply to Koharu Saito (msg # 287):

Heh. Well, it always points north.

. . . It just also is always pointing at a right angle to whatever direction you're facing, no matter which way you happen to turn.

Now disconnect, for thinking about "right angles", and manipulating a "dead thing", and other such impossible stuff. :)

Oh dear, how embaressing. I totally missed that being a joke, and looking back I'm just feeling dense. Very funny.

I think the compass curse affected me! never mind the map

Can we have a thread for all the active buff (and future penalties) that would include what is the effect, who is affected and for how long.

Thanks

Good idea

Why not just use the first post in cards in play?

So. I just want to see if my browser is screwing up or something....

when I view the Game Map area, I see the chart as stated but then I see a picture of a map I assume from a book:

Before the Dawn Map 1
Assault on the Digging Device


Is that what I'm supposed to be looking at?

In reply to Jason Keller (msg # 292):

not at this time. {ugh}. Sadly, I am stuck going more or less old school on this one.

does everyone see the large colection of just about every TORG chart as the Main Map?

current map is https://www.dropbox.com/s/2lqv...dyMap%20mk3.png?dl=0

I will edit the Cards header for Effects

I see the current map as the Group 0 map, and yes, a Wall Of Charts as the Main Map.


...But is it beyond the miraculous power of Lanala?  I mean, if she didn't see being reduced to hamburger as part of the natural cycle, of course.

It would take a miracle to reanimate that corpse!

Clarification on posted Map

the Red E was Killed last round, I didn't realize how little the Red would show from the Black, For Pierre to have taegeted 3 He had to pivot around the Truck. By rules, this is ok, OoM Full Auto does not equal Spray&Pray. However. The OPtant was protected by the Truck and not a valid target. And Jalia is Engaged with the Edeinos near her. I am waiting for her action before adjudicating the Werewolf's as combined it should be dead, then Ben and Jason Shoot the Optant and if needed, Gavin grants him the experience of being squashed like a large bug. That's how I see this playing out...but the Die is a fickle friend....

Clarification on this battle/adventure

This Encounter was written with one thing firmly in mind: this would be the first time any group facing this encounter would see combat. Our group runs the gammit; we have experienced Torger's to never-TORGed-Beforers. We have Only-Played-Etrnity-s, Only-Played-Classic-s, Played-Both-s, and Played-Neither-s. One thing everyone in this group (so far) gas in common is: Prior to this encounter, none of us had played a Classic Torg Combat with any of the other character's in this group.

This equalizer is one of the reasons I chose this adventure to start. It has things written in potentially for no other reason than introducing characters to concepts unique to TORG.

This was not supposed to BE a hard battle, just FEEL like you were in danger. This was a "Safe" way to test Equipment, Tactics, Rules, and learn Rules, Dice, Cards, Initiative, and all the nity-grity without people ever really being in danger, just close enough to make the test seem real.

I think it has done it's job and we can let Jalia, and the other 2 have their actions, and wrap it up,

So, changing the subject from all this dry rules discussion, why aren't there more Cosm cards in play? You guys like being bored or something?

I have a boring cosm card that allows to ignore damage penalties in combat.

And considering how tedious combat is I rather not encounter any of the Dino attacks card other players have :)

Oh noes, the dreaded puppy-eyes!

Sapphire, Ben asked no question, I think we round ear human look alike to you :)

From Sapphire post it appeared she is very informed about the Still Earth thing, how much are the rest of us in the loop?

Sorry. I'll edit. It was Jason

@Still Earth
As per around here:


You posted in around then, so I think you are as informed as I am

In that post Sapphire prayed for something to happen. It happened. Someone who has such knowledge has in fact been placed in her path. In Aylse when (as often happens) a Champion of Honor rescues a damsel being chased by monsters and said has a clue about a world ending event ... well ... you know: the Gods they are sending you a message.

In reply to Sapphire (msg # 301):

Re "Still World"

You guys didn't even know that is what it was being called. Like people in The Walking Dead calling the zombies "walkers" or "biters" or whatever...Folk have a need to Name things but it takes time for a name to take root and spread. The Earth Being Tidal Locked to the Sun was too new when you left, and without radios, you haven't been in the loop.

But "The Still World" rings true to you in some fashion, so you will each accept that name.

And that's about all you know about that.

Best to layer them in as opposed to have them all happen at once.  To my taste at least.

This message was deleted by the player at 14:46, Sun 26 July 2020.

Yeah, though I have to admit, in my Eternity games, I have sometimes felt the temptation to see what it would be like to just pile them all on at once.  Like, three steps into the Living Land, everyone realizes they've lost something critical just before a mutated T-Rex charges out of the mist followed by 1 BD of Edeinos (and maybe ridden by Baruuk Kaah)!  But luckily, that other rustling turned out to just be a stray cat.

Everybody gains a billion Possibilities when the encounter is over.  I haven't actually done the math, but I'm pretty sure I'm rounding down.

In reply to Pierre De Gaulle (msg # 297):

Two reasons for me:
1. My card only works when testing for Defeat, and no one’s been injured yet. And...
2. It kinda screws over the dying person so I can help myself, which doesn’t seem appropriate for a character who’s a doctor and has taken a Hippocratic Oath to do no harm to her patients.

I’m hoping I’ll be able to exchange it for something more fitting, if we go to a different realm.

I'll swap you for it if you want Sita. I can't imagine using my card anyway, but it's nicer than yours.

In reply to Sapphire (msg # 307):

Cosm Cards are a new thing from Eternity, which I stole liked and therefore incorporated. They are not tradable, sorry I didn't include that in their description when I introduced them. However, if you haven't used yours when you enter a new Reality, you swap to a card from the new realm.

Can I play mine now?

We are in a talky... and we could have 'this place' be the place in the card.

In reply to Sapphire (msg # 309):

If you wish, evryone will get 1 Poss from it.

As a frequent GM of demos, I've had some instances where people slam their cosm cards all at once. It gets really busy. Of course, in a con game, I don't want to bog the game down for the new players and give them a bad impression. In a PBP game, there's more leeway.

If anyone wants OOC info on what Sita and Jason did outside of the clearing, you should now be able to read that thread.

There is a suspicion card active correct?

The suspicion subplot affects the character that plays it (Sita). If she experiences problems as a consequence of the subplot she will get possibilities.

It doesn't affect the rest of us, other than perhaps making us suspicious of Sita.

It's always hard the scene in which a new player joins. I think we just have to squint and not look too closely at it.

In reply to Sapphire (msg # 314):

Yes, hard it is when small green wise one new is here.

Personally, I love "Whistler" as a name. Player gets veto rights, but the character was designed to be named by the party.

Also, just to be clear, I fully support Ben's suspicions. With the Life Lessons we can assume he's had being from Israel, I find his actions Totally believable. Too bad the Empathy didn't work.

In case anyone was questioning.

Suspicion is a powerful tool, and it is good that you are using it Ben Sapphire is glad he is too. She isn't suspicious, but with the Law of Corruption in Aylse... well if a person doesn't look untrustworthy he probably isn't

I like Whistler as a name.

I like Whistler.

I found Sapphire's last post pretty amusing. "Why's Ben sensing any mistrust or hostility from us? I mean, he's the only person here who's a racist elf-hater."

Just for the record, Ben doesn't hate anyone in the group.

He is a soldier and is extremely frustrated with how undisciplined everyone are and that they are not acting like an army unit (which is logical as the group is not an army unit) :)

Also, I'd like to point out that as Apeiros pointed out the Empathy scan was a failure so it also tweaked Ben sensing :)

As for the Suspicious card, I took a more liberate look at interpenetrating it. Being more suspicious at Sita didn't feel right but a monster looking thing that just pop out and offered to be our friend?? that was clearly a more logical target. Sorry if it doesn't give Sita her extra Possibility.

Sita turning into a murder machine that may lose control at any moment isn’t cause for suspicion? :)

No, it’s okay though. The Suspicion card is only there to affect the npc’s reactions to Sita. Sita being suspicious of others, or other pcs being suspicious of her, is just for freely chosen “extra credit” rp-ing on anyone’s part.

No, it would made me terrified, petrified and wary of Sita but not suspicious of her. After all, it is out in the open she can turn into a monster :)

And in case anyone missed it, now is the perfect time to put your Subplot Cards into the Subplot area of your Card post...if you want. You are not in Combat, despite Ben's best efforts ;-) and you have no idea what is going to happen in the rescue.

Admission: I have never tried this many PC's before. Looking at things, I believe I need to cut your Hand Size down to 3 each. We will finish the Act as is, but keep in mind it is a possibility {all my puns are intentional}. 5 PCs 4 Cards each = 20 cards. 12 PCs 3 cards each =36...a significant change. But we'll see.

Wait, Unpronouncable gets cards?  They don't even have hands!  Of any size!

Like You are in a position to complain about playing with Tentacles?

That thought brings up another question.

I kept this Normal (as opposed to Mature or Adult) to maintain widest possible player pool. We now have enough characters that after this mission you could split into 3 functional parties, each going off and doing their own adventure, meeting occasionally to swap stories and people. I am fairly certain the number of people I would lose by changing to M is equivalent to the number of people who won't join if it's not at least M.

Thoughts? Opinions? Hopes and Dreams? Zombie boyfriend nicknames?

Seems like a real after-school special lesson to be had here.



I suppose you could say it is nothing but a big hand.

1. I was worried that you were getting annoyed.  Obviously you are not, so nice writing-acting.
2. Knowing that you are not annoyed I'm loving the conflict and tension that Ben's response brings to the scene.