I know there's a list somewhere in the book of what order the questions need to be answered for each team, but for the life of me I haven't been able to find it. Can that get tossed up somewhere, too?

I think that while it may be done otherwise, it would be better if we did it when we do have our teams. After all, this is specific to them, and presumably we have different inciting incidents.

Ricochet, you mean this one? https://www.reddit.com/r/PBtA/...the_team_first_came/ Though that leaves out Meta.

That's the one! I was sure it was in the rulebook, but I totally forgot to check the GM Moves sheet.

Yes, the game assumes you've got between 3-5 players and a single team, so the questions tend to be pretty easy to handle. With us, we definitely need to solidify our teams before we can determine the events that locked us together. Having a bunch of disconnected answers would be awkward to sort out.

And that's true about missing the Meta, but also the Meta is homebrew and the official materials can't account for that in the first place. And if this homebrew order of questions included all the non-official playbooks, it'd be a dozen pages long. :P

If y'all would prefer, you can wait to answer the 'When Our Team First Came Together..."\question(s) after team assignments have been fully determined (but we can easily work with those who have answered already). :-)

The last GM post of IC Thread #1 should happen Sunday night or not long after.  I believe it will be a cliffhanger.  And that will be the last of the freeform flashback for a bit.  The next IC thread shall be in the game present and using the rules as fast as we can get them enabled (actually, there may still be some freeform replies until we can get all aboard).

I will make team assignments around Monday night or so.  I will take preferences already expressed into account.  And afterwards, characters can still swap teams if both are willing.  The only real rule is to avoid duplicate playbooks.

As time is passing and things need to move along, I will say that the game will be centered (although far from limited to) on the Stanley School for a bit.  This doesn't mean that your characters don't necessarily not visit other campuses and places.  It just means you spend some time on the Stanley campus on any given week.  Beyond the one stricture that your characters spend some time at Stanley weekly, anything else probably goes.  Beneath the bright and sunny façade of the campus could be any number of mysteries, loyalties or secrets.  They just won't all be revealed just yet. ;-)

I will continue to copy from the Bullpen to Polls and Debates for a week or two more during this critical setup phase but that will fade soon enough as the 'cement' sets.
This message was lightly edited by the GM at 07:43, Sun 30 May 2021.

The thing is, presumably we came together as our individual teams - so maybe we need separate threads for those? Or at least, mark our answers accordingly, so we know who to reply to.

(I suppose the alternative could be if we say there was a super-team at the start that fell apart when our Beloved Ghost left us, but if everyone answers as part of the same conversation the result seems likely to be very messy.)

Team 1 seems mostly ready to go, barring last-moment additions. If I understand correctly, Max could follow up on the first answer.

Presumably the city Ricochet mentions is New York (which I suspect we'll see a lot of anyway)? Or Everton?
This message was last edited by the player at 11:20, Sun 30 May 2021.

Sorry I've been quiet. There's some stomach thing making its way through my house and just a lot going on at work and school.

No worries, no hurries.  Real Life Takes Precedence.  :)

Can’t get to game PC tonight.  Lots done but I will have to post it tomorrow. :-)

Will we get another reply in our current thread?

Super-busy.  I will catch up with replies tomorrow.  But a lot has been done.

First, IC thread is done and cliffhangered for now.  Go ahead and check it out and get a hint as to who one of your nemesi will be.

Second, a new IC thread is up.  Don't post in in quite yet.  It will be ready for you in a couple of days.  This game is set in the game present and is the actual start of our game proper.  It is the beginning of your second year as a super team.  A new junior team is starting up and I will introduce the campus to new player eyes with these character's eyes.

The first member of the junior team is introduced and is a very minor character in Mainstream Marvel Earth.

I have determined the initial teams and their membership.  There are three teams of five members each with no duplicated playbooks so far.  The mix of boys and girls in each of the teams are roughly even.  If you don't like your assigned team, you may swap with any other willing player as long as, in the end, no playbooks are duplicated per team.  This gets posted tomorrow night.  I just didn't have time to get it in readable order tonight.

Lots to post and reveal tomorrow.  And I will try to catch up on overdue replies then as well... :-)

Busy again tonight.

The provisional team assignments are up in the Character List thread (which itself built off of the Character Grid thread).  If you don't like how you are assigned, you can swap with any other willing player.  The only requirement is that, in the end, there are no duplicated playbooks on a team.  If there are still duplicated playbooks after all player negotiation, I will adjust things.

You may now post in IC Scene #2: New Kids & First Days.  Please read the OOC at the end of the first post.

I didn't get as much done as I would like tonight.  But I should be able to post more tomorrow.  And this game will start to pick up steam soon.  You just can't see it like I can yet. :-)

To be clear, the second scene is a year after we signed up, right?

Honestly, I'd rather we sort out teams, relationships, influence, and what happened before we came together before starting the main story. I don't think we're in any rush, and it would definitely make it much easier for me to write if I knew those particulars.

I have posted an attempt to correct my very bad presentation of the team assignments in the Character List thread.  Please read it, I think you will find the situation much improved... :-)

The biggest problem I have with this is that that we had a situation where players that had something in common asked to team up, and instead now it's on the players to find someone they have no relationship with and ask them if they want to not team up.

In reply to Ghost-Spider (msg # 268):

I agree, but let's just roll with it. I've put a post up in the poll; just need everyone to chime in and say they agree with the proposed moves that will take us back to where we were before.

Busy.  I will try to respond in great detail tomorrow. :-)

OK, folks, let me try and catch up to y'all.  As usual, I am sorry for the delays and misunderstanding.  And I always appreciate your patience... :-)

With a little more time available to me today, I thought I would update y'all  on a few things.

The game is progressing slower and less straight-forward than I, and probably y'all, would like.  That does not mean it is stalled or misdirected.

There are several reasons for this, none of them fatal.  One is that there are simply a awful lot of you.  Another is that real-life is unexpectedly stealing time from me in the short-term (I should get some more free time in the future).  And, to be frank, I have made some honest mistakes in running this game.  Some mistakes won't happen again and others simply couldn't happen again.  I do eventually learn to stop hitting myself with a hammer.  Usually. ;-)

It may seem like I am being very haphazard, starting one half-started thread after another or mentioning some game element I have not mentioned ever again.  It is more like I am spinning plates.  I get something just barely started and then there is something else that requires my more urgent attention.  The cure for this is time.  Eventually, I will get past the heavy lifting part of starting this game and be able to finish what I have started.

For a short time, there will be even more threads added to the game.  Just grin and bear it.  But soon enough, the amount of stray threads will be pruned.  None of the content you have posted will be lost, it will simply be moved to more efficient placement.

The good news is that (at this writing) the most complicated and involved decision, the team assignments, this game could EVER have is nearly done.  The labor pains were painful (an anal-retentive GM didn't help ;-)  ) but it is all slowly downhill from here.  I apologize for the extra (and seemingly unnecessary work).  It shouldn't happen again.  There shouldn't be need for it to.  All that now remains is that Influence, Relationships and When the Team First Came Together entries are filled in for each team by that team's members.

After that, we finally get to just play this darned game. :-)

I'm going to try something different.

The second IC thread, "New Kids and First Days" is leading to some confusion and questions.  Most of this is due to the fact that I haven't really had time to expand upon it.

But no matter, it is not critical that I continue with that thread now.  I will add to it later.  I was not a mistake and anyone who posted in it has not wasted their time.

Instead, I will introduce a new scene that I had always intended to.  This would be IC Scene #3, "the mother of invention".  This thread is completely optional.  You don't even have to read it if you don't want to. If you are a little gun shy after the last confusing thread, I suggest you just hold back and see what happens the other PCs that do post in the thread.

Again, both of these threads are exactly as they are supposed to be.  I simply have changed the order of their development.

Good to hear, boss! Now, a question I've been mulling over for the last few days: What are we actually supposed to be doing with IC Scene #2?

My original understanding is that we had formed the team about a year ago, shortly after IC Thread #1, and now we start our second year at S4, and there is one class a year behind us.

My new understanding is that we had joined up with our individual school choices a year ago, and over time got selected to transfer over to S4, so our teams were formed at some point either in the middle of the previous school year or very soon before the present day, and we're the only class.

My alternate understanding is that we chose our schools a year ago, but they ended up directing us to S4 instead, and we teamed up at the time, and there's a class one year behind us.

I really need to have a grasp on what that's all about before I can do much.

On top of that, the opening post only sets a scene for one character, a mystery NPC who doesn't seem to be interacting with anyone and who appears to be part of that "year behind us" class, since it's present day and it looks like she only just arrived for the first time. What is the expectation for us in that scene? Are we also just arriving for the first time? Have we been there a year already and are supposed to help these new kids get their bearings? What's our situation?

My expectation with Masks is to start in an action scene with a clear goal and obstacle, with a clear setting and direct event to text to, finished by assuming at a player and asking "What do you do?"
This message was last edited by the player at 07:40, Sat 05 June 2021.

Can we please get threads split by team?  It's ok to have a little crossover but there are way too many of us for one thread.  This is the point of having teams/max party size.

You can even run the same thing for each one, it can be a class that each group goes through separately.

I'd also prefer if we could finish character creation before we go much further.
This message was last edited by the player at 14:14, Sat 05 June 2021.

Including team threads for When Out Team First Came Together, Relationships, and Influence, so we can get started on those.

I agree with the idea of separate threads, at least for character creation purposes (the IC threads seem to be for inter-team mingling, which isn't a bad idea though I do think we should get team threads eventually). It might seem a bit cluttered, but it would be much easier to parse. That said, if we don't yet know whether our missing players will return, it'd be hard to make a lot of final decisions on those counts. Still, we can at least start discussing it tentatively (especially in our case since the Counterforce-Max-Leviathan-Ricochet-Jubilee team is probably going to be around anyway, even if it may get other members too).

EDIT: Also, I second Ricochet's question about thread 2 and extend it to 3. As I understand it, they are both set in the beginning of our second year at this school (rather than us being previously at a different school, say)? Meaning that our characters should already be familiar with each other, the campus, the teachers, etc.? I feel the need to ask since the players who posted in the second thread seem to be assuming that they're all new here, meaning that there has probably been a miscommunication.
This message was last edited by the player at 23:57, Sat 05 June 2021.

I strongly suggest that rpol threads should be defined by location & time, representing individual scenes, like this:
Issue 01.Scene 01: Danger Room (Team 1A)
Issue 01.Scene 02: The Soccer Game (Ricochet, Oktopus)
Issue 01.Scene 03: The Dining Room (Open to All)

This approach does mean that you'll get a lot of threads as we go, but it keeps it easier for players to follow.  With this many players, it's going to be real easy for folks to get confused as to where they need to be and where they need to post.