Dice Rifts - The Thirteenth Mystery - OOC

[EmperorNorton1]

Alright everyone! So Eonivar and I have been talking, and we’ve decided…. Ellis and Priya are going to be romantically involved!!!

 

[Eonivar]

Alright everyone! So Eonivar and I have been talking, and we’ve decided…. Ellis and Priya are going to be romantically involved!!!

Yeah I thought the connection between them would be very good for the story.

 

[Purr]

And one day, they're going to have a Demi-demi-god named... er, uh, Demi!

Yeah, that's it. =)

 

[EmperorNorton1]

The girlies are in loveeee (girlies is a non gendered term, language isn’t real) and i love it

 

[EmperorNorton1]

Totaly random, but since my brain's native TTRPG is DnD 5e, and my brain is demanding I tell someone, here are the rough classes for each character!

Priya is a cleric. body fixer? check. I considered sorcerer as well, with the demigod bloodline, but I feel like a cleric is a better fir. obviously, her deity is her father. she's neutral good and probably takes the Arcana or Life domains. She's either a Kalishtar(bit of a stretch but i liked the vibes), or Aasimar(perhaps a bit too diluted for a demigod?). I couldn't find a good demigod race.

Chan Chan is a draconic bloodline sorcerer. (I did consider a divination wizard, it really came to a coin flip). neutral good again, a joy to be around. she'd be a dragonborn because an actual dragon as a party member would be way too broken.

Reyna and Freya Tann are both Paladins, easy. Reyna is giving me Devotion or Heroism vibes, while Freya is giving Oath of Watchers (Or maybe Ancients) energy. In terms of race, I'm not one hundred percent sure, the urge to just go Tritons because they are Atlantians is certainly there. Reyna is Lawful Goof while Freya is Chaotic Good

Jeanne-Marie is a fighter, a Psychic warrior from Unearthed Arcana. a human, who goes from lawful neutral to something like chaotic neutral-good over the course of her arc. good for her, she isn't working with fascists anymore

Ellis is a Colledge of Eloquence bard and yes I found out how broken those were by accident. they're a human. Chaotic Good all the way!

 

[EmperorNorton1]

hey Purr ! When you made my skills, the ones that you already have on there, did you include the +12 one time bonus in the skill scores? thank you very much.

 

[Purr]

hey Purr ! When you made my skills, the ones that you already have on there, did you include the +12 one time bonus in the skill scores? thank you very much.

EmperorNorton1 Heya Alex! If you are referring to your character's +12% I.Q. modifier, the answer is yes! =)

 

[EmperorNorton1]

Thank you very much! I've been working, and i think adding the +12 in is all i need to do!

 

[EmperorNorton1]

Skills are done lets gooooo!!!!!

 

[Epiphany]

Time has been even more scarce than I expected for a holiday weekend. That said, I'll start going through sheets tomorrow and start working out arcs to plan for. I'll also see about establishing a first post this week, showing King Creed's speech and set you guys up for a starting point.

Anyone need any help? Any questions I've missed?

 

[Sherwood]

Just a quick question: When my Borg Tribble begins to assimilate the NPCs around me with its inevitable cuteness, do I get extra xp for that?

 

[Purr]

Time has been even more scarce than I expected for a holiday weekend. That said, I'll start going through sheets tomorrow and start working out arcs to plan for. I'll also see about establishing a first post this week, showing King Creed's speech and set you guys up for a starting point.

Anyone need any help? Any questions I've missed?

Epiphany Here's one - I believe Esbilon asked how far north the vampires from the Vampire Kingdoms have gotten in your game? If I had to hazard a guess, I'd say Mexico, maybe to the southern Texas border at farthest (due to Lone Star's presence)? But that's just memory talking. What is true for your game?

 

[Purr]

*begins casting "Wall o' Text" spell.* POOF! Look! It worked!! 8D

Epiphany (and anyone interested in Chan-Chan). Update and backstory thoughts. Feel free to share yours! =)

Hey Pips! I'm still working out Chan-Chan's Spell list and what's in her horde (Pre-Rifts information!). Most of the rest of her is done.
Pips, could I get a 6d4 and 6d6 roll when its convenient for you, please? (This is for her I.S.P. and P.P.E. from her jump from 5th level to 8th.)

I am also happy to say I have spent Chan-Chan's"Level Fruits" (the name I made up for your experience-based bonus, third from the top, that starts off. "For every level, your character has a +1 they can award to any trait that isn't attacks per melee round (strike, pull punch, perception, etc.). This represents the fruits of their hard-earned experience. If spent on a skill, it's treated as a +5% increase." I threw all of it into a 35% bonus into her ability to Metamorphosis to imitate a particular person or specific animal. What's the percentage now? Oh, a fat and juicy 106%! That sounds like "good sweet fruits" to me!!). Is that all right, Pips, or would you rather I put them somewhere else?

Folks, in this backstory I'm working out, Chan-Chan either receives or is present for a vision/warning from the Grey Seers regarding Tolkeen - a possible future regarding The Thirteenth Mystery game here. As a result, she feels staying in Tolkeen for the long-term is a very bad idea (remember, she's a dragon so "long-term" means something different to her). She keeps this feeling largely to herself. But she loves Pre-Rifts artifacts (Blu Ray players, audiobooks, things of the Earth that once was) and magic, magic, magic! And she really wants to get her hands on as much of them as possible and take them to some hiding spot outside of Tolkeen should the gravest extreme come to pass.

So, I'm getting this strong idea as I make her that she is doing something to combine these elements - like perhaps working at a Tolkeen library and pawn shop, one known for getting at least decent amounts of Pre-Rifts artifacts and magical items. I mean, if you're an infant dragoness without an adventuring party eager for magical items and Pre-Rifts loot, why not work somewhere where the loot comes to you?

I noticed no one else in our team has the Appraise Goods Skill (in either its one or two-Skill form). So, I've taken the two-Skill version with Magic Items as its "excluded" category along with many Technical and Science Skills. At 8th level, I imagine her combination of sensitive psychic powers, Skills, and her being a Grey Seer might make her a minor Tolkeen authority in such matters of archaeological digs, history, adventuring hooks, and the like. (I also imagine she'll know Sherwood 's Freya's famous Sword of Atlantis on sight, but such details are up to Pips, of course.)

I'm also slowly building up a reasonable hoard of items for a person in such a position (think less guns and high tech and more history, TW items, and mysterious items with equally-mysterious pasts. Perhaps one of the hooks we can have together is that your characters have seen Chan-Chan working for years at said library or pawn shop (or whatever's best in Tolkeen - a place this Player doesn't know a lot about)?

Does all of this sound fun, reasonable, and useful route to you or should I try something else?

 

[EmperorNorton1]

Appraise Goods Skill

now, I dont have that, but ellis does have the Professional Restoration and Recognize Authenticity OCC skills as an fyi.

minor Tolkeen authority in such matters of archaeological digs, history, adventuring hooks, and the like.

seems like my historian and your seer are likley to have worked together before? just a connection idea if you'd be willing to pull on that thread.

 

[Eonivar]

Well I got Priya's Character done with skills and bonuses and such.

Now I need to work on the events that happened to in the timeline as well as her equipment.

 

[Purr]

now, I dont have that, but ellis does have the Professional Restoration and Recognize Authenticity OCC skills as an fyi.

Yes, I saw this. =)

seems like my historian and your seer are likley to have worked together before? just a connection idea if you'd be willing to pull on that thread.

Sounds fantastic to me, but I like little seeds like these to be approved by the one managing the garden before they get watered into something more. The last thing I want to do is add something that might conflict with something Pips has going on behind the Game Master screen. =)

 

[Esbilon]

Some thoughts (and on my phone so they won't be long ones).

Option #1: No preexisting group. Most everyone groups up because they catch sight of each other, remembering fighting beside each other in the future, and notice everyone else is looking at everyone else too. Presumably leading someone to say "hey, is it just me?".
1.a. Hook for Chan Chan: her Grey Seer temporal senses are tingling, she overhears enough to investigate and the party doesn't turn down the extra help (who says no to a dragon?)

Option #2: Preexisting group. Everyone was already an adventuring party way back in the day. We'll need to work out what the unifying thread is, since the war won't formally start for a few years.
2.a. what happened to Chan Chan?
2.b. Hook for Mind Melter: they were spying two years prior to 101 PA, perhaps being a 'member' was a point of access and an excuse to be in Tolkeen?

Option#3: You're all members of the Unkillables, an A-Team like group of elite troubleshooters, fighters, scouts, wizards, and whatever else the client needs. There's half a dozen other members and the group is led by "The Colonel" Jason Armitage, a man rumored to be the only survivor of the nuclear strike on Seattle hundreds of years ago, a man who now can't age and can't ever die (allegedly). No longer allegedly, though, as your group watched him finally die after taking a direct hit from tank cannon fire for what might have been the 100th time 5 minutes before the hospital was destroyed.
3.a. Hook for Mind Melter: basically the same as 2, except less suspicious and with generally more access to the Tolkeen campaign itself, as the Unkillables were well liked in the city having operated out of there and willing to defend the city for decades prior to 101 PA.

Okay, that didn't end up being short after all.

Did we ever end up picking one of these? I think that will have quite a large effect on the context of prior relationships.

Which I totally want to have too! The whole being a spy the first time around just makes it a tad more complicated.

 

[Eonivar]

Esbilon I was thinking your character may have already been planted at Tolkeen about the time of the speech, as a long term undercover operative.

 

[Esbilon]

Esbilon I was thinking your character may have already been planted at Tolkeen about the time of the speech, as a long term undercover operative.

Yeah, that was always part of the plan I wrote out a timeline in Jeanne-Marie's background tab which has her in Tolkeen starting 99 PA (that's flexible by 1-2 years if there's a reason to change it).

I'm just a bit concerned about the whole "sorry guys, I used to be a spy, but I'm on your side - our side - now. I swear!" talk. Though I suppose that happened in the Future That Was, so we wouldn't actually have to have that awkward conversation IC...

 

[Purr]

Did we ever end up picking one of these? I think that will have quite a large effect on the context of prior relationships.

Excellent point, Esbilon, and thanks for the reminder! I am for Option #3 followed by Option #1.

Which I totally want to have too! The whole being a spy the first time around just makes it a tad more complicated.

Esbilon "Complicated?" Sure. But I'm also finding the whole idea intriguing and a cool RP challenge to be met. Reading your Backstory 2.0, I like the details you've provided, but... (here come my favorite two words in RPing)... what if your character wasn't a good guy at all through Pips's Future That Was, but the nemesis of the party, sent to hound them, hit them with CS forces until something happens along the line that makes him break with the CS wholly and join the very people he's been sent to kill. Perhaps they, on their own, aid the Empress somehow in some big way? She seems to be the focus of his loyalty after all.

What do you think?

 

[Eonivar]

I'm just a bit concerned about the whole "sorry guys, I used to be a spy, but I'm on your side - our side - now. I swear!" talk. Though I suppose that happened in the Future That Was, so we wouldn't actually have to have that awkward conversation IC...

I guess that is the question, were you discovered later in the war? And upon discovery did you change sides, and prove yourself to the Tolkeen side before the end?

 

[Esbilon]

Esbilon "Complicated?" Sure. But I'm also finding the whole idea intriguing and a cool RP challenge to be met. Reading your Backstory 2.0, I like the details you've provided, but... (here come my favorite two words in RPing)... what if your character wasn't a good guy at all through Pips's Future That Was, but the nemesis of the party, sent to hound them, hit them with CS forces until something happens along the line that makes him break with the CS wholly and join the very people he's been sent to kill. Perhaps they, on their own, aid the Empress somehow in some big way? She seems to be the focus of his loyalty after all.

What do you think?

I'm pretty nervous about being the ex-nemesis of the party. That *really* requires the stamp of approval from every single other PC and is not something I think I could decide on my own. That said, it *is* an interesting twist to things.

What I had imagined is rather less dramatic, more general information gathering, sabotage, the occasional assassination, but nothing that personally involves the party.

My loyalty would then be degraded over time by 1) seeing that D-Bees and mages are pretty regular people for the most part, 2) the split between Free Quebec and the CS as a whole, 3) the incompetence displayed by the CS, 4) the war crimes displayed by the CS, 5) an increase in fascistic policies on the CS home front (e.g. it's not just humans vs non-humans any more, but also men vs women, white vs black, straight vs. queer, etc.).

I guess that is the question, were you discovered later in the war? And upon discovery did you change sides, and prove yourself to the Tolkeen side before the end?

I hadn't actually planned on being discovered, but that's partly because I'm overly averse to having my characters lose. I was more thinking in the vein of turning on my own and approaching Tolkeen's leadership, maybe through Priya actually. She seems like the approachable, forgiving type who could also get a message to the council or whoever else needs it.

 

[Purr]

I guess that is the question, were you discovered later in the war? And upon discovery did you change sides, and prove yourself to the Tolkeen side before the end?

I don't think I like this approach because party members can quite reasonably come to the conclusion that he only changed sides to save his own bacon ("Oh, I'm really a good guy now that you've caught me."). If instead, he comes willingly over to the party's side over something that they have done that has personally touched him (Empress), then I find that a whole lot easier to digest.

I'm pretty nervous about being the ex-nemesis of the party. That *really* requires the stamp of approval from every single other PC and is not something I think I could decide on my own. That said, it *is* an interesting twist to things.

Well, that applies to all of our characters, doesn't? If, say, Alex says, "Hey! I wanted to be the historian! Chan-Chan is stepping on my PCs toes!" then I'll be the first to say that I ought to change my character for the Players' benefit.

Spoiler: Avatar: The Last Airbender spoilers

I can't help but think of Prince Zuko who hounded The Aang Gang but eventually joined it.

If everyone likes the "once-the-nemesis idea," then what I'd really like is to see is Jeanne-Marie in the party, with the hatchet buried at start of game (she begins the game fully trusted - that will help with "social lubrication" if you like Carl Sagan's term). No ball and chain on her ankle so to speak - she is among not allies, but friends, upon their sudden return to 101 P.A..

Also, why should Tolkeen's council be in on this at all? Or anyone in Tolkeen for that matter? Jeanne-Marie is a Mind Melter since birth (not a genetic experiment, result of a Rift landing on her head during her first birthday or what have you). Tolkeen is a haven for such characters. Why tell anyone outside the party that Jeanne-Marie was involved with the CS at all?

EDIT: Real Life calls. See you for now! 8D

 

[EmperorNorton1]

Alex says, "Hey! I wanted to be the historian! Chan-Chan is stepping on my PCs toes!"

Dann, having someone who actualy understands all the lore is pretty important to playing a historian charictar. Chan-Chan is very welcome to fill/share the role!
besides, stepping on toes is my thing. my favorite dance move is trip.

 

[Purr]

my favorite dance move is trip.

YOU are a trip, Alex! Thanks for your blessing! =)