Stengleronymous

Nasri, Goblin Wizard "Oh, mmmmmyes?" Nasri says in his ridiculous and obviously-faked accent, appearing interested in what "Selissa" is saying about the material foci necessary for successful plane shifting. "Have you done much planar exploration, then, fair madam?" he inquires, "I've always wanted to spend more time on the Elemental Plane of Earth, myself, but I worry after seeing so many rocks and stones I would just start to take them for granite!" He then dissolves in a fit of braying laughter at his own pun, or perhaps suffers as asthma attack. It's hard to be sure which, really. After five to ten uncomfortable seconds of people staring at him, he regains his composure and says, "But in all seriousness, I'm sure there are just oodles of interesting things to learn out in the elemental planes! Are you a researcher too?" he asks the gray elf, hoping to learn something the group might be able to use or connect to Hargreave.

Emmanuel “Manny” Puno ST 12 | DX 13 | IQ 16 | HT 13 | Will 16 | Perception 17 FP 13/13 | HP 12/12 | DR xx | Base Speed 6.5 | Base Move 6 Manny encourages Andreas to take point on the initial inquiries into the sign system, both because he wants to get the measure of their new teammate's skills and because he himself is much more interested in anthropological documentation and having the extra manpower lets him satisfy his academic curiosity without leaving the important practical work undone. As Andreas reports his findings, he smiles and claps him on the shoulder in a collegial way. “Nice work, Andreas," he compliments. "For my part, I think we should first get our story straight - who we are and what we're doing here - and then make contact with the smaller group at the camp to learn the norms and communication styles of the locals. Once we've done that, we might even be able to accompany them to the market, and showing up at the market with known trusted people will lend us some extra credibility by association. That sound okay?" he asks everyone, but mostly Jack.

Nasri, Goblin Wizard Nasri vigorously and pointedly refuses to take a "bath" and resists any attempts to make him do so. These other humanoids can do what they want, but the goblin knows the truth: the concept of "bath" is just a ploy by water elementals to get foolish humanoids to let them into their houses so they can drown them more easily, in cahoots with soap merchants who are trying to make the case that rubbing cakes of rendered animal fat all over your body will make you cleaner or improve your odor. No sane goblin, desert-dweller, or desert-dwelling goblin would subject himself to (at best) a massive waste of water and (at worst) an ignoble smothering by a rogue elemental. Instead, he cleans his body the civilized way - by covering himself with olive oil and using a shaped bronze scraper to remove it along with any accumulated unpleasantness. As a result, he actually smells faintly pleasant (if olive-y) for the party. He doesn't buy any new clothes, instead just hanging around the magic item shop until he sees a halfling who is dressed "fancy," memorizing that outfit, and conjuring it with the illusion from his hat of disguise. He looks like a rotund, long-haired halfling calling himself "Milo Goodbarrel" (the most stereotypical halfling name he could come up with in two seconds when another party guest first asked his name) with a horrible orange-and-yellow outfit that just screams "more money than taste" but apparently appeals to whatever twisted sense of fashion Nasri has. He happily hobnobs with the Elven arcanists once they appear to accept that "Milo Goodbarrel" is a halfling and not a goblin. He affects a ridiculous "upper-class" accent and probably comes across like an abrasive gate-crashing buffoon not worth talking to except for the fact that he is actually incredibly knowledgeable about arcane matters and can discuss them intelligently and at great length.

Nasri is happy to go to the party (free food!) but will emphasize again to everyone that VESTRENNA HAS SEEN OUR FACES because she's the one who was scrying on us to check where we were going after the fight with Hargreave, so unless you're Ynessa (who I think was scouting ahead and is generally hard to spot anyway) please go in magical disguise. Nasri will buy a hat of disguise and pretend to be a halfling.

Emmanuel “Manny” Puno ST 12 | DX 13 | IQ 16 | HT 13 | Will 16 | Perception 17 FP 13/13 | HP 12/12 | DR xx | Base Speed 6.5 | Base Move 6 Manny takes the meal packs from Jack, flipping through to see what flavors are available and sorting them in his preferred order for the next several days. As he packs them into his backpack, he glances over at Jordan. “Heading for the markets would be tricky since we still don't have a confirmed time and location for one,” he says. "But I theorize we might be able to find that out if we just keep our eyes open for the right signs. We haven't seen any non-us network traffic since we've been here, right? So if the scavengers aren't arranging markets that way, they must be using some other method to let each other know where and when the next swap meet is going to be. I theorize it's graffiti or something similar, maybe a dead drop system that people would know to check. Private Theriot and I will be watching for stuff like that while we go check out our next possible resource cache."

Nice. Nasri isn't going to show up to the party as Nasri because he's 100% sure that Hargreave at least described the party to Vestrenna when he came to the city, but he might show up disguised as a gnome or something if I can grab a hat of disguise and he'll recommend that no one else who Hargreave saw show up to the party looking like themselves. More likely he'll let their new elf party member who Hargreave has never met take the lead on chatting up Vestrenna...

Emmanuel “Manny” Puno ST 12 | DX 13 | IQ 16 | HT 13 | Will 16 | Perception 17 FP 13/13 | HP 12/12 | DR xx | Base Speed 6.5 | Base Move 6 Manny nods to Andreas' questions and proposed course of action. “Ronnie is actually the one who told us about the markets in the first place,” he explains. "But that was just something he'd heard; I don't think he's ever actually been to one. And a key detail was that the markets move around. So our job is to figure out where they're going to be next," he clarifies. "If you want to do a second interview with Ronnie and see if he knows anything else about them, be my guest. I think posing as a merchant is reasonable insofar as it goes, but my impression of this world is that these 'markets' are more of a scavengers' swap meet where people bring things they've found to swap for things they want or need. I don't know if the 'merchant' profession even exists as such. We'll have to learn quickly what the norms and expectations are once we actually find one."

Nasri, Goblin Wizard “Lovely, lovely,” Nasri nods, happy for Ynessa and Varrik. "I'm sure you two will have an excellent time! I've been meaning to do some spellbook scribing anyway. Probably a better use of my time than crashing an elf party. Especially if they decide to play pin-the-tail-on-the-goblin," he says. He has no idea whether elves really play pin-the-tail-on-the-goblin, but it was a popular campfire story in the Tuktuk tribe, and one he didn't want to investigate the truth of firsthand. He glances around. "Anybody else got elf business? Don't let me hurry you," he says, apparently honestly. However much he doesn't want to linger around all these elves, he's not going to shove the party out the door until they're good and ready.

Emmanuel “Manny” Puno ST 12 | DX 13 | IQ 16 | HT 13 | Will 16 | Perception 17 FP 13/13 | HP 12/12 | DR xx | Base Speed 6.5 | Base Move 6 Manny smiles as Andreas approaches. He watches the man's transformation with obvious fascination, and looks impressed by the speed and thoroughness of the polyskin's action. When Andreas greets him in Arabic, he grins and is about to respond when the infiltrator switches to a language he doesn't know. Is that Greek? he wonders, casting a sidelong look at Eukleidies. Having grown up in an Imperial China territory, he recognizes Mandarin easily enough even if he doesn't speak it. By the fourth language he is wearing an amused expression and lets the man cycle through until he's obviously finished. “English is pretty much our lingua franca here,” he says. "You can probably just stick with that unless we run into folks who speak something else. While we're out patrolling, I'd like your help keeping an eye out for signs of human scavenger activity. My primary interest right now is trying to find one of their markets. Once we do, it will be you and me taking point to gather information from them on where we can find the resources Ark-1 needs and what else they might know about this world that could be useful to us. Sound good?" After a pause, he asks, "Out of curiosity, were you not sure what language I'd like best, or did you just want to demonstrate how many languages you know?"

Emmanuel "Manny" Puno Stats [235] ST: 12 [20] DX: 13 [60] IQ: 16 [120] HT: 13 [30] Per: 17 [5] Will: 15 [0] Move: 6 [0] Speed: 6.5 [0] Hit Points: 12 [0] Fatigue Points: 12 [0] Advantages and Languages [86] Born Sailor 2 [10] Cultural Adaptability [10] Fit [5] Language Talent [10] Luck (Game Time +0%) [15] Patron (Gateway, Equipment) [0] Reputation +1, Berlin Team, Ark-1 [0] Reputation +1, Team Cloak, Ark-1 [0] Native Language: Tagalog (Native) [0] Languages: English, Spanish, German, Hindi (Native) [16] Languages: Arabic, Basque, Finnish, French, Japanese, Latin, Nahuatl, Russian, Southern Min Chinese, Unas (Accented) [20] Disadvantages [-65] Acrophobia (Heights, CR: 15 or less) [-5] Curious (CR: 12 or less [-5] Duty/Project Exodus (Almost all the time) [-10] Flashbacks (Severe -5, 1D minutes) [-10] Guilt Complex [-5] Obsession: Find a New Alpha World [-10] Pacifism: Self-Defense Only [-15] Sense of Duty: Friends and Companions [-5] Wealth (Dead Broke) [0] Quirks [-5] Broad-minded[-1] Whistles while he works [-1] Imaginative [-1] Likes old books [-1] Responsive [-1] Skills [132] Combat Skills Guns TL10/Rifle-15 (DX/E) [4] Beam Weapons TL10/Pistol-15 [4] Judo-14 [8] Knife-13 (DX/E) [1] Leadership-15 [1] Armoury TL10/Small Arms-15 [1] Outdoor Skills Acrobatics-12 [2] Animal Handling (Equines)-15 [1] Cartography-15 [1] Climbing-13 [2] Fishing-17 [2] Hiking-13 [4] Knot-Tying-15 [1] Riding (Equine)-14 [4] Survival (Arctic)-15 [1] Survival (Jungle)-15 [1] Swimming-13 [2] Academics Anthropology (Human)-15 [2] Anthropology (Elephant Eater)-15 [2] Anthropology (Unas)-15 [2] Archaeology-15 [2] Architecture TL10-15 [1] Computer Operation TL10-16 [1] Computer Programming TL10-14 [1] Cryptography TL10-14 [1] Electronics Operation TL10/Communications-17 [4] Electronics Operation TL10/Sensors-15 [1] Electronics Repair TL10/Communications [4] Geography TL10/Physical, Earthlike-14 [1] History (Mesoamerica)-15 [2] History (Southeast Asia)-15 [2] History (Western Europe)-15 [2] Linguistics-16 [4] Literature-14 [1] Meteorology TL10 (Earthlike)-17 [1] Naturalist TL10 (Earthlike)-15 [2] Research TL10-15 [1] Sociology-14 [1] Teaching-15 [1] Writing-15 [1] Social Skills Acting-18 [8] Body Language-17 [4] Carousing-12 [1] Connoisseur (Food)-15 [1] Cooking-15 [1] Detect Lies-16 [4] Diplomacy-16 [4] Disguise TL10-16 [2] Travel & Vehicle Skills Boating TL8/Sailboat-15[2] Boating TL8/Unpowered-15[2] Cartography-15 [1] Environment Suit/NBC Suit TL10-13 [2] Navigation/TL10 (Land)-15 [1] Navigation/TL10 (Sea)-17 [1] Seamanship/TL10-18 [1] Shiphandling/TL10 (Ship)-17 [2] Shiphandling/TL10 (Sub)-17 [2] Submarine/TL10 (Mini-Sub)-14 [4] Submariner/TL10-16 [1] B&E Skills Search-15 [1] Stealth-13 [1] Medical Skills First Aid-16 (IQ/E) [1] Physician/TL10-14 (IQ/H) [1] Diagnosis/TL10-14 (IQ/H) [1] Miscellaneous Skills Hidden Lore/Alchemy-16 [2] Sewing TL10-13 [1] Gear Space Biosuit (DR 15/3, second number vs. crushing, corrosion, toxic) - 5 lbs. Nanoweave Bodysuit (DR 18/6, first number vs. piercing and slashing) - 6 lbs Assault Boots (DR 18/9, +5 Hiking) - 3 lbs. Sonic Stun Pistol (1.8lbs C HT-3(5) aff, Acc 3, Range 30/100, RoF 1, ST 4) - 1.8 lbs. Pocket Pack (penlight, multitool, sticky tape, sharpie, 1 meal worth of food tablets, and a candy bar) - 0.5 lbs. Small Backpack (3lbs, holds 40lbs.) - 3 lbs. - Rope, 3/16", 20 yds (0.5lbs UT81 Supports 2000 lbs at TL10) - 0.5 lbs. - Vapor Canteen (2lbs B/100 quarts UT76 ) - 2 lbs. - Survival Ration x20 (13.5 lbs UT73 ) - 2 lbs. - Disguised Survival Watch (0.5lbs, B/3 months, includes GPS, biomonitor, inertial compass, homing beacon, tiny computer, UT77) - 0.5 lbs - Superfine Vibroblade Large Knife (1lb, BS272, UT163-164 ) - 1 lb. - Small Computer with Good-quality Software Tools for: Architecture, Armoury (Small Arms), Computer Programming, Cryptography, Electronics Operation (Sensors), Electronics Operation (Communications), Electronics Repair (Communications), First Aid, Geography (Earthlike), History (Western Europe), Mechanic (Automobile), Meteorology (Earthlike), Navigation (Land), Navigation (Sea), Research, Shiphandling (Sub) (0.5lbs, 2B/20 hrs) - 0.5 lbs - Electro-Optical Binoculars (0.6lbs, 2B/100 hrs, Night Vision 9 and 64x magnification) - 0.6 lbs. - Mini-Flashlight (0.25 lbs, B/24 hr, 30 yd. beam) - 0.25 lbs - Small radio (10-mile range, 2B/10 hr.) 0.5 lb - Personal Basics - 1 lb. Kept on mule / at base 21 B-cell batteries (1.05 lb, UT19) - 1.05 lbs. 5 C-cell batteries (2.5 lbs., UT19) - 2.5 lbs. Electromagnetic Autograpnel (5 lbs., C/15 min, UT 96) - 5 lbs. Stats: Ads: Disads: Skills: Total: 235 86 -65 132 388 of 400

Happy New Year!

Emmanuel “Manny” Puno ST 12 | DX 13 | IQ 16 | HT 13 | Will 16 | Perception 17 FP 13/13 | HP 12/12 | DR xx | Base Speed 6.5 | Base Move 6 For his part, Manny had spent much of the intervening time chatting with the technicians and Ronnie, as well as examining maps and trying to figure out where these elusive scavenger markets might be. While he was a reasonably competent technician and pilot, his anthropology background was a lot more useful when he had actual real people to talk to instead of sifting through the scrubbed remains of a disused internet. Fortunately, Ark was kind enough to actually send him some actual real people to talk to! His greeting consists of sunny smiles and cheerful waves for each new arrival. He regards Eukleides’ techno-hoplite ensemble with obvious curiosity, and mentions quietly to him and Tamzin both, “Don’t let Major Reygar’s distrust of the battlesuit get to you. On an early mission, we had a squad member in a very advanced battlesuit with more hardware than sense and he almost blew that mission sky-high. It’s not a reflection on you, I promise,” he says with a reassuring wink, before switching his focus as Andreas is directed to him. “Hi there!” he says, with a broad, honest smile. “I’m Emmanuel Puno, the team’s contact specialist. Excited to be working together! Feel free to call me Manny, or Puno if that’s too casual for you. What would you like me to call you?”

Nasri, Goblin Wizard At Meridia’s question, Nasri shakes his head vigorously with eyes wide and frightened. “Oh! Goodness, no. By which I mean, yes,” he comments, blinks twice, and then flicks himself in one batlike ear. “OW! Uh. What I mean to say is, no, I don’t plan to confront them, but I do plan to be prepared for them confronting me. In, you know. A killy way,” he helpfully clarifies. He scratches the back of his head. “I wonder if the churches of magic gods have any notion of something that might be done in cooperation against the Sidewinders. I mean, Corellon is a god of magic as well as, uh, crescent moons and music and goblin-killing, right?” he asks, demonstrating once again just how badly their party needs an actual diplomat. But for all that the goblin is thoughtless, off-putting, and occasionally offensive, he also has an excellent memory. And he remembers what they heard of Vestrenna’s cover story… “But if there are any among you who follow Boccob, or Wee Jas, or something, too, we should maybe put our heads together. Strategize. Assassins trained to kill arcane spellcasters might have a little more trouble if those arcanists have divine backup.”

Nasri, Goblin Wizard Nasri has been very quiet so far and making himself as inconspicuous as possible. Elves might not look as growly as dwarves, but he knows they can be just as deadly, especially to a weak-looking goblin. At this point in the conversation, he pipes up, "Oh, do you all know the wizard Machius? I know he doesn't get out much, but we did hear there was trouble from them at his doorstep. Which, granted, is far from here, but you know. Expatriates!" he says, attempting to include himself in this category in a friendly way that probably more comes across as manic and slightly desperate.

Hey everyone! Sorry for my disappearance. Life was total chaos. I'm back if you'll still have me, but if I've been booted or written out I will of course accept that.