Butchern

Posted and started Chapter 2. If y'all need anything else from Rohm or Max, ask away. Otherwise, you can begin your posts with something like, "After Palmer portaled everyone back to base . . ." :D We can have some down time for y'all to RP together, or we can jump to the building. Up to you. I'll follow your lead.

"That's classified," Rohm and Max said almost in unison. Rohm laughed. "Portal back to HQ," Max confirmed. "Then you can jump to Inferno's apartment. I'll get you the video footage you need. Might take an hour or so to set up. I'll let you know when it is ready. We can put NYPD and non-imbued DSA agents on the building, but I don't recommend it. t will only attract attention, and if a fight does break out, they'll be slaughtered. I will notify NYPD, however, that we are working in the area right after you portal in. They can keep their distance and work to assist any civilians should trouble break out."

That all sounds right to me.

Great. What's the plan? @Caystodd, I think you're up. :D

The team wrapped up the interrogation, and Rohm walked them down to a larger (but still cramped) meeting room. Hound plopped herself into the nearest chair and tried not to look bored. Rohm walked inside the room but stood by the door. "I'm sending you a transcript of the interview now, for your investigation. It is classified . . . obviously," Rohm said. "If he decides to share anything else, I'll let you know. This room is secure, you can use it to check in with your boss. I'll be around on this floor, so if you need anything, just yell." Rohm left the team to discuss their plan. They knew where the phone was and they knew where Inferno lived. They got Max on the phone and walked him through what had transpired. He gave them the green light to get the phone. "What's your plan?" Max asked?

Ask more questions, or we can move on.

Rohm and Archon took a break, and then they went back into the interrogation room and went through it all again with Inferno. He didn't give up anything new in the final hour of the interview, but he gave them his home address and told them where he had hidden the phone. The loose brick was behind the bookcase beside the radiator in the living room. "We can get more details out of him about the attack," Rohm said when she walked back into the observation room. "But I don't think it will produce anything more actionable that what we have already. We'll keep him here until Main Justice decides how to proceed on him. With low-level troublemakers, they ship them off . . . wherever . . . to be de-powered . . . however they do that, then put them on probation. But with Inferno, they might not be so lenient. Regardless of what he said in there, Inferno is in much bigger trouble. Nothing he said today can be used against him. Nor can anything that results from anything he said . . . the phone, the conspiracy, all of it. But we have him on video attacking the boat and assaulting federal agents. That is enough to put him away for a long time. But that isn't up to me."

To summarize up top, PbtA games suffer the same kinds of problems that all RPGs suffer in PbP gaming but may suffer from some of the problems more acutely, depending on the individual game. The player-forward and bare bones nature of the rules, however, could be an advantage in PbP with the right players. The long version: I think they do work fine, in theory, but only so long at the GM is flexible and the players are both active and proactive. And I think the PbtA games you'll find on MWers that are moving along quite well do so 1) because their GMs have adapted them (by filing down a bunch of the edges, metaphorically speaking) to make them work in the sub-optimal environment of PbP and/or 2) because everyone in the game is using some other non-PbP medium (like Discord or text messages) to compensate for the inherent problems of gaming "by post." I have run several PbtA games in PbP, and in all my games, the system was typically waiting for the player to decisively make the next move to take the story in a direction they wanted it to go. And, often, the players need to reach a consensus on something before they can move forward. Most PbtA systems also require a good deal of back-and-forth negotiation between the player and the GM to decide the outcome of a roll. I have found, however, that most PbP players are not decisive nor are they proactive. They have come to PbP, not because they want to game aggressively, but because they want a game to turn to every few days, for a few minutes, when they have the time. PbP players often want the GM to do all the hard work of story and description, so they can then post a few paragraphs of navel-gazing reactions to what the GM said and did. If they don't even have to read the posts of other players, all the better. These are the kinds of player who would never play a PbtA game around the table, but they jumped in to a PbtA game in PbP because the stakes are very low and walking away is as easy as just not posting there again. I would also argue that "reaching a consensus," which is nearly impossible to do in PbP which moves at a glacially slow pace, is almost never actually accomplished in PbP. The active player(s) usually makes a suggestion of where to take the story, and everyone else either doesn't respond or just falls in line because they got to the discussion two days late and "man, trying to argue this stuff out in a forum is just a hassle, so . . . whatever . . ." After the second or third time that happens in a game like Monster Hearts or Apocalypse World, their characters are entirely irrelevant to the story now anyway, so those players just quit and move to a different game.

The interview went on for another half-hour. Inferno appeared to be telling the truth. He confirmed that he did not know who was making the bridge come to life but suspected that it was the Animator. Other than the name, however, he had no specific information. "I was told to stay clear of the bridge" he said, "So I did." Inferno also confirmed that he received two calls, one two weeks ago late in the evening when he found the bag of money and one last week early in the morning. The first call said wait for the second call. The second call gave the specifics. Inferno made no calls on the phone and never took the phone out of the house. After the second call and the deal was done, he took the battery out of the phone and stashed it behind a brick in his apartment. He was given no instructions to check in. In fact, he was told to destroy the phone.

Not a big issue. Mostly just an FYI . . . I accidentally edited a player's post instead of my own (I know, stupid; I had multiple tabs open and I am easily confused). I wanted to be sure I had restored it back to its original form, so I clicked "see edit history" and got a message that said: "There is no edit history to show, or this comment was edited by a moderator." I'm not sure under what circumstances the forum would show you the "see edit history" button (which only appears when you edit a post AFAIK) and there would be no edit history, but in this case, I know there is an edit history because I made the edit. Not sure what is going on there. Here is the post: https://www.myth-weavers.com/index.php?/topic/6573-ooc-and-character-creation-questions/page/11/#comment-125113    

It is pretty common actually. Most radio calls are simple, one-syllable, and disposable. In my limited experience, local cops, who don't to a lot of specialized coordinated radio chatter, are usually even simpler (i.e. more on-the-nose) than colors. I recently worked a thing where the teams were code-named "Front Door," "Back Door," and "Bedroom." Can you guess where each of those teams were positioned? @Caystodd, you are correct. The DC for a Team Check is always 10, so 22 is three degrees of success, so yes, +5 is the cap.

We'll do one more round of questions. Post 'em if you've got 'em, and make your rolls.

The first part of the interrogation went on for about thirty minutes. Inferno was an old pro at this apparently, and was not an easy nut to crack. He didn't seem to believe any of the threats that came from Rohm, but when Archon said them, he believed. Over time, Inferno recognized that he was out of options and spilled what he knew. His story went like this: Inferno was contacted by parties unknown via an "untraceable burner" (his words) that showed up on his doorstep with a duffel bag. The offer was made to him by an electronically scrambled voice on the other end: $50,000 (which was in the bag) to wreak havoc on the bridge. The bigger the mess the better. When Inferno asked him who he was about to work for, the voice said, "The Animator." It was a name Inferno had heard whispers about back in New York. The Animator was a name that all the high-level criminals knew, but no one had met. Everyone believed that one of the organized crime gangs in New York were working for the Animator, though they didn't know it themselves. Inferno didn't know which gang. Inferno was supposed to have destroyed the phone that came with the money, but he kept it as insurance. It was in his apartment in Queens.

That is 3+ degrees of success on the teamwork so +5 to Archon's intimidate roll. Posting the result now.

Archon, if you'd like to Intimidate Inferno, make the roll and let's see what happens. Also, Simuggal, since you threw in some good ideas, you can make a Team Check using whatever skill is appropriate. Palmer, feel free to make suggestions as well.