TheFred

Those outside the mines hurry in. The mines stretch onwards, deeper into the darkness, with many side passages looming link inky pools, not quite illuminated by Kassandra's light. The main passage runs straight ahead, sloping gently downwards. As you rush closer, you hear the sounds of fighting!

It's interesting because, you are right, there's a whole trope around ancient artifacts and relics of the past that's common in the fantasy genre. It's possibly derived from all the mythological stuff we see in the real world which kind of gives rise to the idea that perhaps there did used to be magic in medieval times or Ancient Egypt or whatever and it's just been forgotten. It's also I think reinforced by the trope of older things just being more powerful, perhaps because they've had longer to grow over time.

However, it strikes me that it's not really that realistic. In our world, technology has definitely taken a bit of a circuitous route now and then but mostly trends upwards. Perhaps the construction of the pyramids was ahead of its time and later civilisations didn't quite have that capability. Certainly post-Roman Britain felt like a bit of a step back; even if "the Dark Ages" is a slightly unfair term, they did lack things like Roman construction. However, we don't live in a world where there are loads of lost and forgotten secrets that we no longer have understanding of; history is patchy, but for the most part it's not like we can't do anything that our ancestors could do.

A post-apocalyptic setting is probably the one where this makes the most sense. If all of civilisation got destroyed it's quite likely that a lot would be lost; people would be forced to focus on their immediate survival rather than the preservation of knowledge. This is actually not that uncommon in fantasy settings; the "ancients" kinda ruined their own civilisation or blew themselves up with their hubris, and the civilisations that have followed after just don't have the kind of power that they had.

Note that dodging this trope doesn't mean that your world has to be technologically early - that's kind of my point. A more modern-feeling world might just have surpassed all the civilisations of its past in terms of technology (which could be magic, too, of course). Perhaps all the ancient relics people find are just trinkets by modern-day standards and only really fit for museums?

Sorry for the radio silence, I'd planned to get everything caught up last weekend but I unexpected had rather a lot on.

Buzz takes a tumble so I cancelled his Magic Missile, though I suppose technically he could cast it whilst face-down in the dirt. I noted a +4 to his AC for being prone but actually assuming he doesn't cast MM and stands back up, he doesn't get that - but it doesn't matter, the bandit has a large range penalty and Buzz's touch AC is OK (note: thanks for including AC in your posts, but with guns all over the place, touch AC is more useful!).

Guns crack, and another of the bandits falls to the floor. The firefight isn't over yet, though, as two more come running in from the north, looking around in confusion for the source of the attack.

"They're up there, you idiots!" Their leader yells. "Up on the ridge, in the trees!"

As the newcomers take cover, Buzz decides to leave it, lowering himself down the ridge in an attempt to reach Jen. Unfortunately, cliffs aren't his thing; his foot slips and he tumbles to the ground, the wind knocked out of him.

Buzz takes 6 nonlethal damage and is knocked prone (but I assume he uses his remaining action to stand back up? Technically he could still cast Magic Missile from a prone position I suppose)

The bandit leader takes the opportunity to shoot at the daring but unfortunate gunslinger... luckily for Buzz, tumbling into the bushes makes him a hard target to hit, and the bullets bury themselves in the ridge nearby.

There have been a few things like this before. I think there was once a thread where people could say what they were interested in playing/running in the hopes of organising a swap. I've also been involved in an AP swap where a load of us each ran games for the rest but only two(?) of those are still running.

I've done a few solo swaps myself... none of them have ever really worked out, for various reasons, but I still kinda like the idea, certainly for certain types of games.

I made a character a bit like this for one of these silly-overpowered high-level games where it was like L20 tristalt or something. I could pretty much reconfigure their entire mode of operation on a round-by-round basis. Veilweaving with Veilshifting is pretty good for this, especially with the Veilweaving Sphere as that lets you have all the benefits and then some and none of the drawbacks and still be a Spherecaster (because that makes sense!), though obviously the Vizier L20 capstone is what you really want.

The other option is Spirit Dancer Medium - I think it doesn't work by RAW but if you're using Spheres then combining it with Champion Medium makes good sense, and it's kind of bonkers especially in gestalt. The only issue is the limited number of spirit dancing rounds which can't easily be increased, but if you like doing copious amounts of fiddly maths every round then it's bang on. Also lets you use Permanent Transformation early, which frankly should never have been written, which is quite neat with Belated Shift.

Whatever Nancy did, it doesn't seem to have had that much impact. Continuing to act on instinct more than anything, she begins another chant. Though noticeably different, the dark, infernal words are just as unsettling to hear, as Nancy points at a nearby Skum and attempts to exert her will upon it.

Approaching the next doorway, Molgrug can hear the sounds of... well, something, anyway; he'd been minded to think "the sounds of battle", but perhaps "the sounds of a sort of flailing exertion" would be more accurate? Something to consider when writing his memoir of this experience.

"Well now, I say, what are you lot up to now?" He asks, flinching back as he sees some kind of dead ghoulish creature passing back and forth across the aperture toe-to-toe with Brandisher. "Don't you have anything better to do than messing about with these undead? You all left a potentially-valuable artefact behind for this, need I remind you?"

Bianca Pohlo

Her musings interrupted by the arrows, Bianca can only watch in horror as the injured Snappy is dragged away. With her knowledge of magic not extending to healing, she hovers awkwardly nearby, simply trying not to get in the way.

"Um... is he...? Um, will he, er, be all right?" She asks awkwardly. "Is... can I...? Is there anything I can, er, do to help?"

Molgrug considers continuing to talk at the ice-man until either it relents and gives him the shard, or the hot air melts the ice. Molgrug has nothing if not patience, after all.

However, with his futile efforts at dislodging it proving more than a little underwhelming and sounds coming from the halls ahead that suggest his compatriots may have managed to get themselves into some other embarrassing and compromising situation that Molgrug just has to see, he decides that discretion is the better part of success.

"Right, well, I tell you what, you just hold onto this for now," he suggests. "Just checking that it's, um, secure, yes."

He gives the crystal a little pat before scurrying off.

Whilst the rest of the group are heading off to investigate whatever horrors lurk ahead, Molgrug lingers behind. He's always known he was travelling with a bunch of nincompoops, but even so he can't help but be slightly baffled that after identifying their whole reason for being here they've decided to march off and leave it behind.

"Yes, well, you don't mind if I hold on to this, do you?" The ice-entombed whatever-he-is naturally doesn't respond. Unfortunately, the ice also covers the crystal shard, and Molgrug tugs at it to no avail. "Hmm... seems it's a bit iced over... reminds me of a time I had to audit the fourth-quarter returns figures for a group of gelugons. Now that was an interesting case, let me tell you! Hmm... bless it, it's a bit... stuck... grr..."

He tries chipping away at the ice with his claws. If only he had been so frazzled by that portal - a simple fire spell would melt all this in no time!

On 4/3/2024 at 9:32 AM, Michael said:

It was (iced over)

Ah, drat, that probably means that Molgrug actually can’t pick it up then, since he doesn’t really have anything to chip away at the ice with or anything (other than his claws and 8 Str, I guess). Guess we’ll just have to leave the thing that we’re actually here looking for behind, huh?

Aeos, Psychosurgeon
DUR: 0/30, LUC: 0/30, Wounds: 0, Traumas: 0
Pools: Insight 4/4, Moxie 6/6, Vigour 1/1, Flex 2/2

"Most interesting," Aeos remark. They look at the doctor with interest, sure that there’s as much to be learned from his own demeanour as there is from the unfortunate Null. "Well, we should have to observe them a little longer in order to make a diagnosis… but, we wonder, are you sure the problem isn’t mechanical? All this talk of “crashing”… well, synthetic morphology is well outside my area of expertise, but these cases… they are not exactly known for their reliability. Uploading the ego to simulspace should quickly answer that."

Also I am away atm visiting family and stuff so I’ll try and get a post up but am not that active right now.

On 3/29/2024 at 11:35 AM, TheFred said:

Anyway... is the shard-holding hand encased in ice too? From the description it sounded like it was mainly the rest of him.

What’s the deal with this? I’ll grab the shard if I can but if it’s properly iced over (I was assuming it wasn’t, but best to check) then no point.

I'm away for a bit over this weekend and stuff too. I'll try and get a post up at some point, but I'll be around a bit less.

I'm visiting family and stuff over this weekend; I'll try and get a post up, but I won't be doing any maps or anything for sure. Hopefully that won't be necessary, at least yet, but we'll see.

At any rate, I think it's everyone hiding in the bushes now to act?

I have family stuff on over this weekend so my availability may be limited, please bear with me folks.

You know what they say, a shard in the hand and all that. To me, the course seems clear: grab the shard, then go find the sceptre, then leave and kill those doofuses (doofi? doofus?) who "hired" us, then conquer the rest of the world.

Anyway... is the shard-holding hand encased in ice too? From the description it sounded like it was mainly the rest of him.

I'm not here to tell anyone how to run their games, and the whole "interview" thing has obvious benefits... but yeah, it's a load of work, so that comes as no surprise. That's why people normally leave the pregame threads just to run by themselves - which is of course one of the things that some of us greatly dislike about them, so the interviews IMO are a step up... but they're are a lot of work.

Also... all the other characters have realised that this is the whole reason we're here, right? Seems a bit silly just to leave it behind.

If everyone just leaves, I'll grab it myself. And, if whossisname does prove able to cling on to it, I'll employ the power of persuasion to get him to let me take it. Molgrug can be very persuasive!

21 hours ago, Roughtrade said:

Scared would be the person who keeps asking someone else to touch it.

Well come on, what do you have minions for if not to fetch things for you? 🤨

As much as I’m fully expecting some magical shenanigans or whatever, I’m a bit amazed that these supposedly super-powerful arrogant fiends are scared of a guy who’s so old he can’t move. If he’s powerful enough to stop us just snatching the crystal off him, why doesn’t he just go get that sceptre himself? And if he does have some fight in him, we can just push him over or turn him upside down or something and leave him there, see how he likes that!

Four whole days since he said he'd been a bit ill and had RL stuff to catch up on?