How I Plan To Run The Game

[dalamb]

General

1. During periods when I need a response from everyone (such as combat), three times a week (tentatively Monday, Wednesday, and Friday) I will post the next main turn.

2. When it is not essential to hear from everyone, I may respond to individual posts more quickly, but probably not more than a few times per day so extremely prolific posters don’t dominate the game.

3. Your post needs to make absolutely clear which character is speaking or acting, so must prominently indicate the character name at the start. There can be many good ways to do this, but one I especially like is to use a Fieldset with the character name as the label.

Combat

1. I currently hope to use Roll20 for tactical positioning. This means I will need a heasdshot image from accepted players to use as a token.

2. During combat I need a spoiler with your statblock at the end of the post.

3. For situations where, at a tabletop, your character would make choices in the middle of a combat round, you must post in a spoiler a simple set of instructions that would make it easy for me to do this for you without having to communicate with you mid-round. So, for example, I need all your critical hit confirmation and critical damage rolls in the original post, and guidance for what targets you’d select if you have Cleave. If you don’t, I’ll make a choice on your behalf.

[dalamb]

Likely Kinds of Activities and Encounters

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The campaign will be a mix of types of encounter, generally falling into these categories:

• Boarding party: you’ll be the ones to board and capture Iverinan shipping. Although there are crew aboard, for the most part they won’t engage in combat (they’re Melara’s “followers” in the Leadership feat sense).

• Away team: if there’s buried treasure to be found, y’all will be the ones to go ashore and find it. These could be any of the sort of land-based adventures you are used to, albeit generally with some connection to privateering or piracy.

• Troubleshooters: Melara is a high-level NPC who will “make major decisions” but this is a role-playing game where player character are supposed to have agency, so if trouble comes up, you’re the ones who will need to deal with it.

• Shipboard encounters: If the sahaugin try to board you, you’re the ones who will deal with the problem.

• Underwater. You might get knocked overboard, so need to be able to deal with that (hence the defensive bonus rules), but don’t necessarily have to be able to stay underwater for a long time. There could be a need for some water-breathers occasionally, but if so there will probably be a “split party” situation where I run the above-water and the below-water sections of the party in parallel (with all the problems that can cause with timing of events).

[dalamb]

Sample IC Post

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Although I don't want to be too restrictive in how you post, it seemed appropriate to show you the kind of format that makes things easier for me. (Actual statblock to be added at the end when I finish Garth's sample sheet).

Garth Stormchaser

Garth ran a hand thoughtfully over his chin as he listened to the suggestions of the others. "I can't deny, communication in the midst of combat is a major concern. These rings don't sound like a bad idea - but 2,000 gold apiece means we'd be spending the entire funds for this expedition. If you all think we can get by with what we already have already, by all means let's get ourselves the rings, but it might be wiser to go for cheaper, more utilitarian options. If we have no other means of healing, miss Hudoram becomes a much higher priority on the battlefield. This can potentially limit our mobility, and lead to all other sorts of trouble. And mister Ironwater, you raise an excellent point about sustenance. I've never known the captain to be an inefficient planner, but even the best sailor can be waylaid, and supplies sometimes run low, out in the open ocean, far away from land and reasonable options to restock."

He ended his musings with a shrug. He was fairly sure that if the officers really couldn't agree it would be his job to settle the matter, but for now there didn't seem to be anything wrong with open-ended discussion.

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