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Tarak Tales -- Round Two -- OOC Thread

Into The Unknown is the second Tarak adventure, this one being somewhat more involved, plot-wise, and rather more character-driven in some areas. Yes, we're starting with Cersei, and sticking with her for the first few exchanges, so that we can get her character arc rolling. When the time is appropriate, she will recruit the others. But here is where we can talk OOC about all this kind of stuff. As per usual.

Oh, right, I was gonna get into the habit of posting some standard opening material. Here goes:

Most of you know the deal, but I'll reiterate it, just to be certain. This game is taking place in the world of Tarak, the Tower City, and all of you are residents of the city. It's a huge metropolis, but it's all fairly tightly packed inside this big mesa.

Nearly everyone in the world is pretty much average; they may get skilled, they may have heroism in them, but they're basically just normal folks. Some few are born to be heroes, though, or villains. In Tarak, that includes you people. That's why you have a lot of extra attribute dice, to start with. Now, there aren't such things as professional adventurers in this world; if there were, you'd be some. But every community has people that can be called upon to help out with unusual situations. For Tarak, that small group includes you.

You're part of a small group of movers and shakers; basically, you're the adventurers of the city, so whenever there''s a big job that has to be done, the people in the know can call upon you and your friends. It's a big town, but the group of people qualified to handle unusual situations is generally quite small, so you all know each other and have a working relationship; most of the time you have full-on friendships. Not every member of this group is available every time something comes up, but there's enough folks around, a mission group can usually be rounded up for any given task.

In game terms, the fact that you are PCs gives you an automatic advantage, and in this sort of relatively insular community, that advantage has not gone unnoticed. You're already experienced at working together and at dealing with unusual situations, so that's why you start off with an extra 10D in starting skill dice from the usual, and have gear and such that you likely wouldn't otherwise possess, given your day jobs. Further, although I like to keep my groups pretty small online, there is room for people to drop in and out as the situation warrants (between adventures, at least, or during stopping points within adventures if we have to). New PCs are just members of the group that haven't been called upon yet, "on camera" so to speak, so existing PCs have an excuse to treat the newcomers as friendly and trusted. I don't know if we'll get far enough for that to matter, but if we do, the dynamic is already in place to account for it.

This is the second OOC thread, and the second adventure. We've already had something of a "shake down" in general, so it's only a matter of bringing the new people up to speed (and they can accelerate the process by looking through the first adventure on their own, as well as the first OOC thread).

I do want to reiterate my comment about actions here and now: you can tell from the Example of Play I posted that certain things I let pass with description, but major activities require die rolls, particularly when the time is short and the consequences are potentially grievous. One of the things we'll be working on is all of us getting used to what is what and how to handle it in the text-only format. It would be a lot easier to figure that in face-to-face tabletop play, but the tendency in text is to describe a long thing, all your actions, and that gets tricky when I'm not able to interrupt to ask for a die roll or something. But not EVERYTHING is going to call for dice; when there's no consequence to trying again, and there's no effective time limit, we can assume some things are just attempted until they succeed, if it's possible for them to succeed at all. This should have the net result of saving time.

Suffice to say, I imagine we ought to be prepared to edit ourselves, when necessary. I have learned that lesson myself in other RPs, and this should be no exception. We can work out things here or in PMs if there's a conflict, and then edit as need be.

Oh, and post length is: whatever's required for the moment. If it's action, for example, doesn't have to be long: describe what you're doing, and maybe the intent behind it, if you're planning something or setting something up. But I'd rather not deal with extraneous padding if we don't have to, that just slows things down.

Also: pick a color and font that's comparatively easy to read. :lol: That's just a request from a guy with old eyes.

Other than that, thread is now open. Have at thee.
 
This is the time on Sprockets when we dance... I MEAN this is the time when y'all ask questions if you have any. Misha's PC should know many of the answers, and I'll feed Misha anything she doesn't know. But I leave it up to her how to phrase the data, and how much to reveal of all the stuff that's available.

If we really don't have any questions, I can let Cersei answer Lulu's question, and then move on to the next thing I have in mind...
 
I'm strapped for time at the moment, though I really want to post.

I bring you good news:
I get to stay at my mother's while she and her new hubby go to Michigan to visit family.
So from Sunday night to Thursday, I will be on a helluva lot more.

X3​
 
In the recent battle, it went pretty interestingly, actually. You all saw the hits, but the damages were so tantalizingly close, right up to the end.

The first dagger hit was solid, but the squid's Resistance roll was high enough, it didn't take any damage. Still, since it was such a good hit, I wanted Chay to accomplish the "set-up" function. The chop also hit well, but the Resistance roll indicated it only did Stun damage; there was only 2 points difference between the rolls. So it slithered away, and then the sword was stuck because of the complication.

Lucca's stab action also only did stun damage, being just one point higher than the Resistance roll. But that chop damage? It rolled poorly, and her damage was 14 points higher: a mortal wound, just from that one attack!

Of course, it could still ink at that point, and I figured it probably would have. But I also wanted to let Koh do something. I figured an eye-shot was almost a trademark for him when dealing with tentacled things, at this point, so it seemed the natural choice. For the extra difficulty, I ended up rolling low, getting only a 10, making the total difficulty 20. His to hit was a 21, which meant he did it! So the damage would matter. I didn't even need to consider any extra effects, because all he needed to do was get a Wounded result to push the squid from Mortally Wounded status into Killed status. And in fact, the damage differential resulted in an Incapacitated status, so that did the trick quite handily.

I didn't want this to last a long time or be a big harrowing battle, it was just a warm-up and a re-introduction (or new introduction) to handling the dice and such. I think it worked pretty well, all told.
 
Thank you for handling the combat while we were sitting on our asses doing nothing.

I'm glad Kohdeki was able to achieve something awesome.

It's time to start posting, people!
 
Shouldn't be any more danger before morning, but I'm leaving space open for RPing, if anyone wants to work their characters.

If we want to just go ahead, by all means, I can go for dawn and we can pick it up from there. You all ought to reach the appropriate debarkation point by early afternoon; a full day's downriver travel at speed would put it possibly three days ride away from town, and that's just along the river, is my out-of-my-ass estimation, and that seems distant enough for a hidden base. That isn't counting terrain or how far inland you have to go.

So, RP away, and I'll pick up the plot when you've had a chance for that.
 
WTF?

Are you guys gonna' post, or even give an excuse as to why you haven't?
 
Made a post but my browser totally disagreed with me, thus nothing and I'm too fucking tired to rewrite it now.

Be patient with me.​
 
It's partly my issue; long travel scenes are good in a movie where you can be wowed by the amazing vistas, the mountains and rivers and what have you. Not quite so much in the text, where you're just waiting for something to happen.

i want some idea of how people are taking the travel; are they okay with it, is it wearing on them? It's rare for most city dwellers to spend a night outside of the safe confines of their homes, so this will be an unsettling experience for everyone, I just want some idea of how you're all holding up.

I debated having a tribe of orcs notice you all, but be on the far side of the river. I'll save that for when you reach your debarkation point, though. It'll give you texture, and raise the paranoia level. Most likely they can't do anything, or at least it'll take some time to get the canoes ready...
 
All righty, I think if Misha wants to put something out (or just tell us she can't, here in this thread), I can handle dready (since he hasn't been here in more than a month), and move us to actual land again.

I think you're playing it up well, Kite; you OUGHT to be all paranoid and uncomfortable out in the wilderness, not only because y'all are habitual city dwellers (by necessity), but the fact is, you CAN be slaughtered at any time by superior numbers out in the wilderness with little or no warning, in this world, at least. So as much of that as you want to indulge in, by all means, feel free, long as it doesn't paralyze the whole party (there's such a thing as too much of a good thing).
 
Note about the RP thread: Yes, this guy I had an image of the Predator, in the first movie, just watching them go by, so you can just imagine that sort of image, adapted to the setting. Koh and Lucca don't have to draw anyone's attention on the raft if they don't want to, this is more just a local color incident. Barring any attempt at interaction, my next post is likely to be about the debarking and the start of the hike, because the destination is a decent way inland.
 
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