May 15th

Scan: before you buy, make sure you can use it.

Since Bob doesn't care, the hirelings will, if they want to be hired in the first place. You should interview them, Javan. Find out what they're good at.

OOC stuff:

In his journal, Rory maps the path from each exit to the other and to their nearest sewer entrances. Then he will leave and map where they appear to be in relation to the mansion from a top-down view.

Next, he returns to their hotel to transform into a sclavi wannabe and go out to ask around about the upcoming party. When's that happening? Who's planning it and hosting it? Who's invited?

Afterward, he will browse for an Exit materia, and browse the Command materia available.

Survival
Mapping

Gather Info
Help from Higaide would be nice.

OOC:

Javan is going to interview both fellows, try to get a fell on their personality and skillset.

OOC Clarifications:

The next party, happening all day on the 17th, is being hosted by Drogga of Splinterfist, a well-to-do Ogre woman. She plans to have a concept she heard about, rotating bars, where what food and drink is available is routinely removed and replaced with other varieties. Purportedly this will include Aluvian dishes, which is what passes currently for scandalous. Naturally only those on her personal guest list are invited, the cream of the crop of Thramadan High Society.

One of the people Javan interviews is Alornerk of Aggressor, a Banderling. He is apparently somewhat new to the trade (equivalent: level 2) but seems eager to take on the job. He comes across to Javan as ambitious, not in the 'wanting power' sense but in wanting to further his career as a stealth-oriented thief. He's scored a couple of jobs already, and wasn't detected on any of them.

The other is Zephris of Torinov, a Sclavi. She is far more experienced (equivalent: level 3) and has a large number of heists already under her belt. She's not exactly sloppy, but she has no sense or care for precision and has no problem leaving unconscious bodies in her wake. She recounts to Javan one of her favorite jobs where she nabbed a small ruby and had to run out of the building with the alarms clanging and a dozen guards chasing her down. She tells the tale with relish.

Javan is still waiting on a price tag for the Scan materia.

The man eventually gets back to you and, after some haggling, is talked down to 310g for the Scan 5 Materia. He also mentions it'll be about 5 days to smuggle it in.

OOC:

Oh. Then it's time to find out what Goratin's up to for the week. I'll start by asking if there are any more parties happening this week, and find out what Goratin...does. What does he even do? What's his business? If people talk about him going to parties and hanging out with friends, I'll say something like "that guy has friends? What friends could he possibly have? Tell me." Wanna get them talking about that to pick up on anything relevant.

Gather Info
Plying gossip at/around where he lives. Really hope he's having a party this week.

[Also...wow, Thramada's economy is gorging on the war, and these people are...just living lavishly. Sparing no thoughts for refugees or veterans. "Let's have parties and play dress-up!" Maddening. Glad I didn't have money to tip last time I was here.]

Goratin, it turns out, does have some big surprise planned this week, although no one you talk to has details. In fact several people you talk to hope you have details so you can let them in on the latest juicy gossip. He has something planned for the 18th, deliberately trying to 'cut off' the excitement from Drogga of Splinterfist's party by showcasing how awesome his thing is. Whatever it is. He doesn't seem to be particularly popular; very wealthy, of course, but not even that well established amongst the socialites. He's been known to have deranged and frankly dangerous opinions about rationing resources to help supply the war effort.

Okay...who's invited? Everyone?

What were/are these dangerous ideas of his? Could provide sufficient motivation for Thog. The way people are living and throwing the same garish parties weekly is motivation enough for Rory to take whatever's not nailed down, if we haven't agreed with the Raiders not to do that.

What sort of party is it? I should buy a change of clothes if I am going to attend or even meet the man. We have today and two days to prepare...

It looks like the invitation list to this 'event' is the same as the previous party; the rich, wealthy, elite, etc.

These horribly dangerous ideas include things like not throwing parties with resources that could be hoarded in case the war drags on, to ensure they have supplies for the future. Or investing in one side or another to gain a controlling interest in conquered territory.

The party that Drogga of Splinterfist is throwing has already been described. Whatever Goratin is doing no one knows.

Alright, Javan decides the Materia is a no go for the moment, but he may return later.

Also, he decided not to employ anyone right this moment as it's still not the right time.

He'll will then go to the party's assembling place to give them them his info dump, so they can start talking about the next step.

[Huh, I don't see what's so dangerous about that, in fact it seems quite frugal. He is a fop, though.]

Okay...he's gonna show off the coin. Holy hell he is in league with Gaerlan or he thinks he is. We are going to dress up like foreign new-money businessmen from Sho, who had arrived at that nation with most of our wealth intact (think "big ol' boat"), though not our assets, which we used to buy new assets in the Republic.

At the meeting place, hotel room
"Sounds good. Take 800 from me and hire the good one," says Rory to Javan. "Get the other one too if you can spare the gold. Take this whiskey with you. I don't think we'll need to go straight to the vault, but it never hurts to be prepared. Goratin's going to show off that coin like a fop, and we're going to walk in and take it. We're going to play dress-up again, this time rich as sin. Our story is we're new money from Sho, arrived there with most of our money which we used to buy new land and stuff, whatever nobles call 'assets'."

"I'll drink and cause a big ruckus so that the rest of you and your thiefy friend can sneak inside and work their magic on the magic. We meet up in the basement: you tip-toe downstairs and I'll get kicked out and go in through the sewers - don't mind the smell, but it's gonna be noticeable. Then we get the vault open, grab the coin with gloves and then we'll all climb out of the sewers smelling like pig poop. But before we do that, we'll put on some burlap coats to cover up the suits. We'll all look like a bunch of regular bums."

"We'll have to buy ourselves some horses before all this to hop on right when we're done. Then we'll pay our thief, or thieves, and Tom Cruise outta there."

More afterthoughts from Rory. "Wait, no. I'll dress up as rich new money, the rest of you will dress up like servants. You'll look just like Goratin's people, only I'll introduce you as mine. That's what they do, right? They bring servants with them? Eh, you can just sneak in and pretend you're one of his and you're late, if that's not the case. As for me, the hell do they know about Vesayen, anyway? I'll just make it all up as I go."

"Alright, as the pessimist of this group allow me to point this out: That man is flourishing on top of a city that's all about appearances: he's not just going to show off that coin, he's going to make use of it. Influenced or not, I'd not take him or his security staff lightly if he thinks the coin is important. We could do the deed during the demonstration but I'd rather not risk have a bunch of Gaerlan'ed people in case we fail.", said Javan while doing his sleight-of-hand training and failing 80% of the time.

"So uh, first we also lack terrain advantage, and I'd rather not risk going under disguise either. I'd like to make use of Alornerk, have him 'steal' said terrain advantage from our target and make us a map of the terrain so we have a good idea of where to go but have him touch nothing. If he's caught, he can just say he was working for whom he thinks is a rich person that wanted to know what's the big surprise our target was keeping, hoping they'd get an edge over others... Which is not a lie mind you."

"Zephris would probably our go-to girl for when we actually do the thing, but we need to make sure she doesn't tries to rob anything before we start leaving the place. After that, she's allowed to do whatever she wants except taking the Gaerlan from us."

"So yes, I'm saying we should forget subtle for this one thing that should be done with subtly, but that's because I truly believe this a more volatile situation than at first and... we are lacking on the social skill to pull it off that way. I'm open to suggestions, tho."

"That's just... well, my fear talking here, ok? Like I said, open to suggestions. But whatever we end up doing, an accurate map or blueprint would be a game-changer. Not to mention we could come up with a better plan than my 'smash all the things' that I'm failing to see."

"You have a point." Rory's posture sumps. Thog's not part of the plan - not yet anyway. "We'll also have him mark potential hazards, and stuff we can take advantage of, and then maybe we'll hire Zephris if we need her."

"Hm... hey Higs, what says you? ... Come to think of it, you've been awfully quite for a while now buddy... I fully expect you to stop me on my 'let's break things' suggestion earlier."

Getting back into his "indistinguishable peseant" disguise, Rory visits the Naverre Raiders with Javan again.

After handing the bottle of dillo-cured rotvenom to Bob, he finds Alornerk and pays the boy 200g up front (600g on completion) out of his own pocket for an accurate map that Alornerk will make of Goratin's mansion when he cases it that night, including environmental hazards and advantages.   

He hands Alornerk his Potion of Lesser Restoration and Potion of Sneaking, and asks if Alornerk has all the equipment he needs.

"Use this," he says, handing over Restoration, "if you need to. This, however, I expect I'll have to replace." He hands over the Sneak potion. It won't be much, just about 25g give or take. A smart thief, good or bad, will make use of all his resources.

Higaide shrugs - "Honestly, so long as no one gets seriously hurt, and no one can connect us to Zephris until we're long gone, it's probably as sound a plan as we'll get as of now."

Javan looks around a few times just to confirm they are alone when he whispers this to them, "People are already hurt. I mean, this whole situation is our responsibility. At this point, I'll be just glad we clean up the mess we left without causing an international incident. Like... our actions WILL be influencing the regional policies in ways I can't even start to fathom. Frell... I have to doing this to myself, I'm feeling terrible now."

"Sorry, I don't think my brain can function that way, considering how it was us that started it all. So instead, let's go find a place to crash for the night. Oh, and I'm going to take care of getting us a fake Gaerlan first thing tomorrow, so I can't move until later that day. I'll make sure the weaver get us the best fake Gaerlan we can in these circumstances tho."

[Were you talking about returning with the Gaerlan coins? Or that guy I gored back in Sho? Hmm. Y'know, looking back, we could have just left the coins where they were... but some of us wanted money and we were hoping to deweave the effect or something.]