OOC discussion

If you do it I'll do it. I just don't have a pic for Steve.

Well that felt awkward, but at least we got there together.

I have been knocking around the idea of finding the commissioner and apologizing for lying to him about being a member of the Coins. What do you guys think? I don't think I did anything wrong, even though he might not be happy about  it. His happiness is not what I'm aiming for though. I'm trying to patch our anonymity without being fined or being held for 12-24 hours in a cell. Thankfully "Steve" is a common enough name.

Also, I never actually pulled out an armband and showed it to him at the time. Zeiss, is it illegal to withhold information about what magic schools a person is trained in, or can that be considered personal and private information?

Honestly, i think you'd probably just come off as trying to cover it up. Which you are. And would just make it look more suspicious.

Best let it go, and let him forget about that, than pressing it further into his memory. This guy is a Black White Green Mage. His level has got to be a high number, and for a police commissioner who still bothers to interrogate suspects, not only must his Deception be pretty high, he must be pretty intelligent as well.

I say just let it go.

It isn't considered illegal to hide your status as mage in the Free Feathers or the Enclave. It's only good manners to show it.

Wait, the commissioner had to wake up and talk to Steve. The guy examining the statue was just a nameless Yellow Mage. So...not the commissioner, then.

Yes, they are two different people. The Commiss told me the yellow mage would be dealt with so I don't think having anything to do with him is a good idea. He might hold a grudge against us for his own BS. I don't know him but you never know. Best if we just avoid them really.

You have a point. I'm gonna steer clear of that mess.

Updated the NPC page to reflect Fedler's instrument skillset, and upgraded her painting.

Each party member receives 250 gold pieces from the Coins as payment for the mission of the second adventure. Steve must make note in his character sheet of the money he carries for Breeze.

The party as a whole receives 439 gp from the money they found on the enemies' corpses, and from selling the loot. Divided five way, it amounts to 87 gold pieces and 8 silver pieces for each party member. Fedler, Mihai and Breeze didn't take any equipment, but they're still going to have a share of the gold. *GM puts his butterfly stamp on this decision*

There was 40 gp you guys found in the sewers of Zest's Gate, but that was already divided between all of you, so I didn't count it for the purpose of this post.

Following some disagreements with the players, I'll take some time off to cool down. I should be back in a few days.

...What?

You can ask K or Kolson for the details if you want to know more Rory. I don't want to write this story on the forum.

Me and Rory talked about this and are on the same page. Just so everyone knows.

Now that the honeymoon is over for our characters, I think now's the time to have a sit down and talk about a few things.

1. Things have take a dark turn recently with Konrad stirring the pot and undermining party cohesion.

How do we the players see the characters getting past this? I just want us on the same page here.

2. Assuming we solve that dilemma, I think we could improve some things within the party, to show how our characters are getting better at our jobs.

A. Mihai's sign language is a useful tool. We need our characters learning that ASAP.

B. Figuring out different equipment loadouts for different missions might be worthwhile. Or at least some kind of general set of equipment that we have on hand. Just as an example, basic equipment like manacles and sacks would be something beneficial to all human party members. I'll draw up a list of suggestions when I'm not so tired and we can have a real discussion about it.

One thing that K suggested when we were discussing this the other day was acquiring some healing potions for emergency healing. I think this is a good idea, especially if, god forbid, our healers are either unavailable or incapacitated in some way. I think we should also take a look at what other potions might be available. We make pretty good money for our jobs and anything that improves our plan and combat options is good in my book.

The idea about a party fund has been mentioned earlier. I don't know if that's still on the table, but might i offer an alternative.

I was thinking about more of a party investment thing. If you have a purchase that will benefit the party as a whole (which normally, most of them do), you put it up for all to know. And the characters contribute what they think it's worth.

Admittedly, those of me us that spend more money upgrading their equipment will benefit more from this, but the whole party reaps the benefit when we don't die.

It would damped the damage on our individual wallets, while still retaining us somewhat of a free market, and might avoid conflicts about who should dip into the party fund and how much, since it's more of an up-front honor system.

Just an idea.

OOC: The reason has nothing to do with Mihai or Fedler. Though he has decided to outright say a few things that needed to be said, he's already a little wound up.

I agree on the sign language.

I don't know about a group fund, as we've been good about figuring out or asking who's got the most coin to spare and what they want to save money for if they can't spare any. We had a group fund in Arch's campaign. Last I remember Zeiss was keeping track of it, but when the party split, it just went away from all mention and I don't know if it's still around and in which campaign.

I like your ideas though. I have recently taken a shine to potions in general, as my character in Arch's campaign can't cast magic, in fact they don't have a Yellow Mage with them which turns out can be vital.

Yes, both of our healers are NPC members, and said members can be taken away.

Here are some ideas. We could buy oils that cause Silence on hit and give them to Mihai and Fedler. I was going to get Silence as my next spell, but this sounds more fun. We can buy potions that cause Haste, and we can buy splash potions that cause Slow over AoE (or even Stop). We can get potions that cause us to Float. The strength and duration depends on how strong the potions are that we buy (buy strong!).

There are probably weavers and alchemists in the Coins who provide all this for the elite members. I don't think they'll mind if we put in a special order.

We do that, and the spell I plan to get at 4th level will be Curse. As for my Medium Yellow spell, gotta be Vanish (for me Stealth). Or I could get Dispel on the chance that someone casts Doom on one of us. Vote now?

Potions of Protect, Shell, Reflect (who uses that, right), and Fly may help us in the long run.

Does Dispel work on enemies too? Cause that sounds super useful being able to strip buffs and such off enemies.

You can remove buffs from enemies and dispel debilitating magical effects from allies. I guess we could order Vanish potions for me if needed.

In light of recent events, there's something i wanna make sure of, Rory.

Namely, that we can play this story to it's full extent without you yourself taking it badly. If that starts being the case, please make it explicit so we can address it clearly and unequivocally.

I'm just posting this to make sure. Feel free to ignore it if i'm worrying too much.

Rory, you have badly misread how Konrad has come across to the rest of us. Your behavior has been nothing short of disruptive and something has got to give here. The way Konrad speaks is blunt, rude, and aggressive and because you don't pace it out enough it hits one thing right after the other with nothing to pull it back into "He's a dick, but he's our dick" territory.

If we don't figure this out going forward it may wreck this game and our friendships and I don't think anyone wants that to happen. Do you at least see the problem?

Believe me, I see the problem and it's worrying me.

I thought Mihai was deliberately giving his answer in an esoteric fashion, and decided to respond with "please say it so we can all understand." It was phrased the way it was due to mild annoyance, because he assumed Mihai was answering. And all I can think of is that time Mihai chose not to interact with me on the ship at first when I was trying to hold a conversation with him, to "not give up control" of the conversation to Konrad. And I have no idea what that means or if he's doing that all the time. Zero. I just know that kind of behavior infuriates me.

I'll be as honest as i can here.

First, it's not nearly as deliberate as you might think. and despite how i'm about to dissect it, it's much more of a subconscious thing, also related to things i have to deal with IRL.

Mihai starts doing that when Konrad starts arguing off-point. Like i said twice now, "dancing". He first did that when after Konrad approached him and Mihai confronted him with the problem ("When we had Verdun, you were looking like you were enjoying yourself."), Konrad wouldn't argue the point, and instead took it to revelling in the accomplishment. It happened multiple times after that, when Konrad would simply talk a lot and refuse to simply go "tell me what's the fucking problem". After Mihai finally told him the fucking problem, Konrad wouldn't simply agree to disagree or try to understand him - and let me remind you, it was Konrad who came to him. Konrad immediately tried to - and let me really emphasize this, Rory, because this is the major first part of the problem - WIN the argument. He started going on about what Empires do, and how merciful Mihai was.

Every discussion with Konrad seems to have to be something he has to win. And when he can't, he'll start hitting lower and lower, or go farther and farther off-point, or simply try to get a rise out of his "opponent", grabbing whatever he can to do that. What Mihai does is simply cut off his ability to do it, because from that point on, it's no longer a conversation.

Now, you may not like it, but first let me assure it's not meant to insult you. Second, you have the option to simply disengage. It's no shame whatsoever, and you've had plenty of opportunity to do so until it all reached a critical mass.

Let me assure you, Rory, that Konrad's manner has been equally infuriating to me. I just have a way to deal with it when i'm it's target. What seems to be happening now, is you seem to think your only option is to press as hard as you can or take exception to it, when all you have to say is "if you don't wanna talk, fuck off", and leave him looking like the asshole.

If you can't do that, i'm in a bind. What you ask of me is that i stop playing the character to the best of my ability or damage my friendship with you. I really wish we could go on without me having to do either.

Mihai wasn't being very specific, was he? Konrad merely elaborated for him on what it was Konrad enjoyed about capturing Verdun. Perhaps it wasn't what Mihai thought it was, and I had thought he would elaborate further since he was so angry about it. I was not sure what to make of the multiple elipses Mihai gave in response to that, so instead I addressed it directly and explained why silence won't work with me and asked him what the problem was, to which Mihai answered by playing coy, and Konrad didn't like that. He told him he didn't like it and asked again, "will you tell me what's on your mind?" Finally Mihai told him what the problem was and assumed Konrad loved to torture people for its own reward, which was a falsehood Konrad chose to ignore and instead tried to explain to Mihai how it could have been necessary. Then Mihai said "I don't care, it's not going to happen again." Then Konrad addressed that, telling him in no uncertain terms that holding onto that morality would not have gotten them very far without Breeze's help, and mocked him for it. I don't really see a win-lose anywhere in there, just "Torture is bad, don't do it" "Well it's useful" "Well then screw you" "Oh, well screw you too"

Konrad may also love the sound of his own voice, so he likes to explain, elaborate, etc with more words, big words and all that.

K wrote:Every discussion with Konrad seems to have to be something he has to win. And when he can't, he'll start hitting lower and lower, or go farther and farther off-point, or simply try to get a rise out of his "opponent", grabbing whatever he can to do that. What Mihai does is simply cut off his ability to do it, because from that point on, it's no longer a conversation.

Everybody wants to win an argument, that's why they argue. When things get heated, Konrad throws insults and jabs when he gets angry just like anyone else. Those are the "screw you" moments.

K wrote:What seems to be happening now, is you seem to think your only option is to press as hard as you can or take exception to it, when all you have to say is "if you don't wanna talk, fuck off", and leave him looking like the asshole.

Well Konrad could choose to be way more abrasive than he has been, as you're suggesting, but where would that get him? Everyone else would ask him kindly (or not so kindly) to leave. He wanted to avoid that, so he didn't tell him to leave, just told Mihai he was fed up. And threw an insult into the mix and mocked him, cuz he was upset.

K wrote:If you can't do that, i'm in a bind. What you ask of me is that i stop playing the character to the best of my ability or damage my friendship with you. I really wish we could go on without me having to do either.

Well, maybe the next time it happens I'll understand better. I don't see how it was called for, or worked, in our previous fight, but maybe we'll see an example between Mihai and another player or NPC later on where we'll understand it better. Mihai and Konrad are not going to be friends, that much is clear. I don't know if what I explained when it comes to our previous fight changes your understanding of that, but in this next post Konrad is going to come down from the high horse and offer an olive branch to the group (of which Mihai is part of, but not to him specifically). We'll make this better.

Look, i am fine with us playing this enmity game and still be friends. And i don't expect us to see eye to eye on this. Already there you said plenty of things i just don't see as such, but i don't think we have to agree on everything.

All i hope for is we can continue to be sport about it, and not take it personal. And if we ever do again, talk it over clearly before we go into this hole again.

What do you say?