In Neptune's Realm - OOC thread, Chatter on the high seas Options

[Dumori]

I know that feeling quite well.

[Penta]

Quick note: The bit about gratis equipment is my covering line for any gifts your characters may stumble upon, or stuff given to cover possible OOC oops I noticed over the last few days.

...On that note, my notes scare me. I really did scribble down a capsule description, in full jargon, of how the op was funded. I watch too much CSPAN...None of you will ever see those notes, but still. I felt it worth mentioning.

[Minchandre]

First thing's first: fazzamar, I asked a Russian friend of mine, and she said that while the curses were translated correctly, "shit" and "damn it" aren't completely equivalent in Russian. She recommended this article. Боже мой ("Bozhe moi!") is also fairly appropriate as an exclamation. It means "Oh, God!"

On to, you know, important stuff, I think that a training raid is a good plan. It'll help us work out some kinks in our MO and stuff.

Training, I'm not sure. Universal courses on UCAS military protocol, ship's operations (including piloting, fixing stuff, maintenance, etc), and ocean safety might be a good idea.

Language courses, like in BitW, are also probably good. Everyone needs to be able to speak at least a tiny bit of Spanish, though I guess you can always call up a Level 0 translator autosoft off the Matrix if you need it.

Beyond that...I'm not sure. We had a generous enough chargen that everyone should be an expert in their own field. Maybe some good basics: weapons training, unarmed combat, basic hacking, combat piloting...magical lore training? Maybe some geopolitical overviews of the Caribbean? I know that my character, at least, doesn't know her Barbados from her Cuba.

By the way, I forgot to roll starting cash for Cherry. 4d6+3=17. 17 * 500 = 8,500:nuyen:. Not bad at all (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[Faraday]

Beyond that...I'm not sure. We had a generous enough chargen that everyone should be an expert in their own field. Maybe some good basics: weapons training, unarmed combat, basic hacking, combat piloting...magical lore training? Maybe some geopolitical overviews of the Caribbean? I know that my character, at least, doesn't know her Barbados from her Cuba.

By the way, I forgot to roll starting cash for Cherry. 4d6+3=17. 17 * 500 = 8,500:nuyen:. Not bad at all (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

Nor mine. I also didn't roll starting cash, but I'm not entirely sure how one would roll cash for a spoofed lifestyle. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/grinbig.gif)

I'll just play it by ear and assume low lifestyle. Starting Cash: 3d6=18, amazingly. Hope I'm not jinxed by that one. 18*50=900 (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nuyen.gif)

[Xahn Borealis]

I didn't buy lifestyle, as Penta said we could live off the boat. I'll assume low lifestyle, too. 5d6=11. So, 550¥. Not bad.

Also, I'd like to apologise to Minchandre for ogling your character. And on fazzamar's behalf as well. I'll try not to hit on her.

As for the TARDIS, it's more than 'bigger on the inside'. It's dimensionally transcendent. So there. I also promise not to make the Quicksilver's node play the gorgeous 'vworp vworp' sound. At least more than once.

[Penta]

Yeah, roll starting nuyen as if low lifestyle if you're going with the boat as lifestyle option.

[Digital Heroin]

Salt, like any good Navy man, is thoroughly and completely broke after time ashore.

[Minchandre]

Also, I\'d like to apologise to Minchandre for ogling your character. And on fazzamar\'s behalf as well. I\'ll try not to hit on her.

Trust me, she didn\'t notice. Nerd-dom transcends all genders, creeds, and nations.

Salt, like any good Navy man, is thoroughly and completely broke after time ashore.

Cherry\'s loaded from a patent she owns, but God help her if she knows what to spend it on. She\'s been in the Army her entire adult life.

EDIT: Penta, requesting permission to change Knowledge: Scifi Trids 1 to Knowledge: Hedy Lamarr 1. I had some fun thoughts on the plane (Hedy Lamarr (yes, that one) invented the frequency hopping scheme that is the basis of modern wireless communication.)

[Penta]

Eh, granted.(IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[fazzamar]

In regards to the gratis equipment, Nik doesn't have a lot of wants, so other than possibly a sorcery library or perhaps some spirit binding materials.

About the training bit, I'm pretty flexible, so whatever you think will be fun for us as players.

Also, Minchandre, I'm apologizing now as well for the attention that Cherry is going to get from Nik. The checking her out won't come up as much anymore, but the fact that he is biased against women, considering them to be the fairer or weaker sex, fortunately it's only a minor bias so it should only come up in his thoughts and a little bit in his actions. So please don't take it personally. Don't feel bad, I'm going to have to deal with someone else's prejudice too, cause there's someone with a bias against magic in our group.

[Xahn Borealis]

Mmm. /me thinks briefly.

It'd be a very tight fit and sort of awkward, you'd have to pack really carefully, but I'd allow it this once.

What about 10 rounds of caseless holdout SnS ammo in a small smuggling compartment?

[Xahn Borealis]

I'm going to have to deal with someone else's prejudice too, cause there's someone with a bias against magic in our group.

"Magicians lost me my arm, my career and killed my CO!"

Don't worry, though, he's only as biased as you are. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)
He'll assume you're reading his mind constantly, refuse to shake your hand, but otherwise simply think hostile thought about you.
At least, he will, when he finds out you're Awakened. Speaking of which, when are we doing the IC introductions, then?

[fazzamar]

"Magicians lost me my arm, my career and killed my CO!"

Don't worry, though, he's only as biased as you are. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)
He'll assume you're reading his mind constantly, refuse to shake your hand, but otherwise simply think hostile thought about you.
At least, he will, when he finds out you're Awakened. Speaking of which, when are we doing the IC introductions, then?

I'd imagine we'll get to IC intros really soon...

[Penta]

What about 10 rounds of caseless holdout SnS ammo in a small smuggling compartment?

10 rounds, you could probably just put that in a pocket.

Once you guys elect (or if nobody steps forward, have appointed) a CO, XO, and purser while outside, we'll board the boat and go to breakfast with the trainers, which is where we can do introductions. The posts for that will happen Monday-Tuesday (24-48 hours from this post); I'd still like to see if more of the people who'd signed up for the campaign show up, hence I want to allow all of this weekend for them to post in and show up as players, because once you guys board the ship, they've missed the boat (pardon the pun). We had 11-13 in chargen; We have (by my count) 6 now, with no explanation as to the other 5-7 as to what's going on, at least not from them. I'm not angry or anything (though I will confess that it's kind of annoying), but it does confuse me...And like when this happened with Blood in the Water, make me wonder why it's happening (with all the associated (admittedly narcissistic) worries that "It's me that's the problem, I suck" and stuff; not healthy, not rational, but I do it anyway, can't help it). I know chargen went extremely long, but some comment, even just a note dropping out, would have been nice if that was the intent, especially for those who still post otherwise on Dumpshock. For future reference: If you have to, or just want to, drop out, whenever that is, please give me some warning if possible. It's only polite. If you want and ask, I can write things for a temporary absence, or if you want I can just kill off the character. No hard feelings from my end, but (again) it's really about being polite and not leaving me wondering.

I'll see how breakfast goes, but my vaguely-formed plan is to have 3-5 days for mealtime chatter posts and stuff, and on Friday skim past the rest of what I'll call "inprocessing", into introducing the quarters, and then gathering everybody for the reading of orders and stuff before training begins. That should take either one big post or multiple smaller ones, we'll see how my muse goes, but that should all happen on Friday. I'll then, next weekend, post the training stuff, and you guys can then handle that while I (among other things re this campaign) finish up (or at least figure out the basics of) the details on your first target. We'll then do a quick meeting to finalize cover, how to divide takings (after the government takes their share), etc., before the ship docks in Cape May (on that next Monday), and then I'll give out karma (yes you get karma for the training phase - for good RP only, since there isn't much threat) and we'll have a brief shore phase before we set out to hit the first target. The timeline can be shortened or lengthened, but this is my rough plan as of right now.

[Penta]

After all that:

I'm going to really regret this, I suspect, but I was just going over character sheets, and I realized some of you made what seem like possible errors of facepalm-worthy extent. Not to pick on anyone, but (purely for example) Fazzamar's character doesn't have what would ordinarily be regarded as an essential skill, and I'm not entirely sure if that was a conscious choice on his part. Hence I want to give the benefit of the doubt, especially since we just started.

So...While I'm not saying "go back to chargen", if you guys want to correct possible errors like that (and as a consequence redo your sheets), talk to me privately within the next few days and we'll go over what you perceive as errors and what your proposed revised sheet looks like. Note that this doesn't include backgrounds, and is meant for minor fixes only. We'll keep the RP moving while this happens.

[Xahn Borealis]

I'm going to really regret this, I suspect, but I was just going over character sheets, and I realized some of you made what seem like possible errors of facepalm-worthy extent. Not to pick on anyone, but (purely for example) Fazzamar's character doesn't have what would ordinarily be regarded as an essential skill, and I'm not entirely sure if that was a conscious choice on his part. Hence I want to give the benefit of the doubt, especially since we just started.

Does this include me?

Also how many rounds could I fit in my small smuggling compartment? It's just in case I'm searched, the same reason I keep the Fly in my synthetic cyberarm's compartment.

[Penta]

It's your choice. I mean for it to be used to fix errors, not make tweaks/optimizations, but it's on you guys to approach me.

So far as the smuggling compartment: If it's the one on pg 342 SR4A, it gives no clue how big it's supposed to be. It may depend on where it is. As a temporary ruling, I'll say 12 rounds of SnS is a max for holdout rounds.

[Faraday]

"Magicians lost me my arm, my career and killed my CO!"

Don't worry, though, he's only as biased as you are. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)
He'll assume you're reading his mind constantly, refuse to shake your hand, but otherwise simply think hostile thought about you.
At least, he will, when he finds out you're Awakened. Speaking of which, when are we doing the IC introductions, then?

Out of curiousity, what's his feelings towards adepts? I didn't note it on his bio, but Roger is probably only somewhat aware of his Awakened state. >.>

[Faraday]

Once you guys elect (or if nobody steps forward, have appointed) a CO, XO, and purser while outside, we'll board the boat and go to breakfast with the trainers, which is where we can do introductions. The posts for that will happen Monday-Tuesday (24-48 hours from this post); I'd still like to see if more of the people who'd signed up for the campaign show up, hence I want to allow all of this weekend for them to post in and show up as players, because once you guys board the ship, they've missed the boat (pardon the pun). We had 11-13 in chargen; We have (by my count) 6 now, with no explanation as to the other 5-7 as to what's going on, at least not from them. I'm not angry or anything (though I will confess that it's kind of annoying), but it does confuse me...And like when this happened with Blood in the Water, make me wonder why it's happening (with all the associated (admittedly narcissistic) worries that "It's me that's the problem, I suck" and stuff; not healthy, not rational, but I do it anyway, can't help it). I know chargen went extremely long, but some comment, even just a note dropping out, would have been nice if that was the intent, especially for those who still post otherwise on Dumpshock. For future reference: If you have to, or just want to, drop out, whenever that is, please give me some warning if possible. It's only polite. If you want and ask, I can write things for a temporary absence, or if you want I can just kill off the character. No hard feelings from my end, but (again) it's really about being polite and not leaving me wondering.

This happened to the last game I was in, about half the players just up and disappeared. Don't worry, though, I'll stick around. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

[Minchandre]

Also, Minchandre, I'm apologizing now as well for the attention that Cherry is going to get from Nik. The checking her out won't come up as much anymore, but the fact that he is biased against women, considering them to be the fairer or weaker sex, fortunately it's only a minor bias so it should only come up in his thoughts and a little bit in his actions. So please don't take it personally. Don't feel bad, I'm going to have to deal with someone else's prejudice too, cause there's someone with a bias against magic in our group.

I honestly don't mind; it's a game. I kinda invited it by making a female character in a mostly male group, and noting that she's pretty. I was actually kinda looking forward to having Cherry deal with the sexism of those of her peers who care - intergroup conflict is fun!

Also, Penta: I've noticed that almost all PBP games tend to undergo attrition in the early game. At least here it was during the first month of chargen rather than during the first month of gameplay, leaving holes in our crew.

[Penta]

My view on intragroup conflict OOCly: It's all yummy so long as it stays low-level. The training cruise is a great time to expose (and maybe work towards resolving, or not) such rifts. However, it better stay IC, and stay low-level. You guys can separate IC from OOC, I presume. The moment you can't is the moment I come down with hammers. So far as low-level, I'd really rather it not devolve into actual full combat.

The view of your trainers ICly: It's inevitable to a degree, but not to be encouraged. They'd work to resolve it, though I'm unsure how they could.

So far as attrition: Your point is well-taken, Minchandre, and I can see your POV. It's still annoying, though, especially given the lack of anything sent my way.

[Xahn Borealis]

Out of curiousity, what's his feelings towards adepts? I didn't note it on his bio, but Roger is probably only somewhat aware of his Awakened state. >.>

I'm not sure even he knows. As long as he's sure you can't have any magical effect on him, like a spell, he probably won't mind. Where is your bio? In the recruitment thread?

Also, what if someone PMed the missing members?

[Penta]

PMs would be welcome, but I already emailed a good number of em already. I'm not sure it'd help.

[Faraday]

I'm not sure even he knows. As long as he's sure you can't have any magical effect on him, like a spell, he probably won't mind. Where is your bio? In the recruitment thread?

Yeah, no clue where it is in there though. That thread is way long, I'll just put it here.

[ Spoiler ]

Born 24 April, 2048 to the Audrey family in a rich section of Albany, New York, Angus Audrey was already singled out for brilliance, being given an early genetic tweak for intellect. His childhood involved a fair amount of freedom, (relative) luxury, and the start of grooming for leadership. His father, Walter Audrey, the chairman and CEO of a Biotech company that had survived through the worst of the 21st century, also happened to be a Humanis member and chapter leader for upstate New York. Angus didn’t particularly agree with his father on human supremacy, but was smart enough not to make a fuss.

At 14, Angus began his college career, double majoring in Medicine and Computer Science. Due to his budding, but as-of-yet unnoticed magical ability, he was able to finish his bachelor’s in only 3 years even while dipping his toes into the hacking community, taking the handle of “Jolly Roger”. He proceeded to get his masters in a single year and his Doctorate of Medicine in 2.

During his time in college, he met a number of other colleagues who agreed with his distaste for Humanis. A number of them were also hackers, and so they would occasionally break into racist networks or deface their AR ads. During one run on a Humanis network, they hit a red site and got picked up by Black IC. His friends were able to get out in time, but he ended up getting locked down by psychotrophic IC and burned, he carries the mental scar to this day and would lock up if he got caught in similar circumstances.

After achieving MD and then some in less than a decade, his Father allowed him some freedom to “ease back into the real world” before taking him into the business. Angus already had offers from several corp recruiters and decided to pick up a clinical position with Docwagon. He worked with the outfit for a year (including training) and did well there. Every slotter that wound up on his table got off it alive.

Early 2072, he operated on a shadowrunner by the name of “Spanner”. Having some medical training herself, he knew he was real lucky to be alive, mostly thanks to the presiding surgeon. He gave Angus a commcode and a couple words. "Call this guy when you're in a bind. Tell him Spanner sent ya." The commcode was that of Kevin Roberts, although he didn’t have use of it until a few weeks later…

Not long after getting the commcode, Angus got an Order 1147, “Employment Terminated at-will, no reason given.” The order came a couple pay grades above him, and all contact within the company is cut off. Attempts at finding other (legitimate) employment turned out fruitless. It quickly became apparent that his father was behind this, wanting his son to “come back to roost”.

Angus won’t take this lying down. For the last few months, he’s been spoofing a lifestyle across the eastern seaboard from New York down to Miami, where the promise of employment beckons.

[Xahn Borealis]

How about everyone else? Chars and bios here?