Black and Orange is most likely a bad idea, unless you Want to fight the Halloweenies, er weeners.

I'd suggest Black and Red, some raven species have red feathers on their wings or tails. I like the simple head design for a tag, maybe black head with red eyes, of course just the word ravens works too, though many won't be able to read it according ot the rules, but most gangers would get the idea.

I kind of like the pheonix bird design as an idea for a gang tattoo. (October Pheonix? Rising from the ashes? Too late...)

I was kinda of figuring on October Ravens written on a pair of black wings, but really I was thinking more of what Baby would tag and not so much logo. I would guess that as long as we stay consistent with a Raven theme and whatever color scheme we come up with, we are good. No reason to have an "official" logo as long as we are close. I would think the colors are the most important.

Is anyone waiting on me for anything?

Not me, I'm just waiting for time to pass IC. A LOT of time.

Well, this is only a guess as to why others aren't posting much, but it is definitely why I'm not posting a lot more:

I think we all understand that we have to be largely self-directed in this game, and I reckon we are totally cool with that.

On the other hand, however, the campaign rules in the wiki are clear that (and I think this is a basic rule for forum games) anything non-fluff we are only to post the initiation of the action, and wait to continue until we get a resolution from you.

Well, seems to me that the bulk of us are currently on what pretty much amounts to a combat patrol through hostile territory. You even specified that our fates largely depended on exactly what streets we dared tread upon.

So Legion gave an order pointing us back north to the HQ, and I posted that Grack follows the group. I am not really sure any of us feel clear to post until we find out if we make it back home safely.

Gimme a green light and I got lists o' fun stuff for Our Hero to get up to!

That about covers me. We're headed back to the new house, and hoping to sweep up a couple more members on the way. If Eyeless would ping me, we'd get him in.

You raise a valid point, except for one small detail: No one is in Hostile Territory.

The most recent IC posts have the following information:

Bearclaw and Thumper have this as their location: 00:45:10, Sunday, November 2nd - Skirting the North Border of the Black Plague's turf along NE 140th St, slightly East of the intersection of NE 140th St. & 124th Ave NE

Meriss and Grendel have this as their location: 00:45:55, Sunday, November 2nd - Just south of Kirkland City Park, between 128th Ave NE and NE 142nd Ln

Reading the RL chronological progression of the posts, the implication to me is that you guys started skirting the Black Plague’s turf, then started walking back. You never actually left the old Hammerpack turf, and no one at any point in time indicated a serious (or even a tentative) foray into actual Black Plague turf proper.

The only possible exception to this is Grack, in which case he’d be maybe one block into Black Plague turf, and I already specified the north part of their turf is oddly quiet, and you guys didn’t really detect any hostiles in the area. At least, that’s what your Detect Enemies spell said. :

The general gameplan in the OOC thread was to sit back and watch the Night Hunters and Black Plague rumble, then swoop in to take out the survivors. Since that didn’t happen, the group never made a move. It has since been decided to head back to the new Gang HQ.

So from where I was sitting, you guys were parked on the Hammerpack/October Ravens side of the border, watched for a bit, chatted and discussed some plans and potential new members, then started to turn around and head home.

As far as I’m concerned, everyone is completely clear to post, since no one has gone anywhere/done anything that might require my intervention.

That was my interpretation of the situation, if anyone has a different one please feel free to let me know. Unless I’m mistaken and someone points it out, the above explanation is the situation as it stands, which means everyone is free to post normally.

Let me know if anyone has any questions, comments, or needs something from me. Hope that clears up the confusion and helps get things moving again!

Excellent - I am totally happy to stand corrected!

Green-lit for a safe return to base, you will see a big IC from me within 24!

currently waiting on ink to get back to me so i can mobilize. Not sure if i can just include that in my post or not.

Spark – Go ahead and just include it in your post. You’ve waited long enough (thank you again for your patience) and I want to keep you involved and moving.

Meriss has been notified multiple times that you’re waiting on him, and his last IC post still failed to adequately take that into account. So I’m invoking GM fiat and ruling Ink does contact you back, and you are free to include it in your next IC post.

All - Has anyone heard anything from Neuntoter, Eyeless Blond, or Whipstitch? I haven’t seen any of them do anything lately in DITG.

Well, safely back at the ranch!

Hmmm - wonder what the statute of limitations is on critical glitches....

I can help you with that.

For those particular critical glitches, there is no statute of limitations, largely because Grack isn't experienced enough to know A) that he critical glitched and B) what he should/should not have expected from his magic in the first place. Consequently, I'll just hold on to those until a suitably entertaining moment.

Life's tough down here, after all.

@Winter&Spark: Mea culpa. I was going to post IC yesterday and things just kinda slid away from me.

Zoinks! A harsh sentence indeed!

I was prepared to take my licks, but yeeesh, to have those things hanging over my head indefinitely, when all I had to gain from casting the dice was a temporally localized benefit - kinda seems like the potential penalty becomes, literally, infinitely worse than the potential gain from any die roll.

Could I humbly and cravenly dicker you down to ONE eternal critical glitch to worry about???

Wait, you had TWO critical glitch rolls? I thought you only had one in the first place.

Well then, my day just got a whole lot better…

Adamu -

Winter - as always, I kneel in submission to your awesome benevolence!

DitG

Just wanted to say it has been a lot of fun reading your posts. It is nice to catch a break in the action with Baby down for a spell and just enjoy watching things unfold. Good job everyone!

Slip

Rico's probably going to get his ass kicked. He's a lot more dangerous with his claws than with his fist. But WTF, there hasn't been any combat yet

I've got one more IC put up. Thumper, perhaps surprisingly, isn't hell bent on fighting. Also, I imagine grendel will want to weigh in before the characters start throwing down. Legion has had a while to shout over us if he wanted.

Any rate, Thumper is counting two seconds in his head then he's going to rush Rico if Rico doesn't show signs of backing down. You could definitely get the jump on Thumper if you attacked him while he was talking, I'm prepared to edit my post for that eventuality ... also to roll for surprise.

Don't know if WR wants to weigh in or not, I figure we can start throwing dice at eachother tomorrow if he doesn't. I think it will be a lot of fun, thanks for playing along, Bearclaw. May the best ork win ...

sry ive been gone for a bit, works been kicking my ass lately (i work at starbucks and its the frappucino madness season + were opening a new store across the road). Ill get a post up soon.

WR 1 is now weighing in.

For time's sake, and to keep the story moving along, I prefer pragma and Bearclaw resolve the fight purely through role-playing, a la Doc and Grack's fight earlier. Discuss the details in the OOC thread or via PM and then go ahead and IC post as appropriate.

If you can't agree on how the fight should play out (e.g. Pragma thinks Thumper should beat the living crap out of Rico and Bearclaw disagrees), then by all means throw down with the dice. Remember, no killing. Beyond that, you have a reasonable amount of leeway. If it doubt, ask me first, and then there will be no problems.

For example, if Rico is getting the worst of it and decides to pop the claws, I don't care if he hits and does physical damage, nor do I care if Thumper pulls out the rebar and smashes him over the head, also doing physical damage. After all, hurting each other with Physical damage really only hurts yourselves and the gang, and ultimately since your characters are still alive no one's feelings should be hurt. But be sure to not kill one another, or else there's going to be problems. Remember, you can choose to withhold successes and I expect you to do so to avoid killing each other. If you aren't sure how many successes you need to withhold (if you got a great roll or your opponent is already badly hurt), just make a note of it and I will assist you.

Let me know if you have any questions, otherwise I'm looking forward to watching this fight play out.

Rico doesn't really want to fight. That's not what he's good at. But he figures this guy is going to keep riding him til it happens anyway, so may as well get it over with. Gang life and prison life work the same way in a lot of cases. Even getting your ass kicked will get you respect. Especially when there are two obvious tough guys in the gang, and Rico is willing to tangle with one of them (and no one wants anything to do with the top dog).
It works for Thumper too, becuase Rico is pretty big and scary looking. Taking Rico down will solidify his position.

Rico's giving up a lot. Thumper has a small edge in speed and a big one in skill (those two +1's become huge when everyone's skill is so low), as well as a whole extra inintiative pass.
Rico's got a bigger body. And Rico won't use his claws unless he thinks he's in real danger. He's taken an ass kicking before.
I figure Rico gets a couple of shots in before Thumper gets ahold of him, then it's a couple more rounds of Rico trying to get loose before Thumper gets an arm bar or a choke hold and Rico quits. If Rico tries to quit and Thumper doesn't let him, Rico will pop his spurs and it's a whole different fight.

I'll leave it to Pragma's or Winter Rat's better writing skills to detail the actual fight if everyone agree's with the basic flow of the fight. Rico doesn't get completely humiliated, but has to quit or get killed at the end.

My opinion on how the fight plays out is basically irrelevant, it's whatever you two (Pragma and Bearclaw) agree on that goes. I laid down the one line that cannot be crossed: No one gets killed. Beyond that, what the ending is like and how it gets there is for you two to hammer out, with the dice deciding for you if you two can't agree.

As for the IC posts, don't worry about writing skills, just go ahead and post back and forth with one another until the situation is resolved. Most of the fun of PBP is reading different peoples' writing styles and perceptions of the same situation, after all.

@Bearclaw
I'm agree with your assessment of the situation and I'm fine with your criterion on the IC. I figure we can collaborate to get a good fight that we agree on, I'll send you a PM about it probably tomorrow morning.

Whew, finally got a chance to post. Work has been a royal pain. On Monday literally. Caught a break today, so here we are. Rumble on!

OK, I think we're good.
Pragma did most of the work, I just added a couple bits. Please don't let us hold you guys up anymore.

Dude, you were not holding us up, you were doing cool stuff - doing what we are here to do.

I personally thought it was one of the better scenes so far in the entire game.

And if I can just throw my humble opinion in - the beauty of forum gaming is that no matter how much you post, it really does not stop other people from posting all they want as well.

Rock on, dude.

I will be making a catch up IC post for Twiggs. I have been a little busy the past couple of weeks, i've been moving, just bought a house and it's a pain taking care of all the little stuff. Glad to see the story moving along though.

Hey Adamu, Rico's an Orc also

Oh yeah - I know that. Sorry if my post came across wrong - Grack's twisted musings are often misinterpreted!

When he is thankful that one of the newcomers is not weak, he is talking about you, as Thumper is no newcomer, and already has Grack's respect.

So when I say that the one non-weakling is an ork, I meant you as opposed to all the other new members.

I actually understood what you meant, I must be sick.

I could be posting every day and keep this story moving, but I keep waiting for the guys who've been put in leadership positions to lead.

Dude - if you wait long enough, I am sure they will post, but what's the fun in that? Anyway, you can keep totally busy yourself without imposing on anyone else or appearing to usurp any sort of leadership.

Personally, I say if you've got the time and inclination - POST.

Goodness knows I do.

I guess that means me.

Anyway, I'm on vacation from 09 Jun 08 to 13 Jun 08, so the earliest you'll see another post from me is probably 14 Jun.

Thanks Grendle.
Rico just got in a fight for having initiative. He needed a word from Legion or Thumper to solidify his place. He'll patrol, he'll start cleaning up the shop, and tomorrow, with or without help, he's gonna either start dealing chips or head downtown and steal a bike or car to chop. If he had more money, he'd be a much more dangerous soldier, as would a lot of other guys in this gang.

Bearclaw -

Couple things:

1. Please remember to format your posts appropriately, it's a big help for reading through them. Bold for proper nouns, Italics for inner monologue or emphasis, and yellow for electronic communication.

2. If you rode into the heart of Raider Nation, even without colors, that's going to take a dumb luck roll to see you through it safely. It's not that easy to waltz around Kingsgate going where you want to go, even without flashing colors.

Pick 4 numbers between 1 and 10, these are BAD numbers you don't want me to roll.

All - Please remember to use proper time/date stamps, which include the year. Current slow pace of the game notwithstanding, I do hope (emphasis on hope) to make it to the next calendar year at some point, in which case it's nice to have the correct year labeled. Remember, the time should also be in the HH:MM:SS format, not just HH:MM, because Shadowrun is a game in which seconds matter very much, so please be sure to include them.

I know people are just copying and pasting previous time/date stamps when making their own posts, but this just contributes to a string of incorrect time/date stamps, so please make it a point to make sure yours are correct. Thanks.

One other "minor" request for timestamping... Can players be sure to have their timestamps indicate the END time of their post, not the beginning? I believe this was the agreed upon (I believe across the board) way of keeping track of time/timing so we don't have to "guess" how long it takes a player to complete the actions on top of estimating how long it takes ourselves to do it too?

Also, is everyone basically bedding down for the night/keeping overwatch till morning? Just curious if some kind of "time jump" may be possible since a number of players are either healing, passed out, eating/sleeping etc. etc. till morning. Plus with Grendel on vacation for nearly a week it would slow down any additional "orders" coming from him overnight.

Not sure if WR1 has anything planned or if others have plans for the overnight hours (which is why I'm asking instead of putting up a time-jumping post of my own)... just wondering if getting the ENTIRE group back together in a reasonable fashion might restart the posting rate on here. Not that I have any vested interest in seeing time jump forward a number of hours.. no, not at all

Twiggs is definitely out for the night, I agree, we seem to be in a good place to have everyone sleep till morning-ish Hopefully with orders given, and ready to carry out, we can move posting along, Twiggs has yet to meet Vada' or Baby, ICly, which could be quite interesting.

Bockscar's been keeping watch, and idly scanning all the radio traffic he can in order to find something to shoot.

Rob, on the other hand, is beginning to move back home, and so will (yet again) be unlikely to have reliable internet, electricity, or showers for the next couple weeks. I will let you know when I can post again, but don't expect much till July.

Peace!

Good luck with the move Rob! Thanks for the heads up.

Rico is going to sleep as soon as he's done with his patrol.

WinterRat, Rico's numbers are 1,2,3,4.

Bearclaw - You're good, nothing happens during your trip, so your IC post stands as originally written.

All - I haven't heard any objections to a time bump, and for a number of reasons I think it makes sense. I'll figure out how far to bump things forward and then put up a post to advance the time.

Grack started lurking in the corner in Astral Perception at around midnight, and unless something happens or someone manages to communicate Legion's recent orders to him, he will just keep racking up Assensing training hours until he maxes out at 4 am.

If the bump is longer than that, he will have checked out the park a bit from 4 until daybreak, at which point he will retreat into the sewers, away from the thrice-accursed sun.

I will be happy to IC any and all of that once I know the extent of the bump.

Thumper's planning to play around with the pistol (I really hope it's smart) for five hours, then sleep until the end of the bump.

No objection from my corner. Ink will prolly do a line or two so I can shove my Addiction roll away for a few IC days. Then depending on how stoned he gets haul out his knife and get a couple of hour MA training in, pass out and sleep till whenever various people start yelling at him.

Or vice versa if anyone objects to me training while stoned.

Acctually, good question for you Winter, considering the heavy level of mind altering substances in the Gate, does training time spent stoned count towards advancement?

Aziz is just going to bed down for the night until its time to roll out the hookers, maybe pass the time with some sword exercises, shooting the shit, or what have you.

Back online.

Hey Everyone -

OK, rather than me continuing to rack my brain trying to come up with a good 'bump' post that will essentially say very little, here's what we are going to do.

Everyone is cleared to post as of 14:00:00, Sunday, November 2, 2070.

During this 'downtime', you each have 12 hours of time to rest and/or train, in whatever combination you wish.

If you choose to use any part of the 12 hours to train, you MUST post IC depicting your training time. If you do not, you will not get credit for it. It doesn't have to be a super long post, but it should be a reasonable 'training montage' that at least shows some effort on your PC's part to improve themselves. You should also track your training time on the appropriate section of your character's wiki as well. Note that your training post should be part of your post that shows what you are up to as of 14:00:00, not a separate post. In other words, if you choose to train, it should look like this:

Example
02:00:00 - 06:00:00, Sunday, November 2, 2070 October Ravens HQ
Shade

<Insert Training Post Here>

14:00:00 Sunday, November 2, 2070 October Ravens HQ
Shade

<Insert Post Picking up as of 14:00:00 here>

If you are resting and have any wounds to heal, make the appropriate notes on your character's healing tracker as well.

In either situation, leave a note for me in the OOC thread as well.

To answer an earlier question, yes training time does still count if your character is drunk/high/somewhat less than fully functioning. However, be aware this may lead to some not so good consequences (e.g. Training in Demolitions while drunk most likely will not end well for you). I figure there's enough restrictions on you guys already, and if you are role-playing your character's substance addictions/abuse appropriately, I'm not going to discourage that by penalizing you for training during that time.

If anyone has any other questions please ask, otherwise everyone is free to go ahead and starting posting from 14:00:00.

Mister Juan - The whole point of this bump is to try and sync everyone up, so you are included in this bump as well, because I'm not going to hang back to GM for Felix 14 hours earlier than where everyone else is at. Assume Felix escapes from the ghoul for whatever reason...for now. You may resume posting at 14:00:00 along with everyone else back at Gang HQ if you wish (assuming Felix headed back to the new October Ravens HQ) or somewhere else of your choice.

WR1
Thats all good with me! I somehow have my own doubts that Felix will run into his share of ghouls in the times to come
Anyways, since he was mainly going back to the old Crash turf to pick up his personal stuff, and his bike, should I assumed that he did that?
If you'd rather he didn't make it to the Crash turf, there are 100 ways we could expect the 14 hours laps.
He could have been hiding from the ghouls, could have hidden out and fallen asleep, passed out from casting a spell, etc...