Enthralling Performance works really well if you want to grab attention and keep it. Mostly here though you want to loose the attention and get kicked out of the room

Seth, any thoughts on the pattern rewriting thing? My last post I think...can't decide if Ryl would have been some sort of troubadour (artist way adept) or perhaps invisible path adept in this phase of her existence. Not really being able to remember the ED rules I can't remember how radical the pattern change is and how likely it is that our immortals would subject themselves to it time and time again...?!?

This event (WWII) is over a hundred years ago. I am happy for any number of minor changes in powers and attributes, and for your skills to be very different. I would like it that your character is recognisably the same (hard with Ryl for example as their is no equivalent to the matrix in this age). I suspect that Ryl changed quite significantly in the last 40 years (2030..2070), and its the biggest change you have experienced. So pick a path for history (I feel invisible path is the one that is most likely to have lead to Matrix stuff...but your choice).

@ Sephiroth

I think that if you can smooth talk us out of the room that would be the best option. There will be no magic to attract the spirit's attention or that of the Queen.

You can be the one to do the 'Message for you Sir' and suggest we leave. You could leave with us 'to check how the de-coding is going'

Alyena could try an increase charisma on you but it may attract the spirit and cause it to break out of the enthrall.

The spirit seems caught by Hitlers performance, and there is a huge background count. Its unlikely to notice anything

This looks all very "social" to me.

So the best I have to offer is that if we think the bomb is going to go off, you lot could shelter behind me... The Mighty Bjeorn might be able to survive it, and if he does he will get better very quickly.

I like the taste of chunky salsa... I would rather not try to be it. Let's get out. Go ahead with the talk thing. I suspect the crowd is primed to accept more potentially good news.

Status:

• Everyone is in with Hitler
• Hitler is teaching you the preliminaries for the great ghost dance
• You have the briefcase
• The bomb is about to go off
• Sephiroth is about to smooth talk you out of here

Taking slight liberties with the poison pen thing but hope you don't mind?!? Certainly don't intend to try it on Hitler, we want him irrevecably dead! Seems suitably 'invisible path' spy assassin kinda thing

I have to confess to having forgotten what we are trying to achieve in this thread...something to do with door 27a...? Any chance of a recap?

Thanks

A

np with the pen. Just out of interest who are you planning on using it on


@everyone
I will explode the bomb Friday evening!

OK. Post, or everybody dies!

On anyone who tries to stop us...it just came to me as something I could post about as I'm not sure she has a big influence on the current state of affairs

Etiquette roll:
Cha 7 + Etiquette 1 (+2 Military) + Subject Distracted 1? = 11d6 = 4 hits

I'll have this up tonight.

I'm very sorry for the delay, everyone. Things are getting pretty rough as finals approach.

Seth, I hope you don't mind me taking slight liberties with the layout of the bunker. That line is intended to help the rest of the group find Room 27A quickly, so that they can be a little more prepared when the explosion happens and can get out more swiftly because of it.

No problems, feel free to embellish.

Current situation:

• Alachia has arrived to have a talk with Hitler
• You are walking out of the room with Hitler.
• There is a bomb about to go off in the room you are leaving
• You have the briefcase.
• The corridor leading to room 27A is not far away.

You can walk yourselves out of the room now...and examine the briefcase. To aid you:

In the room outside is an efficient looking Fraulein with a typewriter and black ring dial telephone. She is currently using the telephone...but motions you to leave
You may be relieved to know that the bomb doesn't go off in the next minute
Inside the briefcase are partial instructions on how to perform the Great Ghost Dance (the start up is still on the desk)
There is also a wood carving which looks old...very old. The carving is off a demons face. The knots in the wood that are it's eyes seem to follow you. Astral senses will reveal that this is a Horror Construct

Very glad to be out of that room!

Will look at the Horror construct with one or two of my skills

Horror: http://invisiblecastle.com/roller/view/3024810/ 3 successes.
Magical Threat: http://invisiblecastle.com/roller/view/3024812/ 2 successes

Well we are back to "the present".

The flashback was an experiment, and I learned quite a lot about GMing PnP while doing it, so I hope that things go a lot smoother if we do another. I'm sorry it was a little slow: I was enjoying the pace of this thread at the beginning, then suddenly when we moved to doing the flashback it all went very slow. Part of that was my working crazy hours for a few weeks, and part of it was the slow nature of the flashback scenario, I wouldn't mind if we went back to the earlier pace.

The last "summary post" I did was (I think) http://forums.dumpshock.com/index.php?show...t&p=1059385. This is still relevant.

Ambrose reports that the door is now safe to open.

Should you go to that room, and defend it, you will fulfill the deal in your contract. There are two reasons why that is awkward:

• Angel is about to be taken to the central temple area, and your sure that's not going to end well
• The outer ward did not end when Warder was slain, although all the internal ones (apart from the temple) did. That outer ward is probably enough to keep the outside forces at bay

Mandala has initiated a plan to damage the ward, which might work, but those of you with engineering skills are aware that if there are three pumps in a safety critical system it is likely that the loss of one will not be catastrophic to that system.

All things considered, I don't think that first flashback went all that badly. It'd probably help if we get on to procuring new players before the next one, though. Blackhat might still want to play.

Two questions for you, Seth:
1. Will we be returning to WWII in the future? This is for purposes of whether to keep my re-skilled WWII version of Fearghas or trash it.
2. Have you decided what timeframe our next flashback will be from? I'd like to hopefully get the next historical version of Fearghas done and posted for reference by late next week.

Part of the slowness was due to following two threads for a while (not in itself a problem but...), perhaps if we pause the present and keep the next flashback in the same thread then it won't slow as much. With enough warning to plan out any character changes it will also be easier to know what we can do in that time...I know this is mostly my problem as half me skills mean squat more than ten years in the past

1: Not within this story...I would like to complete this story, and then perhaps run another. I thought I would cut my teeth on an easy flash back before going to Earthdawn
2: Earthdawn.


@Everyone
I would like to get a vote: do you want to use shadowrun rules, or Earthdawn rules for the flashback. I am happy if you want to make 5th circle adventurers in Earthdawn, or play your current characters roughly as is with modifications taking into account no cyberware... I won't be kicking off the next flashback for 4 weeks or so, so you have plenty of time. Once you have roughly done your characters (either as is, as Earthdawn) I will issue you all with equipment. (If you want something special ask for it...but I will be quite generous with the equipment). If you are unhappy making characters but would like to try it, I am happy to make a skeleton for you.

The time line will be towards the end of the time of magic. There needs to be a ritual of Hiding, and the great ones (Alachia, Harliquin, Ehran, some dragons...) are coming together with support from lesser adepts such as yourself to perform this ritual. This will hide elven / orc / etc features and allow you all to blend in as humans.

I'm happy either way. Marduk is a Wizard So I'm happy to make a 5th Circle Wizard. Or I'm happy to play our characters in SHadowrun, just tweaked. Amusingly enough Marduk will be WAY more powerful in some ways as an Earthdawn Wizard.. just because he'll have more spells.

I should learn Earthdawn rules anyway, so I'm fine with doing that. Looking through the player's compendium, it looks like Fearghas would follow both the swordmaster and wizard disciplines. Would both of those be at 5th circle, then?

multi-disciplining is icky

Por que? I am an ED mechanics noob, but it seems like we're getting a large enough amount of legend points by being 5th circle that I'd be able to spread them reasonably between the two.

It's doable.. It's just. Discipline is a way of life, a point of view. Blending 2 dissciplines together, especially as different as swordmaster and wizard is very mind-twistingly hard. And, it just doesn't work well mechanically.

Yeah, I saw that mentioned in the player's compendium preview I'm using. Coming up with a viewpoint that works with both spellcasting and swordfighting won't be easy, but I think I'll be able to do it.

What exactly about multi-disciplining doesn't work well mechanically?

EDIT: Also, where would I find mechanics on how to build a Lightbearer PC?

I have five jobs, a doctoral dissertation and several SR games on the go. I'd rather not learn a new game system if I don't have to.

We would start with the bit of the minimum legend points needed to be 5th circle (which is hard to calculate). I will do some sums and get back tonight with two totals: points to spend on skills etc, and some spare ones to spend on things like group bonds, items,...

Persoanally I think you will be better off as a single discipline (and in most games I am a fan of multi-classes), but its your choice

Normally when playing we use house rules (based on fudge), so I haven't made characters for a while. Doesn't anyone know an equivalent of invisible castle for Earthdawn?

I might have run into one in my earthdawn scrounging of the internets today, but I can't remember any off the top of my head.

Do any of you Earthdawn players happen to have a copy of the Cathay book released in 2008? I've seen some talk that it has a new Sorcerer discipline, comprised of either dragon-born (this seems incredibly appropriate) or spirit-born adepts. It'd be rather ideal if I could find a copy of the sorcerer rules somewhere, since I don't really have any money to be spending on earthdawn books right now.

Also, since my player's guide online preview is missing all the pages after the troubadour discipline page, if someone could PM me the rules for skills, talents, knacks, and possibly a list of the spells, I'd be very grateful.

Sorry my source backs are from many years ago (Virgin mega store were stopping stocking RPG, and I managed to buy 200 books for 50p each) I don't have any recent stuff.

I'm with pbangarth, I don't think I really want to refresh my very limited knowledge of ED rules...as I recall they were complicated with lots of abilities to remember

I've used SR rules for an ED game before and it worked well as long as massed melee combat was avoided (SR being a bit slower for hand to hand in my experience, although I guess with pbp it wouldn't matter...)!

@About next flashback
OK Speaking with Alyena and Bjeorn they are happy with Shadowrun rules...so I guess that makes it a strong vote for Shadowrun rules. Phew

So this far ago, you can have the characters roughly as they are now. Modern skills can be redone as desired. Aria you can do what you want with Ryl, have fun and make a character you are happy with.

@About now:
Current threats:

• the drones are moving in the store room
• The nasty Major will be coming in a couple of combat rounds...he has nearly finished drilling his troops
• The nasty Major will be coming in a couple of combat rounds...he has nearly finished drilling his troops
• "THEY ARE COMING..." for Angel
• The cadaver men are coming

Someone needs to go into the room 27a...Can you do an IC post if you are going. Otherwise I will let Ambrose the NPC go in on his own...thats going to go well

@Aria
Can you make roll me 10 observation rolls for matrix stuff (1 link to invisible castle is enough). Computer + Analyse + Hot Sim mod if you are doing it + anything else relevant

Seth,

Marduk is in the storage Room. How hard would it be for him to go from there to the room 27a Door?
Also, I'm pretty sure I did an assensing on the skull, right before we went back to nazi land, that I don't remember getting information on?

The storage room is a few second (1 combat round) from the basement door. Of course you will have to move into the field of fire of the swarm of drones that are heading towards the door

The skull: IIRC you just had a little look at it, and determined it was interesting, but you spent most of your time sorting out the magical tac net.

The skill looks like this

If you want to spend combat actions assensing it, and using arcana, or any other relevant skill just roll them, and tell me.

9 hits seems like a bit more than just a little look, methinks.

Thanks for pointing that out...I missed it . I'll tell Sabs by PM

Marduk know how solve bigum puzzle


Sadly he's pretty worthless in a firefight.

Well I hope the information on the skull helps

It does.. It makes me think I should be the one going into room 27a
Though we need some serious out of the box thinking to deal with all these incoming threats.

Audacity FTW. Fearghas draws inspiration from that loon Harlequin. Audacity is his friend.


Seth, I added the beginnings of ED Fearghas to my posted sheet, including some ideas for Lightbearer abilities that I found elsewhere. What do you think? Does it look doable, or do you want me to shy away from it for ED flashbacks?

@Sephiroth
I quite like the idea of lightbringer, but I will have to think about it (i.e. go back read books etc). Your interpretation is a nice beginning, I'll get back to you by the start of next week.
Are you planning on those being metamagics in 2070, or just back in Earthdawn?

Dealing with the incoming threats:

Why don't I smash a hole through the roof, so that some of us can go and rescure Angel, and sort the other blood pumps. I'll stay with one or two others in room 27a, with the door closed.

I need to rewrite marduk a bit. Sigh
And of course, I need to figure out how to make him even MORE wizard, for earthdawn.

Well, I didn't have the resources to start the game in 2070 with them, so he would probably remember just a few of them, if he remembers any of the techniques at all. In ED though, I imagine he' still be at the top of his game as a Lightbringer. Relatively speaking, of course. I don't think you'd let Fearghas be a 15th Circle Lightbringer in ED OR SR, since he'd have Astral Shift at that level, even though having Astral Shift* would be AMAZING!


@Big Fella- I like that plan.



*shameless plug

Seth, the Sensing Metamagic makes no sense for my character. Given how much assenssing and arcana he's got. Can I drop it for a point of Adept Powers instead? and buy.. more of those

I like Big Fella's plan too. If we time it right we can be coming up into the security room not long after the major leaves it!
Hopefully the drones will slow him and the cadaver men down a bit.

I also have a plan for the blood powering the big ward.
I'm thinking of summoning a task spirit that knows chemistry. Using its knowledge I can (hopefully) combine cleaning products/solvents to produce preferably oxygen or at least some other gas. This could then have 2 outcomes:

1: blood clots in the presence of free oxygen
2: gas may well produce air locks in the pipes

Both will stop the flow of blood.

I do know Chemistry so if you tell me what's in the room , I can walk you through how to set it up. Assuming of course, I don't explode once inside room 27a

I'm not sure how, but we have an out-of-synch timeline. Some are at a minute after midnight, others at 43 seconds.

I will be out of touch for the weekend (holiday weekend here in Canada... going to the cottage... will be up to my elbows in cold water and mud getting the well and pump functional), so I am sorry if Mandala is less present than he should be. Here are some ideas for him if you want to cover off while I am out of touch, Seth:

1) With Immunity to Normal Weapons of 18 down here in the basement (though not much REA -- 4), Mandala is probably a good team member to occupy the drones if they are not under our control. Psychokinesis (16 dice) should give him enough strength and agility to screw with them at a distance, maybe just turn them upside down and thereby make them immobile.

2) If someone could charge Mandala up with an attack spell that he can Absorb, he can be ready to do one whopper of a stunball on a crowd coming down the stairs. His WIL 7+ Counterspelling 5+ Shielding 4 gives 16 dice which should Counterspell/Absorb 5 Force points of a spell, so a spell cast a Force 5 should be safe. Those 5 points can reduce Drain by 5 DV. So a Force 9 stunball would give a Drain of 5 DV which would be completely negated. Hmmm... OK, if he's charged up, make that a Force 18 stunball, with Drain of 10 DV, reduced to 5, which he should be able to handle with Drain stats of 15 total, plus Centering of 4 more dice for a pool of 19. His spellcasting would have a pool of 12 dice.

3) Mandala has 1 Edge left, I think. If that is so, he will save that point almost without fail for resisting an attempt to Banish him. That would give him 18 dice, with exploding 6s, which along with the services owed to Alachia ... that bitch of an immortal elf ... should keep him from being Banished and give the Banisher a decent headache at double the hits in Drain DV. (roughly 20 DV!)

Thanks for pointing out the time thing Manadala.

SUmmarising the current summary...It is the start of rounds 17&18, The time is 00:01:03

I think I am the guilty party here...my last post was cut and pasted and said 00:00:43. Sabs you copied my time in your last post, could you edit it to 00:01:03?

Thanks

@ Sabs...some confusion about names here? I know I regularly take Aria as a contact...weird alterego thing going on but...



I'm currently playing Ryl! and if you mean the drones, they are in the control of a friendly (double) agent of sorts I think...I'm a little confused as to who Gremlin is but he seems to be on our side