Sagiro's Story Hour: The FINAL Adventures of Abernathy's Company (FINISHED 7/3/14)

[Kaodi]

I'm still trying to figure out how to use this to my advantage. Steal a ton of money and have no one remember who I am? Nope... I'd just get blamed as "that guy who's the real thief's lackey."

Might be low impact, but erhaps you could try trivia and gambling. Bet folks that they cannot quess which member of the team accomplished certain deeds with Dranko did. Since no one remembers who Dranko is, there should be no way for them to guess correctly. You could ever add lie detection magic to the trick to make it look legit. Unless maybe that sort of thing has already been ruled out by Sagiro...

Were Dranko not the monogamous sort of half-orc, he might have been able to one-up Kay's (?) amorous father with this ability to not be remembered. Except... errr... I guess that could get "messy" because none of the children would know who their father was, which would be bad if they ever met...

If Dranko was really good at art, he could do paintings and sculptures and perhaps build up a mystery around the artist who nobody knew about and inflate the price of his works. Which, of course, he could always miraculously "find" more of.

Actually, that might not be a bad line of thought in general: Exploit the allure of an unassailable mystery to your advantage.

 

[Innocent Bystander]

My question would be does the magic pertain only to past events or would it effect future events as well. Think of all the crimes Dranko could commit and not worry about getting caught because if he did, his captors/accusers wouldn't be able to truly remember it was him at the trial.

 

[Kaodi]

I do not think it would prevent him from being caught, or even a trial or anything of that sort. It just prevents people from thinking he is particularly notable; they dismiss and forget him. Perhaps one way it would help is that it might protect him from being recognized as a serial thief. Since no one has ever heard of "Dranko Blackhope" his lawyers could perhaps successfully plead every case as if it were his first crime.

 

[thatdarncat]

Perhaps one way it would help is that it might protect him from being recognized as a serial thief.

I'm pretty sure the wording was pretty specific, about his fame being what was lost? If so, would infamy be different? Dranko gave up being a famous, respected hero.

 

[Kaodi]

I'm pretty sure the wording was pretty specific, about his fame being what was lost? If so, would infamy be different? Dranko gave up being a famous, respected hero.

I guess we will have to ask if anyone has ever heard of Dranko Blackhope, Licker of Everything. That can only be the sort of thing one is infamous for, hehehe...

 

[Everett]

Two things:

1) Why didn't Aravis, Kibi and Dranko all cast Time Stop together to enter the castle? Kibi thought he'd maybe just lie down and nap while the others went on in?

2) Darkeye's desire to talk, like other honorable villains the company has encountered, was apparently sincere. Why didn't they listen? An encounter with a mysterious, supremely powerful adversary claiming good intentions is not particularly inspiring when the good guys all act like mistrustful 8-year olds. Dranko's allowed to act that way: everyone else should have a little more sense.

 

[jmucchiello]

My question would be does the magic pertain only to past events or would it effect future events as well. Think of all the crimes Dranko could commit and not worry about getting caught because if he did, his captors/accusers wouldn't be able to truly remember it was him at the trial.

Yeah, but if he ever gets caught and thrown in jail, he's never getting parole.

A: "Should we release Dranko Blackhope?"
B: "Who?"
A: "I don't know. It's a name on the list."
C: "I don't remember any prisoner with that name. What did he do?"
B: <shrugs>
A: "Don't know."
B: "Must be a paperwork error. Let's move on."

 

[StevenAC]

I've now updated the Collected Story Hour with another chapter (28), which takes the story up to the Company's discovery of the Sharshun castle.

I can't wait to find out what's going on with Darkeye and her unexpected reasonableness... In the meantime, a merry Christmas to Sagiro and all the members of the Company, and best wishes for a happy (and hopefully Story Hour-filled ) 2013!

 

[Piratecat]

Yeah, for Dranko's bargain it's the spirit of the thing, not the letter. (This is true both in character and out of it. Sagiro is one of my best friends and I trust him, and his judgment, completely. Dranko traded fame for something horrible that sits encased in his mind. What is it? He has no idea, and any time he pokes at it it drives him insane. That's a trade-off for some power, and I think it'd be a pretty poor bargain on behalf of the unmentionable abominations if Dranko's gift actually benefited him.

I suspect that every time he wishes he was famous and remembered, that hollow frustration tastes so sweet to the entities who inhabit him.

Two things:

1) Why didn't Aravis, Kibi and Dranko all cast Time Stop together to enter the castle? Kibi thought he'd maybe just lie down and nap while the others went on in?

2) Darkeye's desire to talk, like other honorable villains the company has encountered, was apparently sincere. Why didn't they listen? An encounter with a mysterious, supremely powerful adversary claiming good intentions is not particularly inspiring when the good guys all act like mistrustful 8-year olds. Dranko's allowed to act that way: everyone else should have a little more sense.

I forget. I think it's that even simultaneously time stopped people aren't actually simultaneously time stopped. There may also have been the question of whether one person could bring in everyone else (the answer of which was no.)

As for talking to Darkeye? Screw that. No good could come of it. It didn't matter what she wanted, or whether we were technically allied on a minor point. What we need to do is fundamentally opposed to the reason for her existence. And she set the sharshun on us. And set Sagiro, AND the Karch-Din on us. And we killed her dad. And she had an eye of Moirel possessing her, and she was carrying a shard of the blade that actually hurt the Adversary. And we felt the time pressure; Seven Dark Words and the other red-armored warriors were far too far ahead of us. Nope, some times you just need to kick someone's butt.

But hey, we spared (and saved) her life. That's something.

This was a fight that was very different from what I had expected. I anticipated negotiation, politics, infiltration, lackeys. The truth was so much simpler than that.

 

[LightPhoenix]

So despite my teasing of Piratecat, I think people do know and remember Dranko, it's just that he'll never be famous. The way that I've pictured it is that Dranko has been hit with the same effect that kept the Sharshun a secret. Dranko still exists as an entity that can be interacted with, but he's basically been removed from the history books. This also means that if someone really wanted to know, they would discover Dranko was a Hero of Charagan. However, for all intents and purposes people don't/won't know Dranko's part of the story.