Andrew Moreton
Adventurer
The Summary for today is that the Nock Gun can be impressively deadly when a goblin in a steam suit uses it , Saxby , the Elder thing and an random Ob assassin all felt the hail of lead
ZEITGEIST The affirmative action racial recruitment team of the RHC
- Thread starter Andrew Moreton
- Start date
Andrew Moreton
Adventurer
Some people apply a lot of data analysis to Ob Rings. I got this as part of a discussion between players via email. The pictures are missing...
The question being: why have a third word at all, when you could just as easily have a phrase of two words with only OB? And four words, well you’d probably begin to run out of space on the inside of a ring…
Or if some had two words, some had three and some more, well, we haven’t seen that either…
An OB ring could have some way of showing rings (without fear of eavesdroppers) that displays enough info for two people who have never met, to know:
- who they work for (ring, first 2 words if checking)
- which subset they work for (colour)
- rank (third word), so a boss of one colour could still order a longer word-three of a different colour about if temporarily necessary
- plus you could promote people if they have conspired for long enough and get a new phrase (ok that one is pure speculation)
I do maths, I spot patterns quite well (and agreed, sometimes where there are none), but this has a significance to it that is well above background ….
Having come across several logic puzzles where you sub in the length of the word before, that’s what led me to it when I noticed the bosses third words were BOTH shorter than their respective employees, to the Same Amount. (by stacking the boss on top)
…that’s only a 25% chance of happening randomly with Any random Word (subbing in L and S for an unknown Long or Short word: LL/SS, LS/LS, SL/SL, SS/LL ), and lower % as we only have words of length 4 and 5 in word-slot three, but that chance of it being random could get a lot lower the next time we spot a ring… added to this is the first two words of each inscription have a wider range of letters:
MacB “8,5,4.”
Saxby.. “11,6,5.”
Bergeron.. “3,8,4”
Finona. . “8,5,5.”
as far as we know, Finona didn’t work for MacB at all (or Saxby for Berg: note ring colour): yes one 8,5 could be coincidence, but the 4,5 / 4,5 is less statistically likely to be random due to the narrower range…
Eg: Consider the magic square below. Note that its rows, columns and diagonals each add up to the magic constant 45. What else about it is interesting?
When each number in the original square is replaced by the number of letters in its name - known as its logorhythm - we get a new square. There are four letters in "five", nine letters in "twenty-two", eight letters in "eighteen" and so on.
Amazingly, this too is magic, with magic constant 21. Even better, its entries are consecutive numbers. Subtracting 2 all around yields the classic lu shi magic square, with constant 15, known to the ancient Chinese
The question being: why have a third word at all, when you could just as easily have a phrase of two words with only OB? And four words, well you’d probably begin to run out of space on the inside of a ring…
Or if some had two words, some had three and some more, well, we haven’t seen that either…
An OB ring could have some way of showing rings (without fear of eavesdroppers) that displays enough info for two people who have never met, to know:
- who they work for (ring, first 2 words if checking)
- which subset they work for (colour)
- rank (third word), so a boss of one colour could still order a longer word-three of a different colour about if temporarily necessary
- plus you could promote people if they have conspired for long enough and get a new phrase (ok that one is pure speculation)
I do maths, I spot patterns quite well (and agreed, sometimes where there are none), but this has a significance to it that is well above background ….
Having come across several logic puzzles where you sub in the length of the word before, that’s what led me to it when I noticed the bosses third words were BOTH shorter than their respective employees, to the Same Amount. (by stacking the boss on top)
…that’s only a 25% chance of happening randomly with Any random Word (subbing in L and S for an unknown Long or Short word: LL/SS, LS/LS, SL/SL, SS/LL ), and lower % as we only have words of length 4 and 5 in word-slot three, but that chance of it being random could get a lot lower the next time we spot a ring… added to this is the first two words of each inscription have a wider range of letters:
MacB “8,5,4.”
Saxby.. “11,6,5.”
Bergeron.. “3,8,4”
Finona. . “8,5,5.”
as far as we know, Finona didn’t work for MacB at all (or Saxby for Berg: note ring colour): yes one 8,5 could be coincidence, but the 4,5 / 4,5 is less statistically likely to be random due to the narrower range…
Eg: Consider the magic square below. Note that its rows, columns and diagonals each add up to the magic constant 45. What else about it is interesting?
When each number in the original square is replaced by the number of letters in its name - known as its logorhythm - we get a new square. There are four letters in "five", nine letters in "twenty-two", eight letters in "eighteen" and so on.
Amazingly, this too is magic, with magic constant 21. Even better, its entries are consecutive numbers. Subtracting 2 all around yields the classic lu shi magic square, with constant 15, known to the ancient Chinese
Andrew Moreton
Adventurer
Play started with the Team in the cells recovering after Xambria's escape.
After a quick discussion they headed up for the evidence room to make sure Xambria/Sijhen did not get anything from there and to grab whatever they could to help them. As Nevla, Padme and Manuel headed into the evidence room El Kevin and Ulvaar engaged several Spikers and a flashing orb before being attacked in the back by two assassins and shortly later the other four assassins arrived behind the monsters. Nevlar grabbed the ancient two handed sword and along with Padme headed upstairs to rescue Drelft in the first bout of transparancy. Manuel spent several rounds donning the steam suit , Manuel joined the fight against the assassins and monsters just in time blowing away the leading assassin with a full salvo from the Nock gun, nearly falling down the stairs from the recoil. At the end of the fight downstairs El Kevin and Ulvaar were on single digit hp and spent the rest of the fight moving slowly towards the action upstairs and swigging down potions of cure light wounds.
Upstairs Nevla and Padme quickly dispatched the worm maw and 4 implanters before spending several rounds talking down Drelft eventually they succeeded and he set of to rally the RHC While Nevla and Padme headed towards the office of Saxby where they saw Xambria/Sijhen looting the safe before escaping through the floor and turning invisible. They moved to arrest Saxby in a nasty sword fight before the late arriving Manuel put 6 barrels of a Nock gun into her using his amazing goblin ability to do subdual damage with bullets, Saxby soon went down and was being cuffed as El Kevin and Ulvaar arrived. In the next transparancy they noticed the lanterns in the subway tunnel and got as close as they could. They spent the gap before the next transparency period using wands of CLW and potions of CLW to get people up to strength then rushed to the tunnel.
Sijhen tried to talk them out of attacking him but they ignored him and started up both trains driving them towards the seal with Manuel and El Kevin driving trains Ulvaar , Nevla and Padme attacked Xambria/Sijhen who decided to unleash the Elder thing. Fierce fighting followed leaving El Kevin dazed in the train as it plowed into the wall the impact nearly killed him (Hero point spend saved him) , the Elder thing survived the train crash but not having a Nock gun emptied into it . Xambria/Sijhen fought on and took a fatal stab from Nevla , the thought form of Sijhen fled into the portal as a wave of Nem energy swept out of the portal wrecking the room and destroying Xambria's body. Xambria's spirit fled into Nevla.
The session ended with a quick discussion about the planned train trip they think that Manuel will be a rich Goblin philanthropist travelling with a Kobold Butler, Dwarf Bodyguard, Eladrin Archaeology consultant and Half elf Factotum. They could not think of a practical way to disguise the Goblin or Kobold as anything else for a long period of time
After a quick discussion they headed up for the evidence room to make sure Xambria/Sijhen did not get anything from there and to grab whatever they could to help them. As Nevla, Padme and Manuel headed into the evidence room El Kevin and Ulvaar engaged several Spikers and a flashing orb before being attacked in the back by two assassins and shortly later the other four assassins arrived behind the monsters. Nevlar grabbed the ancient two handed sword and along with Padme headed upstairs to rescue Drelft in the first bout of transparancy. Manuel spent several rounds donning the steam suit , Manuel joined the fight against the assassins and monsters just in time blowing away the leading assassin with a full salvo from the Nock gun, nearly falling down the stairs from the recoil. At the end of the fight downstairs El Kevin and Ulvaar were on single digit hp and spent the rest of the fight moving slowly towards the action upstairs and swigging down potions of cure light wounds.
Upstairs Nevla and Padme quickly dispatched the worm maw and 4 implanters before spending several rounds talking down Drelft eventually they succeeded and he set of to rally the RHC While Nevla and Padme headed towards the office of Saxby where they saw Xambria/Sijhen looting the safe before escaping through the floor and turning invisible. They moved to arrest Saxby in a nasty sword fight before the late arriving Manuel put 6 barrels of a Nock gun into her using his amazing goblin ability to do subdual damage with bullets, Saxby soon went down and was being cuffed as El Kevin and Ulvaar arrived. In the next transparancy they noticed the lanterns in the subway tunnel and got as close as they could. They spent the gap before the next transparency period using wands of CLW and potions of CLW to get people up to strength then rushed to the tunnel.
Sijhen tried to talk them out of attacking him but they ignored him and started up both trains driving them towards the seal with Manuel and El Kevin driving trains Ulvaar , Nevla and Padme attacked Xambria/Sijhen who decided to unleash the Elder thing. Fierce fighting followed leaving El Kevin dazed in the train as it plowed into the wall the impact nearly killed him (Hero point spend saved him) , the Elder thing survived the train crash but not having a Nock gun emptied into it . Xambria/Sijhen fought on and took a fatal stab from Nevla , the thought form of Sijhen fled into the portal as a wave of Nem energy swept out of the portal wrecking the room and destroying Xambria's body. Xambria's spirit fled into Nevla.
The session ended with a quick discussion about the planned train trip they think that Manuel will be a rich Goblin philanthropist travelling with a Kobold Butler, Dwarf Bodyguard, Eladrin Archaeology consultant and Half elf Factotum. They could not think of a practical way to disguise the Goblin or Kobold as anything else for a long period of time
RangerWickett
Legend
No 'two small creatures in a trenchcoat' disguise? Probably for the best.
It's weird. Like, if Captain Planet's planeteers were real and kept saving people, they'd probably make the news, and since it was the 90s, if you ever saw a multi-ethnic group like that, you would at least wonder, "Hey, are those the planeteers?"
But I suppose newspapers aren't as fast to deliver tales of Flint to the Avery Coast. A goblin philanthropist will be weird, but not impossible to accept. Heck, I almost wish I'd put this group in as a real group of passengers, because they would be fascinating to interact with.
It's weird. Like, if Captain Planet's planeteers were real and kept saving people, they'd probably make the news, and since it was the 90s, if you ever saw a multi-ethnic group like that, you would at least wonder, "Hey, are those the planeteers?"
But I suppose newspapers aren't as fast to deliver tales of Flint to the Avery Coast. A goblin philanthropist will be weird, but not impossible to accept. Heck, I almost wish I'd put this group in as a real group of passengers, because they would be fascinating to interact with.
Andrew Moreton
Adventurer
From the moment they designed their characters I knew coming up with a cover for this train journey was going to be interesting. It is made worse because the dwarf, goblin and Kobold have no noticeable social skills.
This is only their preliminary plan I have no doubt that at some point in the planning or when they want to sneak around an enclave we will see a return either of the Goblin standing on the Kobold or stilts appearing.
I figure the group are fairly well known in Flint and to the Ob agents working around Flint but in general are not going to be known to the average Danoran custom official or the low grade Ob agents on the train. Now I think about it adding some tourists from Flint who do recognize them could be fun. I think that is a few more passengers a family where the kids recognise their heroes but the parents are certain it's not them
"Look Mummy it's Bat Manuel, can we ask him if he'll let us ride on Roger'
"No dear it's just some other silly Goblin , look he has a monocle Manuel does not wear a monocle"
This is only their preliminary plan I have no doubt that at some point in the planning or when they want to sneak around an enclave we will see a return either of the Goblin standing on the Kobold or stilts appearing.
I figure the group are fairly well known in Flint and to the Ob agents working around Flint but in general are not going to be known to the average Danoran custom official or the low grade Ob agents on the train. Now I think about it adding some tourists from Flint who do recognize them could be fun. I think that is a few more passengers a family where the kids recognise their heroes but the parents are certain it's not them
"Look Mummy it's Bat Manuel, can we ask him if he'll let us ride on Roger'
"No dear it's just some other silly Goblin , look he has a monocle Manuel does not wear a monocle"
Andrew Moreton
Adventurer
I am sure I remember from somewhere a reference to an Ob spy at the Battalion academy who has been recruiting people . roughly equivalent to SAxby who commits suicide sometime after Saxby is uncovered and the stat of book 6 but after looking yesterday I can find no reference to it. It is the sort of thing my pc's are looking for so I want to make sure I don't miss it out unless it is my imagination
hirou
Explorer
p.404 of compilation Act I, it's in adventure 5:
[sblock]How does one end up working in the Bleak Gate for a mysterious conspiracy? Most of the people here are patriotic soldiers and engineers, recruited with the promise of a chance to serve their country. In the aftermath of the adventure, the party might track down the head recruiter, one Colonel Greg Masterson, at the Battalion military academy. As soon as he gets word of the catastrophe at Cauldron Hill, though, he goes out into the bayou and blows his brains out. He reported to Roland Stanfield, and does not want anyone to discover Stanfield’s involvement, not even by interrogating his corpse.[/sblock]
Where are the spoiler tags when they're needed?
Last edited by a moderator:
RangerWickett
Legend
Fixed that for ya.
Andrew Moreton
Adventurer
This session was spent preparing for the train journey.
The group met with Drelft and took his idea of secrecy to heart their aim is to tell no one except Drelft in the RHC anything until the last possible moment. The players set out to prepare thoroughly for this noting down the list of actions they could take and the skills everyone possessed they were aware that several skills are only possessed by one character and that Ulvaar has almost no useful skills for this except sense motive.
The characters then discussed their plans and decided that their cover was that they were going to find and investigate another Ziggurat for this they would check all of Xambria and Caius's records as well as study at the university library so Know(History) was added to the useful skills the other method they decided to use was to carry out as many of their actions as possible by secretly arranging things with people by stealth here Manuel came into his own as Bat Manuel is the master of the night (stealth +19) and could not fail. They eventually decided on a Ziggurat located on an island off the far coast of Ber , as far as they know there is no such Ziggurat but it was a nice long boat journey and would explain their absence. Here Bat manuel and his cunning dealings with Morgan Cippriano came in , their RHC ship will set off for this mythical ziggurat and under cover of darkness will be met by a familias smuggling ship and the constables will transfer to that for the journey to Danor.
Preparing their cover involved much discussion about if Nevla would attemtp to pretend to be Finona Duvall, no final solution was agreed but she will be weraing a hat of Disguise making her look like herself which may persuade someone that she is the tiefling disguised as an elf. Manuel will be a rich goblin philanthropist with an archeological fixation travelling to investigate eladrin ruins, his Major Domo will be the Kobold El Kevin who decided that the title of Butler was both too dangerous and not majestic enough and he lacked the goatee to be a vizier. Ulvaar will be the bodyguard to explain his heavy armour , Nevla is the hired archeologist a disguise aided by the fact she is sharing with Xambria and has a bullwhip the mark of a committed expert archeologist, finaly Padme will be the fixer responsible for arranging things to suit everyone. They secured their papers and prepared their disguises and shortly were ready to travel.
This took them about 15 of their 35 attempts to prepare things as they rolled fairly well and had carefully selected the skill checks to match their talants so they went to town preparing for the journey.
With the help of Mr Cippriano assorted teams of cousins were tipped off to be ready to assist in Drakr and Crissilyr , then with the help of the university letters were sent to arrange wizards prepared to assist with sending and teleportation in the same towns. Nevla was able to arrange to get Familias agents onto the train as a guard and a cleaner while working through the Vekeshi to get teleportation support and some helpers in Nalaam.
FInally with Dreflt they arranged for back up in Vendricce, two of the constables form the B team will be sent by ship to pick up a prisoner for extradition from Ber however en-route a sending will tell them to open sealed orders diverting the ship at short notice to Vendricce so the 2 constables and the RHC ship as well as their smuggling ship will be available to support any operations there. They also arranged access to RHC secret funds to support the operation them moved them out of the RHC accounts into Familias accounts (for a 5% handling fee) and so have access to untraceable money in the various cities. They are going to end up owing the famileas a debt but think this is more important
As long as the Ob has not infiltrated the famileas they think they are secure and expect that even in the Ob do have agents in the famileas those agents will not be looking for the constables activities.
They are going to get to Danor clean as the Ob are not looking for them yet expecting them to be searching an island for a Ziggurat and I think a team from Gold cell will have been dispatched to get to the island first and try to obtain anything useful before the constables can arrive
The group met with Drelft and took his idea of secrecy to heart their aim is to tell no one except Drelft in the RHC anything until the last possible moment. The players set out to prepare thoroughly for this noting down the list of actions they could take and the skills everyone possessed they were aware that several skills are only possessed by one character and that Ulvaar has almost no useful skills for this except sense motive.
The characters then discussed their plans and decided that their cover was that they were going to find and investigate another Ziggurat for this they would check all of Xambria and Caius's records as well as study at the university library so Know(History) was added to the useful skills the other method they decided to use was to carry out as many of their actions as possible by secretly arranging things with people by stealth here Manuel came into his own as Bat Manuel is the master of the night (stealth +19) and could not fail. They eventually decided on a Ziggurat located on an island off the far coast of Ber , as far as they know there is no such Ziggurat but it was a nice long boat journey and would explain their absence. Here Bat manuel and his cunning dealings with Morgan Cippriano came in , their RHC ship will set off for this mythical ziggurat and under cover of darkness will be met by a familias smuggling ship and the constables will transfer to that for the journey to Danor.
Preparing their cover involved much discussion about if Nevla would attemtp to pretend to be Finona Duvall, no final solution was agreed but she will be weraing a hat of Disguise making her look like herself which may persuade someone that she is the tiefling disguised as an elf. Manuel will be a rich goblin philanthropist with an archeological fixation travelling to investigate eladrin ruins, his Major Domo will be the Kobold El Kevin who decided that the title of Butler was both too dangerous and not majestic enough and he lacked the goatee to be a vizier. Ulvaar will be the bodyguard to explain his heavy armour , Nevla is the hired archeologist a disguise aided by the fact she is sharing with Xambria and has a bullwhip the mark of a committed expert archeologist, finaly Padme will be the fixer responsible for arranging things to suit everyone. They secured their papers and prepared their disguises and shortly were ready to travel.
This took them about 15 of their 35 attempts to prepare things as they rolled fairly well and had carefully selected the skill checks to match their talants so they went to town preparing for the journey.
With the help of Mr Cippriano assorted teams of cousins were tipped off to be ready to assist in Drakr and Crissilyr , then with the help of the university letters were sent to arrange wizards prepared to assist with sending and teleportation in the same towns. Nevla was able to arrange to get Familias agents onto the train as a guard and a cleaner while working through the Vekeshi to get teleportation support and some helpers in Nalaam.
FInally with Dreflt they arranged for back up in Vendricce, two of the constables form the B team will be sent by ship to pick up a prisoner for extradition from Ber however en-route a sending will tell them to open sealed orders diverting the ship at short notice to Vendricce so the 2 constables and the RHC ship as well as their smuggling ship will be available to support any operations there. They also arranged access to RHC secret funds to support the operation them moved them out of the RHC accounts into Familias accounts (for a 5% handling fee) and so have access to untraceable money in the various cities. They are going to end up owing the famileas a debt but think this is more important
As long as the Ob has not infiltrated the famileas they think they are secure and expect that even in the Ob do have agents in the famileas those agents will not be looking for the constables activities.
They are going to get to Danor clean as the Ob are not looking for them yet expecting them to be searching an island for a Ziggurat and I think a team from Gold cell will have been dispatched to get to the island first and try to obtain anything useful before the constables can arrive
Andrew Moreton
Adventurer
Nevla is somewhat stressed about going back to Danor as she escaped from Danoran slavery. I expect that once they discover Eleanor she will be doomed , further I expect her family and their operation to have their names and addresses shared with the Vekeshi and Asreby to ensure they meet an unpleasant end.
Also thanks Hirou for finding that for me it had been driving me mad that I could not find the reference
Also thanks Hirou for finding that for me it had been driving me mad that I could not find the reference
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