roger that...sorry to have missed the Thanksgiving session...

Session 56 last night.

Crazy fight.  Explorers had fallen down an ancient trap to the cavernous second level.  Worked their way around an ancient stream, parleyed with some Scalik (Lizardman) warriors and a shaman named Pehnni, suffered a few falls into the stream, met a giant, hermitish Necromancer who lives under an ancient stone underground bridge.

They made friends with both groups thanks to Stormhammer, a member of the Gurellium Trading family.  The Giant Necromancer also showed them a way north, to the Hal of Winged Prophecy, and the south, where an old crumbling staircase upward lay.

More later about the battle of the stairs.

Session 58 tonight

A Gurellium Trader PC took a crossbow in the side on a rope bridge...and fell off 80' to his death....
group found it's way out, however...

Skofflox, any comments on the system or game?

Quote from: LordVreeg;428273*snip*
Skofflox, any comments on the system or game?

Sure!
Sometimes difficult to join an ongoing group but Vreeg and the rest of the players are accommodating and patient,providing answers to rules and setting questions. Lots of great RP moments!
(and I am no longer the junior member,hooray!)

It is my first chat room game and it is nifty having an embeded d. rolling program (all hail Isobot).Still very immersive...I can see great potential for RP with like minded folk using chat rooms (if maps/graphics/pics were available without having to click off site,VAVOOM).Character generator is cool.

The setting is both deep and broad, encompasing many years of work and play. Interesting "Guild" system that effects xp. use,skills,religious affiliation etc.
Lots of intriguing detail. Still very much a nu'b. so not much more to say as of yet. Need to interact with the setting/group more.

The system is gritty and detailed. Some interesting d. mechanics in regards to wpn. damage. I am still learning. I get help in-game and that keeps the system flowing for me. More to say on this as I become more versed...so far so good though by no means a "light" system IMO!  

Vreeg maintains a Celtricia homepage with rules and setting info available to peruse and this is a great boon. I look forward to Thurs. evening games and am having a blast!
cheers!

Session 59 was strange and wild; Stormhammer had just fallen to his death after being hit by a cultist's crossbow on one of the rope bridges.  The group had gone from being lost in the underground and unsure of their future existence and in a resource-management mode, to the elation of finding the way out...to losing Storm.

It was blackest night when the crawled out the long. fidikmarple stairway, findng themsleves in a long, ruined chamber in the VexKorang swamps.  There was large carvings and statuary, but all on too massive a scale to take with them.  The group looked aout and arround, and the group spotted the tip of a ziggurat to the north.  Since they knew of one, they went that way, stumbling about in the swamp.  AS they reached it, over sunken logs and going over one area of a ruined aqueduct,  they found it was indeed the one they knew, that housed their normal entrance into the underground ruins.  

They had not only escaped the underground, they now knew their position.  

The group skirted the west way around the pockmarked and crumbling edifice, and in the dark fell into a deeper swamp area, but at last came out in the north, front area of the ziggurat.  They struck north with Lanterns hooded, as a few group members saw a large flame to thr north.

This turned out to be a few scailk B'nixBurin burning a humand and an omwo~ alive.  The group killed 2 of them (though thier leader, some kind of death-caster, escaped), and rescued them.  

Now the red light of Tribin, the smaller of the 2 suns, is limning the tops of the leaves of the swamp-groves, heralding the morning of Harvak, the 56th of Tokush.

Interesting session, #61.
The Explorers spent most of it travelling back to town, and a few people spotted the giant Sauroid flyer nearby.
A lot of use of detection and some good skill stretching behind the scenes.  One of the dynamics of a good GS game is players trying to stretch the use of their skills.  

As a side note, as a GM, I often use Youtube links as auditory atmosphere.  Normally Tangerine Dream or Midnight Syndicate.  Sometimes they are also good as personal signatures.  I recommend anyone running an online game get a few links together like this.  Sometimes moody...Sometimes funny.

Kellik's Audio Cue

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=387ZDGSKVSg

The Steel Isle gang is getting a little more canny in using social skills and magic that affects social skills.  This is actually one of the hardest places for GM adjudication.  Combat stuff is a little more black and white, but easier.  However, I consider the social part of it the fun part of GMing.


There was also a lot of good conversation and planning.  And eating.  Neophyte Wurnick ran out of Bagels finally, but he has dome dried pasta, lemon juice, spices, and Bacon.

Vermortis,
IN case you had not seen, this is the main page for the Steel Isle Town.
This is the town's page
go down to the neighborhoods and click on the upper hill.

Session 65 tonight.

The group is back in Steel Isle Town, drinking and carousing with the well known adventuring band, "Eddon's Folly".  Our explorers were holding forth at the Iambic Treblehorn, a Bardic Tavern in the Bazaar neighborhood.

Tomorrow, the second to Last day of Tokush, the group plans to honor an invitation to the Celebration of Piscos of the Axe, at the Church of Irony and Black Comedy.

And then, after the group climes to the Upper Hill and returns Simon's Body to the Most Holy refuge of the Bone, the chapter house of the Bone Knights of Orcus.

Eventually, they'll get back to the ruins of Vexchian.

At times, various and sundry may verbally accost the author (yours truly) as to why pile on layer after overdone layer onto this setting. Why not push a breath of fresh air past their jaded, setting-nostrils, something unique, or failing that, something different and less hoary. Perhaps something more witty or nouvelle, less standard?

While there are actually answers manifold and various, one particular answer is that through dint of familiarity and overwork, I can sometimes feel Celtricia. Feel how it is supposed to be, how it is, not as how I want it to be. I am in the trackless wastes and gigantic spaces between settlements, not writing it, existing in it and perhaps reporting on it. The complicated relationship between race and culture, mixing over the encroaching centuries and millenia, tastes astonishingly real to me. The layer and strata of ruinous history, of pathos and tragedy played and replayed, crushes down on my writer's psyche at times, not as a creation, but as an object I uncover, piece by voide-beast guarded piece.


I still remember the first time this feeling of being, of cross-referenceable logic as opposed to preference, overtook me during a session. Celtricia was by no means my first creation...but it was the first that I knew the answer to questions based on knowing what was already real, and what should come from it.

And unlike those that look back to their hallowed gaming days of their youth as unreachable heights, gaming in Celtricia just keeps getting better. Live and on the IRC, there are times when the reason the groups and your charming expedition-director get sucked into the finely grained detail of a hairstyle or the right clothes or the type of food being eaten is due to the shared unconsious urge to push that shared reality to that immersed level, or if one preferes, a more immersed level, as if the immersion is the actual, secret dirty satisfaction we are all seeking.
And what can one say when one can feel the unseasonable warmth of Tribin and Gerin as they rise over the Bazaar of Steel Isle Town, and can feel the this glory mixing with the sadness of lost comrades shared over an early drink in a rooftop cafe? One can only be glad of the road taken, and the strange solidity underfoot of this road as one delves deeper into discovering what is in Celtricia, together.

Session 64

More awesomeness Roleplaying in town, eating squab, drinking spices ale, making buds... Really great social RP night in general...so much for a pure dungeon crawl.

Excerpts....


" oh shut it, I already feel pretty enough to fart daisies... I hate it"

"Carmen_Ondradet bounces off astell in an attempt to run away from the wild eyed barber"

"Cameleye, "Might as well wait for water to be less wet."

" !roll d%
[21:28] 99
ooc: hamish spontaneously combusts
The Gartier Stops the group dead, " HEY! We're quite full up, folkls...especially for the underage"

"Moss> Look, I don't think this really needs to be a problem.
[21:31] We're all here to have fun.
[21:32] We're not gonna cause trouble and you don't even have to worry.
[21:32] !roll d%
[21:32] 95
hahahahahah"


" The Gartier chakes his head, ducks, and shakes it agian, confused
[21:38] ooc: wait, it worked?"

" Your magics are the epitome of vulgarity. I do not approve of such use. "

"Astell> Can we get some fruit and bacon with our food?
Eddon, " Hey, Viv! Some squab and fires here, if you please!!!"


" Eddon, it is truly a joy to be in your company tonight. to think, if we had happened upon some other place...
[ Indeed.
Eddon smies and waves a hand, " Friends, it was menat to be. Oblimet and The queen of the dance made it so...."
I'll drink to that!
* Astell whsipering
who's the queen of the dance?"

Session 65 was pretty much more of the Soap Opera side of the game moving forward, but at least we got a lot of progress made, so that someday there will be adventuring again. I leave you with some comments from in game. This things has turnined into RP central.

Top comments...
"Hamish_Haldane> It's not as bad as some cursed necromancer or death mage, but hardly a pure Art like Water or AIr"
Carmen_Ondradet waves hamish off.

ooc: that poor bagel never had a chance... against MAX!
Carmen_Ondradet sits, legs sprawled out on the floor drinking kaffee, eating bagels with bacon, and rubbing the sleep from her eyes.

Wurnick, " Max and I go to climb the upper hill, to the Bone Knight's tower. Who comes with us?"
I'll go with you
Then moderate your glibness.
* Carmen_Ondradet smirks at max

The Klaxik ho;ds the gate he had just barred. "The statue Seekers...well, we are not open yet, but I suppose..." he opens the little gate
friends, yes, that would be us
nice to have connections around here...
the best table , under a little umbrella, is laid quickly


Carmen_Ondradet raises her glass to wurnick
the glasses ar rounder than perhaps they should be, but the wine is cool and biting.
he obviously meant alot to you
so to simon
Wurnick, " To Simon, more than we deserve. May he be off and protected."
To Simon, dear companion. Parted from us too soon.
To Simon
to Simon, whom I, unfortunately, could not meet
Wurnik smiles wanly
* MazAbd toasts somberly
the wind and sun moves the clouds off,
and the waitress unfurls the umbrella as the group eats bread and thinks...

Session 66 went swimmingly. The explorers took their leave of the Steel Libram Sages, and moved across the Lower Hill through the Courtyard Row, to the Northern edge of the Rotee Bazaar neighborhood, where they went into the Bookenders Scholars.

Magister Pendelton was pleased to see them, and he was able to dispel the pesky wards on the last scroll, which was written in a version on magetongue tinged with Anarch, probably from the period of the venovian EMpire when the Entropic Overlords Religion was in full sway. The scroll had a grouping of chaos spells on it.
The group did some good rolling and roleplaying, and the Magister decided he want to one up the Steel Libram and so payed a premium to get all three scrolls, especially for their historical worth (especially the Vicorian one). We're talking over 9k Horn here, which could probably buy a small brownston in some areas.


After that, the group moved out, back to the Courtyard row, moving down to the Merchant Row area. When they had gone down the stall and hawker infested Merchant Row for a bit, they were in the Bazaar section of the street and town. The group was accosted by a small cloture of toughs, Orcash and human. Rather than start a fight, the group gave them 4 of the silver skull medallions they took off the bodies...then, on their way into the Red Priest inn, they had the doorman call the Scarlet Pilums that there was a group of suspected Death Cultists nearby.

The group then went upstairs and got ready for the invite-only part of the celebration of Piscos of the Axe, at the Church of Black Humor and Chaos. [/FONT]

Session 70 comes up this Thursday.
Who would have ever expected this online game would go on for 1/2 this long, not to mention be goning strong and still adding members.

Group has finished 8 sessions played in town in Steel Isle Town, and is on their way back to the Vexchian ruins.  They have attracted 4 new followers, as well.

On a related, personal, but truly monumental issue...the Celtricia/Guildschool Wiki has just hit 1000 unique pages.  I am just astounded by that, personally.

Session 71 last week, as the group heads back down through the Leeward Farmlands back to the Vexchian Ruins.  A lot more cultist activity, though the stop at Shuruum's Chrorm farm nets a huge dinner.

Wurnick and Moss, actually. Maz decided that he would be most helpful if he remained alive. However, Maz now officially has the coolest apprentice.

The group aslo found that another farm, further south, had been burned out by the cultists.

====

The Red Knight had informed us that our help wasn't needed at the farm, and that our use would be best if we continued to the ruins, so we did. He also informed us that the cultist's ranks were increasing in response to us, which he said should be taken as a compliment. Maz helpfully suggested their surrender as a more acceptable compliment.

On our way, we had stopped at the first bridge, and Wurnick made us all a delicious hare lunch, while Modo provided some music. Out of nowhere, an owlbear attacked us, knocking Hamish and Max unconscious. Cameleye ran, and Maz followed, dragging Gracie along with him. Everyone else stayed to fight. Modo did his best to aid with inspiring music.

During the battle, Wurnick, unfortunately, misaimed an arrow, which had hit Unconscious Max for 6. Moss had similar luck with his morningstar, and had clubbed Hamish. The owlbear wasn't quite sure what to think of Wurnick Curly and Moss, sans Curly.

Maz and Gracie continued to watch the fight from afar, but Gracie quickly decided that enough was enough. Rushing into the fray, she took a swing with her mighty ax, and with power and luck, managed to be the one to slay the beast.

Current wiki page for the adventurers

Session 72

OK.

I think I've probably said a few times that I prefer a very lethal game, where physics have a strong effect (like, giant creatures can create a huge amount of force).  
And I could also say that it is a game where truly epic creatures. like Dragons, are really, really dangerous.

So I did everything in my power, short of breaking DM objectivity, to let the PCs know that going to talk with the Green Dragon one of their familiars had spotted was a BAD IDEA.  Lore rolls, outdoor rolls, fauna rolls...nothing worked.

Well, 1 round into that interaction, near TPK where only a few miraculous rolls allowed two PCs to escape, killing 4 followers, 2 NPCS (1 an original), and 3 of the 5 PCs.  
Session 73 should be interesting.
Normal PCs start with 5k exp to distribute.    The Followers started with about 4k, though most were up to 4800-5400.  Hamish, one of the PCs who Perished, led the group with about 14.5k EXP after 71 online sessions.  Since the 2 remaining PCs have 13.7K and 9.7k, I am going to start the new PCs with 8.8K.