Out of Character (OOC) Thread

[Laurna]

That finger fumble thing, I have lost posts that way a few times. Frustrating. I have a page on Google docs called "Washburn's posts". It is currently 35pages long. These are the drafts I bring over to the board and then I do a final edit there. Actually as you can tell I find errors after I post and correct them as I see them. Or as Evie sees them  . If I type directly onto the board as I am doing here. I have learned to copy it every few paragraphs. Because I have lost long posts too.

Thanks Revanne. Nice words for Wash and I loved Culumcil's attacking a boar in the bushes.  LOL

First those imported Torenthi dice and now the Torenthi fumbling posts. What will the do to us next?  Don't answer that. 

[Jerusha]

I will definitely NOT do a dice roll to find out!

[Evie]

I see I'm still laid up this morning. Ah well, I have a gallant young man sweeping me off my feet and holding me in his strong, protective arms. Could be worse.   

[revanne]

Hopefully not for much longer, though that depends on the dice as Columcil has a roll to heal Washburn but then it's in the lap of the gods - or rather the Torenthi.

[revanne]

Columcil has discovered a helpful gatekeeper - it's about time our heroes had some help.

[Laurna]

"I can cut the arrow out of his bum too, when you give the sign- it won't be the first time. Though it's usually from a hunter whose mate canna tell a human bum from a pig's backside."

A chuckle*** I was looking for a butt joke but could not think of one. Thank you for saving Washburn's health and his honor. I feared he would be showing his bare butt to the Lady Aliset and that would have been almost as distressing as the injury. 

[Laurna]

I have the image of Master Darcy pacing in the colonnade outside the infirmary, wringing his hands, and generally being more worried every-time someone comes or goes from that room. He is already stressed from magic, lost his horse(did the loose horse make it passed the gates before they were shut? I am certain he would have followed the others. just a bit behind. ) and now he can do nothing for his charge. poor man.

[Jerusha]

At the moment he is sitting on the ground, his back against the wall, as close to the infirmary door as he can get without blocking it.  It was a long, fast walk up that hill.  Nevertheless, he is staining to catch any sound that will hint at what is going on within, rising quickly to his feet when anyone comes in or out, though no one will tell him anything.

He is comforted by the fact that the nuns will probably not be rolling the dice. 

[Evie]

"I can cut the arrow out of his bum too, when you give the sign- it won't be the first time. Though it's usually from a hunter whose mate canna tell a human bum from a pig's backside."

A chuckle*** I was looking for a butt joke but could not think of one. Thank you for saving Washburn's health and his honor. I feared he would be showing his bare butt to the Lady Aliset and that would have been almost as distressing as the injury. 

Wash, Aliset says that if there are to be any revelations of your bare butt in her direction, there had better be a ring on her finger first! 

[Evie]

At the moment he is sitting on the ground, his back against the wall, as close to the infirmary door as he can get without blocking it.  It was a long, fast walk up that hill.  Nevertheless, he is staining to catch any sound that will hint at what is going on within, rising quickly to his feet when anyone comes in or out, though no one will tell him anything.

He is comforted by the fact that the nuns will probably not be rolling the dice. 

LOL!  Well, probably not for removing the arrow and stopping the bleeding, anyway, though for faster than average healing, our good Father Columcil is probably still her best bet.  He can at least speed up her body's natural healing processes (or try to) after the nuns are done with her, to save days or even weeks of natural healing time.  Though as far as HP are concerned, since she's had her injury tended to, I expect she'll have fully restored hit points after a good night's sleep, since IIRC the game manual is kindly disposed that way. I guess in story telling terms, that would mean she is recovered enough for normal activities, but might still have some achiness in her shoulder that will take a while longer to go away?  It's one of those game mechanics thing that works out in the players' favor, but is a bit unrealistic in real world terms, since it means theoretically I could have ended up half eviscerated on the convent doorstep, and as long as I'm patched up enough to keep my HP from going to 0 and get six hours of sleep afterwards, I'd be all right as rain the next morning!  I know they're a praying lot, but still!  LOL!

[Laurna]

"I can cut the arrow out of his bum too, when you give the sign- it won't be the first time. Though it's usually from a hunter whose mate canna tell a human bum from a pig's backside."

A chuckle*** I was looking for a butt joke but could not think of one. Thank you for saving Washburn's health and his honor. I feared he would be showing his bare butt to the Lady Aliset and that would have been almost as distressing as the injury. 

Wash, Aliset says that if there are to be any revelations of your bare butt in her direction, there had better be a ring on her finger first! 

And there in lies the reason for his consternation. Never before this has he ever contemplated marriage. He wanted to earn some title before settling down... at an older age. Being bare butted before a lady, even when it wasn't his fault, could have injured her reputation and earned him scorn at court.

[Evie]

"I can cut the arrow out of his bum too, when you give the sign- it won't be the first time. Though it's usually from a hunter whose mate canna tell a human bum from a pig's backside."

A chuckle*** I was looking for a butt joke but could not think of one. Thank you for saving Washburn's health and his honor. I feared he would be showing his bare butt to the Lady Aliset and that would have been almost as distressing as the injury. 

Wash, Aliset says that if there are to be any revelations of your bare butt in her direction, there had better be a ring on her finger first! 

And there in lies the reason for his consternation. Never before this has he ever contemplated marriage. He wanted to earn some title before settling down... at an older age. Being bare butted before a lady, even when it wasn't his fault, could have injured her reputation and earned him scorn at court.

Well,  yeah, to a point, though medieval double-standards being what they were, male nudity or near-nudity wasn't considered quite as scandalous as female nudity, at least when it happened in a nonsexual context.  There wouldn't be a scandal raised if a lady happened to see a farmer out in his fields in the summer heat clad in nothing but his braies; in fact, there are lots of paintings illustrating just that.  Or if she happened to venture out with her maidservant for a ride and came across a group of men having a swim au naturel, that might provoke giggles but no scandalized horror, since why would they expect anyone to go for a swim in expensive, time-consuming to make clothing? (Even peasant garb was more expensive by their standards than our ready-to-wear, machine made clothing from Walmart.)  The same could not be said of ladies out skinny dipping, though, which is why men were more likely to know how to swim than women, unless they'd learned as young girls. 

That said, a nobleman probably wouldn't drop trou in front of an unrelated noblewoman under normal circumstances, and even under extreme circumstances like this one, they'd probably insist on a chaperone if one was available.  Although that same nobleman might not have a problem baring all in front of a bathhouse attendant or a castle servant assigned to scrub his back and wash his hair.  (Again, while a nobleman might be offered a female servant to assist with his bath, a lady wouldn't be offered a male servant to assist her with bathing. In the first instance, succumbing to temptation might result in the natural consequence of ending up with an illegitimate child, but in the second instance, succumbing to temptation could inadvertently lead to an illegitimate heir, or at least an heir whose true parentage the lord couldn't be certain of, hence one reason for such double standards.)

So if Aliset had been the only Healer available to help Wash, or if Columcil couldn't Heal him and he'd had to bare his bum to all those nuns in the infirmary, that might embarrass him, but it wouldn't cause him to lose honor at court. Though the more witnesses to show he didn't take advantage of the situation, the better, which might not have been very helpful for his sense of modesty, but at least would prevent any scandals. 

[Evie]

I have a game mechanics question, so this should probably be addressed to Bynw, though I'll trot it out here since we're all playing Deryni characters (even if some don't realize it and/or aren't trained).

I was wondering last night about how some of the higher Deryni traits work in terms of game play. In your character creation thread, it says:

Spell Master (Deryni): Be prepared to be impressed. You have learned to push your inherent magical abilities to their upmost potential. This Trait is more powerful than the Spell Slinger Trait. With a successful Test, you can affect an even wider area, numerous targets, or create a greater result. As always, the Game Master is the judge of what you can and cannot attempt to do. The most powerful spells still pale in comparison to the most powerful scrolls. You can dispel the magical effects created by someone using the Spell Slinger Trait, and you also gain Advantage when using the Spell Slinger Trait. This Trait requires the Spell Slinger Trait.

Spell Reader (Deryni): P as in phylactery. You have spent years learning the sacred language of the arcane, allowing you to read power-laced words from magic scrolls.

Spell Slinger (Deryni): That's not bad, but watch this. You are more adept at channelling the arcane power flowing through your veins and can empower greater magical effects. This Trait is more powerful than Spell-Touched, but less powerful than Spell Master. With a successful Test, you can affect a wider area, more targets, or create a more powerful result. As always, the Game Master is the judge of what you can and cannot attempt to do. You can dispel the magical effects created by someone using the Spell-Touched Trait, and you also gain Advantage when using the Spell-Touched Trait. This Trait requires the Spell-Touched Trait.

Spell-Touched (Deryni): It runs in the family. You were born with an arcane heritage, and while the centuries have diluted the power, you are still able to subtly influence the world around you by merely willing it to happen.

Two of these traits (Spell-Touched and Spell-Reader) appear in the Tiny Dungeon RPG manual, and the more advanced spells I am guessing you made up to reflect the ability for Deryni to do higher level magic with more training.  Is that correct?  So if I am reading this correctly, a Deryni who has the trait Spell-Touched will normally roll 2d6, but if they are trained to the point of being able to add the trait Spell-Slinger, this will add the advantage of an additional die to each roll (3d6 as their baseline roll), and if they ever manage to become a Spell-Master, their baseline roll would increase to 4d6, which would explain why someone like Sofiana or Denis Arilan (presumably Spell-Masters) might hardly ever have their spells fail, but someone who is partially trained (like Alaric and Duncan in canon, maybe?) might have a higher rate of failure than a Master, but a higher rate of success than, say, Dhugal (in canon), who has only recently discovered he's Deryni and therefore hasn't had much training yet.  So I could see Denis's baseline roll being 4d6, Duncan's being 3d6, and Teenage Dhugal's being the average 2d6 of someone who has Deryni power but not much training.  Or am I interpreting this all wrong?

If this is the case, then what is the distinction between the Power trait and Spell-Touched? (Or even if I'm misinterpreting how the added advantages work, I still can't quite see a difference between these two.)  Is it that anyone born Deryni, whether they know it or not, and whether they've been trained or not, has Power, but someone who is conscious of their Deryni heritage and has at least basic training in it is Spell-Touched as well?  Right now as the descriptions stand, I'm not really seeing what advantage this trait has over basic Power aside from it being a stepping-stone that might eventually lead to being able to acquire the Spell-Slinger trait with further training.  Unless maybe someone with Power but no training has the capacity to do magic, but only at a 1d6 level, in which case adding Spell-Touched with its 2d6 baseline due to having had some basic Deryni training makes more sense.  But in that case, I would think Spell-Touched should also be an automatic trait when creating a character, if that character is going to be a Deryni with a basic level of training, and players who choose to play an untrained Deryni could add on a different trait instead and then, if they get training later, work up to being Spell-Touched, then a Spell-Slinger, etc.  Or maybe that's how it already works, and I'm just horribly confused? 

I should add that with the Spell-Reader - Scribe - Artificer progression, it makes more sense that each of these should just give you 2d6 as a baseline even though they all build on one another, because one has to first be able to read magic scrolls before one can learn how to write them, and then once one masters that skill, it should be easier to learn how to make non-scroll magic items. So with each new level of mastery, your baseline is still 2d6 for that particular new skill.  But if I'm reading the Spell-Touched - Spell-Slinger -Spell-Master progression correctly, each new level gives an advantage to someone who had the previous one, but the only real difference between levels is that you can do bigger and better, more wide-ranging spells, whatever those spells might happen to be. It's not so much that you learn new skills as it is that you get progressively better at doing them, or at least that's how the descriptions read.  So I'm just trying to get some clarification of whether my understanding of how those work is correct or not.

[Bynw]

I am not going to attempt to do quote based reply on this post. But yes the Traits of Spell-Touched and Spell-Reader do come from the base rules for those that did purchase it. The other 2 Traits that enhance the Spell-Touched Trait but giving it a couple of more levels came from another Tiny 6 Rule book.

The Power Trait is a rewritten (very slightly) version of the Tiny 6 Psionic's trait. Mainly because it has always been my observation and from the words of Katherine in Deryni Magic that the Deryni Magic is more aligned with Psionic powers than your standard Fantasy Magic ones.

Yes I did include the other Traits in an attempt to include the higher powers of those Deryni Adepts of old. Or at least those who are well trained and have long held the tradition of being trained in their abilities.

I really think in re-reading those Traits and gaining Advantage is not really clear. There is no 4D6 rolls in Tiny 6 games. The creator of it didn't really explain it well. In fact, he didn't explain it at all.

I knew that the system would encounter some bumps at some point and need to be tweaked. No, we wont be tweaking the dice unless you all want to come to my place and roll them in a live game.

But it seems that we have ran into a bit of a snag with the Deryni Magic. Which is where I thought we would run into trouble eventually.


These are the Deryni Only Traits:

Artificer (Deryni): This sword was forged with dragon's fire. You have learned to create magic items other than scrolls. To use this ability, describe what you want the item to do and perform a standard 2d6 Test. Failure means you do not how to make the item in question without further research. If successful, you know the proper recipe of ingredients needed to create the item. The Game Master will tell you what you need and how long it will take to craft the item. It is up to you to gather all the items. Once you have everything on the list, you must work uninterrupted until the item is complete. This Trait requires the Scribe Trait.

   I think this one is a keeper. Maybe reworded a bit though to fit more into the Deryni point of view. But this is how one creates many objects that are "Magical" within the Deryni stories. Including the ability to create Wards Major.

Awaken (Deryni): I can give you power, but the priests say it will take your soul. You can give Deryni like power to a Human. Thus they have the ability to learn further Deryni only Traits, with the Game Master's permission. The newly Awakened has the Power Trait automatically and can gain any others that the Deryni using this Trait has on a successful 1d6 Test.

   This too is a keeper. It's how you make a Human into a Deryni. It is how the Haldane's all have the powers that they have when they become king. (Not counting those Haldane's who are also Deryni)

Beastspeaker (Deryni): He has a way with animals. You are able to communicate with animals. This form of communication is primitive and very simplistic.

   This is a good one too. The Late General Morgan can charm the deer to the very gates of Rhemuth.

Blocker (Deryni): Make mommy clear! You have the ability to make any Deryni into a human by blocking their Psionic abilities with just a Standard Test. You can also restore any blocked Deryni with a Standard Test. This Trait requires the Healer Trait. There is no save Test against this Trait.

   This is Rhys, Tavis and others. The ability to remove Deryni power from any Deryni and make them Human.

Healer (Deryni): I've seen worse, son. You'll pull through. As an Action, you can Test 2d6 to heal another creature or Test 1d6 to heal yourself. If the Test is successful, the target creature is healed for 2 Hit Points or 1 Hit Point if used on yourself. This Trait can also be used to cure poison, disease, and other physical ailments that are non-magical. You must be next to the creature to heal it.

   Its good to have more healers back.

Power (Deryni): Also, I can kill you with my brain. You have power because of your species or you are a human that has been granted power by another Deryni. You can read minds of others, create hand-fire or light a campfire or candle, you can tell if someone is lying. And you can communicate telepathically with others. Doing this is an action, and you must make a standard 2d6 Test. If you are trying to manipulate an object or creature, you must have eye contact with it. You can also perform a simple Ranged attack, such as throwing a ball of kinetic energy, which is treated just like any other Ranged attack in Combat.

   This is what I used for the basic Deryni powers. All Deryni have this Trait. Even if they are untrained. Even if they don't know they are Deryni. Refuse to acknowledge they are Deryni. Thus those that are the latter two .. get to roll at a Disadvantage instead of a Standard Test.

Scribe (Deryni): Spells cannot match the power of a well-crafted scroll or charm. You have learned to create magic scrolls. To use this ability, describe what you want the scroll to do and perform a standard 2d6 Test. Failure means you do not how to make the scroll in question without further research. If successful, you know the proper recipe of ingredients needed to create the scroll. The Game Master will tell you what you need. It is up to you to gather all the items. Once you have everything on the list, you must work uninterrupted for a full day to create the scroll. This Trait requires the Spell Reader Trait.

   This one. I don't know. There really aren't any good examples of Deryni Scrolls that are Magical. There are ones that teach you about specific powers and abilities but nothing really that is power themselves.

Shapechange (Deryni): The best way to hide in plain sight. As an Action, you can Test 2d6 to transform into someone else, compleating changing one's appearance and even gender. You can revert to your normal form as an Action.

   A handy Trait used by Camber and his kin.


Spell Master (Deryni): Be prepared to be impressed. You have learned to push your inherent magical abilities to their upmost potential. This Trait is more powerful than the Spell Slinger Trait. With a successful Test, you can affect an even wider area, numerous targets, or create a greater result. As always, the Game Master is the judge of what you can and cannot attempt to do. The most powerful spells still pale in comparison to the most powerful scrolls. You can dispel the magical effects created by someone using the Spell Slinger Trait, and you also gain Advantage when using the Spell Slinger Trait. This Trait requires the Spell Slinger Trait.

Spell Reader (Deryni): P as in phylactery. You have spent years learning the sacred language of the arcane, allowing you to read power-laced words from magic scrolls.

Spell Slinger (Deryni): That's not bad, but watch this. You are more adept at channelling the arcane power flowing through your veins and can empower greater magical effects. This Trait is more powerful than Spell-Touched, but less powerful than Spell Master. With a successful Test, you can affect a wider area, more targets, or create a more powerful result. As always, the Game Master is the judge of what you can and cannot attempt to do. You can dispel the magical effects created by someone using the Spell-Touched Trait, and you also gain Advantage when using the Spell-Touched Trait. This Trait requires the Spell-Touched Trait.

Spell-Touched (Deryni): It runs in the family. You were born with an arcane heritage, and while the centuries have diluted the power, you are still able to subtly influence the world around you by merely willing it to happen.

   All four of these are questionable. As they are more akin to Wizards or Harry Potter magic than Deryni Magic.

Telekinesis (Deryni): Moving without moving You can move small objects just by thinking about it. You must have eye contact with the object and make a standard 2d6 Test.

   Most Deryni have never been very good with TK abilities. Small things. Maybe a coffin or something large with a group. But their havent been any Deryni lifting X-Wings around the 11 Kingdoms anyway. But it's still a keeper for those that have this little handy power. As it is good at openiong locks too.

[Evie]

I think all of that could be easily adapted, and if the game doesn't allow for 4d6 even for the highest masters of an art, then maybe Spell-Slinger could be eliminated and you could just have Power (most basic level that all Deryni have, which will give you at least 1d6 if you aren't trained), Spell-Touched (under this or some other name, like the perhaps too logical "Trained Deryni" or "Spell-Trained," which is your baseline 2d6 level for anyone who has received training in their Deryni power), and Spell-Master for those who have mastered the Deryni arts. 

As for powers like Telekinesis, it could be that Alaric and Duncan are able to pick locks because they both have this special trait, but other Deryni can't do it even though they're better trained. But I think it would also be possible that all Deryni could do this with small objects to some extent (like picking those locks) with varying levels of success, but if you want to take it as a special trait, that means you have a much more uncommon ability with it which would let you pick up heavy rocks, furniture, etc., though yeah, probably even with that level of giftedness at it something the size of an X-wing might be right out.  That would make it a bit more like the Deryni equivalent to something like, for instance, musical ability.  Some people can't carry a tune in a bucket.  Some people can, especially with a little bit of training, sing pretty well and/or play an instrument decently.  But the vast majority of people, even among those with decent musical talent, can't sing well enough to join an opera cast or play in an orchestra.  To do those things would take more dedicated training (and years of it) than the average music-lover would be willing and able to dedicate, even if they were born with a natural gift for music.