The Eye of Anubis: OOC Thread

[Kaitou Kage]

I don't entirely agree that the ghost scene was anti-climactic, or even easy. Ghost fights without force effects and ghost touch equipment are rarely easy, and this was not much of an exception. The 50% miss chance is brutal, even in a 7-on-1 or however many the combat actually had after folks ran off. I know at least two of us were pondering just how quickly this ghost would die. I wasn't necessarily in fear of dying, myself, but I was a little bit nervous that things would turn out -very- badly for some players here and there.

The ending was a bit all at once, but all things considered, I think it's best.

I honestly think this fight worked out fine. The trouble with PbP games is that they take a long time to make things happen. This is just part of their nature. So really, making enemies harder to kill accomplishes less epic wow-ness (not to be confused with WoW-ness) and more repetitiveness. Regular tabletop combat can get dreary and tiresome after a bit, and PbP even moreso. A few rounds of combat is all it should really take to end the encounter (even in tabletop, more than a few is pushing the limits of attention span unless it gets really exciting somehow, imo), and so I think it was handled splendidly.

The wolf scene was interesting and surprising, but I am not going to complain. I think it works and is an interesting contrast to most of the weirdness we've been encountering up until now.

[The Whistler]

5. And finally Id like to say all you guys are RPing excellently, so much so that Ive only got an inkling which classes most of you are. That to me shows that you are playing the characters for themselves rather than the classes which tends to happen alot.

Okay, confession: I had *no idea* Tomas was a paladin until like midway through that last fight scene. This is partially due to me being utterly unable to connect the dots, but mostly to DocBeard brilliantly playing against type--capital work, dude!

As for the scene as a whole, aside from the excellent writing and atmosphere all round, I thought that the only place where the pacing was a little muddy was during the actual combat. The whole prelude with Marilena was nicely drawn out with some great time set aside for IC conversation, and while the encounter with Stefan was pulled off great in a moment-to-moment sense and described really well (I REALLY liked that skeleton cannon), it sort of ended up coming down to "touch attack touch attack touch attack die" after a little. However, I'm willing to chalk that up to the fact that it was uncertain *when* the ghost was going to snuff it, so the whole incident is tough to attach a dramatic arc to anyways.

I actually quite liked the Shepherd bit (although I guess I'm biased ); like a few people have brought up IC and out, I thought it was a really nice thematic contrast to the battle sequence, and really cool for me to be party to as a dude invested in my character. That said, I can't help but wonder if A) if it was planned in advance, and B) where Neo's going with it... Should be interesting.

And now... Go, Alli! Show that antagonist who's boss!

[steveflam]

I'll do my best!

[yalenusveler]

The ghost fight was odd. From one standpoint, the "Ok, holding actions...attack! Touch Attack!" nature was aggravating. On the other hand though, how the scenes were described were beautiful. My mind depicted them as cinema, and good cinema at that. If i'd pay 7$ to see it in a theatre...pretty damn good, IMO

[DocBeard]

I think the fight itself really felt like it was a fight with, well, a ghost. I'm suprised the skeletons didn't turn on us...well, not that suprised...but all and all, I had fun. Admittedly, I got to be a bit of a ham, leaping around and calling down thunder and whatnot, so that may have something to do with it...

...but I really felt like we came together as a party during the whole scene. The group finally bonded, gelled together, had our first big, 'Do we want to bother with these people?' test, and we passed. The dangers and mistakes everyone made felt realistic for Barovia at night, and the ambiguity of the old woman was really interesting.

Okay, confession: I had *no idea* Tomas was a paladin until like midway through that last fight scene. This is partially due to me being utterly unable to connect the dots, but mostly to DocBeard brilliantly playing against type--capital work, dude!

I take that as a compliment, sir! One of the most facinating things in 3E in general, and Ravenloft 3E in particular, is the reinvention of the Paladin. Instead of being Galahad, you're Joan of Arc: Charismatic, blessed by a higher power...but a leeettle crazy. You hear Voices and they tell you to slay evil, and you have to decide how objective they really are. It makes playing a Paladin, even a traditional knightly type, much more...flexable. It gives you more of a role than, "Walking Charisma bonus and face-kicker."

I didn't get ex-Paladined for listening to the old woman's argument about necromancy, for example, which some DMs would do under "associating with evil", especially back in the day when Paladin was purposfully tougher than fighter because you had to luck out and get a 17 charisma to even get a shot at it.

Plus, Tomas's personal arc is basicly coming to terms with the fact that a crazy god no one's ever heard of picked him to be its chosen champion of goodness. So his Paladinity being not very obvious is a good thing.

[Kaitou Kage]

The ghost fight was odd. From one standpoint, the "Ok, holding actions...attack! Touch Attack!" nature was aggravating. On the other hand though, how the scenes were described were beautiful.

I can agree here. The scene played out well, but I like that the first combat of the game had much more direct player involvement. This one, we kind of had to post what we wanted to do, but couldn't actually do it ourselves. The reactive role isn't as fun or exciting for me.

Don't get me wrong, I understand and appreciate -why- you did it. But I think that combat in a PbP works better when the players don't have to rely on held actions and can actually follow through with their actions themselves.

[Nathan of the FoS]

Haw! Triple cross-post, unless I miss my guess. Surely some of this impassioned rhetoric will stick!

[Kaitou Kage]

Probably not with the priest or burgomeister unless we can break their enchantments :/ I'm pretty sure there's a suggestion or three at work.

[Nathan of the FoS]

Well, if we can get the crowd confused (or even on our side! Hooray Otto!) at least they'll refrain from setting on us and ripping us to pieces while we do our best to un-enchant the judges. I figure that's a bonus.

[DocBeard]

Man, where's dispel magic when you need it.

[steveflam]

Or a remove blindness?

[The Whistler]

D'aww.

Otto likes orating.

And y'know what's better than one oration? Three orations. Yay teamwork!

[NeoTiamat]

Things are moving fast.

There's a map of the square in the Cast thread, and the way it looks there's a circle adjacent to platform with Julisca, Sandeluscu and company, and a crowd about thirty feet thick all around it. It takes two movement to get through a square of crowd, and you guys are either on the inside or the outside of the circle.

I can answer specific questions as they come up.

[The Whistler]

Dang--my new entangle spell-like ability only works for everyone in a 40-foot radius, and I *really* don't want to shoot into a crowd....Anyone else have any ideas?

[NeoTiamat]

You know, it seems that extreme stress and danger brings out the best in your posting. I'll just tabulate all the bonus XP when I get the chance, else I'll be bouncing back and forth all day.