OOC Discussion

[Marullus]

"Only two of us are fighters," he thinks. "Ha and I must do our best and not make any mistakes in combat. Not even a little one."

...I wish that was audible so Souta could take offense.

At least Eiji (the gravedigger Eta) is used to carrying bodies!

[jemmus]

How did I forget about Souta? Fixing the post.
That's true, Eiji is a pro at carrying bodies!

[Samwell Turleton]

I interpreted it as your character's internal judgment on Souta for being cut down quickly by the three bakemono-sho. I am glad you pointed that out to get a clarification!

[jemmus]

Me too! Toshizo's not that kind of judgmental jerk. I just sometimes get confused about who's who in the two games. Especially Eiji and Taisho (who's a gakusho in the other game) and also played by ffilz.

[ffilz]

I forget if you mentioned which VTT you are using for battle maps (or how you're doing them). Any thought to actually having us all log into the VTT so we can see the map and zoom in/out? We could also mark our movements. Just some random thoughts that came to mind...

[Marullus]

I am using Roll20. I'd rather not invite everyone in, as I'm using cropping to control what parts of the map are revealed. It does have dynamic lighting features that could allow you to only see what is within your character's actual view - but I I'd have to do a lot more coding and also lock down your tokens to unmoveable to make that work and its not worthwhile.

[ffilz]

I am using Roll20. I'd rather not invite everyone in, as I'm using cropping to control what parts of the map are revealed. It does have dynamic lighting features that could allow you to only see what is within your character's actual view - but I I'd have to do a lot more coding and also lock down your tokens to unmoveable to make that work and its not worthwhile.

Ok yea cropping is easy. You could do fog of war. That’s what I use for my Roll20 games it’s not too much work.

[jemmus]

Sorry for my kind of disjointed posting lately. A co-worker quit with short notice and a lot of work piled up while we were finding a replacement. I'm doing OJT with the replacement, and she's not picking up on things very quickly. Hopefully things will normalize and I can get my head back in the game before long.

[Marullus]

Hey man, we are a week from Christmas and the world is crazy.

[Marullus]

My new favorite word:

FB_IMG_1640032756164.jpg (32.3 KiB) Viewed 619 times

[jemmus]

That word literally has the words for "mouth" and "lonely."

[Marullus]

Wow... that was an emotional roller coaster to write! I promised myself I wouldn't pull the punches but try to faithfully execute Bushido rules. I'm glad (almost) everyone is still alive...

But I am checking out the Karma rules anyway. You know, for next round.

[jemmus]

Yeah, no pulling punches in Bushido! That would be heresy against the OSR gods!

[ffilz]

Absolutely. I think we’ll be making new PCs with some karma…

[jemmus]

I thought about sharing something I just learned about the karma rules. But I don't want to be a pessimist.

[Marullus]

Well... that was hard to write!

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In Nippon, it is believed that the dead will be reborn unless they die
with an overwhelming desire to perform some action in this life or if
their burial rites are not performed properly (the Segaki ritual of
Buddhism). Individuals who fall into these latter categories will
return as some form of ghost. The Gamesmaster may wish to have
Player Characters who fit the description do likewise.

You are not going to be properly buried, or get Segaki rituals.

So, does anyone have a overwhelming desire to perform some action in this life that their character would become a ghost instead of reincarnating? I'm happy to work that into a continuing story.

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However, in
the main when a Player Character dies permanently, then it will be
necessary to calculate his Karma.
The Player Character's Karma score at the time of his death will
influence initial Attributes of his next character of the same
Profession, and may also be used to modify the determination of the
Birth Caste. It is calculated as follows:
Per point of Ki +1
Died in combat +1
Committed Seppuku to preserve Honor +5
Committed Seppuku to restore lost Honor +1
For every full 100 points of On +1
Died for noble cause (eg. to save Lord's life) +1 to 5
Bad karma: Each factor on this list loses Karma at the rate shown.
Shameful Death (Execution)
Commit Seppuku for bad reasons
Die with Level reduced due to loss of On
Die with On lower than 0
-1D3
-1
-5 and do not
count On for
Good Karma
-1 per 10 points
The player will apply the Karma for a dead character to the next
Player Character he designs of the same Profession as the deceased
character. He may do so in one of two ways:
* Initial Attribute Increase. The player may add the Karma to the 60
points allocated for Initial Attributes. Thus, a player loses a Bushi
who had 4 points of Karma at the time of his death. For the next Bushi
Player Character he designs, the player will have 64 points to
allocate among the initial Attributes.
* Birth Caste. The player may instead opt to add or subtract his
available Karma/5 to the die roll for Birth Caste on his next Player
Character of the appropriate Profession. Gamesmasters are warned
that this can lead to a preponderance of Samurai in service or Ninja
in the campaign, and he may not wish to allow it.

Each person that died can make a new character of the same class with +5 Attribute Points for their Karma. (That's my decision, keep it simple.) You mostly had a Ki point, died in battle, and I'm liberally applying "for a good cause" as it was a very honorable death fulfilling your Dharma against an overwhelming threat.

Technically Taka isn't dead. She is still viable as a character (with some more interesting bonds at the moment), and if you'd like to resume playing her, we can work out a few details in the [003a] thread and she can re-enter the story at the same time as the others do. Otherwise, she becomes an NPC and I'll allow you to roll a new Shugenja with 5 Karma anyway.

Decision Point: Now that we have reached this point.... do you want to play again? Do you WANT to re-roll and go on, or is this game complete? I'd like everyone to weigh in, please. It's better not to assume.

For my part, I'm okay to keep running, but fine if we end, too. I have the prep done for the adventures here in Hida Province and we've done a lot of good work putting these rules through their paces. Your new character can either start at the War Camp (as the next group hired to recover this treasure and find out what happened to the last group) or back in the City if you want to pursue a totally different story route instead of getting back onto the same path. (It is odd to me, this idea of reincarnating as the same classes and continuing... but that's OSR gaming for you. )

[jemmus]

Decision Point: Now that we have reached this point.... do you want to play again? Do you WANT to re-roll and go on, or is this game complete? I'd like everyone to weigh in, please. It's better not to assume.

For my part, I'm okay to keep running, but fine if we end, too. I have the prep done for the adventures here in Hida Province and we've done a lot of good work putting these rules through their paces. Your new character can either start at the War Camp (as the next group hired to recover this treasure and find out what happened to the last group) or back in the City if you want to pursue a totally different story route instead of getting back onto the same path. (It is odd to me, this idea of reincarnating as the same classes and continuing... but that's OSR gaming for you. )

One vote for continuing! And one vote for GM's call how to handle what happens next.

Among reincarnation theorists, there's a belief that more advanced human souls reincarnate as different people at the same time. The idea is that the life on Earth in a body is further intense experience and training toward the wisdom and perfecting of eternal soul. For example, Custer and Crazy Horse were reincarnations of the same soul. The soul had had many incarnations as a superior warrior and leader of warriors. With Custer, the soul manifested as a general with lust for fame and eventual political power. With Crazy Horse, as a quiet but brilliant warrior with shamanistic/spiritual inclinations. That one wiped out the other one at Little Big Horn. On the other hand, Custer had a loving marriage, which Crazy Horse never managed. Custer died with his command and his people, but Crazy Horse died bayoneted by own of his own people, serving Custer's victors people. So from those experiences, the soul reincarnated into two people who made different decisions and mistakes along the way learns.

(BTW, that analysis was just based on somebody saying "I found out I was Crazy Horse and Custer." I knew enough from reading about both of them before and later that the theory made sense.

Anyway, this is OSR. We don't know why it didn't take 16+ years for just-kilt PCs to grow up and be ready on the scene. Just like we don't fully understand how shugendo and the world of ghosts and ghasts work. This is OSR. Nobody knows how the things beyond comprehension really fit together.

[ffilz]

I'm game to continue, and would like to continue exploring a Buddhist Gakusho, but I'm not sure I'm keen on picking up where the previous PCs perished. I'd like to understand better how a Gakusho can contribute ti adventure success because they certainly don't have much to contribute in combat (too bad Eiji failed the Karma Yoga trance... Prophesy would have been quite a boon...).

Hmm, did anyone forget to use their blessing? I don't recall how many Eiji actually succeeded with...

[jmacatty]

I'm happy to do whatever everyone else agrees to with one caveat: I'm having a hard time seeing how a group comprised as we are can handle that hag. Perhaps we made very poor tactical decisions, which killed us, but I still have concerns.

[Marullus]

I mean... you're not wrong! This is designed as the Level 1 adventure, but it has been much harder than I expected it to be as well. As far as fighting goes, the Dai-Bakemono is clearly the muscle. The witch has some more advanced tricks, but she's like a shugenja not a bushi.

Lessons I learned from watching you guys tackle this -

• Divide their forces, not yours. When you attacked the house, you split up your party and engaged every NPC at the same time and almost all of you died. When you went into the cave, you allowed an alarm to be sounded and then again set yourselves to face everyone simultaneously. Being outnumbered is a big advantage with this ruleset and you need to find ways to use it to your own purposes. Making a bottle neck was good, but making it wide enough for all three of you to be in the front line was a detriment (because they still then outnumbered you and could do so) - it makes a good argument for a front row with medium weapons and a back row with long weapons.
• Once you outnumber them, getting flanking facing and rear facing is critical for quicker success. The +5 or +10 BCS is too huge to ignore.
• Tripping people is fantastic, but few weapons do it. Getting people prone or hindered really helps (Katsumi the Ninja showed this well.) Getting up from prone is REALLY hard (ask Toshizo, he died both times because of it.)
• The NPCs have as good or better BCS and initiative than you could achieve as starting characters... I don't really see how to fix that, but with +5 Karma you'll be a little better. Remember that the difference between a mook and a regular foe (like the officers vs the bandits) is in hit points only - they still have the same chance to hit and damage you, so them outnumbering you is equally deadly. The armored bakemono-sho were equal foes and you were slightly better than than the wakizashi -sho, but they outnumbered you three to one. You really needed to manufacture some additional advantages or tackle them in smaller groups and not all at once.
• Using social norms to your advantage could help... like Taka getting into a duel with the Dai-Bakemono. Goading him into that (magical or physical) allows you to fight him by himself instead of with his mooks, which is a way to divide their forces as well as gain the On. I think this kind of "honorable challenge" can be used in more situations. Your Gakusho and Shugenja are also pretty formidable in social challenges - using that to your advantage instead of getting into physical fights is potentially viable. There's a broad range of "you get what you want with a price" options so you seldom get a total win without combat, but good stories can result from such compromises.
• Crits are random but hugely deterministic. So much. Pure luck being such a driver is not fixable in the system.
• I feel like we underutilized the other special moves. Most of the swords can do a Thrust attack, which has a small chance to push them back and rob them of their next action. I don't know if it is worth it in the balance, but we haven't really tested these aspects.
• I can't find the rule right now about -1 BCS for each adjacent ally. I think I underapplied it: I didn't use it in that final fight because I was considering you guys first (three abreast) and wanted you to have a better chance, but it might have been more consequential if I applied it to the crowded horde of goblins facing you. Not enough to sway the battle, because it was really the fact that you all caught fire until you burned alive in your armor that did you in.
• It's completely justified for the Japanese to have a healthy fear of fire. That was F***ing brutal.