The Unseen Servant forums

Fuma and Jinsei crouch atop the northern part of the eastern wall, silently listening and occasionally swiftly observing with quick sidelong glances. The frenetic dog begins running south and disappears. A cloud dumps a new sheet of heavy, drenching raindrops, and the re-appears. It's close to it's initial position, but on the ground and to the east. It barks furiously in the dark and through the rain toward Fuma's spot on the tiles of the wall. Fuma decides on taking the role of the nakama's Rabbit. He waits for the alerted guards to approach before springing away.

Long ago, Hari*-sensei had said, "Rabbit. The best at silently watching and listening** and ninjutsu. Special responsibility: Silent offensive spying and listening. And drawing attention and fleeing to lead enemies away from the nakama."


Does Fuma go inside or outside of the walls?

*Needle
**Perception of Hidden Things

Fuma

Once spotted, he goes outside the walls.

Jinsei takes the role of the Rooster for this section of the nakama and gives Fuma the kuji-kuri hand sign for "abort, terminate the action." It's the side of the hand hitting the side of the neck like a sword blade, but much subtly, with just a tiny soft motion. The two ninja drop to the puddled ground outside of the wall. Kaida's voice is heard saying something to the southwest, inside the compound. It can't be made out, through the rain and the hardened clay of the roofed walls.

If you want to do that silently, we need ninjutsu rolls. Or you can do it normally, or even intentionally noisily. Then we need your next actions. Do you run, walk, ninjutsu creep, or just stay still? If moving, in which direction, or where to? Kaida is of course inside the compound, not far from the south wall's gate. Minoru was last seen there as well, at the time when the nakama split up.

Jinsei tried to creep away north into the rainy night.

Ninjatsu [1d20]=3, [1d100]=59
Not sure if I roll a d20 or 100.
Skill Score of 47 and BCS 10
Not sure of modifiers. Ninja shoes, rain, being far away on the other side of a wall?

Fuma

Will try to be sneaky.

Sneak away [1d20]=13 [1d100]=9

Base Chance of Success (BCS) rolls are 1d20. You want to roll under your BCS score. A 1 is also a success, even if you don't have the skill you're rolling on. If you do have the skill, it's a Critical Success. A 20 is a Critical Failure.

Jinsei and Fuma silently slip from the wall to the muddy ground outside it. The dog continues barking at the night, to its northeast. A rough male voice near it says, What does this dog hear? Another answers, Probably just a rat or an alley cat. But let's check it out.

The barking and voices are around 30 yards to the southeast, on the other side of the wall, inside the villa.

Fuma

Fuma looks for a god place to hide, preferable a 100 yards or so from the Villa.

Jinsei, hiding with Fuma well away from the compound, confered in the dark rain: “Let’s regroup with the others and try again tomorrow.”

“Kaida may be in there for tonight. Let’s move around to where Midoru was.”

Fuma

Whispering, "We should pause for a minute or two to let the dog settle down first, then move."

Minoru and Fuma crouch in the lane outside the wall, breathing low, calm, quiet breathes. The dog on the other side gives an occasional suspicious bark. The two guards can be heard walking a few yards, then stopping. One says, Nothing. Should we report to the mistress? The voice of the young man who had called out the alert says, No, she won't want more wet bodies on her veranda. Including mine. One set of steps can be heard trotting toward the house, then walking west upon open air floorboards Two others walk south, their steps briefly crunching on gravel, possibly as the cross the pathway to the gate to the east, where the brush is piled and the cart had been earlier today. The has stopped barking.

Kaida's voice isn't heard, since she announced she was running to the house. But from the behavior of the dog and the young man who is obviously a servant, it seems that she may have gained entry. At least voice of the young man hasn't addressed her again, and isn't heard to escort her out of the compound.

Fuma

Fuma will remain in ninja garb and try to remain unseen. Figuring a fisherman out this late is going to get him in trouble anyways so this is the least likely way to be spotted.

Ninja [1d100]=28 [1d20]=17

Under cover of darkness and rain, Jinsei and Fuma crept silently along the outside wall toward the last known position of Minora. They paused periodically at points of cover, listening, looking, moving again when conditions were right.

At the road which the main entrance was, Jinsei peered around the corner to see if Minora was there. If not, he waited and observed until his fellow ninja showed up. If after midnight he did not, Jinsei returned to the temple shrine park as that was their meeting place.

A light but steady rain continues. The Moon rises over the rooftops and provides the light of a dim glow behind the solid roof of clouds. Jinsei and Fuma move silently back to the place where they'd separated from Minoru and Jinsei, in the street before the merchant's villa. Minoru on his wall across the street observed the incident with the dog, servant, and guards. He's been watching left, right and center for his nakama mates. But mainly toward the villa's wall's southeast corner, because that's the way Fuma and Jinsei had gone. He sees them return to the street the same way. He silently drops from the wall to reveal himself to them. The nakama-- minus Kaida-- reunites. One ninja saw her enter the mansion, and the others heard the dialogue about that. But that is the last anyone has seen or heard of her.

You can try to communicate with each other hereusing the kuji-kuri sign language, but your BCSes are probably pretty low. The one char sheet I checked had a BCS of 8. The skill is probably Wit-based, so few ninja class characters probably have good scores in it. BCS rolls are only needed if you want to discuss something in some detail.
If it's just a simple gesture like pointing to a direction to go and mouthing, "Let's go," no roll is needed.

You could also discuss in low voices. That may or may not set the dog off again. But this is a city street that has traffic every day, and you're outside of the yard's walls. It doesn't seem that mere speaking on the street would set a city dog off. But, of course, you don't know if someone behind another mansion's wall might hear. You do know that it's a rainy night, and the people of Nippon don't like to be out in the rain. (Which is kind of odd, considering that it's such a rainy country).*

Finally, there's the option of just using hensu-jutsu to speak, in the role of your disguise, in regular speech. You might have to speak indirectly with hints, rather than plainly.

All of the characters know that Kaida went into the house around a half hour ago. They don't know what has happened with her since. All does seem peaceful and quiet in the house and the yard, though. If she's been detected, bound and gagged, or assailed by a demon, or fallen into a pit-- there have been no shouts, screams, or sounds of scuffling.
And the guards haven't made any further sounds. On the other hand, Nippon is a land of magic and magical spells, as well as a rather violent land of the mundane.

*This is true about modern Japan.

The black-clad ninja Jinsei silently motioned for Minoru and Fuma to move back between estate walls to elude any onlookers who may come down the road.

There, using the clan kuji-kuri sign language, Jinsei suggested they return to the shrine park to wait, rest and talk. Before leaving, Jinsei changed out of his ninja garb and into the fisherman clothes. He looked at Fuma, implying he too change.