Dice Wedding Bells - Exalted 3e OOC thread

[WlfSamurai]

The DV of the pirates is a 3, and they have 5 soak. Go ahead and roll your dice.

Rolled!

 

[WlfSamurai]

Could I try to take an action and demand their surrender? Not sure which social influence roll that would be off the top of my head.

 

[Random Word]

You can Intimidate with any social pool you can narratively justify to the ST. Typically it's Presence + Charisma.

 

[WlfSamurai]

Yeah, true. I was thinking of the specific social influence mechanical actions.

 

[WlfSamurai]

A bump for WlfSamurai

Thanks for the reminder.

 

[Sherwood]

Everyone gets another 2 regular xp and 2 Dragon xp for the overwhelming win and capturing the other ship.

 

[jaydude]

Going to go ahead and retroactively give Kasumi a new Major Principle: "Propriety is everything". I came up with the idea while working on my post, and figured it would dovetail nicely with Melati's behaviour here (as a form of contrast), as well as my own character concept.

 

[Random Word]

Ugh, WlfSamurai , Enathia's not going to get the romantic comedy of errors she dreams of like that. Don't let me tell you how to play her, but there's nothing there to react to! Your crush gets her first exposure to the horrors of war and turns from a gregarious socialite to an introverted alcoholic mess for a few days, and then she suddenly lights up for the first pretty stranger to come aboard, and your response is to stuff your feelings deep down in a hole and greet the stranger politely? That is arguably very Cathak and a very good character trait in an officer of the Realm, but there's no drama there.

I expected Kasumi, patroness of propriety, to be at least a little bit judgey or concerned at how far off the rails Melati has clearly gone, but I do appreciate how supportive she is of the 'flings with strangers' approach to drowning your feelings.

This PTSD isn't going to fix itself, and Melati can't be humorously oblivious to Enathia's feelings if there's nothing to be oblivious about.

 

[jaydude]

Ugh, WlfSamurai , Enathia's not going to get the romantic comedy of errors she dreams of like that. Don't let me tell you how to play her, but there's nothing there to react to! Your crush gets her first exposure to the horrors of war and turns from a gregarious socialite to an introverted alcoholic mess for a few days, and then she suddenly lights up for the first pretty stranger to come aboard, and your response is to stuff your feelings deep down in a hole and greet the stranger politely? That is arguably very Cathak and a very good character trait in an officer of the Realm, but there's no drama there.

I expected Kasumi, patroness of propriety, to be at least a little bit judgey or concerned at how far off the rails Melati has clearly gone, but I do appreciate how supportive she is of the 'flings with strangers' approach to drowning your feelings.

This PTSD isn't going to fix itself, and Melati can't be humorously oblivious to Enathia's feelings if there's nothing to be oblivious about.

If I knew you were aiming to create drama, I might have had Kasumi respond differently.

As it stands now though, Dynasts having affairs outside of wedlock is hardly a new thing in Realm society, and Kasumi's not exactly one to talk in that particular regard, given how she was sleeping with her swordsmanship teacher for years. Plus, extramarital affairs are really only disapproved of when the principals have a chance of squandering their potency; were Melati to try and sleep with someone she could impregnate or be impregnated by, Kasumi would most likely disapprove.

 

[WlfSamurai]

Ugh, WlfSamurai , Enathia's not going to get the romantic comedy of errors she dreams of like that. Don't let me tell you how to play her, but there's nothing there to react to! Your crush gets her first exposure to the horrors of war and turns from a gregarious socialite to an introverted alcoholic mess for a few days, and then she suddenly lights up for the first pretty stranger to come aboard, and your response is to stuff your feelings deep down in a hole and greet the stranger politely? That is arguably very Cathak and a very good character trait in an officer of the Realm, but there's no drama there.

I expected Kasumi, patroness of propriety, to be at least a little bit judgey or concerned at how far off the rails Melati has clearly gone, but I do appreciate how supportive she is of the 'flings with strangers' approach to drowning your feelings.

This PTSD isn't going to fix itself, and Melati can't be humorously oblivious to Enathia's feelings if there's nothing to be oblivious about.

Yeah, I was still in the "explore internally and see player response" mode. But, I'm happy to create drama. Namely, I'd love to have Enathia come to Melati, acknowledge what's happening (she's been through it), and try to talk to her. I'd see it as noticing Melati in pain, putting her feelings aside, and trying to work with her to get out of that PTSD rut.

As a real person WITHOUT PTSD, I'd have no idea what that "working" with her would look like. Might have to hand-wave that bit.

But, it'd be cool if a really strong relationship grew out of that—with it be platonic/sisterly or as lovers.

 

[Sherwood]

I'll have an IC post up in a bit. Just need to run a few errands first.

 

[Random Word]

If I knew you were aiming to create drama, I might have had Kasumi respond differently.

Not specifically! Drama is one flavour of reaction. When Rykon exposed me to Chuubo's Marvelous Wish Granting Engine I learned a lot about games from Jenna Moran's fascinating design, and one of her main ethos was that in a roleplaying game if your character does something, feels something, etc and no one emotes in response - the world or the other players don't react - that lessens it somehow. In that game the shared pot gets bonus XP if someone reacts to something you do. I thought that was brilliant and insightful. If a character goes through a change and no one notices, did it really happen? So when Enathia pushed her feelings down, I couldn't really react to that character moment, and I felt like that was worth highlighting in case WlfSamurai would have enjoyed it if I had.

Dynasts having affairs outside of wedlock is hardly a new thing in Realm society

Right, right, I didn't think she'd be upset about a trifling little thing like an affair - it isn't even an affair, since Melati isn't married - but being drunk and disorderly while on duty (protecting Arissa and now making first impressions on a new tributary) isn't exactly the height of propriety.

As a real person WITHOUT PTSD, I'd have no idea what that "working" with her would look like. Might have to hand-wave that bit.

That's very fair, but

(she's been through it)

Exactly. As a character, Enathia has likely been to war. In their first battle every soldier has to learn how to survive first exposure to the horrors of war (and the House of Bells does its best to inoculate you against the reality), and then in subsequent battles as an officer how to identify when your green troops are about to break from first exposure and keep them fighting on. Soldiers don't tend to learn healthy coping mechanisms, especially not in this era - drinking the nightmares away is probably a well respected Legion tradition at this point - but officers do learn how to motivate people to carry on and remain functional. You can't have half your unit drunk all day. So basically whatever approach you make up is the right one, because Enathia's not only been trained for this, but done it in the field and (presumably) it worked.

 

[jaydude]

Right, right, I didn't think she'd be upset about a trifling little thing like an affair - it isn't even an affair, since Melati isn't married - but being drunk and disorderly while on duty (protecting Arissa and now making first impressions on a new tributary) isn't exactly the height of propriety.

Fair enough. I might edit my post to reflect that.

 

[WlfSamurai]

Not specifically! Drama is one flavour of reaction. When Rykon exposed me to Chuubo's Marvelous Wish Granting Engine I learned a lot about games from Jenna Moran's fascinating design, and one of her main ethos was that in a roleplaying game if your character does something, feels something, etc and no one emotes in response - the world or the other players don't react - that lessens it somehow. In that game the shared pot gets bonus XP if someone reacts to something you do. I thought that was brilliant and insightful. If a character goes through a change and no one notices, did it really happen? So when Enathia pushed her feelings down, I couldn't really react to that character moment, and I felt like that was worth highlighting in case WlfSamurai would have enjoyed it if I had.


Right, right, I didn't think she'd be upset about a trifling little thing like an affair - it isn't even an affair, since Melati isn't married - but being drunk and disorderly while on duty (protecting Arissa and now making first impressions on a new tributary) isn't exactly the height of propriety.


That's very fair, but

Exactly. As a character, Enathia has likely been to war. In their first battle every soldier has to learn how to survive first exposure to the horrors of war (and the House of Bells does its best to inoculate you against the reality), and then in subsequent battles as an officer how to identify when your green troops are about to break from first exposure and keep them fighting on. Soldiers don't tend to learn healthy coping mechanisms, especially not in this era - drinking the nightmares away is probably a well respected Legion tradition at this point - but officers do learn how to motivate people to carry on and remain functional. You can't have half your unit drunk all day. So basically whatever approach you make up is the right one, because Enathia's not only been trained for this, but done it in the field and (presumably) it worked.

I've always heard about the mantra of always pushing the story forward with your character posts in PbP. The idea being that you give internal reflection of what others are doing and offer something for them to latch on to/react to in your post. Is that what you're referring to? Are those places to read about doing that or how to?

I've just never really been able to put it into practice, really.

 

[Random Word]

That sounds like sound advice, but though I'm sure it could be done Chuubo's is definitely not designed for Play by Post. The mechanic in question is not about progressing the story, so much as making things narratively real, I think. Jenna is arguing that It's just generally less satisfying if a character moment goes completely unacknowledged, so she built a mechanic that actively rewards play that generates reactions, and the act of reacting itself.

To some extent it might be easier in PbP, since time is fuzzy wuzzy and you can backfill as many reactions as you please.

What's prevented you from putting that advice into practice?

 

[WlfSamurai]

Mostly, I don't know how/am not very good at it. I'm way better/enjoy more finding who my character is by playing through/reacting to situations. And it's a lot of work for me to make up emotional states for my characters if there isn't a strong situation to cause it. Mostly because—overshare—I myself am not a very emotional person. So, living in my character's head emotionally takes a ton of work mentally.

And, at the real table, it's not how I play or what I aim for, usually. And since PbP is a means to an end of getting to play TTRPGs because life doesn't really fit table/online play...

Etc., etc.

Always willing to learn or open to suggestions. Always looking to improve play.

 

[Random Word]

Hmm, yes, writing people very different from you, and different from the people you know well, is indeed extremely tricky. There's absolutely nothing wrong with playing a low affect character, though. I wasn't talking about the internal state of the character's mind so much as the outward expression of their behaviour - that's the bit others will react to. Modeling internal state can be really helpful for achieving depth, but you don't need to model an alien mind if you can model the behaviour. Sometimes it helps to imagine how someone you know would behave in a similar situation.

Anyway, it sounds like all of this is a tangent. You're aiming for what's fun for you, and you should continue to do that. All I meant to say was, 'It's a lot easier for other players to react to things your character does than thoughts inside their head, so if you want others to react, act out' - although some characters are supernaturally socially perceptive, and you could give them permission to effectively be able to read your mind, in which case it's a moot point.

 

[WlfSamurai]

Hmm, yes, writing people very different from you, and different from the people you know well, is indeed extremely tricky. There's absolutely nothing wrong with playing a low affect character, though. I wasn't talking about the internal state of the character's mind so much as the outward expression of their behaviour - that's the bit others will react to. Modeling internal state can be really helpful for achieving depth, but you don't need to model an alien mind if you can model the behaviour. Sometimes it helps to imagine how someone you know would behave in a similar situation.

Anyway, it sounds like all of this is a tangent. You're aiming for what's fun for you, and you should continue to do that. All I meant to say was, 'It's a lot easier for other players to react to things your character does than thoughts inside their head, so if you want others to react, act out' - although some characters are supernaturally socially perceptive, and you could give them permission to effectively be able to read your mind, in which case it's a moot point.

Yep. Working her up to engaging Melati. I think she'll pull Melati aside when we're "exiting" the scene and ask her what's going on.

 

[jaydude]

Yep. Working her up to engaging Melati. I think she'll pull Melati aside when we're "exiting" the scene and ask here what's going on.

Mind if I join that scene?

 

[WlfSamurai]

Mind if I join that scene?

Not at all. That'd be an added bonus.

 

[Sherwood]

I am loving the conversation here.

Is there anything I can do to help facilitate that?

 

[Sherwood]

I was well into a post when I saw that Random Word beat me to the punch and posted ahead of me. I had to redo most of what I had typed up. Ah, well. Such is life. lol

 

[Random Word]

Sorry Also poor Captain Dax. She does not deserve the abuse heaped on her by drunk, sleep deprived, and jilted Melati.

 

[Sherwood]

Still, it is a good post, right along with Melati's personality right now.

 

[Sherwood]

Here is an early Christmas present of 6 xp and 6 Dragon xp.