Pathfinder - Ancient Rome (With Magic)

[jodokast]

Okay this is the OOC thread. Keldrath has sent me.

Some things:
1) Could you please put a link to your character sheets here (I think most of you are using mythweavers which is great).
2) You all either need some connection to the roman centurion in Eboracumhas Paulus Muncius, or a very strong connection with someone who does (another PC is the only option I can see but I'll take other suggestions). Its up to the players if you want to trust each other before the campaign begins or not, I'm happy either way.
3) I will be tracking your subterfuge across the campaign. You are going to have an imperial warrant, but the centurion wants to handle things quietly. Depending on who hears of your exploits will affect where the plot goes. If you want to wave your imperial warrent, kick ass, take prisoners, great, but people may hear about it.
4) Given the presence of an Inquisitor I'm tweaking a few things, mostly - the practice of the celtic druidic faith is going to be outlawed. (You have a gaulish druid, its totally different).
5) As a DM I'm happy for players back stories to be filled in as we progress. This will have a strong urban focus, so short vinaigrettes as to connections you may have can be created as we move along. What do I mean by this - lets say you find a clue, a dead body. You want to conduct an autopsy but ain't nobody with skills worth a damn in Heal so you need an NPC. If one of you can come up with a short compelling reason to be friends with the surgeon at the roman encampment this is good. A really good reason will even yield further information.
6) Also remember the campaign house rules:
All character classes will receive 2 extra skill points per level. There is nothing worse than not being able to help for the next session because its all talky talky and your fighter has nothing that helps there. Also Intimidate is by default a CON based skill (as opposed to CHA).

I look forward to gaming with you all. An IC post will go up once I have your connections and sheets.

[Keledrath]

Kemes will speak in Fire Brick

Oh, I missed the intimidate thing. Can it work off of either? I see Kemes as being quite scary, but he has a Con of 8 as opposed to his 18 Cha.

I'll have backstory done by tomorrow night, and be plotting it at work tomorrow.

[whoiam]

Copied over from the recruitment thread:

So, here is Auðr, an Ancient Guardian (Druid Variant) and royalty of the Tribocci.

Spoiler: Basics of the tribe

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With the slow waning of Roman power on the east bank of the Rhine, the Roman empire was left commanding the loyalty of only those few tribes (such as the Tribocci and the Nemetes) that had managed to settle on the west bank of the Rhine.

The Tribocci had actually reached the west bank of the Rhine around the same time Julius Caesar did. They were (briefly) part of a Germannic army attempting to conquer the would-be province. Sadly for them, they were no real match for Caesar. Most of their allies retreated back across the river after their defeat, but the Tribocci settled in what would become Gaul as the odd tribe out in an otherwise Gallic province.

At the present day (about 2 centuries after Caesar conquered them), the Tribocci are much like any other conquered people. The upper levels of their nobility were full Roman Citizens as well as rulers of their own lands, and the rest of the tribe could
gain this citizenship also through service in certain municipal posts (most of which were in the Auxillia).

Spoiler: Backstory

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Like most of the Empire's client rulers, Auðr had a dual education. As a small child she'd been raised by her own people, before being sent to her father's town-house in Rome proper to complete her education. She had been betrothed to a Roman Politician, as a political marriage to improve her father's standing in the Empire.

What Auðr thought of the idea is best expressed by the fact that she was not seen inside the Empire's borders for another three years. And when she did pass back into Roman territory, it was in the province of Britannia. As well as anyone could work out, she had spent the intervening time travelling North through the former provinces of Germannia, before taking a boat into the Gaelic lands and walking south from there.

While she generally glosses over the details of her time outside the empire, Auðr has admitted to relying on the co-operation of the local Druids to ensure her safe passage through most of the lands she'd crossed.

Once back in Roman lands (which happened in AD 130), Auðr signed on with the Legio VI Victrix as a scribe. She was particularly prized as an interpreter - she had a certain flair for diplomacy, and was known to speak the tongues of the Romans, Greeks, Germans, Gauls, Gaels and Celts. As a Scriba, Auðr was entitled to serve one year of every three in Rome itself. Instead, she took up the offer to assist the century in Eboracumhas in their work on Hadrian's wall.

Again, she tends to be tight-lipped about her reasons for turning down the (very lucrative) year in Rome, but the whispers in the barracks are that she's afraid a very annoyed fiancée may be waiting for her in the capitol...

Note: It's probably not that important a distinction to make, but Auðr serves directly with Legio VI Victrix itself, not its Auxillia. She is a full Roman Citizen in her own right (which is about the only reason she can get away with being a practising Druid...) Unlike most of the other party members, she's employed by the Legion full-time, instead of having signed on as a mercenary for just this mission.

Audr (no, I'm not going to insist that everyone use the special 'd') will speak in Dark Green, as befits a Druid.

And to answer point 2, as per the backstory, Audr is a scribe attached to the legion, and knows the centurion at Eboracumhas because she's currently assigned to his Century.

[driftwood]

Amelia Prisca comes bearing a letter of commendation from the College of Vestals. It is awkwardly phrased, full of left-handed (sinister) compliments, and damns with faint praise. However, Muncius comes away with the sense that she is genuinely devoted to Rome ... and that he would rather see that devotion executed on the other side of the Wall. Her official reason is to strengthen Imperial religion, culture, and morality in this outpost of the Res Publica, although it's not really clear what that would mean ... is she supposed to recruit dwarves to be Vestal Virgins? An alternate potential plot hook is that her witch's order, which descends from the Cumaean Sibyl, believes a copy of a lost fragment of sibylline text may be beyond the wall, and she is to recover it.

Amelia will speak in Dark Gray - she is a dour person, skeptical and cynical, given to tsking over the fallen state of the world.

I have filled in the various parts of her character sheet to the best of my knowledge.

[Hypername]

http://www.myth-weavers.com/sheet.html#id=205718 Here is Marcus Flavius Tiberillus and his backstory and why he's on a mission is in the character sheet.
I'm talking in Red The colour of the Imperial Legions.

[jodokast]

One quick point - the emperor doesn't yet know the architect is missing, and the centurion would very much like to keep it that way. By all means you can be assigned to the legion as part of a great honor, but at this stage the emperor believes all is well and the reason the centurion is looking at using a team that isn't completely a military one is he wants to keep it that way. (Hey I've got to have some reason why the quest giver just can't use his army to do his dirty work )

[jodokast]

Also thanks to Keldrath we have a running google sheet https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets...it?usp=sharing

I've inserted the roman calendar, and the first IC post should go up tomorrow.

I'll be using the map for combat, and its got quite a good number of journal features that I'm fairly impressed with.

[jodokast]

Here is the IC thread

For posting I will be ensuring I have the time to do a comprehensive post (if needed) in the evenings (I'm at -12GMT) and can update intermittently across the day (sometimes)

[driftwood]

Not that it matters, but I misread the original post with Muncius having goblets and serving himself as meaning he was obnoxiously only serving wine to himself, not that he himself was serving the wine because he didn't want any slaves or servants listening. Oops. But Amelia would have found some other reason to be offended, so six of one, half dozen of the other.

[Keledrath]

Alright, I am ready finally. Work combined with needing to plan for my Roll20 session last night ended up delaying me somewhat.

As a note, GM approved, I have a zombie. I am calling it a mummy, and fluffwise, it looks like a mummy. A really, really crappy mummy.

EDIT: Also, Egyptian, not oriental

[jodokast]

@ Driftwood. It's all good. I don't expect any player to have certain reactions towards NPCs. If you all want to be a mutinous bunch of agents that's absolutely fine.

Likewise nobody actually has to like each other as PCs. I'd really prefer you not to come to blows, but distention, bickering, and dislike are all perfectly acceptable. (as are honestly and comradeship )

I apologize a little for the piece of railroad but now you are looking for the missing gentlemen feel free to set your own direction.

I should also note that my mysteries are a little more open than you may be used to. Published adventures go along clue1->clue2->clue3-> solution. If you miss a clue you a screwed.

I prefer to have several clues at each step, (and several red herrings also). So you should always have a couple of leads to follow up, and if one of them comes up with nothing, that's not usually an indication to look harder in the same location, just move on to the next open lead.

[whoiam]

So, on the subject of languages:

On the isle of Britain at the time, there would have historically been four languages in widespread use: Latin and Greek (they went everywhere the Romans did), 'Common' Brittonic (native language of the British, including all of modern Scotland not a part of Dal Raita) and Gaelic (native to Ireland originally, but they brought it with them when they founded Dal Raita).

(Those aren't necessarily the only names you could attach to those languages...)

Anyway, in keeping with her 'day job' as a scribe/interpreter, Audr has access to all four of them. I believe Amelia has three of them (I'm guessing 'Dwarven' would be either Brittonic or Gaelic). Kemes and Marcus don't have their languages known listed, but I suspect they're 'Egyptian, Greek and Latin' for Kemes (who has the Int score to know 3) and just 'Latin' for Marcus (as the only member of the party that doesn't have an Int bonus or ranks in linguistics).

[Hypername]

Whoiam you are a druid right? I suppose you have no trouble with me pretty much hunting down celtic druids, right?

[whoiam]

Short answer: No, not really.

Long answer: Even apart from the fact that you're killing members of a different sect while leaving hers completely untouched, Audr's from a pre-Christianised German tribe. This gives her a very Norse-esque view of Death. Dying in battle, especially against a great foe, is the ideal way to end your life. So long as you're not killing off too many, she doesn't especially mind you 'thinning out the herd' and driving the others underground.

[Keledrath]

Huh. And I usually fill out languages before much else on the sheet. But yeah, you named the ones I was going to take

[Hypername]

Good. In-party conflicts suck. A lot.
Seriously though, rooting out the heretics isn't the most honorable thing a man can do. I doubt she will like the idea of subterfuge, assassination, backstabbing etc.
Fluff-wise I think we are going to see one hell of an antithesis here.

[driftwood]

Yeah, and I don't want anyone to think that Prisca is going to blow up the party - any of her wanking is just for RP flavor.

[jodokast]

Ok I've moved the scene slightly to the Solid Leg, but if you want to talk to the centurion before leaving, I'll do a little bit of DM handwaving/running the two scenes at once.

[driftwood]

As a reminder for everyone - this is actually my PF game EV4R!!1 Also my first game on GitP, although I'm in several on another site. So please don't hesitate to point out very obvious things, whether as to PF rules (like Aid Another) or GitP protocol (like how to use the roll tag - found the dice-rolling forum and figured it out, but works differently from that other site).

I will probably err on the side of rolling less, unless jodo tells us a roll is required or I need to overcome an obstacle (but still try to narrate first :) ).

[whoiam]

...I think Marcus and Audr just talked over one another...

[driftwood]

And another cross-post!

[jodokast]

It's all good, I'm happy to work around a couple of questions at once, don't feel you have to wait for one set of questions to be answered to ask yours.

[Hypername]

We don't have to see it as talking over one another. Audr finishes talking and then Marcus begins.

[whoiam]

Hey all... Sorry for the period of silence. I've spent most of the week getting steadily more ill... Now I'm to the point where I'm expected to stay in bed for a few days. Luckily no-one took away my laptop, and I now no longer have work to distract me, so... Catchup time!

We don't have to see it as talking over one another. Audr finishes talking and then Marcus begins.

Hey, I liked the idea of the characters both starting off together and trying to push out their questions ahead of the other. They haven't worked together as a group before, after all. These are the sort of mistakes people can make when they're new to working with each other

[driftwood]

Hope you feel better soon!

[jodokast]

I'm just going to get an affirmation that driftwoods proposed plan is acceptable then I'll update. I think it could be but I wanted to check