Thread: Questioning chirine ba kal

What's going to live in the temple and the ruins?

Also, your tubeway adventures - were the tubeways always underground? Was there anything you could see from the tube car, to give you an idea of where you'd end up?

And did you (or the Glorious General) ever disclose the existence of this mass-transit system to anyone? Clan, temple, or army? Or did you keep it secret?

Lastly, did the tubeway go through the core of the planet, or did it just run under the crust?

Thanks!

The tubeways were all underground; no monorails whizzing over the countryside. There were viewscreens, but good luck on getting them pointing where you wanted. The tubeways themselves were featureless metal shafts with little or no lights.

The tubeways' existence was known to all "educated" people of Tekumel. I use "educated" in the 15th century sense; that is, anybody in 15th century Europe who could read Latin and knew who Aristotle was, would have known of the tubeways. Most of them frankly didn't CARE.

Originally Posted by Hrugga

Helpful...But a few follow-up questions if you please. Could you describe your tubeway car "placeholder"? What did you use for translation when communicating with the P/B people(magic, eyes, translation ball)? Did the P/B folk call themselves anything in particular? So it is safe to say that they know more about you(the Tsolyani), than you knew about them? Can you please describe the differences in their armor in relation to yours...Thank you.

Hope to hear from you soon,

H :0)

PS If you remember any of their names(the P/B people) that would be most helpful. Also, were the P/B folk more or less the same racial stock as the other side of the globe? Where there any other non-humans present other than the Hokun that you know of? Thanks again.

Well, let's see...

The 'placehoder' is somebody who sits in the car with the door open, so the car won't leave - normally, the safety circuits won't let you go through the system with an open hatch, as the tubes are at a very low air pressure.

Eyloa used a spell, and did the translating.

They looked like us, but the armor was 'plainer', if I can be that vague; Phil never did any drawings of them. Didn't see any other non-humans, either.

No other data, sorry; we just didn't stay long, or go back there except when we got lost. Phil just didn't develop it much, from what we saw. And yes, they did seem to know more about us then we did about them, which indicated we had spies in our midst.

Yet another Mystery Of Tekumel that you'll have to go exploring for...

Originally Posted by Atsuku Nare

What's going to live in the temple and the ruins?

Also, your tubeway adventures - were the tubeways always underground? Was there anything you could see from the tube car, to give you an idea of where you'd end up?

And did you (or the Glorious General) ever disclose the existence of this mass-transit system to anyone? Clan, temple, or army? Or did you keep it secret?

Lastly, did the tubeway go through the core of the planet, or did it just run under the crust?

Thanks!

As a player, I have no idea; the players will have to go look. As a GM, I have lists and lists of what's down there.

Yes, the tubeways are all underground. The three viewscreens sometimes work, and you can see what there is to see. The tubes are pretty dark, with only dim little purple lights, and about the only time you can see anything is on the surface / in a station. The screens also can be used to tap into the communications network, which is usually a bad idea as it lets folks know you are coming, so they can get a hot welcome all ready for you.

Yes. We always filed reports, so we could get paid. Getting believed was another issue, though.

Nope, runs down to the core; that's how the technicians got to the gravity engines that are at the core and which provide both the orbital stability and gravity equalization. Please do not touch any buttons. Thank you.

Originally Posted by Gronan of Simmerya

The tubeways were all underground; no monorails whizzing over the countryside. There were viewscreens, but good luck on getting them pointing where you wanted. The tubeways themselves were featureless metal shafts with little or no lights.

The tubeways' existence was known to all "educated" people of Tekumel. I use "educated" in the 15th century sense; that is, anybody in 15th century Europe who could read Latin and knew who Aristotle was, would have known of the tubeways. Most of them frankly didn't CARE.

What he said.

Originally Posted by Hrugga

After all the mayhem, a battle report is in order!!! I would like to know what's lurking down there...Have fun!!!

H :0)

Right. Well, in this game session, the four parties of PCs came on the table from four different directions, and collided more or less in the central plaza. One player took an early lead in shooting up the rest with a bow, and after managing to get to the pyramid's doorway got swarmed by the other three players, who were not amused at being shot at and taking casualties. Melee broke out, with lots of people getting bashed about.

After a lucky dice roll, the door to the pyramid opened, and the besieged player holed up in the entrance chamber to the pyramid and a heap of negotiations - this is a Braunstein, remember - broke out. After lots of talk and money changing hands, the four players allied with each other (we'll see how long that lasts) and will explore the pyramid itself in the next game session.

I will be putting in the vertical table extender, and we'll have a true three-dimensional game; the pyramid has upper levels, and we'll also visit the basement.

(More photos on my Photobucket page, too.)

Oh - almost forgot to mention! We lost power here at the house during the game, and I thought we'd have to stop. Instead, the players all broke out their lanterns (the little IKEA LED lights) and we went right on with the play without a beat. The rest of the game was fought by moon- and lantern-light, and was even more fun to play as everyone tripped over each other and themselves in the dark.

A lot of laughter, and a lot of fun!

Originally Posted by Phillip

That is a fine looking tabletop setup!

Thank you!

I built the table to be used for our sort of 'skirmish gaming', where you have relatively limited parties and you want to get into contact pretty quickly. The table itself is 60" x 60"; the trays around the edges are for dice, sodas, snacks, and the like. The center 'well' is 48" x 48"; there is a basic table surface as part of the table structure, and I have a removable smooth surface for RPG games. This game used one of my sets of 'tiles', which are 9.5" x 9.5" MDF with a half-inch of expanded styrene laminated on tip; this gets a coat of 'earth'-colored paint, and then sawdust sprinkled over the wet paint to add some texture. I then spray paint this (all right, yes I do use an airbrush) with some contrasting colors, and I think you get a nice 'look' to the table.

I have several sets of the 'tiles', one for each terrain type Phil listed for Tekumel, and with the various sets of trees and foliage I have I can replicate any of the types of scenery Phil describes in his works. I have everything from 'arid' to 'mangrove swamp', as well as urban stuff in case we need a townscape. As the Glorious General can testify to, I like modeling; all of this is what I enjoy, and having people drop by to play on the table is the icing on the cake.

My players seem to like this kind of thing; everything is set up and ready to go for them before they arrive, so there's no need to interrupt the flow of the game to set anything out. People do get into their characters, I've found.