Thread: Questioning chirine ba kal

Originally Posted by Greentongue

YES
It is good to know that "I'm doing it right" for many things and it provides a lot of ideas for things I haven't had the pleasure of getting to yet.

One idea I had was smuggling a chest of sex toys into the chambers of "A Good Clan Girl" but wasn't sure if this would effect their marriage proposal or be ignored.
What does being "A Good Clan Girl" actually mean in game terms? *

Another idea was the recovery of a favored heir that had been kidnapped (and transported unknowingly) to effect inter-clan negotiations. **

Another was the recovery of a body part being retained in a box to prevent its owner's regenerating. (reproductive organ) *

Maybe a little too * "sex" and ** "pedophile" orientated
but "Bad People" for motivation to oppose, without being just "loot".
I like things to be "Black & White" in my Sword & Planet style games without being graphic.

From what you say, these may be a little too "above ground"?

How likely is it that the "country bumpkin/foreign scum" would be scapegoated?
Would the Character be more valuable as an "unmarked piece in the game" or just considered disposable? (pure GM call?)
Does who they know / who knows them matter the most when things go badly?
=

Right - in order:

The scandal is not about the clan girl; it's her husband who's going to look like an idiot. A Good Clan Girl is one who supports her clan and thus her extended family; she has limited legal rights, but her clan has the duty and to see that she's supported and protected. It's a very secure and relatively comfortable life. The 'Aridani' woman, on the other hand, has all the rights of a man - including having to pay income taxes, which The Good Clan Girl does not. It's a much less secure life, but it does appeal to the adventurer type.

The husband is the one who's in trouble; he's responsible for keeping his wife happy and satisfied. If he's not, the clan matriarchs are going to send him down to the Temple of Avanthe and/or Dlamelish for a refresher course. It's really hard to get a good sex scandal going in the Five Empires - the attitudes to the subject are so much different from our own. Word will get out about this, and the clan ladies all over town will gossip about it for at least a week. Hubby will get some pointed suggestions from his clan-brothers to deal with this and keep the wife happy, but that will be about it.

The kidnapping is Very Serious Stuff, as it's considered a violation of the Great Concordat if it happened outside the Underworld. The clan affected will call in all sorts of favors from everyone they know to find the kid, up to and including using the assassins' clans. They will also try very hard to keep the Imperium from getting involved, as that always means trouble for everyone - once the OAL gets in the door, they tend to want to ask a lot of questions about anything and everything.

Interesting about the body part. Most of the time, people will just laugh and tell the poor man he should have been more careful. I can see how it would turn into an adventure, though, as the guy's clan will want to Have Words with whoever did this...

I agree with you - this is a little too much for 'above ground' life.

Generally, the country bumpkin/immigrant will not get scape-goated - they are not expected to know the fine points of life and such, so unless they've been really stupid or crass they'll get a stern warning about bringing the clan into disrepute by hanging around with naughty people. Otherwise, yes, they tend to be more valuable alive, and yes, who they know is very important!!!

Originally Posted by AsenRG

I understand the Adjutant. Preventing is always best, and you being that predictably aggressive is bad for his nerves, I'm sure!


Can you put an end to the war?
If you did, what would your god think?

Well, I guess it would be more subtle with, say, Livyanu. "Mess with us and this guy stops helping you" is almost as good, though.

War is all about logistics, though. You can only have Chirine win the day for you if you can get him to the right battle, in time and in reasonably good shape!

If Phil had seen the movie version as well, I'd bet on it being an SNS...


How fresh off the boat was OG when he was married off?


I get it that "bring me five Eyes" wasn't a popular fetch quest...
Good!

Now I think I know the most dangerous skill of Chirine...
Logistics.

BTW, OG had mentioned elsewhere that a player at Gygax's table had perfect memory and even could correct the Referee on details of the dungeon. Does that happen to be you?

The question is, did you shoot the thing at the enemy? It's an undead, right?

My poor Adjutant is always having to tell me that I need to be a commander, and not a trooper. it takes all the fun out of battles, I can tell you...

No; I'm not high enough in the Imperial councils for that.

Agreed; I am a logistics specialist, I think!

No, Phil had not seen the movie, but he had read the book...

You'll have to ask him, sorry...

Agreed, to both!

No, it wasn't me like that at Gary's table: it was me at Phil's table, though...

I think they just killed the thing...

Originally Posted by Greentongue

Because the question was based on the printed EPT rules having an example of a temple with a demon. I was asking if the focus was on the temple or the demon. The answer could easily have been "both" ... but wasn't.
Which was the point of asking.



Before I assume so in this case, I'll ask to have it confirmed (or not).
=

Oh, right, gotcha. In this case, both the temple and the demon are SNS material...

Originally Posted by Old Geezer

I don't have the text of EPT in front of me, but actually, we never thought about things in such taxonomic ways during gaming. We were exploring, the whole idea was to find interesting things. Same as Greyhawk and Blackmoor.

Well, yeah, what the Glorious General said. Mostly, we were just too busy trying to stay alive as Phil threw stuff at us constantly. We dodged and ducked a lot!!!

Originally Posted by Old Geezer

Phil would say "Stop thinking like a 20th Century Midwesterner." (this was before 2000.)

The Tsolyani do not have a societal prohibition on sex like America does. (In fact, a lot of cultures in real life think the US is pretty messed up sexually.) A chest of sex toys in his bride to be's bedchamber would not cause a typical Tsolyani man to blink an eye.

Being 'A Good Clan Girl' means doing what your mother and "aunties" tell you to, doing nothing in public that shows "ignoble action," and marrying who you're told to for the advantage of your clan.

Agreed!!! Phil was always on us about not thinking inside the box, and about learning new cultures. Tsolyanu is a lot like Pharonic Egypt, really...

Have a look at the 'Lord Meren' series of mystery novels - they will provide a lot of good ideas for Tekumel.

Originally Posted by Bren

And as you know, there's a fair number of people inside the US who think our culture is pretty messed up sexually. Because, of course, it is.

Yes!!!

Originally Posted by Greentongue

I can't control the expectations of my potential players.
I'm going for, "Those are Bad People! We must Stop Them!" and playing to what raises that reaction in the players.
How far it is from what the characters would think is the concern.

That naturally raises the question, what would would cause that reaction in the characters? (and still be something the players would recognize?)
While the Pale Bone may motivate people that know the setting, those that are just starting would have no idea.

On the other hand, what engages new players from your experience?
(Besides SHINY!!)
=

Well, a threat to the people in the party or to the clan - or to their temple or legion - is always good; Imperial politics is always good for trouble. The international situation is always messy, and you can have Harchar swoop in for laughs as he makes off with the silverware.

We always used to get a rash when the Temple of Sarku showed up; they were kind of the usual bad guys for us.

I always am able to engage new players with the sheer difference of this world from what they are used to with the usual RPGs. The different world-setting helps a lot - and I have to admit, all the stuff I have in the game room - LOTS of SHINEY! - always gets them hooked. Then we get into the adventure, and they stay for literally years.

Originally Posted by Old Geezer

More than that, we didn't WANT to do PVP. Even if we'd won, that would be playing a game we didn't want to play.

We had other ways to use our time.

Yep, like explore the damn planet. And stay alive while doing it, too. That was a full-time job in and of itself.

Originally Posted by AsenRG

Griefers Hunting Party:;?

Bingo!

Originally Posted by Old Geezer

More than that, we didn't WANT to do PVP. Even if we'd won, that would be playing a game we didn't want to play.

We had other ways to use our time.

Perfectly fair point. People shouldn't play games they don't enjoy. The game you and Chirine have described sounds far more entertaining and more like something I would have enjoyed then and still would enjoy today.

And as I said, that's what my teenage self would have wanted to do. It's not something I recall actually doing or even needing to do. One reason I didn't need to do that was because I was known for being good at tactics and for being sufficiently confrontational that the people in our extended group who had griefer tendencies chose to mess with someone else and to do it when I wasn't around. Of course it also helped that none of our gaming groups included assholes the size of astronomical bodies.

Originally Posted by chirine ba kal

Tsolyanu is a lot like Pharonic Egypt, really...

Now that I did not know and had not guessed. Tsolyanu always seemed more China/Indochina crossed with Mesoamerica to me. That's very interesting. Also it makes your choice of Egyptian miniatures make more sense.