Whiteleaf OOC

[Amara]

Only if I get to have them chase dancing lights around like giant arachnid kittens.

[Arch Lich Burns]

Note to self: draw an (a few) adorable spider kitty(ies)

[Synch]

Will, how would you like Stormcrow to manifest? Do you mean being more compliant with the party? Happy to modify my roleplay if it makes things a bit more congenial.

[willpell]

Will, how would you like Stormcrow to manifest?

Preferably only after taking levels in a psionic class....

(In other words, I suspect that wasn't quite the word you wanted.)

Do you mean being more compliant with the party? Happy to modify my roleplay if it makes things a bit more congenial.

Erm...okay, the crack about needing him to go Evil was a joke; otherwise, I was referring to your comment that without Zaks, he wouldn't really connect with any of the other players. If you know how to play him as being more party-friendly, and don't require any divine head-thwacking to accomplish this change in characterization, then nevermind. Of the things he's done so far, him getting drunk and letching at the bard lady was perfectly fine, but the moment when I thought he was about to attack Varshyl (who I hadn't even statted up because he's not meant to be in combat), that was a tense one, though we managed to get past it. Otherwise, the party hasn't really cooperated with my Plot Rails, but that's not especially your fault in particular.

[Arch Lich Burns]

We are players. We are supposed to screw up the rails. And some cases, destroy the rails compleatly.

[Amara]

Hey now, I'm fully invested if it means spider kittens.

I think everyone will mesh a bit better as a whole once we get comfier with each others' characters, anyway. Our characters may know each other well at this point, but we don't know each others' characters as well. It'll come with time.


Quarg; I apologize as I didn't mean to ignore your post before. I believe I had a reply written up on my iPad, but between the game being temporarily on hold and my being mostly bedridden a few days, it slipped me by. I too was under the impression voidsense was self target only.

On that note, I'm still running a fever, so if I do anything that seems monstrously out of character or bizarre, please catch me on it. It's likely not intentional.

[Quarg]

Well apparently I can not invoke on others except where specifically indicated...

Oh well...

[Synch]

You have a headstrong guy of little intelligence. Just warning you, but I may get into situations I probably shouldn't, and I may pick fights with rude NPCs I wil be roleplaying with common sense in short order. I fear for your plot rails

[Amara]

I fear for what happens if you roll a strength check against them, moreso.

[spiderwrangler]

I think Stormcrow and Kast could likely bond over dealing with all these effing humans. Kast wasn't too far away from pinning Varshyl to the wall with a drawn blade himself, which was why he didn't step up to stop Stormcrow's belligerent actions.... hopefully that doesn't mean that we completely screw up willpell's plot lines.

[Arch Lich Burns]

I dont care if we destroy the rails.

[willpell]

I dont care if we destroy the rails.

This is an uncomfortable attitude for players to have. DMing is hard work even if we don't have an actively hostile audience. I'm not telling you not to have any independence, but if you're not willing to take strongly worded hints that all the action is THAT way, and insist on going THIS way instead, then don't be surprised if there just isn't any action.

And on that note, I also have a new job, which will probably restrict me to posting on weekends for the forseeable. It's been fun so far, hopefully we can keep it going, but the pace is likely to get a bit sluggish.

[Amara]

I believe Burns means more if it inadvertently happens, more so than deliberately causing it.

So long as we don't accidentally create a Curst, blow up a massive arcane energy storing flesh battery with improvised explosives, and set fire to half the nearby farming community in the process, we're at least marginally more within the rails than my current campaign. Dear Lord.

[Quarg]

I believe Burns means more if it inadvertently happens, more so than deliberately causing it.

So long as we don't accidentally create a Curst, blow up a massive arcane energy storing flesh battery with improvised explosives, and set fire to half the nearby farming community in the process, we're at least marginally more within the rails than my current campaign. Dear Lord.

I swear, your group sounds like mine back in highschool...of course none of your players is named Brian and has a thing for black cats does he?

[Amara]

No, no, though the fact that that party's Face is a Kitsune ranger with a wolf animal companion that's treated as an over exuberant large puppy...probably says a lot for my group. Oh, and its charisma based caster is actually good at getting the party in to horrible amounts of trouble because he took the "tactless" social flaw.

[spiderwrangler]

There IS spider research that uses lasers... laser vibrometers are able to pick up seismic vibrations the males produce in the substrate, allowing researchers to record them.

This is a fairly well done video of an example of spider courtship in a species somewhat close to how I picture Kzri (a wolf spider).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b7BvY0lXinY

The male here gets

► Show Spoiler

about the best possible outcome that doesn't result in spider sex, the female just leaves. She wasn't interested, and I could tell from pretty early on that it wasn't going to happen for him.

An interested female will slowly orient towards the male, and if she's receptive, will extend her first two pairs of legs, lowering her cephalothorax and raising her abdomen slightly. A disinterested female will just leave, or if she's feeling hungry, lunge at the male.

If she's receptive, he'll approach, eventually touching her with the tips of his legs... that's the final test, if she doesn't attack then, she's dtf. He'll climb over her back and alternate rolling her abdomen from side to side to access her lady parts on the underside.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iS8cIyxPtrQ

This female gets tired of him after a few minutes, but in the lab, spiders have been reported to remain in copula for >24 hours (which would be unlikely in the field, something would disturb them).

[willpell]

While you're giving a science lesson, mon frere, exactly how much truth is there to the eating-the-mate-afterward thing? Does it happen always, usually, sometimes, or almost never (ie one of those things that got seen once or twice, and was so sensational that it got reported and repeated endlessly until it became Memetic "Truth")? Also, could Xolenon improve his odds of getting away safely if he proferred a snack for Kzri to work on before/during the act, or do spiders avoid crossing those particular streams?

[spiderwrangler]

It is largely dependent on species, with some males actually engaging in 'sacrificial' behaviors... but has been a bit sensationalized. Without any numbers or studies in mind to back it up, I'd say that for the majority of spider species, pre-copulatory cannibalism is more common than post-copulatory. Males are attracting females' attention through vibrations and visual cues... two senses that are primed for detecting potential prey. The whole dancing about part is firstly to get her attention, secondly to identify himself as a male of her species, and thirdly to demonstrate vigor and body condition.

Nuptial gifts are rare in spiders, but not unheard of, so if you wished to implement that as something Monstrous Hunting Spiders do in Whiteleaf, you won't get any objections from me. In general, a well fed female is going to be more likely to value a potential suitor for his sperm than as a meal.

[willpell]

I am afraid that the setback I experienced last week was only dramatic foreshadowing; the real disaster has come, and my career as a high-level D&D GM is effectively over. If you guys still want to play, I might be able to start a new game, but it would have to be much lower "tier", and make effectively no use of spells, magic items, or even more than the most basic of Feats. Even that may prove to be impossible.

[Quarg]

So it sounds as if our options are:

1. A: Abandon the game....
2. B: Drop our characters down to first/second level....
3. C: Translate into a Free Form RP focusing on world and characters more than just killing using dice....

Obviously I prefer C, but then I tended to come from free form RP back in college not 3.5....but it would mean needing you as a world builder to still be GM there willpelll

[willpell]

My worldbuilding depends on access to the resources which I am soon losing. Freeform works poorly for me.

[Quarg]

Then B is quite useless also...

[Arch Lich Burns]

Meh. I dont really care.


Also why cant you just save data on usb?

[Synch]

Yeah, this is what happens when you store it all on a forum or website.

Looks like A is the only real option then. Didn't even get to smash something

[willpell]

Meh. I dont really care.

Good to know that apathy toward the destruction of what is essentially my true self is not confined to members of just a single forum community....

Also why cant you just save data on usb?

I am saving the data, but what I am losing is the ability to edit it, add to it, or access it with anything resembling functionality. Basically, imagine that you lost access to D&DTools or ENworld, only instead of just copies of stuff from the books, this is material that I've specifically created or modified to make it suit my purposes (readability and comprehensibility and ease of cross-referencing), along with having all my houserules and setting flavor baked in. This is an absolute disaster, at least comparable to having all my books destroyed in a fire or the like, save only that I have time to photocopy every page and store the resulting sheets in a single box somewhere offsite.

Yeah, this is what happens when you store it all on a forum or website.

No, this is what happens when the webmistress of that site puts the feelings of people I've butthurt ahead of my fundamental and inalienable rights, which apparently only I am cognizant of.