Homebrew system thread II, part 2

[Eleventh Century Remnant]

Presumably Dirt is now on one end of the door shield and everyone else at the other, it's about the only way this is going to work.

The thing about hillforts is that, amazingly, hills are involved. This explains the higher average fitness of people back in these days from where we are in playerland, and also their shorter lifespans. It's also about the eightieth up of the day, and as the little ones aren't worth fortifying, it's a long way.

There is little rebelliousness evident; Atheleyne evidently runs the place firmly enough, but there's little resentment either- lots of people huddling together, some clanging and battering going on- rebuilding nowhere near on the scale of Qulan, with its' higher proportion of artisans and many more of them total, and most of what there is rather more amateur, but it is happening.

There's certainly a lot needing rebuilding. The town wasn't exactly flattened but it was certainly cut off close to the ground; several pit houses, overflowing with people and being used as hospitals, but most of the larger buildings- especially the keep- blasted. The inner wall's being demolished for repair material for the rest, what wasn't blown up; the keep itself ends in broken, blackened stone just above the level of the ground floor ceiling.

In the grounds is pitched the baronet's campaigning tent, a large pavillion- style thing which seems to be where what's left of the family are; the lord's private chapel is strangely only a little scorched, and it is to there that she leads you.

'The war came to us when we were already overflowing with refugees, and did so in the person of a group of knights and their retainers who had been driven before the storm, and were looking for firm ground on which to stand, turn and fight. You can judge from their gravestones how much success they had.' That explains the unfamiliar heraldry, then.

'Your father agreed that there was no other way, but he sent the women, children and unfit men away under my charge, to hide in the trees of Highwillow Hill'- some two or three miles away- 'and I believe everywhere has the same sad story to tell of what happened next. Many lost homes but few lost lives, why they did not pursue us I do not know; and since then little but toil and terror, working to rebuild and fearing their return.

Your father was wounded in spirit more than in body although that was grievous enough, he has been healed but it has not taken, he is still withering away; your brother Corum went south to try to make his way to Jotunhallr and beg the King for aid; your sister is mooning about somewhere, she fell for one fo the northern knights and I believe she's still in mourning.'

Plan, then?

[Simon_Jester]

OOC:

Spent the whole day driving; aside from needing three jump-starts and wasting half an hour after I missed the on-ramp to a bridge in New York, it went well.

IC:

Larric is probably holding up one corner of the door-shield. He's under a strain but trying to be polite, for the sake of making a good impression among those who know Alfred.

Preferably before we go into the hill-fort and do the heavy climbing involved, he'll say (in the presence of Alfred's mother)

"Milord, milady, can we find a place where no one will even think about touching this lot? I'm not happy having it in the middle of town like this..."

[Fiji_Fury]

Dale is aching himself from all the hiking while holdign the door. It is particularly hard on his left shoulder (the injured one) although he's been accelerating the healing process by using Life magic during the night, though at low levels so it doesn't exhaust him completely (I remember descriptions of Alfred's punch-drunk state from early in the adventure before I joined and don't want any of that).

He takes in the great toil and struggle of the population silently and wonders slightly himself. These people were spared... but their spirits are still clearly heavy with fear and pain. Something needs to be done here.

The description of Alfred's father and his "wounded spirit" tweaks Dale's interest and concern. Either the wound was mystical or the events of the town's destruction were extraordinarily traumatic to the man. Dale will cautiously offer his assistance in examining his father if a private moment presents itself. He's far from certain of his abilities to help, but senses this is something where his skills may prove useful. No mention of it will be made in front of Alfred's mother, yet. Given Dale's uncertainty and the shaky grasp on his own past, he's not keen to open up to another stranger, especially if he might give her false hope.

[Simon_Jester]

OOC:

We have five people, if Rohal is still with us (and I gather he is). Dirt's carrying one end of the door by himself. That left Alfred, Rohal, Larric, and Dale. Larric has very ordinary physical strength and endurance. Alfred is near the upper bound of normal human strength; Rohal (in human form) falls somewhere in the middle with Dale trailing him a bit.

I imagine we'd have Dirt at one end (as ECR said), with at least two normal humans on the other. Dale would probably take a corner with one arm, more to stabilize than anything else, while Alfred or Rohal/Larric handled the rest.

That said, yes, I'm very interested in keeping this stuff away from the townfolk and ensuring that it is well guarded. Come to think of it, he says along with his previous remarks:

IC:

"Not happy at all... can a few men be spared to warn people away? It'll have to be gotten rid of, but carefully and not just yet."

[Eleventh Century Remnant]

They were mostly spared; those who stayed behind got splattered, and- I don't think we ever named the baronet properly either? Sigbert, it shall be. His wounds probably were a bit of both.

Atheleyne's not best pleased at the word that you have basically turned up with a pallet of concentrated drugs and toxic waste; the core population was too small for a physician or apothecary- the priest (one and a couple of acolytes) could do something, there were a handful of cunning-men and women with folk remedies, nobody used to dealing with or storing such things.

'The best thing to do would probably be to dig a hole and bury it for the time being. Why you didn't do that where you found it and then come back for it with a string of mules or a packhorse I don't understand. I can probably find someone to stand guard over the hole.'

She adds to Alfred 'I'm sorry it's not much of a homecoming, with so much to do- there are lands and inheritances to apportion, rents to gather, agreements to be struck, bandits to suppress- and fears to appease. We have heard rumours that the Baron is back from the dead- and the monster who did all this has been put in authority over us. Is that really true?'

[Panzersharkcat]

"Aye, mother. We met her ourselves before finding the Baron, who has granted us control of de Berrey's land until his son reaches adulthood."

(OOC: Now I kind of want Alfred to have another half-brother named Dilbert. Also, I found my description of Alfred's family when looking up de Berrey's name. "OOC: I don't remember if it was mentioned if Alfred had any siblings or not. I know he has Ridebert, who's really his half-brother. If it was never mentioned, then he has a younger brother and sister. Sister would be in her early teens. Brother would be a scholarly type, like his father. Should be around 18 or so." Oh, well.)

[Eleventh Century Remnant]

I'd been assuming they were old enough to get into trouble on their own accord; which evidently they have. The age of the brothers, though, considering the backstory that's just popped up in my head I'll have to change that back, it does make more sense for Alfred to be the oldest.

Corum is on the road somewhere, south of here, hopefully he hasn't been kidnapped or eaten or anything. Given that he was daft enough to set out in the first place, and Alfred is likely to have a (rightfully) low opinion of his abilities as a traveller and survivor, this may not be an absolute. Given that Atheleyne was willing to let him or more accurately hadn't the energy to spare to stop him, well.

She just laughs, briefly and bitterly. 'On another day, in some other year, that would be magnificent news; but now? the cripple supporting the lame. They're worse off than we; half the bandits plaguing us in the north are masterless men once de Berrey's.

Rest, first; light's going out of the sky anyway. In the morning, or perhaps next day, I suppose it would be best to scrape together what armed men can be found and go and see what can be done there.'

[Simon_Jester]

Larric scratches his stubbled chin. "If this de Berrey's men are going bandit for want of a lord, you might be able to get some of them working for you instead of tossing spears at you. Save trouble all round..."

This is directed mostly at Alfred; it looks like Alfred's going to be acting in his father's stead here.

OOC:
This is gonna be great!

[This would be a great time to work on Alfred's persuasion and oratorical skills!]

[Panzersharkcat]

"Aye. With father unwell, I will have to step in. Come first light, we shall head out to speak to those who would be amenable to working with us. For now, we must rest and post watch."

(OOC: And help him grow up a bit, too.)

[Eleventh Century Remnant]

Are you taking Atheleyne's suggestion of temporarily interring the door and glassware, or is there a better idea? (If you do, I strongly suggest you don't put a rock on top of it- fill in with nice, soft soil and don't tamp down the turf.)

You can be proud of your efforts getting the blasted thing there, anyway. Every two hour period I was rolling Athletics or something suchlike, and the failures were the spills and tumbles and near disasters along the way- and there were quite a lot of them. They weren't actual disasters because there were reaction rolls to said near disaster, and you were very, very lucky.

Where does the door end up, and what's Dirt going to do for a shield? There are spares about the place, but thery're human sized and none of them have a plant pot holder.

Alfred's mother would be slightly disappointed that you think you need to stand watches here, of all places, but if you're that keyed up and on edge she won't try to stop you.

What would you be keeping watch for, as a matter of interest? Apart from the unfortunate few who have comprehensively lost the plot, you're not among strangers, this is family territory, home ground. Alfred knows by sight, if not by name, most of the people around here and has for years. A few of the refugees might be dodgy, may bite the hand that feeds them if they think it's edible, but there doesn't seem to have been much trouble.

...Hm. The door's about the only thing it might be necessary to stand guard over. Who goes where, what now?

[Simon_Jester]

We don't actually need the door as such for this. We'll dig a hole (Larric will supervise in the 'actively weilding a shovel while talking' sense, though he may not do as much of the digging properly as some local whose shoulders aren't as worn). Floor it with... hm, can we find any planking? Not building-quality timber necessarily, broken or slightly charred stuff would work, it doesn't have to be strong. That might have been burned for firewood already, can anything be scrounged up? A piece of canvas would work too, just something to provide a layer of flooring for the hole.

Next step is to carefully transfer the chemicals from Dirt's shield down into the floored hole, put something else over top of the chemicals (another piece of canvas, for choice), and gently spread some earth over it- wait. Just as they're about to start, Larric wonders if there's a way to discourage any burrowing animals that might still be active in the winter. Talk to Dirt (gardener!), or to some of the locals. Is there anything we can put down that would make a mole not want to get curious about the bottles?

Anyway. If that's done, spread a layer of earth over top of the cache. Not much, since we will NOT be shoveling vigorously when it's time to unearth this stuff; I don't want to have to gently take away two feet of earth with a hand trowel.

Dirt will then have his shield back, and the stuff is temporarily secured.

Getting some of the Nordens' armed men to stand guard over the chemical cache's location would do the trick, we don't need PCs. Might be best to keep, oh... two guards watching the site, but honestly we don't even need both of them to be armed men, just reasonably trustworthy people who won't wander off. Easy duty.

Larric will nonetheless brief all the men selected to stand watch; he badly needs a good night's rest to (literally) recharge his batteries and won't be doing it himself.

Briefing is as follows:

"It's nasty and poisonous. But the stuff's bottled up and won't do harm as long as it stays so. Don't let any animals go poking around here, warn the village idiot off if you've got one, that sort of thing."

[Panzersharkcat]

(OOC: Any of de Berrey's former men trying to throw spears. People trying to muck around with the chemicals we brought over. That sort of thing. Really the only two I can think of.)

[Simon_Jester]

The chemicals are safe enough and can be covered by the medieval equivalent of a couple of rent-a-cops; they're so dangerous that no one who knows what they are would want anything to do with them.* All we need is someone in place to warn off anyone ignorant and shoo off any animals dumb enough to go digging at them.

The bandit threat is unlikely to attack an inhabited, populated town with its own force of armed men. The family home may have been blown to bits by the Twentieth, but it's still physically secure against lesser threats. I think we can sleep pretty easy.


*How that relates to our own actions... hah.

[Kaelan]

On hearing mention of burying all of the found concoctions dirt pipes up and points to a portion of the pile.
"That does not go in hole in ground" (indicating the collection of plant matter).
"Need to keep in dry store. You have spare chest? Also, do you have metal man in town?"

Dirt intends to have his chain sets modified to ogre size if there is a suitable blacksmith around to do the work. Other than that, this looks like a good place to start growing humans. Just how big a settlement are we talking here in terms of size and population?

As for digging, Dirt will attempt to use his earth magic to shift the ground at our suitable site for a reasonable size hole, compact and solidify the sides and then with the help of anybody who knows the nearby area find a suitable cap stone to cover the lot when we are finished.

On a side note, if we're going bandit hunting are we going to be wearing any type of uniform\colours? otherwise there may be reports of a mad band of mages with an ogre in tow terrorising the local area coming in.

[Fiji_Fury]

Allowing for Larric and Dirt to take over proper storage of the chemicals, Dale will seek out water and soap. A bath, even a cold one, would be appreciated right now, and he wants to inspect his wound and clean it again. Assuming that is relatively straight forward, Dale will then put himself at Alfred's disposal, perhaps having a moment to speak with the knight about examining his father.

[Simon_Jester]

As for digging, Dirt will attempt to use his earth magic to shift the ground at our suitable site for a reasonable size hole, compact and solidify the sides and then with the help of anybody who knows the nearby area find a suitable cap stone to cover the lot when we are finished.

Larric counsels against putting a big rock on top of the hole. Accidentally finding that one of the vials has been crushed under the weight would be bad, and if the stone is big enough to cover the whole chemical stash AND overlap the edges to keep the weight off the vials, it's probably so big even an ogre would have trouble moving it.

A layer of flagstones or cobblestones might work, with enough dirt on top for cushioning, but anything heavier would be a problem.

[Eleventh Century Remnant]

Between the remaining bits of Larric's own salvaged gear, what of the loot he's managed to recognise so far and, embarrassing though it may be, Dirt's bladder, a deterrent can be arranged.

The earth magic helps. Mainly it acts as enough of a scare and tipping factor to stop at least one loony trying to dig up the 'buried treasure' later that night. There are several village idiots and chances were one of them would have tried it without that added touch. Saving the fungi? Right, just try not to handle them too much in case they spore. Some kind of bag, maybe. (At least a couple of the larger flasks and jars are probably disinfectant to kill off errant spores. Undiluted, though, so flesh- melting concentrations.)

Just- capstone? Bad idea. Crunch, seep, I didn't know that was nerve gas bad idea. Sure about that?

I've just gone on an interesting wander through the chemistry of soap, and chances are the village- of around eight hundred people in the outer wall normally, take away the dead and add the refugees- about twelve hundred at the moment; they probably do have someone capable of making such things.

Probably the closest thing they've got to an alchemist in fact, a washerwoman with a generously proportioned... cauldron. (Sorry, couldn't resist.) Dale can manage to wash, although it probably will be cold- that is actually why saunas appear to have taken off in the cold north; they take less wood or charcoal to get air and steam up to a decent temperature than it does to heat a bath full of water. Can't quite justify them here, unfortunately.

Once someone translates into country folk speak for Dirt, ("I don't think we have anyone round' bouts 'ere made out of metal, them's the sort of thing you get in the city. Oh, you mean, why didn't you be a- saying so?") he can be pointed in the right direction; there is a blacksmith, two even- one got driven out and has been taken in by the other, and there is a wary tension in the air.

Chainmail isn't actually that hard; it's also not actually blacksmith's work really, it's the sort of job that minions get pointed at, as it needs a little talent but is primarily bloody tedious. Making chainmail links is skilled; opening and closing them to make a suit out of them is endless fiddly repetition. Turning the scraps Dirt has into something ogre sized and more importantly, shaped, probably going to take two or three days, and one silver coin, or preferably the value in copper to make it easier to split among the apprentices responsible. Haggling?

Panzer, over to you on the heraldry front.

[Simon_Jester]

Mostly OOC:

Between the remaining bits of Larric's own salvaged gear, what of the loot he's managed to recognise so far and, embarrassing though it may be, Dirt's bladder, a deterrent can be arranged.

I am SO sorry I asked...

Just- capstone? Bad idea. Crunch, seep, I didn't know that was nerve gas bad idea. Sure about that?

Larric is absolutely sure that's a bad plan. It's easy for Mister "never been poisoned in my life" to say "drop a rock on the beaker of poison," but then, that's probably how ogres got a reputation for being brick-stupid in the first place.

Hm. Maybe something to that- when you're that big, tough, and generally unkillable, you don't really need much brainpower to stay alive. So intelligence isn't selected for by Darwin as much, and even the intelligent ogres might tend to be mentally lazy because of how rarely they really must think their way out of bad situations.

Panzer, over to you on the heraldry front.

[To clarify, I think he's saying, you're the knight, it's your problem to figure out how to make it clear the rest of us loonies are working for you]

[Panzersharkcat]

(Mostly OOC: He'll handle it in the morning. Rent-a-cops for the chemicals first and then he'll have somebody sew up a tunic(?) for all party members with the emblem of the family to show that yes, they're not just a bunch of crazies running around but are a bunch of crazies working for me, another crazy.)

[Eleventh Century Remnant]

Actually, Panzersharkcat, I was rather hoping you could remind me what that heraldry was...
oh, and if you can post in character, please do. Flows better and helps weigh consequences if you do stuff from inside Alfred's skin, as it were.

The intelligence of ogres, hm, well- it's actually quite a depressing thought to work through that intelligence is a product of vulnerability; that to develop it you have to be fragile, and afraid, and desperate, which on average means that if the species is having a good learning experience there are a lot of individuals carking it and most of the rest aren't having much fun.

Past a certain point of mastery of the environment- past the invention of the bow more likely than the spear- I have heard it theorised that the main pressure towards intelligence is the need to socially outcompete and outwit other members of the same group, that once the foundations of civilisation are reached a community becomes its' own worst enemy and its' own source of evolutionary pressure- towards intelligence, anyway.

Although this is in the wider context of orcdom, so how much pressure that really is is open to debate. Actually, looking back at the orcoid characters I've written up, there's a strong correlation between rank and intellect; whether the smarter ones fight their way to the top, or the need to think fast to lead and stay in charge "turns on" the orc brain, probably a bit of both.

[Panzersharkcat]

(OOC: I don't think I ever made up a heraldry for the Nordens. A shield with a two-headed eagle probably wouldn't work. I'll see if I can make one up right now.)

"On second thought, I believe we only need a few men to keep watch over the chemicals. As Larric has been so kind as to start on that already, the rest of us should turn in for the night. We will have to get you fitted for some tunics with our heraldry on it in the morning before heading off to deal with de Berrey's men. I want them to know they are dealing with people in the employ of my family." He takes a gaze at a nearby banner emblazoned with the Norden coat of arms on it, a kite shield divided in four alternating in red and silver. In the top left field of red is an eagle in gold. In the top right field of silver is a mountain in black. The same thing is on the bottom but reversed. At the bottom of the shield is the motto "Strength through wisdom" in whatever is the equivalent of Latin in this world.

[Simon_Jester]

OOC:

Love the rest, but...

IC:

"On second thought, I believe we only need a few men to keep watch over the chemicals. As Larric has been so kind as to start on that already, the rest of us should turn in for the night."

"Aye, we want a watch- but they're your men, you tell them what to do. I just tell them what not to do. Like "don't dig up a bottle of deadly poison and gargle it."

[Panzersharkcat]

"Aye. Very well. I want two of you here keeping watch over it in one hour shifts. That way we can all get some sleep." He starts counting off who gets what shift, starting from his left to his right.

[Eleventh Century Remnant]

On the heraldry, the local equivalent of latim, the international language of empire and trade, is Authrani- the language of the Empire of Tol Authran,

Guarding a hole in the ground. Okay. That's a lot more of a production over it than I had thought you were setting up- seriously? Every hour? That's going to draw unwanted and unwelcome attention, that active and intensive a thing is going to make it more likely that an incident occurs; therefore (thinks about moons and weather)- it's quite a bright night, actually; none of you need help going off to sleep, but Alfred is awakened about an hour short of midnight by one of the men set on guard.

listening to the disjointed, panicked story there and then or heading for the hole first?

[Panzersharkcat]

He is roused by the man. After figuring out that he should be guarding the hole, he says to the man, "Explain to me on the way" and makes for the hole.

(OOC: Oy vey. I try to be nice and let people get most of a night's sleep. At least none of de Berrey's men have started throwing spears at us... unless that's what happened.)