Leo_G

((Do any of your characters know other characters that know Ian? It would probably only work of you had a friend that would pass the invite to you....unless it was some kind of set-up or something...I dunno.))

That's why you pick up all the saxes to even them out. And who needs a piccolo when you can jam out on a spoprano.

“Welcome,” Linn greeted the group as they approached the mansion entrance. His face looked completely blank, just like it always does, as he bowed his head slightly. “Although your attendance is no longer needed, it wouldn’t do to send you off without an explanation of the situation. Please, come in.”

Linn pushed the door open and stepped aside so the group could enter. The towering foyer was brightly lit and groups men were walking about, examining the area closely and taking pictures. Ian was sitting on the fourth step up on the decadent stair well, his head drooping down. He seemed lost in thought.

((Well, it can be sent naturally(by mail or phone or whatever), by magic(whatever that is...) or tech(holograms and all that space satellite tech stuff thingies) without any problems. Perhaps a villain group heard of the prospects of magical technology and are planning to bust in on it or something. I dunno but if you can't join it's okay, the thread isn't going to close so you could join later if you want.))

“Thank you. You may pass as your presence is still required,” the robot said with a quick scan of Curtis’ invitation. The wide gate silently slid opened enough for a person to pass through. “Right this way. Just follow the path as it leads right to the front door. If you’d like I can print you a map of the estate to help you navigate more easily,” the machine hummed in its helpful yet monotone voice. With a quick scan, it would say the same for Toy Dispenser and Essex to let them pass.

The path to the mansion was wide and paved over and was lined with tall, neatly trimmed trees just until you reached the circle driveway which had an odd crystalline statue in the center. At the double doors, a man with an emotionless face, Linn, would be keeping guard and waiting for the VIP guests to arrive.

Yay, a fellow sax player! The sexiest of all instruments!

As the maltans approached the main gate to the estate, a large sign could be seen hanging over it:

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Due to unfortunate circumstances, the Magitech banquet and demonstration has been canceled. We apologize for the inconvenience.

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In the distance, a few cars could be seen parked at the main entrance of the impossibly large mansion although the lawn stretched over a half a mile to the front gate. At the gate, a few well dressed guests arrived early only to be met by an odd legless, faceless robot that seemed to simply defy gravity by hovering a couple of feet from the ground. They offered their invitations which the robot quickly scanned. “I’m sorry but currently only authorized guests and personnel are allowed to enter now that the Magitech event is canceled. I apologize for the inconvenience,” the machine said in a monotone voice.

When the bot noticed the maltans, it hovered in front of them. “Can I please see your invitation?” the robot asked politely.

The clarinet is damned hard to play! As a woodwind player, I can play all the saxes, flute and a few random others like the recorder but the clarinet is just too tough a transition. It’s a tough instrument to play well but when you do play it well it’s really nice. Jazz flute still blows Jazz clari out of the water though.

And Ian would probably practice all the guitars until he was better than Billyboy and Shinji so he’d get dibs on what to play.

((*Keeps throwing shoes, cups and phone books at Terminus*))

((No one wants to play? Le sigh...))

“Son! The VIP guests should be arriving in a little over an hour,” came a loud voice from the base of the humongous curved stair case of the hugely spacious house.

“Yeah, I know! I’m almost ready!” Ian shouted from his room as he straightened the cuffs of his tuxedo.

In a flash of purple light, a man appeared in Ian’s room. “What was that, I didn’t hear you from down there,” Ian’s father, William Allen Kelly, said with a proud smile on his face.

“I said, I’m almost ready.”

“Okay, well I’ll be in the banquet hall preparing the last of the demonstrations. When you’re done getting dressed, get over there really quick so I can explain the situation to you. Then you’ll be the first to greet our guests....I did try and invite some people that you know.” After telling Ian his instructions, Will hit a button on a slightly oversized watch on his wrist and vanished again in the same purple light.

“Stupid, rackafracen techmagicerraka,” he grumbled as he examined himself in the mirror.

Soon, another man entered the room. He was also wearing a tuxedo. He seemed of Asian descent and in his mid fourties. His short black hair was slicked back and his posture seemed perfect. “Come now, Ian. You’re running low on time,” the man said as he straightened Ian’s bow tie.

“Linn! Cut it out. It looks fine,” Ian protested as Linn dusted off Ian’s already perfect outfit.

“Okay then, let’s get a move on,” Linn replied as he scooted Ian toward the door.

((Quick overview:
Ian Kelly: now 16, still in a bit of an emotional transitional period.

William Kelly: Ian’s father, head of a tech corporation that provides components for other powerful tech companies. Also has been working on a tech/magic hybrid useable by the majority of the population for various applications. His past is mysterious before he met Sandra and married.

Sandra Kelly: Ian’s mother. A strong supporter in her husband’s mystical studies. Having become quite knowledgeable herself, she has kept her husband from treading into any dangerous realms of magic.

Linn: Even more mysterious than Will. He is primarily Ian’s caregiver while his parents are away. Will and Linn have been friends for years even before Ian was born.))

((Okay, I know I’m setting myself up for failure here. For one, I’m in....let’s see, SH101, 24HV, CoT, MA, and GtoA 5 RP threads and I’ve got school and work and when I finally get my PC I’ll have CoX to play so.....

Anyway, this’ll be my first thread that I GM so please don’t disappoint me. I’ll try to keep what I’ve learned about GMing in mind while trying out some new stuff like loosely scripted fights(but not all of them will) and a bit of investigation. There shouldn’t be any Godmodeing because some of the fights should be scripted(through PMs) and the other fights would be skirmishes that don’t go on too long.

Okay, the stipulations. No more than two characters per poster(this doesn’t apply to the game-related Master Mind characters though; those guys can only have one+minions). The character(s) must know Ian or know someone who knows Ian(probably tough because Ian hasn’t met that many but I try my best damn it!). This means, Devious’ character(Pete) knows Ian so anyone that Pete knows can go(such as Reikoff or whatever) can go. Oh, did I mention this happens two years after SH101 so anything that happened in CoT or Millennium Arena(If you’re not in that thread and you like to do a little RP fighting GET IN IT CAUSE IT’S FUN!) doesn’t count.

Just another semi-open/semi-closed RP you say? Well, perhaps but I’m not going to close mine. If you can think of a way for a character to enter in that is logical then be my guest but if the entrance isn’t then I’ll toss the idea in the garbage because I’m the GM!! Entrances will become harder and harder as the story progresses and I actually have and end to this so if we all work together we might finish in a few months...

Now, invitations will be sent out by Ian’s father which will sound something like this:

Be the first to experience Magitech, an astounding breakthrough to open up the world of magic and technology to the masses.

Your presence, <insert name>, has been requested at this prestigious banquet to unveil this new advancement to the world. You will be welcomed as a VIP and receive the first batch of prototypes as gifts for your attendance. Don’t miss this life changing opportunity!

K-Tech enterprises

Enclosed would be the address to the mansion, the time(around 6:30pm) and a message saying:

<insert name>,

If you didn’t buy into that spiel, then that’s okay but you’d be doing me a big favor in attending. Not only do I hate dad’s little parties but I sense something.....odd. Hope you decide to come.

Ian Kelly

or some such rubbish. You can change the additional message to flavor whoever he’s asking. If you’re a villain, it doesn’t matter. He likes to fight heroes and villains so I don’t see a reason why it would change anything. Even if it was some villain that decided to hold everyone hostage, he’d get a kick out of trying to stop them. That’s kind of stupid isn’t it? Also, if you're bringing an acquaintance of an acquaintance of Ian then the message should probably be relayed to them.

How would you receive the message? Well, his father owns a tech company so whatever you feel is cool.))

Although I play sax in real-life, I don't have any of my characters capable of playing musical instruments. They might sing not-so-bad but they train all the time so their competent skills are a bit focused.

The way to balance that out should be:

Robots, if defeated, are costly and time consuming to replace.
Zombies, just keep going as a legless one-armed torso and can be quickly reconstructed/replaced.

That probably isn't used as a balancing factor though. Also, what about natural vs. whatever? Are there any ninja or thug RP MMs? I haven't seen many.

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And I know I'm guilty of not wanting to lose. I cling to every last back-door that's with in reasonability, even some that are borderline.

In fact, I think I've killed mysef as many times as I've let someone kill me >.>

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I feel you don't have to let your characters die to lose. Running away is as good as losing if you ask me....although I would find it difficult to find a way for Ian to escape death if he were defeated....no travel powers....

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Just like Acid won't launch anymore nuke-style weapons, especially ones that phase until 20 meters before contact or something along those lines.

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OMG did he really do that ?

Okay, I'm *REALLY* going to bed now.

Yeah, I know. Besides, people can cheat on the dice rolls....I probably would if I lost too many times in a row >.<

Thinking about what Plague said....It seems like all the RPs that have mass amounts of fighting on them tend to be balanced so that one character can’t disturb the plot with a character’s spectrum of powers. It would probably end up more balanced and fun(not to mention less of a headache on the GM) if people did PM each other for battles and what not. It would also be far more entertaining too, I would say. Your character has some special sensory device, the GM sends you a PM saying “Might be able to notice so and so.” or some other stuff I’m too unknowledgeable to think of.

So.....instead of making the GMs wrack their brains trying to figure out how to stop people from harming the story, they can actually think of more story. And battles can go either way, sometimes winning sometimes losing but everyone always gets away somehow. That sounds nice....maybe we should promote that.....might slow down posts for those that aren’t speedy too.

OKAY, I’m going to bed now....

Online dice rolls FTL!

Very well said, and you made me laugh when you said you forgot where you were going with it ^^.

Maybe we should all just sign a pact....a pact to actually lose every now and then.....I'm working on it but sometimes I feel I'm setting my characters up for failure rather than just being outsmarted or unlucky in an RP.

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As for ATs, I get annoyed when people insist on not following them because it more often than not leads straight to tank-magery. As a GM it also makes my job more difficult when setting up challenging encounters if one or more characters is a walking plot device who can pull a counter for everything out of his back pocket.

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Hmmm, very interesting. Two opposing viewpoints.

First you have the guys that don't want their imagination to be limited by in-game confines like AT, AT modifiers, power sets, etc.

Then you have the guys that don't like characters with almighty powers or limitless resources which could cause difficulties with the story and immersion of role playing.

Lastly, you got the guys that try to meet somewhere in the middle(I tend to do this).

Anyone else have an opinion on limiting characters to AT?

Personally, I don't like AT limiting or following strict in-game powersets. If you want to make a guy that scraps with psychic weapons and psychic armor, go ahead. I suppose if you don't cross that magic line of dominating plot/battle it's okay but it's more fun when characters have weaknesses and flaws that people have a chance to exploit tactically instead of overpowering others with sheer power.

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As for WHY demons are so annoying...because it seems like everyone and their granny makes demonic pacts for awesome powers. It's cliche!

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Aww, but everything I come up with is cliche...even if I don't know it.

The demon character I have in the works is a female oni(in game, she's Mistress-Oni....not a very good name but I never have good names). Her main powers are a demonic bow and her ability to control/change into smoke. I decided on smoke/ash because her brother demon uses fire and wind(like the in-game oni). As for her demon ninja, I thought of using tengu(karamatengu and shibatengu) that she conqured and taught ninja tactics to.

There's other stuff but that's the jist of it. How cliche is that?

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I get kinda irate at people using demons as their characters or having their characters in some way associated with demons.

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I have to ask why is that? I ask because I have a character that's essentially a demon mastermind with demon ninja. If I can find out what peeves people off about them I can at least try to dodge that or figure something out to cover it up .

And when it comes to tech, I don't really care it's just you never know what they're going to pull out. I run into few posts that say exactly how much and what kind of gadgets and tech people have on them(or capable of obtaining) in an RP. It's probably just me but I keep thinking, "Okay, they just made that up..." while the mutants only have so and so different applications of their powers.

I suppose that's why I tend to stay away from the stuff in RP because it's too complicated. Mutants have limits because their powers probably have limits; Mystics may tap into something they're not prepared for and get their soul ripped from their body or something; Naturals are limited to what their body can sustain; Tech/Science can be limitless and often times is portrayed as such in RPs. Do people subconsiously build in limits to their tech?

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I also notice a LOT of people limit themselves to the archetypes. There are a few notable exceptions of course.

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I tend to limit myself by AT....kind of. My main katana scrapper guy has element 'control' which I try to downplay because it seems overpowered to me. It's weird.....I don't really know what I can do about AT limiting....I guess as long as you don't have a billion 'I win' powers on a characters you're good....right?

How do you know if characters have crossed the line?

Thanks for changing the subject...I really didn't want to go even deeper into that stuff .

Something that Ess brought up: Villains befriending the little android. Those must be some soft villains....

Well the reason I say look for female characters is so you get the general idea how they look in the CoX realm. You could just go to Atlas Park and take a look at Ms. Libery(which isn't played by a guy because she's an NPC...). She's very attractive....I don't think I should say anything else....

Hey! My 3rd grade teacher was HOT!

....I mean, she was young and attractive(don't have many of those in my educational career).

All I have to say is follow these steps:

1. Confirm you're between the age of 13-18(I'm sure you're somewhere between there 2.0).

2. Go log onto CoX and find various heroines/villainess and rate their attractiveness.

3. Imagine them as teachers.

For me, I could imagine what most male reactions would be. I'm 19 so I still know adolecents(12-16 right? or is it 13-18?) .

Yeah, now that I think about it....what are you doing reading SH101? I dunno, maybe you always read it but maybe you *DO* have a little extra time on your hands this weekend...