The Grippli Blight: Friday March 7th, 8pm EST

[Brindisium]

By request, internationally acclaimed NWN DM Opinvu (Director of The Yar Lich and other MAFTA nominated productions) is bringing us a new season of entertainment:

THE GRIPPLI BLIGHT
(A TREE ROMANCE)

Season Première: Friday March 7th, 8pm EST
Genre: Action / Adventure / Drama / Mystery / Grippli / Arik
Tag line: What the Brak is going on!?
Staring: US!
Qty: 13 episodes
Episodes: 1-2hrs long
Beginning: Foothold
Ending: Arik Subteranion

BE THERE

Please use this thread to confirm your interest. Updates and reminders of the episodes will be posted here. A separate thread will be opened in the IG forum for in-character postings related to the story.

Thanks Opi

[SpymasterGend]

Interested? OF COURSE. Regrettably, my availability starts around 10pm est on fridays. If some episodes to air on alternate days of week, may well tune in live rather than dvr.

Cheers,

Gend

[Aelswith]

Action, adventure and drama! Oh my!
If by some chance I should miss it, I’ll die!

Weliana Killer. 😀 😀 😀

[Corgano]

Fridays at 7 Central, eh? I’ll be there in one character form or another…

Best if you hide your sheep… and bring on the Grippli Blight!

Peace,
Cor

[Brindisium]

The title for Episode One is now confirmed

Grippli-gedon
( The Gripplis forsee a foul )

[Valgrimm]

Fridays are good for me, but 8 is a little early. I should get there at some point.

[Opinvu]

❗ This is Fridays, 13 Fridays, 13 Episodes.
❗

Thanks for posting Brindisium. Yes, this is by request from the Brindisium-Durok himself. I was lead to believe a collection of people already know of this as were part of the request for a long campaign that includes and ends with Arik. I agreed, and kept to most of my promise. The campaign does include all of Arik, a tree and Grippli, and Yes! It starts in Foothold. The rest and details of that is a suprise! 😛

Good question!

Spymastergend asked in a way:

If some episodes to air on alternate days of week, may well tune in live rather than dvr.

I will have my episodes on paper and will take notes of the live player/DM changes to the flow of events in the episode. A Rerun might be doable. Though, it would be a “rerun” it would most likely be a narrated tour of what happened with say a witness and a Bardic translator.

On that note, and without spoiling anything, I would like to request commitment of chars involved. Nothing more frustrating than having Key knowledge holders of the group as well as key players or leaders take a leave of absence but gain a few new faces with different talents. This was requested to be Campaign-like and it would be encouraged to make it a diverse team or set of players. I have several reasons for this. Considering the depths of Arik will be intertwined to the plotline, “treasures” will be obtained and personalized to the ones involved in the plotline. (all participants might find something Special and meant for them) Somethings may spill over to the rest of the week, and as the campaign is open to ALL, the overflow is also open to all that didn’t/doesn’t attend the Friday Live episodes.

The exception to the set chars is evil interaction/intervention. Meta-info gaming is forbidden so your evil character doesn’t know what’s going on with the Good team following the plot, but they might know from tavern talk etc.. So, be a loud mouth through out the week with the involved char and maybe some evil will spread the rumors. This does mean I will work with and allow evil characters to be the secondary alt. char that can be involved. This would be an acceptable reason the first char is absent. This also may make more work for you as a player; you may get more info on one char than the other…No brain sharing!!! Cheeeeesey!

Valgrimm wrote:

Fridays are good for me, but 8 is a little early. I should get there at some point.

I get off work at 5pm Pacific, or 8pm Est. Sometimes I am home right on the dot, and sometimes early due to my variable lunch hour. And, I will also need some set-up/preparation time. So… it won’t be so prompt to but close to as possible for the other time zone needs.

➡ LOOK TO THIS POST FOR UPDATES AND RELATED DISCUSSIONS ❗

[Ceorlas]

Lippitom sets out and carefully furbishes his lock-picks, re-tunes his lute, grinds a clean sharp edge to his hand-axes .. and, with a rogue’s patience, awaits further developments in what promises to be an entertaining saga.

[SpymasterGend]

Gend sits in a darkened room, fingers steepled. He is plotting, always plotting, as spymasters are wont to do. Circles within circles. Inventing reasons and evaluating ploys to convince the Other that offspring must retire early on Fridays. A nap withheld earlier perhaps? By itself, not enough, and costly. His brow furrows in concentration.

[Valgrimm]

Just a quick recap of who’s coming and who they are using

Brind: Durok
Ceorlas: Lipi (good we need someone with rogue skills)
Aels: Kel
Corgano: ??
Sun: (coming later) Sun
Val: Port or Valgrimm

I can bring either, unless other party members feel like port slows things down too much or is just plain annoying, I most likely will use him. It looks like we have melee fighter covered, between durok, and whoever aels uses, so val would be overkill and less fun to play. Plus we will have someone to chronicle the adventure if I use port.

[Aelswith]

I’ll bring Keli. I think. For whacking things. 😀

[SpymasterGend]

At least one plot has borne fruit, so to speak. Sun will be able to participate at least to some degree, depending on timing. And while she also brings some moderately roguish skills to the party, she may not be fully qualified to pass into the latter Arik stages. As always, though, she will lend a hand if at all possible.

Gend

[Brindisium]

@SpymasterGend wrote:

At least one plot has borne fruit, so to speak. Sun will be able to participate at least to some degree, depending on timing. And while she also brings some moderately roguish skills to the party, she may not be fully qualified to pass into the latter Arik stages. As always, though, she will lend a hand if at all possible.

Gend

Great Gend.

Corgano is planning to bring Belferon so for the good of the party I will probably leave Durok supping ale in the ‘Nest and bring Kyriarri. Unless Rasbedian (another mage) is going to make an appearance. I did discuss it with him and have PM’d a reminder.

I believe that is a reasonable set of skills, maybe just a bit rogue/bard heavy at the expense of a cleric?

[Valgrimm]

Brind: Kyriarri
Ceorlas: Lipi
Aels: Kel
Corgano: Belferon
Gend: Sun
Val: Port

wrote:

maybe just a bit rogue/bard heavy

We need lips rogue skills, we don’t necessarily need ports bard skills, so I can use whichever char the group wants me to use, to balance things out.

And yeah we could use a mage. Where you at Kamas?

[Brindisium]

I vote you stay with Port Val. He can record our adventures for posterity and he’s a hoot to have around. In case you didn’t know Kyriarri IS a L25 mage but if Ras shows up and we have more flexibility I could bring Durok or a mage or a monk or a half-orc cleric/shaman to round things out. Or a very bitter and twisted feral druid with a score to settle 😈

[Aelswith]

I could bring Loli who is a 25 Monk, or even Aels, *Sticks her finger in her mouth, causing a gag reflex*, what ever would be best for the party. 😀

[Douglas2440]

Traudek’s in. Should be home around 9 have a concert Friday at 7:30 wait for me if you can or not don’t care one way or another.

Douglas

[Douglas2440]

Then again what levels would be best if i’m too low a lvl with Traudek (level 8 hopefully 9 soon) i can sit out

[Valgrimm]

Everyone is welcome of course! this is markshire. Our party will have a mix of high mid and low levels, so don’t worry about being too low, 9 in fine.

Aels you should bring Kel, that way we have a heavy hitter, besides Bel. Plus port loves having kel around.

Updated:

Brind: Kyriarri (arcane caster)
Ceorlas: Lipi (rogue/bard)
Aels: Kel (melee fighter)
Corgano: Belferon (melee fighter)
Gend: Sun (rogue)
Val: Port (bard)
Doug: Troudek (fighter?)

Looks like we could still use a cleric, we do have a bard and a half, but a cleric would be better. One thing that we might want to factor in here is to make sure we all are using characters that have a reason for adventuring together, and also ones that will work well together. I don’t know what the adventure hook is (I can’t wait to find out) But any lonewolf, borderline evil characters aren’t like to head off with a band of do gooders. Plus we don’t want any of the party members assassinating portales or lipi before we even get to arik.

[SpymasterGend]

You don’t have to be evil to want to throttle Port sometimes…

Gend

[Douglas2440]

Nope, i agree i think his alignment (if possible) would be lazy neutral

[Corgano]

@SpymasterGend wrote:

You don’t have to be evil to want to throttle Port sometimes…

Gend

You ought to make this your quote Gend or a tag line in your profile… 😆

[Opinvu]

EPISODE 1

Went well, great! I agree. Thanks all for showing, moving right along appropreately yet still having your RP time along the way. (I like steady moving, BUT I don’t like silent running point to point then rushing to get your words in. I have two hands to type, but only 1 eyeball to read with.)

Points from Episode 1 for the rest(OOCly).
Take this experiance as a Template. I will need some pauses for a narratve that does mean something IC and OOC for you the player. Example, there was no need to search the Winter Bridge and woulda been waste of time. Use your own discresion.

Try to keep one Conversation leader. The rest can whisper to each other as they crowd around and feed that person questions and etc. (This will help my reading if all questions and statements come from one person when appropriate)

I am trying to keep these in around 2 hour episodes. Trying. You all didn’t notice that was 3.5hrs last night. Okay by me 😀 . The narratives and some Blockades will be set to help guide you but I don’t want this to be just a hallway you all are forced down. I am making them all different mission types. Last night spawns were all MS spawns. Except a few vines and bugbears to bug you. And yes all players are welcome with whatever level char they have available.

Splitting up the group. This is an unspoken NO NO, usually, I can’t be in two listening circles at once. It can be done with these episodes where we only have this going on. No one was not envovlved. I will allow PARTY chat so I may see all your going ons and *emotes*. PLEASE, please do not forget who is not standing next to you and the fact you cannot hear them say they found some object and then run 4 zones to their rescue…OR send a copy in DM channel. Just remember I might not be listening or able to and if there is no quick response to a *search* ping the DM line.

Good point on the ‘hook’ for all alignments to keep caring. There is one, it’s just not fully understood yet. The hook is still tied to the tree. And yes it should be enough to keep them $$ hungries intow until they learn of the Arik hook. I even wrote up a special thing for Nordbert.

[Valgrimm]

https://markshire.com/phpbb2/viewtopic.php?t=3703&start=15

Link to Portales bio, he is chronicling the entire quest in his journal, if anyone wants to catch up.

I had an absolute blast last night and am looking forward to next week. You are a mad genius opi. Port will be joining the group once again, but don’t expect him to have done his share of the work.

[SpymasterGend]

Much fun. Believe I was largely to blame for splitting the party, er, twice. Misinterpretations of group decisions both times. Sorry. Perfectly logical from a role-playing standpoint of course–there’s a certain risk you take when putting a newly arrived foreigner in a scouting role.

But for ease of Opi it might make sense to have a more structured leadership “voice,” both for dialogue and “announcing” decisions–however those are reached–so that the next steps are clear to all, and we don’t have half the group run to one cave and half to another (I will point out, however, that it was Kel and the foreigner who went to the nearest cave). This is I think especially pertinent when there is a character in-party who, by himself and perfectly in-character, creates a great deal of noise and chatter (see sig–amended per Corgano suggestion).

And Opi–thanks for the vegepygmies!

Gend

[Valgrimm]

I believe what Opi is looking for is a party leader, a seasoned adventuring character, who would “take charge” and handle alot of the interactions with DM controlled NPCs and at the same time keep the other party members moving and on track. I think Durok or Belferon could fulfill that leadership role (Durok did fill that role most of the time). Belferon seemed to stay in the back of things and didn’t say a whole lot. (He was doing his Blizzard impression) So then Durok would be the logical choice, though I’m sure he’ll receive plenty of interference from other characters in the party.

[Brindisium]

Durok would be happy to accept military command, I’m sure, but his negotiating skills might prove to be a little…. one dimensional. Which brings me to my point, different situations require different skills and we have lots of interesting skill sets and personalities in the party. As long as we acknowledge who has the reins at any one time I’m sure we’ll be fine.

That would make things a little easier for Opi to follow and simpler for him to give everyone in the party a chance to shine. Even Portales, if he lives that long.

Really enjoyed the first session. Opi /is/ a mad genius, the exchanges between Portales (Valgrimm) and Lipitom (Ceorlas) were hilarious (c.f rhymatrophy 🙂 ), and seeing Keliana (Aelswith) go into battle with an umbrella was awesome. In fact I enjoyed everyone’s adventuring company, thanks folks.

[Opinvu]

@Brindisium wrote:

As long as we acknowledge who has the reins at any one time I’m sure we’ll be fine.

That’s what I was thinking when I wrote it. No worries about splitting up. It’s aDM and NWN no no that is sought to be avoided on the fly.

Not all situations can be delt with in the same mannor and I don’t want to confine the options, I just wanted to bring to forethought the unseen negatives and how one can work around them. Such as plitting up and *searching piles of tattered belongings* While another is *feeling the tree for strength and weight anchoring ability for a rope hold* then wondering where the hell their DM is. So, take these as hints to time saving. Cause really all went fabuolously well. I don’t ike breaking the mood with tells of do this stop that, try this.. that are OOC when things are still going smoothly and happily. So, asking to repeat your question or did I miss anything is embaressing. 😳

[Corgano]

@Valgrimm wrote:

I think Durok or Belferon could fulfill that leadership role (Durok did fill that role most of the time). Belferon seemed to stay in the back of things and didn’t say a whole lot. (He was doing his Blizzard impression) So then Durok would be the logical choice.

Well, there were so many people speaking and asking questions I would have asked, there was no real reason for him to speak up. I’d just have been repeating others questions.

I’d agree that Durok makes a fine leader and can interact with the NPCs even if he is a bit… blunt. 😀 Nothing wrong with that. He’s a Dwarf after all… 😆

Belferon would have invited the grippli for a pie and some ale and then gone into a long story involving an 8-headed lion of the pass, a vampire moose, or a sea cave squid… Bel has a tendancy to tell stories so it’s best if he listens more and talks less. 8)

I DO enjoy the banter between characters… just not so much when we’re talking to NPCs, so I can keep it straight on what we’re supposed to be doing. BUT that’s just me personally.

As for splitting up, yeah that’s a no no. I think we avoided doing that (mostly). And I think we’ll do better next time around.

My .02 cents.

Peace,
Cor

[mule]

I even wrote up a special thing for Nordbert.

*yawns* what? I do read these you know…

I think Port should lead. That’d be interesting.

– mule

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