SDMB: The Rule of Three
Welcome to the play thread for the SDMB play-by-post RPG: The Rule of Three, in the vein of the illustrious Fighting Ignorants and the years-long SD LOTR.
[ul][li]What is the Rule of Three (RoT)?[/ul][/li]RoT is a play-by-post RPG campaign taking place on the SDMB.
[ul][li]What kind of schedule does the game have?[/ul]Play will progress when what I believe is an adequate number of players have posted. For relatively unimportant moments in the game, such as determining marching orders, etc, this will require a simple majority. I’ll give enough time for everyone to post during important story moments. I hope for players to be able to post at least once a day, excepting occasional delays, which are understandable.[/li][ul][li]How do I join?[/ul][/li]We currently having a waiting list to play. If you’d like to be put on the replacement list post in the setup thread or send me a private message.
Notes on posting (for players):
Players, please make it clear what you’re doing when you post. Is your character speaking? Are you telling me what you want your character to do? Are you saying something OOC (Out Of Character)? I should be able to tell at a glance what you’re trying to do. If you’re asking me an important question try to bold or color it so that it jumps off the page at me. Thanks in advance and good luck!
Introduction:
[spoiler]RoT takes place in a medieval fantasy world called Mados. More specifically, the action is centered in the divided kingdom Tiribunus (adjective: Bunic). The Bunic borders have been shrinking for decades now (especially in the east). The mists (a strange, corrupting presence seen at the edges of civilization) and the far and mountain folk have been slowly reclaiming the edges of the map.
Castle Hammerfall and its surrounding community were built at the western foot of the Broken Jaw Mountains in the Eastern Provinces (a “province” is a colonized area outside Tiribunus proper) about two and a half centuries ago. For the last hundred years things have been on the decline in the Eastern Provinces, peaking during the last two decades; crop failures and plagues have forced most of the population west and left the remaining lords destitute. Godrick Faramond, the Lord Hammerfall, was among the more stubborn land owners who refused to relinquish his hold- that is, he was until his death three years ago.
He left his children a ruined keep and abandoned, infertile land. They could have gone to serve another lord, perhaps in nearby Whitewall. Instead they and what remains of their entourage packed what little they could and made southwest along the coast of the Bay of Tears. Their reasons are their own, known to few others besides themselves. Some claim the mists have clouded their minds. Others say the loss of their holdings have driven them mad.[/spoiler]
Notes on nobility and honor:
[spoiler]Nobility in Tiribunus is based around land ownership: A family must own land to be considered truly noble. That being said, the majority of nobles don’t personally own any land. Their families do.
Honor is a code that regulates how nobles treat one another. It has nothing to do with how nobles treat peasants. Indeed, a noble who works his serfs to death, burns entire villages to the ground and sells children into slavery can be considered very honorable by his peers. Peasants have no honor and so nobles are not obligated to treat them honorably. Serfs enjoy a small measure of protection in that if one kills or otherwise harms a serf it is similar to vandalizing their master’s property. Of course, not all peasants are serfs. “Free agents” enjoy no protection at all.
Nobles are expected to to be honest and true in their dealings with fellow nobles, to spare the lives of noble noncombatants (execution of criminals an exception), to show respect to their superiors and so on. Different nobles put different values on honor. Some only care that they have the appearance of being honorable. The actual intricacies of honor would be too much to post here, but suffice it to say that if a noble is looking for an insult to one’s honor (real or imagined) as justification for war it would be very easy to find.[/spoiler]
Notes on gender:
[spoiler]RoT’s game world is not as sexist as actual medieval society, but gender roles still exist. Women can’t pledge their support to other houses except through marriage and they can’t own land except by becoming widows (they lose their land if they remarry - many a hostile takeover has been performed by marrying the widow of a powerful lord).
Though it is rare, some women do become professional soldiers.[/spoiler]
Notes on magic:
RoT is a low-magic campaign. The average person in the game world will never see magic in their lifetime. Spellcasters are feared and treated with suspicion and occasionally outright hostility. No one knows why some people are born with inherent magical powers and others are not, but of course everyone has a theory. Magic tends to be more common among those with recent Mountainfolk or Farfolk ancestry.
Notes on the system:
[spoiler]Health
Characters have an amount of Health boxes equal to their Size (5 for most humans) + Stamina (2 for most humans), with an average Health of 7.
Each Health box can be filled with up to three points of damage. There are three types of damage: Bashing damage (equal to one point of damage), Lethal damage (equal to two points of damage) and Aggravated damage (equal to three points of damage).
As a character takes damage the points are assigned to empty Health boxes.
For example: If a character with 7 Health boxes takes 2 points of Bashing damage, he would now have 5 empty Health boxes and 2 boxes with Bashing damage. If he then took a point of Lethal damage he would have 4 empty Health boxes, 2 with Bashing damage and 1 with Lethal damage. If all a character’s Health boxes are filled damage is then distributed among previously-filled boxes, with bashing damage upgrading to lethal and lethal upgrading to aggravated. The system works much better visually, so if it’s confusing don’t worry too much about it.
All that’s important to know is that bashing damage and greater can impose dice penalties if it fills up a character’s last three boxes. Lethal damage can make a character pass out if it fills up a character’s final box, at which point he risks taking aggravated damage each round. If a character’s final box is filled with aggravated damage he dies.
A character heals 1 point of Bashing damage every hour. Bashing damage doesn’t have to be treated.
Lethal damage is healed at 1 point per two days if untreated or unsuccessfully treated. It’s healed at 1 point per day if treated successfully.
Aggravated damage is healed at 1 point per week if untreated or unsuccessfully treated. It’s healed at 1 point per three days if treated successfully. Aggravated damage represents truly grievous injuries: If a character ever takes any amount of aggravated damage he has just had a brush with death.
Willpower
I will occasionally note that a character has used Willpower. When I do I’ll also note how much Willpower that character has left. Willpower can be regained by a full night’s sleep; a night spent riding or keeping lookout will prevent a character from regaining Willpower.
Virtues and Vices
All characters have Virtues and Vices determined by their players. Players do not know the Virtues and Vices of their fellow players, though it might not be too difficult to determine it through gameplay (such as noticing that a certain character has inexplicably gained Willpower). Whenever a character fulfills a Virtue they regain ALL spent Willpower. Whenever they fulfill a Vice they regain a single spent Willpower. Virtues are much more difficult to fulfill than Vices. [/spoiler]
Here is a map of Pordeaux, a duchy on the Slave Coast, where the game begins.
Here is a blank world map to give perspective. The continent whose southeastern corner is occupied by Pordeaux is mainland Tiribunus.
