DeletedUser
THE FALL FROM GRACE
The three cloaked and hooded men strode along the dark and damp stone corridor, lit only at sporadic intervals by small torches, there was no sound apart from their own footsteps, the crackling of the torches and the occasional scream coming from the distance.
The three men kept on walking, as the torches on the walls became more frequent, aside from large niches in the walls that stood in pitch blackness, snarls and growls could be heard coming from the niches, but three men ignored them, the corridor split at a T-junction.
The trio turned left, and continued walking down the corridor, soon it ended in a wooden door, guarded by two hooded men holding fearsome double-ended halberds.
The man in the centre of the trio stepped forward and whispered a few words of an ancient language and the guards instantly stepped aside, one of them opening the door as they did so.
The three men moved through the into a corridor whose walls were lined with human skin, stretched taught over the stone, punctuated by the occasional decaying head, some of the heads had grievous injuries, whilst others were deformed, mutated into an unnatural design.
The corridor came to an end at another door, again guarded by two men.
After whispering the password, the trio passed through the door without trouble, the next corridor was lined with niches, in which stood statues of warriors. All cloaked and hooded, and armed in the same manner as the guards.
Eventually the corridor widened out into a massive room, decorated with corpses spiked to the wall, statues of men, women and children in pain, and various symbols.
Standing beside the walls were a large number of armed guards, standing in the centre of the room stood a large number of cloaked and hooded men, chanting words in an ancient language.
One of the men who was gathered around the centre of the room turned and walked towards the three men.
The central man of the three men moved forwards to greet him.
“Everything is ready my lord.” The man whispered, bowing.
“Good. The ritual can begin.” The other man said, who promptly turned and nodded at another hooded man, who turned and walked into a hidden doorway.
Several minutes later a group of hooded men came out of the hidden door, carrying a life-size wooden puppet.
They carried it to the centre of the room, and placed it in the centre of the four men.
The four men began to chant once more, louder this time, and suddenly, without them touching it, the puppet stood up, and began it’s dance…
High Inquisitor Raerrith strode along the bright stone corridor, the bags under his eyes and the ever increasing wrinkles on his skin showing the signs of the increasing stress the Inquisitors had been put under,
The number of murders in the court had been increasing, and he had no leads whatsoever, and one of his team had been assassinated but a few weeks ago, and now the king had summoned him…what was he going to tell His Majesty?
Raerrith walked through the open double doors into the great hall, in the middle of the room sat the king on his throne.
Raerrith bowed, and waited for the king to speak.
“High Inquisitor Raerrith,” began the king, “How comes the investigation?”
Raerrith paused. “It comes slowly sire, but will no doubt yield results soon.”
“Good. You may go now.”
“Sire.” Raerrith bowed as he stood up, turned and walked out of the chamber.
In a long forgotten age, there was four mighty kingdoms that covered the land, ruled by noble kings, wars were few and far between, and when they did occur, were usually resolved by single combat.
Of course this time of honour and glory could not last, eventually one by one the kingdoms fell to rebellion, plague and strife, their kings murdered, their gleaming citadels burned. Now in their place stood 18 small kingdoms, their borders and rulers constantly changing as wars raged between the new rulers of the land, these new rulers were not the just, chivalrous kings of before, but tyrants who survived by keeping an iron grip on their kingdom, some rulers who came to the throne had illusions of chivalry, and hoped to restore the lands to the glory of old, naturally such rulers did not usually last more than a year, before falling foul to either assassination or a coup.
It is under the service of one of these kings however, that we find our characters, who have little clue of what is about to befall them…
You are all members of High Inquisitor Raerrith’s Inquisitors, you work for King Herenduil, ruler of the kingdom of Turshire.
You effectively act as the king’s bodyguard, eliminating any possible threats to the king.
Recently however, a series of brutal murders has rocked the court, and you have no lead as to who might have committed them, now you and your fellow Inquisitors must attempt to unmask the murderer, and deal out justice.
The setting is low mediaeval, i.e; 12th/13th century.
Character Sheet:
Name: (self-explanatory, if you need help, try; http://rinkworks.com/namegen/fnames.cgi?d=1&f=0)
Age: (again, self-explanatory)
Gender: (self-explanatory)
Occupation: (your role as an Inquisitor, i.e thief, mage etc)
Equipment: (what you’re carrying)
Appearance (what you look like)
Bio: (your character’s background, how they came to be an Inquisitor, etc)
ATTRIBUTES:
Below is a modified version of Alawa’s character creation mechanism that was modified by Braet, and now further modified by me, the system is used to define a characters abilities, i.e, if you haven’t got enough points in it on your sheet, you can’t do it in the RP, and beware, I will be checking your attributes each time that you do something that requires on of the skills listed below.
Attributes are broken into Physical, Social, and Mental.
PHYSICAL: The core movement abilities of your character
Strength: Brute physical power
Dexterity: Familiarity with your body’s capabilities in motion
Stamina: The combination of physical and mental fortitude
SOCIAL: How well you character interacts and is perceived by others
Charisma: How well you present yourself to others
Manipulation: How well you can garner response through deceit and trickery
Appearance: How attractive you are to others
MENTAL: Your mental capabilities
Perception: Conscious and intuitive capabilities to notice details
Intelligence: How smart you are (duh)
Wits: Mental reaction to given situations
Abilities are broken down into three categories
TALENTS: A listing of talents, most are self-explanatory
Alertness: Recognizing specific details
Athletics: Running, climbing, jumping, swimming
Brawl: Fighting with your fists
Dodge: Not getting hit by stuff
Empathy: The understanding the emotions of others'
Expression: The ability to convey meaning through written word or oratory
Intimidation: The ability to gain information or action through threat
Intuition: Gut feelings
Leadership: The ability to motivate through force of personality
Streetwise: Understanding the vernacular of the underbelly of society
Subterfuge: Lying
Performance: Ability to entertain audiences
SKILLS: A listing of skills, most are self-explanatory
Animal Ken: Understanding animal behaviour
Crafts: The ability to construct or repair
Tracking: Your ability to track people or animals using only the signs they’ve left
Riding: Your ability to ride a horse (Or similar animal)
Shooting: Your ability to use missile weapons such as Bows, Crossbows and Javelins
Melee (Small Weapons): Your Skill with single handed weapons such as Swords, Axes, Knives, Clubs etc
Melee (Large Weapons): Your Skill with Large two handed Weapons such as Spears, Glaives, Two Handed axes and swords, etc
Thievery: Your ability to pick peoples pockets and crack locks without being caught
Stealth: Sneaking and hiding
Survival: The knowledge required to adapt enough to continue breathing
Discipline: Your ability to stay focused on the task at hand despite the distractions all around you
KNOWLEDGES: List of knowledge’s, most are self-explanatory
Academics: (Can Read 1, Fully Literate 2, Formal Schooling 3, Academic 4, Scholar 5)
Herbalist: Your Knowledge on plants and how to create potions, poisons and poultices from them
Enigmas: Ability to solve puzzles
Trade: How to get the best deal when buying or selling things
Investigation: Combination of formal investigative procedure and common sense
Sorcery: Your ability (Or Perceived ability) to cast spells and/or resist their affects.
Linguistics: How quickly you can pick up and learn a foreign language
Medicine: Healing
Occult: Knowledge of the supernatural, legends, and myth
Research: How to find a sought answer
Science: The application of science (this is medieval science, think Alchemy)
That's the list of attributes (which can not be altered) and Abilities (which can be within reason. I know I couldn't list it all)
Attributes and abilities are ranked 1 through 5. As a general belief the numbers can be described as such; 1 poor, 2 average, 3 good, 4 exceptional, 5 outstanding.
Attributes: All categories begin with a base of 1. You are given the following breakdown of points to allocate between the three main attributes (Physical, Social, Mental). They are 7/5/3. That means you can put 7 points into one main attribute, and then 5 in the second most important to you, and finally 3 in the least important. As an example;
I have a soldier. I believe physical, mental, and lastly social to be how I rank importance. I spend 7 points in physical. I have 1 in each category already. So I spend 2 in strength, 3 in dexterity, and 2 in stamina so my final categories would be Strength 3, Dexterity 4, and Stamina 3. Then I would spend 5 points in mental, and lastly 3 in social. Hope it makes sense.
Abilities: All three categories start with nothing in any of the ranks. You can spend the following 13/9/5. Just like attributes, take a moment to look at all the available abilities and rank your categories in order of importance. Your most important logically should have 13 points spent in it, then your second 9, and finally 5 in the least important. There are several abilities that do not require any specialized knowledge to use, Athletics being the first I saw. I can run, but have never been formally trained in real nuance, so I'd have just base dexterity to fall back on. There are others that you have to have at least one rank to perform. Medicine seems to be a good one to use as an example. If you have no training in first aid... you can leave my dangling broken arm alone until somebody who does know what to do comes along thank you very much.
Complex eh? It's easy once you grasp the process. Three more rules;
First, you can only have one rank of 5 on your entire sheet. I don't care if it's attribute or ability. You may have two ranks of 4 anywhere on your sheet. All other ranks must be 3 or less.
Second... you get 11 free points to spend wherever you want on your sheet. Attributes cost 5 points each rank. Abilities cost 2 points each rank. So, example, you could pick two attribute ranks, or five abilities, or one attribute and three abilities.
And Third; My own Jack Of All Trades rule, to prevent any player using the system to create a really powerful melee fighter that can cast massive spells, I will use the following rule; If you have a 5 or 4 in either the Shooting, Melee (Small Weapons), or Melee (Large Weapons) categories then you may not put any of your points into Sorcery, This rule is in force for the reason I have already given, and because in this setting Sorcery is a very rare and skilled art.
MAGES: You may only have a limited number of spells and magic items (up to 10 spells and up to 5 magic items), these spells & magic items MUST be listed on your character sheet under Equipment, along with their effects, keep the spells realistic, such as Deflect Missiles, Fireball, Freeze etc etc, no ‘Destroy army with flick of wrist’ or ‘Cause giant tidal wave’, and remember, casting magic is exhausting!
----------------------------------------------
RULES:
No god-modding, no meta-gaming, no killing off other player characters without prior permission, etc etc, and unlike my previous RPs, this one is OP driven, which means I’m in charge, and so if you post something that doesn’t fit, then I’ll PM you and ask you to edit it.
And finally, we welcome new players, do if the RP's already well underway, but you want to join, then feel free to join, just PM me your character and I'll work it into the story.
-----------------------------------------------
Name: High Inquisitor Raerrith
Age: 43
Gender: Male
OCCUPATION: High Inquisitor
Height: 5 foot 10
Appearance: A medium sized man, with close cut black hair with patches of grey appearing, he has large bags under his eyes, and wrinkled skin.
He wears dark green leggings, and a crimson tunic, which lies underneath a coat of mail, on his back he wears a light brown cloak, pinned to his chest by a golden brooch inlaid with his family’s coat of arms, attached to his belt is a pouch, his eating knife, and his broadsword.
Bio: Born to the house of Raerrith, he grew up amidst a civil war that nearly destroyed the kingdom, his family had taken the side of the as yet uncrowned Herenduil, Duke of Cruickhaven. At his coming of age Raerrith fought alongside his father under the service of Herenduil, he proved himself to be a skilled warrior, fighting at the Crossing of the Valkeryie River, the battle of Rilwor, the attack on Agerd, and the siege of Beall.
After the war ended and Herenduil took power, Raerrith was give the privilege of High Inquisitor, since he has gathered together a team of experts to help protect the king.
PHYSICAL: 7
Strength: 3
Dexterity: 3
Stamina: 3
SOCIAL: 3
Charisma: 2
Manipulation: 2
Appearance: 2
MENTAL: 5
Perception: 3
Intelligence: 3
Wits: 3
TALENTS: 9
Athletics: 2 (3)
Brawl: Fighting with your fists 2
Intimidation: 2
Leadership: 3 (4)
SKILLS: 13
Riding: 2 (3)
Melee (Small Weapons): 4
Melee (Large Weapons): 5
Discipline: 2 (3)
KNOWLEDGES: 5
Academics: 2 (3)
Investigation: 3
Research: 3
The three cloaked and hooded men strode along the dark and damp stone corridor, lit only at sporadic intervals by small torches, there was no sound apart from their own footsteps, the crackling of the torches and the occasional scream coming from the distance.
The three men kept on walking, as the torches on the walls became more frequent, aside from large niches in the walls that stood in pitch blackness, snarls and growls could be heard coming from the niches, but three men ignored them, the corridor split at a T-junction.
The trio turned left, and continued walking down the corridor, soon it ended in a wooden door, guarded by two hooded men holding fearsome double-ended halberds.
The man in the centre of the trio stepped forward and whispered a few words of an ancient language and the guards instantly stepped aside, one of them opening the door as they did so.
The three men moved through the into a corridor whose walls were lined with human skin, stretched taught over the stone, punctuated by the occasional decaying head, some of the heads had grievous injuries, whilst others were deformed, mutated into an unnatural design.
The corridor came to an end at another door, again guarded by two men.
After whispering the password, the trio passed through the door without trouble, the next corridor was lined with niches, in which stood statues of warriors. All cloaked and hooded, and armed in the same manner as the guards.
Eventually the corridor widened out into a massive room, decorated with corpses spiked to the wall, statues of men, women and children in pain, and various symbols.
Standing beside the walls were a large number of armed guards, standing in the centre of the room stood a large number of cloaked and hooded men, chanting words in an ancient language.
One of the men who was gathered around the centre of the room turned and walked towards the three men.
The central man of the three men moved forwards to greet him.
“Everything is ready my lord.” The man whispered, bowing.
“Good. The ritual can begin.” The other man said, who promptly turned and nodded at another hooded man, who turned and walked into a hidden doorway.
Several minutes later a group of hooded men came out of the hidden door, carrying a life-size wooden puppet.
They carried it to the centre of the room, and placed it in the centre of the four men.
The four men began to chant once more, louder this time, and suddenly, without them touching it, the puppet stood up, and began it’s dance…
High Inquisitor Raerrith strode along the bright stone corridor, the bags under his eyes and the ever increasing wrinkles on his skin showing the signs of the increasing stress the Inquisitors had been put under,
The number of murders in the court had been increasing, and he had no leads whatsoever, and one of his team had been assassinated but a few weeks ago, and now the king had summoned him…what was he going to tell His Majesty?
Raerrith walked through the open double doors into the great hall, in the middle of the room sat the king on his throne.
Raerrith bowed, and waited for the king to speak.
“High Inquisitor Raerrith,” began the king, “How comes the investigation?”
Raerrith paused. “It comes slowly sire, but will no doubt yield results soon.”
“Good. You may go now.”
“Sire.” Raerrith bowed as he stood up, turned and walked out of the chamber.
In a long forgotten age, there was four mighty kingdoms that covered the land, ruled by noble kings, wars were few and far between, and when they did occur, were usually resolved by single combat.
Of course this time of honour and glory could not last, eventually one by one the kingdoms fell to rebellion, plague and strife, their kings murdered, their gleaming citadels burned. Now in their place stood 18 small kingdoms, their borders and rulers constantly changing as wars raged between the new rulers of the land, these new rulers were not the just, chivalrous kings of before, but tyrants who survived by keeping an iron grip on their kingdom, some rulers who came to the throne had illusions of chivalry, and hoped to restore the lands to the glory of old, naturally such rulers did not usually last more than a year, before falling foul to either assassination or a coup.
It is under the service of one of these kings however, that we find our characters, who have little clue of what is about to befall them…
You are all members of High Inquisitor Raerrith’s Inquisitors, you work for King Herenduil, ruler of the kingdom of Turshire.
You effectively act as the king’s bodyguard, eliminating any possible threats to the king.
Recently however, a series of brutal murders has rocked the court, and you have no lead as to who might have committed them, now you and your fellow Inquisitors must attempt to unmask the murderer, and deal out justice.
The setting is low mediaeval, i.e; 12th/13th century.
Character Sheet:
Name: (self-explanatory, if you need help, try; http://rinkworks.com/namegen/fnames.cgi?d=1&f=0)
Age: (again, self-explanatory)
Gender: (self-explanatory)
Occupation: (your role as an Inquisitor, i.e thief, mage etc)
Equipment: (what you’re carrying)
Appearance (what you look like)
Bio: (your character’s background, how they came to be an Inquisitor, etc)
ATTRIBUTES:
Below is a modified version of Alawa’s character creation mechanism that was modified by Braet, and now further modified by me, the system is used to define a characters abilities, i.e, if you haven’t got enough points in it on your sheet, you can’t do it in the RP, and beware, I will be checking your attributes each time that you do something that requires on of the skills listed below.
Attributes are broken into Physical, Social, and Mental.
PHYSICAL: The core movement abilities of your character
Strength: Brute physical power
Dexterity: Familiarity with your body’s capabilities in motion
Stamina: The combination of physical and mental fortitude
SOCIAL: How well you character interacts and is perceived by others
Charisma: How well you present yourself to others
Manipulation: How well you can garner response through deceit and trickery
Appearance: How attractive you are to others
MENTAL: Your mental capabilities
Perception: Conscious and intuitive capabilities to notice details
Intelligence: How smart you are (duh)
Wits: Mental reaction to given situations
Abilities are broken down into three categories
TALENTS: A listing of talents, most are self-explanatory
Alertness: Recognizing specific details
Athletics: Running, climbing, jumping, swimming
Brawl: Fighting with your fists
Dodge: Not getting hit by stuff
Empathy: The understanding the emotions of others'
Expression: The ability to convey meaning through written word or oratory
Intimidation: The ability to gain information or action through threat
Intuition: Gut feelings
Leadership: The ability to motivate through force of personality
Streetwise: Understanding the vernacular of the underbelly of society
Subterfuge: Lying
Performance: Ability to entertain audiences
SKILLS: A listing of skills, most are self-explanatory
Animal Ken: Understanding animal behaviour
Crafts: The ability to construct or repair
Tracking: Your ability to track people or animals using only the signs they’ve left
Riding: Your ability to ride a horse (Or similar animal)
Shooting: Your ability to use missile weapons such as Bows, Crossbows and Javelins
Melee (Small Weapons): Your Skill with single handed weapons such as Swords, Axes, Knives, Clubs etc
Melee (Large Weapons): Your Skill with Large two handed Weapons such as Spears, Glaives, Two Handed axes and swords, etc
Thievery: Your ability to pick peoples pockets and crack locks without being caught
Stealth: Sneaking and hiding
Survival: The knowledge required to adapt enough to continue breathing
Discipline: Your ability to stay focused on the task at hand despite the distractions all around you
KNOWLEDGES: List of knowledge’s, most are self-explanatory
Academics: (Can Read 1, Fully Literate 2, Formal Schooling 3, Academic 4, Scholar 5)
Herbalist: Your Knowledge on plants and how to create potions, poisons and poultices from them
Enigmas: Ability to solve puzzles
Trade: How to get the best deal when buying or selling things
Investigation: Combination of formal investigative procedure and common sense
Sorcery: Your ability (Or Perceived ability) to cast spells and/or resist their affects.
Linguistics: How quickly you can pick up and learn a foreign language
Medicine: Healing
Occult: Knowledge of the supernatural, legends, and myth
Research: How to find a sought answer
Science: The application of science (this is medieval science, think Alchemy)
That's the list of attributes (which can not be altered) and Abilities (which can be within reason. I know I couldn't list it all)
Attributes and abilities are ranked 1 through 5. As a general belief the numbers can be described as such; 1 poor, 2 average, 3 good, 4 exceptional, 5 outstanding.
Attributes: All categories begin with a base of 1. You are given the following breakdown of points to allocate between the three main attributes (Physical, Social, Mental). They are 7/5/3. That means you can put 7 points into one main attribute, and then 5 in the second most important to you, and finally 3 in the least important. As an example;
I have a soldier. I believe physical, mental, and lastly social to be how I rank importance. I spend 7 points in physical. I have 1 in each category already. So I spend 2 in strength, 3 in dexterity, and 2 in stamina so my final categories would be Strength 3, Dexterity 4, and Stamina 3. Then I would spend 5 points in mental, and lastly 3 in social. Hope it makes sense.
Abilities: All three categories start with nothing in any of the ranks. You can spend the following 13/9/5. Just like attributes, take a moment to look at all the available abilities and rank your categories in order of importance. Your most important logically should have 13 points spent in it, then your second 9, and finally 5 in the least important. There are several abilities that do not require any specialized knowledge to use, Athletics being the first I saw. I can run, but have never been formally trained in real nuance, so I'd have just base dexterity to fall back on. There are others that you have to have at least one rank to perform. Medicine seems to be a good one to use as an example. If you have no training in first aid... you can leave my dangling broken arm alone until somebody who does know what to do comes along thank you very much.
Complex eh? It's easy once you grasp the process. Three more rules;
First, you can only have one rank of 5 on your entire sheet. I don't care if it's attribute or ability. You may have two ranks of 4 anywhere on your sheet. All other ranks must be 3 or less.
Second... you get 11 free points to spend wherever you want on your sheet. Attributes cost 5 points each rank. Abilities cost 2 points each rank. So, example, you could pick two attribute ranks, or five abilities, or one attribute and three abilities.
And Third; My own Jack Of All Trades rule, to prevent any player using the system to create a really powerful melee fighter that can cast massive spells, I will use the following rule; If you have a 5 or 4 in either the Shooting, Melee (Small Weapons), or Melee (Large Weapons) categories then you may not put any of your points into Sorcery, This rule is in force for the reason I have already given, and because in this setting Sorcery is a very rare and skilled art.
MAGES: You may only have a limited number of spells and magic items (up to 10 spells and up to 5 magic items), these spells & magic items MUST be listed on your character sheet under Equipment, along with their effects, keep the spells realistic, such as Deflect Missiles, Fireball, Freeze etc etc, no ‘Destroy army with flick of wrist’ or ‘Cause giant tidal wave’, and remember, casting magic is exhausting!
----------------------------------------------
RULES:
No god-modding, no meta-gaming, no killing off other player characters without prior permission, etc etc, and unlike my previous RPs, this one is OP driven, which means I’m in charge, and so if you post something that doesn’t fit, then I’ll PM you and ask you to edit it.
And finally, we welcome new players, do if the RP's already well underway, but you want to join, then feel free to join, just PM me your character and I'll work it into the story.
-----------------------------------------------
Name: High Inquisitor Raerrith
Age: 43
Gender: Male
OCCUPATION: High Inquisitor
Height: 5 foot 10
Appearance: A medium sized man, with close cut black hair with patches of grey appearing, he has large bags under his eyes, and wrinkled skin.
He wears dark green leggings, and a crimson tunic, which lies underneath a coat of mail, on his back he wears a light brown cloak, pinned to his chest by a golden brooch inlaid with his family’s coat of arms, attached to his belt is a pouch, his eating knife, and his broadsword.
Bio: Born to the house of Raerrith, he grew up amidst a civil war that nearly destroyed the kingdom, his family had taken the side of the as yet uncrowned Herenduil, Duke of Cruickhaven. At his coming of age Raerrith fought alongside his father under the service of Herenduil, he proved himself to be a skilled warrior, fighting at the Crossing of the Valkeryie River, the battle of Rilwor, the attack on Agerd, and the siege of Beall.
After the war ended and Herenduil took power, Raerrith was give the privilege of High Inquisitor, since he has gathered together a team of experts to help protect the king.
PHYSICAL: 7
Strength: 3
Dexterity: 3
Stamina: 3
SOCIAL: 3
Charisma: 2
Manipulation: 2
Appearance: 2
MENTAL: 5
Perception: 3
Intelligence: 3
Wits: 3
TALENTS: 9
Athletics: 2 (3)
Brawl: Fighting with your fists 2
Intimidation: 2
Leadership: 3 (4)
SKILLS: 13
Riding: 2 (3)
Melee (Small Weapons): 4
Melee (Large Weapons): 5
Discipline: 2 (3)
KNOWLEDGES: 5
Academics: 2 (3)
Investigation: 3
Research: 3
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