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[Patrick Hunt]

I am toning them down, I add up all the different modifiers for each turn to pick what to do with him after I post an initial action that just feels like it fits then alter the turn as needed. The ring it came out 75% self control so he left. But that also means he has built up frustration so being insulted in the street by a kid when he's already in a bad mood came out at 51/49 in favor of head pulping. Then I always factor in the immediate setting and the situation to make a final choice which should keep things in line with the game unless something goes horribly wrong. Like watching his friends die if he ever makes any.

If they do come out violent but it doesn't really make sense or fit the situation I'll alter it to be more fitting. With luck it won't happen often though I have a few different reserves in place to prevent it getting that far but I didn't think I'd need any this early so didn't include any.


I'm not gonna go berserk and start killing everything, unless the situation calls for mass casualties anyway.

[LordBucket]

Talking is a free action, right?

[Silcugar]

Haha, is that how they do a magic duel in Glistens? Much more physical than what I had in mind, but I'll take it.

[Rolepgeek]

You know, if she's good at weather control, she might be good enough to lightning you and keep herself insulated from it, regardless.

Since I am forced to picture your character as mini-Celestia, this image is also hilarious.

EDIT: Other note, I finished reading Hard Reset yesterday. It has piqued my interest in fanfics/watching MLP past the first season.

[LordBucket]

Haha, is that how they do a magic duel in Glistens?

Well, no...but the 'no weapons' rule made my entire method of dueling invalid. I assumed that was deliberate on your part. Aurora is a telekinesis duelist. With no weapons, what exactly was she supposed to telekinetically manipulate other than her body directly?

When the deal was issued, I expected we'd be fighting indoors, and I'd be allowed to use weapons. Fighting outdoors where the clouds are and with no weapons was pretty much the worst pair of disadvantages Aurora could have been given, considering her opponent. So I had to improvise. Clover did say that this would be a duel, amongst other things...of ingenuity. With Autumn probably able to zap me with lightning, staying in close contact seemed the simplest way to render her particular skillset useless.

So, had to touch her...telekinesis on her body directly...and I like hugs. So hugs it was.

You know, if she's good at weather control, she might be good enough to lightning you and keep herself insulated from it, regardless.

Maybe. Or if she's a skilled telekinetic she might even be able to simply push me off or respond in kind. Or if she can teleport, she can teleport out of my grip. What I'm doing is by no means certain. It would have no chance of working against any of my Glistener dueling partners.  I'm pretty much depending on Autumn being an inexperienced duelist.

Since I am forced to picture your character as mini-Celestia, this image is also hilarious.

Do you like ba- hugs?

EDIT: Other note, I finished reading Hard Reset yesterday. It has piqued my interest in fanfics/watching MLP past the first season.

Excellent fic, if a bit dark. It has two sequels, by the way.

[Rolepgeek]

I just have to imagine Celestia-themed normal pony hugging Autumn Swift while she turns blue, then the classic black silhouette with white bones as blue lightning strikes her and leaves her with rather frizzy hair.

I do know about the sequels, though I haven't gotten to them yet.

As a note, fighting inside would be a huge disadvantage to Autumn Swift, not so much an advantage for your character. Without weapons is certainly a disadvantage for you though.

[LordBucket]

Autumn just got way more dangerous. Lightning I can arrange to not be where it strikes. But if she's a good enough illusionist that I couldn't even tell it wasn't her I was physically strangling, that means she was maintaining audio, visual and tactile illusions all at once, while also maintaining her own invisibility. Seems fairly improbable that she would be doing all of that together at once while simultaneously applying telekinesis to her water vapor to provide tactile pushback against me...so I can only assume she was doing her illusions by implanting sensations directly into my mind. That's dangerous stuff, and it seems peculiar that she would be that good of an illusionist and not have mentioned it earlier.

And since there's no way she could reasonably have set all that up and teleport faster than me after the match started, presumably that means she replaced herself some time ago and it was her doppleganger who accepted the match and the audience  has been wondering this entire time if I'd noticed.

[Silcugar]

It does seem like too much for one pony to cast, now doesn't it? I mean, an invisibility or cloaking spell takes a lot of concentration by itself, so conjuring weather effects and maintaining other spells at the same time seems rather intense, even for an expert.

[Patrick Hunt]

Well in theory it would actually be possible to do, but the back lash would be insane mentally and physically if you tried to hold that level of effort for any length of time.

[Rolepgeek]

I have a feeling she's a case of Scissors Cuts Rock and When All You Have is a Hammer combined. It's all just weather magic. Just a solid dummy of water vapor. That's how good she is. It's not a cloaking spell, it's just part of the weather.

THERE IS ONLY RAIN.

[LordBucket]

It does seem like too much for one pony to cast, now doesn't it? I mean, an invisibility or cloaking spell takes a lot of concentration by itself, so conjuring weather effects and maintaining other spells at the same time seems rather intense, even for an expert.

You seem to be implying that she's cheating. That seems unlikely to me given the audience. Clover, the Magister, three university judges...somebody would notice. Even if it's one of the university staff helping her, that seems like a terrible risk for them to take.

The simplest explanation to me seems to be that this is "implant experience into your head" illusion rather than smoke and mirrors illusion. Manipulating 5 different objects telekinetically isn't really five different spells. Maintaining audio, visual, tactile illusions plus weather control and invisibility probably doesn't need to be 5 different spells either if I'm the only one experiencing those things.

Doesn't matter. If it's a targeted illusion, hopefully I teleported out of either range or focus. Even if not, whether it's just Autumn or multiple ponies...they'll get tired eventually. Probably.

Just a solid dummy of water vapor. That's how good she is.

That just seems implausible to me. I was both in physical and telekinetic contact with the doppleganger, and yet I apparently had no idea it wasn't her. Which means not only was I receiving the physical sensation of strangling a pony rather than strangling a ball of water, I would have felt pushback on my telekinesis. Telekinesis is something I'm really good at. It's ridiculous to suggest that I just "wouldn't notice" I was squeezing water vapor instead of a pony. And we can't even explain that away by saying the GM dropped the ball and just didn't notice the tactile part, because he specifically commented on the physical contact a couple posts back.

Simplest explanation is that Aurora has been in some sort of magically induced trance since before the duel started. Autumn said her specialties were weather and control...but she didn't specify control of what.

Plus...I referenced This Platinum Crown in my original character submission. If Silcugar has read that fic...this is a very obvious thing for him to do.

[Rolepgeek]

Yeah...I meant she made the water vapor feel like not being water vapor, simply because she was that good at dealing with fog and such. >.>

I also doubt she teleported. If it was a cloaking spell, I would think she would have made it where she was standing, then simply backed up with the dummy still there.

Reminds me of the ninja from the Hidden Rain Village during the first season or so of Naruto, though. Rain susbstitutes, everywhere.

[Silcugar]

I agree. It is rather unlikely she is cheating. But how, then, can she do all of this so quickly?

As far as the dummy thing goes, I didn't imply it was an obvious fake from close up because you spent so much time talking to it, so I would have have to nullify most of your post by saying, "By the way, this is definitely not a pony." But you seems so eagre to squeeze the life out of her that I couldn't stand to break your heart!

Even so, the dummy, in reality, would have dissipated so quickly that you wouldn't have noticed anything specifically odd about it. Well, besides the fact that it was destroyed on contact, and that it wasn't living.

Also, I said that your action was more physical than I anticipated, and it was. Physically grabbing onto your enemy in a magic duel is very physical. But that is irrelevant, because you did experience at least some kind of force resist you as you were choking her.

And finally, no, I haven't read that fic.

The most important thing I'm taking away from this, though, is your questioning of the validity of my posts (which is fine as long as it doesn't bog down the game) and your apparent inability to go along with the game. Both these combined demonstrate a problem we must fix. I don't want to have to explain out of character knowledge to you every time you find something illogical. Normally, this wouldn't be a problem, but your previous two actions (attempting to teleport out of a duel and calmly walking up to Clover in the middle of the duel) show me that you are actively defying the game, likely because you have some issues with how I'm running it or, more specifically, the logic of my characters.

Firstly, let me explain my logic.

Your character attempted to teleport out of the arena of a duel. Now, I think it's pretty logical to assume that once you're in a duel, you should stick to it. I didn't think I'd have to explain that to you. Saying 'It wasn't mentioned in the rules' is akin to agreeing to a shootout at sundown, then sniping your opponent safely from the clock tower. After all, the agreement was a shootout, they never said it was supposed to be revolvers.

So, as far as that point goes, you are technically (very technically) justified in thinking teleporting outside the arena is allowed, because the rules weren't fully explained in excruciating detail to your character. But I was hoping your character, who has knowledge of noble customs, would see this as dishonourable, or at least rogueish or underhanded. You are, after all, exploiting perceived loopholes.

Next, your character, in defiance of logic, walks up to Clover and expresses your personal (OOC) concerns. She says 'Wards are suddenly in place.' I assume this means you believe I pulled them out of my ass. Well, while I didn't think they were necessary at the time, but your actions showed I had to find a way to enforce the rules. And so, wards. But I think it is reasonable to assume they would be there in the first place. Next, you say the rules were changed mid-battle. They weren't. But I'll get to that in my conclusion. Finally, you say that weapons are dropped at you feet in defiance of the rules. Well, I can counter this bit in the conclusion.

The rules were always set. The wards thing enforces a rule I thought went without saying. The no weapons rule was meant to give you pause. After all, you've already explained that weapons are key to your craft. I expected you to defy those terms, at which point I would have explained the counterbalance rule, which is pretty much an intended loophole in the rules. And you might say that I just made up that rule, but if you'll look at my previous post, you'll note that Instructor Days had always been levitating those bags, which are full of countermeasure to balance the battle.

But none of this would be a problem, not even if I had fucked up majorly, if you'd simply go with the flow. I'm not perfect, but I think I know what I'm doing. So, if you'll keep all objections to NPC logic and plot consistency OOC (where I can address them without altering the game), and not alter your characters action in defiance of perceived unfairness, we can continue without issue.

[LordBucket]

you are actively defying

That statement very nicely cuts to the heart of the issue here.

https://www.google.com/#q=defy
"1. openly resist or refuse to obey."

I'm withdrawing from the game. There is a philosophical difference at work here that is irreconcileble. I signed up to play a game, not to jump through pre-defined hoops and be reined in every time I don't do precisely what's expected of me.

I assume this means you believe I pulled them out of my ass.

Yes, that's exactly what I thought. And I tried really hard to justify what was going on in any way other than "GM didn't like that I didn't do what he wanted, so he made stuff up to box me in."

The word you used to describe the whole Bsyen-oath situation was "obey." You wanted us to obey. And like your complaint above that I'm "defying" you, you're apparently playing out some sort of bizarre control issue here rather than trying to run a game. In games, players decide what players do, not GMs. Yet here we are 6 weeks in and everything we've done so far has been one great big elaborate dominance assertion gimmick.

When Sam didn't react the way you wanted him to to the ring, you immediately jumped in to tell him what you thought he should and shouldn't be doing. I approached the duel in a way you didn't like, so from my point of view, you immediately made up a bunch of new abilities that Autumn shouldn't have had to stop me from doing it my way, and then handed me an invisibility effect so that you could feel good about me proceeding in a way that you had thought up instead of me. But I didn't follow your lead, I tried to teleport out instead...so, nope, asspull wards to stop it from happening, and metal balls handed to me so I could proceed in the way you wanted me to proceed instead. And now here you are complaining that I'm "defying" you and not "obeying" and doing what you want.

I thought this was a game, that players would play. Not a story where the only way to proceed to to do exactly what the GM wants us to do.

Ironically I was giving a MLP-game GM advice on this very topic not that long ago.

So, have fun the rest of you. Looks like this is a one-choice-only story where every time you don't do what the GM wants, the world changes to keep it from happening.

I'm out.

[Rolepgeek]

Alright. I'm seeing a pattern here, and the connecting factor is LordBucket. Across multiple games. But aside from that.

GMing in such a way as to conceal things from the players is an excellent thing to do when you have a strong playerbase and one who trusts you, as it allows for a great deal more story.

However, when you have a player who is moderately familiar with the setting(no, not intimately, it's not modern-day Equestria), who wants to do loopholes in everything, it becomes an issue, because they don't realize what loopholes are actually loopholes, and which ones are just brick walls painted to look like loopholes.

You had a lot of options, LordBucket. I'm disappointed in you for going against your character, even if the action itself was clever. You made your character one who specialized in two basic things, which did restrict your options...but you need to stop being so technical about every little thing if you wantbto play the game. Wards around a dueling arena to prevent shenanigans like that would not be uncommon. Nor would they be something the GM(or people running the duel) should really need to tell you about, as well as I doubt you'd notice it when preparing for a duel.

You had no idea what her abilities were, whether you made assumptions or not. Surprisingly powerful perhaps, but everyone here is supposed to be powerful. Patrick is a novice RPer, no offense to him, so he needs some guidance. Metal balls in the bag were already there. You just don't know everything about what's going to happen, and it seems like you hate that.

But yes, if I was a GM, depending on my mood, I might have done the same thing, asspull or not. If I didn't have something like that already planned for a situation like this, notes and such, I might just have a judge follow and berate you. It was clever, but it was also cheap, like the party wizard using baleful polymorph on the mind-slaved dragon the enemy has.

You've decided it's one choice only because the options you chose were not available to you. Dring the prologue. The prologue is always more restrictive than the rest of the adventure. That's the nature of it.