Long Game 33: Life

[Sart]

Titud scratched his ragged beard. He needed to get it shaved, but that wasn't easy to do without a razor. He had tried it once. He hated the looks he had gotten from the others, coming into class with his neck cut in several places. Unfortunately, that meant he hadn't shaved in a month. That was probably the least of his concerns. He had no real money to speak of, so his admission to the university was already in question. And now they were saying that there were skin-dancers. As if he didn't have enough to worry about.

No, there was only one thing to do. He had to leave the academy, and soon. Tuition would sink him, and he did not want to live on the streets. However, he couldn't afford to waste his time here. He had been able to pay for tuition for one term, so he would study here for one term. After that, he would get out of town. There was no point staying if it would just end in bloodshed. With that in mind, he walked forward. It was past time for him to become an E'lir.

[Paranoid King]

William stared up at the university. He'd planned to go all his life, of course. Just like his brother that had gone before him. Not going would be unthinkable. One who didn't go to the university could possibly get a job as a farmer, or perhaps an innkeeper. His family would certainly disown him. But as for the university itself...

It was a sprawling area, filled with buildings. He'd heard all about it from his brother. The fishery, which wasn't actually by the sea, the archives, which weren't actually archived, and the crockery, which had nothing to do with cooking. And did they practice naming? Everyone knows that's an old fairy tale. You can't control things just by saying their name. It flew against all logic and reason.

As for the skindancers... well, that would have to be false, too. Just a rumor to scare the students into getting their homework in on time. "Turn in your finals, or the skindancers will get you. OoooOoo." Hah. He could see right through their lies. Yes, he'd show them. Instead of wasting his time on such rubbish, he'd apply himself to the things that mattered. And when he became a master... Well, some things around here would change, that's for certain.

Edited April 29, 2017 by Paranoid King

[Paranoid King]

Commonmonth 15, 27th year of the Century of the Fruitbat:

Dear Diary: I am aware that you are a journal, not a diary, nor are you sentient, but as this is the method which I have seen people chronicle their thoughts, I have decided to give it a try. If it proves to be an unsatisfactory method, I shall revert to writing in code, as I normally do.

Life at the university is decidedly strange. I had thought I was prepared for any strangeness that might occur. By simply analyzing the oddities, I would be able to find the cause, and eventually replicate it myself. However, I attended a sympathy class yesterday. It's not going to become a habit or anything. Stop looking at me like that, diary. The master, (Master... Ralmond, I think?) had lit a bonfire in the corner of the room. In the center of the dais, he had a candle (unlit.) Students were seated on rows around the edges of the room, which went down as they approached the center to allow students at the back to easily see. Master Ralmond challenged the students to come up and light the candle without the use of any tools. They were not allowed to touch the candle or the bonfire in any way. Imagine my surprise when a bright-eyed student stepped up, arrogantly snapped his fingers, and lit the candle. I had been observing closely, and saw no connection between him or the candle. Master Ralmond then gestured towards the candle and extinguished it. This process was repeated a few times with other students. The process was slightly different with each of them. The first student was the only one to snap his fingers. The third student stood on the right side of the stage instead of the center. Master Ralmond seemed to have no relation to the lighting of the candle. The candle was lit once, apparently by itself, as nobody came forward.

Master Ralmond then explained to the remaining students about a connection of the mind. That simply by believing hard enough that the candle was lit, it was. I "borrowed" the candle after class, and could find nothing out of the ordinary with it. I attempted to light it on my own, but was unsuccessful. I will attempt to conduct future experiments on the candle to answer the questions I have with the procedure. For example, where does the energy to light the candle come from? What are the limits of this connection? (Did Master Ralmond light the bonfire with this method?) Does the connection only work based on heat, or could objects be moved through the air? Does distance play a factor?

I shall report back to you soon. For now, signing out:

-William Opuscule

[DrakeMarshall]

Working on a real post, but can I just say the Kingkiller Wikia is a spectacular resource? I've read the books, but it's been a couple years...

[Jondesu]

38 minutes ago, Drake Marshall said:

Working on a real post, but can I just say the Kingkiller Wikia is a spectacular resource? I've read the books, but it's been a couple years...

Thanks! Now I know where Yll is for my RP.  (South of the University, which is in the Commonwealth, and on an island, so there would have been a boat/ferry ride, for those who are curious.)

[DeTess]

@Elbereth, I just noticed that the countdown timer is for 48 hours. As it says everywhere that the cycles is 36 hours (with 12 hours between cycles), would it be better to have a timer till the end of the cycle, instead of till the start of the new one? Or am I mistaken about how this works?

Also, I'd like to ask everyone that has only posted RP so far to also try and put up some game discussion(even if it is in the form of more RP, like Hael's contributions have been). Pure RP is very nice, but usually doesn't help too much with getting a read on someone.

I'd also like to hear some people's opinions on filing complaints on C1. Given that getting someone brought on the horns will not give us any information regarding the victims alignment, and the chances of hitting an elim are no larger than in any other game, I'm inclined to go with a no-vote policy for this first cycle unless someone says or does something really suspicious. However, I can also imagine that it can be really rough on the Edema Ruh (and Caeldish commoners to a lesser degree) to miss out on those 5 jots. Plus, there might be some part of the rules I've overlooked that makes bringing someone up on the Horns early more important than I might have realized.

-------------------

Telar flopped down on his bed, feeling exhausted. And also still hungry. He’d missed the Chancellor’s announcement (and dinner), but there was enough talk about the speech among the students that he was able to piece the gist of it together. Apparently the Chancellor thought that everyone should think on the philosophical question of the meaning of life. Also, there was something about ‘skindancers’. Everyone Telar heard talking about them was either afraid or dismissive of them, so he guessed it was some kind of hazing ritual. Well, whatever would happen, would happen.

His first courses had been interesting, though also somewhat disturbing. Telar was wondering whether they intentionally taught physicking after dinner to ensure prospective surgeons obtained strong stomachs. He didn't really want to become a surgeon anyway, but he'd promised his parents that he'd follow those courses. "You'll go to the university, and you'll learn something useful there, young man." Telar thought he'd done a passable approximation of his father's voice.

He let out a sigh. Sure, he wasn't exactly dumb, and he had steady hands, but the thought of rooting around inside people's bodies and trying to put them back together made him queasy. No, he was far more interested in studies focused on the work of the mind. Linguisitics, rhetoric and logic where more his thing than trying to put broken people back together. "And why did they have to use such realistic pictures during an introductory course anyway?" Telar muttered to his ceiling.

A fitful sleep came soon after, and Telar dreamed of people dancing around him without their skin on, while he desperately tried sow their skins back on.

Edited April 29, 2017 by randuir

[Stick.]

@randuir the timer is for 36 hours :-P It says 21 hours are left, and the game started ~15 hours ago. 

[DeTess]

Just now, _Stick_ said:

@randuir the timer is for 36 hours :-P It says 21 hours are left, and the game started ~15 hours ago. 

It was 1 day and 9 hours half an hour back.

[Stick.]

Just now, randuir said:

It was 1 day and 9 hours half an hour back.

Oh. Must've changed it then heh

[Elbereth]

Something I forgot to mention: If a PM is completely OOG, put it in blue text and it will not count towards your PM:Post ratio. Only if it is completely OOG, though. Anything in game will cause it to count. 

2 hours ago, little wilson said:

Well. I didn't "catch" it. I sort of GMed the first run, so I'm rather familiar with the rules of DP and the Horns, both of which kind of sucked to handle, since very little of either was automated. >>

It is much better now.  

10 minutes ago, randuir said:

@Elbereth, I just noticed that the countdown timer is for 48 hours. As it says everywhere that the cycles is 36 hours (with 12 hours between cycles), would it be better to have a timer till the end of the cycle, instead of till the start of the new one? Or am I mistaken about how this works?

Check again. It was fixed significantly before your post.  

[DeTess]

1 minute ago, Elbereth said:

Check again. It was fixed significantly before your post.  

Yep, it seems so. I should have checked again before hitting post.

[Sart]

Titud continued pondering his options. The classes he had been to were interesting, but of little real world value. The more advanced subjects took years of mastery to attain. He didn't have that kind of time. He paced, occasionally scratching his beard. If he was to reduce his tuition, perhaps he could stay longer. He looked over the list of common deductions. One in particular caught his eye.

"File a complaint about someone."

That was all it said. If you filed a complaint, you would receive 5 jots off of your tuition. To some of the richer students, that was mere pocket change, but to Titud that could mean the difference between a year or not. Still, there was no one to complain about. He was only a new student, and an Edema Ruh to boot. He hadn't exactly made any friends or enemies here. Perhaps, if he raised one, he could then quickly take it back down. It would cause some animosity obviously, but it might be worth it. He decided to raise the question to one of his Professors.

If a complaint is retracted, do we still get the deduction off our tuition?

[Jondesu]

21 minutes ago, Sart said:

If a complaint is retracted, do we still get the deduction off our tuition?

I hope not, that sounds like a cheap way to get some free money while skirting the rules.  Elbereth can of course make the call, though.

I'm curious, how much of what we do is public vs only in our role PM?  The field(s) we study, for instance: are those publicly known, or only to us? Where we're lodging?

[Alvron]

2 minutes ago, Jondesu said:

I'm curious, how much of what we do is public vs only in our role PM?  The field(s) we study, for instance: are those publicly known, or only to us? Where we're lodging?

The fields we study is known only to us unless you tell someone or they spy on you.  It will be shown if you are elevated but not in what field.

[Sart]

Titud answered the Yillish man's question with a quote from the student handbook.

Quote

Will Lodging, Tuition, and Social Classes be public knowledge?
Lodging and Tuition are private. Social Classes are public.

And ninja'd.

[Straw]

Notes regarding the rules:

-The Vintish Nobleman starts with 2,000 drabs, and gets 3,000 drabs per term.

-The Aturan Nobleman starts with 1,334 drabs, and gets 2,000 drabs per term.

-The Yllish Commoner starts with 749 drabs, and gets 1,123 drabs per term.

-The Cealdish Commoner starts with 658 drabs, and gets 987 drabs per term.

-The Edema Ruh starts with 304 drabs, and gets 456 drabs per term.

-If you have EP in a field and the master of that field places DP on you, your EP will be subtracted at a rate of 1 EP = 1 DP in until you have zero in either Master DP or EP in that field. (Removed DP will not count against you.)

Edited April 29, 2017 by Straw
Grammar

[STINK]

Oh yeah if people could not go for Linguistics that'd be great thanks.

[Assassin in Burgundy]

Jurdaan had never heard of skindancers, but he had never heard of a lot of things. He was never quite a normal child, and hadn't grown up surrounded by the fairy tales that plagued many children's imagination. People had stayed away from him due to his mental instability, but Jurdaan always knew he had been more than that. Simply put, he cracked under the stress of his own intelligence. And that was one trait that would surely help in these dangerous days. 

[Paranoid King]

Game related discussion, hmm? Well then.

I would recommend that people not get offended if someone votes on them D1.

• Nobody has any real suspicions by this point, but voting reduces tuition, so it's good for the person voting.
• The more people are voted on, the more spread out the votes are. Therefore, it's good for the people who were previously voted on.
• On that note, Stick. You're looking rather brown today. An inborn disease? Or are you a skindancer who didn't look in the mirror this morning?

36 minutes ago, STINK said:

Oh yeah if people could not go for Linguistics that'd be great thanks.

As for advancing through the ranks, it's actually easier to become a master in a subject that's contended. If you're alone in investing in the subject, you invest 5 points, which are then taken away. Then 4 points, taken away. By the time you reach El'the, you only have 2 points to spend each turn, which you have to spend 8 times to reach master rank. (Total of 11 turns)

On the other hand, if you only advance every other turn, you would have 5 saved up after you advance. Then 8, then 9, and then it only takes 3 more turns to reach master. (Total of 9 turns)

If you advance every 3 turns, it takes longer just because it takes 9 turns to get to El'the. But by that time, you have 21 points saved, and become a master immediately.

So advancing every 2-3 turns is the best amount of competition. So see if you can PM 1-2 people to advance in linguistics with you, and you'll all advance faster. And then you can tell everyone else to stay away from linguistics.

[STINK]

I'm gonna believe you on that, 'cause I don't have the time to do any kind of maths. So, anyone wanna be my Language pal?

[Haelbarde]

The assessment done,  he now had time to consider the report further. It was slightly worrying how many complaints had been thrown around last time,  and the tuition inflation associated with having a complaint filed against you had caused at least one Edema to be kicked out of the uni for a term due to the unexpected price hike. The complaint had been random and baseless too.

He knew also that a single complaint in a given month could guarantee expulsion,  so were there any complaints,  there needed to be many complaints so the load was shared and no one was expelled without cause.  He mused that not complaining also left the skindancers an opportunity to potentially expell a student or even two,  of their choice.  Preventing that from happening would seem prudent.

He checked the time and sighed.  It was time for his next class,  and he'd barely been able to finish the work. He was going to need help if he was to keep this up.

[queensteph]

4 hours ago, randuir said:

Telar dreamed of people dancing around him without their skin on, while he desperately tried sow their skins back on.

I guess you could say he dreamed of noskin-dancers? 

 

 @Paranoid King , Could you be so kind as to elaborate on the "lets cast complaints on lots of diff people" for me because

it kinda sounds like a good idea but also kinda confusing? (just like the logic behind it/why you think it's a good idea)

I don't want to follow a plan I don't fully understand. Thanks in advance. 

@STINK Isn't it probably a good idea to keep what art you're studying a secret from the thread? 

Edited April 30, 2017 by queensteph
changed boldness / STINK IS A NINJA

[STINK]

Ideas are neither good or fun. They are fun or not-fun. And I don't want a repeat of last-game where I had one elevation. So yeah, everyone stay away from Linguistics unless you're PMing me about it so I can get at least two elevations k

[BrightnessRadiant]

Okay so...still trying to figure out the workings of this particular game. Correct me if I'm wrong about anything, and please help me out with anything you see lacking in my analysis.

Complaints seem to be a very tricky thing, especially for the first cycle when not many people have posted their thoughts and there isn't much to go on. It would seem less dangerous than the lynch votes in other games, but dangerous nonetheless. Especially for the students with less money, considering they won't be staying at the golden pony(which takes away 1DP). I feel like if we are going to add complaints on someone we probably shouldn't start with the poor unless we really suspect them (which probably won't happen on the first cycle) considering they would be more likely to get expelled. I know this point makes me a bigger target, but I'd rather get voted on if it meant protecting a fellow student. With these thoughts in mind, how would we act in the best interest of the students when it comes to complaints on the first cycle? I can't tell if it's worth the risk. Anyone have thoughts?

Something else I wanted to point out.. I've read the posts were people have been talking about how many skindancers there probably are in this game and it made me curious. I actually resorted to doing the math! lol ...If in the last game there were 24 players and 4 skindancers then that gives a 1 in every 6 ratio. If there are 27 players now then to get a 1 in 6 ratio again we would need 4.5 skindancers(which is impossible of course lol). So I would presume that if they did raise the number of skindancers to balance out the 3 extra players then there would most likely be no more than 5 skindancers among us. That being said...I still wouldn't completely rule out the idea of 6 in case they thought that the students had an unfair advantage last game seeing as how they were the victors. This is just my theory, and it is based on my own thoughts and math skills(don't trust them too much lol). Does anyone have thoughts on this as well?

 

[Paranoid King]

1 hour ago, queensteph said:

 @Paranoid King , Could you be so kind as to elaborate on the "lets cast complaints on lots of diff people" for me because

it kinda sounds like a good idea but also kinda confusing? (just like the logic behind it/why you think it's a good idea)

I don't want to follow a plan I don't fully understand. Thanks in advance. 

So when we complain about someone, we get a reduction of tuition. This is really helpful for those without money.

There are nine masters, each of which gives out 5 DP. They can only assign DP to students with complaints. If no complaints are given, nobody will be in danger. If everyone is complained against equally, people will be assigned DP somewhat equally. Which should come out to 1-2 DP each. (Distribution is a bit random, but it evens out with enough people.)

DP does nothing until you get at least 5 of it. It's not truly dangerous until you get 11. Even if only 18 people are voted on equally, each of them should get, on average, 2-3 DP. The only annoyance from complaints come if you have biased masters, (Which won't happen for at least 6 turns,) or if less than 10 people are voted on. If more than 10 people are voted on equally, there is nothing to fear from complaints.

So voting equally on every gives reduced tuition for everyone. It also provides insurance against last-minute votes, which would be a guaranteed expulsion for that player. There is almost no chance of being brought on the horns if everyone votes equally, and everyone gets some tuition reduction. Wins all around.

1 hour ago, BrightnessRadiant said:

[Complaints] seem less dangerous than the lynch votes in other games, but dangerous nonetheless. Especially for the students with less money...

Note my above arguments. Also, if everyone votes against everyone else, everyone will receive a tuition reduction of 8 jots.

Edited April 30, 2017 by Paranoid King
Responded to Brightness