Long Game 2: The Devil's Den

[Alvron he/him]

'Thalot, Furux, Monkshood, Oleander and Merasha. Five more poisons tested and none of them strong enough to neutralize Modeft's mysterious toxin.' Vron thought with frustration. 'Four days, eighteen poisons and I'm still no closer to curing myself.'

Rising from his bed, Vron opened the shutters allowing fresh air to mingle with the stale smell of sweat and vomit. Turning towards the door he spotted an empty mug on top of a small table beside the door.

"Jac hasn't delivered todays water. Something must've happened."

Grabbing the mug, Vron opened the door and stepped into the hall. Heading downstairs he found Jac sitting just outside, his fellow youths leaning against walls looking somber.

"Jac, what's wrong?"
"It's the inn, the one who gives us your water. He's dead."
"I see. Do we know what happened?"

Not looking up Jac just shook his head. "He was kind to us. He would let us play in his loft when it was raining. Who would want to hurt someone that nice?"
"'twas one of 'em spikeheads. Had to be." another said.
"Cant be them." a third chimed "Why would they bother with someone like that?"
"Was to. I saw 'em my very ownself I did." "Na-ah"

Before he knew it a minor scuffle had started. Letting the boys continue their mock fight, Vron handed Jac a couple of boxings. "Get a couple of your lads to tidy everything up when things settle down."
Turning towards the tavern, Vron felt Jac grab his arm. "Be careful of the guy with the horses. I think he wants to do something messy to Cessie. Everyone's been saying that she's the inquisitor."


I really need to start writing my plotlines down when I think of them. Trying to work in a good story while the game constantly changes is a fun challenge.

Edited February 18, 2014 by Alvron

[Kurkistan he/him]

Motion to shorten the day by as many hours as we lose if Meta posts the write-up immediately? There cannot possibly be a question here.

[PorridgeBrick he/him]

I second that motion. The vote is decided already.

[bartbug he/him]

I 3rd that.

[Gamma Fiend he/him]

Seems to be a group consensus, so,
In the immortal words of Monty Python....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l1YmS_VDvMY

Get on with it!

[Quiver he/him]

The crowd milling outside the inn surprised Quillion. It wasn't like this crew to stand and debate their actions in the streets. As he approached the group, however, he saw the mistborn and someone else working on a pile in the dirt. A body lay on the ground, dried blood from it's opened throat seeping into it's clothes.

His clothes. Quillion recognised the body as Dyrings, the cut as the raggedy tear left behind by an Obsidian dagger.

He stopped where he was. Aside from Peng and Aonar, everyone else were keeping their distance from the corpse. Maybe they still were uncomfortable with the Inquisitors handiwork.

Whatever else Quillion was, he was still an Obligator. A skaa could be buried in the dirt somewhere, and no one would care. But an Obligator still neded to witness things like that. How else were they to be remembered?

Inside, he offered a prayer to The Lord Ruler, to guide Dyrings soul. Then, after a moments hesitation, he whispered another quick prayer on the innkeepers behalf.

It was to the Survivor.

Edited February 18, 2014 by Quiver

[Grayv he/him]

I also will vote for Cessie. Praise the Ja.

[Aspren]

Aspren had arrived at the inn before the crowd had formed outside. The door was open and there seemed to be five or so discernable sets of ashen shoeprints at the threshold. Dyring always cleaned the threshold last when closing up the Inn for the night. Upon entering he noticed Dyrings body and Herwynbe tending to Peng.  It looked like it hadn't been too long since the killers, assumedly spiked, had left. Dyring's corpse seemed fairly fresh, the pool of blood still expanding. There were three coins embedded in Dyrings club, which lay to his left. The jagged cut along his neck seemed to indicate that an obsidian dagger was used. Rather than stand and gawk he decided to give the inn a look over first. By the time he was done most of the crew had crowded outside, with Peng and Aonar preparing to bury Dyring.

 

"You're going to bury Dyring in a pile of ash and dirt in front of his own inn? What kind of burial is that? If you really wanted to bury him in a place that he'd want, I'd suggest that you bury him in the cellar, where the ground is saturated with alcohol and at-least his grave won't be dug up by grave robbers. And for goodness sake, cover up his body! Don't just let him lie in the open like that!"

 

With that Aspren walked off, a satchel in his hands, without offering to help with the burial. He returned a while later with a plain wooden coffin.

[Gamma Fiend he/him]

The Crew was growing restless.
Almost everybody had shuffled through the bar and paid respects to Dyring's corpse. Poor Roban was working overtime, pushing himself to his limits, keeping everybody fed and giving them multiple servings of antidote water, it appeared Roban's way of dealing with grief and stress was over-working himself.
Gamon thanked Roban for the drink and raised a toast for Dyring.
"To the cranky barkeep. May the Survivor be leaving him messages in the afterlife."

It was almost night time. The sun was starting to set, the ash falls had tapered off, and there was a quiet tension in the air, a silent density almost as prevalent as the Mists that came out every night.

We should probably be looking for Cessie, Gamon thought to himself.
It wasn't for purely revenge reasons, either. He had purchased four horses earlier for the purposes of his cold-blooded plan to draw-and-quarter the Inquisitor. It was savage, but how else did you make sure an Inquisitor stayed dead?

Besides, he only bought enough horsefeed for just the afternoon.

[Metacognition he/him]

Night 7 (Hunting the Hunter)

 

The Crew met at the late Dyring’s inn. Well, everyone except Cessie. She had evidently gone to ground.

 

There were a few surprises, as Aonar showed up in his hazekiller armor and Gamon led a small herd of horses.

 

When they finished burying Dyring, everyone stood around silently, planning their next move. Peng finally came in from outside, covered in dirt and ash. He scanned the room, meeting each member’s eye.

“It ends here,” he said. “I’m tired of burying people. We’re going out and we’re going to find Cessie before she has the chance to strike again. We’ve been living in fear for the last few nights, huddled in corners and hoping that we’re not next. No longer. Modeft hired us because we’re the best and we’re going to prove it to him. It’s time that Cessie felt the fear. It’s time for her to hide and run, because we are coming for her. This time, we’re the hunters and we’ll not rest until we’ve caught our prey!”

 

The Crew stood a little straighter with that, some of their anxiety melting away. Peng quickly separated them into groups. They’d trust the mysterious note and start by sweeping that side of the Harrows. Each group was to search a building. Once the building was cleared, they’d all meet back out onto the street and move down to the next set of buildings. No one was to get too far away from the others, so that when Cessie was found, everyone could be there in an instant.

 

It was well into the afternoon by the time the Crew had meticulously worked their way down to where The Fishing Hole stood. Aonar, Ridge, and Grave were the group assigned to check it. As they entered the abandoned building, the first thing they noticed was that the dust had already been disturbed. While it could have just been beggars looking for somewhere to sleep, as they had found in other buildings, these tracks seemed too scattered, as if there was consistent and multiple people coming and going. Then there was the specks of blood on the floor.

 

“Go get Peng,” Aonar whispered to Grave. He adjusted his armor and shared a look with Ridge before moving further in.

 

The afternoon light cast elongated shadows across the floor, making the entire place seem like it was draped in black velvet. Ridge moved off to the side, staying close to the walls, as Aonar followed the blood trail. It led behind the bar.

 

Aonar’s breaths came quicker as he made sure his shield was at the ready and then walked around the bar. Cessie sat there, still dressed in the Inquisitor robes and leaning against the back of the bar. Her eyes were closed and she had a hand pressed against her stomach. Her breathing was shallow, but strong. The wound looked mostly healed already.

 

Aonar glanced at Ridge and nodded. They’d found their Inquisitor. At that moment, Cessie’s eye flew open and her hand flew up, releasing a spray of coins towards Aonar.

 

The coins embedded into the shield, but Cessie continued to push on them, throwing Aonar back. He tumbled and came up in a crouch as Cessie made her way to her feet.

 

“Only two of you? After the last time, I’d think you’d know better,” she said with a grin.

 

Aonar tightened his grip on his dueling cane. Peng better get here soon he thought.

 

Cessie grabbed an Obsidian axe she had stashed underneath the bar and shot forward, sprinting on legs made fast with pewter. Aonar feinted in one direction and then dove in the other. You couldn’t overpower someone burning pewter easily, so as he had been taught, he tried to keep Cessie from figuring out what it was that he was going to do.

 

Ridge was working his way around, trying to get behind Cessie when a handful of coins shot towards him. He yelped and dove under a nearby table, yanking one of the legs off as he felt the coins thud into the the table top. Using the leg as a makeshift club, he leapt from behind the table and rushed Cessie, just as Aonar had recovered and was doing the same.

 

Cessie kicked a nearby table towards Aonar, causing him to stumble, which meant that now Ridge had to face the Inquisitor alone. He’d be massacred. Cessie chopped through the table leg with one solid blow and then punched Ridge in the stomach dropping him. Cessie raised her axe, getting ready to deal the final blow.

 

A spray of coins ripped through one of the windows and Peng’s body followed. Cessie turned in surprise, but was able to push the coins away. Peng pulled out a set of glass daggers as he landed on a table top. Aonar had managed to get back to his feet as well and the two of them circled Cessie. There was the sound of rushed footsteps as the rest of the Crew hurried to catch up.

 

We just have to keep her from escaping, Aonar thought. She won’t be able to fight us all once the rest of the Crew arrives.

 

Indeed, Cessie seemed to be thinking along the same lines, as she tried to run towards the back room and likely out an exit out there. Peng cut her off with a shower of coins in that direction as Aonar moved in with a swipe at the arm holding the axe.

 

She barely got her axe up in time to block the blow, but Aonar’s dueling cane held. While Cessie was distracted with Aonar, Peng tossed one of his daggers to Ridge, who was still curled up on the floor. Ridge caught it and hamstrung Cessie before she could get away from him.

 

Cessie cried out and toppled to the ground. Ridge rolled out of the way as she tried to chop at him with the axe.

 

At that moment, the rest of the Crew finally arrived and surrounded the downed Inquisitor.

 

“You think you’ve won?” Cessie spat at them. “This is just the beginning! You may have defeated me, but my minions will finish off the rest of you! You’re all doomed and I will have my revenge!”

 

“You may yet get your revenge,” Peng whispered. “But today, we have justice.”

 

And with that, he took his dagger and plunged it into her heart.

 

“Now what?” Asked one of the Crew as they looked down on Cessie’s dead corpse.

 

There came a whinny from outside and then Gamon came in carrying a few sections of rope, a huge grin on his face and a twinkle in his eye.

 

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

Night 7 begins! I’m going to switch things around, because this 36 hour thing is really getting to me, between this and school and work and such. From now on, there will be 24 hours in a night, considering that the most that happens at night is the night orders and there will be 48 hours to each day. How’s that sound? So to get us back on track, there will be 28 hours to this night.

 

Cessie turned out to be the Inquisitor and is finally dead!

 

 

The Inquisitor Role:

 

INQUISITOR: Somehow, you're hidden among the crew. You must have a very good (and very large) pair of sunglasses. Like the Mistborn, there's only one of you, but whenever a Misting dies, you can convert a different player to your side with the role of the dead Misting. You can only do this with the freshly dead though, so the conversion must happen during the very next night turn. To aide you in your quest, Ruin has granted you 5 special abilities.

• UberPewter - Ruin has blessed you with exceptional strength and endurance. You survive two attempts on your life instead of just one. After the first attempt, you appear as a Thug in the write up, but still scan as a regular villager.

• UberTin - You can listen in on any conversation without the other person knowing. This includes PMs. If all the other Tineyes die, your ability does not allow for PMs to continue.

• UberCopper - While this ability doesn't protect you from emotional Allomancy like a regular Smoker would be, you register as a Regular Villager during any attempts to seek you.

• UberBronze - Gives you the ability to pierce Copperclouds as well as the typical Seeker role abilities. Smokers who have their Copperclouds pierced will lose their protection from emotional Allomancy, as well as their target.

• UberSteel - Without this ability, you cannot kill. You'll have to rely on your converts for kills if you lose this one.

To convert another player, you need a dead Misting and one of your Ruin granted abilities. Your target will have a 50% chance to gain the powers of the dead Misting and your Ruin granted power will be used up. If you give up your final Ruin power, you will die. You cannot convert the Mistborn.

 

 

Cessie - 13 (Gamon, Barty, Wes, Ridge, Vron, Seran, Kukri, Aonar, Herwynbe, Quillion, Roban, Wilson, Peng, Grave, Aspren)

No Vote - 4 (Windrunner, Aether, Mathieu, Cessie)

 

Updated Player List

Edited February 19, 2014 by Metacognition

[bartbug he/him]

Do we get to know what her remaining powers were?

[Metacognition he/him]

I just added them right before you posted that.

[Kurkistan he/him]

Nice write-up, Meta.

 

So. Uber-Tin. Well This post has been reported for attempting to skirt the rules.

 

Let's do damage control, shall we?

 

I doubt Cessie was reading many PM's at night (or any, I think). Using Uber-Tin would be mutually exclusive with any other action, and I think that the Inquisitor acted every night. Someone chime in if there was a night when she could have been inactive.

 

So that leaves Cessie reading day-time PM's. Not all of them, though:

 

I doubt she chose Tin on Day 1 because there wasn't much of interest, but either way anything she saw wasn't interesting.

 

The other days, after Peng came out, are more problematic. She likely used Tin every single day after that. Until Day 6 (the first vote for Cessie). She had to use Pewter that day, so no Tin. Day 7 was probably Tin for the last time.

 

So just about anything sent before Day 2 or during any of the Nights is likely safe, but any other day besides Day 7 should be assumed to be entirely in the hands of the Spiked, of which there are 4.

 

I can't recall: were there any on Day 3 (the first time there were any Spiked) who suddenly became vocal about PM'ing Peng our roles? That might be a very nice target to focus on.

 

EDIT: Start of Day 3, for reference's sake. I'm to bed for now, though.

Edited February 19, 2014 by Kurkistan

[PorridgeBrick he/him]

Well, this means that all the Spiked know everything Peng does. This means we have only one option: level the playing field. Peng, post all the info you got from all the nights except the one where Cessie was using another ability. Yes, it's drastic, but the only ones who won't know already are the non-Spiked.

[Kurkistan he/him]

No Porridge, it does not mean that. At worst, most of our daytime conversation is compromised. The nighttime info is still safe.

Edited February 19, 2014 by Kurkistan

[Peng the Just he/him]

No Porridge, it does not mean that. At worst, most of our daytime conversation is compromised. The nighttime info is still safe.

so all i need to do is sort through my hundreds of PMs for this game and figure out during which cycle they happened in. great. :/

[Metacognition he/him]

Feel my pain, Peng. Feel my pain and come over to the dark side!

 

EDIT: No, this is not confirmation of anything; just a statement of how many PMs I had to go through! I'm honestly glad you guys killed the Inquisitor! Makes my life far more simple! 

Edited February 19, 2014 by Metacognition

[PorridgeBrick he/him]

I'm sure she listened on at least a few nights: the info is just too valuable. But I guess we should be sure first.

Still, even if she only listened to days, that's alot.

[Herowannabe he/him]

Well, I have to say I'm not happy I was right.

We have to assume that she knew what roles everyone had (unless someone decided not to PM it to Peng when they snapped or whatever). The fact that her attacks took out all of our most important Mistings other than Peng is more evidence of that. Now, as for what we are to do about that- I have no idea.

[Metacognition he/him]

I'm going to clarify some rules here, as I think you guys are confused about a few things.

 

Some roles have consistent powers. Other roles have activated abilities. I don't ask the Thug to send in an order every night that basically says that they are turning on their Pewter. I don't ask the Tineye to state whether they're allowing PMs or not. Unless they state otherwise, the Smoker is always at least smoking themselves. Those are constant, passive abilities of the role and are separate from the activated abilities a role might have. A Coinshot or a Seeker need to activate their roles, as those roles have a target. 

 

How this plays with the Inquisitor's abilities, I'll let you guys decide, but I'll say this much, some of the UberMetals are passive, consistent powers. 

 

 

If you guys want, I can update the General Rules Thread to include these types of situations, but I intentionally left it as bare bones as possible to allow other GMs the freedom to tweak things as they see fit. Just because I run the game a certain way doesn't make that the only way and if there's one thing I hate, it's stifling creativity! 

 

Plus, I didn't want to turn anyone away because the game started to read like a complex derivative of a first edition DnD game!

 

 

I urge you guys to make use of me and ask me for clarification of anything you're not sure about. I'll do my best to answer what I can without giving the game away. If you're unsure about how a role or a power works, or if a situation confuses you, I'll do my best to answer it. 

Edited February 19, 2014 by Metacognition

[Gamma Fiend he/him]

I love the implied drawing-and-quartering. Absolutely fantastic write-up, Meta! Wish I could up-vote even more.

It really looks like UberTin basically screwed us all, especially with Meta's clarification.

I agree with Hero, though. We are kind of back to square one, and I have no idea what we should do next, really.

[Kurkistan he/him]

@Meta

Okay then, so at least Uber-Pewter was passive. With "some", that leaves Copper and Tin as realistic possibilities. So Team Evil could just know everything.

[PorridgeBrick he/him]

Okay. That's not good. So we should assume that at the very least all day info is breached, and quite likely all night info, especially with how they've been finding all our mistings.

Meta, does the Inq hear all in-coming PMs as well as out going? Do they know who the other participant is?

And basically, Peng is dead tonight. We have no lurcher, and even if he draws pewter or iron, they still have a Coinshot to overwhelm it. As such, I request an extension to the day in advance so he has time to sort through his PMs and figure out some sort of successor to his knowledge, as well as what he should reveal publicly.

[Peng the Just he/him]

I did SO much work with the PMs, trying to control who knew what information, but it looks like all I did was help team evil. They have a HUGE intel advantage now. Lets sort this into good news and bad news

Good news:

Cessie is dead.

several mistings have snapped, which is helpful.

some of those mistings identities are still hidden from team evil because the PM was sent after the inquisitor's death

bad news:

The spiked seem to be able to kill multiple people per night

the spiked know almost every misting and will probably begin to slaughter them systematically.

 

Lets think logically about who might be spiked at this point. It seems unlikely that the inquisitor would have spiked an inactive player, so Mathieu and Windrunner are probably clear. more likely, she spiked mistings, so that they got rid of an enemy misting and got a convert in one move, or picked players who have a lot of influence and a reputation for cleverness in order to control the public opinion.

[PorridgeBrick he/him]

I don't think she would spike mistings, since the spikees would be obvious from a sudden loss of their powers.