Kasimir

Darth Plagueis, as you've flagged, is mispelled. Picture time?

Brandon Sanderson's books have been known to regularly stop anything from bullets to the Death Star's laser.

The Obsidian Mountain Trilogy should be fine. There's an indirect reference, but there isn't very much else there, if I'm recalling correctly. I would second the Old Kingdom Trilogy, and would back up suggestions that you don't read Codex Alera (or at least be forewarned because there will be references, and if Warbreaker was too much... Same with regard to the Kingkiller Chronicles. However, if you don't mind being left to hang, then just read Book One. Book One's clean. (Again: if you don't mind just reading one book of a series, then I also recommend Sasha, of Joel Shepherd's Trial of Blood and Steel series. It starts clean but builds up in later books.) Shadowprowler and the sequels by Alexey Pehov should be fine as well. (I don't recall anything that'd become an issue, but my memory of that book isn't as good as it could be.) Especially, try the books of Tamora Pierce. She's generally very good about that, but you'll have an indirect reference in Battle Magic. T.A. Barron's Merlin and subsequent Avalon series are pitched for younger readers ( =YA), but I loved his worldbuilding, and I don't know if you might enjoy that. The Vineart War trilogy, I would also recommend Throne of the Crescent Moon by Saladin Ahmed. Besides that, I can't think of anything else.

I admit that it would be cool, and that was kind of my reaction, but past that initial gut response, I prefer that he doesn't. It would have been interesting, don't get me wrong, and it would've been especially interesting, I think, as an extension of the "Well, are there better ways to handle Epics? Do we just kill all of them? What do we do about Epics, really?" questioning that David is going through, courtesy of Megan and the fact that Steelheart is dead. And yet at the same time, it doesn't really fit as well. For one, the whole selling point of David and the Reckoners--at least the way it hooked me was as a telling of the Badchull Normal. For another, if David was someone who thoroughly hated all Epics, a lot more strongly than he does, then yes, we could've gotten an interesting tension if he'd become one. But David's position on Epics had become (if it ever shifted from the beginning) more nuanced than that. I enjoyed the repeat of what David's father said: "Sometimes, you have to help the heroes along." It's got a pretty promising angle, in how it shifts the light in which David regards Prof and Megan. But there's also a second (to me, underlying) idea there: maybe he's looking in the wrong place for heroes. Or rather, the heroes are everywhere. Including, it seems, in David himself. (And in that sense, his father did help the heroes along.) tldr; it would gel with the first reading of that theme, but it wouldn't work so well with the second, which is that you can find heroism in the mundane.

1. Kvothe (Kingkiller Chronicles) 2. Kelsier (Mistborn) 3. Kaladin (Stormlight Archives) 4. Kilvin (Kingkiller Chronicles) 5. Kellen Tavadon (The Obsidian Trilogy) 6. Kar Vastor (Star Wars: Shatterpoint) 7. Kar (Mistborn) 8. Kastor (Age of Mythology: The Titans campaign) 9. Kon (Bleach) 10. Ki-Adi-Mundi (Star Wars) 11. Kirel (Circle of Magic) #11 is just there as I was uncertain if Kastor actually went against the spirit of the question, coming from a game campaign, rather than a book. Without looking it up, name 7 works of fantasy that don't have an article in their title. Edit: Added more specificity to the question, since it could be taken as finding 7 works of fantasy that never used an article in the text itself.

While working on this (currently secret) game set in Roshar, I surprised myself by coming up with the idea for a Reckoners QF. This is set way before the events of Steelheart, so there shouldn't be any spoilers from Firefight in the game. I'd appreciate some feedback as my current inclination is that the QF is a bit too elaborate: I'm tempted to 'trim' the roles off more by possibly leaving out the Veterans and the Ex-Convict, in order to reduce the Town's safety net. This QF was inspired by the idea that we have a lot of players here who appreciate mindgames and messing with their fellow players' heads (i.e. trolling) way too much Without further ado, I present to you: Riddles in the Dark: a Reckoners QF A game of deception, mindgames, and atmospheric creepiness. You wake. Nothing meets your eyes but an impenetrable darkness. All is silent. You prick your ears, trying to pick up the slightest sound, and are rewarded with the drip-drip-drip of water somewhere. Your head aches. Who are you? What do you remember? “Finally!” says a voice you don’t recognise. “You’re awake.” A flame flares to life; the face partly-illuminated by the lighter is one you don’t recognise. Grimy and tired, the person nods to you. “Another one here to join us, I suppose.” “Who are you?” you croak, are surprised to find your throat is bone-dry. He hands you a flask of water and you accept it. As you drink slowly, he replies, “I’m Kam. I’m one of the survivors.” His mouth twists in an expression you’re not sure what to make of. At your puzzlement, he goes on. “You see, right now, you’re one of us. A prisoner of the Epic Acuity.”

There are many things I could say about Firefight (and if I ever get my thoughts organised enough, I'll probably say some of them) but the biggest thing that's on my mind since I woke up this morning, two days post-Firefight is: Male!Firefight and Megan's powers are supposedly the inverse of each other, and there's a relation there with regard to their weaknesses. (He wields fire, her weakness is fire.) So, what's Male!Firefight's weakness? Alternate realities? :S

By the Lord Ruler's toenails, we're all more lively than you living people! What's wrong with all of you? Spiked got your tongue? Oh wait. I think they got mine. I think it's missing at the moment. Did someone check my grave? Maybe a cat ate it. I hate cats. They're nasty creatures. I hate this town. I wish I'd never stopped here. Now I'm stopping here forever. Did you hear that? It's cold. I hate the rain. I hate the way the wind doesn't stop. I hate it hate it hate it hate it. The dead speak but the living remain silent as the grave. When will it stop? Dead men tell no tales. Alas, if I've had any secrets, they're buried with me but there are more secrets in this infernal town--wheels within wheels, and a keen tongue and a clever eye may yet ferret it out. But not like this. I was a villager, just an ordinary man, no metals, no powers. I was alive. I had a voice. I spoke, until I was silenced. How long until it is your turn? Will you speak then with the dead? Keep the fires burning, blacksmith. Burn the dead, burn them, flesh and bone to ash and dust until there is nothing left. I am rotting in the ground but my message lives on and must be passed to the hands of another. Listen, then. I will tell you my secret. The Spiked are you. The Spiked are all of you. A man who falls silent in the face of a murder is as guilty as the hands that wielded the sword, that wash themselves in blood. Et tu, Brute? It is over, now. Silence has fallen, and the question will go unanswered. Listen. Ruin is a madness; a madness that only needs a little push. The truth is written in blood.

But would that make him Steelslayer or Stealslayer? *flies away*

I'm assuming since you're implying you're on mobile, you meant to say that he wouldn't have been dead if he had. Vezeih mir. The question had to be asked, nonetheless. Ash, define 'early on'. In fact, give me a time stamp, if you can. Was this around the time where everyone was worrying about Eoldren's little stunt? Because if it was, your logic just fails there. But there's something else I could say about your reasoning, depending on the time stamp.

Well, well. If Wilson dies tonight, time for the suspicion to skyrocket...

Some questions I'd like answered. Will follow them up the next morning where possible. Of all the things I'm most wary of, it'd be narrowing down on our suspect pool at the moment. At this point in time, we don't have enough to have tunnel-vision. Keep 'em fluid, as the Lord Twinborn Almighty would say! 1. Peng, you voted for Dom in a quick one-liner. Do you suspect him, or did you feel that using him as a buffer for Eliminator kills is pointless? What are your other suspicions? Did you have nothing to say despite the few debates going on in the day? 2. Wilson. When I did up my vote trackers, I recalled that I'd only really put one vote: that on Hreo, and that'd stuck, until I shifted my vote to myself. In other words, despite being active in discussion, I had low vote flexibility. Given that, I'm curious about why you considered that part of Sart's logic to be faulty? 3. Ostrich. This is in connection with something I felt Wilson didn't give enough weight to. She noted that Sarcomere had asked a somewhat legitimate question about exactly why Ostrich felt the need to communicate privately with all involved in Eoldren's stunt. I find myself with the same question, and I think it shouldn't be ignored. I'll take Wilson's word for it (...a dangerous sign, Kas, stop that now!!!) that role reveals happened in that clusterchull. My question is: why then take it to the PMs? Why not bring it up publicly in thread? 4. Newan. As far as I can tell, you've had a single post in the Day Cycle, and that was a one-liner which can be read in many ways. You asked why the dogpile on Hreo. Which could mean just about anything from the fact that you think it was a bandwagon, that no-one had any good reason to go after Hreo, or that the last few people didn't have any good reason to vote for Hreo. I find it interesting that you didn't take note of the different motivations aired for voting Hreo, nor that some were more shaky than others. The lack of specificity in your one-liner and the fact that it can be passed off as being confused about what is going on in-thread really makes me wonder. More to say, have you, Supreme Lynchmaster? Hmm? People I'd especially like to hear more from and who've yet to be pushed on this: Jain, Joe (I know he's said he's busy with homework--but you've also said you generally find innocents rather than suspicious people. Who are you increasingly convinced by?), Cleo. If there are people you feel I'm leaving out, feel free to shine the spotlight on them too. I'm simply highlighting those who, at the moment, appear to be flying under the radar--generally a sweet spot for an Eliminator to be in.

Lord Ostrich put a vote on Eoldren. He's also not recorded as a no-vote. Meta, may I clarify that your standing list is correct? And does a Seeker's nullification turn the person's vote into being recorded as a no-vote, or will they simply vanish? If so, it appears that some vote shenanigans has happened...and on Eoldren, no less :S I don't see where else the vote may have gone to, so it isn't Rioter action that we're worried about. Of course, that doesn't mean we didn't have some weird case like a Rioter and a Soother hitting the same person, or two-Rioter action, or...

I'm really tired and I just woke up, so this could be wrong, but here's an updated vote list, tracking vote-shifts, arranged from most votes to the least, and within each tied votes section, in alphabetical order. Sart (3): Wyrm<4>, Wilson, Eoldren Ash (2): Seonid, Maili<3>, Ament Hreo (2): Kas<1>, Ren<1>, Araris<1>, Unodus, Weiry<2> Kas (2): Kas<2>, Wyrm<3>, Sart Dom (1): Maili<1>, Claincy<2>, Weiry<1>, Peng Eoldren (1): Maili<2>, Tekiel<1>, Mek, Tekiel<2> Jasnah (1): Araris<2> Macen (1): Claincy<3> Nobody (1): Hreo Tekiel (1): Wyrm<2>, Sarcomere Unodus (1): Ren<2> Jain (0): Wyrm<1> Joe (0): Claincy<1> Edit: Yep, told y'all I was all eh from having just woken up. In no alphabet does 'K' come before 'D'. My bad >>

Indeed, Ash, my vote hasn't mattered. It hasn't told me that you prefer to merely cite the reasoning of another player, without any elaboration, or awareness of the weaknesses of such reasoning, or its refutation. It hasn't told me that despite endorsing the view that there are more meaningful (elaborate? Where are they?) places my vote could go to, you also endorse the contradictory position that these positions aren't really meaningful, because, in your words, you "don't want to pull the trigger." No, it doesn't tell me things about how cautiously you say you want to play, and how I'm going to file your playstyle for this game. Your reactions cannot tell me about your consistency, about how you're trying to appear, about whether there's any shift in how you're sounding now, as compared to your previous actions. Indeed, Ash, nothing about your reactions or your statements with regard to voting and my vote, in particular, radiates information. So noted.

You really think I'd be so lucky as to get Wit a second time? After the hash I made of the first? Anyway, just to publicly state my reason: first, I admit I wanted to pre-emptively block objections (already hinted at in Hreo, even if he chose not to pursue them for the moment) that my aggressive defense of lynches was problematic and favoured Eliminators more. In addition, as I've mentioned, consistency is very important to me as a standard of argumentation. If I am defending the usefulness of lynches, then I should indicate that I do not find myself exempt from this, and reasonable grounds of suspicion can, too, be brought and found against me. I acknowledge it and raise it. What y'all want to do with it is another matter. I'm one voice and one vote in a group with the same power, after all. Imagine: you might actually have to play the game! The horror, the horror! And, as mentioned earlier, I do think we need to hear from the lurkers, from Ash, and from Dom. Edit: Colour editor, stop eating my code. Really.

Hmm. First, I don't endorse taking out fellow players just because they have playstyles I disagree with, and Hreo has given a sufficient response to allay suspicions on the grounds of my later points, even if I find his response weak. As I have mentioned, Point 1. cannot be taken to be a point for trusting Hreo or for distrusting Hreo. I merely added it for thoroughness. So I find it slightly interesting that Hreo is invested enough to attempt to defend against that as well. Second, I'd appreciate if if you don't put words in my mouth. I said you were an experienced player, and I stand by that. I did not say that entailed you were a dangerous player. While I have a personal danger-ranking full of tiers and scales for all the players, that is not pertinent to the matter at hand, and Wilson can certainly attest to the fact that you are nowhere near the tiers I'd actively seek to kill if I were an Eliminator. And that, I mention, because that is my standard for 'dangerous'. Third. I'm going to try to make everything as brief and curt as possible, because we could argue about how best to play this game until the Spiked kill us all. And that is a distraction from other concerns we should be discussing. No one is going to deny we don't have sufficient evidence at this point in time. The sad fact is, mislynches happen. Sometimes, we make bad mislynches pretty late into the game--anyone who wonders just needs to take a look at LG7, where we ended up mislynching a noble Smoker who had a kandra and House powers. What I do deny is: discussion with the pre-agreement that we shan't lynch anyone, or worse, shan't vote is effective. I think that is absolutely not the case at all. Think about it. If you have a role, that's fine, but you're also a villager. You just have extra add-ons. (Imagine, especially, if you're a Thug.) If you're a villager, your vote is your power. Your vote is your power and your voice, and without it, your voice can be ignored. With your vote, you are making a powerful statement about your suspicions--and it enables you to put pressure on another player precisely because it could lead to a lynch. But when are we going to have sufficient evidence by your lights, Hreo? Next cycle? The cycle after? With no pressure on anyone at all to speak? (Did you notice that the people on Ren's list still aren't speaking up? That Dom is still remaining silent?) Do you think we can trust the Seeker? Did you forget there are no safe roles in this game, as Meta has already said? Do you think we even have a Seeker, or a Mistborn with bronze? Has the trauma of Beetle faded from most minds, already? What happens if/when your Seeker dies? Do you think the dead are going to speak to us, then? Perhaps conveniently hold a note telling us who their killer was? How often do we actually have smoking gun evidence in the game? Just look at MR4. By the time we had smoking gun evidence pointing us to Macen and Aonar, it was very late in the game. How much evidence is enough for you? What is the threshold you want? If you've noticed, precisely because we don't have any safe roles, the most certainty you will ever get is word of Meta, and that comes at a lynch. The way I see it, any of the plans that Hreo can propose to counter my arguments are perfectly compatible with a scenario in which we lynch. How does the fact the game begins with a night cycle make a difference? Your answer reveals your problematic preconceptions. It's not about evidence. Unfortunately, Vron has disappointed us by not telling us who his killer was. Alv, if you see this, I am disappoint. That's so inconsiderate of you. This means we begin the game with a man down. That also means that unlike most other games in which we say, "Well, we can wait for the second day to begin earnest lynch discussion", we have already incurred the waiting casualty. Why is data so important? Precisely because we're shooting ghosts at the moment. That's just what mathematical modelling is. We're constructing models of Eliminator behaviour from a single data point at the moment. It's no surprise that we should be getting it so terribly wrong. What we exactly need is more data and a toothless model of discussion is not going to get us the data only a lynch can provide. With more data, we can revise our models. We can remove assumptions about how the Eliminators are playing, how they are regarding the lynch, and draw connections between players, such as who is defending whom. We can determine if the Eliminators are treating the lynch passively, in which case we look amongst the silent players, or if they are actively agitating for a lynch, as Awes did in LG5. It's simply arrogant and foolish to assume that with our limited information now, we'll know how this specific Team Evil is playing. For that, we mut have data. And the beautiful thing is, the more idea we have about narrowing down a pool of suspects, the better the baseline for our Seeker (if we do have one) to work from. So even though your model is predicated on sitting by passively and waiting for the Seeker to verify people, it's still a weak model precisely because it isn't giving the Seeker good data to work from. I suggest we can partner the Seeker and help them with their task. That's what I have to say. I'll leave it at that. I am not going to divert the discussion any further than I may have. I'd still like to hear from Dom, who has been ominously silent, and Ash, who's been flagged. I also note that at some point, we may want to lynch the Seeker to ensure their information has been good. This is a cold-blooded way of playing, so it may not be a good idea, but I raise it, nontheless, as a possibility. And as I've previously said, I will vote for Karnad and put my money where my mouth is. After all, I might seem suspicious after I've aggressively advocated for actual lynching and argued against passive play, branding it as toothless. My continued attacks on Hreo might seem like the act of someone attempting to ensure a lynch death. In addition, I have been actively defending Eoldren, a player accorded some degree of suspicion for his stunt, even though it seems I have little reason to. On these grounds, what suspicion we may have might accrue to me. But most of all, I admit, I'm a fool who takes earnestly the dictum that you should not propose an idea if you're not willing to endorse it strongly, or have it done to you--as it may be, to the death. Good luck be to you all.

I strongly disagree with Hreo's points, and I will post a fuller response later, when I'm a little less busy. Before that, I will note one thing. I've been debating doing this, but I am willing to put my money where my mouth is. What is it, you may ask? I think we need a lynch. I think we can't sit back and delay, and I think we don't just need the lynch discussion (and discussions if we've already agreed not to lynch someone are, I argue, toothless. People sometimes reveal things under pressure. Without voting and without the threat of a lynch, the pressure just isn't there.) We need more data, and sitting back and waving our hands and waiting for Seeker evidence--assuming we even have a Seeker (note Wyrm's very pertinent point that a Seeker doesn't have to be Village-aligned this time!) isn't going to get us that. So, I'm pretty sure this fellow, Karnad, is a pretty nefarious character. I encourage you to smite him. Why, he's been suggesting pretty dodgy tactics, such as smiting an innocent villager in red. He's been urging us to kill, he's been uncharacteristically silent in the group PMs, and he's been in contact with some fellow dodgy characters. Edit for grammar.

I'm not sure if you're asking me specifically, Maili, or just everyone who voted for Hreo, in general. I'm going to briefly summarise my reasoning as follows: 1. Hreo's been sashaying up to Ren's reasoning, nice and smooth-like, and pretty much what he does as an Eliminator. -He's made a good response to that, and I accept he would probably do the same as a Villager. Still, it's something I took note of, and it's mostly gut on that point, so I shan't give that much credence at all. It's neither a reason for distrusting him nor a reason for trusting him. 2. I find the comment he made on not having enough information for a lynch so he'd vote for no-one: A. Disingenuous. As Claincy said previously in the game you ran, Maili, we've fought about this in almost every single game. I find it strange that Hreo's trying to pass that off as some sort of consensus good move. (Again, Hreo's words can be read two ways. My reasoning for choosing the stronger reading is supported in my earlier post, but generally, the point is that Hreo isn't making a descriptive claim. He's also endorsing a normative one.) B. Second point of why it's disingenuous: Hreo's an experienced player. So I find it slightly strange that he'd immediately suggest shutting down on the lynch discussion but put a band-aid on that by saying "Well, y'know, we should discuss, anyway." 3. As I see it, usually, we'd say, 'well, we don't need to lynch today as this is a LG. So we can wait one night for more information and then proceed.' Unfortunately, such a strategy is predicated on the game beginning with a day cycle. i.e. We start with no one down at all. But as this game started with a night cycle, it seems to me that we do need the information that both lynch discussion and a lynch will give us. A. Extension of point 3: at this point, it looks to me as though leaving pressure on Hreo is more fruitful than leaving pressure on Eoldren. Eoldren seems to have been fairly forthcoming, by this point, about his motives. Hreo has not. We should be at about half-time by now, if I'm not mistaken. We still have plenty of time to change our votes, Maili. I'm slightly surprised that you want us to seal off things so quickly. You yourself have acknowledged this tacitly by swapping your vote to Ash. B. Extension of points 3 and A: if forced to choose, at this current point in time: I'm more inclined to go with lynching Hreo than Eoldren. Perhaps my gut is a Darkfriend, but it reads to me as though Eoldren is a player who made a gutsy but ill-considered move and is not Spiked. If there is additional convincing argument or reason to choose Eoldren over Hreo, then my vote is naturally going to be flexible. Edit: Redid the numbering scheme because I made a mistake with the alphabets.

...I've never had to do this before, and I'm not sure if this is the right place for it, but might I politely request to not be further conscripted into RP? I've spent this time establishing Karnad as a stranger to the town and someone working for a nobleman not part of Tyrian Falls. There's really no reason for him to be serving the town baron as a courier. I apologise if this is getting on everyone's nerves, but I get a bit twitchy when the character I'm playing gets pulled into RP--especially RP reasonably contrary to what I've already set up. Thank you! Edit: Again, the colour editor eats my code. I think it's an Awakened Editor... Edit 2: I'm still the most recent post. Here's an updated vote tally, also tracking vote shifts: Hreo (4): Kas, Ren, Araris, Unodus Nobody (1): Hreo Jain (1): Wyrm Dom (1): Maili<1>, Claincy<2> Eoldren (2): Maili<2>, Tekiel, Mek Joe (1): Claincy<1> Ash (1): Seonid, Maili<3> At this point, the only one I'd flag is Wyrm. Anything in particular you're looking to get out of Jain, King? I must stress that despite the Eoldren incident, we shouldn't fixate on Eoldren alone. Pertinent questions have been raised, and we'd possibly like to open up discussion a little more than turn Eoldren into our discussion-bottleneck. tldr; talk more people! We're not dead yet!

Claincy, thank you for the response. I appreciate it. I would add a note of caution to your alternative depicting "what Eoldren should've done", Ash. At this point, I have no particular reason to trust Wilson or Claincy, and I find it interesting that you're so willing to immediately trust them with information on what you'd do. (Note: I said that I have no particular reason to trust Wilson or Claincy--it does not entail that I necessarily also distrust them. Rather, I find myself in the position where I have neither reason to trust nor distrust them.) I merely note that I'm a little surprised to find you with such (seemingly) strong reason to trust another player, so early in the game. (In particular, Wilson has often accused me of overcompensating in my paranoia towards her. This may be true; at the same time, I find early expressions of trust somewhat puzzling.) The points of the weaknesses of Eoldren's approach, such as the questions of how he actually profiled them, or if it was useful, if it fit his professed plans, and that it might be a useful strategy for a Spiked!Tineye, are, I believe, well-taken. Those, I will acknowledge, are well-raised. Myself, I admit I'm at a loss as to what to think. 'Phishing', as it were, isn't exactly a new strategy in this game--as Joe might very well know. (Those of you who are curious, see LG3--Gamma pulled the exact same trick, though a bit more fleshed out, on Joe in order to elicit a Spiked confession and to end the game.) I feel that it seems a bit risky as a strategy for the Spiked to do, even a Spiked Tineye. The plan could easily backfire: it's more risk than reward. At the same time, I've long learned that it's a dangerous thing to superimpose my preconceptions of 'sensible Spiked play' onto how Team Evil actually plays--these assumptions aren't always warranted. To be very frank, I do not know what to think. Eoldren's plan is bold, and actually, a rather interesting move for a newer player, and on those grounds, if it is the case that he isn't Spiked, then I must applaud it. (It certainly beats hiding in the shadows and waiting for someone to contact you...) On the other hand, the qualms raised are genuine, and it seems somewhat ill-considered. And I still find myself with some reason to distrust Hreo, so I'm not keen to move my vote. If possible, I'd like a response from Ash, as well.