Fifth Scholar

“The Surgebinders are no longer a protection to us,” the grizzled man whispered. Naldam’s eyes widened in disbelief. Vedem put her hand to her mouth. Father had never spoken of the Radiants this way. When the first squadron of Windrunners had flown in over the clouds, driving back the monsters spawned from the Everstorm, and the rest of the Radiant orders had followed and set up their perimeter about the land, she had thought that he would die for joy. His joy was certainly great at the prospect of not being dead another way, namely, speared upon a stake as a sacrifice to the Lord of Hatred who drove these creatures and the new, backwards storm. But his tone was serious as he continued, looking his wife, Idai, in the dead centre of her steely green eyes. “They can’t go on like this. Can’t you see? Squadrons suddenly turning on themselves, formations being sent off to the wrong places and leaving us open to attack. If one of the Skybreakers hadn’t been trailing his group and seen the enemy vanguard switch direction, we’d have been wiped out yesterday.” “So what?” Idai snapped. “They’re too tired to continue? Stormlight should let them run on, and we have plenty. Maybe they’re just plain incompetent. They’re new to this too, you know. Not the heroes you think of them. Just elevated slaves for the most part. How would they know better?” He pounded the table emphatically. “It can’t be that. The Fused are warriors beyond our reckoning. Thousands of years of experience. Yet even they will fall to the new Radiants. No, something else is keeping them back. You’re wrong, Idai. They do know better. They are our heroes, because they have to be. But…maybe something else is wrong. Why were the Truthwatchers so far from the other units in the last Everstorm? And two or three Dustbringers, from the sound of it, just wandered off. Maybe…” He trailed off. Naldam and his serious eyes picked up the thought. “Maybe someone is giving them bad orders. Who’s in charge, Da?” The heavyset man sighed. “The Blackthorn is a changed man, they say, and I wouldn’t lay more blame at his feet. But those around him are not immune to corruption. The Oaths may be sworn by those who would work evil with them as well.” He locked eyes with Idai, and an understanding seemed to pass between them. “I think you’re right, bud. The Radiants have some issues to sort in their own ranks. And they need to sort it quick. The Everstorm will come again soon.” Idai turned, and he frowned after her. “Where are you going?” She tilted her head with mock patience. “Well, someone should tell a Radiant about this, yes? We certainly aren’t going to sort through them. I don’t need a living Blade through my sternum if I run into a traitor. But I think I can spare a chat with that handsome young Stoneward captain.” She spun out with a smirk. He gazed after her, and sighed. “Come on, kids. We’ve got some preparations of our own to make.” Welcome to MR66: Knights of Wind and Truth! Jah Keved is the latest battlefield between Dalinar Kholin’s Coalition, sustained by his growing ranks of Knights Radiant, and the Fused forces led by Odium. However, troubling tidings have winged their way back to Urithiru. The mixed squads of Radiants, intended to allow the Orders to find ways to work together, have been experiencing increasing dysfunction in this area. The report of Callar, a young Stoneward, suggests that the Radiants have infiltrators in their ranks–knights who would use their vows to allow Odium to sweep over the land. They must be rooted out, or Dalinar’s forces will be hopelessly weakened when the true blow falls upon them. The rules of this game may be accessed here. They are also available in crude format in the spoiler below. The IM for this game is [TBD]. Please see him or her, or myself, with any concerns or questions you have about the game as it progresses. Signups have begun and will last for about nine days, until Saturday 4 November at 9:00 PM EDT. Unless otherwise noted, this will be the standard rollover time for the game as well. Do note that I will be at work on 12-hour shifts for half of the game, so expect delays in requests for vote counts and rules clarifications. The earlier in the cycle you ask something, the better your life, and mine, will be. Good luck! Player List: Spectators: Pinch-hitters: Quicklinks:

Hmm. It might…actually be doable with my schedule? Give me a day or two to check that/pick a ruleset and I’ll decide whether I’ll take the slot. Edit: I’ll take it. Let me get the rules to committee.

It’s refreshing to be C1ed I do think this game can/should be rerun at higher player count to get a better idea of how the rotating kill and extra lives would play out without a distro that was pretty much mandatory Thanks to Kas for running, as always, and for all the newbies who gave it their best. Raven in particular nearly saved it for us

Yes, this is a problem, hence my desire to apply some lethal pressure to Sart. I’ll be back in six hours but will miss EoD so I’d prefer we start consolidating on people.

Hello, I was on a 12-hour shift and thus found it rather difficult to be here 2 Elims with one koloss-blooded makes the most sense to me if I were doing distro. Three lives, two votes. 3-7 is way too bad a starting ratio unless all the Village are koloss-blooded or something Village could feasibly have anywhere from one to three koloss-blooded and I think there’s a decent argument for each of those. Don’t find the CC too helpful, especially in something as fast as a QF, so Sart. Seen anything else you care to point out?

I’m in as Adze, who is very grateful there are no Lurchers to hit this time around

Appreciate it. Well, I’m a Tineye, and Araris isn’t lying about what it does (it keeps PMs open, no special actions). Curious that we have three, apparently, as that seems steep regardless of Araris’ alignment. Also curious that we have the public alignment list and no roles which apparently interact with it in terms of actually caring about what it says (yes, Thugs can change it, but they don’t otherwise change based on what the list says). Maybe that was literally just Mat? Honestly the only thing stopping me from joining the Araris train at this point is my respect for him as a player, and a feeling that he’d have distanced better from Wiz. Otherwise a Soother/Tineye pair feels…reasonable? I think there’s still a piece of this puzzle missing, though.

Reads are an interesting ask, given that I just now substituted in and have not been paying attention to the game beyond the fact that I am reasonably sure that the alignment list probably isn’t 100% trustworthy …but everyone seems to want Araris dead anyway. Okay, I’ll backread when I get off my shift in ~6 hours, but until then, I’d appreciate a quick rundown of relevant public information (especially role-claims) because looking at what JNV has, I’m interested in what’s been said.

Will be busy the first few days of the game, but am happy to pinch-hit. Curious what this Set-up will reveal

The QF kinda drained me despite how fun it was, and while an LG/MR would in theory be easier on my schedule to run, I think I’ll take a rest and let others take the slots for now

Nope. It’s a Pawn ability, not a role, and was therefore locked to the Pawn. In a similar way, Haigha doesn’t let you traffic your rook through your Queen even if you’d submitted the action for XP.

Three apiece. Aman, Labyrinth and Sart were all cursed.

A Writeup Shall Come. Results…Shall Come First. The Chess Minigame is over! Though neither King was captured, the Red Team possesses a significant material advantage of 7 points, and carries away the trophy! Final boardstate will be edited in when I’m not on my storming phone >> Your victory points, as promised: Unveiling the FINAL STANDINGS QUINTESSENTIAL: 13 THE KNOWN NOVEL: 13 Ashbringer: 12 _Stick_: 11 DrakeMarshall/Scars of Hathsin: 9 Amanuensis: 8 Experience: 7 Wonko the Sane: 6 Sart: 6 Archer/WitIsTheBest: 2 Matrim’s Dice: 1 xinoehp512: 1 |TJ|: 1 Labyrinth: 1 And some doc links! Fully Spoiled Rules Spec Doc Cards Doc Bandersnatch Doc White Pieces Red Pieces GM Master Spreadsheet Finally, the true reward of this game, the Paper Plate Awards! Step forward onto the podium and claim yours! THE KNOWN NOVEL: You are already a Victor, but I must award you the designation of Fiercest Competitor. Never content with the victory points lying about, you went your way to garner as many as you could for yourself, playing the game like a true FFA, and saw your efforts bear fruit. You were a valiant Knight in the garrison of the Red King. Additionally, by spreading your Time curse to both Alice and the Dormouse, you also win the dubious honour of Typhoid Mary! MATRIM’S DICE: Your longsuffering and patience as you were hit with the Madness early in Cards, suspected in Jabberwock, and given a disjointed team in Chess, has earned you the Truest Stoic award. Thank you for giving it your all throughout the game, even though it didn’t go your way much. EXPERIENCE: While you excelled in the Red Doc strategising with your teammates, your most outstanding effects on the game certainly came in the Cards game. Though you fell willingly upon your Pepper-laced sword during C2 to ensure that Alice or the Knave would not be exposed, your time as the Duchess was laden with significance, helping you to roleblock the Queen who was hunting you during C1. As such, I award you the title of Doughtiest Scapegoat. DRAKEMARSHALL/SCARS: There is no question as to what you deserve. You quite obviously receive Cutest Murderpuppy for your Vorpal Sword assassination of Sart, and your ruthless planning in Chess. WITISTHEBEST/ARCHER: In the grand tradition of our great IM watching over this game, you were in several important positions, but due to a quieter thread and PM presence, managed to mostly evade watchful eyes until the last cycles when it could be borne no more, flying under the radar with aplomb! As such, I grant you the title Most Devoted Adherent to Araris Valerian. XINOEHP512: After receiving largely standard roles in this game, you were nonetheless subjected to a withering barrage of suspicion from all corners, particularly a very confident Wonko. As such, you receive the Most Remarkable Citizen award! QUINTESSENTIAL: Your return to SE was a swooping and triumphant one, seeing you snatch the matriarchy of Wonderland for yourself and use it to set your realm back in order, and granting you co-Victor status. However, it came about from the efforts of others as well, whom you trusted and who did not fail you. As such, you are awarded the Most Benevolent Monarch prize! Try to avoid taking too many more heads, wouldn’t you? _STICK_: You were adrift at sea for much of the game, and were in the centre of the time cursing without yourself being cursed. Nonetheless, you steeled yourself and, though doubtless cursing my name by the end, etched out two hard-won victories for yourself. You therefore earn Ordinary Time’s Strongest Soldier. ASHBRINGER: You came in at exactly the right time in the Cards minigame, performing a perfect kill on the only player not sitting to Tea and securing victory for your faction. And in Chess, though you seemed quiet as the Dormouse you had been, you were another instrumental part of Red’s victory. I therefore award you the Clutch Gene award. Sorry for all the headaches I gave you. (Not really. :P) AMANUENSIS: Ever the joker in these games, you received three difficult roles one after another: the Knave of Hearts, the Jabberwock, and the White Knight. Despite being cursed unexpectedly, you rose to the challenge of each, and gave the difficult wincons I assigned you your all. I therefore present you with Most Dwimmer-Crafty Third Party. May the Sun ever shine on your swords. SART: No suspense here either: you had ALL the time shenanigans happen to you. You were Cursed, kicked out of a Party thanks to a curse, resurrected yourself as a Bandersnatch using your curse, and were the scariest time-travelling bishop to ever cross a chessboard. If Stick is Ordinary Time’s Strongest Soldier, you are Daylight Saving Time’s Strongest Soldier. |TJ|: Bro I’m sorry you just got piled on this game. Especially as My Son. You win Most Feared Spectre, and also Most Interrupted Queen (your poor actions :’)) WONKO THE SANE: You get the trophy case. Most Prolific PMer, Most Dastardly Schemer, Puppet Master Extraordinaire, Complimenter of GMs, Most Dedicated to His Craft, Best Confidence Level in Blackout, Most Likely to Fall For Fifth’s Silly Traps, Quinn’s Strongest Soldier. You deserve every last award. Thanks for making this game your own. LABYRINTH: I think you just straight-up get Most Unlucky. Your Alice role could have done so much, and you just hit the very few wrong people with it. Thanks for being the prime Guinea Pig in this Wonderland world. Thank you, thank you, to everyone who played. This is in my top 3 GMing experiences (and I’ve run a lot of games, with a lot more free time usually). Y’all made this your own and I loved it. GM retrospective, a decent writeup, and fuller thoughts are coming. And possibly some parodies. Edit: I NEARLY FORGOT TO THANK @JNV SPECIFICALLY! Go shower the best co-GM I could have asked for with all due upvotes, praise, and adulation

That’s the game! (my sleep schedule pictured below)

Four and a half hours left in the game! Get moves, votes, actions, and desperate pleas in before then!

Cycle closed!

Last Cycle Vote Count: Stick (3) Xino (2) Sart (2) Experience (2) Archer (1) Wonko (1) Mat (1)

Cycle closed!

No. Edit: I have received a request for a pinch-hitter that I may not be able to fulfill. If I cannot fulfill it, the player in question’s piece will be movable by his or her team, and assumed to be the loser in any contest of move order.

“And hath ye slain the Jabberwock? Come to my arms, my beamish boys! O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!” I chortled in my joy. … “Oh wait, none of you actually resolved this mess. Sad.” ‘I think I’ll go and meet her,’ said Alice, for, though the flowers were interesting enough, she felt that it would be far grander to have a talk with a real Queen. ‘You can’t possibly do that,’ said the Rose: ‘I should advise you to walk the other way.’ This sounded nonsense to Alice, so she said nothing, but set off at once towards the Red Queen. To her surprise, she lost sight of her in a moment, and found herself walking in at the front-door again. A little provoked, she drew back, and after looking everywhere for the queen (whom she spied out at last, a long way off), she thought she would try the plan, this time, of walking in the opposite direction. It succeeded beautifully. She had not been walking a minute before she found herself face to face with the Red Queen, and full in sight of the hill she had been so long aiming at. ‘Where do you come from?’ said the Red Queen. ‘And where are you going? Look up, speak nicely, and don’t twiddle your fingers all the time.’ Alice attended to all these directions, and explained, as well as she could, that she had lost her way. ‘I don’t know what you mean by your way,’ said the Queen: ‘all the ways about here belong to me—but why did you come out here at all?’ she added in a kinder tone. ‘Curtsey while you‘re thinking what to say, it saves time.’ Alice wondered a little at this, but she was too much in awe of the Queen to disbelieve it. ‘I’ll try it when I go home,’ she thought to herself. ‘the next time I’m a little late for dinner.’ ‘It’s time for you to answer now,’ the Queen said, looking at her watch: ‘open your mouth a little wider when you speak, and always say “your Majesty.”’ ‘I only wanted to see what the garden was like, your Majesty--’ ‘That’s right,’ said the Queen, patting her on the head, which Alice didn’t like at all, ‘though, when you say “garden,”—I’ve seen gardens, compare with which this would be a wilderness.’ Alice didn’t dare to argue the point, but went on: ‘-- and I thought I’d try and find my way to the top of that hill— ’ ‘When you say “hill,”’ the Queen interrupted, ‘I could show you hills, in comparison with which you’d call that a valley.’ ‘No, I shouldn’t,’ said Alice, surprised into contradicting her at last: ‘a hill can’t be a valley, you know. That would be nonsense— ’ ‘The Red Queen shook her head, ‘You may call it “nonsense” if you like,’ she said, ‘ but I’ve heard nonsense, compared with which that would be as sensible as a dictionary!’ Sart was not killed during C5! He was not even attacked, in fact. _Stick_ was killed during C5! She was a Village Rath of the Creatures of the Looking-Glass! Amanuensis succumbed to the madness! He was the Jabberwock! Vote Count: Amanuensis (5): Wonko the Sane, Quintessential, DrakeMarshall, Experience, Matrim’s Dice xinoehp512 (2): Archer, Amanuensis The Jabberwock minigame is over! All factions have failed their win conditions! Not enough death to go around The Creatures of the Looking-Glass and the Jabberwock failed to eliminate all the Bandersnatches! The Bandersnatches failed to outnumber the Creatures of the Looking-Glass! The Jubjub Bird failed to ensure the survival of exactly one Bandersnatch, one Village Rath, one Village Tove, one Village Borogove, and itself! The Jabberwocky minigame is over! Unless otherwise noted, all roles, alignments, abilities, items, and victory conditions have been lost. The third and final minigame has begun: the Chess minigame! All players are alive again. This minigame will last three cycles. In it, you must outwit the opposing chess team, playing as a piece for your own team. There are two teams: White and Red, which will be public, but each have their own doc to coordinate privately. Teams will earn points in the following ways this game: 5 points to each member of the victorious team (captures the opponent’s king first, or, if neither king is captured, whichever team has a greater material balance by the end. If material balance is equal and neither king is threatened, neither team will receive points.) 1 point to each team which promotes a pawn, and 1 additional point to the pawn which is promoted 1 point to the piece which makes the most captures by the end of the minigame, and 1 point to any piece that makes a capture The chess match will be played using the standard rules of chess, with the following exceptions: The game begins in media res; pieces are not necessarily on their starting squares. The entirety of the board cannot be seen. Each player can only see the square he is on, and each square he can legally move to, as well as its occupants. (Example: there is a queen standing on e5 and a bishop on g7. The queen cannot see the h8 square along her diagonal, and the bishop cannot see the d4-a1 squares. Each piece can, however, see the other.) More than one piece may legally occupy a square. However, pawns still cannot move straight ahead into or through already-occupied squares, and queens, bishops, and rooks still may not move through occupied squares. If multiple pieces occupy a square when an enemy piece or pawn lands there, that enemy piece will capture every piece which it legally can unless the Protect ability is in place. There is no check or checkmate. The king is instead a normal piece which can be captured (but still counts for victory conditions). If a player attempts to make an illegal move, such as a pawn move forward onto an occupied square, or a longer move along a pathway which is now blocked, it will not be counted and the piece will remain in place. Captures are automatic and do not need to be noted when submitting moves. Moves do not necessarily alternate between teams. See “piece movement” below. Only pieces whose players have multiple (2+) madness votes can be captured. Otherwise, if another piece moves into its square, it will simply share the square with that piece. The piece with the most madness votes will be roleblocked and unable to move. If there is a tie, all pieces in the tie will be unable to move. Piece movement: Pieces do not move in regular alternating order of colours. Instead, there are 14 moves available each round which both teams may attempt to use, ordered from 1 (the first move made) to 14 (the last). These moves may be bid upon by any players taking actions. If three or more players attempt to use the same slot in the move order, all players involved in the bid lose their turn. If two players attempt to use the same slot in the move order, the player with the current madness vote placed closest to the beginning of the cycle moves in the chosen spot. The other player is moved up or down one spot if able, and if not, loses his turn. Players may submit moves on behalf of pieces not their own which are of the same colour using their action slot, provided that the additional move for the second piece is submitted in both GM PMs. Example: Kasimir is a Red Pawn on c7, and Wyrmhero is a Red Knight on d4. Because he is a good bro, Wyrm submits the order “Move Kasimir’s Pawn c5→c4, move 11” while Kas submits “Move c7→c5 move 10, allow Wyrm to move me c5→c4 move 11.” Unless otherwise interrupted, Kasimir’s Pawn will move from c7 to c5, and then to c4, farther than it could have gone with only Kas’s action. No piece may move more than three times per round of moves. Chess clarifications: The standard rules of chess may be found here. Please submit any moves made in algebraic chess notation, though you do not need to note captures (unless you are a Pawn, in which case the only way you may move diagonally is by making a capture ). Neither team is considered to have castling privileges. The white pawns move towards the eighth rank, and the red pawns towards the first. Teams/Player List: White Pieces Red Pieces Good luck!

That is all! Please hold as we get this minigame wrapped and the final one unveiled.

No faction has yet failed its win condition.

Cycle closed! Come back soon to see who made it through the tulgey wood

A little over two and a half hours! Get in votes, actions, etc.

To clarify, as there has been confusion in PMs: @Wonko the Sane is still alive in this minigame. Carry on