[OOC] The Blood Compact

[akje]

Now I can either wait on Shikaru to post Magnus's response to Hale's call, or I could assume Magnus would tell him to walk and go right ahead and post Hale taking his squad into the woods. Which is the place one might conveniently run into other characters.

[Grimoire Gaming]

Is it daytime still in the RP? If so, I wont be able to post until nightfall.

[The Grey Dust]

It depends on where you are at. It's daytime in England. Which would be early morning, before noonish probably. But time is fluid depending on where and when you are.

[Grimoire Gaming]

My character is still state-side, not too far from kilo point. Just wondering if the characters there now are doing their dealings at night or not.

[Wraithblade6]

I'm going to say, where my characxter is is later than what's going on in London. It's starting to get dark in the Midwest USA.

[Wraithblade6]

Hey... Shit I drank too much. Time to rock out to random nightcore vids. Find me on steam. The war is won before it's begun, release the doves, surrender love.

[Grimoire Gaming]

Lols, so if that underground base is now built, has it been a month and a half since the kilo point battle (and therefore, my last post)?

[Wraithblade6]

YOU... post. fuck I'm fucked up. Dota! invite me...

[Grimoire Gaming]

I'm working on a post now. Putting it up in a matter of seconds. P.S. I asked you a question. >.>

[Wraithblade6]

Lols, so if that underground base is now built, has it been a month and a half since the kilo point battle (and therefore, my last post)?

@Silent Observer

Yes... or there abouts.

[akje]

good morning. ... yes. i can work with this. I'll have a post up for Hale as soon as I get to a computer (currently on phone) EDIT: Posted for Hale, I like to put my characters in mortal danger as you can see. This aught to be hilarious/horrifying

[thewizardguy]

<Snipped quote by thewizardguy> Then I don't see your problem. But Camelot is protected through the 1500 years of it's existence. The fact that it still stands means something. Despite it being buried underneath the centuries.

@The Grey Dust

Being old does not justify nuke-proofing, it's age is irrelevant. The fact that I'm not actually throwing a nuke at you is irrelevant to the fact that you just stated a nuke would be insufficient to destroy camelot. There is no level of firepower above 'nuclear warfare'. There is nothing higher than that. So you're basically stating that Camelot is immune to any damage inflicted by anything, ever, until we develop Antimatter Explosives. Your character's one supposed weakness is that he can be killed during the day, but if he sleeps in a magical impregnable fortress immune to any and all damage surrounded by a vast network of spies and soldiers in a country filled with vampires, that isn't really a weakness.

[thewizardguy]

Akje, you do realize that Mithy and Gabe are in Oklahoma, right? I'm not entirely sure where Kilo Point is, but I'm pretty sure it's nowhere near Oklahoma City.

[The Grey Dust]

<Snipped quote by The Grey Dust> Being old does not justify nuke-proofing, it's age is irrelevant. The fact that I'm not actually throwing a nuke at you is irrelevant to the fact that you just stated a nuke would be insufficient to destroy camelot. There is no level of firepower above 'nuclear warfare'. There is nothing higher than that. So you're basically stating that Camelot is immune to any damage inflicted by anything, ever, until we develop Antimatter Explosives. Your character's one supposed weakness is that he can be killed during the day, but if he sleeps in a magical impregnable fortress immune to any and all damage surrounded by a vast network of spies and soldiers in a country filled with vampires, that isn't really a weakness.

@thewizardguy

Nuclear warfare is your limit of firepower? How strange. I thought you'd at least go for something more fun as molecular destabilization. Camelot has withstood the 1500 some odd years. Weathering through the ages. It is also hidden underground as the centuries piled up upon it. It is an immortal kingdom lost to the ages of time. But I'm sure you have no concept of eternity and the significance of protecting something to withstand the ages. Merlin however foresaw this and casted a ward over it to both conceal it from scrying and prevent its destruction until the King returns from Avalon to reclaim his throne. But if you cannot accept this line of logic, of preserving something against decay, then you could also argue Bedivere believes Merlin has done this whether or not it applies. Either way, I.C. there is no suggestion to Bedivere that the nukes would work. But of course if we metagame everything... The fortress is not impregnable. There are no other vampires there due to the amount of Judeo-Christian symbolism found in Camelot. And no humans walk the halls as guards either as the only ones who Bedivere would allow to do so are the other knights of Camelot. There are no modern turrets or surveillance. The only modification is a phone landline running from the ceiling with a direct line to Parliament. Although the darkness of the underground can be banished away by a flashlight. Thus you can walk into it. Most likely falling into it on accident. Not knowing where you end up but falling into the dark abyss until you hit water. To then be unable to walk back up and must wander the halls until another exit is found. A story I'd like to throw in would be of how an English solider accidentally came upon Camelot. While exploring the halls, he found Bedivere in his Red Dragon form, guarding over his treasures. But either way, Camelot's only defense is the last knight and Merlin's meddling. Dare I ask why you are so critical of some elements by the way? You always seem to expect elements of reality when it is convenient for you. Yet, disregard it with little more than a brush off when we raise question. For example, you have still to explain the full extent of Gabriel's powers, nor any form of perceived weaknesses. Yet, you constantly bash on us regarding our "OP"-ness. Furthermore, you have place the Purge in Kilopoint in a large scale assault as if they were ready to do battle without any form of reverse knowledge from either side. Which is to say you managed to move a force of Purge member with tanks and all, to a relatively small base in kilopoint knowing vampires are going to strike it without the vampires noticing or Kilopoint putting out a high alert for potential enemy movements. You have made Kami-no-Kage with some special life-extending formula (I'll disregard the batteries for now until you develop this) and for some odd reason he knows that Bedivere arrived in the States even though Bedivere could be anywhere with his water merge abilities and decides to hunt him down. You have created technology which is supposedly to fight vampires, yet unless the Purge has extreme lobbying, they are producing weapons of war which world governments ought to be more concerned about. The attack on kilopoint and attempted bombing of should have landed the Purge in some really bad press. Yet the world government has allowed the organization to exist without any intervention or audit. SOLIDER I take it is the official group because of the regulation it has. You seem to "force" the issue at hand into your design with disregard to the contribution of others to the lore and story. Just take the interaction with Mathew Stone. You would believe that Mathew would get audience with the Collector just because he called? Just because sudden interest overtook him? If someone like Bill Gates decided to call up the Queen of Brittan and ask if her entire country wanted to conduct business with Microsoft such that no Mac's would be allowed in Brittan, do you think they would actually meet face to face? Or would Bill rather send a proxy to meet the Queen's people and discuss business matters? It would be illogical for actual business people who have never met each other to sit in chat about undisclosed business with Mathew did not specify. As for securing nuclear weapons, if men like Mathew Stone have nukes, one would expect the UK (hence by extension Bedivere) also has nuclear weaponry (which ironically would be weapons of war he would collect for display purposes in self-satisfaction but he'd never use them because he prefers the way of the sword). So then, should we escalate once more? Or will you begin to see that it is not just your story here but a joint venture requiring yourself to be respectful of the design of others and not just justify your own when they are clearly equally shady though no one bothers to point them out because they just go along with it and take it for face value in the interest of not controlling things which are beyond their domain.

[akje]

Akje, you do realize that Mithy and Gabe are in Oklahoma, right? I'm not entirely sure where Kilo Point is, but I'm pretty sure it's nowhere near Oklahoma City.

@thewizardguy

Oh, I interpreted it as them having gone to Oklahoma after finding him in Kilo Point. Eh, oh well, in that case Martin was looking at some other street performer also playing the violin. It doesn't really matter since I didn't intent for them to interact at this point anyways. As long as SOLDIER HQ is somewhere in/near Kilo Point, otherwise Martin has no real reason to be there. And as for Bedevere's weakness. You are right to say he can't have no weaknesses. But when I read his bio I can think of a few ways to... play checkmate against Bedevere. As for Camelot, it states nowhere in his bio it's indestructible. Only "Buried beneath the centuries" is extremely vague I agree. This could be interpreted in a few ways: - Camelot is well fucking hidden, this should not protect it from a nuke large enough to level the south part of the British isles. - Camelot no longer exists. The castle he retreats to is either a copy (see first option) or in his mind, in which case he is physically still floating in a body of water somewhere. - Camelot is placed not in England, but on some remote location such as deep below the Atlantic or in some kind of pocket dimension. If this would be the case it would survive the nuke by virtue of your nuke "missing" Camelot. But there are a lot of clever tactics Mathew could pull from his sleeve to ruin Bedevere's unlife I'm sure. Either way, reading the BIO I think Bedevere would be set back if the British Isles would be removed from the maps. Not that that's up to me. I just hope there really are pocket dimensions involved. EDIT after reading @The Grey Dust's post: So it's underground. So yes it's Physical and well hidden, and wouldn't survive nuclear holocaust. But @The Grey Dust raises a good point. The question is about whether Bedevere believes it to be indestructible. And regardless of the existence of magic wards, Bedevere believes his keep to be safe. So he'll call Mathew's bluff.

[thewizardguy]

*Sigh* Just from the tone of your wall of text I can see that somehow I have managed to offend or anger you. This was not my intention, I simply wished to point out the flaws in your concepts. I'll run through your wall of text, ignoring your insults. First, molecular destabilization is nonsensical as an offensive weapon. I could go into detail on this point, but doing so is meaningless. I can completely accept protective wards, and something being protected against decay. To me, that makes absolute sense. Assuming Merlin did ward the place, taking into account that he was a powerful wizard, it's most likely well-protected. However, a nuclear bomb is capable of annihilating entire countries. The radiation, heat and shock wave combine to create a wall of destruction that leaves very little of anything even remotely intact. There is a big difference between warding off decay, and warding off the equivalent of 50.000.0000.000 kilos of TNT. Bedhivere's belief is relevant to the current IC situation. If, according to you, Bedhivere does not see nuclear bombing as a threat, then feel free to act on that premise and call Mathew's bluff. It's your character, and his beliefs are fully yours to control. However, this does not impact the fact that you made your castle nuke-proof. Your information about the method in which Bedhivere is guarded within Camelot does severely influence my approximation of how powerful he is. I lacked this information previously. I am a critical person for multiple reasons. The first is that I am critical by nature. The second is that I fear that overpowered characters can easily rip apart a roleplay and destroy it. In my experience, if a metagamer like you is allowed to go out of control, then they can - without any ill intent - ruin the experience for others. The above is not meant as an insult. You have a great way with words, are excellent at describing both people and situations, and have a rich imagination. I love your reworking of the Arthurian legend, and Bedhivere as a character. However, much like me, you're a metagamer, and unlike with myself, I have no control over your actions. That makes me paranoid, and while I would love to simply blindly trust that you will not abuse your vastly overpowered character, I just don't know you and that worries me. I fear that your actions will remove agency from all other characters. Furthermore, I would encourage you to question me in all things I do if you believe they may offer any form of harm to the roleplay, or distress any characters, or if they simply don't make sense. I will enquire and debate you on the subject, and then, if I agree with you, I will make any alterations necessary. I have explained Gabriel's weakness previously, as well as the extents and limits of his power. Here's a quote, dated 20 days. You may find it on Page 14 of this OOC, if you wish to check.

Gabe

Let me clarify Gabe: Gabriel is a boss. Although it has never been previously established just HOW old he is, suffice to say he's old enough to have met Cain in person, and have been worshipped by the Mesopotamians. He is absolutely ancient, and he was created for the purpose of being a mystical, mysterious, thing. Now, the whole 'no magic' thing has already been shattered, this run has a lot more magic than previous ones (where Mith's pyrokinesis was a topic of debate, and Gabriel was the magicalest magic-man out there) so he's no longer as magical as he used to be. However, he's still massively psionic, capable of great mental feats. Gabriel can instil emotions in people, create illusions, generate insanity, read minds, and do many other things. He has never, however, 'mind controlled' someone. The act of mind control takes control away from a player, and this decreases people's fun. As such, I never plan on having Gabriel do anything like this. Instead, he merely shifted Kami's senses slightly, causing him to think the heart was a bit to the left. To balance out how rampantly powerful Gabriel is, I added in several factors. First off, he doesn't pick sides. He has no intention of saving humans or vampires in particular, and doesn't care for either. He might interfere occasionally, for fun, but he isn't going to 'fix' the results of any battle. As such, he doesn't take agency away from the players - their actions are still what determines the outcome of the battle, and the story as a whole. Furthermore, while this has almost never come up, Gabriel is physically weak. While he's still stronger than a human by far, his strength is barely above that of a Newblood, and any Oldblood should be able to beat him down in a physical confrontation. I created this so that, if one takes into account Gabriel's capabilities, there is an effective counter to them and chance of defeating him. He's certainly powerful, but use of robots, drones or people like Mith (who are immune to psychic tampering) will nullify his greatest abilities. Thus, to me, are the basic rules of making an overpowered character. If one 'side' has a truly OP character, then other character's actions become irrelevant compared to this overpowered character. In order to preserve agency, overpowered characters must always be neutral in a conflict. Furthermore, there must always be a method available to defeat them, if necessary they should serve as a 'boss battle' for other players to gang up against.

The Purge are and illegal military force that exists within America, and is in direct confrontation with their military. The only reason they are not being exterminated is because (1) they're hard to find/identify before they're rallied by Kami no Kage and (2) They only hunt vampires, and as such are less of a concern. Better yet, they almost exclusively hunt down compact-breakers like Magnus. As such, the military isn't nearly as bothered with exterminating them. Do recall that SOLDIER (Matt) pretty much attacked them on-sight, and initiated all hostilities that ocurred between the two parties. But you're right that I hadn't thought of the specific political ramifications of the clash between the Purge and SOLDIER in Kilo Point, and should pay more attention to that. Most likely, both through the display of advanced weaponry and because of the battle between SOLDIER and the Purge, they're going to have drawn more military attention. I did not expect to meet Bedhivere. And as previously established by Matt, he likes to meet people in person. Which is why he didn't send a proxy, which would have been much safer for him. Hell, from the way things are turning out, this mistake may cost him his life. This is not a principle I expected Bedhivere to share, especially with his focus on secrecy. As previously stated, Mathew Stone does not have any nuclear weaponry. The UK quite probably does have nuclear weaponry. Also, it would be in control of the Brittish Government, as opposed to Bedhivere. This is, assuming he's not pupppeting the whole country.

[Shikaru]

I have a lot of reading to catch up on e.e. Internet has been hella spotty the past few days, in case you are wondering why I haven't been posting. Nothing to do right now other than read this and post, so expect a post up soon.

[Shikaru]

Right, probably should have said this a lot sooner, quite frankly I forgot. SOLDIER HQ Isn't in Kilo Point, as stated, it's elsewhere. Out of a list of random locations, I think I'll choose Nashville. Now, even if it IS an outpost, it's one of the main ones in the country, It does have it's own mini-HQ of sorts, which is what Martin could be at so as to not completely kill the entire post(s). On a un-related note to Martin: lmfao at the post with Hale. I honestly laughed hard about the rednecks, and how true it was to a LOT of people in my town and towns around it.

[The Grey Dust]

I apologize in advance for keyboard warrioring. However, I cannot let such disrespect go unpunished. You are rather vexing in your defense. You do not trust your fellow roleplayers. Thus I dare ask, who are you to determine who is a threat to destroy a roleplay? It is not a power grab compartively speaking, your characters hold far more control over the roleplay thus far. Hence I'm inclined to say that you are back-seat GM'ing if I may, as you are attempting to exert control over everyone else through escalation. You claim you are not attempting to offend me but you clearly do with what you are insinuating that I would abuse power to make the story my own whereas so far I have yet to do anything to significantly suggest I would do so. Do you believe I am effectively here to ruin the roleplay for everyone? Or perhaps just yourself as you feel impelled to snipe not only at me but even the GM as you did earlier. Hence I feel as though you are being slightly passive-aggressive there if not tongue-in-cheek. As for your claims of me being a meta-gamer, when have I metagamed? I did not happen to have info on everyone present, everything thus far has reasonable explanation as to why Bedivere may know of people. If Mathew stone is a significant person, a quick search for information can be easily done, then again I did respect your post and state that they really did not talk about any information you did not want to divulge, given that I gave that choice completely up to you, I'd say I was anything but interfering. Hence blaming just flat-out bad judgment of a person's character on your own personality is a fairly blatant excuse to me for attacking others. Your weaknesses are... A bit farfetched. Mental blocks and deviations are hardly weakness. Simply stating "He doesn't pick sides" doesn't make a weakness. There is no restriction there to pick a side or the other, nor does he have some form of higher authority to moderate him. There are absolutely no repercussions to any of his actions, so picking a side or not, really is not a weakness at all. Sure it is an imposed characterization, but that's similar to me removing the weakness against light and simply having Bedivere "Not like going out in sunlight because it bothers his conceptual ideal of vampires being creatures of the night." A pretty bad excuse for a weakness really, and unless you are willing to accept this, your first case is invalid as a claimed weakness. "As such, he doesn't take agency away from the players" But he can and he did as demonstrated by Kami-no-kage, although this may be a moot point since it is your own character, past the meta aside it is still an example of influencing the battle and story as a whole to allow a PC to avoid death as deus ex. Furthermore, your claim that Kami's Perception was merely changed would be awkward as did Kami not have robotic advancements to allow his senses to be sharpened? Unless his mental facilities are untampered, wouldn't he be able to perceive where the heart actually is with the use of technology? But again this is your character so I have no knowledge of what augmentations he would have nor how Gabriel could adjust for them if they were present. As for physical weakness, this is also a invalid point as psionically speaking, Gabriel could manipulate the perception to make him appear where he is not. Beating him down in a physical confrontation is also useless as Gabriel would simply avoid that an run away. As such, since you mocked me for claiming Camelot and your notion that it is an impossible place to get to, I now do the same to poke at your logic in saying that Gabriel could not easily escape to avoid physical confrontation all together. The UK is actually one giant feather in the Collector's cap. While he doesn't have total control over it, he holds enough of a stake in the country's politics to represent the nation silar to a prime minister, with the support of Parliament. Although protocols for nuking require far greater war powers than Bedivere could manipulate without direct threat. For Bedivere at least, he does lay claim to the UK, and all she contains. As for making Camelot nuke-proof, while this idea seems farfetched, it would make sense to do so. Warfare was not limited to swords and bows, and one could argue Merlin foresaw things coming. However if you would rather not have it warded to such an extent that is fine. I would just request you honor my requests when I make them as I probably should to limit your influence on the Rp. Such as how a Purge agent got in the U.K. especially after the press on the attack the Purge did on K.P. would have created, the U.K. would be in uproar and more anti-purge. Unless they were a hidden sleeper agent in the U.K. or something before this and following Void. Then how would they have information on Void unless they managed to track Void down or known associates, of which void was supposedly unheard of and perhaps only Bedivere would know about Void due to the vampire's activity in the U.K and his legendary sword. Or maybe how did your Purge agent even survive long enough in the U.K. given the vampire and werewolf population which is a rather nice network for the London underground such that anyone suspect of being a Purge agent would be known from circulating rumors which will eventually reach Bedivere. But I do not believe in redoing what is already spoken and done with unless it has some significant influence on the plot. Hence while I complain about it, it is already been done. I'll just have a vampire infiltrate the Purge later. Any who I'm not going to be a hypocrite about it all and I'll just let the GM's word step in in all this and see what changes need to be made. I plan on having Bedivere's agent call up Mithias through the intercepted phone call Magnus did to dial the same number and offer Mithias a trip to Wales. Maybe i'll have another vampire deal with Void just as a brief "Bedivere kindly requests you regulate your activites" note. And suggest that perhaps the next point of interest will be France? Internationally speaking the U.S. would be a bit more alarmed, but elsewhere maybe we'd have better luck. However I'm open to suggestions as to what would happen next. I just feel another attack on U.S. soils would be the end of the vampires or Purge in the U.S. But an attack on France would escalate things to a global scale such that maybe the world becomes factioned down the four lines? (molecular destabilization also was a joke. In reference to the Purge's use of super science.)

[Grombus]

planes arent safe imo after wizard posts ill get off plane and be at kilo point, then the real fun starts