Zeroth

I, the Demon King, Will Summon My Own Damned Heroes!

@floodtalon
Just out of my own personal taste I'm not a fan of genderswaps, but it's not my character. I would suggest really weighing how much it ties in to their desire to become "a different person," though--what was "gender" to them? Did they suffer for not meeting some standard of manliness or not being feminine enough? Did they have real and legitimate issues tied to their biological sex, medical or otherwise? And if their actions and personality don't change, would changing their gender really achieve anything? Although you could, if so inclined, try to answer these questions in the future rather than the present--maybe their story is about finding out what these answers are to them.

Again this may just be personal taste, but I'm not fond of characters who place too much weight on their gender as part of their "identity." A character who says "I am a civil engineer who listens to smooth jazz and rides a Harley" has an identity formed from active, observable skills, tastes, and preferences. Someone who says "I'm (insert random letter of sexuality/gender/political spectrum or an abstract adjective like intelligent, creative, etc)," isn't telling me something I can see about them in most cases, therefore I have only their own perceptions of themselves to go on--and if someone has to tell you how much of something they are, instead of just showing you, then it's just an informed trait they may or may not actually demonstrate.

@Gardevoiran
Whatever the Monster is, that's pretty much set in stone. You could change certain features if you wanted--colors, styles of fur, distinctive shape of the eyes, etc.--but they are specific creatures rather than categories. You will, however, be able to change into many different species of monsters over the course of the RP--transforming and evolving is one of the primary goals.

I, the Demon King, Will Summon My Own Damned Heroes!

From time to time, everyone may want to check the 0th (lol ain't that an appropriately coincidental name) post for my announcements. Things like updates to the NPCs, summaries of the story once we get further in, etc.

I, the Demon King, Will Summon My Own Damned Heroes!

I'll be using the 0th Post for certain important announcements.

5/11: NPC List in Character Tab has been updated!
5/17: NPC List in Character Tab has been updated!
5/28: NPC List in Character Tab has been updated! Gratz to Jason for being the first to ding! The Cave is getting low on resources...
6/6/2018: NPC List in Character Tab has been updated! Crispy's origins have become more clear...

6/16: GM-POSTS WILL NOW FOLLOW A NEW FORMAT. Based on which players are interacting at the time, I will sort everyone into PARTIES and respond to those parties as they complete their "turns." This does not mean you can't play solo, but I WOULD prefer that everyone not go solo all the time so as not to devolve into spammy back-and-forths with each player. I will continue to do my best not to leave anyone behind too much.

7/22: NPC List in Character Tab has been updated!
7/25: Gratz to Jason on being the first to Transform! Jason is Evolving! Dun dun dun dun...

8/9: CONGRATULATIONS! We've reached 500 posts! Keep it up folks, and there may be a little something extra in it for ya! ;)

5/22/19: CONGRATULATIONS! It's a little late, but we've reached 1000 Posts! Also, as of May 8th, the RP has been going for ONE YEAR! Everybody clap your hands if you believe--Just don't pray to the Demon King! ;)

7/19/2019: Everybody wish Jollan CONGRATULATIONS! After a lengthy PM session to catch him up, his character MIIBA is ready to join the rest of the Damned Heroes! In Other News, ALL PLAYER GROUPS ARE NOW ON DAY 5, albeit some are still in the morning and the Monster Party is in the early afternoon. Hopefully, a major overhaul of the NPC Tab will be in the future...along with a lot of other NEW characters...

I, the Demon King, Will Summon My Own Damned Heroes!

@Old Amsterdam
Personally I don't have any preference for the numbers of each creature, now that we've got at least one of each. Another Dire Rat would certainly be welcome, but ultimately it's up to you!

I, the Demon King, Will Summon My Own Damned Heroes!

@floodtalon
Is the genderswap something you would consider absolutely, genuinely vital to the character's personal narrative? It kind of seems there just to be there, which is exactly why I made mention of genderswaps being unpreferable in the in-depth version of the CS. Also, Mana Orb is non-elemental magic damage, not piercing, and Lesser Force can only be used to manipulate things like a pair of invisible hands, not for combat.

@Lucius Cypher
The Past Life is supposed to be a human from our version of modern-day Earth, not a denizen of the Demon King's world. Also, any carry-over Skills from your Past Life are decided by me after I've examined the complete draft of the CS, though I'll certainly take your preferences into consideration. And we start off with nothing in the inventory and no equipment, only gaining that over the course of the RP itself.

@CriticalHit@Old Amsterdam
All four of you are welcome to join! You might all want to look over the first post of this tab, since it has more detail on the CS and what I--and the Demon King--are looking for.

I, the Demon King, Will Summon My Own Damned Heroes!

@Guy0fV4lor
You will grow larger, but it isn't a 1:1 ratio! Slimes poop too!

You can eat virtually anything of nutritional value, given enough time and energy!

You can only split into multiple slimes after at least tripling your body mass, which likely will not occur unless you really want it to because A) it would make you a mother and B) you'll probably evolve first!

@King Cosmos
Both of your assumptions about Ardur are correct, actually! Grinding a skill IS effective, but only to a certain level. I like to compare it to martial arts--the simple quote goes that Bruce Lee fears the man who practices 1 kick 10,000 times. It's true that by repeating a technique the student gets better at it--but to be a true master of a single technique, it also makes sense that after your first 10k, you probably want to do more repetitions that aren't so...monotonous. You can stand there and do a roundhouse kick from your rigid stance, and you'll get good at it. But then if you practice doing a roundhouse kick on a moving target; if you practice doing it after countering the opponent; if you practice doing it at different heights and angles; and so on and so forth, then you continue to get better.

In other words, there will be diminishing returns, and spamming stuff for level ups won't really work until you spam them in a more creative way--like your idea of trying to use multi-targeted versions of the same spell.

If you wanted it to be in a similar vein of 'increasing the chances of success' it could be something as simple of a skill that lets her know how well and how efficiently a material could work with another? At a low level it'd only be a general idea of perhaps how 'good' or 'bad' a material would react with another. At higher levels it could let her know how potent an ingredient is, how well an ingredient would react with another, and if that particular ingredient had any special or odd properties.

Basically just a type of analysis skill for alchemy. Effectively, 'increasing chances of success' would be written in practice as 'I can tell how well this reacts with something, but now what the effects are until the skill gets stronger/I discover it myself through trial and error.' With the 'chance increasing' bit basically more or less being intuition, a bit of educated guesswork, and previous experiences. sort of. Not sure if I'm explaining it right, but that's the best I got at the moment. The skill itself would get stronger by discovering new items/ingredients and using said item and ingredients in alchemy. A helpful tool, but one that only grows as the user explores their alchemical abilities.

@Rune_Alchemist

Brilliant idea, it does this now! Feel free to change the description in your Character Sheet to reflect that!

I, the Demon King, Will Summon My Own Damned Heroes!

@Guy0fV4lor
You could, but it’d basically be like vomiting so that liquified crystal would not be very, uh, sterile.

You could! But be aware you would risk simply helping them eat you as well!

@Rune_Alchemist
Because of the sort of segregation between “narrative” use of the skills and “gameplay” so to speak, I’d actually like your opinion on whether you prefer the skill as is or if I should rework it a bit. Originally I intended it to “Increase chance of success” when attempting to, say, mix together a healing potion. But unlike a tabletop we aren’t really rolling dice (or at least you guys aren’t) and in the narrative sense something either works or it doesnt, it doesn’t work at 46% effectiveness or fail randomly. Would it be better to have it boost the power of things you make with Alchemy instead?

@King Cosmos
It IS possible to create new spells, or skills, or many other things through experimentation! That’s exactly what I want to encourage! But the thing is, you may not see results immediately or you may have to piece together bits of information from trial and error.

See, the way I’ve been doing this is that every time someone does something, I try to think of applicable skills. Depending on what they do, how often, how creative, how interesting, how good they would logically be at it, etc, I assign certain values behind the scenes. The definition of skill, after all, is doing something well because one has practiced it.

For instance, Ardur the Pixie got a system message that he was “experiencing a fast rate of Skill Progression” because something he did was an effective way of learning or getting better at something in particular. When he, or any other character, reaches a certain threshold in my behind the scenes calculations, he will unlock a new Skill or cause an old one to increase in rank.

It’s sort of like Skyrim, except you can’t immediately see the perk tree.

I, the Demon King, Will Summon My Own Damned Heroes!

@Guy0fV4lor
The thing with the Wisp corpse is okay, but normally tool usage is not something associated with the slimes. You COULD possibly learn some skills or figure something out involving tools, but it’s going to take time, practice, and creativity.

You couldn’t generate enough force to use an object inside your body as a weapon while grappling at the same time.

Mixing substances could be done. Just keep in mind it’s inside your body, not a safe test tube.

Dissolving an object or grinding it up would require you to digest it.

At this point yes, your only option is to use Tackle over and over.

You can consume the crystals. At full MP the experience is like a short lived sugar rush.

Also everyone CAN speak, because you all have humanly intelligent man nds. All the monsters can communicate to a degree, but players can fully speak out loud.

@UltraCraftGames
You uh, might want to really consider some of the implications of Peter’s situation here. Are you sure you want to take that course of action? It’s fine if you do, it just may have some consequences...

I realize now that I’ve done so much world building that some things which are obvious to me are not to you guys, and for you to be self motivated to explore this world you may need info. So everyone please ask any questions you have about the environment or the monsters or whatever and I’ll try to either answer or give leads and clues in my posts!

I, the Demon King, Will Summon My Own Damned Heroes!

@Guy0fV4lor
What do you mean by manipulate? Like shooting them out, or fitting things together or what? Also what are you planning to do with it?

I, the Demon King, Will Summon My Own Damned Heroes!

@ReusableSword
As Ardur found himself a new crystal to perch on, he felt his wings becoming heavy and tired. Yet as soon as he lit upon the blue mineral, it gave a pulse of light! Then it began to dissolve, and the powdery substance sank into his skin with a tingle in mere seconds—leaving him now stranded in midair.

Used a Mana Crystal.
MP is fully restored.

System

But the fatigue in his wings suddenly disappeared, and once more he could support himself in flight! Though during his fall he had come much closer to the creatures down below...

---

@Gobby
As Puck headed towards the light—passing over the crowded pool, around the smoking bonfire—he soon came to the outer edges of the cave. It seemed normal enough—in fact, even more normal than what he had already seen. There weren’t many crystals or herbs here, only craggy rocks and smooth stone. All the typical cave formations were here, and the colors were brighter. And up ahead, a large opening gleamed with blinding sunlight…

Which made the huge, black furred silhouette even more threatening by contrast.

A burly, clawed hand reached out to try and grab Puck.

“Lookie here boys, found us a snack!” boomed the big thing’s voice. A gaggle of goblins around it began to cackle, jumping and swiping at the pixie themselves. Puck might have gotten himself into a bit of a pickle here…

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@Kazemitsu
As Asura threw his weight around, the Wisp buzzed in surprise just before the red ooze slammed into it. The creature tumbled backwards, dropping out of the air for a moment. Then it flashed with fury, and launched another magical projectile at the slime!

---

@UltraCraftGames
Peter didn’t seem to realize that, at this point, the two Goblins had taken their crystals back to the bonfire, and were now among a group of their fellows—including one very disturbing one with scars and red, mysterious markings all over him.

The Wisp’s first two shots were successful, taking his targets in the back by surprise! They fell to the ground with pained yelps—but they weren’t dead. As they began to get up, growling and snarling, their companions immediately noticed Peter.

“Who dares mess up Crispy’s fire party!?” roared the burned Goblin. He raised his torch, and the other Goblins began to rush towards Peter. The Wisp quickly grabbed a Mana Crystal off the floor where the two Goblins before had fallen, but even with his MP restored he could only get off two more shots before he was once again out of MP—and with no other crystals nearby! His shots slowed down two of the three goblins charging him, but the third swung at him with a short club that looked to be from a tree branch.

Meanwhile, Crispy held out his free hand, and a ball of fire began to swirl around his palm...