HI there ! Here is my character. Let's see how we can introduce him in the narrative. Any idea? Name: Paul Locks Age: 44 Job/occupation: Paul was Toby’s English Professor at the University of Seattle. He was an outgoing, young and respected teacher. He was also caring and close to his students. He saw Toby's downfall and he wanted to help him. Paul was a writer and a musician too. Appearance: Paul was quite tall and a little bit plump. He had very long hair and he pulled his locks into a man bun. He also had a very thick and ruffled beard. He was always tired and alcohol abuse had ended up in dark rings under his eyes. Nevertheless, he had a charming complexion that revealed a strange and perceptible beauty. Personality: Prone to anxiety and chronic depression, Paul had spent every single day of his life bargaining against nefarious thoughts. They were sneaking in and out of his head. He could not forsee them as they had already started to nibble his soul. These gusts, as he called them, always had a start ahead. For this reason, Paul struggled hard to catch up, make a decisive move and be saved from syncopated anxiety attacks. However, he found his saviors in his work. When he started teaching, he was still working on his Phd and was a teacher in middleschool. The children were to him a powerful army that could keep the gusts away. But they were still here, crouching and looming behind the kids at the back of the class, ready to pounce at the sound of the bell. The kids were the powerful remedy he needed: pure and unaware, smiling and howling, holding grudges and forgetting. That was the blissful oblivion. That was something he had not experienced in his childhood and it was what he wanted to feel. He wanted to live his childhood again and being a teacher was a way to go back in time and change his past. Day after day, Paul unwitingly unveiled superimposed strats of Masks to the eyes of the others: dedication, empathy, serendipity and passion. However, no one could see his true self which was locked and hidden way behind the masks, where the gusts were gods. History: Thirthy-three years ago, Paul and Lucas were born. As twins they were always together and they shared everything. Their personality were dual and balanced. Paul was really meticulous and liked abstract concepts. Lucas was dreaming dreams and had pragmatic tastes. Lucas always laughed when Paul thought. In the end, it created a creative stream and they would broke down in fits of laughter. One day Lucas met this girl. He moved out. He lived with her. They got engaged, married, pregnant, house cats kitchen and everything. Paul was left alone with his gusts. Lucas became an independent engineer and a brilliant musician and Paul ended up as a teacher with creative tastes. As a teacher he would live school years happily like Lucas. He deserved it he thoughts. After some years like this, he learned in the news that Lucas had been butchered after he had had dinner with this girl. It had been 2 years that they had not talked. They were still good friends but it was decided that they would part for good. The death of Lucas was a huge shock for Paul and the only way he could ease the pain was having artistic experiences. He started to read write Thrillers because he needed to understand.
"He started to write thrillers because he needed to understand". Sorry there is no "read" at the end and no capital letter to thriller. I am sorry for posting this but the forum won't let me fix my mistake.
Ok, plotting time. How is everyone going to find out about Toby's death? Who finds out first? I was thinking maybe someone gets a phone call from Desi at the police station or something? Or they turn on the news and hear about it or something? Don't even worry about it. It's really minor and I still understand what you were trying to say.
A call from Desi would be highly improbable. He would not have the time to do so. He will go through a lot: testifying, being processed and maybe charged at some point which would lead to police interrogations (is that the correct expression? ) I think the news could be a good solution. I also thought about the killer plotting against the friends. He traps them. For example, he could send to the other characters parts of Toby's body with a note attached to it. In it, there could be a picture, the name of a friend and a sentence that reads: "Toby is dead. [Name of the character] is next". One way or another, he would compel everybody to act in a specific way if they want to save this friend, thus blackmailing all the characters. It could impact everybody and every action in the game since everybody would have to act together.
Yeah, that's a good point. The news is probably the best idea. That's a pretty cool idea. I do kind of want it to be like the killer is trapping them all and none them are safe.
How can we put it? I don't think I can show up now in the story. We can either wait for the beginning of the week at the University or the same day when the news is broadcast / when Locqs receives a special package/ ...?
Ok, plot time again! I've started on the next part. It's Desi in the immediate aftermath of finding the body. He's talking to a cop at the scene and she's asking him if he can answer some questions for her. Just standard protocol, nothing to do with him being a suspect or what have you. There's cops and news people all around and Desi is just full on traumatized. But I'm not sure where to go from there.
He's gonna have to ride it out... you gotta take us deeper inside the safehouse which is Desi's mind... also how far away from each other do Kenzie and Tremaine live?... I wanna kinda keep time since certain times have already been dropped, give it a 24 type of feel... good start to this game
Hi ! Sorry, I haven't been around for few days! I have the impression that we need more characters and people involved in this story, if not our dear GM is going to play all the NPC on her own . I don't know what to say after the last post and I am trying to think about what Tremaine can do too. I can create another character if needed. About the characters: Tremaine is taking a shower Desi is with the police Paul is still sleeping or having his anxiety attack I think. . I think I used a very long time span with my character and we have the impression that the day is already over at the end of my post. Sorry for that. What can we do to gather all the characters or make them act separately but consistently? Can we make Tremaine and Paul act upon one another while Desi is at the police station ? (but it will not be coherent with my last post about Paul) Can we say that Desi spends the day at the police station and Tremaine and Paul come across each other late at night, in a pub for example where they were both having a drink on their own? We can also talk about what happened to each characters during the 24hours that followed the discovery of Toby's body and set the subsequent scene on Monday, where all the characters would be in the same place at the same time (i.e. the University) I don't know I'm just thinking about it, what do you think?
I kind of like the idea of them all receiving threatening messages from the killer and then when they all come together they realize they all got messages?
Me too !! so let's go for it And how can we do this? Are the players introducing the message or the GM?
I have lots of idea about this (i.e. The players doing it) and I'm totally into it but there might be a flaw. If the players decide the content of the message and how we are going to be tricked, we might end up in a plot hole. Maybe we should prepare this together so as to keep a consistent unfolding of the plot. If the GM came up with the message and the trick, the players might be going to react to this and it would lead to improvisation, which is good I think. I think there are two solutions, either the players write about the messages and the tricks and we decide together or the game master do it and the players react to the unknown, which would be more realistic. I don't want to sound authoritative at all but I'm French and I still have difficulties being sure about the tone of my speech. I just want to talk about this on an equal footing
Maybe they all get the same message? Something with a vague kind of 'I'm watching you/you're next' kind of vibe. But yeah we should discuss the content of the message together/how they receive them together. Once we decide on the content of the message then we can all have each character find it in different ways.
Could we think about something linked to the university? a message during Paul's lecture or something like this. All the characters would be together in the same place. it could a message on the board or a message inserted in the powerpoint, a student dying or else I don't know
Here's what I was thinking: the characters all discover the messages on their own. Then when they're all together, say, at the University, they find a message on the board or whatever and they realize that they have all been receiving these threatening messages.
I think Rog is correct about us needing a few more characters to move the story along... I like the message idea, too, and I think there should be an announcement about Toby and instructions to be careful around the campus...
Hopefully we'll get more players soon. And yeah, there should definitely be an announcement about it at the school.
