As you cautiously emerge into the clearing, bearing off to the left, two more of the lizards on the right of you begin to stir about and make irritable noises.  You have reached the point where you can gaze obliquely down the channel of the little stream off to the left and see that it is at the moment peaceful and deserted.  If you proceed much farther into the clearing, you will be spotted by at least one lizard.  What would you like to do?

Tarton stays where he was (hopefully hidden) when Erolith began walking to the left, watching and listening for movement on the left side of the clearing.

Perception (if you want it): 14

Quote from DragonHunters >>

Artifex just found a pretty pebble, and is fully focused on it sitting in Their palm as It moves with the group.

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Per: 3

This is so fitting cause I'm stoned rn. I'll read it tomorrow but just wanted to say playing with you guys is already awesome

 At least you & Artifex rnt stoned in Boulder LOL

Quote from badfishingdad75 >>

Tarton stays where he was (hopefully hidden) when Erolith began walking to the left, watching and listening for movement on the left side of the clearing.

Perception (if you want it): 14

 Tarton hears and sees nothing unusual close at hanf.  In the clearing to the south, the faint squashings definitely reached the waterside; but then they became muddled and seemed to swirl about the clearing.   Currently, all is still.

Quote from OisinmacCameron >>

Quote from DragonHunters >>

Artifex just found a pretty pebble, and is fully focused on it sitting in Their palm as It moves with the group.

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Per: 3

This is so fitting cause I'm stoned rn. I'll read it tomorrow but just wanted to say playing with you guys is already awesome

 At least you & Artifex rnt stoned in Boulder LOL

"It might be nothing, but I think something or somebody stealthy has been moving through these reeds recently," The Black Rose whispers.

"Are we going to try to negotiate, or is it kill on site?" Tarton asks. His hands ready to draw his weapons, but not touching them yet.

"I believe we should try the diplomatic approach, but if anything goes wrong, perhaps you could hide beforehand and get the drop on whatever may come," The Black Rose whispered, tightening his grip on his quarterstaff.

"Perhaps some bait will draw them out? I want a closer look at those lizards, see how domesticated they may be. I can be the bait so to speak, if that's helpful."

(just as a preview of your completely insane DMs evolving thoughts on certain matters, here's what I put for guidelines in the new game thread set in this world (Sauvogia) as contrasted to the ones at the beginning of this thread)

• Open to players in all time zones

Posting frequency guidelines: I am fairly relaxed about how often people postl I well understand myself how things can come up IRL that make it difficult to keep a commitment you thought you would have no problem with when you joined the campaign. Like many things, the greatest fun for the greatest number is my guideline. Thus:

• I will bot your character if, in my judgment as DM, it is necessary to avoid holding up the story unreasonably for other players. Within those admittedly subjective lines, I try and do it with as light a hand as possible. But I will far more often bot than kick. C.P.A.o.a.H.C.D. (Cursed Plot Armor of a Horrible Character Death) is a nuclear option that I reserve for far worse player behavior than just vanishing for a while, as long as it doesn’t become a pattern for which there is no reasonable explanation.
• Vanishing, according to the legally required disclaimers, is also somewhat subjective but does have goalpoasts. These are not set in stone, but generally I ask players to try and post at least once every three days. If your character is directly involved in ‘action’ (not necessarily just combat, but any scene requiring your character’s active participation) I ask that you try and check the board at least once a day and post any actions / responses that are required from your character by the situation within 24 to 48 hours of the post to which you are responding. In that case, 24 hours will be the guideline for combat and other “high alert” type situations; 48 hours (two days) is fine for other situations where your character is active.
• Except in the ‘active character’ situations mentioned above, I will not automatically bot characters until one week has passed beyond the guidelines above. Before that, I am open to considering any other solution you wish to propose and will only vew the three day guideline in terms of whether it’s becoming a pattern.

This game is set in my homebrew world of Sauvogia; and t have worked long, hard and lovingly on the homebrew elements that distingish it from oh, say, Toril. Please do not ask me if your Harper agent background character can be born in Longsaddle so they can also have the Harpells as a patron because you think it would be cool to play a bard where … um … you know, the ‘harp’ pun ,,, <icy DM stare begins to penetrate through adamantium helm of infinite denseness +6>

• No, please. Trust me. It will not go over well.
• No, the DM’s puckish, nay, sometimes impish, humour is fine. That’s completely different. In fact and for lagniappe, I will go so far as to whisper in your ear that this is in fact one of the primary hazards faced by the characters of those who incur the DM’s wrath by WEARING admanrium helms of infinire denseness +anything instead of having the courtesy to remove their helm in another half-mad faerie knight’s home and cast their eyes about them long enough to realie that they are in fact, not in Toril but in Sauvogia. Link to Sauvogia’s collected homebrew content aggregator page will be edited in when that site/page Is opeerational.

• Until then, most of the homebrew content can be accessed on the 'What lies Beneath Cricket Tor' game and recruitment threads(game thread link below)

• Yes, there are links to other published worlds, and so long as you don’t prickle the crotchety old DM’s ‘we had to walk uphill to the dungeon, all three ways, back in the old days, and we didn’t even have but one alignment axis to limp on either too!’ prejudices, he’s actually as tame as spilled blink dog puppy milk about bringing in whatever background or content you want on a case by case basis with a character from wherever world you’d like. In that case, though, please let me know in the application post and then DM me to work out whether it will work with the world as it currently sits and if so, the details of working it in to your character’s unique beingness
• As you might have gathered from the introductory cutscene, there are portals to the Feywild and to at least one of the Domains of Dread within spitting distance of the initial campaign area. I also own some or all content in both cases, and am automatically fine with you using material from supplements related to either dimension: but I still request that you DM me to work out details as you would with any outlander-type or other such character

HOW TO APPLY: Post an application in this thread following the process outlined below

• Yout first message should be a statement of interest in which you use the forum’s dice roller function (looks like a picture of a d6 face) to drop in a set of ability scores. Write whatever you want about any ideas you might have for this character and then click that d6 face. It should open a popup menu in which there are three tabs, and the right hand one will give you a full set of 6 ability rolls. Set it to reroll ‘1’s once. If you hate what you get, use point buy
• This part is important if you did NOT take point buy, but are satisfied with the abilities you rolled. Once you have posted that message and are ready to finish the rest of your character application, use the ‘Quote’ command which you will find IN THE LOWER RIGHT FRAME AROUND THE MESSAGE YOU’VE JUST POSTED to add the contents of that message to a quote box in a new message that using that command will start you writingTHIS WHICH I HAVE JUST SAID IN #2, IS IMPORTANT. If you do not do this, and later edit the message in which you have those dice rolls IN ANY WAY, there is a risk that the system will try to reroll those dice, If this happens, the message will be flagged as having potentially manipulated dice rolls. If you have the rolls in a quote box which is generated in the way I have described, it protects them from this fate; but not if you cut-and-paste them or qupte them in any other way besides the inevitable exception to the rule, which is to use the ‘Multi-quote’ command right next door to the ‘Quote’ one you just used. And the reason this works is that it is the same command except that it allows you to store up multiple quotes before you post; and more importantly allows you to switch from one page to another of the thread without losing those quotes.
• Once you have your dice rolls safely in the quote box and your final application post started, cut-and-paste the following form. This is an intelligence test. If you find it necessary for me to explain that I wish you to add the salient details describing your character under each heading of this form, this is perhaps not the sort of game thread whose style would tend to appeal to you in any case and you might prefer to search for campaigns with such labels as ‘Monty Haul’ or ‘hack-and-slash’. If you find it necessary for me to explain those terms to you, my confdience factor in the prediction I have made increases considerably
•  

  1. Name (if different than your username) and pronoun you the player wish to be known by:

  2. Character name:

  3. Class (planned subclass):

  4. Background:

  5. Backstory:

     • Please bear in mind the fair warning you have received of my poetic madness and the disclaimer below I want to see your character’s backSTORY, not what their two personality quirks, one bond, one flaw and one ideal are. That’s perfectly fine if you want to include it, but lump it in with the ‘background’ that generated it in #4 above

  6. Relax! Have fun!! What the (*)*)(@*&$ing (#(@$(( are you so tense for?!?!?!!!!

• 5. I do not assume the same about you in the slightest, if you require me to mention that I now want you to click the “Post” button. This is actually the sign of a sufficient reasoning power and independence of mind to realize that there might have been some other thing, like a portrait for instance, which I would require in step #3. Bonus points if you just shot me a dirty look and said, ‘We’e on #6, QM, stop hprsin’ around …

6. … what, I’d like to know? And why do the poor horses get the blame every time there’s a matter of … frivolity … in the air? As a gentlefae and a poet knight, I would think that dragonflies …

1. If you’re still here with your mind halfway intact and not leaking too many fluids, haven’t quit in disgust at the frivolous madness, and haven’t managed to p**S me off with flagrant incivility intolerance or humbuggery
2. I presume you’d like to know how many players these games hold and what your chances of being picked are, eh? Well, there are currently ___ two ___ games set in this world, this thread {link: } and the origin thread, ;What lies Beneath Cricket Tor?: <purple prose et. al.> {link: } Each one has slots for up to nine active players, with the last three slots held at DM’s discretion based on story flow and the laws of hospitality … which I respect much more than I do many human laws. Within the limits of being hospitable also to my fallible and imperfect self. If either thread is listed below as currently having more than six but less than nine active players, please message me about one of these slots.

Thread                                                             Current # of active players         /     Main slots remaining       /       Backup slots remaining

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"We Trade in Madness around Here Too, you Know...":              0                   /                 6                           /                 (3)

• https://www.dndbeyond.com/forums/d-d-beyond-general/play-by-post/186192-we-trade-in-madness-around-here-too-you-know-a

What lies Beneath Cricket Tor? :                                                 4                  /                    2                          /              (3)

• https://www.dndbeyond.com/forums/d-d-beyond-general/play-by-post/173124-what-lies-beneath-cricket-tor-a-campaign-in-the

• … which is a lovely way of distracting you from noticing that I haven’t told you that I’ll pick the character(s) that best fit the current group and needs and send a congratulatory DM to the lucky sacrificial lambs … ah, I mean, fortunate new players in my campaign …

• … with among other things the campaign link
• … No. Seriously. PLEASE don’t just jump in and start posting what your character does before I send you this link. Seriousl
• … That is an excellent way to invite an immediate fitting session for a full suit of C.P.A.o.a.H.C.D. If it is necessary for me to re-explain what C.P.A.o.a.H.C.D. is, perhaps this game would not have suited your taste anyway. You would perhaps have found the mental effort neessary to remember to go back and check what other characters have done before yours acted themselves and gotten everyone killed in rhw 90’ long wall of fire the other mage just posted fifteen minutes ago they were casting at the foot of the 60 foot long smooth granite slope on which your entire party is standing and on which you just posted you are casting a 150’ x 150’ grease spell centered on you, just a slight bit on the taxing side as far as your mental energies and capacities are concerned. You would probably find threads labeled ‘Monty Haul’ and ‘hack-and-slash’ … tbat was a test. I jjust talked abour THAT. Go look it up.

• …If you think that the height of humour is to tell me that your character came from a fishing town and was so fast with their hands that they were always in demand with the fishing fleet as a master baiter, don;t even bother. I have been a hormonally stupified tweenage idiot in my time and frankly find it rather boring now. Which if you are a genuine hormonally addled tween idiot yourself will probably p**S you off more than about anything else I could say. Go home and grow some fangs before ye try tweaking the old fox in his own lair, cublings, I bear you no ill will but its only one small start in the long process of realizing we’re not as all that as we’d like to all that and at the same time others aren’t nearly half as air ball as we think they air ball. Or in other words, I ain’t nearly got the time left on this campaign world we call ‘keep Vermont wyrd’ to even begin the process of your instruction…which can include learning when such things are perfectly appropriate, Good salty five-letter Anglo-Saxon words were invented for a reason, but you wear them out if you’re droppin’ the f-bomb into every other syllable you take.
• …
• Have fun! Ye goddessess! What am I babblefloweringon at you like this for?...”
• Open to players in all time zones

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Looks like I forgot to post this earlier. Looks great.

Erolith crouches down at the clearing’s edge. Looking back to the group he whispers, “From this point on we run the risk of being spotted. Who wants to proceed?”

”The alternative is to wait and see if we can spot the being that follows our movements.”

(placeholder.  I'll edit in Gwrgi's response when I get back from errands & have access to the thumb drive I prepped it on, or by tomorrow at latest if night goes nuts))

"Again, I'm more than happy to be bait. What could go wrong? Besides, I have a knack for being a touch slippery, and in my experience, I'm just lucky enough to survive the consequences of my curiosity. So far at any rate"

"To use bait is not a bad idea; just be careful," The Black Rose whispered. "But I suggest that Tarton and Erolith hide in different positions than the rest of us. I, myself, am not the best at being sneaky, so I don't want to draw attention to the rest of you if I am discovered. As long as we all keep an eye on Artifex, we should be ready to attack if needed," The Black Rose whispered and then added, "You can keep an eye on Artifex for both of us." The Black Rose winked at Gwrgi. 

Tarton says, "Off I go then." in response to The Black Rose, and hides where he suggested.

Stealth in log: 12

(was planning to get this in sooner, but I think it pretty much fits with what's already being proposed.  Just edited in response to Tarton's action.  Please describe where and how he takes his post; all others please post what each of you does from this point and where you end up, also if you get there openly or sneaking through the grass on the verge.)

Warned by The Black Rose’s sharp ears that there is something amiss near the lizard pens, Gwrgi holds up her hand to halt the group. “I share your concerns about that watercourse to our left, Erolith.,” she says softly to the Ava’sidhe forester. “Espeially since we saw the wild lizard pack headed upriver so near south of here. But if there is a thinking enemy about, as The Black Rose fears, they might be clever enough to take advantage of the distraction such natural concerns produce to attack us unexpetedly from the right. Some of us, at least, should follow up on this without delay.”

 

You are currently all gathered about Erolith in the position he was in the last time I posted a map, Thus, you are all still concealed by the last smattering of reeds the path walls have thinned to. If you proceed any further into the clearing directly, though, one or more lizards are sure to see you and will probably alert the others. You might also try to emulate the foe The Black Rose fears is about by creeping through the reeds and grasses at the edge of the clearing in an attempt to flank the lizards (or get farther away from them, if you go the other way). The only drawback to this plan which Gwrgi can think of is the possibility that an intelligent enemy would be intelligent enough to foresee this response; in which case, as she says, it becomes a cwnfyrdd game between you and a player who has known the dice board you are playing on since its hatching and whose stakes are your lives. However, in that case, as she also points out, then the first dice have been cast and you are already playing the game at this very moment as you stand whispering together. If Artifex or anyone else wants to try either sneaking around to the other side of the lizard pens or acting as a diversion from others who are, in short, she sees no reason that she can see not to go with that plan.  When she understands that Tarton is about to sneak into position, she casts guidance upon him, and as he doesn't need to use it to get to any position from the stream to the grassy edge just before he passes the large corral (the farthest he can get without needing another stealth roll), he can essentially get advantage on any one ability roll of his choice for the next minute...so long as she keeps concentration.

 

"The game is afoot." Artifex chuckles quietly, before standing up and striding with full confidence into the clearing.

"Such beautiful Mus-tarine" they say loudly as they approach the lizard pens. "You should come out of the bushes stranger. What threat could a single elf pose? I bear no ill will, and I would thank my hosts face to face. I am only passing through, but hospitality is important. Let us have have an open dialogue" It gets closer to the pens as They speak, hoping to soothe the beasts.

The Black Rose stayed put, attempting to blend into the surroundings where they all stood. As Artifex walked out, he whispered to Gwrgi, "Let's stay here and hide the best we can. You're keeping an eye on Artifex for the both of us, right?” If Gwrgi moved, The Black Rose was ready to follow as stealthily as possible.

————————-

Stealth: 17 

Tarton sneaks away from the lizard pens and towards the water, keeping to the edge of the clearing as Artifex attempts to draw attention, as that is what he understood the plan was.

Stealth in log using the advantage that Gwrgi gave him: (1st roll is 10, 2nd roll is 17) 

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Realized I didn't roll. I'm thinking performance to see how distracting Artifex is and Animal Handling for calming the lizards. Does that work for you DM?