Move 3 (Chapter 1.3)

[yhlee]

Time: 361 (high calendar)
Place: out-rift near Station Moongray

[Edited to add: NOTE: I'm flying back home tomorrow but will be keeping an eye on this move or any questions you might have. I should be able to resume normal GMing activities starting Wednesday. Sorry about that!--YHL]

[GM's note: feel free to continue to wrap up any last business in Move 2.]

Whoever is monitoring the Wasp notes that there are no major issues emerging from the rift into the target place and time. The visuals show strange energies crackling around the moth as it passes back into normal space-time. For days afterward, the energies' patterns haunt your dreams, as though conveying a coded message in a language you knew before your birth.

It doesn't take long for someone to notice your arrival. A transmission arrives from the direction of Station Moongray. The Wasp's mothgrid asks for your attention, and plays it. The message is given first in the high language, then repeated several times in other "low" languages: "Greetings, travelers. This is Station Moongray of the heptarchate, under the command of Administrator Nirai Paerani. Do you require an escort to the station?" It is accompanied by a local starmap giving coordinates to the station and the identifying information of a proposed escort, a non-combat research moth called the Butterfly Lens that has been patrolling the rift. The transmission goes on to offer succor in exchange for information about the other side of the rift.

[Players should feel free to discuss their response then, possibly, open communications with the station. The administrator will repeat the greeting message until someone responds or the Wasp attempts to approach the station.

Yehan will notice that someone has taken the task of translation very seriously--the heptarchate doesn't have the greatest track record in this area, but the low language translations are extremely competent, fairly polite, and convey a sense of eagerness for contact with people who can bring the station information about other times and places.

The Wasp's more advanced scan functions can verify the presence of the Butterfly Lens about a half day away and whoever queries scan will be almost certain that it only has the kind of light armaments that you'd use to defend against local debris.]

Comments

Splitting the party [paging GM: plot stuff]

[vass]

[Hmm. So I'm thinking Ashari asks Iawa to come to their quarters for tea and asks them to stay behind. Does that sound okay?

And depending on how tactful Ashari decides to be, Iawa might be proud to be trusted to guard the ship while everyone else goes on the mission, or hurt that Ashari doesn't want to use them for the mission.

And depending on what works with the GM's plans and what the rest of the crew are up to, Iawa may therefore be free to come running if the rest of you get in trouble, or might get into trouble with NPCs while alone and unarmed back on board, or might decide to disobey Ashari and visit the station without permission.

Because, um, whatever we decide to do, like fuck am I spending the next however many moves liveblogging Iawa reading philosophy books back on board while you peeps have all the fun.]

[GM POLICY: re: splitting the party]

[yhlee]

[GM policy on splitting party: I agree that having anyone's character sit out while others Do Things is generally not fun, and that I want to avoid that happening unless it's prearranged (e.g. someone is on vacation for a couple weeks and needs their character to be off doing other things). If you choose to have Iawa stay behind, vass, I will make sure that there is stuff for you to do. From my perspective splitting the party for any length of time is not ideal simply because it reduces inter-player interaction and the more independent plots there are, the harder it is for me to coordinate them. But if that's how you want to handle it, I will definitely make sure (say) Iawa gets juicy plot time.]

[ETA: General policy/guidelines post reiterating this, and for further OOC discussion if desired.]

Re: [GM POLICY: re: splitting the party]

[vass]

[*nodnod* Thank you.

@ smokedetective: I am still interested in knowing where you want to go with the potential party split.]

Re: [GM POLICY: re: splitting the party]

[venndaai]

[Sulen's interested in recruiting Iawa to help with their and Virmad's plan, but they're not going to challenge Ashari's authority on it.]

[Also Sulen and Virmad don't have to split from the party if that would interfere with the story, we could stick with the others and pretend to be Rahal and just try to get information out of whoever the party comes across. I think it'd be fun to give Sulen and Virmad and Iawa a small plot where we try to find ways to cause some havok, and maybe later mess up the local calendar a bit right before we take off with Remi, but idk if that would be too complicated.]

Re: [GM POLICY: re: splitting the party]

[smokedetective]

[Splitting the party probably isn't the best idea, but Ashari still definitely asks if Iawa, but feel free to say no. I think it would be interesting if Iawa disagreed.]

Meeting in Ashari's office

[vass]

[Okay, let's go.]

Iawa arrives at Ashari's office promptly, and tries to be subtle about looking around. Is the blue-eyed frog statue some sort of Andan joke? The scattered hairpins might be carelessness, but more likely are some sort of carefully coded signal.

"You asked to speak to me privately?" she says.

Re: [GM POLICY: re: splitting the party]--Space Radios!

[zuhrovet]

[Sasha spent a fair amount of time on the voyage optimizing the encryption on the Space Radios, so we should be able to set up scenarios where some of the party members go do something and others act as mission control from the Wasp, lurk in a nearby coffee shop as backup, or what-have-you, without losing contact. Obviously any particular player should pick where their character goes, but I like the fact that we can share information without all eleven of us tagging along together like a Space Bachelorette Party.]

Re: [GM POLICY: re: splitting the party]--Space Radios!

[slybrarian]

[Sometime we are going to run out of Space Phone minutes at an inconvenient moment.]