PLAYER PLOTS | 2h APRIL

[groundrules]

Hello, busy people! Just patching together details of the two upcoming optional player mini-plots you folks have nimbly sewn together!

HEISTING HOMIES

With so much salt in this city, eating the rich was never tastier. IC and OOC momentum has been building, so now's probably a good time to iron out who's doing what.

As per our beautiful calendar, the merchant vessels are discharging in the second half of the month, and the auction houses start earning sweet coin over the 17-24 April period — meaning more eyes will be on them and on guaranteeing safe transfer of the revenues they earn, than on the bank itself.

I hadn't planned on a mod-led log for this, as I was thinking you might want to do your own posts — but let me know if you need me to put up a post on this on 17 April.

Otherwise...

MAKE IT RAIN

• A SCRAWNY BANK MAP APPEARS. Like a manta ray on Sci-Fi steroids. • The bank is publicly open between 6:00 - 18:00 and locked up with magical reinforcements overnight. • GENERAL ACTIVITY the public at large is welcome on the ground floor open area, and in the spots for lenders and currency exchange. The government finance and library keep are open to administrative personnel and rare government officials. High-ranking merchants might be permitted to escort their goods for storage, or to meet on the upper floor. The lower floor is exclusively open to bank personnel. • SECURITY: armed lightly — swords, batons, some rare talisman-crafted binding magic that can temporarily paralyse targets, if they're struck. Day-to-day security forces are neither magic users, nor adept at casting magic. GROUND FLOOR: 25-30 sentries, shift changes midday local time. UPPER FLOOR: 15 men, shift changes 11:00. LOWER FLOOR: 15 men, shift changes 10:00 and 14:00. • Civilian administrative personnel (lenders, cashiers, servants) are unlikely to risk their hides to defend the goods. • SLEEP CURSE: cross into the casting regions (helpfully delineated by purple carpets), fall down dead asleep for four hours. Security sentry badges have been magically enhanced to protect against the curse. The guards have a curse-breaking password that will wake the affected instantly or render speakers immune for eight hours. The password changes daily. • Actual vaults are locked securely and might need a lock-breaker. Unless someone's got some interesting picking skills in their satchel — hire a NPC? • PLANNING THREAD HERE.

ROW THEM BOATS

As merchant ships gather to sell human alongside inanimate wares, Archeval ( darkeststars ) player Loren said our resident Sith Lord would be prime game to raid some boats and release some of the (wo)man-shaped merchandise. He will lead this fine expedition, with some help from NPCs and from any other characters willing to throw their hats in the ring.

This plot allows us a window of opportunity to try our hand at a test drive meme — so let's see how we do, and how we like the idea. Some key points:

JUST ANOTHER SAVIOUR COMPLEX

• Calendar dixit: the weather starts deteriorating again over 26-30 April, to certain supernatural effects. • Ahead of that, a NPC post on 24 or 25 April (TBD!) will alert characters of the arrival of the vessel Imperious (that's right, Archeval), carrying a substantial number of slaves and potentially some otherworldly captives. Characters will be ICly asked to join the rescue, but participation is optional on an OOC level. • Scout information from the so-far absentee Merchant will relay some of the obstacles ahead. • 27 April: we will have a combined log for existing characters playing out the rescue, as well as any new characters interested to test drive. • This event will count as game canon for any characters that participate. • APPLICATIONS OPEN: 3 May. • QUESTIONS/COMMENTS/CHAT THREAD HERE.

Comments

PLANS

[groundrules]

Talk among yourselves: when is the operation taking place? Who's handling what part of it? Which of the vault areas are characters going to? How will they handle the vaults? Lug the money out?

NOTE: you do... incidentally happen to have a party member who can teleport. And a party member whose acid can erode all the things.

[somebadnews]

Five is Very Bossy and I apologize for him. He's going to want to know what everyone involved can do, and then dismiss most of their ideas and tell them what they're going to do etc. He's fully planning on teleporting his way to success and needs a hand with the extraction because this stuff is heavy. He can possibly teleport in with one or more people, but they'd have to be useful. (Assuming they want to listen to him! He at least sounds super confident.)

Also I'm fully up for a hit to his ego if anything goes wrong. Because getting hit with a sleeping curse and having to be carried out would be something he did not anticipate...

[weifinder]

Please teleport Mina in.

... Please.

IM VOLUNTEERING OTHER CHARACTERS I REALISE!

Wei Wuxian is much better at scouting out the situation, but look Mina can produce endless Acid. That's useful inside! THEY CAN TAKE SHORTCUTS. But yeah Wei Wuxian can scout out the floors and have that inside eye on things, depending on mod decree on what a tiny paperman carrying a guy's consciousness can witness and deduce.

Wei Wuxian's usefulness in this would be more to scouting out the area, or in asking Lan Wangji to carry things afterward as needed (are the things him, seems possible).

[somebadnews]

That would be super useful and completely doable if she's willing. Can you be stealthy Mina, this is important. (As much as Five would like to be in and out without a trace, sometimes things happen and you have to be prepared okay.)

And yes 100% absolutely they need Wei Wuxian for this. I am fully invested in having a paper doll recon so they can scope out what their openings are. Air tight plan.

They probably need to have a meeting of the morally ambiguous at some point to hash these things out.

[beitangmoran]

Moran is fine with doing general mapping out planning and honestly being told what to do because he's never done anything of the kind lol

I'd probably volunteer him to pose as a client in the lobby, maybe dressing in his best finery to appear as a rich merchant and going in to ask for what possible service he could get, thus distracting some of the ground floor employees into catering to him.

[downswing]

his best finery

Ah, so the moth-eaten rags, not the knife-torn ones?

[somebadnews]

This is a great plan. Lookouts would be fantastic too... he actually seems capable of staying calm and not causing a scene, what a concept.

RECAP

[beitangmoran]

Just to recap so far we have :

- Mingyu on whoring duty to earn half of the money for the map, other funds to be provided.

- Wei Wuxian on reconnaissance as a paperman to verify accuracy of the map

- Five and potentially Mina teleporting in for actual looting.

- Possibly Catra on standby in case muscle is needed for a hasty escape?

[groundrules]

This is great, thank you for recapping!

You guys are looking good, barring the sleep curse (unless the paper man is securing the password). You have a map source (Mingyu, who has already approached Haltham), a distraction (Beitang Moran), reconnaissance (Wei Wuxian), one or two infiltrators (Five and prospectively Mina) and getaway muscle (Catra).

Only thing I need to know on my side is: which vault are they going for?

...which, I suspect Five (and/or Mina) are best equipped to tackle, so far.

[beitangmoran]

I was thinking that to satisfy the most pressing moral objections, they might be asked to hit only the fullest vaults, and not empty them totally.

Also maybe stick to getting coins/loose gems and maybe avoid objects that might be difficult to sell. Will let them confirm!

[weifinder]

Paperman can secure the password, as long as Five and he are making contact beforehand (Five can run into paperman)!

[somebadnews]

This sounds good. As far as the vaults go: their primary target will be the coin, so the main vault in the basement in the goal. Five is very confident that he can do all the robbery single handedly if he has to (sure), but he... will tire out if he teleports too much. Best course of action is to get the door open from the inside and have some muscle behind him to haul it away before he teleports them back. (Have the kid's coffee ready.)

Also in the interest of time/worth the gem vault might be a good target. 100,000 coins is a lot to carry, so more bang for their buck. That magical items vault though... could be tempting, how much do they want to press their luck.

LOOT

[somebadnews]

Ahaha so... I'm democratic, even though the very tired manchild here is expecting effusive praise for all his (and only his) hard work. So feel free to weigh in!

From the list here I'd say something like this:
Sell:
- All the obvious gold bars ($$)
- Most of the gems. (Make a case?? for the pale ones, because Five isn't making jewelry over here, argue as you like)
- Ring (just looked like it would be worth something, what)
Keep:
- Sword (he probably used it before the heist was over tbh so... maybe less than pristine ??)
- Mirror (shit from the magic vault was hard to get so figure it out)
- Cloak (might... wear it... at some point?? it's cold out?? what would happen...)
- Keys (assuming they're to something come on, they're gold...)


Just my thoughts, discuss as you like. :>

[bearshermark]

tears from your local uninvolved smith who could use the gold/gems to make valuable things if only he had decent forge access. PALE GEMS FOR THRALLING.

[somebadnews]

GET INTO IT, EL... they can always hold on to a few because they're small enough to carry. Little pouch. You could make the case. :'>

[weifinder]

Wei Wuxian would argue to keep the pale stones and then learn they're better for thralling, but basically he knows not everyone has their own and they'll need more + warming charms given the weather, both are thrall magics.

He'll also outright say the rings likely made of human bone, and there's a soul attached to the cloak. Some old man?

(He's of limited opinion on the rest!)

[somebadnews]

Do you... do you want to keep the human bone ring. Because we could also toss it into the sea.

Logical arguing can sway on the gems, as long as they have enough left over!

[descendency]

Mingyu would like to be reimbursed to the tune of the 12500g he spent on the map.

Adding up the non-item (just gems/gold/coins) the total take is 130,800. Adding IN the sale value of the magic items, the take is 132,285.

Less the cost of the map, that's 107,285.

Split nine ways, that's roughly 11,920 g per person.

This is assuming we are splitting it equally nine ways to everyone involved?

I imagine we will be able to take the items to someone for appraisal to know the sale value, so we'll know how much the ring/keys/etc. are worth.

I'm for splitting it up this way so that heist people aren't footing the entire bill from the Merchant as we've also got auctions etc. going on. (Rather than setting aside the 100,000 g and playing with the remaining take, I mean.)

Am I making any sense at all, I feel like I'm rambling skjkfhsfks

[somebadnews]

THANK YOU for doing the math, that's fantastic. Might minus a few of the gems if the pale ones get put aside or if anyone needs some for... necklaces or whathaveyou, tell me about it.

Five just wants to get shit moving, so he'll be agreeable to splitting it up as long as they've got enough to cover them. If not... he'll just... take your shares from you when you're not looking probably.

[downswing]

If you folks bring the loot back home, Lan Wangji can help identify the ring bone as human for you.

He's. Got experience with.








...yeah.

[descendency]

Wangji, why.

[weifinder]

Both of them just immediately like, oh yeah, that's human bone--

Re: LOOT

[soulsrob]

raises hand

winnie just wants that fucking mirror pls thank

[somebadnews]

On the condition that you find out what it does this is your mission.

FINAL ANSWER

[somebadnews]

Sell:
- Three gold bars at 1kg and one gold bar at 500g (for 45,000)
- 14 dark blue gems (450/each for total 6,300)
- 6 pink gems (700/each for total 4,200)
+ 60,000 in gold coins

Keep: (interested party in brackets)
- Mirror (Winnie)
- Cloak (Wei Wuxian)
- 19 pale gems (Mingyu/Wei Wuxian/Moran)
- 6 dark blue gems (Mingyu)
- 2 pink gems (Mingyu)
- 1 ruby (Mingyu)
- 3 emeralds (Mingyu/Five -- a tip to himself for his trouble)
- Sword (Mingyu)
- Creepy Ring (Wei Wuxian/Mingyu/Wangji)
- Keys (Rachel)

The Cut:
- Remaining gold 115,500 to go towards their expenses, any splitting of the take can be argued to your heart's content. (For the record, Five is in favor of a much smaller split of the take to satisfy everyone who participated. Who gets the final vote is entirely up in the air.)


Note: Check my math!