OOC Chatter I

[Zhym]

And here Fingers wasted a language proficiency on goblin.

[Zorroroaster]

With a name like Fingers he should be able to pick it up pretty fast.

[Marullus]

With a name like Fingers he should be able to pick it up pretty fast.

[Zorroroaster]

[Marullus]

[Brag] My wife threw me a surprise Hobbit Birthday Party last night. Tolkien is not in her geek repitoire, so she had to Google all the things to do. She is awesome. [/brag]

Edited. Holy crap that was a big picture. Deleted!

We had menu items for breakfast, second breakfast, luncheon, afternoon tea, dinner, and supper. Hobbit door cookies. Candy "one rings." Keebler "council of Elrond" elf cookies. Various drinks and much fun. Loved it.

[Zorroroaster]

Ha!

[KingOfCowards]

[Brag] My wife threw me a surprise Hobbit Birthday Party last night. Tolkien is not in her geek repitoire, so she had to Google all the things to do. She is awesome. [/brag]

Edited. Holy crap that was a big picture. Deleted!

We had menu items for breakfast, second breakfast, luncheon, afternoon tea, dinner, and supper. Hobbit door cookies. Candy "one rings." Keebler "council of Elrond" elf cookies. Various drinks and much fun. Loved it.

That's awesome. Happy birthday.

[Rusty Tincanne]

@ Stirling: I am thinking Clay Weatherwax would be interested in joining your outing. I am just (slooooowly) finishing up his deity's write-up. Work has been super-dooper-pooper busy lately. I will have enough time to do an RPG, but the set up is stalling me.

@ Marullus: Happy belated birthday!

[Stirling]

Good, I was going to the merc camp and tavern to recruit another couple of bodies. If there is a pony and trap/ wagon we can use then I'll go straight away. If you are in the Eruanna chapel it might be easier to IC join up.

[Marullus]

Recruiting and departing is best in the Tavern.

You can approach the mercs if you like.

It looks like you can recruit Adalen Noas (still in the tavern) and Clay Weatherwax (now arriving). We might have another elf shortly, too. Grizzly Woman isn't in town yet.

[Rusty Tincanne]

Hi all,
I was wondering what the more seasoned folk recommend for taking regarding provisions. I was thinking 6 days worth (2 fresh, 4 preserved), and then hope for good rolls for foraging as I travel. Does that seem about right?

[Zhym]

I don't know what it'll be like in Marullus's game, but in Keehnelf's game on which this is based some expeditions ended up being pretty long. I wouldn't set out without enough rations to last at least 10 days, personally. Starving sucks.

[Rusty Tincanne]

Good to know. Thanks.
In Torchbearer one preserved ration can be cooked up to make food enough for several people. Did you all ever try that in the west matches game?

[Marullus]

I don't know what it'll be like in Marullus's game, but in Keehnelf's game on which this is based some expeditions ended up being pretty long. I wouldn't set out without enough rations to last at least 10 days, personally. Starving sucks.

Most characters have a handful of preserved rations (6-10), which is good. What I'd recommend is paying 14sp to get 7 days unpreserved rations before any expedition. They last seven days, so you're good on the way to where you're going and you keep the preserved ones in back-up or for the return trip, since they're more than twice as expensive.

Keehnelf didn't really use the foraging rules; but they're in the book and I'm making that a standard thing. This should help in a small way.

Good to know. Thanks.
In Torchbearer one preserved ration can be cooked up to make food enough for several people. Did you all ever try that in the west matches game?

Torchbearer includes a Cooking skill which this uses. Non-class skills are not really much of a "thing" in Lab Lord. Keehnelf put a placeholder for them in the house rules, but never really got to the point of having NPCs use much of them, and there's no mechanic for how a PC would learn them.

Cooking on the trail is just good RP, and I encourage it. I do like to reward good RP, but there's not a whole lot of mechanics involved here. You need to have food in order to eat.

[Rusty Tincanne]

I love that TB doesn't take any of the non-melee stuff for granted, right down to needing to use a helmet to do the cooking in.

Thanks for all the input. The rules say fresh rations last "a few days." The more concrete "7 days" is more useful. Thanks.

[Marullus]

Thanks for all the input. The rules say fresh rations last "a few days." The more concrete "7 days" is more useful. Thanks.

Yep, the Town Business thread covers these clarifications. If you want to purchase food or anything else from the general equipment list before heading out on an expedition, a post on that thread recording the transaction is all it takes. Helps keep things consolidated.

[Stirling]

Hello I wanted to question one of your house rules which in practice doesn't seem to make sense. It is the issue if mounts were you say humans use horses but cannot ride pony or mules. I can understand the other way with restrictions on smaller or wide legged dwarven folk not being able to ride horses. But a should a 5'5" skinny waif of 8 stone 10, (122lbs) be able to ride a pony carrying a 4'11" tall, 200lbs dwarf stonemason? When I think of pony I imagine typical smaller stout horses Geronimo rode.

Any thoughts?

[Marullus]

It is a generalizing principle for a simplified rule set. Could a very large pony carry a very small human? Sure. The intent here is not to arbitrate the combination of extremes, but to create a simplified balancing structure.

But, lets discuss...

First, what is a pony? A pony is defined as being shorter than 14 hands 2 inches (58 inches).

What is an average pony?

For showing purposes, ponies are often grouped into small, medium, and large sizes. Small ponies are 12.2 hands (50 inches (130 cm)) and under, medium ponies are over 12.2 but no taller than 13.2 hands (54 inches (140 cm)), and large ponies are over 13.2 hands but no taller than 14.2 hands.

What is a pony in our game?

Pony (30gp) - 120' with 200lbs, 60' with 400lbs

...I'm assuming it is an average/medium pony (over 12.2 but no taller than 13.2 hands (54 inches (140 cm))

I don't see clear guidelines for "when you're too tall for a pony" (I just tried some superficial research) but about half of internet opinions say that a human somewhere in the mid 5' range should move up to a horse, even when discussing a 14.1 or 14.2 extra large pony.

The Lab Lord Basic rules don't even define heights/weights for races. If you want to consider it, you can look to Lab Lord Advanced. The largest a randomized dwarf gets is 168lbs and 4'6". At that level, a pony could still carry them, but if they're heavily armored, it might cross the threshhold and slow the pony down. For humans, it ranges from 100lbs to 215lbs and from 4'10" to 7'2". A small human could be almost as short as a dwarf.


TLDR: If someone wanted to play the minimum-sized human, I'd probably allow an exception to ride a pony for story purposes. For a generalization, though, I'd rather leave it that humans need horses.


What is the concern, though?

For your character, she is six feet tall, and her weight plus gear pushes the limit for a pony's normal carrying capacity. I'd say it is most appropriate for her to ride a horse.

If it is a cost concern that bothers you, you needn't pay 75 for a fleet-footed riding horse. A 40gp draft horse is fine and only 10gp more than the 30gp pony.

[Stirling]

Okay no problems, I think it is just my thoughts on what is a horse/ pony. As fan of jumps horseracing (Cheltenham in March, the Gold Cup ) I picture a riding horse like that, a charger ( light war horse). Geronimo/Genghis Khan rode hill ponies. Maybe that is a confusion of language this side of the Atlantic, as you would probably say they rode horses not ponies. I was brought up watching black and white T V, and old cowboy movies with 'pony express', Champion the Wonder Horse, etc.

[KingOfCowards]

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