Voicechat Notes: Saturday 23rd April 2022

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tulpa
Posts: 118
Joined: Sat Sep 25, 2021 5:00 am

Voicechat Notes: Saturday 23rd April 2022

Post by tulpa »

Q: What exports out of the Lost Lands are there, if any?
A: Exports are probably various relics or treasures that are dug up. If people have the right contacts they can sell those to interested buyers outside. As far as local resources are concerned, he doesn't really know. It's also hard to get things out of there, if it's from the quarantine it could be diseased or corrupted etc. It can be rough, you'd have to find the right buyers. Imports are probably just luxury stuff, mostly. There are a lot of people in the Lost Lands that have a lot of money, who can afford to buy expensive imports that are luxury items. Maybe these items aren't completely luxury, just nicer things that you don't see a lot of. A lot of the ships that are alluded to, they have multiple destinations within the quarantine that they can go to. If you see a ship it's not necessarily the case that they're going out of the Lost Lands. There's Port D'Esilio. There's at least one Huecatn port. Sea travel is definitely the preferred way to conduct trade in the Lost Lands. It's a lot safer than by land, considering how far flung things are.

Q: What's the Huecatn port?
It's a fairly major port city. It's affiliated with one of the three major groups within the Huecatn. The Huecatn on the coast, they're the ones that are strongly anti-Resen, because of what happened. It's a big city, there are probably a couple of other settlements as well. A lot of trade happens there for people who think that the people of, e.g., Port D'Esillio are upstarts.

C: The Liberi don't trade in any major civilized hub, they just kind of 'do their own thing'.

Q: Without OOC information, is it possible to predict or manipulate the place someone might come back after death? For example, could someone make it so that inmates of a prison popped into existance...back in there cells?
Or, is the place people come back just supposed to be somewhere in the area, but you abstract it to a few locations in game for ease of not being naked on the streets and what not?
A: It's not something that can be controlled. He is honestly working some of that stuff out, it's kind of hand-wavey at the moment due to some lore stuff. At least with what he's currently got lore-wise, it's weird that people are showing up back in Shadgard.

Q: Speaking of death and the Undying, what sort of safeguards are or will be in place to ensure that there is no accidental dragging of off-faction corpses to out-of-bounds locations? For example, were a Dominion or true exile player to be slain inside Ravenwood or Tarueka (or outside, for the truly unfortunate), then someone unrelated attempts to be courteous and drag the unrecognized body back to Shadgard's crypt?
A: He might need to put in a thing for when players are dragging a corpse of someone from the opposite faction/someone who's been banned into a town. Perhaps the guards would say "Hey, they're not allowed in here." There could potentially be a thing where, after some amount of time, the corpse just gets delivered to wherever the faction-friendly place is.

Q: Is padded cloth better than soft leather for channeling? Can I channel unhindered in padded cloth armor?
A: it is not currently but it will be. Right now, channelling drop rates are based on armor weight. He wants to make it based on material type eventually.

Q: What ports or types of cities are along Khaldea's coastline?
A: He's still plotting out exactly where the 7 cities are. At least two of those are going to be on the coast. It's an ideal place to have a city, for trade etc. He imagines there are a few smaller settlements along the coast as well.

Q: Are Treasure Scavenge, Treasure Hunter's Eye or Wanderer's Eye affected by the Perception skill in any way? The helpfiles do not mention it, but I would just like to have it confirmed that it wasn't perhaps forgotten.
A: Yes they are. Perception is the primary influence on whether those occur or not. Smaller items are harder to discover than larger. If you hide a tiny thing it's going to be harder to notice for those who have those abilities.

Q: What does the Nuumic military look like? How big is it? Do they have particular preference on wich class they draw or draft from? Does it have restrictions? is it considered honorable or dishonorable to fight in the military, or is it just a duty?
A: Something he probably has to think about. With Nuum they have the same kind of attitude to a lot of things: you've got the grunts doing the grunt work. A lot of times they'll look down on people who are bigger and stronger and broader etc. because they think physical labour is for workers. One way to help get some prestige, admittedly, is to join the military. On the other hand, a lot of people look at that as sort of demeaning manual labour. That'll change as you move up the line. A tactician or commanding role would be a lot more honourable. You've also got military people who are doing things using their occult talents. That's a completely different story, they're definitely going to be highly regarded by Nuumic society.

Q: Who does Nuum fight? Is it all border disputes with Khaldeans and Viali?
A: The Nuum are fighting in the Brownlands, currently skirmishing a bit with the Viali. Everyone in Nuum is hoping that someone else will take care of the "war effort". Active conflict is mainly going to be in very specific geographic locations rather than across the Empire. Wherever the actual conflicts are is going to be where they're putting in the most effort. The inhabitants of that region are going to be constantly petitioning to get support from the rest of Nuum. It's going to be a matter of contention between the people who are there where the conflict is happening and the rest.
It's going to be a major thing in Nuumic politics, sending people to petition like: "Hey we're trying to defend the border here but also nobody is helping us". It's a thing that's causing some civil strife probably.

Q: Would slaves be the ones probably dying more as fodder? Are there any requirements for all Nuum of a certain class to serve for any amount of time?
A: Yeah. It's not like there are just droves and droves of slaves, though. You're also going to have people that are volunteering. In the lower classes, you'll also probably going to have those who are required to serve a certain amount of time. As long as you're not one of the slave class, you do get compensated/paid for it, though. People can use it as an opportunity to earn a place for themselves. If they do well, they can work their way up that ladder.

Q: Are there any notable special force groups for the Nuumic military? What do they do?
A: They have the occult ones who use all manner of occult tricks in espionage or assassination, or mass disruption of enemy troops. There are all sorts of fun things they can do with the occult abilities available to them. You're also going to have conventional, non-occult specialists as well. He doesn't really have any specifics in mind for that.

Q: Could a slave serve to earn freedom?
A: A slave wouldn't be able to choose if they joined the military or not. If a slave did end up in the military and they ended up doing well, it's possible they could be elevated out of the slave class. It would just depend on where they are and what the local officials want. If the one in charge of the slave class wanted gladiator games, then that could be a thing. It would be dependent on the administrator.

Q: Do the Nuumic have any military presence outside Nuum?
A: They might want to but no one else wants them to. Everyone else kind of assumes if they start pushing somewhere, they're just going to start taking things over. There are going to be rumours, but no known garrisons or fortresses. They're very inward-looking anyway. They would like to have some nicer land, but on the other hand they do have their own little pockets of magic land anyway that serve them really well. They're in pockets out there, it's just not viable to expand out in the desert. They're more interested in cultivating what they've got. There is a small amount of ambition to get more land, nonetheless, and they also want to continue to assert that they're a mighty Empire. Part of that is having land and preventing competitors from having more land. If they ever tried to move military forces to their port, both the Fasa and Viali would be like: "uh-uh". They could try it at some point, but it would be like ... it isn't going to be received well, so they'd have to think about it.

C: He always imagined that there are a good number of Nuum who are going out and about outside of Nuum because they want to improve other places as well as their own. They're met with suspicion by some, others think "Oh, that's nice of them". As prideful and such as they are, that's not the only facet of them. A lot of them definitely do have this idea that they're trying to get humankind to ascend. "We're trying to get everyone to reach the next level of being". There's an obvious tendency for them to be like "We're better than you", but that's not necessarily to the exclusion of all else. There are going to be some that are saying "We would like to include other peoples, at least the ones we don't hate". It's a less common mindset, but not unheard of by any means.

Q: What are the Nuumic views on halfbloods (Nuum/other race) or other races in general gaining power in Nuum? what about specifically in Nuum's military?
A: For the most part they're going to look down on stuff like that, as you might expect. They're a prideful society. A lot of them do feel like they're almost a different people from the rest of humanity at this point. The theory is that the Nuum have been tampering with their physical bodies; there's speculation that that's why they're a beautiful people. Mixing that up would often be seen as a bad thing (though that's a generalisation): it would be diluting something they believe their race has worked toward and they'd see that as something of a regression.

Q: Are the Nuum against other races coming into their cities?
A: Some could visit but they'd definitely be treated differently.

C: COGG isn't a perfect world; some of these cultures are difficult. Some of these cultures' focuses are awful! But a lot of making a fantasy world is modelling it after reality. He hopes it is seen by people as a believable parallel with our world. This world isn't how he believes the world should be.

C: One of the differences between the Rhuidim and Nuum is that, with the Rhuidim the bloodline in terms of following relations back to Rhun himself is the thing, whereas with the Nuum the taboo of mixing with other peoples' cultures is more of a general physiological thing (dilution of genetic enhancements), though there is definitely going to be some prestige in being descended from Nuum herself or her students.

C: Other races have weird and wonderful physiological features, too. Rhuidim are kind of monochromatic, they're grayscale. Giganti are really big and tall, which is attributed to their kind of different creative mythology.

C: There are ugly Nuum as well! It's more just like, a lot of people will agree that the ceiling is higher for beauty standards with the Nuum. It could have a big effect for people who are higher up in class. There might be times where higher-ups specify "Oh we're not going to let you marry this person because they're ugly."

Q: Who has the longest lifespan?
A: He's going to have to think about that (but had an instinctive response that he's going to withhold!)

Q: Do Giganti have a catch-all term for non-Giganti? Would lowlanders work?
A: Yeah that could work! He didn't have any particular one in mind.

Q: Are there any particular weapons the nuum carry for ceremonial purposes?
A: He doesn't know. The typical kind of stuff. Perhaps the kopesh ("that lil' hookedy-sword thing"). He hadn't really thought a whole lot about it and is going to need to consult with our local weapons enthusiasts.

Q: Is there any particular city region the Nuum have military presence in?
A: They all have their own. Though technically an empire, they all feel they can rise above the others. The biggest seat of power is going to have the bigger military presence.

Q: Does the Nuum have a known coat of arms for their military?
A: No, but would be fun to come up with.

Q: Does channelling feel any particular way for a druid?
A: Other than just kind of feeling a connection with a wider sort of presence/network these other creatures or entities are connected to, no. It's definitely that kind of feeling.

Q: When a character has their final death, there's a notice that the player has the option to either shelve or retire that character. I'm curious about the circumstances that warrant shelving a dead character: would shelving them be solely for the purpose of saving those sunset points for later, or might there be other reasons?
A: He doesn't know. You shouldn't even have to retire the character. He thinks this was put in really early on and isn't sure why he put a thing about shelving in there. Probably you could shelve them, then hang out in the death lounge with other people that had perma-died. He doesn't even remember if it lets you log in. He thought sunset should work for a perma-dead character automatically, but isn't sure. He'll make a note to make sunset points automatically draw from dead characters.

Q: What skills or stats, if any, determine how beach-combing goes?
A: It looks like it's just luck. It's not skill-related... but there might be other factors (nudge nudge).

Q: What might the Nuumic oppinion be on other culture's forms of occult or similar, e.g. Giganti Rune Carving?
A: They're probably interested. Re: Rune Carving they'd probably be fine with it, but the Nuum are not A-okay with the Mountain Father so it wouldn't work anyway.

Q: Would you ever consider post-cap gain? Like, 100k for 1 skill point, or possible "cap upgrade" where you could spend X amount of XP to increase a skill cap. Not skill, just a cap.
A: With post-cap stuff, he doesn't know that he'd want to do skills. It'd be a whole new thing to then balance, so, don't know. Let's see if we can come up with some good ideas [on the BBS]. It would probably have to be a whole discussion of its own.

Q: Will sunsteel be a limited release material, or will it be an alloy that players who manage to get access to celestium will be able to make?
A: He doesn't know yet. It could work either way.

Q: Do the Huecatn have a name for Toteo's Aphraen splinter?
A: He has tried not to focus on that kind of thing too much. He imagines they have one but doesn't know what it would be, doesn't have one in mind.

Q: Has gravity been discovered, named and studied yet?
A: Yeah, at the very least, the khaldeans have wondered about it. It's safe to assume we can use the term gravity, and for characters to know about things falling, the mechanics of that.

Q: How alike are the Brownlands and the Lost lands. The helpfile on Khaldea makes it sound like they're as bad in terms of lawlessness, just without the nethrim and infested. Is that accurate?
A: He wouldn't say that they're especially comparable. the brownlands is more of a conflict zone, a hotzone between two peoples. It's also not the most hospitable place: it's arid and crusty. He wouldn't say there are a bunch of people that are living out there in settlements. It's also a significantly smaller region, the Lost Lands are huge compared with the Brownlands. The Brownlands is just a border region between Nuum and Khaldea.

Q: Are there broadly itinerant groups besides the Fasa?
A: There are some in Khaldea. He imagines there are a good number of Faewyr that move around. Both in Tyr Wyrd and over in Arad. They're definitely more prone to wandering, but not as much as the Fasa (obviously it's a thing of theirs). He imagines there are some groups of Hillfolk that do the same.

Q: What is the story behind the Phoenix Court in New Emberlight? Why is it the one area least touched by pirates and the like.
A: He'll have to have an NPC come talk about it sometime.

Q: What's the info on armor use skill you're keen on (Teri is mad)?
A: There's nothing new since the last couple times we talked about it. Something about avoiding chink chances could be possible? He's honestly not looked into it at all.

Q: How old is the resen presence on Arad? (older than Nuum? Younger than Nuum but older than Viali? etc.)
A: It's definitely been around a very, very long time. He doesn't know how he's going to answer that yet. It does bring him back to thinking about timeline post that was made.
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