Voltex

You know, I've always felt like these games lacked a real player villain. Hence my... humble contribution.

yeeeeeetThis season is certainly lining up to be interesting, I'll wait for more past the prologue that gives shades of the interesting stuff to come... There's plenty to come. There might be less chapters, but there's a lot to them I think. S3 is sort of a soft reboot. There's a lot of new stuff, too much even for S3.

The Loremaster Meet Voltex Aodh, Grand Loremaster for the Knights of Ekimu (a title that he despises). Assigned to record the histories of Okoto following the Battle for the Dawn, he has completed his task just in time for the first stirrings of the coming storms.

FOREWORD: THE LOREMASTER To whomever might be reading these records, I share the humblest of greetings with you, and hope that these histories shall serve you well. With the Mask Maker Voltex having vanished following the Battle for the Dawn, the recording of history had fallen by the wayside. Between the War of Five Kings and the Magical Crisis, this was something that the Knights of Ekimu could no longer tolerate. I suppose I must give you my name. I am Voltex Aodh. My mother named me for the Mask Maker himself, after he saved her life during the Battle for the Dawn. I was born shortly after the battle’s end in late 327 AE, and my childhood was spent being sheltered from the War of Five Kings thanks to the efforts of my mother and the Mask Maker, who watched over me in disguise as a father figure. I have no great achievements or titles to my name, aside from the title of ‘Loremaster’. The Lord Commander of the Knights has seen fit to appoint me as the so-called ‘Grand Loremaster’, leader of all Loremasters across the island, but I cannot stomach it. I am not worthy of being a grand anything; were it not for Khan Nato forcing the task of assembling these histories upon me, I doubt it would have occurred to the Kingslayer to name me to such a role. These histories have occupied me for the past five years. My mother passed away during the Magical Crisis, and lacking the warrior skills that are so prominent and revered in Aodhiim and my house, I decided to journey north and join the Knights. I was sworn in as a Loremaster in Training and sent back to Aodhiim to serve under the Council of Fire, and was soon visited by my namesake. He came with grave warnings about a war to come, ancient powers awakening, and another Mask Maker that would soon arrive on Okoto. I returned north to share his worries, and was rewarded with Khan Nato assigning me to record everything of significance on Okoto since the Battle for the Dawn. It is now the second month of 347 AE, and the task is finally complete. It was a dangerous and often frustrating task, for I have only recently entered my nineteenth year, and began this task in my fourteenth. I have had to wade into the viper’s nest that is Kamuk, and evade the political machinations of King Vinheim and his rivals. I have translated the drunken rambles of Khan Terrorsaur, forced my presence on Lord Onaku, and interrogated Khan Nato. I have insulted the Kingslayer and Toa Kopaka. I have debated and argued with Lord Commander Luroka. I have disobeyed direct orders from Imperator Sil, and balanced on the knife’s edge that is any conversation with Makani Chloe. Recording the War of Five Kings and the Magical Crisis has forced me to survive repeated interactions with all of the most dangerous individuals on this island, with my mind and the words I speak as my only weapon and defense. Most of them are lost, now, in the politics of their nations and of Okoto. They have forgotten what united them together during the Battle for the Dawn, and few have acknowledged the sudden appearance of the Elemental Creatures and Keetongu. I have watched, listened, and learned as the Mask Maker bid me. There is a war coming – the Great War – and I begin to fear that even if Okoto can be reunited, we will be too weak to survive it. Ancient powers awaken, and the Barren stirs. All I can do is pray. Everything before this was just prelude. REVIEW

he brought up the end of S1 because to this day you still complain to me about letting Jed kill you, despite having it explained to you repeatedly the many near-impossible rolls he had to succeed in order for the situation to turn out as it did. I have already apologized to Nato, and intend to apologize to Luroka once we've both had time to settle and cool off from this - I do not need to and will not apologize to the rest of you, who were not involved.

I would have found some IC reason. Showing the rest of them Vakama would have happened regardless, and it'd be easy for Elittra to become paranoid that some of them might attempt to spread the info to undermine her... particularly the person who controls a network of spies. The blackmail plot allowed me to make my move E1 instead of E2 or E3. I understand why both Nato and Luroka would be upset. I am less understanding as to why all of you feel the need to try and lecture Burn and I, when the only two who should be complaining - Nato and Luroka, in case it wasn't obvious enough - have, so far, have said their pieces and moved on (albeit, Luroka's was... less than BZP-appropriate off-site, but still somewhat understandable). If I can visit this topic without finding yet another person calling me out on this, I will be happy to drop the matter, and proceed with a gentleman's agreement not to do this in the first round in the future.

Burnmad, Tex, I'm very disappointed in you. Look at what you two have done. You've made Luroka upset, and all because you just had to keep him from betraying you. Breaking the rules and metagaming to save your own characters' skins... is this what you've come to? Apologize to Luroka. N O W. Alright, so a couple things in response to this post first. 1-Luroka has a history of betraying people in other games, but especially in these games, and in Bara-Magna, his betrayal blindsided everyone he was allied to, and threw us for a loop for a couple rounds, as well as impacting the rest of our game. Now, that is exactly what a betrayal should do - but in these sorts of games you need to be able to trust the players you're allied to, and I couldn't trust Luroka. 2-The entire point of these games was to create a game where meta-gaming would drive the plot. It's why in the very first game I made sure to highlight the idea of the 'Backdoor PMs'; if someone learned something OOC or had OOC motivations for a move, so long as they could provide a good IC justification, it would be alright. 3-This really could be a part of Point 2, but I'll say it here: no rules were broken. And now a few more in response to this one too. 1-Is it a bit petty? Perhaps. But as I stated above, Luroka has a history of betraying people, particularly in these games, and he has a history of doing it suddenly and without warning. There was no chance that I was going to trust Luroka at his word that this time would be different, so I took steps to prevent the risk of it occurring again. 2-I will again reiterate that one of the major points of these games when I created them was that if you could provide appropriate IC justification for moves being made due to OOC reasons, then it was totally fine. This is also the reason why I never introduced a set of hard rules. These games are meant to be as open as possible, limited only by what the players and hosts can think up. I had both IC and OOC reasons to turn on Luroka, and then I managed to give myself an opportunity to play it out. 3-Don't question Nato's capabilities as a host here. You haven't seen the PM, and you haven't seen how I set the scene. We were in my character's private residence, with the front door locked (three times), and in a soundproof cellar (which was also locked, using a key only my character had). The only NPC Nato could have used was Vakama, and he was chained to the wall by all four limbs and severely weak and injured already. Bringing in NPCs or causing some random event to prevent me from fulfilling my plans would have been a cheap move. It also almost didn't work, and might have actually failed if Luroka hadn't quit. His character is stronger than mine, and had already managed to crack my character's mask; another solid hit would have broken it, and it's already been established by Nato that losing your mask in this game would be just as crippling as it was in canon. Had that happened, it's likely that my character would have either been imprisoned or killed, as Burnmad's character would have recognized the changing tides.

I stand by my decisions, but I'd like to apologize nonetheless, since I know the situation with Ta Koro last night would have been a sucks situation for any GM to have to deal with. Particularly so early in the game. So for that I will apologize, Nato.

Vakama being my prisoner isn't much of a plot twist. Most people already knew it was a thing.

we're a friendly bunch when we aren't murdering each other

Nah, it's loads of fun. I was just showing them my latest work of art when suddenly Kuan tried to attack me, the fiend.

you broke bzp

I don't think Elittra has children, so if she dies I'll have to be some total newbie.

Should've been the breaking bad title theme

Ta-Koro has its own theme music already courtesy of Burnmad e:I'm dumb you said episodes not villages, good grief sure go for it

Coming Soon: Shorter than Volume I (only a Foreword and three chapters are planned right now), Volume II will set the stage for Season 3.

just because Elittra happens to share the exact same design doesn't mean she has to share the exact same height

don't be lame This one In fact if you replaced all the shades of blue with their equivalent shades of red, that's Elittra.

Just become orange

dun dun dunnnn e: it's going to be fun playing elittra

Written in the style of the Mask Maker Voltex's histories, detailing the events of the War of Five Kings and the Magical Crisis - two events that have changed the face of Okoto forever, and signal the Great War to come.

Nato

also please stop with the pet names

Ooh, you're welcome to come build it in Ta-Koro. It can be a joint project to... improve our relationship!

so we just need one more person in Ice? who hasn't signed up yet that we can bully