The Vault: Descent (OOC and Sign-Up thread)

[The Corsair]

It had become a myth, a bedtime story. Travelling troupes performed the old epics of The Vault, telling the tales of heroes who braved its depths. Each one was a tragedy, ending with the hero returning to the surface unsuccessful, or never returning at all. Once these plays were history, then they were entertainment. Now they are simply 'not in fashion'.

But then there's the terrifying thing. No-one remembers the story of how The Vault was closed.

And now it's open again.


When the world was young, a mysterious door, set into the side of a grey mountain, opened. Inside was a twisting cave filled with horrors that time has forgotten the names of (or were they never truly written?) As years passed, adventurers from far and wide came to conquer The Vault. Emperors sent in armies, Priests called on Gods, and Stonesmiths tried to seal the doors shut. All failed, and most are not remembered. Also not remembered, is how The Vault was finally closed.

And so the world too forgot about The Vault itself, forgot that it was real. All the lives lost to it, all the whispered things of what lay within. Everything faded.

The world grew up, and the races that inhabited it mastered their magics and machines in the thousands of years that followed. Now, as industry carves away at the ground, and fills the sky with acrid smoke, The Vault has opened again. Will the might of technology make short work of closing The Vault, or will it prove as great a challenge as it was ten thousand years ago?


The Game

I'm really psyched for this one guys, been cooking it up for a while. I'm looking to essentially GM a dungeon crawler-type RP. The Vault itself is structured as a series of floors, each constituting its own episode. On each floor, I will lay out what (generally speaking) will be facing the adventurers and piping up with the occasional spanner in the works.

The setting is a pretty standard 'turn of the century' Steampunk with whatever magic/occult/lovecraftian horror flavour you want to bring to the table with your characters. Really, just about anything goes.

So all we need now is a group of willing adventurers.

Signing Up

To sign up, post a general character bio with the following information:

Name
Age
Sex
Physical Description
Skills
Weapons
Motivation

I've added 'motivation' for this RP, as every character should have a reason they're adventuring into The Vault. These could be things like 'to see what's at the end', 'to be the one who closes it', 'to gain a greater understanding of what it is and why it opens' or something more personal like 'to redeem myself in the eyes of my father/mentor/God/lunchlady'. It doesn't matter what exactly the motivation is, as long as your character has one

[MWBailey]

What type of RP are we talking about? Is it like the usual ones on here, or is it based on points, etc.? Just wondering.

[Ranger Reid]

I will play, just wondering about the level?   I have a new character to toy with.  But he would be low level right now.

[Steampunk Away]

I am interested, but am unsre of how often I cn post. I have a few characters ready to go.

[Ranger Reid]

I know I am a frequent poster, and this has made the game rhythm to brisk on the other game.  I will pace my own input so as not to rush anyone.

[Prof. Isambard Ravenwood]

Yeah, I'm in, need more details on finer aspects of the gameplay, though.

[Steampunk Away]

Seems like we are getting the irregulars involved on this one  . I am joking of course.

[Ranger Reid]

I will enjoy playing someone without the ranger's world weary irritability.

Of course,the new guy could be just as hard to get along with lol

[MWBailey]

Funny, I'm not feeling irregular...

[Prof. Isambard Ravenwood]

I'm thinking someone more like Reid for this character, cold, irritable, and badass with a large sword...

[Ranger Reid]

Irritable is way fun to role play.  I could tell you D&D stories,that are local legends...  (okay just one)........

My,character was tired of one party member talking incessantly, blundering along, giving away our position.   In character I told him to hush, but he took it personal out of character and started showing his arse.

So we were debating whether a door was trapped.   I slipped a private note to the dm, rolled the dice, and in game my character threw the dwarf through the door, which had a fireball spell on it.

The gang quoted me for,ages. "Do you think it's trapped?"

My character "Let's find out."

[The Corsair]

So gameplay-wise it'll be about as rule-driven as the other RPs here (as in, not at all).

At the beginning of each level of The Vault I'll post a general run-down of what you can see/know about the surrounding area. The OOC thread might get a post with some more info or explanations of certain things (i.e roughly what a mook can do to you, while the gameplay thread just says 'you see 10 mooks').

As the troupe travel through each level, I'll be posting with what you're finding as you're going forward (i.e your characters pass through a door, I make a post saying 'on the other side of the door you find a room with blah blah blah).

Basically, leave space in your posts (plot-wise) for the GM to interject. Otherwise, play as you would any other RP on this site. It's going to be like any other, insofar as it's about the characters reacting to their situation and dealing with the threats facing them, only instead of the situation and threats being cooked up as you go by the players themselves, it'll be done by the GM (myself).

[The Corsair]

So do we have enough interest? Or should I hang this one up for later?

[MWBailey]

Very interested, yes, but I've got quite a bit on my plate at the moment (Family medical and other RL crap). Plus the irregulars RP in which I'm already having my character(s) do a kinda-sorta sabbattical thing, so although I'd love to just join up, I really don't feel right about doing so right now. I'm really sorry about that, Corsair.

[Ranger Reid]

I am game, but maybe we wait a few weeks?    My work might send me out soon and I would be isolated.  So starting say.... September 1st I would know for sure deployments are over for this season.

[Steampunk Away]

I'm game. Jut not horribly good at posting a lot, but getting back in the groove of being on the forum.

[Prof. Isambard Ravenwood]

^ Ditto.

[The Corsair]

No rush

The pace of the game will be slower than some of the others around here, given that it's somewhat dictated by how frequently I'm posting (which will be regular, just not necessarily daily)

[Alexis Voltaire]

I might throw my hat into the ring on this one. Been itching to RP again and ive got a fun character in mind. Have to see once I get proper internet hooked up again.

Have you ever played Steamband Corsair? This sounds a lot like one of the roguelike 'band variants.

[The Corsair]

Not at all! I'll take a look at it.

If people are better poised to have a go at this, I can launch it in a week or so. Around October I'll have a week where I'm totally unavailable (shooting a short film) but aside from that I can be running this game daily.

[Alexis Voltaire]

Steamband is worth a go for the steampunk flavor, Id also reccomend a variant called Furyband if you find it a fun game to play. Both are free downloads if you can track down the file host. The 'band games have a steep learning curve but theyre quite fun for roleplaying, especially Fury since theres a huge amount of character options. My last character on furyband was an etherial dragon rune-mage that had a taste for orcs (thanks to a nifty and slightly morbid game feature that let you butcher meat from anything you killed.

I should have internet in the next week or so.

[Ranger Reid]

Still intereted, but working in remote mountains out west right now.  Cell is spotty and internet is the stuff of memory and legend.  Will be done and home for sure in 2 weeks. 

[Alexis Voltaire]

Im two weeks out as wel. I went to get my internet turned on yesterday, turns out the isp can't hook it up until the 15th.

[The Corsair]

I'll tentatively say 2 weeks until we get characters going then

[Ranger Reid]

I am home now.   Starting to catch up.    It is difficult in the other games I am in because the story has grown without me.  I felt like I needed to explain my absence at least to myself.  Seems harder than I thought it would be.

I will make a new character for this game.