Story Post: Haul: The Needleworker (8 comments) Two figures prowl silently across the rooftops of the city, looking out for the

Two figures prowl silently across the rooftops of the city, looking out for the right opportunity for the next haul. Juniper scouts an open skylight, slipping on the roof tiles and injuring their foot in the process, and after a moment’s pause 4st leaps down through it. The rest of the team are absent: Clucky and JonathanDark are laying low, and when the group return to their lodgings they find that NadNavillus has fled town.

The Haul is 7 Florins and a Glove.

Extra! Extra! Read All About It!

Welcome to this edition of the City Distorter, bringing you fake news from the Cities underbelly. 

In this new series of stories, we will visit the “Real Thieves of the City”. We are lucky to connect with a recently retired but still notorious operator.  We will refer to him as Mr N for sake of anonymity.

Reporter: “Mr N, with your recent retirement, do you miss that lifestyle at all?”
Mr N:  No, I don’t think so.  Things are different now with the City cracking down,  I don’t think this is a viable lifestyle anymore.

Reporter: You still have connections on the streets, what are you hearing this week?
Mr N:

Well, there is still a very active group trying to squeeze the last florin out of the City.  There was a recent job down at the Needleworker but, it pulled in a pitiful haul.  Nothing like the old days. 

Overall not much happening on the streets:

4st:  The Informant managed to nick 3 florins from me as I fled the city.
Clucky: Roamed the streets picking pockets.
Jonathan: Joined looking for pocket change.
Juniper: Ever the hard worker, she kept slogging away as a laborer.

Reporter: How do you see this playing out?
Mr N:

Well, it’s still somewhat close but Clucky has a lead and it’s his to lose.  I always liked to keep good books so, the way I size the net worth up is:

Clucky:  121 (Florins: 13, Pouches: 83, Possessions:  13, Secret Hustles: ~12)
4st: 112 (Florins: 32, Pouches: 39, Possessions: 26, Secret Hustles: ~15)
Jonathan: 108 (Florins: 9, Pouches: 96, Possessions: 3, Secret Hustles: ~0)
Juniper: 27 (Florins: 21, Pouches: 3, Possessions: 0, Secret Hustles: ~0)

4st could add an easy 12 points by finding or buying a Loupe, minus it’s cost, but still has to deal with the selling process.
Jonathan is a bit behind with a 13 florin gap to close, that will be tough, maybe he’s banking on some bad luck hitting others.
Juniper could be a swing vote with this lot needing three votes to pass anything.
Clucky will want to keep things quiet, hand out a florin here or there and time his exit.

Reporter: Can anyone really know what’s going on?
Mr N: I don’t know, this is just my best guess.

Mr N: (sipping a glass of wine) Me, I’m just going to enjoy the sunshine.

Well that wraps up this edition of the “Real Thieves of the City”.  Stay safe out there.

Proposal: More Love for the Glove

In the rule “Possessions”, replace the text for the Effect of Glove with the following:

The Linger Plan gives you 4DICE2 Florins Covertly instead of 2DICE2

The Effect for the Glove currently references a Plan that no longer exists, which is not fair for any Glove owners

Sunday, May 19, 2024

Proposal: Punt Kick

In the rule “Distribution”, remove every sentence and bullet point that contains the term “punt”.

Having seen this run for a while and time out some conversations that would have gone somewhere, with some players agreeing to whatever was on the table because they didn’t want to be blamed for causing a punt, I think it may be worth going back to requiring the group to reach an actual agreement for each Haul.

Saturday, May 18, 2024

Proposal: Sitting this one out

Reached quorum 5 votes to 0. Enacted by Kevan.

Adminned at 20 May 2024 08:52:35 UTC

In “Rules and Votable Matters” part of the Clarifications section of the ruleset

replace

If the City has voted DEFERENTIAL on a Proposal, that vote is instead considered to be valid and either FOR (if more Thieves have a valid FOR vote on that Proposal than have a valid AGAINST vote on it) or AGAINST (in all other cases). However, in either case, votes of DEFERENTIAL made by other Thieves on the same Proposal are not considered to be valid. If there are six or fewer Thieves, then the City’s vote of DEFERENTIAL on a proposal is only affected by this rule if all Thieves who are not the City have cast a vote on that proposal.

with

If the City has voted DEFERENTIAL on a Proposal, they are not considered to be a Thief for the purposes of totaling quorum on that Proposal. Votes of DEFERENTIAL made by other Thieves on the same Proposal are not considered to be valid, but the Thieves who made them still contribute to quorum

Recently we had a couple of proposals time out that were 3-0 with one def vote from Kevan. Due to the “six or fewer active players” clause, this was not enough to get 4 votes and pass the proposals before a timeout. However, unless Kevan changed his vote the proposals were a lock to pass, because even if the other two people voted against it would still be 3-2 (and oddly enough suddenly be able to pass when previously it couldn’t until the timeout)

I believe this keeps the vote as intended—as an explicit way for the emperor to opt out of a proposal.

It does mean in some circumstances where say, a 7 person dynasty is split 3 FOR 0 AGAINST 1 IMPERIAL DEF that the proposal cannot be enacted but I’m not convinced that is a bad thing. The idea being reaching quorum and enacting something early is that unless someone changes their mind or joins the dynasty, everyone elses votes can’t change the result. But in the 3/0/1 scenario, the other three people still voting could change the result. So I think its arguably an improvement to not let proposals get enacted in that state.

Story Post: Haul: The Pewtersmith

4st, JonathanDark and Juniper are agreed.

Adminned at 20 May 2024 08:53:32 UTC

NadNavillus eavesdrops while posing as a customer to learn where the artisan keeps their most precious wares, JonathanDark scouts out a loose window, and 4st leaps away across the rooftops with the goods later that night. Clucky and Juniper lay low.

The Haul is 6 Florins, a Candlestick and an Unappraised Gem.

Friday, May 17, 2024

Proposal: Sell! Sell! Sell!

Timed out 3 votes to 1 with an unresolved Imperial DEF. Enacted by Kevan.

Adminned at 20 May 2024 08:51:15 UTC

Add to the section named Black Market:

As a Street Action, a Thief may attempt to Offer one of their possessions from their Inventory to the Black Market by performing the following Atomic Action:

Identify a Possession in their own Inventory and remove the Possession from their Inventory.
Determine the possessions Value from the Possession Table; Rolling for possessions of random value. This is the Determined Value
Increase their Notoriety by the Determined Value
Roll a DICE 4, then set the Possession’s Black Market Price for this instance of the atomic action to be the Determined Value minus the result of the roll.
If the Possesion’s Black Market Price is positive, the Theif may Gain Florins equal to its Black Market Price.

I have to move this hot merchandise somehow!

Proposal: Flexible Opportunist

Timed out 3 votes to 0. Enacted by Kevan

Adminned at 19 May 2024 18:17:57 UTC

In the rule “Hustles”, replace

As a Weekly Action

with

As a Street Action

and replace

defaulting to “One of Us”

with

defaulting to “Labourer”

If we’re going to have reveals of everyone’s Hustles, either through a dynastic mechanic or just by sleuthing out the changes in gamestate, we should probably allow everyone to change their Hustles more often. Currently, a Weekly change means that after you’ve been shamed for your Hustle, you could continue to get penalized by your fellow Thieves in the Hauls for quite a number of Hauls and not be able to do anything about it.

Proposal: Snitch

Timed out 3 votes to 0. Enacted by Kevan.

Adminned at 19 May 2024 12:44:23 UTC

Add a Hustle named Snitch to the Hustle table:

| Snitch || Action: This Thief gains 2 Notoriety then the City makes a Story blog post reporting all Thieves chosen Hustle.

Someone is always watching.

Story Post: Haul: The Tinsmith

Clucky, Jonathan and NadNavillus are agreed.

Adminned at 18 May 2024 10:14:49 UTC

Clucky and Jonathan scout out the building from across the street, and NadNavillus eavesdrops to learn when the workshop will be left unattended. A few hours later, 4st leaps in through an upper window, unbolts the main door from the inside and the team clear the place out. Juniper lays low.

The Haul is 14 Florins, a Candlestick and a Helm.

Thursday, May 16, 2024

Proposal: Render Unto Caesar

Timed out. Passes 3-0—Clucky

Adminned at 18 May 2024 16:35:06 UTC

In the subrule “Notoriety”, replace the second step of the Notoriety Check with the following steps:

* Roll a DICE(51-N) where N is their Notoriety. If result is not 1 then the check succeeds and all remaining steps are skipped. Otherwise, the check fails.
* Subtract 10 from their Notoriety
* If they have any Pouches in their inventory, remove one randomly-selected Pouch from their inventory
* Remove 50% of their Florins, rounded up

As was mentioned in a blog post comment, distributing half the Florins to the other Thieves in a failed Notoriety Check is strange and probably not on-theme. This change is essentially paying the fine for being caught to the City rather than the Thief’s fellow Thieves.

Also cleaning up the Notoriety Check to make individual steps out of the one really-long second step.

Story Post: Haul: The Tailor

Clucky, JonathanDark, NadNavillus and Juniper are agreed.

Adminned at 17 May 2024 09:00:45 UTC

Clucky, Jonathan and Juniper scouted out the shop out for anything of value, NadNavillus eavesdropped to learn which were the more valuable and stylish fabrics, and 4st leapt over the counter to grab a gemstone from a piece that the tailor was working on, injuring their hand on the pins and needles that were holding it place, but escaping with it regardless.

The Haul is 14 Florins, a Cloak and an Unappraised Gem.

Proposal: Countryside Villa

Timed out. Passes 3-0—Clucky

Adminned at 18 May 2024 16:10:03 UTC

If https://blognomic.com/archive/financial_planner is enacted, this proposal does nothing.

Add a new dynastic rule called “The Countryside” and give it the following text:

The Countryside is a publicly tracked list of Thieves. Thieves in the Countryside may not take dynastic actions and are not considered to be Free. Thieves in the Countryside always have a Plan of Rest, a Hustle of Retired, may not be added to Gaol and are not considered to be Thieves for the purposes of the Informant Hustle or when Florins are distributed via a Notoriety Check

When a Thief Flees Town, the following atomic action occurs

- Destroy all of their existing Pouches by removing them from their inventory, and gaining Florins equal to their value
- Perform a Notoriety Check
- Add them to the Countryside

If all Thieves are in the Countryside or Gaol, the Thief (or Thieves) who is in in the Countryside and has the most Florins (amongst those in the Countryside) achieves victory

Add a new plan called “Flee”

You Flee Town

Add a new Hustle called “Retired” with Description

This hustle has no effect


Add a new dynastic rule called “Police Presence”

There is a publicly tracked value called Police Presence, which is by default 0 and represents the City’s ability to crackdown on crime.

When the City performs a Crackdown, a DICEX is rolled where X is the Police Presence. If the result is greater than 10, all Thieves not in the countryside are sent to Gaol.

Add the following steps to the “Distributing”  atomic action, right before “Change the status of the Haul post to enacted”

- Increase Police Presence by DICE3
- Perform a Crackdown

Alternative endgame proposal that gives us some press your luck elements. Any round you can choose to tap out or you keep going and hope the squad can get another heist in before the law catches up to them.

Proposal: Must Have Been Rats

Popular, 4-0. Enacted by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 17 May 2024 17:39:33 UTC

Swap the third and fourth bullet points in the rule “The Haul”.

The bullet point added by What Was That Noise should have been before the Plan processing step, not after it.

Proposal: Financial Planner

Withdrawn. Failed by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 17 May 2024 17:38:41 UTC

Add a new rule named “Retirement” with the following text:

Each Thief has a Retirement, which is privately tracked by the City and defaults to empty. A Thief with an empty Retirement cannot achieve victory.

As a Street Action, a Thief can privately communicate a new Retirement to the City. A Thief’s Retirement, when not empty, must contain all of the following at the time that it is communicated to the City:
* The text “Combined Florins and Pouch Values greater than:” followed by an amount equal to this Thief’s current Florins and Pouch Values combined plus 50
* The text “Have in Inventory:” followed by one or more unique types of Possessions (not counting Pouches) with static Values, in which those Possession types have a combined Value of at least 10 and this Thief has none of those types currently in their inventory
* The text “Notoriety less than:” followed by an amount equal to this Thief’s current Notoriety minus 10

At any time, a Thief can privately communicate to the City a request to get the contents of their Retirement, and the City should privately respond at their earliest convenience with the contents of that Thief’s Retirement.

A Thief may Retire by making a blog post with the Story Post category and the text “Retiring” somewhere in the post title, and in the body of the post the contents of their current Retirement as tracked by the City. A Thief who has Retired has achieved victory if the contents of their posted Retirement, when treated as criteria, are all true for that Thief at the date and time that the post was made.


In the subrule “Containers”, add the following text:

At any time, a Thief may privately communicate to the City a request to get the Values of all of their Pouches, and the City should privately respond at their earliest convenience with each Pouch by name in that Thief’s inventory and that Pouch’s associated Value.

To win, you don’t have to have the most amount of Florins, but you need to try to reach more Florins/Pouch Values than you have right now, plus specific Possessions and less Notoriety.

It’s a nice balancing act, because while you could just get Possessions from the Black Market, you’ll lose Florins and gain Notoriety, which pushes you further away from your Retirement goals. You have to continue to cooperate with your fellow Thieves to get what you want.

This also makes it less of a good strategy to put a Thief in Gaol just to block their victory, because they’ll get either get closer to their Notoriety goal during that time or get more breathing room to gain Notoriety in pursuit of their other goals when they get out.

Story Post: Haul: The Coffeehouse

NadNavillus, JonathanDark and Clucky are agreed.

Adminned at 16 May 2024 15:31:45 UTC

A busy half-hour is spent rifling through the pockets and bags of other patrons. Clucky, Jonathan and Juniper keep a Scout’s eye on which of the customers seem to have more to spend, NadNavillus does some Standard distraction work, and 4st makes a Leap for the coatrack on the way out.

The Haul is 23 Florins and a Cloak.

Wednesday, May 15, 2024

Proposal: Workplace Injury? Call 1-800-ITHURTS!

Timed out, 3-0 with 1 DEF. Enacted by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 17 May 2024 17:35:18 UTC

Add “Roll a DICE3. On a 1, gain a random injury” to the effect of Scout

Give the Body injury the following Effect “If you have three or more Body Injuries, you may not take dynastic actions and your Plan is always set to Rest during a Health Check.”

In the effect of Hand injury, replace “Standard, Pocket or Scout” with “Standard, Pocket, Unlock or Scout”

Gaining notoriety doesn’t really make narrative sense, and definitely seems to be the far superior option to picking up injuries. So thinking we just turn notoriety into a thing you get for selling stuff or getting caught while injuries you can pick up from doing riskier moves

Also sneaking in a change making it so you can’t pick locks with a broken hand just because that narratively fits

Proposal: What Was That Noise?

Reached quorum 4 votes to 0. Enacted by Kevan.

Adminned at 16 May 2024 15:24:51 UTC

Add a step to “The Haul” after the third:-

* Roll DICE3 in a secretly random manner. On a 1, select a secretly random Thief and change their Plan to “Lay Low”.

Adding an element of uncertainty to even the best-planned burglaries, which also serves as a shadow in which a sly thief can hide with some deniability. (Prompted by 4st’s comment on Discord of this seeming like “the most coop dynasty ever instead of the banditry it presumes”.) Did your tooled-up scout really miss the action after encountering an unexpected guard patrol on the rooftops, or did they deliberately hang back to watch the job fail?

Story Post: Haul: The Chophouse

Clucky, Jonathan, Juniper and NadNavillus are agreed.

Adminned at 16 May 2024 08:35:11 UTC

Pushing cheap cuts of meat around their plates, JonathanDark, Juniper and NadNavillus patiently watch the counter staff and Scout their sightlines, waiting for the moment to move. When it comes, Clucky takes a straightforward Standard approach at the till. Once the takings have been grabbed, 4st makes a Leap across the top table to grab some silverware, and the gang make quick their escape.

The Haul is 22 Florins and a Candlestick.

Proposal: Taking Out The Trash

Reached quorum 4 votes to 0. Enacted by Kevan.

Adminned at 16 May 2024 15:23:15 UTC

In “Distribution” replace “then that Target becomes the Current Target. Otherwise the Current Target becomes Restaurant.” with “then Next Target is set to the name of that Target. Otherwise the Next Target becomes Shop.”

The Takeout proposal accidentally left an instance of “Restaurant” in place in the Distribution rule, which Target Practice then failed to amend because it expected it to say “Shop”.

Tuesday, May 14, 2024

Proposal: Richer and Grander

Illegal. Juniper already had 2 Proposals still in the queue as of the time and date of this Proposal: “Rich and Reckless” and “Being Caught”.

@Juniper, you need to wait until “Rich and Reckless” either gets enough votes to fail it or enact it, or until it times out. You can also vote against your own proposal “Rich and Reckless” to withdraw it, and in this case that would make it fail immediately due to having a Quorum of votes AGAINST.

(closed by JonathanDark)

Adminned at 15 May 2024 07:26:10 UTC

Add a new step to the end of the list in “Distribution”:-

* A Thief’s Wealth is equal to their Florins value, plus the Florins in all of their own Pouches.
            * A Team’s Wealth is equal to the sum of all Members’ Wealth.

In “The Haul”, replace “If there is no pending Haul post” with:-

If there is no pending Haul post and the City has not made a Triumphal post so far this dynasty.

Add a rule named ‘Grand Heist’ with the following text:

==Grand Heist==
Each Thief can have a number of Grand Heists, which is publicly tracked and defaults to zero.

Grand Heists have a Description, which has no effect, but helps to create a good narrative.

Every Grand Heist must be completed by a Team. A Team must have at least 1 Thief in it. All Thieves in a Team are known as Members.
To create a Team, a Member must make a blog post with the names of every Member. This Team is created if every player mentioned responds to this blog post with for.

At any time, if a Team has met the Standard for an Grand Heist then they may Attempt it by making a blog post announcing as such. Such a Team is known as an Attemptor. A Thief not in the Team, or the City, must then respond with for if they can confirm the Attemptor has met the Standard. The Attemptor then makes a Notoriety Check, one for each Member. If they succeed, all Members may increase their Heists by 1. If they fail, all Members are placed in the Gaol. Each Thief may only claim each individual Heist once in the dynasty.

Any Thief who has claimed four Heists has achieved Victory.

The possible Heists, their Descriptions, and their Standards are as follows:

{| class="wikitable sortable"
|-
! Heist !! Description !! Standard
|-
| Mansion Jewels || Only the richest get into this mansion. You'll need to flash your cash - and there's the small matter of the 50 florin entrance fee… || This Team must have more than 200 Wealth. Pay 50 Florins to Attempt this Heist.
|-
| The Monk's Diamond || It takes speed to outrun the swift monks at the temple. Plus, the police station is right next door. Better have a good escape route. || No Members may have any Injuries. Perform one additional Notoriety Check for every ten Wealth this Team have. This Team must announce their intentions to perform this Grand Heist five days in advance.
|-
| Amethyst of Strength || The legendary Amethyst of Strength is held at a nearby museum. It doesn't actually grant strength, but it's surrounded by some pretty strong guards. || One Member must have the highest Arms value. No Members may have any Pouches.
|-
| First Prize || At the underground Bragging Competition, the judges are happy to turn a blind eye to any wrongdoings, as long as you're the best in something. || One Member must have the highest Notoriety. Perform an additional Notoriety Check for every Member.
|-
| Crystal Chandelier || At a fancy restaurant, the biggest gangs often have shootouts. If a notorious thief shows up, maybe they'll clear out - leaving the beautiful chandelier for you. || The current Target must be Restaurant. At least one Member must have a Notoriety of at least 48.
|}

Tried fixing my proposal..? if something’s wrong then i’m not going to edit it any more.

Proposal: 2 Armed 2 Dangerous

Fewer than a quorum not voting AGAINST. Failed 1 vote to 3 by Kevan.

Adminned at 16 May 2024 15:22:11 UTC

Add a Possession called “Knife” with value of 5 and with an effect of “This is a Weapon. Add 1 to the Party’s might when totaling it during the Haul”

Add a Possession called “Pistol” with value of 5 and with an effect of “This is a Weapon. If it is Loaded, add 3 to the Party’s might when totaling it during the Haul”

Add a Possession called “Shotgun” with value of 10 an effect of “This is a Weapon. If it is Loaded, DICE10 to the Party’s might when totaling it during the Haul”

Add a Possession called “Ammo” with value of 1

Add a subrule to Possessions called “Weapons”

Some Possessions are Weapons, as identified in their effects. Each Thief may have one Weapon in their inventory marked as Equipped, which is publicly tracked. Thieves that possess a Hand injury in which may not have a Weapon marked as Equipped. (If a Thief picks up a Hand Injury while having a Weapon marked as Equipped, that Weapon ceases to be Equipped).

A Thief may Equip, Unequip, or change which weapon of theirs is Equipped as a Street Action

Weapons may Loaded or Unloaded and is by default Unloaded (whether it is Loaded or Unloaded is publically tracked). A Thief may, any time as an atomic action, remove Ammo from their Inventory in order to set one Weapon in their Inventory to Loaded.

In the Burglary after the step “If the Party Might is less than the Defense of the Current Target, apply the Trap of the Current Target” add the step “Set all Equipped Weapons to be Unloaded” 

Add a target called “Gun Shop” with a Defense of 7, loot of “Add two randomly selected weapons and 3 Ammo to the Haul”, and Trap of “Each Thief whose plan was not Rest or Lay Low gains a random Injury, then rolls a DICE3 and if the result is 1 sustains a second random injury”

Proposal: Caught Holding The Bag

Timed out 2 votes to 0 with 1 unresolved Imperial DEF and 1 unresolved regular DEF. Enacted by Kevan.

Adminned at 16 May 2024 15:21:39 UTC

In the subrule “Notoriety”, after the text “If result is 1 then check fails”, add the following text:

, one randomly-selected Pouch (if they have any Pouches) is removed from their inventory,

If the proposal “Being Caught” was not enacted, then in the subrule “Notoriety”, after the text “If result is 1 then check fails”, add the following text:

, they lose 10 Notoriety,

As Clucky pointed out in another comment, it’s easy to make Notoriety not a big deal if most of your Florins are in Pouches. This removes the safety net and makes Notoriety a much more meaningful mechanic.

Proposal: Rehabilitation

Reached quorum 6 votes to 0 with one unresolved DEF. Enacted by Kevan.

Adminned at 16 May 2024 09:30:43 UTC

In the rule “Gaol”, add the following text:

At any time, a Free Thief may pay a fine of 15 Florins and then add themselves to the Gaol. This action is known as Surrendering.

In the subrule “Distribution”, after the text “For each Thief in Gaol, subtract 1 from their Time Served” add this text:

and subtract 5 from their Notoriety

Here’s a way to remove Notoriety faster, by serving time in Gaol. You can significantly reduce your chances of getting Caught in the future by paying the price of not being able to do anything for a few Hauls. It’s also a little bit of compensation if the other Thieves put you in Gaol against your will.

Proposal: Being Caught

Withdrawn. Failed by Kevan.

Adminned at 16 May 2024 07:57:46 UTC

Add more text to the end of the ‘Notoriety’ rule as follows:

Once a Thief is Caught, they lose half of their Notoriety rounded up.

now i’m at 42, i’m going to fail nearly everything.

Story Post: Haul: The Gemwright

JonathanDark, NadNavillus, Clucky, Juniper and 4st are agreed.

Adminned at 15 May 2024 08:23:41 UTC

Clucky, Juniper and NadNavillus spend a few hours Scouting out the old building in the jewelry quarter, before returning later to break into a back office where 4st can Unlock the safe. The team make a quick exit, barrelling out through an alley door that JonathanDark was trying and failing to Unlock from the other side.

The Haul is a neat 17 Florins and three Unappraised Gems.