Desiderius raises an eyebrow incredulously. "I sympathize with the loss of your esteemed pater and the ill times Gallus Florensis has fallen upon, but no amount of pity or understanding will prevail upon Voluntas to forsake our legal, rightful claim to this vis source. It is critical to my project for the forthcoming Contest, though I may be willing to trade or barter once my project is completed."
I don't. Believe that Voluntas has a legal, valid claim as I discovered upon my joining Galus Florensus. So mani magi being deprived of power. . She smiles sweetly. How long until we might depart. I'm sure you have much to do with our Vis.
"Fortunately for us, and the Order at large, fact is not dependent upon your belief. And I would have expected filii of Justinius to have the grace not to exhibit impertinence to one who has just saved her life, but it seems the apple has fallen quite far from the tree. Now, it appears that my associate has collected our rightful, legal property, so we will be going. Good day." He Leaps back to Voluntas, leaving behind the stench of rotting flesh.
Phessalia puts the lead phial in her pocket and likewise Leaps away.
(Corvus is not in sight.)
The goblins will not disperse any time soon. They seem to be confused after their Queen departs, and mill about in frustration and anger.
Any body language to pick up on?
Attravere punches a fist into his other hand, then turns to Cygna with a sigh. "Seems we're simply outmatched. Probably best to wait until they disperse. If they do. It would save you from one of my castings and might give me a chance to rest."
He then lies down.
For whom? And what are you looking for here?
Who was she just talking to? Who could she reasonably presume to see?
Nevermind, I'm done with this particular thread.
Cygna moves to the edge of the cottage and looks down at the (what she believes to be) imps. [color=red]"Sophronia! Are you okay?" Cygna yells down. ((I think she saw Sophronia try to make it to the cottage and then get pulled in by Desidarius.))
[color=red]"Will you be able to make it back to the covenant okay?"
Assuming she gets an affirmative on both parts, she looks at Attravere. [color=red]"Please don't look for a couple of minutes." She removes her robe, her cobbled shoes, and her hair-shirt, and sets them neatly on the roof before assuming her heartbeast form. [color=red]"Would you be so kind as to return these to me when you get back to the covenant?"
"Sophronia is still here?" He'll glance sit up and glance about.
Once Cygna makes her request he'll lay back down.
With his eyes staring straight up, "Certainly."
[color=red]"I believe she's in the cottage, seeking refuge from the...imps or whatever they are."
[color=red]"Thank you." She will then fly back to the covenant and resume her daily business...perhaps slamming doors and rattling the pans a little louder than she would like, as this is yet another epic fail on her part. Another in what seems like a growing list of her failures.
She could also see Phessalia just outside the window. I'm pretty sure you were already aware that Desiderius was appalled at Sophronia's behaviour (he made no attempt to hide that), so I honestly didn't know what kind of "body language" you were looking for.
Neither the other two magi saw where Sophronia went; she landed just short of the cottage, and after the horde passed, she was gone. (Desiderius cast a ReCo at Voice range.)
Sorry, I wasn't aware I could see her. That wasn't clear to me. The way I read the post was that I saw Desiderius leave and Attravere and Cygna saw Phessalia leave. I thought you were combining posts, because they couldn't see Desiderius leave.
Like I said, I'm failing to see the point of this part of the thread. If we have no legal claim to the vis, we should realistically know it, or at least from a metagame perspective I should know that she does or doesn't know it or is mistaken in her understanding, perhaps tragically so. All I have received in response are vague statements like it sucks to be in the sticks. I'd be fine if she had a legal theory and it was wrong. I can RP a character believing something that isn't true. So, let me know what to believe and I'll RP it. Please be explicit, make it public or private.
Es macht nichts.
One of the few things players have some sense of control of is what their character knows or believes, or can reasonably believe. Of course, she just committed the crime of depriving a magus of their power by collecting the Intellego vis, and if that's the case, I'd like to know if I'm going to be facing a trial story. IMO, it's a reasonable request.
You can expect that Libellas will file charges against Sophronia, as she herself filed the claims and would have been sure to cross all her T's and dot all her i's in filing all the paperwork on Libellas' behalf. (There may BE a loophole, but if so, it's something she's not aware of, or she would have preempted it when she was still batting for the other team.) She is savvy enough to realise her best chance to escape censure there is to resort to underhanded dealings, but she is certain Jonaquil will come at her with all she's got.
You can also expect that Voluntas will maintain their claim and fight for it, though based on Phesallia's reputation, she is doubtful that they will file charges for contesting the vis-- the horde of faeries stampeded through before anyone from GF had lifted a finger, and you were a half second away from almost certain death. Defending one's own property only goes so far, and public opinion is already strongly against Phessalia, so they are unlikely to add insult to injury by accusations of Depriving.
In talking with the other magi she becomes convinced that Lucia Jerbitonis is grateful for Iapetus controlling the mob of angry faeries, and is unlikely to charge GF with a crime, though Schola may still maintain the validity of their claim for the Imaginem source.
The other covenant's claims were registered officially and lawfully. Unbeknownst to any of your characters but Attravere, the records of all those rival claims were destroyed in an "accidental" fire at the Mercer House, and Gallus Florensis' re-registered claims were filed immediately afterward. Your characters won't know that unless Attravere chooses to share that information, which he thusfar has not, ostensibly because it would make his House look bad.
I've given you the basis upon which your rivals are building their claims. Legally there is no precedent for a covenant wanting to contest having lost its covenant status, as all dead covenants in Stonehenge have previously stayed dead, so it is quite literally entirely up to the players, how you choose to try and counter the arguments against your covenant's claims. The most unequivocal way to get rival claims dismissed is to prove your covenant never lost quorum, but that will prove difficult because when you signed the charter, the signatures were dated. Liliana is the only original member remaining; can you accumulate and provide any evidence (legitimate or otherwise) to the survival of any of the previous magi?
And naturally, Stonehenge is pretty bloody corrupt; here, you can get away with anything short of blatant diabolism if you buy the votes you need.
I'm really not sure how much more spoonfeeding you want or expect here.
And for the whopping clue-by-four:
There's a faerie doppelganger of Leona floating about nearby. She has NOT been inconspicuous.
Can you "prove" the survival of one more? There is only one active Quaesitor in the Tribunal, who is drastically overworked, and unlikely to have mich time to spare in investigating anything - either for you, or against you.
Then don't dangle things like, if you don't do X, you strengthen their claim. That is a patently false statement. They have a claim, it would appear to be legal, we do not. If we're to go along the lines of being corrupt, fine, I'd have liked to know that. I would've liked to have based my characters actions on what I could reasonably believe at the time. In other words, I would never have let Sophronia collect the Intellego vis, nor be involved with this story, without having some sort of cover. AFAICT, we have no allies of note, were are utterly alone, and again, AFAICT the interactions I've had with my House suggest that they have provided all the support they intend to for some time. So, don't call it spoonfeeding, call it adequately informing a player that is. Yes, I've read a lot of what has gone on, but sometimes it is exceedingly difficult to put pieces together and figure out what's going on.
I would appreciate a retcon, as Sophronia's actions are inconsisent with my intent for the character. IF that's not possible, she sends Jonny a gift basket of Intellego vis, signed,
with all my love,
Sophronia XOXO
See, this (Leoona) is something I didn't pick out, exactly my point. I think I've read a lot of what's gone on, but things get missed. And, again, would my character have any reason to know this (Leona)?
Well a big problem with this is that the knowledge is all out there, if the pcs pool it. The "if" being the operative word.
Sinmore believes the faerie in the woods IS Leona-- contracted lycanthropy from it. Cygna and Attravere have also seen it and know it isn't Leona (Spring vis gathering 1220, Death and Taxes), but you can provide an eyewitness who can swear truthfully that she "saw" Leona in spring 1220, and would happily show off the lion claw scars.
Note that you do not have to be shady about it-- you could work above the table and try to figure out what you can do to get the others to drop their claims, but so far no one has seemed to have any interest in that.
That request for action seemed to endorse the theory that we had some loophole to back up our vis claims. It's my fault for not clarifying what my character could reasonably know are the result of her actions before acting. Now that I have a better idea of how you run a saga, I will make a more concerted effort to clarify what my understanding of the options that my character can reasonably know.
Not any kind of loophole-- just pointing out that if they can show no one tried to contest the vis, that makes it more difficult to convince the Tribunal that Gallus Florensis believes it has any rightful claim.