This will be another re-run of my "Adventures in Role Play" (AiRP) campaign.
You may want to read the Amber thread in the Game Proposal Forum for some further background.
Please read the latest post in this thread before doing anything else!

"Along Divers Ways" is a Play-By-Post adaptation of my "Adventures in Role-play" introduction to Amber Dice-less role-play.

It's setting is non-canonical in the true sense of Amber but is set in an Amber Universe approximately 5 Amber years after the "Keep of the Thirteenth Hour" Events, which in turn occurred 5.5 years after the End of the Pattern Fall war.

The "Keep of the Thirteenth Hour" was a previous Amber FtF introductory campaign. As Amber history records it, these events were known as "The Rodian Wars".
There were 2 potential outcomes to this, but things went awry and the repair of the Pattern failed at the final hurdle (not that any of the characters will have any idea about this).

It's been 5 years, Amber time since, storms rage across Shadow making it's traversal either difficult or impossible, cutting off and isolating huge swathes of Shadow, including, amongst others, all the Golden Circle States, the Central belt around Yggdrasil, and the Courts of Chaos.

The campaign also non-canonical in that I've changed all the names - I just hope I can remember who is who (or don't slip up and use the wrong name).. Those familiar with Amber shouldn't have much difficulty working out who is who.

Character Concepts and Creating Characters
Characters will initially know nothing about each other, initial characters originating on different Shadow Earths, with later additions originating from shadows as campaign progression allows. In almost all cases they will probably known nothing about Amber, The Courts or anything else Amber related (there are reasons why some characters may know about some things). All new characters that join the campaign will start from the same position as the original characters. They will have neither Pattern nor Logrus abilities and will have to learn from scratch.

The campaign is designed for people who know nothing about Amber, the Amber Multiverse(Shadows), and/or dice-less Role-play. If you're familiar with the canonical Amber background, as per the 10 books, then you're welcome to play just don't assume that what you know is true, happened, happened as per the books, or anything else.

At the current point in the campaign all of the existing characters have reached the point where they can manifest the Pattern, have the basic Mindwalk the summoned sign/Pattern sight, and are learning to Shadow Walk.

At the current point in the campaign,new characters can only be introduced at a point the existing characters can encounter them in shadow.
As noted in the opening paragraph 'New' characters will pretty much have to start from scratch. This is very much connected with the campaign history. In very simple terms, anybody who was known in Amber at the time of the 'Rodian War' that is not on a very select list of Amberites would have been exterminated in the early stage of the war.
Only those with Amberite blood who've never been anywhere near a Pattern and/or were completely unknown in Amber survived, which is where the characters all stem from.

As with all PBM games 'Real Life'@TM happens and people drop out. This means I am  looking for players to take over existing characters. This is the only manner in which you can play a character who already has Pattern abilities!

Please jump to the bottom of the thread and find the reference for which characters are currently available.
When we reach a point suitable to introduce any new characters then it will be indicated in the latest 'Bump' post.

If you choose to join you are going to need to catch up on the background, even if you think you're familiar with Canonical Amber. Events have moved on considerably since the books. So don't assume that anything you know is true or correct.

One of the primary drivers for this start, apart from learning what's happened across Shadow, is how characters who know nothing of their heritage (true in most cases) react when they're had their whole world turned on its head, and everything they thought they knew about the world and their place in it, turns out to be completely different from anything they thought was true.
This message was last edited by the user at 20:17, Thu 18 Apr.

How long (months, years) real time do you envision spending on the "Zero" phase of "Zero to Hero"?

What sort of attachment is it, as there may be other options that do not require email.

In reply to evileeyore (msg # 2):


How long is a piece of string?

It mostly depends on how fast the characters work through things, how fast they post, and how much interaction there both between characters, between characters and NPCs, and between the characters and the environment.

They have a huge amount to learn, not only in terms of acquiring "powers", but also in terms of the whole "Amber" background and everything that has happened. How long would it take you to unlearn everything you thought you know about how the universe worked and learn what the new reality is, it's history, and it's politics?

And I have quite a lot of scenarios for them to work through as the process of coming to terms with the new reality..very much learning on the job in a lot of cases.

I send the character sheets as "Word" documents, but I can send as PDFs, or ODT files, or upload them to "WeTransfer" and send the link via rMail.

In terms of posting rate the game will proceed as fast as the slowest poster.

So if somebody goes on holiday for 2 weeks, doesn't tell me, and I need their input for their character then things will get held up till they respond.
If I know in advance I may be able to anticipate things.
I'm in the UK so US players posting "Overnight" European time may get a response the following morning (UK) time. A lot depends on how busy I am on any given day, and not only do I have a full-time job with a work's firewall that prevents access to a lot of sites, I also have other hobbies that may have priority at times. I do however try and respond to posts on a daily basis.

Ah... why do we have to learn all that before the apron strings are cut and the PCs are free to fly?  A lot of amber's background is often learned (for me anyway) by getting out into the Shadows and experiencing the reality of it.  Finding the weird places on the map, questioning the poeple who live there, and then figuring out what to do next.

Like, I don't have to learn the entire history of Asia in order to learn martial arts.  Didn't even have to learn the history of the martial art or any politics, just started learning how to "boot some head" (so to speak).

I get it, some teachers are going to be "You learn it my way or the highway"... but again this comes back to "how much zero" are you imposing?


Right, so do you have any idea of how long you expect or hope for that to take?  You aren't new to PbP, you've got to have some idea in mind you are aiming for.


It can't be copy/pasted into rMail or the Character Sheet function in the game?


It's a really good thing to set an expected pace.  If you say "I expect a post at least every two days†, I plan to be able to post every day for each thread (and no more than that)†, if you go more than three days I will move things along for the thread, if you're longer than that I will NPC you until you can be sidelined.  If you need to be away, please let us know when you're going to be absent and how long for."

The above would tell really fast posters, the type who prefer say Discord/IRQ, that your game might not be their cuppa, and Players who can barely manage a post a week to maybe also give you a pass, instead of wasting time making a character and then being sidelined within a month.  And specifically the "†" sets a posting expectation for prospective Players, what you will hold yourself to and what you will hold them to.  It's really useful to set that sort of a schedule even if...


See, this tells me that you will probably be posting at least every other day.  A nice pace, not breakneck, but also not so slow as to get nowhere ever.

However, "the game will proceed as fast as the slowest poster" means if someone only posts once a week, the game will crawl, Players quit within a few months, and it will completely fall apart... unless you get really lucky and that's everyone's preferred posting speed.

Your analogy doesn't hold. You knew Martial Arts existed, what they were about, and something of their history before you started learning an Martial Art.
If you didn't have any idea that Martial Arts existed, and were suddenly told that Martial Arts existed, and that you had to learn one, then knowing something about them becomes significantly relevant.


The Characters don't know the Pattern exists, or the Logrus exists, or in many cases that Magic exists, or that Trump exists, or what they may be able to do with any of them..


It's a "how long is a piece of string" question, and depends on what characters do or don't do, and/or what options they choose to pursue at what time.
When I ran this the first time, I had envisaged a couple of months for the first part, realistically having run this once, then realistically 4 months, but that's a meaningless answer as you have no idea what I deem the first part entailing.


Does RPoL support .docx or .odt character sheets? I'm still trying to work out all the facilities offered by the site.


True, but I'm reasonably flexible, but yes a reasonable pace would be expected, and yes once a week would mean that things wouldn't progress as fast as I'd like, but sometimes RL gets in the way.

I currently have 3 players with completed characters and a 4th in the works.
Really need 2 to 3 more players before I kick things off.
So if you're considering playing, then submit your questionnaires sooner rather than later please.

I'm still looking for 2 or 3 more players.
Once the game starts there is no facility to take onboard new characters for quite a while, and even then the same basic restrictions as for the starting game will apply. If I start with my current players then anybody wanting to join will have to take over a "starting" character type NPC.

Last Call..
I'm about to pull all the players together so if you were thinking of playing say so now..
After this point I have no facility to take onboard new characters for quite a while, and even then the same basic restrictions as for the starting game will apply.
Anybody wanting to join after this will have to take over a "starting" character type NPC, and catchup on all the background..