HOU: Inventory Based Initiative

In a previous post I gave some broad thoughts on generally using a FILO Initiative System.

I also am going to be testing out using (relatively) static Initiative Values, which are determined directly based off a player character's Inventory Slots.

• Every character has ten Inventory Slots by default.
• Three of these are "Fast Slots" characters can freely grab items from, the rest require an action to grab them from their pack and such.
• Generally: most items take up one Slot each.
• Your character can carry up to 5 additional Items, but this makes them Encumbered; making them slower / less acrobatic / etc.
• If your character ever attempts to carry 16+ Inventory Slots of Items, they go at the bottom of Initiative and are immobilised.

• Your character's Initiative Value (IV) is equal to 10 - the number of filled Inventory Slots they currently have.
• (Carrying items in Encumbrance can lower your IV into the negatives).

When Initiative is called for, participants declare actions going from bottom to top. Then they are resolved going from top to bottom, to allow for all those FILO shenanigans.

I feel like overall this is a little game-y and abstracted, but still works well?

- As a player, you have to make the decision: do I carry more armour, equipment, etc. to be ready for any situation? Or do I try to go in with very little and rely on being quick?

- You can adjust your IV on the fly by just dropping shit. Heavily armoured knight needs to even the odds against a speedy boy? Dramatically tear off your armour and close the distance. Or is your party lugging a bunch of loot out of the dungeon? Is the loot worth your life, or is it better to try and figure out a clever way to retrieve it later?

- Having a hireling carry things becomes a really good strategy, but also puts that hireling actively at risk as they are slow and vulnerable.

- Originally I was going to consider having spellcasters be forced to carry a bunch of magical paraphernalia, which would also place them lower in turn order along with heavily armoured knights? But for now I figured as a better catchall, all magic goes at the bottom of Initiative regardless of what you're carrying, just as a general sort of balance.

- Any effects which play with Inventories now also play with Initiative. Besides making it fun to brew ideas, it also reinforces players needing to consider their Inventory. 

- Beware the naked guy speed running around with nothing but a sword.

Strain

This mechanic is pretty much ripped straight from the GLOGosphere (if anybody has a good citation let me know), but along with the above it gets recontextualized to do a lot more lifting.

Whenever players do something physically exhausting- such as using a specific ability, engaging in some physical activity, etc) they must fill one of their Inventory Slots with Strain as well. This Strain can only be cleared out by resting, relaxing, etc.

- So acquiring Strain sort of acts as another risk vs reward sort of mechanic for players to engage in. Do you do the flashy or decisive thing, but take a penalty to your Initiative & Inventory until you can take a rest? Or is it better to hold out and wait for a better time?

- Besides injuries / afflictions, it's also one of the primary motivators for having players take rests or downtimes to heal off their Strain.

- Since I'm going mostly diceless, Strain also acts as a way to settle direct physical contests by just auctioning how much Strain either side is willing to take on so that their desired outcome happens.

HOU: Word-Based Spellcasting, Diceless Version

A while back I shared my previous versions of a Word-based spell casting system. I've heavily revised it since though so, consider this a fresh-ish version. The basic guts of it go something like this:

To cast a spell: your character selects [Words] they know from their list of known [Words]- usually a [Verb] + [Noun] pairing- and describes what they are hoping to achieve with their spell and what they are targeting.

They then must determine what sort of Law(s) they must follow to cast the spell; sort of akin to this post at Was It Likely?. These Laws are given out by their templates, so different forms of spell casting might follow different Laws.

The rules your character must follow to learn [Words] and the specific rules by which they resolve these spells are determined entirely by the class templates which granted their spell casting ability.

That's really the main bones of it as far as the system-agnostic end of it goes. In a practical sense: imagine instead of writing unique spells, a lot of that energy gets shifted to going into creating unique ways for characters to interact with Words & unique Laws which they must follow in casting their spells.

1. Everyone interacts with [Words] differently depending on what "class" they are.

Besides there being a lot of variance with [Words], how a character acquires and uses [Words] also adds a lot of texture to how different forms of spell casters operate. This isn't just like, how a character literally learns a [Word] within the fiction of the setting, but I also mean on a practical mechanical level.

- What if you could only learn one Verb ever? one Noun? Creating a sort of hyper-specialised caster (a personal favourite of mine, Go Snake Wizard!) 

- What if your character only learned Nouns, but they could be flexible in their application?

- What about a character whom learns Adjectives?

- What if you didn't permanently learn [Words], but instead had to perform [Word] games that tell stories in order to use a [Word]?

- What if your character constantly had to be observant of whats around them, in order to pull [Words] from that and write freestyle poems to cast spells?

- What if your character could also use their [Words] to change their Laws? Or program their spells?

Certain [Words] are definitely very, very powerful (e.g. [Person]); so either limiting them or using them as high-end loot is important.

2. Basically: each Law for a spell is either a While or an If/Then statement.

I guess in theory there's probably other models that work? But wracking my brain this is what I thought was natural and practical.

"You can [Strike] [Lightning], but it only will strike the highest point nearby outdoors."

"While your character is touching the ground, they [Enhance] their [Strength]."

"If your character swallows an egg whole, then on the spot they can [Elongate] [Snake]."

Really the important part is that the Law needs to pose a significant penalty, restriction, etc. They need to make using the spell really fiddly and interesting and annoying to use, but fun to set up. Imagine trying to figure out how to [Strike] [Lightning] on a specific target in the middle of a dense city for example. Spells REQUIRING shenanigans by the player to activate.

If players want to do spell-research kind of stuff, creating or modifying Laws is a great way to do that too.

3. Some more personal, system-specific sort of magic thoughts related to my current rules draft:

- Since spell casting is super fiddly to activate and use, and it's also extra slow and interruptible, I don't intend to limit the actual usage rate of spell casting. Sling spells all day, be free wizard! The only mechanical limitation for that then is that I also limit spell casting so that it cannot restore wounds, heal the dead, etc. Any limited resource remains limited. (I personally also don't care for healers mechanically much anyway, but that's more a personal pick so grain of salt).

- I like every spell-caster to not just feel different, but to operate on different rules to each other whenever possible. The sort of chassis-differentiation thing from my last house rules carried over here, but now also the addition of Laws pushes that even further to make everyone a whacky bastard. Truly a precious revelatory yoink from Was It Likely.

- I feel like Words + Laws are easy to come up with on the fly as a GM, but I also hope the systems in play let players get loose with it too. In my last set of house rules, I had a player whom only could manipulate [Garments] who did all sorts of whacky anime bullshit despite that limitation, and just being surprised by players in that way is one of my favourite things.

HOU: Distress as Brain Posture, FILO, Other Combat Thoughts

(I laid out a sort of post-plan previously but not even one proper post in and I'm abandoning it. Sorry! But it's in the name of "just post" energy).

I mentioned my plan for a Balance-based HP system prior. More or less all of that remained true into the current draft, so I'm just going to jump off from there to quickly wrap up combat-thoughts.

Distress

As another character-sheet-attackable, imagine Posture HP again but for your mind. But different.

yes again JoJo- I swear I consume other things; this just keeps happening to be useful 

When something significantly unsettling, stressful, spooky, or ゴゴゴ happens- your character becomes Distressed. This isn't long-term stress or morale or anything like that, this is gauging pure jump-scare moment-to-moment adrenaline reaction sort of stuff.

With a moment to Steady themselves, your character can easily take a breath and recompose themselves; just like with their Balance for the Posture system.

But if some more bullshit catches them off guard, that means it's up to the player to pick whether its fight or flight.

• Fight: press on and face it, but you are shaky and easy pickings the whole time
• Flight: running away is honestly such a good strategy

Or for a little more nuance, there's the other 3 F's.

• Freeze: Freezing up in a dangerous situation is probably not advantageous (although, if you are in a safe enough spot that a friend can shake you out of it?), but I also can picture Distress being used in situations where taking a second to think can help as well. Giving a speech and your rival throws you off? Sitting in a slowly ticking death trap? Freaking out might mess you up more than the reaction tine lost.
• Forfeit: Surrender often can lead to unique situations!
• Faint: Okay this one probably for sure isn't ever going to be picked by the players, but it's not for them. Since their enemies also operate on the same rules, all of these 5 F's also can act as alternative non-violent ways of ending a conflict mechanically.

Afflictions

"Injuring" players is more codified as giving them "Afflictions"; as a sort of catch-all for any less-conventional injuries, mutations, etc. While I have some example ones written down, a lot of these can just be thought of as "placing a restriction on what the target can do." Slash their hand? Can't use that hand. Burn their eyes? Can't see anything. More creative mechanical options work too, but I figure on-the-fly this is simple & intuitive enough.

Engagement

Everyone (only sometimes) has a sort of secret extra layer of defence in melee combat: you actually have to be in range to swing a weapon at them.

In HOU, this might mean using your whole turn to 1. move up to them and 2. begin combat with them proper. While it's a little less intuitive, I think it will be important mechanically?

• It really really disincentives charging in swinging. If you run right in and start the fight, you're basically giving them the chance to swing at you first. Instead either circling each other and waiting for the right move, ganging up on someone, using cheap tricks, etc is way safer!
• If the target also happens to be faster than you and you run in to engage them 1:1, they basically can easily wipe you out without an exit strategy.
• Conversely and more importantly: it gives players a chance to react with any sort of violent monster that would run right up to them and start swinging.
• Spells & Projectile Weapons sort of ignore this, but they also tend to be slower in Initiative and have other considerations to worry about.

Weapons

I have boiled everything down into 5- technically*- kinds of weapons.

This all starts with just like, your stock standard one-handed Melee weapon, serving as the archetype against which any other kind of weapon is judged.

• Small: In my previous house rules grappling basically meant that targets using small weapons auto-hit each other, and targets using big dumb weapons auto-missed. That sort of ethos of grappling-as-equalizer carries on here too. Per the Balance post, a target wearing a ton of armour might be real tough to deal with in conventional 1:1 non-magical combat; but getting the drop on them and grabbing and shanking them where they are unarmored hopefully feels like an intuitive strategy for players.

• Ranged: With every character essentially having limited actions, theater of the mind, & 2 HP- Ranged weapons would basically be unstoppable. Besides just including cover as balance, making Ranged Weapons act lower in Initiative felt natural. It gives players times to observe the threat, and dramatically dive to cover before they become pincushions.

• Heavy: Since there is no HP, Big Weapon = More Damage wasn't on the table. So instead, again trying to think of real combat a bit, Big Weapon = Controlling the Space, like swinging around a big sword or holding people off with a polearm. Mechanically this became attacking targets without being engaged; making the threat more naturally that charging in against the guy with the big weapon means they can poke you before you poke them.

• Binding: I'll level with you: I wanted a non-violent option for players and thought all the ropey/chain weapons were a good way to do it.

*Technically whether a weapon is blunt / slashing / piercing sort of matters, but really its the sort of thing that can be figured contextually right? Mace beats skeleton, axe beats plant, etc.

FILO Initiative

I originally adopted a FILO each-character-has-a-turn system for a few reasons.

1. In TTRPGs, I Don't Like Healers

A lot of better & older writing exists on this so I'll be brief, but the role of "sit and undo our mistakes" in more standard D&D type games stinks.

In older version of my house rules, instead I adopted an Estus Flask sort of system as a precursor to my current Balance system. Every player could heal themselves a little bit by just steadying themselves. If a player still wanted to engage in supportive play, instead they had to distract enemies, make openings or protect players to create that precious window for them to take care of themselves.

That sort of thought carries over here, just even moreso when everyone sorta has 2 HP.

2. Interrupting People is Fun

You ever think of those scenes in martials arts flicks or like swashbuckling sword movies where the bad guy is about to strike someone down and then another character unexpectedly jumps in to defend them?

Or in a heist movie when someone does a last minute improvisation to cover up a mistake?

Or like you ever play a game and someone is about to do a winning play but then you last minute stop them?

I love that shit- and FILO is a really good way of getting that dynamism and turnabout energy in any situation, combat or non-combat.

3. Timing as a Form of Defence

Besides whats been brought up previously- being fast lets you dictate fights + interrupting people trying to harm you- the existence of a clear & visible turn order also gives players a little buffer, sort of like a strategy game.

You know whose going to be coming up when, so the timing & information really help players formulate strategies... if they aren't distracted, which blessedly I haven't had to deal with as much since college.

4. Timing Makes for Fun Character Abilities

Depending on how deep a breakdown I do for the list of abilities I wrote, I can go into this more in-depth, but design-space wise I love letting players bend rules and cheat. Messing with the turn order or action economy in general is a nice intuitive fun way to provide them then with defence, offense, utility, etc all in one.

Heading Out Unknowingly - Intro

original art provided by my lovely wife, CV Pham

Since I read this awesome post at Was It Likely, I've been itching to give my house rules a radical rewrite. For what interests me more specifically in play- seeing people deal with strange situations- it just made sense!

I initially talked about some of the ideas I was forming in this post, and I intend to sort of formalise and continue with that in order to share ideas in post-form over the next few weeks.

1. Balance: a Posture-based HP System
2. Distress, FILO, Engagement, Afflictions, Weapons
3. Diceless Spellcasting using Words & Laws
4. Inventory Based Initiative
5. ??? - (Honestly don't know how many posts I'll need, you get the plan though)

If you'd rather also just read the whole thing now sans commentary, it is also finished and out now on itch as Heading Out Unknowingly.

It isn't quite GLOGosphere and I think it's not quite as true or as cool as Cottonmouth-proper, but its something I made heavily inspired by both after lurking and watching for years.

Thank you all for everything.

Columbos & Sherlocks: L'Inspecteur

Remember that one brief month when people were hacking Cloak and Sword games into classical murder mysteries?

Class: L'Inspecteur 

Starting Paraphernalia: relatively modest shabby clothes, a conspicuous injury or well-controlled innocent sort of vice, some sort of unconventional skill not befitting an investigator (gardening, opera, etc)

You are not an officer of the law or a professional detective. You are a little old woman who professionally tends gardens, an old priest who rides around the village on his bicycle, an elderly novelist who travels place to place for writing inspiration. Wherever you go though, you always seem to be chased by murder.

George Fort Gibbs, for G. K. Chesterton's short story "The Sign of the Broken Sword"

Who, Me?: As long as you actively keep up appearances as doddering, old, and a little daft- characters whom do NOT have Esprit for you will treat you as a nosy nuisance they wish to be rid of as soon as possible. They are willing to do any small task to get rid of you- answer a question, let you view their room, etc.- but they would never do anything as drastic as attempting to harm you, let alone kill you.

People Person: As long as both characters are in the same room you can tell what, if any, sort of relationship they have (e.g. romance, rivalry, family, held Esprit, etc). This does not work if they are obscured, dead, or wearing any sort of mask or face covering.

Connections: By considering two pieces of evidence in your mind for an hour, you can determine if they are connected or not as well as generally how they are connected. You cannot use this ability again until you uncover another piece of evidence or some other development happens with the investigation.

One More Thing: If you ask someone a question they weren't expecting or ask them at an unexpected time, they are compelled to either answer truthfully or to offer up a barely-believable lie; the kind that might be suspicious but not actively evidence of wrongdoing.

Astound the Experts: If your character makes some keen deduction, uncovers an overlooked piece of evidence, or otherwise performs some impressive detective work- any officers of the law or experts in a field useful to the immediate investigation hold Esprit for your character until the end of the investigation.

Know a Guy: Once per investigation, you may declare your character "knows a guy." This guy is an expert in some skill or field which none of the current party members or NPCs involved in the investigation possesses. They may interpret or examine a single clue or piece of evidence for the party to completely contextualise and offer expert advice on it (e.g. a forensics specialist to examine blood spatters, a clockmaker to act as an expert witness to check if the clock was tampered with to potentially disprove an alibi, etc). This "guy" can either be a recurring minor character who "happened to be in town," or a new minor bit part depending.

Detective Vision: Your character can tell if evidence has been tampered with, or if a piece of evidence is conspicuously absent. They cannot tell what is missing or how something has been altered, they merely know that "something isn't quite right here..."

Did It For Love: If anyone lies on behalf of someone else, you can instantly tell that they are lying. You don't know for who or why exactly they are lying, just that they are.

Has There Been a Murder?: Upon first visiting a town or city, roll 1d10. On a 10, a local prominent figure has recently been murdered and the culprit is still at large. If your character was already investigating a murder, somehow these murders are connected.

Stay in Town: Any chivalrous or honest folk must heed your orders to stay in town at their residences while a murder investigation is occurring; or they may appear guilty. Any dishonourable, meal-a-day sorts though may come and go as they please; but this will mark them as a guilty person in the eyes of the law.

Announcement: If your character possess some key piece of evidence that was formerly hidden (e.g. the murder weapon which was thrown in the lake, fibres from the culprits' jacket, etc) they may shake it around and make a public announcement about it. The culprit, whomever they are, are compelled to make some move to cover up their crime. This is done completely secretly, however it still done sloppily (creating yet more inconsistencies or evidence thanks to the tampering) or without alibi (the culprit acting at a suspicious time).

Oh, Really?: Whenever your character makes some form of obvious mistake (e.g. getting a time wrong, a character's name wrong, etc) any NPC whom witnesses it is compelled to correct them, even if this would divulge other information (e.g. invalidating an alibi, revealing they know a character they claimed to have never met before). If multiple NPCs are present, this ability defaults to the smuggest most egotistical one present.

J'Accuse!: Your character may publicly announce that they have solved the case. All suspects and persons involved in the case must show up at the time and location of your choosing. All present have Esprit for you until you are done presenting your case, and none of them may actively harm anyone else while they hold Esprit for you. If your character ever fails to accuse the correct culprit, they lose this ability and may never gain it again.

Howdunnit: Once ever, you may declare that your character knows exactly what happened. The GM must describe the murder, in perfect detail, leaving out no clue or tell. Now, this just leaves your character to figure out how to prove the facts of the case in a way that would hold up in the eyes of the law.

Angevine Cloak and Sword

The province of Angevine is located along the far borders of Manteu, nestled in the valleys of the Bebrye Mountains.

It is an afterthought in the minds of many noble families bickering in En Plus Paris, a territory that has changed hands between the neighbouring powers a dozen times in the many different wars which have occurred across Ganymed. Even then most of these conflicts were the boring margin notes of glamorous campaigns; with perhaps the only noteworthy event being the gallant march of General Ymlin leading his army across the frozen mountain passes and into the heart of the country (a move so bold and yet so gauche so as to be unreproducible).

To those aligned with the Cardinal and his interests however, the question of the Principalities weighs heavy on the mind.

Crespi

Just barely past living memory, the prominent D'Angevine family was all but wiped out in the Patte de Chat Massacre. Some suspect the machinations of the former Grand Duke and his tragic folly, while others blame it on a raid by a foreign power or perhaps a plot of the Dragoman. The only survivor of the Cat's Paw, Baroness Coulrina D`Angevine, never spoke of the incident while she lived; instead living a private life away from court with her close personal friend, one of the Marquesses of neighbouring Les Lances, at her estate. Both of them lived to ripe old age and died weeks apart from each other some ten or fifteen years ago, leaving no formal heirs.

However, if the rumour is to be believed, the clergymen attending the dying Baroness witnessed a miracle.

Whispering the traditional prayers of her people with her dying breaths, the Baroness' body burst forth into the first seven of the holy servitors that are the Principalities.

Had this happened once, it would have been a miracle propelling D'Angevine to Sainthood. The fact that now multiple members of the faithful in Angevine have now had similar miracles occur over the last decade or so, is what has lead the Cardinal and his flock to worry.

Mstislavovo Gospel book cover

Principality

(also called Rulers, halfangels, or to doubters: favele)

Physical Description

• Each Principality shares the same "default" appearance, sort of looking like each one uses the same soft-faced boy or young woman as their starting "base."
• Each one additionally has 1d4 unique traits to distinguish themselves. These are usually the most prominent features of whomever birthed them (e.g. a Principality born to a man with a long nose and prominent smile lines would likely have a long nose and prominent smile lines).
• Principalities do not have genitals, anuses, etc.
• The neck of each Principality is wreathed with tiny white bird wings.
• Each has a varying number of wings, usually around 2d6. The number of wings is viewed auspiciously by Angevine locals.
• At rest, the wings sort of fold up around the neck, like a priest's collar.
• The Principality may, at will, flex out their neck-wings. When they do they seem to glow with the light of a migraine aura, and you can see the sun through your closed eyes or the building you're in or if it's night. The wind also seems to rush around them, harmlessly jostling everything (like that thing in Ghibli movies sometimes? I would find a clip but I can't be assed to search for it).
• They seldom do this though, as it is fearsome. Typically it is only reserved to stir Esprit in the penitent or the downtrodden of the faith, and call them into action.

Physiology

• Principalities seemingly are born to answer the prayers of the faithful in Angevine (and only in Angevine; though outside members of the faith on pilgrimage appear to be able to produce them). They still very seldomly appear, and do not appear to every petitioner. What seems to help the odds are:
• praying specifically in the name of St. D'Angevine (dubiously heretical considering she has not formally received sainthood)
• being elderly
• being an orphan
• having a prominent frailty, disability, etc
• being a child 
• being particularly innocent- a hermit, a virgin, etc
• praying a lot for this to happen. a LOT
• going on pilgrimages or quests or other chivalric/holy things
• Principalities are born by bursting forth from the heads of the faithful.
• This literally splits their heads open. The process is excruciating and takes about three days- one for the Principality to claw its way out, one for the wound to scab over after, and one for it to heal into a feather-lined scar.
• Despite the pain, the only lasting harm to the faithful is usually the feather-lined scar, which is usually viewed as a mark of veneration.
• Principalities are born fully formed.
• (You know those depictions of medieval/renaissance babies drawn as weird little adult men? Reverse that- these are like adults who have been drawn as little babies).
• Principalities' minds are human-like, but either due to their nature or their experiences they aren't quite human.
• While they are generally a little confused and naive, the mind of a Principality is fully formed with a handful of skills useful to running and maintaining society (e.g. a Principality born knowing how to collect tax, knowing how to administer orphanages, etc).
• Principalities are not motivated by fearsomeness, violence, danger, etc. You could completely gut one and they would be completely unmoved beyond the waste it makes.
• Similarly: they are pacifistic by nature, and cannot bring themselves to directly harm another living being.
• Principalities do not need to eat or drink. Instead: they are physically maintained by holding Esprit for the faithful.
• Typically shortly after being born, this manifests as admiration and praising of their parent. However they may also may latch onto any number of holy men, martyrs, Saints, etc
• When a Principality dies, their neck wings unfurl and their heads pop off before flying off into the sunset. Amongst their kind, they claim that they are leaving their non-angelic half behind to join with the rest of the angelic host until the end of days.

Honestly all the cherub heads are giving me deja vu. Did somebody else make a post at some point with like a ton of baby heads with wings? Feels very GLOG, hope I'm not treading old ground

Compared to the other provinces of Manteu, Angevine was lacking in almost every way. Nothing but small hamlets sipping at rivers of ice-melt, rime-covered bushes of stout dark berries, and valleys lined with Patte de Chat flowers. No great armies, no wise scholars, no plentiful resources.

However, now Angevine has been blessed with a resource in the Principalities.

Due to a very dubious loophole, technically each Principality is kin to Baroness D`Angevine through their angelic birth. This means technically each one is part noble, partially of their parent's lineage, and (potentially) part angelic being. To bolster his resources for his war with the queen in the surrounding provinces and avoid the question, the King grants each newly born Principality the title of Vidame through arrangements with the local bishops.

The eldest and most fiery (relatively, in the terms of angelic pacifists) of the original Principalities born from Baroness D`Angevine is the exception, instead inheriting her barony as Baron D`Angevine L'Lèvre. However, the Baron largely operates in the region through his many advisors, and is seldom seen outside of holy days.

This all is deeply upsetting to the existing local nobility, largely Queen loyalists, who quietly seek to undermine and reestablish things properly in the region without upsetting the faithful or the peasantry. Wouldn't want to risk a revolt, schism, etc. on top of the current civil conflict.

In practical terms: the Principalities all are born to labor for the betterment of Angevine through all manner of holy functions to maintain society. They are technically subjects of the King, however in practice they answer to the Cardinal. They are also known for their charity and magnanimity, which has earned them the devotion of many poor faithful souls.

Principalities in power in Angevine also have given rise to their own unique forms of court intrigue.

• While they cannot directly harm one another, they very much can order harm upon another for the sake of a greater good. If they witness it though, they themselves immediately will die; and bringing it up too much can make them ill.
• Halfangels can commit minor violence if its in defence of the innocent. So, if one needs to fight, often they will bring around a child or an old person to defend in the fray. Often this is their parent. Also often they are not very good at fighting, because of course they aren't.
• Angevine is a land of hospitality, where every guest is expected to give a gift to their host. So violence between two Principalities often takes the form of horrific white elephant feuds. Given their pure nature, Principalities cannot neglect or turn down the gift; so to do maximum harm one might gift the other something that requires intense and laborious personal care, like a rare plant from the Academie Gramarie or a creature from far flung Noblessie.

Cloak and Sword: Oaf

The recent revival of the old Cloak and Sword bandwagon has been so great, I decided to revisit it.