Overlord's Orders II

[Redwall Musician]

"That's why I pressured Daniel into using it. He had used me for his brain washing fun with the beavers," said Musician.

[DanielofRedwall]

"The beavers pressured me, in to brainwashing Musician, though! They can be pretty persuasive..." Daniel then shuddered.

[James Gryphon]

"I see.

Well, regardless of any distractions, the fact is that there was one person piloting, and they should have been more careful with what they did to my base. Besides, if it wasn't for their music and their games, none of those distractions would have been there in the first place, so...

... Taggerung of Redwall, you're finished."

The capsule Taggerung was standing in shot up into the air, and, strangely, went through the ceiling, which remained perfectly intact afterwards.

"The capsule he's in will be delivered to a convenient place where the authorities will eventually find him. As my former body double, they'll believe he is the leader of this so-called terrorist group, and get off of my case.

Now then.

The last five missions I sent your group on were all failures. Five of your comrades are now gone. Would you like to guess what will happen to you next?"

[DanielofRedwall]

"Ummm... You're going to dismiss us?" Asked Daniel, hopefully, although he knew that what was coming would be much worse. He started shaking all over and his teeth chattered insanely.

[Redwall Musician]

Musician's heart pounded slightly, but she didn't let anyone see she was nervous. She then turned to James and smiled, "I suppose, oh great and wise ruler, that you shall do as you please. For I am but a servant and I am here to do as you bid."

[James Gryphon]

OOC: Sorry for the delay; I had a bit of writer's block, but now I think I know how to proceed.

There was a long silence. The servants began to wonder if the Overlord planned on just leaving them there to die in the darkness, when finally his voice came again, this time asking a strange question.

"Tell me, how are you feeling right now?"

[DanielofRedwall]

DanielofRedwall thought awhile about this question, before replying, "Curious to see what you do too us, which I know will be completely fair, as you are a very judge ruler, and maybe a bit nervous." Secretly, he wondered why he didn't take Redwall Musician's approach earlier, like on the last question.

[Redwall Musician]

Musician gave a carefree smile, "I feel like I should behave." She was hungry and it was given away when her tummy grumbled. "And I feel as though I need scoff. Haven't eaten since this morning."

[James Gryphon]

"I see.

Musician, get out of my sight. Someone will contact you in the normal way, if I ever desire your service again."

The capsule slid up, leaving Musician's movements unhindered. She crept away into the darkness, in the direction of the only remaining normal submarine. A minute passed, then Daniel could hear it cruise away from the station.

"Now then.

The fact is, I would be concerned about someone who wasn't at least a little nervous, in the face of imminent disaster. Reckless regard for a threat is not a trait beneficial to self-preservation."

The lights in the station came on, revealing the control panel and the entrances, but the room was empty. Daniel noticed, for the first time, several small speakers across the ceiling.

"I haven't been here on this station in person in years -- and the fact is, I didn't even require any of the items I sent all of you to obtain. Recovering them would have been beneficial, but I had something different in mind.

I brought all of your original group, my most trusted servants, here for a special purpose, and contacted other of my subjects to ensure that you would fail all of your missions. Don't be overly concerned with their fates; none of the punishments I prescribed were fatal.

I did this to test you, reasoning that the best individuals would make their way to the last, and I think I indeed have a suitable person.

Soon, I will depart on a very long journey, and I need a lieutenant to take control of my empire for the time that I'm gone. Seeing that you have made it to this point, I imagine that you'll fit that role adequately.

Everything you need to know to maintain and control my territory is on the especially large submarine I have docked with this station. Make good use of it to expand my influence, if at all possible.

If I'm not back before you pass away, then select another, suitable servant to take your place and continue doing your work.

Finally, you have the right to make use of any frivolous luxury items I have left behind in my territory. Just make sure that they are replaced if you inadvertently destroy them.

Farewell."

The Overlord's voice faded away, possibly for the last time, leaving Daniel alone in the station. What he did then, well, is a story for another time.

---

OOC: Well, that about wraps this up, only a few days over schedule. I'd be glad to hear some feedback from y'all.

With this round, I generally tried to set it up so that if you died, you knew why -- all of the people that were removed had an in-story reason why they should go, though for Matthias, I really did pick him at random, using random.org's list scrambler.

Also, some people just plain weren't here, so I got rid of unresponsive players pretty much in order. Taking out Head was kind of a stretch, given that the other servants consistently gave him positive feedback in that round, but it was still possible to make up a way for me to take him out, thanks to Musician.

I tried to play a more grim and serious Overlord than Tagg did. Taggerung's Overlord was quirky and almost approachable; I wanted mine to be a more sinister figure, to build on the sense of danger. I also tried to encourage high writing quality, as this is almost like a RP. One of the things I didn't like as much about the first round is that people just got really silly really fast. I think y'all responded well, though, and I'm pleased with how it turned out.

Finally, some of my favorite quotes from this round:

"Explain why you felt it was necessary to dose all of my servants with caffeine."

"But anyway, trust Redwall Musician to spill the beans! She was eavesdropping and barged in and started talking about EVERYTHING to do with our last trip."

"It all began as I was checking in. I had my ticket, and was wearing a black coat with a pink hat as I sat down to wait for my flight. I noticed a woman not far away wearing the same hat and coat as me. It was then I realized she looked just like me.
"The others were sitting behind me, playing with Daniel's iPod and texting there moms. They didn't notice the woman come up and sit next to me. I polity said, "Hey." She replied "Gjdgnasfl." She spoke the death defying beaver tongue!"

"Why the hotel guests were shooting at us, it was because Musician had previously taken a photo of them, and they seemed mad at it, and wanted to get revenge."

"One lady told them to be quiet, and ToR started arguing with her for some reason. Before I knew it all the people at the restaurant were fighting with Daniel and ToR.

"The beavers and I tried stopping Musician, which we succeeded in doing. But when it stopped, there were still cow noises going on. There was a snorkeling cow outside our window!"

[Taggerung_of_Redwall]

OOC:Yeah, things didn't go over in the first game as well as I'd hoped, they was practically nothing substancial and everything from the start was plain silliness, which was not what I was hoping to create in the game of 'Overlord's Orders'. Nice job on this round, JG.

[DanielofRedwall]

OOC: Great work, JG, and not just because I won! I thought I would have been dead when ToR got out, but oh well! I'd be happy for another go, don't mind who is Overlord. My picks would be you again, James, ToR or Matthias, but I'd be happy for anyone to be Overlord. Also, some great quotes there, I especially love ToR's! Was the ending trying to create a possibility for a sequel, or something similar?

[James Gryphon]

OOC: I thought I would have been dead when ToR got out, but oh well!

The last round turned out to be kind of tricky for me -- I wanted to plan something elaborate out at the beginning, like a death-trap or something, but I didn't think about it much, and I never got any inspiration for it anyway, so when the last round was coming up, I started getting a bit antsy, because I didn't have a clue what I was going to do.

The possibilities included setting up some kind of logic test, or trying the death-trap thing after all. I threw out the "would you like to guess" part really just to buy time while I tried to figure it out, since the game had been proceeding in good order, and I didn't want to slow it down.

After your responses, a day or three passed and I couldn't think of anything, but then it occurred to me that I could go with a very simple, feelings-based question, which I think I had thought of before, but initially dismissed. Anyway, as it turned out, your character passed, and Musician's didn't. It's a good thing, too, because I don't know what I'd have done if you both gave similar answers.

Was the ending trying to create a possibility for a sequel, or something similar?

Yeah; in fact, I wrote it so that if you're okay with hosting, you could take right over, and it'd be possible to write a direct sequel to this one -- tying things in a bit, unlike with this round and the last one. The only reference I made to the first round was referring to Tagg as my "erstwhile body double", and I didn't make anything more out of that; it was just supposed to be like an in-joke.

[DanielofRedwall]

OOC: Hmm... hosting... I could have a crack at it, but I'm not sure. It does sound like fun, but I'm not sure if I'd be able to come up with good enough problems. If I think of a few good ideas, I'll start up a new one! I'll only do it if everyone else agrees, though. Do you think I should be Overlord?

[James Gryphon]

Well, you made it to the end in this round, so that says something there.

If you want to give it a crack, and if everyone's willing to play, that's the important thing. I'm sure you'll do fine.

The Overlord does have a tough job, in some ways -- since everything he does is intended to try to set a tone for others to follow. I tried to keep everything I did almost completely serious -- without too much in the way of humor or fantastic elements -- to try to keep things under control. As it was it still got kind of close to the edge a few times.

Another thing: Most of the time, in the first game, the servants themselves were the ones that told everything about what went wrong. The only problem is that if they're giving out silly responses, that means that everything in the round is going to be silly.

Eventually, Tagg confined things with the "ten destroyed limousines" story. Although at that point it was too late to keep the story from going out of control, I thought that was a good principle and copied it in all of my normal rounds. As such, every scenario in Overlord's Orders II had a definite framework, and you had to explain everything relating to what I decided went wrong, instead of both what went wrong and how it happened. I don't know how much that helped, but I believe it was at least a little beneficial.

The main factor to our success, though, is that all of y'all who were able to participate were ready and willing to play out a more grounded story than the first one. If that's still the case in the next round, it should be successful, no matter who's running it; if it isn't, then I think it's likely bound for trouble. So don't be afraid that you might mess up and drag it down -- the games live or die because of the entire team, not any one person.

[DanielofRedwall]

Yeah, both times actually! In fact, me and Redwall Musician both made the last round! Thanks for the tips, James, if everyone else agrees, I'll start up a new round!