Legwork Guide

Made with special thanks to those who participated in the discussions on the web-board.

Note: "You" is used indiscriminately to refer to both players and characters throughout the guide.

Legwork serves several functions for players and characters on the Emblem of Ea:

1. Getting information
2. Letting staff know what you’ll be doing in response to a situation and/or plot
3. Alerting staff that you and a group of others have come up with a plan to deal with some problem and wish to schedule a scene.

For example

1. ‘I want to see if anyone knows more about Mr. Mysterious, the NPC Whirlpool emitted last night. I will go to taverns in the noble’s district and…’
2. ‘Given that tensions are high between Alexandrians and Myrrish people, my bard will be visiting all-Myrrish taverns and singing rousing political pro-Myrrish songs. This is because…’
3. ‘Okay, Whirl! Now that we know where Mr. Mysterious is hiding and that he’s raising undead in there, we (that is to say, Character X, Character Y and Character Z) want to go put a stop to him! We will disguise ourselves as hermit crabs and…’

These are not mutually exclusive categories; you can write a legwork that serves multiple functions.

From the staff side of things, legwork serves as an indication of interest in a plot, helps disseminate information, lets staff know when people are ready to schedule scenes, alerts them to the fact that someone may be in a position to get information, defend against an attack, or what have you at a later date (as in #2, above)…etc. We like to see good legwork waiting for us in the queues!

What, you ask, constitutes ‘good’ legwork? Below are a number of tips which should help you to write good legwork requests, starting with general pointers and then going through each of the different categories above.

General:

1. Clearly state your goal(s). What is it that you’re trying to accomplish?
2. Tell us what your character is doing to meet those goals. Who is he/she speaking to? What skills/spells will he/she use?
3. Be specific, both in terms of goals and actions. ‘I want to know more about Mr. Mysterious’ is likely to get you the name of his favorite breakfast cereal, whereas ‘I want to know where Mr. Mysterious lives’ will get you the information you actually want. Similarly, ‘I will be encouraging pro-Myrrish sentiment’ will force a DM to page you with, ‘…How exactly will you be doing that?’ whereas ‘I will go into pro-Myrrish taverns (gather information to find out which ones would fit the bill), ask the bartender if I can play there for free (diplomacy), and then sing pro-Myrrish songs (perform)…’ means that both you and the DM know exactly what you’re doing, and they can apply a circumstance bonus to your check(s) if necessary. Typically, detailed legworks will produce better results than vague ones.
4. Tell us if you plan to use anything besides the obvious check to give yourself a circumstance bonus. Do you want to Intimidate the people you Gathering Information from? Ask them sweetly (Diplomacy)? Bribe them (I will spend up to X amount of money to grease palms and loosen tongues)? Let us know.
5. Try not to dictate to staff how something will go. It’s sometimes necessary in legwork to say ‘If X happens, I will do Y’—but try to cover all possibilities if you are stuck doing so.
6. Legwork requests do not guarantee that you will get a DM scene. If you want to speak to an NPC, put in a legwork request that explains how you will be trying to get in to see that NPC if they’re the busy sort, what you plan on saying to them, and what you want from them. That way, staff can decide whether to dust off the NPC and have them speak to your character or answer the request with an @mail. Which one they choose to do will depend on a number of factors, including how busy they are, so don’t get discouraged if you wanted a scene with the NPC and didn’t get one.
7. Be creative. Your character is unique, and has unique skills, spells and contacts. Don’t be afraid to tap into those in a legwork request (see #4).

Now that we’ve gone through general tips, we’ll cover specific tips for each of the three functions described in the first section.

Legwork Type: #1, Gathering information

This is by far the most common legwork request we get on Tenebrae and it can be a source of frustration for players and DMs alike, so I will discuss it in some detail.

First, before you even think about putting in a request to get more information about something, ask other characters about the topic! Often they will have been in a plot where they learned something, or someone will have experienced something similar at an earlier date, or someone knows something about that villain, or… RPing with other people first saves DMs from having to type up the same basic information over and over and means that you won’t have to start at the beginning in your inquiries. Remember, too, that rumors can be posted in the aftermath of plots, which may mean that there is simply nothing to follow up on—it’s much easier to get a sense of whether or not that’s the case if you talk to someone who was in the plot.

A few notes on the Gather Information skill. First, it covers all attempts to get information about things (which may sound obvious, but many people think that they can use Diplomacy or knowledge skills in its stead). Second, a check takes 1d4+1 hours to make, so keep in mind that it’s time consuming ICly. We’re really flexible about time on the game, but if there are ICly time constraints we may enforce them. Finally, we generally frown on making exactly the same check twice (and we reserve the right to impose penalties for annoying the same people over and over with questions), but you can always ask to look in a different place!

What if you don’t have a lot of ranks in gather information? Well, you can get a circumstance bonus by looking in places where the information is likely to be and/or using other skills (intimidate, diplomacy, etc.). However, if someone is consistently rolling above 40 on their GI checks (yes, we do have some characters that can do that) and you roll a 15—no circumstance bonus in the world is going to get you the same amount of detail as the person rolling 45. So, what do you do? The best solution is to RP with the characters who do have a lot of ranks in gather information and ask them if they’ll look into things for you.

Tips for gathering information

1. Clearly state your goal, be specific about both what you want and what you’re doing, and be creative. Yes, I know I’ve already said these, but they’re worth repeating.
2. Ask for the names/descriptions of other PCs investigating the topic. That way, if you roll low, you’ll know who else is looking into it and can go RP with them before you put in more legwork. It also will mean that it will be easier to get a group together to go do whatever needs to be done in the end.
3. Don’t put all your eggs into one basket. If you write in your legwork that you are going to look absolutely everywhere and then roll a 1, it’s much harder to try again than it is if you say you’re just asking around in taverns in the noble’s district and roll a 1.
4. Once you have information, go compare notes with other PCs! Often, information that you get from taverns (where you’re looking) will be different from information that you get from the Academy of Sages (where the wizard is looking). Putting the two together will give both of you a more complete picture of what’s going on.
5. Don’t put in requests to find out about other characters; contact those characters’ players directly. If there’s a problem, /then/ come to staff—but by and large it’s okay to ask someone what your character would find out by making a gather information check on theirs if you really want to know.

Legwork Type: #2, Letting staff know what you’re doing

Will you be patrolling the streets after sundown in the areas where the murders have been happening? Will you try to speak to the bereaved families you brought back to Alexandria and help them fit in in the big city? Will you be Detecting Magic on street corners to see if you can spot the individuals that the vampires have Dominated?

If so, let us know via the legwork queue. In all likelihood, we’ll just respond with an, ‘Okay, that sounds good,’ but occasionally we may make a scene out of something that a character is doing. Also, a preemptive request (such as patrolling the streets) may not net you a scene—but it will let us know that you’re interested in the plot even if you don’t have the gather information skill, and we’ll be sure to tell those people who /are/ asking for more information about the murders that you’ve been seen walking around the streets after dark...

Again, be specific about what you’re doing, and if at all possible include it in your day-to-day RP. Pose patrolling. Pose walking with a crying woman. Pose staring at an adventurer and ending up with a massive headache. Staff will be more likely to consider running a scene or doing something special with your request if we think that you’re using it to generate RP on the grid.

#3. Alerting staff that you want to schedule a scene.

So, you’ve got your information, you’ve figured everything out, and you’ve got yourself a group. Great! Whoever is in charge should drop a legwork into the queue letting staff know that you’d like to schedule a scene.

This section has been copied and pasted from bbpost 6/21:

1. We like player initiative and player-initiated scenes. But these need to be coordinated ICly in advance. All PCs involved must have RPed and agreed on a plan in advance. IC letters might be an acceptable substitute, depending on the DM's discretion. The IC plan for the scene (e.g. we're going to location X to look for the bad guy and bringing along special tools P,Q, and R.) must be submitted to the DM in advance. If this plan is overly lacking in specifics or hasn't been circulated to all the PCs, the scene may be canceled or postponed until proper planning has taken place. Basically, you don't need to sit in a DM's plot room to figure out what you're going to do. ;)
2. Players can feel free to propose scene times and help with finding a time slot that works for everyone. But DMs need prep time and a clear schedule to run scenes, so only DMs can actually /set/ scene times. If the DM hasn't mailed or paged you back with some version of 'Ok, the scene will be on <day> at ' the scene isn't scheduled and may not be run. Keep in mind DMs have different available times and even when online we might be too busy with other things to run a scene.
3. When you agree to a day and time for a scene, you should be there. If you're late, don't be surprised if the scene goes forward without you or is canceled. If you miss a scene, also don't be surprised if you aren't included in followup scenes or other scenes pertaining to that plotline. @mailing or paging the DM in question in advance is a good idea if you think you might be late or entirely absent - you'll be more likely to be included in followups and you'll be more likely to stay in the DM's good graces that way. Remember - it's not very fun for the DM or the other players to be waiting around, and we're all here to have fun.