Intermission 5 Page 4
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“So wait… does this mean Kamau can only use one ring?”
“I’m afraid so.”
“No, I can use two.”
“But Mister Kamau, we just got done explaining—”
“AHHHHHHH oh it’s all right.”
“Yeah. I used to wear three back in the day, so I’m already used to the general strain. And I’ve had a pretty comprehensive crash course in keeping my balance with just one arm at this point, so the phantom weight isn’t an issue either.”
“Wow, that’s very impressive!”
“But, if you had that many rings at one time, you would’ve had to be a high-ranking member of the Imperial Guard.”
“If that’s the case, why are you in league with nefarious scoundrels such as ourselves?”
“Mac, shhhh. We have this thing where we pretend we don’t all know Kamau’s big secret.”
“…You don’t know anything about my big secret.”
If you thought there was not enough people trying to regenerate Kamau’s arm before, you just wait…
screw that, check if you can fit one on his toes.
or whatever else pointy things he has? ears? nose?
Nose ring alright, but like those piercings.
Speaking of people who can wear more than two rings…
I’ve remarked before that with 3 Atk, 3 Def, and 15 HP, Kamau has the strength of three men. That doesn’t mean he can handle 6 rings, but there’s another 3 for the collection.
I was going to point out that you wouldn’t necessarily be high ranking in the Guard just by being strong, but Macadamia has a point in that you wouldn’t have access to rings otherwise. It isn’t just that he could wear three rings at once, but also that he had three rings to wear.
strength of 3 men as base, probably more when he had both arms, plus 3 rings, strength of how many men would it add up to? this sounds important enough to be well-known person in the army. his case of “being a traitor” must be really well-recognized. actually from the public opinion point of view, Kamau is probably the number 1 villain in our party.
Hmm…
Could you make a ring out of a severed arm, and if so, what would that do?
I bet it wouldn’t give you “be able to wear +1 rings” ability
Not yet. Look out for Corpse Essence in Macadamia’s level ups. (I joke, but that’d be a mildly horrifying and interesting ability, especially if it was something like offensive smiffing – smif an enemy with 1 HP left into a ring, killing them.) The original Ringsmif did work with the remains of extraplanar creatures…
I think it’s not impossible for something to give an extra hand slot, but I’d expect various restrictions. A traditional miner’s helmet with the light would basically spend the helmet slot on the hand you’d use to hold a torch. There’s artificer shenanigans around gadgets to hold wands for you, though that probably wouldn’t come up as you can’t use a wand and a weapon in the same turn here. Floating shields and swords do show up in D&D.
Actually, the rings-phantom-weight thing is very interesting. I’m probably overthinking and analyze too much the DM’s/GM’s artistic license for worldbuilding, but still –
If putting on too many rings causes a magic backlash that feels like heavy encumberance, then … how did the 5-ring-guy-that-lost-his-arm even managed to put on that many? he should have felt the “weight” as he started putting on that one-too-many ring, be it 5th, 4th, or even 3rd ring, and shouldn’t be able to put on any more, just due to the sheer weight felt after the previous one.
To get all of this working as written, I see these options:
First two work in favor of exploting this on enemies, third means we could try using this carefully ourselves.
Or you just get insta-zapped by one of the gods for playing with deadly things too much.
This is all the background explanation for what is already written in the rules: Each character can equip two rings at once.
I’m sure that people will get all concerned the next time we equip rings that we need to be very clear that we don’t want to equip too many and die. I’m also sure that this falls under the category of actions that characters won’t take even if we ask them to, so the worry will be unfounded.
What if that was a punishment for something, they obligated him to wear a little by little one ring at a time and trough sheer willpower they managed 4 against all odds…
And then they said to put on the 5th
We actually don’t know anything about Kamau’s big secret. He’s considered a TRAITOR, and every party member has speculated that he used to be a guard, but there’s other roles in the Empire as we’ve seen with the Justiciar (who has a closer helmet to the one in Kamau’s Kofi preview, with a horizontal eye slit). We’ve also seen his flashback to another young girl which he keeps getting reminded of by Ricki and dollmom.
Be careful to draw a distinction between what has been confirmed and what has been implied. We have hit a bond threshold, hopefully we’ll get some clarity on what that means during this Intermission. We have an incentive to do whatever we can to meet the requirements to keep progressing Bond since we do know that Ricki will benefit for maxing out social links, but I don’t know if it’ll be as “simple” as picking a dungeon.
One-on-one dungeons would make this a hard choice, since everyone else would be put on hold. That does help prevent getting “stuck” side questing, as otherwise having one bond dungeon unlock more bond dungeons would encourage putting off other options (not that we’ll always get a choice, see the Tavern Basement). We might also hit bond thresholds before we have the opportunity to do anything to advance them, needing something like the Estate.
Speaking of Social Links, some tarot matchups in the Persona style:
Kamau: The Hanged Man. Pretty obvious, self-destructive martyrdom.
Lara: The Devil. A corrupting influence who has lost faith.
Macadamia: The Hierophant. A scholar bound by rules and tradition, plus the figure itself is religious. Could also see The Moon of fear and self-deception, we’re still getting to know him.
Ricki: The Fool. Potential waiting to be realized, starting on a journey with lots of hope and a skewed understanding of the danger involved.
Last panel looks awesome.
Just to poin this out…
White eyes > dark vision
Red eyes > night eyes ability