Freetext Friday

1. Freetext Friday

   #1

   Alright, so, a few years ago, Wulfhere started a Freetext Fiesta thread with the general idea of spreading the love to poor, maltreated freetexts on a weekly basis. I think that this inspired some of my better submissions, so I'm going to semi-resurrect the idea. I call my version Freetext Friday.
   
   My intent is to declare a freetext in this thread each Friday in the hope of inspiring some submissions for it. If you put up a submission with the appropriate freetext between the declaring Friday and the subsequent Friday, then (as long as I notice it) I promise to comment on the sub. You can mention it here to draw my attention to it if you like. It doesn't have to be a finished post - you can put it in Advice Requested if you like (though then I would really recommend mentioning it here!). I'll still comment on it.
   
   I am going to institute one rule, though. I call it the Last Minute Desperation Rule. Specifically, it works like this: Imagine that you are running a game, and at the last possible minute, you realize that you've forgotten something. You didn't describe the magic sword, or the villain, or the mayor, or whatever. If you were to click on a freetext named after what you need, the posts that pop up should be helpful to you.
   
   In other words, if the freetext were Sword, a magic sword would be fine. A non-magic sword would also be fine. A guy who makes swords would be fine. A guy who fights with swords is pushing it. A guy whose background is tangentially related to swords is no good. I don't want to stifle creativity with this, but I don't want to fill up freetexts with things that are only barely related and therefore make the freetexts less useful.
   
   Anyways, for this first freetext, I wanted to find something that could be combined with the current Quest. So, in looking over the list of freetexts, I settled upon Hammer. Go for it!

2. Re: Freetext Friday

   #2

   I thoroughly approve of this idea, and thus present Gateshatter for your consumption.

3. Re: Freetext Friday

   #3

   I like this

4. Re: Freetext Friday

   #4

   Great idea!

5. Re: Freetext Friday

   #5

   Thanks to those who participated, and I guess it's Friday again. Looking through the freetext list, I was appalled to find that one of the most important elements of fantasy has only ONE entry!
   
   How can you have Arthur without Camelot, or Harry Potter without Hogwarts, or Dracula without, uh, Dracula's Castle? You can't! Well, you can, but it's boring. That's why today's freetext is castle. It can be a Den of Evil, a Fortress of Solitude, a Keep on the Borderlands, or any other kind of castle. Good luck!

6. Re: Freetext Friday

   #6

   Argh! I have a castle sitting here on paper, but I don't have the time to properly quantum entangle it with a submission post. I henceforth declare that next week I shall post both the backlogged castle and the new freetext submission!

7. Re: Freetext Friday

   #7

   
   Argh! I have a castle sitting here on paper, but I don't have the time to properly quantum entangle it with a submission post. I henceforth declare that next week I shall post both the backlogged castle and the new freetext submission!
   

   
   
   I am experiencing the same thing. I find Freetext Friday to be quite inspirational, it just takes me awhile to properly mangle my great ideas.

8. Re: Freetext Friday

   #8

   I understand the problem. In fact, I'm sitting on a castle-related sub myself.
   
   I don't want a time limit to discourage people from taking part, so I'll loosen up a bit. Even if you don't actually put the submission up during the week, if you mention that you've got one in progress during the week, then when it comes up, I'll comment on it.
   
   That said, today is Friday, so while I encourage you to finish those castles, it's also time for a new Freetext. This week, I'm going to let my recent acquisition of the Buffy RPG guide me. In other words, give me your horrible, blood-sucking masters of the night. Be they seductive, monstrous, or even sparkly, this week's freetext is Vampire. (Buffy flavor is, of course, not required).

9. Re: Freetext Friday

   #9

   Sadly, I was unable to finish off my subs before the night twisted into the newness of Friday. However! That also means there's a new freetext to be done! Seeing as DLM hasn't posted anything yet, I provisionally propose that the next freetext that needs some love is experiment. Surely we can come up with interesting experiments for our mad scientists and mages to be doing, and there's bound to be a few experimental mishaps hiding in the corners, waiting to be cleaned up (or just trying to live out their limited days in peace).

10. Re: Freetext Friday

    #10

    Wow, I plum forgot that it's Friday.
    
    But yes, Experiment sounds like a good one to me.

11. Re: Freetext Friday

    #11

    Sadly, I did not finish my vampire in time, but I will post it sometime this weekend hopefully.

12. Re: Freetext Friday

    #12

    I present to you, admittedly a little late, The Anaszti.

13. Re: Freetext Friday

    #13

    Friday again! This week, I'm going to suggest a new Freetext, one that doesn't currently exist. But simple lack of existence won't stop me!
    
    Water within the desert. Warmth amidst the tundra. Life among the endless stars. Civilization on the internet. A place of respite, where one can escape, however temporarily, the harsh conditions of the outside world. This week's Freetext is Oasis. Whether bases of operations for people operating in hostile territory, strategic objectives, or last chances at survival, oases have proven important in both real life and in fiction, and this website seems sadly lacking in them.

14. Re: Freetext Friday

    #14

    Hmm, let's try for something a bit more straightforward this week. See if we can't get at least one.
    
    What's better than hard-bitten detectives? Vampire-bitten detectives! The streets of Chicago have never been pretty, but at least in real life they've never had to worry about horrible monsters lurking on just the other side of reality. This week, the Freetext is Urban Fantasy. Kind of a jump back to vampires, I guess, but wider in some ways, narrower in others. I don't care if your Urban Fantasy is set in contemporary times, but it needs to be city-oriented.

15. Re: Freetext Friday

    #15

    Friday once more.
    
    It's hard to imagine something more traditional RPG than this week's freetext (at least, for me it is). Cruel, twisted minions, malicious brutes, or warrior culture barbarians; they can be all of these and more. There are certainly other options, as well. Regardless, this week, the freetext is Orc.

16. Re: Freetext Friday

    #16

    For the Oasis Freetext Friday: I present Hacienda Solfatara
    http://strolen.com/viewing/6583
    
    I intend to cover each Freetext Friday challenge, to the best of my ability.

17. Re: Freetext Friday

    #17

    If I may, I'd like to suggest a Freetext for the week following this Friday (January 6th):
    
    Divination...
    
    div·i·na·tion [div-uh-ney-shuhn] noun
    
    1. the practice of attempting to foretell future events or discover hidden knowledge by occult or supernatural means.
    2. augury; prophecy: The divination of the high priest was fulfilled.
    3. perception by intuition; instinctive foresight.
    (From Dictionary.com)
    
    This magical art plays a very important role in many of our favorite stories. It covers the birth of heroes, it portents the end-times, and reveals that which was lost. Let's see what we can find in our imaginations?

18. Re: Freetext Friday

    #18

    Having totally forgotten that yesterday was Friday, I say go for it! Divination it is!

19. Re: Freetext Friday

    #19

    Friday again! Wheee!
    
    This week's Freetext is one that I think is a good one, but which only Scrasamax has made any entries to so far: Celebrity.
    
    Actors, actresses, bards, war heroes, or merely professional celebrities, they all can qualify. Joan of Arc qualifies. So do Ciaphas Cain and Paris Hilton. Regardless, these figures can serve as interesting background elements, or as front-and-center personages. Fantasy Hollywoods, items which create fame, and anything related to celebrity lives are of course also acceptable.

20. Re: Freetext Friday

    #20

    I got a decent chunk or writing done on my Divination submission, but it seems even a week is not enough anymore. In case anyone was interested, here is what I have done: 
    
    

    The Great Sleeper, Sorketz Zor'Kets, a eccentric dreamer and established prophet.
    
    There is a special tower is the city of Stessal: A rigid, three-sided monument of weird blue stone. Each side depicts a celestial body, a star sign of mystic importance. The Southwest face bears the constellation of Eschenvair, the Eye-Prince, a linear formation of three stars with a fourth, the brightest, centered below. The Southeast wall  portrays Dunaacht, the Enlightened Slug,  another formation with a three star base, but with a star above the leftmost, and a fifth, the brightest, to the right and slightly above that one. Finally, the Northmost image is a chaotic splash of color: reds, blues, greens, and yellows of all shades seem haphazardly smeared around. This is a representation of Ma'Sik, the Imprisoned Artist, the believed creator of our world.
    
    Eschenvair lends his Ever-Reaching Sight, to see beyond the heavens.
    
    Dunaacht lends his Throne of Lethargy, to properly contemplate.
    
    And Ma'Sik is The Unaware Subject, to be studied and understood.
    
    At the top of this strange tower, in a globe of sturdy glass, is the bedchamber of Sorketz Zor'Kets. Here he sleeps, sometimes for many years, rousing only to speak of his findings amongst the heavens.
    
    The rare occasions on which Sorkets Zor'Kets visits the waking world and the beginings of legends. It starts with a mighty yawn that echos for miles around, then the ritual popping and cracking of long-slumbered joints, and an event known as "A Thousand Years of Piss," whioh I leave up to your imaginations to detail.
    
    The Great Sleeper will then, only after his "morning" preparations, meet with the kings, lords, heroes, and wise men of the age. There is a manuscript known as "Constan Slepp," a document detailing the process of interpreting Sorketz Zor'Kets' most fabled gift. Sorketz Zor'Kets, after laying in a bed for years at a time, always emerges with sores typically of extended periods of dormancy. These bedsores are said to be proof of his dream-travels that transcend time and space, a gift granted to show the world he is no charlatan and that his intent is true and just.
    
    The book gives lengthy and detailed descriptions of what sores to looks for, and their meaning. It accounts for every size, shape, tint and hue, as well as location on his body and proximity to other sores. Reading the book, you would find that it paints a grotesquely precise and disturbingly vivid mental image of the worst case of bedsores imaginable (and some no mortal mind ever would have imagined on its own).

    
    
    If anyone really likes it and wants more, I'll try to keep at it. I could use some more ideas on areas to flesh out, details to add, and such.
    
    Celebrity sounds good, too. Maybe I can add a bit of that to this. Hm.

21. Re: Freetext Friday

    #21

    Don't worry too much about the week thing - at this point, I grok that it's not really enough. If you put up a submission, and I recall making one of it's freetexts a Freetext Friday freetext, I'll comment on it.
    
    On the Great Sleeper, I like the bizarreness of it - it strikes me as a bit Fabled Lands -esque, if you get the reference. As for what I think it could use, hmm. I'd kind of like to see events that go on around the Great Sleeper. I could imagine festivals when he wakes up, or a class of heralds who spread the word of his findings to the people (naturally, they'd be odd, themselves. Say, they could be the guys who carry his chamberpots to the corners of the globe to be emptied, spreading the news along the way). Something along those lines.

22. Re: Freetext Friday

    #22

    Yay, Friday!
    
    One of the ways in which civilizations are often made to seem that small bit more exotic is to have them ride on something unusual. You've got goblins on wolves, tusken raiders on banthas, drow on lizards, and I know I've heard of Hastur cultists riding on byakhees. So, with that in mind, today's Freetext is Exotic Mounts.

23. Re: Freetext Friday

    #23

    Howzabout a week for those institutions of higher education? This next Freetext will be University.

24. Re: Freetext Friday

    #24

    I believe that I missed Friday. Oooh.
    
    Well, today's as good as any.
    
    Hmm, well, with MoonHunter seemingly, back, how about something his way? Supers!
    
    Heroes and villains like the Flash or Black Manta. Cities like Gotham or Metropolis. Places like Wakanda or Latveria. Things like the Green Lantern Rings or.... Well, you get the idea, I'm sure.

25. Re: Freetext Friday

    #25

    So, it's Friday again. That means time for a new Freetext.
    
    Looking over the list of Freetexts, here's one that catches my eye.
    
    It can be a distinctive cultural feature or a hallmark of a dark regime. Sometimes the method can function as a time limit. In some cases it may just be flavor, in other cases, it may end up being oh-so life-or-death. I am talking about execution. The wild west would hardly be the same without some hangings. In feudal Japan, seppuku probably qualifies as another form. You have the dementor's kiss of Harry Potter and the guillotine of revolutionary France.
    
    So give me methods of execution, people whose lives are shaped by executions, places where these things happen, or anything related, really. Good luck.

26. Re: Freetext Friday

    #26

    Excited for tomorrow's freetext :) Looking forward to doing one (or two)

27. Re: Freetext Friday

    #27

    Hmm, Friday again.
    
    If there's one thing every adventure needs, it's a way to get the players started on it. Can there be any better generic plot hook than the old man who knows things? Maybe he wants to know more. Maybe he knows something but can't act on it. Maybe someone else needs his knowledge and he needs your help to get to them. Maybe... you get the point. But surely these wise old men can be more than just plot hooks, right? That's why this week's Freetext is sage.

28. Re: Freetext Friday

    #28

    I'm still trying for something sagey, but the sub eludes me! Only idea i had was parrot-sages (or sage-parrots) with 2,000 year old lifespans. Yeah---
    
    

29. Re: Freetext Friday

    #29

    How about 30 mercenary sages all of them intellects, scientists, wits, mystics, salesmen, masters of the law, students of history, religious scholars and  guardians of dark secrets.  But these men and women are not bound by some strict moral code or overpowering sense of duty to some higher organization or person. And if they do have strong agenda, they don't come straight at it.  They serve in the halls of power, but they aren't part of the power structure.  Yet they may be the smartest person in the room, which makes them dangerous.    Specifically when they will sell their mental talents to the highest bidder. 
    
    These could be the lobbyists, the lawyers, snake oil salesmen, inventors, spy masters, military contractors and charlatans of the ancient world.  Rasputin and Archimedes would be examples of guys like this from history

30. Re: Freetext Friday

    #30

    I kind of like the idea of sage-parrots, actually. Maybe you could have a library where, instead of books, they have parrots, or something. Who are all the past lives of the sage who runs the place. Or something. I don't know. I like the idea, though. A 30 works too, though. Also, no time constraint (I've still got an execution sub underway). But if it takes a while, you should point it out here, because otherwise I'll probably miss it.
    
    Anyway! It is Friday! And that means a new freetext! Exclamation point!
    
    Back when I first arrived at the Citadel, there was a plague of Drizz't clones. In fact, I seem to recall that the most commented sub on the entire site was a Drizz't clone at one point, though I think it's gone now. That wasn't all, though. There were also a lot of assassins. A LOT of assassins. I even did one myself (second submission - don't look for the first, it's gone). Nowadays, though, that seems to have ended. But maybe we've gone too far! There were a lot of assassins for a reason: assassins are kind of cool! So that's the freetext for this week: assassin.
    
    And also your Citadel history lesson for today. Wow, I feel old.

31. Re: Freetext Friday

    #31

    Oh hey, Friday.
    
    Howzabout Mine for this coming week. Dwarves, kobolds, futuristic ore conglomerates, etc. Great places for new stuff to be discovered or for taking over by monsters.

32. Re: Freetext Friday

    #32

    Inspirational, I foresee the Octo Pelagic ice mines solidifying into existence soon. ;)

33. Re: Freetext Friday

    #33

    I will continue to look forward to hearing about the Octo Pelagic ice mines, but until then, it is still Friday, and you know what that means....
    
    Today marks the 150th anniversary of the battle between the Monitor and the Virginia, the first clash of ironclad ships and  signal that the world was changing.
    
    In honor of that, today's Freetext is WWMWBI - that stands for "What Would My World Be If?" The idea? Posit a major societal or situational change that might happen to a setting and consider some possible ramifications. Hopefully, commenters will consider what might happen to their own settings. But there are a lot of societal changes that have happened in real life alone; consider how many more there can be in fantasy or science fiction.

34. Re: Freetext Friday

    #34

    Ivanhoe jousts. Harry Potter plays Quidditch. Luke Skywalker bullseyes womp-rats in his T-16. Where would heroes be without tournaments to prove how much better they are than everyone else? You can have competitions for prizes or as a substitute for war. They could be related to magic or reigion. But regardless, this week, the Freetext is sport.

35. Re: Freetext Friday

    #35

    I don't have any theoretically evocative description this week, but the freetext is king.

36. Re: Freetext Friday

    #36

    One of my favorite submissions on the Citadel is Voonsai. Check it out if you haven't already. This week's free text is for him, and it's Wyldling. Pick an animal and a young adult, and squish them together. Ideally, end up with someone who can give the PCs trouble, but who they won't attack because, you know, basically an innocent kid.

37. Re: Freetext Friday

    #37

    Hmm, I appear to have forgotten to put one of these up last week, but oh well.
    
    This week, let's go with familiar. Traditionally little demons in animal form, but sometimes just hyper-intelligent animals. Sometimes servants, sometimes masters. They can be helpful or malevolent. Outside the wizard sphere, even someone like Navi could probably qualify as a familiar.

38. Re: Freetext Friday

    #38

    Inspiration strikes! I did one!
    
    http://strolen.com/viewing/Familiar_Elementals
    
    Not great, but I needed to get it out. Woohoooo, Viva Freetexta!

39. Re: Freetext Friday

    #39

    Woohoo, somebody actually did one last week!
    
    Here's a fairly straightforwardish one:
    
    Clown
    
    Horror or humor. Medieval jesters or space comedians. Clown disguises or clowns disguised. Pies! Seltzer! Facepaint! Giant shoes! What more can you want?!

40. Re: Freetext Friday

    #40

    Alright, here's a classic:
    
    One of the staples of fantasy treasure is the gem, and it's also the Freetext for the coming week. Rubies, sapphires, emeralds, diamonds, unreal stones. Stones with magical powers or those merely beautiful. Stones independent of other items, and those part of something larger. Places where they're mined, cities carved out of them - there's a lot of room within this one.

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