#/:'D technically i only lose one ability which I don't use that often but i'm a perfectionist

[dailyadventureprompts]

Tableskills: Making a Game of It

Recently I learned a bit of an unspoken truth that I'd brushed up against in my many years of being a dungeonmaster that I'd never seen put into words before: If you want to liven up whatever's going on in your adventure, figure out a way to engage the players in some kind of game. It's simultaneously the best way to provide a roadblock while making your player's victories feel earned.

This might seem redundant, since you're already playing d&d but give a moment of thought to exactly what portions of d&d are gamified. Once you learn your way around the system, it becomes apparent that D&D really only has three modes of play:

Pure roleplay/storytelling, driven by whatever feels best for the narrative. Which is not technically a game, nor should it (IMO) be gamified.

Tactical combat with a robust rules system, the most gamelike aspect.

A mostly light weight skills based system for overcoming challenges that sits between the two in terms of complexity.

The problem is that there's quite a lot of things that happen in d&d that don't fall neatly into these three systems, the best example being exploration which was supposed to be a "pillar" of gameplay but somehow got lost along the way . This is a glaring omission given how much of the core fantasy of the game (not to mention fantasy in general) is the thrill of discovery, contrasted with the rigours of travelling to/through wondrous locations. How empty is it to have your party play out the fantasy of being on a magical odyssey or delving the unknown when you end up handwaving any actual travel because base d&d doesn't provide a satisfying framework for going from A to B besides skillchecks and random encounters (shameless plug for my own exploration system and the dungeon design framework that goes with it).

The secret sauce that's made d&d and other ttrpgs so enduring is how they fuse the dramatic conventions of storytelling with the dynamics of play. The combat system gives weight and risk to those epic confrontations, and because the players can both get good at combat and are at risk of losing it lets them engage with the moment to moment action far more than pure narration or a single skill roll ever could.

I'm not saying that we need to go as in depth as combat for every gamified narrative beat (the more light weight the better IMO) but having a toolbox full of minigames we can draw upon gives us something to fall back on when we're doing our prep, or when we need to improvise. I've found having this arsenal at hand as imortant as my ability to make memorable NPCs on the fly or rework vital plothooks the party would otherwise miss.

What I'd encourage you as a DM to do is to start building a list of light weight setups/minigames for situations you often find yourself encountering: chase scenes, drinking contests, fair games, anything you think would be useful. Either make them yourself or source them from somewhere on the web, pack your DM binder full of them as needed. While not all players are utterly thrilled by combat, everyone likes having some structured game time thrown in there along with the freeform storytelling and jokes about how that one NPC's name sounds like a sex act.

A quick minigame is likewise a great way to give structure to a session when your party ends up taking a shortcut around your prepared material. Oh they didn't take that monster hunter contract in the sewers and instead want to follow up on rumours about a local caravan? The wagon hands are playing a marble game while their boss negotiates with some local mercahnts, offering to let the party play while they wait. The heroes want to sail out to the island dungeon you don't have prepped yet? Well it looks like the navigator has gone on a bit of a bender, and the party not only need to track them down but also piece together where they left the charts from their drunken remembrances as a form of a logic puzzle.

Artsource

[tarakaybee]

Oxventure - Portal Combat and Final Final Campaign Thoughts

This is gonna be a bit of an essay, but I have had a lot of thoughts over the years.

Honestly, in the end, Oxventure just managed to stick the landing for me. My one major ask with my complex relationship with this D&D show, and the reason that I stopped watching it, is that I wanted to be told a good story. I feel like sometimes when I talk to people about this, I get given the excuse that "it's just a comedy" and that you don't need to follow the rules to have a good time, neither of which is at all where my complaints lie. Don't get me wrong, I'm a massive nerd for the mechanical minutiae of 5E and love to minmax and roleplay using my character's stats and abilities, but the rules don't automatically equal a good story. It certainly can help to create a story with dramatic tension if the rules carry with them the possibility of death and failure, you only need to listen to The Adventure Zone: Balance to see that you can tell a good D&D story that follows the rules as little as it feels like, and have an overtly comedic tone, while also telling a really strong, effective story with a realised world, an escalation in dramatic tension and three dimensional characters.

I love Critical Role, Dimension 20 and that first arc of TAZ, but my personal favourite Dungeons and Dragons actual-play is Not Another D&D Podcast, which is basically the platonic idea of Oxventure (and also is more consistent and a better told story than TAZ in my opinion). The setting and characters are explicitly comedic archetypes, and they can spend half an episode riffing, but they're much more competent at keeping the story on track, which is after all, part of the reason I invest in this game. When I say that Oxventure started to get boring and receptive around Season Two, that I think they mess around riffing with each other too much, which saps time away that they could've spent developing their characters or fleshing out the world in any conceivable manner, and that they don't follow the rules enough for the game to have any tension, I want you all to bear in mind that my favourite D&D show is one that starts with a five minute conversation about dragon pussies before introducing any of the PCs, and that one PC has a possum who has the ability to scribe letters and act as a lawyer, purely because she joked about it so often the DM was forced to canonise it.

I thoroughly enjoy Johnny and the Oxboxtra crew, and I've always thought that they had it in them to tell great stories, and I was proven to be correct when their Deadlands and Blades in the Dark campaigns concluded and told amazingly compelling, dramatic stories without losing their comedy edge, and that encouraged me to give the main campaign another shot. For the most part, this final arc has been more of the same kind that I got bored by and stopped watching, but these last two episodes managed to pull through for me. The story and everything the story has ultimately been about came to head afterward the main fight with the post-climax confrontation with Lilliana.

I love the bold choices that Luke, Andy and Ellen made, technically none of those spells should have worked the way they did, but for the purpose of the story it worked. Corazon's big sacrifice was a great story beat to end on, it was a bit of a cliche, but cliches are used for a reason. What I like about Corazon and Dob's big sacrifices is that Corazon would never have done that in episode one, wheras Dob was always this good and always would have done, and his choice affirms what we love about him. Ellen acted the hell out of that scene too, I'm glad that she got a big moment as well.

This campaign is the one that got me into the TTRPG hobby, it was bittersweet to see it end after all this time. Inspired by Dob, I ended up playing my own Half-Orc Bard in a weekly campaign that lasted five real years, it's not an exaggeration to see that that was a whole and significant period of my recent life that Oxventure kicked off. Knowing now what they know about the way Oxventure turned out, I'm genuinely curious to see what they'll all do differently, since obviously they won't want it to just be the same kind of campaign a second time. I personally hope for a story that sticks the middle, as well as the landing and takeoff, but we'll see!

[astridellejo]

A couple of people in my dance class are taking some time to learn a little bit of ASL so that they can understand me when I'm signing, which is so cool! I feel like I've actually become more chatty now that my primary mode of communication is ASL. But I'm still very new at this, and very far away from anything resembling fluency. My signing may seem fast to the average speaking/hearing person, but I'm well aware that it's slower than molasses in the arctic to a fluent signer.

I did eventually figure out how to make my iPad talk so I can use it as a makeshift AAC device. But that's slow and the volume on the tablet often isn't loud enough for people to hear. Plus it takes time to type out my thoughts. I know enough ASL now that it's often much faster and easier for me to sign instead of use text-to-speech. Unless I have to discuss something complex using sign vocabulary I don't know yet. It seems my reality of no longer having a functioning voice is finally starting to sink in. It only took seven months.

What throws the speaking/hearing folk off is that my hearing still works. Mostly. It's about 75% of what it used to be. I can't hear my dance instructor in the gym, and a lot of people sound like Charlie Brown's teacher sometimes in busy environments. What can I say? I'm old now and I've listened to a lot of loud music. But when I start signing around speaking/hearing people, they immediately conclude that I'm deaf and stop talking completely. I mean it makes sense. Sign language is by d/Deaf people for d/Deaf people. Why the hell would someone who can hear use sign language? Right? (Well, I mean there are reasons, but do I want to get into that with the uni student working at the pharmacy while I'm trying to get my prescription refilled? Not really.) Should I bother trying to explain to speaking/hearing folk that I can still hear them? Would it even matter? Because they still wouldn't be able to understand what I'm signing.

I feel like I'm in this weird in-between space with ASL. I mean here's this incredibly useful and helpful visual language I can use in place of communicating orally (since I can't anymore because thanks spasmodic dysphonia), But technically it's not for me. Ya know? There's this whole culture and history attached to it that I'm learning about (and it's fascinating and gives me a whole new reason to hate the telephone), but it's a culture I'm not a part of and can't be a part of because my earholes still function enough to comprehend oral communication.

Is not being able to talk even a disability? Oh no! Can't talk! What a bummer! This is an absurd disability! But it is a disability because it hinders my ability to do basic things like, I don't know, chat with the cute check-out girl at the grocery store or whatever. I can't make or receive phone calls (oh no so tragic [sarcastic sadface emoji]). I can't tell my friends about the cool show I just watched unless I have my tablet with me for assisted communication. I can't narrate my YouTube videos. (That one is kinda frustrating.) I can't hum to my favorite music. Ugh!

Okay, this post kind of got away from me. I guess I have thoughts I still need to work through about losing my ability to speak and where that puts me socially. While it is indeed a disability, I don't really consider it a loss. More of an inconvenience. Because now I'm the one who has to bend over backward to make myself comprehensible to the world at large. And that's a little annoying.

So I'm grateful that there are people out there who are willing to meet me halfway by taking the time to learn sign language. Seriously. Go learn sign language. It's the best! I love it!

[thedetectiveofinaba]

I finally started playing Transistor and it's probably one of the instantly fav games from the start :D The gameplay is handy and exciting to try out, the graphics and art is A+ and the storyline is quality material Plus I enjoy the saltiness Red has & the dynamics between Man in the Transistor and Red Now if only a certain Camerata baddie would die before I've died more than three times it's just about perfection. Sybil, I'm going to kick your ass one of these days

[papipopsicle]

AFTERTASTE PART SEVEN

Pairing: Archie Andrews X Reader

Summary: In which two best friends since childhood test whether sex and friendship can co-exist without causing conflict. Including OC's Flick and Cherry, a bisexual and lesbian in a sapphic relationship who are best friends of Y/N.

Song: Dream Boy by Waterparks

Warnings: swearing

Words: 2.1K

MASTERLIST

feedback is always appreciated

Y/F and Y/M Robins were far from perfect parents. Y/F had the mental age of a toddler at times, and being an estate agent who always has to go the extra mile- he often wasn't home when his wife needed him the most. Y/M, on the other end of things, had been a stay at home mum until Y/N turned 16 last summer, and now she helped with all the administrative work for Mayor McCoy. She was a maternal creature which, coupled with her brilliant sarcasm, made for some explosive conversations. The two met on the first day of university and got married a week after the last.

When Y/M first found out she was pregnant with little Y/S Robins, the two realised they wanted a quiet bubble of a town to raise their children and grow up with them. But it wasn't until their second daughter was about to turn seven until they found their forever home in the quaint town of Riverdale. Ten years passing before their eyes, and the picturesque place didn't seen all that anymore.

Jason Blossom's death had nothing to do with the short gunshot sounding over the waves of Sweetwater River, the noise which woke Y/N from her sweet unmemorable dreams every few nights. The summer days rolled into early August without anyone caring, Y/N spending most of them at Cheryl's side listening intently to her past adventures with her brother. Betty threw herself into an internship at a publication house; Flick and Cherry had volunteered at a summer camp, and Archie was helping his dad out more and more with constructions job.

Although it hadn't been the start to the relationship Y/N had hoped for- the nervous giggles and hand holding, short and sweet kisses on late night walks followed by poetry worthy cuddling. There was a magnificent silver lining as Archie's muscles gained definition, and he suited the sweaty builder look far too well.

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y/n Humph!

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Cheryl busy being my own icon

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"Earth to my gorgeous queen? Y/N/N?" Cheryl quizzed her friend, who currently resided at the poolside of Thornehill Manor. Her mind was off on a glorious tangent about her rendezvous in the kitchen at two in the morning. Fixing herself a glass of water, when Archie slips his hand into her pyjama shorts, his other around her mouth muffling her needy moans.

The red headed beauty shoved her y/h/c friend playfully, warm skin sweaty under her pale touch. Y/N blinked innocently and sent her an apologetic smile, "What?"

"I asked if you've thought about dating anyone else since Clayton?" The fiery ginger girl enquired with her usual upbeat tone.

Cheryl knew she had a unique quality about her which made it almost impossible for Y/N to lie to her face. The y/h/c girl scrunched up her nose, hiding the smile the idea of Archie Andrews brought to her face. 'Yes. We started off as fuck buddies but never actually fucked. Then I drunkenly asked him to be my boyfriend, now a month later I think we may genuinely work out.'

"Maybe." Y/N bit her bottom lip, listening to her friend's squeal as she squeezed her sun tanned arm.

"I knew it! You have this euphoric glow you only get when someone else makes you climax." The redhead affirmed confidently, watching the Robins girl's eyes bug out before hitting her arm, "Y/N/N, you know your secret's safe with me."

"Fine." She sighed and took a sip of her fruity cocktail, "It started off as just fooling around, honestly I just needed to let off some steam after everything. I knew he was into the kinds of things I was, I mean he used to tease me about it non stop. And it was good, so good I stopped being a pussy and asked him to be my boyfriend."

"Holy freaking hell!" The Blossom girl grinned with excitement, "Dare I ask, who is it?"

Y/N deadpanned at her friend, "Guess."

"Please don't tell me it's that muscular oaf Reggie, he's pretty but there's not exactly much going on upstairs." Cheryl tapped her temples and rolled her eyes at the thought.

"Nope."

The ginger thought for a moment, consulting her liquid courage and splashing her feet around the waters edge, "It's Archie."

All it took was a side-eyed glance at the y/h/c girl's blooming rosy cheeks to know she definitely wasn't wrong. Y/N severely lacked the ability to lie, even if her tone held conviction, her features were far too expressive and told the truth all on their own. It's not like they were hiding it from anyone, but the past four weeks had gone far too quickly without any moments to spare for the world around them. They slept together each night, the majority of that time not actually spent sleeping, but they hadn't been given the chance yet to explore more romantic avenues.

"It's fucking Archie Andrews- you're fucking Archie Andrews and don't you dare deny it." Cheryl gawked in her gorgeous white and nude bikini, watching as her friend lay back against the hot marble slabs which encased the large pool with the largest grin adorning her plump lips.

"We haven't had sex yet, so technically you aren't completely correct." Y/N winked but carried on before the girl exploded with a hundred questions and could never be turned off, "Trust me, I want to, and I'm sure he does too. But you know, it's his first time, I want it to be perfect for him."

"Y/N/N, you really love him, don't you?" Cheryl gagged to begin with, but she found it sweet in truth. She wanted someone to hold, who would hold her right back just as tight for no other reason than needing to.

Y/N sat back up and paddled her feet, "You have no idea, Cher."

Arch 🧡

That new post should be illegal

Tiger 💛

Ooo

I like this reaction

Maybe I should post more

Like this one

Cheryl pushed me in the pool

And I may have had a drink

Or three

Arch 🧡

Well that's sexy

I swear nobody looks good like that how on earth

You're a goddess

But also

How's she holding up?

Tiger 💛

🥺😇

Broken

But she's strong yk

You coming over for dinner?

Arch 🧡

Yeah Y/D invited my dad too

Need me to pick you up from Cheryl's?

Tiger 💛

Awe cute we love a bromance, and it's all good my mommas coming now anyways :))

Hours had elapsed far too fast and soon the summer heat simmered into cool waves of wind brushing over sun kissed skin. Cheryl's arms were clasped around the blonde's shoulders in a tight embrace.

"Thank you so much, Y/N/N, I don't know what I'd do without you!" The Blossom girl professed with sparkling eyes and a brilliant smile.

Y/N beamed up at her, fingers carding through her damp y/h/c hair as she looked over her shoulder to see her mum pulling into the driveway, "You don't need to thank me, Cher, friends look after each other. Message me if you need me, okay?"

Cheryl promised she would and the two teen girls hugged goodbye, with Y/N soon heading home- listening to her mother gossip about Hal and Alice's screaming match last night, Y/N loved her inability to keep her mouth shut sometimes.

"Mom," The y/h/c stopped her mid sentence and received a side eyed glance in response, "I need to tell you something and you're totally not allowed to freak out while you're driving."

Y/M's eyes widened and her grip tightened around the steering wheel, her daughters very rarely confided in her. While she knew her youngest was safe in her promiscuity, neither of Y/M Robins' girls ever shared their secrets so for the most part she took finding out into her own hands.

"Honey," The forty four year old's calm tone was hardly comforting to the teenager, "if this is about you and Archie fooling around, your father and I figured that out a long time ago, like so long ago. Who do you think does your laundry? When your underwear starting looking like dental floss, we caught on pretty quickly."

Y/N felt like a deer in headlights, "Mum, what the hell?" Her cheeks heated to an inhuman temperature.

"It's nothing to be embarrassed about, as long as you're being safe and he's-"

"For the second time today, and I can't believe I'm saying this to you, but I am not having sex with Archie Andrews!" Y/N's high pitched voice sounded through the car. It truly was a blessing and a curse to have such open minded parents in situations like this. She thought about telling her mother the truth, but Y/M was a blabber mouth as well as a gossip, so Y/N chose to withhold certain pieces of information.

The Robins matriarch dropped the subject but didn't forget about her daughter's tone, and continued to ramble on about how odd she found Penelope Blossom and the whole Blossom family in general. "Like why on Earth is Rose in a wooden wheelchair? They know it's the twenty first century, right?"

As expected, the Robins household was once again filled with warm laughter and copious amounts of food. The topic of Jason was skimmed over, and Y/S found herself away from the dinner table. The eldest Robins sibling was currently pleading with Alice as she began shoving all of Polly's belongings in the boot of Hal's car. She couldn't comprehend life without her best friend, not after losing Jason. They were meant to be going travelling together for a year- working the worst jobs and staying up all night to watch the sun rise in different countries. But instead, Y/S's eyes were blinded by tears as she screamed down the street at the speeding car, with Polly Cooper taken out of her life indefinitely.

Y/N was oblivious to the dark inner workings of the Cooper clan, Betty's knowledge about her and Archie unbeknownst to the loved up teens. She'd spent every second not occupied by her internship trying to justify the romantic act as a fleeting moment of loneliness fuelled by alcohol. She wrote in her diary ideas on how she could win Archie back over, not knowing it was in fact, too late. Betty found herself hopelessly in love with the boy next door, unfortunately for her, the girl across the road was the only one his mind found.

Archie and Y/N washed up while their parents resided to the living room with three glasses and a bottle of white wine. The short girl turned the tap off after placing the last utensil on the draining board, flicking her sudsy hands at the boy's face. "What the-"

She didn't give him a chance to finish that thought, jumping up and wrapping her legs around his torso- planting a kiss onto his lips, then cheeks, then forehead. The two fell entranced by each other, planting pecks across nape of her neck and top of his head.

"Son," Fred's voice called out from the next room and the two immediately pulled apart, hearts beating in their ears, "we're going in a minute."

"Alright." He replied, placing his girlfriend on the floor once more.

"I wish you'd stay." Y/N pouted childishly, she meant the words entirely but hated feeling overbearing. Her life had been turned upside down this summer, it started off with her unable to fall asleep with another person next to her- now Archie's chest was her most comfortable pillow and is arms were the warmest blanket.

"Tomorrow night instead, Princess? I promised my dad I'd spend more time with him before senior year." The boy reasoned, holding her close and unknowingly feeling the exact same way, he adored holding her by her waist and pulling her close under the duvet.

"Monopoly night at yours?" She grinned and he nodded back in reply, the two sharing a final kiss in the kitchen before walking into the hallway.

Y/N felt at ease as she wished the two a goodnight and headed up to bed. She took off her tea dress and replaced it with Archie's bulldog t-shirt, managing to reach the same length on her thighs as her dress did.

Arch 🧡

I can still smell your perfume on my sheets

Tiger 💛

Marking my territory obviously x

Arch 🧡

I love it

Hope you sleep well baby x

Tiger 💛

Call me that tomorrow and we won't be sleeping so you better rest up tonight x

Arch 🧡

Whatever you say, baby x

Tiger 💛

Goodnight x

Arch 🧡

Night princess x

part eight?

wanna be tagged? just send in an ask x

[ladyinbooks]

hi! i’ve been a lurker for a while ever since I binged IB this summer and I am?? still not over them??? like not even CLOSE

I’ve had the tab open ever since and I’ve been rereading my favorite parts obsessively for months now (I’ve been feeling pretty shy about commenting lately, im sorry ^-^;; but please know that I really love everything!) and i can’t help myself from returning to the parts featuring Mas-Hain and the boys before Shit Hit the Fan. 🥺

I’m really curious about the dynamic between the two delegations, especially if anyone other than Jay and Samuel started becoming friends during those 5 months. Who were the other humans and lenians? How did the human delegation interact with each other? What did the human delegation think about Samiel’s fondness of Jay? Did everyone who noticed Samiel’s affection disapprove, or did some look at those two and think ‘kids these days, *fond head shake*’? When was the atmosphere friendly between the two delegations? When was it hostile? Were there other members of the delegations who became friends during that time? What did they bond over? If the two delegations had learned to care for each other more, would Mas-Hain have turned out the same way? What if the kill order was sent out, but the human delegation looked at it and said ‘no’? What then?

I guess the first chapter always gives me this impression that the Mas-Hain project really was working, which is why I can’t stop thinking about,, them. being friendly and cool with each other. watching Samiel and Jay be young and silly. forgetting about the war out there,,, and then. u know. not start killing each other.

Hi Anon! :D It's lovely to hear from you (and don't worry, I'm a lurker too)! I'm so pleased you enjoyed IB, and I will admit you put a huge smile on my face when I read you still think of it (and read bits of it)!

Absolutely no apologies necessary about being shy about commenting. The most important thing for me is that you enjoyed the fic, so I'm very happy! :)

As you've probably guessed, I tend to ramble excitedly when I get excellent questions like yours! So I've put my babbling behind the cut below:

Firstly, I have to say I love the fact you asked about Mas-Hain! It's not often I get an opportunity to shout about it, so thank you!

The other humans and Lenians were hand-picked by their respective sides, mostly based on their abilities or political ties. Both groups were military, but the individuals were not only soldiers (if that makes sense?). Jay is actually a great example of this: technically he's a pilot. In reality, he's actually far more useful as a military-political operative, working in complex situations. Because both groups weren't 'just' soldiers, they were also quite good at thinking outside the box, so they were chosen precisely because they wouldn't default to picking a fight when living in close quarters with the enemy.

I think until they were all assigned the mission, the human delegation hadn't met before. I suspect they went through high-intensity training before Mas-Hain, to ensure they wouldn't cause an incident. They could work together, trust each other because they were being formed as a unit, but on a personal level didn't know much about one another. I think close proximity over the months of Mas-Hain changed that to some extent - they all got on relatively well.

In terms of the human reaction to Samiel's fondness for Jay, I think to start with it flew under the radar. The whole point was they were there to learn more about one another, so two people forming a loose kind of friendship wasn't outside the bounds of the mission. I think attitudes may have changed when Samiel started to lose all subtlety (seeking Jay out above everyone else; affectionate touches etc.), at which point I suspect people moved to cautious concern. After all, even though the point is to start building ties, getting too friendly with the enemy can cause a whole host of problems.

That said, I think there was also a fair degree of tolerance to it. Certainly to my mind, Palek in particular was slightly heartened to see Samiel forming something of a friendship (even when he had to report it to Deneira). Samiel was, I think, a fairly isolated person - even amongst his fellow Severne - so I think Palek may have been less concerned than some of his colleagues.

I think on the whole the atmosphere was mostly cautiously optimistic, veering towards tentative friendliness. I don't think either side trusted the other, but equally the reason the individuals were mostly picked was because they were open to the idea of talks. The Mas-Hain model of cooperation was based on the Medusae's mode of diplomacy (adopt your enemy and learn from them), so there had to be a degree of tolerance.

I think sometimes tensions did flare - most likely when someone accidentally crossed a cultural boundary they weren't aware of. (For example, I could see some of the humans discovering Samiel was showing Jay some salzon skills, and thinking they could learn too. Which would have been a big no!)

I think the others gradually started to form vague friendships. I don't think you can live in close proximity and not develop some camaraderie. I suspect they bonded over weird similarities in military life, along with stories of families and the discovery that both sides were not, in fact, the monsters you warn your children about.

That said, I think one of the tragedies of Mas-Hain is that no one was given enough time for these bonds to develop fully. I think had there been more trust, the whole murderous ending could most definitely have been avoided. Precisely because the people on both sides were sent for their skills of thinking beyond a simple command, had there been closer ties, I have the vague notion that they could all have ended up going rogue, and trying to work out exactly why the humans had been sent a kill order. (Which honestly makes me think of happier AUs, where Samiel and Jay are part of a roaming band of piratical human and Lenian deserters, who go around trying to fix things. They keep bumping into a furious Hird, who is desperately trying to arrest them. XD)

I absolutely agree with you: I think it was working! Unfortunately, I think before it was given enough time (and keeping in mind neither Deneira nor Lault wanted a positive outcome), it became the mess that happened in IB. Sadly, I think the ruined potential of Mas-Hain is one of the really frustrating tragedies of the IB universe.