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The richest man in interstellar orbit, the magnate of the solar system, the kingpin of space science, Professor Doctor Sir Martin K. Rombridge, Esquire (also vice president of a small African mining nation) is holding, tonight, in his orbital luxury cruise vessel, a high-society gala of some of the most influential people of the future.

No, he hasn't been murdered... yet. A death threat is almost as serious... and leaves something to be prevented. Things like that happen something like this: A robotic servant glides over, carrying a tray with a single glass of bubbly champagne for the man with the plan Dr Rombridge himself. He lifts the glass and finds a small piece of paper stuck to the condensation on the bottom of the glass. Yes, condensation (the cruise ship has simulated gravity). Rombridge squints his dark brown, wrinkled, whiskery face and slides the limp piece of paper away from its bond with the glass. All he sees is blurry black ooze where letters should be. He flips down some glasses, squints some more. Maybe - is that an 'a'? Followed by a 't'? Yes, the first word is 'At'. Rombridge is onto something. He beckons over a servant, a human servant, to read the slightly diffused letters.

"At the strike of midnight, Professor Doctor Sir Martin K. Rombridge, Esquire, Honorary Vice President of Mgubalkwala, shall be dead as a consequence of", begins the servant, then after a moment of silence frowns, as if trying to make out even hazier letters. "The rest is unreadable sir." The servant crumbles it in his hand.

"Oh God," breathes Rombridge. "We have a Class B security breach. Lock up the guests in the ballroom - no one gets in or out. And lock me in my panic room. And contact the Earth-Moon Orbital Detective Agency."

"Yes, sir" intone several nearby robots.

"What time is it young man?" Rombridge barks.

The servant looks at his watch. "I'm afraid it's 7 o'clock, sir. The party started just an hour ago."

"And it ends at midnight," Rombridge frowns.

~~~

A wealth-n-stealth franchise detective vehicle parks itself smoothly in the docking bay.

"I'm sorry," quips a dockhand. "We have a Class B security breach currently underway. Unless you're -"

"The detectives from EMODA," said the first detective, emerging from the vehicle holding a badge. The other one got out too, hands on his or her hips, staring at the dockhand.

"Suit yourselves. Last ship that goes in or out." The dockhand locks the doors, puts a release timer for midnight, and follows the two detectives into the rest of the building.

They are met almost immediately by the human servant.

"Thank you for coming!" he says. "The guests are all in the ballroom."

"Tell us what happened then get in there yourself," said the first detective. "We'll need to interview everybody. Rombridge is an extremely high-paying customer of ours."

~~~

~~~

Host: Unreality

1)

2)

etc...

The more the merrier. Sign-ups will cease in a couple days. Sign up if you want to play and get real into it because I will be sending each person a character/personality/etc. This personage will be known to everyone; however, each person will also have a secret or two about themselves that only they know. Also, two people will need to be Detectives. If you're a detective, you're in charge of asking people questions and figuring out who is the intended murderer(s). But everyone wants the huge cash reward that Rombridge would pay them, not to mention the fame, if they found the perpetrators.

The two detectives are in an alliance and work as a team, but everyone else is on their own in the beginning; you can, however, form an alliance and put multiple minds together, comparing what you know/suspect/etc. The first alliance (or individual) to solve the premeditated murder wins the game.

The detectives cannot break their alliance, cannot add new people onto their alliance, and cannot join other alliances. However everyone else is free to form and break alliances and even be part of multiple alliances. When PMing each other with game-related stuff, please include me in the conversation, as a host I won't be doing much, just posting updates every hour (not real-life hour but rather 8pm, 9pm, 10pm, 11pm and MIDNIGHT in the game) so if I could see what's going on behind the scenes that would really help. There's no need to officially declare an alliance in the public thread (you can if you want) but please send me a PM with the official alliance roster when you do so I can keep track.

The idea is to always talk in character in the thread (and even PMs) and the thread acts as sort of the background chatter, people talking to other people and accusing other people. The detectives also ask their questions and receive answers on the public thread.

Anyway all that shenanigans only begins when the game actually begins, which is after I see how many people have signed up so that I can make roles.

~~~

~~~

Host: Unreality

1)

2)

etc...

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Haha, you know those notifications in the upper right hand corner? I'm at 239. Anyone have more? :P

528 :P

Out of my "alliances", the one with Jicochi and Mlaku is at ten pages with 186 replies. Man, I had them going. Even when I dropped out of our accusation of Mr McCudgeon, I came up with a lie, and they started believing me again. Then Mlaku realized it had to be me, Jicochi, or Al, so I started a separate convo and convinced him it was Jicochi. :D This was so much fun, haha.

This will sound silly, but aside from the notes I was sending Hex-Dash, I was playing it like I wasn't the murderer, looking for every possible reason someone else might have done it. And it worked. ;D

Good game, guys. I can't wait to do this again. :D

next time the motive/evidence behind the killer won't be as abstract though and there'll be more evidential stuff too :P Hehe. But I'm glad you had fun playing the bad guy

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Okay, goodies, here's where you went wrong. At the end, you really needed to post your guesses in the thread, and agree to some sort of split fortune or something. That way, everyone technically wins, and Rombridge survives.

I made a request for people to post their accusations on the main thread to give us process of elimination, but I found it hard to accuse people myself based on rule 4: You must not say anything or reveal information that would cause undue emotional distress in an individual. If you say something and realize afterwards that it causesd undue emotional distress, you must immediately cover it up.

To find loopholes, I was trying to compare the handwriting for the notes to old samples stored in my databanks, but unreality insisted that they all looked the same. He kept emphasizing "flowery" handwriting, which should have been a clue... :duh: Up until the end, I was still convinced that Rombridge was somehow getting messages out of the Panic Room (though I couldn't figure out how, hence the reason I began questioning the computer's loyalty :wacko: ). It was only after the time was up that it dawned on me that I might not have been getting real notes from the beginning...BTW, they all insisted that I deny the notes existed, if anyone was wondering.

Rule 1 let me bypass the notes to submit an accusation (the Rombridge suicide one :dry: ): You must follow any direct spoken or motion-implied orders from Rombridge. You must also always be within one hundred miles of Rombridge at all times and wait on his order (the closer the better except in situations of purposeful isolation such as the panic room, aka, what's happening now)

From the 8 o'clock post:

Meanwhile a loudspeaker from the panic room turns (it has very limited battery power though) and Rombridge says that from this point forward the wall computer (aka Unreality) is accepting accusations

And I handed over the will because of the very beginning:

"Oh God," breathes Rombridge. "We have a Class B security breach. Lock up the guests in the ballroom - no one gets in or out. And lock me in my panic room. And contact the Earth-Moon Orbital Detective Agency."

I didn't make alliances with anyone in part because I didn't think that a robot like #4-9 could really take sides with or against anyone. Basically, I tried to keep to a reactive system. If people made a request or statement in a PM or on the main thread, that allowed me to respond, or make a query of my own. So I only have 61 notifications. :lol:

I definitely noticed how "plugged in" Maw was during the whole thing, so I suspected him at first, but I didn't really know anything that was going on from anyone else, so it was hard to judge what anyone else was doing, since no one else really seemed inclined to talk to me or tell me their story. Which made it very hard to get anything from anyone since I couldn't be aggressive (the whole Rule 4 thing).

BTW, Jicochi requested the list of directives that governed me, but he asked (not ordered) and he didn't say I had to give them all out, so I gave him a carefully chosen subset so that if the hacker and the would-be murderer weren't the same person, I wouldn't inadvertently reveal rule 7 to him: You must follow orders of non-Rombridge human beings.

This was fun and I did enjoy trying to figure things out as the Robot* (although like I said, I spent most of my time in utter confusion as to what else was going on behind the scenes :wacko: ). One thing to improve it would be to make the time periods more hard-and-fast since I couldn't always figure out why time would proceed like it did. I do think that there did need to be some give and take for this kind of game, but the way you strung it out at the end did get kind of ridiculous (even though you were desperately trying to give the rest of us one more chance than we deserved). :lol:

* @Izzy: the robots of the Asimov variety as opposed to the Douglasian kind. :thumbsup:

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Out of my "alliances", the one with Jicochi and Mlaku is at ten pages with 186 replies. Man, I had them going. Even when I dropped out of our accusation of Mr McCudgeon, I came up with a lie, and they started believing me again. Then Mlaku realized it had to be me, Jicochi, or Al, so I started a separate convo and convinced him it was Jicochi. :D This was so much fun, haha.

Gah! Haha, well played and good excuses! :D:P

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Yeah, rule #4 made me incredibly happy, because I knew if you ever accused me, you'd be forced to cover up. I fully assumed the suicide thing was a cover up after you told the detectives I did it. :P

Fun times.

The wall computer was definitely a bit Marvin-y. :P

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Hahaha, I was so scared you and LJayDen were secretly plotting against me in a different convo. It's cool, I had like four alliances, ours was just the most interesting. I can't believe we made.. *thinks* four guesses, all making sense. That was so much fun.

I can't believe I ended up tricking Mlaku that final time. I thought I was done for.

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Hahaha, I was so scared you and LJayDen were secretly plotting against me in a different convo. It's cool, I had like four alliances, ours was just the most interesting. I can't believe we made.. *thinks* four guesses, all making sense. That was so much fun.

I can't believe I ended up tricking Mlaku that final time. I thought I was done for.

Like I said, no one wanted to confide in the robot. :( You can attest to that, Izzy, since my synopsis of events was probably pretty dull for you, no? :P Did I tell you anything that you didn't already know? :unsure:

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Like I said, no one wanted to confide in the robot. :( You can attest to that, Izzy, since my synopsis of events was probably pretty dull for you, no? :P Did I tell you anything that you didn't already know? :unsure:

Haha. I did already know everything you sent me, but I didn't really care about the information. I just wanted to know what you thought about me. :P If you would have said something like "SO AND SO SUSPECT MAW MIVVELTON OF MURDER", I knew I would have had to change my strategy.

*still wants to hear from the detectives*

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should I post my ruminations/plans for the second mystery game or wait a while?

Obviously, you can't post everything you're thinking about since that would ruin the twists and turns you have planned, but I think that talking about game format issues and vague intentions ("ruminations") would be best if started as soon as possible to get feedback so that you can tweak the final product for the better. :thumbsup:

It'd be interesting to hear any specific changes you have in mind in how the events proceed that differ from the first game's format and other structural changes that you have in mind. I'm sure that some people have already given you ideas in PMs on how the new version should change and it would be good to see what ideas you've adopted.

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Thanks unreality (once again) for a great game. I'd love to play another. There were two stand out things for me in this game:

1) that as someone else I think mentioned, there wasn't a time frame for each hour. Even a hazy one would have suited me better maybe.

2) And this is more to do with me, but I guess I didn't fully grasp the nature of game right away. It took me a while to realise that there was no fixed way to play it, that it wasn't so much a case of Ask someone what did at this time? and where were you at that time? etc. The mechanics weren't clear to me, and I was slow to catch up on them. That's why I want another go :ph34r:.

Also, a quick question to whoever can answer: How much could we as players bend the rules as we went along and change the storyline. For example, when Izzy was passing instructions to dawh, was this something that unreality said could be done, or something interpreted by you Izzy?

And Izzy, well played ;). You did it brilliantly. What made you have dawh kill me off? Again as an example of my question above, was this something you took upon yourself, or was it pre-ordained that you could kill someone off using dawh? I'd be lying if I had said I had anything concrete on you, but I only suspected you. I didn't suspect anyone else really because we were all on a level playing field, ie everyone had a motive, means, and something to hide, so nobody stood out except you. And you only stood out because, you knew everything pretty much, always one step ahead, like a good murderer :thumbsup:. Again I had nowhere near anything concrete, and I definitely wasn't going to guess any time soon because this was just a feeling, and it probably could, and would, have changed down the line.

But yeah, great game everyone, I really enjoyed the role playing, that added something to it, it was hard getting out of the habit of usin' the ole a-pos-tro-phe :P

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JS, when I was given my role description from unreality, the part about the handwriting analysis stood out to me, so I started musing about how I could use hex-dash to my advantage. I pretty much made him do my dirty work. :P (He sent me what he knew about everyone, killed you (I had to send two notes to get this order carried out, because I forgot to specify a time the first time :P), and sent the will I wrote to Rombridge's lawyers, which resulted in a necessary gag. Unreality never specifically said I could kill you, but he never said I couldn't, and I figured since I'm a murderer anyway.. :ph34r:

Dude I had to kill you, you scared me. :P You were the only one (aside from maybe dawh and the inactives) that I couldn't make eat my every word. I had nothing to fear from Jiccochi, Mlaku, Serv, Mr Mc or Mrs Mc. Fleur and I had a sort of.. strange relationship, but I felt that he trusted me. You couldn't be manipulated, and had to go. I would have probably offed dawh too, if I didn't need him so much.

Oh, in case anyone was curious, here are the notes from me to Hex-Dash.

Note 1

Salutations, my little bot. Do not fret, I am aware that it is in your programming for it to be impossible to betray me. Which is why I require your expertise in communicating with humans to relieve my stress in this deplorable position. I need you to make a list of all your correspondents since my withdrawal to the panic room. I also need you to include the key facts you have discovered about them. I trust your discretion in what is important to maintaining my safety. I want you to place this list under the third tile from the exits nearest the stern (where my cameras tell me no one is) and make sure no one has a clue it is there. In fact, I forbid you to speak of the letter or otherwise hint of its existence. If it gets in the wrong hands, it might be the death of us all. I then want you to rejoin the group (make sure NO ONE sees you go over there), and continue communicating as usual. The letter needs to be there by 9 o clock.

Now, during your designing, engineers questioned whether or not to give you the ability to kill. They decided that, when it comes to matters of life preservation, the ability might come in handy. KILLSWITCH, ENGAGE. It has been turned on. I know you might be feeling confused or scared at your new ability, but it will only go to good use. You can only kill under explicit instruction from me. Disregard any orders you may receive from other people. When information surfaces, I may instruct you to carry out an assassination. Again, speak of this to no one and drop no hints.

Finally, use whatever means necessary to find out what Captain Fleur has Random Al looking over (he's here to assassinate a business man, and I'm afraid that that means me). This can be found out by talking to either of them. If they ask where you got this information, tell them you were given direct orders from me.

I know that may seem like a lot my little botling, but I have that utmost confidence in you. Remember to maintain a sense or secrecy about yourself. At the ten o clock hour, I will send further instructions to inquire about what you have found out.

Good luck.

Sincerely,

Master Professor Doctor Sir Martin K. Rombridge, Esquire

PS. Don't forget to apply your oils, I don't need you rusting on me.

Note 2

Kill Reno Starkey. Do this subtlety. Do not frame anyone else aboard this ship with this good riddance. He is involved in affairs that are illegal aboard my ship, including the attempted murder of me. By killing him, you will be handsomely rewarded.

Regards,

Master Rombridge

Note 3

Robot,

Upon receiving these orders, I command you to kill Reno Starkey IMMEDIATELY. From now on, any order you receive from me is to be carried out with the utmost speed, and you are forbidden from stopping to contemplate loopholes.

Also, I'm going to need you to contact the media. You are responsible for ensuring they are here before midnight to film anything that might go on.

Finally you are to in no way show any of these notes to anyone, hint at what it says on them, clearly state anything it says on them, or any other loophole there of. I am most upset with you.

Rombridge

Note 4

Robot,

From here on out, you are forbidden from contacting the ship's computer, hazarding a guess at my forthcoming murderer, contacting anyone aboard this ship or replying to their inquiries, leaving notes around, or using any means of social intercourse including but not limited to speech, sign language, flare signals, Morse Code, any language you've invented, mathematical cryptograms, recreation of these letters, and so forth. Failure to observe these rules set forth by your master is a violation of the Starways Congress law regarding the interactions between robotic servants and their masters. Your punishment will be complete annihilation, and as your master, this would be very upsetting to me.

Below I have rewritten my will, and I need you to transmit it to my lawyers on Earth, have them sign and agree to it, get it notarized, etc. My will is my personal property, and I forbid you from reading it or giving it to anyone besides my lawyers to read. The above rules apply. I know you are capable of transmitting messages without having read them. MAKE SURE IT IS NOT INTERCEPTED. You are not allowed to contact anyone and tell them to intercept it. If you recall, you're not allowed to contact anyone whatsoever.

I, Professor Doctor Sir Martin K. Rombridge, Esquire (also vice president of a small African mining nation), hereby entitle my entire estate to my secret lover and loyal painter, Mr. Maw Mivvelton. My cheating scumbag wife is to get NONE of my property or money. Since I have no heir, this is the best solution. All my belongings, including my robot Hex4Dash9 are to go to Maw. I also want it publicized that the sex was great.

Tell Maw I love him very much (He knows).

(Ground Control, to Major Rom, your circuit's dead, there's something wrong. Can you hear me Major Rom? Can you hear me Major Rom?)

For here, am I sitting in my tin can, far above the moons.

Planet Earth is blue, and there's nothing I can do...

Signed,

Professor Doctor Sir Martin K. Rombridge, Esquire (also vice president of a small African mining nation)

Regards,

Professor Doctor Sir Martin K. Rombridge, Esquire (also vice president of a small African mining nation)

PS. You were an awesome robot. I will miss you very much. Thanks for your humble servitude

Edited by Izzy
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What do you mean strange? Are you talking about the night that you started talking in gibberish?

Bah. No. >_> ..Though I feel like that happened in more than one conversation.. :blush:

I mean that I didn't have as much control over your actions as I would have liked (as I did with Jicochi and Mlaku, for instance. Even though I did convince you to accuse Jicochi), and you probably didn't trust me as much as would have made me comfortable, but I felt (or, rather hoped) that it was enough to keep me in the clear.

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alright this is what i've been planning for a sign-ups opening post;

~~~

MURDER MYSTERY II: The Shifting Sands of Shyzoth

In ancient times the desert city of Shyzoth was a shining jewel, an oasis of prosperity amid the bronze and white crystalline sands of the vast desert. A thousand years before it was the seat of the greatest and largest empire of this planet, an empire spanning multiple continents. Now the empire has long since fallen into disarray, a multitude of competing city-states. Of these regions, however, Shyzoth is perhaps the oldest and most powerful. It is a city webbed by canals, aqueducts and irrigation systems where water == life in such a harsh location. Its buildings are ancient and sandy and majestic, topped with colorful minarets and the dominant religion, Hanshin, supplies many towers as Pinnacles reaching toward the exalted land in the sky.

The city is also a city of intrigue. A shady organization known as Tal'vrak runs the underground. Black markets thrive using secret signs and smoke symbols, integrated into the bustling street markets. Amid the trading of ancient empire artifacts and array of useful items is the trading of illegal weapons, drugs (Shyzoth is the capital of the world for an addicting desert flower called psyflora) and even slaves. There are certain streets that even the stalwart City Enforcers hesitate to visit. Streets that you can go to hire dark-robed monk assassins and slimy cutthroats, but only if you accept the risk of dying in the process.

The politics of Shyzoth are as complex and twisting as its high-walled streets and network of dusty canals. A figure known as the Mazoth rules the city as sort of a mayor, but the Mazoth does not have absolute control, far from it. The Mazoth must answer to his puppet masters, the Shyzoth Chancellors, a group of 5 ex-Mazoths that supposedly have lots of wisdom and charisma but really just have pockets full of gifts and bribes from various organizations, companies and individuals. Many potential Mazoths run for office on the idea of bringing justice and accountability to the halls of leadership, but they have to balance this initial desire with the possible future of becoming a Chancellor themselves after their 5 year term is up. It's a public election to be a Mazoth but when a Chancellor dies, the remaining Chancellors hold a private meeting to choose the replacement from ex-Mazoths, hence all the @ss-kissing that goes on.

That's not all though. It is often said that Shyzoth has two different avenues of leadership. After the empire fell due to its connection to a violent religion called Zamoa (which is now outlawed everywhere and hated and feared), all city-states are ideally supposed to be secular. However the religion Hanshin, which has been around for a very long time as the religion of the desert nomads, has taken root in Shyzoth in the past few hundred years and come to dominate the spiritual scene. The church is led by women only and the position of Theocrata goes to the most esteemed of these women. It is a position of dictatorship and extreme fundamentalism. Hanshin is a religion that attempts to integrate itself with every possible aspect of daily life and make its presence known.

Now that we have some background, let's introduce the scenario. A small number of people have gathered in a public square to hear the speech of a man known as Cabuul. Cabuul entered the city a couple weeks ago with a small troupe of followers, admirers and "disciples" that he collects in his wanderings. Many different types of people come to these kind of speeches. Many have crazy theories about codes within what he speaks. He has called himself a Martyr for Truth even though he was still alive. He's an enigma and a troublemaker. Medical personalities have diagnosed him with mild schizophrenia and extreme narcissism. Social personalities have described his voice as fluid and delicious and captivating.

Now he's dead.

More details to come later, but basically the City Enforcers have quarantined off the square and everyone that was listening to Cabuul's speech for one reason or another must remain inside until the killer has been brought to justice. However city law states that a quarantine can only be under effect for a certain time limit. If the killer has not been arrested by < *** >, the quarantine lifts and everyone can go home - including the killer, and this will become a cold case. (There are no intermediate "hours" or anything like that, it's a straight shot).

Now the City Enforcers have supplied two of their best people to be the official handlers of the case, and unlike the two the detectives from the previous MM, the City Enforcers have actual authority here. They can make arrests and prevent BTSC with the arrested person while they question them under influence of truth serums. However after the third (or maybe fourth?) false arrest they will be taken off the case and then the killer can only be caught my a majority vote citizen's arrest. Ordinary citizens cannot make arrests or accusations on their own, they must present their case to the City Enforcers who have agreed to hear out any cases reasonably before deciding to arrest. If the arrest was correct, the credit will go to the citizen that suggested it (or to the City Enforcers if they did it of their own volition).

There are also other things that need figuring out. There will be a list of questions that citizens want to find the answers to in addition to snooping out the killer. There are more crimes than just murder. If the citizens deliver correct answers to the City Enforcers they will be rewarded; punished for wrong answers. Also the killer may or may not have a secret agenda in progress during the events.

All of the characters will have more personality and more secret information than last time and the events around the murder will be more fleshed out… it's a good idea to not give away all your info at once though, not if you want to survive and possibly win. There will be multiple layers of intrigue.

There will also be "items", tangible objects (possibly evidence-related) that can change hands and be used to provide various information, abilities, etc.

Don't let yourself be covered by the shifting sands of Shyzoth…

SIGNUP

Host: Unreality

1) …

Also if anyone wants to dual-host with me or something just let me know. I haven't made any of the characters or backstories or murder scenario or items or whatever yet so if you want to help me with all that PM me.

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