With the Grand Tourney coming up at the end of the month, it's time to sign your characters up to compete! Below you'll find information about the events we'll be running, some quick basics about how they'll work, and a sign-up form to fill out.


The Grand Tourney features a variety of different competitive events, and this time the Inquisition has been invited to submit competitors from those at its Kirkwall outpost. OOCly, we'll be focusing on the few events that are either most prestigious, or that we think will be of most interest to our PCs. They are:

Martial

The Joust: along with the grand melee, the joust is the highlight of the Tourney and the most prestigious (and therefore most lucrative) to win. It is open only to knights or those of similar status (Templars count and acknowledged nobles can likely slide in as well. If you're unsure, ask us!)

The Grand Melee: this year it has been announced that the melee will be conducted as a team event rather than a free-for-all. The Inquisition will field at least one team, depending on interest.

Armed Combat: individual fighters face off against vicious creatures from across Thedas. This event is open to all.

Unarmed Combat: a 1v1 wrestling competition that is very popular among the common folk because it's the event one of their own is most likely to win. This event is open to all.

Archery: the greatest marksmen in the world will face off over several rounds to determine who has bragging rights for the next few years. This event is open to all.

Magical

Historically, mages and magic of any kind (including enchanted weapons, runes, magic accessories or armor, etc.) have all been strictly forbidden at the Tourney. However, after some bold statements by Tevinter at the last Tourney to the effect that they could wipe the floor with any other nation if they were allowed to enlist their mages, this year several controversial new events have been added to the slate. While they are officially put on by the Tourney organizers, they are considered 'exhibition' events only, to be held a safe distance from the main event, with minimal prizes and no effect on the determination of the overall Champion.

Magical Melee: a smaller version of the Grand Melee, this will also be a team event, in which groups of 3-4 (with a max 2 mages per group) facing off.

Magical Combat: like the Armed Combat competition, mages will have the chance to test their mettle against vicious creatures from across Thedas, including some Fade-Touched and Tevinter-bred creatures brought in specifically for this competition.

Non-Combat

In addition to the martial competitions, the Tourney is also a hotbed of political activity. The Inquisition won't be immune to that! We'll have options for PCs to take on handling particular political overtures or problems, and the stat sheet we've designed reflects that. Players who would like to get their characters involved in some diplomacy or espionage work should also fill out the sign-up form and indicate that interest. They'll be assigned tasks or opportunities, and we'll role for their success, similar to how we role for combat outcomes.


The way this will work OOC is that along with your sign-ups, we're going to ask you to fill out a brief little stat sheet that we've designed just for this plot (though if we like it a lot, it or something similar may pop up again in the future). More info on that is provided below. Once we have a list of all the PCs signed up for each event, we're going to create brackets and fill them in with NPC (or creature) opponents.

The events will be "held" in Discord, where we'll publicly roll the outcome of each match-up, and then afterwards post the results. That way everyone can RP about their characters' progress through the competitions, and about the fortunes or misfortunes of others in the lists, without having to thread out a whole bunch of battle scenes against NPCs. (You are of course welcome to have a friend NPC for you if you'd like to play yours out, as long as you stick to the final outcome the dice decide.)

There are prizes for the official competitions, so if PCs win they may get a bag of money or a fancy new weapon or similar, and their success will reflect well on the Inquisition. Even if they don't win, if PCs put on a good show and do well enough on the Inquisition's behalf, it may have an impact on the opinions of the many rich and powerful natives gathered to watch.

The deadline to sign up is 11:59 PM (Eastern) on May 18. If you don't sign up, your character can still attend, but they won't participate in the Tourney events or be assigned any diplomatic or espionage missions.

Signing Up

You may sign up as many of your characters as you like, and they may compete in as many events as you like. Side characters are also welcome as long as they are Inquisition members or allies.

As noted above, the Joust only allows knights or similar, but otherwise the events are open to anyone. Only the two mage-specific events allow the use of magic and magical items. Inquisition mages will be allowed to choose whether to participate in mage events or in normal events. They can't do both, and if they choose to participate in the normal events they will need to be very careful throughout the Tourney to pretend that they are not mages, to avoid even the perception of possible cheating. Rifters will also be able to make the same choice. The Inquisition will strenuously (very very strenuously) advise that any accusation of cheating at the Tourney, even if untrue, could be a terrible blow to its reputation in the Free Marches. If you do intend for your character to use magic in a non-mage event, please inform us so we can prepare their dungeon cell in advance.

Stats

We're going to use a very streamlined little stat sheet for this event, focused on the skills that will be relevant to the specific things we're running as part of this plot. They are:

• Armed Combat
  
• Horsemanship
  
• Marksmanship
  
• Unarmed Combat
  
• Combat Magic
  
• Support Magic
  
• Healing (magical or otherwise)
  
• Diplomacy
  
• Stealth
  
• Wealth (Your character's access to cash they can easily dispense to influence people. A standard Inquisition salary is level 1.)
  
• Connections (Your character's ability to call on people they know outside the Inquisition for information and assistance. Higher levels of this would represent ties to powerful people and the ability to influence those people's opinions or actions.)

For each category, you'll need to pick a value between 0 and 12. Those numbers correspond to the levels of ability described below:

• 10-12: Extraordinary. People among the best in Thedas, with decades of experience and exceptional natural ability.
  
• 7-9: Elite. People who have devoted their lives to developing this skill, with decades of training and experience, and substantial natural ability.
  
• 4-6: Professional. People who have had regular training, and possess either some experience or significant natural ability. Good enough to get a job utilizing this skill.
  
• 1-3: Apprentice/Amateur. People with no experience but either some training or decent natural ability.
  
• 0: Unskilled. People with no knowledge or ability whatsoever.

All characters will begin with 25 points to distribute between the skills above. Characters will also receive 0.5 additional points for each year they are over the age of 20, up to a maximum of 35 total points.

For example, Alistair begins with 25 points. He is 34 years old. 34-20=14; 14/2=7, so Alistair gets 7 bonus points. 25+7=32, so Alistair gets 32 points. Silas Caron is 'somewhere in his 40s' and acts old so we're going to say he's 48. He starts with 25 points, and 48-20=28/2=14, so he gets 14 bonus points. 25+14=39, but the cut-off is 35 total, so Silas is Too Old for his additional experience to outweigh his increasingly decrepit body and plateau in mental acuity, and he only gets 35 points.

If you're afraid of numbers, you can use this calculator.

You are not required to use all of your available points in these skills, especially if it just isn't realistic or IC for your character. And as a reward for restraint, players may also choose to devote some portion of their points to other possibilities.

Goals & Prizes

One thing that people can put points toward is supporting a goal. The points contributed toward these goals represent characters at the Tourney working to further those goals in small and passive ways, like existing peacefully where people can see them, or being overheard in conversation about the topic in a tavern, chatting with a stranger in line, etc. The points will go into a pool where they are combined with the results of the diplomacy plots that will be available during the Tourney and counted toward changing hearts and minds. How many points each goal receives will have an impact on the game going forward and may "unlock" new missions in the future.

You can put points toward more than one goal, but cannot spend more than half your total allotted points on goals.

• Improved Perceptions of Rifters
  
• Improved Perceptions of Mages
  
• Improved Perceptions of Templars
  
• Improved Perceptions of Elves
  
• Improved Perceptions of Qunari/Vashoth
  
• Improved Perceptions of Dwarves
  
• Improved Perceptions of the Inquisition
  
• Increased Chantry Support
  
• Social/Economic Stability
  
• Social/Economic Revolution

Additionally, you can also spend points on winning prizes. This will allow your character to win a prize of some sort from the many Thedosian carnival games at the Tourney, or otherwise happen upon something cool during the event. You're of course welcome to have them acquire some mundane stuffed prizes at the ring toss just through RP, but if you'd like a cool magical or rift item, this is your shot to get one without spending AC Points. Each point put toward winning a prize will get you one die, which we'll then roll and total to determine your prize, with the cooler/more powerful items having higher numbers. (You won't get to specifically pick your reward here, but your character is welcome to try to trade with others.) If your character isn't the type to spend hours playing medieval skee-ball, you can come up with some other explanation for how they acquired this item: winning at cards, bought it from a mysterious trader, found it forgotten behind the beer tent, whatever.

STAT CLARIFICATION: These points will not be used for anything other than the events described. We aren’t going to spring an attack on you guys and make you roll with these numbers to decide if your characters live or anything like that! To that end, they can reflect effort as well as ability. If your character could be good at something but isn’t going to attempt that here at all—for example, they’re good archers, but aren’t competing in any events—it’s fine to adjust their numbers to reflect that. Just keep in mind:

1. The group events will take multiple things into account. Just because your character isn’t participating specifically in archery or armed combat doesn’t mean points in those areas can’t help their team in the melee events.

2. Larger point gains for the listed Goals will be available via diplomacy and espionage plots that utilize the wealth/connections/diplomacy/stealth stats, so deliberately lowballing your character there to put points into Goals instead may be counterproductive. But on the other hand, it is less risky, since you might fail at diplo/espionage plots.

3. The described levels and what they represent should still function as skill ceilings. A character who could be a professional archer but isn’t trying/is deliberately throwing or who is not participating in the events at all can put a lower number than 4. But a character who does not have the requisite decades of experience/training can’t put a 10-12 just because they try hard.