[X] Incomplete Boon: Knightslayer - Unlocks certain scenes and makes it easier to battle Pages, Squires, and Knights. Unlock by dueling and defeating 9 different Pages, Squires, and/or Knights (1/9)

[X] Sparring with Gabriel - +2 training dice and +3 Relations with Gabriel.
 
Line's Luck Locked (KreenWarrior)
Another attempt at skaldic verse, this time regarding the fight at Half-Dan's farm.

Fire's-line[1] braves Muspel's-sign[2]
Fearless groom follows doom
Aid lion-heart's[3] stalwart heir[4]
Athwart eagle's unshaved court[5]
Wolf-wives[6] find no windfall
Witness war-child's wild end
Lion-heart swears line's luck
Locked close till Ragnarok


[1] Halla, based on Steinarr's kenning
[2] Smoke
[3] Half-Dan, based on Danish coat of arms (probably three centuries too late, but I couldn't figure out what they used in this era, so it might just as easily be correct)
[4] "heir" is pronounced the same as "air" so this alliterates :V
[5] "Eagle's unshaved court" - 'eagle' is a carrion animal, so raider; 'unshaved court' - his gaggle of followers.
[6] Valkyries are sometimes said to have rode wolves
 
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[X] Sparring with Gabriel - +2 training dice and +3 Relations with Gabriel.

[X] Vague Trick: Stomping-Power-Lunge Trick - A powerful Pierce trick that sees the wielder stomp the ground before delivering a potent attack. The stomp itself can also deal significant damage to a prone opponent.
 
[X] Sparring with Gabriel - +2 training dice and +3 Relations with Gabriel.
[X] Yes, keep the previous plan
 
[X] Sparring with Gabriel - +2 training dice and +3 Relations with Gabriel.
[X] Vague Trick: Stomping-Power-Lunge Trick - A powerful Pierce trick that sees the wielder stomp the ground before delivering a potent attack. The stomp itself can also deal significant damage to a prone opponent.

[X] Yes, keep the previous plan
-[X] Assign the 2 new Training Dice to Hamr

Can't wait for the title of Warmother.
 
With your hand in his, he shakes it. "My name is Gabriel Blackstone, Squire on the Eighth Bead of the Second Decade."

You return the shake and brush a loose strand of hair from your face. "Halla Steinarsdottir," you blink and scramble for a response to the second thing he said, "uh, age fifteen?"

He stands frozen, still shaking your hand. He seems a little bit lost as he looks at you.

...Maybe he doesn't know how to respond to that either?

You cough and he flinches. He quickly releases your hand and steps away, a light streak of pink on his face. There's a lot of horror in his eyes, but what is there to be horrified about?
Vikings are freaking scary.

Among other things, Halla just made it clear that she's only been combat-training for about three years, and Gabriel has to know that vikings get more dangerous as they get older.

As for the other benefit I have no idea...I could go either way on that one. And I don't see this changing the previous plan notably, so I'll still be voting for that. We'd need to assign the two new training dice (assuming we pick that option as we should), but as the author of the previous plan, I'd just put them into Hamr (we really need to get that to 5).
Better a boon than a trick. We're not short of things to pour training dice into, we're not short on ways to get additional tricks, and "Stomping-Power-Lunge Trick" doesn't look like it's amazingly better than the tricks we already have.

[X] Incomplete Boon: Knightslayer - Unlocks certain scenes and makes it easier to battle Pages, Squires, and Knights. Unlock by dueling and defeating 9 different Pages, Squires, and/or Knights (1/9)

[X] Sparring with Gabriel - +2 training dice and +3 Relations with Gabriel.

[X] Yes, keep the previous plan
-[X] Assign the 2 new Training Dice to Hamr
 
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Vikings are freaking scary.

Among other things, Halla just made it clear that she's only been combat-training for about three years, and Gabriel has to know that vikings get more dangerous as they get older.

Yeah, I don't know if that was him spotting Hallr in some way or realizing the implications of her not having a title along with her young age and the relative shortness of her training. Like, she's just some girl and she can still kick his ass. That's actually not quite true, but it is true that the average Viking without a title is still scary as hell, something he may not quite have internalized.

Better a boon than a trick. We're not short of things to pour training dice into, we're not short on ways to get additional tricks, and "Stomping-Power-Lunge Trick" doesn't look like it's amazingly better than the tricks we already have.

I think the trick would get learned somewhat faster and be more generally useful, though it is true that the Trait doesn't require training successes, just deeds...but honestly, I just don't have a preference. I've removed my vote for either.
 
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After that fight, I'm particularly curious how that Knight armor works.

Well, first, it's better than mail, which is better than a gambeson...a Good Gambeson is +8 Endurance. Knight Armor being on the order of +20 Endurance at a minimum (and possibly much higher) is a good estimate (unless metal armor has actual damage reduction or something like that instead of more Endurance, in which case it's probably still at least +12 and whatever effect metal armors have). That does a lot to cover their occasional weak turns without Focus all on its own.

It may also actually bolster their Focus (ie: the number of hits needed to break focus), and provide a pool of Faith (or whatever their resource is called) like Sagaseeker provides Orthstirr. It could obviously also have lots of other abilities, but those all seem like the most likely ones to me.
 
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With your hand in his, he shakes it. "My name is Gabriel Blackstone, Squire on the Eighth Bead of the Second Decade."

You return the shake and brush a loose strand of hair from your face. "Halla Steinarsdottir," you blink and scramble for a response to the second thing he said, "uh, age fifteen?"

He stands frozen, still shaking your hand. He seems a little bit lost as he looks at you.

...Maybe he doesn't know how to respond to that either?

You cough and he flinches. He quickly releases your hand and steps away, a light streak of pink on his face.
Ah yes, definitely living up to the Nanoha part of our build.

Just wait until we learn to shoot fire out of our eyes,
There's a lot of horror in his eyes, but what is there to be horrified about?

You look over your shoulder, but find nothing standing behind you.

...Weird.

You ignore Blackhand's laughter as you collect the fallen sword and make your way home.
... This is the first time Gabriel's ever touched a girl, isn't it? Like, literally, the first time he's been close enough to a girl his age who wasn't a family member to shake their hand. He is to his horror realising that he just enjoyed getting all hot and sweaty with the young, pretty Norse lass and for all her faults wouldn't mind doing it again.

Of course, a good Christian can't marry a heathen...
 
[X] Incomplete Boon: Knightslayer - Unlocks certain scenes and makes it easier to battle Pages, Squires, and Knights. Unlock by dueling and defeating 9 different Pages, Squires, and/or Knights (1/9)
[X] Sparring with Gabriel - +2 training dice and +3 Relations with Gabriel.
[X] Yes, keep the previous plan
-[X] Assign the 2 new Training Dice to Hamr
 
[X] Sparring with Gabriel - +2 training dice and +3 Relations with Gabriel.
[X] Vague Trick: Stomping-Power-Lunge Trick - A powerful Pierce trick that sees the wielder stomp the ground before delivering a potent attack. The stomp itself can also deal significant damage to a prone opponent.

[X] Yes, keep the previous plan
-[X] Assign the 2 new Training Dice to Hamr

I see people saying that the boon is better than the trick. They are wrong.
For when foe is standing, we can knee them in the groin, but what if they are lying on the ground? We must be able to stomp, my friends, to always be able to crush that most vulnerable of regions.

Ah yes, definitely living up to the Nanoha part of our build.

Just wait until we learn to shoot fire out of our eyes,

... This is the first time Gabriel's ever touched a girl, isn't it? Like, literally, the first time he's been close enough to a girl his age who wasn't a family member to shake their hand. He is to his horror realising that he just enjoyed getting all hot and sweaty with the young, pretty Norse lass and for all her faults wouldn't mind doing it again.

Of course, a good Christian can't marry a heathen...
That's dependent on what writings and teachings of your sect of Christendom says, don't ya know. But we're spoken for anyways, gg squire.
 
Runes have power when they are used, so depending on the quality of the knight, their armor on top of being made of fantasy metal, may have magic inscribed into it in Latin, probably, to make it even better.
 
[X] Incomplete Boon: Knightslayer - Unlocks certain scenes and makes it easier to battle Pages, Squires, and Knights. Unlock by dueling and defeating 9 different Pages, Squires, and/or Knights (1/9)
[X] Sparring with Gabriel - +2 training dice and +3 Relations with Gabriel.
 
Ah yes, definitely living up to the Nanoha part of our build.

Just wait until we learn to shoot fire out of our eyes,

Yeah, Friendly has been a wonderful choice of Boon and I'm so pleased we have it. I'm pretty sure this is the sort of opportunity that wouldn't be on the table (or at least not nearly as easily) without it.

... This is the first time Gabriel's ever touched a girl, isn't it? Like, literally, the first time he's been close enough to a girl his age who wasn't a family member to shake their hand. He is to his horror realising that he just enjoyed getting all hot and sweaty with the young, pretty Norse lass and for all her faults wouldn't mind doing it again.

Of course, a good Christian can't marry a heathen...

I hadn't thought of this interpretation but it's pretty plausible. Especially given Halla's Beautiful Boon, which hasn't technically kicked in yet mechanically but probably is already influencing boys her own age, given that she's 15.

And, of course, who he'd be willing to marry is irrelevant since, as others note, Halla is very spoken for.

EDIT:
On another, though related, subject: It occurs to me, and we might want to ask Steinarr...why hasn't he ransomed Gabriel? It sounds like he's a member of a formal military order (who would, one would think, ransom captured members) and ransoming prisoners is pretty standard Viking behavior (they mostly only took them for economic reasons, after all). The presence of Jerasmus, and nature of said presence, tells me there's more to it than 'his order refuses to pay', but I'm curious what that 'more' actually is.

Like, is this a lesson for him? Is being a thrall for a while considered a good opportunity for his personal development by Jerasmus as one of his mentors?
 
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Glad to see the strategy worked. "I'm just going to parry this magic it'll be fine... And now my sword is gone." I wonder how much higher his defense pools would have been if we didn't neutralize his weapon first.

Still, we won, and successfully completed the Befriending! Very nice.

What was the current plan for the next turn?
 
Glad to see the strategy worked. "I'm just going to parry this magic it'll be fine... And now my sword is gone." I wonder how much higher his defense pools would have been if we didn't neutralize his weapon first.

Hard to say. Could've been a lot better or not at all, depends on his specific Trick equivalents and capabilities...

Still, we won, and successfully completed the Befriending! Very nice.

Yep. Well, started it anyway...his current opinion of us is 1/10 (assuming we take the sparring option, which seems near certain given the vote tallies), but that's a lot better than the -2 it was before (the negatives are mostly reserved for people who are clearly actual enemies).

What was the current plan for the next turn?

It's this (plus 2 extra dice in Hamr Training, for 6 total, since we're getting extra training dice):

[X] Plan Family And Shopping

-[X] (Personal) Spend time with...(Write in)
--[X] Drifa
-[X] (Personal) Spend time with...(Write in)
--[X] Asva
-[X] (Visit) Go visit...
--[X] Asvir!
--[X] Visit the seeress and go shopping

Training:
-[X] (Blackhand's Training) Try to develop old/train new hugareida tricks (Write in)
--[X] Train Halting-Vortex 1d6
--[X] Train Imaging Skill-Trick 4d6
-[X] (Steinarr's Training) Ask Steinarr to teach you a trick/some tricks (Write in)
--[X] Train Leaping-Cleave Trick 1d6
-[X] (Training) Hamr (8 successes to rank up)
--[X] Train Hamr Itself 4d6
--[X] Train Bash 1d6
--[X] Train Dodge 1d6
-[X] (Training) Hugr (31 successes to rank up)
--[X] Train Composure 1d6
--[X] Train Management 1d6
--[X] Train Scouting 1d6

Orthstirr:
-[X] (Orthstirr Usage)
--[X] 4 Hamr
--[X] 6 Hugr
--[X] 4 Fylgja
--[X] 3 Silver-Tongue
--[X] 1 First Impression
--[X] 18 free for tricks
 
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