Life according to Niklas, part III
I died and was floating around in some sort of infinite featureless continuum of nothingness - incredibly frustrating. Normally when you die in a game like this, at least you can go talk to other dead people. But because of the Necromancer in the game, I was strictly forbidden to talk to anyone at all. A cool feature of the game, but very frustrating when you're dead. For me I guess it was a good thing since it allowed me to come back, but everyone else who died was under the same quarantaine rules, not knowing if they would be raised.
Back in the loop
Anyway, I died, and Kol immediately started "fund raising". He did a great job working to get me back, and taking the temperature of the other participants at the same time.
During my absence I saw Tasslehoff killed, and finally we had some tangible lead! On the night after I was resurrected, though Pinman stripped me of my prohpetic powers, making the exchange of 2 for 1 rather expensive. I'd like to think I redeemed myself, but it was still frustrating. The reason I lost my powers was that I only had them through my unwilling connection to Captain Pinman in the first place, and when we fought it off that connection was severed.
At any rate, the situation now was very very different. Previously we had been wallowing totally in the dark, not even knowing with certainty that there truly
were wolves. Now we had one killed, and two more obvious associates in merciary and qoou, who had been trying to save Tasslehoff in the vote. I immediately (ehrm, well, after some RL business to take care of) started a bandwagon on merciary, and we got ourselves a second wolf hide.
Orb woes
Then there was the issue of the orb, that needed to be destroyed. We had a pretty decent idea on how it should be done - using the silver from the amulet - but getting all the pieces in place proved trickier. We needed the forge of course, but it wasn't until I finally got to see the description of it that I realized how it should be done. It could be used to "combine" items, assuming you had str 3. "Combine" the silver with some other item and then kill the orb. Actually my original plan was to simply combine the silver with the orb directly, enclosing it, but Kol had a better plan.
Anyway, I first tried to convince Kol to give the forge and the silver to Catharsis, along with enough strength items to make sure (s)he had enough to use it. But suddenly Kol refused, claiming he wasn't sure I hadn't been raised as a wolf, and questioned my motives for wanting the orb destroyed. Sigh,
not the right time to start getting suspicious

. But he complied to at least go with the plan, if he could be the one to use the forge.
Luckily he managed to convince Catharsis to let go of the cannon, giving him the +1 strength needed (he already had the dagger stolen from LightFang earlier). But Catharsis wouldn't give him the orb, and before we really had time to discuss it he instead started the process of combining the silver with the brittle knife, which would give us a knife of silver. Turns out that was the right move,
especially considering what happened to Catharsis on the night after. If (s)he had done the forging instead of Kol, we would have been infernal breakfast.
Sacrifice of Catharsis
Come night I had concocted another plan. We had to kill someone with the orb, and then we could vote to kill the last wolf, qoou, on the next day. But there was another option - since we couldn't be
totally sure that qoou was guilty, we could use the orb on him in a suicide scan. That way we'd either know for sure of his guilt, losing one innocent to the orb instead of someone we picked to die. Or we would find out that he was innocent, thus only losing an innocent who we would have planned to vote for the next day anyway.
Catharsis had a similar plan - except with a different target it turned out. I didn't know about it though, but Methos did. Catharsis died in a suicide scan, exposing LightFang as a wolf. That was unexpected for several reasons. First it made it obvious that Stuck in Pi's ability was of no use. Second it brought our attention back to (GM) Pinman's words about the four horsemen. There were four wolves, not three, and qoou was still the last one of them, obviously

. So when Renata "scanned" him and found him evil, it was only a confirmation of what we already knew. If she had come back and said he was something else, I'm actually not sure I would have believed her, or rather I might have concluded that her ability was as useful as Stuck in Pi's. That's how sure I was about qoou.
LightFang never had a chance on the vote the day after, never having a chance of course. During the night, Methos was to kill the "useless" Stuck in Pi, but luckily for him the orb's sway over the wolves was broken. Tolis died instead, and we had a hard time figuring out why. But we were so close now that it wouldn't matter anyway, the last wolf wouldn't be alive another night for another kill.
Killing the last wolf - not
On the day after I started another bandwagon on qoou. He was quickly beyond hope, but he tried bravely to clear his name. I called him up on AIM to talk to him, thinking to catch him in a lie. Instead he told a very believable story, holding on to it even past the time when I claimed I no longer had the ability to save him (which was true, everyone who could have changed their votes had gone to bed). Bewilderment set in, but there was truly no time to stop it. But even before the results were revealed by Pinman, I knew in my heart that we had failed, and that the last wolf was the lying "prophet" Renata.
When I saw Kol and Methos online the next day, I told them of my conclusion, and Kol reminded us that he still had the poison. Bingo! Use the poison on Renata, kill the orb with the knife, and we win! Methos had received the orb in the vote, and Kol grudgingly agreed to hand over the knife as well. Then it was simply a matter of crossing fingers and praying. I didn't realize how close we were to losing anyway though - of course we should have given Methos the necessary strength items for protection, but the thought never crossed my mind. Luckily

gripe

Renata picked me over Methos, and we got an innocent win.
On the last day I also got a message from Frozen In Ice about joining him on his boat trip. Since I was so sure we were winning, I saw no reason to agree. It would have felt like running from the final battle. Too bad I went and died instead...
In conclusion I'd just like to say thanks to my buddies Kol and Methos for a solid team performance, to Izipo for doing the best you could even when placed in the refridgerator, to Catharsis for another remarkable team performace and sacrifice, and to Renata (and the other wolves) for giving us a merry chase, and for a brilliant first entry to the NotWs

. And of course to Pinman for the great game, and everyone else who participated to make it a great experience! Thanks all!
Now to get some well-needed rest before the next one starts...
