Basic Strategy, Monday, Period 4

[halfman-lion.livejournal.com]

Class met in the Danger Shop today, which had been set up to look like a dimly lit dungeon, deserted save for a swarm of small, ugly beasts that looked a bit like purple bears with lizard heads.

"Last week our subject was acknowledging things about ourselves we can't change or forget," Tyrion said without preamble, and with some pride he'd gotten the wolves to show up in Danger Shop again. "This week, we begin a unit on making the best of what you have. You may be strong. You may be clever. You may be lovely to look upon. You may be rich. Unless the gods gave with both hands at your birth, it's unlikely you're all four. It's far more likely you're weak, stupid, ugly or poor -- relatively speaking, of course."

"Your choices are two. You can either concentrate on what you have a gift for and hope it's enough to get you through anything, or you can spend your life trying to master the things you're worst at in hopes of balancing yourself out. All things being equal, and assuming you're being honest with yourself about having tried to improve, I'd say you're usually better off focusing on your skills and making them as good as they can be. A swordsman does not prepare for battle by reading, nor should he, and it makes no more sense for a weakling to spend his days fiddling about with a sword. He might hurt himself."

"But -- because this is my class, and I have the right to be perverse sometimes -- today we will start with a single kind of skill, and pretend we're all trying to improve our strength." He pointed to a beast. "Your job is to fight these lovely fellows. They've no ability to speak or reason -- all you can do is find a way to bash your way out of this one. After you've done that, we'll talk some more."

Before he released the class to fight the beasts, he added, "And by the way, because this got me into trouble last time, I must add these creatures are not real. They're a kind of film and can't hurt you. Don't ask me how it works."

Library, Monday

[faithandscience.livejournal.com]

With both of his classes being held today, and library duty, William made sure to arrive early to set things up before he had to run off to class.

...All right, maybe he just liked spending time in the library. Shut up. In any case, arriving early turned out to be rather prudent, as he ended up having to mediate a rather heated dispute between some of the military history volumes.

Defending Yourself [Monday, Period 1]

[furious-maximus.livejournal.com]

"Welcome back. Hope you all enjoyed your weekend." Max eyed his students. "And that you took the time to do your homework."

"Today's lesson is actually going to be short because I'm going to try leaving most of our time for some demonstrations, but there is something I'm hoping you all pick up on today: each of you has a set of instinctive reactions when threatened. Everyone has different ones, of course, but the lesson to learn is that most of them are useful. Maybe not all the time, or in all situations, and it's useful to be aware of when to fight your instincts, but it's also important to realize that no matter how new you all are to the concept, each and every one of you has some ideas about how to defend yourself. And not all of those ideas are bad ones."

"For instance," another look around, this time with a grin, "I gave you a homework assignment last week I gave you a homework assignment with very little guidance, and I'm willing to bet that you all managed to do it. And I also suspect that most of you came up with something the others didn't, if only because of the way you think about things."

"So let's see them. Everyone take a moment to show us what you've brought, and explain why you picked it. And feel free to talk ideas with each other."

And then Max's grin turned downright evil, and he nodded toward the door that wasn't part of the usual classroom setup (thank you, Danger Shop!). "While you're doing that, you'll find a list of your names in totally random order by the door. If you're at the top of the list, come on through for a personal evaluation." That totally wasn't going to be an ambush so that Max could evaluate your instinctive reactions to surprise attacks. Unless it was.

Hint: it totally was.

[Continuing my no-sign-in experiment! If it really is a problem for you, feel free to leave an OOC comment, or hit me up via email! Or AIM! Or LJ PM!]

So You're a Fugitive From Justice, Tuesday, 3rd Period

[cataclysmicluck.livejournal.com]

"Hey, everyone, welcome back," Zayne said. "Now that we're past the 'why' of my former status as a fugitive, we can start to get into more interesting things. Today I want to talk about friendships when you're on the run."

"Unfortunately, we have to start with a couple uncomfortable truths. When you're accused of a crime and run, it's going to convince a lot of people that you did it. That probably includes at least some people you know and love. And it's understandable," Zayne said. "If the authorities they've trusted all their lives say you did something and all they know is that you ran away, it's going to be tough for them to side with you. It hurts, but it happens. And maybe worse, even if they believe you, you might be putting them at risk if you rely on them. My Dad believed in my innocence, but then he ended up getting kidnapped as bait for me. Even if they're prepared to help you, they're probably not prepared for what that really means and what kind of danger they'll be in."

"So it's probably a good idea to make some friends on the wrong side of the law if you're there anyway. In some ways, it seems kind of like you're putting together a criminal crew. And... well, that's because that's exactly what it is," Zayne said. "It's part of the life if you want your best shot at surviving."

( The Crew )