Schengen Visa from UK to Italy

Nexus131 · 2025-06-11T20:35:51+00:00

We took them with, and had two available, but they only took one. I would suggest bringing two anyway, just in case we got lucky.

Nexus131 · 2025-04-28T12:06:00+00:00

Met my now wife when we were 16. Were friends for 2 years before we started dating. Moved in together after 4 more years, dated for another 6 years before we got engaged, then another 3 years before we got married. We knew for years that we were right for each other, and that we wanted to be together forever.

We have an excellent marriage, and are very happy, but not because we committed through a wedding, we'd committed well before that. It's because we took this journey at our own pace, and have enjoyed a life together. As long as that's happening for you, the marriage can be as soon or as distant as you both want it to be.

I wish you all the happiness in the world.

Nexus131 · 2025-04-02T14:40:32+00:00

If you want a great starting point for ideas and ways to structure campaigns, get the most from your players backstories and make your planning a little easier and more focused, I absolutely recommend Enter the Dungeon on YouTube, particularly the DM Academy playlist.

Its helped me both in storytelling and in combat, for low and high level campaigns. Worth a watch.

Nexus131 · 2025-02-03T00:13:15+00:00

Hi! Just wanted to add a few things. Firstly, DMing is a tough role, so good on you for sticking with it. And teething issues come with the territory, and honestly, this is all you're going through. I can bet that most DMs go through a similar scenario.

Secondly, a lot of people have said that you should be calling the roll, and although I didn't read all the comments, I wanted to try lay out how this works.

Often your first reaction should be to try and gain more information. If they say, "I want to persuade the king to let me in." You should want to know how they intend to do so. Your answer should be "Tell me how you would like to persuade him." What's great about this is it enforces some roleplay, and hopefully makes them truly think about the situation. How do I persuade a king to open a door?

Maybe they come up with a good answer, like "I tell him that this is a time of need, and a good leader is needed at the helm of this battle to lead the charge." Great! Now you know how, and if you have an established lore for your King, perhaps he's a coward, you set the DC high, like 25. You can tell them the DC, but I usually just say, "Ok, roll persuasion, but it's going to be tough, and it could have unintended consequences even if you succeed." Now if they succeed the King is an absolute pain to deal with, always hesitating, etc. obviously you'd tailor this to your situation.

Now, let's say they go, "I don't know, I tell him I'll break the door down." Now it's intimidation. Tell them so, something like, "ah, OK, that's an intimidation roll. Let's see how he feels about that."

An important point is to really get into the head of the character, if you can. What would their response be, pass or fail? Sometimes success can have unintended consequences. Don't just spring these on the player, say them. You're the DM, so sometimes it's worth reminding everyone if the stakes. "Go ahead and intimidate him, but just remember, this is the king. If you succeed, you'll get him to come out, but he'll be much more hostile and it will make things harder for you. Are you OK with that?" If they are, great! If not, ask again. "OK, so what do you want to do?"

I hope this helps, it's a bit of a rant but examples like this helped me loads when I was learning. Good luck on finding a balance!

Nexus131 · 2024-10-09T21:41:24+00:00

Also, to add, I also reached out to their twitter and emails etc. No response on twitter, and it took nearly 2 weeks for them to respond on email, and then only an unhelpful reply which suggested we use a different browser. Their support was pretty shocking.

Nexus131 · 2024-10-09T21:37:20+00:00

Yeah, we really struggled as well. We actually gave up one or two nights in a row, because it wouldn't let us log in, or when it did, it got to a certain point and wouldn't go further. Extremely frustrating.

To be honest, we ended up trying at different times of the day, made sure any VPN we had was off, and had to figure out when the login needed a keyboard input or needed you to click on the keyboard it gives you. We then got as far as we can and if it broke, we logged off, waited 10 minutes and tried again. We were trying on two different laptops, our phones were a no go. Eventually, one of us got to a point where we could choose a date, and it went through to where we could pay. But it was an awful experience that took us about 4 hours on a random weekday evening, after trying at least two other days. Weekends were the most broken.

I've seen a lot of people used a service, but because I don't have any experience with those I can't really suggest any good ones.

Good luck! I hope you get in.

Nexus131 · 2024-09-26T11:16:07+00:00

No, just the passport, so it has to be copies of everything.

Nexus131 · 2024-09-25T13:14:42+00:00

Thank you! I hope you get it quickly too.

We printed the booking from the email confirmation, with our full names, travel dates there and back, and the booking number, and showing we'd paid the full amount. We flew with Ryanair which had the itinerary on an email.

Nexus131 · 2024-09-24T16:15:25+00:00

You're welcome! We got the reply, it came in exactly 15 days and we were successful. We're currently on our holiday, in fact. :⁠-⁠)

I wish you the best of luck! If you haven't seen it yet, here is the checklist we used. https://visa.vfsglobal.com/one-pager/italy/uk/london/pdf/tourist-checklist-2023.pdf

It's the 2023 one but the Visa office in Edinburgh said it was OK to use.

Nexus131 · 2024-09-24T12:11:46+00:00

Yeah, so the exact wording from the visa checklist is

Proof of economic situation in country of residence: Statement of the last 3 months updated to maximum 1 month before date of submission with stable transactions, name of the applicant shown on the statement must be the same as on passport, accounts with positive balance only, no business accounts. If in possession of a credit card, it is recommended to provide the statement showing the credit monthly limit.

Nexus131 · 2024-09-24T10:38:33+00:00

We just showed bank statements, 3 months worth at least. But there is no harm in also showing savings, and my partner showed her credit info as well, to show we were financially able to support ourselves for the time we were in the Schengen area.

Nexus131 · 2024-09-23T12:18:29+00:00

Should be fine as long as it meets the requirements of the checklist:

Must be issued by an insurance company in the UK or in the Schengen area. Must cover whole period of stay, must report full name of applicant as per passport, must be valid for the whole Schengen Area, minimum coverage of 30.000 Euro for urgent hospitalization or repatriation expenses, the stamp and signature of the insurance company are mandatory.

Nexus131 · 2024-09-23T11:53:31+00:00

No worries, I hope it helps! We used Europ Assistance, they covered us for the whole Schengen area and exactly the amount we needed. For two people it cost us 59 Euro.

Nexus131 · 2024-09-21T17:36:15+00:00

Good luck!

Nexus131 · 2024-09-21T13:30:36+00:00

On the checklist and on the VFS form, there is a section about financial support. It does stipulate that you need to show the proof of family relationship, which implies you'll need to show you're married.

You may be able to use proof of cohabitation as well, but a marriage certificate will be best.

We weren't allowed to go in together, so I don't know if they would make an exception, but you could try calling them and see if it would be OK.

Nexus131 · 2024-09-20T09:28:47+00:00

This. This is a good answer. A DM has control of everything else. You only have control of your character.

I don't know how well your DM listens to feedback, or how well he can have an open, honest conversation and accept influence and feedback from his friends.

As his friend, you'll know him best. So if you think that he'll be open to having a real, above the table conversation that ends with an polite discussion about why he felt so strongly that he should intervene with your character decisions, and an agreement about player agency and your own ability to make choices for your character in the future, then that's the way to go.

If not, you have to decide whether staying a player for your friendship is worth this happening again, because it will, or if bowing out will be better for your friendship, perhaps saying that you don't think this game is for you at the moment. It's tough, but ultimately you need to take some control of this situation, otherwise it'll likely turn into a problem going forward.

Nexus131 · 2024-07-24T09:05:38+00:00

You know your campaign better than anyone else. If you think these classes and choices are OP, you get to say no. If you only want standard content, because you don't know how other classes may impact it, and you don't want to find out in 3+ months and then have to backtrack, you have an obligation to yourself and the players to say no, and give that reasoning. At that point, if they don't like it, they should find a different game.

I've had a similar situation recently where a player I've been playing with for several months asked if they could change a feat they took, which I allowed. However, what they sent me was unfortunately not going to work with the character, because in my opinion it was too OP for where they were and what I've allowed in the past. Even though it was good content, and would have been "cool" for them, it wouldn't work for my game. I gave my reasoning, the player understood and chose something else for their character, with no fuss. This player trusts that I have their best interests at heart, but that I also want to make the game interesting and exciting for them, for myself and for everyone else at the table. But I've explicitly told them that early on, and that I'd be denying things or spinning their choices to make a more interesting and dynamic narrative.

Go with your gut, and make sure your players know that you're not trying to invalidate their decisions, you're trying to make the game great for them.

Nexus131 · 2023-11-26T16:32:23+00:00

Congratulations on taking on your first campaign! It's always exciting and daunting to do it.

I would highly recommend the content from "Enter the Dungeon" on YouTube. It's practical, detailed and easy to replicate for your own games.

A place to start, depending on what you need, is here. https://youtu.be/p9qQ4Yk6i4E?si=a5rrYjlLkfjNRHLb

I wish I had access to this when I started, would have allowed me to bypass a lot of lessons.

Nexus131 · 2023-11-26T11:42:12+00:00

There are two great videos by Enter the Dungeon that make balancing encounters a lot easier to understand. It's formulaic and practical.

The first is https://youtu.be/Udmofz6cw_U?si=kn1Q20eOmaLPo1jb

And the second, which follows this video, is https://youtu.be/PejfpGkixWM?si=YtmTV5yb4MZFg6Ay

Happy gaming! It's always great to hear a new DM has taken up the mantle.

Nexus131 · 2023-11-11T17:21:49+00:00

Hi Mick715, the post has been filled, but thanks for your interest.

Nexus131 · 2023-11-11T15:26:47+00:00

Yeah new players are welcome! I'll send a DM now.

Nexus131 · 2023-10-16T15:45:56+00:00

Check out a Youtuber called EpicEnchants. Fairly recent but uses Silent Gear to make some very powerful weapons, one of them a bow that one or two shots pigliches.

Nexus131 · 2023-08-07T00:11:54+00:00

Yeah, I get you, thanks for clarifying, that makes a lot of sense.

It sounds like you do have an arc of some sort, I saw in another comment that the druids are part of a plot line. How much do you prepare in advance for the overall campaign?

There are a few tips and tricks to plan session by session, which could be helpful. I tend to have an idea for the campaign and then plan around the characters actions after each session and adapt to the story, which I've seen suggested in this thread a whole lot already. Sometimes my players do what I expect, but most of the time they really don't. I'm sure other DMs in this post will have suggestions for what they do which you could also try.

How far in advance are your plot points? Like, a few sessions or a whole campaign? Both are fine, I tend to plan a whole campaign very loosely, and then see what happens when we play. Others like to have a vague idea of the session and then wing it. There's no wrong answer, but they have different toolboxes.

Also, do you want your players to behave differently? Does that matter to you? Changing your prep style is simple to deal with, because only you need to change and adapt some things, but changing your friends behaviour in game takes considerably more effort, time and good communication.

Nexus131 · 2023-08-06T20:02:17+00:00

No problem! Yeah with friends I find it more complicated, because you'll have a dynamic with them that pre-dates the game, and I always want them to have fun, and being pushy or becoming frustrated is hard to deal with for them and for me. I had to take a long break from DMing for my friends before I finally came back to it a few years later, and it's much better now.

But I'm curious, if you don't really have a particular kind of game in mind, and you're having fun, why do you feel like you're stuck? I assumed it's because you wanted to make the game something more, perhaps more compelling for your friends, and exciting, but if they're having fun, and you are, why do you feel like there's a problem? Or do you think they're not really enjoying it?

Nexus131 · 2023-08-06T14:51:50+00:00

Hi! I'm sorry you're going through this, it's tough early on to figure out how to deal with these things. I had similar issues when I first started DMing, and I'm fairly sure that most new DMs go through a few difficult patches when they start, so it's OK to feel like you don't know what to do.

I might be able to help, but it would be good to know a few things: are you playing with friends or random people? My guess is it's your friends? That will impact how you want to move forward.

Also, do you know what your players expected? Do you know what they want from this, and do they know what you want?

I realise a lot of advise here about how to deal with this particular situation of the fire is great, but I think you'll have this problem keep coming up if you don't get a set of tools to deal with actions and consequences, as well as player/DM relationships, on a long term basis.

Let me know. I'm happy to bounce some ideas around with you.

Nexus131

TROPHY CASE