Year 1, Early Spring, Week 1: Buried Alive-Action 1-
I Inform EVERYONE EXESSIVELY that I am going to do this, I create Pools of Liquid Ice in the Very Nearby wilderness and around camp, with an indicator so people can tell they are there, but Animals and unintelligent beings may not, The Indicator is the Differently colored soil surrounding an ice pool, created via Conjuration
I Use Alchemy and Ice Elementalism to create the liquid Ice from one Unit of Doof Blood, and whatever liquid is available commonly.
The Intent is that the ones in the Wilderness are Traps, and the ones around home are for Storing Things
-Action 2-
The Doof Skull and Doof Cloth are used to Call forth a Basic Permanent Demonic Spider made from Hair, using Conjuration to summon more of Nero's Hair, Summoning to bind the Spider to it, and Hair Elementalism to create it's Physical body. It's first Job is to Excrete and Weave a Web Of Cloth around our home, leaving an entrance on both sides, the intent is to create the most basic walls and a floor. Conjuration is used to summon more Doof Fur for weaving as needed.
If Prompted by someone else, The Demonic Spider will instead Use Gathered Materials to Perform another task, such as reinforcing a wall that they make.
"And so that is my plan for my part of the job, Any questions?"
[0=0, 1 Flaw] Using the blood of those slain in cold blood, you create impressive-looking frost scars on your hands. Now you're a real villain!
Needless to say nothing else gets done. Oh, and you use a unit of Doof blood, though you doubt anyone cares.
Frost-Scarred Hands-1 Doof Blood[1+1+0=2, 0 Flaws][0=0, 0 Flaws] With no knowledge but several tokens of your desired product, you attempt the dangerous art of Calling untrained. Needless to say, it goes flawlessly as all your plans do. You wince at the frost burns on your hands.
The Doof Skull and Doof Wool Cloth are consumed in the transfer, but provide the basis necessary to find a subject; your knowledge of Hair and Binding aids in this as well. The resulting Hair Spider has a nice skull-like abdomen and comes up to about your knees. Your knowledge of Communion let you keep it relatively calm on arrival, but it's still a big bug and will probably begin trying to trap and drain things of their fluids in short order unless you can find a way to contain or direct it.
+1 CallingNow Dabbling Caller-1 Doof Skull, -1 Doof Wool Cloth+Hair SpiderTove smiles smugly to herself as she goes around getting ready for the expedition, already these so called nobles were ceding leadership and authority to her, as was proper! After spending the required amount of time mentally patting herself on her back she then went though their meager supplies, gathering up whatever she figured might be useful in their expedition and set off with Polmarop and whatever members of the lesser nobles would be joining them.
Taking three obsidian rings and 100 coins from the supplies for trade goods or bribes as needed. Tove leads the expedition outward! Our mission is to gather information of the surrounding area, especially on any of the unwashed barbarian tribes! If any tribes are found we'll try to recruit them, wow them with shows of magical ineptitude cleverly disguised as skill, maybe if they are small enough we can bribe/hire/'seduce' them or conquer them by force! Tove of course is the nominal leader of this expedition (with proper respect to Polmarop when he's in earshot of course), although if anyone else has any actual useful skills for this quest she'll graciously allow their input into how to actually go about it.
Albert glanced at the monster-woman-thing, nodding at her plan to gather servants. "I may be able to help with those barbarians. Fire and sword can be a very convincing pair, after all."
Action 1: Attend Tove's expedition to gather barbarian servants/workers. Be useful, maybe kill things if needed. Graciously cede leadership of the expedition to her.
Albert would glance around at the other exiles, shrugging. "I am hardly a builder, so I won't be starting any projects of my own for a long while. If any of you need my assistance, ask."
After the map is made, join the grand expedition.
After the expedition moves a decent way away from the camp:
"Since I'm the only one here with a decent amount of diplomacy experience, if we meet sapient locals, nobody other than me should speak unless there is a dire need for speech. Even then, the locals should under no conditions be referred to as if we owned them or as if they were servants. Tove will be allowed to sneakily influence the minds of the locals and/or subliminally seduce their leaders, but still should not try to speak to them. Do I make myself clear?"
[0=0, 2 Flaws] The first step to subjugating the locals is finding them. This is, as usual, far more complicated than it looks.
As they cross a relatively unremarkable patch of rugged ground, it collapses beneath them, sending Albert, Lorkotol, and Tove tumbling into the dark. As their eyes adjust to the chittering gloom, they make out what almost looks like ominous ruins among the cavern walls.
[1+1+0=2, 2 Flaws] The group can't quite agree on whether to look for a way out or explore more generally, and so compromise halfway. This results in Tove picking up some kind of idol, which she realizes is A Mistake as soon as its pedestal begins making grinding noises. The two make it back to camp slashes up by the screeching hordes of... whatever was down there and apparently wanted their idol back.
Needless to say, Tove keeps it. In the light, it seems to be made mostly of some kind of purple mineral, veined, cracked, and cloudy, over a core of much deeper and purer purple crystal. The shape is loosely in a face, the inner mineral showing through eye and mouth holes as well as the natural gaps in the outer mineral, though it's tall and thin enough to be heavily, heavily stylized. She hopes.
Tove, Albert, Lokotol: Slashed UpTove: Perfectly Normal Idol((Harder to do the second action, since, presumably I'll be dead by then. But here's an attempt.))
If conquering a tribe actually works out somehow, Tove will focus the rest of her efforts on making sure that they are loyal to her... And the rest of the group of course, if that can be fit in. Using her most subtle mindwarping spells, a combination of flesh, Polymorphing, mind magic, and seduction to slowly work love and obedience into their minds, hopefully without them even realizing it.
((not sure if allowed to make a branch like this, if not just ignore the next part!))
Upon failure, but shockingly not deadly failure to convert any tribes to the cause, Tove comes to the realization that she might only be able to rely on herself out in this desolate wasteland. To that end she turns her magic inward, using flesh and polymorphing on her own body in an effort to increase her own somewhat low physical strength and heartiness by creating more and denser muscle mass and shifting the composition of her natural chitin, hopefully with minimal outward physical changes.
((Also man, what would the chances be of more then half the players just dropping off the face of the earth right at the start.... Weird...))
[3+2+2+1+1+0=9, 1 Flaw] The changes make you look chubby, made worse by the fact that it increases your metabolism to support all that additional muscle mass. You're not fat, you insist through bites of food, there's just a lot of you!
On the other hand, your muscle tissue can now tank sword blows and you can lift large boulders at will.
+Chubby, +Consumption Rate+3 FleshAction 2: Try to be available to help anybody who needs my help, magical or non-magical. If I'm not needed, then just stand guard to make sure we aren't all murdered by monsters.[/b]
[0=0, 0 Flaws][0=0, 0 Flaws] You keep watch to make sure nothing sneaks up on and devours the camp. This mostly consists of playing with rocks like they're action figures.
...what? You're
bored. Also stinging from all the lacerations you got nearly being eaten.
"I'll join you, Tove, but only after I finish helping the rest of our group find our stuff. Would any of the Communers care to assist me?"
Use Commune magic to create a map of the surrounding area with red blips on it that mark where our unclaimed (by us) lost stuff is.
[0=0, 0 Flaws] You attempt to Commune a map up. Perplexingly, you fail to find any extraplanar entities that know the exact layout of your immediate location including the stuff you just now dropped. Which, now that you think about it, would actually be kind of creepy anyway. Would it be just watching you while you sleep, or...?
Though based on the noises you keep hearing at night, you probably couldn't find an extraplanar entity because they're all already here.
Sorry for the unexpected break. Sure, I'll change survival to trapping. That seems more specific and reasonable. Assuming that works...
Have a fabulous time discussing with rats, my dear, but I'm afraid that my skill set doesn't lend much to your sort of work. Instead, I think I'll be setting up wire traps around these parts. A man's got to eat, after all. And perhaps... I shall do my own part in setting up a living area
Isias attempts to build a perimeter wall, using earth magic. Assuming that is successful, he also enchants the earthen wall with protection
[0=0, 1 Flaw] Working the native rock proves harder than you anticipated, and your primary accomplishment during the week is snapping a piece off and bouncing it off your head. Ow.
[1+1+1+1+1+0=5, 1 Flaw] With nothing to enchant, you just try again. It's not so hard once you get the hang of it, and by the end of the week you have a rock ridge about 8x8x40 feet.
...it's not much of a perimeter as is, but it's a start. Your lack of supporting skills and the fact that you were working with solid stone also made it hard to forge a proper wall, but a mound is pretty close anyway.
Oh and you nick your head again. You forgot dealing with stone was obnoxious like that.
+1 EarthStinging Head x2Harry surveys the area carefully for more specific information on the kinds of wildlife or other threats using his knowledge of Life magics.
[0=0, 1 Flaw][1+1+1+1+0=4, 1 Flaw] So the good news is that your expedition succeeds where Tove, Albert, and Lokotol's didn't!
The bad news is kind of extensive. For one thing, you were trying to find animals and plants, not a nearby tribe. For another, you were hoping to study them at a safe distance, not be hog-tied and carried into their village on a pole. The obsidian idol looming over the specific spot they take you to looks also not fantastic, being some kind of warped demon or something you think. The fact that there's very clearly an altar at said spot fills you with the opposite of reassurance about the whole not sacrificing and eating you thing. The mouth of the idol is open and kind of leans over the altar, which is a good place to hide snakes. The tribesmen themselves looks like some kind of hunched pale white fishmen, which as hosts go leans you further towards pagan sacrifice and ritual cannibalism.
So yeah, some things to work on.
[0=0, 0 Flaws] With little else to do, you attempt to persuade the fishmen to maybe not eat you so much. They're fairly ambivalent about it.
Captured By Fishmen*drools quietly on self*
With little else to do, Sir Knightly has a pick shoved into his hand. He gently falls over, thereby using it against the ground.
[0=0, 0 Flaws][2+1+1+1+1+0=6, 0 Flaws] Knightly proves himself a supernaturally unskilled miner, successfully burying himself under a veritable barrow of jagged stones while cackling about how you can't make him work if he's in here.
[1+0=1, 0 Flaws][0=0, 2 Flaws] His conscience (and remembering there's fewer ladies underground) eventually gets the better of him, and he begins excavating himself after all. Progress is slow, but he manages to preserve the barrow shape as he goes. Who doesn't want to live inside a literal tomb?!
+1 Mining
Now +0 Dabbling Miner+6 Unit Barrow (1 Excavated)"Nyaaaaaah!"
[0=0, 0 Flaws][1+0=1, 0 Flaws] You all get to experience the treat of seeing Polmarop attempt to swing a pick. He's a master dancer, so it's very graceful, but about equally as productive. Come to think of it, screaming
"NYAH!" whilst flailing at a seemingly random spot of ground, only to switch where he's swinging at is pretty symbolic of his rule in general. Overall, a worthy pastime to look at while resting from your own endeavors.
[0=0, 1 Flaw][0=0, 1 Flaw] This continues for a while. Also fairly representative, now that you mention it.
At the end of the week, Polmarop calls a meeting, apparently dissatisfied with everyone's performance. Which would be pretty reasonable if he hadn't spent the week telling stones they would rue the day they defied him. There's a roughly steak-shaped piece you think might be his chief rival now.
Anyway, he opens by introducing some very special guests- apparently a local fishman tribe has captured Harry and are threatening to sacrifice him to the gods unless you pay his ransom. Polmarop puts "one of you" in charge of the matter, which means he'll be cross with you collectively if somebody doesn't deal with that. Telling him you reviewed the situation and opted to do absolutely nothing about it might or might not count.
He then moves into a lengthy and rambling tirade about how disorganized everything is. It's one of those peculiar rants mixing indecipherable jargon ("The Glory of Almarech The Undying!" in a section about carrots), airheaded blathering (his speech about not dying in the middle of a rocky wasteland includes a section on carrots), and shrewd observations (he notes that there doesn't appear to be any water here, which he further acknowledges as problematic for both growing carrots and not dying in general).
Bearing in mind Polmarop's penchant for pageantry, his final order set can be divided somewhat among "Masters" of things. This is partially grandiose terminology, partially grandiose ambitions: Polmarop would like nothing better than to have an official "Master of Feastings" to cook food, but anyone currently cooking food would by definition fit the description. He fairly coherently mentions the following tasks:
-Master of Hostages to deal with the Harry Incident
-Master of Lesser Peoples to figure out how the local tribes are surviving and then copy that
-Master of Necessary Liquids to find a source of water
-Master of Commerce to establish lines of trade
-Masters of Mining to begin mining
The possible overlap and vagueness are pretty par the course, as is, obviously, the ridiculousness of declaring anybody trying to find water a "Master of Necessary Liquids."
((Food and Liquid consumption to be handled at month's end; as might be expected, everyone requires a unit of each every week. Bear in mind there are eight of you and Tove now eats like a horse.))
Heatwood Wagon
-20 Units Doof Hearts (4 Ashwood Barrels)
-20 Units Flooterboof Spleens (4 Sunwood Barrels)
-10 Units Screllscritch Intestines (2 Jadewood Barrels)
-5 Units Dew Snail Brains (1 Garnetwood Barrel)
-5 Units Noogle Meat (1 Jetwood Barrel)
-30 Units Bopfruit Wine (6 Assorted Wooden Barrels)
-19 Units Doof Blood (4 Assorted Wooden Barrels)
-10 Units Onyxblossom Brandy (2 Onyxwood Barrels)
-5 Copper Picks (1 Garnetwood Chest)
-5 Copper Shovels (1 Peridotwood Chest)
-5 Copper Axes (1 Topazwood Chest)
-5 Copper Fishing Rods (1 Jetwood Chest)
-500 Gold Coins (1 Rotwood Chest)
-1 Jadesteel Anvil
-10 Doof Leather (1 Garnetwood Bin)
-10 Tin Bars (1 Saltwood Bin)
-9 Doof Skulls (1 Sunwood Bin)
-9 Doof Wool Cloth (1 Bopwood Bin)
-10 Obsidian Rings (1 Jetwood Bin)
-10 Flooterboof Leather Trousers (1 Peridotwood Bin)
Hair Spider wandering docilely near Nero. It's a spider the size of a small dog, with an abdomen reminiscent of an animal skull. It otherwise appears to be made of hair.
You had several other wagons when you got here, but are uncertain exactly what was in them or how much of it survived the Blood Moon.
Crude 6-Unit Barrow (1 unearthed) containing Sir Knightly. You can still hear his voice, as though he were still here...
1x1x5 Tile Stone Ridge near camp perimeter
Baron Polmarop
-
+7 Archmaster Metalcrafter (0/14)
+6 Grandmaster Gemcutter (0/12)
+6 Grandmaster Gemsetter (0/12)
+5 Master Enchanter (0/10)
+5 Master Runecrafter (0/10)
+5 Master Metalsmith (0/10)
+5 Master Clothier (0/10)
+5 Master Weaponsmith (0/10)
+5 Master Dancer (0/10)
-
Lavasilk Loincloth studded with Emeralds, Onyxes, Rubies, Rubies, More Rubies, and an image of a penguin in Noogle bone.
Glorious Fang of the Fallen Empire's Fury: A gold spear with a ruby head. Heavily enchanted, but you're not sure with what.
Lorkotol (ATHATH)
Slashed Up
-
+5 Master Blue Mage (0/10)
+3 Adept Runecrafter (0/6)
+3 Adept Gater (0/6)
+1 Novice Communer (0/2)
+1 Novice Protector (0/2)
+1 Novice Diplomat (0/2)
-
Purple Witch Hat
Glowshroom Shepherd's Crook
Tove Ashwringer (Criptfeind)
Slashed Up
Chubby, x3 Consumption
9-Tier Muscle Density
-
+5 Master Flesh Elementalist (3/10)
+3 Adept Transmogrifier (0/6)
+3 Adept Transmuter (0/6)
+1 Novice Mind Elementalist (0/2)
+1 Novice Seducer (0/2)
+1 Novice Weaver (0/2)
-
Red Silk Dress (lil tight, fatty)
Doof Leather Servant Crop
Purple Idol
Isias Reborn (griffinpup)
Stinging Head x2
-
+5 Master Vitamancer (0/10)
+3 Adept Protector (0/6)
+3 Adept Earth Elementalist (1/6)
+1 Novice Water Elementalist (0/2)
+1 Novice Trapper (0/2)
+1 Novice Dodger (0/2)
-
Black Cloak
Iron Stabbin' Knife
Harry Kelln (Pencil_Art)
Captured By Fishmen
-
+5 Master Vitamancer (0/10)
+3 Adept Communer (0/6)
+3 Adept Summoner (0/6)
+1 Novice Persuader (0/2)
+1 Novice Enchanter (0/2)
+1 Novice Protector (0/2)
-
Heavy Leather Robes
Bronze Butcher's Cleaver
Albert Stone (Playergamer)
Slashed Up
-
+5 Master Fire Elementalist (0/10)
+3 Adept Destructor (0/6)
+3 Adept Swordsman (0/6)
+1 Novice Courtier (0/2)
+1 Novice Dodger (0/2)
+1 Novice Dancer (0/2)
-
Purple Robes
Bronze Longsword
Sir Knightly (Roboson)
Thoroughly Entombed
-
+5 Master Transmuter (0/10)
+3 Adept ? ? ? (0/6)
+3 Adept Metal Elementalist (0/6)
+1 Novice ? ? ? (0/2)
+1 Novice Transmogrifier (0/2)
+1 Novice Seducer (0/2)
+0 Dabbling Miner (0/1)
-
Knightly Armor
Knightly Steel Knuckles
Nero Deserter (Shadestyle)
Frost-Scarred Hands
-
+5 Master Hair Elementalist (0/10)
+3 Adept Summoner (0/6)
+3 Adept Conjurer (0/6)
+1 Novice Alchemist (0/2)
+1 Novice Communer (0/2)
+1 Novice Ice Elementalist (0/2)
+0 Dabbling Caller (0/1)
-
Purple Trench Coat
Obsidian Combardiche