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6.3 Event Plotting
6.3 Event Plotting
OOC info
Welcome to the end of the cycle! The storm is upon us, and a new area has been opened.
There will be no event post on the main comm. Instead, make your own logs to include these prompts, and any other prompts you want to add. There will be a end-of-the-month post and the TDM around the 20th.
Use the happenings form to report on what your character’s been up to!
Post any bulletins to the bulletin board and bother your fellow guests with your walkie-talkies!
Fill out as much or as little of this form as you like:
New this month
At the Staywell
The dining hall features one long table and the same meals every day: a nice, continental breakfast, sandwiches for lunch, and chili with cornbread for dinner.Throughout the month, new books appear on shelves in the hotel lounge. However, the are strangely unintelligible. Some are written in familiar letters, but the letters don't make words. Some are written in letters that none of the characters in Wellstone have ever seen before. The existing books are still there, but nothing readable is added to the library this month.
Also, the pool is broken, since the antlion destroyed it. The pool area is cordoned off, and the pool itself dry.
The General Store
The General Store's stocked up with cowboy-themed memorabilia. And knives! There are a lot of knives. Utility knives, hunting knives, cooking knives. There's a whole display of them. Wonder why!Around town
The diner’s special for the month: pecan pie! Again.The diner is somewhat operational again. There is food, more than just pecan pie. But no matter what you order, the waiter brings you either: a giant platter of chicken nuggets, a sandwich with pickles instead of bread and jam as filling, or a cold can of soup. If you want the pecan pie, you'll need to serve yourself from the display on the counter.
Monsters are still around, stalking the edges of town, looking for their next meal.
When you visit the few other locations in town, you’ll find the employees friendly and welcoming, although they may say some strange things, in addition to the handful of phrases they usually say:
The receptionist: "Fine day today! A nice one to go out for a stroll on your own. Give you some time to think!"
Owner of the General Store: "Whoa! Is that a knife in your pocket or are you happy to see me?"
The bartender: Cleans glasses and stares out the window.
The waiter: "Good morning! What will you have? Oh, great choice!" He doesn't wait for a reply and comes back an empty glass.
The gravedigger: Stares into the horizon, seemingly lost in thought.
The sheriff: He's back on bath-duty, and gives those who spent copious time in pool jail a Stare when they enter the baths.
The weather
Hot. Hot hot hot and dry. The ground feels like dust beneath your feet, little puffs of dust cloud around each footstep. The sky is clear and the sun is bright.The cistern
The cistern has been located under the graveyard, but it is nearly inaccessible, so far down that it would be dangerous to try to get in there without supernatural or technological means.The Storm
Content warnings: natural disasters, earthquakes, mass destruction
The first two weeks of the month, everything is clear and calm. Yes, there are still monsters out there, but everything else seems oddly normal for the last month of the cycle. The waiter looks a bit worse for wear, sagging as if from the heat, and the monsters start to attack earlier in the day, but aside from that, nothing of note occurs, at least not weather wise.
The third week, the tremors begin. At first, it could just be someone running on the floor above you, or it could be a train passing by--except there are no trains in Wellstone. The tremors happen randomly, and might shake a glass off a table, or make you miss a step.
They escalate toward the fourth week, bigger tremors, more often. Things fall and shatter, bottles break in the saloon, NPCs waver. The waiter falls over, often, his eyes more and more terrified.
Cracks start to open up in the earth, and people may tumble into them. The bathhouse is the first building to go, falling into the earth.
The last day of the month, the shakes rarely give you a break, tearing the town apart. Buildings fall, and the Staywell starts to shatter, a fissure opening up, separating the pool from the rest of the hotel (thanks, Antlion). The north side of the hotel falls off, and by the end of the day, the entire hotel collapses to the ground, along with anyone in it.
tl;dr:
The first two weeks of the month, everything is clear and calm. Yes, there are still monsters out there, but everything else seems oddly normal for the last month of the cycle. The waiter looks a bit worse for wear, sagging as if from the heat, and the monsters start to attack earlier in the day, but aside from that, nothing of note occurs, at least not weather wise.
The third week, the tremors begin. At first, it could just be someone running on the floor above you, or it could be a train passing by--except there are no trains in Wellstone. The tremors happen randomly, and might shake a glass off a table, or make you miss a step.
They escalate toward the fourth week, bigger tremors, more often. Things fall and shatter, bottles break in the saloon, NPCs waver. The waiter falls over, often, his eyes more and more terrified.
Cracks start to open up in the earth, and people may tumble into them. The bathhouse is the first building to go, falling into the earth.
The last day of the month, the shakes rarely give you a break, tearing the town apart. Buildings fall, and the Staywell starts to shatter, a fissure opening up, separating the pool from the rest of the hotel (thanks, Antlion). The north side of the hotel falls off, and by the end of the day, the entire hotel collapses to the ground, along with anyone in it.
tl;dr:
- It's that time again: Wellstone will be destroyed by the end of the month.
- Objects, people, and buildings will fall into the growing fissures in the ground throughout the month, until at last the Staywell is enveloped by the earth.
The Urge
Content warnings: monsters, killing monsters/animals, murder, possession, not being in control of your own body
You wake up not where you were before. You have no idea how you got here. You have no idea why your hands are covered in blood.
In front of you is something, or someone. A monster, perhaps. A vulture, a six-legged dog, a cacti creature. Or a person: a friend, or an NPC. You have killed them, with a weapon, or with your bare hands. You have no idea how or why.
You might wake up in the hallway of the hotel, in the back of the diner, or out in the middle of the desert. It isn't where you were before. You don't know how much time has passed, but quite a bit of it. What you need to figure out is: what do you do now?
An urge takes over characters' bodies, much like in 5.3, but this time, that urge is simply to kill. The urge isn't directed at anyone or anything in particular, but it is only sated by killing. Once you have killed, you come back to yourself. And now you have to deal with what you've done.
When a character is taken over by this urge, they are a strange version of themself. They're much like their double in previous third months of the cycle: the worst version of themselves. But no matter which worst version this is, this one really, really wants to kill. Any character is capable of murder with this prompt, and improvised weapons will often be found and used.
Characters can't be talked out of this state, but they can be redirected. If a character is first going after another player character, they can be redirected to a monster or an NPC, and vice versa. Think of a monster in a bad monster movie, whose only impulse is to kill.
At first, it's more likely to kill monsters, but by the end of the month, it becomes harder and harder to resist the urge to kill your fellow player characters.
So: you've killed. What now?
You may gain up to five memory points with this prompt. One for each time you engage with it (up to 3), and two extra points if your character is killed using this prompt. You do not have to follow the usual death penalty with this prompt.
tl;dr:
You wake up not where you were before. You have no idea how you got here. You have no idea why your hands are covered in blood.
In front of you is something, or someone. A monster, perhaps. A vulture, a six-legged dog, a cacti creature. Or a person: a friend, or an NPC. You have killed them, with a weapon, or with your bare hands. You have no idea how or why.
You might wake up in the hallway of the hotel, in the back of the diner, or out in the middle of the desert. It isn't where you were before. You don't know how much time has passed, but quite a bit of it. What you need to figure out is: what do you do now?
An urge takes over characters' bodies, much like in 5.3, but this time, that urge is simply to kill. The urge isn't directed at anyone or anything in particular, but it is only sated by killing. Once you have killed, you come back to yourself. And now you have to deal with what you've done.
When a character is taken over by this urge, they are a strange version of themself. They're much like their double in previous third months of the cycle: the worst version of themselves. But no matter which worst version this is, this one really, really wants to kill. Any character is capable of murder with this prompt, and improvised weapons will often be found and used.
Characters can't be talked out of this state, but they can be redirected. If a character is first going after another player character, they can be redirected to a monster or an NPC, and vice versa. Think of a monster in a bad monster movie, whose only impulse is to kill.
At first, it's more likely to kill monsters, but by the end of the month, it becomes harder and harder to resist the urge to kill your fellow player characters.
So: you've killed. What now?
You may gain up to five memory points with this prompt. One for each time you engage with it (up to 3), and two extra points if your character is killed using this prompt. You do not have to follow the usual death penalty with this prompt.
tl;dr:
- You are taken over by an urge to kill. You wake up minutes or hours after your last memory, and find something or someone dead in front of you.
- When under the influence of the urge, you are your worst self.
- You may kill monsters or people with this prompt.
The Catacombs
Content warnings: caves, tight spaces, claustrophobia
So, you've died. Someone, taken over by the urge, has killed you. That sucks, my guy! It sucks, and you hurt, your head aching like you've just tried to remember something important. No matter where you died, you wake up somewhere cold, dark, and damp. You're on a stone floor, and you're quite sure you died, but you seem fine. You are, in fact, fine. And you're nowhere that you've ever been before.
Welcome to the catacombs. A sprawling web of tunnels and rooms, that seemingly stretch on forever. You're welcome to explore, to seek things out, to discover why you're here, and where, in fact, you are.
Strangely, the ever-present feeling of being watched is absent here.
The area you will wake up in is a series of small clear spaces connected by tight tunnels. Some are so tight it's terrifying to try and get through. The walls and floor feel like solid stone in some places, and oddly squishy in others. Some tunnels are damp, while others are bone dry. The walls can be smooth, or oddly dotted with what appears to be old bones. For those in tune with the feeling of death, it is palpable down here, death surrounding and encompassing you, coupled with an intense, deep, thrumming feeling of life.
As you explore, you may find yourself in various caverns:
Further exploring may turn up more discoveries, but it will take a long time to traverse this place, and the paths are confusing and winding and difficult to remember where you've been. It's desperately dark, so unless you can figure out how to light it up, it's even more impossible to travel through.
There also doesn't seem to be a way back to the surface. Try as you might, no way up appears. Even in the cistern, the surface is so far above you, and the ground up there so thick, it's impossible to break through. And your walkie talkies can't reach the surface, but you can talk to folks below!
Food can be made in the glistening room, and shelter can be found in the derelict Staywells, or in the ships. You can survive down here--but for how long?
tl;dr:
So, you've died. Someone, taken over by the urge, has killed you. That sucks, my guy! It sucks, and you hurt, your head aching like you've just tried to remember something important. No matter where you died, you wake up somewhere cold, dark, and damp. You're on a stone floor, and you're quite sure you died, but you seem fine. You are, in fact, fine. And you're nowhere that you've ever been before.
Welcome to the catacombs. A sprawling web of tunnels and rooms, that seemingly stretch on forever. You're welcome to explore, to seek things out, to discover why you're here, and where, in fact, you are.
Strangely, the ever-present feeling of being watched is absent here.
The area you will wake up in is a series of small clear spaces connected by tight tunnels. Some are so tight it's terrifying to try and get through. The walls and floor feel like solid stone in some places, and oddly squishy in others. Some tunnels are damp, while others are bone dry. The walls can be smooth, or oddly dotted with what appears to be old bones. For those in tune with the feeling of death, it is palpable down here, death surrounding and encompassing you, coupled with an intense, deep, thrumming feeling of life.
As you explore, you may find yourself in various caverns:
1. A large space taken up by what looks to be the Staywell. Except it looks like the Staywell Manor on top of the Staywell Manor on top of the Staywell Hotel, on top of the Staywell Hotel, and so on. Some rooms are accessible, but most are crumbled under the weight of a hundred Staywells.
2. A strange, wet cavern, echoing and filled with the sound of dripping. If you explore this cavern, you can find derelict ships, similar to the ones found out in the desert in cycle 3.
3. The cistern. Stone stairs descend into the cistern, and it stretches out in front of you, impassable as ever.
4. A strange cavern with glistening walls. They aren't wet, but if you shine a light on them they sort of... glitter. This room is strange, for when you're in it, and you think of something you want, it appears. No matter what it is, it appears. It is usually not quite right, but there it is! Sort of!
5. A long ways through this maze of tunnels, you can find a strange membrane blocking a section.
Further exploring may turn up more discoveries, but it will take a long time to traverse this place, and the paths are confusing and winding and difficult to remember where you've been. It's desperately dark, so unless you can figure out how to light it up, it's even more impossible to travel through.
There also doesn't seem to be a way back to the surface. Try as you might, no way up appears. Even in the cistern, the surface is so far above you, and the ground up there so thick, it's impossible to break through. And your walkie talkies can't reach the surface, but you can talk to folks below!
Food can be made in the glistening room, and shelter can be found in the derelict Staywells, or in the ships. You can survive down here--but for how long?
tl;dr:
- You've been killed by someone overtaken by the urge. You find yourself underground in a series of confusing tunnels.
- If you explore the tunnels, you may find various things of interest.
- Food and shelter can be found, but there is no apparent way to leave.
Catacomb exploration
Re: Catacomb exploration
A: Do nothing.
B: Do something very fucked up actually.
C: idk something else?
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If you wish for a person, you get the glitter in the room coalescing into what looks like a person! At first. Then, as the glitter falls away, so does the person. It collapses to the ground in a pile of blood and bone and viscera, along with some small objects that may represent the person to your character.
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1. John was able to sense the tentacle torture pit back in Cycle 3. Does this place feel similar in its fleshyness and life-death-stasis energy? Could this be part of the same location?
2. Sometimes the floor feels squishy - is that because it's glitching from stone to meat, like the cistern sometimes did?
3. Can a character with flesh-manipulation powers part the membrane, or does it reject that kind of tampering the same way the cistern walls and hellpit tentacles do?
no subject
2. Sure is!
3. The membrane quivers and shakes in response to any attempt to manipulate it, so it seems like it's slightly more able to be messed with than the cistern walls. Damaging it in any way makes it instantly and visibly heal over with knotty-looking scar tissue. Repeated manipulation attempts do start to make it look more... ragged. Over time.
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2. what can be salvaged from picking thru the shipwrecks
3. if cecelia were to call out to the ghosts by name and ask for their help, is there anything that can come of it
4. are there any life-preserving resources that can be found in these caverns (food, water, etc)
no subject
2. Items similar to the cycle 3 prompt can be found. Nothing entirely useful, but depending on what she's searching for, she might find parts of ships that could be used for something! Let us know if she's looking for anything in particular.
3. Nothing. It's dead silent. Any presence she may have felt on the surface is deadened and gone here.
4. Food and water can be created in the glistening room. It may not come out the way you exactly ask for it, but all food will be edible and water drinkable. There are also some caverns dripping with water, and it doesn't burn like the water in the cistern. If she's brave enough to try it, she'll find that some of the water tastes relatively normal. Some... less so. More fleshy. One of the caverns that she could discover through exploring has a nice serene pond in it with potable water, and a waterfall cascading from a short cliff.
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Slowly, she finds some things. She finds some water-stained pages that are ruined beyond comprehension. She finds a diary but it's someone's daily life completely unrelated to Wellstone, on a planet not so different from her homeworld, but not the same either. She finds star maps of stars she's never seen before. She finds a book of what appears to be poetry in an alien tongue that can be translated with a lot of work. She finds writings from a myriad of cultures that don't seem to share anything except a core of humanity.
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1. Do powers work down here?
2. If so, if Darin were to punch one of the normal walls, can he break through to see if there's meat in the walls like the barrier blocking the cistern?
3. Darin has a lot of inherent knowledge of minerals and ore being a smith. Would he be able to discern what that glittery substance is/is made of/anything of that nature?
4. What is the membrane most closely resembling? Is it like webbing or is it like a weird skin?
5. Is there anything in the Staywell Pile from previous loops? ie, the stockpiles of materials Darin had squirreled away or the previous fortifications that were washed away before the manor took the hotel's place? Any remains of monsters, NPCs, things they've previously encountered?
6. Is there anything in the Staywell Pile that can be used as parchment and writing utensils?
7. Is there a jukebox? (I'm only being partially serious here but if there is I will lose my mind)
no subject
2. They are, in fact, meaty! Some are more tendon-y or fibrous. The meat itself is reserved for the thicker walls.
3. He can tell that it's nothing he's familiar with. It is not of his world.
4. Fleshy webbing. Like a thin, but strong, piece of flesh across the entry.
5. There is some. More from more recent cycles, the longer ago it was, the less likely he will be of finding anything handy. The most recent Staywell is there, the Manor, and it is the least decayed. Oddly, the lobby and bulletin board are very accessible, as well as some of the second floor. The rest is destroyed. There are no monsters or NPCs.
6. Yes, post-it notes!
7. Nope.
no subject
Are there any other remnants of any of the other buildings? Like the missing jail house?
no subject
There aren't other buildings here, in this cavern.
no subject
- Can he tell how old any of the caves are? Could he determine if any other people have ever been down there?
- And, for that matter, are there any bones or other physical signs of people?
- Are there any bits of the Staywell/Manor in the catacombs that are actually part of "real" Staywell that Pal could detect? For example, he'd be able to tell if the bulletin board was the "real" one because he could read familiar thanergenic signatures all over it. Similarly, he could tell if a bed or a chair had a familiar thanergenic signature.
- Do the catacombs have the same rancid Death Vibes as the rest of Wellstone? And are there any areas that are particularly death-y because a lot of people died there?
no subject
2. There are bones! There are bones in some of the walls. No signs of living people.
3. Yes, the Staywells are all real. They are all one and yet distinct at once.
4. From the event: "For those in tune with the feeling of death, it is palpable down here, death surrounding and encompassing you, coupled with an intense, deep, thrumming feeling of life." -- No where in particular is more death-y than else where, of where folks have explored so far. Let me know if you want more details about the death vibes.
no subject
A couple follow-ups!
- When you talk about the Staywells being crumbled under each other's weight, is this fairly literal? ie., in the lobby, there might be chunks of collapsed roof and masonry from recent-ish Staywells, and under that plaster dust from even older Staywells, etc.? I'm picturing what would literally happen if you dropped one house on top of another hahaha
- Is there anything in the Staywells that indicates anything about the people who were there before? Personal items, clothes, bodies?
- Tell me more about these bones! Are they fairly similar to the skeletons in the cemetery?
no subject
1. Yep, literally one hotel on top of another. The most recent Staywell will be the most accessible. The ones under it quite inaccessible, more like a pile of rubble under the newer ones.
2. No bodies, but clothes and personal items from dropped characters can be found in the three most recent Staywells, although the second and third are far less accessible.
3. Yes, but far, far older. They still fluctuate in age, but the ages are like either 1000 years old or 100000.
Re: Catacomb exploration
2. Same deal with the life energy, what's that like? Is it like life in the sense of blood and vitality and that sort of feeling? Or, more of a wild nature life "magic" feel? More like a druid and less like a vampire, if that makes sense?
3. If Arthas were to touch the membrane with his frost magic/aura, what would happen, if anything?
4. Is it possible to raise whole skeletons out of the bones in the walls, or are they too old/brittle/destroyed?
no subject
2. The feeling of life isn't exactly blood and vitality but it's closer to that than wild magic. It's the opposite of death and the presence of living.
3. A bit of the membrane would freeze, blacken, and then quickly heal over like a wound.
4. A vast, vast majority of these skeletons are way too old to be dragged from their spots and will simply crumble upon reanimation attempts, but there are a few bones here and there that seem newer and could be reanimated!
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