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I'll wait a few more hours to see if strawpoll works, and if not, I'll make a decision based off of posts.
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Dec 17, 2020 20:04
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| # ? Jun 5, 2024 07:48 |
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Gods of Thunder sound cool.
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Dec 17, 2020 20:56
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I'd like to learn about The Congregation, Bleeder's cult.
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Dec 17, 2020 21:07
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Bleeder seems like they're gonna be a problem, and they're in close proximity to us, so The Congregation is a decent bet.
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Dec 17, 2020 21:29
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Looks like no dice on strawpoll for now. So... VOTING CLOSED - Cult Factz The Congregation - 2 The Sunburners - 0 The Gods of Thunder - 1 The Backup - 2 The Blackwings - 3 The Musers - 0 The Rustloved - 1 LOADING...  ...LOADING
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Dec 18, 2020 00:54
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Awww, I missed the update post. I was going to throw in for the Congregation like I tried to do on the poll.
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Dec 18, 2020 01:08
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ANXIETY: [ X ][ X ][ X ][ X ][ X ][ X ][70%] [Disquiet] "You want to know the cruelties, of the metal cult, the First Lord made for herself?" Her voice is right there behind your ear, even as you watch her move out far enough to become a pale spot against the river black. Her sycthe sings low as it sweeps back and forth. She points with sog-rot hand to the western sky, where the storm boils on the mountain fence. "She roams there, in the blackmetal city. Roaming too are her Blackwings - soldiers of that gravity metal, psychic-wove of mind, powered with the blood-sorcery of Tyranny." The scything of the water makes it keen, a sharp finger over wet glass. "The First Lord, oh so old, only human of those Mightiest Three. What to do when you can never wake? What to think when you can never sleep? How to watch so many dreams, while scouting so many miles?" Śmiercią lowers her arms, and stares to Heaven with the waters around her shoulders. "You spread your subconscious across miles of artificial thought. Buoy your sanity with so many little tin soldiers..." She looks right at you. You tense up just a degree further, desperate to remember all she's telling you - there is no Silver Mind to reflect it into memory, no Dark to zealously commit every detail for recall. It was you. Just you; wet, bloody, sore, tired, scared. "But what you want to know is the measure, of their armament and the ease, with which they send you to my sickle." You don't nod, and don't blink. She doesn't walk back towards you (with her arms outstretched?). But her arm raises just enough to make the blade of the scythe rise above the water. "MIGHTY. As armed and angry, fast and accurate, as the Lord whose mind they support. NUMEROUS. No true army, but a terror of number, for a single soldier to overcome. SORCEROUS. Great war machines, fueled by such Lordly blood, gifted Tyrannical intent." She steps back once. Only the scythe and her hooded hidden head visible. You still don't look away. "Their city of patrol, the First Lord's nest, is named Dust. West of Edgeil, north of Jandoubi, is where they cluster and command. Beware, Tyrant Child- If one sees, all see, and soon Hunter sees..."  Śmiercią descends, the last of her pale swallowed by the river black. You're left sitting there too scared to move, limbs ice cold and heart clawing to get out of your chest. You don't know if she's coming back. If she's going to hurt you again. If she has more to tell. Was it over? A half hour goes by, the sky starting to hue with blue. You force yourself to look away from the river at last, realizing that you were in danger. You're too afraid to look at the Holy Land behind you, and stand with your eyes downcast and legs shaking so bad you have to fall over and crawl some of the distance. But you force yourself to the one safe place your deteriorating mind can remember was close enough. Its bulk sits there, warm copper and dark wood. You pull yourself up the sturdy side, and numbly work the door open, before quickly going inside and pulling it close, forcing its immense slide lock. You carefully lie down on the floor of the small copper-wood bathroom, barest light coming in through the small airslits across the top of the stall. You're seizing, body contorting with sharp tensions, but you endure it with the relief that you were finally safe. Red's cloak keeps your pain-wracked body warm, and you bury your face into your pack to bite it and hold down the sounds of fear. Delirium comes and goes. The day replays in a series of blank spaces, surfacing to relive a screaming few seconds of something burrowing into your skin, teeth digging up through your veins, your sword held up high to kill... ANXIETY: [ X ][ X ][ X ][ X ][ X ][60%] [Disquiet] You startle awake to your heart beating too fast, body still in pain from the day's long abuse and the awful tension of speaking with Śmiercią. The hard wood floor doesn't help, either. Your eyes are drawn to the airslits. Strange. The light coming through them was colorbright now. Enough to make the inside of the stall visible, as you breathe in deep and stretch the bone-crackling tension out of your limbs. It's warm... and you hear birds chirping. What was going on? You wanted to know, but the power of your anxious exhaustion keeps you still. The mushrooms had no spore. The Silver Mind was a flat matte gray. The Dark was an empty starfield.  It was only you and your unreality. For a long time, you hold Red's cloak like a blanket over your head in a comfortable twilight state. You drift away... but your heart leaps again into thunder-pace, startling you a final time into sitting up from fear you'll suffocate. Your eyes go immediately to the airslits- but only fog and gray creep through with silence. It wasn't long after dawn. You haven't slept at all, you're sure of it. Only delirium. You sit up and scuttle to a corner, waiting quietly to listen to your surroundings through the thick wood. ...nothing. It's clear out. You knew you had to get up and move around if you were going to get back to the Hideout. Build up a second wind. Your sword is out and your gun is kept slung low for a quick draw as you spend an entire minute slowly pushing the heavy slide open, and then peek outside with baggy bloodshot eyes.  OST: Dawn THE EIGHTH DAY ANXIETY: [ X ][ X ][ X ][ X ][50%] [Disquiet] HP: [ 3 / 20 ] FP: [ 3 / 14 ] No mist. But it was very dark- the sky was boiling with stormclouds, and there was an immense ozone smell coming down from above. You look around with blurry vision and see nothing. Wait... you do see something that has you squatting with creaking knees and your gun out. Some weird shapes just across from where you exited. A minute of watching and the motions of the winds reveals them to be shrubs. Just big leafy fancy shrubs, popped out of the open field. Realizing it's helping you stay awake, you wander over to take a look, tensed back up into a tireless kill stance. Getting near reveals more mysteries. There's scattered square shapes in the gloom, which you make out as a bunch of tables and chairs. The bushes were cut off at angled chunks, where there's now a large square indentation in the grass. There's even the trash can you rummaged through before.  You stare at the change for a while, mind sweaty and aching. You decide to sit down at one of the tables. They were of a weathered but sturdy wood, similar to the one by the little lake. You stare at that special table, across from you through the two bushes, while holding onto the feather you had found there. Kwiat. Have to get back to Kwiat. You stand when you feel the pressure abruptly drop. The clouds are taking strange shape from the winds acting unusual, and you can feel the land beneath you resonate. You're running on empty. You're scared. Something bad is about to happen. You have one last mile to rush between you and your secret room. No powers left save your own two feet. So you start jogging north, already ragged and ready to collapse, as the sky breaks open.
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Dec 20, 2020 17:47
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PLAYER CHOICE You're in rough shape. It's barely past dawn, and divine weather has visited the holy valley. There's a mile and change between you and the Hideout. The Silver Mind and the Tyrant Manifest are disabled. What's come down from the sky to trouble you?
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Dec 20, 2020 17:48
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Starlight generally means Dancer-aligned, which might go a little bit easier on us. Let's go for Starlight Cloud.
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Dec 20, 2020 18:40
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i'm not sure how much the weather cares if its Lord likes us? this is a weird as hell setting so maybe the clouds are sentient and will understand Dancer thinks we're a friend, or maybe it will poo poo debuffs all over us regardless since that seems to be her specialty. not sure myself which is likely to be the least worst option but i don't know if we can count on our friendship level to help us out here fluid showers sounds the most normal to me but that's no guarantee it's not also loving horrifying 
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Dec 20, 2020 18:47
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Fluid Showers sounds like Bleeder's thing, and it'd make sense for them to be happening considering Bleeder is in the area.
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Dec 20, 2020 18:49
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Yeah, it doesn't say what fluid is showering down, and if it spreads corruption then it could be really awful. Ash Visitation might be sensible though, on the grounds that it's presumably fire-elemental and we have Burner's shroud granting us significant fire resistance.
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Dec 20, 2020 19:21
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I went for Ash as it sounds the most likely to be associated with Burner. I wasn't sure if Starlight or Fluid would be more Dancer (Fluid made me think of movement and dancing, but the triple tech did use the phrase "Starlight, Sunlight, Moonlight" to describe Blue, Red and the Player, but no indication of which one was supposed to be Starlight. And Midnight Noon just screamed "HUNTER".
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Dec 20, 2020 21:36
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pumpinglemma posted:Yeah, it doesn't say what fluid is showering down 
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Dec 20, 2020 21:38
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pumpinglemma posted:Yeah, it doesn't say what fluid is showering down, and if it spreads corruption then it could be really awful. Ash Visitation might be sensible though, on the grounds that it's presumably fire-elemental and we have Burner's shroud granting us significant fire resistance. I like this logic. My guess would be that none of the possible options are beneficial, and something fire-aligned fits best with our defenses.
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Dec 20, 2020 22:06
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pumpinglemma posted:Yeah, it doesn't say what fluid is showering down, and if it spreads corruption then it could be really awful. Ash Visitation might be sensible though, *smash cut to the Sunburners swinging moloch thuribles, ash of chaos-incense corrupting all it dusts*
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Dec 21, 2020 00:33
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counterpoint: neither clouds nor starlight are inherently harmful further point: a starlight cloud is basically a really cool disco ball
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Dec 21, 2020 01:44
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The sun is a star. The suns rays cause cancer. Therefore starlight causes cancer. Do you want the PC to get cancer?
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Dec 21, 2020 01:47
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Randalor posted:The sun is a star. The suns rays cause cancer. Therefore starlight causes cancer. Do you want the PC to get cancer? literally everything causes cancer now. our head is 380% cancer.
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Dec 21, 2020 01:50
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VOTING CLOSED - Weather Divine Midnight Noon - 3 Pearlfall - 3 A Powerful Wind - 2 Fluid Showers - 2 Ash Visitation - 5 Rainflare - 3 Starlight Cloud - 12 LOADING...  ...LOADING
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Dec 21, 2020 02:20
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a trippy lightshow is perfect for someone in our psychological condition!*  *absolutely not medical advice
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Dec 21, 2020 04:27
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pls one day we need to go to Ulthar to meet kitties
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Dec 21, 2020 04:39
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Is Lady Death able to follow us there? If not, we should just say "gently caress it", hit up Burner and Dancer, ask them if they want to take a road trip to the Kingdom of the kitties, and spend the rest of our days opening tins of cat food for the kitties and giving them pets. Maybe it'll mellow the Tyrant out as well (or maybe he'll think that we lord over them by being the provider of their wet food).
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Dec 21, 2020 14:56
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The "wet food" the cats of Ulthar eat doesn't come in tins. (But they're still super-adorable.)
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Dec 21, 2020 22:30
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pumpinglemma posted:The "wet food" the cats of Ulthar eat doesn't come in tins. What are you talk about? We have a giant can opener that's unbreakable. You just have to change your definition of "tin" slightly.
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Dec 22, 2020 02:10
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OST: Star Signals What's happening up there? It's much too dark, even for the density of clouds. But then you see them boiling inside - great plumes of starry blue light. It wasn't lightning though, it was a steady glimmer hidden under the cloudskin. You jog as fast as exhaustion allows, only to be stunned by a myriad of sensations. The first was the air drying out with enough speed to make your eyes sting. Second was a persistent tingling in your skin, as though raindrops of static shock were peppering you. Third was a droning hiss in your ears, a cold static that bounces off the dry air. It makes running even harder from the difficulty breathing, compounded by your anxiety's rage insisting you were in a state of constant suffocation. You're only a quarter of the way to the Hideout when the clouds finally break. You hold down a shriek and duck under a rock to watch it happen. The starry light roils, and then BURSTS from the sky, a great shine that drips with the motion of liquid. It breaks apart as it descends, starkly visible against the darkened sky. Determined, you step out from the rock, and start to run again. But you slip, feet unsure. Your body is stinging not just with pain, but the strange tingling caused by the sky. You step forward, shrugging it off. Why does moving seem harder than your exhaustion can explain? (HT - Run!) 14 - [3]+[3]+[4] = 10 - Success! ŚTAR̀LI̢GH̵T C̛LƠUD̷ (HT - Run!) 14 - [4]+[5]+[6] = 15 - Failure [By One]. You can do it. One foot in front of the other, just don't look up or listen to the hiss, just run until your leg catches on a rock and you SLAM into the ground hard enough to hurt. How? Why?! You were SURE you had good footing and... and you see the sky. You see it coming down, faster and faster, your skin feeling worse by the second and why does it sound like there are voices?  Your itching at yourself as you limp along. The skin, the skin, it was PIERCING through it little invisible long lines starry starry warm lines stabbing your karma oh the death of a thousand tiny knives across your pitiful fortune... You can't scream. You can't think. You can't rely on the silver or the black. Red's cloak is over your head as you stumble and gasp for air. Gotta get back. Gotta get back. Don't let the starlight fall onto you it doesn't want you to get back. The world was drowned with a brilliant stage-black starry-blue, and the voices were growing more distinct; you felt them now vibrating inside the star shower... the static bends your mind into images of monstrous fulfillment. You have to push. You're not going to make it. (HT - Run!) 14 - [6]+[1]+[2] = 9 - Success! S̨TA̧R͞L̷IGH̶T̶ CL͘O͜UD͟ (HT - Run!) 14 - [2]+[2]+[6] = 10 - Success! S̨T͡ÀR̛LI͞GH̸T CL̶O͘UD͟ (HT - Run!) 14 - [6]+[5]+[5] = 16 - Failure. Why is it so hard?! Just RUN! Run galloping and hands waving to bat the static off your face off off stop listening to the voice whisper whisper telling you about the signals hidden inside of stars oh the lovely lovely wish-upon of the mighty mighty shooting-star and you tumblefall on the hills and smash against the rocks and you're sick sick with stardom- HP: [ 2 / 20 ] FP: [ 2 / 14 ] It's come down for true now. The starry blue fades as it reaches the ground, soft soft little plumes spackling your soul with karmic hatred. All the wishmight of the Heavens spilled with no intent but to muddle fortune unto dissolution. You climb back up after collapse, and look. you're standing on a hill and you ͜ ͜ ͜ ͜ ͜ ͜ ͜ ͜ ͜ ͜ ͜ ͜ ͜ ͜ ͜ look to the storm and you  You hear what's hidden inside the light. You stand tall and stare at the starry damnation. You clench your fist and know you must overcome. (HT - Run...) 14 - [5]+[3]+[2] = 10 - Success. ̶STARL̀ÍGHT ̸C̨L̸OUD (HT - Run.) 14 - [1]+[3]+[4] = 8 - Success! S̕TA҉RL͢I̸G̨HT̀ ̛C͘LO͡ÙD (HT - RUN.) 14 - [1]+[6]+[3] = 10 - Success!! ST̕ÁR͝LI͏GHT C͘L̵O̴UD̡ (HT - RUN!) 14 - [2]+[1]+[2] = 5 - Success!!! HP: [ 1 / 20 ] [PASS-OUT RISK!] FP: [ 1 / 14 ] [PASS-OUT RISK!] Red stains the ground with every step. Blood boils in your veins to force every breath. You're no longer awake or aware - you're a shadow under starfall, weaving and running up the hillside, clawing skin and gnawing hands to chase the ravenous light away. You're pushing, pushing, to a limit you know will be tested time and again. You're laughing in starry delirium as you tumble down the last steps into the Hideout, body ready to snap in two. You start to crawl across the courtyard, one slow yard at a time, so close to the safety of the doors. But you're not even halfway there and you already know. Your body doesn't have enough left. You can't make that final stair climb. Wasn't that wonderful? Could there be any better an erasure? Here it will end. You, splayed out on the cold stone, body writhing mad with karmic horror, every part of you slowly losing the luck of the draw, even the beat of your heart struggling against probability to keep pumping, as that chance grows increasingly slim. Voice, voice, voices and you mustn't listen don't listen never listen but these starry secrets could CHANGE you they promise. The stars in the sky were no longer dead - oh awful with their newborn life; promising promising promising and all you need do was wish, make a wish, reach up and cup the liquid starblue and let it change you in escape from Śmiercią... 
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Dec 22, 2020 05:28
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A skateboard...has poor sweet Kwiat been Tony Hawk this entire time and we've been too blind to see...?
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Dec 22, 2020 05:53
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hmm.... I wonder. >Make a wish; something that made you happy.
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Dec 22, 2020 06:42
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oh no ... it's the wrath of poochie
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Dec 22, 2020 07:07
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everyone knows that player characters die in fives; but oneruns always die alone alt+f8 five times. or shift+f5 once? Hodgepodge fucked around with this message at 09:06 on Dec 22, 2020 |
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Dec 22, 2020 08:21
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Skateboard! ... Does it still have the food we left with it?
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Dec 22, 2020 12:59
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 The Silver Mind posted:Your eyes open. Well, one of them does. The other was swollen shut from smashing it on the doorframe, and you already know you're going to catch Hell from Aitvaras AND Mom, with plenty of flak from Miss Bella as well. You roll over on the stone floor, listening to the birds and the sounds of the summer tropic just outside the school's front door. Under it was the steady grind of the skateboard, going back to its practice after it had retreated from the sounds of chaos. ANXIETY: [ X ][20%] [Disquiet] HP: [ 4 / 20 ] [+3 HP] FP: [ 7 / 14 ] [+6 FP] Your eyes ope- GUN UP AIMED OUT ON YOUR FEEEeeeeeeooouugghhh. You collapse back down from your spring-action standing motion. The gun remains aimed out, swept with sluggish ferocity around you. When nothing reveals itself to be moving, you shake the lead out long enough to assess. Oh. You're alive. Barely. You have no idea how, but you made it across the courtyard and up the stairs, and collapsed in the front hall of the school. It couldn't have been long- you look back outside through the open door and see the starry droplets were still raining down. Your spine is cold from the karmic mangling, and you missed an entire night's sleep. But, hey, you were alive and safely inside. After a minute's struggle, you stand back up and start to limp around, gun held at your side. You bop your head on the wall with weak frustration. The day was already lost- you were in no shape to explore or work, and couldn't go outside until the storm was over. You could feel Śmiercią's impatience hovering over you, her furious disappointment a breath-stealing spike of fear. A wasted day was one step closer to the scythe, and proved your lack of worth. ANXIETY: [ X ][ X ][30%] [Disquiet]  You shuffle around lamely in the front hall, leaning against the door to watch the starlight and listen to its creepy static-song whispers for you to come play wishmaker in its glow. When the voices start to become too clear, and you swear you smell smoke, you flip the rain the bird and head back inside to walk in circles some more. A part of you was avoiding your room to pretend you weren't going to hole up in it and stay there for the next day and change. The certainty crawls into your mind where the scythe left an opening, festering as you pace and start to chew on your wound from the swamp, still terrified that little sheets of thin meat were trying to grow in your blood. What do you do? What what what? The bile of worry floods your guts, reminding you of how little you've had to eat. The truth was standing at your back, waiting with grim impatience. You were going to waste the day. You were going to hunker down and pray for the quick mending of your miserably insufficient body. You were going to make Śmiercią that much more ANGRY with you. It's true. You should have had a Lord killed by now. Two, even. One week and you've accomplished nothing worthwhile. NOTHING. You don't even flinch when you bite into the wound so hard you taste blood. You bite harder, tears welling up, your other hand pounding into the wall. [-1 HP] Once the fit passes, you slide down to the floor and shiver, slipping into disassociation. But eventually the anxiety motivates you again, every little sensation setting you off into another sloppy wave of your gun to ward off the threats real and the imagined. You stand up and stalk around, turning a corner to find the lockers again. You quickly climb inside one, closing the door as you sit on the small floor. The starsounds were distant, a lovely twinkling chime.  Inside of the locker, where you feel safe, your brain unwinds from the disquiet just long enough to force yourself into a lovely trick- you'll stay in the Hideout while waiting for nightfall and sleep, but you'd be *productive* about it. Which means you'll go get Kwiat, and then bumble around in a delirium until you felt properly fooled into feeling better about being a complete waste of life! Your new brain is working great. Black August fucked around with this message at 06:17 on Dec 23, 2020 |
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Dec 23, 2020 06:11
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PLAYER CHOICE Golly gee you sure are a useless piece of poo poo who will die in pain and fear because you're WORTHLESS, but that doesn't mean you can't waste the day pretending you're being productive, in your goal of murdering 7 insanely powerful wackos!! How's the day go?
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Dec 23, 2020 06:14
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I'm pretty curious about what the Blue Book has to say about our pacing here -- obviously our patron is unhappy with us, and we're a wreck, but is it actually expected for successful oneruns to kill a Lord in the first week or two? ... Are there successful oneruns? We've seen references to a late game, but... one wonders.
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Dec 23, 2020 06:25
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There has never been a successful onerun.
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Dec 23, 2020 06:25
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Encouraging!!
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Dec 23, 2020 06:27
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Shame we don't have anything we could try and catch some of the rain with. On the other end of the scale, what's the Blue Book have to say on early deaths? Less in the "new player dangers" sense and more players purposely speedrunning gameovers.
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Dec 23, 2020 06:36
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CHICKEN KNIGHTS. All caps, bud.
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Dec 23, 2020 07:10
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Antivehicular posted:I'm pretty curious about what the Blue Book has to say about our pacing here -- obviously our patron is unhappy with us, and we're a wreck, but is it actually expected for successful oneruns to kill a Lord in the first week or two? We've met four of the lords already and it seems like any of them would eat us for lunch in a straight fight, at our current power level. Killing any of them week one is probably not the "intended" pace, judging by how outmatched we've been in almost every hostile encounter.
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Dec 23, 2020 09:55
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| # ? Jun 5, 2024 07:48 |
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Arcanuse posted:Shame we don't have anything we could try and catch some of the rain with. I voted to deck the halls with boughs of holly. That way we're doing something that will hopefully help to lift our mood in future!
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Dec 23, 2020 13:33
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