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santime rolled 1 12-sided dice:
4
Total: 4 (1-12)
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 Posted: Thu Apr 05, 2012 7:00 am
Hmm... may she should have put even more fear to water the desert properly? But hey, what's that?.. The ghoul noticed a tiny, yet colourful and vivid flower sprouting on the edge of a sand dune. Wow, Shenny actually never thought such flower can grow in the desert, in the first place. Even Ktur was impressed enough to forget about his toenails he was so preoccupied with a moment ago and run towards the diorama.
(( Total HP: 19
Points earned: 1))
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santime rolled 1 12-sided dice:
8
Total: 8 (1-12)
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Posted: Thu Apr 05, 2012 7:02 am
And it was clearly his fault. May be, Shenny thought, horseman was feeling envious or something, but the air inside grew hot and arid again, no sing of that cool nice breeze anymore. Shenny was almost sure she didn't do anything, except for may be she was shaking the diorama too hard.
((HP: 14
Points earned: 1))
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santime rolled 1 12-sided dice:
9
Total: 9 (1-12)
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Posted: Thu Apr 05, 2012 7:03 am
And it was getting worse and worse, it was clearly too hot inside. Shenny was a bit afraid about the flower's destiny: it looked fine yet, but it wouldn't last forever with such conditions. She eyed Ktur suspiciously? May be it's his very presence affecting the environment? He was far from the diorama the only time she managed to succeed...
((HP: 11
Points earned: 1))
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santime rolled 1 12-sided dice:
3
Total: 3 (1-12)
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Posted: Thu Apr 05, 2012 7:03 am
The ghoul tried to repeat the same trick that helped her with raising a flower, but this time she put a bit more of fear to cover the entire desert with a real rainforest.
((HP: 11
Points earned: 1))
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santime rolled 1 12-sided dice:
8
Total: 8 (1-12)
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Posted: Thu Apr 05, 2012 7:04 am
When the rain stopped, the ghoul examined the environment only to realize nothing had changed. She kicked the diorama in frustration.
((HP: 6
Points earned: 1))
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santime rolled 1 12-sided dice:
8
Total: 8 (1-12)
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Posted: Thu Apr 05, 2012 7:05 am
Well, that wasn't a good idea. Her only success, the flower, started to wither, its petals fading away.
((HP: 1
Points earned: 1))
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santime rolled 1 12-sided dice:
7
Total: 7 (1-12)
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Posted: Thu Apr 05, 2012 7:06 am
Suddenly Shenny had an idea... if she's right it will explain everything. Looks like the little world inside the diorama was a full copy of the real world around her. If that's true, it runs under the same laws, and the real world isn't something you could easily affect, no matter how much fear you have, or how strong magic to do you use. The world and its existence depends on so many little coincidences, chains of events, etc, you would probably never be able to do the same trick twice, as well as you're almost never able to predict the exact effects of what you're doing.
((HP: 1
Points earned: 1))
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santime rolled 1 12-sided dice:
3
Total: 3 (1-12)
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Posted: Thu Apr 05, 2012 7:07 am
So, Shenny finally understood, that's why the whole idea of finding "the correct way" or "the exact technology" of affecting the environment was wrong. It would lead her to nowhere, like in the real world you unfortunately never have the exact and known technology to affect it, except for living there. That is life. That's why you have no guarantee of success no mater how deeply you mastered it. And she was clearly mistaken, there's nothing wrong about Ktur. Of course, being a horseman, and a native Famine, he knows quite well what he is doing, and it was stupid to assume his skills in this would be worse than hers. But his failure only proves her theory right.
A couple of raindrops hit the sands, and then a rain began watering the dunes and accompanying Shenny's thoughts.
((HP: 1
Points earned: 1))
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santime rolled 1 12-sided dice:
1
Total: 1 (1-12)
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Posted: Thu Apr 05, 2012 7:08 am
"Thank you, Ktur", she addressed the horseman. "I've finally learnt my lesson."
"I don't think I'll come here again", Shenny sent him a nice smile. "Be well".
The ghoul stood up, and took a last look at the little desert. It all ends in fire.
She lifted her finger, and the whole environment inside the diorama flared up; it was all blazing behind her back, while she was walking away from the place.
(( HP: 0
Points earned: 1))
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Posted: Fri Apr 06, 2012 1:15 am
Vegetation LabFor once there is no unfamiliar Famine clan face on the training field, simply a strangely disorganized layout of scattered tables and boxes, which look like they could have been scavenged from the garbage of the human world. And... A familiar face that may disappoint or even alarm the attending students.
Their very own Famine Heir, Cymbeline.
Good luck learning anything from this one!Stage 1 IntroductionThe bony ghoul begins discussing something in roundabout terms, often going on a tangent, sometimes pausing and gazing off into the distance... Crazy cackling is frequent. Perhaps you should look in those boxes she seems to be gesturing to. Roll 1d6 to determine it's contents! 1. You have a glass foot stool, a bag of dirt, and a vial of... gross water. 2. You have a fish tank, some muddy bottom soil, and a tube of de-mineralizing serum! 3. You found a clear box, some dirt, and something you do not want to drink. 4. You found a bizarre helmet, some protective padding, and a strength potion. 5. You have an empty terrarium, dark earth, and just enough dirty water for a little stream. 6. YOUR CRYSTAL BALL IS WEIRD-SHAPED AND- a beanbag stand and magic wand? Start tallying up your "learning" points! If you rolled 1-4, you get +1 point, and if you rolled 5, you get +3 points. If you rolled six... Cymbeline is wondering if you are the crazy one! Stage 2 SetupNow the heir is talking about plants. Unlike the half-mad babbling from the initial explanation, this is not insane rambling. This is science jargon! You still can't understand what she is talking about in between the simple words like "plants" and "weeds" and "pesticides", but you attempt to follow her example as she sets her own terrarium up. It is more complicated than it looks, the 'glass' sides slide, fold, and rotate until the cube has morphed into an enclosed rectangular tank with two semi-separated compartments. Roll a 6 sided die to figure out how well you did. 1. That isn't so b- Maybe this way... Erm... OKAY, your terrarium is set up, although it seems a little lopsided. 2. You set out to figure it out yourself. And after much fussing and an unhealthy SNAP, it appears... mostly right. 3. You aren't half bad at this whole Famine-technology-assemblage stuff! You are only 1/4 bad. 4. It only took you three tries, but your terrarium looks okay! 5. You seem to follow her example to the letter, maybe she's not a bad instructor after all! 6. You... cracked your box. Maybe she won't notice. How well did you do? Take your "learning" points from the previous stage, and calculate your new total. If you rolled 1-4, you get +1 point, and if you rolled 5, you get +3 points. If you rolled six... Cross your fingers. Stage 3 SelectionCymbeline is now handing out bags... of seeds? And her ramblings have turned to a delightfully nonsensical spiel on the similarities and differences of humans and insects and students (which still might fall under the "insects" category) and finally, plants. She brings you the box, and expects you to select one brown bag and one tan bag. Roll 2d6. The first number determines which tan bag you select. Apparently these are common and useful Human plants. 1. Oats 2. Sweet Corn 3. Asia Strawberries 4. Sugarcane 5. Cherry Tomatoes 6. Vanilla Bean The second number is which brown bag you pick out. These are plants, weeds in particular, you might be familiar with. They are all FEAR-based varieties that are known for their ability to produce herbicidal toxins, or irritate the skin, or spread like wildfire and choke out other living species. None of them are very pleasant plants, to be sure. You might now be starting to understand what Cymbeline was getting at with all that crazy science babble. 1. Noxious Ivy 2. Hunchback Beggarweed 3. Strangling Knotweed 4. Fiery Spurge 5. Weregoose Grass 6. Bindweed Stage 4 EvaluationNow that you seem to have everything you need, you begin to set up your tank. It is all very self explanatory at this point. A bit of dirt in each of the semi-separated compartments, human seeds in one side, FEAR seeds in the other, and voila! Time to add the magic ingredient. Following Cymbeline's wildly graceful example, you pour the small vial's fluid into the soil in each compartment. And then... BAM! Suddenly you have two fully grown plants. And in the time it takes to wonder how half the Famine clan is still as thin as a rake, you begin to notice a dark, misty substance leeching from the FEAR weeds into the healthy-looking human plant. Cymbeline begins to walk between the tables, examining the terrariums. For this section, you will have to compare your two plants on the scale below. This represents how compatible the selected FEAR weeds are with human plants. The closer they are together, the better the resulting hybrid! Hunchback Beggarweed <-> Oats <-> Strangling Knotweed <-> Cherry Tomatoes <-> Weregoose Grass <-> Sweet Corn <-> Fiery Spurge <-> Asia Strawberries <-> Noxious Ivy <-> Vanilla Bean <-> Creeping Bindweed <-> Sugarcane <-> Hunchback Beggarweed For example, if you have Strangling Knotweed, it is more compatible with either the Oats or the Cherry Tomatoes than it is with the Asia Strawberries. This can be represented by distance. The oats and tomatoes are only 1 place away. But the strawberries are five points away. (Notice the Hunchback Beggarweed is on both ends of the scale, it can be imagined like a circular scale after all.) For a distance of 1, you get +3 "learning" point and pass the course! For a distance of 3, you get +1 "learning" point and pass the course! For a distance of 5, you fail the course. Oops. =( POINTS DISTRIBUTION [ Horsemen Points Distribution: ] (Select only one option based on your results) TO OBTAIN 3 HORSEMEN POINTS: YOU MUST HAVE 9 "LEARNING" POINTS TO OBTAIN 2 HORSEMEN POINTS: YOU MUST HAVE BETWEEN 4 AND 8 "LEARNING" POINTS AND PASS THE COURSE TO OBTAIN 1 HORSEMEN POINT: YOU MUST HAVE BETWEEN 2 AND 3 "LEARNING" POINTS AND PASS THE COURSE, OR FAIL THE COURSE WITH MORE THAN 3 "LEARNING" POINTS
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santime rolled 1 6-sided dice:
1
Total: 1 (1-6)
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Posted: Fri Apr 06, 2012 1:18 am
Today morning wasn't any different from the last few days.. Shenny was pretty much preoccupied with her Alchemy classes, and almost forgot she still has time for training, before the lessons start. Since she learnt everything she could from the environmental studies, the ghould decided to try something new... perhaps, it can teach her something not less interesting.
When Shenny arrived at the training grounds, the whole place was just a total mess of scattered boxes and tables... or so it seemed. Despite the chaos, her curious eyes noticed sort of a pattern in the organization. A couple of students were working with the boxes moving them around, strangely enough there was no horseman looking at least a bit like an instructor around. Finally Shenny managed to notice a young bony girl, probably of her age doing something under the huge pyramid of boxes and other stuff. Shenny approached her with a casual "Hi", but the ghoul was quite deep in her own thoughts and didn't noticed Shenny. One of the students sent her an alarming look and whispered "It's a HEIR TO FAMINE". Oh wow. This tiny ghoul is a Heir?... She didn't look anything badass like Invictus, the only heir Shenny seen before. Well.. good to know. And probably good, Cymberline, that ws the ghoul's name, didn't notice her... who knows what kind temper does she have.
Soon enough it all was explained. Cymberline managed to finally notice Shenny, and started what would be sort of lecture; Shenny tried her best to understand the ghoul's words, but that was nearly impossible. Metaphors, analogies, roundabout terms, awkward pauses... also the heir appeared to have an interesting inner world: she would easily stop in the middle of her sentence and gaze off into the distance completely forgetting about the reality around.
Don't get it wrong: Shenny was a clever ghoul, and she met quite a lot of teachers before, "easy ones" and "hard ones". She could easily tell that Cymberline is really, really smart and highly professional in what she was talking about, but following Arel's rule of no questioning dropped her chances of really understanding it down to a significant zero. Well, may be not so significant: luckily, Shenny was fond of poetry and metaphors herself, so at least, she managed to understand they're actually working on vegetation, and their main material are the boxes.
Shenny grabbed the closest to her. Mmm... A glass foot stool, a bag of dirt, and a vial of... gross water. The water was surprisingly free from any kind of oil, but it was quite dirty.
(( +1 learning point))
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santime rolled 1 6-sided dice:
4
Total: 4 (1-6)
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Posted: Fri Apr 06, 2012 1:20 am
Cymberline briefly looked and Shenny's box and continued lecturing. The heir actually changed the tactic: now she was talking in a very particular manner one can find in those manuscripts nerds are fond of. To cut it down, it was a scientific jargon.
"All right, all right" thought Shenny. "You could ease that, sister. We all recognize how smart you are, seriously. You're cool one". Of course, the ghoul would never say that aloud. To tell the truth, she kinda sympathized with Cymberline: after all, she always preferred smart ghouls, and Cymberline would be one of the smartest ever. At least, judging from her manner of lecturing, she would easily fit Amytiville staff.
The heir's speech was dedicated to plants and all the aspects of floral life. Shenny tried to ignore here words and focus her attention on what the ghoul was actually doing - and she was preparing one of the boxes, which appeared to be a terrarium. Shenny carefully followed each of her steps.. or tried to. It took her just about three tries, but now the terrarium looked pretty much fine.
((1 + 1 = 2 learning points))
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santime rolled 2 6-sided dice:
5, 2
Total: 7 (2-12)
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Posted: Fri Apr 06, 2012 1:24 am
The heir handed some bags to the students; Shenny noticed most of them had quite puzzled faces, as they opened the bags to find some... seeds? Yeah, that were seeds, and quite ordinarily looking ones.
Cymberline was lost in her thoughts: she was right in the middle of constructing a very difficult philosophical concept of similarities and differences between humans, students and insects, with the main point lying in students being insects.. or humans being students... no, wait, it was insects being humans... Bloody Mary. Curse the scientists. Shenny wondered for a moment, if Cymberline is doing that intentionally, or is it really a type of person she is?..
Shenny took one brown and one tan bag, as the ghoul suggested. It appeared that both bags were carrying seeds: tan bag have been hiding some Human-world seeds, while brown ones were full of familiar, fear-based seeds. Shenny's bag contained Hunchback Beggarweed, human world seeds she didn't know, but there was a tiny little label at the bag written, perhaps, by one of the former students: "Cherry tomatoes". Shenny had no idea what Cherry Tomatoes are, but it sounded scary.
Shenny tried to improve her tank according to her own sense of perfection rather than Cymberline's explanation. She formed two tiny hills of dirt, one in front of another, and put the seeds inside them. Next, pouring the magic fluid from a little vial the Heir gave them before, into the soil. WOAH! A quick flash, and there were two different fully grown plants residing peacefully in the hills. Cherry tomato appeared to be quite cute, and not scary at all: a tiny trees with the dark green leaves and little round red fruits looking pretty much like the demons eyes.
For a moment, Shenny was wondering, why the Famine clan is called Famine, and why are they so thin, if they possess such a wonderful food production technology. But then something strange happened: a bush of Beggarweeds produced something like a sigh, and some kind of dark, misty looking substance covered the entire plant, from roots to leaves. Shenny wondered, if she did anything wrong, and it's a kind of fear-based parasite infection. Cymberline was walking between the tables examining the tanks, and the ghoul was almost ready to ask her, when she noticed the substance was now leeching towards the Tomato plant, or Demon's eyes, as Shenny called it for herself.
From a lecturing the heir was giving to one of the students near Shenny finally managed to realize they were testing two worlds plants compatibilities. When the ghoul reached her table, Shenny prepared to listen to one more hard lecture, but surprisingly the heir said exactly four words, and all of them were easy to get: "Not bad. Course passed".
The whole experience was so strange and messy, Shenny couldn't even admit she's happy she didn't fail. She probably needs to try it again... But she was still feeling quite puzzled leaving the training space.
((Cherry Tomatoes + Hunchback Beggarweed = distance of 3, pass the course!
1 + 1 + 1 = 3 learning points;
FINAL RESULT: 1 horseman point obtained!))
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Posted: Sat Apr 07, 2012 7:52 am
POISON/ ANTIDOTE CRAFTING:The ability to make poisons and potions from few materials is considered a vital skill for the clan of famine. When resources are scarce, one must improvise and use the tools at their disposal. Or just mix things and force something to drink it, (or injection, that sometimes yields much better results). Those wishing to make a poison not only need to know what is effective and what is not, but how to cure it as well. Killing a test subject too soon is…inadvisable.
Sadly, students will not be getting to play around with the more dangerous ingredients and runes, but they will get to make a few ‘interesting’ concoctions with the various ingredients they have. Aside from making their minor poison, they must also make an antidote. Untimely, their goal is to create more than what they destroy as then they can harvest more ‘results’ at a later time.Stage One Students are led to a table littered with various possible materials. Rolling 3 d 10, they get 3 ingredients. If one is rolled twice, (two of the dice give the same number) they may roll again until they have 3 different ingredients. 1- Thyme (+2) 2- Mint (no bonus) 3- Mandragora root (+1) 4- Dried dragon blood (+1) 5- Human’s tears (-2) 6- Mysterious mushrooms (+1) 7- Filtered Water (-1) 8- Mysterious yellow substance of questionable origins ( -2) 9- Rune stone (+1) 10- Foxglove (+2) Add up the points for your ‘unrefined’ solution. Stage Two Taking your mixture to the filtration system, a smaller version of a chemist’s set, you must roll 1 d 4 to determine how well you refined your poison. 1- Not much seems to have changed but now it’s an odd thick brown paste. (no change to your poison, UNLESS in the negatives in which it gains +1) 2- It looks… like the color changed? (+2 to your poison!) 3- The result is a glowing blue thick liquid. (+3 to your poison!) 4- You end up with a clear, if slightly tinted liquid (+4 to your poison!) Taking your Original results from the ‘unrefined’ solution and adding the filtration bonus, you now have your POISON TOTAL. Stage Three Now onto making an antidote. The table of ingredients sits rights next to the poison…probably not the best idea, given how some might mix the two. Rolling 3 d 10, students get 3 ingredients. If one is rolled twice, (two of the dice give the same number) they may roll again until they have 3 different ingredients. 1- Thyme (-2) 2- Cactus flower (+2) 3- Human’s Blood (+1) 4- Dried human’s blood (+2) 5- Human’s tears (-2) 6- Crushed skulls (+1) 7- Filtered Water (NO CHANGE) 8- Mint (-1) 9- Rune stone (+1) 10- Foxglove (-1) Add up the points for your ‘unrefined’ solution Stage Four Taking your mixture to the purification station, it’s a battery of small open flames and strange symbols, you must roll 1 d 4 to determine how well you refined your antidote. 1You end up with a thick tar like substance. (+4 to your antidote!) 2- It’s a glowing red paste now (+3 to your antidote!) 3- Not much changes, it just got a little thicker (+2 to your antidote!) 4- You end up with a clear, if slightly tinted liquid (no change to your antidote, UNLESS in the negatives in which it gains +1) Taking your Original results from the ‘unrefined’ solution and adding the purification bonus, you now have your ANTIDOTE TOTAL. Stage Five The student must now administer their poison and antidote to a small mouse, bird or fish minipet raised to gauge how effective a poison is. They're kept in one of the tanks nearby. They can administer their creations by mouth or by injection. NOTE! To be considered a ‘pass’ the antidote MUST be stronger than the poison, even if it is in the negatives. If they are equal it is considered a fail. POISON BREAK DOWN -3 to 0 <- It's pretty vibrant but apparently you want it turning dark 1-2 <- A few black spots here and there, not much really 3-4 <- The black outweighs the color in ratio now, it's pretty good actually! 5+ Your minipet is a deep black, good job! ANTIDOTE BREAK DOWN -3 to 0 <- It doesn’t seem to help at all, it's still back 1-2 <- Helps a bit, but only a few dots of color have come back 3-4 <- The subject is cured! Back to their normal color. Well done! 5+ Your subject is not only cured, but extremely better than before! The colors changing on their coat. POINTS DISTRIBUTION [ Horsemen Points Distribution: ] (Select only one option based on your results) TO OBTAIN 3 HORSEMEN POINTS: YOU MUST HAVE A +3 DIFFERENCE IN THE POISON AND THE ANTIDOTE. POINTS MUST BE IN THE POSITIVE RANGE TO OBTAIN 2 HORSEMEN POINTS: YOU MUST HAVE A +2 DIFFERENCE IN THE POISON AND THE ANTIDOTE. POINTS MUST BE IN THE POSITIVE RANGE TO OBTAIN 1 HORSEMEN POINT: YOU MUST HAVE A +1 DIFFERENCE IN THE POISON AND THE ANTIDOTE. POINTS MUST BE IN THE POSITIVE RANGE POSITIVE RANGE DOES NOT INCLUDE ZERO. A PASS ALONE DOES NOT AWARD POINTS.
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santime rolled 3 10-sided dice:
10, 2, 5
Total: 17 (3-30)
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Posted: Sat Apr 07, 2012 7:53 am
As much as Shenny wanted to visit Cymberline again today, she realized the first week is slowly going to its end, and there were still tons of things on Famine she hadn't tried. And Shenny would hate missing an opportunity to learn something, if she could. Well, she realized it's impossible to see and try everything within just a given week, and spreading her attention between all the activities here would only lead her to miserable results in each discipline, but.. there was at least one more thing she should try with no doubts. Poisons. Shenny was so fascinated by the Famine Alchemy, she would curse herself for missing this class.
There were a couple of students already trying upon her arrival. Their instructor explained that obviously students won't be given really dangerous ingredients, but never the less, they have a good variety of ingredients to perform some interesting combinations: it all depends on them. The basic logic of the glass was to teach pupils how to create an effective poison (and what's more important, an effective antidote) with just a few natural ingredients.
To pretend this situation, they were only allowed to take three of them. Shenny hesitated for a moment, and left her choice on the Foxglove (she used to hear it's poisonous), Mint (she had no idea how it works) and Human tears (that just sounded romantic).
((Foxglove (+2)
Mint (no bonus)
Human’s tears (-2)
POISON TOTAL: 0))
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