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PLAYER PLOT: Grand Theft Dreadnought
WHO: Flint, Vane, everyone volunteering for the Dreadnought plot
WHAT: Stealing a Dreadnought!
WHEN: Justinian 7-9
WHERE: Somewhere between Brandel’s Reach and the Waking Sea
NOTES:Violence, bad words, etc. Feel free to post your own top levels, or hop around in various threads. We can do group threads or individual ones, whatever works!!
WHAT: Stealing a Dreadnought!
WHEN: Justinian 7-9
WHERE: Somewhere between Brandel’s Reach and the Waking Sea
NOTES:Violence, bad words, etc. Feel free to post your own top levels, or hop around in various threads. We can do group threads or individual ones, whatever works!!
The Journey; Sails and Ropes and Dreadknots
As the ships push out from the Kirkwall docks, it’ll be clear on each crew who has final say on each deck. On the Walrus, it’s Flint, on the Reaper, it’s Vane, but the mission they have is the same. Despite how often the two captains bicker on a daily basis, when in action, they’re a well-oiled machine, minimal communication needed, decisions made with grunts, looks and nods. These men know each other, know how they fight, how they sail, how they command, and there’s a damn good reason neither’s murdered the other as of yet.
Daily life on the ships is crowded and active. There’s always a set of crew on the deck, making adjustments to the rigging and sails, either on the deck floor or high up on the ropes, and depending on how afraid of heights and how nimble you are, you may end up one of those people higher up. While Flint is more often on deck, Vane is more often up high. There’s watch outs posted on the masts, bow and stern, but only half the crew is above deck during the time traveling from point A to B.
Many will be below, catching some sleep in the rows of hammocks in the crew quarters (where you will have your own set up), or in the galley, scarfing down food, possibly listening to John Silver spin old wives tales to anyone interested in listening, or sharing pirate stories with the newcomers. The pirates in the crew will guffaw and shove at each other, making rude commentary and rough housing, or lounge around drunkenly yammering while the seas are calm. It keeps spirits high and the men bonding.
At night, it’s quieter on deck, fewer manning the ship, and you may be able to catch one of the captains in their quarters, mapping charts or drinking idly, waiting for sleep.
Scavengers; Can you Dread-Not?
When the ships arrive at the stalled Dreadnought, they aren’t alone. It seems, over the time the vessel has been stuck and abandoned, a hive of scavengers have moved in, picked away at the bones of the ship, and settled in to make homes out of the ghost hull.
We came for the ship, not the attachments. This means removing them.
After sending some scouts to inspect the situation, the Reaper and the Walrus weigh anchor behind a cliff to discuss strategy, the two ships brought together tight, with Vane, Flint and Silver crossing over to one deck to decide on the angle of approach and method of attack.
The Dreadnought is run aground too close to the shallows for the Walrus to maneuver up to her side properly. While the scavengers don’t have cannon or large guns to attack the approaching Riftwatch crew with, a head-on conflict is still unwise. The Reaper will make the approach, as it’s a smaller ship with less hull draw, and engage from a short distance with arrow volleys, to hold the attention of the scavengers on deck. Meanwhile, the fighting crew from the Walrus, aboard the Reaper, will take to the water, boarding the Dreadnought through the oar deck, and start to clear out the hull, moving towards the top deck, until they can clear an area for the Reaper to pull alongside, allowing the rest of the crew to board.
It’s murder time, kids!!
Parking and Peacing Out; The Dreadnautical Return
So You Found A Dreadnought. Now What?
Now, it’s hauling this massive bitch back home, as Charles Vane eloquently puts it, while wiping blood from a cutlass. Silver will be put in charge of the Walrus, and Flint will stay behind on the Dreadnought as leads are tied to the thing at varying points on the bow.
Towing it back through Brandel’s Reach and the long journey back to Kirkwall will be a tedious and tiring thing, but each lead must be watched carefully, and each ship must pull at the same speed to insure none of the ropes snap, causing the whole caravan to come to a halt and another hour or so of work to be done before they can be underway again. Ropes will need to be tended to, repairs may need to be made, inventory accounted for, and of course, someone has to drive the thing.
Feel free to take this time to explore the Dreadnought itself. There’s only the barest traces of gaatlok remaining, and the shattered shell of what was once a cannon, but it’s interesting nonetheless. The ship was once home to hundreds of Qunari, and while there isn’t much remaining to tell of them, the atmosphere of it still hangs about the ship, like phantoms in mist.
After the Dreadnought is maneuvered into the secret cove where it will remain hidden until the Division Heads decide what to do with it, the crews of each ship will be returning to Kirkwall, and a mission report will be posted to the Riftwatch network, where everyone can weigh in their opinions on it.
charles vane | ota, feel free to pile in and make group threads, my dudes
[ the crews in naval forces are always a bit slim - less men than you would've liked sailing either one of these ships if you were coming from nascere. there, you had your pick of crew, and shortage wasn't much an issue most days, at least, not for charles vane (well, not until eleanor). here, they're run a bit thin both on able hands and training. those that know what they're doing are mostly still novices, with those more intermediate guiding them, so if there's nothing of dire need for the captain directly on deck, vane's in the rigging.
when he was a boy, first brought into blackbeard's crew, rigging monkey was his job, and he's quicker and more confident with it than most. if you're new to this sailing job and someone sent you up onto the ropes, don't worry, the captain's up there to help you out. and if you're looking entirely too petrified to move, once you've made it up to the first sail on the mast and looked down, vane will be calling you over, a spare rope in hand. ]
Here. Come on. [ once you're close enough, the rope will get tied around either your waist or your wrist, whichever seems more secure, with the other end lashed snugly to the mast itself. ] There. You slip, it'll hold. So quit moving like a fucking snail.
[ hurry the frick up, they got shit to do.
otherwise, you'll mostly find him drinking with the men below deck. he's a fairly more accessible captain than flint is, not so much cloistered away in his cabin or in talks with his quartermaster. you can tell the two came from different lives, despite how well they work together when it counts. ]
can u dreadnot;
Guns at the ready! [ Vane's calling out from the main deck as the Reaper sweeps in closer to the Dreadnought. The 'guns' in question are the ballista and large, mounted crossbows that fire heavy bolts, often packed with antivan fire, or lashed to ropes they can use to drag the ship in against the other, making a swift boarding easier, but there's neither attached right now. they aren't looking to damage the dreadnought any further, and they ship isn't pulling close enough to board until the second crew, hidden below deck right now, is on board. ]
Fire!
[ vane calls out, and stops a boot against the deck floor to signal the crew below that they've moved in as close as they're willing now - time to unload and get swimming for the oar ports.
while the artillery guns are being reloaded, it's time for the crew not involved with that to raise bows. ]
Archers, ready!
dreadnautical return;
[ after the obnoxious travel back from Brandel's Reach, the several stops to tie and retie the leads that kept the Dreadnought towed along behind them, Vane's relieved to finally be detached from the massive thing, watching it from where they're about to board back onto their two original ships and head back to the Gallows. ]
Remind me why we wanted to hold onto this useless log.
[ they don't have cannons, they don't have gaatlok, they don't have qunari rowers. it's all but useless, save for the fact it's a goddamn dreadnought, and simply seeing one is terrifying for most. ]
dreadknots
She shuffles over to Vane and miraculously manages to neither look down nor cling to Vane himself for dear life as he tethers her to the mast. ]
Cool, cool, cool, awesome. And the rope won't cut me in half if I fall and stop falling all sudden-like?
dreadnautical return
no subject
The Reaper sweeps onto the dreadnought, and Kostos follows them, staff wielded more as a shield than a weapon while he dodges clusters of fighting and pushes for a vantage point. A wisp trails just behind him, attentive and ready to spring to his defense. Insurance. He isn't good to anyone dead, and he doesn't trust these people to understand what it is he's doing for them enough to care about protecting him so he can do it.
What he's doing for them is: barriers, mostly. Once he's scrambled onto the side of the angled forecastle, they begin springing into place twice or thrice a minute, just before a blade or a blow lands, turning fatalities into nothing at all and feeding what's left of their energy into the people they've surrounded.
It won't last forever. In his experience, someone always eventually notices, and they say kill the mage, and then he has to move. But in the meantime he's scanning the chaos on the deck, looking for someone who's already a terror, already cutting their way through, already nearly unstoppable—someone who a reasonable amount of magic and attention could turn into an invincible nightmare.
b. peacing out.
The first thing he does is throw up over the side of the ship.
The second thing he does is stride around like a man who knows what he's doing, in case anyone noticed the first thing, until he can fall in line to follow orders with a scowl and set jaw that mostly mask how hollowed-out he looks around the eyes. That's still the case halfway through the long, annoying journey back, when he takes an opportunity to retreat below deck. He's looking for where people slept—did they sleep? are Qunari allowed? surely—but any distraction will work.
a. scavengers
She's been on board for a hot minute, cutting down enemies and defending allies as needed, mostly without orders or instruction other than the initial call to arms. But Kostos, who she hasn't really interacted with ever and who is wielding a big ol' magic stick, looks like he knows what he's doing.
"Priority targets?" She asks without preamble. Athessa blocks a sword with her daggers and kicks the attacker away, more nonchalant than anyone has ever seen from Little Miss Look At Me, Be Proud Of Me, Give Me Attention. She's in her element? Weird.
"Or do you want someone to watch your back?"
can u dreadnot | ota
That's the signal, let's move!
[ This is when Athessa gets to show her competent side, to truly earn the attention and praise she craves on a daily basis. With her blades strapped to her hips and a vague instruction of "clear the dreadnought," she's as equipped as she needs to be to jump off of the Reaper and board the grounded vessel. She doesn't even scream on the way down to the water, which is a surprise.
She does, however, squawk a little when she's nearly obliterated by the corpse of a scavenger falling overboard, off the dreadnought and into the water in front of her face. ]
OH FUCK! Nevermind, it's fine, just a dead guy. Ok, time to climb. [ Said quietly, and mostly to herself, but also a little bit to anyone around her. ]
no subject
no complaints.
scampering up the side of something ill-advisedly is more or less the definition of her element, flexibly agile and small enough to move at speed not available to the bulkier among them—roughly of a size with athessa, she expects to hit the deck more or less together, which has the side benefit of leaving neither of them exposed anywhere, at least to start. )
Starting as we mean to go on.
( you know. with the dead guy. )
no subject
The oar deck isn't densely populated with the scavenger-squatters, but there are more than a few they need to deal with before they can consider this level cleared and move on to the next. ]
There, [ Athessa mouths, pointing with a dagger towards the far end--she can't remember if it's the bow or stern, but she's pointing at it so it's not like anyone can mistake where she means--and indicates a path with a sweeping gesture. Clear out from one end to the other, then move on.
She looks at Gwenaëlle and raises her eyebrows in a silent question, punctuated by a thumbs up. Sound good? ]