MOD EVENT ↠ Happy Campers

[faderifting]

WHO: A lot of people
WHAT: Wilderness survival practice
WHEN: Drakonis 9:47
WHERE: The Vinmark Mountains, which we will continue to spell that way forever.
NOTES: OOC post. Teams below!

After everyone in need is given a brief overview of wilderness survival skills—how to start a fire, how to craft a basic trap, how to recognize any deadly-toxic local flora, etc.—teams will be transported to a point on a nearby mountainside and told to reach a different mountaintop within five days for pickup. They'll be provided with a knife and a hatchet to get them started but otherwise not permitted to bring anything except anything truly necessary for their health (lyrium for Templars, for example), their sending crystals, and their clothes. But if they hide extra things in those clothes to cheat with, that's between them and their team members and consciences.

The terrain between the two mountains is a woody, hilly, rocky valley, cut through with a river that branches into a few creeks and feeds a few ponds. There are caves, thickets, and a few small open fields, all populated by the expected wildlife and perhaps occasionally a hermit or little group of bandits. A road crosses through the valley, but there are no villages or permanent structures. If at any time the team is in danger they can't solve themselves, they can ask for a griffon rescue.

If they reach their pick-up point before the five-day mark, they have to hang out there and wait anyway, but they'll be able to do it in a nice spacious cave beside a spring, stocked with bedrolls, soap, playing cards, and two bottles of wine.

LOG TEAMS

These teams plan to log out portions of the adventure. Our general advice is to keep it chill and spammy, but you can do serious standard logs if that's what your heart desires. The provided prompts are optional, intended to help you get started, and you're welcome to ignore them or add to them if you want.

• TEAM 1: Gideon, Vanadi, Colin, and Sol might deal with three straight days of unrelenting rain (which may cause floods, depending on where they go and where they set up their camps) and a swarm of furious hornets.
  
• TEAM 2: Petrana, Loxley, Herian, Aenor, and Bastien might deal with a day and night of strong, unpredictable winds that try to topple shelters and whip away anything loose, as well as a patch of wilderness filled with traps left behind by overzealous hunters.
  
• TEAM 3: Benevenuta, Dirghe, Sawbones, and Adrasteia might deal with a heavy, raucous thunderstorm and a rotting rope bridge over a gorge that can only be avoided by either climbing up and down the sides of the gorge or losing half a day of walking.
  
• TEAM 4: Benedict, Marcus, Laura, and Vanya might deal with a rock- and mudslide, caused by previous rains, and a bear scavenging through their food that seems more lost and confused than aggressive.
  
• TEAM 5: Edgard, Sidony, Diana, and Valerius might deal with three straight days of unrelenting rain and a pair of raccoons that follow them for the entire journey, intent on stealing their food.
  
• TEAM 6: Ket, Richard, Barrow, and Erik might deal with a day and night of strong, unpredictable winds that try to topple shelters and whip away anything loose, as well as a flock of extremely loud and somewhat aggressive birds nesting above their camp.

HANDWAVE TEAMS

These teams have opted to handwave. Feel free to just discuss OOC what they would have gotten up to or learned about each other in the process. If you wind up inspired to play something out after all, you will not be arrested.

• TEAM 7: John, Vance, Cosima, and Nell.
  
• TEAM 8: Thais, Derrica, Maud, and Joselyn.
  
• TEAM 9: Ellis, Julius, Mado, and Nadka.

Comments

Sol Noon| Team 1/ota

[noonrodeon]

1. Getting Started

As much as Noon is thoroughly enjoying his retirement, he still jumps at the chance to go on the trip. Or training. He does realize that other people do not have quite the extensive experience living in the woods as he does. The inclusion of a hatchet and knife seem downright charitable, but Noon figured this whole "no other equipment" business was more guidelines than a hard rule.

He waits until they're dropped off and any potential bootlickers well out of the way before he says, "Right, let's see what we have."

The total sum of the illicit supplies stuffed into pockets and boots were:
- 4 greased bow strings
- 1 small whetstone and file ​
- 1 oil skin waterbag, neatly folded
- 2 balls of twine
- 3 additional pairs of socks

He looks back up at his comrades expectantly.

2. Mud

There's angry hornets, which really as far as dangers in the wild go is relatively mild. They escape, one way or another, and then Noon promptly begins gathering up handfuls of mud, what exposed skin he has in a layer of it.

"Good thing it rained after all, eh lads?"

BANTER (for hikes and campfires)
a. Hmmm, shoulda brought a book after all.
b. Reckon all things considered, we got off pretty lucky.
c. [ In the middle of a long hike, through the pouring rain, he has the audacity to start whistling ]

Wildcard

Team 6 (open, brackets or prose is fine, threadjacking is also fine)

[sohighandwild]

I. You'll blow us all away

Ket is in no way an outdoor person, though she does her share of the work without complaint. (Or at least without any external complaint.) One skill she does have, however, is knowing how to tie a wide variety of knots. Granted, she's never needed them to secure tents against huge gusts of wind before, but the basic principles hold. "Hey," she shouts to whoever is nearest as she works her way around the camp. "Come hold this for me, I need another hand." At least the winds aren't constant, but their unpredictability is its own special problem.

II. Mine?

Her hopes that the birds would give up and go away seem to have been dashed after hours of squawking. Not that she's visibly lost her temper; no, instead, Ket is combing the campsite for small, roundish rocks. She's making a little pile of them, which might just be a decorative cairn if not for the dark looks she keeps shooting up at the flock in the trees.

III. Campfire banter

a. Don't tell me that no one remembered to pack any alcohol.
b. What if we all went back to town and entered a pact to swear we were out in the woods the whole time?
c. Wildcard, choose your own adventure

Team 3 OTA: no rules just right

[babewyn]

Storm comin’:

[ The clouds cover came rolling in thick about an hour ago, innocuous at first. The off and on prattle of rain is just a nuisance until the first sizzle of lightning cracks through the canopy, close enough to smell. A bone-rattling boom of thunder cascades through the surrounding hills.

Hatchet in hand, Dirghe has paused mid-whack at a felled tree, blade buried deep in rotten wood.

Hard to say what the metal seams in his broken horn are made of. Silver? Maybe?

He furrows his brow. ]

...This feels kinda like unsafe to me.


Later:

[ The nice thing about the rain is that it’s a reason for them to delay solving the rope bridge problem. The nice thing about the rope bridge problem is that it gives them a reason to stay out of the rain and close to the fire while they think it through.

It’s just visible in the fading light through the rain, old planks flagging in the wind.

This isn’t a cave so much as it is a jumble of rock jutting out of an eroded hillside, the low shelf of basalt overhead broad and flat enough to keep the floor dry.

Mostly dry.

It’s the kind of storm where everything’s a little damp, water coursing down over the shelf around them in curtains of cold runoff -- enough to fog their breaths and numb their toes. There’s room enough for all of them to sleep eventually, but only enough for Sister Sara to stand. Currently Dirghe is hunched over a pile of wet branches like a gorilla in a doghouse, head tilted awkward to keep the one longer horn from scraping while he sorts the soaked through wood from the only kind of wet. ]

I think we got enough if one of you magely types wants to do the honors.


Wildcard?

[ Wildcard! ]

Team 5 | OTA free for all

[truthtied]

a. Forest Negotiations

When it is inadvisable to continue traveling and they must stop, Diana attempts parlay with the raccoons. She sits in wet grass across from the raccoons. Between the three of them is a small fish, several mushrooms and five pinecones.

"The raccoons are learning to barter," she says when approached, with the tone of someone who thinks this is a perfectly normal statement, "But I suspect they'll still try to steal if given half a chance. They're not nearly as sneaky as they think they are."

The raccoons chitter. The one on the right takes one of the mushrooms and Diana sighs.

b. Mortality, the weakness of the flesh ect

Caves are not particularly comfortable, but they're a great deal better than trying to sleep out in the rain. Even with her powers as curbed as they are, Diana does not tire easily. The severity of the cold is a new one. As is this rather specific pain. When she tugs off her boot and wet sock to investigate, she lets out a surprised laugh. "I have a blister."

Not surprising, given the weather and the comparative newness of her boots. It's an impressive one, squishy and large. She gives it an experimental poke, clueless as to how one goes about dealing with a blister.

WILDCARD