[CLOSED] SAFE HARBOR

[katabasis]

WHO: Edgard, Gwenaëlle, Glimmer, Holden, Abby, Derrica, Darras, Gabranth, Flint
WHAT: Destroying the defenses blocking entrance to Val Chevin's harbor.
WHEN: Now
WHERE: Val Chevin
NOTES: Thrills, chills and spills; please cw in your subject lines if applicable.

Intelligence deciphered thanks to a a signal book recovered from a Venatori agent abroad has revealed that the entrance to Val Chevin's harbor is guarded by a series of buoyant underwater traps which, when sufficiently jostled on their tethers, will activate and release an explosion of elemental magic designed to destroy any unregulated shipping. If there's to be any hope of ever approaching the city by sea, these defenses must be punctured.

Fortunately, there is a point playing very narrowly in Rftwatch's favor. The beauty of Val Chevin's harbor, and the feature which makes it so desirable as both a trading port and shipyard, is its deep waters. This has historically made Val Chevin difficult to effectively block. You would have to sink a considerable amount of stacked detritus at the harbor's entrance to interfere with the passage of most trading vessels. This means that breaking a few ships on Tevinter's mines and letting the flotsam go where it will is unlikely to cause more problems than it solves.

—Which all sounds very pretty on paper. In practice, the prospect is unbelievably dangerous given the bare facts: someone is going to have to sail those ships into those mines.

But that's the very last problem anyone has to worry about. Before getting to a potentially explosive, fiery death, Riftwatch has to actually get close enough to the traps to effectively trip them.

Three poorly conditioned Antivan merchant ships—acquired by Riftwatch in recent trade—have been hastily restored to appear as active trading vessels. They've retained their Antivan colors and heraldry. When the Walrus, Riftwatch's resident combat-equipped (pirate) ship, is seen chasing them into Val Chevin's harbor, it will appear to anyone watching as if they are a convoy of desperate merchant sailors attempting to escape being captured or destroyed only to tragically run headlong into the harbor's defenses.

In a further effort to disguise the ruse, the three merchant ships each have a few special passengers: a few dozen corpses retained from the recent skeleton war in the Gallows who, now that they've been more or less stripped of their red lyrium, will make for convincing proof of casualties to anyone poking around in the aftermath.

With all this in mind, Flint has assigned the following duties:

FORWARD SCOUTS - Holden and Edgard, riding a griffons. They will approach Val Chevin at sunset, a few hours prior to the arrival of the convoy. Their orders are to attempt to observe and report the placement of the underwater mines and note any additional defenses which may interfere with the efforts. They must approach from the South. Should they be spotted or attacked by defenses from the city (the probability seems high), they must be seen fleeing toward the Orlesian army encampment. Once night falls, they can skedaddle back to the Walrus by griffon and rejoin the convoy.

CAPTAINS - Darras, Derrica, and Gwenaëlle. Each of the three merchant ships will need to be sailed directly into the minefield at night. While it's not particularly technically work (and each ship will have a minimum crew of to assist in the initial travel), Darras, Derrica, and Gwenaëlle will be responsible for ensuring each ship makes the correct final approach before bailing at the last possible moment.

CREW - Glimmer, Abby, and Gabranth will each be assigned as seconds and support to the aforementioned captains. They'll be responsible for overseeing the effective evacuation of the three sacrificial ships and helping with any last minute course correction. Should something catastrophic happen and a captain be unable to do their job, they're responsible for guaranteeing their assigned ships successfully trips a mine.

RESCUE EFFORTS & DEFENSIVE MANEUVERS - Everyone, but Holden and Edgard can utilize their griffons once the pyrotechnics die down and there's no risk of being illuminated by an explosion. There will be a brief period where the Walrus may stray in range of the city's defenses (think: ballistas and magic) during the recovery efforts. While the Walrus will do its best to stay long enough to fetch everyone back, but if someone wants to be dramatically assumed dead and left behind only to wash up on the coast and end up in the care of the Orlesian Army, now's your opportunity.

In true Riftwatch fashion, nothing can be completely simple. Mapping underwater traps and sailing in the dark is an inherently risky business that's as much luck as skill. Despite their best efforts and through no real fault of their own (though feel free to have your characters feel guilty if you want to), whichever ship Abby ends up on will suffer a glancing blow by an unexpected mine on the way into the harbor. It won't be enough to destroy the ship, which risks exposing the whole charade. Steering the ship into a second mine or guaranteeing it is in some way sabotaged by other means before it drifts further into the harbor will require some derring-do from both her and her assigned captain (and anyone else who might somehow be in a position to scramble to assist them).


(ooc: Feel free to thread as much or as little of the action/your assignments as you like. The general intent is to give everyone a smorgasbord of prompts to pick from and enough detail/guidance to color your play with rather than make anyone feel shackled to their tasks. Think of this as a party mingle log, except instead of dancing and witty repartee it's explosions and the threat of drowning. For this reasons, assignments and pairings have been left purposefully vague.

If you have any questions, want any additional information or want me to inflict crew to captain match-ups on you then, please hit me up in the questions thread below. Otherwise, feel encouraged to make up details and complications. The only requirements are that they don't blow the cover story and that all three ships successfully end up mine'd.)

Comments

[muckspout]

"So you're telling me we're looking for the ocean that does not have sailboats in it?"

Edgard cocks his head to one side and leans close over the saddle looking down, the wings just missing him. Sunbeam graciously maneuvers to account for this.

"That seems like...most of it?"

He sighs. He's not trying to be difficult.

"Trust you, but this seems like a lot of guesswork."

[acreage]

"We're looking," he corrects, "for the parts of the harbor they avoid. There's a difference."

The routes they take, and don't take — reliably — can be revealing. If they're lucky, they'll be able to pick up on a pattern before the sun sinks completely.

[muckspout]

"Suppose so."

Edgard nods and puffs out his cheeks a little. He observes Holden observing the harbor and attempts to mimic him.

There are a long few minutes in which there is silence and Edgard looks at the ships below him. He then fidgets with his saddle for a few moments. After nothing has happened for about ten minutes, Edgard directs Sunbeam to start lazily drifting in a circle around Buggie.