outofsticks | OOC PLOTTING: BUY MORE CRYSTALS

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!plotting

OOC PLOTTING: BUY MORE CRYSTALS

SETTING UPDATES

Thanks to Beat’s final wish/sacrifice, a small handful of stars have returned to the night sky. They are few in number but shine brightly nonetheless. For the first week of the month, upon seeing the stars, songbirds will sing a non-stop tune to the skies.
A rumbling can be felt beneath the earth as the skeleton of the Sky Guardian starts to regain her willpower to return. The rest of this plot hook will be left up to player action.
Callan’s Corruption has been mostly dealt with. While he is still partly Corrupted, his head is clearer, and he will be able to fulfill his duties as Lake Guardian. This does not mean that he is not still an asshole. He is, in fact, still an asshole.
As is the case with most Guardians, when they are free from their eternal prisons/suffering, they give something special to the Grove. In this case, Callan’s gift… is a month-long torrential downpour. This is what you guys want right? Potential flooding?? Yeah, he knows you do. (He’s pretty sure he’s helping.)
- Even though a normal month-long rainstorm would cause plants to die because Too Much Water, everyone’s plants they’ve worked so hard to raise, as well as their regained buildings and the sort, will be perfectly fine. (Unless you want them to not be fine, then that’s your choice.) In fact, the plants may grow to gargantuan size during the storms — think of Stardew Valley’s giant produce, that’s what we’re going for.
- Plants inside the greenhouse/not exposed to the rains will not be affected by this unnatural growth.
The Burned Town has been cleaned up thanks to Enciodes & a handful of player characters (and Moder)! It will henceforth be called “North Aldric’s Grove”. The map will be updated when Wolfie has a second (as will the locations page, naturally). Players are free to now put buildings in that area thanks to the ground being stable. Enciodes has already installed the Archives/library in there as a treat.
Zahliya has eaten the sun shard he was entrusted with. Thank you Mizuki for the idea. As a result, his ability to cure corruption has been enhanced significantly… and will likely be influenced further by his questline happening later in August.

PLOT UPDATES

Within the Grove, it seems as though furniture is going on strike. Tread cautiously, because even the act of sitting down in a chair or laying in bed may result in you being bucked, rolled or thrown off. Dressers are especially moody, and doors? Oh, they will NOT stop creaking.
Breaking the furniture only makes things worse, so act with caution. Unless you want to play Night of the Living Chairs…
In the end however, all they really want is some TLC. Cleaning, upgrading or repairing the furniture will settle them down. Probably.
Aside from this minor bump in the road, things seem quiet for once. Or, they will, until Suri’s newest gifts to the Grove show up. Every character will receive a small bag of gemstones, each of them randomized ICly — and if you wish to randomize it OOCly, you know the mods will be there for you. Every gemstone has a meaning, a healing effect, or both — but upon contact with the gems, they’ll influence the characters with the opposite meaning. For example, rose quartz is the stone of unconditional love… or, it was. Now? All it brings is hate, and player characters will quickly find themselves under this curse.
- Gem meanings can be found with a quick Google search. We the mods do not have predetermined meanings for you. If you choose to gacha it, we will give you meanings when you gacha, otherwise this is up to your choice.
Discarding the gems only seems to amplify the effects as well, and the curse only seems to worsen as time goes on.
To break the curse, characters must hold the afflicted gemstone and perform a true act of what it embodies. Going back to the rose quartz example, this would mean holding it and performing an act of unconditional love. Anything goes with these acts, so be as creative as you like!
On a truly calmer note, as the skies clear up after the downpour, a few stars now dot the night sky, twinkling in the darkness. This is entirely new after centuries of darkness. A soft rosy joy radiates from the moon, and the night feels peaceful and safe.
Whether you stop by Ydalir’s one night, or Heimr’s as the sun sets, both are quietly emotional and urge you all to spend the night out together, watching the skies. They give you blankets to lay on in the clearing, bring teas and cocoas and dim the few lights that do remain in the Grove. The stars dance in the sky, and you are all here together, for better or for worse.

OOC UPDATES

Remember how Summer was supposed to be chiller? That. Did not happen and Amity is very sorry. Amity promises not to sabotage the next beach episode with Plot. (Wolfie makes no such promises though /s)
The plot for Zahliyaquest is in the post linked above; please do relevant plotting for that event over There, but feel free to mention here if your character will be participating. This is just so that Wolfie has an easier time keeping track of participants, questions, etc etc. Thank u :>
As always, we mods take player feedback, plot suggestions, wishlist items, whatever else, extremely seriously. Feel free to reach out to us with whatever you need! Special thanks to Rubie for the suggestions this month.
If we forgot anything important that happened in July, please let us know so we can edit the post!

Please use the following form for plotting:

Character:
Status: Who is your character? What did they get up to last month and how is it impacting this month? Did they discover something? Are they harboring a clue? HMM
Seeking: Any CR or plot thread you want to kickstart!
Not Seeking: Anything you'd like to avoid.
Anything Else: A permissions post, opt-in for a character-specific power or whatever else.
Meme: you know you have one.

Threaded | Flat

haha remember that time we put rock gacha on the BAC page and you guys thought it was so hilarious well guess what—

Character: Loop

Status: Hello!! They are new!!! Still getting settled in and also adjusting to all the colors and having to speak to more than just Siffrin! Please be gentle with them they're like a skittish animal

I'm p much just playing things by ear rn but plans for the month:
- They've been sleeping outside but it's raining all month now so uhhhhhhh... someone should probably drag their ass inside. That someone might be Siffrin but they're stubborn so this might take a few tries to keep them from wandering back out
- Gemstone stuff, they're going to be way more unpleasant than usual whoops but it's fine! They're also depressed and lazy so it'll balance out the thirst for conflict!! Unfortunately this does not help their ability to socialize but I guess they have to overcome all of that somehow so yeah, pry some honesty out of this bitch.
- Might kill someone (looks directly at Siffrin) WE'LL SEE TEEHEE ☆ their mental state is already bad enough tho gemstones are not helping. they need to vent, talking about feelings is hard but violence is fun and easy.
- In a more longterm plotting sense they are EXTREMELY interested in the stars/local celestial deities... please talk to them about stars. they are going to harass all the star-adjacent NPCs. they are going to stargaze as soon as the option is available.
- Loop has learned the work fuck, please teach them more bad words so they can insult Siffrin across as many language as possible

Seeking: holds out my arms please come to me,,,,,, BUT to highlight the kinds of characters that would vibe best with them. highly interested in anyone who would talk stars/constellations/astronomy with them; anyone related to time travel bullshit; (fellow?) non-humans would also catch their attention but they are kind of uncomfortable in their own body so it's a bit hit or miss there.

also anyone who talks to Siffrin, the ISATs are a package deal sorry I don't make the rules. Loop is weirdly protective/competitive??? when it comes to Siffrin, depends on the kind of interaction but if someone is mean to Sif there's like a 50/50 chance Loop will either join in the bullying or defend him. if it's a positive interaction there's a 50/50 chance Loop will get jealous or avoid that person completely. they're going to be noticeably averse to getting close to anyone who ends up befriending Siffrin BUT that's something they gotta figure out how to deal with, dwbi

Not Seeking: they are not even close to emotionally prepared for romance rn, sorry but u cannot kiss the star they don't even have a mouth

Anything Else: heyo I have an opt-out for spoilers and also lots of heavy themes that are doomed to come up when ur character is from a timeloop game where the protag kills themselves a lot (usually on purpose!!) please please please let me know if you don't want Loop to engage in any of that kind of stuff around your character. will probably only come up with close CR eventually but YKNOW. THINGS TO BE AWARE OF.

also the fun fact I am constantly trying not to be blatant about because it's major ISAT spoilers (u should play the game its very good)(it's only like $20 wow so cheap also there's a free demo), but if u rly wanna know here u go click on this go wild

Loop is actually the same person as Siffrin, time travel stuff bad end timelines etc yknow how it goes. Which is why their relationship with Siffrin is so ?????? look sometimes you really hate your own guts but also part of u wants to see a version of yourself succeed, but ALSO sometimes you want to strangle them how fucking dare they be better at being you than you were what the fuck

Meme:

Character: Siffrin

Status: New and awkward about it! Siffrin is nice and helpful even with strangers, but he's still slow to get close to anyone so he's just made some acquaintances so far while sulking around the grove. Extremely depressed due to being stuck here, and the only thing keeping him sane atm is unfortunately Loop, but he'll be acting normal for everyone else because he'd rather die than open up to anyone. So y'all will just get awful puns while he has a slow, quiet breakdown.

Seeking: F...friends?? He doesn't know how to make friends intentionally, the few he has were pretty much dropped into his lap by the universe and he got so extremely attached to them he nearly broke reality because of it. Y'all could be having regular happy hangouts and he will still be unsure whether that makes you friends. Please, he needs an extrovert to drag him into shit, and also probably an introvert he can relate to.

He'll also eventually be making a trek out to the temple Heimr told him about to try to solo the evil god thing and probably die in the process, possibly with Loop tagging along, whenever things have quieted down enough for it. Maybe during all the rock curse shenanigans? We can blame his suicidal tendencies on rock stuff, it's totally not just what he's like. Anyone that'd wanna try to stop them or join in or whatever else could be cool!

And yeah, Siffrin and Loop have the most It's Complicated relationship imaginable and the inhabitants of the grove have likely been forced to witness their weird antagonism at least once or twice. But Sif also wants Loop to make some friends and might try playing platonic matchmaker if anyone is willing! Just...subtly, because Loop would definitely throw a fit if they knew.

Not Seeking: Sif is canonically asexual so definitely nothing along those lines, and he's fresh off finally broaching the topic of feelings and kissing and whatnot with one of his friends and there was intent to explore that, so he's not really open to anything romantic with anyone else rn either. ISAT's setting is really chill about polyamory and whatnot, so I won't rule out the possibility entirely, but it'd be the most slowburn shit ever and Sif would still have some guilt about his not-boyfriend to grapple with. Also, please know that despite the cute art style and the fact that Siffrin is a 5'1" manlet, he's in his mid-twenties.

Anything Else: ISAT deals with some heavy subjects, especially where Siffrin is concerned, so please lemme know if there's anything you'd like me to avoid touching on specifically! Most likely to come up is depression, suicide and self-harm, maybe alcoholism. I'll also generally try to avoid big ISAT spoilers but some stuff is likely to come up with Sif coming from the end of the game, so let me know if I should avoid all spoilers at any cost!

Meme:

Character: A.B.A. (pronounced like Swedish pop group ABBA for the unfamiliar)

Status: Brand new and already miserable. A.B.A. is desperately trying to live like she normally does in an attempt to gain back some normalcy, but that was...travelling. So she's just been kinda wandering outside like some sort of horrible cryptid and sleeping wherever when she gets tired. This isn't going to work out so well with the rain, and she refuses to go to the inn again because she thinks it's haunted. It's obviously not, but you can't tell her otherwise. Her wet stray cat vibes are gonna be through the roof.

Other than that, it looks like I joined just in time for shenanigans. I need to figure out what I'm gonna do with the gemstones, or just randomize them. Either way, she's probably going to try to eat hers.

Seeking: Fwends? 👉👈 I'll be the first to admit A.B.A.'s difficult as hell, but it's just because she's shy and everything scares her. The good thing (???) about her husband not being here means she'll be more desperate to find new people to hide behind. I mean talk to. Let her hold your keys, tell her about your favorite books, feed her so she keeps popping up at your porch. It's all good.

I'd also like to get her a replacement axe at some point, so anyone who could point her (and me) in the right direction would be great. Preferably 7ft tall and looks like a key. That's a normal thing to ask for, I assure you.

I'm also never opposed to negative CR, especially since A.B.A. is prone to getting into arguments. ...Usually from her misunderstanding a situation and refusing to accept she's wrong. I'm currently more focused on positive CR just to get her grounded, but obviously if it happens, it happens. And it's beautiful.

Not Seeking: Shipping, she won't be interested. Girl just got here and you ain't a key.

Meme:

Threaded | Flat

QUESTIONS

GEMSTONE GACHA

Jami's unsocialized feral gremlins

Rubie's Rowdy Roundup

wolfie wonders why we're alliterating

Lavvy | Loop.... i have no choice in the alliteration

Kelly | Siffrin

weasel and the weirdos™

Merlot hoping she isn't too late | A.B.A.