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meadowlarkooc2020-02-08 01:55 pm
EVENT 008 WRAP UP
As the last of the Displaced activate the gates at each of the four locations on March 4th, a change occurs for all of the Displaced, whether they're located at one of the gates or not. First, they will all have a vision at the same time: of people throughout the ages crossing long, ornamented bridges, with the end result being a gate. Once they pass through this gate, they'll see over a hundred different locations, as if they're capable of seeing the world in its broadest, fullest view. Soon enough, the vision will pull back far enough to show the solar system as a whole before blinking out, leaving anyone who's experienced it with a feeling of vertigo and fatigue. Within a few moments, those effects fade, leaving all of the Displaced with a bright blue chest that's glowing.
For any of the Displaced at the gates, they will soon find themselves in a new location underneath New Amsterdam. Anyone who's been in the underground cave systems of New Amsterdam will recognize their surroundings, but this is a location that's as yet unexplored. Surrounding their arrival point, there will be several pillars that have lit up: white, blue, gold, orange, indigo, red, and black. At their feet, there will be a large golden disc that's covered in interconnecting triangles.
Now that they've arrived at the New Amsterdam gate, they need to work together to unlock this gate's capabilities as well. By unlocking/activating the New Amsterdam gate, the characters will be unlocking fast travel for the game as a whole. In order to unlock it, there will be five triangles (which signify the unity between humans and gods) that they need to step on at once. However, that alone doesn't do it. That means it's time for some more touchy feely nonsense. The Displaced have to make a daisychain of the empathy bond around the five triangles, and step forward to allow the five main Displaced chosen to activate the five triangles at the same time. You know those really annoying raid mechanics where everyone has to do the same thing at the count of three? Well, here's yet another one.
In the meantime, they can explore these new ruins, or head out and find their way back home. Anyone who left things at the other gates can go back and retrieve their things and fast travel back home.
What does this all mean?
◉ The Displaced have unlocked fast travel. Despite the lack of clarity behind the visions, they will all innately know how to travel between different hubs in the world. Each of the 104 megacities has a hub. For now, fast travel is limited to Earth, and we'll cover how to expand it to the colonies below.
◉ All of the Displaced can travel between the five gates with a single thought upon stepping on this pillar. They can also travel to any of the hubs. They will need to travel to a hub location to fast travel, so they can't do it out of their own homes.
◉ Fast travel means that characters can now avoid customs, long travel times, and even quarantines where cities require it. However, they will be in these cities illegally, so they likely will want to avoid drawing too much attention to themselves while there.
◉ Characters who want to take up residence in another city can do that now, though they will need to go through legal means of declaring their new residence. Characters will need to declare entry and exits via customs to relocate, so for these specific cases, they will need to take trains around the world.
Now that the gates have been unlocked and fully activated, many mysteries have come with this particular discovery. For one thing, why were the Displaced forced to hit all four locations at once? Why do they have access to all of the world's cities and seemingly nowhere else? Were there other locations in the past and what happened to them? Why do the Displaced have this power, and what does it mean?
The fact of the matter is that this system was in place long before any of the Displaced showed up, making it so that they can try to delve into the past of this world—if they so choose. For anyone who doesn't care, this will just be a very convenient means of Displaced public transit.
For now, some facts about what these gates mean for the game as a whole:
◉ We've modified our Locations page to add a subheader for the 104 megacities outside of New Amsterdam. In the main body of the entry, we've added some restrictions, and we've supplied links to our prior city write ups so that players can know what's in place. Beyond that, this is where you all come in: we're keen to flesh out the world as a whole more, but it would be nearly impossible to write up over a hundred different cities and not hate ourselves. We have a preliminary list of the "New" major cities, but are looking to expand it further.
◉ Right now, North America and the colonies are unreachable locations. Via exploration, characters will be able to locate relics that they can use to tap into the fast travel system and expand it to these locations. That will require traveling out to space, or finding someone to do it for them. Any fast travel expansion plots will be player plots moving forward and do not need to involve the entirety of the game. Characters can also use these relics to set up multiple hubs in cities, as well, if they so choose. These hubs will be available to all of the characters innately, so choose wisely.
Please see our next section for more information on how to pursue plots involving our artifacts/relics! They won't only be tied to the fast travel mechanism.
◉ We've updated the FAQ section under "What abilities does the thing in the characters' chests grant?" to clarify how this will be unlocked for all future incoming characters. Thanks to the feedback on our past unlocks, we're going into this with a lot more clarity about the types of questions players will be asking.
◉ In order to travel, the characters will need to go to the hub in each location and think of where they'd like to go. Somehow, this network will know exactly where they mean and will automatically transport them there.
◈ New Cairo, New Rio de Janeiro, and New Oslo all have hubs set up within the cities proper, making it so that characters won't have to travel to the ruins and traverse inward back toward the cities in question.
◈ The hubs will always be located near the center of a megacity geographically, or where the center was located when the city was first developed.
◉ The activation of this network will lead to a permanent change for some characters in the game, causing them to have lost many of their advantages and buffs. We've reached out to the players in question about these changes, but this activation comes with a player plot for all of the characters involved who were previously much stronger. These changes will apply to all applying characters who join the game down the line.
The artifacts will be in-game tools for the Displaced to learn more information about what they are and why they've been brought to this world, as well as give them some new weapons and tools to use to their advantage. As we noted above, some of the artifacts will be linked to expanding the fast travel system, though this will be more a matter of discovery.
EDITED: Thanks to a suggestion from Iola on February 13, 2020, we will retroactively be adding that if characters hold on to their relics for a full IC month, it will begin to resonate and glow. The glow itself will be in one of seven colors: indigo, blue, red, orange, gold, black (it'll become obsidian, as if it's a volcanic object), or white.
How will the characters discover this? We have some ideas, but feel free to bring us any others via our Plot Engagement page. If your character has an idea for how to find information that isn't listed below, we'll work with you to make it fit our setting! As it is, following up on this information will require you to reach out to us to follow a plot!
◉ At the end of March IC, Caroline Forbes (gasping) will be bringing a lot of wealthy people in for a private auction in New Amsterdam. Between that private auction and the public bachelor/bachelorette auction, characters will be able to schmooze with the rich and powerful who will have connections. Characters can also put their relics that they brought back from the ruins up for auction!
◉ Diana Prince (monomachy) also works at an art gallery, and has connections within the art scene. She may be able to put the Displaced in contact with purveyors of older artifacts.
◉ Lan Wangji (wangxian) also has connections within the art community, and can try to find someone who's interested in older objects.
◉ There are also the worshippers who have been depicting the Displaced on shrines for some time and have been located at several events (Insomniacs' Ball, Harvest Festival, and the Winter Solstice festivities). While these individuals are difficult to find in the "wild," so to speak, and they don't maintain social media accounts, they're located at local farmer's markets and may be taking up some gardening gigs. They also love naturalist and homeopathic-focused events.
◉ Otherwise: reverse image searches? Find historians? Use the gates to fast travel to cities with nice museums?
We're limiting relics and artifacts that have some plot significance to one per player. We will only make exceptions where one character grabbed a relic for another character not participating or who didn't grab a relic for themselves. Any other relics they find will just be pretty decoration pieces.
◈ The only relics that won't count will be any of the bones that were found along the way. Those bones won't hold any significance in terms of the metaphysical lore in the game, but they can be tested in a lab by a scientist.
◉ If you haven't commented with your character's relics yet, you can feel free to do so until our Power Ups due date (March 13
, 2020 at midnight UTC). Head over to the thread on the Event Log to do that!
Whether someone has been here from the beginning or just arrived last month, they are eligible for a power level up. The thread itself must involve them in the ruins themselves, and the thread itself must be at least 5 comments. Threads must reach the 5 comments and be submitted here by March 13, 2020 at midnight UTC.
To put in for your power level up, please comment with the form below.
After we have approved your level up, you will be able to submit it on the powers page to level up your character's power at any time.
Thanks to feedback we received back in September, we want to use the time following this event to give players room to develop player plots, get their character properly ingrained in the game itself, and utilize the open fast travel system to explore the world as a whole. Our primary focus in pushing this plot forward was to make this more possible. Characters can continue to use New Amsterdam as their HQ, and most new characters will continue to first arrive in New Amsterdam (with the exception of plots that necessitate their placement elsewhere).
That said, we do want to look forward to our next event, and we have five paths in mind that the characters can take. This movement will depend on both player and character interest, and the next event may end up being a smaller event meant to help develop one of these three paths. In order to get a read on this movement, we typically use the Plot Engagement page, characters' plots that we see in motion, and players expressing interest to us. If you have a specific direction in mind, feel free to declare interest below.
1. The first major plot involves the AIs Cassius and Judas, as well as their mysterious associate, Johann. During the Brain Surgery Log, Johann claimed that Cassius had the Displaced steal Judas for him, and he even thanked Laura previously for giving Judas to him. Since Johann experimented on most of the Displaced within his care, he likely has a target on him. In addition, he also has noted involvement with Katelin Jovavich, one of the gubernatorial candidates in New Amsterdam.
In addition, Cassius and Johann seem to have exhibited knowledge of why the Displaced are in-game. El also has an investment in retrieving Judas from Cassius.
We'll add that there are more places where Johann's influence can be seen, but we'd like the characters to work that out themselves! If you have any theories or suspicions, we're happy to confirm or deny anything outright.
2. Speaking of Judas, there are still mysteries to uncover about his capture and involvement with the UNA. How long had he been held by the UNA, and what does that say about the AI/human war as a whole? The official history of the world takes the side of the humans, but even so, they were happy to keep an AI locked away in their military base, and were likely utilizing him to fortify and increase their strength.
In addition to all this, now that Judas has been taken by the Displaced, what does that mean for the UNA? Whatever it means, they're still keeping quiet about it.
3. During the gates plot, several mercenaries operating on limited knowledge helped ambush and kidnap several of the Displaced. If any of the mercenaries made it out alive, they'll be difficult to find for one simple reason: they're all dead now. Some characters got information about their mercenary outfit (the Global Spiral), but little else. Why were these mercenaries hired to bring the Displaced to these gates, and why were they forced to operate on so little information? Why were the Displaced able to travel between megacities on commercial trains as if they were cargo?
4. There is the mysterious individual who drops off the Displaced with notes to carry (so to speak) to the other Displaced, and this individual also sent a note to Gaby back in IC late October declaring that he protected her from the UNA infiltration of Morningstar agents' home in IC September. Who is this individual? What is their involvement in everything that's going on?
5. Somehow, the Mariana Trench seems to be a significant piece of information tied back to the Displaced, especially Project Spinetail (as reported by Ren Amamiya here) and a resulting earthquake (as reported on by Cassian Andor here). What does this mean for the Displaced?
There will be some overlap in these five points, but these are the big metaplots in movement right now, and any one of them can lead to an event. How that event takes shape is ultimately up to you. At this point, we primarily wanted to help you visualize some of the directions available for gamewide plots and events moving forward.
Once again, if you're interested in one of these plots in particular or feel strongly about addressing a certain path with our next event, please declare interest below. Keep in mind that declaring interest does not guarantee that an event will be about this, as we will need some IC character movement in this direction!
Thank you for participating in this event! It opened up a lot of the world, and that's part of why we want to give everyone (new and old) some time to breathe in the next two months. That means that if we have an event in March, there is a high likelihood of it only being a slim event rather than something as ambitious and wide reaching as this one was. As we stated from the beginning, our goal was to unlock fast travel opportunities—especially since while New Amsterdam has been fleshed out, Meadowlark was always envisioned as an open-world game where characters would be able to move freely. We felt this was the right time to open up this step.
As always, our event wrap ups are focused on the events themselves and branches off of them, so if there is anything else you'd like to explore, please hit us up at Plot Engagement! No matter how big or small, we're happy to work with you to craft the player plot of your dreams.
Thank you for helping make this event a great one! And please feel free to ask any questions below. Our focus was on outlining this new game mechanic, so it's very possible that we missed something critical. Please let us know!
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