« activity check: january 2024 »

[seawarden]

ACTIVITY CHECK: JANUARY 2024

Ahoy, mateys! Here be the monthly Activity Check!

In the Extra Notes section, please note the following, as well as anything else worth noting:

• Anyone who encountered the altar and the fire horse beneath the volcano, and what happened.
  
• Notable finds in the volcano.
  
• Turtles saved.
  
• Who is afflicted by the sleeping curse and any solutions/remedies that have been attempted/discovered.
  
• She Sews Lovely/The Price of Freedom quest results.
  
• Wolf pups trained.

Please check our Activity Check guidelines on our Game Info page for complete details, but here is the quick list of what you need to know:

» Only threads dated from January 1st through January 31st count towards the month's activity. (With the exception of certain backdated threads, read the linked AC guidelines for more details.)

» Activity requires one thread of at least 5 comments. The comment count is from your character.

» Any thread counts, including those made within your own entries and subthreads within your own toplevels. Individual entry posts do not count, only the threads within the posts. TDM threads with non-game characters will count.

» Continuation threads are considered as part of the previous thread so they count as one thread not two. For the sake of ease, we would like the two threads linked together.

» You are exempt from any checks for hiatuses that last for over 21 days. Anything less and you'll still need to submit your AC unless there are other circumstances.

» Because we are a capped game, there is no strike system. If you do not make the AC requirements, you will be cut.

» Bonus AC points: All extra non-quest threads not used for AC will be worth 2 extra points that can be used for reward redemption. Please check our Rewards page for more details.

There will be no warnings. All submissions are due Wednesday, January 31st 11:59PM US Eastern.

EXTRA FIELDS: This is not required and completely optional, but included in the submission form are two optional fields: Extra and MANTA Board Posting.

For the Extra field, this is just a space for players to note anything that occurred in their threads that they think might be fun for us to know. So if something particularly interesting happened (for example: discovering a new creature or location, an old artifact, or perhaps a character has stolen something), we highly encourage players to jot them down! Who knows, we may even find a use for it… In addition, we may ask players to submit certain activity related to an event.

You may also submit MANTA board requests to be included in the upcoming board. We will try to add them immediately, otherwise we'll save them for the next Board or a time we deem fitting. If you don't have one in mind at the time of AC, you can post it later to the upcoming Captain's Log announcement.

Don't forget to check out the Bonus AC Donation Post to unlock a special March event!


If you have any questions, ask them here.

FORM: Fill out the following form and comment directly to this post. If you have multiple characters, please put them in one comment.

<b>Player:</b> Name <b>Character:</b> Character | journalname <b>Proof:</b> <a href="THREADURL">Date</a> <b>Extra:</b> OPTIONAL can delete if not used. Any incidents, encounters, or discoveries made by the character can be included here. Blurbs are fine, links to threads optional but helpful for reference. <b>MANTA Board Posting:</b> OPTIONAL can delete if not used. If you have any quests for us to add to the MANTA Board, whether it is a general, armada, bounty, or special quest, dump it here! Please be sure to note what kind of request it is.

Comments

QUESTIONS/SUGGESTIONS/ETC

[seawarden]

Have any questions or clarifications about the AC? Hit us up!

Nimona

[pinksidekicking]

Player: Xae
Character: Nimona | pinksidekicking
Proof: 01/22

[psionicmolotov]

Player: Ruka
Character: Kimmuriel Oblodra | psionicmolotov
Proof: 01/09

Extra:
Healing coins found in continuation of thread from last month, planned to be distributed on Nogard.

Encountered angry horse in sulfur fields, took a tablet from the altar.

[indispensable]

Player: taso
Character: Alhaitham | indispensable
Proof: 01/09

Extra:

Alhaitham was asked to be a 'witness' to Dongfang Qingcang's (eventual?) victory over the flaming horse. I believe the plan is to try and tame the horse but Autumn can probably confirm this. Alhaitham will have most likely inspected the area after and maybe grabbed a tattered book or two.

He and Freminet also found a cavern in the volcano containing many Fire Crystals! They snagged a couple to bring back, with Alhaitham in particular having given them to Cid and Kaveh.

Took care of some zombie mermaids, with special thanks to Benedikta (linked above) and March 7th.

Drank a potion for the sake of a book and has deeply regretted that choice since. (Mild NSFW warning for the link.)

Kaveh got them a house. They're totally sharing a bed. They've also been very gay to each other but everyone knew that already.

Has been inducted into Cid's crew (The Hideaway) not long after arrival because Kaveh is there and they are a package deal (everyone will soon learn this).

[callmekacchan]

Player: Mog
Character: Katsuki Bakugou | callmekacchan
Proof: January 2nd

[historiology]

Player: Caprica
Character: Sorey | historiology
Proof: 7th Jan

[empyrean_mirror]

Player: Clover
Character: Kaveh | empyrean_mirror
Proof: 1/10

Extra: Ohh lord here we go. This month, Kaveh:
--chased the slaver with Rem by dressing in the fairy silks and posing as the seamstress, and then maybe detonating a great deal of bloom cores while in Nogard.
--He then took Rem home for the weekend so she could lay low for a couple days.
--Went to a party for the Hideaway crew, got piss drunk, met many of his other crewmates and also Benedikta, everything's just fine.
--Went to the hot springs and was vaguely awkward at Dion, and also got courted by penguins and possibly accidentally became their king, or some sort of penguin idol.
--Was a MASSIVE FUCKING ART NERD with Eizen in the volcano
--If I summarized all the times he was gay at Alhaitham we would need multiple comments. They don't know they're in love yet. More on the next episode of As The Turtle Turns.
--Helped Freminet move firewood, then again when Freminet was sick from a mermaid bite
--Picked frostflowers with Lyney. Also got fucking smashed with Lyney.
--Was given fire crystals by Alhaitham and so has made two rings of fire resistance for the two extra-flammable boys and a flame butterfly to help keep the ship warm.
--Bought a house and immediately engaged in an ongoing war of attrition about the decorations. Housewarming party to come in february.
--Has been roasted by: Cid (x2), G'raha

Character: Misaki Yamazaki | torinoko
Proof: 1/8

Extra: Misaki has joined Daqiang's crew, and as such spent most of her time dicking about in the volcano, searching for relics. These threads have not fully completed so it is yet uncertain what she has found, except that ice magic is not the best choice for a flaming horse, nor is suplexing it with one's bare hands.
Misaki attacked the slaver with Fenris once and has a knife wound in her gut to go with the fetching burns on her arms.
Misaki has maybe accidentally adopted one of the wolf pups because her grimalkin familiar fell in love with him.
She will be attempting to summon the dream demons with Daqiang's portion of the curse, which I am sure will go totally fine and result in no consequences whatsoever, ahaha...ha. (Thread is here and will be ongoing into february.)

[ligero]

Player: Danni
Character: Cyrus Douglas | ligero
Proof: 1/11

[heir_conditioned]

Player: Cytes
Character: Shoto Todoroki | heir-conditioned
Proof: January 07, 2024

Extra: Nothing extra, extra. Mostly manta board stuff.
MANTA Board Posting:
Shoto fought a jellyfish with Rem, spent some time looking for flowers for his friends, fought mermaids, trained wild doggos to be good boys and girls, nommed some magical fairy parts, all sorts of fun stuff. Thanks for another fun month.

[seasaltkeys]

Player: Megan
Character: Roxas | urbaninja
Proof: 01/09

[thearchangel]

Player: Red
Character: Garrus Vakarian| thearchangel
Proof: 1/10/24

[gr1m]

Player: Leo
Character: Professor Turo | fractales
Proof: 1/7

Extra: Turo kept himself rather busy this month—
• Worked on training several wolf pups alongside Dojima, trying to encourage their hunting instincts to track down scents. Trying to keep the balance of basic instincts and being capable of safely working with humans, he certainly would rather this than them being culled. Would be highly likely to take one in.

• Managed to make the time needed to finish upgrading of both the Poke and Substitute Dolls in order for them to be more effective in this world. Still may induce people to feel as if they must pick them up an hug if found cute- plushie power?

• During the Phantom Moon's first voyage out to explore islands Turo studied the seals that made one of the island's coves their own. He also found a few interesting flowering plants, a few of which might eventually grow berries- he has taken some living samples of these to see just what those could be.
• Turo also found several golden yellow feathers, some of them quite large, along with sign that made it clear they game from an avian-like creature that may enjoy the berries the flowering plants may grow. The creature they came from not yet identified.

• Rem and Turo gathered several fire crystals from within a volcanic tunnel, which they will be studying to use in their magitek creations as a power source. Turo able to refine them in order to make use of them.

• Working with both Rem and G'raha to create magitek that created a barrier/forcefield of sorts to protect the individual holding it. Which leads to—

MANTA Board Posting: A general quest for those interested in testing barrier creating magitek prototypes. Rem, G'raha and Turo only managed to create a prototype due to how busy the month had been, but would like help in testing them out. How much force and power can the barrier hold up to? Explosions? Magic? Help find out so data can be collected to better the creation of barrier generating magitek devices!or something like that ffffff Jade has a better one to go up officially!

Character: Reaper | gr1m
Proof: 1/9

Extra: Not too much-
• After spending an entire month on the downlow, Reaper has resumed his usual 'ghosting' around, watching and listening. May or may not have accidentally made some people believe certain parts of Nograd -upon it settling- are haunted by a red-eyed dark spirit.

Oops?

• He also helped test out one of Cid's crossbow nets combined with his dark/shadow magic to create the affect of silencing whatever is in the net on top of causing it to fly through the air towards the target quicker.

Emet-Selch

[emet_sulk]

Player: Chips
Character: Emet-Selch | emet-sulk
Proof: Jan 11

Extra: I believe Emet and G'raha will at some point be exploring the volcano and finding some kind of mysterious machine? So I've been told lmao.

[yuezun]

Player: Autumn
Character: Dongfang Qingcang | yuezun
Proof: 01/06

Extra:

Special Notes:

Fire Horse - Thread ongoing, but Daqiang is attempting to tame it and it will do it's run away thing eventually

Sleeping Curse - Daqiang is affected and has been successfully staving it off between a combination of Fire Salts and Angeltic Jellyfish Jelly; He has also be attempting to craft counter-curse rituals to no success (with this curse; next month may have some semi-success with the fire horse per your answer to my question on the manta board.)

She Sews Lovely/The Price of Freedom - Thread ongoing with Xenk, but plan was for Daqiang to let the woman go after learning the truth of the 'merchandise' and then go hunt down the merchant; Jans has been pretty busy, though, so it might end up dropped and handwaved.

Other Events/Quests:

Avaleci Fire Sprites - one of them will manage to sneak their way back to the Phantom Moon by clinging to Daqiang's robes and not being successfully shaken off. It sticks to his quarters and has taken to harassing keeping the chickens from last month warm.

Frost Flowers and Ice Crystals - Before getting cursed, Daqiang managed to successfully transplant two of the frost flower plants into a planter and is keeping them in the proper frosty conditions in his cabin by planting one of the ice crystals in the pot with them, but has plans to get another one mounted by a jeweler so he can make a magical planter that's larger and won't shed cold past it's sides.

Dragon Heated - Daqiang and Rem tested the potion (it got awkward), and then received a copy each of the sequel/fanfiction(?).

Background, not threaded but to be referenced in some ongoing threads:

The golden eggs from December's event have hatched into fluffy chickens with gold colored (but not real gold) feathers. They are still small and have not grown enough to start laying their own eggs, but Daqiang has noticed that some, not all, of the molted down feathers have turned into golden flakes after coming off them. Larger feathers may produce more substantial gold later down the line.

[ketheric]

Player: Jarret
Character: Ketheric Thorm | ketheric
Proof: 01/09

Extra:
- Seemingly took down the flaming stead with Rem and procured remnants of a stone tablet embedded at the base of the altar along with a chunk of obsidian, convincing him to bring it back to the Paladins (begrudgingly) for research purposes.
- Inadvertently saved the turtles from the ice giants on his journey back from the lava caverns and was 'bullied' into joining Rin at the hot springs reluctantly.
- Acquired a couple fire crystals whilst traversing the difficult terrain of the lava caverns with plans to inquire of their worth and usefulness once safely back in Nogard.
- Wandered onto the Enterprise II after mistaking it for the Stormbringer and found one Benedikta Harman, a familiar face amongst the crowd and had a little 'heart to heart' of sorts about their past, future and present.
- Enlisted the aid of a surly Corsair crew to attack the seamstress' vessel, promising them a share of the bounty only to be met with resistance from the light bringer himself, Xenk Yendar. Thread is just being fleshed out so not quite sure how it will pan out yet!

[tilfrosset]

Player: Cheska
Character: Jill Warrick | tilfrosset
Proof: 1/21

[garudas]

Player: Sheila
Character: Tifa Lockhart | starshower
Proof: 1/06

Extra:

• Tifa and Faris saved a poor little turtle that had rolled over on its shell, and sang it a sea shanty.
  
• She managed to help the Paladins get the Seamstress to safety for She Sews Lovely.
  
• The Avalanche crew now has a fire sprite living aboard their ship.

Character: Benedikta Harman | garudas
Proof: 1/08

Extra:

• Benedikta and Cid found the altar and managed to subdue the fire horse long enough to search around. She found a dagger made of bone in a secret room hidden behind the shelves. They also discovered that the fire horse could not move or break the altar when it attacked but Cid's egi, Ixion, could.
  
• Benedikta failed in kidnapping the Seamstress for The Price of Freedom, and tried to take her away to safety instead, but ultimately had to leave her behind with the Paladins.

[acheat]

Player: Squid
Character: Jarlaxle Baenre | acheat
Proof: 1/08

Extra: Jarlaxle and Kimmuriel ran into the big blazing horse and made off with some pictures of the alter and the items on it, as well as a stone tablet from the alter.

[crystalrepose]

Player: Blueraven
Character: Miriam | crystalrepose
Proof: 1/5

[catsgothistongue]

Player: Wahoo
Character: Ranma Saotome | catsgothistongue/treebornekettlegirl
Proof: 1/07

Extra:
-Assisted Fenris in going after the slaver in Price of Freedom, though the slaver unfortunately escaped while they were dispatching the guards, some fatal courtesy of Fenris, while Ranma dispatched other guards nonfatally, who got grazed by a bullet in the leg for his troubles but should heal thanks to his ki. They proceeded to search the residence to search for information. Ranma found chains and shackles for multiple slaves that were no longer there, the only sign of there being more apart from the chains were signs of dried blood.

-Fought/is fighting the ice giants with Faris and Xenk on separate occasions to save the turtles.

-Exploring the volcano currently with Rem to find treasure.

-Bullied some peeps as you do and got bullied himself.

[scooba]

Player: Mio
Character: Freminet | Scooba
Proof: 1/11

Extra: Alhaitham and Freminet went into a cavern to get some fire crystals. Also, he tried to make a few clockwork penguins with said fire crystals and might have exploded a couple of them.

[afflatusexarch]

Player: Seraph
Character: Cloud Strife | makoglow
Proof: 1/06

Extra: Cloud made sure to help the seamstress from getting taken back with the Corsairs. Gave Rem some cloth to potentially lie to the quest giver and tell them that the seamstress was dead to buy more time. He also participated in training wolf pups ( please give him one ) and the hefting contest. Please just give Tifa the reward already his heart can't take any of this.


Character: G'raha Tia | afflatusexarch
Proof: 1/04

Extra: G'raha voted for the Paladin to not be executed even though he had been a victim of the Paladin in the past. He helped the Paladins ensure that the seamstress made it to Elah safely and got himself stabbed in the process. Yay! Other than that, G'raha continues to find and study artifacts - several that he found on the Avaleci eldue to something more going on there than just a nice little resort area. He wants to dig into that more, but had been a little preoccupied with trying to find out what is causing the nightmares. G'raha has some theories about where this sleeping curse might have come from, but has been asking others to assist and what they have discovered.

MANTA Board Posting: General - continue to research the cause and potential cure for the sleeping curse

[sanji]

Player: arisa
Character: sanji | sanji
Proof: 01/18

[unshod]

Player: Phennoix
Character: Fenris | unshod
Proof: 01/13

Extra: Fenris attempted to kill the slaver from Price of Freedom. Twice. He got away both times but Fenris looted whatever he could find about safe houses, ledgers, anything that could track the man down so he can kill him and/or end his slave trade. He killed a lot of guards. My Proof and this thread are the threads he did it in.

[ramuhs]

Player: Laena
Character: Cidolfus Telamon | ramuhs
Proof: 1/21

Extra: HERE WE GO:

• BETA TESTERS: Just an update that thanks to all the public testing, Cid will have enough data to finish improvements and everything will be available in March. Though if anyone who helped participate wants to go ahead and say they got an early final version from Cid, feel free! I'll probably have him ask the network what he should try to work on next cos my brain is not creative enough
• FIRE HORSE + ALTAR: Cid and Benedikta encountered fire horse and Cid's newly formed egi, Ixion, kind of charmed? Subdued? They're not sure what happened but it kept the fire horse off while they could explore a secret room that had some daggers that were clearly used for sacrifice along with books that I will leave it up to the mods (lmfao) on what's in them. But likely sacrifical ritual stuff. They also witnessd the fire horse try to attack the altar before running back off into the lava.
• SHE SEWS LOVELY: Although Cid was a bit suspicious due to the wording of the ad, he and Benedikta initially infiltrated a decoy ship from the Paladins thinking only goods and perhaps a creature or something else was there. While dealing with the Paladin guards, the seamstress escaped and upon realizing it was a young girl, Cid convinces Benedikta to let her stay with the Paladins instead of coming with them, believing she is safe with the Paladins and they can focus on hunting down the owner because fuck him for traumatizing his wife—

Cid has also adopted a little fire sprite for the ship.

===============================

Character: Eustace | flamekthunder
Proof: 1/07

Extra:

• TURTLES SAVED: Saved one turtle with Zhao.
  
• WOLF PUPS TRAINED: One. That he is reluctant to return and you can bet your dead ass he's going to adopt it later somehow—