imaginaryooc | Test Drive

Test Drive

Welcome Back, Reclaimers.
Mod Contact | FAQ | Interest Check | Path Information

It's still home... isn't it?

Perhaps you have, as many before you, been pulled from your universe. Perhaps you've been here a while now. Either way, the moon base is just as it always has been since it was landed gracefully by Lucas down to the land of Faerun.

Except that it isn't.

It isn't the Moon Base at all, and even if it was, you can't quite seem to recall what the Moon Base was. Faerun is the furthest thing from your mind.
You wake up on a beach feeling as though you've just gotten quite the kick in the head, your memory foggy and jostled within your soupy brain. It's a pretty beach, at least, the water kissing the shores a sparkling shade of blue, the fresh scent of sea salt on the wind, the rustling windchimes of palm leaves. It's idyllic, even with the occasional flash of static in the corner of your eye.

Wait, the what?

Is... Is the water in the distance a repeating texture? What? No, that couldn't be possible. Besides, it's so far out, you wouldn't want to go check... would you?

It looks like there's a few abandoned cabanas where the green meets the sand, and there's quite a lot of land beyond it to explore. Why not get your bearings and meet up with some friends? Assuming you recall they're your friends, anyway. You'll need the shelter when night comes, after all; temperatures drop fast when the sun drops and the ocean breeze keeps blowing.

Supplies and Status

On the island during the tutorial drive, you'll have access to your BIAS, including everything you've had on your person up until this point. During the game we'll provide instructions on how to regain your other items, but feel free to handwave it for the drive. Characters are encouraged to pick up any sort of tropical supplies you can think of for the drive, though we will provide more ideas and guidelines during gameplay!

As explained in the Q/A session, personal memories are yours to decide when your reclaimer will recall them. For the duration of the test drive and the game, memories of just how anyone got to this island, what the relic is, and where Lucretia is will not be accessible until they are revealed by reclaimer's efforts during the adventure. There will be no feeling that your personal memories have been tampered with or removed, but reclaimers might feel as though they've recovered from something physically traumatic. They will not be out of commission at all physically and may use their path actions as soon as they wake up.

Tropical Tutorial

Further inland from the beach you've woken up on, there's a few accessible areas, and the general shape of the island becomes clear. It's kind of... foot shaped. In the middle of the first portion of the island is a saltwater pond that appears to have a tacky swim-to bar set up. Just past that is a forest, and in that forest is a land bridge to the next island.

The second island seems to be oddly foot-shaped. At the ball of the foot there are some ruins, where you'll find the only other person on this island- Angus! He's made himself a little camp there, and doesn't give you any reason to suspect danger in the ruins.
It doesn't seem as though the 'toes' of the foot are too far to paddle to, but if you attempt to, you'll find yourself unable to get past the halfway point, as if there's some sort of invisible barrier. Your path actions won't be able to detect its nature; all it seems is as though it's just a part of how things are.

Speaking of the way things are, they sure seem strange. You might not remember what you ate for dinner last night, but you do recall what trees and grass look like and how doors should be attached. It looks like things might need to be debugged.

Debug Dafuq?

Harmless havoc is everywhere, even in those abandoned cabanas! Floors are ceilings! Ceilings are floors! Stairs going up lead to a lower floor, and downward ramps take you only a few rooms to the side. Static in the ocean, transparent-textured trees; it's starting to look like a hacked video game in here.

You get it by now. Things just aren't the way they're supposed to be. You've been around long enough to know what the moon base is like and This Ain't It. Perhaps you can fix it, though. Get those d20s ready or just choose-- can your Reclaimer do anything about these glitches?

Perhaps you've come across someone locked inside a cabana room-- because, well, they might be standing perfectly upright inside their room, but outside you are very certain their door is halfway into the ground. Will your rogue skills help you pick the hinges of the lock? Will your barbarian strength help you knock that door down? Or perhaps your technomancer skills can hack into that door and turn it upright?

There's no end to the possibilities with your path actions, which means no end to furthering the glitching either. Took a hard turn on that lockpicking roll? You might unlock your arm right off your shoulder. Got a little too wild with your wildshape? Wow, that dog sure has a long neck.

Café Calamari

So that saltwater pond. Weird, right? What's weirder is, there's a squid there right in the middle... and if you were on a certain mission to Lyrabar, you might even recognize this cephalopod. It seems pretty excited to see new customers, beckoning reclaimers up to its bar with its long arms. Grab a seat and chat with friends! There's plenty of room, and it doesn't seem like there's much other company to be had.... nor is there much else to visit just yet.

The Squid appears to be manning a tourist-trap of a swim-to bar, though occasionally you might catch him having to upright a recently-reversed roof. While you can order anything from Bender's menu from this Squid, it would seem he doesn't notice some of the dishes are not quite what they were before; a completely inedible salad made of die-cut paper leaves, a donut that's actually just milk-sweetened rice pressed in a donut shape, a cup of coffee that doesn't pour out no matter how many times you try to drink from it.

This Tree has Bananas, B-A-N-A-N-A-S

Just past the saltwater pond is a forest with trees unlike you've seen in Faerun so far. While coconut palms grow to the outer cliffs and near the beach, the more inland one goes, other bright-yellow-green trees grow, as well as bold red-flowered trees. Each of these trees seems to bear a different tropical fruit-- mangoes, bananas, guava, breadfruits, starfruit. There's even pretty bushes full of hibiscus.

But just like the areas you've been to so far, things are a little out of whack. You're pretty sure hibiscuses aren't supposed to grow made of glass, and that fruits generally aren't hollow, air-filled, and bouncy. You're definitely sure tree bark shouldn't be the gray-and-white checkerboard of a transparent digital canvas. For whatever reason, though, the bananas seem to be perfect. There's probably a joke in here, somewhere.

Of course, no one's around to stop you from trying to pluck these fruits! You might even be successful in doing so, if your hand would just stop clipping through some of them. If you manage to pick one, why not take a bite? They might be strengthening… or might dull your powers altogether. Maybe they'll grant low-level fire breath (try not to aim it at the trees) or generate more static than usual. Not feeling brave enough to test out any mystery effects? Take a fruit or two back to Chef Squid-- he might cook them up into something more palatable (and with fewer status effects).

Where's the Fire, Angus?

There is one other familiar face around the island. It looks like Angus has set up camp near the ruins, but just like the other things on the island, it seems glitched in such a way you can't get anywhere near his tent. What's up with that?

Every once in a while you might catch young him running to and fro, excusing himself from chatter with a "sorry, I'm on very important business, sir!" or a "Pardon me, m'am!" and hurrying away to talk to… a tree? Or a building? Or to puzzle over a bench that's buried half-way diagonally into the ground. "This just isn't how it's supposed to be," you might overhear Angus say, and perhaps if you listen long enough you'll catch him having a one-sided conversation with one of these glitched structures. "Sir, I know you're just trying to help," he'll say, "but have you ever seen a tree before?"

No matter what you say, it appears Angus can't be distracted from whoever he seems to be keeping up with. It might feel a bit lonely now; he's the only non-Reclaimer member of the Bureau left around. Leon, Bender, Davenport, and most importantly, Lucretia, can't be found or magically detected anywhere on the island.

Ruined Adventure

Just past Angus's impenetrable camp is an assortment of strange stone ruins. They seem to be different floors dug deep into the ground in an expanse a bit larger than a football field, rubble and dirt covering the bottom. There are rising towers within the stone-walled pit, but despite its desolate nature, there don't appear to be any monsters in it quite yet.

What you will discover, if you decide to enter, are well preserved and brightly-colored murals. Each of the murals, if you study them enough, depicts how to perform different path actions! Though it would appear those path actions are performed by... little animals? Weird.

Unfortunately, some of the murals seem to show static, or are depicted out of order. Maybe you can debug these too, and use them as a guide for re-learning path actions-- or try them in the steps shown. Who knows what'll happen.

Those path actions could come in handy down there, as in the desolate corners of the ruined city spawn low-level monsters. They're not quite threatening enough to most reclaimers, but they'll be great practice for getting back into the swing of things. And hey, meat.

A Note from your Navigators

Welcome, Island-dwellers! We'd like for you to take this test drive as an opportunity to go as wild as you like. Want to roll your own d20s to determine how good or bad debugging goes? Go right ahead! Want to create a new meal to order from the Squid Bar? Get cookin'! The Tutorial Test Drive will not be mandatory for application, nor will the events that transpire be canon or remembered during the actual adventure.

code bases by tricklet

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Are there any plants among the grass that are actually real and not something glitched out? Christine would like to use Herbalism on them to determine if there's any medicinal value to them (if there are any to start with)!

Howdy! Yes, there are some real live plants mixed in there! There aren't many with medicinal value, but there are a few. Their only helpful effects are the rough equivalent of popping a couple Tylenol.

There's also weed, though, so that's nice.

i. rolling around at the speed of sound

[Michael wakes up with a fuzzy head and an unpleasant taste in his mouth.

He rises, shaking the sand out of his suit irritably. Great. He's wearing so many things, he is never going to get all of this out. He's coming up short on a lot of facts right now, but he does not like sand.

As it happens, he doesn't remember much of anything right now. But that doesn't feel like something to panic about; it'll probably be fine. There's more important things. A couple of very specific more important things. He doesn't remember it, but he can feel it: there's somewhere else he's supposed to be. He looks up and down the beach. He has a good feeling about one way...and also about the other. Maybe there's a couple other places he's supposed to be? If one of them is more important, he can't tell, so he just picks a direction and starts walking.

The magic he's got feels utterly natural. Why wouldn't he have powers? After a few minutes, he just casts Haste on himself. You may see him Sonic-ing his way along the perimeter of the island in a navy-blue blur.]

ii. the squid

[Michael steps out of the treeline, and stops short abruptly.

Were his memories in order, he would understand what he's feeling. He'd know enough to hide it and carry on like normal, so nobody ever suspected anything. But right now, all he knows is that his stomach flips unpleasantly at the sight of the Squid. It makes him feel sick and anxious, like he wants to just go away and hide until he can forget the thing even exists.

(That...is that revulsion? Is it gross? He thinks it must be gross. It looks like it stinks.)]

Woah, hey. [Seeing someone about to approach the pond, he reaches out to stop them.] Don't go over there!

iii. wildcard

[ w/e man ]

[Clear neither likes nor hates it here. Clear feels thoroughly neutral about this island paradise, and she has absolutely no idea why. There's a frustrating hole in her understanding of her own emotions. It shouldn't be there. She knows that much.]

[She's not any more frightened of or irritated by the squid . . . thing than she is by anything else here, at least. If anything, she's curious, approaching it but not too quickly or too close.]

[Then someone's using exclamation points at her. She jumps away from the encroaching hand like a startled cat, shooting its owner a glare.]

What? Why?

Oh, I don't know. The giant squid monster?

[it's visibly terrible, who would possibly want to be near it?]

. . . Yeah?

[She. Looks from him, to it, then back again. Clearly puzzled. Kind of annoyed.]

Is it dangerous? [She's pretty sure squid don't eat people, but this one is enormous.]

QUESTIONS

no subject

no subject

Michael | Balance Transfer | OTA

ii

no subject

no subject

i

no subject

no subject

ii

no subject

no subject

christine delacroix | balance transfer | ota

debugging

no subject

no subject

Sans | Balance Transfer | OTA

toe boat - time to get off on the wrong foot

no subject

no subject

Papyrus | new player | ota

Re: Papyrus | new player | ota

no subject

no subject