Arc Sphere Distortion

Arc Sphere Distortion

by Steve Matulewicz

Why Should I Go - Mountain View

by Josh "Enlon" Whelan

Why should you go to Mountain View? The amazing sights of course - we as a staff are doing our best to bring you NPC’s in garb, monsters that will look like monsters, and an event that will pull you in.

After our success with Learn to Fly, Gau Dring is hoping to bring you our first solo-thrown event and deliver an experience that all will enjoy. Our goal is to push the PC’s in a difficult siege situation and constantly keep you on your toes.

Also at this event we will be play testing new mechanics as well as an old proposal. From the fighter abilities to the elemental missile, we want to incorporate as much into this event as possible to give people something to be talking about for a while.

So if you want a tough fight, immersive event, and a chance to lose, come on out to Gau Dring Presents: Mountain View.

I Can't Even... Gifting

I Can't Even...

 By Sara "Zarine" Jessop

...The Art of Gift Giving

            It's the most wonderful time of the year. Snow is falling out my window, and Yule is fast approaching. Soon, we will all gather together at Cecil's Yuletide Tavern (which is a way better title than whatever he's calling it this year. Why do we let Kings name things?) where we shall socialize in all our fancy finery, exchange fabulous gifts, sing carols, give money to charity in hopes of winning sub par prizes, and learn who among us can't handle their liquor. Since I have already covered public drunkenness and fancy dress, this week I would like to focus on something a little bit different; gift giving.

            Dear reader, selection of the perfect gift and the presentation thereof is quite more important than you might imagine. A gift conveys to the recipient how you feel about them and how much thought and effort you are willing to put into their happiness or misery.

Oh it hath, it hath.

An Atypical View: Season Two: #49

What You Missed - Nedengiving by Justin "Dresden" Theriault

[Editor's Note: photos by Andy "Nymbous" Whitty]

A Very big thank you to all those who were able to make it out on Saturday and come together as a realm and help those in need, as well as celebrate and fill our bellies! 

Immediately upon entering, it was explained to the adventurers that two types of ticket were going out; Red tickets were issued from winning carnival games, and green issued from bringing can goods or exchanging gold. These tickets could be spent on items in the auction based on color. They were then given the opportunity to gamble at New Eden Casino, Play carnival games at the Neden Rag Tag Game room, or meet with Curator Syruss and receive a guided tour of the SmithNEDian (Neden's Museum of Magical artifacts)

The museum included a magic mirror the adventurers could ask questions to, a pensieve, some sort of blue box of the law, and many other rare artifacts.

             

Carnival games included Ring Toss, Plinko, Shoot the Zombie (those three included a blue ribbon fragment as a prize should an adventurer get a certain ring, or score), Pin the brain on the zombie, bag toss and 3 Piñatas. Red tickets went out all day and people spent gold after gold trying to win those precious blue ribbon pieces. 

Appetizers included meatballs, cheese and crackers, home roasted holiday nuts, two kinds of potato salad, as well as green salad and a veggie platter. 

Once everyone was seated, Lord Nymbous gave a toast to those in attendance, and promoted Sir Syruss O'Leary of Neden to Neden's first ever position of 'Duke'. 

The spread included Turkey, Ham, Baked stuffed chicken, Mac & Cheese, Mashed Potatoes, two types of stuffing, cranberry sauce, vegetable medley and bread rolls. Lord Nymbous carved the first slice, which went to Duke Syruss, after which Neden promptly served the hungry adventurers at their tables. Following the meal was the bardic, Tuilli and Tao went head to head and both delivered hilarity at the Lords table. Tao ended up winning and walked away with the Apple of the Lords' eye (literally). Ask him about it. 

Following the meal, there were tournies and post meal relaxation, and then dessert. All desserts were homemade and delicious, and the cake looked phenomenal. After dessert things got wacky (as they often do in Neden) - and a game was played where an adventurer would try to sneakily tie as many balloons as possible to an unsuspecting victim. Razmith seemed to be the target of most peoples balloon-based antics.

He didn't notice for a while.

Then the auction was held. The moment many had been waiting for! Many Artifacts were auctioned off, including a few of the Magical Variety! Tuilli, Karmha and Aveline (a new adventurer whose adventure in Neden was her first in these lands) received in house items, as well as a couple others.

All in all it was a fun filled day and I'm so thankful you all came out to celebrate with us. We managed to collect 176 cans in total that were donated!

Thanks for coming Adventurers. See you next time!

Choose Our Own Adventure Part 3

Choose Our Own Adventure

Leadership is a Four Letter Word

By Jason (Aeston) Rosa

Well the idiots I found myself with were pretty stupid, so I thought I might as well find out if they were stupid enough to listen to me. I summoned up my best voice of authority (it starts in the diaphragm you see, the trick is to yell, not to shout) and started doling out orders to people who I knew would be useless without my direction, and I suspected would still be useless even after they had it.

First of all, that troll. At this point there was only one wagon-guard left and I’m pretty sure he was only focused on the fact that whoever buried him after he met his demise in the next few seconds would be sure to find out that he had soiled himself. Since Kenna the murder-elf seemed like she knew how to use those swords she was always menacing about I sent her to put their pointy end into that slobbering lumbering reject from a fairy tale.

The man hiding behind the cart wasn’t far from getting disemboweled by those goblins, but I knew how to deal with that too. Despite the moniker of “priest”, any follower of Aurora I’ve ever met has definitely been suppressing a deep homicidal rage. I told Simon to go give those greenies some “religion” and I saw the flash of light behind his eyes that told me all I needed to know about how they would end up.

Finally, as I concluded Chloe was the least offensive of our lot (a low bar to be sure), I tasked her with chasing after the young woman to try and convince her we had the situation well in hand and that she would be safer with us than without us (all probably untrue but I don’t see anything wrong with lying for a good cause).

Moments later the dust had cleared. The troll was dead and the guard that had somehow survived the encounter was gazing at Kenna with a disturbing amount of admiration in his eyes. Simon was stepping over the bludgeoned bodies of the goblins and helping the young man up on his feet, and Chloe was walking back towards us, her arm around the young woman, speaking whatever platitudes were necessary to keep her calm.

The very thankful young man spoke with a haughty tone to his voice, but explained to us that he and the young lady, who was his sister, were the only children of a very wealthy merchant family in the lands of Sharangil. This pair, who claimed they were a lot more capable than they looked, were on their way to Blackwood to attempt to negotiate some trade deals when they were attacked by a bargain-basement set of monsters.

Their manners were pretty good, since they were happy to offer us a considerable reward for helping them and extended an even more reasonable reward if we continued to escort them to their destination. I shot Chloie a look and she shrugged indifferently. I didn't relish the idea of adding babysitting to the list of tasks I was now all-of-a-sudden-responsible for but as I said before, I am a greedy, greedy man. In the end...

Why you Should Go: Echoes of Ragnarok II - Muspelheim

by Jason "Aeston" Rosa

Years ago the terror of Bedlam was unleashed upon the Realms, consuming whatever it touched. Great heroes, mortal and fae, banded together to limit our losses and eventually end the threat completely. But releasing Bedlam affected places other than the Realms. All through the multiverse bois spilled out ahead of the black ichor with no intent other than to destroy, and many places fared much much worse than the Realms. One such place was Norlund.

The Echoes of Ragnarok is a story about the aftermath of Bedlam in a dimension other than our own. Norlund was in the midst of Ragnarok, the holy death and rebirth of their world, and the heroes of the Realms have been tasked with restarting that great final battle so that the irreparably broken lands of Norlund can be set right again.

Echoes of Ragnarok II is a dungeon crawl in the tradition of Rhiassan crawls dating back to the beginning of the What Lurks Beneath storyline. Slogging through enemies in tight corridors, managing resources and contenting with new and unique enemies, and working together in a large coordinated group to solve puzzles and beat challenges. We take great pride in the amount of detail we put into our props and costuming, and we try hard to make sure many different play styles are engaged in many different ways throughout the day. We are thrilled to have the same clientele come back every single year, assured that they will have an entertaining and challenging day.

Unfortunately the event has already hit its cap for this year but if you’re interested in seeing what Rhiassa has put together and being a part of the day, we can promise that you’ll have a good time NPCing and you’d be more than welcome to be a part of our crew! Please contact me at aeston@giantsquid.net

If you’re interested in reading up on the past history of the Echoes of Ragnarok storyline, everything that has happened so far is written up in our Quest Log, which you can view here.