MOD PLOT: FLU SEASON

[faderifting]

PLOT: FLU SEASON

Instead of an open log post by us, this edition of the mod plot is designed to be woven throughout your normal RP. It consists of specific symptoms suffered by specific characters, which will develop in several phases. We'll be detailing the Phase One symptoms below, along with a list of afflicted characters. Later this month, we'll be updating this post with information about Phase Two.

It will be up to the PCs to (i) discover that there is a problem, (ii) investigate it, and (iii) ultimately find a solution. Please use this post to plot, brainstorm, theorize, and ask questions. Because RPing out every experiment or angle of investigation that characters might attempt is impossible, we're happy to allow some aspects of this inquiry to be handwaved if they're instead discussed on this post, so that everyone has a chance to get involved and contribute if they'd like. The way this plot is designed, you should also feel free to ask us a lot more questions than usual so that we can provide info and feedback to help fuel your investigations. We'll be closely tracking the Questions section and replying as promptly as we're able in order to help keep things moving. We will not be responding to questions in plurks or on discord, and we strongly encourage you to use this post rather than those mediums for as much of your plotting as possible to avoid excluding other players.

To be clear, there is no single correct way to approach this--there isn't just one precise solution that we've decided on and that you all have to read our minds to try to guess at or else you'll fail and everyone will die. We know what the problem is and we've made up some possible ways to fix it that we'll push the game toward if everyone seems stuck, but you're a creative bunch and we're open to alternatives, particularly if they develop through collaboration and create RP for a range of characters.

If this sounds at all intimidating (or conversely inspires you to ask highly-technical questions), remember that neither of us is a scientist, and this plot and its solution will not involve any complex specialized knowledge--it's all hand-wavey magic at its core. You should be able to participate without ever opening Wikipedia. We certainly don't intend to.

PHASE ONE

Phase One symptoms will last for roughly 7-10 days. During this phase, characters will have more energy and confidence and will be able to push themselves physically further than normal. At first, this may seem like nothing more than a persistent good mood and sense of determination, but as time goes on it will progress to a feverish mania in which characters are increasingly restless and driven, unable to sleep or even to sit still for more than a few minutes at a time. Characters may become fixated on a particular project or interest, or they may find themselves leaping from task to task, unable to finish anything. Toward the end of the week, they will also show signs of actual fever, running hotter than usual and sweating more. At week's end, their skin will begin to tinge blue.

Each case will of course be slightly different, and we leave it up to you to determine exactly how rapidly your character's symptoms develop, how severe they will be, how exactly they'll manifest, how quickly others notice, etc., with the understanding that no character will experience symptoms so mild that they're able to go about their business unaffected the entire time, and no one should experience symptoms much more severe than the above description. Please stick within the general bounds we've described, but otherwise do as you like, and ask us below if you have any questions.

Two additional phases with more severe symptoms will follow, so it's fine if characters do not immediately notice that something is wrong or come up with a solution this week. In the meantime, hint hint, the mystery rifter from this month's arrival (who we are assuming was brought back to Kirkwall rather than left to die in a field) will remain alive but unconscious, and show no improvement.

PHASE TWO

Starting Wintermarch 25, characters affected by the mysterious illness in the Gallows may begin to experience new or different symptoms.

Templars will begin experiencing steep drops into the symptoms of severe lyrium withdrawal: aches, irritability or melancholy, shaking hands and limbs, strange dreams/nightmares, and periods of disorientation. As time goes on they may become tired enough to border on sleepwalking and experience mild and temporary hallucinations while awake.

Taking their usual doses of lyrium will alleviate these symptoms temporarily, returning characters to Phase One for a few hours at a time. Taking additional doses throughout the day can hold off the withdrawal symptoms temporarily but will cause the original Phase One symptoms to worsen during those times. It will essentially feel as though characters are moving through their personal lyrium-dose schedules at an accelerated pace, experiencing in half a day what might occur if they quit lyrium cold turkey for a week.

Templars will need to balance concerns about increased lyrium tolerance and reliance if they take too much, on one hand, against the possibility that the withdrawal may kill them—as it has killed Templars in the past—on the other.

(Obviously, no one has to actually die.)

Rifters will continue to experience Phase One symptoms until Wintermarch 28. In addition, however, any special abilities they possess may become more powerful and somewhat unpredictable—pyrokinetically starting a small fire may light an enormous one, etc. Rifters without their own special abilities may also begin to exhibit some. The most common and likely manifestation will be unpredictable telekinesis or elemental magic, all significantly weaker than that used by native mages. If you would like to propose a different ability for your non-powered rifter, you can do so here.

After Wintermarch 28, just as rifters’ abilities begin to become dangerous in their unpredictability, the course will suddenly reverse. From then on, rifters will instead have serious difficulty using or accessing any ability, whether their own or newly developed. After a few days, all rifter abilities will cease to work at all except for abilities related to their anchor shards.

The Unnamed Rifter currently in the Inquisition’s care will remain unconscious during this time. His fever will spike and he will begin sweating profusely. The sweat will now be tinged blue. However, it will become even more difficult for people to remember or focus on him unless they are looking directly at him. It is entirely possible that he may be forgotten entirely. If someone is dedicated enough to him to pay close attention and keep notes on his presence and condition, they will notice that at the end of Phase Two he vanishes entirely while their backs are turned and never reappears.

Fenris will continue to experience his Phase One symptoms, but the lyrium brands will burn and also begin to shrink/tighten, sort of like scabs. His abilities may become more powerful and unpredictable, and will then abruptly become less powerful than normal, following roughly the same schedule as rifter abilities. However, unlike rifters, his powers will not stop working entirely.

Everyone else, curing this is up to you! This illness will not naturally resolve itself if everyone waits it out, so we strongly encourage discussing and plotting ways for your characters to stop it. Proposed efforts or solutions can be brought to the questions thread, and we’ll tell you the results. Efforts that involve contributions from multiple players/characters are especially encouraged.

PHASE THREE

Starting Guardian 1, characters will begin to transition into Phase Three of the illness.

Templars will continue to experience the symptoms in Phase Two, either rapidly cycling through the stages of lyrium withdrawal after lyrium doses, or wallowing in those symptoms for prolonged periods if they choose not to up their lyrium intake.

However, if they've opted to try to mitigate this by taking more lyrium, they may eventually be able to achieve a sort of equilibrium by basically constantly sipping on small amounts of lyrium. If that's the case, they may be able to function semi-normally, as in the earlier stages of Phase One, though they will continue to have blue-tinged skin and sweat.

There's also an opportunity for up to one Templar to stop experiencing the illness effects entirely, for reasons that would contribute toward finding a cure. If you're interested in this, please go to the mod contact page and let us know. We'll wait about 24 hours to see if anyone is interested. If multiple people are, we'll RNG.

Rifters, meanwhile, will continue exhibiting blue-tinged skin and sweat, and all of their abilities will be completely inaccessible. They won't experience any new physical symptoms, other people may begin to notice something different about them.

For Guardian 1-2, Phase Three will manifest as a mild and unplaceable sense of strangeness. Others may look at rifters they know very well and feel as though something is unfamiliar about them, even though there's nothing specific they can pinpoint. Over the next few days, people will also begin to forget about them easily--not entirely and not immediately, but someone may forget to check on a rifter they'd previously reliably been looking in on during the plot, forget to invite a rifter colleague to a meeting, or feel strangely surprised to find them in a place that shouldn't be surprising at all, like rifters' own bedrooms. By Guardian 6, people may begin to have trouble recalling details about rifters they know, such as their names, eye colors, etc., even when asked directly about those details.

Meanwhile, rifters will begin behaving strangely as well. Specifically, their most defining traits—the top two or three key aspects of their personalities—will gradually become exaggerated, crowding out nuance and less fundamental traits. Someone who is very optimistic may become incapable of being realistic instead of relentlessly positive, someone who is usually quietly brave may tend toward louder bravado. It won't be something they are generally capable of noticing about themselves, although if it's pointed out to them and they give some serious thought to their past behavior they may be able to agree they're acting different now.

The Mysterious Rifter is now gone, barring potential retcons or additional facts that may be added in the event someone did kill him in the Fade or the real world. If he is going to have been killed, whether in the Fade or in the real world, please decide and let us know by end of day Friday. If we don't hear anything definitive by then, he will simply have vanished.

Like Templars, Fenris will continue to experience his Phase Two symptoms and is also eligible for the opportunity, mentioned above, to stop feeling the effects entirely. His abilities will never stop working, but they may sputter out at inopportune times, so it would probably be unwise for him to try passing through anything solid–just in case he also solidifies before he's out of it.

PHASE FOUR

Surprise! We're not done yet.

Rifter Symptoms: Phase Three symptoms continue as described above, but beginning on 6 Guardian, Rifters will begin to experience an additional symptom. If it weren't bad enough being blue and increasingly forgettable to everyone around them, they will also begin to be a bit harder to see, like their opacity is being gradually turned down. This effect can be noticed both by Rifters about themselves, and by others, though for natives, it will be even harder to focus on Rifters than before.

To add insult to injury, Rifters will also have moments where they are briefly incorporeal. It will begin as fleeting, confusing moments that won't be immediately identifiable, such as going to lean on a table and feeling as if you've somehow missed, or inexplicably dropping things as they somehow slip through your hands. This will continue to happen several times each day, so the reality of the situation will soon become apparent. At first each episode will last just a few seconds at a time, but the frequency and duration will increase as time goes on.

Initially they'll only be partially incorporeal, so that, for instance, if a hand is held out rain might drip right through, but they can't walk through a stone wall. By the end of this week, Rifters will be experiencing at least half an hour (total) per day of total incorporeality, enough that they could be sitting in a chair and suddenly find themselves on the ground. These incidents will be more likely to happen when their focus is elsewhere; if they're putting active effort into remaining present, they'll be more solid visually and physically.

On the bright side, any physical ills Rifters may have been experiencing will no longer trouble them. Any illness or injury will fade away as these symptoms worsen. They will feel neither tired nor especially energetic, just a steady baseline level of 'fine' that doesn't invite any further thought.

Lyrium Stores: With the increased demand for lyrium to treat affected Templars (and possibly a few Rifters), the Quartermaster ordered additional stores to be transported from the dock warehouse to the Gallows before the quarantine. Today, word gets around that when the Quartermaster went to oversee inventory of this increased stock, he discovered that the majority of it had somehow liquified and dripped from its containers, leaving about an inch of standing lyrium in the storeroom. Only a few crates were unaffected, and these have been relocated while Gallows staff work to clean up the mess. Some were heard to grumble that this is the most literal example yet of the Inquisition throwing money down the drain.

OOC Notes: We promised you hints this weekend and got a little delayed by RL, but in addition to the above, which we hope provide some assistance, we want to give you a couple other notes that we think may help focus your efforts. We'll add more in coming days if necessary to help facilitate a cure.

1. First, we want to close off one avenue of inquiry that we know has continued to puzzle a lot of people. The Fade/people's connection to the Fade is not the source of the problem or a solution. The Fade isn't sick or doing anything weird (other than the weird shit the Fade has been doing regularly anyway). If it were, mages and natives with anchors would be part of this, too.
   
   
2. Magical healing of all kinds will continue to have the effects described here, even if the mage's goal is to heal something other than the present illness/its symptoms. No form of magical healing is precise enough that the mage can pick and choose which of a person's ailments to deal with.
   
   
3. We want to highlight a few threads of conversation, IC and OOC, that we think are getting warmest. We've linked to the tags we think are most deserving of additional attention, but note that inclusion here doesn't mean the tag is totally correct, and we certainly aren't endorsing the entirety of any given thread.

Also, please note that the fact that something isn't included here doesn't necessarily mean it's wrong. We're only human and can't keep track of every thread or every discord/plurk comment; we're sure we've missed things. This is just the stuff that either jumped out at us in our review of the major comm threads we're aware of or that we happened to be online to spot on discord when it came up.

The goal here isn't to provide an exhaustive list of good ideas or to single out particular players/characters, just to highlight some recent inquiries that are aiming in the right direction in some way, to help you guys focus your questions/guesses/brainstorming/investigation and so forth going forward. These are presented in no particular order.

• "So that could be the way it was transmitted to Templars - he *is* a Rifter so it spread to them, he's something similar to lyrium in his blood so it spread to those who had that.
  
• "has anyone tested the sweat?"
  
• "Did you look at it with the microscope?"
  
• "Templars have lyrium in their blood already--if they were exuding more, they'd not be going through symptoms of its withdrawal. It's as if the plague is burning it out of them."
  
• "i wonder if his blood was always the way it is now . . . no wonder he was so offended by the idea of being a magic nullifier"

THE AFFECTED

The following characters will experience symptoms:

Adalia Alistair Araceli Bonaventura Bronach Cade Harimann Chloe Price Cosima Niehaus Daenerys Targaryen Elros Fenris* Fingon Gabriel Reyes Galadriel Haldir Ignis Scientia James Kirk

James Norrington Janzik Joltcable Klaus Von Reinherz Leonard Church Luwenna Coupe Maedhros Maglor The Medicine Seller Petrana de Cedoux Prompto Argentum Rey Sarkan Simon Ashlock Thranduil

No other characters will experience symptoms, no matter how much contact they have with one of the afflicted listed above.

OPTING OUT

The listed characters will experience the listed symptoms, and due to the nature of the plot we cannot provide a complete opt-out that leaves any of these characters unaffected. We obviously won't require you to actually RP any of this if you aren't comfortable with illness RP, but your character will still be impacted, so we would recommend handwaving that your character is ill somewhere off-screen and backtagging things set before symptoms begin instead.

If you have a character who isn't listed and are uncomfortable with the plot, they can be away from the Gallows/Kirkwall during this time—once symptoms are noted we expect that those who exhibit them will be confined to the Gallows and easy to avoid. If you have a specific situation that you don't feel is compatible with these options, contact us and we can discuss.

Comments

QUESTIONS

[faderifting]

[crowncitizen]

A few questions!

1. Does this go into effect starting immediately?

2. Would magic have any effect on this illness? I.e, would any healing spells help alleviate any symptoms or would the sleep spell Saoirse inevitably casts on Prompto actually work

3. Would sleeping aids, potions, or other remedies of any kind have an effect on the illness?

4. Once the fever takes hold and skin starts turning blue, would the character still be in a hyperactive, restless state or would they finally, eventually collapse from exhaustion/lack of sleep?

[extraverse]

How badly will their self-judgement be impaired if at all? Will characters be able to realize that something is wrong with themselves? If they are affected will they be able to figure out something is wrong with the others affected? Would it be the kind of thing where they just don't realize anyone is sick or would it be like "I'm not sick, but you totes are?"

Or is that one of those things that's up to us?

[rowancrowned]

1. What happens to characters who are forcibly put to sleep, by physical or magical means?

2. What happens if you double down and take lyrium?

[dirth]

Hi there!

Would there be anything in any kind of documentation that might reference an illness of any similar nature in the past, if someone was going to look into it? If Solas were to sleep himself and look into memories, for example, would anything like it have happened before/would there be any memories or recollections that might help towards finding some sort of cure?

Would spirits be able to help/know anything? :D?

Also, relating to the Rifter - does he have an anchor-shard that Solas might have to soothe somehow? He'd be curious about him and would at least try, especially with how it compares/contrasts to the Herald, if that works!

[provenforce]

this is late but it literally just occurred to me. Would this have any effect on abilities like Rey's, her connection to the Force, being able to sense emotions in others and move stuff?

phase 2

[rowancrowned]

Just curious as to what would be termed a species-specific trait as compared to an ability. Could the mods elaborate on this one?

[justice_is_blond]

Is anyone who got 'used' to Cole previously better able to remember the mysterious rifter?

Further, would cleansing herbs/potions have any impact?

[aceso]

Would a spirit healer and their spirit buddy be able to detect anything "off" about those affected? What about spirit mediums?

[dirth]

A few questions! Again, sorry for Solas being Solas.

1. Would he be able to use his dreamer abilities to help people get to sleep/reach the Fade as a kind of cure?

2. Regarding the Rifter - does his disappearance have anything to do with the Fade? If so, would he be able to be found there and questioned/‘dealt’ with? Would that lend itself to a cure?

[faithlikeaseed]

Are the templars out at Skyhold affected? If not, would a templar's symptoms eventually resolve on their own if s/he traveled far enough from Kirkwall?

[aceso]

Putting this as a separate question since it's a different topic: are the Red Templars that the Inquisition captured in Rivain still locked up in the Gallows, or have they died? If they're alive, what is their current status regarding this illness?

[keenly]

Will anti-magic and nullification spells have any suppression effect? Sort of like it has vs. spawning rift-demons in DAI?

Belated and specific question:

[youwonscience]

Is this illness affected in any way by Cosima's own chronic illness, which is kept in check mainly by spirit healing? In Phase One, at least, she missed a check-in due to hyperfocus elsewhere, but I assume that since the health of people affected is under pretty strict scrutiny, mere neglect won't be an issue as such.

I'm fine if there's no interaction at all, it just occurs to me that considering the sleeplessness especially, her body may be holding up less well than an otherwise healthy rifter's and I wanted to check in about it.

[justice_is_blond]

Back with another dumb question!

If the mystery rifter gets cut and bled a little, would there be any discernible lyrium in his bloodstream?

[provenforce]

Phase 3 questioning,

Would rifters have the same sense of oddness for one-another? like say if Kirk and Rey were together would one of them look at the other one and be like 'wtf who are you' even though they're good friends?

ALSO if a rifter were to cut themselves or be bled or whatever, would they be able to notice anything weird going on with their blood?

[paladingus]

In terms of theorizing--so everyone affected is either a rifter, or someone who takes lyrium, yes?

[lyriumcarved]

Will others outside of the listed group above be able to "opt in" to catching it at any point? Just curious! It just seems like the most plausible way to get some involved who definitely won't have anything to do with the plot, otherwise.

[faderifting]

To answer your actual question, no, people can’t opt in. To answer a question you didn’t ask, whoops, sorry—Fenris should have been included in the list, but he won’t be affected the way everyone else is. During this phase of the plot his lyrium brands will become itchy and raised and a little leaky, like an allergic reaction. His abilities may also activate on more of a hair-trigger than he’s used to.

[rowancrowned]

man it sure is weird that no one who takes lyrium or is a rifter can access the Fade during this time bc they can't sleep

so strange

Plotting GDoc

[paladingus]

Lark made a lovely gdoc for anyone who wants in on the IC researching to do plotting and theorizing and coordinating stuff for characters to do!

[faithlikeaseed]

Now we have a timeline and a clean plotting document (thank you K2!!!).

If you have any questions on how to add things to the timeline safely, please hit me up (Plagueheart on Plurk; Plagueheart#0051) or ask on the respective plurk/in #plotchat on the Discord!

Mysterious Rifter

[sunshinethroughgrey]

So if one intrepid Warden researcher had gone and made sure she had a list of all affected to see if she could find a connection, and then found this un-named Rifter and kept a Very Close Eye on him because in her notes, he exists and she has to keep telling herself he Does exist, does she note anything off about his shard or anything else, before he disappears?

Re: Mysterious Rifter

[faderifting]

Nope! The rifter's shard continues to behave normally as far as even the most-focused observer can tell, and there are no other symptoms beside what we've already described above in the post. One moment he's there (but extremely forgettable) and the next, he's gone.

RIFTER QUESTIONING

[dirth]

Since Solas will 100% be tracking this guy down in the Fade and asking him stuff, I wanted to make sure everyone had an input. So! Here are some of the suggestions so far for me to put to the mods:

Are people where you came from experiencing symptoms like this?

What symptoms were you experiencing before you turned up here unconscious?

Why is it so hard for people to remember you?

What are dreams like in your world?

[foundmyselfagain]

Why do people have trouble remembering you, and can we do something to make him more...memorable, basically. silly hats? we can do silly hats.

Sort of Phase 3 question

[tar_minyatur]

Hey mods, on a somewhat broad tangent how bad is the weather at sea, because uh, if we exaggerate character traits Elros is going to want to go to sea *right now* and fight him some sea monsters.

Re: Sort of Phase 3 question

[faderifting]

It's February, so the weather at sea is pretty comprehensively miserable. It's freezing, windy, and often stormy. As a note, when we say "character traits" we mean on a very basic level -- think 'loyal' or 'selfish' or 'diligent' or whatever. A specific desire to hunt monsters wouldn't be amplified, while the underlying traits that cause him to enjoy monster hunting, like bravery, might be. We're not saying Elros can't hare off to sea if you want! We leave the details up to you, we just wanted to take this opportunity to clarify precisely what we mean by trait in case it is helpful for figuring out what's going on.

Phase 4 Question

[nadasharillen]

Is there any perceivable pattern (area of effect, pinpointable epicenter, proximity to something etc) to which Lyrium supply boxes survived and which didn't?

Re: Phase 4 Question

[faderifting]

Nope! The only noticeable pattern in terms of layout is that all of the lyrium that's survived is grouped together, in a stack of crates all together on the same pallet up against the wall. It is in a back corner of the room, but all of the lyrium around it has liquified, so being 'out of range' of something would not make sense as an answer.

UPDATE

[faderifting]

We think this is getting to the point where it isn't fun for anyone, and you're all really close and have gotten everything else so far and solved the big and important "why" questions, so:

Our ideas for things that would help restore them to physical reality at this point include having them intentionally embrace their own complexity and will themselves back into being whole people, but—since they aren't Cole and aren't exactly what Cole was—doing that in conjunction with things like binding them permanently to their own anchors, or temporarily binding them to anything else so they're tied down to the physical world/can't accidentally be cleansed/dispelled/banished and then having Templars use their abilities, since their abilities are lyrium-based and "enforce the reality and immutability of the world," to reenforce the rifters themselves as real, etc.

We're also open to hearing alternative proposals if you guys come up with something else! It's all magical mumbo-jumbo. But in general our preference is for things that will involve innovation, since rifters themselves are new and weird, versus applying a single spell or potion that already exists, as well as promoting interaction/RPability and allowing multiple characters to participate in implementing it.