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faderiftooc2020-02-27 11:34 am
faderifting) wrote in faderiftooc2020-02-27 11:34 am
Entry tags:
MOD POST ↠ March Assignments
MARCH ASSIGNMENTS
Assignment teams and details will be posted and linked as they're determined.
↠ The Heart of the Matter: Bastien, Ellis, Wysteria
↠ Dramatical Cats, Diplomatical Cats: Gwenaëlle, Sabine, Jenny Lou
↠ The Best Shade Plans: Barrow, Marcoulf
↠ In the Nick of Thyme: Ilias, Matthias, John
↠ Tulipgit to Quit: Sawbones, Tavin
↠ How Do You Solve A Problem Like The Anders: Jenny Lou, Alistair, Ket
↠ Uncrossing the Crossroads: Richard, Loxley, Athessa, Yngvi
↠ In the Enemy's Grippe: Nikos, Derrica, Lino
↠ Join the Navy, They Said…: Bastien, Darras
↠ How to Train Your Draconology Expert: Julius, Fitcher
If you didn't sign up for assignments and wish you had, we'll have more next round (or sooner)! And if you did sign up for assignments and wish you hadn't, hahaha sucker.
Jk, just let us and your teammates know if you need to back out for any reason.
RULES
OOC, the only two rules regarding these assignments are: (1) they must be RPed in some way, not entirely handwaved, and (2) you have to file a report by the deadline. Otherwise, you can handle them basically however you want. For example,
— Format: You can write a log addressing the main action/meat of the assignment, handwave that and do a log or crystal post that’s instead focused on deciding what to do about the problem or discussing how it went after the fact, or whatever else, as long as you RP about the assignment’s substance in some way.
— Personnel: You can limit the assignment to only the assigned team, if you prefer, or you can take other people along, whether that means involving just one other specific character to go for some specific reason or turning the assignment into an open log/discussion that the whole game can participate in. Just make sure everyone on the team is on board with whatever you decide, and check with the relevant project leaders or division heads if you want to include someone whose suitability for something is in question, since they might not be willing to OK their inclusion.
— Content: If you want to add obstacles, problems, pit stops, etc. to your assignment, you can, as long as they’re reasonable given the scope and spirit of the assignment. For example, if your characters are tasked with finding a lost child in the woods, it’s fine for them to accidentally wander into a bear’s den or to get caught in a storm that causes a flash flood in a ravine, because those are hazards that make sense given the assignment and its setting, whereas finding a zany artifact that causes bodyswaps or assassinating Corypheus would be outside the scope.
GENERAL QUESTIONS
— Chain of Command: Division Heads are everyone’s boss, and Project Leaders and Assistants should be deferred to on assignments originating from their projects. Otherwise, if a situation arises where you need to know who would be formally in charge—such as if the involved characters are split on how to approach something and someone would need to have the final word—you can come up with your own reasonable answer (“Bob is the only one with experience here so let’s say he's the leader”), you can choose whoever has the highest ratio of consonants to vowels in their name, or you can ask us and we'll decide using another test that is equally arbitrary but more unpredictable.
— Resources: Unless otherwise stated, assume your characters have a budget sufficient to do what they’ve been asked to do, but not enough to be reckless or wasteful. If being short on money would make something more fun to RP, you can do that. If acquiring something extravagant and ridiculous, like a team of dancing bears, would make something more fun to RP, talk to us about it first—not so we can say no, but so we can arrange a way for your characters to luck into acquiring things at a bargain without anyone having to pretend it’s a good use of money.
— OOC: Everyone assigned to the team is responsible for RPing the assignment and getting a report posted by the deadline, and everyone assigned to the team is eligible to earn 5 bonus AC points when the report is done. Extra characters who are brought along or involved but not assigned aren’t eligible for the bonus points. If for whatever reason something can’t get done by the deadline, please talk to us about it! Failing to complete a report without contacting us might result in the group getting last priority when future assignments are handed out.
How to Train Your Draconology Expert
REPORT DEADLINE: April 5, 2020
ASSIGNMENT: Now that the project has established that Corypheus’ dragon started out a regular, non-nightmare dragon, it seems useful to establish how it was corrupted with red lyrium. It seems likely that some expertise was required to get that close to a high dragon without, you know, dying; tracking down who that expert might have been seems a useful step toward working out how the transformation was done in the first place. A small team to research a list of possible suspects and track down their current whereabouts (and/or their mysterious disappearances).
DETAILS: Researching draconology experts who were active during the years after Corypheus' escape but prior to Corypheus' emergence will turn up--among as many other less likely candidates as you'd like to invent for your own purposes--the following possibilities:
There won’t be time for very many further steps beyond identifying the possibilities and the above information, but if your characters would pursue any particular avenue or dig up additional specific information about any of these people, we can let you know what they might find.
QUESTIONS? If you have questions specific to your assignment, reply to this and we'll answer them. If you have general questions applicable to every assignment instead of just yours, ask here.
The Heart of the Matter
REPORT DEADLINE: April 5, 2020
ASSIGNMENT: The Merchant-Prince Daniello Bassadoar, up until recently, supported the Inquisition, but he has abruptly turned towards neutrality. We need to figure out why. Diplomacy has gotten their hands on a large shipment of books; your mission is to accompany this shipment and, while in Bassadoar's home, find out what happened to dampen his enthusiasm. The best team will be made up of people who can chat about books (especially romance novels) for hours.
DETAILS: Although he'll accept the shipment and allow their presence, initially Prince Daniello will be distant and difficult to speak with for any length of time, leaving handling the shipment and hospitality to his wife and staff. His young wife, Tomasia, will be friendly in a way that occasionally gives way to looking very sad, but impossible to crack if pressed. Both will say that their newfound neutrality is a matter of principle.
Information as to what’s gone wrong will actually come first from the couple’s nanny, who tends to their toddler, Agostino. She’ll steal a moment during one of the child’s naps to sneak aside with a Riftwatch member and tell them that the little-seen, occasionally-heard child she’s been caring for is not sick and is not actually Agostino at all.
Acquiring further information could occur in one or both of two ways:
However it's found, the truth is that Agostino was taken by Tevinters some months ago. The boy currently residing in his nursery is a Tevinter—a slave’s orphan, as far as Daniello and his wife are aware—who was given to them to help them maintain the appearance of normalcy, which they’ve been instructed to do if they want their boy kept alive and someday returned to them. Whether Daniello and Tomasia consider Riftwatch to be trustworthy allies who might help them get their son back or self-interested enemies who might give away the game and get their son killed will depend on which of the approaches they took.
QUESTIONS? If you have questions specific to your assignment, reply to this and we'll answer them. If you have general questions applicable to every assignment instead of just yours, ask here.
Dramatical Cats, Diplomatical Cats
REPORT DEADLINE: April 5, 2020
ASSIGNMENT: Pieces of jewelry made from the glass of Eluvians were briefly all the rage during the Storm Age. A very prominent collector of such vintage pieces, Madame Hortense Keating, recently moved to Starkhaven to be closer to her son, a local merchant. Although she is not very fond of Riftwatch, she is very, very fond of certain musicals-- and is now too old to comfortably attend the theatre. A performance of the musical Les Chats by Riftwatch members will earn her friendship and access to the collection, including all-important authentication papers that will allow Riftwatch to rule out pursuing Eluvians confirmed broken—or discover fakes and confirm new leads.
DETAILS: The team sent to Madame Keating will have access to masks and costumes acquired from a group of actors who were so bad at performing Les Chats--due to trying too hard to make people take them seriously, mostly--that they've given up. Some of them will still have bits of fruit and vegetable smeared places and need cleaning. (Some might also be missing, if improvising replacements would be fun.) They'll also have Madame Keating's household staff, all given the day off of their other work to fill in other roles or be background extras.
Some potential complications include: Madame Keating's cook finding this whole proceeding ridiculous and needing to be persuaded not to just stand there fuming in a cat costume, her maid feeling so liberated by it that she'll need to be persuaded afterwards not to quit her job to become an actor (or at least to wait a few weeks so her departure can't be blamed on Riftwatch), and one of Madame Keating's friends apparently losing his sense of propriety entirely when confronted with furry body suits and being a little handsy with the actors.
Whether the performance itself goes off without a hitch or with many, many hitches--you're welcome to roll for it if you want--Madame Keating and her friends will be so delighted by it that it will be easy to maneuver her afterwards into showing off her jewelry collection. The authentication papers will confirm that the majority of the eluvian pieces were crafted from the shattered remains of two unaccounted-for eluvians (or just "elven mirrors predating the Imperium," as Keating will describe them) the last known to belong to Lord Regnault Beauvau and a merchant named Beneta Figiovanni in the Storm Age.
QUESTIONS? If you have questions specific to your assignment, reply to this and we'll answer them. If you have general questions applicable to every assignment instead of just yours, ask here.
How Do You Solve a Problem Like the Anders
REPORT DEADLINE: April 5, 2020
ASSIGNMENT: A team is tasked with sneaking Revered Mother Adalberta of Perendale (not present in the city at its capture, obviously) into the Anderfels to meet with Chantry leaders in Hossberg. As a native Ander who trained in Hossberg, it's believed that Adalberta's personal connections will help her accounts of the invasion be believed and convince the local Chantry leaders to help spread the truth and support resistance. Unbeknownst to the Revered Mother, the team is also smuggling a recently-retrieved eluvian into the city to facilitate future work.
DETAILS: Revered Mother Adalberta is about 60 and in good shape, the sort of woman who does lots of brisk walking and vigorous gardening. She'll bear the rigors of the road with good humor and resilience, and will do her best to help out and do her part rather than expecting to be waited on, though she'll occasionally need some assistance with the roughest terrain and obviously can't defend herself. She's a very earnest woman, but with a quietly dry sense of humor and clearly deeply troubled by the war and its impact on her homeland, which she hasn't visited in a few years.
Orders are that no one outside of Riftwatch is to learn of the eluvian, but that protecting Revered Mother Adalberta is the #1 priority. These goals may come into conflict at the border or when attempting to get into the city, forcing the team to risk either Adalberta or the eluvian or themselves in order to circumvent security. The team will need to keep watch while she meets with leaders at the local Chantry, but must also be careful to remain unobtrusive--not only do they need to avoid detection by local authorities, but they also don't want to give the impression that the Revered Mother is under any sort of duress. As long as they do that, the meeting will go well--Adalberta has several old friends among Hossberg's clergy, including now-Revered Mother Seguina (who it turns out is actually a distant cousin). It won't be an easy talk, they will speak for hours, late into the night, but in the end Adalberta's report will be that she thinks they believed her, even if they do still have some reservations. Ultimately, unless you'd prefer some form of failure, the team will get her back to Cumberland safely and the eluvian installed in a safely-hidden location in the city of your choice.
The authorities in Hossberg aren't particularly wary, because so far nobody has made much attempt to infiltrate the city, since it's so far away and who cares about the Anderfels. The native resistance is their main concern, and the group will see signs of its influence like those previously reported if they go looking, mostly in the form of wanted posters and graffiti, which most often takes the form of dead crowned griffons, quotes from the Chant, or the arms of House Augustin. The authorities also aren't dumb though, and Adalberta isn't a totally unknown figure, so if you'd like to add the complication of the government getting wind of her presence to force some escape hijinx, feel free.
QUESTIONS? If you have questions specific to your assignment, reply to this and we'll answer them. If you have general questions applicable to every assignment instead of just yours, ask here.
The Best Shade Plans
REPORT DEADLINE: April 5, 2020
ASSIGNMENT: A contingent of the enemy force in Orlais is rumored to be making moves toward the Orlesian front line's flank, thanks in part to the broken blockade at Val Chevin enabling the Anders and Venatori forces to finally begin resupplying the occupation force directly. While Orlais' fighting force is deploying its own rag tag force in answer, a prominent art historian from Val Royeaux has written Riftwatch begging that they assist with rescuing a collection of paintings from notable Steel Age portraitist, Solène Portier, which currently is being kept in the collection at Château de l'Orfort and lies in the path of the two opposed forces.
DETAILS: Barrow and Marcoulf will be able to reach Château de l'Orfort without significant trouble and will have time to load the portraits, which are of considerable cultural value, into their cart for transportation. However, at that point they will find their escape is complicated when the Orlesian and Ander-slash-Tevinter forces clash practically on the château's front lawn.
The team will have a choice to either a) make a clean getaway with the art, or b) attempt to sabotage the enemy forces and aid the outnumbered Orlesians, but potentially lose the collection.
If you choose the second option, let us know, and we'll roll for whether or not they manage to preserve the collection.
If you choose the first option, their escape will be successful but not necessarily easy, as the Ander and Tevinter forces will have blocked off the main roads as part of their assault. They'll be forced to take a longer road through relatively deserted plains, without any signs of civilization or opportunity to purchase supplies or stay in an inn, with only one another, the horses, and the portraits for company, and midway through a thunderstorm will roil up unexpectedly and threaten to damage the art.
QUESTIONS? If you have questions specific to your assignment, reply to this and we'll answer them. If you have general questions applicable to every assignment instead of just yours, ask here.
In the Nick of Thyme
REPORT DEADLINE: April 5, 2020
ASSIGNMENT: The explosion of refugees coupled with uncertainty surrounding the prospect of shipping safely into the west Waking Sea thanks to the collapse of the Orlesian blockade has caused massive shortages in Cumberland and the surrounding countryside. Riftwatch has gotten word that the Tevinter powers in occupied Val Chevin have prepared a shipment of desperately needed supplies which it intends to send to a refugee encampment West of Cumberland in a bid to curry good will with
the rabbletheir neighbors. Riftwatch is to assault and take control of the caravan and deliver aid to the refugees themselves.DETAILS: The agent in Val Chevin either got the date wrong, or someone changed plans. Either way, the supply caravan will beat Riftwatch to the narrow road crossing where the assault was meant to take place, and the team will be forced to play catch up. When they finally reach the supply train, they'll find that without the tactical advantage of the crossing to aid their assault, the supplies from Val Chevin are simply too well guarded to successfully hijack.
At that juncture, the team will have a choice: either destroy the supplies from a distance (like with fire maybe), preventing Tevinter from using them for PR but also preventing the refugees from receiving aid, or allow the the enemy force to successfully pass through to the refugee camp. They won't have much time to make a decision before the caravan travels far enough that they risk any efforts to intervene being visible to distant watchmen and lookouts, which would mean both ensuring the refugees don't get the supplies and letting Tevinter have credit for trying.
If they would attempt some sort of Plan C, reply here to let us know what it is!
QUESTIONS? If you have questions specific to your assignment, reply to this and we'll answer them. If you have general questions applicable to every assignment instead of just yours, ask here.
Tulipgit to Quit
REPORT DEADLINE: April 5, 2020
ASSIGNMENT: Bartolo Nuño, an Inquisition ally, has taken to tulip breeding—as have most of the nobles in Antiva, most of them betting huge fortunes on tulip futures, while Nuño has only pursued it as a side-hobby to dog breeding. However, his latest batch of bulbs has been rumored to be extremely promising and bidding on them likely to be both record breaking and just the thing to lift Nuño’s lackluster fortunes. However, a blight (small b) has begun affecting tulip bulbs, some of Nuño’s included. Find cures for the blight or at least make Nuño’s immune, and earn his unending gratitude and financial assistance for Riftwatch and the Inquisition.
DETAILS: The team has the option of developing, or at least attempting to develop, two potential solutions:
1. A fungicide that will protect tulips from the fungus. This will ultimately require acquiring significant amounts of drakestone--at least some of which will need to be collected from mining tunnels directly, since funds are limited--and various plant oils to experiment with and find the correct and least wasteful balance.
2. An advanced form of the fungus that will more quickly and stubbornly spread and ruin everyone's tulips equally. This could be discovered either intentionally or unintentionally, by exposing the fungus to processed lyrium and Amrita Vein oil.
They could also plausibly happen upon both.
Depending on which they successfully develop, they'll then have several choices. For example, if they have an advanced strain of the fungus, they could use it to destroy most of Antiva's tulips and pop the economic bubble surrounding them--which wouldn't particularly enrich Nuño directly, but would hurt several of his competitors who have invested more heavily in their bulbs than he has as a hobbyist.
Or they could use a combination of their fungicide and the advanced fungus to ensure that all tulips are ruined except Nuño's. Or they could provide the fungicide only to him and assist him in keeping it a secret from everyone else. Or they could provide it to him but make the fungicide freely available--or available for purchase, since Riftwatch could use the money--to other Antivans seeking to protect their own yields, which would earn less gratitude from Nuño specifically but might earn favor from other, less prominently positioned Antivans.
Sawbones and Tavin are welcome to either make this decision themselves due to not having time to consult with someone before Nuño needs them to explain what they're doing, or to consult with their Division Head about what to do.
QUESTIONS? If you have questions specific to your assignment, reply to this and we'll answer them. If you have general questions applicable to every assignment instead of just yours, ask here.
In the Enemy's Grippe
REPORT DEADLINE: April 5, 2020
ASSIGNMENT: While much of Nevarra's ecclesiastical wealth lay in its necropoli, the Chantry in Nevarra City also housed a number of artifacts related to Lord Hector of Nevarra, whose alliance with Andraste drove Tevinter from the city in -180 Ancient. Riftwatch has received a tip that these relics may be passing through a Chantry in the village of Doman for verification and repacking, before they disappear up the Imperial Highway forever. Thanks to a convenient tributary of the Minanter River, approaching the village looks like a soggy but not impossible affair. However, the Chantry itself has been converted to an infirmary for enemy soldiers struggling with the grippe; getting in and out without attracting attention will not be easy. A team will be sent to recover what relics they can using whatever method and means they deem necessary.
DETAILS: As stated, reaching the Chantry will be feasible if the team passes quietly enough up the tributary in the dark, though let me know if you want to roll for stealth or muddiness etc., for added tension/urgecy for the remainder of the mission.
However, the Chantry itself will be too crowded for any sort of straightforward breaking and entering. How the team works around that is up to you. One plausible possibility is pretending to be representatives from the Imperial Chantry there to verify the relics and prepare them for safe transportation. Another might be to pose as healers and/or soldiers with the grippe, which might require less acting or Imperial Chantry knowledge but make it more difficult to find the artifacts, etc. Or feel free to brainstorm something completely different, and let me know if you need more settling details to bounce off of.
Respond to this thread with the method the team decides on. I’ll roll for success on whatever factors seem relevant and/or fun, and get back to you promptly with part 2: what the team will discover and what decisions they'll need to make about it.
QUESTIONS? If you have questions specific to your assignment, reply to this and I'll answer them. If you have general questions applicable to every assignment instead of just yours, ask here.
no subject
please let us know of any challenges of fun and/or relevancy, if the team will have had prior knowledge as to where the artifacts are being kept or hidden, what will be discovered and what decisions we need to make!!
thank u
no subject
Since they don't have any in-character reason to ask after Chantry relics, they'll have to rely on good old-fashioned snooping around to locate the artifacts. Luckily, the Chantry is not huge; unluckily, there are a few guards around doing regular patrols, so the longer they take to search, the less time they will have to decide what to do with what they find.
Which is to say: they'll be in a bit of a rush when they finally find the door to the cellar and the relics below.
The most valuable and cherished of the relics themselves are of the finger bone and sword hilt variety--things that could be slipped out under a jacket unnoticed--but among them will be an active eluvian that responds to the passphrases used by Riftwatch agents. Those on-site clearly aren't aware of what it is or how excited their superiors will be to have it, and leaving it for them to keep isn't an option. Getting out with something so large and heavy and finding a way to move it safely past the troops, however--whether by road or by river--will require some creativity.
(Side note: the Chantry is flammable. A Chantry on fire might serve well as a distraction for escape and for drawing the attention of those enemy troops positioned nearby. It also might take out a not-insignificant number of the enemy soldiers on their sickbeds inside. It wouldn't really be a war crime because there is no standardized international law. Cheers!)
Alternatively: This plot was obviously written before the real world went to hell, so if you guys OOCly do not feel like writing not-technically-a-war-crime at the moment, we have a secondary option that you are free to use, ignore, or combine with the above:
In a comedy of fortunate coincidences like unto the Brothers Blues, Nikos, Derrica, and Lino may happen to find the eluvian at the same time as 1) someone left the garden-level back door unlocked, and 2) a local farmer has parked his horse and wagon full of hay just outside to argue with the guard about whether said guards are blocking too much of the not-muddy part of the road. If they hurry (and/or cause a small distraction in the other direction), they can shove their fancy mirror under the hay and make a daring wagon-based escape.
Assuming the team makes it out alive and with the eluvian intact, their orders will be not to bring it back, but to travel deeper into enemy territory to plant the eluvian in the wine cellar of a trusted contact, so it can be used to slip back into Nevarra's occupied territory without crossing the front lines in the future. Once it's situated, the team will have the choice of returning to the Gallows through the Crossroads (no enemies, but a strong likelihood of wrong turns) or the same way they came. Either way, you can assume they do make it back, +/- whatever appropriate complications sound fun to you guys to include.
Please reply here if you have any questions! Otherwise I'll look forward to this report. :)
Join the Navy, They Said...
REPORT DEADLINE:April 5, 2020
ASSIGNMENT: A team is to be sent to "join" the lowest ranks of the Orlesian Navy at Val Royeaux under the "command" of their contact Lieutenant Armand de Vereux to glean information from the often overlooked rank and file—clerks, cook's helpers, deck swabbers, cargo loaders, etc—about the sabotage of the ships forming the blockade at Val Chevin. Once they feel they've got substantial enough information to lead to something else, they're to give the Lieutenant a good reason to discharge them from service.
DETAILS: Keen observers that they are, Bastien & Darras will soon notice that there's a growing divide in the lower ranks of the Navy between those who chose it as their career and those who have been conscripted or pressed into service more recently. As the numbers of the latter continue to increase, so does the amount of grumbling, and it won't be difficult to identify some likely ringleaders of the disgruntled conscripts. The most likely is a fellow called Bruleaux who seems to have some sway among the men and contacts on other ships, and definitely seems to feel frustration that the navy is rumored to be planning an offensive in the wake of the blockade.
If they can manage to get themselves into his orbit, they'll be able to confirm that he's strongly opposed to the war for its impact on people like him, dragged from their homes and forced to fight, and for what? But they'll also learn that his ship left Val Chevin a few days before the blockade was broken, so he probably didn't personally participate, whether he knows more or not. They may also notice hints that Bruleaux has a friend or patron among the officers in the city. Learning more than that will require either a fair bit of time and patience, or some sort of shortcut into Bruleaux's friendship before he'll be willing to confide that he does have a sympathetic ear within the officer ranks who he says is helping to coordinate things between ships. But he's not going to let slip anything about the blockade specifically, so it's difficult to tell whether this is related or if they've stumbled into plans for some well-meaning civil disobedience.
Whatever reason they come up with for their discharge, after wringing what they can from Bruleaux, should ideally not involve fatalities.
QUESTIONS? If you have questions specific to your assignment, reply to this and we'll answer them. If you have general questions applicable to every assignment instead of just yours, ask here.
Uncrossing the Crossroads
REPORT DEADLINE: April 5, 2020
ASSIGNMENT: Eluvians have been used sparingly so far, but obviously represent a powerful resource if they could be used as shortcuts into useful places. Teams will be sent into the Crossroads to explore different sections, map the eluvians they find, and determine where those eluvians spit them out, in hopes of discovering secret routes behind enemy lines.
DETAILS: Exploring the Crossroads will lead the team to encounter the usual hazards: stray wraiths, paths that end abruptly, paths that appear abruptly, eluvians that are visible but upside down on a different chunk of floating rock, etc.
In the process of their mapping and exploring, however, they'll be able to reach--by either the dumb luck of falling through a weak bit of ground into a chamber or by cleverly solving a puzzle, your choice--a circular hub of dozens of eluvians that's been previously undiscovered.
Traveling through most of the eluvians will result in the team finding themselves in a variety of nondescript moss-covered ruins, underground caverns, abandoned mountaintop chateaus, etc. One eluvian will spit them out right onto the edge of a cliff that drops down into a Deep Roads chasm, so they should proceed with some caution, generally.
The most notable will be one that transports them into a dusty old attic where, if they carefully maneuver out from under the sheet covering the eluvian and the various pieces of large furniture and giant old paintings in front of it, they'll be able to tell by peering through the single window that they're in Minrathous, on the uppermost floor of a house on a populated street, with sounds below that indicate it's currently occupied.
Any further steps would require careful planning, so they'll need to put everything back just as they found it and ideally not leave any footprints that might lead someone to discover the eluvian before Riftwatch can figure out what to do about it.
QUESTIONS? If you have questions specific to your assignment, reply to this and we'll answer them. If you have general questions applicable to every assignment instead of just yours, ask here.