Bay 12 Games Forum

[Mushroom, Pig is the last Saga. I'm not quite certain what your intent is.]
What resources would we need? They are plants and minerals, they are their own resources. The storage will grow as they do.
I am starting construction in the Saga of the Rabbit.

((Sorry, mixed up names. It should be Rat.))

"Then I am not sure I understand your plan in the slightest. Do you want no framework, no organization? These things will be easier to make if we use what other gods have left behind, rather than creating from nothing."

Age 2, Saga of the Pig Rat, home room
Koaring does not know whether the nameless mechanical god takes time to sleep. If they do, Koaring's nervous energy has him up and about early enough in the saga to awaken his classmate with a pounding on their chamber door. When the god objects that the Saga of the Rabbit is logically better suited to working together on a project, Koaring glances at the storage pit, now illuminated by the baleful glow of the Gourd. "I am loath to put off this task any longer than necessary. No, I intend to set out now regardless of Saga. Won't you join me? We could discuss any plans you have for the design, the better to refine our search."

Turn 2 Actions

Saga of the Rat

First thing, Koaring brings the Gourd of Corruption out to the common storage. (It may be moved again later, depends how things go.)

Thinking carefully about the requirements of his collection for Resource Acquisition Lab, Koaring decides to concentrate on storage conditions and presentation; size and diversity will mostly depend on luck for now. At the same time, it seems very likely that someone else in the long history of the Academy has had the same or similar ideas. He's been meaning to explore the place a bit, anyway. He checks if {null} is around to invite them along.

Use a Miracle to activate Wandering Nose: Koaring is searching for abandoned museum or display furniture that he can make his own. He doesn't want to anger any older gods at this point, so he will be careful to verify any candidate is genuinely unclaimed before appropriating it, including checking with Student Services. You know, just in case he stumbles upon the treasure room of a god of dust and cobwebs.
Edit: Per the conversation below, Koaring is now looking for "natural" materials in accordance with {null}'s outline, to the extent that he understands it. He still thinks a certain amount of cabinetry will be useful, but he is curious as to what the unnamed god will fashion.

Saga of the Rabbit, most likely
Reserve a Miracle as an intra-Academy Action to support {null} in construction and adaptation of either a new space or improving the menagerie, their choice.


Saga of the Horse
Attend Class: Resource Acquisition Lab. Spend 1 Interaction acquring resources!

Saga of the Goat
Attend Class: Divine Miracles
Today Koaring has a question to ask: "Professor Yínfà, I am interested in cooperation between gods in working miracles, and perhaps even between gods and mortals. I tried performing a miracle for my mortal followers this past age, and honestly the result exceeded my expectations. I was wondering if and how followers can contribute to such divine acts."
Turn in written assignment on a successful miracle:

Saga of the Dog

Koaring has not forgotten about Baba Yāo fù and his unmet daughter. He has put it off perhaps too long already; he now resolves to change the adjective on the latter. Not accustomed to the strange flow of time in Qiángdà, divided as it is between students and everyone else, he is uncomfortably uncertain what to expect.

Interaction: Visit family. A nice social visit this time. Be polite even if Koaring can't manage friendly. Also, use minor god magics to apply temporary infertility measures before he sets out, in case things get heavy with Baba Yāo fù.

Dun blanches at his response. She probably should have remembered that beast-things were often touchy and easily riled, but what was everyone here's aversion to reproduction? Maybe she should have just cloned herself after all...

"I was uncertain whether you would object to peripheral involvement in reproductive activities, and will avoid implicating you in the future. If you would rather preserve your collection and avoid entanglement with such a matter, I would also be willing to share ownership of the menagerie in exchange for improvements to it or shared use of a room that is similarly useful to me."

"It may be best if we stick to joint projects for now. I'd like to consult with the other one, but you may expect improvements to your menagerie or a new purpose room early next age, I think. The other matter, it costs me much time devoted to your gain. I do not know how you can help me similarly."

Koaring hesitates, suddenly struck by the idea that Dun – or anyone else – could confront Baba Yāo fù without the penalty of the hex she's laid on him. But no, the Hag is a wily opponent and he's not about to subject Dun to the same risk without far better planning. "If I should discover a want for something that touches on your specialties I hope we can revisit the topic without prejudice. Reproduce as you wish; but I am in no position to accept yet another responsibility."

Saga of the Pig

Koaring is disappointed but hardly surprised to watch his Gourd begin the early stages of decomposition. It would just be one more mistake this Age.

On the positive(?) side it does illustrate the problem before him. Although the rot setting in has far more to do with the physical gourd, it is easy to romanticize it as an emblem of the evil corruption that still glows from within. Baba Yāo fù had said in her parting words that she feeds on the suffering of mortals, that she felt it as a compulsion. Such a life is anathema to the son of the guardian spirit Jaleniniqel, and to one extent or another the whole of his pantheon. Koaring still feels the temptation, the sickly reassurance that once he partakes of the Hags' corruption he won't mind it any longer. Yet he finds that each moment he resists makes the next moment easier to get through. That he would be unpained after his transformation is only a speculation, his current horror is very present in his mind.

Now he only needs to invent a way to free his daughter from the same corruption, preferably without becoming an enemy of Baba Yāo fù or fighting her directly against the malus of her hexes.

Yeah. Only.

"Unless Dwarf was already max-stressed out by other factors." — This is the difficulty for investigating insanity and red arrows. Stress is known to be stored as a perpetual sum. The bucket in your analogy is not checked on a month-by-month basis; the bucket is never emptied. Thus reaching the breaking point represents the accumulated total of all things that a dwarf has experienced since the first tick they entered the embark.

Dwarf Fortress doesn't show that sum in any meaningful way, only the recent thoughts and a handful of long term memories. There is a terrible information deficit here. Meaning that, yes, a dwarf may sit at 99,999 for quite a while until a single drop of rain pushes them over.

This is why Loci's experiment is so compelling: it is deliberately set up to exclude all thoughts that are not from focus needs. And when it is run, dwarfs don't accumulate significant stress relative to other known or suspected causes. (I recall it was something like 6 points in ten years, when the danger mark is ~100,000)

(The perpetual sum method makes it just as easy to go the other way; as it did prior to the stress & memories rewrite of 0.44.10, when the majority of dwarves accumulated such a deep reserve of good thoughts over a lifetime that they were in a state of bliss no matter the circumstances. I would be surprised if such a method can ever be mathematically "balanced" across a suitably wide range of play styles to give meaningful, non-extreme stories to the bulk of the DF audience.)

Saga of the Goat

Dun stares at Koaring for a few seconds, considering both his proposal and his curious response.

"I suspect assistance will be excessive... but I do wish to perform exceedingly well in this class. This would probably be a good arrangement."

She glances between the two gods as though evaluating them.

"Speaking of family matters and pacts, and as long as I have both candidates on hand: Would either of you be interested in experimenting with divine offspring? I desire a messenger to ferry communications and materials for me, but only a god can traverse the magma chamber. The offspring of two gods might suffice, and would be an interesting experiment regardless. If you are not interested in servants I would be willing to pay in other currencies."

"Ah, as long as we are cooperating, I noticed the menagerie you —"

Koaring's voice trails off as Dun gets her request in first. His eyes grow wild as he is proposed his second child in an Age he had expected none. "No!" he shouts, startling himself. He thought he had better control than this. "Leave me out of it! You don't know what you're doing!" Burning with embarrassment, he hurries away to his private quarters. His shame is all the more acute knowing that until the Saga of the Ox he had been contemplating whether he might benefit from exactly such an arrangement.

---

---

Saga of the Rooster -> Saga of the Dog

Koaring spends an a long time simply staring at the Gourd of Corruption, such that he hardly notices the change from one Saga to the next.

The Gourd is an unquestionable triumph, and yet he has so many questions. The simplest: how could he have succeeded so well when he still feels the lingering effect of Baba Yāo fù's enchantment? The hardest: should he accept his defeat and join his lover and his daughter, or should he continue to fight on the side of Peanut Village with the proof sitting in front of him that he could still improve their lives? Somewhere in-between: if he doesn't consume it right now, just what in the abyss is he going to do with a house-sized fruit full of consolidated malice?

The answer to the simple question is all around him as he looks out over the enormous, miraculous crops he has created. After his long stint with the Amazons, he had begun thinking almost exclusively in mortal terms of bravery and achievement. Small wonder the Emperor of Scholars had laughed at him when he said he wanted to outdo his Guildmistress in honor: in one saga he has performed an act that this entire village of mortals could never match in several generations. And he only did it when he forgot his own preoccupations long enough to stop fiddling around with the crops like a mortal farmer and start to work on a divine scale.

Koaring has the sense, true or not, that his classmates (with the possible exception of the nameless amnesiac) have more experience than he at flexing their powers. So. He cannot change them today. But he can, he must, start imagining his own actions more boldly and more creatively if he is to earn his place among them. Even if he does succumb to the temptations of his corrupt lover, he would still be crushed underfoot unless he can become quite a bit stronger than she is. So. What better place to learn and to practice than at the Academy of the Gods?

Koaring hauls the Gourd of Corruption (resource 15) back to the Academy and stashes it in his private room. He's not certain how well it will keep there, but unwilling to risk the common storage for now. What new trouble would he face if one of his classmates put it to use? Worse, what if it vanishes and he loses his chance to remake himself in his new family's image? Not to mention, it certainly adds variety to his coursework collection of plants!

Saga of the Horse

Koaring finds it difficult at first to trawl for specimens while managing the wind board, until he switches to his dual right arms for casting the net. Even then it is a new activity for him and he slips more than once. His swan mother's heritage allows him to recover easily in the water, of course. He slightly envies the eight-armed classmate's ease of manipulation. In other circumstances, perhaps, he would have made an effort to engage her in chatting, but the events of this Age have left him disinclined toward small talk.

He busies himself with discoveries instead. The "maiden's tears" sounds more useful for mortals than gods, and he doubts the hags are susceptible to its poison. He doesn't know for sure, though, one more reminder of his failure to learn more about their weaknesses. "Evergrowth" on the other hands is fascinating. He extends his divine senses and although he might not catch the whole secret of its creation he can observe the similarities between it and each of the other species in the water: a telltale wave in the blade here, a notably oblong air bladder there, the evergrowth borrows a little bit from everything around it. Koaring wonders what would happen if it was placed in a truly sterile environment without other plant life to copy, but that is not an experiment he can try in the middle of the lake. In some small part he is pleased to discover that even though his pride as a warrior may be shattered, his inclination with plants (and algae) is undiminished.

Given what he has seen of the dolphin-headed god's personality so far, he is not surprised to learn that his future plans are not focused far in advance. It is a mindset that Koaring can appreciate. He wonders how a freshman is supposed to know of any interesting places in the plane to recommend. He certainly isn't going to suggest the corrupted forest, the only location with which he has any familiarity.

---

Saga of the Goat - Divine Miracles class

Koaring remains uncharacteristically quiet throughout the introductory class. (Though who knows whether the room full of relative strangers will detect the difference?) Professor Yínfà frightens him somewhat; he imagines the powerful goddess judging his behavior and finding him lacking. Although he has not strictly speaking broken any Academy rules, or least not any conveyed to him, he nevertheless holds himself at fault for conceiving a daughter upon the evil hag so soon after being pointedly discouraged against it.

The pair of senior students cause him almost as much discomfort. In his raw and nervous state it is difficult for him to disentangle exactly why: the laws protecting freshman should be practically inviolable with such a powerful teacher and class advisor keeping watch. All the same, the presence of total strangers given access to the safest place he knows cannot improve his mood.

Reviewing his notes in the twilight of the Saga, Koaring notes the three assignments to carry out. At least reporting on a failure will be no problem, he thinks grimly to himself. He is at such a disadvantage against the hags of the corrupt forest that he is sure to botch whatever he tries.

* * *

After class he approaches his classmates Qu and Dun: "I . . . I do not trust those seniors. I can't see how they would get around the restrictions placed on them, but my gut feeling is that they would act to our disadvantage if they could."