inthenightmods | exploration

exploration

EXPLORATION

ACTIVE EXPLORATION SLOTS: 0/8

Explorations are currently OPEN. They will close again when we run out of active exploration slots.

Building a structure may be done at any time and does not affect the active exploration slots.

•••
The forest engulfing Beacon is dense and uncharted, but that just means there's never a shortage of cool stuff to discover lurking off the beaten path. There's always new locations, plot clues, or extra resources to be found, so although venturing into the woods is always dangerous, the rewards may just outweigh the risks.

Once you come up with a plan, please fill out and submit the form below. We'll respond in one of two ways, depending on the nature of your exploration:

In most cases, we'll respond with a single write-up detailing the outcome of your exploration. For example, characters venturing out into a particular part of the woods may discover a new location! In that case, you'll receive a full description of that new location, along with any other details worth noting, such as forest spirit encounters or difficulties along the way. If your group would then like to react to any of this or explore that location after its discovery, you can then respond with your own write-up of everything your group would investigate, and we'll let you know what happens as a result. And that's it! Then the exploration is wrapped, the location becomes available to the game at large, and you're welcome to thread out any details of the exploration if you like.

In limited cases, an exploration request will open a dialogue between the players and mods to determine the outcome of your exploration. For example, characters attempting to interact with forest spirits may get the chance to play out that encounter, whether it be a pleasant conversation or, uh, the forest spirit trying to kill you, since that happens sometimes. Explorations of this nature will not always result in a response like this, as it'll depend on our availability as mods. If you're interested in doing an exploration like this and don't want to leave it up to chance, PM us! We'll work with you to schedule an encounter.

Regardless of which type of exploration you end up with, what you do during an exploration is entirely up to you, so feel free to get creative! We always try to reward creativity in some way, even if it's not a success in the way that you hoped for.

•••
Before you embark on your quest, here's everything you need to know about explorations:

Exploring uncharted territory is intended to be dangerous, and there is always a risk of failure, injury, and other setbacks. If you're not on board with these risks, exploration may not be in the cards for you.

That said, the exploration form includes an opt-in for serious injury and death. If you aren't interested in having your character(s) at risk for that stuff at this time, you can let us know upfront. Please keep in mind that opting out of serious injury/death does not mean you're opting out of the above risks of failure, injury, and other setbacks. Those risks are always in play during explorations. In addition, while opting out of serious risks doesn't mean you'll get a watered down exploration, some discoveries lurking out in the forest are reserved for risk-taking characters. For example, opting out of serious risks eliminates the chance of running into the hostile green-eyed spirits, so characters interested in pursuing green-eyed spirit plot threads will have to put themselves on the line to do so.

If you choose to opt into the risks of serious injury and death, your character's safety is forfeit and you give the mods the right to maim accordingly (though, of course, we'll check permissions posts in doing so). This does not mean that groups opting into these risks will always be tormented and killed! It's just helpful for us to know your preferences and expectations upfront. Please keep in mind that opting into the risk of serious injury or death applies to the whole group, not just individual characters.

Explorations into the area of Beacon currently occupied by the Parade will always be extra dangerous. Characters will run the risk of encountering the Parade itself, but besides that, the Parade's presence gets all the forest spirits in the area extra revved up, increasing their hostility. We'll give you the "danger zone warning" at the top of the exploration if you're about to head into Parade-infested territory, as characters may be seriously injured or killed at any point during an exploration within the parade route. You can check the Parade's schedule on the calendar page.

Chance of success will be left up to a mix of mod discretion and RNG. We'll typically use a RNG to determine what you find, if anything, but we'll also take player/character ingenuity into account. In short: If you have a solid, creative plan, you're more likely to be rewarded for that. Aimlessly wandering won't always get you nothing, but it's less likely to earn you something neat for your trouble. (However, please do be encouraged to follow the dumb idea that's in your character's heart. We will reward for IC idiocy, too.)

Having torches from the bonfire with you will also increase your chance of success, though be careful: If you lose the torches while exploring, someone will have to recover them or they're lost forever. Additionally, you must request torches through the item request page in order to take them on explorations. Torches not logged through the item requests page are not considered game canon.

Once you receive a mod response to your exploration, you will have one week to tag us back. If that week timer runs out, we'll consider that exploration closed, and mod responses will stop. You're welcome to handwave your own IC conclusion to the exploration at that point. To be extra clear: the time it takes for us mods to respond to your exploration is not included in that time limit. The timer starts fresh each time we tag you back.

Explorations over two weeks old will be wrapped in the next mod response. This is to prevent explorations from dragging on for too long, which will slow up our system, but more importantly, it'll make for awkward timing issues in the game! We don't want to leave players waiting on exploration outcomes to be able to engage with the rest of the game.

Characters may only embark on one exploration at a time, no matter how small. Pretty self explanatory! One at a time, please. If you play more than one character, you may send them on concurrent explorations, but keep in mind that we might deny exploration requests like this to give other players a chance to hop in.

We will only accept a maximum of 8 active explorations at a time. If those 8 slots fill up, we'll close the queue to new submissions until we're able to wrap some of the active adventures. This number is based on mod availability.

Explorations will always be closed during events except under rare special circumstances. Similarly, explorations can't be forward- or back-dated to happen during an event. Go do event things instead!

You can also submit an "exploration" to build a new structure on this page! Just use the appropriate form below.

To EMBARK ON AN EXPLORATION, please fill out the form below:

player name(s): (please list ALL PLAYERS involved with the exploration!)
character(s): (please list ALL CHARACTERS involved with the exploration!)
area of exploration: (please be as specific as possible! we need to know where your character is/is trying to go.)
date(s) of exploration: (you may forward or back date by up to two weeks from the current date.)
plan: (what, specifically, are you doing? this is the place to detail the plan in full, so be sure to include all of the relevant details so that we can factor it all into our response. consider questions like: what's the goal? are you bringing supplies or torches? does anyone have experience or training that could assist with your plan? is anyone already injured or impaired? tell us what your plan is! AS A REMINDER, EXPLORATIONS WILL TYPICALLY ONLY RECEIVE ONE RESPONSE TO DETAIL THE RESULT, so it's important to be clear about your intentions and plans!)
is your group willing to accept risk of serious injury/death? (a simple yes/no is all we need, and please only give ONE ANSWER for the whole group. a "yes" here doesn't automatically mean you'll all die horribly, and a "no" doesn't mean you won't get anything cool. we'll check permissions posts before injuring/killing characters.)

To BUILD A STRUCTURE or ALTER THE SETTING, please fill out the form below:

Please note that with the recent discovery of the medical center, each player may only explore the medical center ONCE for the time being in order to give everyone a chance to get involved. If exploration requests die down and there are still areas to be uncovered, we may lift that rule. We'll make an announcement in the OOC comm should that happen.

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Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Ah! If you would like Billy to have a torch from the bonfire to help with his exploration, mae sure to let us know on the item requests page.

And, whoops, there may have been a slight miscommunication on the posts—they're vertical and sticking out of the ground, and there's two posts on each side of the river. Like these things. There's nothing actually connecting the two sides of the river yet, though Billy has access to enough rope to reach the other side. It (and the posts) are also strong enough to hold his weight!

The debris is too far down for Billy to learn anything else about it right now.

done! and oops my bad asdf re: posts

IN THAT CASE, it'll make things even more efficient for him. he'll try his luck at looping one end of the rope to a post on the opposite side while he ties the other end to a post on his side of the river. after that, he'll just commando crawl his way to the opposite bank.

Success! Billy will absolutely be able to make it to the other side of the river through this method. Though, huh, is he just imagining the skeletal arm that reaches up to grasp his ankle? Fortunately, it misses, barely scraping him with a single bony digit, and sinks back down into the dark and murky water.

Once across, Billy will find himself facing what appears to be the remnants of a long forgotten path. It heads south.

he is going to be slightly startled by that pesky skeletal arm, so he is going to hang back for a hot minute to see if it was just his imagination or if there is actually something in the river. maybe toss a rock in etc.

if nothing comes up, then he will continue down the path.

That pesky arm! When Billy checks out the water afterward, though, it doesn't appear to have been disturbed in any way. Weird.

Same as when he throws in the rock. There's a sploosh as it drops into the water, and then the ripples settle and he's left with nothing for his trouble.

But when he turns to head down the path again, he's hit square in the back with the rock he just threw. It's still wet.

asdf that arm's looking for a fight

he'll be pretty pissed about it, turning around to see if he can catch sight of someone (or something) screwing with him. but he isn't dumb enough to prod the water further. not that he even has the equipment or the tools to do it with. maybe if he had a gun, but since he doesn't, he is going to give the river a final wary glance before he continues on his way.

he will be much more alert of his surroundings now, making sure there aren't any threats nearby or tailing him.

Luckily, the rest of Billy's adventure down the path is relatively uneventful. He'll notice some odd sounds out in the forest, like twigs snapping and something heavy swinging in the trees overhead, but he won't be able to see anyone lurking out there, forest spirits or otherwise.

After a few minutes of what is probably a rather tense walk, Billy will discover... The village! It's a core location, so it's been added to the main post of the setting page. Nice work, Billy.

Would he like to explore any part of the area more thoroughly?

oh sweet, he'll definitely want to take a look around the village!

he'll start with the rec center first. maybe take a look around the gym, auditorium and swimming pool. give it a full sweep. if nothing of interest shows up, he'll move onto a different area.

With just a cursory glance around the rec center, he won't find much that isn't already listed in the description. It's a run-down building in desperate need of some fixing up, but it's a space with a lot of potential. It's also probably quite creepy to poke around in by firelight, so there's that.

The only thing of interest that Billy will find is in the pool area. Next to the water is a pool noodle! Exciting!!!

a pool noodle

if he was more of a fun dude, he would be excited about it too. UNFORTUNATELY, he's just too serious to fully appreciate it. he'll probably be back to take another look around, but for now, it looks like the rec center is turning up empty.

he will head to the library next. check out the different rooms, dig around and maybe see if he can find some more information about beacon from any books, tapes, etc there.

Most of the books at the library seem to be fiction, and some of them are in languages that Billy might not be able to read, with some that he can't even recognize. A lot of them feature bite marks, too. Weird.

If he spends enough time searching, he'll come across a large picture book with photographs of a cozy-looking little village and a lake with a lighthouse, among other locations. The photos were taken in daylight, which makes it difficult to see the resemblance at first, but there's no mistaking it: that village is the very one Billy is currently in.

Of course, spending enough time digging through the shelves means that Billy is in the library for a while. During this time, he is able to hear faint skittering noises here and there. Nothing seems to get too close to him, though.

billy will want to know where the lake with a lighthouse and other locations in the picture book are once he recognizes the village. if the book doesn't provide him with any information on their possible whereabouts, he will continue searching through other books in the library as well as any map collection or archives available.

he'll be too focused on his find to bother checking on the skittering noises, but he will be keeping his guard up.

If Billy pays close attention to the pictures, trying to piece together a map of the town, he'll be able to figure out that the lake and lighthouse are to the north of his current location, which matches up with the layout of Beacon. The other places are more difficult to triangulate, but that odd-looking one seems to be on the coast somewhere, at the edge of the forest. In some photos, it's possible to see mountains nearby.

Whatever was scurrying around seems to have lost interest in Billy, but he can hear the sound of tearing paper from somewhere near the front desk.

it looks like he has a better idea of which direction he'll need to go for at least two of the locations, so he'll want to keep moving forward. taking the book with him (yes, he's gonna try), he'll quietly go investigate what could be at the front desk first.

just in case it's something threatening, he'll have a knife at the ready.

Whatever it is, it's behind the desk, making loud ripping sounds. It's definitely the noise of shredding paper, but it's also the noise of clicking jaws and teeth. Over the counter, Billy can see a white mass bobbing up and down in time with the tearing.

If he peeks over, he'll see a hunched, humanoid figure shrouded in white veils. When it notices him, the figure lifts its head and turns it, presumably, in his direction. Hard to tell what with all the veils. Small pieces of paper flutter out from beneath the lace and cloth, landing on a pile of books that the entity was crouching over. It... looks very much like they were eating them.

The figure, which can reasonably be identified as a forest spirit, stands to full height quickly, as if embarrassed, and folds their hands on the counter. They're rather short, compared to most humans, barely over the top of the desk, and their hands are fittingly stubby with little toddler-like fingers.

They sure do look like they're ready to help Billy check out his book!

it's a good thing billy met daylight and rastus so early on because he would have been #shooketh to find a strange white blob wearing a layer of veils. if it shows no signs of hostility, then he isn't going to pick a fight with it. he will still keep the knife at hand (because better safe than sorry), but he'll keep it lowered for now.

he isn't sure he should be handing the book over to something that was just munching on a pile of them, sooo he'll greet it and ask it a couple of questions first — namely "who are you?" and "do you work here?" with a glance towards the ruined books.

The Librarian(?) considers his questions and nods emphatically beneath their veils. Looking around, they fish out a piece of paper (it doesn't look like it was torn from a book, thankfully) and scrawl a message in haphazard writing:

ME YES

with that response, bill will ask them what their name is and what they can tell him about this village next. he'll also mention that he wants to take the current book he has on him with him.

Ooh, one of the difficult questions. There's a long few moments of consideration before writing:

LIBRAN

small
empty
NO FOOD <(｀^´)>

They underline that last point several times, irritated, before reaching with one hand for that book. Give it, Billy!! They've gotta check it out!! But oh, they remember something, and:

no post ƪƪ’▿’)

What does this mean? Perhaps it's up to the viewer's interpretation.

he still doesn't trust him fully with the book, but he'll hand it over along with a bag of snack he had grabbed from the general store (call it a preventative measure of sorts. if you're gonna eat something, eat that! not the book.)

anyway, he has no clue what "no post" is supposed to mean, so he's gonna ask the blobrarian to clarify. what do you mean no post?

NO POST is rewritten several times, not so much angry as emphasizing. What don't you understand, Billy? No post!

Anyway. The book is taken, the spine stroked with a reverent touch . . . but the snack is instantly snatched away, shoved deep into those layers and layers of robes. There's no sense of pockets in there, but nonetheless, there it disappears. Goodbye, snack.

Now begins the process of checking the book out. It's slow and sacred, and involves a lot of careful stamping on the inside of the cover.

ok ok sheesh no post then! he'll just wait for the librarian to be done, so he can finally take his leave.

Yes good. The Librarian takes quite a while to stamp the hell out of that book, and when they're done, they hold up two stubby fingers. Two weeks. Return it on time.

he will be sure to!

he mostly just wants to find somewhere with better lighting so he can take pics of the book's content or at least sketch out/jot down notes on the locations shown within.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

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