TreeQuest: Magitech (Riot Quest)

Turn 29 Combat Results

One Tree used the same "possible message to the Last Star" trick a few times, but received no obvious reply. Aside from, apparently, the youngest Yuadore spectacularly crying every time the Forest attempted to send a message - though it only happened three times, so that was still a possible coincidence.

One Tree has consistently tried to sense the Natural Energies or Magic of the world. This time, it did find something - though not, perhaps, what it was looking for. Specifically, every piece of Magic cast radiates a tiny bit of Magic energy that will linger on the caster and the surroundings of the spell - an incredibly subtle thing, but potentially useful for finding traces of Magics previously cast. When trying to find "Natural Magic," the Forest's Sensing Trees eventually picked up a general background fog (or radiation?) of long-gone Spells. This background Magic is extremely weak and isn't strongly attuned to any Element in particular, as far as you can tell, aside perhaps from Magic itself. While this is probably not what the Tree wanted to sense, it is potentially useful to explore - and, additionally, the Sensing Trees are now able to filter it out of their Senses, simplifying future attempts at scanning for Natural Magic (or other odd, subtle, and/or esoteric effects).

One Tree, by analyzing the many different ways attacks bounce off the Shields of the Forest, came up with a core theory for a Reflective Shield upgrade - which the Forest is fairly certain is a very specialized case of Justice Magic. While the current prototype makes the Shields a dozen times more fragile, that's something the Forest is fairly certain it can fix. The simplest solution, most likely, will be to accept a fairly weak Reflection effect (perhaps 1/10th of incoming damage initially?) in exchange for the Shields losing no toughness whatsoever, though Shield toughness and Reflection seem to be something of a tradeoff, with time and effort allowing a slow increase to both. (Research project gained - Shield successes will contribute. +2 Raise the Shield successes this turn.)

One Tree worked on using Lying Magic against the Monsters, which was moderately effective at combat (giving your various Two-Legs extra chances to collect food) but had absolutely no other results such as progress or reduced difficulties.

One Tree worked on designing and building improved Spike Launchers, which are still very much in the prototype stage, but were effective enough at combat (though not yet better than the normal launchers).

A variety of Trees made attempts that contributed mildly to projects and/or combat, but were not major breakthroughs. (Relevant entries listed with the write-in, inside the Rolls spoiler, and labeled "Minor result.")

The Shield held with few true concerns - save for one or two moments of peril, as truly exceptional Monsters attacked. Similarly, the Empty Void kept attacks down somewhat, and (presumably) continued blocking off any attempt at Scrying the Forest from outside.

The Forest put in a massive amount of effort into Rock Hunting… and found nothing. Indeed, at the end of an incredibly detailed and rather paranoid survey, the Forest is absolutely certain that, if there is anything to find, it can't be found by the Forest currently or with Elder Sensing Trees (with all planned upgrades including anything added this turn). Thus, the Forest is fairly confident that this Vision was misleading - with slight chances of 'misinterpreted' or 'the Rock is just that advanced.' On the upside, the Forest is fairly certain that it is also under no Illusions at the moment - since checking for those was one of the actions required to be certain of the search's results - and the Forest has made considerable progress on the Elder Sensing Trees (50% of Rock Hunting progress contributes, at normal Turn rates). Additionally, the Forest found - at quite some range, and long buried a dozen feet underground in an old landslide - an Ancient Technology power supply, which looks like it could be wired into the Laser, allowing for a certain number of free Laser strikes at night.

Between Illusion Search and the effects of Rock Hunting, the Forest is quite certain it is under no Illusions, and has learned some about the Shadow-Spinners and their Illusions. (+5 effective successes to Study Illusions.)

Betty Grimm was helpful in the defense of Talanburg, as were the Trees there - another point in your collective favor in public opinion. Killing Monsters tends to endear you to the Monsters' would-be victims; who knew?

The Forest made small bits of progress on analyzing Advanced Movement and the Magic-Drain power, and tested the results on invaders. (Research multiplied by 0.125; damage applied as normal.)

The Forest performed so much analysis of Monsters that it gained significant (50%) insight into Monster Energy.

Also note that the Forest gained +2 Resources from various Magic-Drain uses.

---

The first Monster to show up was also the single largest. A Rattling Skeleton, twenty feet tall and shaking the ground (as well as rattling its own bones), stomped towards Newton Village from the northeast. Old Man Materson met it in the outskirts of the Village, and everyone could feel him gearing up for a serious fight.

"Everyone" included, apparently, the Rattling Skeleton. It gave him what you are fairly certain was a wary look, backed off a few steps, changed direction ninety degrees to head northeast, and walked away.

Materson, privately, was shocked. "Didn't actually expect that to work," he admitted quietly. (GM note: 1 in 4 chance; I wasn't expecting it to work either!)

All in all, you're thankful. And, as it so happened, Materson and the Sword Tree (which was running up at that point to help) still got to slay some Skeletons. A number of smaller Skeletons (human-sized) were following the big one, and several of them kept right on their original course without turning. In short order, Materson's Fire disintegrated those Skeletons that the Sword Tree didn't smash. (+1 free Swordstreeship effective success.)

None of them were wearing fuzzy pink slippers, which reassured the Seer Tree for no reason anyone could comprehend. Nor, indeed, were they wearing anything - pink or otherwise, slippers or otherwise. Though a few were holding weapons. (Why that question occurred to the Seer Tree, even the Tree itself couldn't say.)

A foe encountered once before showed up. Maybe it was, truly, the same foe - the Forest wasn't sure how to tell. But the wraith-like Nameless something fought by the Unpredictable Tree, or another of its kin, showed up at the Forest and basically slid straight through the Shield without interacting with it at all. Then it started chopping holes in Trees - or trying to.

The Sensing Trees tried to scan it and - reported nonsense. Temperatures simultaneously tens of thousands of degrees below zero, and so high as to be immeasurable? Immunity to Magic, or complete transparency to Magic - despite Magic attacks clearly working on it, when tested? That it didn't exist? That it did, and was an Illusion? That it had existed once but did no longer? That it was Living Void? That it had no relation to Void whatsoever? For once, the incredible Sensing Trees were firmly outmatched. Though, admittedly, it was possible the Sensing Trees might have better results once upgraded to Elder - and, indeed, you've added "analyzing these things" to the list of planned upgrades in the planned Elder Sensing Tree design. Thankfully, due to considerable effort, the Forest could be reasonably certain that it wasn't preventing the Forest from understanding the Sensing Trees' results, or any similar Illusion effect - the Forest's mind was its own.

Clearly under attack, the Forest tried half-a-dozen different offense actions, just to see what worked: Bees, Ants, Lasers (thankfully this was during the day), Spikes, Exploding Nuts, Melee attacks, Fire from the Lesser Fire Salamander, Death from the Bear, and Magic-Drain. Of all of these, Magic-Drain and only Magic-Drain was a bad idea - the resulting Magic was wrong (though in a very different way from Malice) and damaged whatever Tree tried to take it in - and, thankfully, the Forest immediately noticed and stopped (Targeting and Analyze successes). By contrast, "throwing as many types of attack as possible at it" seemed incredibly effective; its phasing ability seemed to be increasingly less effective the more types of attack it was dealing with. Indeed, the Forest put two points of Laser damage as a test - and the second seemed to do no additional damage from the first.

Nonetheless, under the weight of several effective attacks, it quickly dissipated and faded into nothingness.

A slight distortion to the world, that had grown with its presence, faded with it. Again, not Malice, as far as the Sensing Trees could tell. Probably the "damage to the world if you aren't careful / it isn't careful" mentioned.

The single most annoying Monster this turn was a small birdlike Monster (bird: looks most similar to mundane Owls and Ravens - the size of a good-sized Owl, though with nineteen legs that somehow worked together effectively) with impossibly sharp claws and beak (capable of cutting through solid oak with ease) and a mid-range relatively weak Magic Curse effect. While it was easily stopped by the Shield, it nonetheless was an utter nuisance. It showed up near the turn's start, just after nightfall, and stayed just out of easy range until just before dawn, when it left. This happened for seven nights straight, forcing the Forest to keep its Creatures under cover and being generally quite distracting. On the seventh night, the Elder Defender Ent managed to shoot a volley of Spikes at it - only for it to dodge. On the eighth night, the Forest (and Avo and Gadro) had to heal several Corvids that tried to gang up on it - its dodges and attacks were uncanny. On the ninth night, the Forest resolved to just shoot it with a Laser and burn the Resources to fire at night - so, of course, it didn't show up. (Cost: 5 Resources healing several Corvids from what would have been fatal wounds.)

One of the easiest Monsters to defeat this turn was called an Ominous Shadow. A vague, winged Monster that tends to hover a few thousand feet up in the air, out of range of most weapons in this day and age. From that range it slowly drains its current prey of Energy (and Magic) - at a rate that can't be survived for long by even the most vigorous of Two-Legs. For the very brief time between its attack (on the tallest of your Trees actually) and your response, you felt like it was draining about one Resource per five minutes - but it barely had five seconds before you carved it to pieces with a beam of coherent light (3 effective Laser successes). You did learn something from it, though, about the process of Draining Magic.

With your new ability to tell Monster from (strange) Animal, you identify that a local legend is both real, and technically Monstrous - Monstrous in the sense that it has a faint Connection to the Source of Monster Energy(?), but little to no Malice. You witness - at quite some range - a Tea-Kettler! A generally harmless Monster that looks a lot like a Corgi, but likes to run around backwards while making a high-pitched whistle like a teakettle. Its whistle is a moderate Magical deterrent to anything that wishes it harm, but the Tea-Kettler is essentially harmless otherwise. … Honestly, you're half tempted to adopt the thing; it's not like it has to eat much.

And, indeed, your Wolves and Ben Grimm promptly followed up on that thought, giving you one (amusing) additional Monster. With significant backup from the mentally vigilant Forest, they also killed a Shadow-Spinner that had been passing by and tried to eat it. Said Shadow-Spinner was apparently not from the main nearby colony, though you're never quite sure of such things.

Another set of Monsters were only marginally more dangerous. Two dozen Slimes tried oozing into your territory, but each and every one proved weak to Water Magic. The few that you were otherwise vaguely worried about proved cripplingly vulnerable. The first Slime ran into the Beavers - who are experts in Water Magic - and after that said Beavers cheerfully volunteered to handle all the rest. Indeed, three of the most harmless Slimes were kept as pets (requiring no upkeep but also generating no obvious bonuses… they could probably eat mundane invasive plants?).

There were quite a few Monsters that you'd seen before, as well, that were fought and defeated by your various Creatures and Allies, with a few attacks from the Forest (including the Elder Defender Ent) for good measure, but that weren't dangerous enough to warrant mention. Nor, with the Forest's extensive analysis and overwatch, did any of them do any damage whatsoever. They did, however, give you a modicum of usable Resources (mostly mineral variants), significant Monster Energy analysis experience, and the thankfulness of Newton Village. (+5 Resources, 10 free effective successes to Monster Energy, and +1 Newton Village Favor (8->9)).

The Forest noted that Lasers - especially with their recent anti-Monster upgrade - were particularly effective against nearly all Monsters.

Marta Yarrow the Herbalist made some progress fixing Newton Village's food situation, working with the Village to try to figure out what Monsters were at least somewhat edible, and what the Forest could easily make edible with the right effort.

Several members of Irn were unwilling to stay behind your defenses and made a point of helping kill various enemies - with Archers being their greatest overall contribution, but several individuals (including Sara, to no one's surprise) distinguishing themselves.

But at the very end of the turn, a massive Miniature Roc showed up - a Monstrous Bird large enough to carry off a full-grown Human, and nearly as tough as its namesake. With it came a wave of Monstrous Ants, distracting the Forest. Though everyone fought mightily - the Death and Telekinesis expert Bears, Arthur Scrat, Avo and Gadro, the actual (rather furious) Ants, and a large herd of Deer, notably all teamed up to cut a swathe through the attackers and save a lot of the surrounding wilderness - this severely limited the available combatants for fighting the Roc.

The Miniature Roc tried to assail Newton Village directly - initially targeting the livestock. A token attempt at negotiations broke down almost immediately - it was ornery, spiteful, and mentally tough enough to ignore any attempts at convincing it to change. The Forest would have used Lasers on it, if it hadn't attacked at night. However, despite these setbacks, the Trees using Telekinesis, with a bit of help from the Elder Weather Tree, were able to bring it down to the ground. There, three Trees - the Commander Ent, the Tall Most Ancient Tree, and the Elder Defender Ent - took the fight to it in person.

The first goal was to damage one wing enough that the Telekinesis-using Trees wouldn't have to strain so hard to keep it ground-bound.

The Elder Defender Ent was actually able to accomplish this with a scorching lance of Ice/Fire - the Roc's feathers were Fire-resistant, but not Fire-immune, and once they caught, the Monster started taking steady damage, and definitely lacked sufficient lift to reach the sky again. The smell of burnt feathers filled the currently-fallow farmland. But before all was said and done, this single attack left the terrifying Monster half dead. (8 base successes *1.1*1.03 Forest bonuses *1.5 Feathers *0.5 Roc-toughness *3 Ice/Fire bonus = 20.39 successes. 19.61 HP remaining.) The one downside of this attack: it blocked the Bees from easily assisting.

After that though, the fight was a slog. Three skilled combatants, lunging to strike, dancing away to dodge. One terrifying central figure, a Monster that could terribly wound (and possibly kill) any of the three if it only got its talons on them. Bits of branches went flying, and trickles of sap and black (even blacker under the daylight) blood seeped into the Earth. Time and time again, the Trees survived only thanks to the vigilance and analysis of the Forest, warning them a split-second before each attack.

Ultimately, the Roc felt itself on its last legs, and decided to take down as much as it could before it died. It charged straight at Newton Village, Malice spilling from it.

On the outskirts of the village, just thirty feet from the Yuadore's house, the Tall Most Ancient Tree caught up and tackled it. The Tree was nearly split in two by its retaliatory swipes, but bought just enough time for the Elder Defender Ent's Vine/Roots to lash the Monster to the ground - allowing the Commander Ent to finally finish it off. (4 Resources needed to repair Tree. Total damage dealt to Newton Village: one terrified baby crying miserably on and off for about six hours before settling down for a good nap; he was fully back to his cheerful self by the next evening.)

Steve Robertson had been heroically standing between it and Newton Village, but was honestly relieved when it died before reaching him. He'd killed a fair few Monsters across the turn, but this one was a bit beyond him.

Given the chance to examine its corpse, you noted that its Skin and Flesh were oddly Bone-like or Stone-like. Its body was unlikely to biodegrade well, due to the aforementioned odd nature, coupled with its flesh containing an unusual variety of moderate poisons and toxins. In particular, it appeared to be made partly out of silicon, which is mostly indigestible even to the Forest - much less to your Creatures or the Two-Legs. (+2 successes to Flesh, +2 to Earth, and +2 to Lethal Pollen.)

As a side-note, the closest link between the Miniature Roc and the Seer Dream that the Forest was able to discern, was a marking on its corpse that looked vaguely like the "rock" in the Dream. Sadly, a second survey revealed that several Trees have (and have, in some cases, had for years) markings just as similar (if, indeed you are paranoidly looking for a blob of approximately that shape). So, for that matter, did multiple inhabitants of Newton Village and the Irn Refugees. So do clouds occasionally - at least one every few months by your memories. All in all, you concluded with near-certainty that it didn't (at least by itself) mean anything. You are certain that the Roc was carrying no detectable surveillance - technological or Magical - and that it didn't have anything else obviously odd (for a Monster of its size and strength).

…That said, you decided to burn the body to ashes, and carefully retrieve and dispose of any Blood that had leaked into the Earth. Just in case. It's not like you could get much nutrition out of something that strange and toxic, anyway.

---

The Unpredictable Tree was, of course, isolated and alone, adventuring. To fight off Monsters, it… mostly either ignored them, easily killed them with massively superior strength, or used Movement Magic to run away. And it had many opportunities to practice that last one - some sort of Termite-like Monster colony would have terribly injured it, if it hadn't learned the Movement techniques. It tried various Teleportation tricks, but wasn't able to get anything significant working at this time (teleporting a single grain of soil is very impressive for a novice, but deeply ineffectual when you want to transport yourself). It made a point of ending the turn as close to home as possible, planning to return home at the next opportunity. (GM note: This is happening at the same time as the previous turn; given what we already know did and didn't happen in this time period, the Unpredictable Tree couldn't make it home this turn short of a critical success enabling outright teleportation. But, there was study and use of Movement Magic - so some progress at least. +4 effective successes to Fast-Travel Tome: Movement (Movement Research).)

The Mad Science Tree lived up to its name by seeing a horde of Monsters appear, and immediately wondering the logical question - to any self-respecting Mad Scientist - "If I cut this up, what happens?" Well, in general, the answer tended to be, "the Monsters die." Also in general, this tended to please the Ant Colony, who (with reason) viewed most Monsters as threats.

That said, systematic analysis suggests several things:

1. The Malice Storm didn't strengthen individual Monsters to any significant degree. It did, however, obviously result in far more Monsters around - almost certainly at least partially through creating more Monsters.
2. The Malice Storm was intense enough to stand a nontrivial chance of killing individual Monsters, thus they took shelter. (Yes, this is generally similar to "how Trees don't like floods due to too much water." With a side-order of "I expect to get washed away if I'm not careful" - which is also very much a concern during floods.)
3. Physically, most of the Monsters killed shared some of the usual properties of Monsters: designed for aggression rather than normal life, lacking an obvious method of reproduction, ignoring some of the limits of biology and mundane Physics thanks to the Energy from their Source. Additionally, however, a lot of them seemed to have remarkably little wear-and-tear to their bodies, as if they had been born mere weeks ago.
4. A variety of further information on Monster Energy. (4 dice; 2 successes.)

---

The Moles have grown marginally more numerous and somewhat more efficient. Instead of granting the Forest +25% to ONE of Growth or Survival, they will always grant +15% to both.

Christmas is coming up next turn, and the Forest (and Newton Village, and Irn) are all looking forward to it! Unless sometree objects, the Forest will contribute to the feast.

---

Author's Notes on Rules changes:

First of all, sorry a few weeks turned into more than six months!

A lot of the slowness is simply on my end - overall mental state, IRL events, and my expectations for this quest (aka perfectionism).

Another good chunk of slowness came from the following sequence:

1. I realized I needed better scripting to cut down on number-crunching busywork.
2. I tried to hilariously overengineer the scripting.
3. I spent a while on item 2.
4. I realized I was being silly and set up a much smaller script to just use the existing Spreadsheet from last turn better.
5. I got back to writing the turn.

However, there are several things within the quest that I think could be improved, and I'm hereby making some changes to attempt to do so.

The Creature votes are getting annoying to constantly analyze and calculate, and basically never exceed the necessary ¼ of the vote-count. So, rules change:

1. Creatures and Allies always give a set bonus during normal turns, interrupted only by the most extraordinary of conditions.
2. You may set 3 Creature and/or Ally Missions per turn. These are write-in options. The count is limited by my ability to write per turn, not by any player or in-universe constraint. The magnitude of what one can reasonably accomplish, however, grows with your Creatures and Allies. These will be chosen the same way as Focus Actions always have been, except that they are Write-Ins - though "Assist X project" is practically always a valid Write-In for this purpose.

I'm fairly confident that this will work nicely, but if it winds up being annoying, I can change it further.

Write-ins are slowing the quest down, as are the large number of active plot-threads and things to keep in mind. I've been brainstorming different solutions, and I want to try one for now - with the expectation that this is likely to be further tweaked. Specifically, I'm planning to post the working draft of Turn 30 in an accessible Google Doc. It'll be set to allow Suggestions. Then readers can comment, and potentially gain Omake rewards for being helpful. In particular, I'm hoping for help sketching out write-ins, Newton Village and Irn happenings, and probably some other stuff.

---

Actions, Turn 30:










Summary

Your Votes should look like the following:

[ ][Action] Action
[ ][Focus] Action
[ ][Focus] Action x2
[ ][Focus] Action x3
[ ][Focus] Action x4
[ ][AutoFocus] Automated Focus; vote by plan
[ ][Creatures and Allies] Write-in
[ ][Creatures and Allies] Write-in x2
[ ][Creatures and Allies] Write-in x3

Newcomers should add one of the following:

[ ][Tree] Heart Tree
[ ][Tree] Mind Tree
[ ][Tree] Root Tree

This vote will always be open.