Search Requests

[glencolans]

SEARCH REQUESTS

At game start, the map is completely unexplored and covered by a "fog of war" obscuring its features. New characters will be randomly dropped onto the island's shores; from there, to uncover tiles on the map and figure out more about where they are, search requests are required to document movement, attempt to uncover hidden materials and passages, discover or confront dangers, find old ruins and create new settlements, and potentially, solve puzzles related to the mystery of the island itself.

RULES AND GUIDELINES

• Search requests are a required mechanic of this game. A search request for the current AC cycle must be submitted in order to pass AC without a strike.
• Mistakes in search requests will never be penalized. Don't be afraid to eyeball a distance or make an approximate guess; if the math doesn't quite match up, or the path doesn't exist, I will offer alternate destinations and work with you in order to decide how the search request will resolve.
• Search requests will rarely be immediately fatal. Unless your character is doing something intentionally reckless, I will do my best to offer paths of escape for any sudden dangers that arise.
• You can be as precise or as vague as you want. If you want to exactly plot out the squares your character will travel through and search every IC day, that is totally fine. It's also fine to simply report that your character is staying in one place all month, or to give a starting point and a desired destination, with a general request to search a wide area. Just note that, the more vague you are in your request, the more I will extrapolate to fill in the blanks.
• Retroactive/backdated search requests are allowed. They just can't be used for the current month's AC if they fall outside of the current month's AC period, or overwrite a previously submitted search request. Forward-dated search requests are also allowed as long as they fall within the same IC day that the request was posted (for example, if you post a search request on IC Day 30 morning, you can make that search request last for the entirety of IC day 30, not just the morning of).
• Thoroughly searching a square, rather than just traveling through it, halves movement through that square. So if you choose to search every square along a path, you'll only travel half as far as someone moving with purpose to a destination. Remember that simply traveling through a square will still fully reveal it.
• IC Days are split into three 8-hour increments. Each of these corresponds to one OOC day. Morning is from 4AM -> 11:59AM, Day is from 12PM -> 7:59PM, and Night is 8PM -> 3:59AM.
• Several examples of search requests are provided below to help illustrate how they work. If you still have questions, please ask them in the FAQ (or in your search request!).

MAP REFERENCE/TRAVEL CONDITIONS

TRAVEL CONDITIONS | IC DAYS 15 → 17

MORNING

DAY

NIGHT

BEACH

OCEAN*

JUNGLE

FOOTHILLS

MOUNTAINS

4 squares/hour
(32 total)
3 square visibility

4 squares/hour
(32 total)
5 square visibility

4 squares/hour
(32 total)
1 square visibility

2 squares/hour
(16 total)
3 square visibility

2 squares/hour
(16 total)
5 square visibility

2 squares/hour
(16 total)
1 square visibility

2 squares/hour
(16 total)
1 square visibility

2 squares/hour
(16 total)
1 square visibility

1 square/hour
(8 total)
0 square visibility

2 squares/hour
(16 total)
2 square visibility

2 squares/hour
(16 total)
3 square visibility

1 square/hour
(8 total)
1 square visibility

1 square/hour
(8 total)
5 square visibility

1 square/hour
(8 total)
7 square visibility

1 square/hour
(8 total)
3 square visibility

*The average human can only tread water for three hours

LEGEND

- Preexisting Structure

- Ocean

- Reef

- Deep Water

- River

- Natural Landmark

- Beach

- Jungle

- Mangroves

- Character-Made Landmark

- Foothills

- Mountain

Click on any of the map tiles for details.

I

II

III

IV

V

VI

VII

VIII

IX

X

XI

XII

XIII

XIV

XV

XVI

SUBMISSIONS

# | A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z
All new characters will be given a toplevel to this post. To submit a search request, fill out the below form and copy/paste it as a response to your toplevel.

<b>IC DATES:</b> <b>STARTING SQUARE:</b> <b>ENDING SQUARE:</b> <b>DETAILS:</b>

IC DATES: The IC dates the search request covers (I would also recommend putting this in the subject line to make it easier to keyword search later). You can use whole days, partial days, or a combination of either. To verify what IC days line up with real-world days and events, consult the Calendar.

STARTING SQUARE: The square your character is starting their search request on, format TILE.COLUMN.ROW. This should line up with your previous search request, or your starting location if newly arrived/revived.

ENDING SQUARE: The square your character is ending their search request on. If you're not sure where they'll end up (the area is unexplored/your character has a vague idea of where they want to go/you're not sure on the math/etc.), you can give a more rough answer here. Something like "they want to make it to Tile II," or "as close to II.AA.3 as possible" are perfectly valid answers.

DETAILS: The meat of your request. This is where you describe:

1. The path your character is taking,
2. The squares you want them to search,
3. Any special actions your character is taking during this period of time (or inaction), and
4. Any other special notes or questions you might have about this request.

Again, you can provide as much or as little information as you want; saying that your character is simply moving from point A to point B without searching anything is 100% acceptable.

NAVIGATION

Comments

Day 34

[cactusy]

Here.

[glencolans]

Morning 034
Starting Square: VII.I.6
Ending Square: VII.K.8
Duration: 8 hours
General Search Results:

• bar magnet
• crude jewelry - several pieces of tinfoil wrapped around each other to form a loose bracelet, painted red and yellow
• mysterious weapon shell - same design as the one found yesterday, same condition
• charcoal
• metal shiv
• polished stone (fluorite)
• small cardboard box

As Shaw travels southeast around the cabin, her higher vantage will let her see definite signs of activity that were not there the previous day - the slight movement of opening and closing window shutters and doors, some shaking trees, the startled shriek of an animal. She can't tell exactly what is going on, but there's definitely some manner of things happening in and around the VII.J.8 vicinity.

[cactusy]

As she onward, are there any particular spots where she might be able to get a clearer view without giving away her position?

[glencolans]

I routed her from VII.I.6 -> VII.I.9 -> VII.K.9, which is basically as close to the cabin as she can get without attempting to jump on top of it from the cliffside. She could try that, of course. Otherwise, available scouting locations, such as tall trees with a nicer vantage, are conspicuously absent along this ridgeline and in the valley below.

[cactusy]

While attempting to surveil from on top of the cabin is not... not something she'd do, she's going to confer with Rust (using their ridiculous poetry code) and see how things are going with him before going ahead with anything too drastic! I'll pop back over with an answer in a bit.

[cactusy]

OKAY, after chatting with Rust, Shaw will indeed be attempting to get herself down onto the cabin roof as quietly and covertly as possible! That said, while she knows how to jump/fall safely, she's trying to avoid suicidal recklessness here, so she'll only do it if she feels there's a solid chance she'll succeed without giving herself a serious injury! (OOCly I'd fine with it not going well, she would just have to have good reason to believe that it could.)

[glencolans]

The distance down from the clifftop to the cabin's roof is nearly half a kilometer, and at least fifty feet into the valley. Unless Shaw has a way to control her descent or break her fall, I think she would realize that this would be a risky decision before she makes the attempt.

[cactusy]

Would climbing down be possible?

[glencolans]

It would, yes! It's a sheer cliff, but it wouldn't be impossible with the right equipment and skill.

[cactusy]

ALAS, while she has rope and carabiners, she gave her climbing pick and piton to the airfield crew; she'll table this idea for now!

[cactusy]

Regarding this! Rust will give Shaw the whistle that means "head's up/warning", but not the whistle that means "fall back immediately", so she will choose to continue onwards with the plan outlined here, just moving extra cautiously.

EDIT to add some info about her skillset if that would be useful: highly observant, usually has good instincts for when the Vibes^TM are off (exception: trusting her government bosses even when the evidence of their betrayal was staring her in the face), some training in wilderness field work but not to expert-level.

[glencolans]

Day 034
Starting Square: VII.K.8
Ending Square: VII.K.8
Duration: 3 hours
General Search Results:

• quiver (empty)
• small cardboard box
• two arrows

Shaw spends the first two hours of this request moving into and observing from a tree in square VII.K.7. Then, when she receives Rust's whistle, she moves back into square VII.K.8 to follow the trail of blood towards the cabin.

For the most part, Shaw's foreknowledge of the dangers in this area, plus her exceptional caution and awareness, keep her from running into any overt traps. It isn't until she's skirting around a obviously-laid leg snare that she feels a sharp sting, and then quickly realizes that she's scraped against some metal barbs tucked within the branches of a prickly bush. A few minutes after that she starts to feel extremely lightheaded and disoriented in general.

The blood trail is leading practically to the cabin's doorstep. Will she continue?

[cactusy]

SORRY SUBMITTED MY COMMENT TOO SOON let me ask Carolyn a question first and then get back to you.

[aluminumandash]

SO SHAW'S PLAYER IS DEEP IN THE WILDERNESS AT THE MOMENT (method rp) but she got in touch via PM to say: She's going to whistle out a questioning/"what's up"/"u good" tone to Rust; if he indicates that all is well, she'll continue on towards the cabin despite her predicament, but if he gives her another warning, even if it's not a firm "fall back", she'll retreat!

Hopefully it's kosher for me to pass this along! (And I figured I'd let you decide the timing of the whistle wrt Rust's thread with CG so he can respond accordingly!)

[cactusy]

What Carolyn said! I may occasionally have internet like I do now, but she has full NPC rights for Shaw.

[glencolans]

Shaw whistles her question...and receives no response, because at this point Rust is quickly bleeding out further up the trail. Without any response at all, would Shaw continue?

[cactusy]

When she hears no response, she'll retreat to look for him!

[aluminumandash]

noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

CW: descriptions of gore, hallucinations, implied drug use

[glencolans]

Day 034 ➜ Morning 035
Starting Square: VII.K.8
Ending Square: VII.K.17
Duration: 21 hours
General Search Results: (none)

Things get blurry after that. It feels like Shaw spends hours just wandering back through the trail of trees that she took to get here, looking for traps, looking for signs of Rust. At one point she sees Rust's body - or someone's body, it's hard to tell on account of it being flayed - lying in a puddle of swirling blood. He's gently cradled in a bed of leaves with rays of light streaming in through the canopy overhead. A monster leans over his body, tall and spindly and cloaked in shadow, grinning at her with a mouthful of yellowed fangs. As Shaw staggers forward, the monster hauls the body over its shoulder and slips into the forest. She seems to spend an eternity chasing it. The moon rises, falls, rises again in sepia, falls - seven times in total with the stars spinning in between. It's moving too fast. The jungle's parched trees alight in flames and fill the air with smoke.

As Shaw falls in slow motion to the ground, she feels a rhythmic pulse reverberate through her bones:

.--. .-. . - . -. -.. . .-.
- .... .. ... / .. ... / -- -.-- / ...- . ... ... . .-..

Shaw wakes up at the start of Day 035 in the middle of a section of flattened jungle. She has the absolute worst hangover, but otherwise she is unharmed.