route_1065 | HOENNWEEN: INTRO CHALLENGE LOG

Entry tags:

HOENNWEEN: INTRO CHALLENGE LOG

Who: Hoennween Plot Participants!
Where: Tohjo Falls!
When: Wednesday, October 29th
Summary: You've just received a call from a mysterious voice asking you to come help save the world. This is Day One of The Rest Of Your Life™ — the introductory skirmish that will determine your field position for tomorrow and the advantages you'll have going in to the fight against Archie and Maxie.
Rating: PG-13 in general; please mark threads that go higher accordingly!
Log:

YOU ARE HERE. YOU'RE FIGHTING THESE GUYS AND ALSO POSSIBLY THESE GUYS. THEY'RE NOT HAPPY TO SEE YOU.

ETA: AND THIS IS YOUR BACKGROUND MUSIC!
KEY:

• GRAY areas in the north are a range of mountains that form a natural barrier around part of the Tohjo plain where the Elite Four's resort is located. It is both difficult and dangerous to get up into the mountains proper, but this seems to be the direction from which most of the Team Magma Grunts are entering the area.

• GREEN areas in the southeast and southwest are densely-packed forested areas interspersed by lakes and rivers that seem to be feeding into the main waterway into the area. It is both difficult and dangerous to venture into the woodlands proper, but this seems to be the direction from which most of the Team Aqua Grunts are entering the area.

• The BLUE area in the south is the massive lake that feeds the eponymous falls that give Tohjo its name. You will also find Team Aqua Grunts here taking great care to hold control of the lake, if you're interested in engaging in a water battle.

• PINK diamonds in the east and west are the sites of massive formations of Mysterious Plot Crystals™ jutting up from beneath the surface; the Grunts on both teams appear somewhat wary of these growths, so they will be keeping a reasonable distance from them while still doing their best to protect them.

• The BROWN rectangle dead-center in the map is...the Elite Four's resort. Not exactly what you might call a fortunate place to be located, but it's easy to see why this might be considered prime real estate for both teams. You're likely to find members of both Team Aqua and Team Magma hanging around here, so be cautious!

A FEW OTHER SETTING NOTES:

• As per Arceus's summon, there will be Gen VI Pokemon joining the battle on their own! You may NPC these Pokemon, within reasonable limits; you may not capture them in Pokeballs, and they are still wild so they will not take commands from characters the way a captured Pokemon would from its trainer. However, they do recognize that the portaled-in humans are fighting on roughly the same side as they are, so they won't attack player characters and might occasionally come to their aid if need be — you're free to NPC them as you like for purposes such as this.

• The aforementioned Gen VI Pokemon can be any Pokemon that swarmed during September, plus any of their evolved forms. They've had several weeks in the wild to get buff and settle in; now you can see what they've got to show for it!

• You may NPC the Team Aqua and Team Magma Grunts as you see fit; either one can be found anywhere on the map, though Team Magma will be more highly-concentrated in the northern areas of the map, and Team Aqua will be keeping more to the south.

• There is no restriction on how many Aqua and Magma Grunts you may fight.

• You may fight members of both teams on this log if you so choose; you are not required to pick just one or the other to focus on for this particular log.

• You may forego Pokemon battling entirely and simply beat up the Grunts with physical violence yourself. If you KO a Grunt, they will white out and be warped to the nearest Pokemon Center back down in the regions proper, where they will be arrested by an officer of the Kangaskhan Police.

• FOR CHARACTERS INTENDING TO USE HONEDGES LIKE WEAPONS: due to the high volume of questions we have received on this topic (it's a popular inquiry!), we want to clarify for this Pokemon in particular —

If you choose to use a Honedge as though it were a traditional sword, the most that the Honedges will allow might be slapping the grunts with the flat side of the blade. They are still opposed to attacking/killing humans, opponents or not, and if you try to stab an opponent with them, you're going to get a really obstinate ghost sword going incorporeal and ineffectively going through them. There's also the fact that you're grabbing them by the head and swinging them around — they won't like that very much.

PLEASE NOTE: if you intend to use a Honedge in this manner anyway, we may ask that you experience light IC consequences for it later in the plot! We're not barring you from getting your sword skills on with your Honedges; we're simply pointing out that there may be natural outcomes that follow from those choices.

• UPDATE: if you would like to interrogate the grunts, check here for information you can learn from them!

~

☆ THE NUMBER TO MEET OR BEAT IS 50 PARTICIPANTS ☆.

REMEMBER: IF YOUR CHARACTER DOES NOT POST TO THE INTRO CHALLENGE LOG AT LEAST ONCE
(AS A TOP-LEVEL COMMENT OR IN RESPONSE TO SOMEONE ELSE'S TOP-LEVEL COMMENT)
BEFORE 9:00 PM EST on OCTOBER 28, THEY WILL NOT COUNT TOWARD THE 50-PARTICIPANT GOAL!

~

QUICK LINKS

EVENT LINKS MASTERPOST | THE INTRO CHALLENGE INFOPOST | QUESTIONS FOR MODS | INTRO CHALLENGE PARTICIPATION CHECK-IN THREAD

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[Henry had literally been on his way to Tohjo when he got the call. Glowgan and Eleanor -- the Inkay and Trevenant he met during the swarms -- had both been feeling uncomfortable for a while, but when both of them demanded independent leave at the same time, that was when Henry became concerned. His Pokemon felt a strong need to move to Tohjo Falls, so Henry dropped every single obligation he had and started traveling to Tohjo Falls. When they went to bed on the 28th, both had been antsy, convinced that they weren't going to arrive on time... and then the 29th happened.]

[Long story short, here he is: a seventeen-year-old boy with a wide smile. He's smiling mostly because oh boy, oh boy, people gonna kill people today!]

[He'd let Glowgan and Eleanor head off to help with the wartime preparations, dragging his two starter Pokemon around with him as he searched for some other way to assist. Who cares if this isn't Ylisse's army? This is his Pokemon's army, so it's Henry's army too.]

[Soon enough, he decides to inspect the crystals, mostly because he's heard mention of "glowing pink gems" for about as long as he'd been in Johto, and this is his opportunity to see them up close. Instead of trying to hear Kimblee and Electrode's conversation from afar, like a normal Grunt would, Henry simply strolls up to them, with a Murkrow on his shoulder and a Vulpix in his arms.]

Heya! What'cha doin'?

[Oh...hello there. He doesn't recognize the voice, nor does he recognize the person it's coming out of, but he'll acknowledge him anyway.]

These crystals have been a particular interest of mine for a few months now; I'm wondering if these have the same properties as the ones I have experience with.

[Henry makes a thoughtful noise as he looks up at the massive tower of gem. If he had to guess, this would probably be similar to Dragonstones or Beaststones, which enable certain races to transform into various creatures... but if they are the same, there's no Taguel or Manakete around here to try it out on. Too bad.]

What properties do yours have? You're not just talking about what they feel like or how tough they are, right? 'Cause, I mean, the fact that they're huge and glowing and pink kind of implicates a bigger meaning than that.

Oh, quite.

[Goodness, sir, you give off the impression that whatever pops into your head comes immediately out of your mouth.]

Things like this erupted out of the ground several months ago; they were destroyed back then, but the shards did some interesting things when they had a sufficient amount of energy put into them.

[That impression is 100% correct.]

[At the very least, though, he listens. If the gems popped out of the ground a few months ago, they're probably similar to the small pink gemstones people kept talking about on the Network.]

Oh, so these are the ones that shake and give Pokémon headaches and stuff, right? What do they do when you put energy in 'em?

Edited 2014-10-27 21:20 (UTC)

They both draw it in and amplify it, from what I've seen, until it reaches a point that the crystal can no longer contain the energy it's gathered.

At which point they explode rather violently.

[And there -- right there -- you can see Henry's demeanor change entirely.]

[He gives out a little gasp and clenches his fists, body language practically oozing excitement. Exploding things? Heck yeah! Exploding things with those red and blue guys around? Double heck yeah!!]

That's so awesome! We can use these to wipe out a bunch of those grunts at once!

[Now, that's interesting.]

...We could, if we so chose.

[Let's see where this goes, shall we?]

They're easier to weaponize in shards; it would be more strategically sound to take one of these down and then use them more like grenades - charging up the ones we want and controlling what we destroy and what we don't, rather than simply taking out large numbers of the party on both sides.

Oh, yeah, you're probably right.

[Tactics were pretty much never Henry's strong suit, mostly because he finds the concept of "don't kill your own soldiers" kind of difficult. But this is exciting, so he's gonna try regardless!]

But how are we supposed to get it apart without anyone noticing? There's almost no one around here, so it'd be really obvious.

[Oh!]

Unless we just shatter it so that it doesn't explode, but the pieces fly all over the place... it'd look like collateral damage from a battle...

[...

Rule #1 - it's only acceptable to kill your own side if you're using them as meatshields to defend yourself.]

There you go. Physical damage, rather than anything energy-based.

[See, that's what makes you a major and him a lieutenant, Kimblee.]

Okay, so once they're all over the place, we just pump 'em full of energy and kablammo, right? But it's gotta be a way that can't be seen, or else we'd be found out...

...man, I really wish I still had my dark magic... [The definition of dark magic for him is, literally, "magic that cannot be seen with the naked eye".]

A mage, are you? Well, we don't have anything of the sort here...

[He tips his head down to the Electrode there.]

Fortunately, that's what she's for.

[Henry looks at the Pokémon. He honestly has no clue what she is, much less what she does. She... apparently has a metal shell or something, and that's kind of confusing him, because he was under the impression that Pokémon are natural creatures...]

How does she help?

Edited 2014-10-28 00:40 (UTC)

By firing electricity exactly where I tell her to.

That might be pretty obvious with the sound and the light, though. You'd need some kinda conductor to get it there... [He can't use the ground, for obvious reasons. Or maybe Kimblee has some weird Pokémon thing up his sleeve that Henry hasn't learned about yet.]

It would be obvious, yes, but if it's well-done enough, who's going to stop us?

[Henry, we are going to shrapnel-bomb everyone who tries.]

[Instead of responding, Henry's grin somehow gets even wider, because he knows quite well what they're going to do to everyone who tries. He just hadn't realized they have that kind of power!]

Woohoo! This is gonna be awesome!

Let's see what we can do about getting one of these crystals down, then, shall we?

[...you are gonna have so many shrapnel bombs, Henry

you can use them by setting them on fire too]

[ !!!! ]

[he can help with that!]

[this is really shaping up to become Henry's perfect day and it's kind of terrible.]

Sounds good! So, like... do you have any Pokémon that can throw something that high? 'Cause I don't. [When your options are a baby Murkrow and a Vulpix you don't know how to evolve, battling can be difficult.]

[...Hmmm.]

I have us covered on the brute force aspect, don't worry.

[And he'll just be tossing one of those Pokéballs out and hello there massive steelsnake.

...clearly Kimblee just doesn't believe in Pokémon that look like natually-occurring creatures at all, if the Steelix and Electrode are anything to judge by.]

[Well the Steelix looks like it's kind of made of naturally occurring substances... maybe...]

You are so cool!

[He's not addressing Kimblee. He's addressing the Steelix. Due to A. having Pokéspeak and B. being an insensitive jerkass, Henry tends to completely ignore Trainers in favor of their Pokémon when they're sent out.]

[...that actually gets him to pause for a moment, because wow this guy is giving him so many Ryuunosuke Uryuu flashbacks - he had the exact same reaction to Nagara when he still had her.]

Her name is Acasta.

[And Acasta clearly don't give a shit, given that she responds easily to Kimblee's gesture to have at those crystals.

...we are going to have a bit of a problem because physical attacks will apparently get the things to splinter a bit and they'll give fragments, yes

that also just encourages them to grow harder

jfc what the hell]

All right, that...

[...was not supposed to happen, exactly]

[ ... ]

That didn't work.

[Thank you for your input, Sherlock.]

[They clearly can't just keep ramming the thing with Acasta, so...] ...what now?

Well, we could always just blow it up. We can't render into nothing, after all.

[Kimblee.]

Yeah. I guess there's no way to do it quietly, huh? Nyahaha!

[ ... ]

Let's knock 'em dead! [ :D ]

(no subject)

explosivecombat - 2014-10-28 02:07 (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

cawsforalarm - 2014-10-28 02:09 (UTC) - Expand

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only