(1) Atalantia - Scourge of Magic

Game Master mdt

Connor held up a hand to his head like he had a massive headache.

"A what?" he asked Flann.

"A puzzle of graduating fluids. A seemingly limitles supply of fluid and vessels of consistent but varied volumes is presented, and the audience is asked to produce a specific volume of the fluid which none of the provided vessels can easily measure. Like getting four pints out of three and five pint pitchers. A graduation puzzle? Thatmaynotbewhatthisis,butthat'swhatIthoughtof..."

Connor tried to rack his brain over how to solve the puzzle.

Intelligence Check: 1d20 + 5 ⇒ (12) + 5 = 17 (Shot down by Mr. Dicebot again.)

"You ok there Flann, I didn't understand any of that. So we put sand in the jars right?"

"There ought to be a prompt. Maybe from our guide, or text carved into stone? Something to let us know how much of each color of sand we need... I was waiting to see if there were traps." If no one tries to stop him, Flann will enter the room to check around the sand and jars for clues or further instruction.

Perception: 1d20 + 12 ⇒ (7) + 12 = 19

"By all means." Connor agreed, looking around.
Perception: 1d20 + 8 ⇒ (20) + 8 = 28 (Ohhh, what should I have used this on, Intelligence?)

Looks like we lost Volita, no posts on her aliases either

Volita's eyes cross, and then she speaks. "The lady says that Flann is smarter than he looks. Each of the containers require a specific color of sand, or mixture of colors. One color is primary, one is secondary, and one is tertiary. Which colors are primary, secondary, or tertiary are determined randomly when you activate the four armed statue, so she can't tell you that. Nor can she tell you which containers require one color or multiple colors, that's random when the main door opens. In other words, for us, it's a constant. But it's not constant from prison appearance to prison appearance. She can tell us the order of the locks though. We have to unlock the sarchophagi in the Four Armed Statue room first, then the north west room, then either the middle room or the northeast room, then the main hallway, then the west room, and finally the Lion sarchophagi guarding the southern door. If we guess wrong 3 times, all the locks freeze and we have to reset the locks to start over." She frowns, and then groans. "The pattern for resetting the locks is random as well. The two containers in the sand room reset the locks, or they reset the locks and the colors, or they set off a sandstorm for half an hour in the room that will rip our skin off if we enter. So we have to try by trial and error to figure out if it's one sand color, two sand colors, or three sand colors, in them, if we need to reset the locks. The small vases are half the volume of the larger vases. Most of the containers take as much sand as the large vases, there will be some that are smaller that require the smaller vases. We can't just pour it in, we have to have it exact from a vase. Oh, and no single container takes all three colors, just one or two each."

You started the 'prison run' at just after sunset, spent an hour flying through the desert, another half hour getting the door open, and another half hour since then looking around and resolving the statue. You're fairly far south on the curve of the planet, so the nights are pretty long right now. The night is currently 15.5 hours long, so you've got 13 hours left

"oh traps, I guess hiding stuff in the sand would make sense. I'm on it."

Adran takes a few to familiarize himself and examine the room and all.

Perception: 1d20 + 16 ⇒ (20) + 16 = 36 +3 vs Traps

Adran finds no traps in the sand, or in the vases.

(I moved the characters on the Encounter Map again to put all of us in the room.)

"Four Armed Statue room, NorthWest room that has that door, middle room or NorthEast room," Connor said, looking behind him at the locked door to the NorthWest and then through the sand room to the NorthEast, "the main hallway that Adran tried to pick, the West room must have those double doors to the West, and then the South door past the Lion sarchophagi."

Connor paused, thinking. "We have to learn the patterns as we go. Three colors. Locked sarchophagi or doors in order. The two largest vases here are the 'graduation activators'," with a look to Flann, "but three wrong guesses and all the locks freeze. We have to collect colored sand in the small vases to put sand into the large vases, no pouring."

He took a breath, saying "The Regent said '238' for the prisoner's number. Seeing no corridors with two hundred and fifty jail cells, I don't suppose the color mix is 'two', 'three', 'eight'?" to Flann.

Looking at Volita, Connor added "If we're concerned about the sand storm, I can make small astral constructs to do the job of adding sand to the vases, and we can stand in the hallway. You look...preoccupied, Volita, so I'll make the constructs."

To clarify, each stone container can hold either as much sand as a small vase, or a large vase. No stone container can hold more than what is in the correct sized container, and the sand must be poured from a container (IE: you can't just put a bunch in your pack and dump it out). The large stone containers either take 1 color of sand, or 2 colors (two small vases, each full, poured into one large vase to get a large vase that's half one color and half another)

"So the front door sets how many colors each lock takes. There is a one in three chance that resetting changes which color is primary. If we lose time to a sandstorm, we know for sure it didn't change. We need to figure out the size of the reset jars first, but we can make attempts on the first set of sarcophagi in the meantime. Luckily, there are only six possibilities, cut in half by the static size once we get a correct guess on one puzzle, and if we're careful, we can keep track of relative colors, and we won't lose much time to a reset on the final lock. Once we re-crack the first lock, we just apply colors... We can reset about seventy eight times- 25, worst case. We should crack a two-vase code in about six resets, twelve, worst-case... Uhm... We're guaranteed to get two of the puzzles solved." Flann's tone indicates that that's the good news. "Let's hope there is a non-brute-force solution. For that to be the case, any clues would be color-independant, and the puzzle is keeping track of the color cycle... Hopefully. We would have a significantly higher chance of an early escape in that case. Each time we reset, we will know for sure which color was prime last cycle, and if there is a sand storm, we will know the color order for sure. We should take a close look at the first locks for hints?"

No hints really, this is an intelligence test, most people in this situation in this world wouldn't have the math knowledge to be able to work out the rigid way the locks work to slowly and methodically test each one.

"So I won't pretend to understand most of what you said but you want me to take a closer look at the lock? Can do. See if any indicators which color combo or something. Let me give it a look."

Perception: 1d20 + 16 ⇒ (18) + 16 = 34 +3 vs Traps

Adraniel spend a few minutes going over the container next to the sarcophagus. The container is not booby trapped in anyway, but it is magical in his experience.

The sarcophagus next to it, on the other hand, is trapped six ways from Sunday, with traps on top of traps on top of traps, and then some traps on those traps.

"I'm glad you're here, Flann." Connor confessed. "If it was a sculpting contest, I'd be your man. But not something like this. And you as well, Volita-and-Kalvara."

Connor held out his hands, and began making astral constructs to lift and carry the vases.

Connor's attempts are.. mixed. Three of them look sort of like their intended target, if you squint your eyes. Mostly they look like long lost little semi-transparent cousins. The fourth looks like a semi-transparent version of Flann.

Volita gives Connor a look. "My breasts are not that big."

:)

"No hints here boss, but if I try any thing with fancy death box here I'm pretty sure I may be vaporized or something. So guess I will help lug sand. Just tell me what to do."

Adran helps begin whatever process Flann has in mind by helping to move the sand.

"You're a sculptor, Volita, you know the material dictates how our vision comes out." Connor breezily countered.

"Yeah, Adran, let's have Flann tell us how to solve this." Connor agreed. "Meanwhile - everybody out of the room, just in case we get a sandstorm. We can watch from the doorway."

(Moving characters on Encounter Map again!)

"We need to try the first lock three times. Make up one large container of each color, and let's see what that looks like. We only have to use the constructs if we're trying to reset. Keep making sets of containers, big, small, small."

Still not sure how many inputs the first lock has, but if it's more than one, those get the same color each guess. I didn't see what colors are available.

1st guess: red (red, red...)
2nd guess: blue (red, red...)
3rd guess: yellow (red, red...)
If that doesn't pop the lock:
Reset 1: red, red

If you look at the map, you can see the containers on it. The first one is immediately next to the small sarcophagus.

Flann fills the small stone receptacle with red sand, and then the sand explodes out in his face, covering him in red dust.

The blue does the same, and finally the green.

Flann, if you look at the map, you'll see the Red, Blue, and Green pits on the map, indicating the colors of the sand.

The receptacle then closes off after the third attempt, sealing over with a sound of grinding stone.

Going back to the sand room, the constructs pour red sand into both receptacles in that room, and there's a grinding sound as the sand vanishes, and the receptacle in the hallway near the statues opens up again.

Flann sighs. "That doesn't give us much to go on... I doubt we hit the one combination in thirty-six that gives us a clean reset, but we know for sure the first lock isn't all one color. assumingmyassessmentofthepuzzleissound... Uhm, small containers outside this time. Red/blue, red/green, blue/green. Let's hope it doesn't mind what order they're in. If I'm right, one of these guesses should open the first lock. If not, order does matter" Flann hesitates at the door into the reset room. "The sand storm would have gone off already, right? I think so, I'm just... there's a lot of bones."

Flann pours the Red/Blue mixture in, and the sand explodes in his face again, it's getting very itchy as the darn stuff manages to worm it's way into every crevace of his skin and clothes.

The red/green sand pours into the receptacle, and then the sand swirls and turns a vivid yellow.

The sarcophagus next to it creaks and hisses, as if air was escaping from it. Then the lid slides off and reveals a container of white sand with a key pressed firmly into the sand.

The key's symbol matches the northwest door.

Opening the northwest door reveals two receptacles, and two more sarcophagi.

Flann scratches under his collar as he eyes the white sand suspiciously. "Let's all hope this is not a fourth color... We do now know that this lock takes two colors." The halvavian scratches some notes onto a roll of simple gauze from his chirurgeon's kit.

Walking down the hall with the key, Flann opens the door, and peers inside. "Two sarcophagi, one container- no, two... but one's in the corner. I wonder why. I think we need to solve these two containers simultaneously, which is troublesome. We haven't been plagued by traps so far, but it wouldn't do to take that for granted... We can send the constructs just in case. We've got one try at this before we have to reset." He points to the receptacles in the northwest room. "Large red, large red... and get ready to try reds in the reset room again. I don't know if the solutions there are evenly distributed between the three outcomes, but there's a good chance colors didn't change, and the only way to get useful information from that lock is to try the same combination again. If we don't get a sandstorm, and blue/green works on lock one again, then we've had our first stroke of extraordinary luck. Forgive me if I do not sound confident..."

Flann & Connor send the constructs in with red sand. The northern receptacle sends a rejected shower of red sand up into the constructs face, coating it red.

The other receptacle, however, grinds like stones, and the red sand solidifies. The right hand sarcophagus gives a grinding sound, and the lid slides off, revealing white sand with a key pressed firmly into it.

The key matches the door that's in the center of the complex (Just south of the sand pit room).

"I... think that means we can try each lock three times before we have to reset them? We need to finish this room before we try the next, unless I misunderstood our guide. Let's try a large blue, then a large green." Flann bounces down the hall to the new room and unlocks it. "Lock set three is one receptacle. Don't put anything in it yet."

"Good work, Flann!" Connor says when the first sarcophagus shows a white key. "I hope by 'reset', it doesn't mean the keys are reset as well. We could be up to a pile of keys in a few hours otherwise."

-----------------

"Yes, I'd rather open the doors one at a time. It's like we're being led from door to door this way." Connor muttered as Flann went to the NorthWest room followed by the Center room. Taking a quick look inside the NorthWest room, Connor announced "No jail cells here, either. I hope this isn't an 'all or nothing' stage to the cells."

Flann get's a face full of green sand when he tries green in the other receptacle, and then the receptacle closes off, sealing itself away, as does all the other receptacles.

It's three failures, that's the third failure

Red/Blue in hallway failed (D area), Red failed in northern receptacle (A room), Blue failed in northern receptacle (A room)

Flann coughs and sputters. "Oh, right. Okay, everyone into the Hall while we have the constructs use two big red jars in the reset room again. I sure hope we lucked into the clean reset code. I still don't fully understand that one. We're making good progress though."

The two red sands cause grinding sounds, and the two doors that Flann opened slam shut with a grinding sound.

Flann notices that his pocket is lighter, and the keys they acquired are gone again.

Flann turns out his pocket and scuffs the floor in disgust. "Hamburgers! All right, little red, little green, let's see if that reset code is any good..."

Flann is able to open the sarcophagi again, and retrieve the first key.

You lucked out big time, I randomly generated the reset code, and you just happened to pick the right one first time

From now on, you can just say 'Re-open the existing locks' and jump straight to the 'new attempts'

When the keys disappear, Connor states "Well, that answers that question. We have to be right all the time to keep the keys."

Commanding his astral constructs, Connor adds "Going into the hallway for safety as needed, Flann. Adran, Volita-Kalvara, I think we're safer here in the hallway."

"But if the rooms are empty except for sarcophagi and keys, then the South door must be the final goal. Better than a guardian monster in each room!"

Volita tilts her head, and the nods. "The purpose of this is to slow us down, so we have to leave the prison without getting to where we need to go. If we didn't have the voices, we'd still be figuring out the puzzle. As it is, we've spent an hour just to get here. We might want to hurry."

"Neat. We don't have a sandstorm to worry about, but maybe we should start a bucket brigade. I need two of each small color so we can try the pairs. Red/blue, red/green, blue/green. Once that's done we'll have a few tries at the one in the middle. Big containers, red, blue, green."

After a minute of moving sand, Flann turns to Volita. "What's a, uh, like, I heard Gods do this thing like taxes? What's our guide like? She's been fair, and I was rude."

"Jury's still out." Volita says non-commitally.

Wont' be doing a lot of feedback from her, in case her player comes back

Basically, room s are A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, from upper left to bottom right. With H being the southern areas.

Flan spends 10 minutes setting up again, and unlocks everything again before returning to room A. Flann is coated with a mess of red and blue sand, the poor halfavian is beginning to look like he has been in a paint factory during a sand storm.

Then another red and green cloud envelops him.

However, the blue/green sand swirls instead and turns to a bright almost sky blue. Cyan

The second sarcophagus grinds open, revealing white sand and a key.

The new key matches the doors to the eastern most room (accessible from the sand room and the hallway).

"When we get out of here and show ourselves to the Regent," Connor deadpanned, "Flann will voice our displeasure at the difficulty."

"Keep going, Flann."

(Looks like a race against the clock to the South door being opened.)

Nice work :)

Adran continues to help where he can to hurry things along.

"There may be some larger pattern to the locks. There was mention of primary, secondary, and tertiary colors. I would guess Red to be primary in this pattern so far. Let's do the one in the middle room first, then the two in the other room, starting with the one in the north corner. Can you make a faster construct? Anything we can do to reduce the time it takes to transport containers would save us time in the long run."

The process continues as follows:

For each new container, Flann starts with the large containers: red, blue, and green, then small containers: yellow, magenta, cyan, resetting as needed. He'll stop after these three to see if he can discern a larger pattern to the locks, and assess the new circumstances.

"I am curious to see what these locks do, as the next locks are in the hall, and not behind doors. I would, uh, get your weapons ready. Just in case. Everyone still in the network?"

The central room blows the red sand into Flann's face again. Spitting sandy dust out of his mouth, he adds the blue, and gets another face full of sand and dust.

The green sand, however, works, and there is a grinding somewhere in the ruins somewhere.

Moving to the northeast room, the red sand works in the north corner, but nothing happens. Adding Red to the southern receptacle causes both the northern receptacle and the one Flann is over to expel their dust, filling the room with red dust and as he coughs, the whole thing locks up again.

"Still here, Flann." Connor assured him. "I can make more small constructs, and make them a little faster on their feet."

"-And we lock up again. Let's move faster!" Connor stated.
(Constructs #5 and #6 on Encounter Map)

"Okay," Flan croaks, "these two are linked, like the ones in the reset room. That's thirty six possibilities. I'm going to put a different color into the first one, to see if it's just waiting for the other one to fill, or if it really accepted red. Looking at the solution pattern so far... I'm going to swap green and blue in my test cases. I think green is the secondary color. That may be meaningless, or it may save us a little time. When we have things reset, I'll try green and green in here."

"If we have enough containers, have a construct or two just keep solution containers filled and near their respective receptacles while we bucket brigade the new locks." Moved stuff on the map.

Flann puts green in the norther receptacle, and nothing happens. Then he puts blue in the southern receptacle. Both then blow sand out, filling up the room.

Need to know what combinations you're trying in here. So far, you've tried Red & Green, and Green and Blue

I thought I tried Red & Red first.
03: Red & Blue
04: Red & Green or Red & Red
(reset 2)
05: Green & Green
06: Blue & Blue

"It's possible the lock doesn't care what order these receptacles are in... I'll try sets of three colors, then sets of four before repeating the pattern with the receptacles reversed..." Flann is now leaving trails of multicolored sand wherever he walks.

You did, sorry, so you've already tried Red & Red, and Red &
Green

Flann's next test, Red & Blue, sits there for a second, and just as he's about to clamp a hand over his mouth to avoid more dust, the receptacles seal over and there's more grinding heard off in the distance.

No wai!

"For the record. I do not believe in luck. Please no one cut off my foot in the night. Peg legs are not my aesthetic." Flann moves through the sand room to the hall, collecting a large red pot. The quick construct following at his heels with a second large red pot, waiting for the next set of instructions.

"Don't know if these two are linked, but I'd sooner assume they are. Let's start with two big reds, one at a time to make sure they're linked."

Flann, heading out to the hallway, finds that the two recessed receptacles are not unsealed, and can be filled. They were sealed earlier!

The next half hour however, as much as luck has been on his side, is nothing but mouth fulls of dust for Flann, until finally he tries Blue in the northern receptacle, and then Red/Green in the southern one. The red/green turns yellow, and then the two sarcophagi in the hallway both grind open and the lids slide off, revealing two keys that match the two symbols on the double doors to the west.

It requires two people to open the double doors, one on either side, turning the keys simultaneously.

Opening the door, Flann finds not one, not two, but six Receptacles. This time, there are 4 small receptacles, and 2 regular sized ones.

There are two sarcopaghi as well, one with a scroll symbol on it, and the other with a dagger symbol on it.

There is another statue similar to the elemental statue used to start the unlock process, but it's broken, with an arm broken off.

Flann waits for everyone to gather in front of the doors before having Adraniel unlock them. Once they're open, he takes a look into the Western room. "Oh, Hamburgers. Six?" He's not too bothered by the massive tentacular statue. If there are traps, Adran will tell them. "Possibly four and two... These could match the first six. The four individual codes, then the paired ones on top..."

"Do we want to stop for a minute and check the room? We could be at this for a while. Worst case, this puzzle would take... Like three months to crack the way we've been doing it..."