[SD:OA] Gear and a Ship - Chapter 2

Gem points towards a store with a pair of giant hooks bracketing the door. “There! That looks cool! Let’s go and see what they sell.” June t

Gem points towards a store with a pair of giant hooks bracketing the door. “There! That looks cool! Let’s go and see what they sell.”

June tightens her grip on their shoulder. “They sell fish. Bigger fish, but fish nonetheless. We need to buy at least one piece of equipment each. In particular, we’re looking for something that will be useful out on the sea.”

Samuel nods, “And then we sign you up for the guild. Though definitely equipment first. If we need to earn a little more cash, we’d end up back there, anyway.”

June, “At least by what Silverwhiskers said, what we’re looking for shouldn’t be too expensive. Low level gear for the ocean will be common. Oh sure, we won’t find a water breathing effect, but useful nonetheless.”

A gaggle of children run past, pushing Emrys into Gem and June.

Samuel sighs, “Though maybe we should get off the main street, at least until we know where we’re going.”

June, “We should have asked Silverwhiskers where to go.”

Samuel, “I like the guy, but there’s only so far you can trust a merchant.”

Gem frowns, but doesn’t say anything.

Emrys notices not only this, but also spots a place off in the distance and points. “There! I didn’t get any direct suggestions, but the red barn looking place had a lot of chatter. Sounded like a decent place to equip for the sea.”

Gem, “Why is it a barn?”

They don’t get an answer to this, but do get dragged over to the building. Which, upon closer inspection does seem to have a decent supply of equipment inside. Though a large section is taken up by scale mail made with scales as in from a fish. Which the sign itself makes clear is their specialty, “Scales and More, but mostly Scales” with some stylized fish to both sides.

Once inside, Gem sees something and pulls Emrys and June over and points at a display. “Magic wands!”

And they aren’t lying. Inside the display are a variety of wands. A serpent fang carved down with a gem pierced in the tip that has sickly green veins through it. Two wooden wands, mirrors of each other, carved spirals that might fit together. Coral where only the handle appears worked at all, the rest appearing as if it grew that way. Another wooden wand, except this one looks like a piece of driftwood that had at one point been struck by lightning.

Each with a small plaque underneath writing out their info. The last one in particular draws May’s attention.

{

Thunderstruck Storm Wand of the Sea [5/5] 12C

A wand crafted from the limb of a Black Pine that was struck by lightning and fell in the sea, becoming driftwood. Acts as a Wand style casting implement. Air spells cast through the wand do not suffer penalties when cast into or under salt water. A charge can be used to add an electricity kicker to an Air spell.

}

June shakes her head, “A wand would be fine for Emrys, but I need a Tome. You? Well, I won’t say a wand wouldn’t be good for you, but I think you want a staff style implement. If only because they can be crafted to also work as a normal weapon. Wands aren’t exactly up to stabbing and smacking people with. Plus, the bonus fits you better.”

Gem, “I know staves give a damage boost, but a wand just feels proper magical!”

June raises an eyebrow, “I’d rather our damage dealer with the DPS implement. Though if that storm wand just natively added a lightning kicker to air spells instead of using a charge, it would be tempting. Especially as we’re planning to go out to sea.”

Emrys nods, “I was thinking of getting something that acted as a wand. The bonus to spell potency is important for illusion spells. Though I don’t think the wand form factor may be the best for our ocean adventure.”

June snorts, “And you think a tome is?”

Emrys shrugs, “Eh, any book magical enough to be a casting implement isn’t going to mind the water.”

And with that, the conversation mostly dies down as the party focuses on finding their gear.

Samuel who had been focused on it from the start finds his gear first.

{

Coral Vambraces of Freedom 14D

Plates of carved coral infused with bronze and backed by leather. Allows arms a greater freedom of movement underwater. Enhances personal field’s resistance to piercing.

}

A simple enough bit of kit, but the “freedom” effect would be big if, or more likely, when he ends up in the water. Oh, and piercing is an important defense for underwater.

June did actually end up with a tome.

{

Tome of the Feline 12C

A normal enough book, except the clasp is wood carved to look like a cat’s paw. Acts as a Tome style casting implement. Thematically matched spells gain boosted implement bonuses.

}

Which given her buff spells matches her perfectly.

Next to find their gear was Emrys, though honestly he found his at about the same time as June, she just got in line to checkout first.

{

Prism of Aquatic Diffraction 14D+

A glass prism mounted in a driftwood case. Acts as a Wand style casting implement. Illusions cast through the prism are not warped if cast through the surface of water.

}

A simple tool with a simple effect. Emrys could now cast an illusion spell from a ship’s deck into the water without it being warped.

Though last, but not least, Gem ended up stuck. They had found more than enough things, but couldn’t make up their mind. However, they finally ended up with a weapon. It wasn’t a casting implement, sadly, but it did affect her spells.

{

Short Spear of the Piercing Winds 11B+

A wooden spear stained to a dark brown with engraved spiral lines that reveal the woods original light blue color. Wind skills cast from this spear take on a spear-like form. Damaging skills gain a minor bleed damage kicker.

}

As they walk down towards the docks, Gem can’t help but whine about their weapon. Or rather, the cost. “It’s awesome, but I had to pay, like, 250 gold! None of you paid more than what, 160 a piece? I’m probably going to depend on you guys to help pay my way!”

Samuel, “Well, we do need to make sure your weapon is top of the line.”

Gem, “Oh sure, I understand that, but even with the high rank, the level is lower. How’s that work out for the price? Even June’s tome is a level higher!”

June nods, “True, but you’re all missing the important detail. Yours is the least specialized. My book? Cat spells, and the others? All aquatic focused.

“Your spear through? It changes Air skills, not spells, from whatever they were into a single target piercing effect. An effect that isn’t even limited to damaging skills. Though that bleed kicker for damaging skills is nice.”

Samuel frowns for a moment, “Oh, yeah, that would be important. I bet an aoe buff skill would get boosted if single targeted through the spear.”

June nods, “Thus the price tag.”

Gem sighs, “Fine, but that doesn’t mean I’m happy about paying that much.”

Emrys, “Bah, you can cast Wind Blade, what, 13 times before you run out?”

Gem, “14, but that’s because Wind Blade gets an extra cast at level 5.”

Emrys gestures at them, “Exactly! And it won’t be long before your other magic skills start boosting that as well. You need to learn new spells to make better use of your Mana pool.”

Gem shrugs, “Meh, I’ll figure something out. For the moment, I think we’re here!”

And they are. Beneath them the cobble street had turned to wooden planks of water and all around them buildings are either on stilts or basically just rafts. Ahead of them, though, is their true goal. Where the crowd falls away in favor of purposeful and ordered patterns. People loading and unloading actual ships, though what ships! You can really tell this is a fantasy world.

The first of which to draw their attention was actually one of the ships suggested by Filegreen. Spear Tooth sat oddly in the dock, set a bit too far back compared to the other ships. And unlike some of the others, it looked normal enough until you got up close. Then the group found out it was set back because there was a giant Narwhal’s horn mounted to the front as a weapon.

June was actually walking up to the ship when they as a group, decided this wasn’t the ship for them, all without talking. It was simple enough. As they watched, the crew came up out of the ship, fighting. Not an enemy, but among themselves.

It was a little hard to tell, but it seems there was a disagreement. Either way, no one wanted to take the already risky cross-ocean trip with either a new crew or one actively turning against themselves.

So the four kept on walking past the Spear Tooth and down a handful of births until they found the Blue Gator. A ship that also lived up to their name. While the decks and such seemed to be made of wood, the hull was made from the leather of a giant blue alligator. Well, they assume that was the source. It could have been from a crocodile or some other similar creature, but they figured the name came from somewhere.

Sally the Beardless, was a character. Not in a bad way. She did however not have any spare rooms on her ship. “Oh yah, we heading out to the golden coast. Literally got golden coasts. Not literal gold, look it though. A color thing, which I can appreciate. Anyways, there’s a popular trio of dungeons out there.

“A sequence they are! Quite rare that. White, light green, to green. Filled up ereyesterday when I announced the destination.”

So the group continued on, only to find that the Rainbow Dash had actually set out already. That left the Salty Baron and the Pair of Twos. Now Gem was chaos locked, but gambling? Not their thing.

So, since the other three didn’t have an opinion one way or another, they headed towards the Salty Baron. Easy enough to find as it is quite white in color. Though, unlike a lot of other ships, the name wasn’t quite so literal.

The white of the hull came not from literal salt, but rather some sort of wood. Which June saw as a sign of rare sanity. To make a ship that stays afloat purely because you threw enough magic at it was, in her opinion, not the smartest move.

Even better, when meeting with Sssally, they find out the shop still has openings. She’s only doing a routine trade run and travelers are limited to those just looking to get to the other continent. Which is definitely a draw, but any ship crossing the sea can do that and others are going to exciting places.

Sssally was a nice enough lady as well. Her scales were a deep rusty red, with her crest lightening to a pink at the tips. Though the front scales instead change to an orange.

She greeted them readily enough, “Well! I hear your group isss looking for passage? We expect calm seasss, which ironically, I’ve found tendsss to turn your sortsss away.”

Samuel, “That is disappointing, I admit, but we asked some other travellers and got pointes your way. Well, more like we got a list of names. Still, they rate you highly. We can only blame and praise our luck if we get to the other continent peacefully.”

Sssally nods, “I can ressspect that. Though I also charge more for that. 23 gold a head. You four ssstill up for it? You’d be passengersss and ssso not exsspected to do much of anything. Though you alssso won’t be turned away from helping out, essspecially with any fightsss.”

June nods, “That would be acceptable. When should we show up?”

Sssally shrugs, “The Salty Baron isss leaving early tomorrow morning. Ssshow up before your inn servesss breakfassst. We have a buffet on the ssship that the crew cycle through as we leave. Oh, but that’ll cossst you. The 23 gold only covers basic mealsss. Though we do have fishing rodsss and such to catch your own. If that’sss your thing.”

Samuel nods, “To be expected. 23 isn’t exactly a lot of money.”

Sssally laughs, “Oh, don’t worry about me losssing money. Even when we’re charging ten or ssso gold, I ssstill make a profit. Just not azzz much.”

Regional Chat - Chapter 1

Squirming Runes - Chapter 3