Following the Whispers - Tribulations.

saerrael · July 2013

Following the Whispers - Tribulations. @saerrael

Short Code: NW-DCJV53UTU

Mission Type: Story/ Light Combat

Average Duration: Between 13 minutes and 45 minutes, depending on exploration, actually reading and how fast one cuts a way through the combat.

Amount of Combat: Not much. The area that has the most combat comes with a difficulty selector.

Starts at: Any gate to the overworld map.

Mission Summary:

Weeks, blessedly silent, have passed since your fruitless encounter with Lord Ferenhar. Due to this time having passed, you have put your own ordeals out of your mind and have picked up your life successfully.

Of course things do not stay this peaceful. A day or two ago you started, once again, to hear things. The whispers returned and they seem stronger this time. More urging, pressing. It takes you hardly any time to distill your information due to this.

Once again, you follow the whispers.

Author tips/hints:

This is the second quest in the Following the Whispers campaign and works from the idea you've ran the first.

If you like to actually obtain answers and have your hand held throughout a quest, this may not be the quest for you.

If you, however, like to explore all the nooks of a map, aren't adverse to some philosophy and/ or are interested to find out what ever may have happened to Lord Ferenhar, you've come to the right place.

Screenshots:

Additional notes:

-Safe for lvl 60s at Easy, including Clerics, though combat is not always a walk in the park.
-Highly detailed, handmade maps that are fully explorable lest the quest demanded restrictions.
-Over 30 costumes made. Several unique NPCs with quest-, optional-, and flavour text.
-Incorporated sound effects to add to atmosphere. Light music.
-OOC opt out of storyline.

-This quest will be addressed again when the new assets of Feywild are available.

Start build of quest: May the 20th, 2013.

First publish : July the 3rd, 2013.

Second version: August 28th, 2013.

Test ran on:

-level 60 Devoted Cleric (Easy mode.)
-level 60 Devoted Cleric and level 60 Trickster Rogue (As a duo, to test Hard mode.)
-level 52-54 Control Wizard (Easy and Medium mode.)
-level 25-26 Trickster Rogue (Easy and Medium mode.)

Pronunciation list for video reviewers:

Saerrael: Sah-air-rah-el

Lord Ferenhar: Lord Fair-'n-har

Sszzyr Deduis : I pronounce this as 'Sisser Deduis', but I'm quite certain the correct pronunciation here would be 'Seer Deh-duis'. (Not Se-er, as the word. Not sure I made sense there >.> )

Eilaya Silentread: Ey-lah-yah Silent-read

Graaver Wyrmsbane: Honestly, I have no idea how this first name is pronounced x.X Grey-fer, probably.
Last name is Wirms-bane, obviously.

Yentiln Vicelord : Jen-til, last name is obvious.
Janstina Tallcrippler: Jen-sti-nah
Caithyra Songsteel: Kay-thi-rah
Mareak Silverkin: Ma-rak

Any other name is either as read or not important enough to mention.

Stream:
By Dungeon Masters.

Patches:

(This apparently got eaten due to reaching a max amount of characters in the post. Sorry! I'm afraid I did not save these notes anywhere else but here.)

July the 4th until august the 1st: various.

Second version: August 28th, 2013.

runis12 · July 2013

An interesting thing about following up on some authors' campaigns is seeing how vastly they have improved since their last quest. You most definitely can see it in this one.

This quest gave me some ideas for my current project! Hehe. Thanks, Saer. XD

harbingerdrum · July 2013

Great mapping and story.

Excellent job overall, keep up the great work.

I have been contemplating a good version of a hardness slider and can't steal Zovya's mushrooms. Hmm, wonder how a scale would work ??

Heh heh, I will keep thinking on it, your scales are safe.

Again, great job and worth the time. Thanks..

.

saerrael · July 2013

runis12 wrote: »

An interesting thing about following up on some authors' campaigns is seeing how vastly they have improved since their last quest. You most definitely can see it in this one. This quest gave me some ideas for my current project! Hehe. Thanks, Saer. XD

Thank you very much, Runis

And quite proud to inspire someone who inspires me, as well!

harbingerdrum wrote: »

Great mapping and story.

Excellent job overall, keep up the great work.

I have been contemplating a good version of a hardness slider and can't steal Zovya's mushrooms. Hmm, wonder how a scale would work ??

Heh heh, I will keep thinking on it, your scales are safe.

Again, great job and worth the time. Thanks..

.

Thank you kindly!

Feel free to steal the scales, that will keep me on my toes to keep coming up with different things

zovya · July 2013

Wow wow wow wow wow. So creative! I've got to steal some of your stuff for my next one.

PS. loved Ben and Jerry

karitr · July 2013

runis12 wrote: »

An interesting thing about following up on some authors' campaigns is seeing how vastly they have improved since their last quest. You most definitely can see it in this one. This quest gave me some ideas for my current project! Hehe. Thanks, Saer. XD

I watched a little of your quest being played on Zovya's stream last night and it looked quite a bit different to when I ran it - I will definitely be playing it again as well as adding Saerrael's to my play list

saerrael · July 2013

zovya wrote: »

Wow wow wow wow wow. So creative! I've got to steal some of your stuff for my next one.

PS. loved Ben and Jerry

Thank you! Steal away *grins*

karitr wrote: »

I watched a little of your quest being played on Zovya's stream last night and it looked quite a bit different to when I ran it - I will definitely be playing it again as well as adding Saerrael's to my play list

I hope you have fun.

aracnakat · July 2013

Nice quest. Beautiful interiors and landscapes. Please review mine if you get a chance, "Finding the Artifact" NW-DFHDG2BLH.

~Kat

saerrael · July 2013

aracnakat wrote: »

Nice quest. Beautiful interiors and landscapes. Please review mine if you get a chance, "Finding the Artifact" NW-DFHDG2BLH.

~Kat

Thank you very much!
I will when I can tear myself away from the Foundry~

lolsorhand · July 2013

Really liked this one

Also, I found the chair when I played it. Was a nice touch lol.

saerrael · July 2013

lolsorhand wrote: »

Really liked this one Also, I found the chair when I played it. Was a nice touch lol.

Awesome! I've not heard anyone finding that one without hints. Good to hear you liked it.

thalazar1 · July 2013

just finished and rated. have a good story and great effects driving it. the areas looked really cool with lots to see. very fun and well worth the run through. was also nice to see alternate encounters (i know i tend to stick to the same ones

)

saerrael · July 2013

thalazar1 wrote: »

just finished and rated. have a good story and great effects driving it. the areas looked really cool with lots to see. very fun and well worth the run through. was also nice to see alternate encounters (i know i tend to stick to the same ones )

Thank you!
I actually had basically one enemy type in my first quest, my second I thought more deeply about what would be logical in the environments and story-wise. I'm glad you enjoyed that hard work, took me quite a while to make costumes, test individual mobs on combat style, (find a green magic using mob!), etc, etc.

saerrael · August 2013

Not meant as a bump, but I did wanted to add the following information without breaking the OP (again! xD ).

Currently test running both the Following the Whispers campaign quests.

Whispers is playable, unbroken and doesn't seem to have suffered in any other manner from being republished aside one description in the Crypt (the DM note floaty book has no name suddenly). This will be fixed and I will republish when publishing is no longer bugged. It's not game-breaking, in my opinion.

Checked. It's filled in in Foundry, but does not show up in live.

Tribulations will get an overhaul (especially the cave map), but most will be aesthetic in nature. I am estimating that may take me a few days.

Note that there is a teleporter used in this quest, but that it is not needed to complete the quest. I tested it, though, and it worked for me, even if it has been moved downwards.

I'm seeing a lot of empty descriptions in Tribulations (that had been filled, before). I'm still having to go into Foundry to see if there is or is not information there.

Checked. Same as Whispers: it's filled in in Foundry, but does not show up in live.

I also noticed vines that never had flowers, suddenly do. (The larger vines, not the wall vines and gazebo ones that were meant to have flowers.)

Checked. All ivy now come with flowers.

And that my purple mushrooms are suddenly blue, which makes the caves much too blue in palette.

Checked. Previously purple mushrooms are now blue. This is not an overly large problem as I was already planning to redesign the colouring/ lighting in the caves.

Technically, both quests are fine, though. The problems are, basically, cosmetic in nature. Though I've yet to hop into the Foundry for these quests, so I'm not certain just yet if there aren't problems preventing me from re-publishing (aside the current publishing bug, that is).

As you might have guessed, I'm currently in the Foundry checking for broken stuff and fixing what I am able to (not touching the teleporters as instructed). Also started on recolouring and relighting the cave.

Last edit for today; spend about 4 to 5 hours running through Tribulations. Will revisit tomorrow to tweak further.

August 28th, 2013.
Currently publishing the second version.
...and going back to building the third quest of this campaign afterwards.

roguish98 · September 2013

Loved it! Looking forward to more. I laughed out loud at Ben and Jerry

Really enjoyed the cave interior!

saerrael · September 2013

roguish98 wrote: »

Loved it! Looking forward to more. I laughed out loud at Ben and Jerry Really enjoyed the cave interior!

Thank you very much!
I'm sorry Q3 is taking so long, I see quite a few people's responses that they'd like to know what on earth is going on in the story of the campaign. Sadly, I've been having a lot of trouble, including a dying monitor. And I was already on 2 months of development time simply building maps!

Glad you enjoyed Tribulations!

sapientcrow · September 2013

I had to come here and give praise to these campaigns. The quests have evolved and get better and better and so does the story and the hand made design. They just shine in their attention to detail and really well thought out cohesion. Much respect to the author and I can not say enough that everyone should indeed check this one out and make sure to review it.

grimah · October 2013

Just saw this thread after prowling the foundry forums (I am now an author yey!) Just have to say (i think i reviewed it) that i played this a couple weeks ago actually, and thoroughly enjoyed it. However i did get lost in the cave for quite along time. Played hard mode solo, and it was fine.

I would like to get a professional opinion on my foundry, and tell me if its up to scratch (thinking of sending it to feature soon) Its called "The Silence of Haydenwick" NW-DFUTEUGUE

Following the Whispers - Tribulations.

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