Festival of High Chasaline

...for in character discussions, contributions and Wheel of Time themed stories.
Kordin
Posts: 712
Joined: Wed Feb 18, 2015 5:17 pm

Festival of High Chasaline

Post by Kordin » Sat Jan 08, 2022 6:55 am

ToL post - viewtopic.php?f=4&t=15654

Making this topic in advance, to keep notes in and important info for each event during the festival as well as participant list.

Location - Cairhien, meet at the Stump

Bring at least 2 draughts and one container (sack, pack, pouch, purse etc.)! ;) maybe also a canoe or raft just in case :mrgreen:

Kordin
Posts: 712
Joined: Wed Feb 18, 2015 5:17 pm

Re: Festival of High Chasaline

Post by Kordin » Sat Jan 08, 2022 4:15 pm

Scavenger hunt list

Items worth three points
a black sphere
scalp of a mercenary bandit
scalp of a cloaked man
scalp of a corpse (half-man)
scalp of a giant horned lizard
scalp of a large predator
scalp of a grey man

Items worth two points
a rusty skeleton key
a citrine gemstone
a finely crafted jewelry box
scalp of a lithe woman
a man (unnamed greyman)
scalp of a darkfriend trooper
scalp of a darkfriend leader
scalp of any aiel mob
scalp of a hired thug
a ring-quilloned sword
a dark oak javelin
scalp of a scorpion
scalp of grass
scalp of a Cairhienin outlaw

Items worth one point
a small canoe
an egg
scalp of a shivering tree
any one herb
scalp of an ancient tree
scalp of moss
scalp of a lazy guard
a copy of Hawkwing's Amaline Poems
a copy of the Karaethon Cycle
a piece of sandstone
a blunt dagger
a packet of needles
a brass storm lantern
a pair of blue velvet slippers
a large wooden raft
scalp of a lion
a finely-woven rug
scalp of any spider
a large slab of meat
any one plate of food
a cane
a large melon
a shovel
a shimmering yellow dress
a vial of thick yellow fluid
scalp of a stag
a gold-chased goblet of steaming dark wine
a dull-gleaming hunk of rock
an oilstone
a hammer
scalp of a carnivorous plant
an apple
a flask with 'badass' stamped on it
a short brass telescope with carving
a finely carved meerschaum pipe
scalp of cute deer
scalp of massive elk
scalp of elk cow

Kordin
Posts: 712
Joined: Wed Feb 18, 2015 5:17 pm

Re: Festival of High Chasaline

Post by Kordin » Sat Jan 08, 2022 5:08 pm

List of participants throughout the event. Apologies for taking so long, made notes for next time. Thank you so much for attending!

Callesa
Laligam
Bogdan
Rovin
Nyro
Emily
Liia
Rhys
Kavia
Adael
Alvana
Jafra
Amellia
Helgi
Chiron
Taziar
Vhalerie
Shiver
Selane
Millana

Kordin
Posts: 712
Joined: Wed Feb 18, 2015 5:17 pm

Re: Festival of High Chasaline

Post by Kordin » Sat Jan 08, 2022 5:18 pm

Logs will be posted in the upcoming days, there's a lot to go through

Kordin
Posts: 712
Joined: Wed Feb 18, 2015 5:17 pm

Re: Festival of High Chasaline

Post by Kordin » Sun Jan 09, 2022 4:28 am

A bit of info on how it was planned and how it went...

Plan was;
  • gathering in Cairhien or in Valan Luca's for those who know where and how to enter
  • have people settle, RP out if anyone was doing that
  • start of with a show from whoever from the Guild or Glee was around, other than me - thanks Nyro :)
  • tour of the Menagerie, show people a fun zone, get some creative ideas going, set the feel for the event
  • Trivia with questions from books, questions about the game, and a few common riddles for people to catch up with points who may not be so familair with the game and/or books
  • a race with a few twists
  • a scavenger hunt
  • an RP improv event that would be optional, also chance to score some extra points and try RPing if that's something you usually don't
  • anything in between that people would like to see and/or do, like Bogdan the Gleeplicant and his performance - sorry it wasn't before a larger audience, next time avoid ropes :D
The idea was to make an event for all types of players to find something enjoyable, and get items for rewards that would be an additional incentive for those who otherwise might not show up as they don't enjoy and/or like these types of things. So something for the RPers, the PvE players, the PK only crowd and those in between all of that.

I chose to have the first part in Valan Luca's as I think the zone is really interesting, has some fun mobol like the performances, the gift shop and a number of other things that had to be cut out to save time as this took about 2h. That was a mistake on my end, as I didn't quite take into consideration just how long it would take to move a certain number of people from one tent to another, and the timing of the each performance mobol etc. I do encourage people to check it out more, see what we might've skipped - Thom is there and you can find some spicy letters ;)

Add to that the free will of participants, people talking, exploring on their own, getting stuck in certain rooms ;), leaving to get more food (also something to consider for next time - moar plates!) etc., and something that I somehow thought would take 45 min to an hour, became just over 2h.

Still think it's a faboulous zone for festivals, I'd even suggest adding and changing a few things if Staff agrees;
  • have the gift shop take crowns or give change back to save time and not add unnecessary complications with players
  • instead of the handful of hawker mobs, place an oven in one of the rooms at the midway-entrance or just a food stand shop
Trivia was me giving questions and riddles, originally thought of counting down, but again I didn't really consider the time, so we switched to me giving an approx time I felt was enough to have people send answers via TELL, and then said STOP when time was up. One of the reasons was also not to give people a chance to Wiki anything related to books or mud ;)

Then there the race and scavenger hunt.

The scavenger hunt wasn't an issue, it's pretty simple and self explanatory. Have everyone have a spare container, simply so only items from the lists provided are inside once it's over, and no extra items you usually carry around (i.e. waterskin, cash, lights etc.). Easier to check for accuracy and point distribution. The idea was to also start that by fireworking everyone, for fun and in the spirit of the Guild ;) but the race started with that and was a bit disappointing to be honest...not exactly a rain of people I expected over Cairhien....it was also suppose to be individual, but to save some time and maybe add a bit of fun to it - two person teams were made. Who grouped with who was done in order of "where" list as that was easiest and fastest way, also probably most fair, to pair up people. Some might've wanted a bit more time before the hunt started (IIRC I gave 2 min to look at it, 8 for the hunt :? ) - giving more time to look is more time to prepare, and while it's fair to give some time to look and prepare, the point is also to have people rush and try to multitask between reading the lists, gathering correct items and running back. I was counting on some mistakes to make it more fun and challenging - things like people putting yellow vials in containers while on the list it was the "honey" herb "vial" :D

The race - originally I envisioned this in a lot more complicated way...
Have several FCs weave as many Blind weaves as possible, hold them, firework blind contestants and have them spam back within a certain timeframe. The problem with that is the weaves, sps, holding them, trusting all weaves are held (nothing against anyone, just trying to keep everything as fair and transparent as possible) and people not using draughts etc. Also if I wrote something wrong regarding how weaves work - I don't play channies so, sorry :? It also begs the question how to award the FCs and not disqualify them from the contest, therefore "robbing" them of points or a point at least.

In the end I decided to just make sure everyone had a draught, and just fireworked them. Some did fly, others were just blinded. Asked Nyro to sit in a room in the Palace, not hidden as that would take forever for people to find him, might make people think a stabber is in the city etc....
Everyone had to find him, clap him on the back, and return to the Stump in the park in a certain amount of minutes.

The clap emote is to make sure people are focused and paying attention. Not clapping would result in no point given. Picked Palace for basically similar reasons - make sure people are paying attention and thinking as it was said he would be -inside- Cairhien, but I assumed due to being fireworked or other reasons, some might only look outside the Palace. Thankfully also, it's a fairly big Palace :mrgreen:

After all this, and since we broke the 3h or even 3:30h mark by now :? :oops: It was time to give some rewards - the weapons. Many had to go, some even before all this (apologies :( ) and I'm sure some might've even been bored out of their minds :P . Calculated the points, announced the leaderboard and gave out the prizes.

Then it was RP improv time, which also took a bit to start due to PK and waiting on some to return from said PK.
The idea is fairly simple - wrote 15 scenarios/roles and where it's happening, two person teams, same deal with scavenger hunt - pairs made based on "where" list. The points would be awarded by the audience which is the participants who didn't do the last improv, and maybe those who just wanted to watch. Done by just sending me a tell with 0-3 points per each person in the team which performed last. One minute to prep, via tells, and two minutes to RP it. If it all didn't take so long, it would be probably 2-4 or something longer even depending on the overall mood etc.
Unfortunately only 6 people out of 14ish or more had the strength and will to stay for this :)

The lists for scavenger hunt are in a post before this one, so here are the other RP Improv scenarios that weren't picked. Those that were will be posted separately once I go through all the logs. After sleeping over, I probably won't post Scavenger hunt log - since it's just me standing in same room, as well as Race log - same reason, it'll just be people walking in and out. So it'll just be the tour, Nyro's show, Bogdan's performance, RP Improv and as far as I remember that's all worth posting in log form.

The RP improv scenarios not picked (I remember some of you asked me not to post them, but I figured there's no harm since it's RP improv, and I don't mind anyone reusing any of this for any future event :) );
  • Isle of Mad Men - Ship left without you and one of the madmen chased you up a tree but isn't channeling. Instead he's professing his love for you. Except you're not sure which one of you.
  • Imre Stand - You are newbie peddlers on your first trip to trade with the Aiel. Since it's your first time, you completely forgot to restock your wagon, and the Aiel are walking towards you to begin trading.
  • Toman Head Road - You want a baby S'redit so you set out to find one, but you don't even know what a S'redit looks like.
  • Domani Palace - You're palace servants on a mission to find the kings favorite pair of sursa (Domani chopsticks) but ruffians keep attacking you on the streets. You'd complain about security to Lord Ituralde but he overheard one of you calling him "Little Wolf".
  • Evil Braem - One of you was tricked into using the portal stones, you were teleported to Evil Braem and now cute deer are trying to kill you.
  • Lugard rooftops - You're hiding from a Black Talon on a rooftop above a Lugard bakery, and think the urchins might rat on you but you have no gold coins on you. Also your stomach is growling due to the tempting aromas coming from the bakery.
  • The Stone of Tear - You're on a tour given by one of the High Lords and you're utterly unimpressed by the Stone, and nauseus from the stench of rotten fish.
  • Seanchan side of Tanchico - You both live on a fairly prestigous street in West Tanchico and want to complain about crolm poop on the streets but are too afraid to tell the Seanchan to pick up after their pets.
  • Undisclosed underground location - Meeting of Randland criminals. You're two bandits, one working for Paishain, the other for Ragnor. You're trying to convince the other one that your job has the better benefits.
  • City of Illian - You're city guards debating if pink fire breathing lizards actually exist and where would they live, also if you could learn to train them like Seanchan train raken, and what you'd do if you could.
  • Shayol Ghul - You are two quite lazy Forsaken considering working against the Dark One and making sure the Seals remain intact, as you'd like to relax for at least one more turn of the Wheel.
  • Remen - You're a pair of Black Talon murderers, waiting in ambush for their victims to arrive, but you have a moment of sharing and reveal to each other that one actually wants to be a florist and the other a pastry chef.


A few last thoughts after this exhausting but fun learning experience....
  • never do this again alone - the prep work is not that big of a deal given enough time and imagination, and some knowledge of what's all in game to potentially use. However the amount of focus required, the log editing etc....hrngh... :mrgreen: For me it was still fun, and I was or rather am, so pleasantly surprised and happy so many of you showed up and thankful for all the epic donations for the reward pool. But at the end it was very exhausting and mind went to a weird place of shutting down while also running on 6000 Thoughts Per Minute without shifting gears :?
  • split it up into parts, as was suggested by some after it was all done - all day event would probably he hard and many would only be able to attend 1 or 2 events. Splitting it into few days or one weekend is probably best, if ever done on a scale like this, and with this crowd..
  • more consideration for time - people's free time, time to do the admin work, time for each activity etc.
  • make sure to have fun
That's it for now. Just wanted to share all this. Still have to go through all the logs, and I also got disconnected at one point so need to see what I lost if anything...

EDIT: and since I got a few questions "wtf is High Chasaline" :mrgreen:
Last edited by Kordin on Sun Jan 09, 2022 5:06 am, edited 4 times in total.

Kordin
Posts: 712
Joined: Wed Feb 18, 2015 5:17 pm

Re: Festival of High Chasaline

Post by Kordin » Sun Jan 09, 2022 4:36 am

For those curious here are also the trivia questions etc...not all were picked and some slightly changed, again to cut it short and save some time..no answers will be given, in case anyone wants to reuse any of these :)

Wanted to have easy but not too easy ones, some really hard ones (like the Gray Sedai one, but I thought with the amount of Gray and Brown AS around...who knows, might've been an easy one ;) ) and some that fit somewhere in between easy and hard, depending on your knowledge, memory and/or knack for riddles.

WoTMUD related
  • Name at least three reasons why an innkeeper wouldn't let you rent? Bonus point for naming six.
  • Name first rank 8 Gleeman, bonus points to name first rank 7 Illuminator?
  • There was a forum based RP competition with songs some years ago. Name the winner and 2nd and 3rd places, bonus point for each title if you can remember it per entry.
  • What is the name of the LS character who was more or less constantly IC ,RPing a pirate?
  • Name the founder of the PRC Swordbrothers, later known as the clan Sword and Hand.
  • Which horse would you get after giving a stable hand "a yellow stable ticket"?
  • Who are the targets of Almoth mini-chain? General descriptive answer accepted, bonus point for exact mob names.
  • What do you need to make a glass tiger? Bonus point if general location of items is known. Another bonus point for another known location of one item needed.
  • Name all three Khel smobs.
  • Where is soap made in-game?
  • Which gem is required to make a superior staff? Bonus point for knowing crafting location.
  • Which two items are needed to craft wooden poles in-game?
  • A large, brighty painted merchant's wagon is a shop that can be found in various places around the map. Name the two named mobs that can be found there.
  • Where can a massive mahogany throne be found?
  • Where can a blue orb be found?
  • There is a room where in black and white stone are a burning white flame and a fang like black stone, set in a circle of red rock. Where can that room be found?
Books/WoT lore related
  • Name at least 4 known trolloc bands. Those implemented as clans in-game do not count. Bonus point for correct spelling of all named.
  • Who killed Gaidin Hammar? Bonus point if given reason why he was killed.
  • What is the name of the Gray Ajah Aes Sedai who was part of the group sent by Eladia to kidnap Rand in Cairhien, before the battle of Dumai's Wells, but only mentioned in The WoT Companion, not in the book Lord of Chaos? Just first name is fine.
  • Who of the Emond's Field five dies in the Last Battle?
  • Which of Five Great Captains has the nickname "The Little Wolf"?
  • Name the three ruling bodies of Tarabon.
  • Defender of the Realm - is the title of the ruler of which nation?
  • Which Forsaken disguised himself as a Gleeman?
  • What are the names of Egwene's parents?
  • What is "White Tower Schism"?
Riddles, unrelated to game or books
  • I don’t have eyes, but once I did see. Once I had thoughts, but now I’m empty. What am I?
  • I am the beginning of everything, the end of time and space, the beginning of every end, and the end of every place. What am I?
  • I can fly, but I have no wings. I can cry, but I have no eyes. Wherever I go, darkness follows me. What am I?
  • What gets wet while drying?
  • What can you hold in your right hand, but never in your left hand?
  • I have cities, but no houses. I have mountains, but no elevation. I have woods but no trees. I have water, but no fish. What am I?

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