(no subject)
PREMISE
Your characters arrive...
One day, you wake up at the bottom of a drained cenote in a dark, rocky cavern. You don't remember how you got there, merely the last thing you were doing in your own world. You don't know where you are. You don't know what mysteries surround you.
Why are you here?
You are alone in the cenote. If you follow the narrow tunnel ahead of you, you find yourself in a series of connected limestone caves packed with glowing fungi, crystals, the occasional firefly or frog, and odd plants that seem to get odder as you walk. The caves lead into the region called Centralia, the heart of the underground system called Omphalotus, and there you must stay - until a way out can be found.
These caves will provide you with a place to sleep. Food to eat, water to drink. Spores in the air allow speech between languages, heal injuries. There are methods of communication, for reaching others in far-off places. These caves provide everything necessary for a reasonably comfortable life.
The state of Omphalotus
If things on the caves seem a tad too convenient, especially for being an alien world, it's not your imagination: the environment is actively accommodating itself to suit your characters' needs. It won't suddenly sprout a gaming computer with internet access, or a mindless minion to serve you fresh daiquiris, but the topology may change from time to time to make public areas more accessible, or new plant-life may evolve to solve a common conundrum. Combined with the random influxes that are constantly pulling new lifeforms in from other worlds, it makes for a very diverse and often confusing environment.
The current state of comfort isn't a random accident: these caves have been undergoing constant change for many years. Each 'generation' of settlers has it easier than the ones that came before it. The farther back you go, the harsher life in the cave system was. In fact, every group of settlers until now has met demise for lack of often simple creature comforts, ranging from a lack of penicillin to a lack of drinkable water. Consider yourselves extremely lucky: yours is the first round of settlers that will probably not meet their cumulative end as a result of poor subsistence planning. Unfortunately for anyone sensitive enough to detect them, the myriad ghosts roaming the land were not so lucky. (Keep this in mind when NPC'ing a native spirit entity.)
You can have spectral entities from any fictional source. They can be sentient or not, as you choose. You can give them a back-story. The only thing to keep in mind is that the reason the ghosts are in Ompha in the first place is because they were pulled here from another dimension, just like your characters. Not one of the ghosts currently in residence is a native of the caves. You can choose whether they were pulled in post-death, or brought in alive and died here. If the latter, the entity might have some serious traumas. It also might have some heartbreaking stories to tell (which you may elaborate on at your whim).
What the characters know
Why is your character here? No one really seems to know the answer, but there are the following pieces of information:
1) There are strange energy readings in the caves, detectable by any character sensitive to it or possessing tools that can detect it. This energy may interfere with abilities and equipment, and it seems to spike oddly at seemingly-random times that just so happen to coincide with new arrivals.
2) There are ghosts and other restless spirits in the caves, wandering around the 'Nightmare Fuel' section of the Gardens. If your character has a way to communicate with the undead, they can try to get useful information from the spirits. However, the spirits may give rather cryptic answers, and many are just as lost as everyone else in the caves.
3) The many other, seemingly random events and discoveries that will be revealed as time passes. (Aside from events, there are messages carved into the rock in languages your character may or may not be able to read, strange artifacts that seem to be left behind, lost messages floating around in the mercury system, and other signs that there were once others in the caves, though any other trace that these people existed at all has vanished.)
4) The seeming presense of something huge, something far-reaching, that holds an unknown amount of influence throughout the caves. Is this lifeform benevolent or malevolent? Random or there for a reason?
Are these clues to the truth or nothing more than red herrings? Only time will tell.
Now what?
It's all up to you what your character does in the caverns of Omphalotus. Your character can discover a new tunnel or cave. (Let the mods know what you're up to, and we might even add the new area to the official map.) Along the way, they might encounter a hideous monster. Several characters can team up to explore the caverns or head to the Room of Illusions to share a group fantasy and explore each others' worlds, have a card battle or a Gladiator-style tournament.
Other options include, but are by no means limited to: battling to the death in the middle of the Gardens, exploring Topside, throwing a wedding celebration in the Larder, finding a pet or recruiting a pet or summon monster, setting up a shop or a school in Centralia, trying to get answers from the ghosts, and discovering a new plant or animal. The plot is almost entirely player-made.
The mods will occasionally set up what seems to be a random event, but even the simplest thing can start to shed light of the mystery of the caves and why your character is here. Whether working together to find the truth or hiding secrets from each other, interaction and exploration are the driving forces of this game.
Minor characters and alternate universe versions of characters are welcome, as are original characters of all kinds.
Premise | Rules | General FAQ | Applications FAQ | Submit an Application | Map and Locations | Living Environment | Fungus, Flora & Fauna Guide
Taken | Reserved | Wanted | Hiatus & Drop | Permissions | Contact List (Locked) | Complaints/Concerns
Directory | Mercury | Logs | OOC | HMD | Musebox | Omphalotus OOC Chat
Your characters arrive...
One day, you wake up at the bottom of a drained cenote in a dark, rocky cavern. You don't remember how you got there, merely the last thing you were doing in your own world. You don't know where you are. You don't know what mysteries surround you.
Why are you here?
You are alone in the cenote. If you follow the narrow tunnel ahead of you, you find yourself in a series of connected limestone caves packed with glowing fungi, crystals, the occasional firefly or frog, and odd plants that seem to get odder as you walk. The caves lead into the region called Centralia, the heart of the underground system called Omphalotus, and there you must stay - until a way out can be found.
These caves will provide you with a place to sleep. Food to eat, water to drink. Spores in the air allow speech between languages, heal injuries. There are methods of communication, for reaching others in far-off places. These caves provide everything necessary for a reasonably comfortable life.
The state of Omphalotus
If things on the caves seem a tad too convenient, especially for being an alien world, it's not your imagination: the environment is actively accommodating itself to suit your characters' needs. It won't suddenly sprout a gaming computer with internet access, or a mindless minion to serve you fresh daiquiris, but the topology may change from time to time to make public areas more accessible, or new plant-life may evolve to solve a common conundrum. Combined with the random influxes that are constantly pulling new lifeforms in from other worlds, it makes for a very diverse and often confusing environment.
The current state of comfort isn't a random accident: these caves have been undergoing constant change for many years. Each 'generation' of settlers has it easier than the ones that came before it. The farther back you go, the harsher life in the cave system was. In fact, every group of settlers until now has met demise for lack of often simple creature comforts, ranging from a lack of penicillin to a lack of drinkable water. Consider yourselves extremely lucky: yours is the first round of settlers that will probably not meet their cumulative end as a result of poor subsistence planning. Unfortunately for anyone sensitive enough to detect them, the myriad ghosts roaming the land were not so lucky. (Keep this in mind when NPC'ing a native spirit entity.)
You can have spectral entities from any fictional source. They can be sentient or not, as you choose. You can give them a back-story. The only thing to keep in mind is that the reason the ghosts are in Ompha in the first place is because they were pulled here from another dimension, just like your characters. Not one of the ghosts currently in residence is a native of the caves. You can choose whether they were pulled in post-death, or brought in alive and died here. If the latter, the entity might have some serious traumas. It also might have some heartbreaking stories to tell (which you may elaborate on at your whim).
What the characters know
Why is your character here? No one really seems to know the answer, but there are the following pieces of information:
1) There are strange energy readings in the caves, detectable by any character sensitive to it or possessing tools that can detect it. This energy may interfere with abilities and equipment, and it seems to spike oddly at seemingly-random times that just so happen to coincide with new arrivals.
2) There are ghosts and other restless spirits in the caves, wandering around the 'Nightmare Fuel' section of the Gardens. If your character has a way to communicate with the undead, they can try to get useful information from the spirits. However, the spirits may give rather cryptic answers, and many are just as lost as everyone else in the caves.
3) The many other, seemingly random events and discoveries that will be revealed as time passes. (Aside from events, there are messages carved into the rock in languages your character may or may not be able to read, strange artifacts that seem to be left behind, lost messages floating around in the mercury system, and other signs that there were once others in the caves, though any other trace that these people existed at all has vanished.)
4) The seeming presense of something huge, something far-reaching, that holds an unknown amount of influence throughout the caves. Is this lifeform benevolent or malevolent? Random or there for a reason?
Are these clues to the truth or nothing more than red herrings? Only time will tell.
Now what?
It's all up to you what your character does in the caverns of Omphalotus. Your character can discover a new tunnel or cave. (Let the mods know what you're up to, and we might even add the new area to the official map.) Along the way, they might encounter a hideous monster. Several characters can team up to explore the caverns or head to the Room of Illusions to share a group fantasy and explore each others' worlds, have a card battle or a Gladiator-style tournament.
Other options include, but are by no means limited to: battling to the death in the middle of the Gardens, exploring Topside, throwing a wedding celebration in the Larder, finding a pet or recruiting a pet or summon monster, setting up a shop or a school in Centralia, trying to get answers from the ghosts, and discovering a new plant or animal. The plot is almost entirely player-made.
The mods will occasionally set up what seems to be a random event, but even the simplest thing can start to shed light of the mystery of the caves and why your character is here. Whether working together to find the truth or hiding secrets from each other, interaction and exploration are the driving forces of this game.
Minor characters and alternate universe versions of characters are welcome, as are original characters of all kinds.
Premise | Rules | General FAQ | Applications FAQ | Submit an Application | Map and Locations | Living Environment | Fungus, Flora & Fauna Guide
Taken | Reserved | Wanted | Hiatus & Drop | Permissions | Contact List (Locked) | Complaints/Concerns
Directory | Mercury | Logs | OOC | HMD | Musebox | Omphalotus OOC Chat