Summer Solstice 2014
| Summer Solstice Event | |
|---|---|
| Year | 2014 |
| Date From | June 14 |
| Date To | June 30 |
| Main Organisers | Shadowfax |
| Theme | Chaos containment |
The theme of the Summer Solstice 2014 event was "Chaos containment". A new regional organization called the "Ostiarium" was created for the event, the Ostiary leader gave out Chaos-related quests. The event was organized by Shadowfax and Kagome.
After it was over, the Chaos creatures created for the event were redistributed into a variety of different areas that suited them.
Timeline
There were two groups of quests: the first four were only available for the event, and the latter three that became available during the event yet were obtainable thereafter. Note that strange, new creatures, many of them powerful, began appearing at random around the areas affected by Chaos, so that made the quests all the more difficult. On the day of the solstice, the origins of these creatures were made manifest: magic portals leading directly to the plane of Chaos. It was up to players to destroy them.
| Date | Summary | Quests | Areas |
|---|---|---|---|
| June 6 | Event announcement; Chaos creatures begin appearing around the Corruption | ||
| June 14 | Note retrieval quest available | Main Ostiary Camp opened; Temple of Schlyne opened | |
| June 21 | Chaos portals began to appear | Portal closing quest available; Warpstone and neutronium gathering quests available | Gaseous Gosades area opened (reworked fire plane from last year's event); Temple of Schlyne addition opened; Killing Fields of Sallipis opened |
| June 23 | Hill giant king quest available | Occidental Ostiary Camp opened | |
| June 24 | Keeper quest available | Phtom Island (gith) instance opened | |
| June 30 | Event-only quests (note retrieval, warpstone and neutronium gathering, portal closing) go offline |
Quests
Event-only quests went as follows:
Note Retrieval Quest
This quest began with the Ostiary leader in their main camp, just east off of the Great Southern Road near Thalos.
Knight Commander Rigel Stormcrow, 'The Ostrium has been stemming the tides of Chaos for over thirty years, patrolling the perimeter to keep it at bay. Now that druidic magic is more widely available, we hope to be able to find a more stable solution than constantly casting wards. The Ostrium is looking for a courier collect some notes about the subject from some of our agents. The first task is to travel through the Corruption of Chaos and retrieve some notes from the priest Emric. He is in the Chapel of Aris. 'Emric is a native of Ironseed who returned to his hometown and has devoted his life to unlocking the secrets of controlling the Plane of Chaos with the goal of undoing the Corruption's harmful effects one day. He is a knight of our order and has been working diligently on a means of perfecting the wards we use to contain the Corruption of Chaos. 'Chaos is populated by strange, monstrous creatures. The way is perilous, but we can compensate you for your troubles.'
The player then located Emric and talked to him.
Emric, the priest of Aris says, 'Good. I didn't want to leave. I was hoping the Ostrium would send someone. Take these to the Knight Commander at once.'
With Emric's notes in hand, the player returned to Rigel Stormcrow and gave them to him.
Knight Commander Rigel Stormcrow says, 'Up for another courier run? All right. I'll look these over while you're performing your next task. We need to go to the Sinar'i Valley and retreive some notes from the high priest Telengar. 'Telengar was slain during the early stages of the Corruption of Chaos and has since risen as an undead. You need not be afraid of him. His sanity is a bit fragile, but he has been cooperating with the Ostrium and taking notes about what he has observed within the Corruption. 'Although Telengar himself is docile, many of the other former inhabitants of the valley are not. Many of the elves were driven mad or transformed into mindless undead and attack anything that moves. You'll need to be careful.'
The player then traveled to the Sinar'i Valley and talked to the High Priest.
The High Priest of the Sinar'i looks up at you for a moment and says, 'Ah good, the Ostiarium sent you. I have been diligently working on a means of containing Chaos as the Knight Commander suggested. Please take my notes to him immediately. There isn't a moment to waste!' And with that, he returns to reading his books.
Once the player gave Telengar's notes to the Knight Commander, he had this to say:
Knight Commander Rigel Stormcrow says, 'Fantastic work.' He scans through the High Priest's notes and says, 'I've never heard of this Dulladan person that Telengar mentions. Go to the Temple of Schlyne and talk to her priest, a entity named Seker. Ask him if he knows anything about this Dulladan.'
The player then talked to Seker, the high priest of Schlyne with a speech impediment.
Seker, the high priest of Schlyne says, 'Indeed I know Dulladan. He was one of Schlyne's faith-faith-faithful from the beginning and is interred beneath this very temp-temp-temple. Rather, I should say that he was one of the death goddess-dess-dess' faithful, for he is no long-long-longer. He has taken his gift of unlife-life-life from Schlyne and is attempting to establish himself-self-self as a god of strife. His papers are buried in his coff-coff-coffin, which he will no doubt defend. You will have to slay him to get them.'
After a lot of fighting, the player defeated the Heresiarch of Strife and retrieved his notes, which he then gave to Rigel Stormcrow.
Knight Commander Rigel Stormcrow says, 'Thank you very much. I don't recognize the language, so we'll have to send these out to get them translated. The fate of the world depends on the work that the Ostiarium does to protect it, so we are well-funded by a number of regional organizations, so we can afford your services.'
Warpstone and neutronium quests
Once the note retrieval quest was completed, two more quests were made available. The first was obtain and ingot of warpstone:
Knight Commander Rigel Stormcrow says, 'Now that means of creating permanent Chaos wards is possible, we must work to provide the raw materials necessary to construct them. The rarest mineral we require is warpstone. We need warpstone ingots, as many as you can bring. 'Telengar informed us that the valley elves originally bought the warpstones they used to construct the catalyst to open the rift to Chaos from the Grae Keep on Ramanek, the northern continent, and that warpstones are the byproducts of mysterious, powerful beasts from the shadow plane called the Unnamed. They sold for a small fortune, so they must be difficult to obtain.'
Finding neutronium involved talking to a few people first:
Knight Commander Rigel Stormcrow says, 'Since we hope to construct permanent wards against Chaos soon, we will need a means of powering them until we can carve the necessary runes on them to collect sunlight and moonlight. We can't devote the manpower to keep knights at each ward. Our consultant from the Planar Research Guild has suggested that we use neutronium, a rare heavy element only found in the deep reaches of outer space. There is only one known reliable source of neutronium, and that is fusion quasi-elementals. 'During the Fire Plane Invasion of 591, it was reported that the fire demigod Pyrenius had fusion quasi-elementals as servants. Go to Mercia and inquire of turcoplier Waerstan of Pyrenius' whereabouts and see if there is a means of reaching him. The church of Shadowfax keeps an eye on his activities.'
Waestan, turcoplier of the Light says, 'Pyrenius has moved from the Ethereal Plane of Fire to a distant planet on the Material Plane called Gaseous Gosades. There once was a portal leading to that world in the Wilderness of Zin, far away to the east in the K'tinga River Valley. If you want more information, I suggest talking to the Red Mage in the Temple of Zin.'
The Red Mage says, 'The fact that Pyrenius has moved to Gaseous Gosades is news to me, but I trust that Turcoplier Waerstan's information is accurate. The wardstone guarding the portal to Gaseous Gosades is in the western part of the Wilderness of Zin near K'tinrooj, a section called the Killing Fields of Sallipis. Knowledge of the 'wardbreaker' spell is trickling through the adventuring community. That is the spell you would need to access Gaseous Gosades.'
Once players entered the poisonous atmosphere of Gaseous Gosades, then they had to hunt down and kill a fusion quasi-elemental.
Portal closing quest
Knight Commander Rigel Stormcrow says, 'Our great work is in peril because of the numerous Chaos creatures that have been attacking our patrols. The Ostiarium is overwhelmed. We are recruiting every able-bodied adventurer to help us. The monsters have been spotted emerging from glowing red portals all over the Corruption of Chaos. The largest concentration appears to be near the rift in Ironseed. Unlike that rift, these portals lack a catalyst and can be destroyed. If you find one of these portals, dispel it immediately before more monsters can arrive!'
Once this quest was available, a portal appeared semi-randomly (at one of twenty locations) with a guardian entourage and spawned monsters until it was destroyed by players via the 'dispel magic' spell, whereupon another appeared a short time later. During the nine days this quest was available, 236 such portals were destroyed.
See also
- Event Page on main website
- The Nature of Chaos
- History of the Rubicons, volume 3
- A world map, with areas affected by Chaos marked
