Mage's Journey

>>239279
Eat grass for good luck.

>>239279
Tell him to use his Waypoint spell to go back to the City he has set as his home.

Cast mordenkainen's faithful watchdog

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"Eat grass for good luck."

They're not quite sure how this is considered lucky.

>>239279
Retrieve mystic herb and lighter of endless from bag.
Roll up herb into spiff and ignite with lighter. Use this to attain 'unbidden' state.
Assemble 'Lorem Ipsum's Eight-Fold Gate'
Use gate to chain together 'Thaumaturgic Feedback Loop' spells together.
This should cause an overflow, which will reset our INT to 0. Since we are an idiot now, we must love high places, so climb a tree and figure out where the fuck we are.

>>239316
make sure you pack more grass for later, just in case.

Reconsider life choices

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"Retrieve mystic herb and lighter of endless from bag.
Roll up herb into spiff and ignite with lighter. Use this to attain 'unbidden' state.
Assemble 'Lorem Ipsum's Eight-Fold Gate'
Use gate to chain together 'Thaumaturgic Feedback Loop' spells together.
This should cause an overflow, which will reset our INT to 0. Since we are an idiot now, we must love high places, so climb a tree and figure out where the fuck we are."

They aren't sure what most of that means but climbing a tree does seem like a good idea.

They see a river, mountains, a series of caves, and what looks to be smoke off in the distance.

>>239350
Bathe on the river first before you start meeting people.

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"Bathe on the river first before you start meeting people."

They settle on the river being their best bet for now and set out. A bath and some clean drinking water might not be a bad idea.

Besides, there's no telling what's lurking in those woods.

>>239395
Into the caves we go.

So what do we find?

>>239410
Do what >>239407 says and make for those caves, ignoring whatever that is behind you.

You gotta treat these stalker types like you would a kouhai.Only notice them when it's in your best interest. If you turn around, it'll probably become shy and leave.

Might be helpful to take stock of our inventory and spells.

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"You gotta treat these stalker types like you would a kouhai.Only notice them when it's in your best interest. If you turn around, it'll probably become shy and leave.

Might be helpful to take stock of our inventory and spells."

They didn't see any stalkers but they have to admit that forest did give them a funny feeling. They check their Bag just in case.

They have a Magic Tome, a Coin Purse, a Water Flask, and some Gemstones.

>>239456
Read an inspiration quote from the tome for confidence boost.

>>239461
>inspiration
inspirational*

>>239456
Get a sword and become a spellsword

Or a mageknight

>>239456

Sounds like we're prepared. Go into the caves, maybe we'll find treasure.

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"Sounds like we're prepared. Go into the caves, maybe we'll find treasure."

They would love nothing more than to explore those caves. Unfortunately, there's a rushing river in the way.

>>239494
Cast Freeze Water on river and make an ice bridge.

>>239494
Summon a small water elemental to drag you across the river.
Have it accompany you on your journey.

>>239504
>>239512

This. Get in that motherfucking cave already.

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"Cast Freeze Water on river and make an ice bridge."

They summon all of their almighty Mage Power...

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And safely cross their ice bridge.

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"Get in that motherfucking cave already."

They enter the cave...

>>239554
Suddenly cave goblins.

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"Suddenly cave goblins."

They don't see any cave goblins. In fact, they can't really see much of anything.

They can hear the sound of dripping water.

>>239556
Neutral, blue-skinned cave goblins.

>>239561
Cast Light.

>>239561
Cast Light Fairy.

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"Cast Light."

They cast a Light Spell. That's much better.

Now they have two options. Left or right?

>>239571
Right makes right.

((Alright pausing Mage's Journey for the night! Thank you for participating in this, it will return tomorrow!))

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>>239576
CAST MIGHT

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"Right makes right."

That seems logical. Kind of. It's all the Mage has to go on so they follow the right pathway.

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And come across a Crystalline Cavern.

>>239877
Examine Crystals for any immediately detectable magical traps.
Also examine the shiny pool of liquid.
At the same time try to keep the figure, which is probably just a shadow from the stalagmites, in the corner of your vision.

Also cast a spell to reveal hidden objects on your lower body. Having a biological sex or a gender to refer to you would be more convenient than the "they" right now.
... Unless of course the young mage choses "they" as their pronoun of preference.
Which would be quite interesting.

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"Examine Crystals for any immediately detectable magical traps."

The Mage can't sense any traps but there does seem to be some kind of power emanating from the Crystals. This place seems sacred.

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"Also examine the shiny pool of liquid."

It's just a pool of water. It's reflecting the glint off the Crystals.

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"
Also cast a spell to reveal hidden objects on your lower body. Having a biological sex or a gender to refer to you would be more convenient than the "they" right now."

They aren't quite sure why they would do that. It doesn't seem appropriate right now. Especially not with that figure watching in the corner.

>>239962
Are you sure it's not a shadow?
Shine your light at it.
>>239959
Does the water appear to be drinkable or poisoned?

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"Are you sure it's not a shadow?
Shine your light at it."

The Mage approaches warily...

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It's just a statue.
They breathe a sigh of relief.

"Does the water appear to be drinkable or poisoned?"

It seemed to be clear and clean when they examined it before. Should they chance it?

>>240023
It's doubtful a statue of some thing with a wide grin would be placed in front of a pool of harmless drinking water. Or maybe it would.
It could either mean "we're friendly, this water is good" or "HA,HA, look at you sucker drinking the poison."
Don't risk it.

Place the least valuable gemstone, or a coin in front of the statue as a sign of respect.

>>240023
Rub the statue's horns for good luck. Its probably some sort of genie or something.

>>240031
I agree. Try throwing a coin in the pool. Maybe offer a quick prayer?

>>240058
>>240023
>>240031
Oh and the gemstone or coin i mentioned is also a great thing to know if you're alone.
If you are, you can pick it up on your way back.
If you are not, it's probably better that you've initiated contact by giving them something first.

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"It's doubtful a statue of some thing with a wide grin would be placed in front of a pool of harmless drinking water. Or maybe it would.
It could either mean "we're friendly, this water is good" or "HA,HA, look at you sucker drinking the poison."
Don't risk it.

Place the least valuable gemstone, or a coin in front of the statue as a sign of respect."

They decide they shouldn't disturb this place any longer. As a sign of respect they place a couple of Coins and their Amethyst at the statue's feet.

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The Statue's mouth opens, bearing a gift.

>>240090
Try not to pee your clothes in shock and horror first of all.

>>240090
smile back and explore another part of the cave.

>>240090
Take it with a telekinetic spell and take the item that way.

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"Try not to pee your clothes in shock and horror first of all."
"smile back and explore another part of the cave."
"Take it with a telekinetic spell and take the item that way."

All of these seem like wonderful suggestions but the Mage only has Elemental magic at the moment. They can acquire new spells later.

They are torn between leaving and accepting the gift.

>>240137
Accept the gift.

>>240137
>All of these seem like wonderful suggestions but the Mage only has Elemental magic at the moment.
...
So you are saying that those things don't work?
You could not "not pee your clothes" without a spell?
You can not "smile back" without a spell?

Damn.

Either way, it does actually seem to be a gift so try pushing it out of the mouth with the Magic Tome, so you don't cut your soft mage fingers on the statue fangs..

>>240141
NO! That's a terrible idea, it will bite they're arm off!

>>240152
It's a test of trust, obviously.

>>240175
But we have no reason to trust a statue. It isn't even alive.

Or is it?

Also seriously.... did you pee your pants?

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"Either way, it does actually seem to be a gift so try pushing it out of the mouth with the Magic Tome, so you don't cut your soft mage fingers on the statue fangs.."

They decide not to look a gift..statue..in the er, mouth..Bad analogy. They decide to use their Tome to remove the gift.

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A small pouch drops out. The Statue's mouth snaps shut behind it.

>>240218
Check out dat fat loot.

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They think it feels like...sand? Something grainy for sure.

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"Also seriously.... did you pee your pants?"

>>240222
Eat the sand. Gain mad power.

Eat sand along with the container.

>>240246
>>240252
No, please don't. Just keep exploring or whatever.

>>240246
>>240252
Why not taste the sand first to make sure it doesn't taste like poison.
>>240252
No. We're not eating a bag of cloth.

hmmm, I agree a taste couldn't hurt. yolo

>>240224
Well hope you were wearing diapers or something.

Also before leaving check the room for any hidden holes or doorways one last time. Even in the pool of water.

>>240278
>>240263
Actually i reconsidered. How about we take a LOOK first before even tasting it.

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"Why not taste the sand first to make sure it doesn't taste like poison."

They decide to test it and sprinkle a bit of the Sand onto their tongue.

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hhgghhHHK.

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Okay no actually that's not bad. In fact any hunger they might've had previously has completely vanished.

They decide this might come handy in emergencies.

>>240372
I wonder if you enjoy playing with our emotions, or if maybe the quantum multiverse theory is true, and we just get to witness the one outcome where after the initial shock it was not poison after all.

Back to matters at hand: Look for doorways.

>>240377
Thank the statue before you leave.

>>240377
Dunk your head in the water

>>240387
Yes
>>240389
Yes
>>240402
I think we should wait until we know more about the cave first.

>>240402
Let's not stretch our luck.
Clearly this is a holy place of some sort, judging by the crystals and we were rewarded for our offerings with nutritional ... sand.

>>240417
Fine, attempt to identify anything special about the water
Then dunk

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"Thank the statue before you leave."

They turn and give the Statue their thanks. They should have not been so quick to judge.

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"Back to matters at hand: Look for doorways."

They scour the room but it would appear this is a dead end.

>>240539
>>240442

>>240539
Before we go, attempt to feed light thing to statue.

If that doesn't do anything go back and go left this time.

>>240569
Should we really dunk our heads in a possibly holy pool?
... Well i mean okay i guess there would've been some warning signs if not.

>>240539
eeerm, did it move? Talk to it, maybe it speaks english

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"Before we go, attempt to feed light thing to statue.

If that doesn't do anything go back and go left this time."

They offer their Light source to the Statue.
It doesn't respond.

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They put the Sand in their bag and head out of the Crystalline Cavern.

Only left or back now.

>>240671
Wait you forgot the other two people!
Don't only reply to me... :|

>>240590
>>240569

>>240671
Back

>>240671
I mean. I guess it not responding to you offering it the light is a sign that it is just a statue, but we could still try the water before doing what >>240707 said

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"Fine, attempt to identify anything special about the water
Then dunk"

Whoops! They almost forgot!

((Guys, I'm going to take a break! I'll be back in a bit, it's just my back is killin me. They'll check out the water next.))

>>240782
Go down the left passage after checking the pool of water. Ignore the sissies wanting to leave

>>241826
Yeah, this. Don't leave the cave just yet.

Before we go further, lets figure this sex thing out. Using "they" is ridiculous, its plural. Does our MC have multiple personalities? Might as well use "it"

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"Before we go further, lets figure this sex thing out. Using "they" is ridiculous, its plural. Does our MC have multiple personalities? Might as well use "it" "

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Anyway, here's the pool. They think it just looks like normal water but there does seem to be the shadow of something down below. Should they check it out?

>>251933
What are those sparkling things?

>>251910
Sex, not gender. There is a distinction, ya know

((All other comments about sex and gender will be ignored. I'm sorry. There's no reason you would need to know this information, the word provided is
"they" and it will remain "they". Thank you.))

>>251933
Are those magic stalactites or something? They're surprisingly bright for being in a cave.

>>252194
Its because you tried and failed to make me look stupid. "They" is a terrible way to refer to our MC, try a singular pronoun instead of a plural one. But really, nice try with the image. B for effort

Well, at least I know that Chibi is some special snowflake poster who tries (and fails) to maintain the moral high ground. Also, when proven wrong, Chibi will just ignore you due to lack of integrity. I learned a lot today. Thank you.

((I said I wouldn't respond to these anymore but I feel like I need to point this out. "Sex, not gender. There is a distinction, ya know". Implying you know what nonbinary is. Implying that you know "they" is a pronoun commonly used by nonbinary people. So please. Try to have a little more respect. The only reason I posted the image in that fashion was because this is not the first time somebody has mentioned it and frankly it's a little invasive.))

((I don't have the time or the energy to continue this story or deal with these rude transphobic comments. Intentional or not, they are transphobic and rude. I apologize to those of you who had nothing to do with this and I hope you have a wonderful day. Thank you.))

Apparently I'm offending a fictional character's ideals. Nonbinary refers to gender, I'm inquiring on the FICTIONAL character's sex.

I must be getting trolled

People ask these questions for story immersion. People are interested in fully fleshed characters. I'm not asking to troll about however the character identifies as

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>>252222
>"They" is a singular pronoun.
It is clear that the author did not want to use "it," and it is a common convention of English that referring to peoplewith "it" is dehumanizing. It is exceedingly common for many people to use "they" as an indeterminate or neutral singular pronoun while referring to a person of unknown gender because (according to the previous convention) "it" would be offensive. Shakespeare and Chaucer also both used "they" as a singular pronoun, evidence that this convention has been well established in the English-speaking world for thousands of years, perhaps for as long as English has existed.
Repeatedly stating things is not the same as "proving" them.

For the record: I agree that several of the uses of the pronoun were awkward. Unfortunately, there are times when awkward prose is difficult to avoid. It is a writer's judgment as to when awkwardness is acceptable, and it seems this author deemed these uses necessary. It is a fair complaint to say there was a lot of awkward phrasing. However, the middle of the quest is not the time to critique syntax.

I agree with OP on one point: repeatedly asking this question after they initially ignored and/or demurred was rude. Whether they were interested in "immersion" or not, they clearly indicated that they were not interested in answering the question, and didn't consider it relevant. Continuing to prod after this point was at best idiotically oblivious and at worst intentional vindictive derailment.

>>252749
I feel the need to point out that, by responding, you have broken your promise not to respond. Either that, or you initially lied. I reluctantly agree with mHRX20X7 on one point: indicating that the question was "invasive" is unreasonable, as mHRX20X7 nor any of the other users ITT (myself included) had any reason to suspect that the PC was a self-insert or representative of you whatsoever. As they pointed out, they were asking about the character's identity, not your own. Taking it personally was therefore not fully reasonable, but either way you did a more damaging thing by not just ignoring it like you said you would. That was foolish.
For the record: your quest had promise, and your art was cute and well-done. It seemed a bit like you were making the quest up as you went along, but that is not an undesirable quality. I can sympathize as well with your reaction here, even as I'm telling you it was the wrong one to take. It's hard to not take things personally sometimes.


This quest was not fated for this. It was doomed in the end by the combined tragedies of a quest-taker who could not let an irrelevant point go and a quest-giver who could not leave that quest-taker alone due to personal politics. You are both responsible for its loss and neither of you are the better off for it. I hope that both of you are as unhappy as I am with this ending, and that this unhappiness prompts you both to make wiser decisions in the future.

>>253715
The reason I had to repeat myself is because OP doesn't understand the difference between gender and sex. If OP didn't initially post that passive aggressive image along with a direct quote from me, I wouldn't have to point out how foolish this is. Its almost like OP doesn't know how to get the audience to emotionally invest in a character

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>>253954
>I had to
>If they had done X, I wouldn't have to...
Bullshit. You didn't "have to" do anything. Nothing obligated you to press the point other than sheer bullheadedness. Nothing prevented you from focusing on the quest itself. You could have stopped asking when it was made abundantly clear that OP was not interested in either gender or sex, but you didn't, and that can only be your fault.

>Its almost like OP doesn't know how to get the audience to emotionally invest in a character
The middle of a quest is not the proper time to critique that quest, including in manners of "emotional investment" or writing quality: this is also a problem with your ahistorical claims about pronouns. This is common sense: a thread can be derailed by criticisms like these easily. A QM can't respond to critique and run the quest at the same time. It is clear from the fact that the QM established no backstory that that is the style of the quest they intended to run, a fact you overlooked in your quest to be as self-righteous as possible.
>B-but he bruised my ego!
Pathetic.
This is all assuming, of course, that it is necessary to know the gender/sex of a character in order to become emotionally invested in them, a claim you have taken for granted and shown no evidence in support of. In opposition to this claim, I present "The Brave Little Toaster." This film features, as the protagonist, a toaster with neither gender nor sex. It is therefore impossible, according to you, that the audience can be "emotionally invested" in the adventure of this character. This statement is absurd, because "The Brave Little Toaster" is hardly unique in its main characters' status as a genderless being. Human beings are capable of becoming emotionally invested in fucking anything, including things that do not or can not have gender identities, such as robots or shapes or abstract concepts: this is thought to be a consequence of the ability to empathize. It is unsubstantiated and simply contrary to common sense that it is harder to identify with a non-binary presumably human protagonist than a fucking toaster with a face.

Your claim that the gender of a player character must be disclosed for the audience to experience a meaningful connect is therefore plainly ridiculous and unfounded. You are responsible for positing it anyway and claiming it as fact, when the truth is that even if it was fact, you would still be ultimately responsible for your actions. You had an undeniable hand in the derailing of this thread, and claiming that you were under any kind of obligation to do so is a lie.

>>254376
Oh, its not my ego that's bruised here. I asked a question and OP responded in a rude manner. Plus, OP's answer was irrelevant to the question. I'm seeking a simple answer, its not my fault OP has a massive victim complex. Why are you defending someone who is objectively wrong?

You all keep mentioning gender, yet I've never questioned the MC's gender. Seems as if everyone gets sex and gender confused. Work on your reading comprehension

>>254703
>My ego's not bruised, I was just offended by a rude response and proceeded to throw a tantrum
If it quacks like a duck...
>Why are you defending someone who is objectively wrong?
Because you were both wrong. Gender and sex are two different things, but in a situation where the player character's gender is not relevant, it can readily be inferred that their sex will not be relevant either. Ignorant or in spite of this, you plunged on. You are both guilty of acting from "victim's complexes:" you assumed immediately that the "non-binary" picture was intended as an insult and lashed out, and OP took an impersonal and initially reasonable inquiry as a personal offense. If either of you had simply declined to take offense personally, the quest wouldn't be dead, but instead each of you elected to become a victim. Make no mistake: this is your fault as well as theirs.

>>239279
OP if you're still there, next time adress the player either as "you" or "[Character Name]". It is still neutral but is way more immersive IMO
Also you should just have said outright you wouldn't mention the sex or gender of the character because it was irrelevant, that would have cut short any discussion. The way I see it you wanted to make a trans/nonbinary/whatever character and didn't concieve that the readers wouldn't immediatly associate "they" with what you had in mind. Speak to your players before going passive/aggressive on them, we're not in your mind mate.
Also players will always want to know the gender/sex of the PC if you don't specify. ALWAYS. Be prepared