The Stalkers RPG: Dustwoken Season 1 - General Chat Thread (Savant Hideout - Beachwood Farmstead)

**Neo Emolga** · 07-23-2022, 03:53 PM

Ughhh, okay, I'm sorry for being so missing in action lately. I look at the days I last did updates and I'm like no way, it couldn't have been that long ago but eh, that's the truth. I definitely need to budget some of my time in better ways. :P

Since I haven't been quite on top of this lately, I'm broadening the open window people have to submit actions (though you can still submit them after the submission window, but I will move along if time is up and there's nothing else that's submitted). I've been now giving four days to submit actions but if you guys need extra time because I've been kind of lax with updating (busy with other stuff, too) and you haven't been checking the forum quite as often for Stalkers updates because they've been a bit more spaced out lately, please let me know.

Also, if certain things don't quite make sense and you need some clarity on things (especially the rituals since this is something totally new that's going on and may not make 100% sense compared to traditional Sin Purge rituals from previous Seasons), please don't hesitate to ask! I'm also not against giving hints if you think you might need them!

**C0L0R3D** · 07-23-2022, 08:51 PM

Ah, I wouldn’t go worrying about it. Stalkers is 100% a thing that doesn’t need to be one’s top priority in life, and while it brings happiness to some it still doesn’t meant you gotta roll with it 24/7. That’s something I can get behind without a doubt!

And hints wise… if you can answer it, which of these two little rituals are we closer to gaining more ground on? Majistus and Phudistus, those neat sounding stuff?

**Neo Emolga** · 07-24-2022, 02:35 AM

Originally Posted by C0L0R3D

Ah, I wouldn’t go worrying about it. Stalkers is 100% a thing that doesn’t need to be one’s top priority in life, and while it brings happiness to some it still doesn’t meant you gotta roll with it 24/7. That’s something I can get behind without a doubt!

And hints wise… if you can answer it, which of these two little rituals are we closer to gaining more ground on? Majistus and Phudistus, those neat sounding stuff?

Sure, I can go into these a little further, especially since I feel you guys have found enough parts and uncovered enough lore to reveal this stuff. I think if you were to backtrack and go through all of the material, you’d map this all out, but I understand that’s quite an endeavor and with the heat everyone’s been having, let’s face it, who wants to do that? ;P

So here we go, this should explain things a lot more in detail.

OVERALL BACKGROUND

So as you probably have realized, the “Sin Purge” ritual thing isn’t one ritual this time, it’s three separate rituals (Black Moon, Puhdistus, and Majutsu) that aren’t connected to each other. I’m sure at one point people thought they were! That’s me being sneaky and coming up with something fun and different this time! Ah hah!

Between all three of these rituals, there are enough resources to eliminate nine Stalkers in total (three for each ritual), but there are only six Stalkers, so you actually have more than enough. What that means is you don’t have to complete 100% of all three of these rituals. In fact you could ignore one entirely and still complete the season using all of the resources of the other two. Or you can use some of all three to varying degrees! There’s some wiggle room with this.

SO WHAT’S BLACK MOON?
What you’re doing here is reassembling and using the last remaining weapons of a group of demon assassins that have come and gone long ago. These were designed to preserve innocent Pokémon, but utterly annihilate the demonic spirits possessing them. Though the guild is gone, you can finish the work they started and make use of the last remaining weapons they have disassembled and left behind.

The Lore
Black Moon was a syndicate of assassins and demon hunters who used Seabourne as a hidden outpost hundreds of years ago. They have a bit of a gothic kind of theme going on, but that’s just the nature of the guild. These Black Moon assassins are Savants just like you, but unlike you who kept your memories and were brought here by Xerneas, they were brought here by Uxie, Mesprit, and Azelf and had their human memories wiped (very akin to PMD). They completed their original mission, but never returned home as they didn’t even remember anything about their former human lives. Their lives as Pokémon were all that they knew now, so they continued on as demon hunters and lived out the rest of their Pokémon lives this way.

What’s going on with this ritual?
As mentioned above, Black Moon gives you enough resources to defeat three Stalkers. And this takes the form of three different weapons: Ombre, Obscurité, and Létal. To eliminate a Stalker, you need to assemble one of these and target one of the civilians who you believe is a Stalker. If you’re right at that civilian is in fact a Stalker, poof, wave one of those Stalkers goodbye! But if you’re wrong, nothing happens but you just lost your turn. Aww.

What do we have and what’s left?

[Aether Prism] (Collected 1 of 3) (There are three of these out in the field and you have one. You’ll need one of these for each weapon you reconstruct!

OMBRE (The Dagger):
[Jagged Ombre Blade] – Collected!
[Ombre Hilt] - Currently missing.
Once you find the hilt, Ombre is good to go provided you have a spare [Aether Prism] available.

OBSCURITÉ:
[Obscurité Base] - Currently missing.
[Obscurité Shadow Essence] – Collected!
So you guys just need the base and as long as you have a spare [Aether Prism], Obscurité’s yours!

LÉTAL:
[Dark Létal Runes] - Currently missing.
[Sigil Fragment 1] - Collected!
[Sigil Fragment 2] - Currently missing.
[Sigil Fragment 3] - Collected!
[Létal Chakram Base] - Currently missing.
This one is probably the least completed and still has three more parts to find, but it’s definitely still within the realms of possibility!

What are the conditions for using a Black Moon weapon once completed?
First, you would need to know who is a Stalker. You can find that out by reaching the end of one of their routes, or if you have a strong hunch already and think you’ve figured it out, go ahead and pick your target! Just a few things.

The user of one of these weapons needs to have a Pokémon typing that is super-effective against the Stalker. So in this case, if the Stalker is a fire-type Pokémon and you’re a water type, it’s lights out for that Stalker! And the nice part is the civilian victim is free and no longer bothered by that Demoni!
You CAN get it wrong and if the weapon is used against a non-Stalker, nothing happens and the turn is just wasted. That’s the only penalty, so while you could trial and error it a bit, you might end up paying for it in lost turns. But if you’ve narrowed it down to only a few suspects and you think it’s worth trying a little trial and error on all of them, have at it!
Once the weapon has been used to successfully eliminate a Stalker, it crumbles and it can’t be used again. You’ll have to build one of the others to wipe out another Stalker.

Once you’re ready, you can simply state something along the lines of “I’m using Ombre/Obscurité/Létal on #92 Eve the Eevee because I’m sure she’s a Stalker!” and you’re golden and you’ll find out if you were right or not. If you were right, you don’t even need to finish the Stalker’s route, they’re done and won’t be a bother anymore! Cheerio!

SO WHAT’S THE PHUDISTUS RITUAL?
So Phudistus is a dark but actually helpful voodoo-themed magic that works off of destroying Stalker Phylacteries (which serves as a binding point and a kind of dark spirit anchor for the Demoni that’s linked to them). The Demoni need these to inhabit the bodies of their victims for an extended period of time like this. Think of it like needing an oxygen tank to go scuba-diving, except the oxygen never runs out. What the Phudistus Ritual does is it uses the Demoni’s Phylactery, destroys it, and rips the Demoni absolutely to shreds, committing them to a lovely eternity of torture and harassment in Kadotus (a dark parallel underworld realm that they’ll never get out of) and they only exist in pieces. But the victim they inhabited will be perfectly fine! If there’s a particular Stalker you despise, oh Susannah, this will do nicely, heh heh heh. >:3

The Lore
A band of fighting type Pokémon, in the wake of having their towns and livelihoods decimated by a group of evil psychic types, banded together to form a faction called Iahko. To fight back against these kinds of demonically possessed Pokémon, Iahko revived an ancient and previously forbidden type of magic called Taika. Taika, as it was discovered, is totally bent on obliterating evil and promoting healing, even though this magic looks dark and murky itself! Now, Taika did have many dark components to it, but it’s a dark magic being used for a good cause, which is what you’ll do if you use this.

What’s going on with this ritual?
Every Stalker has a Phylactery (they’re buried in the Stalker’s lair and you’ll know who the Stalker is when you get to the end of their route). So for example, let’s say we have a Stalker named Evilface who is actually Eve the Eevee. Once you go through the trouble of getting through all the obstacles in Evilface’s route, you’ll learn the truth that Evilface is actually Eve the Eevee AND you’ll find Evilface’s Phylactery there. You’ll use those for this ritual!

What do we have and what’s left?

Right now, you don’t have any Phylacteries. I don’t want to spoil too much, but for some Stalkers, you’re getting close to the end of the routes, but for others, you still have a bit more digging to do. Until you get at least one, you can’t really make use of the ritual, but you can get the setup going in the meantime!

As for the rest of the ritual, it consists of completing two main parts, restoring the Taika Temppeli (magic temple) and The Completed Välineitä (instruments). You’ll also need to use a [Putki] each time you perform this ritual. And here’s what you currently have going in terms of completion for that:

[Putki] (Collected 1 of 3) – You have one but there’s still two more out there.

TAIKA TEMPPELI – You know the location, it’s in (3) Kako Industries Field.
[Taika Tekstit] - Currently missing.
[Palauttaminen Mantra] - Currently missing.
So you still have some digging to do for these, but you haven’t gotten a Phylactery yet anyway, so it’s not a big rush.

THE COMPLETED VALINEITA
[Taika Ritualli Tome] - Currently missing.
[The Varjo Välineet] - Currently missing.
[The Olemus] - Collected!
So there’s some more work to be done here as well, but again, not a biggie, you can definitely still get there.

What are the conditions for using the Phudistus Ritual once completed?

Once the Taika Temppeli has been rebuilt and restored and the Completed Välineitä has been put there, the ritual is ready to be performed. And to perform the ritual, you’ll need these.

The Stalker’s Phylactery (which means you’ll need to go through the entire route to get one of these)
A [Putki].

And you’ll state something along the lines of “I’m performing the Phudistus Ritual on the Evilface Phylactery.” Provided you have the Taika Temppeli rebuilt and Completed Välineitä to go with it and you have a [Putki] to spare, Evilface will be utterly destroyed and humiliated and Eve the Eevee will be free to celebrate with sunshine and cupcakes!

And that’s it, it’s really just getting those first parts with the Temple and the Instruments completed, but you have made some decent headway.

SO WHAT’S THE MAJUTSU RITUAL?
This is one of the more interesting rituals I’ve thought of, but essentially this entire route focuses around dreams and the realm of dreams, Yume. Majutsu is a dream and sleep-related witchcraft where relics, artifacts, and spell components are created and forged in Yume and then brought into the material realm (often through Dorimugeto dream gates, which you’ve encountered already). As you can imagine, this creates some pretty powerful stuff. Apparently someone said “hah, in your dreams, nerd” to them and they took it seriously and decided to literally do that and make this the way they open up their can of whoop-ass.

The Lore
This is also a kind of otherworldly witchcraft that was recently cleansed by revivalists who dumped the nasty stuff but preserved the helpful stuff. Sure, there was a time Majutsu could pull terrible things from nightmares into the living realm. Instead, you’re using the nicer stuff as cleansing ritual components. When you master this skill, you’ll someday be able to pull that rainbow rocket launcher that shoots fireworks and sparkly flames that also cook your popcorn, but that’s outside of the context of Stalkers for now.

What’s going on with this ritual?
This is a bit of a weird route in that it involves Savants giving up some things along the way. To perform the ritual, you must first become a Tatsujin (guru), and this happens if you get 10 Kurosuōbā (crossover) points (ha ha, and you all thought you’d die if this happened! Tricked ya! >;P). Once you’re in this state, your Pokémon typing becomes “Kūsho” which means no traps you encounter will ever be super-effective or not very effective against you. Everything will be regular, unmodified damage. It has a slightly better chance of keeping you alive by making sure damage will never be doubled in a way you might not be prepared for. If you need to become a Tatsujin quickly, just visit the Funsui (well) in (5) Jade Acres Park. You’ll get 5 Kurosuōbā points right away each time you visit.

If you die, you lose the Tatsujin role, but you can earn it back by encountering Kurosuōbā points again.

Instead of using Phylacteries the way the Phudistus Ritual does, you need the Stalker’s Memento, and there’s six of these out there and they have mini-routes of their own. You actually have a few of these already, but there are others out there! What the ritual does is it empowers the Stalker’s victim by energizing their spirit and will to survive by having them recall positive memories in the form of refreshing, empowering, and invigorating visions. So in Eve the Eevee’s case, Eve would suddenly recall her better memories through this ritual and through her memento and would fight back and win against Evilface, freeing her from the Demoni’s control.

Mementos can be anywhere and take the form of anything. Stalkers will go out of their way to look at them and very often they tried to stash them away (the victim’s spirit at least stopped them from destroying them). So these mementos are often buried in strange places and sort of have mini-routes to them.

What do we have and what’s left?

First, you need to collect the Mementos. You have a few!

[Unopened Note] - Collected!
[Ancient Chalice] / [Ceremonial Knife] / [Occult Figurine] / [Bloodstained Armband] – (Collected!, BUT only one of these is a Memento, the rest are junk. You need to figure out which one is the right one!)
<Hidden Memento>
<Hidden Memento>
<Hidden Memento>
<Hidden Memento>

So you have 2 out of 6 of these. Not bad!

Next, you need to complete the dream altar (the [Yume no saidan].

YUME NO SAIDAN – The site of this, once completed, will be at the (1) Beachwood Farmstead (Benni’s farm).
[Shadoupureto] (Shadow Plate)] Currently missing.
[Kage no Shukufuku] (Shadow Blessing)] Currently missing.
[Shado Sunadokei] (Shadow Hourglass)] Currently missing.
[Shadoutsuru (Shadow Tools)] Collected!
[Shadoumemorizu no hon (Book of Shadow Memories)] Collected!

Okay, believe it or not, the toughest parts of this ritual are actually done already ([Shadoutsuru (Shadow Tools)] and [Shadoumemorizu no hon (Book of Shadow Memories)] and I am surprised how fast you got these, but really, the toughest parts of this whole thing are out of the way).

Once you have all that together, you need a [Shiryoku] each time you perform the ritual (very similar to the [Putki] from the Phudistus Ritual).

What are the conditions for using Majutsu once completed?

The nice thing about the Majutsu ritual is that it saves you from having to do the whole Stalker route, so it’s the safest method for eliminating a Stalker and you don’t have to deal with their dangerous lairs, but there’s a few catches with it. In terms of materials, you’ll need these:

A Memento (and I’ll identify these for you once you get them)
The name of the Victim (Eve the Eevee for example)
A [Shiryoku] (sight)
And you need to be a Tatsujin when you perform it.

And that’s essentially it. Once the Yume no Saidan is completed and you’re a Tatsujin, you can simply state “I’m performing the Majutsu ritual on the [Happy Eevee Birthday Card] to free Eve the Eevee.” Provided you have a spare [Shiryoku] to use, you’re gold and Eve the Eevee goes into POWERHOUSE MODE and yeets Evilface into space where Evilface will cry for his mommy. And then Eve celebrates with cheesy pizza. You are welcome to a slice.

-----

So there you have it, that’s pretty much all the goods about the three rituals and stuff. There’s still plenty of stuff to uncover, but you guys have made pretty good headway and I foresee a lot of the pieces falling into place soon enough. Enjoy!

**DayBreak** · 07-24-2022, 04:11 AM

No worries mate. Honestly, I've been guilty of similar, and by that I mean falling behind on several action cycles. ~~For example, missing Scy's ascension into Tatsujin.~~

**DayBreak** · 07-27-2022, 03:41 AM

This takes place during the night while Lyric is asleep after their trip to the well.

I wrote this mess 3:30 in the morning and I was about as tired as Lyric is here. As a result, this is probably just as incomprehensible as my own dreams, made worse by the mild buzz of a headache that was coming in. Yayyyyy....

Anyway, small story detail backstory infodump thing to probably help flesh out Lyric's character below, as well as a bit of info about one of their past selves in particular.

Past Nightmare

Spoiler:

**Lychee** · 07-29-2022, 04:11 AM

Eep! So many things to do, so little time! Looks like there's 10 more kills left, which is equivalent to 20 turns... But if all ten of us take an action every turn, we have 200 more turns as the upper limit. I bet it's less than that though!

We should definitely pass the jewelry that tells you if you've talked to a stalker around between all the Pokémon who are doing interviews -- then we can be sure of everyone we have interviewed, one way or another.

**C0L0R3D** · 07-29-2022, 10:57 AM

Ooh, I was gonna bring that idea up actually! If someone else can try to find / arrange the fang delivery, I could go off and take the necklace for a spin. See if things are looking particularly murder-y on anymon’s end.

**Lychee** · 08-24-2022, 10:51 AM

@C0L0R3D
"You're looking quite injured there, friend! Are... are you going to be okay searching around tonight? Stay away from anything sharp!"
Since the Rest action heals 50% of all of your stats, and you've been damaged in all of them, it might be worth doing! Just to... you know... keep the death count down... Or else doing something unlikely to be harmful, like using Diplomacy on Altrea the Eldegoss.
@sammy0295
"We need to fix this book, and this key! Since we don't know where the key goes yet... maybe the book is higher priority?"
That said, it's not like we need the book urgently either. But if you don't know what to do, doing that is certainly helpful!

Still on my informant list is:
- Mortek... whose wife was just murdered... oh dear.
- Junlus, haven't heard much from him in a while
- Betta, because even though shes posessed, maybe she is still in there and can give us a memento to free her for Majutsu? I'd rather not stab a child...
- Terron the Linoone, because having a kid that's demon possessed probably means you notice strange things...
- Vanni or Shesha, because they work at the clinic and might know more about the townsfolks mental health...

**C0L0R3D** · 08-24-2022, 07:44 PM

Not to fret, advice now followed! Guess I was jumping the Bullet Seed gun when I wanted to keep going. Though I guess that’s a funny contrast to back in the normal S5. Back then, I was all for running away and such!

EDIT: Me again. I... think the Pelipper evidence is no joke. I’ve my reasons, which are mainly that whole Macabre Mantra thing. While it mostly points at Korak, I had to take that down to a hospital and then went through one heck of an unpleasant time. And the reports of this guy with this Snivy doll, when there are likely none other in town (unless this Snivy was actually the town Servine a few years back)... yikes. Sounds rather coincidental.

**Neo Emolga** · 08-27-2022, 04:18 PM

Hi there!

I know I've done all the action posts in the queue, but I'm going to give some peeps who haven't made an action yet (especially Noble and Lychee!) at least until the end of the weekend to make one before I swing things over into the Day 7 Day Cycle (after finding out who gets murdered for Night 6 of course, muha ha ha! >:3).

I'm trying to get back into doing these a little quicker, but I understand throughout a good chunk of July and August, I've been slow and people might be relying on that and not checking in quite as often as usual. So on about Monday or Tuesday, I'll get the next cycle going.

Cheers and enjoy the weekend!