Flight Rising Discussion

[quote name="@MirageTheShadow" date="2021-03-10 04:44:28" ] Ooh the community garder idea is awesome! Also I'm buying some of those strawberrys. Even though most of my dragons eat meat and bugs. [/quote] Guest strawberries ;D But oh gosh, you bring up the possibility of an underground farmer's market--I love that! Anyways! The last two regions are...tricky, and will likely require further editing passes even after posting, so for the moment I figured I'd just dump a few misc. tidbits that didn't belong anywhere else. [LIST] [*]The parasite jungle (underjungle) is partially based on the abyssal zone, whalefalls, and hydrothermal vents [*]I imagine that the most common bioluminesence is in the yellow through blue range, with a special abundance of green. [*]That said, red light penetrates furthest, and while I don't have the bio chops to back this up, I do like to imagine some underjungle plants produce [i]infrared[/i] signatures (something done by our plants as well, though less famously than their UV markings). Infrared senses might be used for hunting down there, too. Maybe a theoretical Nature ancient can pull that off... [*]I'm headcanonizing Mirage's excellent point about underground farmer's markets [*]There's a [i]lot[/i] of variance between underground settlements, I just drew a map that would include many points of interest. You could have a shallow root city that's basically only belowground for temperature control. You could just as easily have a deep "taproot"-like construct that delves directly into cavern layers. [*]I have no good geology thoughts; I do think the Behemoth shapes the Labyrinth, obviously, and I lean towards a sense of both "pulling" land away from the main Sornieth landmass while also accumulating many, many layers of dead leaves, seabird guano, timber, etc. all trapped by the roots, which could decompose and result in a deep, rich soil layer. Though given the height (well, lack thereof) of the Labyrinth that might also imply that the Behemoth essentially germinated on bare rock in the ocean. Hardcore! [*]I kind of hem and haw on the idea of invasive species. Like, Nature mad science is fun, but would they really be so careless as to allow the spread of new invasive species? I think the answer there is that the Flight isn't monolithic; they tend towards conservation, but there are a few oddballs really trying to push communal evolution at a faster clip. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. [*]Settling underground can be a big pain--why bother? Well, part of it's that the Behemoth, earthmover that it (or she, but we'll reach that) is, tends to create relatively easy conditions to move into. Pockets of air, tamped earth, gaps between roots, y'know. She's a magic tree; her roots don't necessarily stay in [i]quite[/i] the same place. [*]Other reasons for settling belowground include: temperature control (the wet season is a WET season, not to mention humid!), defense, high settlement density on the surface, economic opportunities (rare plants and the like), looking after the Behemoth, obsessive need to fill every square inch with life, research that can only be done belowground, The Vibe. [*]Credit to @Leopardmask for this one, but I do think using she/her for the Behemoth could be pretty widespread in the Labyrinth. My own clan sees Gladekeeper, the Behemoth, and the Labyrinth as deeply connected (perhaps not [i]quite[/i] interchangeable), and anthropomorphizing their giant symbiotic buddy sounds reasonable. Maybe more than reasonable...who's to say the Behemoth isn't intelligent in its own way? [*]Speaking of, some possibilities of how the Behemoth interacts with dragons: she's literally just a big tree, she's a sort of unknowable mind that is preened and cared for by dragons without really intending to [i]shelter[/i] them, that she's aware of and cares for dragons but "thinks" in such a strange, long-form way that she doesn't interact with them directly much (or can be very "needs of the many, screw the needs of the few"), or that she [i]does[/i] interact [i]very[/i] directly for her own inscrutable (or hell, scrutable) reasons. If you want a sproutkeeper who has a psychic link with their sprout, do it! [*]I think a Hearthpool would make a great target for a Plague raid, and the cleanup/aftermath an interesting setting. If you write something like that (or anything else touching this lore! <3), let me know. [*]It didn't make it into the map, but given how the Behemoth might have "built" the Labyrinth, and given how Gladekeeper came [i]after[/i] the reactor explosion...buried second age cities. [*]There's actually a lot of stuff not on the map. I'd draw a second but it's getting silly. I did plan for like...these fields of colorless grass. I really like the image of coming out into this cavern far too big for your torch to light, and everything it [i]does[/i] reach is just this soft, swaying grass, like a ghost of the surface. Wading through that, getting lost in it. Looking around and all you see is grass and darkness. I just couldn't think of a good excuse for why the area would be so big and yet wouldn't get settled except to make it dangerous. [*]There's fair stretches of the root tunnel maze that have the same vibe as an empty hotel corridor after hours. [*]If you want to make your own undercolony (and please do!), please, put it anywhere! My loose mental map though is that a lot of the public undercities are in Everbloom and Gladeveins, and as you move into the Wilds and towards the Behemoth, they become much less open to other Flights. Then the Behemoth itself probably has a [i]huge[/i] root portion all decked out in lanterns and with adorable little food shops and skylights big enough to fly through, but then a second, larger "behind the scenes" portion devoted to monitoring and perfecting the Behemoth's health. There's quite a few "hidden" root cities along the border, many of which delve deep, and almost none around the Pox Consulate (in case anyone got any Bright Plaguey Ideas). Of course, now the Behemoth itself is trying to squash the Consulate, so who knows! [*]Thanks to its disconnected, 3D structure, most of the rootbed is unexplored. [/LIST]

OK wait theory: What you use to get lair space are offerings to the deities. Evidence, for your normal lair you have to buy the slots but it says the deitly lets you have the expantion. This also could be the same for the hib-den, where the things you get are the offerings instead of treasure. That's why there are stupid rare things like eggs or boss items sometimes.

Nature...is ALIVE! So then the whole thing is just one big tree...

Nature and Plague are both horrifying. I can see Nature being one big colony of trees and underground roots, and Plague as a living mass of flesh and bone- and both grow, pushing at one another for supremacy over other flights.

It's horrifying and I want to live on the Eldritch Flights, please.

I haven't actually forgotten about this thread! I'm just neck-deep in a different worldbuilding project. But I did slip in some render time for a few custom images of the rootbed. [img]https://i.imgur.com/61Rxh79.png[/img] [img]https://i.imgur.com/TnUvrJ3.png[/img] [img]https://i.imgur.com/JnXAhtV.png[/img] (Released to the community, do whatever you want with them as long as you don't try to sell them/claim credit for them) Most areas would be much more "rooty" in terms of the walls, but good ol' Flowscape doesn't have quite the assets for that...hopefully the lighting update drops and I can get a little more creative.

[muffled yelling]

I love environments that look like this, I'm so delighted to see a representation of what you're describing... I'm especially loving that last one and the mental image of a clan living in a sinkhole like that! A big central area of sunlight, and then more defensible dens further in, in the darkness...

Ahhhhh that looks so amazing!!

Man i LOVE all the ideas in this thread, especially a vastly unexplored subterranean layer of the labyrinth in the rootbed... :eyes:

This is really an exciting concept for me, because ever since I want to say last... November? I've been low-key obsessing over Eldritch tree/nature dragons... (have some active breeding pairs and am working on more eldritch tree breeding projects lol) including a pseudo-alliance/partnership with Shadow dragons/clans/energies/etc. I have some dragons now that frequent caves underneath the Nature domain (I'm totally not stealing the concept of the Underdark from WoTC what are you talking about), and some of those caves are rumoured to go as far as the Foxfire Bramble... Like, I'm REALLY EXCITED about the content of this thread and I don't have time to dive in now but may I please babble about my ideas here at a later point in time? [quote name="Leopardmask" date="2021-03-01 12:26:12" ] eldritch Nature eldritch Nature eldritch Nature- [/quote] YESSSSSSSSSSS IT MEEEEEEEEE

Might actually consider a vacation in nature... :eyes:

This is definitely tempting me to move to Nature. I love it here in Shadow, but just wow...