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Vale FAQ

Feb 21, 2016
Vale FAQ
  • FAQ

    A list of commonly asked questions.

    A. Yes. Thrown weapons are a universal skill that only ever do 1 point of damage and can never be improved by techniques.


    A. No. The crafting skill is all you need to be a crafter. The skill itself is broken into two levels which denote your rank within a guild rather than your skill. It is this rank that restricts your ability to craft higher level recipe and is not representative of your level of skill. The Kingdom are holding back the greater and more powerful recipes for their own crafters, at the start of the game.


    A. No. At the start of the game pistols can only be fired and held in one hand due to the nature of the weapon and the skill involved. It may be possible to develop a skill later to expand on this.


    A. No. This is not an option due to the fact that a pistol is a non combat prop and as such is not safe to hold whilst fighting in close quarters. Due to the nature of the game there are to many chances for accidents to happen here and as such we want to avoid these as much as possible.


    A. IDV make many types of arrows. We require arrows to be a min size across, faced with foam, not sealed with a latex or similar surface. Also the head must be flat not "ball" shaped. If in doubt please send us a picture


    A. Yes. There is not limit on the amount of pistols a player can carry. Each pistol must be fired individually and the appropriate call must be made after the cap is discharged. More complex crafted firearms must be made in the vale and have the relevant scroll attached.


    A. Arrival Times Doors will open to get on site from midday on Friday and Time in is at 6pm. Cars will need to be off the roads near the camps at 4pm but both camps are still relatively near the camping fields to move kit across after this time. If people wish to arrive on Thursday they may do so after 4pm and there will be a charge of £10 per person for this.


    A. Time in is at 6pm on Friday. At 1am in the morning on Friday and Saturday the barriers around each camp will become solid allowing no player from an opposing camp to pass through. If a player from an opposing camp has special permissions to pass through a barrier, these permissions are rescinded until 10am the following morning. Time out is at 3pm on Sunday.

    The OC reasoning for this is that, after this time the IC games operation desk will not be manned. There will still be someone manning OC operations for any health and safety needs but you will not be able to generate new characters. As an addition to this there will be no refs in camp after this time and as game staff will be unavailable the option for large scale night assaults is something we want to avoid due to safety reasons.

    Although we are not stopping anyone going into the wider site after 1am we would advise you that the site is full of potential hazards that we would very much like you to be aware of and as the level of crew is at a minimum at this point we urge you to be very careful and be sensible in your interaction with the environment. No on-site features or systems will be active between these times. The ritual circle, guilds, the tinkers machine the fane and the black mirror are all inactive during this period and the Vale resource nodes do not generate any products over this time either.

    From an IC perspective there are many theories as to why the barriers act the way they do at night. Some believe it is a function of the beings that create them and that the demons and the gods will it to be this way, others believe that it is more to do with the cyclical nature of the Vale itself and yet others surmise that another force entirely has sway over the energy. Suffice to say that no one really knows for sure but there are many avenues of research underway to divulge the real reason that this phenomenon occurs…

    We have decided to do things this way to provide you with the most immerse experience we can while at the same time allowing people who want to relax, to be able to do so in the relative safety of a closed camp.


    A. Yes you can still attack and defend. You would still be wounded however and therefore cannot use any skills which require concentration or any techniques.


    A. The simple answer to this is that you don't. It is not information that is available at the beginning of the game due to these skills being so rare in the wider world and the fact that you need a crafted item to use the skill, which are generally only available in the Vale for the most part. All information is available at start of play but please think about the level of combat or magic you want to wield when you are picking your initial stats. IE. cut is generally a low level ability where fatal, I'm sure you will agree would be a much higher tier skill.


    A. Yes. The First tier deals with the skills involving pistols and Muskets and the 2nd tier will deal with the more powerful and specialist skills that are available.


    A. The hit system is Global but if you take a wounding blow it is important to note where that blow lands as it means that you will either lose the uses of an arm or leg or become incapacitated if hit in the body or head. You will also become incapacitated from a leg or arm wound unless you have resilience. This is also important for the healers as they then know where to work on you for role playing purposes.

    If you have resilience you do not become incapacitated upon receiving a leg or arm wound and may continue to fight and defend without the use of techniques or concentration abilities.


    A. No. The template for a minion is different from the Template for a Necromancer. The bodies that are created for Undead involve very precise and specific magic that creates a shell that allows the use of certain skills only. It may be that the individual Undead remembers that he or she could once before have used a pole arm or two weapons before his transformation but the new body stops them from being able to perform techniques and skills with these weapons. Any more information about the reason for this must be gleaned from the liches in play.


    A. No. If you are promoted to a Shade or Reaper you keep the styles that you had as a minion. Choose wisely.


    A. Minimum phys reps for the three known forms:

    Necromancer: All exposed skin white, dark lines radiating from the eyes like veins. Increasing amount of script on the skin as more souls are acquired within the phylactery, the names of the souls appearing in an ancient script as they grow in power.

    Necromancers prefer the magic-imbued robes of a spell-caster; marked with arcane symbols and warding, however this is not a requirement. Although necromancers do not usually "rot", some iron mantled or vassals of the Desolate may prefer to have a more deathly persona.

    Shade: The shade must be provided with a dark hooded robe or cloak as part of the ritual. All exposed skin should be pale or white and the face is generally covered with cloth or scarves. Shades are the infiltrators and scouts of the Undead hordes and the look and feel here is one of stealth and silent death in the shadows. Many Shades manifest glowing green eyes or the deathly green palour of necromancy whereas others are like living darkness, flowing in and out of the shadows.

    Reaper: Reapers are the heavy hitters of the Undead forces and as part of the ritual must be provided with a suit of heavy armour. This form is the most resilient and deadly in combat and as such it may be worth looking at costume that will bulk you out and make you look as bug and imposing as possible. White skin to any exposed areas as a minion but many reapers wear helms and masks with horrific visages to make them stand out among the other minions of the lichs.


    A. When you shoot a pistol of other firearm the call is simply <elemental type> Dart after discharging the weapon. The default location is always the body and anyone shot by a firearm should consider that they have been hit there. If however a player prefers to shoot someone in a different location they should indicate this by announcing the location directly after the damage call, ie, fire dart leg. We believe that this provides a clear statement about how the wounds are received but also allows for roleplay effects during duels or flashy shots etc.


    A. When a character dies in the Vale the body is absorbed into the Vale itself and all items not bonded to a character are left behind.

    In the event that a character does not bleed to death or cannot die in the conventional sense then yes, looting is allowed but please ask first and acquire consent that you are doing so before physically searching. Otherwise, the default is 30 seconds to search the corpse with a hand hovering over the body.


    A. Necromantic crafting is the means that allows all Undead forms to be created. A ritualist cannot complete a ceremony to create a new form without a crafter being present within the circle. At this time the skill is very basic with you being aware of how to form and bind the magic summoned by the ritualist into the body that is being created. Minions are a very simple form of body and can be created by higher level necromancers and liches without the need for a crafter but anything higher than this is impossible without this skill.

    The way that you go about this crafting is totally and entirely up to you. If you decide that your rituals require you to use tools in the creation of the body, or potions and oils, or mystic runes of your own to augment the ritual and focus the magic, that is all fine. It is down to the individual crafter to determine what they use to focus and construct the new forms and how they end up looking. The three forms that are known of at this time are well within your grasp to understand and you are very sure that you will be able to focus and control the energy necessary to create these powerful constructs. The details of the resources and other materials needed to do this will be available from the Lich at the start of the game.

    What amount you partake in the rituals is up to you and the ritualist to decide. With the skill being so new and the Vale being so rich in power, it is only now that the Lichs have been able to pass the skills of crafting on to necromancers and allow them to craft their own greater servants.

    As to the future, it is unknown as to if it will be possible to craft other forms or items, the vast amount of mana and resources it would take could be very dangerous for those involved. But with skill and enough power it is said that anything is possible within the Vale to those who want it enough.


    A. Yes. The way you interpret the runes and add them into your ritual is the important thing. So long as the way you weave the magic and meaning of the runes into your ritual makes sense and you dont try to do anything obviously contrary or anachronistic then things should go well. There is always the random element however so nothing is a sure thing...