Archived GM Notes: This page is unsealed GM-notes pertaining to PRPG2. It is not canonical to PRPG2. It may contain contradictions (even with itself), and preliminary ideas that were merely written down as I thought of them, for later consideration. The absence of something mentioned here from the canon does not necessarily mean that the party "missed" it, it could have been mooted for other reasons or simply discarded by me.
UNSEALED after review.
Primary Goal
Use the purified Elements of Harmony on the Crystal Forest, thereby stopping its growth and fixing the Changelings (restoring their hive mind), who will in gratitude restore the water to Equus (gradually, not cataclysmically!)
- REQUIRES:
- Purified Elements
- Understanding that the Crystal Forest is a serious long-term problem
Purify the Elements of Harmony
- REQUIRES
- Each Element of Harmony
- Understanding that the Elements require purification
- Various situations by which an act of exceptional virtue can purify the element (to be provided both planned and on-the-fly, either is fine)
- Any act of exceptional forthrightness or honesty, or -
- Not sneaking the Element of Honest out of New Canterlot
- Element of Honesty
- Any act of exceptional loyalty or duty, or -
- Not forsaking the NPC who helped the party in Trenchtown.
- Any act of exceptional kindness or compassion, or -
- Helping the ex-cultists in Docktown including those who threatened the party
- Any act of exceptional quick-wittedness or good humor, or -
- FIXME
- Any act of exceptional generosity or self-sacrifice, or -
- Giving the treasure that Narein amassed to his victims
a better idea might to explicitly require an act of friendship Any exceptional magical virtuosity (4dF=+4 and absolute result >6) or clever use,
- or - Successfully attempting to magically purify the element explicitly
- (difficulty 6, Unicorn Magic/)
- or - Successfully attempting to magically purify the element explicitly
Element of Honesty
- Location: The LIMINAL KEEP, under the Lake of New Canterlot. Power when Corrupted: False divination (tending to drive seers to despair) The element is kept with equipment to facilitate scrying in the dome of the Liminal Keep, Bluestar’s sanctum sanctorum. Access to the Liminal Keep requires exploration in New Canterlot, including possibly talking to NPCs, and figuring out how to access the keep (involving the hidden water level regulating
dam. Bonus points for not draining the Lake.)
Bluestar himself found the Element in the periapocalyptic period and kept it in his secret fortress. He knew of, and wrote about, its corruption. His journal, explaining that the element is corrupted, can be found in the Liminal Keep, in his quarters.
Element of Laughter
- Location: Court of River Winder, The ruined Seapony city of Finniapolis
Power when Corrupted: Random magical effects (tending to be comical but dangerous)
The element is currently trapping the Lesser Draconequus Clamor, who is imprisoned in the Court of River Winder, as noted above. Clamor was trapped by local clever pony trickster and rogue Nimble Nickers, who had previously made a living entertaining (and sometimes scamming) others with the corrupted Element. (Unfortunately for him, Nimble lost the secret to his incredible success when it was effectively expended to trap Clamor.) The puzzle lies in retrieving the element without freeing the draconequus. FIXME: how to effectively communicate that just taking it will free Clamor. Also, address why Nimble Nickers didn’t do whatever the players are doing (perhaps it requires them to trust the person taking it, and Nimble was trusted by nopony nor did he trust anypony to not make off with “his” element.)
Element of Loyalty
- Location: Palace of Train Oil, Trenchtown Power when Corrupted: Inspires loyalty to the bearer (but also modified by Eastmumsie) FIXME: See main notes for who found this element and how it came to be modified by Eastmumsie.
Element of Generosity
- Where: House of the Black Lotus, Isle of Stonepipes
Who: Narein the zebra alchemist.
- Power when corrupted: Gives people illusions of their heart’s desire. Getting it: It is trapped in Narein’s laboratory, in his equipment for making the Black Lotus potion. Puzzle: FIXME extracting the element from Narein’s equipment. Safely.
Element of Kindness
- Where: Temple of the Dawn, Old Docktown underground, Docktown Who: Millennial Dawn (unicorn/fake alicorn) Power when corrupted: Makes people think the wielder loves them. Getting it: Taken by force of arms most likely; it will be on Millennial Dawn’s person.
- It has no special associated puzzle, the noncombat challenges are mostly of
a mystery-solving or social nature.
Element of Magic
- Where: Reliquary in the Catacombs of the Tower of Chimes Who: Nopony (although Starsong is the associated boss) Power when corrupted: Corrupting magical power Getting it: Extensive puzzle, TOWER OF CHIMES RELIQUARY PUZZLE, represents
- the culmination of the PRPG2 puzzle aspect.
Tower of Chimes Reliquary Puzzle (aka MOAP)
- Where: Catacombs of the Tower of Chimes Getting to it: Secure the Tower of Chimes from the Shadhavar, Explore it carefully and
- gain entrance to the Tower of Chimes catacombs by enacting the
TOC FUNERARY RITES described.
- The reliquary is an extremely durable spherical object fixed on a base. It has a Lunar Element that can be adjusted to point at the moon (wherever it is at noon, even if the planet is in the way.) It has a lens on the top (for the sun at zenith through the ToC). It has a lens at the bottom (for light from the discharge tube puzzle). It is surrounded by five concentric rings on which are mounted holders on arc-shaped inner rings, which allow the holders to be positioned at many points of longitude/latitude on the globe of the reliquary. The reliquary surface is also punctuated with tiny holes with diaphragms covering them. The holders are for colored magical crystals, the other elements of harmony, which must be over the surface of the sphere at the same time certain stars are on the other side of them (again, possibly with the planet intervening). Finally, the correct musical tune must be played in its presence to open it; the key consisting of a modification of pony folk songs - but with the complication that ponies in the golden age used a different tuning than that used today.
The machine properly configured reliquary is activated by the light of the noonday sun at zenith. Until the discharge tube puzzle is solved, the reliquary is inert, but each of the other aspects of the puzzle (stars, moon, music) can be checked independently. Of course, the stars will have to be in the right position for whatever time it is currently to check that aspect. The reliquary gives feedback for the correct positioning of only _all_ the stars being correct (it would otherwise be too easy to brute force, causing problems when the puzzle was tried again later at noon when the stars had moved and the brute-forced combination was no longer correct), but it also gives feedback when the proper tune is played, when the tune is played but with the wrong tuning, and when the moon indicator is pointed at the moon. The feedback is primarily in terms of magic although it also makes subtle noises. The feedback is important because the players would otherwise be justly angered if a minor mistake in the other aspects of the puzzle prevented the successful use of the sun being at zenith, which occurs only twice per year. There is an ELECTRICALLY SYNCHRONIZED CHRONOMETER in the reliquary chamber. Elsewhere in the ToC is the master clock (a pendulum swinging in a vacuum jar with electromagnets, after the shortt-synchrodrome) which needs to be repaired so that the chronometer will work. Observations made from the ToC observatory can be used to set the chronometer and to find the stars necessary for the astronomical aspects of the puzzle. Since the observatory is at the top of the tower and the master clock is in the basement, this will also require some cleverness on the part of the players to precisely set the clock at solar noon.
TOWER OF CHIMES RELIQUARY - CONSTELLATION LEGENDS
- Which element of harmony goes with each star is to be determined by recourse to the legendarium of ponies in the Dusts. Most of the legends do not relate directly to the constellation, rather, the legend has something to do with the object in the constellation; some inductive leaps may be necessary. KINDNESS LEGEND
- Requires knowing that the constellation Seedling is was known as the Butterfly in
The Seedling. The specific star clue is also related to the butterfly interpretation. The legend is basically hagiographical of Fluttershy.
- LOYALTY LEGEND
- Related to a non-zodiacal constellation that is a loyal companion to one of the zodiacal constellations; the complication is recognizing that the zodiacal constellation is not the one to point the device at.
- Related in a straightforward fashion to the corn. (Involving buffalo sharing it generously with ponies.) A complication is that, in the year of the reliquary creation, there was a supernova visible, and it was the most prominent object in Corn. It has been replaced by a nebula. A pony named Star Cluster would probably know about the impermanent nature of a supernova. The complication is that the erstwhile brightest star in Corn went nova in the centuries between Star Cluster and the present, leaving a nebula. (The Kernel)
- Related in a straightforward fashion to the Apple, and the only one to involve the constellation itself rather than a literal item. (The pony sees the constellation, and is reminded of Applejack, making this one another bit of hagiography and a dead giveaway relative to the other legends.)
- Related to a pony who used an empty cauldron to perform stage magic in a
time of famine. Note that the legend does not call the cauldron a cauldron by name.
- MAGIC LEGEND
- Requires knowing that “friendship is magic,” as its legend concerns friendship on
- Concerns a red herring. Has no element or constellation connection.
- Concerns a fake duck made to float with gourds (a plausible constellation connection), but the legend concerns a pony behaving ignobly with it.
- Concerns a garden path, and a flower (making it have a plausible constellation connection), but it has no EoH connection.
TOWER OF CHIMES RELIQUARY - MUSCIAL TUNE
- Part of the tune is the “dies irae” like song of the flagellants, who it should be noted have been singing the same song since 2095 (and thus it was heard by Star Cluster) although they are now dying out in light of improved conditions. They can still be heard in Slag Hollow.
TOWER OF CHIMES FUNERARY RITES puzzle: Where: Tower of Chimes
- Getting to it: Explore the Tower of Chimes; the location is in the basement.
Gist: You enact the funeral rite to trigger the sarcophagus to “devour” the “corpse”.
- Obviously, that it is safe to do so is not intuitive, so presumably the PCs must find out this (and the triggering funeral rite) from in-game sources. Possibly an NPC
will tell them about the rite and the catacombs, and the documentation of what to do can be found in the ToC itself.
- Having been “devoured,” the party member will find him/herself in the ToC catacombs. There is also a mechanism to signal someone above to trigger the mechanism and allow somepony in the catacombs to return; however, in the absence of a collaborator left above, returning will require any nonspecific means. (E.g. magic or destructiveness, or having the foresight to modify the mechanism.) The mechanism works using the potential energy of the mass of the “corpse” to provide energy. The ritual is triggered by expansion of mercury when blazers are lit in the proper order (incorrect lighting order prevents functioning; it is reset by the mercury cooling.) Another element of the triggering is to pour a sequence of libations the proper places; they drain to buckets on levers. The density of the libations is measured to determine if the proper offering is put in the proper place. (strong wine, water, and olive oil are the libations)
=== SYNCHRODROME PUZZLE
DISCHARGE TUBE PUZZLE
TOWER OF CHIMES POWER SOURCE
TOWER OF CHIMES MUSIC PLAYER PUZZLE
- Location: Tower of chimes Requires: Understanding the pneumatic chime control.
- Programming the correct music into the sequencer.
- in the presence of the Reliquary, thereby ironically making the chimes the least essential aspect of the tower of chimes puzzle. However, they have the advantage that they do not require retuning to open the reliquary.
- Chime patterns are encoded on paper tape and read pneumatically. The paper tape is eight bits wide. The first seven bits select a particular chime from the Tower of Chime’s 120 chimes.