OOC Plot Discussion [Sep 2020]

[scension]

Hi friends! Since this game is shaping up to be about the players slowly solving the plot mysteries as well as the characters, and because things have been kind of rapidfire up till now, a couple of us figured that a post to collect our OOC thoughts on the various current mysteries might be useful. This is a post! Please use it for whatever you like - suggesting your own theories, suggesting stuff that your own character might not pursue for whatever reason but other characters might, a place to plot next steps if you prefer it to plurk or discord, it really doesn't matter /o/

Potentially relevant links:
- September mod investigations/questions where we've been getting/pursuing most of the clues
- most recent IC meeting log
- current IC common knowledge cheat sheet courtesy of Haki
- bonus activity submission page including the plot clues given as rewards
(tell me to link something else here and i'll do it)

I have put in some toplevels just for organisational purposes but feel free to make your own or go without!

Comments

[thetyger]

Atsushi went to get honey from Minato and some things were discussed. The Combees are losing their homes due to the rain and they don't make as much honey as they used to. He also has been eavesdropping at work and gathered some information from the boba shop employees:

- No one working there has gotten sick from drinking the free end-of-shift boba, nor the orders that were wrong and not taken by customers
- They worry the honey supply will not match boba demand, and they've been using powdered berries to fill in the gaps with the dwindling berry supply as well
- Some employees do experiments with mixing berry juices for new boba ideas and use Combee honey as sweetner sometimes, one employee's usual taste testers have been getting a little sick lately
- Sometimes they go to the farm to get the honey, and sometimes Minato brings them jars of it himself

Theories:
It might be possible that the boba shop is getting honey from a second, and maybe illegal or sketchy, source since they're low on Combee honey.

[thetyger]

The little girl buried in the sand said she saw a blue or purple light before she lost consciousness, maybe that was lightning?

[thaumewturge]

blue or purple defs has me thinking Ghost or Dark type...Litwicks use their lights to lure people off like will o'wisps and drain their life energy, but I think Rhel's got the only Litwick on the island? Sandyghast/Palosand would fit with the beach problem maybe...

MISC. THINGS OF POSSIBLE NOTE

[thetyger]

Re: MISC. THINGS OF POSSIBLE NOTE

[thetyger]

Things that don't really fit anywhere because they're random theories:

- Minato mentioned to Atsushi that it feels like the island has gotten more people in the month that he's been there. Maybe Dittos are taking the place of the boba zombies in their real lives.

- The Mudkip breeder works at the Daycare Center, but insists he didn't want to get rich off selling them and was just trying to help out the Game Corner. Maybe the Game Corner owners have something to do with the weather, so people will keep playing to get Mudkips.

[regression]

- Gyarados prefers persim berries
- it's protecting 2 magikarp, one red and one gold (shiny)
- it appeared a month ago
- most likely dropped off by a trainer because it's difficult for magikarp to level up in the wild

laughs i don't have anything else, but if they can't calm the storm, the island will flood then they would prob need to evacuate everyone to go to the next island with them. gyarados' problem (people) would be solved, though i don't know how well the magikarps will fare in stormy waters.

[compendiem]

intro log
- "Some of the daycare workers whisper about rumors of a pack of wild Drifloon seen around town whenever the rain calms down to a drizzle and luring little kids into the thick fog and getting them lost."
- "There are also whispers about the hospital, hushed words about how it's haunted by the spirits of the deceased and that when a group of Murkrows gather around a patient's window, it's to mark that person with misfortune and death."
https://pokespe.dreamwidth.org/493.html?thread=58861#cmt58861
- The targets are all children. All the ones who have gone missing are also all children.
- The old man at the Game Corner endlessly played the slots as if possessed. But he's dead now, and so is that lead.
https://pokespe.dreamwidth.org/493.html?thread=72173#cmt72173
- The old folklore about Drifloon dragging children to the afterlife is commonly known by everybody living on the island.
https://pokespe.dreamwidth.org/493.html?thread=72685#cmt72685
- The girl who got buried in the sand was alone when she found the Drifloon at the beach. It was raining and too dark to see clearly, and she remembers a blue/purple light, wind, and a voice, but not getting buried in the sand.
https://pokespe.dreamwidth.org/493.html?thread=544493#cmt544493
- Skyler, a 6-year-old boy who went missing, is friends with three other children: the aforementioned girl who went missing and got buried, another girl who went missing at around the same time (no further details obtained), and a boy who did not go missing.
- The boy who did not go missing is Casey, a 5-year-old with a Lotad. He denies knowing what happened to Skyler, but admits he, Skyler, and Lotad has snuck out to the beach before to teach Skyler how to swim.
- Skyler does not have his own Pokemon (not counting the family Persian) and has yet been unsuccessfully at catching one.
- (thread incomplete? idk if you guys wanted to ask anything else or that's the end of the investigation)
https://pokespe.dreamwidth.org/493.html?thread=974573#cmt974573
- No more bodies are found buried in the beaches. It can be inferred that this isn't the Drifloon's typical MO
https://teamboba.dreamwidth.org/1911.html?thread=87927#cmt87927
- According to Akira's Drifloon, the Drifloon collectively have been taking kids, the kids are not dead, and ??? about the kids being on the beach. When asked where the kids are, the Drifloon leads Akira to the hospital and circles the perimeter.

[compendiem]

https://pokespe.dreamwidth.org/493.html?thread=207085#cmt207085
- The Gyarados is covered in both recent and old injuries and scars, but does not seem to be badly wounded.
https://pokespe.dreamwidth.org/493.html?thread=391405#cmt391405
- The Gyarados likes Persim berries, but does not care for boba. Sometimes it will bring berries down under the water.
- Those who have shown it kindness and feed it are allowed as close as 50 feet but no closer.
https://teamboba.dreamwidth.org/3149.html?thread=83789#cmt83789
- The Magikarp have been seen playing around with an Azuril. Gyarados allows this, but doesn't go out of its way to protect it like it does the Magikarp.
- Gyarados can understand human speech.
- (more to come? more to come as Gira and I continue threading)

[compendiem]

https://teamboba.dreamwidth.org/3149.html?thread=51277#cmt51277 /
https://pokespe.dreamwidth.org/536.html?thread=795928#cmt795928
- The tide gets higher every day. The water level seems to be slightly higher on the northwest side.
- The northwest beach is largely deserted compared to the rest of the beaches around the island.
https://teamboba.dreamwidth.org/3149.html?thread=84557#cmt84557
- At the northwest beach, the sand is rougher and in some places appear almost black, best seen at low tide.
- The black sand does not feel Weird or Odd, the Pokemon do not react to it in any way, but it feels heavier than sand from other parts of the beach.
https://pokespe.dreamwidth.org/893.html?thread=923261#cmt923261
- The rain doesn't sweep from one side of the island to the other, but rather, rain clouds seem permanently in place overhead and it just rains harder or lighter. The difference in the beaches is possibly due to the waves, or the island sinking.

[compendiem]

https://pokespe.dreamwidth.org/493.html?thread=176877#cmt176877
- Boba shop employees get free boba at the end of their shift and any orders that were messed up. Nobody's gotten sick... yet.
- Considering that they're actively hiring new employees, perhaps the turnover is pretty high.
https://pokespe.dreamwidth.org/493.html?thread=262637#cmt262637
- The secret menu incorporates various berries from the garden around the lake.
https://pokespe.dreamwidth.org/536.html?thread=913944#cmt913944
- Minato denies contaminated honey, as both he and other Pokemon have been eating it without ill effect
- All the honey comes from the Combee hives in the berry garden surrounding the lake.
https://pokespe.dreamwidth.org/493.html?thread=5869#cmt5869
- Maybe humans shouldn't eat the berries

[compendiem]

intro log/https://pokespe.dreamwidth.org/493.html?thread=836845#cmt836845
- "There are talks of strong Pokemon trainers having headed out into the storm to try and get help from other towns, most of them quickly forced to turn back, and others— whether they were lost at sea or managed to break through— never heard from since."
- The storm seems to worsen when people try to escape the island. Sagi and Minato were targeted by lightning when they tried.
https://pokespe.dreamwidth.org/493.html?thread=665325#cmt665325 / https://teamboba.dreamwidth.org/3149.html?thread=80461#cmt80461 / https://pokespe.dreamwidth.org/493.html?thread=867053#cmt867053
- The Legendaries most prominently featured in library books include: Moltres, Articuno, Zapdos, Lugia, Ho-oh, Kyogre, Groudon, Dialga, Palkia, Giratina, Tornadus, Thundurus, Landorus, Xernea, adn Yveltal. Lugia can cause 40 day storms with a flap of its wings. The myths they're involved with are considered common knowledge, and pcs can handwave knowing these myths if they're the sort to ask about them or read the books.
- There are no statues or ruins honoring the Legendary Pokemon in Toran; they are not worshipped as gods.
- The storm was at its worst 1) when Minato and Nanami first arrived, and 2) when everybody else arrived. During this time, it was also very windy.
https://pokespe.dreamwidth.org/893.html?thread=886909#cmt886909
- a Blue Orb is needed to summon Kyogre. It is located in Mt Pyre and heck if anybody knows how to get there

[infiltrationtools]

Frrom an OOC perspective, knowing what I know about Pokémon and the fact that the Gyarados in the lake was probably abused by humans in the past, I have a possible theory that the Game Corner is operated by some Rocket-like evil team that was responsible for that prior abuse, and subsequent distrust towards humans. How responsible this team is for the obviously weird weather and the role of the Kipz remains unclear.

[scension]

.... i felt compelled to check and the one non galarian pokemon line that learns defog below lv10 or so is ducklett at lv6....... this is too game specific to be an actual clue but there is fog :|a

my thought about the beach was def off when framed like this i think

who do we have who would be likely to wait until night time and snoop around the hospital, would that be the next step in narrowing down where the kids actually went?

[rateup]

oh that kinda makes sense... in the old games (that itaru's familiar with), a red gyarados was rampaging in the lake of rage due to forced evolution by team rocket. and the fact that the gyarados of that lake is looking after a shiny magikarp would mean that this is going to be a repeat of that incident in the games?? 🤔

[infiltrationtools]

Rhel and Akira have a thread where they plan to do exactly that, snoop around the hospital!

[thaumewturge]

see I'm wondering if the boba + kids aren't connected to the storm in some way

because like if someone's being Sketch and doing experiments, what better way to make sure no one finds out than a massive localized storm that keeps everyone trapped?

[thetyger]

I wonder if the Game Corner and boba shop are working in tandem. They're both making a lot of money during the storm, and the boba shop is new.

more drifloon info

[thetyger]

A plot clue, that Atsushi will not make any sense of, but will tell people about. Are Drifloons the ghosts of dead kids just playing in the sand? Who knows?

[scension]

:|a they could also have stolen them from the kids who went to the beach...

[thetyger]

We'll see what happens. This ended up being played out here.

[authoriser]

re: murkrows at the hospital
assuming the murkrows aren't being lying tricksters, it looks like they're just being branded as the next unlucky black cats when all they want to do is play with the kids at the hospital.

they also appear to be a standalone case rather than being connected with the drifloons, because heck if they know what the balloons are doing.

Re: GYARADOS

[infiltrationtools]

UPDATE: The Gyarados is connected to the northwest of the island. It's probable that whichever humans hurt it also took it away from its home. I'm thinking now that the solution is to take Gyarados and its kids back to its normal home, and that might help with the storms somehow? Gyarados is certainly stronger than a pack of Mudkips.

[scension]

re the purple light: how useful it is at this point im not sure but sagi "sees" it outside the hospital twice in a drifloon encounter and goes on to see it again when baby yjh tries to lure a drifloon out so it sure is A Thing. what kind of thing? i don't know!!

[thetyger]

I read through those, and what stands out to me is the grin, tbh. A Pokemon that does the ghostly grin thing?

[scension]

there are a few pokemon that have big grins but i have been thinking about gastly since the grin came up in that thread: there was a gastly balloon in the first part of that investigation with atsushi, hsy found another prankster gastly in the hospital, it's purple, it's a gaseous pokemon so there wouldn't be anything for sagi to hit when he yeeted himself, gastly learns hypnosis naturally at a low level which would cause people to fall asleep, its pokedex entries suggest that it can also just make people faint if they're inside its body...

the main problem is i'm not sure how much of this counts as out of game pokemon knowledge and therefore how much counts as circumstantial :|a