Nightingale: It Is Not Craig’s Fault – Really!!
Normally, when anything goes wrong, CCF blames Craig.
This is not prejudice. It is not scapegoating. It is not even particularly unfair.
It is simply the natural conclusion reached after nearly thirty years of careful longitudinal study, during which Craig has repeatedly demonstrated a remarkable ability to be standing beside the lever, button, door, explosive device, suspicious hole or recently deceased important person at precisely the moment something unfortunate happens.
Science has standards.
But even Craig isn’t up to breaking an entire realm.
That is deity-level fubar.
Craig is more of a minor mischief-maker: drop the portcullis on your friend’s head, build a staircase to somewhere that doesn’t technically exist, pull the lever before anyone has finished reading the sign. That sort of thing.
His one genuinely historic act of mischief — failing to pick a gold dragon’s pocket — happened so long ago that normal people would have forgotten about it by now.
Unfortunately, Dave has the memory of a herd of elephants and holds grudges longer than magpies.
So the dragon remains on the permanent record.
Welcome to the Sylvan Cradle. Probably.
After clearing a few caves in the Abeyance Realm, the Realm Walkers decided it was time to broaden their horizons and headed for somewhere with the pleasantly Fae-sounding name Sylvan Cradle.
This sounded promising.
“Sylvan” suggested trees.
“Cradle” suggested comfort.
There was every possibility of a peaceful green woodland full of gentle breezes, chirping birds and perhaps some nice people selling artisanal jam.
Myles opened the portal.
There was some fumbling.
Eventually everyone stepped through.
Everything went black.
This, initially, was regarded as normal.
Portal travel in Nightingale is not exactly Jetstar, although it does involve standing around wondering whether anything is happening.
The darkness lingered.
No loading screen appeared.
There were sounds.
There were no pictures.
Craig immediately blamed the developers for producing low-budget portal effects without so much as the decency to provide a Stargate-style hyperspace tunnel.
Everyone else blamed Craig.
It was instinctive.
This time, however, an independent inquiry subsequently determined that Craig was innocent.
The game had crashed.
Nightingale was shut down, restarted, rejoined and generally encouraged to reconsider its life choices.
Eventually, the party emerged into the Sylvan Cradle.
They had been expecting a sunny green realm full of lush forest and vigorous growth.
Instead, an overcast sky hung above twisted, warped trees in a landscape that looked as if Mother Nature had woken up with a migraine and spent the morning making threats.
And for once they couldn’t even blame Craig.
He was still loading.
Mary Poppins Dave Ain’t
Someone had thoughtfully left a map at the portal, clearly marked with various points of interest.
This was suspiciously useful.
Nevertheless, Myles examined it and the group headed toward the druid camp.
The route involved a cliff.
Fortunately, Realm Walkers have umbrellas, which in Nightingale operate according to the well-established Victorian scientific principle that opening an umbrella while falling several hundred metres makes gravity reconsider its position.
Craig, Myles and Zaph floated gracefully down.
Dave jumped.
Then Dave remembered the umbrella.
There are moments when the human brain produces a wonderfully expressive silence.
This was one of them.
Mary Poppins he ain't.
Somewhere below, the ground prepared to receive him.
The druids were rather surprised when the party eventually arrived. Apparently it had been quite some time since anyone had come through the portal.
Certainly not four intrepid, inept Realm Walkers equipped with umbrellas, weapons and a statistically dangerous level of confidence.
Opportunity Awaits
The usual process followed.
The party wandered around town asking whether anyone needed help, had employment opportunities, possessed valuable information, or was prepared to join a travelling organisation with no meaningful occupational health and safety policy.
Dave and Myles picked up followers.
The group also acquired three quests involving the corruption and the Boundless.
There was some discussion about making better equipment.
Their current picks were no longer up to mining the tougher rocks in the new realm.
Unfortunately, improved picks would mainly benefit Dave.
The proposal therefore received the level of cross-party support normally associated with introducing a new tax.
Hard pass.
Instead, CCF headed off into the wild slimy yonder.
Myles dropped a waypoint on the map.
This constituted the plan.
There was also a magical flying race course mounted on one of the buildings, so Craig, Myles and Zaph decided this was clearly the sensible way to travel.
Dave declined.
He stated that his flying incompetence did not require further public demonstration and set out on foot.
Soon they arrived.
Well.
Three of them arrived.
No guesses who got lost despite Myles providing clear directions.
Craig.
Naturally.
Druids With Lasers
At the destination, some druids were attempting to open a Fae forcefield among a set of ancient ruins.
Their method involved firing up some sort of magical laser apparatus.
Unfortunately, every time they activated it, the Boundless attacked.
This was strongly reminiscent of the radar equipment back in Icarus, which apparently operated according to a similar universal rule:
Switch device on. Summon everything hostile within several kilometres.
CCF offered to help.
And, somewhat disturbingly, helped.
Three waves of Boundless arrived.
Three waves of Boundless were dispatched.
Rewards were collected.
Nobody destroyed the laser.
Nobody accidentally killed a druid.
Nobody even built an unnecessary ramp over the ruins.
It was unsettling.
Zaph then persuaded one of the druids to follow him, because what this expedition clearly needed was another innocent bystander.
There Is a Bear in There
Myles had been complaining that Nightingale was getting a little too easy.
The game heard him.
This is why Myles should sometimes keep these observations internal.
The wolves from the starting realm had now been supplemented by bears, vicious lizards and weird pigs.
Nature had apparently examined the Realm Walkers and decided ordinary wolves were insufficient.
Challenge accepted.
We Came, We Saw, We Kicked Its Corrupted Ass
The group cleared several Boundless camps.
The new enemies were becoming distinctly less polite.
The Edward Scissorhands impersonators were a bit of a shock.
Other Boundless had apparently discovered grenades.
And then there was the corruption itself, which coated Dave in a sickly red glow and slowed his movement.
This may have been a magical status effect.
Or Dave may simply have been over-ece-numbered.
Over-encumbered.
One of those.
Despite this, the camps fell and the group started collecting a respectable quantity of Tier 2 Essence.
Better equipment was now within reach.
Possibly even equipment capable of compensating for the people using it.
The group then explored an ancient ruin.
They descended into its depths, where corrupted vines crawled over the walls and the décor could best be described as Victorian Botanical Garden After Several Poor Decisions.
Eventually they found the source of the corruption.
Excellent.
They had absolutely no idea what to do with it.
Less excellent.
Nearby they also discovered the realm transmuter, a device that allows minor cards to be played to alter aspects of the realm.
Myles was immediately keen to try it.
Unfortunately, the transmuter was itself corrupted and unusable.
Nightingale had now successfully presented the party with two important magical mechanisms in rapid succession, neither of which they could actually operate.
Progress.
The Game Kicks It Up a Notch
Apparently someone remained concerned that CCF was not having enough fun.
At the next corrupted camp, Nightingale added a weird corrupted treant-like creature.
Because the logical escalation from grenade-throwing Edward Scissorhands monsters is an angry diseased tree.
The party dealt with that and then cleared a small village.
Nightingale had also started adding environmental challenges to buildings, requiring the Realm Walkers to work out how to enter them rather than simply walking through the front door like customers at Bunnings.
It also continued hiding things in random places.
This encouraged exploration.
In theory.
In practice, it encouraged Zaph to hack through walls and complain that every wall he demolished had nothing behind it, while every wall Dave chose somehow concealed a chest.
This suggested either a hidden loot mechanic or the universe itself was trolling Zaph.
Both explanations seemed equally plausible.
Not everything appeared on the map.
While heading toward the next location Myles had carefully tagged, Dave spotted an interesting structure containing a column and wandered off to investigate.
Obviously.
Which meant everyone else had to follow.
Not because they wanted to see the column.
Because somebody would shortly need to rescue Dave.
Dave jumped through an opening onto the ground floor.
Myles discovered a puzzle room requiring six glyph symbols to solve.
Zaph and Craig took one look at this measured, methodical puzzle-solving opportunity and immediately went to the roof so they could fight their way downward instead.
This is the CCF doctrine of combined arms.
Myles looks for clues.
Dave looks for loot.
Zaph looks for firing positions.
Craig looks for gravity.
After clearing the building, the party found a corrupted creature they couldn’t help.
They also discovered notes left by an earlier explorer who had been investigating the corruption.
At last.
A clue.
A proper clue.
Written down and everything.
They then helped a druid build his camp.
After that they helped some other druids defend another ruin.
There was an uncomfortable pause while everyone considered what was happening.
Clearly Puck had kidnapped CCF and replaced them with helpful people.
It was the only rational explanation.
We Moved Base
Craig then asked whether he could put an estate cairn in the druid village and use it to move quickly between realms.
Dave explained that this was not how estate cairns worked.
You could have multiple cairns.
However, only one could be marked as your respite point for fast travel.
Craig listened to this explanation with the sort of attention usually associated with a Labrador being taught tax law.
Still, one undeniable fact had emerged.
The druid village was in considerably better condition than the ruined heap CCF currently called home.
So, in the finest tradition of colonial-era Realm Walkers arriving somewhere pleasant and finding people already living there, the village was appropriated for CCF use.
Storage was moved into the temple.
Workbenches were installed in the houses.
Presumably the druids watched all this with growing concern.
The party then made a quick trip back to the former camp to retrieve the more exotic resources they had accumulated.
Soon, the old ruin was largely abandoned.
The new base had walls, shelter and neighbours.
There was no vote.
It’s Only Rain
The Realm Walkers headed back out beneath heavy cloud.
Rain began to fall.
Smart travellers raised their umbrellas.
Craig did not.
Craig had lost his.
This was concerning for two reasons.
Firstly, umbrellas are useful in the rain.
Secondly, in Nightingale an umbrella is also approximately half of your aviation system.
Nobody yet knew where Craig’s umbrella had gone.
Possibly Craig didn’t know either.
The inquiry remains open.
Spelunking We Go
The final destination for the night was a cave.
This was generally welcomed because Nightingale caves had turned out to be considerably more interesting than Icarus caves.
In Icarus, a cave was often a geological cupboard containing worms.
In Nightingale, caves increasingly resemble somebody asked the Fae to design an escape room while suffering from food poisoning.
This cave took some exploring to find, but eventually the group located the entrance.
Inside, they discovered more notes from the previous explorer.
These contained the extremely useful information that a potion could be created to remove corruption.
Excellent.
Finally, a solution.
The group pushed deeper into the cave.
Corrupted plant tentacles lined the passages and smacked anyone who got too close.
Dave, meanwhile, decided that glowing red and moving slowly was apparently his new signature look.
Eventually, because even CCF occasionally follows an obvious trail to its logical conclusion, they found the source of the cave’s corruption.
There it was.
The thing they had come to cure.
If only they had the potion required to cure it.
Fortunately, this group does not give up easily.
It does, however, frequently discover that accomplishing one simple objective requires establishing an entire industrial economy.
They checked the recipe.
To make the potion they needed an alchemy bench.
To make an alchemy bench they needed lumber and crafted stone.
That meant they needed a woodworking bench.
And a workbench.
So the party established both.
Now they could make the alchemy bench.
Excellent.
Except making the actual potion required glass and some herbs.
They had the herbs.
Of course they had the herbs.
Dave had them.
Dave has all the herbs.
If Nightingale contains a plant with even the remotest possibility of being useful in a recipe three months from now, Dave has already harvested it and put it into a chest labelled something magnificently unhelpful like Stuff 4.
What they did not have was glass.
Because Dave had been slacking off.
Puck Poses a Moral Dilemma
At this point Puck decided everyone needed to think about ethics.
This was poor timing.
Puck essentially posed the following philosophical question:
When you are deep inside a cave and encounter a unique creature created by the Fae using magic on an ordinary animal — perhaps a wolf — what is the morally correct response?
Should such a unique being be respected as a rare manifestation of Fae magic?
Should it be left alone?
Should—
“Would you just shut up already, Puck? We are trying to kill this uniquely named creature, yelled Myles.”
There followed the sounds of combat.
Then silence.
“Done – said Dave – now what was the question?”
Puck's ethical seminar had not gone well.
A crown symbol had appeared on the map and moved as the creature moved.
This was extremely helpful.
The game now clearly marked unique creatures so the Realm Walkers could efficiently track them down and kill them.
Somewhere, the fates wept.
But legendary steak is better than normal steak.
This is also philosophy.
Crafting
The group returned to base.
Myles built a smelter.
Dave finally mined the crystals needed to make glass.
This allowed Zaph to manufacture the corruption-cleansing potions.
By the time all the infrastructure and resources were in place, they had enough materials to make approximately seventy potions.
They made five.
Nobody likes excess preparation.
Myles also constructed a refined smelter so Dave could make himself a better sword.
It had been a productive night.
Corruption had been investigated.
Druids had been helped.
A village had been acquired.
A unique magical creature had been ethically converted into ingredients.
Industrial glass production had begun.
Naturally, this called for music.
Tonight’s Campfire Song — Sung by Craig
At some point Craig supplied the evening’s campfire entertainment.
For legal, artistic and basic public-safety reasons, the surviving CCF transcription has been reconstructed into the following approved edition:
The woodland watched Craig hatch a plan,
And every branch objected.
Myles had maps,
Zaph had his bow,
Dave had steel,
Craig brought raccoons,
Which nobody had requested.
Every mountain called him upward,
Every wall became a game,
Every tree looked vaguely chop-able,
And now the wilds all know Craig’s name.
There was probably applause.
Or something caught fire.
These things can sound remarkably similar from a distance.
Did We Learn or Achieve Anything This Week?
We learnt several important lessons.
Do not leave your umbrella behind, Craig.
Rain is only the beginning of the problem. There are cliffs in this game.
If a portcullis falls on your head — Craig made it happen.
This remains one of the most dependable diagnostic tools available to the group.
If you are going to solve puzzles, distract Craig.
A puzzle with Craig nearby is merely a mechanism awaiting premature activation.
If a tree has survived a thousand years in a tower, Craig will chop it down.
Age, historical significance, architectural integration and basic common sense are not recognised protections under the Craig Forestry Act.
Disclaimer
For the sake of fairness, accuracy and avoiding correspondence from Craig’s solicitor:
IF something goes wrong — 99.95% of the time it's Craig. However, the corrupted realm — out of his league.
There.
It has been formally acknowledged.
Craig did not corrupt the Sylvan Cradle.
Probably.
Achievements
There were, against all expectations, actual achievements.
First Fledgling Steps
Complete the Abeyance main quests.
Apparently CCF has now officially taken its first fledgling steps, despite having already killed enough wildlife to materially alter several ecosystems.
Dave achieved — What Dilemma
Killed a unique creature.
Puck will be delighted.
Myles achieved — Refined
Put on airs.
You thought it was going to be build a smelter, didn’t you?
Craig achieved — Not My Fault
Caught holding the lever.
One appreciates an achievement system with a sense of irony.
Zaph achieved — Why Isn’t This Working
Forgot to set his respite point.
Which, after all the earlier discussion about respite points, cairns and fast travel, seems almost professionally negligent.
And so another evening in Nightingale drew to a close.
The Realm Walkers now had a better base, better equipment, glass production, corruption potions, followers, several dead unique creatures and at least one unanswered question concerning the whereabouts of Craig’s umbrella.
More importantly, they finally had the means to tackle the corruption itself.
Tune in next week to see if we can distract Craig long enough to cure the corruption.
