Chapter 4: A Plan Forms

Location: Spawn Town. Guude’s house:

Guude stood in the center of the multicolored room at his newly built house. The other mindcrackers stood in front of him waiting to hear him speak.

“We have been invaded by an enemy like none we have ever faced before. They are cunning and willing to attack without warning. They also have the ability to impersonate our own. He/she/it, we don’t know, attacked Zisteau at his lens and he had to initiate the self destruct so that its weapons did not fall in to their hands. We are not sure how many are in the enemy numbers, so far there is only one, but it could be more. I’m looking for ideas on what to do,” Guude finished looking at the crowd expectantly.

Bdouble0 was the first to speak up, “I say we just find them and attack, we’re great at PVP. We could take them down.”

“Yeah it shouldn’t be too hard,” added Milbee.

“No, this guy was tougher than any I’ve seen, he is at a whole other level. A straight forward attack would be suicide if there are more of them,” Zisteau said looking Bdubs in the eyes.

“Maybe we could set a trap,” Pakratt chimed in. He looked around and a few gave some nods of approval.

Guude surveyed the crowd. These were basic ideas that anyone would have come up with but they needed more originality. He didn’t blame them though, they were all very sure of their abilities. “Kurt, did you…?” he let the question hang in the air, not wanting to finish it.

Kurt sighed, “Yeah, I’ll do it. I need some help if I’m going to-“ He stopped abruptly as the door behind them open and everyone turned to see Baj enter the room.

“I see you started without m-“ Baj said, suddenly stopping as he saw himself seated at the meeting. Everyone turned to look as the silent Baj stood from his position in the center of the crowd. Shree and MCGamer both turned to hold him but he pulled out a sword and struck them. He jumped backwards and switched to his bow, firing a flaming volley at the new Baj before throwing an enderpearl out the nearby window. Pause and Etho both turned to the injured Shree and MCGamer to check on their wounds. They were badly hurt but would be ok.

Baj had been hit in the chest plate with an arrow and only a quick bucket of water kept him from dying. “Good thing I wore projectile protection today…” he said.

Guude turned to Kurt, “Write down whatever supplies you need and I’ll get them to you.” Kurt quietly nodded.

“We should probably send a team to check out the lens, make sure he wasn’t able to salvage anything,” Zisteau added. Pause and BTC both stood volunteering to go with Zisteau.

“Alright then, at least we have something planned.” Guude finished as he started to write down jobs for everyone. 

Chapter 3: The Redstone Master

Chapter 3

Beef walked toward his destination and in to the building. There were tables and chairs and a counter to the left. “So what’s on the menu?” Beef asked the man behind the counter.

“We have sandwiches, you can get beef or pork, the chicken went to my other shop,” Kurt replied reading a book on the counter.

“I’ll have pork and a glass of water with ice,” Kurt turned around and took out the pork and bread and handed it to Vintagebeef.

“The water and ice are in the cooler behind you,” he said.

“Thanks man…”replied Beef trying to figure out a good way to bring up his question. “Kurt you need to come out of retirement,” he finally blurted out.

Kurt slowly closed his book and sighed. “I’ve said it before, I don’t do redstone anymore…I gave it up after the…incident,” he paused before saying incident. He had a solemn look on his face, a tortured expression of someone who doesn’t want to remember an event from their past.

“Look, we have a code magenta and we need your expertise…” he said slowly.

Kurt suddenly looked nervous, “I want to help but I can’t. Ask Etho or Generik, I augh them good enough to handle whatever is needed,” he started to turn away.

“Wait, I didn’t want to do this but I’m calling in the favor you owe me,” Beef said, catching Kurt off guard. “When I taught you how to walk, you said you’d pay me back the next time I needed a favor. This is that time.”

Kurt put is head down, face in his hand. “Fine, I’ll do it. Just let me grab some supplies” He walked over to a nearby chest revealing it to be filled with stacks upon stacks of redstone and redstone blocks. “I never could bring myself to get rid of the stuff. Get Etho and Generik and have them meet me at-“

“We’re meeting in town first,” Beef said cutting him off. “We need to fully organize”

“Ok fine, I’ll meet you there, just got to stop at my base real quick first,” then without another word he walked out the door and towards the nearby mountains.

Beef looked toward him, nervous if he had made the right decision. Maybe pressuring him after the incident was too much. He walked back toward the nether. He had to gather everyone. Luckily Guude and  Zisteau were doing the same. 

Chapter 2: The Town Drunk

Chapter 2:

Zisteau breathed a sigh of relief as he made it in to the nether. This was the home of his ancestors and he knew he had a long trek ahead of him. So he set off, only knowing a vague direction and digging his way through. He was glad he had a good pick with him; he only hoped it would be enough.

He finally heard the distinctive sound of a nether portal and dug over to it. He walked through and was greeted with daylight for the first time in what seemed like forever. He walked over to the nearby town, it was a place made of hardened clay and the road was full of puddles and dirt. Some of the buildings were only fronts but this was the right place.

“Beef! Where are you!” he called out after crossing through a wooden archway. Vintagebeef poked his head out of the nearby wagon, rubbing his eyes.

“Oh hey Zedsteau, what are you doing all the way out here,” he said barely stifling a yawn.

“This is urgent, I need to speak with him, demanded Zisteau.

“Oh…” paused Beef, “I’m not sure that’s a good idea”

“I know, but we don’t have a choice,” he said urgently.

“Ok, but I don’t know how much he’ll be able to help in his state,” replied Beef as he turned around to lead Zisteau toward his target.

The two went between a couple buildings and started to follow a gravelly path in ot the forest. It wasn’t well maintained and there was an odd smell coming from up ahead. They reached a small cave and Zistea looked around. He saw a brewing stand and cauldron with a fire lit underneath the latter, probably using netherack. Quickly peering inside, Zisteau could see some potatoes and spider eyes fermenting in the cauldron. He turned his head to the leaft and saw Guude sitting there and drinking a potion of weakness. Next to him was a stone block with an item frame and pickaxe attached to it.

“You know what, Wilson…,” Guude said to the block, heavily slurring his speech, “I really do hate worms.”

“Guude, we have an emergency,” said Zisteau, trying to remain calm.

Guude ignored him and continued talking to the makeshift turtle, though he was mostly unintelligible. Zisteau solemnly shook his head. “Beef, go get some milk and hurry. We don’t have time for this.” Beef, looking worried quickly sprinted out of the room and back toward town.

Zisteau kneeled down to Guude. The drunken man was still talking to the turtle. “No…you left out the letter T, thumbs up so he can see…” It was all gibberish to Zisteau.

“Guude, you need to pull yourself together, we have a code Magenta,” Zisteau said trying to keep his voice steady.

Guude suddenly stopped his rambling and looked toward Zisteau with his eyes wide. He stood up quickly and walked over to the entrance as Vintagebeef returned with the milk. Guude snatched it from Beef and drank the bucket full of milk in one shot. Shaking his head suddenly, he turned to Zisteau, “Zisteau, get everyone together in Spawn we need to discuss our options. Beef we need you to get the Redstone Master to come out of retirement.”

Zisteau turned and immediately ran to the nether portal. Beef looked in shock, “Are you sure that’s wise, I don’t think he’ll do-“

Guude cut him off, “He has to; he may be our only hope. Now I have to go get some supplies. I’ll meet you in Spawn for the meeting.”

Mindcrack Movie Part 1: It Begins

Note: The following chapter and all future chapters are based on the trailer made by EnderSoup. The link to this video can be found here.

Chapter 1: It begins

As the sun began to set, Zisteau sat atop his floating lens surveying the landscape. There had never been much trouble going on other than some minor internal disputes but he had built this platform to help keep the land of Mindcrack safe. Something lately had been unsettling him but he couldn’t place it. It was getting to be night time and he thought he might get some sleep to pass through the night.

He turned around and began heading lower in to the lens towards his bed when he saw something odd. He saw himself standing there on an arm of the lens.

“Well, I guess the world is glitching out a little,” he said as he went to investigate. The figure was standing there. It was clearly the same as Zisteau, a zombie pigman wearing an American Flag Suit. As soon as he got close it attacked, knocking Zisteau back and almost off of the lens. He quicky stood up and grabbed his sword but the doppelganger quickly punched and sent the sword flying from his hand. Zisteau began to retreat but the attacker was too quick and jumped in front of him. Zisteau threw a punch but the attacker ducked out of the way and sent a fist in to Zisteau’s stomach, knocking him prone.

“What are you?” asked Zisteau, breathing heavily.

The stranger didn’t answer; instead he pulled out his own sword and began to make a final blow. At that instant, Zisteau knew what had to be done. He rolled out of the way of the attacked and plowed his head in to the attacker. He rushed over to one of his chests as the attacker stood up and began to advance. Zisteau pulled out a bucket of lava and poured it in the space between them before stepping back on to a pressure plate. The pistons surrounding began to move and a block of redstone was set in to place. Zisteau waved and jumped backward in to the stream of water in the center of the lens as the self destruct took effect. As he slowly plunged down he saw his lens begin to detonate as tnt charges were activated. He reached the bottom and walked slowly and hurt to his nether portal. He looked up and said to no one in particular, “I fear the worst has just begun”

The Tale of the Raines Family

In my first excursion in to tabletop roleplaying games. I was filling in as a needed charsimatic hero on a friend's D20 modern campaign. It took me a while to pick everything and figure out how to play but I built my character. The only thing left to do was pick the name. Now, I put a lot of thought in to my character's name (despite it almost never being used by the people I play with) and it took  me a while to come up with. Finally I decided to name him Claude Raines after the invisible man himself. I thought this fitting for a charismatic character with the occupation of "Celebrity". I was only able to play a few sessions with this character but I got hooked on these types of games.

The next semester I made a new character for my roommate's game set in a city as it experiences a zombie outbreak (interpersonal conflicts sadly derailed this game). I made my character a former weatherman (and charismatic hero) named Stormy Raines. From now on, all of my characters would be members of the Raines family. It quickly become a running gag and when a friend started up a high fantasy Pathfinder game I knew that my character would be an Ancestor of my modern characters.

Jim Raines the Wise (Wisdom was his lowest stat), the half-elf bard, ladies-man and guy who htes elves and drinks way too much began his journey here. The game was based off of the Red Hand of Doom module but had a lot of variations. There are lots of stories to be told here but we will skip most for now. In a small town in the campaign, we had a series of talks with the town council in which I jokingly tried to convince them to rename the town, "Rainestown" after me. The DM said to roll so I did and rolled a natural 20. The adventure continued and I eventually finished with the Great Jim Raines.

The next campaign was set with new characters in a new area and had nothing to do with the previous one. however, I added some backstory to my new character and to my last. Jim Raines eventually went back to Rainestown and over time a religion formed around him as the legendary slayer of a lich. This occurred after he went to face the trial of the Starstone (test to become a god) and never came back. No one was sure if he succeeded or not but a bountiful harvest that year led many to believe he had. Skip forward a few generations and an Aasimar was born. He was a descendant of Jim Raines and proved to many that their religion was right and it began to spread. This Aasimar was named Emilio du Francisco Von Raines and he grew up a devout believer but hated the attention. He eventually left town and trained to be a ninja. This became my new character for the next campaign.

Now I have just begun a new D20 modern campaign with urban arcana and my first non-charisma based hero. She is a Techno-Mage named Summer Raines and she comes from the city of Rainesopolis where she is the daughter of the High Priest/Mayor of the town.

Minecraft videos

I will soon be starting some minecraft let's play type videos. I know there are a trillion of these but it sounds fun and I think I'll be good at it. I'll be embedding the youtube videos on this blog.

Expedition to the Faraway Lands

The Following is the diary of an explorer discovered along with his remains

Day 1: My small boat crashed today on the shore of a new continent. This is where I was headed, off to explore the vastness of the world. I was in territory far past the edges of the map and I was excited about the journey. I had some tools with me and a blade for if the wildlife became too rough. I plan to explore a little and eventually start up a small settlement for people from my homeland to come.

Day 2-Morning: I heard noises in the night and they kept me up. It was probably my imagination but I thought I heard the sounds of people moaning and odd rattling noises. I came from a peaceful land and never heard anything like it, but it is day now and I am ready to adventure some more.

Evening: Well that was an odd day, I found some pigs and I roasted their meat with some wood I had gathered but I couldn’t bring myself to eat. I had traveled all day, I should be hungry but I’m not. I’ll continue filling out my maps I’ll only write if something interesting happens.

Day 5: The last few days, I have seen odd signs and terrain that doesn’t make sense. I have seen sand that has fallen in odd ways and water falling as if small channels had been dug to combine the flows. It is probably my imagination getting the better of me.

Day 8: I have still not eaten since I arrived and I ended up throwing some of my food away when my pack began to fill. Something of this place seems familiar to me now, as if it comes from an age when the world wasn’t…right. Things just seem odd as if terrain is random. Maybe I was too sheltered in my village.

Day 12: I decided to investigate the nightly noises and it seems as if this land is more nefarious than I imagined. I saw the dead walk the forests. I fought one of them off with my blade but it scratched me before I could take it down. That explained the moaning but after that I ran as fast as I could. It explained the moaning. I heard the thing make the same noises, but the rattling and hissing have not yet been explained. I cannot sleep now, knowing what plagues the night. And this seems unimportant now but I finally felt hungry enough to eat for the first time since I arrived.

Day 15: I have not stopped moving since the incident on night 11. I have taken refuge on top of a tree to catch my breath. I have seen arrows whiz by my head and what I swore were small explosions behind me. Needless to say, I am frightened. Though it seems as if they are hurt by the daylight so I should be safe while the sun is out.

Day 20: I have found evidence of someone else being on this land. I found a torch resting in the ground, burning and creating a light. I did some nearby exploration and found what appeared to be a shelter dug in to the ground. There was a bed in there and after blocking the entrance I slept for the first time in almost 2 weeks.

Day 27: I have found more of the hiding holes in the ground but I now fear whoever left them.  They kept traveling in one direction. It seemed as if they moved at the same consistent pace and always rested at night. This person is fearless; there is only one bed each time, so they must be traveling alone. I am following the trail, my own inquisitiveness getting the best of me.

Day 34: I have continued following the trail, fleeing and fighting the hordes of the undead that fill this land. I sometimes swear that I hear a dog barking occasionally in the distance. I have stopped ending my journey at night. I travel nonstop and this person has begun to build his hiding places in the air above the ground. He is fearless and therefore terrifying.

Day 57: I barely know what is real anymore. I have found amazing canyons and deeps holes leading to the depths of the world. Sometimes lava flows freely over the ground.

Day 74: I have become hardened, I can fight these creatures easily now but I must stay vigilant. I shake constantly though it feels unnatural, as if the world itself is shaking instead. I have been traveling so far, finding the occasional work station and building small boats to continue my journey westward. I feat the world itself is unraveling.

Day 85: I know I heard it this time. An unmistakable barking of a single dog as morning rose. I am getting close. I know it.

Day 91: My vision is cloudy but I keep hearing the barking, just ahead. I believe I have caught glimpses of this man I am following but I cannot be sure of what is real. I haven’t eaten in well over a month.

Day 92: I heard a sound of some sort of humanesque cry. It sounded like “Gee GEE GEE” I don’t know what it means but I am scared now. I saw a mountain of sand fall in front of me. I now fear that he is hunting me.

Day 93: I know he is out there somewhere, I’ve heard him, I know it. Maybe it’s just my (diary ends here)