The Rise of Ants 2: The Jungle!

[Morgaln]

I just realized: we have the power of the swarm available for this turn, right? In this case, I vote for applying it to Research Skill.

[kinglinus1]

It's 5 turns one way. This is for normal ants, though, not a Speedster hero - so if Antigone is going alone, it will take only 2 turns, like it did the first time. Are you taking any Klaffese ants with you?

That was the plan...

How many ants are traveling with me?

[Sniccups]

Turn 9: We Work with Life

Actions
-Research Power
-Research Skill
-Feed the treehoppers
-Gather food

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Antigone and a small group of Klaffese ants begin the journey back to Vannethia. It quickly becomes frustrating for Antigone to go so slowly.

Dave helps with skill research.

As the newly powered-up Life magic reaches Antimony, she focuses all her effort into growing wings - and she does! Wings burst from her thorax and grow to their full size. Antimony immediately realizes that the effort has depleted all of the calories and magic stored in her body, and after spending the rest of the turn recovering figures out that it might take a while to learn how to actually fly. After all, she’s never used wings before.

Fiona continues to travel northeast along the stream. Partway through the turn, she comes across a place where the stream joins with another, even more vast stream to create a huge river, wider than three hundred ants are long. She does not know which way to go.

Theoanta explores the canopy of the trees around the hive. She sees the Heliconia flowers discovered by Antimony the previous turn, as well as the sloth (which has moved to a different tree since the last time you saw it). She also sees the silhouette of an enormous flying creature overhead, but never what the creature is.

Antitan starts combat drills with the soldiers. He finds a few soldiers who seem rather adept with your Life magic, but does not get a chance to figure out what exactly they can do.

JoJoAnt and Zektak try to create a healing spell with their newly strengthened Life powers. After some trial and error, JoJoAnt develops a Heal Self ability, and Zektak quickly learns how to do it as well. It is still relatively weak, and cannot affect others, but it is progress.

---

Research Power
Failure

Research Skill (Swarm)
Great success! Skill +12 due to Swarm
Next Skill Trait reached! Options below.

Feed the treehoppers
As they are fed, the treehoppers begin producing a sweet liquid, which you decide to call honeydew. You do not have enough treehoppers for this to provide a significant amount of food for the colony.

Gather food
Failure, Food +4 from plants (see the next section).

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Life (moderate) power trait gained. You become even more adept at gathering food, and the plants around you seem to be growing faster and larger than they did before.

The plants in your plot have grown to their full size. You now have a much more reliable source of food, adding a constant amount to every effort to gather food. You could change this into a simple passive food source if you set up farmer ants, but you do not know how to set up groups of ants yet.
However, feeding the treehoppers here still requires an action, since the whole point of the action is to let them eat while keeping them from hopping away - and you don’t yet know how to make this easier. Training them, building things to keep them in, and setting up a constant patrol are all viable options here, and each requires a different Skill Trait.

3 Food consumed
+2 Size from Growth

Begin Voting!

Spoiler: Skill Traits

Show

Writing- Recording ideas with symbols.

Animal Training- Training insects (and bigger animals, if you can manage it) to live and work with you.

Basic Crafting- Putting things together to make more things.

Firecraft- The art of making and controlling fires.

Building- Making structures, as opposed to just digging them out.

Ant Building- Creation of things out of your own bodies. (Many types of ants do this.)

Hive Partitioning- Learning how to make groups of ants - sub-castes, if you will - for a specific purpose.

Counting and Math- Greater knowledge of numbers, ability to measure things and keep track of time, plus some arithmetic.

Edit: Heroes level up this turn. Each hero gets two points to add to any of their stats. For example, "Skill +2" or "Armor +1, Power +1"

(Wow, you finished a lot this turn. It took quite a while to get this all done.)

[Morgaln]

- Gather Food
- Increase Food Storage
- Feed Treehoppers
- Research Skill

Skill vote: Hive Partitioning

Now that life power is stronger, Antitan will go back to experimenting on living ants' exoskeletons. He'll include the promising soldiers he found and focus especially on increasing traits that makes them (and himself) stronger fighters.

Edit: Level Up: Armor +1, Power +1

[Eternis]

- Gather Food
- Increase Food Storage
- Feed Treehoppers
- Research Skill

Skill Trait: Hive Partitioning
But next time Writing!
(We do need farmers, butI've got a plan, guys!)

Dave is going to try and learn Untiring now that he feels like he can take a break from helping out with skill research. If no-one's teaching today, then Dave is going to focus instead on modifying his body to a) store extra nutrients, and b) maybe even produce the same kind of liquid those weird tree-hoppers do.



Also, how do the level ups work?
(Edit)
Power +2
That's how they work!

[Sniccups]

Dave is going to try and learn Untiring now that he feels like he can take a break from helping out with skill research.

Also, how do the level ups work?

A: Someone who knows Untiring has to teach it to you with their action. I'll need an alternative action in case no one feels like teaching this turn.

B: Level ups have now been added to the turn post.

[BrutalZandax]

We should probably have a running list of all the plants we have found and actually are growing.

-Gather Food
-Increase Food Storage
-Feed Treehoppers
-Research Skill

Skill vote: Hive Partitioning
Theoanta will experiment with using Life powers to grow plants into different, more useful, shapes.
Skill +1, Power +1

[flappeercraft]

- Gather Food
- Increase Food Storage
- Feed Treehoppers
- Research Skill

Skill Trait: Hive Partitioning

JoJoAnt works on making this healing skill be able to work passively whenm he wants it to. As in enough to be mid combat and use it without requiring much thought other than I want to heal.

Level up: +1 Power +1 Armor

[Xihirli]

- Gather Food
- Increase Food Storage
- Feed Treehoppers
- Research Skill

Skill Trait: Animal Training

Fiona shall embark southwest to see what there is to be discovered!

Level up: +2 Speed

[Zweanslord]

- Research Power!
- Research Skill
- Feed Treehoppers
- Expand Food Stores

Skill: Animal Training

This allows us to not need to spend an action on Feed Treehoppers, sets us up for future training of other animals and keeps the caste system simple: Hero and ant.

Zektak level up: +2 Power.

Zektak sees the others ants work on ways that are related to life power and finds it difficult to pick at first. Then he goes over to Theoanta who seeks power in growing plants in all kinds of shapes and helps, trying to make fancy creations out plants.

Sniccups, which skill would be best synergise with using life to manipulate plants and such to grow in all kinds of shapes?

[kinglinus1]

- Gather Food
- Increase Food Storage
- Feed Treehoppers
- Research Skill

Antigone travels back to the hive, and on the way she experiments with using life magic to increase the toxicity of certain plants in order to make deadly poisons.

Speed +2

Skill vote: Writing!

Edit: I love the fact that Fiona and Antigone chose the same increase.

[Ramsus]

- Gather Food
- Increase Food Storage
- Feed Treehoppers
- Research Skill

Antimony practices how to fly.

Skill Vote: Hive Partitioning

Antimony: +2 Power

[Sniccups]

Sniccups, which skill would be best synergise with using life to manipulate plants and such to grow in all kinds of shapes?

I don't think there are any that would be particularly better, since you already have Growing.

[Xihirli]

- Gather Food
- Increase Food Storage
- Feed Treehoppers
- Research Skill

Antigone travels back to the hive, and on the way she experiments with using life magic to increase the toxicity of certain plants in order to make deadly poisons.

Speed +2

Skill vote: Writing!

Edit: I love the fact that Fiona and Antigone chose the same increase.

We'll have to race eventually.

[Personification]

- Gather Food
- Increase Food Storage
- Feed Treehoppers
- Research Skill

Animal Handling, the SWARM WILL RIDE!!!!

Ant-Eye will try to stop sleeping through Mondays and get back to working on Druidic wards for the hive and tree. I won't be able to post over the weekend, so on Monday he will do the same thing. He will also get +2 Power

[kinglinus1]

We'll have to race eventually.

I'll have to grab untiring first.

[Sniccups]

Turn 10: No One Knows How Treehoppers Actually Work

Actions
-Research Skill
-Feed treehoppers
-Gather food
-Expand food storage

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Fiona cannot go southwest. She is on the north side of a stream far wider than she can jump or swim across, flowing northeast and joining with one flowing north - and she still hasn’t figured out an alternate way to cross.

Antimony practices with her wings. She now knows how to fly, and it is much faster than walking!

While bored on this very slow trip, Antigone mixes her magic with various plant materials to create a poison - and create a poison she does. This poison is so strong it can kill an ant with just a tiny dose, and she made enough to kill many, many ants. She doesn’t even know what she did, or which plant it came from, but it’s certainly deadly.

JoJoAnt makes no progress on healing.

Theoanta and Zektak grow plants into a number of odd shapes, but don’t figure out any particularly useful ones.

Antitan doesn’t figure anything out about modifying ants.

Dave does not make any progress on storing nutrients in his body.

Ant-Eye doesn’t have very much success with wards, either.
(Also, Personification, I would like more information about what you mean by wards.)

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Research Skill
Failure

Feed treehoppers
After being fed, the treehoppers molt once more (they apparently had reached their full size, but not actual maturity) and emerge the same size, but with a few new changes in their anatomy. They start to do something you have heard of the queen doing, but never see before - you call it “mating”. You don’t understand it, but feel like understanding its purpose might lead to some insights about biology.

Gather food
Failure; Food +4 from crops

Expand food storage
You now have room for 30 food.

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Hive Partitioning skill trait gained. Guide to using this below.
3 Food consumed
+2 Size from Growth

Begin Voting!

Spoiler: Hive Partitioning Guide

Show

Here’s how Hive Partitioning works. At any point, you can use an action to create a specialized section of the colony for a specific purpose. Effectively, you can have an extra action, but that action will be the same every round. You can dissolve one of these specialized forces back into the main hive without using an action, and you can have a maximum of three of these forces at once - or, more accurately, you can have one fewer force than you have normal hive actions, so your maximum will increase when you hit a certain Size.

(Yes, this is effectively the “Food Force” from the first game codified into an ability.)

This also gives you the ability to designate groups for a specific purpose in combat, and if you ever encounter an ability which is mutually exclusive with another ability you can have only part of the hive learn it.

[Xihirli]

How did I get to the north side of the stream? Didn't I go north to get to the stream?

[kinglinus1]

- Gather Food
- Research Power!
- Feed Treehoppers
- Research Skill

Head back to the hive and try to find a way to replicate this poison, or if it can't be replicated, make a distilled poison that can be replicated.


Uh... How do I know it can kill an ant with one drop

[flappeercraft]

- Create Food Force
- Create Power Research Force
- Research Power!
- Feed Treehoppers

JoJoAnt takes a break from learning healing and tries to grow wings!

[BrutalZandax]

-Create Food Force
-Create Feed Treehoppers Force
-Research Power
-Research Skill

Theoanta will continue her research into Plant shaping(the shaping of plants)

[Morgaln]

- Create Food Force
- Create Treehopper Feeding Force
- Research Power
- Research Skill

Antitan will continue his research of last turn, still trying to figure out how to use life power to increase the ants' combat capabilities.

[Eternis]

- Create Food Force
- Create Treehopper Feeding Force
- Research Power
- Research Skill

Dave will continue his attempts to alter his physiology, this time focussing more on the act of internal conversion of things into digestible materials- maybe even eating some of the tree-hopper food to try and figure it out.

[Ramsus]

- Create Food Force
- Create Treehopper Feeding Force
- Research Power
- Research Skill

Antimony tries to learn the Untiring hero skill. (I assume we can only learn one at once yeah?)

[Zweanslord]

- Research Power!
- Research Skill
- Create Food Force
- Create Treehopper Feeding Force

Zektak moves over to JoJoAnt and tries to help making him grow wings. Pointy wings! Maybe he learns how to teach/modify other ants this way too.

[Sniccups]

How did I get to the north side of the stream? Didn't I go north to get to the stream?

The hive is on the north side of the stream. The stream flows east past the hive, then turns northeast. You have always been on the northwest side of the stream.

- - - Updated - - -

Uh... How do I know it can kill an ant with one drop

With your magic, of course. You got a sense of its lethality when you made it.

[kinglinus1]

The hive is on the north side of the stream. The stream flows east past the hive, then turns northeast. You have always been on the northwest side of the stream.

- - - Updated - - -



With your magic, of course. You got a sense of its lethaloty when you made it.

...Yes, that's how Antigone knows. Don't do a headcount when we reach the hive please.

[Xihirli]

The hive is on the north side of the stream. The stream flows east past the hive, then turns northeast. You have always been on the northwest side of the stream.

- - - Updated - - -



With your magic, of course. You got a sense of its lethaloty when you made it.

Okay, then Fiona's going to go from the north to the Northern North. Maybe think of a cool name for the area on the way there.

- Research Power
- Feed Treehoppers
- Try to get the Treehoppers "weaned" I guess? Like, get them to start eating the plants we're growing for them without us directly feeding them.
-Begin harvesting their excreted stuff we can eat.

[Sniccups]

- Try to get the Treehoppers "weaned" I guess? Like, get them to start eating the plants we're growing for them without us directly feeding them.
-Begin harvesting their excreted stuff we can eat.

A: Weaning them would require the Animal Training skill. Remember, it's not about getting them to eat, it's about keeping them from escaping the hive while they eat.

B: I already said that 1 Size of treehoppers does not produce enough honeydew to feed the colony.

[Sniccups]

Turn 11: Splitting the Hive

Actions
-Research Power
-Research skill
-Create Force to Gather Food
-Create Force to Feed Treehoppers

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As no one is teaching this round, Antimony tries to figure out Untiring by herself, but does not get anywhere.

While bored on the trip back to the hive, Antigone figures out which plant she used for the poison, and how she made it. She doesn’t manage to find any seeds to grow it.
(I would tell you what this plant was if I knew. I’m not sure how I would go about researching what plants are poisonous to insects.)

Theoanta grows a plant into several cool shapes, but her real success comes as a plant that forms a new, useful shape - one like a ladder, that is easily climbable.

With Zektak providing power, JoJoAnt manages to grow wings in a similar way to Antimony. He does not yet know how to fly.

Dave makes no progress on his own digestive abilities. It may be useful to get a better understanding of how digestion works to use this idea.

Antitan, having decided to create an elite squad of soldiers, works to alter their bodies for more combat effectiveness. He manages to thicken the chitin on their bodies, adding to their Defense.
(Morgaln, feel free to come up with a name for your elite squad.)

Fiona follows the bank of the larger river to the north. After traveling for a while, she spots a huge, brown-black insect-like monster, maybe even bigger than the walking sticks on your tree, with many legs and enormous antennae. She spends a lot of the turn hiding from it, during which time she names it a “centipede”.

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Research Power
Great success! Power +6

Research Skill
Failure

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The Food Force does not find any new food, but brings in the 4 food from the garden.

The Treehopper Feeding Force brings the hoppers outside to eat. As they eat, the females appear to do something else as well. Closer inspection reveals that after mating last turn, they have laid their eggs inside the plants.

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3 Food consumed
+2 Size from Growth

Begin Voting!