#sso fort maria

[fictional-library-tournament]

Prelims round 1, poll 19

Propaganda

Scarlet Devil Mansion Library, Touhou:

It's said to have books of all kind, in thousands of different languages, and about countless different things. Some of the books were written by the librarian herself, Patchouli Knowledge. The was also probably one of the first recognizable set pieces in the windows touhou games, being the fourth stage in it's introductory game.

The Lines Between, Dimension 20: Neverafter:

Contains all versions of every story ever written, told, or imagined - free existential horror with every checkout!

"You're nothing more than scratches of ink on someone else's piece of paper."

The Lines Between is a massive place between stories, and staffed by diverse and deific librarians who are just doing their best, such as Glossary, Key, Legend and Index. The library is physically made of books, scrolls, and parchment. Its areas include the Hall of Stories, the Canonade, the Tower of Tales, and perhaps most remarkably: a brilliant view of the Auroratory. It is a beautiful aurora borealis of voices, preserving auratory stories that aren't necessarily written down. It is possible to swim up and into the Auroratory.

Fort Maria Library, Star Sable Online:

(All images come from ssoblr users)

So this is not necessarily a public library and it was abandoned for a long time (as far as we know) but the druids have it up again recently in game. It was built as part of Fort Maria centuries ago by the time of the game, and holds books from all those eras.

It is a gorgeous and expansive place with secret passageways, rare tomes, fluffy seats, old abandoned research, a lot of study areas, old relics, a moving bookcase to a portal cavern and even its very own library ghost!

It is, in my opinion, one of the most atmospheric places in the game. Even without sound on it is gorgeous and bring across its intention incredibly well, and with the sound on it is incredibly eerie. The music here is very limited and quiet, and the player’s footsteps echo through the library.

I feel like whatever you’re researching, you will find something on it in here. It feels like a place you could spend your whole life reading in, and still only have read a tiny fraction of the books there.

the citizens of jorvik (fictional star stable online island) keep all the witchcraft books in there and all their super secret and cool magic books, it was closed for years and it's very mysterious. one of the coolest characters (mrs. holdsworth) in the whole game hangs out there a lot, and it's home to a cute little capran named beatrix and she took her name from her favorite book. the only way you get in the library is by feeding her snacks and reading her books and she's also one of the coolest characters in the game (imo). also beatrix is friends with one of the horses in the game and she often is seen playing with the horse so :) OH and also there's a full heckin portal room in the lower floor!!! with a little pond and a portal that at some point the main characters (the "soul riders") get kicked in by the evil guys (the "dark riders") into this place called devil's gap (despite the name there's just one witch basically vibing in the gap potentially helping out the evil guys but we haven't figured that out yet). and it's gorgeous, if you're worrying about looks. the inside is all wooden and home-y and the portal room is also very pretty eye candy, it's very glow-y.

Bookholm, The City of Dreaming Books by Walter Moers

None

[orvizs]

[sso-montana]

Justin reference/redesign (FUCKING FINALLY-)

some info's regarding the design:

the poison mark and white streak in his hair were caused by Katja

I hc that the necklace he's wearing used to be Catherines

the bottle of medicine is not for him but Montana

the black nail polish is Montanas doing (sin drew him with it once idek if it was bc of style choices or not but I am running with it)

this has cost me way too many breakdowns I will never be doing this again (that's probably a lie) also yeah I gave him a different outfit for before the DC incident to reference his old design and just bc I wanted to mixed them in general

[lilisjorvikadventures]

Welcome to Fort Maria

She has been waiting for you.

Feel invited

by all her knowledge

and all her secrets.

What will you do, traveller?

Will you study the past?

Are you looking to the future?

Are you the one writing History?

Are you ready for what you will find in these halls?

Are you ready for all she has to offer?

Are you ready?

[marikken]

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[lukas-crowsong]

still not quite sure what actually happened during the whole pool of pandemonium sequence with the dark figure lowkey

the soul riders ask afterwards who you see but i didnt see anyone in particular?? was that intentional??? i wasn't sure what the game wanted me to do so i ran towards it and it vanished. never got explained to me but i have the perception skills of a worm so idk wtf just happened. maybe it was important maybe it wasn't

[sso-maev]

Whichever people designed the environments for these past few events deserve the pay raise of a life time

[jorvikzelda]

A perfectly normal trail ride with absolutely no odd or out-of-place occurrences at all.

[kelly-dreamway-sso]

so when can i move in

[centeris2]

after months I finally caught up on all the sso quests sometime last week. I don't have to avoid spoilers anymore. yayyy

but catching up on the quests was more like

-runs through fort maria- -runs through fort maria- -runs through fort maria- -runs through for

Repeating "SSO is an AU of SSL" over and over to myself as the game moves further from SSL and the first few years of SSO. (It's helping, slowly.)

[salty-medley]

SSO - Fort Maria paintings

This library contains a lot of rather interesting paintings, most of them sadly only related to the druids, but for a part of them, few details are a bit intriguing:

The "roman" temple

Why would we find roman ruins in an island which is on the north of the Baltic Sea ? I guess most people don't think about it but it was my main reaction when I saw it in Epona. Now... That painting could give the start of an explanation: if you look at the ambiance and the light, you'll see it's not in earth anymore, it's in the in-between worlds path. And it's a portal. Maybe a portal to travel on either another world ( roman themed one ?) or on another country, like the Roman empire.

2. The harbour

This one looks rather normal, you can think about Cape West or Fort Pinta... Which one by the way ? There's not the colors of Golden, nor the statue of Fort Pinta, and certainly not the fortifications of the last one, and we know that it was fortified since the start, and the boats are more modern, something you can find in the 50s/60s. So where could it be ? Well, it still can be Cape West if we consider that the permanant autumn weather is related to the witches, but it can also be another sea side city in Jorvik, something on the closed part of the map.

3. The castle

One of the most interesting ones, if not the most. Keep in mind that I don't change the orientation of the screenshot, it's the right side. It looks like Silverglade castle, but... There's like a lake and mountains, full of snow, behind it. But the painting represents spring, there's a blossoming tree here. So... Where it is ? Could it be the lands eras before ?

4. In the sky

It's clearly not an unknown place. Do you remember the cloud event with Mica ? That strange castle silhouette you can see in the clouds ? Well, you have it with more details. We can see something like a plaza and stairs to a higher place, some columns and some trees made of clouds. There's also several winged horses ( why not pegasi ? Because Pegasus is a name, not a specie. Winged horse is a way better term) and one single human girl, probably Aideen or one of her incarnations. I though that it could be a cloud civilization BUT the magic side of the Wildwoods made me think about MPL and I think it's one of their main inspiration, so why not wild winged speaking horses ? It's dumb and childish, right in their current line.

The only question would be: why stairs when they can fly ? Eh... That one is a real mystery.

5. Mystical valley

You will say "Oh but it's a wild forest like in the Wildwoods, it's here ?" Well, since when there's palm trees in Wildwoods ? When you look more at it, the whole light make it feel warmer than the Jorwegian islands, something almost tropical. And... Is it a dinosaur like creature in the water ? Could it be what was the valley of the dinosaur before ? No, there's a south american pyramid on the right side, and a giant head. Plus, you can see some openings in the cliff, like if they were living in it, despite the small waterfalls. But you still can see a horse like creature and the soul riders runes... Very weird mix, making me think that Jorvik and its present location could just be our world's version. If you heard about the String theory, it's based on it. I have a very hard time to conceive Jorvik having both roman and pre-columbian ruins at the same time while being located near Iceland. You'll excuse me people, but having several dimensions looks more logical at that point.

6. The storm

I can't say if it's earth or not, but these rocks are really unique and threatening at the same time. Kinda looks like petrified waves, no?

7. Druidic stone

Another strange forest painting... This one has horses and a druidic stone on it, so I assume it's Jorvik. Once again, it gives a more warm feeling, it doesn't look like it's in the north of Europe at all. There's something prehistorical, I can explain why.

8. Ruins

That one intrigues me like A LOT ! These ruins looks like medieval ones, something from the early medieval era. But why are they that destroyed ? The whole place is unknown to me, I can't figure where it is, and what is the era of the painting.

[starbornsoulrider]

You guys remember Twig right?

This one

Anyways I think it’d be funny to make her Halo’s problem

Like idk how exactly they meet her yet but shit happens and now they have to take care of her

And it basically goes like this:

[natduskfall]

Okay, I have reached that one talk with Rhiannon where she tells MC, Linda, and Alex about the time she got ambushed by a dark, cloaked figure in the woods, and almost lost her Wild Whispering gift.

We don’t know who the figure was. Maybe it was Darko, maybe it was someone else. But the story reinforces the concept that there are several, overlapping magic systems. It almost seems to imply that people who use the opposite of the magic that comes from Aideen can also have the gift of Wild Whispering, but it is corrupted. Maybe reversed? Or just used for evil.

So, theoretically, it is possible that Darko has the gift of Wild Whispering as well, but his is corrupted. He can sense the light of Aideen in starbreeds, maybe even normal horses. But it resonates most strongly in MC. It is possible that he can also reverse, corrupt, or extinguish this light within the horses, thus corrupting them, making them into Dark horses. He breaks the horses, and forces them to bend to his will, and the will of their chosen rider. Maybe the ability to “sense” the horses, and the light of Aideen, is uncomfortable for him, tho he can push it out. But not in the case of MC. He did say he wants to extinguish the light of Aideen in all horses.

SSO lore enthusiasts and theorists, are there any theories as to why Darko can sense MC's presence, or what is it that he feels inside us? It's been bugging me.

[calamitymoonmoon]

Apparently the Romans settled on Butter Hill some two thousand years ago. And nobody’s been into Fort Maria for years and they say nobody who’s made it over the wall has ever made it back. And the Great Thunder, the local ravine, was created by a gunpowder factory explosion a couple hundred years ago. 

Anyway, off I go to deliver the honey.

[dinosaurvalley]

im back in the trenches so heres some small(ish) scale stuff i wish sso had:

you could talk to the npcs even if they didnt have quests, even if its just a single line or like “what im busy” when you get too close to them like how they do in fort maria. i love that stuff. i want the mean npcs to tell me to get lost

you could forage for horse food? like why can i forage for rubia and jute and whatever but theres no carrots or apples i can pick. please im spending all my money on gear

kind of related to the last one and ive mentioned it before, but i wish horses had randomly selected favorite and least favorite foods that would give more or less xp if you fed it too them.

the soul riders should have things they do. anne should do dressage training, lisa could go on trail rides, linda could be wandering around the silverglade library, etc. just something so theyre not standing around doing nothing for months.

are all the crafting stations in valedale? if so thats stupid. add crafting stations to ranger outposts and the rescue ranch and other things. if thats already a thing then disregard this

you should get a crafting kit, not for everything, just for like some of the small stuff you get from path of terra or whatever, maybe make it so you can only use it while sitting down somewhere to give sitting and actual use

idk what else, my brain is fried, add on if you want

[rinravenkeep]

The Trees are part of the Squid's Plan! (major main quest spoilers)

After spending way too long playing through the new quests in SSO, I've come up with a theory. A real long theory. That the Life Wardens are siding with both Dark Riders and Soul Riders in order to repair the Wild Weave and reconnect with one another, inadvertently helping the Dark Riders to free Garnok.

Lemme explain.

This is the map in the Fort Maria portal room. It shows the seven major Life Wardens that we know of, but it also gives us some clues about the story going forwards.

First, the obvious.

Yeah, there's no way that little illustration in the corner is anything but Ol' Squiddy's Tentacles. But we knew he was imprisoned between worlds, in neither Pandoria nor Jorvik - so finding out he's been chilling in the Wild Weave, or a location only accessible by it, makes sense.

Next, when it comes to putting a name to each of these trees I think most are fairly self explanatory. We've known about most of these trees for years, even if they've never been a part of the story, such as with the Ice Tree by the Stonecutter's Vault in Dino Valley, and the Unnamed Tree way up near where you finish the Red String Trail in the Firgrove Mountains.

Where it gets interesting is with the two trees I couldn't place; such as the one between the Sentinel Tree in Mistfall and the Ice Tree in Dino Valley; and the one on the far left, signified by floating islands.

In my mind it makes sense to have a couple of the trees sprouting in Pandoria, since the two worlds are connected by the tree roots - and the only floating rocks I know about are in Pandoria - but who knows.

Overlaying the normal map on top of these locations makes it pretty clear that they're supposed to correspond to real map locations. The only anomaly is the Ice Tree and Sentinel Tree, whose positions are reversed on the portal map.

What's interesting is that Garnok, if I'm following the map's logic correctly, would hold exactly the same positioning as the Dark Core Oil Rig.

(For context, we know the Rig's position from old skybox errors that used to show it when stood in the right spots, some maps from the books (which I know aren't always canon anymore, but hey it's the best we've got) and, most recently, if the player looks South when entering Devil's Gap, thanks to that little black hole we helped Sunshine open up recently.)

Where am I going with all this? Okay!

Firstly, we know that the trees have helped the Dark Riders in the past. The Life Wardens have repeatedly said the only loyalty they have is to each other, and quite frankly after what the Jarl did, who can blame them. (Thanks Jon).

This is going into massive spoiler territory for the most recent quest as of 17/1/24 so if you haven't completed it yet, flee.

The Sentinel Tree in the Wildwoods has been corrupted by Pandorian magic for a while now. But in the newest quest, we saw Sabine using the Runesmasher to break into it and create a portal to free Erissa.

Side tangent about the hammer:

For those who didn't play the Halloween quests, basically one of the Jarl's servants got the ice valley smith to make a hammer that could destroy runestones, broke one open, and a Vala witch gave him immortality. Aka. Sive (or an identical Vala witch), who is deeply connected with the Life Wardens and who probably gave Sabine the hammer when we saw her in Devil's Gap, has no problem with this action.

The Life Wardens, or at the very least Sive, their ally, wanted the portal opened and Erissa freed.

Why?

To re-grow the Wild Weave.

Assuming Garnok's position on my map was correct, the only way the Dark Riders now have to free him is to go directly through the Wild Weave.

And since we're good people who like nature... yeahhh the Soul Riders are totally going to end up healing some trees and inadvertently opening the path to Garnok wide open.

Oh yeah. We're going to mess up royally.