The Becoming: The Phouka

[Talolan]

Kickstarter Update 71

Folks,

For today’s update I’m pleased to share a bonus tale; one that I initially hadn’t planned on writing. It is also the first Becoming™ tale for a creature that may or not make it into the game but if it does, well, it could be as either a player race or an NPC. Today’s tale is about a Phouka and it is, for lack of a better word, a “sweet” tale, especially when compared to the Becoming story of the Valkyries.

When I was doing my research on Irish mythology and folktales, I ran across a story by Lady Wilde an Irish poet, political activist (pro-Irish nationalism and women’s rights) who lived in the 19th century. And yes, she was also the mother of Oscar Wilde. She wrote some great stories and sadly, had a very rough life (you can find her story here). I had already read a lot of her other stories but when I read this one, I was very touched by it. I made some not insignificant changes to her story and as a result, we have the origin story for the Phouka.

Since I know that this story will lead to a lot of speculation on the forums, let me simply just by saying that as per our Kickstarter and forum discussions, I have not committed to having player mounts, as opposed to pack animals, in the game but nor have I ruled them out. The difficulty of course is the performance hit we will take for having mounted combat or simply just a lot of people riding on their mounts. Andrew and my opinions haven’t changed on this subject so please, simply enjoy the story for what it is. I will say however, that if we do have mounts, having a shape-shifting Phouka would be a damned cool mount for the TDD. Also, we have considered (and talked about this on the forums as well) having a non-human race and the Phouka would certainly be one that is worth thinking about for possible inclusion.

For those that are disappointed that this story isn’t as dark as the last one, please remember that not every story has to be dark or every story light. It’s about creating races and tales that fit the realm and I think this story does both rather nicely, as does the other tale that I have been working on for this week. Again, I do hope you enjoy this Becoming tale of the Phouka. FYI, for those who might be expecting a 6-ft tall rabbit, sorry, wrong tale.

All is going well here at CSE and I’ve greatly enjoyed seeing both the pumpkins you folks have been carving (choosing the winners is going to be sooo hard) and the contributions on the B&Bs on the forums. It is this type of involvement and feedback that will help make Camelot Unchained the game it can and should be.

As always, our thanks!

-Mark

Click through for the story.