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Jutta's Tales: The Bog Mother. (A URW Horror Story.) Hi, I want to try something different. Instead of a character story, I tried to write a horror story based in the URW. There might be more. I think Jutta has a few stories to tell.

This is a little dark, and based on true things.

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Jutta was my mother's mother. She came from the far north, away from the coast we call home now. Mother told me that she came from the Owl Tribe, before settling down with her husband, a Seal Tribe man in his homeland, our homeland. He had been killed before I was born and Jutta had moved in with us. Father, was a Seal Tribe man through and through, and didn't like Jutta. On good days, he said she had the touch of the Spirits. On his bad days, he would say she drank too much of them instead.

But she seemed so ancient, so wise to me, I was just a little boy at the time. I took her word as law much to my practical father's annoyance. I was forever panicking over spilled salt, casting the expensive substance over my shoulders, refusing to whistle indoors for our dogs and all sorts of old Spirit ways. It seemed for beings who didn't care for humans, they certainly cared a lot about all sorts of things we do according to Jutta.
 
Even though it has been many long winters since she left us, I still remember her sitting in front of the hearth. A broken net over her lap, her curled and swollen fingers deftly passing the bone shuttle needle through the cords, stitching it. The little clicks of bone, almost lost with the wind whirring past the window, sending snow against the sides of the cabin we were in.

My job was to hold the lengths of cord taut as she worked. An important job she always told me. Fixing Father's fishing nets was my favourite job, not just because I get to stay in the warmth, curled against Jutta's leg, but because Jutta would tell me stories.

Now I sit in front of the fire now, my children's children around me, watching me whittle, I still remember her stories or was they more warnings? I clear my throat, the children looked up expectantly. They were waiting for the next tale, as I did when I was their age. The wind howled and made them jump and look around skittish like deer and I smiled. “Have you ever heard the Bog Mother?” I started, echoing Jutta's words from so many moons ago...

Winters on the coast are cold but with the sea air keeping the worst of the snow out, it is nothing like the far north. There was a village that was on the tip of the world it seemed, so far north and so cold. But nothing was colder than the people.

Hunger and death was a constant companion to the people,  Nothing would grow in the stony frozen soil for most of the year. The kept reindeer was scraggly starving beasts but the people made do. Yet they didn't move on. Some say they were cursed, banished to the far frozen north for some evil deeds, land and bloodlines cursed. All I say is that when the milk of a doe was ending, they often mixed it with the does' blood, bleeding the beast slowly keeping it alive and the hot blood mixed in with the thinning milk was their favourite treat.

In the leaner years, when the villagers, deep into the dark months felt their stomachs ache with hunger, what little food there was, was shared out to the village hunters, trappers and crafters first. The men eating what they could as they needed to find more. The scraps was given to the womenfolk to pick whatever they could from the lean bones, breaking them for marrow like starving wolves. Whatever, if ever, anything was left it was scraped into the pot and boiled, the thin soup dished out to the elderly.

There was one year though, it seemed the Spirits was plaguing the village, traps were sprung but lay empty and half the reindeer does lost their calf, the other half just didn't carry. The villagers already was gaunt from one bad winter but a worst spring? Followed by a tragic summer since the hunters was bringing barely any food in, just enough to keep them all from dying.

The Summer Solstice brought the village leaders and the Sage, to the middle of the village. The old Sage, was barely able to stand but still chanted and cast a few bones into the fire and watched them burn. A sharp snap from the bones made him fall back. “A bad winter!” Was declared, the omens black.

Worry filled the village far faster than food in the stores. Was it worse to die slow starvation or quick? People muttered as they walked past the storerooms again and again, looking at the small amount of food as if it would change.

In the midst of summer, a young outsider housewife, who married into the Tribe but a year ago gave birth. The first one in many years. However births was not celebrated like yours. They marked another mouth to feed, another drain on scarce supplies they had. The other women, the ones who hasn't bared in years talked in hushed tones about it, how not right it was, how did she bare when even the does were barren. Even the Sage couldn't answer. The babe, seemed not quite right; small, pale and silent. The Tribe women whispered about it, how it wouldn't survive the night.

Summer ended, and so did Autumn, the hunger and whispers grew as the child survived. Curses, and promises with Spirits was muttered, why else this year was so barren when the mother wasn't so? Didn't all the trouble start when she arrived?

When winter began to creep into the village, one of the village women who lost her only child years ago began to tell the others about the unnatural sickly looking child who had weaned. Eating food. Even though it wouldn't survive till Spring. A waste. It's portion of food could feed her husband who brought that seal in. At the start of winter, it was just hot words in the cold air but as winter continued, and the hunger sank deeper in their bones, she wasn't the only one saying it any more.

Winter is bad time to get a head full of bad ideas. No one had the energy to shake them off or think, all they kept hearing is how they could get more food for them, for their family. The mother hid herself and her son away, while her husband a crafter, unskilled was low in the village so kept quiet. He was already distrusted for marrying outside the Tribe. So he wasn't told when the leaders went to have a meeting on a nearby hill, out of eyeshot and earshot of the village.

Hunger was a desperate beast that day, it's growls echoing in all the leaders' stomachs, the wicked anger clawing through them as they decided. In the older times, in leaner times, ones they thought they had passed, they would send the elderly off, into the woods with no supplies. One less mouth to feed. The outsider's child should be banished first, not one of the elderly. It was decided in harsh but quiet tones.

They waited till the next full moon on the solstice, the Sage had said it would be best. The Spirits could snatch up the child before it's soul was left to howling void. The next words was heavy on his tongue, blood ritual offering are best on the solstice. One of the leaders jumped in his skin and admonished the man for his crude words. Blood rituals hadn't been done in generations, though they still drained the does when hunger set in.

The mother found out only when the Sage knocked on the door of their cabin as night fell that evening. The leaders were just behind and with a glance into their solemn gaunt faces, she knew what they were here for. She screamed, cried as her husband held her. She tried offering them anything but her son. Food, valuables but in the end she offered her life up. Surely an adult's portion was far greater than what a babe would eat?

The leaders accepted it with a jerky nod. Better on their soul, a woman give herself up then condemn an infant. She followed them out into the night, each of the men holding a burning torch, the guttering flickering lights surrounding her leading her deep into the marsh. The frozen ground crunching under her leather boots. She was sobbing to herself, the icy cold night freezing the tears on her face. The moon came out from behind a cloud, bathing them in the silvery light. She was handed a torch and ordered to walk away into the bog away from the village, away from her child, sobbing.

The babe didn't survive long, neither did the husband who followed within a week. The woman was never seen again, but she was heard. The next full moon, an eerie call came from the bog. The village's best hunter grabbed his bow and arrow and crept out. He was shaking as the cold wind blew across him and a thin woman's sob drifted over him. He raised his bow and arrow thinking the outsider had returned, but there was nothing. He approached slowly and carefully thinking she must have been hiding behind a tree. He scurried home terrified.

Again, the next full moon, the sobbing was closer now, the edge of the marsh now. The leaders gathered up as many men as he could arm, and marched them out to see what was happening. He heard the thin sobs and spun around, the noise seemingly surrounded them. They scattered, fleeing in haste away from the painful wretched sobs.

They thought they were safe in the village, the cries moon after moon, never left the bog. The village learnt to live with it, the Sage drumming on full moons to banish the evil and stop the sobs. Maybe it was that, and not the offering which made the game plentiful, the traps full and the nets bursting with food. The village recovered even, the next winter easy to get through, even the bog was silent. Years past, the old Sage passing on, and drumming stopped. It was waking up the children who soon filled  the yards of the village, horrors forgotten.

It was after that winter solstice, when the children first mentioned her. The Bog Mother. The lady in the marsh, who called to them to play who promised them that she would be their mother. The children told the adults fled, all of them except one. One who had argued with his mother that morning, one who didn't know the dangers of the bog, one they found the body of face down in the mud, dead. They told the children never to play near the bog, to ignore any voices, any lights.

It didn't stop there, a child woke up next full moon to a voice outside his window, calling for him. His brother sleepily awoke to see the boy leave the room and never return. Another child, and another, soon they were gone. The village died out but they still say she is out there, the Bog Mother, looking for her child every winter. If you sit quietly you can still hear her calling, or sobbing for her child she lost.

I finish my story and look at the spell bound children, just then the wind blew past the window, a thin almost wail, sending the children to tears and screams. You know, it did almost sound like a distraught woman calling out.

May 26, 2020, 09:12:49 PM
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Re: Varied handaxes? There are 2 types of hand-axes defined in-game.  One hand-axe has 3 blunt, 6 edge, and 5 point damage, while the other hand-axe 4 blunt, 6 edge, and 4 point damage.
May 28, 2020, 09:18:19 PM
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Re: map not loading Hi Sami, I was able to open my saves on another (newer) Chromebook running Crouton! (EDIT: I simply installed the Linux version and am running it successfully, instead of trying to get Chromebook to run Crouton/Linux to run *Steam* to run URW.) Not sure if my former issue is still worth you looking into since my situation was so weird.

Happily playing now. p1m lives!

June 07, 2020, 08:17:05 PM
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Re: Bloodscrapes disappeared on reloading Got this fixed (with Cornan from Brygun. Thx!).
I seem to have flipped certain routine parameters which then broke bloodscape timestamps. It's back to normal now, which means bloodscapes are removed after two days from their first appearance. Would be better if they faded gradually, and according to elements - maybe to adjust that in the future.

Fixed - persists in 3.62.

July 06, 2020, 03:08:12 PM
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Re: Who were "Njerpez" ? If the game change log said: "Based on historical references it has now been verified that The Novgrod Russians never did thing X, and therefore in this game release The Njerpez also don't do thing X" then all the questions and arguments by user1805 would be highly on-point.

But, at the moment to me it seems that user1805 just slightly misinterpreted what Sami meant to say in the game change log. I believe Sami meant only to say that "It is intended that Njerpez behave in a way X, and it has now been verified that they really do X in the game."

Then, of course we can have another discussion about if Njerpez should behave this or that way based on fully accurate historical facts about Novgorod Russians. But, to me that seems to miss the point. The game doesn't claim to be 100% historically accurate. Many things are simulated based on historical facts, but not all the things need to be so. Especially the tribes, they contain a lot of artistic freedom. Therefore the game creator can say that "in the fantasy world I created the element X behaves in a way Y because I wanted it that way", and I find it hard for anyone else to counter that. Like, can anyone say that "I don't believe you imagined it that way, you need to imagine it some other way!". I always thought that the very essence of imagination is that anyone can imagine the way they do.

August 24, 2020, 01:01:27 PM
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Gaining the high ground; Elevated hunting blinds/tree stands Elevation is crucial in UrW, both when hunting for game and exploring for encounters on the map. Finding game in a coniferous forest without a vantage point is a losing proposition most of the time.

Hence why I suggest; tree stands or raised hunting blinds! Wooden towers with a little optional windowed shed perched atop from where a character might be able to have a good view of the surroundings - and possibly shoot game within range. I figure they might have two different useful modes to them giving them increased versatility;

- A local zoomed-in mode, where you could physically climb up into the hunting blind and get a good overview of the local terrain just like when climbing a tree (and possibly not alert nearby game to your presence quite as much as on the ground) while still being able to take potshots at game coming close (bait coming in handy here).

- A wilderness map mode, giving that one map tile better vision over the surroundings by raising the effective elevation by 1 level (for example; a hunting blind built on a Coniferous Forest tile would raise it to the effective elevation of Heathland, giving sight over surrounding Coniferous Forest tiles and lower, but not over Heathland and up).

The cost is left to be determined, but trading wood, time and effort for one of these could be an attractive option for lots of players; hunters active and passive, merchants, explorers, Njerp headhunters ...


Hunting blind in a field in Baden Wuerttemberg, Germany


A small hunting tower made from logs in Salo, Finland


A deer stand in Bavaria, Germany

August 25, 2020, 05:56:04 AM
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Re: "The Challenge" Day 101 14% injured, 0% starved

Checking out a new village in case they have any silver.

Day 102 14% injured, 0% starved

Checked another village, this one had the robber's quest. I accepted it but I am probably going to let it lapse. Returned home, found a glutton in my traps.

Day 114 13% injured, 0% starved

Finished my 1x2 sauna.

Day 119 10% injured, 0% starved

Visited some villages in driik, didn't find any silver but did get a travelling companion quest. Luckily, my character is actually is Sartolanian so it's going to be easy to take him to a village.

Day 123 7% injured, 0% starved

Traded 10 lb of superior elk fur for a perfect shovel. I'm going to go find the island where the reward from the travelling companion quest is, though I can't dig it yet of course.

Day 141 0% injured, 0% starved

Visited a new village, got the branches quest, bought some rye grains and flax seeds. The flax does rely on a mod but winter will be over by the time i plant them, and the OP says that's okay after winter. It's late soil month right now so I'm almost there. I still have 7 cloudberries left from way back at the beginning. I've been using them to bait my traps slowly and replacing them as they get eaten but soon it will be swidden and they'll go stale and I'll eat the rest of them.

Day 153 0% injured, 0% starved

It's Swidden (April) now. I have been building a little cabin just a few steps away from the sauna, mostly for lack of other things to do. The snow is thigh deep still and I'm checking everyday [alt-a s] to see if I can start preparing a little field yet or not, but it's not yet. I guess I should gather up my furs and wander around looking for travelling traders to get some silver, or failing that, explore the driik villages until I find one.  The robbers quest did expire, I never went looking for them.

August 30, 2020, 03:09:33 PM
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Re: Let salt be salt, not preservative
You can mod thee recipes to ask for dried meat.

That’s quadrupling the recipes. Raw, salted, smoked and dried. And same for fish.

You put it like this:
Code: [Select]
{* cut} then it accepts raw, salted, smoked or dried meat cuts.

Alas there is not a similar workaround for fish.

September 05, 2020, 07:46:10 AM
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Disengage command & Shouting function for human companion I know currently companion already have several functions, but what I would like to suggest is adding some commands that distinguish them as intellectual human beings from simple-minded hunting hounds.

One of the commands I want to suggest is to ask companion to disengage from enemies. Dogs, although no disengage command available, leash can make them at least stick around you and even stop them from being aggressive by unleash & leash them spontaneously. However human companions cannot be leashed (of course) and more importantly, cannot communicate during the fight, which doesn’t really make senses to me. I already have two companions died from stupidly charge to large pack of beasts without my command/ help and that’s frustrating. Their deaths are really unnecessary if we could just retreat from those animals since most of them are not willing to fight us to death and will flee if injured.

One more thing about the command to companion is the shouting function. We can command dogs out of our sight but can’t command human companions out of sight? This really make no senses to me and I really hope this function get added into game soon.

September 15, 2020, 05:01:37 AM
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tanning terminology + rinsed should not spoil I have had several thoughts about the tanning of skins in this game for a long time. Here's my suggestions on how to make the tanning feel more right - at least in my experience.

I updated this post after I wrote a suggestion about curing:
https://www.unrealworld.fi/forums/index.php?topic=5837.msg15649#msg15649

1) Rename the 'rinsed' * skin to 'hard' * skin and remove it's ability to spoil. Rotting at this already-tanned stage doesn't make any sense to me. Also the 'hard' adjective describes better what is expected to do next. Also IRL this is how we refer to skins at this stage.

2) Remove the need for water for cleaning skins. When I do that IRL, don't require water.

3) Curing should be immediately available for fresh skins, not after laborious cleaning (fleshing), which is easier on dry skin. (The membranes break off more easily on dry skin.) Moved to the curing thread.

4) Rename all fur-bearing fresh skins to 'pelt' (ie: "cleaned ermine pelt") with the exception of:

5) Rename all big fur-bearing skins to 'hide' (of the size available to use in kota construction, for example, so 8lbs in my understanding)

6) Dehairing seems to have an odd step after it. A dehaired skin is not dry, but very wet. It doesn't need to be soaked, quite the opposite. The membranes are scraped off or at least broken when they are dry. A thorough wash and salt water are beneficial after dehairing, to slow the rotting which caused the dehairing in the first place. I'd alter the soaking step to a wash and dry. (I'm aware of many methods of tanning, but in this rubbing method the game uses this would be appropriate.)

7) Make dehairing process rename previous 'pelts' and 'hides' to 'skins':

Like so:
Spoiler: examples • show

fresh snake skin
(wait too long and it becomes spoiled snake skin)
(optional step: cured snake skin)  no spoilage
clean fleshed snake skin
tanning snake skin
hard snake skin                    no spoilage
snake leather                      no spoilage

fresh hare pelt
(wait too long and it becomes spoiled hare pelt)
(optional step: cured hare pelt)   no spoilage
clean fleshed hare pelt
tanning hare pelt
hard hare pelt                     no spoilage
hare fur                           no spoilage
 
fresh hare pelt
(wait too long and it becomes spoiled hare pelt)
(optional step: cured hare pelt)   no spoilage
dehaired hare skin
cured hare skin                    no spoilage
clean fleshed hare skin
tanning hare skin
hard hare skin                     no spoilage
hare leather                       no spoilage

fresh elk hide
(wait too long and it becomes spoiled elk hide)
(optional step: cured elk hide)    no spoilage
clean fleshed elk hide
tanning elk hide
hard elk hide                      no spoilage
elk fur                            no spoilage

fresh elk hide
(wait too long and it becomes spoiled elk hide)
(optional step: cured elk hide)    no spoilage
dehaired elk skin
cured elk skin                     no spoilage
clean fleshed elk skin
tanning elk skin
hard elk skin                      no spoilage
elk leather                        no spoilage

8 ) No cutting weapon needed in dehairing.
9) Tanning by smoking, in the same style as smoking meat.

My reasoning apart from what already been said:
a) one could instantly recognize which animal skins become leather and which fur
b) currently one cannot distinguish a dehaired "tanning elk skin" and a fur bearing "tanning elk skin" before the whole tanning process is finished
c) curing is not very useful nor realistic atm. Suggestions would help that. Moved to the curing thread.

d) using 'hide' only for bigger skins is more proper English in my understanding. English is not my mothertongue, but I understand all these terms are a bit vague and interchangeable at least to some degree. I would love the get some native English feedback on this. Anyway, IMHO it would be good for the game interface to establish a terminology anyway to easily distinguish between fur-bearing and non-fur-bearing skins and their states of progress.

EDIT: after reading this: https://www.newlifeonahomestead.com/tan-hides-using-traditional-cheap-easy-methods-part-2/ I find using the 'fleshing' term is indeed more appropriate

October 23, 2020, 12:03:21 PM
1