The Phoenix {reboot}

Yeah. I'm haven't posted in a while because my character is just waiting on the vote. I think everyone is in position no? If not maybe they missed it?

Sorry I've been busy all week. I would do my post but I don't think I have much for Elly to do. She's already on the deck waiting for the captain and due to her shy nature, she won't go up and talk to anyone. Other then having her pace back and forth and eat her meal, I don't have much to do with her. But I'll give more info on the Witches of Summivin. Tell me if you need me to change more info or give more info on something.

Summivin/The Mist Islands

Geography
Summivin is the largest of seven neighboring islands called the Mist Islands. They are called the Mist Islands due to the thick clouds that cover the islands for most of the year. During the early days of airship travel, the Mist Islands were considered a dangerous place to go, and many ships were lost trying to explore the area. But over the years visiting nations have built lighthouses and other such structures to help coming ships get though the fog, making the Mist Islands a safer place to go. Even with the advances, airships still disappear in the Mist every once in a while. Because of the disappearances, many sailors believe the Mist Islands to be cursed.
The three smallest islands of the Mist Islands have no life of them, with the exception of birds who go to the islands to islands to breed away from predators, and few insect species. The fourth smallest is a jungle islands with no civilization. The second and third largest are home to many small tribal people. And Summivin, the largest, was thought to be like the fourth islands, until the rather recent discovery of the Witches of Summivin.

The Witches of Summivin
The Witches of Summivin only came to global attention less than a hundred years ago. They are considered one of the last great magic civilizations. The Witches are known for their all female society, and their unwilling to share information with outsiders. Because they isolate themselves, much about the Witches are not known. It is known that they haven been isolated for a long time, even during the age of wizards and magic. But important information about their society, like why there is no men there?, have gone unanswered. The Witches consider themselves human, but a few outsiders have there doubts.

Government
From what is known on how the Witches' government works, there is no one ruler or even a ruling class. Responsibilities of a ruler are split though different groups. In Summivin, a Witch is given a certain class in which they are trained to do certain jobs within that class. Examples of different classes:
The Light-Hand Workers - doctors, tailors, jewelers, artists, cooks, and so on. (Elly would be this)
The Heavy-Hand Workers - black smiths, miners, wood cutters, engineers, architects...
The Tongues - politicians, "The Greeters", shop-keepers...
The Law - judges, lawyers, teachers...
The Fighters - the police, hunters, and "The Curse of Shadows"
Witches in a certain class can do whatever they want in the class, and can even change jobs throughout the day.
The job of a politician seems to be a different then in other nations. Their job is decide where to move people from other classes into other towns where they will be more effective, as well as who becomes what class. The Law class, however, are the people who make and keep the law. Laws can be decided by anyone and given to the Law class who will decide if that law is necessary or not. The Summivin police make sure the laws are being obeyed and arrest those who don't keep the law.

Military/Technology
Technology in Summivin seems to be different. They are not an underdeveloped civilization, but they are one of the few magic-based civilizations left, and the tech evolved along side their magic. They have machines that perform certain tasks but they run on what seems to be magical energy from a near by witch. They don't have airships however, nor do they seem to want airships.
Summivin seems to be a peaceful islands with little to no war. But that doesn't mean they defenseless, far from it. There is a job for the Fighter class called "The Curse of Shadows". Whenever an outside force threatens Summivin, The Curse of Shadows go to work. Like the name suggests, they work in secret. At first they will steal equipment and weapons from potential invaders, usually people who invade the other islands of the Mist. If the enemy was openly declare war on the Witches of Summivin, that is when the weird stuff start to happen. Important people are found brutally murdered, entire ships are found with their crews gone, people are found crucified or impaled on sticks. The Curse of Shadows use a lot of scare tactics to scare people away from declaring war against them. It's all very public and they want you to know who is responsible for doing these things, so it is easy to trace it back to the Witches of Summivin. So far it has worked, there have been no successful invasion of the Summivin island, and only one group has ever declared war on them.

Other Facts:
- Summitown is the only city in Summivin which outsiders are allowed.
- Summitown is newly built city, built just for trade with outsiders.
- The Witches tend to trade with private industries, and wealth/noble families, and not entire nations.
- Medicine, clothes, and jewelry are the top exports in Summivin, making the Light-Hand Class most common in Summitown.
- Many people don't go to Summivin due to the fear of the Mist Islands, the magic that is looked down upon in the rest of the world, and the Witches' attitude towards outsiders.
- The Witches are known for there ability to fly short distances, usually to the other Mist Islands.
- The tribes of the other Mist Islands, know of the Witches and have many different myths and legends involving them.
- The Witches were thought to be just a legend for a long time, before they were discovered less then a hundred years ago.
- Some outsiders have blamed The Curse of Shadows on the disappearance in the Mist, but since the Witches want to make public warnings, this is unlikely.

Well as far as I can gather I'm the only ones actually on deck are: Amelia, Mitsuhide, Blue and Selitos.

And for the others:

Varsh and Markel appear to be telling eachother stories somewhere below deck unless I missed them actually ascending.

Aurea appears to be hiding near the top of stairs, for what purpose I'm not entirely sure, but as near to actually being on deck as to be able to see people so we can assume she's at least on deck.

Currently waiting for Sebastian to post (my apologies for taking so long to get my post up).

Guilder seems to be hunting out our dear captain below deck, after momentarily appearing on deck.

Alexandria and the captain appear to be having tea below deck.


Also, just because it's confusing me, why does everyone seem to tag all characters bar themselves in their own posts?
And unless I somewhat missed this, is the captain's cabin below deck or above? Because some people have acted as if it's one while others as if it was the other? Because if it's above deck then most of us are actually on deck, if not then most of us are down below in the corridors. Also as I'm now really confused I honestly have no idea what's going on anymore and I'm going to lie down xD

Ponerj, I will make sure that I get your post in Details, but I had one question. Are their islands in the east or in the west? (the "Western" nations are the civilized nations and they make up 2/3 of the world and the "Eastern" nations are places unaffected by the Wizards/the Denauc technological revolution and make up the other 1/3 of the planet)

Fabricator, the Captain's Cabin/Quarters is the only room above deck technically, so there are more people above deck than you said.

Also, sorry to everyone for not posting yesterday, but my dogs destroyed my mouse so posting was basically impossible. I am working on it however.

Thanks to you all.

Yeah I think an actual map layout would possible help here. I'd kinda been working off Firefly for my reference with everyones quarters more or less being in the same spot.

Ship Example

I've just posted a link there to an example of a ship layout, obviously it's just a rough example and not what it actually looks like but I'm going to assume it's something similar to this? with the captains quarters at the rear with the Galley nearby then everything else more or less below deck and maybe the engine room at the rear below and Amelia's quarters between it at the rest of the ship.

If people want I can try and dig out some templates and draw up a proper map of the ship so we've got better references for where everyone lives. Though that may end up being more for my own sanity rather than anyone elses benefit. But the offer is there. *whimpers*

To my mind the ship is reminiscent of the older sailing ships. In which case the Captains room would be under the poop deck which would be elevated above the maindeck. So his cabin is technically on the same level as the main deck. I don't know if this ship would also be big enough to have a quarter deck. HOWEVER then on the underlevel I feel like the galley would 3/4ths of the way forward with the wardroom (dinner/common area) just abaft of that. The crew quarters would be off to the side of it and there would be a stair to the stern of that leading to the main deck. to the stern of that stair would be engineers quarters and engine room.

If there were a deck below that I feel like that would be for cargo, water, and ballast. From illustration and talking it doesn't seem like we have a gundeck, nor frankly do we have the crew necessary to man much more than basically 2 guns. Foreward of the galley would be probably also be cargo space, as well as on the deck below it with removable gratings to make removing cargo from the bottom deck easier with some kind of winch system in place on the forecastle.

One some ships the galley and wardroom are often one and the same with a smaller cutout inside for the cooking to be done proper.

I could certainly see the entire lower deck filling out the curve of the bow being used for storage or water tanks for drinking and such. I could certainly see a pulley system being arranged at the forecastle to lead down to the storage hold below.

So most likely we've got:

Deck 1. Cargo Hold
Storage with cut straight through ship to deck 3.

Deck 2. Cabin Crew and Engine
Engineroom at the aft of the ship, with engine quarters in front of that. Stairs leading up through the ship to the 3rd deck. Then the Galley and mess hall if they're classed as separate or what-have-you. Then we've got Cabins for crew filling up the remaining space leading to the fore.

Deck 3. Captains Quarters and Maindeck
So we've got the captain situated at the aft/stern, with main deck taking up the majority of the space. Removable floor panels and assemble crane system to access contents of deck 1 near the fore. Main stairwell leading below would probably be in the center of maindeck.

Deck 4. Steering and upper deck
Helm and controls to keep her flying, most likely situated above the captains quarters with stairs leading back down curving either side of the deck. Quick question, who is our helmsman out of curiosity?

If there's anything I might have missed shout up and I'll draft up a layout later this week. Also point out if I'm totally off on it as well as I'd rather we got it right.

Yeah that sounds about right. Galley and wardroom being combined sounds like a much better idea than mine.

Fabricator's second idea is what I was thinking, and I can add that to Details if that would help when your final draft is finished. Also, to answer your question, Caintry steers the ship because of his connection to the wind makes an exemplary helmsman with an acute nimbleness that most can not accomplish even with such a small ship, so he takes the responsibility. (the navigator is by his side for general direction but he handles the fancy stuff)

Also, I will initiate the vote once we get everyone officially on deck, because if I am not mistaken, the only one off deck is Sebastian (I may be totally mistaken) and myself (I will be going up to make the announcement as soon as Sebastian gets up there).

Just wondering, are people who haven't actually spoken to the captain yet going to be able to voice their opinions about their direction or simply have to love it or lump it because they didn't speak sooner?

Makes sense, though Someone will probably have to deal with the ship during times when Caintry isn't on the helm but then again it's not exactly hard to set up a mechanism to keep it heading due course almost indefinitely and given the setting hitting something isn't likely.

When the Captain will make the announcement, your vote post will be your vote with whatever reasoning you want to back it up with, for note, this is not a tally vote. How many people that vote for an island will count as much evidence for a place as the reasons you provide, but the final decision does fall on Caintry (he may not choose the island with the most vote due to reasons, but if it is overwhelming of a vote on one side he would be forced to chose that one) Such as when he took Parada out of the vote before it even started, so you will, in a way, get to share your concerns and your praises with any of the islands.

To my understanding, Mitsuhide, Rel'Kaz, Aurea, Amelia, Guilder, Selitos and Blue are on the main deck whilst everyone is below deck, Varsh, Merkel, Alexandria, Sebastian and the Captain. Not sure about Elweise.

Varsh and Markel are on the main deck, for they just came out of the Captain's Quarters which are above the lower deck.

Yeah I think everyone bar Sebastian is above deck, and he'll most likely be joining once he posts. It was my mistake for thinking the captain's cabin was below that's added to the confusion I think.

Hey just wanted to let everyone know that for the next 2 or 3 weeks that I won't be on that much. I will check in and post if I can but it probably won't be very often.

Hey guys. I'm hoping to post later today. I've been busy this weekend so I haven't been able to post.

Note: Alright, it seems everyone is above deck, so I will write up a post that will initiate the vote later tonight. If anyone has questions about how the vote is going to work feel free to ask.

Thanks!

Posts up, and I felt I'd throw a bit of conflict in :P

Hey guys sorry I haven't been on. I lost my internet and haven't been able to get on till now

Salutations my fellows! So far, the vote has been really interesting so far, and it seems no one is throwing the vote one specific way. That is great! You definitely are not going to make it easy for Caintry to decide, and so I really can not wait for the rest of the votes to come in!

Sincerely,
Oz