I awoke, to the sensation of gentle swaying, and thought myself back aboard ship. However, there was an uncomfortable ache in my wrists. I tried to move them to a more comfortable postion, only to find them stuck in place. I came fully to my senses, and realised that I was bound, wrists and ankles, to a wooden pole, that was being carried by two scruffy looking men in ragged pirate garb.

There follows an Excerpt from the Logge of Chatte.
Hephaestus says, "I say! You there! Where are you taking me?"
Shambling Eric says, "BrAinS!"
Hephaestus says, "Oh, I see. Look, you seem to be reasonable sorts of chaps. Why don't you just let me go?"
Decaying Ernest says, "BrAinS!"
Hephaestus says, "But whyever not? What have these cultists ever done for you? What do you get out of it?"
Shambling Eric looks at Hephaestus' forehead meaningfully.
Shambling Eric says, "BrAins."
Hephaestus says, "Ah."

The rest of the journey was completed in silence. Presently, we came upon a clearing on the beach, in which there was a village or hamlet of sorts, several bamboo huts with palm frond roofs. Out across the edge of the surf led a pontoon, moored against which was a sinister looking sloop. As I'd hoped, the means of my escape was here. I just had to escape, so that I could escape.

My bearers placed my pole down across a trestle near the fire at the centre of the circle of huts. As I hung there, I was approached by a new group, two scantily clad women with oddly painted faces, and a witch doctor wearing a large, round mask. The women tore off my shirt, and began annointing my chest with a sweet smelling oil.

"I say!" I cried. "Steady on! I'm a happily married man! Well, a married man at any rate!"

The women ignored me, and continued their task. The Witch Doctor then approached, and began mumbling something under his breath, while shaking a primitive rattle, which sprinkled some kind of fine powder over me.

"Look!" I shouted. "You can just cut that out! You may have enthralled these poor pirates and made zombies of them, but you'll find me a tougher nut to crack! Your rituals won't work on me!"
"This isn't a ritual," he replied, with a sinister giggle. "Oh, no no no."
"What on earth is it then?!"
"Seasoning."
"Ah."

Hephaestus' Log, 26th November, Breakfast Time. No Breakfast in evidence.

When dawn broke, I forged on, deeper into the jungle, and soon had become lost, or rather, more lost than I had already been when I was stranded on an uncharted isle, separated from my crew, with no credible hope of rescue.

I must have been stumbling around for hours, the vegetation preventing me seeing more than a few feet in front of me, when in the distance I heard drums and chanting. Since I had already resolved that the only chance of my salvation lay in the unlikely hands of the cultists, and lacking any other plan, I made for the commotion with all speed.

Some sort of ceremony was taking place in a wide jungle clearing. I got as close as I thought safe from detection, and drew my telescope up to my eye. The masked men were around an altar, preparing something. At last, one of them moved, and I was able to see what they were doing - the object they were creating was an effigy of myself. Though the head was a potato, it was still a good likeness. I especially liked how they'd put a parrot feather in the hat made of broad red leaves, and in more friendly circumstances, I'd have been moved to award some sort of prize. However, seeing that doll told me two things; the cultist had long known of my presence, and most likely bore me ill will.

Tired of all this sneaking around, I decided to go on the offensive. There were only three of them, after all, and while they'd clearly seen me already, they didn't seem to realise that I had also spied them! Bursting from the undergrowth, I fell upon them, hammer swinging, and two were quickly seeing stars. However, the third had leapt away, and had snatched up the doll.

I gritted my teeth, gripped my hammer and advanced upon him. He backed away from me, and, drawing a long bone needle from his belt, drove it into the doll's left leg. There was an unusual sensastion of pins and needles, then the leg flopped dead, and I almost fell. However, I was made of sterner stuff, and hopped menacingly onwards. The cultist gabbled some gibberish about moons and stars at me, and drew another bone spike, and drove it into the doll's right arm. My arm fell to my side, and my hammer fell from my nerveless grip. But still, onward I hopped, faster now, hoping to rush him, and fell him with a mighty southpaw blow. However, a third needle to the doll's other leg cut me short, and I fell to the ground with an "argh!"

Thinking he had me, he advanced now, giggling and gibbering, raising a needle to the doll's head... I had moments to act, so I grabbed the first thing that came to hand, and heaved it into his face. He screamed and clawed at his eyes, dropping the doll. I sniffed at the noxious substance on my hand, and understood. As the owner of such an animal, I knew monkey poop when I smelt it.

The cultist's concentration was broken, and my paralysis ended as soon as it began. Snatching up the doll and my hammer, I rounded on the luckless cove.

"Right!" I snarled, "let's see how you like it!" and brought my hammer down on the doll's head. I believe it was at about this time that I lost consciousness.

Hephaestus' Log. Date th November 25th, Suppertime.

I awoke on the beach of a deserted inlet. After taking a moment to cough up a pint of sea water, and pick seaweed from my beard, I stood, and took stock of the situation. I realised that if I were to escape this place, I would have to locate some cultists, and commandeer one of their rafts. I headed off into the jungle, looking all around for signs that my compatriots had survived, and perhaps come this way.

Unfortunately, as I was looking over my shoulder, I tripped over something, and fell headlong into the jungle. As I slid to a halt, I gave out a little yelp - I was face to face with a grinning skull! I recoiled back in horror, sprawling to the ground, only to be confronted with another. Again, I recoiled in horror, then I realised - waitaminute. There's skulls lying around all over the place here. I could be recoiling all day. Instead, I picked one up. It rattled.

Turning it over in my hands, I realised that this wasn't just a skull. Someone had cut the top off, attached it with a hinge at the back, and held it shut with a locking clasp at the front, converting it into a grisly, yet somehow charming little object d'art, such as one might pick up in the souvenier shops of Cnossos to keep one's baccy in. Drawing my poinard, I inserted first the tip, then the little sharp spiky bits on the hilt into the lock, attempting to jiggle or prise it open, but it stayed firm. Not to be deterred, I bashed the thing against a nearby rock, but with similar lack of progress. While these cultists were clearly ghoulish headhunters of the worst kind, you had to admire the craftsmanship.

Appraising it with a craftsman's eye, I realised that nothing was going to open one of these things, short of the kind of heavy blacksmithing equipment that one can only find in a port. Fortunately for me, however, I always carry such equipment with me. I reached over my shoulder and drew my Ban-O-Matic 5000 Blacksmithing Maul from its sling, and placed the skull on the rock before me. With a mighty, overarm blow, I brought the hammer down on the skull with all my might.

*KLONK*

For a moment, the skull stood, unmoved. Then, - bee-yoing - the lid flipped open, with a noise like a ruler twanged on a school desk. Looking inside, with some trepidation, I discovered... fifty three pieces of eight! Neat!

My eyes cast over the clearing. Now I knew what I was looking for, I could see that this place alone was the final resting place of some ten or twelve poor pirates. I gathered them together on the rocks, their sightless eyes imploring me, a mute testament to the terrible fate that had befallen them at the hands of the cult.

I jingled the pieces of eight in my hand, and did a quick bit of mental arithmetic...

*KLONK* bee-yoing
*KLONK* bee-yoing
*KLONK* bee-yoing...

Buy the time my grisly task was done, I was up to four hundred and twelve pieces of eight, and in two of the skulls, I'd found a fetching aquamarine bandana, and a pair of stripy pants.

Hephaestus' Log. Date, 25th November. Bedtime.

Have found the remains of previous explorers of the isles. It seems the cultists have beheaded them, converted their skulls into caskets for their personal effects, and left them in clearings and groves across the island. A ruthless freebooter might find it quite lucrative to loot these burial grounds... but had best be careful, lest he find his pants being stuffed where his brain ought to be...

After the recent announcement that there is a new kind of familiar in preparation, speculation has been rife. Well, I say speculation. Arguments, fighting and open warfare are more like it. On at least one ocean flags have formed sides along the "It's an owl, doofus!" and "It's obviously some kind of fish, fool!" lines. I think there'd probably be open war, if it wasn't for the fact the "Duh! It's a vulture!" faction wasn't poised to sweep in and take on the victor in their weakened post-conflict state.

I can't let this go on. It's tearing the game apart. I have to step in now, and at the risk of my position here at Three Rings, reveal exclusively just what this familiar is!

I was first alerted to the existence of the new familiar, when I heard Galene, Gaea and Hera whispering about it. They stopped when they saw me, however, which only served to make me more curious. I resolved to track one of them down, sneaked aboard Galene's ship, and hid. (Top Tip, would-be stalkers, if you're hiding, you may find that there's insufficient cover. Do what I do - bring your own elephant to hide behind. It makes you very difficult to spot.)



Soon enough, she came on board, and the amazing secret was revealed!



Yes, amazing though it may seem, it would appear that the new familiar is the Hephaestus Doll.

But wait, that's not all. What's this odd shape here?


Let's use the Three Rings CSI image enhancificator to clean that up.


Egad! And... Can it be...?


ZOMG!!!

Well, clearly we're into very interesting territory here. The real question is how deep does this go?

Science Experiement!

What we clearly need here is some kind of supercollider to put this doll in. So I mailed them at CERN and asked them if I could have a go on their Large Hadron Collider. I waited a while but they've not got back to me on that, alas.

So, I had to make do with what I had, and sorted out something to hit an OM Doll really hard, to see what happened:



Developeron Particles!

So, what started out as an investigation into the shiny new familiar has not only solved that mystery, but also led us, quite by accident, to discover the fundamental particles of the universe, and the origins of existence itself. Which is nice.

Hello, Bloglodytes*!

Gaea's unavailable this week, but it made her sad to think of you all out there, anticipating your quota of QOTW, so here I am.

One of the perrenial questions we get asked is what it's like to work in the Three Rings office. It is Teh Awesome place after all. The sad fact, for a lot of us OMs, though, is that we don't work there! As some of you may know, a lot of the Ocean Masters work from home, and there's a very good reason for this. YPP is a worldwide enterprise, and if someone's spamming the inns, griefing your playstyle at 12pm Central European time, you don't want to wait five hours for those Californian types to wake up, eat their granola, and get on their surfboards over to the Three Rings office to sort it out for you. You guys never sleep, so neither can we.

This means, sadly, that many of us rarely see the hallowed halls of the office, except on occasional pilgrimages to the mothership. So the question, I suppose, becomes what's it like to work outside the Three Rings office.

My day starts much like most peoples' - I get up, get dressed, eat my breakfast, and take my dog for a walk. Some would say, working from home, that the getting dressed part is optional, but I always do it, for two reasons. First, I feel it's difficult to summon the correct gravitas to adjudicate on serious issues in one's pyjamas. Second, the other people who walk their dogs on the field I go to sort of demand it. The walk serves me as a sort of replacement for the daily commute that most people experience, though unlike the bus, my dog is rarely late.

Then I settle down at my desk, fire up the forums and staff chatroom, and see what's caught fire while I've been asleep.

Myself, I am based in Merrie Olde Englande. We're eight hours ahead of game time here, so as my day starts, the office staff have long since gone to bed. Hence, this phase of the day is usually characterised by my reading the conversations that have gone on, and realising that they happened five hours ago, and all the witty replies I'm coming up with are a bit late.

As my shift starts, I log on to the oceans I'm covering. Depending on the time of day, and how busy it is, I'll be on between two and six oceans at the same time. How can I keep any eye on this many oceans? This is my desk:

(Click for a better look)
All four screens work off the one mouse too. Groovy huh?

I'll be fielding your petitions and complaints all morning. Sometimes you'll get a quick response, but sometimes you'll have to wait a while; if something complex or time consuming turns up, like a theft from a crew's ships, working on that can create quite a backlog. Once it's done, it's a matter of working through that backlog. So if you've ever had to wait a while for a rename, that's why!

Once my early shift is over, it's lunchtime. Due to the way my shifts work out, I won't be on again until the evening, leaving me with a six hour lunch break to play with. If I had to pick one thing I love about being an OM, it'd be that I get my time off in the afternoon, not the evening. Later, in the evening, I'll be back on, and by that time, it's office hours back at the office. This is essentially when I get to check in with the guys in the office, unless of course it's the weekend, which with me, it usually is

So, that's my take on working out of the office. Part foreign correspondent, part night watchman.

* literally, "blog goers". Clever huh? No? Oh well, please yourselves.
PS. This entry got lost in the space/time continuum when the blog was relocated. Fortunately, I was able to reverse the polarity of the neutron flow, and divert it through the flux capacitor, allowing me to go back and retrieve it.

I was just on my way out of here, when I noticed that there were some quick questions for me, so here's a little postscript....

Did Hephaestus and Aphrodite come into the game at the same time as a coincidence?
As far as I know! As I'm sure a lot of players may do, I had my "if I were an OM, which god would I be" worked out long before I ever seriously considered applying for the job. You see a lot of New Agey veneration of various earth and nature gods (sorry Gaea!) but not a lot of love for those hard-working gods who, if real, would be responsible for all the comforts we take for granted. So let's hear it for Hephaestus, God of Gadgetry, Hermes, God of Telecoms and the Internet, and of course Prometheus, who gave us fire, and started us off on the long road to the techological society we live in today.

As such, Heph certainly wasn't suggested to me, I'm pretty certain Aph didn't know what my pick was going to be when she picked, so unless she says different, it's all a sparkly coinkydink!

Do we blame (your) pegleg on Zeus or Hera?
Actually, that one's all down to Artemis.

If we could build a temple anywhere on any ocean to host rituals and sacrifices in your name, where would you want to put it?
Hard to say. I wouldn't like to get cornered into "mi favirt iland iz." I suppose the obvious pick is Hephastus Forge, isn't it? Cochineal is said to be a volcano crater, so that'd be another option. Havoc and Diastrophe are also suitably volcanic. Blackthorpe on Sage looks a bit like a volcano crater. Immokalee looks about ready to erupt too...

What should be sacrificed there? Would you require a special dance or song or...something?
The worship of Hephaestus should involve the messing about with cool gadgets, playing video games, and crafting stuff. So pretty much continue on as you are.

Mortals say "oh my god".  What do gods say?
Nothing, we just go straight for the banstick.

One question has been on the minds of enquiring pirates this week - Malacats! What are they? Where did they come from? Why are they green? Hang on - that's three questions! Clearly there's a lot to answer here, and it's not going to be answered by idle speculation. Science experiment!

So, I headed on up to the Palace Shoppe, and bought myself a bag of Malacats. This brings us to the first experimental fact we learn about Malacats. Put more than about four of them in a sack, and things start to get ugly. I'm not sure that's too relevant, however, I think that cats get like that anyway.

Much squalling and scratching later, however, I got them all back to my Secret Aboveground Laboratory. As you can see, they're quite a handful.

Experiment 1.
Now, the first and most obvious question first - are these cats who've simply fallen in some dye? Well, there's only one way to check...

Man, I tell you, if you thought cats didn't like going in a sack...

Early results looked quite promising, with the new Light Green dye producing something that looked a lot like a Malacat. However, cats are pretty fastidious creatures, and set about washing themselves immediately. Short of steeping a cat in some mordant, I don't think we'll see a permanent effect. However Malacats got the way they are, I believe it's natural in origin.

Experiment 2
The next hypothesis is that they're native to Malachite. The evidence for this so far is that they appeared not long after Malachite was released. Seems pretty persuasive to me. However, we know for a fact that no ships can travel between oceans, and thus there's no trade of items between oceans at all. So if they're Malachite natives, how did they get everywhere else? Can they swim? How can we test that...?

Out to sea with two of my new companions. One of them is following me, one of them is roaming the ship. Fools! They suspect nothing!

We've arrived at the testing area. So far, both Malacats appear to be enjoying the life on the ocean wave. Onward!

Here Be Monsters! A Triketos and a Gorgonyx are nearby. They don't appear too interested in us. Fortunately, I planned ahead, and brought some swabbies with me, so I plank a couple as bait.

That got their attention! The Triketos turns, sneezes a few spears at us, and it's all over. The gorgonyx swarms in close, and hoovers up the remaining wailing swabbies.

Back home at the Forge - and they're ok! Nightmare, Seraph and Piggy McLaren welcome their new emerald overlords. Oh and yay! Pegleg! ...oh, wait...

Conclusions:

• Yes, Malacats are excellent swimmers, and could quite conceivably traverse the uncharted, unfathomable expanses between Malachite and the other oceans.
• Swabbies are delicious.

Experiment 3.

To all intents and purposes, Malacats appear to be perfectly normal kitties. They get on well with normal cats, so I don't think they're from another planet.

I think that the answer is likely to be much closer to home. I believe that there may be something in their diet that cats just can't get on Midnight, Cobalt, Sage, Hunter or Viridian.

Just about lunchtime, we leave the experimental subjects in an enclosure in the laboratory.

An hour has passed. The cat seems well-fed and relaxed.

Oh!

Well, there you have it, proof positive. Malacats are the way they are, purely because they live on a diet of Malarats. Nothing could be simpler. And I didn't have to dissect any of them.

Wait, if that's the case, why are Malarats green?

Quiet, you!

-----

No cats, triketoseses or gorgonyxes were hurt in the making of this blog. Some rats and swabbies, though.

As you may already have noticed*, interested parties have now been invited to apply for the post of Ocean Master.

No doubt you're all furiously updating your CVs, honing your letters of application, and telling your boss where he can stick his lousy job, because "I'm gonna be an OM!" You may well be wondering, however, what happens next? How best to prepare for the next stage of the selection process? Well, as one of the most recent Shiny New Hands, I am in a good position to tell you about the way it all happens.

Second-stage hopefuls are invited to a secret location to participate in selection tests

The morning of the first day is a meet-and-greet, followed by an address by Our Leader. After that, we break for lunch.

As you have probably noticed, the Ocean Masters are a literate erudite lot (with the obvious exception.) This is of course one of the basic requirements of the job. Although that's mostly selected for in the CV sifting stage, we kick off after lunch with an essay test, just to establish that you're OM material. This might sound a bit daunting, but it's really not. I don't know what the set question will be this time around, but I seem to recall that when I applied, the question was something like "How, if at all, is van Fraassen's constructive empiricism an advance on the logical positivists' philosophies of science?" So, really, as you can see, just a formality. Nothing to worry about.

The first day's testing complete, the applicants are dismissed, but this is far from the end; although they are released to the OM barracks for rest, sleep is not permitted. Testing will begin again at 8am, and any applicant who falls asleep in the meantime is excluded from the selection process. Ocean Masters are marked by their endurance, if you can't make it through the selection process without sleep, you'll never make it in the real world, soldier!

Ocean Masters must be able to evaluate and dispense judgement on situations quickly and accurately. This is tested the following morning on the shooting range. The range is a scale replica of Alpha Island on Midnight. The applicant is must advance along a predetermined route, along which targets representing ban evaders, filter evaders and alt abusers pop out of the doors and windows. Applicants are judged on both their speed and accuracy, with points knocked off for any greenies killed. Only the eight highest scoring applicants will progress past this stage.

After a simple meal, the selection process concludes with the surviving applicants participating in a single elimination, no-holds barred blindfold martial arts tournament. This takes place in an octagonal caged arena in the centre of the compound. I really have only two pieces of advice here. The first, though you won't be told this, there will be a range of weapons strewn around the arena walls - if you can find it, I recommend the bat'leth. The second - watch out for those tigers! (I asked Cleaver later on which part of the OM role this stage tested, but he just shrugged and gave me a manic grin.)

So, as you can see, whilst there's quite a lot of mystery and mystique surrounding the process, Oceanmastery really is just like any other job.

*If you have not yet noticed, then I'm afraid that you've failed the first test. Better luck next time!

In the last exciting installment of Blog!, Apollo answered the perennial question - who would win in a fight, pirates or ninja? And while his reasoning certainly seems sound, I thought we could put this to the test, and finally settle the question once and for all. Science Experiment!

Here I am aboard ship. Clearly, not ninja enough to conduct this experiment.

Better.

For this experiment, I have also selected a black/black skull dagger, and some black leather gloves, should martial arts be required. You will note that there are no swabbies in the picture; as a ninja, I work alone, since ninja are well known to be affected by the Inverse Square Effectiveness Law (i.e. the more of them they are, the more useless they are.) Professor Monkey is here strictly as an observer, and will not take part in any of the tests.

So, off I go, taking the experiment into the field ocean! Soon enough, I am engaged by the Witty Sailfish, an  orange sloop, containing garden variety brigand pirates.

Diagram 1: Fools! They suspect nothing!
Diagram 2: Eschewing crude, loud cannons, as a ninja should, I resolve to sidle up to my opponent stealthily, and grapple him.
Diagram 3: As it turns out, being a lone ninja, I quickly run out of sail tokens. The Witty Sailfish obligingly sidles up to me stealthily, and grapples.

As we see in Diagram 4, the pirates have had no compunction about using crude, loud cannon, and I'm starting with a row of cannon damage. Still, I am confident that this rabble is no match for my superior ninja skills!

Diagram 5: Victory! Almost. As we see in the bottom right, Loud Luana has indeed succumbed swiftly to my blade. So die (almost) all who oppose the Ninja! Unfortunately, at this point, the other five pirates mob me, and it's all over very quickly.

Conclusion: In a fight, Pirates win. Ninja work best alone, whereas the more pirates the better!  One-on-one, a ninja may have the advantage, but that never happens. Also, we can clearly see that eschewing loud, clumsy weaponry is a grave mistake. Go Pirates!

Next Week: Robots vs Zombies.