Editing Talking to Trees (section)

==Talking to the Tree==
We go to the Tree.  The High Elf suggests getting rid of the Oasis miracle, which she could probably arrange.  We ponder whether that’s going to be a problem.  Vidan thinks that he could sanctify us out of the Oasis miracle, but that would bring the Oasis’ direct attention.  A shaman miracle would probably be better?  Scout thinks he could probably Scout/Find the Path away from the group a bit, but then we have to worry about the being-on-the-same battlemap issue.

Vidan, with help from Gale and Scout, comes up with a ritual to put Scout on an inset battlemap.  He and Gale and Stella will be on the three corners, and there will be ritual rolls, and then Scout will need to escape without anyone seeing him.

The High elf will provide us with space, but reserves the right to veto Scout going to see the Tree if she thinks it’s a problem.  “Oh good.  Our rituals rarely have Quality Control Officers,” says Vidan.

They do the ritual, and Scout sneaks off.  The High Elf doesn’t stop him, so he asks entrance, and spends a DI.

Inside there are a grove of Trees.  There’s not anything obviously to talk to, but he’s obviously IN a Spirit.  He spends a DI to stay connected to Middlesea.  There’s Green here– more Essence and Nature than Alchemy.  The Essence changed the Nature of the Spirit, in some way.  The Nature is mostly just passplant-y sorts of things.  The spirit has connection to the spirit hubs on the outside, and .  There was someone Big who did this, making a big Green ritual, that changed its nature which still resonates, and also connected it to the trees outside it.  The Essence change Scout is less clear on; the Nature change was more that it had a connection to the world in one place.  Now it has lots of connections in lots of different places.  They’re both at least hundreds of years old.  THere’s more than one sigil on the green; none of them are ones Scout recognizes.

Scout introduces himself.  Nothing happens for a minute or two, but then Middlesea says “Its connections to Jabar are difficult to maintain in a holy land, and are shrinking.  A large enough either Green or Shaman ritual could strengthen it.  De-holy-landing Jabar would be fine, but it would weaken Jabar against the Oasis, so maybe don’t do that, but it would work.  Bringing it power from the heart of Green would work.  There are probably other ways to help.  A strong reality spell might help.  Disentangling it from Melmane could help if it was only holding here and not beyond.”  

Scout ponders. He asks whether it knows anything of the Oasis’ plans– is it just trying to grow?  It doesn’t know, but growing is probably part of its plans.  Looking around, Scout thinks a ritual here with 25 DI would work.  A bunch of smaller rituals in the 5-10 range at each Tree would work.  A Nature ritual could be done, but something on the similar power level.  A Nature/DI ritual would work if you are long on skill and short on dice.  (Don’t do that, seems to be the subtext.)  Severing it from Melmane would be relatively easy.  Connecting it to the Heart of Green would change its nature, as that would be far from defending against the Oasis.  (The Grove is about 35 DI, ish?)  A well-designed ritual with several people putting DI in will be worth 10 successes, or something.  And then there’s the amount of DI being put in, and then there’s the number of successes to do the ritual.  

Scout casts Detect Broken, to see if there’s anything wrong here; he sees something way over there oh crap that’s the Oasis, okay, bye!  He escapes.  It takes a few hours to re-connect with the party.