Tags: Loop Hero, OC NPC, fake walkthrough, just talking, screenplay/script format, Hero (Loop Hero), The Grave Keeper (Loop Hero), Yota (Loop Hero), The Songbird (Loop Hero)
This is a fictional mod for “Loop Hero” that adds a new building for the camp: the Amphitheater. The Amphitheater has an associated NPC named “the Songbird” whose operatic performances raise the Survivors’ spirits, increasing productivity around the camp and aiding in chronicling history that might otherwise be forgotten. This “mod” also includes a new card/map tile, upgrades for the Amphitheater, and corresponding dialogues.
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After 25 tiles are placed in the settlement, a dialogue with the Grave Keeper is triggered. [Note: If there are already 25 tiles in the settlement but the Cemetery has not been built yet, then the next tile built after building the Cemetery will trigger the dialogue.]
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Grave Keeper: I’ve been hearing things lately. Voices.
Hero: Uh oh.
H: Uh, maybe you should see the herbalist. I don’t know if her potions help with this sort of thing, but she’s the closest we've got to a doctor.
GK: No. Voices as in singing. Music.
GK: I’ve heard it in my head. As if it’s coming back to me.
H: Oh. That’s far less concerning. Heartening, even.
GK: Although, it’s still in bits and pieces.
H: Keep at it. Don’t give up hope.
GK: Thank you. I will. And I won’t. Respectively.
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[The next time the Hero returns from an expedition, a dialogue with Yota will be triggered.]
Yota: We have a small problem.
Y: Did you really teach the Grave Keeper that ghastly tune he’s been humming?
Hero: I didn’t teach it to him, no. Only encouraged him to keep at it.
Y: Ah, that makes more sense. You don’t seem like the musically-inclined type.
H: Hey!
Y: While I appreciate your supporting him, that humming has the others all on edge.
H: This is the first song that’s returned to the world. I think that’s something to celebrate.
H: Music is an integral part of oral history. Not only that, but it can boost morale, lift spirits, inspire hope.
Y: The only thing he’s inspiring is 10-foot leaps into the air every time someone hears a bump in the dark anymore.
H: All right, I get it. I’ll talk to him.
…
Grave Keeper: Ah, hello.
H: Hey, about that song-
GK: I continued. As you said. Eventually, the melody stitched itself together. Became whole again.
GK: Alas, the lyrics yet elude me.
H: You know how sometimes you’re trying so hard to remember a word, but it isn’t until you’ve given up and stopped thinking about it that it comes to you? Maybe if you stop, it’ll come back to you.
GK: Different acoustics might help.
H: Like…inside the crypt?
GK: An amphitheater.
H: It seems a bit frivolous considering the state of things.
H: Still, I suppose having a place for performances couldn’t hurt. And we could use it for gatherings, celebrations, lectures…
GK: As you see fit.
H: All right, you’ve convinced me.
GK: I leave it to you.
H: Everyone always does.
Effects: - Unlocks the Metronome card. - Unlocks the sound test menu in the camp.
Description: A semicircular stage built of stone and pretension, perfect for focusing sounds from within towards the tiered rows of benches in the audience. Proof of the enduring human need to speak and be heard.
Item Slots: -
Resource Cost: 15 Preserved Rock, 5 Stable Metal, 1 Orb of Expansion
Golden Landscape Card
Effect: Multiplies the effect of a day's or loop’s passing on adjacent tiles by the current loop number.
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Songbird: Ahh, at last. A stage where my voice may reach the people.
Hero: Who are you? With such ostentatious clothing, I hardly think I could have missed you around camp before.
S: Well, perhaps you are blind to the bird’s plumage until you are looking for it, hmm? Or, would it be ‘deaf to the song...?’
H: Excuse me, but could you at least introduce yourself before spacing out?
S: Like the others, I don’t remember my name.
H: I see. My apologies.
S: And yet…
H: And yet?
S: Words are flooding back to me… Yes. I can scarcely recall anything about myself, and yet a hundred lifetimes worth of tales resound within me. Surely the lives they chronicle are all long ended, though.
H: If their memories yet live, are they truly dead?
S: Hmm… Yes. ♡ I am quite certain they are all thoroughly deceased.
H: Oh, well, in that case-
S: Tee hee. Please don’t act so put out. I’m only stating facts. Even so, perhaps their deeds can inspire those who yet survive them to continue doing so.
Effect: Increases the number of resource shards received from tiles in camp by +1 each (can increase the number above a tile’s maximum).
Item Slots: +1 Jewelry Slot
Resource Cost: 32 Preserved Rock, 8 Stable Metal, 3 Orb of Expansion
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H: I see your performances have become quite popular.
S: The others have been enjoying the tales of those very dead people we spoke of, yes. My songs seem to inspirit them greatly.
H: Well that’s good to hear. The camp could use a bit of cheer.
S: Maybe once you’ve restored the world to its fullest, I’ll sing a song about you as well. ♡
H: In that case, I’d better get back out there and enact some worthy exploits.
S: I’d say you’ve a number of marvelous deeds to your name already, but I’d never turn down an offer of inspirational material. I look forward to it.
Effect: Increases the number of resource shards received from tiles in camp by +2 each (can increase the number above a tile’s maximum).
Item Slots: +1 Furniture Slot, +1 Jewelry Slot, +1 Max Slot
Resource Cost: 42 Preserved Rock, 15 Stable Metal, 6 Orb of Expansion, 2 Astral Orb
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S: I dare say Hero, you have me spoilt for choice for the next verse of your ballad.
H: Don’t fill up all the pages just yet. There’s more to come. That, I promise.
S: Oh, don’t worry. This draft is just in case you end up following in the footsteps of all those other, definitely deceased heroes I sing about. ♡
H: ...
S: I’m just teasing. Don’t look so grim. You’ve gone as pale as that odd fellow with the cat.
H: He’s actually the reason we have the amphitheater to begin with, you know.
S: You don’t say?
H: He was the first of us to remember a song, but couldn’t recall the lyrics. He hoped a spot with good acoustics would help.
S: Is that why he hangs about in the stands so often? I’ll have to ask if he has any requests. ♡
Effect: After an expedition, gives 3 Memory Fragments for every boss defeated.
Item Slots: +1 Furniture, +1 Jewelry Slot, +1 Max Slots
Resource Cost: 65 Preserved Rock, 10 Orb of Expansion, 2 Astral Orb, 2 Orb of Unity
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S: ...
H: Lost in thought? Or working on your next verse?
S: The former. I spoke with the Grave Keeper.
H: Did he say something to dampen your spirits?
S: Quite the opposite, actually. He showed me how hazy the line between life and death is here. Did you know he can speak with the dead?
H: Oddly enough, it’s probably the least unusual thing he’s told me.
S: You asked before if someone was truly dead if their memory lived on. At the time, I made a jest of it. Now, I’m not so sure.
H: Things are pretty up in the air right now. Even universal laws like death seem to come and go on a whim. Even more so than before.
S: It seems so.
S: My apologies, but I would like some time alone to think.
H: Sure thing.
Effect: 1% chance for any basic resource shard collected from a tile in camp to be a complete resource instead.
Item Slots: +1 Furniture, +1 Jewelry Slot, +2 Max Slots
Resource Cost: 80 Preserved Rock, 13 Orb of Expansion, 8 Astral Orb, 10 Orb of Unity
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H: By the way, were you able to help the grave keeper remember his song?
S: Hmm? Oh, yes. As you might expect, it was a funerary hymn.
H: Ah. I suppose it’s only natural that might spook people, echoing through the cemetery in the dark.
S: I disagree. That song is meant to bring peace to the living left behind by the lost.
S: Between you and me, I think he just has that effect on people. He isn’t tone deaf per se, but, well, he throws everything into a somber key. I think it’s charming, though. ♡ He has a way about him that is very much his own.
H: No denying that.
S: Say, Hero. Would you give me the honor of teaching you this song? I can’t help but feel it has some special meaning, given how it’s connected the three of us.
H: Sure. It couldn’t hurt to have a tune in my back pocket, I suppose.
S: I hardly think music from your rear would be considered respectful to the dead, but if that’s your personal spin on it, I won’t stifle your artistry.
H: ...
S: ♡