Dark Clouds [Closed Patrol]

Smokestripe paced back and forth not far from the entrance of the camp, his paws itching with excitement. There was some joy in being given a new apprentice, even if it wasn't his first one nor would it be his last. It was...Almost a bit like being an apprentice again, getting a taste of the world for the first time even if its from their eyes. His tail swished as he came to a stop, glancing toward the apprentice den for any sign of Sootpaw. While he had pondered if he wanted to show him the territory first, he had settled on hunting. It was an important skill and something he felt that Sootpaw would rather like. The tom seemed prideful from their brief interactions - being able to stretch his legs and feed his Clan would hopefully do the apprentice good.

Sootpaw yawned and stretched, lazily getting up. His eyes shot open as he saw Smokestripe pacing near the entrance to camp. His shock turned into a sly smile as he glanced over at his sister, who was still sleeping. He got to start training first! Proudly, he walked out of the den and joined Smokestripe. "Am I learning to fight today?" He mewed.

Smokestripe eyes glimmered as he saw Sootpaw step from the apprentice's den, dipping his head to greeting. However the light in his eyes dimmed slightly at the first question that left the apprentice's mouth, his whiskers twitching as he shook his head. "Afraid no fighting lesson today," he said, shifting on his paws. "While...Knowing how to defend yourself is important, being able to provide for your Clanmates is even more. So, today's lesson will be hunting," he explained, keeping a careful eye on Sootpaw. He was interested to see the young apprentice's reaction, wondering if Sootpaw would be disappointed in the idea of hunting or if he would embrace it.

Sootpaw's happy attitude dropped instantly. "Hunting?" He complained, "But real warriors fight, not hunt." He had the slightest thought of regret at being mean to his mentor, but he shook his head. "I suppose let's get it over with. I'll soon be too good for this anyhow." He then started padding out of camp.

Smokestripe's ears fell flat on his head at Sootpaw's words, almost a bit hurt by that remark. He said nothing, not until Sootpaw walked past him and into the territory. He took in a deep breath, turning and following after his apprentice. "Real warriors care for their Clanmates, Sootpaw," he said as he moved to take the lead, glancing over his shoulder at the young tom as he turned their path to head in the area he had already decided they would be hunting at. "If nobody hunted, a Clan would never survive. While I do not mind that you prefer the idea of fighting over hunting...I will not stand for the idea that cats who prefer to hunt are not 'real warriors.' We will do a lesson on fighting soon enough...But knowing how to hunt is a skill that is needed day to day unlike fighting."

Sootpaw was a bit taken aback by this, no one had ever talked to him like this before. He also never thought about it that way, he supposed the clan did need to eat. "Sorry Smokestripe," he replied, as he tried to put a pep in his stride. Maybe hunting would be ok, but he would still prefer fighting. "So," he started, "um, what are we hunting?"

Smokestripe sighed softly in relief as the young apprentice apologize, his stance quickly perking up as he came a stop, having reached their hunting location. "Its fine, Sootpaw. Fighting does have an...Appeal to it, doesn't it?" he noted, recalling his daughter's boast on fighting any cat who dared to show their face on the border. He never truly understood it, always disliking the idea of fighting but then again he wasn't a very brave cat...

"As for what we are hunting...Its really whatever we can find," he said as he tasted the air carefully, trying to sort out the scents of prey over the general muck of the territory. Finally he located a frog, scanning the marsh until he spotted it resting on a log not far from them. He jerked his head in the direction of it, trying to point it out to Sootpaw as he dropped into a crouch. "Hunting is a mix of skills," he explained as quietly as he could, slowly pulling himself toward the frog. "One must be aware of their surroundings but also be aware of themselves - being silent is of the up most importance to not scare away the prey that is being hunted. Stepping in a deep pool of mud that you failed to notice can easily alert of the prey of your presence. Once you get as close as you dare..."

He came to a stop, pausing to judge the distance as he lowered himself even closer to the ground, his legs tensing. He took in a deep breath and launched himself at the frog. Smokestripe's paws truck the frog, it having taken notice of him seconds to late. With a quick blow, it hung limply in his grasp as he turned to look at Sootpaw with a smile. "You judge the distance and make the jump. A swift bite to the neck or a blow to the skull will kill it easily. Now, see what you can smell and give it a go," he ordered.

OOC: On WCC, we are currently using a Hunting System to decide if we catch prey or not. In normal hunting topics, you do not have to use it but for your warrior assessment, you must use it to show an understanding of how the system work. The first thing you need to know is that the hunting system relies on a dice-based system. To know how to roll dice, you more or less know how the system works.

Under the area in which you write the post, is the preview button. Upon clicking on that, you will notice something - under the preview of the post is a 'Rule' post with a bunch of information, we will be coming back to that in a second. Under the 'post a reply' section is a little thing called Dices roll with two clickable boxes on it. The first one, labeled Dices rolls #1. Clicking on the box will pull up three things - Big dice, effect dice and hunting dice. Big dice is unimportant while effect dice is for battling (I'll teach that in a different topic unless we run into a battle encounter) We, of course, will be using the hunting dice. Next to that, is Dice rolls. Those are the number of dice you are rolling. Once you have it set to Hunting Dice and 1 rolls, you just type up your topic and post normally. When you do, a bot will post after you and give you the numbers you rolled. Using this number, you find out how well you hunted.

After this, its pretty simple. On the Hunting System topic, there is a list of prey you can choose from. What Clan you are from and what number you roll on the dice decides what you catch. The prey must be chosen before the dice is rolled of course. Once its decided if you have caught the prey or not, you simply edit your post to reflect if you caught it or missed. Nothing terrible.

You may notice on the Rule section that there is a battle encounter. If you roll a 10, you are attacked by a creature of your choice - the list that you can choose from also being in the Hunting System topic.

Hopefully this teaches you how to catch prey here on WCC~ Just try to catch something, whatever you want. Once you roll your dice, simply go back and edit your post to reflect what you rolled.

The member 'Badger' has done the following action : Dices roll

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'Hunting Dice' : 7

Sootpaw watched Smokstripe catch the frog, and, as much as he hated to admit it, felt a little bit of awe spark inside him. Hunting was just a fight against prey! He chuckled as he thought that this was simply a battle for his clan's territory, except it was against smaller prey. He opened his mouth and tried to scent prey, it took a while to try to scent it, but finally the scent of a toad hit his mouth. Glancing around, he finally managed to spot it sitting near the trunk of a tree. Attempting to imitate his mentor, he crouched, stalking the toad. As he reached it, he leaped onto the prey, attempting to swat it, eventually landing a blow to it's head. Against his will, pride swelled within him as he brought the toad back to his mentor.

The member 'Minecraftnerd' has done the following action : Dices roll

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'Hunting Dice' : 10

Ooc: Uhhhhhh....Badger? I've never battled before. And I've checked the stats, whatever animal I fight will bring my character to 0. Sorry that I haven't changed it yet, but I don't know what to do.

OOC: Don't worry about it, I'll bring in the animal and have it attack Smokestripe. Also, I suppose its Soot's lucky day. He gets to fight. Also an Owl wouldn't bring you down to 0 as it can only deal 10 damage a turn but its chill. Nobody likes bringing in the fight.

IC: Smokestripe watched Sootpaw with a careful gaze, his eyes shining as he watched his apprentice catch the frog. A chuckle escaped him as he picked up his own frog, padding to meet the apprentice before laying the prey down at his paws. "Hunting isn't that bad, is it?" he teased slightly, catching the hints of pride that flooded through the younger cat. He opened his mouth to say more but paused, a scent hitting his nose. He raised his head as his eyes narrowed, trying to sort out the the scent when his eyes caught movement. There was a glint in the sky as terror gripped the warrior's heart.

"Move!"

The warrior didn't waste a moment shoving himself forward, pushing Sootpaw back as he braced himself in front of his young apprentice, hissing at the sky as a shadow swooped toward the two cats. Talons slashed at Smokestripe as the owl came in, having been aiming for the younger tom or perhaps the frog that Smokestripe had dropped - it was hard to tell. The warrior flinched under the blow, pain flashing through him but he wasted no time swiping back at the owl, attempting to drive it away from the two of them. His eyes blazed with anger that it would dare try to lay a talon on his apprentice, a fury that he hadn't felt in a long time since that fowl badger had almost taken Larksong's life twice. No animal was going to hurt his friends while he was around.

Wild Owl uses Talon Strike on Smokestripe, dealing 10 damage and costing 10 stamina.

Smokestripe uses Upright Front Paws on the Owl, dealing 13 damage and costing 20 stamina.

Smokestripe
50/60 HP
140/160 SP

Wild Owl:
37/50 HP
110/120 SP

Sootpaw
20/20 HP
80/80 SP

OOC2: (Copying and pasting from an old topic)

Battling is a bit more simpler then hunting, dice rolling barely needed. Every cat has a rank - kit, apprentice, newly appointed warrior, young warrior...Ect. Each of these ranks has health and stamina and a certain amount of moves that they can use. As an apprentice, you have 20 health and 80 stamina while Larksong and Smokestripe, as young warriors, instead have 45 and 160 stamina. The health and stamina of each rank can be found here. More health means that you can take more damage, and the stamina means you can more moves before you run out. If either of these hit zero, then you are out of the fight. Either you faint, or you run away. Your cat doesn't die unless you want them to do so you never need to worry about that.

Each rank-up expands the amount of moves you can use along with increasing the damage that each of them does. The list of moves with damage and stamina cost are found here. The stamina cost remains the same for every rank, its simply the damage that changes. Certain moves have special effects, such as dealing more damage to an opponent not focused on you (such as here, the badger is distracted on Lark at the moment so Smoke's attack deals more damage) or some of the stunning such as the move that Lark did on the badger.

Stunning moves means that the opponent cannot attack for a certain amount of turns. Most stunning moves have a certain amount of time, such as one turn while two requires a dice roll with the number rolled (using the Effect die) decides how long they are stunned. If you use one of the dice-rolling stun, its always a good idea to edit your post after rolling to say how long your opponent is stunned. Also, a turn lasts until you post again. So if your opponent is stunned for two turns, they they have to post twice before they can attack again.

Also, keeping track of your opponent's health (like I did in my post) along with your own is standard practice to keep things from getting confusing. You simply list what their health/stamina looks like after your post is done and damage is taken into account. Uh...I don't know what else I need to say. Here is also the Battle Rules. They are important as well.

Sootpaw watched in horror as an owl attacked Smokestripe, but was proud of his mentor when he fought back. Suddenly realizing where he was, he scrambled over to where Smokestripe was, and clumsily swatted the owl, managing to unsheathe his claws at the last second.

Sootpaw uses Front Paw Strike on Owl, dealing 6 damage and costing 10 stamina.

Sootpaw
20/20 HP
70/80 SP

Smokestripe
50/60 HP
140/160 SP

Wild Owl
31/50 HP
110/120 SP

Ooc: How'd I do?

OOC: You did great!

IC: Smokestripe felt a flicker of pride in his chest as he watched Sootpaw swing at the owl, the creature beating its wings as it tired to pull away from the two cats. The warrior's eyes narrowed as he dropped into a crouch like he did for hunting, throwing himself forward at the owl even as claws raked his chest. His claws dug into the owl's wings as he brought it to the ground with his added weight, shifting carefully to avoid the talons as he tore away at what he could.

Wild Owl uses Talon Strike on Smokestripe, dealing 10 damage and costing 10 stamina.

Smokestripe uses Leap-and-hold on the owl, dealing 11 damage and costing 10 stamina. The owl is stunned for 2 turns.

Smokestripe
40/60 HP
130/160 SP

Wild Owl
20/50 HP
110/120 SP

Sootpaw
20/20 HP
70/80 SP

The member 'Badger' has done the following action : Dices roll

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'Effect Dice' : 6