Hello, hello, hello.
It’s been a minute. It’s not that I didn’t want to get this posted last week, or that I, again, started to foolishly wait for my latest orders to arrive paralyzed to do anything else, or that I spent a hundred hours hunting Jin Dahaads, but that I, instead of going by half-measures, decided that I would push Bogstop towards a natural conclusion as far and as completely as I possibly could last week.
Hrm, that sounded ominous.

But, before we get to Bogstop, here is the rundown on recent stuff:
I got Kale from what appears to be a new EU warehouse and I’m still waiting on my HQ stuff to leave customs – I’ll post about that stuff when I get it, but for now: I’ve had a couple of intense KD:M filled weeks.
I finished the PotStars settlement that I played with a friend on the weekends and we had a real interesting Finale fight that took ages – 3+ hours I believe – between a survivor with the Hazmat Shield and a Sunstalker set, that was forced to be Honorable (D) from the Black Knight tactics card who thus couldn’t gain sharp from attacking the blindspot, and the Dragon King who just couldn’t hit or irradiate the poor thing either.
In the end, unfortunately for him I guess, the Dragon King came out on top as the Hazmat Shield eventually failed the 2+ rolls a couple of times.
We also started a new PotLantern settlement that is kept fairly vanilla the day after, but we added Spidicules to see what’s up with that (what that leg doin’) and watched as it ran circles around us in our/my first fight against it in year 3.
It’s definitely an interesting encounter. Stats have – as always – been included on the Stat-page.
Oh, and probably the most important thing – I unlocked the Infinite Lives strain – so that is available now as well from the FA-deck.

Meanwhile in Bogstop: only 3 people are returning from last year’s Nemesis fight against the Black Knight as the Inverted Mountain claimed another soul. Unfortunately it was Celestine, our recent Club Master, who was taken from us by gravity.

For this year’s Settlement event we get: Lights in the Sky.
Ooh, that’s a good one! It’s always an uplifting moment when the Sunstalkers dance across the sky. Not that these people knew what’s going on..

At this stage in the campaign we were looking at 3 hunts of our choice before we would have to deal with the final big nemesis fight before one more hunt and then the finale.
So, overall there’s 4 more hunts and 1 nemesis to go. We could fight 1 more regular lope, the legendary lope, 1 Dragon King and 1 Dung Beetle Knight, if I wanted to hit all of these years with different encounters. With 18 people in the settlement we should almost be safe to guarantee us reaching the end no matter what happens even if every fight went side-ways.
However, I have already stated that I am looking at leaving the Dung Beetle at home entirely for this campaign at this point, and it will get its chance in a less frogdog-focused place where we can till the underground soil until the Vampiric Artichokes, arti-choke us.

For the time being I spent 3 endeavors on smelting Iron and 1 more to make Leather. This would set us up to make the Marchioness Gloves, which we do.
The gloves are a big part of the set’s functionality – if the 4 affinities are activated, deflecting a hit with a sword nets you an additional activation during your next turn. This means you could either uphold deflect every turn, or attack an additional time. Unga that bunga, amirite?

Looking over the remaining rerolls in the settlement Sir Hermes decided he would consume the Love Juice together with Beastia.
With a 4 being the lower number of the two, Velocity Bonk was born, gaining Giant’s Blood (FA) from her age 1 milestone.
Afterwards there was nothing else really to do but depart again already.

To start “the plan” I made, we would be hunting another, ideally final, regular Screaming Antelope in an attempt to hopefully gain enough ground to gather or find 4 more Iron and the necessary resources to build the Antelope Mask at the Mask Maker – its just a Pelt we need, really.

The Chosen Hunters:
Ghurt (Wrath, Marchioness bits)
Cleavelette (Killennium Cleavers, Dragon Armor)
Ruby (Lantern Glaive, Frogdog Armor)
Velocity (Bullfrog Mace, Bullfrogdog Armor)

The Huntphase:
Something I wanted to quickly state right off the bat.. I wouldn’t mind fighting a Lvl3 Lion this year instead of a lope either. I was (and still am) starting to miss the kitty-cat after so many Frogdogs over several settlements.
But it’s not looking good, the Antelopes have been evidently grazing very close to town, as we immediately find a patch of Devoured Grounds. But.. nobody has 3+ understanding.., so we could only continue to wander around aimlessly for a while.
At least until we found a Faceless Statue (basic HE06). We did have Sculpture innovated back home, so in one fell swoop everybody had gained 3 understanding and with it the Insight milestone. Seems this was a class field trip. All four survivors gained Explorer (Ghurt +1ACC, Cleavelette +1EVA, Ruby +3Surv/Ins, Velocity +3Surv/Ins).
Shortly afterwards we were presented with a Test of Courage (basic HE85). Both Ruby and Cleavlette qualified to gain the Adventure Sword, and whilst it was an all-round decent weapon, I did not take it along.
Shortly afterwards we heard that a Migration had been triggered in the distance and we just knew the Lope had moved to the end of the board.., uh, known world.
Wondering how long this hunt would take us, we stumbled upon a Space Between the Rocks (basic HE62). Without a pickaxe, Velocity (Weak Spot – waist D) just couldn’t seem to focus at the task at hand and in the end could not pull herself away from the dark chasm and its delightful promises, As she eventually did rejoin the group, she seemed changed in a way.

Pushing onwards, we found a Broken Lantern Oven (basic HE35) in the midst of what seemed like a destroyed settlement – a hint of what future might befall us, no doubt. Cleavelette was able to harvest a Broken Lantern, but I did not temp fate by lingering any longer.

Overwhelming Darkness – Ruby was presented with the chance to save another survivor while passing through the gloom, and she did opt to do it.

We name the new woman Möff and continue on into ..
The Grazing Fields. Velocity was able to heal the 1 arm damage she just took from passing through Overwhelming Darkness, but our attention was already focused on a Cloaked Stranger (basic HE96) that was approaching our group. Ruby was quickly singled out by the stranger and before she knew it, she got a smooch from a bug man (she rolled a 7). We felt our hearts flutter from the touching moment.
A sudden shower of Acid Rain (basic HE22) puts a stop to the joyous moment though. That’s a rough event – we took 3 damage to EVERYTHING. Ruby did revel in the storm, but it did even turn off her Immortal (D) as she just stood there, steaming, caustic liquid eating through her gear. The storm did not move home.
And there it was.., the true prize I had been waiting for: a Dead Antelope. Of course we looted it. We got a lot of hide from the carcass: 2 Pelt and a Crap Spider that was feasting on the remains. Sadly, no Lions to be found here. I would have switched up my plans to a legendary lion in a heartbeat.

Cleavelette rushed us towards the lope and as we tried to keep pace, the group was quickly surrounded by Wailing Smoke (basic HE08). Thanks to Ruby’s Delirium (D) however – all her gear has noisy – we could counter the wails by making a ruckus as she “shakes that thang”.
One last event left.. and it was a horrible one to get: River of Blood (basic HE46). Ghurt immediately found the monster’s path though. And just seconds later Ruby did as well. Cleavette on the other hand suffered a Broken Rib severe injury. Velocity was a little more carefuly and only re-took the arm damage from earlier.

And whilst we have eventually managed to reach the Screaming Antelope, the town suffered from starvation in the meantime, they ate just about everything that was left at home, including a Broken Lantern, some funky soot mushrooms and a Bullfrogdog Tusk.
Not ideal. But also not unexpected.

As we set up for the Antelope fight the Feline Entity did her best White Lion impression and tried to chomp it.
We also got a Survivor Corpse and a Mammoth Leaf as extra terrain, both reminding us of our home.
And after we had signed our worries away, Ruby’s Delirium (D) did something I had not seen yet – it gave me 2 positive tokens… both were +1EVA-tokens.

22 (23) cards in the deck – the Screaming Antelope began the fight with Stomp and Snort.
Nobody was close enough to see the horribly salivating Antelope so the lope headed to the closest Acanthus plant to eat it.
Afterwards it charged towards the edge of the board and our group via Diabolical.

Ghurt activated first, as he so often did. We saw a hit location with a crit effect on top of the deck, so he swiftly moved into the lope’s blindspot and attacked. He did hit. And a 9 was a critical wound as well. That meant he would deal almost a third of the hit points of the monster as damage (8 of 23) in a single swing! And the lope has been dazed on top of that.

Ghurt wasn’t done just yet though and he surged, hitting one more time, dealing a 2nd critical wound. And this one had a critical effect that would deal even more wounds as the antelope moved until the end of the next round! I love that card! He ended his act and stepped away with his leather boots to not be affected by Legendary Horns.
Ruby ran towards the acanthus patches in a sort of an interlude, dashing and surging to also pump up her armor.
Cleavelette then took the initiative to runs up to the monster and attack as well. Two hits were achieved and with Cleaver spec she could ignore 1 wound reaction.. that didn’t exist. She manages to hit with 12 exactly, just barely wounding now that the tokens were gone. A 2nd wound followed without much fanfare.

After the lope had turned its attention towards Cleavelette, Velocity charged into its side, ready to hit like a freight train.
I did set her up poorly in the beginning and she had to dash to get the full +6ACC from the charge. I could have planned ahead for that, really.
But somebody put the brakes on this train anyhow, as, in the end, she only hit once, so the Onslaught keyword was not active for the attack.
All that effort amounted to a single wound as the dust cleared.

As the Watcher’s brain flickered and the Horripilation Dice shifted, the next round began.

10 (11) cards remaining. The antelope did not get dazed this time and instead wanted to Chow Down on some leafy greens. It ran over Cleavelette, which meant the monster would suffer a wound. It did however heal 4 wounds from having a snack before Chow Down returned to the top of the AI deck. Velocity took the opportunity to dash to the edge of the board, to be outside of Diabolical‘s targetting during the second flow on Chow Down.
Being trampled over again, Cleavelette took a second hit to the chest and suffered a severe injury for it. She did roll a Lantern 10 like a pro and turned out fine. Funnily enough this did wound off Chow Down due to the movement.

Ghurt activated and we saw the next cards on top of their respective decks: Chow Down number 2 and the Giant Maw. What a pairing.
I did not want to risk Wrath for this, so Ghurt would simply use his required 1 movement (for Hyperactive D) and activate Deflect on the sword (possible due to the Marchioness chest).
Cleavelette was deemed most expendable weapons-wise and she dashed into range for the Dragon Armor‘s effect to jump at the lope with +5STR/+2ACC. She hit the monster 3 times. And after 2 wounds dealt, the lope ate one of the Killennium Cleavers.. sure. I guess that was exactly why I did not want to attack with Wrath. Oh sweet, terrible vindication!

With the immediate threat dispelled, Ghurt dashed in, surging to attack. He dealt 1 singular wound without further benefits.
Velocity charges at the lope and hit it twice this time, one of them even being a perfect hit.
With all that momentum this time, she first wallops the monster for 68 on the first attack, dealing 2 wounds. And whilst the second hit is only for 36, it also inflicts 2 wounds at once.
Ruby picks another acanthus and takes another 1 damage to the arms.

5 (6) cards remaining. The lope wanted to Bolt. You couldn’t blame it. It attacked Velocity, hitting 3 times (on 3+) before sliding along the edge of the board.
Diabolical did draw it back in though.

Ghurt activated first. He hit easily on 2+ and inflicted another critical hit on a 7. He surged as well, but seeing the fear on the eyes of the monster, his emotions flared up and he could only stay his hand.

Velocity dashed away afterwards to possibly kill the monster. She charged in, hitting both times.
The first attack came in at 32, far above the 20 needed for 2 wounds dealt. The second hits scored 26 still, which also dealt 2 wounds, killing the monster with blunt-force-trauma to the everything.

That poor Screaming Antelope.
The fight went about as well as we could expect from it. Of course, losing 1 of the 2 Killennium Cleavers was far from ideal, but as far as weapons were concerned, we would be able to make due with a single one, surely.

In a way this was a monumental, albeit easy, Lantern Year, with both Ghurt and Ruby reaching their retirement age. This has been, of course, somewhat calculated as we now have 3 (or, rather 4, honestly) high value targets for a metamorphosis festival (of which we can hold 2).

But first: rewards!
Ghurt (+1SPD) and Ruby (+1SPD) gained their age 4 milestones each. As Cleavelette (Soft Landing FA) aged up as well.
After weapon proficiency (which didn’t do a lot for us) we were on to resources.

From what we got, we’re not likely to get too far with the 4 Iron for the Marchioness boots though.

This is one of those Lantern Years that are a part of a filler arc in a way, so it feels fairly inconsequential in the grand scheme of things, partially because we flattened the monster like we did and the fact that we knew we likely would.
Poor antelope, really.

For now this will be all as I retreat back into the shadows, I will try to get these last lantern years out at a quicker pace than 1 per week, but promises like these seem to rarely work out.
Next time we will be setting up for a Dragon King Lvl3 – an opponent I was a lot more fearful of, having fought it only once at the time in the context of the Finale for the People of the Stars.

As always, thank you very much for your time, and don’t let the antelope taunt you into a fight for your leafy greens,
Amathul