The Ethereal Holding Grounds
Hey there. Thanks for joining Lagoon Cave. Your registration is in the hands of the Primordial Oath-Taker. Once approved, you’ll have access to the Lagoon and all its cave-glorious. But we need to go over some house rules so everyone is comfortable here. And remember, this is text-based, so reading is kind of a huge part of how this is all played out. Not the only part, but a huge one.
Just a heads up: signing up and gaining approval means you’re cool with abiding by these rules and agree to do so. If you don’t want to, just delete your account when you get in. But if you’re cool with following those rules, enjoy the Cave and all its wonders.
What Lagoon Cave Is
Lagoon Cave is a Massive Multi-Player Online Role Playing Game (MMORPG). It’s a chill haven on the web to just explore, enjoy friend both old and new, play games, go on adventures, vibe, find your creative stride and genuinely just ebb and flow.
Be who you are, do just about whatever you want, and play around.
The World is comprised of a bunch of different biomes, features and quests. These are typically played across message boards and certain biomes have certain activities that can be done together or solo.
Items within the world are hidden, discovered and traded in message board posts and through exchange centers throughout. Vending Pools allow folks to buy biome specific items from the World itself over players, and currencies are used to … well help the economy keep moving.
Currencies include:
Lagoon Crystals: Used by all players for general trade, upkeep and payments.
Oath-Taker Palms: The Currency of the Oath-Taker rank, used at altars and specialized exchange stations. Oath-Taker Palms are specialized to Oath-Taker ranks only and can only be received and distributed by those of the Oath-Taker ranking.
Maverick Blades: Only given to Mavericks by the Soaring Koi of the region, and exchange is often between Mavericks, Mavericks and Merchants or Mavericks and Oath-Takers, though Mavericks can convert their Blades to Crystals at exchange stations. Blades are used for specialty items that Maverick classes can trade and sell.
Bardic Notes: Every bard needs their note. Bardic notes are used by Bard ranks to trade between each other, garner new recipes, pay for spaces to jam and bring music to the realms, among other mysterious quest line oddities. Simple Nomads and Villagers can exchange their Crystals for Bardic Notes at exchange stations to provide a tip to their favorite musical muse.
Merchant Tokens: Merchant tokens are specialized currency that are only given to the Merchant rank. These tokens allow merchants to buy in bundles and trade in the Undercove and other shop arenas. They are specific only to the Merchant Rank.
Bar Coins: Barkeeps ranks throughout the lands use Bar Coins to unlock recipes and expand their taverns and pubs. Simple Nomads and Villagers can exchange their Crystals for Bar Coins if they want to help tip their local barkeep and increase the size and capability of their “shop”.
Every Player is given an account with a quick starter pack inside. The Pack is already distributed giving new Nomads (the default rank) a chance to explore without heavy limitations.
Likewise, anyone starting who says they have interest in an item or Lagoon Specialty can be given that rank and starter pack from registration approval. You aren’t stuck in your rank, but you will need Primordial Oath-Taker approval to jump around. Likewise, you can stack ranks, but switching them puts you back at the beginning of the achievement pile. Gotta keep it fair.
Specialized Areas are arenas that aren’t your typical world areas. These either don’t have message boards or have very particular boards and features.
Base Specialty Areas are:
Journeyman’s Respite: Where you go to find mythical feats, test your luck and explore odd places. Only your personal chat is available.
Coffers and Exchange: This area only features exchange and currency options as well as a vending pool with special items dropped in. Only your personal chat is available here.
The Cave Walls: A place for artworks from all kinds of minds, there is a very explicit forum and chat room here. The page is built for artistic display over adventuring. That said, there are goodies and loot to be found in places of quiet expression.
The Taverns: You’ll find a majority of tavern and pub threads here, as well as some fun games and other activities to fill your time with. This is one of the only places “in-game fighting” can happen, and there is a specific thread for it.
The Shops: Consider this the Lagoon Cave Market Place. While in-game villages and have local shops, this is the hub for all things merchant. Conversations here are focused on exchange and building partnerships. Anyone with in-person, physical businesses can also, ORGANICALLY and in a non-spamming or corporate manner, promote themselves. You will need to submit a request to do so though. That way everyone stays safe.
The Training Fields: Train your brain, your mind and your ability to come down when you need it most. The Tents are located here for those who train endlessly. Friendly competitions are found in these grounds and random goods can be looted here.
Your Cove: This is your player home. Your coffers, your inventory, your pet and fireplace, your brew-hub and more. This is your sanctuary within the Cave and it takes you to the important facets of your account.
Text-based doesn’t mean “just text”. It means the progression is typically text, but there are other retro-like things to do.
Games and Fidgets are designed for solo play and group play. If you’d like to play alone, just use the solo feature on the opening screen. For groups, create your own area within the game and paste the code that pops up either in the group chatroom, a small thread or in a private chat so you can play against others.
How to Play In-World
Playable areas are broken up into at least 3 different places:
Message Boards.
Chat Rooms/Private Chats.
Solo Games and Exploration.
Message Boards are shared spaces and open to the public or those in your village/rank set. If you don’t want the world to know about it, don’t post it here.
These are also the areas you’ll find wide announcements, community events, updates and upgrade announcements, warnings, quest progressions, new storylines and more. So keep an eye on them.
Responses in the boards are pretty relaxed, and the best thing to do for in-game play is to respond to the most recent thread. If a different reply in the thread seemed interesting, message the originator and start up a side quest. You can do that here.
Chat Rooms and Private Chats are quicker with responses, and a place where folks can just chatter. Private chats are better suited for in-game personal/private quests and musings. Chat Rooms are great for talking smack when playing games, figuring out who’s around and just typically talking to them.
If you and a party want to do your own thing, you can request a chat room, but it might take a minute since everything is human run. Group private chats are your best bet. Just make sure your campaign clears within 30 days. The chats clear to retain privacy and fluid maintenance. Boards stay up unless otherwise specified in the topic threads.
Solo Games and Exploration are exactly what they sound like. Chill games you can do alone, vendor pools you can purchase items at, chat rooms with low flow and message boards with a chill ambience for those who want to stay social but solitary. While community is a major fun point of the game, solo players can just vibe if they want without penalty.
Text-based roleplaying is … old. It’s an old method of hanging out and letting your imagination run wild. Which is exactly why we love it.
Actions are usually comprised of asterisks (*), sets of paired colons ( :: ) or hyphens/tildes (-/~). An action is something you’re doing like *types up the rest of the rules, meandering over verbiage*. Just try to stay consistent with your formatting so others can latch on.
If you’re building a story, you can use formats like “Charact x: Hey Johnny.” If you’re joining a story in-world as your own avatar, just chat as normal and use the action cues in the “Actions” section. If you want to emphasize a word, that’s usually don with italics. Bold words bring players’ attentions to it and is often seen as speaking sternly. And CAPS … well that’s yelling. Don’t uh… Don’t yell at people. Unless it’s in-game and appropriate. Otherwise it’s just jarring, rude and kinda signals that you’re not okay in some form.
Text marks/ Punctuation marks are both used to signify how someone is talking. An entire wall of punctuation marks is spamming. Picture yourself in a public place wherever you are just exclaiming endlessly in the physical world. Authorities are called, hospitalization assessments are had, your everything is out for the world to see. Same rules. But in your private chats, exclaim and be weird away. Just no dickish behavior.
Hopping around from Biome to biome, page to page and game to game is totally encouraged and how you win things, pick up new items, learn more about the lore, etc. Everything is designed to grow and expand, so keep exploring. And if there’s something you love, let us know yourself or let your village leader know so they can tell us. Follow your friends, make new ones, go on adventures, enjoy your Cove, whatever suits your fancy. It’s the Lagoon world. You can just mellow here.
The Lagoon is a place for you to explore yourself, mates. So go be you. If something comes off a little nutty, or you get a “hey man, not cool.” don’t think it’s the end of your roam. Everyone here is going through life looking for the same stuff. You can give yourself abilities, backstories and other attributes. Play with your personality and enjoy the fruits of your experiments. Just remember, Kindness and Rage can be friends and often are. Just because someone is kind in the Lagoon doesn’t mean you can step all over them. There’s a good chance they’re harboring a very large, vengeful creature. And if they aren’t, someone they know in the realms sure does. So balance it out and let’s ebb and flow and just be who you be.
FAQ
You MUST be at least 18 to hang out in the Lagoon. It’s an adult space where adults go to hangout and relax without worrying about adult problems. Sorry kiddos, but this is some nostalgia-level vibe time. You’ll have your own one day.
Immovable Rule: 18+ only.
AI is everywhere. And while it can be a hella useful tool for mechanical coding, creative endeavors like avatar creation, original works and other outlet expressions, are kept organic/human. Sure there are CPUs throughout the game, but they uh… They aren’t very smart. Some by design.
Privacy is held at a pristine standard. No place on the internet is 100% safe. However. Everything has been calibrated to keep your info in-game and in your hands. You can delete your data and account when you want. We don’t share your information with anyone. And any tools we use to make the world what it is have been vetted to ensure your privacy comes first.
That said, please don’t abuse the high-privacy lifestyle. It’s there for safe play and less worry. Not to be exploited. One of our Oath-Takers can be rather psychotic when it comes to upholding this balance in the face of its abuse. And it is welcomed.
Your Avatar is an expression of who you are as a person. You can upload a profile picture that best suits you, create one with other members in the Lagoon, commission pieces for Crystals, and probably a bunch of other things (that’s for you to find out). But your Lagoon Avatar is you. So choose the name you love, be the creature you’ve always wanted to be and live the wild life you’ve always wanted. Just make sure respect is at the top of your list and everything is smooth damn sailing.
If you need help creating an avatar, feel free to run down an Oath-Taker. They can help you out. And if you really need something, message them. Oath-Takers don’t bite out of spite or malice, just to eat if they need it. (This is a joke… mostly).
Approval happens pretty fast, usually within a few hours. Some approvals can take up to 48 hours depending on red flags sent during the approval process (think bot behavior, flagged usernames, etc.).
Most folks who register are real people not looking for trouble, so stick to the 2-24 hour rule there. Sometimes, it’s a few minutes. Just depends where the Primordial Oath-Taker is at the time.
Enjoy Some Moonlit Bubbles While You Get Approved.
Happy Popping.
Lagoon Rules
Yeah, there are rules. They exist to keep this place safer than the rest of the internet and give folks a place to truly chill and enjoy being them with others doing the same damn thing.
Immovable Rules:
- Anything having to do with a minor will get you banned and reported to the authorities.
- Do not use this platform as a harassment, stalking or illegal hub for activities. There’s enough of that shit out in the world.
- Don’t fucking shame anyone for their beliefs or their reality’s perception.
- Don’t fucking harass people with your reality’s perception.
- Explicit Consent for being talked to, hung with or anything else is mandatory. All parties need to be completely okay with whatever is going on.
Oath-Takers are the enforcers. These folks are heavily vetted and routinely checked to make sure they can maintain a fair and impartial stance when upkeeping the rules. They’re extensions of the Realms, not there to gain favor from villages or the nomads of the lands.
That said, they’re also players. Consider them beneficial mechanisms of the world. They can drop gifts and help peacefully solve disputes so everyone can keep having a good time.
Respect is mandatory mates. That doesn’t mean you go sniveling around and showing your belly. It means everyone gets space to be who they are and exist how they want. That means your interactions are along the lines of how you would like to be interacted with. And continuation of that interaction has to be mutual. Likewise, no spamming boards, chatrooms, mods or other players. Don’t make false reports because of a bad thought with no grounding. And please, no damn bullying. Let’s be most excellent, huh? The outer world is shit enough.
Language is as open as it needs to be. Everyone here is an adult, so let’s act like it, yeah? Some folks like to swear (I’m one of them). Others would prefer more PG language. Just respectfully let someone know if something gets under your skin with the way they’re talking and see if you can moderate yourselves. 9.9 Times out o 10, you can.
The “isms” are also prohibited. Seriously folks: racism, sexism, genderism, ageism, ableism, etc. are not allowed. This includes:
Ableism: Discrimination against people with disabilities.
Ageism: Prejudice based on a person’s age.
Cissexism: Prejudice against transgender or non-binary people.
Classism: Discrimination based on social or economic class.
Colorism: Prejudice based on skin tone.
Elitism: The belief that people with more money, power or education are superior.
Heterosexism: Discrimination against non-heterosexual people.
Lookism: Prejudice based on physical appearance.
Racism: Discrimination based on race or ethnicity.
Sexism: Prejudice based on sex or gender.
Sizeism: Discrimination based on a person’s body size.
- Plus all the other shitty isms out there. Don’t be a shit person. Be an awesome person.
Intellectual Property (IP) is taken seriously here. Folks are sharing original characters, creative explorations and world-building. Don’t steal it. Period. And don’t pass off something you stole as your own, mate. Only cool Pirates allowed, not shitty copyright-ignoring pirates. Be the former. Not the latter.
Thanks for taking the Cave rules seriously. Enjoy your play.
~ Primordial Oath-Taker