It's finally time to officially introduce the new cultivation feature on Realms Away! As many of you have probably seen, we have a new Cultivation page to play with. But what does it actually do, and how does it work? If you have been visiting the Serpent's Apples daily diligently, you will be granted all items you need to get started for now.

Cultivation is here

The goal of cultivation is to earn/grow specific items over time. For this, you will need to follow these steps:

1. Unlock an area for cultivation by using the exploration item for it! Midgardsormr should have awared you with a Map to Serpent Glade
2. Prepare an unused plot with a tool item. Fortunately, Midgardsormr prepared a Snake Rake for you. Beware though that not every area can be perpared with every tool.
3. Now that the plot is ready, you can plant seed items! Not every seed item works on every plot, but you an find seeds for apples at the Apple Tree that work with this first plot!

With something planted, now is the time to keep tending to the plot daily. You may tend to 10 plots each day, so in future you may want to choose wisely. Your plot progress is displayed when you click on it, letting you know when the next stage of progression is reached. Once the final stage is there, you will be able to harvest your reward!

future thoughts

Cultivation has a lot of potential, and I don't want this to go unused. Other than elemental apples, I plan to use it for cultivating off-season trait items. There will be new types of areas for this, as well as many new items and a lot of new art that needs to be drawn (plus, Fengarion will return with a new store, offering you the items to plant for a sizable amount of magic)...As such, please be patient with me- it will happen, I just need some time cx

Midgardsormr

More adventurers...I should have known. Recently, you've been arriving in droves.

Midgardsormr

Can't exactly fault you with how big of a rift the guardian tree created, but I digress. You must return. Neo Maera does not need any strange creatures freely roaming around.

Midgardsormr

Our kind has suffered enough. I can offer you to take a look around my glade, but that is the extent of my generosity.

Midgardsormr

Do not try me. You will regret it.

Midgardsormr

...although, maybe you can be of help.

Duration:  October 1st - November 1st, Realm: Neo Maera

Through an enourmous rift, you stumble into the realm of serpents - and find yourself in a forest of gigantic proportions, with a rather annoyed looking serpent man looming over you.

Neo Maera, the realm of Serpents has been discovered! Unfortunately, your advances are blocked by a suspicious serpent by the name of Midgardsormr, who tells you that you may not proceed out into the world. It seems you will need to stick around and gain his trust within this mysterious forest for now! But not to worry, there will be perks for you as well.

magical apples

As per usual with events,  you can earn magic , by completing the newly released Event Prompts! The main currency for this event, however, are appleseeds - which you will need to collect. If you collect enough seeds, Midgardsormr may grant you some of his mysterious magical apples...and, eventually, his trust. These all new apple items can be used to change the variant of your companion!  There are multiple ways to go about it:

• Feeding your sleeping companion an apple of their (base) element will cause it to awaken instantly
• Feeding your companion an apple of their (base) element will awaken artefact powers in them if they do not have any
• Companions with artefact powers can eat apples of other elements, and may be granted a second element and different form (if it exists).

You will also want to have an eye out for the new daily, Serpent's Apples, and check in on Midgardsormr every day. If you do it for 10 days, he has a special gift for you that goes hand in hand with another reveal to happen on the 11th of october!

Serpents unleashed

With the reveal of Neo Maera comes the reveal of the serpents- and some new items! You can buy the new serpent MYO item from Midgardsormr during october, or mayhaps the travel location Serpent Glade interests you? The Soft Egg will be regularly available in Aknaras grotto for coins as well. The Tetrapodophis (multi arms) trait for serpents can be achieved by buying a Stone Snake Idol from Freaque Antique!

Monthly Prompt

It's a hatch! Or is it?
Some dragon eggs were found, but were they all hatched? Show us the state of your dragon egg and earn 80 !

Choose your characters path!

A small update, but a fun one! From now on, professions are no longer hard coded html - they integrate with lorekeeper now. This opens up the potential to set professions that are customary for any realm, not just the Lopilands - although they were, of course, the prime subject for this implementation. 

Your Lopilu can no show their class of on their profile!
Simple go to edit the profile and pick a profession there, and it will show with the profession icon on their info page and profile. Neat, right?

Not a fighter? Not finding what your character is looking for?
You can also write a profession into the text field instead! This will display on your character the same way but with a default icon. Take note that a profession selection overrides the text!

What's next?
Probably more classes per realm and also some generic crafter and gatherer jobs, once I find time to. It will also be easier to release the missing Lopilu classes now :)c

Hopefully you enjoy this tiny update!

You were just chilling as suddenly a hoard of little critters runs past you...what the heck?!

It is finally time to make companions official! But what exactly are they, and how do they affect the different Realms? 

What are companions?

Companions are small critters, or sometimes even objects with a soul, that can be found in any realm and the reflection. They begin their existence in a sleeping form and can be awakened through careful care, or by feeding them elemental energies. Each Companion type comes with a base element that they are attuned to, but by feeding them energies of a different type, some may obtain a second element. For some, these beings are simply pets and friends - but a handful of companions are capable of more than that.

These special creatures are often referred to as having artefact powers, which is denoted by a little star. This allows them to share Their elemental magic with someone they have a strong bond with, potentially granting them the alter transformation!

care for your companion

For now, the only way to awake your companion is by caring for them daily. To do this, you will want to visit your Companion page and select one of them. Then, simply choose the care option! Each companion takes a different time to wake, so keep at it and one day they will awake for you. In future, there are going to be other ways to do this via special items.

Stay tuned to learn more about companions, and how to feed them elemental energy through one of their favorite healthy treats as Realms Away progresses further!

Name & attach them

Companions can be named or attached to characters! You can do this from your companion page as well. Keep in mind that if your companion awoke with a star, it has the ability to let your character unlock the alter transformation! Not to worry, however- you can attach and detach pets as you wish. But canonically, they may only transform if their companion is with them.

Contest: become a Companion Creator

To celebrate their official launch, take part in the Companion Creator contest and potentially bring your own idea to life! Any entry gets rewarded with 50 magic and a choice of 1 of the 9 starter companions through the Companion Creator prompt. The winner(s) will see their design implemented on the site and receive one for free!

Introducing: User Factions!

Originally a part of the amazing world expansion extension, Factions are groups that admins/mods can create. They have some neat features I will list below that can make plotting your characters more interactive and fun! The twist is: I made them available for every user to create! But what do factions do? When creating a faction, you will be able to fill the following fields:

• Name
• Type (Tribe, Guild, Clan, Gang, Group, Family, Syndicate, Corporation, Legion - potentially more in future!)
• Summary
• Thumbnail and banner image
• In-depth description
• Ranks that you define!
• Links to a location, species, figure or other faction!
• Public or private factions (private factions can only be joined by your own characters)

Any faction can be joined by any character, unless the faction is private or is missing ranks.

Faction Ranks

In order to accept members, your faction will need ranks. You can go wild with these, but it is recommended to set one entry rank with a breakpoint of 0. Don't know what a breakpoint is? No worries! It just means any character with 0 faction Standing can join. Faction standing is a currency used to decide ranks within factions for each character, and does get reset if your character switches factions, soyou always start at the bottom!

Rank Promotions

You plotted something with another user, and their character thus gets a more important rank than the newbie one in your faction? You can give them a  promotion. This can be done in two ways:

1. If the intended rank is not a leadership position: Go to your factions and click edit members. Here, you can assign the character enough Faction Standing to reach the next rank! 
2. If the intended rank is a leadership position: Create closed ranks and manually assign the character to them!

Attachments 

If you want to go further and make it easier to find your faction/give even more lore, you can add attachements to it! At the time, you an link your faction to any of the following:

• Figures
• Species (Fauna)
• Locations
• Factions

I hope this update brings you some fun and more flexibility in creating plots with others!! Please report any bug you find in the bug channel on discord <3

Access your factions from the dashboard, or here: Your Factions
View & search existing factions by Realm, Species, Type and name here: View Factions