Vertigo

Chapter 4 ~ A Sound in the Wood

Gill and I started walking through the forest, keeping an ear out for anything in the brush. The beetle had been a lucky find, and I wanted to find a few more creatures before I retired for the night.

After playing trading card games for quite a few years I had a general idea of what made a good deck, and some of the strategies for them. Other games that relied on mana of specific types usually forced you to choose one or two types to play since the more mana types you needed the harder it became to summon your creatures. In other games in which you had one source to summon from you had to find a balance between damage and healing that worked for you. Some went all in with damage, while others had slow burning decks that chipped away at their opponents while keeping their health up. I even used a deck solely comprised of creatures that summoned allies to overwhelm my opponent quickly. While each individual creature wasn't very powerful the overwhelming amount of creatures was enough to make a lot of them succumb.

With single source decks you also had to prepare for anything. You didn't know if your opponent would have a fire breathing drake, or a siren singing to ensnare you. Magic and items were also a consideration, and sometimes even harder to account for.

Vertigo had the single source draw like the later type, but since it was pulling directly from my HP it required a second layer of calculation. My health verses the summoned creatures, armor, and spells that I used. There was also the unknown element of what kind of creatures, spells, and gear were out there. I had only begun to scratch the surface.

The first step was obvious. I needed to expand my deck if I was going to even think about competing in a tournament, and with little time I wanted the creatures in it to be as practical as possible. Versatile creatures with abilities that made it easier to fight against overwhelming odds seemed to be my best bet.

At the moment I had a mongoose and a beetle. Neither of them could fly or swim which caused some limitations, and they didn't appear to have a special attack of any kind. Water type creatures might not be as useful in a forest, at least not the kind I would be able to capture on the first floor. Once we leveled a bit, and had a few more companions, we would try for a sprite or spirit type creature with a water spell.

That left an air bound creature, like a bird or bat. Even if it wouldn't be useful for fighting they could be used to scout the area, or watch for traps on a battlefield from above. Catching one wouldn't be easy with two land bound creatures unless we found a bird nesting on the ground, or a low lying tree branch. Gill was three foot tall and not as stealthy as a real world mongoose as far as I could tell, and the beetle didn't appear to be built for climbing trees.

We'd have to stick with land bound creatures until the right opportunity appeared. Maybe we could find an egg to hatch, though I didn't know if hatching was possible in Vertigo. If not there was always trading, or the auction house, though I wasn't keen on that idea for creatures yet.

I considered bringing the beetle out to walk with us but I wasn't sure how quite a creature made of chitin could be. It would also consume more HP to keep a second active creature at all times. Besides, I was still getting used to the area, and one mongoose seemed like enough to keep track of. It wasn't like I could have an entire menagerie walking with me the entire time.

I also needed to decide where to go. We had gotten off the main path, though I still had a general idea of where the portal was. I wasn't too worried about getting lost because I could always port back to The Hub and walk back to the bar, but I didn't want to do that unless I had to. Porting back would mean starting fresh from the first portal, and losing all progress. If Vertigo was a persistent world I wouldn't find new creatures by going over the same area again and again. Yet another thing I would need to find out about.