Storyline
The storyline will be public, and the happenings of the Moat teams will largely guide the direction as allegory. For example, tournaments may be expressed as encountering enemies, and they may be visually represented in the storyline too.
Chapters will be unlocked as the team accumulates EXP or hits certain milestones.
Chapter 1:
Something Stirs in the Murky Depths
A frog, motionless at the edge of a moat.
The water was dull and brown, undisturbed for seasons.
Once, many had gathered here; spelling their names loudly, playing, laughing. Now the reeds stand brittle and bare. The few that remain have faded to gray. Some changed their names to spite their fate, others holding on as they wither.
The frog sat as still and quiet as the waters that surround it.
The frog stares, not blankly. It sees something. Beneath the surface. Something we weren’t meant to see. Not yet. That’s why we call it the Oracle.
Something stirs in the murky depths.
The Oracle watches. The reeds still with apprehension and boredom.
A single deep croak. A single ripple moves through the water, barely nudging the cattails.
As the Oracle croaks, memories of the game we forgot resurface in the minds that hear it. Old cleats rediscovered by those who hear it. They hear their names on winds from afar.
The frog is calling. It is Summoning.
Chapter 2:
The First Summoning
Rain welcomed the First Summoning.
By morning the fields were soaked beneath a steady downpour, but no one seemed bothered by it. If anything, the weather felt appropriate. Afterall, frogs are stronger in the rain.
They arrived from every class; Knights, Rogues, Rangers, and Wizards. A brave group risking a totally new quest.
Another group had chosen the exact same day for their own tryouts, thinning the numbers and forcing improvisation. Instead of class against class, the summoned were mixed together into strange temporary alliances. Every team carried at least one member of each order.
The games became wonderfully chaotic. Conflicting incentives left and right. Do players play for their team? Or their class? Or both?
A deck of omen and challenge cards governed the day, twisting otherwise normal frisbee into something far stranger. Each point, a card was drawn. Certain decrees changed the rules entirely. Some forced cooperation. Others sabotaged movement, strategy, or common sense. Others yet reshaped the field itself.
Players drank throughout the day as rain turned to mist and mist turned to sun. Between points came cheers, heckling, prophecies, and increasingly questionable tactical decisions. Opposing classes secretly worked together to gain experience for their order.
At one point, a Wizard launched a fireball directly into a Ranger’s face hard enough to become instant legend.
By afternoon the Summoning migrated from the grass fields to the shoreline. Wind rolled in off the water. Waves crashed nearby while the games continued barefoot in the sand beneath clearing skies. Upon our tent, a red-winged blackbird lingered almost the entire day. An emissary from the same place as our great Frog.
As the final matches approached, every class remained nearly tied.
Then came the omen card: Plague.
Turnovers would now cost a class experience points.
The Rangers immediately turned the disc over three possessions in a row.
The remaining classes entered a final clash. In the end, the Knights pulled ahead and claimed victory in the inaugural Summoning.
Everyone left exhausted, sandy, sunburned, and grinning.
The First Summoning was complete.
We will be summoned again.
Chapter 3:
Maiden Voyage
The First Party set out upon their maiden voyage to the shores of Erie, ten adventurers strong. One Knight on the expedition, joined by Rogues, Rangers, and Wizards alike. There, beneath a relentless wind and upon sand so soft that every stride became its own trial, the party fought through skirmishes against distant guilds. Some battles were won, some lost, but one victory stood above the rest: the defeat of the very guild that would later claim the tournament crown. Though fate denied a rematch in the final trials, the tale had already been written.
The beaches themselves were unlike any battlefield the party had crossed before. Every cut demanded twice the effort, every chase swallowed by the sand. The wind became another opponent, carrying discs into impossible paths and forcing every member to rethink the magic they thought they knew. Yet amid the chaos came courage. Emily, a Wizard of the party, claimed her first tournament score, her first assist, and her first full layout upon the sands—a trio of milestones earned on the same legendary weekend.
As twilight fell, the party raised tents alongside dozens of other wandering factions, transforming the woods into a temporary village of adventurers. It was there that an ancient amphibian sage revealed a curious truth of the natural world: frogs, when competing for a mate, sometimes gather into a chaotic, writhing phenomenon known as a Mating Ball. To commemorate the finding, each traveler received a small relic bearing the memory of the Mating Ball, forever marking those who witnessed the strange rite of the frogs.
No quest should end without treasure. By completing their first Tournament Quest, every member of the expedition unlocked the Yellow Visor, an uncommon piece of head equipment. It cannot be bought, traded, or crafted. It is earned only by traveling beneath the Moat banner to a tournament beyond the kingdom.
As with all worthy expeditions, history remembers not only the victories but the campfire conversations. Strange phrases echoed through the village long after the games had ended:
"Get that cloaca over here, girl."
"I'm Fish."
"HELP! THIS IS NOT MY DAD!"
"Remember, if it is down... we can call it up."
"Would you rather have a blime or a blumpkin?"
"Wow Rick... your tent is soooo huuuge."
Future scholars of the Moat may never decipher their meaning. Nor should they. Some relics are meant only for those who stood around the fire, or who heard the horrible tunes of that minstrel DJ.
Thus ended the First Beach Expedition. The Company returned with blisters between their toes, sand in every imaginable place, new equipment upon their brows, and fresh loot in their packs.