Greetings Starmourners,
Dust off your snowboots and pull on your mittens, because Winterflame is here again!
For the uninitiated - because we DO have a lot of new faces this year - here's a little backstory! (For those who know the story already, just scroll past this part.)
Five hundred years ago, a Tukkav by the name of Laus Koldain began a new tradition, which he called Winterflame. The holiday was modeled after traditional Toof Circles, but with a decidedly more inclusive bent. Occuring once every four years, Winterflame is focused around togetherness, a way for Tukkav in all corners of the galaxy to extend their natural feelings of hospitality and warmth to non-Tukkav. This multi-racial holiday has become rather popular, with gift giving, story circles, and of course, drinking, as popular mainstays and traditions.
As usual, transport to Winterflame will be available from Omni Station. But there's something a little different about getting to the festival grounds this year...Rohna Guzmas, Firekeeper and Winterflame Ambassador, will probably be able to tell you more.
Just like last year, expect things to happen all month long as we add new faces, introduce new features, create new content, and keep things rolling along just like a snowball.
Right now, you can go and enjoy the snowmounds, start a snowball fight, make some snowmen (be sure to PUSH mounds and snowmen), learn about Winterflame and get accustomed to the cold climate.
As for this month's promo, it's....you guessed it: GIFTCATCHERS!
WHAT THE HECK ARE GIFTCATCHERS?
Giftcatchers are a Winterflame tradition that evolved from the Tukkav custom of hanging gift-laden nets in the doorways of their huts before a hunt. Originally meant to appease the local spirits, the custom became associated with prosperity and generosity over time. It was enthusiastically adopted by offworld celebrants as an integral part of Winterflame gift-giving.
Giftcatchers are available for purchase on the website and you are able to hang them in-game for yourself or your friends! Once you've purchased them, you can simply HANG GIFTCATCHER FOR ME or HANG GIFTCATCHER FOR <player> and it will be placed in the room! You can additionally add ANONYMOUS to the end to give someone an anonymous gift!
Once hung, they will be filled with gifts sometime during the in-game day! Giftcatchers come in 4 varieties: Simple, Silver, Gold and Platinum, with each tier containing higher and higher values of gifts inside! That's not to say that you won't luck out if you stick with the Simple giftcatchers, though - they have a chance to contain all the gifts as well. After a giftcatcher is full, you may OPEN GIFTCATCHER and retrieve your prizes. Check out HELP GIFTCATCHERS to learn more about the workings of these Winterflame specials.
There are a LOT of prizes in the giftcatchers this year, so let's get right into the prize list. Among the prizes you can get are:
a fire pit table
an MX-C001 snowball machine (with flavor syrups!)
a flame-wreathed genevault
a frost-cold genevault
a bunch of brand new fish (in a chilled plastic fish bag)
a ConflaGreat portable incinerator
a garish bag of festive sweets (courtesy of Candy Dan)
Along with countless toys, games, minipets, collectible cards, atomic matter articulators, and much more.
As for artifacts (because of course there's artifacts), as a great BIG present to all of you, we have made EVERY promotional artie ever released in Starmourn available in the giftcatchers this year - and there's so many of those, I can't even list them all!
Additionally, for every 5 giftcatcher of each type you purchase, you'll receive either a hunter's or tracker's version of that tier! So if you purchase 5 gold giftcatchers you'll get a tracker's (or hunter's) gold giftcatcher. These special versions contain double the reward value as the regular versions! However, these giftcatchers will only be filled on December 25th (tracker) and January 1st, 2020 (hunter). These tallies count over multiple purchases, so if you purchase 5 single giftcatchers over the month, you'll get a special version with your 5th purchase.
The SS Ironbeard is also back this month, and while whoever pilots this massive capital ship remains a galactic mystery that would stump the wisest Rek Chronomaster, what ISN'T mysterious is the packages full of goodies that it rains down upon whatever planet it is currently orbiting.
NOTE: The SS Ironbeard will only orbit racial homeworlds (and Scatterhome, since it counts as a racial homeworld. But not Glisal II or Song) and will toss gifts to everyone who happens to be on the surface at the time. You may only receive one such free gift per day.
Happy Flameday!
