Post by Wolfe on Mar 28, 2020 13:07:23 GMT -5
The Amity Colosseum was a real marvel of modern engineering. Introduced six years ago at the 10th Vytal Festival, the structure is an enormous levitating arena that can move vast distances, making the journey to the host Kingdom every time the festival is held, so this time floated all the way from its home base in Atlas to Mistral for the Thirteenth Vytal Festival. The architectural marvel has a distinctive inverted cone shape that tapers to a point at the bottom where an enormous dust crystal powers the structure. Located above the main dust crystal are two levels of docking bays for air buses and other transportation to receive and offload passengers. Large archways lead passengers to the seating area which surrounds the arena. The seating area is the largest of any permanently airborne structure in the world, comfortably able to seat eighteen thousand people from across Remnant. The closest ring of seating to the arena itself are red seats reserved for contestants of the Vytal Festival itself along with other VIPs that typically include faculty members of both combat schools and Huntsman Academies along with the occasional politician or high flight businessmen.
Above the seating area are huge holographic screens, which display the aura monitors for tournament matches, as well as videos of the matches in progress to include action replays and commercials. The tournament presenters in a small booth above the top level of the seating area, and for this tournament rotate out but always form some combination of two individuals who are either current faculty members of a Big Four Academy, or former finalists of the tournament itself.
The audience is protected by an invisible force field which prevents projectiles and other objects from leaving the fighting area powered by hard light dust. When hit, the force field pulses a light blue color and ripples around the impact. It can prevent flying contestants from smashing into the spectator stands and is also able to absorb stray bullets or semblance attacks.
The tournament matches themselves take place in a large octagonal arena measuring 150 meters in diameter. The arena can change its environment into several different "biomes", including grasslands, forest, fire, ice, geyser fields, stormy mountains, desert, an ocean and beach with a wooden ship, city ruins, gravity arenas, and a swamp. The arena also has artificial weather effects, such as thunderstorms and an artificial sun. In all matches, the central octagonal section measuring 50 meters in diameter remains the same regardless of the biome.
During the team round, the arena is split evenly into two biomes, which are chosen randomly at the beginning of every fight for each half of the arena. For this opening match of the First Year bracket, the biomes randomly chosen were City and Desert.
To the left side of the arena, the combatants can see a sprawling urban area that was old and decrepit, made up of beaten and battered old buildings and thus providing a very cramped battleground where advantages in range would not matter nearly as much. Most of the buildings appear to be made of brick and concrete, but a few have wooden barricades or steel support beams contributing to the overall ruinous state of the arena. There seem to be about six structures arranged along a cracked and broken asphalt road, each standing around 20-25 meters tall, with 2-4 floors each, all with at least one wall completely exposed. It wouldn’t be nearly as exciting if the audience couldn’t see what was going on, now would it? Each room is about 5-10 meters in length and width, and each floor is furnished with real but inoperable equipment like a standard apartment complex would be, with dilapidated bedrooms, kitchens, bathrooms, and similar living areas.
To the right side of the arena, the combatants can see a barren waste of sand dunes with some as tall as 6 meters and inhabited only by the occasional cactus or tumbleweed. Hot and hostile, this climate is best suited for students from Vacuo, but the desert isn’t exactly kind to them either due to the increased drain on stamina within the blistering heat. A wicked sandstorm whirls across this field, impairing vision where it passes to complicate any long-ranged combat.
This particular match would be fought between Haven Academy’s Team KASH who came in as their school’s first seeded team and Atlas Academy’s Team ARCT (Arctic) who came in as their school’s third seeded team. The following graphic flashed up on the big screens as the introductions began, with the aura levels of each student being displayed under their names. On the commentary team for this particular match was current Haven Academy faculty member Theloria Shadecloak and her former teammate and current Vale Huntress Bianca Hunter. They were teammates on Team CBLT (Cobalt) who were finalists in the Eighth Vytal Festival Tournament.
The first voice over the mic was much more boisterous and animated than Shade’s own, so it must belong to Bianca. ”Hello, ladies and gentlemen and welcome to the opening rounds of the Thirteenth Vytal Festival Tournament! What we have here is a couple of first year teams duking it out for one of two guaranteed spots in the final eight where the best two teams of every year along with two wild cards will duke it out for the title of Vytal Festival Champion!”
The woman was really animated, and it was clear that she was no stranger to speaking on a live mic. ”I am currently a huntress in the Kingdom of the Vale and my name is Bianca Hunter and I happy as heck to say that I am joined by my former teammate and current Haven Academy faculty member Theloria Shadecloak to bring all of you live commentary on this match between the third seeded Team ARCT from Atlas Academy and the first seeded Team KASH from Haven Academy. The biomes selected for this match by the rolly-spinny thingy or as my colleague Thelly likes to call them ‘Random Number Generators’ is City and Desert, meaning that this match will most likely not be fought at range and will likely come down to who can close the gap and beat the hell out of their opponent.”
There was a pause to breathe that lasted only a moment or two before Bianca continued: ”That is the Atlas Team ARCT stepping out right now with Team Leader Aarbei in the front with the blonde hair and the thick metal gauntlets, Rajani behind him with the beanie and the long rifle, Cam behind him with the orange hat with the dual pistols, and Todd behind that with the yellow goggles and some classic submachine guns in either hand. Annnd I’ll then pass it over to Thelly to introduce the Haven Academy team.”
Aside from getting a visual look at their enemies, for the first round the First Years were going in blind. They didn’t know the semblances of their enemies due to no past footage to study, and they didn’t really even know their capabilities unless they figured it out somehow from the classmates of the team they were fighting against.
Shade’s voice then came on the mic, neutral and emotionless as ever as Team KASH went into the arena. ”The purple haired girl in the front with the umbrella is the team leader, Kishka. The redhead with the wicked metal limbs is Brigit, and the white haired faunus behind her with the bow is Argent. The other redhead trailing a bit behind them is Holly, and together they’re the first seeded Haven Academy Team KASH.”
Bianca’s voice cut in quickly after that to immediately stir up some drama. ”So, since I hear most of these are yours and in your class every day you should have a good idea of their combat capabilities. What percentage chance do you give them of winning this match, Thelly?”
”One hundred.” was the immediate response from Shade.
”One hundred percent? Damn, Thelly living up to her name and throwing shade literally before the first match even starts. Any particular reason why you think so?”
”Frankly, with the Huntsmen shortage Haven Academy first years have gone through way more danger and way more practical training that any other First Year class since the very first right at the end of the Great War. Each one of the members of Team KASH has gone through the equivalent of a Huntsman level mission with only the support of the other trainees to keep them going. The gap in combat experience is just too large in my opinion, because three of the members of the Haven team down there were in the Rochdale mission and fought against threats up to and including Alpha Beowolves which are threats to licensed huntresses.” was the long form answer from Shade, but Bianca had some words immediately for that canned response.
”So you’re saying that other first years don’t have the same level of danger and field experience?”
”Yeah, I think that’s fair.” was the response from Shade.
”But I seem to recall that we fought against a Deathstalker in our first year at Beacon, so maybe you’re not giving the other schools enough credit.” Bianca started, but the other faunus interrupted her.
”Bianca, we ran from a Deathstalker our first year at Beacon.”
”That may be true, but we did try and fight it first.” was the concession from Bianca, before shifting gears as the timer began to count down on the bottom left of the screens. This timer showed when the match would start and was currently at the two minute mark.
”Alright, it looks like the match is going to start here within the next minute or two. For those just tuning in – this is the Vytal Festival’s opening rounds, featuring First Year huntsmen trainees from across Remnant. The camera is now focused on the middle area between the two biomes, which is give or take about fifty meters long. At the beginning of the match, each team gets half of the center area and can deploy however they want so long as they do not go backwards into one of the biomes or forwards into the other team’s section. The red line on the big screen shows the dividing line, and placement along that line usually reveals a lot about each team’s strategy. Team ARCT, for example, is very close to the line with all four members within about five meters of each other and is visibly looking like they’re going to charge over at first opportunity. With less than a minute to go until this match starts, Team KASH has very little time to decide how they want to play against that extreme aggression from the Atlesian team. Thelly, what does the position of Team ARCT say to you?”
”That they think they can charge over the gap and steamroll the Haven team. The only reason you’d ever toe that line instead of starting much farther back and using the biomes is if you for some reason want to fight in that open, flat area in the middle of the arena. You do this if you have ranged attacks that would be much harder in either the City or Desert environments, or you do this because you think you’re fast enough to just run the enemy down before they can get a chance to set up. Their confidence must be very high to try such a risky strategy, and we’ll see how it works out with them Bianca.” was the final word from Shade as the timer hit the final ten seconds and Bianca took the mic again to count down along with the screen.
”Five… Four… Three… Two… One… BEGIN!”
Above the seating area are huge holographic screens, which display the aura monitors for tournament matches, as well as videos of the matches in progress to include action replays and commercials. The tournament presenters in a small booth above the top level of the seating area, and for this tournament rotate out but always form some combination of two individuals who are either current faculty members of a Big Four Academy, or former finalists of the tournament itself.
The audience is protected by an invisible force field which prevents projectiles and other objects from leaving the fighting area powered by hard light dust. When hit, the force field pulses a light blue color and ripples around the impact. It can prevent flying contestants from smashing into the spectator stands and is also able to absorb stray bullets or semblance attacks.
The tournament matches themselves take place in a large octagonal arena measuring 150 meters in diameter. The arena can change its environment into several different "biomes", including grasslands, forest, fire, ice, geyser fields, stormy mountains, desert, an ocean and beach with a wooden ship, city ruins, gravity arenas, and a swamp. The arena also has artificial weather effects, such as thunderstorms and an artificial sun. In all matches, the central octagonal section measuring 50 meters in diameter remains the same regardless of the biome.
During the team round, the arena is split evenly into two biomes, which are chosen randomly at the beginning of every fight for each half of the arena. For this opening match of the First Year bracket, the biomes randomly chosen were City and Desert.
To the left side of the arena, the combatants can see a sprawling urban area that was old and decrepit, made up of beaten and battered old buildings and thus providing a very cramped battleground where advantages in range would not matter nearly as much. Most of the buildings appear to be made of brick and concrete, but a few have wooden barricades or steel support beams contributing to the overall ruinous state of the arena. There seem to be about six structures arranged along a cracked and broken asphalt road, each standing around 20-25 meters tall, with 2-4 floors each, all with at least one wall completely exposed. It wouldn’t be nearly as exciting if the audience couldn’t see what was going on, now would it? Each room is about 5-10 meters in length and width, and each floor is furnished with real but inoperable equipment like a standard apartment complex would be, with dilapidated bedrooms, kitchens, bathrooms, and similar living areas.
To the right side of the arena, the combatants can see a barren waste of sand dunes with some as tall as 6 meters and inhabited only by the occasional cactus or tumbleweed. Hot and hostile, this climate is best suited for students from Vacuo, but the desert isn’t exactly kind to them either due to the increased drain on stamina within the blistering heat. A wicked sandstorm whirls across this field, impairing vision where it passes to complicate any long-ranged combat.
This particular match would be fought between Haven Academy’s Team KASH who came in as their school’s first seeded team and Atlas Academy’s Team ARCT (Arctic) who came in as their school’s third seeded team. The following graphic flashed up on the big screens as the introductions began, with the aura levels of each student being displayed under their names. On the commentary team for this particular match was current Haven Academy faculty member Theloria Shadecloak and her former teammate and current Vale Huntress Bianca Hunter. They were teammates on Team CBLT (Cobalt) who were finalists in the Eighth Vytal Festival Tournament.
The first voice over the mic was much more boisterous and animated than Shade’s own, so it must belong to Bianca. ”Hello, ladies and gentlemen and welcome to the opening rounds of the Thirteenth Vytal Festival Tournament! What we have here is a couple of first year teams duking it out for one of two guaranteed spots in the final eight where the best two teams of every year along with two wild cards will duke it out for the title of Vytal Festival Champion!”
The woman was really animated, and it was clear that she was no stranger to speaking on a live mic. ”I am currently a huntress in the Kingdom of the Vale and my name is Bianca Hunter and I happy as heck to say that I am joined by my former teammate and current Haven Academy faculty member Theloria Shadecloak to bring all of you live commentary on this match between the third seeded Team ARCT from Atlas Academy and the first seeded Team KASH from Haven Academy. The biomes selected for this match by the rolly-spinny thingy or as my colleague Thelly likes to call them ‘Random Number Generators’ is City and Desert, meaning that this match will most likely not be fought at range and will likely come down to who can close the gap and beat the hell out of their opponent.”
There was a pause to breathe that lasted only a moment or two before Bianca continued: ”That is the Atlas Team ARCT stepping out right now with Team Leader Aarbei in the front with the blonde hair and the thick metal gauntlets, Rajani behind him with the beanie and the long rifle, Cam behind him with the orange hat with the dual pistols, and Todd behind that with the yellow goggles and some classic submachine guns in either hand. Annnd I’ll then pass it over to Thelly to introduce the Haven Academy team.”
Aside from getting a visual look at their enemies, for the first round the First Years were going in blind. They didn’t know the semblances of their enemies due to no past footage to study, and they didn’t really even know their capabilities unless they figured it out somehow from the classmates of the team they were fighting against.
Shade’s voice then came on the mic, neutral and emotionless as ever as Team KASH went into the arena. ”The purple haired girl in the front with the umbrella is the team leader, Kishka. The redhead with the wicked metal limbs is Brigit, and the white haired faunus behind her with the bow is Argent. The other redhead trailing a bit behind them is Holly, and together they’re the first seeded Haven Academy Team KASH.”
Bianca’s voice cut in quickly after that to immediately stir up some drama. ”So, since I hear most of these are yours and in your class every day you should have a good idea of their combat capabilities. What percentage chance do you give them of winning this match, Thelly?”
”One hundred.” was the immediate response from Shade.
”One hundred percent? Damn, Thelly living up to her name and throwing shade literally before the first match even starts. Any particular reason why you think so?”
”Frankly, with the Huntsmen shortage Haven Academy first years have gone through way more danger and way more practical training that any other First Year class since the very first right at the end of the Great War. Each one of the members of Team KASH has gone through the equivalent of a Huntsman level mission with only the support of the other trainees to keep them going. The gap in combat experience is just too large in my opinion, because three of the members of the Haven team down there were in the Rochdale mission and fought against threats up to and including Alpha Beowolves which are threats to licensed huntresses.” was the long form answer from Shade, but Bianca had some words immediately for that canned response.
”So you’re saying that other first years don’t have the same level of danger and field experience?”
”Yeah, I think that’s fair.” was the response from Shade.
”But I seem to recall that we fought against a Deathstalker in our first year at Beacon, so maybe you’re not giving the other schools enough credit.” Bianca started, but the other faunus interrupted her.
”Bianca, we ran from a Deathstalker our first year at Beacon.”
”That may be true, but we did try and fight it first.” was the concession from Bianca, before shifting gears as the timer began to count down on the bottom left of the screens. This timer showed when the match would start and was currently at the two minute mark.
”Alright, it looks like the match is going to start here within the next minute or two. For those just tuning in – this is the Vytal Festival’s opening rounds, featuring First Year huntsmen trainees from across Remnant. The camera is now focused on the middle area between the two biomes, which is give or take about fifty meters long. At the beginning of the match, each team gets half of the center area and can deploy however they want so long as they do not go backwards into one of the biomes or forwards into the other team’s section. The red line on the big screen shows the dividing line, and placement along that line usually reveals a lot about each team’s strategy. Team ARCT, for example, is very close to the line with all four members within about five meters of each other and is visibly looking like they’re going to charge over at first opportunity. With less than a minute to go until this match starts, Team KASH has very little time to decide how they want to play against that extreme aggression from the Atlesian team. Thelly, what does the position of Team ARCT say to you?”
”That they think they can charge over the gap and steamroll the Haven team. The only reason you’d ever toe that line instead of starting much farther back and using the biomes is if you for some reason want to fight in that open, flat area in the middle of the arena. You do this if you have ranged attacks that would be much harder in either the City or Desert environments, or you do this because you think you’re fast enough to just run the enemy down before they can get a chance to set up. Their confidence must be very high to try such a risky strategy, and we’ll see how it works out with them Bianca.” was the final word from Shade as the timer hit the final ten seconds and Bianca took the mic again to count down along with the screen.
”Five… Four… Three… Two… One… BEGIN!”
1950 total words