Vent antechamber · Velstraven · Morass Games Wiki

A small room of chapter 1. When you walk in, the room card reads: The vent door swings shut in the draft before anyone can pass.

Narrated walkthrough

Vent antechamber from its entrance — Vent antechamber: how to solve it

Getting there

Chapter 1, ground floor. Take the Entrance court's west arch; the Vent antechamber is the first room, and its south passage leads on to the Shelf passage. The vent door is a doorway in a partition inside the room, with a small landing behind it.

What is wrong

"The vent door swings shut in the draft before anyone can pass." The metal vent hood above and to the side of the door blows its draft straight down onto the door; the Hood's card says "Its breath blows straight down onto the door; the hood turns on a collar."

What you can work

Hood: The vent hood, about 2.3 m up. It turns on a collar in quarter-turn detents and sets where its draft blows.
Door: The vent door in the partition. A push swings it open; the draft swings it back unless something stops it.
Sill: A stone sill under the door's lower rib; a prop grown there can hold the open door.
Catch: A spring catch on the wall that takes the door once it is swung fully back.

Solution

A nudge

Orient turns the hood one detent on its collar. At one quarter turn its draft breathes up the wall instead of down onto the door, so nothing pushes the door shut any more.

The full solution

Aim at the Hood and cast Orient (Will + Will + Water) once.
Orient turns the hood one detent on its collar. At one quarter turn its draft breathes up the wall instead of down onto the door, so nothing pushes the door shut any more.
What you see: "The hood turns; its draft now breathes away from the door, up the wall."
Handle the Door (E; pad Square) to push it open.
A hinged door with no draft on it stays at whatever angle you leave it. Before the hood was turned, the draft swung it straight back.
What you see: "You push the door open; with the draft turned away it stays where you leave it."
Optional: once the door has swung fully back, Handle the Catch on the wall.
The spring catch holds the door by itself, so it stays open even if the hood is turned back later.
What you see: "The mechanical catch takes the door." Too early: "The open catch does not yet meet the door."
Walk through the doorway onto the landing behind the partition.
The room's goal is getting through, not just opening the door; crossing the doorway is what counts.
What you see: "Vent antechamber settled." The room card names the last repair: you are through the vent door.

Other ways that work

Brace (Growth + Growth + Growth) on the Sill: push the door open by hand first, even with the draft still on it, then cast Brace on the Sill within about three seconds, while the door is still swung wide. The strut bears on the lower rib and holds the door open at a passable angle: "The prop bears against the lower door rib and holds the door open against the draft."
The room also accepts turning the Hood by hand, but it hangs above standing reach, so a hand press from the floor answers "The handle is above ordinary standing reach." Orient is the practical way to turn it.

Watch for

Each turn moves the hood one detent. One or three quarter turns send the draft up the wall; two or four point it back at the door ("The hood turns; its draft still breathes straight onto the door."). Trust the reply, not your count.
A push against the unturned draft opens the door for a moment, then "the draft from the hood swings it shut again". That does not count as a repair.
Brace cast while the door is nearly shut is refused: "The rib is too close to the sill for a person-wide opening."
The paper draft strips by the hood show which way the air is going.
Spells on the Door itself are refused with a reason, for example Directed impulse: "a blow jars it but does not carry it open."
The Reading lamp (Handle it, or Heat it) and the Reading shutter (Handle or Orient it) stand in every room. They only light the room to read by and work none of its fittings.

If it goes wrong

This room has no failed state. To put it back as you found it, hold R for one second (pad: Start, then Restart from autosave); that reloads the autosave made when you entered the room. Nothing here can break. If the door has swung shut, turn the hood and push it again.

Achievements here

Breath of the Antechamber: Solve the Vent antechamber.

Spells used

Orient, Brace.