I like town adventures although it generally doesn't do much as far as xp is concerned. But with a large group I don't get much opportunity to role play "down time" or just a good party/tavern crawl.
But in this case we had one and as I had expected, the BBG had made a visit at a time when the party could not directly conflict with him.
Of course one of my players decided to do that anyway and critically screwed up the BBG big time! In doing so he also killed himself in the process but it did derail the current path the adventure was going on for the next 2 meetings.
That's what I like - when the party takes my plans and forces me to dump them. No kidding - really - it makes for a better game for everyone.
Write up follows:
As Guyus was mounting his paladinial steed the rest of the party was trying to plead with the knight that he was making a large mistake. Confronting another person here, in town, now? This could only end badly especially since we did not know WHAT Karis was doing here. Guyus began trotting after Karis’ fading form. Gwyn was contemplating a dose of stun poison to the horse, some of the party was following, but it was Detheron and a call to Frey to hold the animal that stopped Guyus’ ride.
While there was arguing in the street over what was happening, Norris ran down the alley behind the 3 Dog Hotel to try and follow the half-ogre when a figure confronted him from the darkness. Another man was there and would not let Norris pass, holding him at bay with his rapier. The two men bandied words, a tossed net, as well as a slash or two and the other figure tried to whistle out a sleep spell which failed. Great, a bard of some sort. He whistled out a message spell to someone named Maulin and Norris backed away. The two men walked back to where they had come, Norris unable to follow Karis through the alleys and the other bard successful in stopping the half-elf in his attempt.
As for the rest of the party, they had gotten Guyus calmed down and eventually the party was given to understand to follow Karis was not an option. Most of them went back to 3 Dog to rest while Detheron and Ludwig went to Grey Raven Hospice to heal those who needed their help. It was a bit after 11 when the party was all together again and we talked about what was to happen next.
Karis and co (Red Clouds) were here and seemed to have no interest in the Lycos Suns – instead looking for information on Kysoth. As in Kysoth’s Helm, the item Havic had gotten in Glittercap. We wanted them to go and to leave soon – but needed to lure them out of town. We decided to forge a copy of Frink’s map as well as the paperwork/page from Kysoth’s tome and get a local member of the thieves guild to sell it to the Red Clouds – thereby outfitting Karis and his people with what they wanted, getting them out of town, and doing it in a way where the Sundered Chains was not directly tied to it.
We needed to find the local guild and Norris went to the Split Beard Tavern, taking Aleron with him as muscle assuming something went wrong. The bard walked around, buying a drink or two, playing a song, and subtly reaching out to the patrons there. Two of them did speak with him, one was a loud youngish man named Anannis who was clumsily trying to signal being a thief but failing at it (Norris eventually left him behind), the other was a average nondescript man named Lamelon who was indeed a member of the local guild. Norris explained what he wanted and they settled on a deal of roughly almost a dozen doses of the antidote the alchemist was working on.
The two friends left and Norris made a drop of the documents when Thurin was done with them, meanwhile Aleron did take 5 crowns from Anannis offering to do the job the young man wanted (seemed to be a marriage certificate dated at least 5 days ago).
We awoke at 8 and took breakfast where we shared what we had learned and went over what our plans were today. Thurin and Mebali were going to go back to Morei where they would continue to help the alchemist. Supposedly an aviary was sent to Dilabria and we were hoping that a lifting on the quarantine would occur that would allow other alchemists up north to help the beleaguered Morei and Flatrock in making more distillates and cures.
The rest of us went to the Grey Raven Hospice where Father Timon Beerdrinker had tapped a number of “holy” casks of very potent ale. We joined him and what acolytes here in numerous toasts and then we started getting patients, passerbys, anyone who wanted to drink and party with us on successfully curing the plague. The hours flew by and the group of revelers had gotten to almost 60 by this point. Detheron had miscast a spell and one of the personages was floating upside down by a single foot. Most everyone was either comatose, blitzed, or incapable of much of anything. Only Havic and Gwyn were mostly vertical, their dwarven constitutions overriding most of the effects of the alcohol.
But it was when Havic noticed that Iohannes was here, and one or two other members of the Lycos Sun sharing a brew with everyone…as well as Vanir. Holy crap!!! The dwarven barbarian tried to have Norris cast a spell on him but the bard miscast his own spell and made 9 members of the party turn invisible! Taking advantage of the situation, Havic snuck behind Vanir, took out his enchanted boar spear “Jotunfang” and stabbed the mage from behind! He hit him a second time and hissed in the mage’s ear.
Vanir reached back, grabbed the dwarf, and a ring on his hand flared to rainbow light. The two of them disappeared! Havic was dropped to the floor in some strange room somewhere, Vanir right in front of him. The mage’s hands came up but the dwarf was a split moment faster. He whipped both of his enchanted Lightning Javelins and hurled them. A crackle filled the room and a blast of twin bolts tore through the mage, hit the wall, bounced back, and did so again and again until both the dwarf and the mage slumped over – Havic’s last sight before dying was Vanir staggering, his clothing on fire.
Being as the party was drunk, no one noticed what happened, either Vanir appearing or Havic disappearing. Iohannes and his people left and Gwyn watched them go. By this time it was about 4 and most everyone was unconscious except for Gwyn, Detheron and Guyus when representatives from Sir Bork had arrived. We were summoned to the nobleman in fact this was the 4th summons today (the others had fallen victim to the ale and party).
Staggering (except for Gwyn) we walked out of the Hospice and across town to Bork Keep. It was Marketday though and Detheron took us for a detour through the stalls – eventually filled with a desire to purchase an entire 200’ long spool of braided leather cord. He dumped most of his commons and carried his purchase with a drunken smile. We arrived at Bork Keep, gave up our weapons, and went in to see the nobleman who was apparently waiting 6 hours for us to arrive. He was not happy.
Plus when we did arrive it was only 3 of us and two of the group was practically blindingly drunk. Gwyn tried to talk to the nobleman, explaining that we did not get any of the summonses and that we were relieved from curing the plague and were caught up in the festivities. Sir Bork was understanding (sort of) and left it to Gwyn that we should all come back to see him tomorrow at 11 AM.
From here we went back to the 3 Dog Hotel, Sir Bork having lent us two guards to help get the party home. Upon arrival though the proprietor was sitting there unmoving and our hackles were rising. The door down the hall opened and suddenly web arrows filled the air. It immobilized most of the group except for Gwyn who was just under their sticky reach. Aleron had awoken long enough to find himself stretched out in the webs.
But the last figure down the hall was the red leather jerkin wearing figure of Maulin, the mage and second command of the Red Clouds. He disappeared in a spray of sparks and one of the member busted into a nearby room. Gwyn gave chase and heard splintering wood – eventually seeing the shuttered window in the back had burst open and the figure was down the alley and gone. However in the bed was a very charred and burned dwarven figure, Gwyn had no idea the significance
The webs were cut free and the guards went back to inform the militia what had happened. Gwyn brought everyone to a single room and was laying out broken glass in the hall as an alarm when he heard a zap behind him.
Blinking into the room with his unconscious companions was Maulin. He had a wand pointed at the dwarf and his hand was hovering over Detheron. They exchanged words, Maulin saying that Karis wanted only a second item now (what was the first) and then would leave. He took Detheron’s magical staff Heimdall’s Bulwark and the two foes exchanged a last set of quips before Maulin blinked away.
Tuesday, September 27, 2011
Thursday, September 22, 2011
Meet 143, Adv 12, 9/10/11
Sometimes characters die, other times campaigns end, other times characters are retired. I don't remember all of them and I'm sorry to those that I do and have forgotten, however when able to I do bring back past PC's for cameo appearances now and again.
This time I've turned a former PC, friend, and party leader into the enemy. The party knows he was a bad ass and what some of his strengths were, but they also know that it's been a year and a half in game time and the bad former friend has gone over to the dark side and joined with the other adventuring group that almost 2 years ago kicked the party's ass - and apparently took over as leader.
They don't seem as anxious to face their former companion as they once did and are even more unsure of the firepower he now has at his beck and call.
Write up follows:
At the border of Rakewood with the autumn sun slowly making its way towards the horizon, Aleron had his falcon fly off to the east to scout the area for any trouble that might be there, finding none. With care we walked across the badlands towards the dotted shape of the northwestern homesteads until the sun had set and just around 10 we arrived exhausted at Frink’s old home.
Where to put the 59 pilgrims we had as well as our own sizeable group? We cleared out the two homes as best as possible and situated all the children and some of the women there. Then we set up smaller camps around in groups of 5 and 10, hoping the sky would remain clear throughout the night. No fires. It was to be a cold meal at best and the group now about 70 in number slumped off to sleep.
Havic took first watch and he realized very swiftly that this was a BIG group of people, over a large area. And we were out in the open. The time passed and when it was through he awoke Mebali. Throughout the night, whoever was on watch had their eyes opened and ears alert. The badlands were quiet for the most part, only a strange noise closer to dawn from the north.
We awoke a bit after 7 and after prayers and breaking our fast we decided not to head back to Flatrock via Kreladale to avoid any entanglements with Vanir, orcs, or the Lycos Suns. So instead we would walk south for two hours and then use the far sight of High Mesa as a landmark and make our way towards the city.
We did have to pass by the Dunbury homestead where we were told to leave and go away by whatever hermitage lived there. Around 10:30 we shifted our path east southeast and after noon came through Northgate with our charges in tow. The Hetman of the pilgrims and his 3 adjuncts were taken into custody by the local militia, escorted to Black Court for failing to adhere to the quarantine the town was under. Meanwhile word of our return and supposed “cure” was being spread. The guards did say that Iohannes and the Lycos Suns had come in this morning with a new passel of dirt, bugs, and other possible points of contagion and were at the Alchemist’s tower with Morei now. And there were new adventurers in town also; their leader was a giant of some sort.
The group did not want to meet Iohannes or this other group at this time so they went to the 3 Dog Hotel where they eventually grouped in one of the rooms to discuss plans and possibilities. We wanted to find out what was going on at Morei’s so Norris opted to go. Meanwhile Thurin was going to copy a set of Thane Kysoth Beldenstone’s notes and Havic was out to get his hammer from Coogan Smithery.
Norris returned with some poor news. Morei was there as well as Iohannes and a handful of his men, but also a large figure, almost 8’ tall, half-ogrish, clad in heavy steel armor and a greenish cast his brown skin and mismatched sized eyes. Who was he? Someone from another adventuring group, Red Clouds, and he was angry at Iohannes and did not want to leave until the Lycos Sun’s representative would speak with him.
We talked about this figure until it was postulated that this might be our long removed and erstwhile leader/companion, Karis. The description matched, the attitude matched, and he did have some dealings with the Red Clouds – specifically the former leader a brutish fighter-type named Feldon. Was this Karis? The Red Clouds already had a problem with us from over a year ago – we needed to verify this.
Aleron volunteered to go to the Far Travel Hotel and seek out any information on the Red Clouds and what was going on. Were they with the Lycos Suns? We needed answers. The king’s man ventured off eventually getting to Sword Gate where he spoke with some of the guards there and counted 11 of the mercenary types hanging outside. He had some conversation with a member of the Red Clouds, a fairly astute figured named Maulin, and Aleron was verbally rebuffed, the ranger leaving with what graces he could and then went to the Far Travel to get information that way.
The innkeep was willing to talk and a few coins passed to pay for the information, learning that there were 7 or so main members and 5 or 6 hirelings/henchmen. The leader was indeed Karis and most of the Clouds did not stay in town, hiding outside the town near the stables. They had been here for a day or so and seemed to be paying day to day – wanting to leave whenever the Karis figure wanted their party to go. Aleron left and once outside – felt a bit odd and lightheaded – but kept going back to the party, telling them what he had learned.
We needed to know when Karis was going to leave the alchemists as we did NOT want to run into him at all, keeping our presence a secret. Thurin sent his familiar, Pop, to hide outside the alchemist’s tower and would let the mage know when the ogre left.
At this point Havic and Aleron went to the Black Court where they presented Corvalis Trueborn with the pages from Thane Kysoth Beldenstone and told of Glittercap. The dwarven magistrate grew wroth, wanting to know WHY the party did not bring the supposed disease origin to the lab yet? We had a wrap around explanation where we spoke of Karis and him being there was going to cause a problem. Corvalis dispatched a 4 count of the court officers to Morei’s lab with orders to tell Karis to leave the alchemist at this time as he was impeding the search and processing of a cure for the people of Flatrock.
We did learn that someone from the Red Clouds had come to the court earlier this morning for any information about a Kysoth, it was memorable because to Corvalis this was the 2nd time in the same day that anyone brought him anything about Kysoth. We thanked the magistrate and rejoined the party, happy to learn through Pop that Karis was indeed escorted away.
At 3:30 we went to the Alchemist’s Lab where we showed Morei our tick head, the egg, and assorted water and dirt. We did talk with Iohannes who was surprised at what we had brought. He told Morei that she should stop going over the items the Lycos Suns had brought and devote her attention to the Sundered Chains and their findings.
Morei was going to work on the distillate tonight, and Mebali and Thurin were going to stay and help her. She figured it would take about 6 hours to work up a successful test and then would know if it could be a cure. Iohannes volunteered to take the party out for dinner, the Lycos Suns and the Sundered Chains. He suggested the Dog and Fox and we agreed.
Dinner was at 6 and our combined group (missing the wheelwright and the wizard of course) numbered around 20. Unsure at first what to expect we were surprised to have a pleasant evening. Iohannes showed no sign of remembering Detheron or Gwyn, made no comment that the Lycos Suns had any negative dealing in the past with the Sundered Chains, and was forthcoming with history of the group.
He was looking to charter a teamstering organization but didn’t want to start from scratch, so purchased the defunct charter of the Lycos Suns and gave what past dues and fees were necessary. They then took small jobs as well as those sponsored by the Slaver’s Guild and used the former contacts the Lycos Suns had established as a spring board for the new organization. He did comment that about 3 months after they had been reestablished there was a box released to them that had been held.
It contained some contracts, a few letters, some credit marks, and 12 bronze headed amulets that looked like wolf heads. He then showed us one from his neck. He also volunteered that they were useful to get past some wards. We shared information with then and when we next noticed, it was after 8:30 and we had had a rather great meal with Iohannes and his people.
We wished them well and when they left, talked about what we had learned. Detheron was convinced that Iohannes and his people were telling the truth BUT they were also convinced that they were the same group and people from over a year ago. Was it a spell? Forgetfulness? Domination? We fretted over the possibilities for a while until the beer had run dry and there was nothing more to do except call it a night.
It was about 9:30 when we picked ourselves up and left the Dog and Fox, intending to head towards the Alchemist’s Tower and see if the items they had brought back did indeed form the basis of a cure for the plague. When they left the tavern though they couldn’t help but notice across the main thoroughfare on Cheapside Ave was a gargantuan figure riding the largest Clydesdale horse they could ever fathom finding. He was clad in a heavy set of black platemail, sported a heavy war lance complete with pennant, and was watching the group.
Guyus looked at the figure intently and was hit with a heavy sensation that it was evil, definitely and decidedly so. However, we did note that the figure was staring right back at Guyus with the same level of intensity that our paladin was showing! Karis? We sure thought so.
He turned his horse about and rode at a cantor down Cheapside Avenue away from the party. Guyus gave a whistle and his paladinial steed appeared at his will, the knight growling that that figure was evil and we should follow him now.
This time I've turned a former PC, friend, and party leader into the enemy. The party knows he was a bad ass and what some of his strengths were, but they also know that it's been a year and a half in game time and the bad former friend has gone over to the dark side and joined with the other adventuring group that almost 2 years ago kicked the party's ass - and apparently took over as leader.
They don't seem as anxious to face their former companion as they once did and are even more unsure of the firepower he now has at his beck and call.
Write up follows:
At the border of Rakewood with the autumn sun slowly making its way towards the horizon, Aleron had his falcon fly off to the east to scout the area for any trouble that might be there, finding none. With care we walked across the badlands towards the dotted shape of the northwestern homesteads until the sun had set and just around 10 we arrived exhausted at Frink’s old home.
Where to put the 59 pilgrims we had as well as our own sizeable group? We cleared out the two homes as best as possible and situated all the children and some of the women there. Then we set up smaller camps around in groups of 5 and 10, hoping the sky would remain clear throughout the night. No fires. It was to be a cold meal at best and the group now about 70 in number slumped off to sleep.
Havic took first watch and he realized very swiftly that this was a BIG group of people, over a large area. And we were out in the open. The time passed and when it was through he awoke Mebali. Throughout the night, whoever was on watch had their eyes opened and ears alert. The badlands were quiet for the most part, only a strange noise closer to dawn from the north.
We awoke a bit after 7 and after prayers and breaking our fast we decided not to head back to Flatrock via Kreladale to avoid any entanglements with Vanir, orcs, or the Lycos Suns. So instead we would walk south for two hours and then use the far sight of High Mesa as a landmark and make our way towards the city.
We did have to pass by the Dunbury homestead where we were told to leave and go away by whatever hermitage lived there. Around 10:30 we shifted our path east southeast and after noon came through Northgate with our charges in tow. The Hetman of the pilgrims and his 3 adjuncts were taken into custody by the local militia, escorted to Black Court for failing to adhere to the quarantine the town was under. Meanwhile word of our return and supposed “cure” was being spread. The guards did say that Iohannes and the Lycos Suns had come in this morning with a new passel of dirt, bugs, and other possible points of contagion and were at the Alchemist’s tower with Morei now. And there were new adventurers in town also; their leader was a giant of some sort.
The group did not want to meet Iohannes or this other group at this time so they went to the 3 Dog Hotel where they eventually grouped in one of the rooms to discuss plans and possibilities. We wanted to find out what was going on at Morei’s so Norris opted to go. Meanwhile Thurin was going to copy a set of Thane Kysoth Beldenstone’s notes and Havic was out to get his hammer from Coogan Smithery.
Norris returned with some poor news. Morei was there as well as Iohannes and a handful of his men, but also a large figure, almost 8’ tall, half-ogrish, clad in heavy steel armor and a greenish cast his brown skin and mismatched sized eyes. Who was he? Someone from another adventuring group, Red Clouds, and he was angry at Iohannes and did not want to leave until the Lycos Sun’s representative would speak with him.
We talked about this figure until it was postulated that this might be our long removed and erstwhile leader/companion, Karis. The description matched, the attitude matched, and he did have some dealings with the Red Clouds – specifically the former leader a brutish fighter-type named Feldon. Was this Karis? The Red Clouds already had a problem with us from over a year ago – we needed to verify this.
Aleron volunteered to go to the Far Travel Hotel and seek out any information on the Red Clouds and what was going on. Were they with the Lycos Suns? We needed answers. The king’s man ventured off eventually getting to Sword Gate where he spoke with some of the guards there and counted 11 of the mercenary types hanging outside. He had some conversation with a member of the Red Clouds, a fairly astute figured named Maulin, and Aleron was verbally rebuffed, the ranger leaving with what graces he could and then went to the Far Travel to get information that way.
The innkeep was willing to talk and a few coins passed to pay for the information, learning that there were 7 or so main members and 5 or 6 hirelings/henchmen. The leader was indeed Karis and most of the Clouds did not stay in town, hiding outside the town near the stables. They had been here for a day or so and seemed to be paying day to day – wanting to leave whenever the Karis figure wanted their party to go. Aleron left and once outside – felt a bit odd and lightheaded – but kept going back to the party, telling them what he had learned.
We needed to know when Karis was going to leave the alchemists as we did NOT want to run into him at all, keeping our presence a secret. Thurin sent his familiar, Pop, to hide outside the alchemist’s tower and would let the mage know when the ogre left.
At this point Havic and Aleron went to the Black Court where they presented Corvalis Trueborn with the pages from Thane Kysoth Beldenstone and told of Glittercap. The dwarven magistrate grew wroth, wanting to know WHY the party did not bring the supposed disease origin to the lab yet? We had a wrap around explanation where we spoke of Karis and him being there was going to cause a problem. Corvalis dispatched a 4 count of the court officers to Morei’s lab with orders to tell Karis to leave the alchemist at this time as he was impeding the search and processing of a cure for the people of Flatrock.
We did learn that someone from the Red Clouds had come to the court earlier this morning for any information about a Kysoth, it was memorable because to Corvalis this was the 2nd time in the same day that anyone brought him anything about Kysoth. We thanked the magistrate and rejoined the party, happy to learn through Pop that Karis was indeed escorted away.
At 3:30 we went to the Alchemist’s Lab where we showed Morei our tick head, the egg, and assorted water and dirt. We did talk with Iohannes who was surprised at what we had brought. He told Morei that she should stop going over the items the Lycos Suns had brought and devote her attention to the Sundered Chains and their findings.
Morei was going to work on the distillate tonight, and Mebali and Thurin were going to stay and help her. She figured it would take about 6 hours to work up a successful test and then would know if it could be a cure. Iohannes volunteered to take the party out for dinner, the Lycos Suns and the Sundered Chains. He suggested the Dog and Fox and we agreed.
Dinner was at 6 and our combined group (missing the wheelwright and the wizard of course) numbered around 20. Unsure at first what to expect we were surprised to have a pleasant evening. Iohannes showed no sign of remembering Detheron or Gwyn, made no comment that the Lycos Suns had any negative dealing in the past with the Sundered Chains, and was forthcoming with history of the group.
He was looking to charter a teamstering organization but didn’t want to start from scratch, so purchased the defunct charter of the Lycos Suns and gave what past dues and fees were necessary. They then took small jobs as well as those sponsored by the Slaver’s Guild and used the former contacts the Lycos Suns had established as a spring board for the new organization. He did comment that about 3 months after they had been reestablished there was a box released to them that had been held.
It contained some contracts, a few letters, some credit marks, and 12 bronze headed amulets that looked like wolf heads. He then showed us one from his neck. He also volunteered that they were useful to get past some wards. We shared information with then and when we next noticed, it was after 8:30 and we had had a rather great meal with Iohannes and his people.
We wished them well and when they left, talked about what we had learned. Detheron was convinced that Iohannes and his people were telling the truth BUT they were also convinced that they were the same group and people from over a year ago. Was it a spell? Forgetfulness? Domination? We fretted over the possibilities for a while until the beer had run dry and there was nothing more to do except call it a night.
It was about 9:30 when we picked ourselves up and left the Dog and Fox, intending to head towards the Alchemist’s Tower and see if the items they had brought back did indeed form the basis of a cure for the plague. When they left the tavern though they couldn’t help but notice across the main thoroughfare on Cheapside Ave was a gargantuan figure riding the largest Clydesdale horse they could ever fathom finding. He was clad in a heavy set of black platemail, sported a heavy war lance complete with pennant, and was watching the group.
Guyus looked at the figure intently and was hit with a heavy sensation that it was evil, definitely and decidedly so. However, we did note that the figure was staring right back at Guyus with the same level of intensity that our paladin was showing! Karis? We sure thought so.
He turned his horse about and rode at a cantor down Cheapside Avenue away from the party. Guyus gave a whistle and his paladinial steed appeared at his will, the knight growling that that figure was evil and we should follow him now.
Thursday, September 8, 2011
2nd Campaign, Meet 3, 9/5/11
Labor Day Weekend and my daughter wanted to sit down and play some D&D. So we continued with Lina and Thimbles in the elusive search for the goblin general and to bring him to justice. We were in the crypt still and she wanted to stay and check out all the doors to make sure we didn't miss anything. Plus it would be fun. Her words, not mine.
I think I saw tears when Thimbles went down at -4 hit points. Scared the hell out of her. She was so proud when her next blow was a 15 and she rolled a 7 for damage - doing 9 points (+2 to her str checks due to a 17 str) of damage to the 5 hit point skeleton that had just killed her friend, companion, and father. High fives followed and she was beaming.
It was in the fight with the boss undead fighter guy that she asked, "Why did you roll the 8 sided dice 3 times for hit points instead of once?" I was showing her what went on on my side of the screen and rolled all the hit points before the first blows would fall of the baddies we would be fighting. I explained the undead warrior was more powerful than a regular skeleton (3 hit dice) and would have better hit points and better ability to hit us.
She thought about it briefly, noted that the undead warrior ended up with 15 hit points, and said, "Then lets make sure we hit him more often than he hits us! Let's roll for initiative!" she grinned with the bright yellow 6 sided dice in her hand.
I cannot tell you how proud I am and how great she is.
Write up follows:
Lina and Thimbles looked further down the corridor, noting more doors on both sides of the hall. They approached the next one and it was with a stout should and firm push that the elven warrior was able to shove the heavy stone door open.
The back of the room had four alcoves set at 1 foot above the ground and then 2’ successively above the former, in each cubby was the skeletal remains of some humanoid being with heavy skulls. Otherwise the 10’ square chamber was featureless. Lina wanted to check out the alcoves but the two friends were a bit nervous about doing so. She approached the lowest one and poked the body inside with her sword twice. Nothing happened.
After that she began sweeping out the bones, the clattering noise filling the room and echoing faintly down the corridor. Once it was empty we looked inside – nothing. She wanted Thimbles to check the next alcove but the Halfling archer wanted little to do with that. So Lina once again began sweeping bones out and onto the floor.
It was amidst the clattering of bones that Thimbles held up his hand and asked, “Hey, did you hear something?” He glanced into the hall and gave a squeak of alarm as 4 wandering crab spiders were clack-clack walking their way towards the noisy crypt the two companions were in.
Thimbles got a nasty scrape against his leg but his armor held as Lina pulled him back from the door and blocked it with her body, sword, and shield in order to keep the oversized arachnids out of the room and at bay. Her blade rose and fell while Thimbles shot at the closest spider. It was a few short strokes later that she split the crab spider almost in half and it slumped over with a guttering squeal. The ferocity of the blows and sputtering fire from Thimbles torch must have stolen the fight out of the other 3 spiders as they turned away and scuttled down the corridor, fleeing the fight.
We waited a few minutes but the spiders did not come back. Feeling safer, Lina went back to the alcoves and finished number 2 and 3 – coming up with nothing in either. The last alcove was 7’ off the ground. She braced herself on the bottom of the 1st one, using it like a ladder, and pulled herself up to prod the skeletal remains in the top cubby – when the figure within grabbed her sword blade and stopped her.
She jumped down, pulling her blade free, avoiding the walking skeleton that dropped to the floor and pulled a rusting short blade with him. Thimbles was first and ready and fired a sure shot – the arrow hitting the skeleton in the chest. And doing nothing what-so-ever. “Damn, Lina,” he groaned, pulling out his own shorter sword, “I think we have a problem.” As he was trying to get it ready though the undead pulled back its arm and thrust the Halfling full in the chest. Thimbles groaned and fell over, bleeding terribly as his breath grew weak and still. Then the undead turned to face the red faced and furious elven warrior.
As for Lina she ducked the skeleton’s directed blow, wound up her hips, arced her sword over her shoulder and uncoiled. The heavy sword swung around like a steel pendulum and smashed the skeleton to pieces in a single blow! She then dropped to her knees, used one of her healing potions on her friend to stabilize him and another from his pack to bring him back to life. As he coughed and choked and she helped him up she said, “No problem, Thimbles!” with a cheery voice. We checked over the wreckage, the skeleton had nothing on him of value, the sword was badly rusted and pitted, but in the alcove it had resided in Lina did uncover a large brass key.
We left the crypt and went back to the hall. There was a 4th crypt that we were able to open but outside of an old sarcophagus holding nothing but the remains of some long dead person there was nothing to keep our attention.
We had a problem with the next two doors; the ancient crypts long unopened did not budge from our efforts regardless of anything we tried. Giving up for now we went on to the last door. It was unlike any of the other crypt doors, situated at the end of the corridor. There was a carving on it of an angelic figure with its arms raised and a sword in his hand, fancy designs cut into the edge of the door frame. We tried to open it but the door refused to open.
Lina looked over the door carefully and between the angel’s carved hands was a deeper hole – shaped like a key hole. She took out the brass key and turned it. Long unused tumblers clattered in the lock and the great door opened.
The crypt was larger than any of the others. A heavy stone chair sat on the far side of the chamber, a skeletal figure sat in it, clad on moldering chainmail and its bony claw holding the hilt of a silver tinged sword. Offering crates and boxes were on either side of it. Neither companion wanted to enter. “Shoot at it,” Lina said.
“Why?” Thimbles asked. “If it is alive, my arrows don’t do much against skeletons.”
“If you shoot it and it moves, we’ll know it’s alive. Also it’s not like the other skeletons we fought – it’s wearing armor and has lots more flesh on it.”
Unsure at first, Thimbles drew back his bow and fired. Dead shot. The arrow hit the chainmail with a sharp report, and sure enough the skeletal warrior DID stand up and hiss at us, storming over with little red flames in its eyes and its silver sword shimmering in the air. It made a nasty humming noise and the two companions were momentarily stunned as it stalked closer and struck at Lina.
Thimbles backed up a step and shot, his arrow hitting the undead and making it hiss again. Lina struck, solidly slicing into the horror. But unlike before her blow did NOT drop the walking dead, only made it stagger back and come forward swinging.
The two friends sweated a few close hits with the undead until it connected twice on Lina, cutting her forearm open on one blow and mortally wounding her on her upper chest with a second. Thimbles risked getting brained to pour a healing potion down Lina’s throat, blocking a few of the undead warrior’s blows with his own sword until his friend was able to stand once again.
Then the two of them struck the undead figure again and again until it fell over and the fires in its eyes went dim and guttered out. As for the sword it was wielding, it glowed faintly on the floor, silvery light coming from its blade. Lina bent down to pick it up, reading the words “Silvercut” written across its mirrorlike surface. She smiled as she slipped it into her belt.
The two friends looked around the chamber for a few minutes, sat in the throne once or twice just to see, and decided that enough was enough. They were going after the ‘General’ in the goblin area next after eating some dinner. We still had Lina’s unused sleep spell and she also had a web scroll that we could use to help even the odds should we need. So we squared our shoulders, took out our trail rations, and sat down to a meal before heading off to bring the ‘General’ to justice.
I think I saw tears when Thimbles went down at -4 hit points. Scared the hell out of her. She was so proud when her next blow was a 15 and she rolled a 7 for damage - doing 9 points (+2 to her str checks due to a 17 str) of damage to the 5 hit point skeleton that had just killed her friend, companion, and father. High fives followed and she was beaming.
It was in the fight with the boss undead fighter guy that she asked, "Why did you roll the 8 sided dice 3 times for hit points instead of once?" I was showing her what went on on my side of the screen and rolled all the hit points before the first blows would fall of the baddies we would be fighting. I explained the undead warrior was more powerful than a regular skeleton (3 hit dice) and would have better hit points and better ability to hit us.
She thought about it briefly, noted that the undead warrior ended up with 15 hit points, and said, "Then lets make sure we hit him more often than he hits us! Let's roll for initiative!" she grinned with the bright yellow 6 sided dice in her hand.
I cannot tell you how proud I am and how great she is.
Write up follows:
Lina and Thimbles looked further down the corridor, noting more doors on both sides of the hall. They approached the next one and it was with a stout should and firm push that the elven warrior was able to shove the heavy stone door open.
The back of the room had four alcoves set at 1 foot above the ground and then 2’ successively above the former, in each cubby was the skeletal remains of some humanoid being with heavy skulls. Otherwise the 10’ square chamber was featureless. Lina wanted to check out the alcoves but the two friends were a bit nervous about doing so. She approached the lowest one and poked the body inside with her sword twice. Nothing happened.
After that she began sweeping out the bones, the clattering noise filling the room and echoing faintly down the corridor. Once it was empty we looked inside – nothing. She wanted Thimbles to check the next alcove but the Halfling archer wanted little to do with that. So Lina once again began sweeping bones out and onto the floor.
It was amidst the clattering of bones that Thimbles held up his hand and asked, “Hey, did you hear something?” He glanced into the hall and gave a squeak of alarm as 4 wandering crab spiders were clack-clack walking their way towards the noisy crypt the two companions were in.
Thimbles got a nasty scrape against his leg but his armor held as Lina pulled him back from the door and blocked it with her body, sword, and shield in order to keep the oversized arachnids out of the room and at bay. Her blade rose and fell while Thimbles shot at the closest spider. It was a few short strokes later that she split the crab spider almost in half and it slumped over with a guttering squeal. The ferocity of the blows and sputtering fire from Thimbles torch must have stolen the fight out of the other 3 spiders as they turned away and scuttled down the corridor, fleeing the fight.
We waited a few minutes but the spiders did not come back. Feeling safer, Lina went back to the alcoves and finished number 2 and 3 – coming up with nothing in either. The last alcove was 7’ off the ground. She braced herself on the bottom of the 1st one, using it like a ladder, and pulled herself up to prod the skeletal remains in the top cubby – when the figure within grabbed her sword blade and stopped her.
She jumped down, pulling her blade free, avoiding the walking skeleton that dropped to the floor and pulled a rusting short blade with him. Thimbles was first and ready and fired a sure shot – the arrow hitting the skeleton in the chest. And doing nothing what-so-ever. “Damn, Lina,” he groaned, pulling out his own shorter sword, “I think we have a problem.” As he was trying to get it ready though the undead pulled back its arm and thrust the Halfling full in the chest. Thimbles groaned and fell over, bleeding terribly as his breath grew weak and still. Then the undead turned to face the red faced and furious elven warrior.
As for Lina she ducked the skeleton’s directed blow, wound up her hips, arced her sword over her shoulder and uncoiled. The heavy sword swung around like a steel pendulum and smashed the skeleton to pieces in a single blow! She then dropped to her knees, used one of her healing potions on her friend to stabilize him and another from his pack to bring him back to life. As he coughed and choked and she helped him up she said, “No problem, Thimbles!” with a cheery voice. We checked over the wreckage, the skeleton had nothing on him of value, the sword was badly rusted and pitted, but in the alcove it had resided in Lina did uncover a large brass key.
We left the crypt and went back to the hall. There was a 4th crypt that we were able to open but outside of an old sarcophagus holding nothing but the remains of some long dead person there was nothing to keep our attention.
We had a problem with the next two doors; the ancient crypts long unopened did not budge from our efforts regardless of anything we tried. Giving up for now we went on to the last door. It was unlike any of the other crypt doors, situated at the end of the corridor. There was a carving on it of an angelic figure with its arms raised and a sword in his hand, fancy designs cut into the edge of the door frame. We tried to open it but the door refused to open.
Lina looked over the door carefully and between the angel’s carved hands was a deeper hole – shaped like a key hole. She took out the brass key and turned it. Long unused tumblers clattered in the lock and the great door opened.
The crypt was larger than any of the others. A heavy stone chair sat on the far side of the chamber, a skeletal figure sat in it, clad on moldering chainmail and its bony claw holding the hilt of a silver tinged sword. Offering crates and boxes were on either side of it. Neither companion wanted to enter. “Shoot at it,” Lina said.
“Why?” Thimbles asked. “If it is alive, my arrows don’t do much against skeletons.”
“If you shoot it and it moves, we’ll know it’s alive. Also it’s not like the other skeletons we fought – it’s wearing armor and has lots more flesh on it.”
Unsure at first, Thimbles drew back his bow and fired. Dead shot. The arrow hit the chainmail with a sharp report, and sure enough the skeletal warrior DID stand up and hiss at us, storming over with little red flames in its eyes and its silver sword shimmering in the air. It made a nasty humming noise and the two companions were momentarily stunned as it stalked closer and struck at Lina.
Thimbles backed up a step and shot, his arrow hitting the undead and making it hiss again. Lina struck, solidly slicing into the horror. But unlike before her blow did NOT drop the walking dead, only made it stagger back and come forward swinging.
The two friends sweated a few close hits with the undead until it connected twice on Lina, cutting her forearm open on one blow and mortally wounding her on her upper chest with a second. Thimbles risked getting brained to pour a healing potion down Lina’s throat, blocking a few of the undead warrior’s blows with his own sword until his friend was able to stand once again.
Then the two of them struck the undead figure again and again until it fell over and the fires in its eyes went dim and guttered out. As for the sword it was wielding, it glowed faintly on the floor, silvery light coming from its blade. Lina bent down to pick it up, reading the words “Silvercut” written across its mirrorlike surface. She smiled as she slipped it into her belt.
The two friends looked around the chamber for a few minutes, sat in the throne once or twice just to see, and decided that enough was enough. They were going after the ‘General’ in the goblin area next after eating some dinner. We still had Lina’s unused sleep spell and she also had a web scroll that we could use to help even the odds should we need. So we squared our shoulders, took out our trail rations, and sat down to a meal before heading off to bring the ‘General’ to justice.
Wednesday, September 7, 2011
Meet 142, Adv 12, 8/20/11
The boss monster was a giant bloated queen tick about the size of a Hum-V and with a psionic kick to boot. Her movement sucked but since she had a free psionic blast each round to stun or knock out an opponent as well as the ability to summon the other ticks in the area if near. She was big, had only a single hit attack though that did considerable damage - but the kicker for everyone was the 5 point damage reduction which made most of the arrows and smaller weapons ineffective to hitting her.
As for the pilgrims and griffons to be found afterwards - all hail the mighty wandering monster tables. :)
Write up follows:
We finished our lunch at the Temple of Odin and once more prepared ourselves for the trip down into the bowels of Glittercap. It took 15 minutes and some shuffling with the ropes to get everyone at the base and once there we headed off to the northeast, walking through the foot deep water till we arrived at the stairs to 2nd level. Detheron had prepared a log of everburning spell on our few remaining torches and we passed them out amongst the group as we headed down.
The rain had let up by this time and the water was barely 2’ deep here now. We looked into the main chamber and saw it was how we left it. The decision was made to go and check out the shrine room once more, to see if Thurin’s charmed will o the wisp was still there. Cautiously we went to the southern door, opened it, and wandered the hall till we arrived at the shrine room.
Peeked in – and nothing. The wisp was gone. Ok. We filed in and went over what our options were and what to do next. Go down the 3rd level and find the Kysoth’s Shield? Seek out the wisp’s? Hunt down the source of the plague? We debated a few minutes over the pro’s and con’s of the options before us.
It was Guyus and his contact with Odin that lead us onward. He felt an evil presence..no two of them…just beyond the northern door. Their taint reminded him of undead. The group decided to take out the undead and do it swiftly and now. We lined up right outside the door, weapons at the ready, and then stormed the hall in an effort to take the undead down.
The hall beyond was circular on the right with about 2’ of water of the floor. A cadaverous dwarf with glowing red eyes was at one corner and in the gloom beyond was the 2nd. A few of us plunged forward but the difficulty of the deep water slowed us down and our first blows fell short, allowing the two wights to close with surprising speed and hit the group. Again, Guyus was protected from the undead’s chilling touch, but the others in the party were not, with Aleron taking the worst of the wights blows, his life force draining from him at a prodigious rate.
It was a few minutes of solid swordplay before the wights died. Healing was dispensed and Aleron was tended to by our healers. From here we had an option, move onward down the corridor or head back. We opted to head on.
The corridor turned eventually to the left and we saw how it rejoined with the main room we had come down, there was a slope of passage up that we could take or head to the left towards the current or moving water. We wanted to get dry so took the rising corridor. We walked two abreast, fighters with spears and shields in the front and back in case any giant ticks came.
And they did. Two of them.
The attacked with shrill screaming and launched themselves at the party but before their assault could amount to anything major, Thurin’s sleep spell but the two ticks down – and then a hack and stab ended them as a threat. Huzzah!
We moved on, taking care as we walked. A feeling was stealing over us, a feeling that maybe something was watching us, was keeping tabs on us. It was unnerving. The corridor turned to the left and we walked that way, and it was here that the smell hit us. It was roiling and fetid and unlike anything we had ever smelled before. And in the great opening before us were three more of the giant ticks and some huge monstrosity that HAD to be the source of the plague.
It was a tick, but large and bloated and covered in cancerous growths. Its back scraped against the ceiling in places and its legs were thick and layered and serrated in places. It had to weigh over half a ton and according to Gwyn – it was talking to him in his brain!!
From what he could tell it was a tick from over 1200 years ago, living on a dog, and then it grew ill and a fire came and the dog fell down the cistern and the tick bounced lower and lower away from the fires and it survived down here in the dark. And it wanted its eggs to grow. But the eggs often died and to date there were only 6 of the younger ticks around. And they needed blood – fresh blood to have a better chance of surviving.
The dwarf was relaying this to us as we were thinking of backing out of the room and making an escape. This was the contagion point –either the mother tick or any of her eggs. Could we fight her? Do we fight her? Can we? We noticed that as we talked about it – the tick queen was realizing our decisions in time with Gwyn’s hearing of it – so damn it – we were out of time.
We attacked.
Sleep spells were fired off, dropping two of the other ticks. Strength spells were cast. Bless spells were cast. Our fighters charged in while Norris was inspiring courage and competence to the party. But the tick queen was more than capable, she let off a psionic blast that awoke the sleeping ticks and stunned some of the party members. Guyus assaulted the queen with Aleron and Havic joining is right afterwards.
The tick’s carapace was thick and most of the bolts and arrows bounced off. And then there was the bite – everyone struck was affected by the plague as if they had suffered for 3 days! Plus the tick queen kept randomly stunning party members. It grew difficult when she summoned a swarm of normal ticks from the surrounding area – thousands of them and sent them at the group. Detheron held them at bay with a quick spell but the group still had to leap away from the burrowing insects.
One by one the party was losing strength and succumbing to the bites of the ticks. But as the last two giant ticks were taken down we were able to concentrate our blows on the tick queen as a group and before too much longer, her body was beaten and battered enough that she slumped over and died at long last.
We looked around and the chamber behind where the tick queen had been standing was the egg chamber – over 60 of the foul ovoids, each about 2’ long, in a stew of yellow and red slurry across the floor. Guyus went in, brought out one of the eggs for the party and then spend the next 15 minutes hacking into each and every over sized tick egg and splitting them open, killing the immature and often still dead tickling inside.
The party was fouled, filthy, and most like brimming with contagion. We had to leave and leave now. We took some of the tick queen’s blood as well as her head, walked back into the water and rubbed most of the filth off of us (as well as a cloudburst spell), and made our way out of Glittercap’s bowels. There was still Kysoth’s shield as well as the undead and the will o the wisps – but we had enough for now and decided that we would come back here at some other time after we took care of the plague in Flatrock. Getting this contagion source back was our first and paramount job now.
It wasn’t until 4:30 when we left Glittercap and started the long walk out of Rakewood. We would not make it to Flatrock tonight, but would easily reach Frink’s homestead by nightfall or shortly afterwards.
Imaging our surprise when we ran into pilgrims walking. 60 of them. They were pilgrims from Flatrock who were taking their chances out in the wilderness. They were heading what they thought was northwest towards the town of Northedge, and doing it this way to avoid the King’s men patrolling the roads turning back people from Flatrock for fear of the plague.
We spent some time explaining who we were (they knew of us and Ludwig as well), what we were doing, and that we had a cure with us in a fashion with the blood, eggs, and tick head. It took some convincing but the pilgrims agreed to head back with us to Flatrock.
But it was near the edge of Rakewood Forest that chance struck again – this time in the form of 6 griffons. The eagle-headed winged lions were terrifying to the throng with us and Detheron used his dwindling spell listing to talk to the chimeric beasts. They were tired and heading north for resting and molting and were tracking some signs of a large herd of man-beasts (the pilgrims) – hoping to pick off a few of the weak ones and then go.
As expected, negotiations broke down and the closest griffons tried to snag some of the pilgrims and fly away. We gave chase and missile weapons flew but it was Detheron suing the Avianstorm whistle that did the trick and THOUSANDS of every damned bird in the nearby area went nuts and filled the air with bleats and cries and songs and wings and whatnot – making visibility difficult and chasing off the griffons that were at the edge of the assault.
We did all snag a large amount of magical scroll writing feathers/quills from the fallen griffons and with lots of cure minor spells we fixed up enough of the pilgrims that we had only lost one.
It was 6 PM when we reached the edge of the Rakewood Forest and started the walk toward Frink’s Homestead to rest for the night.
As for the pilgrims and griffons to be found afterwards - all hail the mighty wandering monster tables. :)
Write up follows:
We finished our lunch at the Temple of Odin and once more prepared ourselves for the trip down into the bowels of Glittercap. It took 15 minutes and some shuffling with the ropes to get everyone at the base and once there we headed off to the northeast, walking through the foot deep water till we arrived at the stairs to 2nd level. Detheron had prepared a log of everburning spell on our few remaining torches and we passed them out amongst the group as we headed down.
The rain had let up by this time and the water was barely 2’ deep here now. We looked into the main chamber and saw it was how we left it. The decision was made to go and check out the shrine room once more, to see if Thurin’s charmed will o the wisp was still there. Cautiously we went to the southern door, opened it, and wandered the hall till we arrived at the shrine room.
Peeked in – and nothing. The wisp was gone. Ok. We filed in and went over what our options were and what to do next. Go down the 3rd level and find the Kysoth’s Shield? Seek out the wisp’s? Hunt down the source of the plague? We debated a few minutes over the pro’s and con’s of the options before us.
It was Guyus and his contact with Odin that lead us onward. He felt an evil presence..no two of them…just beyond the northern door. Their taint reminded him of undead. The group decided to take out the undead and do it swiftly and now. We lined up right outside the door, weapons at the ready, and then stormed the hall in an effort to take the undead down.
The hall beyond was circular on the right with about 2’ of water of the floor. A cadaverous dwarf with glowing red eyes was at one corner and in the gloom beyond was the 2nd. A few of us plunged forward but the difficulty of the deep water slowed us down and our first blows fell short, allowing the two wights to close with surprising speed and hit the group. Again, Guyus was protected from the undead’s chilling touch, but the others in the party were not, with Aleron taking the worst of the wights blows, his life force draining from him at a prodigious rate.
It was a few minutes of solid swordplay before the wights died. Healing was dispensed and Aleron was tended to by our healers. From here we had an option, move onward down the corridor or head back. We opted to head on.
The corridor turned eventually to the left and we saw how it rejoined with the main room we had come down, there was a slope of passage up that we could take or head to the left towards the current or moving water. We wanted to get dry so took the rising corridor. We walked two abreast, fighters with spears and shields in the front and back in case any giant ticks came.
And they did. Two of them.
The attacked with shrill screaming and launched themselves at the party but before their assault could amount to anything major, Thurin’s sleep spell but the two ticks down – and then a hack and stab ended them as a threat. Huzzah!
We moved on, taking care as we walked. A feeling was stealing over us, a feeling that maybe something was watching us, was keeping tabs on us. It was unnerving. The corridor turned to the left and we walked that way, and it was here that the smell hit us. It was roiling and fetid and unlike anything we had ever smelled before. And in the great opening before us were three more of the giant ticks and some huge monstrosity that HAD to be the source of the plague.
It was a tick, but large and bloated and covered in cancerous growths. Its back scraped against the ceiling in places and its legs were thick and layered and serrated in places. It had to weigh over half a ton and according to Gwyn – it was talking to him in his brain!!
From what he could tell it was a tick from over 1200 years ago, living on a dog, and then it grew ill and a fire came and the dog fell down the cistern and the tick bounced lower and lower away from the fires and it survived down here in the dark. And it wanted its eggs to grow. But the eggs often died and to date there were only 6 of the younger ticks around. And they needed blood – fresh blood to have a better chance of surviving.
The dwarf was relaying this to us as we were thinking of backing out of the room and making an escape. This was the contagion point –either the mother tick or any of her eggs. Could we fight her? Do we fight her? Can we? We noticed that as we talked about it – the tick queen was realizing our decisions in time with Gwyn’s hearing of it – so damn it – we were out of time.
We attacked.
Sleep spells were fired off, dropping two of the other ticks. Strength spells were cast. Bless spells were cast. Our fighters charged in while Norris was inspiring courage and competence to the party. But the tick queen was more than capable, she let off a psionic blast that awoke the sleeping ticks and stunned some of the party members. Guyus assaulted the queen with Aleron and Havic joining is right afterwards.
The tick’s carapace was thick and most of the bolts and arrows bounced off. And then there was the bite – everyone struck was affected by the plague as if they had suffered for 3 days! Plus the tick queen kept randomly stunning party members. It grew difficult when she summoned a swarm of normal ticks from the surrounding area – thousands of them and sent them at the group. Detheron held them at bay with a quick spell but the group still had to leap away from the burrowing insects.
One by one the party was losing strength and succumbing to the bites of the ticks. But as the last two giant ticks were taken down we were able to concentrate our blows on the tick queen as a group and before too much longer, her body was beaten and battered enough that she slumped over and died at long last.
We looked around and the chamber behind where the tick queen had been standing was the egg chamber – over 60 of the foul ovoids, each about 2’ long, in a stew of yellow and red slurry across the floor. Guyus went in, brought out one of the eggs for the party and then spend the next 15 minutes hacking into each and every over sized tick egg and splitting them open, killing the immature and often still dead tickling inside.
The party was fouled, filthy, and most like brimming with contagion. We had to leave and leave now. We took some of the tick queen’s blood as well as her head, walked back into the water and rubbed most of the filth off of us (as well as a cloudburst spell), and made our way out of Glittercap’s bowels. There was still Kysoth’s shield as well as the undead and the will o the wisps – but we had enough for now and decided that we would come back here at some other time after we took care of the plague in Flatrock. Getting this contagion source back was our first and paramount job now.
It wasn’t until 4:30 when we left Glittercap and started the long walk out of Rakewood. We would not make it to Flatrock tonight, but would easily reach Frink’s homestead by nightfall or shortly afterwards.
Imaging our surprise when we ran into pilgrims walking. 60 of them. They were pilgrims from Flatrock who were taking their chances out in the wilderness. They were heading what they thought was northwest towards the town of Northedge, and doing it this way to avoid the King’s men patrolling the roads turning back people from Flatrock for fear of the plague.
We spent some time explaining who we were (they knew of us and Ludwig as well), what we were doing, and that we had a cure with us in a fashion with the blood, eggs, and tick head. It took some convincing but the pilgrims agreed to head back with us to Flatrock.
But it was near the edge of Rakewood Forest that chance struck again – this time in the form of 6 griffons. The eagle-headed winged lions were terrifying to the throng with us and Detheron used his dwindling spell listing to talk to the chimeric beasts. They were tired and heading north for resting and molting and were tracking some signs of a large herd of man-beasts (the pilgrims) – hoping to pick off a few of the weak ones and then go.
As expected, negotiations broke down and the closest griffons tried to snag some of the pilgrims and fly away. We gave chase and missile weapons flew but it was Detheron suing the Avianstorm whistle that did the trick and THOUSANDS of every damned bird in the nearby area went nuts and filled the air with bleats and cries and songs and wings and whatnot – making visibility difficult and chasing off the griffons that were at the edge of the assault.
We did all snag a large amount of magical scroll writing feathers/quills from the fallen griffons and with lots of cure minor spells we fixed up enough of the pilgrims that we had only lost one.
It was 6 PM when we reached the edge of the Rakewood Forest and started the walk toward Frink’s Homestead to rest for the night.
Friday, August 19, 2011
Meet 141, Adv 12, 8/6/11
Sometimes its little details that end up in the game that make for a memorable night. Long in the past the party were slaves and we had no shoes - so adventuring in the caves was difficult, very difficult, and around the table we called the first adventure "The quest for Shoes."
This night had us all soaked, sick, wet, and tired - and most of us did not have multiple pairs of underwear - so we had to dry out what we had. And we lost two sets - which had the trope around the table being Mako's voice from Conan saying, "Let me tell you of the days of high adventure, when we sought out the lost underwear, but that was another story."
It also happened, the party was pretty hurt, tired, and unable to function so we had to enact the rest for a full day option which was almost never done. An entire day of everyone just sitting around and healing!
Yeah - needs to happen more often.
Write up follows:
Our clothes were soaked; most of us had little else to wear. Plus the fetid water had gotten into everything. We would need to dry our clothes, to say nothing of actually cleaning them. While most of us were getting some sort of camp set up, Norris and Detheron opted to ride out of Glittercap while the sun was still up and gather what dry wood they could find from the surrounding forest.
They had only gone a short distance when they heard a horse nicker and saw a figure mounted not too far from them. Tall, broad, very muscled, his bearing was that of a king’s man and he identified himself as Aleron. He was a ranger that had been on the trail of Vanir for some time, the erstwhile wizard being responsible for the death of his mother and other atrocities that the young ranger had seen.
He had eventually been guided by the Adventurer’s guild in Cymbarton on the trail of Detheron and then through many other avenues until he had arrived in Flatrock. From there it was many inquiries (the least of which was to the crazed herbalist Zinther) that had him get to Frink’s home. From there he had tracked the group over the course of 15 hours westward to the Rakewood Forest and then to Glittercap.
The druid and bard were initially distrustful of the strange ranger. He did supply patents of nobility declaring him to be Aleron Greystone, direct lineage descendant of Baron Hadrick Greystone who had been second to Earl Maronnia during the crusade 50 years earlier. Plus he had a letter of marque from Dumethian Dracowulf and other items of reference. We warily accepted him as he was. Norris did ask him how he got past the satyr and Aleron said something about a deal to pass and purple underwear. Needless to say, that did not garner comfort to the two of them, figuring Aleron to either be strange, deluded, or a liar.
We gathered wood during his conversation and with his steed it was easy to come back to Glittercap with more than enough wood and kindling for tonight. Introductions were made and Norris stretched out what food we had into something better than just rations. Aleron filled us in on his background and we in turned filled him in on the plague, Frink, and what we’ve learned of Glittercap so far. Dinner ended just before 8 and after that we broke straws and decided who would be keeping watch and when.
Bit by bit the party went to sleep. Night moved on and we stayed inside the Odin Temple, occasionally going out to stoke the fire and turn the underwear hanging up in order to keep in drying. It was during Thurin’s watch as well that we noted a change in what was going on out there. A single glowing ball of pulsing plasma was wandering over the ground in a small tracing pattern. The elven wizard went out and approached the will o the wisp to converse with it.
This time though, even though he knew he had charmed it earlier, the will o the wisp seemed difficult to placate. In fact the longer that Thurin spoke to it, the more it became agitated. At the last moment, he cast invisibility on himself and the will o the wisp discharged a bolt of lightning where he was. Then it was some cat and mouse as the invisible wizard ran away from the wisp and back towards the temple, closing the door and waking Gwyn. The two of them watched the wisp wander about, firing bolts of electricity here and there – one of them burning Detheron’s underwear to a crisp. Then a second wisp arrived and the two of them went back to the hole towards the underground and disappeared again.
The two of them watched for a while until satisfied the wisp wasn’t going to return. However it was obvious that the fire was guttering out there and neither elf nor dwarf wanted to step out and add fuel. It was after about a half hour that Thurin went to get some rest, just falling asleep when Gwyn kicked him awake and shouted, “It’s stealing my underwear!” before running out into the dark with his repeating crossbow, a quiver of bolts, and Elfsplitter wrapped in his off hand.
Gwyn was chasing some ghostly figure outside his visible range, relying on the residual heat left by its passing, only obvious to his infravision. It ran along the edge of the Glittercap walls and then out of the camp itself. He stopped, not sure if he could get back in with the sun down. He fired a single bolt into the trees, not hitting anything. Cursing, he readied his crossbow and ran out of Glittercap and into the Rakewood Forest.
He plunged on for a short distance, confident he was gaining ground as the footsteps were growing more obvious before him. But then his feet crashed through some pine boughs and he fell – 30’ straight down into a spiked pit, his crossbow landing with a crunch just outside his reach, and a wooden spike slamming through his thigh, his gut, and his shoulder, pinning the dwarf to the ground.
He lived, but was in serious pain and unable to move.
Taking shallow breaths he tried to get some idea of what was around him when he heard from above a figure calling out, “Are you ok?” And giggling.
Damned satyr again.
It taunted Gwyn for a little bit, dropping rocks near him to piss him off. The dwarf twisted back around and saw the half goat-man was there with Gwyn’s underwear in his hand – and wearing a set of purple underwear stretched tight across his nether regions. “Huh,” Gwyn thought, “I guess that ranger guy Aleron was telling the truth.”
The satyr left after getting pissed off and ripping Gwyn’s underwear into quarters and chucking them down at him, telling Gwyn he would get a few others of the party, the dwarf losing blood slowly through the many holes in his body.
A short while passed and Gwyn heard some strange trilling noises. Something winged flew nearby and then down the pit hole, landing at his back. And then it stuck a needle into his shoulder and drank. Fuck shit damn it – stirge. And a big one too. After drinking its fill it pulled its bloated form off of the dwarf and flew up and away. Most likely to get other stirges. It was time to move.
Gritting through the pain Gwyn levered his upper body off the stake, shuddering as he did so. Unable to get off the spike completely, he took hold of Elfsplitter and hacked at the base of the spike in his shoulder. The jarring impact was sickening but the spike was cut and Gwyn gulped in agony as he caught his breath.
But three more stirges came, two of them getting a beak into the bleeding dwarf while the last one was caught with a wild grab, crushed, and hurled across the base of the pit its wing torn and unable to fly. The two unwounded ones took to the air and left again. Angry now, Gwyn lifted himself slightly off the last two spikes and cut them free. He was near death, teetering on unconsciousness, but no longer staked to the ground.
Meanwhile after a few minutes had gone by Thurin woke the rest of the group and informed them that Gwyn was gone, will o the wisps were out there, and something stole the dwarf’s underwear. We gathered up our belongings and Gwyn’s as well, strapping on armor and swords again even though we were all pretty damned tired (no one even getting close to enough sleep). Before walking out Aleron noted that there was a tick out there, a giant one, and it was partially on top of the building. Odin be damned!
We charged out and the fight with the tick was short lived as it was unable to get a good bite on anyone and jumped into the temple where it was surrounded and hacked to bits. Booyah!! From there we grabbed our underwear and followed the ranger out as he tracked the dwarf to the edge of Glittercap and beyond (Detheron making a command decision that we are leaving now and coming back some other time in the morning).
It wasn’t much beyond this that we came upon the pit trap and Gwyn far below. We rigged up some rope and Havic went down into the pit to help Gwyn out. He trussed him up into the rope and the party hoisted him up slowly out of the pit, careful not to jar his spike riddled body too much. Once out the satyr made his presence known and Norris fired off a countersong to keep his charming at bay.
Gwyn lifted his repeating crossbow and even in pain took aim in the woods where the satyr’s voice was and fired all 5 times – one of the bolts hitting the mark! The satyr was obvious and we charged in and hacked the forest fey to bits – battle done! We all noticed though that it was wearing the purple underwear that Aleron had mentioned and that had the party trusting the ranger a bit more.
Detheron, Ludwig, and Aleron all worked on the dwarf, taking out the spikes and doing what they could to stem the bleeding. We were practically out of healing and needed to rest. Thurin was badly wounded before from the will o the wisp and the elf and dwarf needed some time without movement. We decided to travel out of Rakewood since we could not get to Glittercap and try to make it to Frink’s homestead.
The ranger led the way in the dark dark gloom, an oil lamp lit to guide us and we lined our way out. Norris kept up a song in case any other fey touched creatures tried to encounter us. It was about an hour or so later that we did encounter something – right in front of us emerged ten 8’ tall green skinned trolls!
They looked at us, we looked at them, and then speaking to them in ogrish both Havic and Gwyn were surprised to find out they liked the bard’s music! We talked for a bit, they were not looking for a fight, and were willing to let us pass for a fee of 50 crowns for each of the trolls – total of 500 crowns. We didn’t even haggle – happily paying the fee and moving on, Norris Rickrolling the party through the encounter with his deft lute playing.
We slogged to the edge of Rakewood about 6:30 and once there Detheron turned into a horse so that we could carry Thurin and Gwyn who were very bad off. The trip to Frink’s took almost 3 hours and once there a few of us policed the bodies from within and buried them outside. The place was them stripped of linens and clothes and we stretched out resting the entire party the entire day.
It did us well. What healing we had was dispensed, spells were studied, books read, weapons tended to, arrows cleaned, armor repaired, even some gathering of apples and other light game went down. Our two worst off party members slept well and it was on the morning of the NEXT day, Watermonth the 27th that we prayed and reprepared ourselves and made the decision to go BACK to Glittercap.
We left at 8 AM and arrived at Rakewood at 11, eventually pushing through the woods between Aleron’s tracking and our own deciphering of Frink’s map, getting to Glittercap about 12:30. At 12:45 we set up camp at the Temple and were getting ready to eat lunch before going back into the underground and take out the source of the plague.
This night had us all soaked, sick, wet, and tired - and most of us did not have multiple pairs of underwear - so we had to dry out what we had. And we lost two sets - which had the trope around the table being Mako's voice from Conan saying, "Let me tell you of the days of high adventure, when we sought out the lost underwear, but that was another story."
It also happened, the party was pretty hurt, tired, and unable to function so we had to enact the rest for a full day option which was almost never done. An entire day of everyone just sitting around and healing!
Yeah - needs to happen more often.
Write up follows:
Our clothes were soaked; most of us had little else to wear. Plus the fetid water had gotten into everything. We would need to dry our clothes, to say nothing of actually cleaning them. While most of us were getting some sort of camp set up, Norris and Detheron opted to ride out of Glittercap while the sun was still up and gather what dry wood they could find from the surrounding forest.
They had only gone a short distance when they heard a horse nicker and saw a figure mounted not too far from them. Tall, broad, very muscled, his bearing was that of a king’s man and he identified himself as Aleron. He was a ranger that had been on the trail of Vanir for some time, the erstwhile wizard being responsible for the death of his mother and other atrocities that the young ranger had seen.
He had eventually been guided by the Adventurer’s guild in Cymbarton on the trail of Detheron and then through many other avenues until he had arrived in Flatrock. From there it was many inquiries (the least of which was to the crazed herbalist Zinther) that had him get to Frink’s home. From there he had tracked the group over the course of 15 hours westward to the Rakewood Forest and then to Glittercap.
The druid and bard were initially distrustful of the strange ranger. He did supply patents of nobility declaring him to be Aleron Greystone, direct lineage descendant of Baron Hadrick Greystone who had been second to Earl Maronnia during the crusade 50 years earlier. Plus he had a letter of marque from Dumethian Dracowulf and other items of reference. We warily accepted him as he was. Norris did ask him how he got past the satyr and Aleron said something about a deal to pass and purple underwear. Needless to say, that did not garner comfort to the two of them, figuring Aleron to either be strange, deluded, or a liar.
We gathered wood during his conversation and with his steed it was easy to come back to Glittercap with more than enough wood and kindling for tonight. Introductions were made and Norris stretched out what food we had into something better than just rations. Aleron filled us in on his background and we in turned filled him in on the plague, Frink, and what we’ve learned of Glittercap so far. Dinner ended just before 8 and after that we broke straws and decided who would be keeping watch and when.
Bit by bit the party went to sleep. Night moved on and we stayed inside the Odin Temple, occasionally going out to stoke the fire and turn the underwear hanging up in order to keep in drying. It was during Thurin’s watch as well that we noted a change in what was going on out there. A single glowing ball of pulsing plasma was wandering over the ground in a small tracing pattern. The elven wizard went out and approached the will o the wisp to converse with it.
This time though, even though he knew he had charmed it earlier, the will o the wisp seemed difficult to placate. In fact the longer that Thurin spoke to it, the more it became agitated. At the last moment, he cast invisibility on himself and the will o the wisp discharged a bolt of lightning where he was. Then it was some cat and mouse as the invisible wizard ran away from the wisp and back towards the temple, closing the door and waking Gwyn. The two of them watched the wisp wander about, firing bolts of electricity here and there – one of them burning Detheron’s underwear to a crisp. Then a second wisp arrived and the two of them went back to the hole towards the underground and disappeared again.
The two of them watched for a while until satisfied the wisp wasn’t going to return. However it was obvious that the fire was guttering out there and neither elf nor dwarf wanted to step out and add fuel. It was after about a half hour that Thurin went to get some rest, just falling asleep when Gwyn kicked him awake and shouted, “It’s stealing my underwear!” before running out into the dark with his repeating crossbow, a quiver of bolts, and Elfsplitter wrapped in his off hand.
Gwyn was chasing some ghostly figure outside his visible range, relying on the residual heat left by its passing, only obvious to his infravision. It ran along the edge of the Glittercap walls and then out of the camp itself. He stopped, not sure if he could get back in with the sun down. He fired a single bolt into the trees, not hitting anything. Cursing, he readied his crossbow and ran out of Glittercap and into the Rakewood Forest.
He plunged on for a short distance, confident he was gaining ground as the footsteps were growing more obvious before him. But then his feet crashed through some pine boughs and he fell – 30’ straight down into a spiked pit, his crossbow landing with a crunch just outside his reach, and a wooden spike slamming through his thigh, his gut, and his shoulder, pinning the dwarf to the ground.
He lived, but was in serious pain and unable to move.
Taking shallow breaths he tried to get some idea of what was around him when he heard from above a figure calling out, “Are you ok?” And giggling.
Damned satyr again.
It taunted Gwyn for a little bit, dropping rocks near him to piss him off. The dwarf twisted back around and saw the half goat-man was there with Gwyn’s underwear in his hand – and wearing a set of purple underwear stretched tight across his nether regions. “Huh,” Gwyn thought, “I guess that ranger guy Aleron was telling the truth.”
The satyr left after getting pissed off and ripping Gwyn’s underwear into quarters and chucking them down at him, telling Gwyn he would get a few others of the party, the dwarf losing blood slowly through the many holes in his body.
A short while passed and Gwyn heard some strange trilling noises. Something winged flew nearby and then down the pit hole, landing at his back. And then it stuck a needle into his shoulder and drank. Fuck shit damn it – stirge. And a big one too. After drinking its fill it pulled its bloated form off of the dwarf and flew up and away. Most likely to get other stirges. It was time to move.
Gritting through the pain Gwyn levered his upper body off the stake, shuddering as he did so. Unable to get off the spike completely, he took hold of Elfsplitter and hacked at the base of the spike in his shoulder. The jarring impact was sickening but the spike was cut and Gwyn gulped in agony as he caught his breath.
But three more stirges came, two of them getting a beak into the bleeding dwarf while the last one was caught with a wild grab, crushed, and hurled across the base of the pit its wing torn and unable to fly. The two unwounded ones took to the air and left again. Angry now, Gwyn lifted himself slightly off the last two spikes and cut them free. He was near death, teetering on unconsciousness, but no longer staked to the ground.
Meanwhile after a few minutes had gone by Thurin woke the rest of the group and informed them that Gwyn was gone, will o the wisps were out there, and something stole the dwarf’s underwear. We gathered up our belongings and Gwyn’s as well, strapping on armor and swords again even though we were all pretty damned tired (no one even getting close to enough sleep). Before walking out Aleron noted that there was a tick out there, a giant one, and it was partially on top of the building. Odin be damned!
We charged out and the fight with the tick was short lived as it was unable to get a good bite on anyone and jumped into the temple where it was surrounded and hacked to bits. Booyah!! From there we grabbed our underwear and followed the ranger out as he tracked the dwarf to the edge of Glittercap and beyond (Detheron making a command decision that we are leaving now and coming back some other time in the morning).
It wasn’t much beyond this that we came upon the pit trap and Gwyn far below. We rigged up some rope and Havic went down into the pit to help Gwyn out. He trussed him up into the rope and the party hoisted him up slowly out of the pit, careful not to jar his spike riddled body too much. Once out the satyr made his presence known and Norris fired off a countersong to keep his charming at bay.
Gwyn lifted his repeating crossbow and even in pain took aim in the woods where the satyr’s voice was and fired all 5 times – one of the bolts hitting the mark! The satyr was obvious and we charged in and hacked the forest fey to bits – battle done! We all noticed though that it was wearing the purple underwear that Aleron had mentioned and that had the party trusting the ranger a bit more.
Detheron, Ludwig, and Aleron all worked on the dwarf, taking out the spikes and doing what they could to stem the bleeding. We were practically out of healing and needed to rest. Thurin was badly wounded before from the will o the wisp and the elf and dwarf needed some time without movement. We decided to travel out of Rakewood since we could not get to Glittercap and try to make it to Frink’s homestead.
The ranger led the way in the dark dark gloom, an oil lamp lit to guide us and we lined our way out. Norris kept up a song in case any other fey touched creatures tried to encounter us. It was about an hour or so later that we did encounter something – right in front of us emerged ten 8’ tall green skinned trolls!
They looked at us, we looked at them, and then speaking to them in ogrish both Havic and Gwyn were surprised to find out they liked the bard’s music! We talked for a bit, they were not looking for a fight, and were willing to let us pass for a fee of 50 crowns for each of the trolls – total of 500 crowns. We didn’t even haggle – happily paying the fee and moving on, Norris Rickrolling the party through the encounter with his deft lute playing.
We slogged to the edge of Rakewood about 6:30 and once there Detheron turned into a horse so that we could carry Thurin and Gwyn who were very bad off. The trip to Frink’s took almost 3 hours and once there a few of us policed the bodies from within and buried them outside. The place was them stripped of linens and clothes and we stretched out resting the entire party the entire day.
It did us well. What healing we had was dispensed, spells were studied, books read, weapons tended to, arrows cleaned, armor repaired, even some gathering of apples and other light game went down. Our two worst off party members slept well and it was on the morning of the NEXT day, Watermonth the 27th that we prayed and reprepared ourselves and made the decision to go BACK to Glittercap.
We left at 8 AM and arrived at Rakewood at 11, eventually pushing through the woods between Aleron’s tracking and our own deciphering of Frink’s map, getting to Glittercap about 12:30. At 12:45 we set up camp at the Temple and were getting ready to eat lunch before going back into the underground and take out the source of the plague.
Tuesday, August 16, 2011
Meet 140, Adv 12, 7/30/11
Will o the Wisp.
A monster I have used so very rarely, and probably not for at least 15 years. Normally just a creature I would skim over and look elsewhere for. I think it's mostly because of the depressive and alien feel to it, (same with the Leucrottia) that made it something I could not sink my teeth into.
Well for the underground area of Glittercap, I wanted to make it feel otherworldly. Not another dwarven mine, but something just to the right of normal, just outside the realm of expected. And for that I fashioned an area of giant plaguebearing ticks using hit and run tactics, dwarven wights with cunning intelligence, and brooding depressing globes of animated plasma.
I have to say, I should have used these things sooner - they've been a blast.
Write up follows:
We gave thought to following the two wights but decided not to risk running down the dark corridor in pursuit. After making sure there was nothing in here to concern ourselves with, we drew up back into marching order and pressed on, going down the easternmost door towards where the wights had run off to.
It was a moldy corridor, and within 10 paces our booted feet were slapping in the wet puddles that were collecting there. Norris checked it out briefly but we decided not to risk the bard walking point assuming the wights were nearby. So it was spear butts and cautious steps as we walked into the deepening greenish/reddish algae slimy feeling water, eventually it rising to 4 or 5 inches.
Corridor turned to the left and went seven or so paces before ending, a door on the right and left wall. The right door was closed mostly the left one firmly seated. Checked them both for traps and found none and according to Guyus, he felt a faint evil presence north and west – meaning the right. We readied weapons and pushed the heavy door open.
The water was here as well, what was once some forging room. Big anvil mounted to a stone plug, coal beds (empty), and a few workbenches. Nothing of worth in here any longer. The far end of the room the water was 9” deep. There was another door, this one on the west wall – also not entirely closed. And again, our paladin sensed the evil nearby.
We drew up ourselves and opened the door. Corridor was a long “U” here and the wights were separated down each of the legs, far out of melee range and hissing at a distance. They were watching us with their dead dwarven cunning eyes and waiting to see what we would do. The party suspected a trap and did not want to step out there – the water would slow our movement and they were split up – someone was going to get badly hurt.
We decided to shut the door and then 4 of us dragged the anvil and stone back, blocking the door from opening – and preventing the wights from getting us from behind. We talked about where to go next and wanted to check out the other door outside the forge room. Norris declared it safe and this time Guyus opened the door. It was stuck and required a solid shoulder which the knight supplied and the door rumbled open. He rocked in half a step, gathered his balance, and rocked back out.
At the exact moment that a 5’ diameter mass of green slime dropped from the ceiling right where he was just standing.
We backed up quickly while the slime used the water as a buoyancy device, allowing it to float after us. Gwyn used his firestaff and hurled a blast of flame at the slime, burning it and shrinking it in the process. Torches were passed out and spread and we threw them at the slime, further burning it each time while we tried to give ground. Even Mebali got in the fight but he was scarred by the slime and required some burning to get the diseased mass off his forearm.
The slime eventually was burned away and we carefully looked around, nothing else. Thirty foot square chamber, two other doors out, one would lead right back to wights. We checked the southern door and opened it, showing a long corridor running west. We hadn’t heard from the giant tick in a while and were expecting it to show up.
According to the rough map that Norris was making, there were some strange gaps along the area and we thought they might be secret doors, but the group found none. We followed the corridor as it wound eventually south and then east again – linking up with the barracks chamber at one point and another door would open up to the room with all the bodies we had first encountered the tick in. Figuring we had gone full circle, we looped back to the original tick chamber and drew ourselves up into a potential fight, heading north toward the kitchen area.
It was about here that Guyus informed us that he felt the evil presence again and surmised it to be the two wights once more – just outside the kitchen and to the right. We readied our weapons and were going to run into the hall enmass to do battle, with Guyus and his paladinial skills at the front.
We hit the wights like a hammer, Guyus severely wounding the first one and Gwyn following with a whirlwind attack that injured both of them. Meanwhile Havic took up position on the other corridor with King, expecting to see the giant tick any moment, spears at the ready to receive charge. The wights tried to attack Guyus but only succeeded in hurting themselves as they tried to touch him. The rest of the party hung back avoiding any issue if possible and watching the southern opening for any sign of the tick or other wights.
The combat was not going well for the wights who could not touch Guyus without getting burned, so one of them picked up the other, swung him around and threw him into the paladin before running away down the hall! Guyus couldn’t stop him and he was escaping until Gwyn gave chase and caught up to the fleeing undead. They clashed in the hall and Gwyn was struck, loosing life force from the chill touch.
Guyus finished off the first wight and helped Gwyn on ending the second one. And no ticks came.
We healed wounds and then regrouped, deciding to follow on, hoping to learn of the way down. The corridor continued for a short distance until we came to the other side of the forge room, a series of doors on one side of the chamber. We opened them up, seeing a strongpoint with a few dwarven skeletons there and nothing else.
With no where left to check, we followed the last of the passage until it came to a set of stairs with water cascading down the slick stones in a clockwise turn as it went down into the gloomy darkness. Norris opted to check it out, the half-elf walking some 40’ down until the passage ended at about 3’ deep of water and a closed door. IT was not locked and merely closed, and the water was seeping easily through the wide gaps in the door. He came back up to us and we talked about going down into the mess and entering the 2nd level, seeing if we could learn something before retiring for the night.
The door opened to a very large chamber, 30’ x 50’. An open archway was on the northwest corner of the room, the water slowly making current in that direction, meanwhile there was a tight door on the southeast corner of the room. Mebali put Ludwig on his shoulders as the party entered the deeper water and made their way to the closed door. We lit a lamp and handed out a few more torches while the group got ready to knock the door open.
It burst to the right and the water swarmed through the gap, lowering the depth in the chamber but also soaking the group and knocking Mebali and the Halfling cleric to the ground. We crawled through the opening and shoved the door closed behind us, the party soaked to the skin and feeling run down. We would not be doing much more of this.
There was a door to our right and the corridor, with about 2’ of water in it, went left and turned counterclockwise around some central mass of stone. We left the door and walked on, eventually coming to another door as well as the corridor continuing and turning to the right.
We talked about what we were doing and decided to open the door before moving onward. It was some sort of prayer room, four worn dwarven statues at each corner, two other doors in here. On the eastern wall in deep dwarven runes was written, “Honor to the All-Father.” We looked around for only a few moments and decided to shut the door and move on.
But we had only gone a few paces before the door opened and two of the closest statues were there, assaulting the group! The statues were strong, and our first trade of blows resulted in very little damage being done. Mebali was hit in the mid-section, the wheelwright crumpling down and hugging himself with broken ribs. Gwyn, Guyus, Havic, and even Norris pressed forward to hold the statues back, but their blows were so strong, they kept knocking the group back, clearing the space in front of the door with each swing of their arms.
Detheron called to Frey and Dispelled the magic in the area, using one of his precious greater mistletoes as a focus – temporarily dropping the magic on 3 of the statues! The group assaulted the now still statues, their weapons doing more damage with each fevered swing. The lone animated statue came closer as we dropped one, and then a second statue. Thurin turned invisible and went down the hall.
The dispelling ended and our assault faltered for a bit. A few of the party were hit hard, and the statues’ blows did also have a slowing affect on the group, dragging our movements down and making our ability to dodge difficult.
It was at this time that those of us on the rightmost area of the corridor began to grow despondent and weary, lying down and bemoaning our misery. What was this sorcery? Only Thurin seemed unaffected.
And then he saw it, coming around the corner was a glowing pulsing ball of light 2’ in diameter, crackling with electrical energy. What the hell was it?
We dropped all but the last statue, that one was getting weaker and crumbling away. And then the ball of light shot out a blast of energy and shocked King with a stroke of lightning. Damn it! Thurin yelled that it was a will-o-the wisp and most likely beyond most of our skills. We plied weapons against the last statue, the group getting battered in return.
But it was Thurin’s lucky casting of Charm Monster that STOPPED the will-o-the wisp. However as we learned quickly – it was Thurin’s friend – not ours – and a very dangerous friend indeed. The statue was taken down and we dragged the despairing members of the group away from the floating energy creature. Thurin spent a few minutes with yes and no questions, learning that the wisp was down here with 2 others, there were some undead down here, and something dangerous (most like source of the plague).
We did not want this wisp following us and we wanted to leave it here and get the hell out of the subterranean chambers now. So Thurin convinced the wisp to “wait right here in this room and he’ll be right back” you know, because the wisp and he are friends. Then he shut the door and we all ran as fast as we could back through the watery chamber, up the stairs, and eventually back to the surface.
We went to the Temple of Odin in Glittercap and decided that we would set up camp now.
A monster I have used so very rarely, and probably not for at least 15 years. Normally just a creature I would skim over and look elsewhere for. I think it's mostly because of the depressive and alien feel to it, (same with the Leucrottia) that made it something I could not sink my teeth into.
Well for the underground area of Glittercap, I wanted to make it feel otherworldly. Not another dwarven mine, but something just to the right of normal, just outside the realm of expected. And for that I fashioned an area of giant plaguebearing ticks using hit and run tactics, dwarven wights with cunning intelligence, and brooding depressing globes of animated plasma.
I have to say, I should have used these things sooner - they've been a blast.
Write up follows:
We gave thought to following the two wights but decided not to risk running down the dark corridor in pursuit. After making sure there was nothing in here to concern ourselves with, we drew up back into marching order and pressed on, going down the easternmost door towards where the wights had run off to.
It was a moldy corridor, and within 10 paces our booted feet were slapping in the wet puddles that were collecting there. Norris checked it out briefly but we decided not to risk the bard walking point assuming the wights were nearby. So it was spear butts and cautious steps as we walked into the deepening greenish/reddish algae slimy feeling water, eventually it rising to 4 or 5 inches.
Corridor turned to the left and went seven or so paces before ending, a door on the right and left wall. The right door was closed mostly the left one firmly seated. Checked them both for traps and found none and according to Guyus, he felt a faint evil presence north and west – meaning the right. We readied weapons and pushed the heavy door open.
The water was here as well, what was once some forging room. Big anvil mounted to a stone plug, coal beds (empty), and a few workbenches. Nothing of worth in here any longer. The far end of the room the water was 9” deep. There was another door, this one on the west wall – also not entirely closed. And again, our paladin sensed the evil nearby.
We drew up ourselves and opened the door. Corridor was a long “U” here and the wights were separated down each of the legs, far out of melee range and hissing at a distance. They were watching us with their dead dwarven cunning eyes and waiting to see what we would do. The party suspected a trap and did not want to step out there – the water would slow our movement and they were split up – someone was going to get badly hurt.
We decided to shut the door and then 4 of us dragged the anvil and stone back, blocking the door from opening – and preventing the wights from getting us from behind. We talked about where to go next and wanted to check out the other door outside the forge room. Norris declared it safe and this time Guyus opened the door. It was stuck and required a solid shoulder which the knight supplied and the door rumbled open. He rocked in half a step, gathered his balance, and rocked back out.
At the exact moment that a 5’ diameter mass of green slime dropped from the ceiling right where he was just standing.
We backed up quickly while the slime used the water as a buoyancy device, allowing it to float after us. Gwyn used his firestaff and hurled a blast of flame at the slime, burning it and shrinking it in the process. Torches were passed out and spread and we threw them at the slime, further burning it each time while we tried to give ground. Even Mebali got in the fight but he was scarred by the slime and required some burning to get the diseased mass off his forearm.
The slime eventually was burned away and we carefully looked around, nothing else. Thirty foot square chamber, two other doors out, one would lead right back to wights. We checked the southern door and opened it, showing a long corridor running west. We hadn’t heard from the giant tick in a while and were expecting it to show up.
According to the rough map that Norris was making, there were some strange gaps along the area and we thought they might be secret doors, but the group found none. We followed the corridor as it wound eventually south and then east again – linking up with the barracks chamber at one point and another door would open up to the room with all the bodies we had first encountered the tick in. Figuring we had gone full circle, we looped back to the original tick chamber and drew ourselves up into a potential fight, heading north toward the kitchen area.
It was about here that Guyus informed us that he felt the evil presence again and surmised it to be the two wights once more – just outside the kitchen and to the right. We readied our weapons and were going to run into the hall enmass to do battle, with Guyus and his paladinial skills at the front.
We hit the wights like a hammer, Guyus severely wounding the first one and Gwyn following with a whirlwind attack that injured both of them. Meanwhile Havic took up position on the other corridor with King, expecting to see the giant tick any moment, spears at the ready to receive charge. The wights tried to attack Guyus but only succeeded in hurting themselves as they tried to touch him. The rest of the party hung back avoiding any issue if possible and watching the southern opening for any sign of the tick or other wights.
The combat was not going well for the wights who could not touch Guyus without getting burned, so one of them picked up the other, swung him around and threw him into the paladin before running away down the hall! Guyus couldn’t stop him and he was escaping until Gwyn gave chase and caught up to the fleeing undead. They clashed in the hall and Gwyn was struck, loosing life force from the chill touch.
Guyus finished off the first wight and helped Gwyn on ending the second one. And no ticks came.
We healed wounds and then regrouped, deciding to follow on, hoping to learn of the way down. The corridor continued for a short distance until we came to the other side of the forge room, a series of doors on one side of the chamber. We opened them up, seeing a strongpoint with a few dwarven skeletons there and nothing else.
With no where left to check, we followed the last of the passage until it came to a set of stairs with water cascading down the slick stones in a clockwise turn as it went down into the gloomy darkness. Norris opted to check it out, the half-elf walking some 40’ down until the passage ended at about 3’ deep of water and a closed door. IT was not locked and merely closed, and the water was seeping easily through the wide gaps in the door. He came back up to us and we talked about going down into the mess and entering the 2nd level, seeing if we could learn something before retiring for the night.
The door opened to a very large chamber, 30’ x 50’. An open archway was on the northwest corner of the room, the water slowly making current in that direction, meanwhile there was a tight door on the southeast corner of the room. Mebali put Ludwig on his shoulders as the party entered the deeper water and made their way to the closed door. We lit a lamp and handed out a few more torches while the group got ready to knock the door open.
It burst to the right and the water swarmed through the gap, lowering the depth in the chamber but also soaking the group and knocking Mebali and the Halfling cleric to the ground. We crawled through the opening and shoved the door closed behind us, the party soaked to the skin and feeling run down. We would not be doing much more of this.
There was a door to our right and the corridor, with about 2’ of water in it, went left and turned counterclockwise around some central mass of stone. We left the door and walked on, eventually coming to another door as well as the corridor continuing and turning to the right.
We talked about what we were doing and decided to open the door before moving onward. It was some sort of prayer room, four worn dwarven statues at each corner, two other doors in here. On the eastern wall in deep dwarven runes was written, “Honor to the All-Father.” We looked around for only a few moments and decided to shut the door and move on.
But we had only gone a few paces before the door opened and two of the closest statues were there, assaulting the group! The statues were strong, and our first trade of blows resulted in very little damage being done. Mebali was hit in the mid-section, the wheelwright crumpling down and hugging himself with broken ribs. Gwyn, Guyus, Havic, and even Norris pressed forward to hold the statues back, but their blows were so strong, they kept knocking the group back, clearing the space in front of the door with each swing of their arms.
Detheron called to Frey and Dispelled the magic in the area, using one of his precious greater mistletoes as a focus – temporarily dropping the magic on 3 of the statues! The group assaulted the now still statues, their weapons doing more damage with each fevered swing. The lone animated statue came closer as we dropped one, and then a second statue. Thurin turned invisible and went down the hall.
The dispelling ended and our assault faltered for a bit. A few of the party were hit hard, and the statues’ blows did also have a slowing affect on the group, dragging our movements down and making our ability to dodge difficult.
It was at this time that those of us on the rightmost area of the corridor began to grow despondent and weary, lying down and bemoaning our misery. What was this sorcery? Only Thurin seemed unaffected.
And then he saw it, coming around the corner was a glowing pulsing ball of light 2’ in diameter, crackling with electrical energy. What the hell was it?
We dropped all but the last statue, that one was getting weaker and crumbling away. And then the ball of light shot out a blast of energy and shocked King with a stroke of lightning. Damn it! Thurin yelled that it was a will-o-the wisp and most likely beyond most of our skills. We plied weapons against the last statue, the group getting battered in return.
But it was Thurin’s lucky casting of Charm Monster that STOPPED the will-o-the wisp. However as we learned quickly – it was Thurin’s friend – not ours – and a very dangerous friend indeed. The statue was taken down and we dragged the despairing members of the group away from the floating energy creature. Thurin spent a few minutes with yes and no questions, learning that the wisp was down here with 2 others, there were some undead down here, and something dangerous (most like source of the plague).
We did not want this wisp following us and we wanted to leave it here and get the hell out of the subterranean chambers now. So Thurin convinced the wisp to “wait right here in this room and he’ll be right back” you know, because the wisp and he are friends. Then he shut the door and we all ran as fast as we could back through the watery chamber, up the stairs, and eventually back to the surface.
We went to the Temple of Odin in Glittercap and decided that we would set up camp now.
Thursday, July 28, 2011
Meet 139, Adv 12, 7/23/11
One of the things that sometimes is jarring to people who just listen into the games we play are the occasional adult and blue jokes and ribaldry that flows across the table. From big gay dungeons to countless sword jokes there is often something that comes up and makes the players laugh.
The latest meme is a deal that our druid made with his animal companion, an albino carnivorous ape that has already killed one party member and tore the arm off another. It's mate had died and the beast was lonely so when it was asked to carry the frightened wolverine down 30' of rope it balked and wanted what any red blooded male wanted - an opportunity to get laid.
Our druid informed the ape that although he could turn into an animal, it would be a male animal so there would be no recourse there. He offered to then teach the ape various ...self pleasuring techniques. But the master stroke came when the ape who had seen our mage, Thurin, practice the various polymorphing spells, asked if HE could turn into a female gorilla for him, and the druid without pause said, "Yes" without pause. And without informing the mage of his decision.
Since then we've had many jokes about this and I suspect that at some point a polymorph spell will go awry and our dangerous gorilla will get the chance to have some sweet sweet loving.
Write up follows:
Getting down the rope was fairly easy for everyone in question except for Detheron’s companion, Digger, the dire wolverine. The 140 lb wolverine had no way of traversing the 30’ drop or the rope. Detheron cast a reduce spell on Digger and then spent some time talking with King on how to bring the other animal down (knowing the carnivorous ape would be able to climb without issue).
Then the conversation turned into some strange discussion where King was lonely since his mate, Kong, had died and he wanted a female gorilla companion. Would Detheron be willing to transform into a female gorilla? The druid said that he transforms yes, but not into a different sex. Then there was some pointing to Thurin, the transmuter mage making no secret of his ability to polymorph himself when need be. King wanted to know, if he risked bringing Digger down, would Detheron get Thurin to transform into a female ape for him?
Without hesitation, or even explaining it to anyone else in the group, Detheron heartily agreed.
Satisfied now, King picked up the reduced Digger and the two of them went down the rope to the floor of the cavern, the druid shaking his head and wondering how he was going to explain this deal…and even if he should explain this deal.
Once down here, Detheron cast Log of Everburning on a pair of torches and between Mebali and himself, we had enough light to see clearly. Norris volunteered to explore the 4 passage choices, Havic going with him. The two westernmost ones that went north and south only travelled about 40 feet before coming to an end. Each one ended at a blank wall but we did learn that some time in the long ago past, they were trapped (spear traps) and the traps had gone off.
As for the two easternmost ones, the entire complex was at a slight angle running north east, so the water running into the place from the hole above due to the rain ran in that direction and after 20 paces or so, we noted it began to pool up, about 2-3 inches of the foul water covered the ground. Looking down there, the corridor turned to the right but even at the limit of our torch range the passage continued and it continued to deepen.
This left the southern passage so we lined up into marching order, taking care of the 7’ ceiling, and walked on with care. At the end there was an archway on the left, most likely at one point a wooden door was there, and the passage did turn to the right. Norris volunteered to check it out. It was when he was looking to the passage that something burst from the dark archway and drove him to the ground.
He screamed as whatever it was shoved its head into his back and began to SUCK blood straight out of him. Giant tick. Huge. About the size of a small pony and weighing well over 60#. We tried to drive it off, but most of our weapons just bounced off its thick carapace, before it disengaged itself from Norris and screaming shrilly, jumped back into the dark of the archway.
As for Norris, he was shivering, sick, pale, and staggering – and to both Detheron and Ludwig, it was obvious he was infected with the plague. And infected as if it had incubated within him for almost 3 days unchecked!! We did not see the tick in the next room and we dragged him in there where Detheron spent some time binding his wound as well as asking Frey to remove the disease affecting him.
A quick look at the room, it was some sort of gathering and it was filled with bones, well over 60 skeletal remains of dwarves, dwarves that had died over 1200 years ago, died from the plague. We did notice blood smears in three places: roughly even with the portal we entered, near the south end of the room by another passage, and near the north end of the room, by a third passage. Also there were 2 other doors on the right hand side of the chamber.
While we were clutching weapons and trying to get a bead on the tick and any other issues around, we did hear a shrill warbling scream from the north, followed by some splashing. The tick had gone north.
After 10 minutes of guarding every portal and the tick not returning we took better stock of the place and our choice. The two closed doors on the right were stone, heavy, unlocked but stuck, and we heard nothing on the other side of them. The portal to the south opened to a short hall with a door on one side and another portal on the other. And finally the archway to the north did open to a short hall and then some larger room, most likely a kitchen.
There was treasure scattered about the room, but a fast Detect Magic revealed three items, a set of silver spectacles, a craftsman’s hammer, and an iron rod like a truncheon. We spent some time deciphering what they could be establishing that the spectacles would aid in reading, the hammer in some sort of blacksmithing, and the rod was some sort of magical truncheon with a button that when pressed caused the next hit to be VERY impactful.
And according to Gwyn, to his infravision the kitchen room was a good 15 degrees warmer than the room we were in. We decided that since the tick went this way, we should check it out. Carefully we approached the room: table, counter, old oven, stone cabinets, some chairs. And it was warmer. Was it the over? Not too sure. A fast Detect magic spell was fired off and something magical was glowing from within the cabinet. Nice.
And the cabinet opened a short 3’ tall lizard looking figure with vestigial wings came out holding a helm that was glowing with a detect magic spell on it and began gibbering in some sibilant infernal tongue. No one knew what he was saying and then 4 others came out. Havic beheld the helm and knew it to be Kysoth’s Helm. It took him a moment to rage and then the barbarian stormed forward, spear out and at the ready and he flung one of the little men away, barreling him into the table and chairs.
The creatures all burst into flames and then they charged around Havic, one of them racing towards Gwyn. They scratched and swung and bit, but didn’t do any real damage to the group. And then Detheron called to Frey and unleashed a Quench spell on the group of them, dousing their flames and killing them in the process. The battle was over before it began.
We looked over the cabinets, it was a nest of some sort for the demonic figures and we took a smattering of gold ingots and a few other stones before going back to the other chamber.
From here we opted to go to the south passage and check out the door on the right, noting that it was partially open. Norris carefully explored it and saw it was a blank wall beyond the door with a spear trap already fired off some time ago. The spear head was silvered steel so we took that with us and moved on.
The other choice to the south was a larger chamber with another door out of it, and was at one time used for pottery or ceramic. A large kiln was still here and there were shards on the floor but nothing else of value. There was also another passage out of here on the north wall which we verified met up with the other corridor we had originally came down.
The door on the south east end of the room was looked over, declared to be untrapped and unlocked. But it refused to open after being unused for 1200 years. Gwyn and Havic spent a few minutes bashing their shoulders against it until it opened. A short corridor ended at another door further down. However, Detheron’s warning spell against snares and pits was blaring at him and the druid made everyone stop as he pointed out (to his eyes) what was an obvious pit trap.
It was closed, stone lidded, and most likely according to Norris’ observation be triggered on 50 lbs or so of weight upon it. However, about halfway across, there was a locking point where the two sides of the lid meet up and with a bit of luck, a skilled engineer could force the pit locked with a spike and hammer. So our bard crawled across, rope at his waist, braced against the wall and keeping his weight back and well distributed and disarmed the pit. Well done Norris!
We travelled across the surface (no issue anymore) until we came to the door. Again it was closed and stuck and Gwyn and Havic did their dwarven run and bash at it, forcing it open. This revealed a smallish chamber with 5 very dry papery skinned wrapped dwarven bodies in here as well as two other doors on the other side of the chamber. What were they? Sir Guyus, our paladin, informed us that two of the bodies were decidedly evil – which we took to mean undead.
Guyus, Havic, Norris, and Gwyn were in there, getting ready to hack off the dwarven skulls when the stood up and attacked. A hit was blasted against Havic and the dwarf howled in agony as the undead not only hurt him, but also sucked live force and energy from him! Damn it – wights! Quickly the party tried to run back and make room, no one being eager to do battle with the debilitating undead. Sir Guyus felt safe as the undead would be hard pressed to touch him but Havic was struggling to keep his back with the end of his boar spear.
Norris kept moving backwards through the party, allowing the rest of the group to step forward. Detheron called to Frey and a flaming Sphere appeared, just missing Sir Guyus but easily hitting the wight. Thurin crept in and made his way to the corner of the chamber.
And then something big, black, and screaming shrilly barreled into the back of the party, just missing Norris and sinking its head into the dire wolverine, Digger. The damned giant tick was back. We fought both sides of the battle line now, two wights at the front, one of them already going down from a smiting of evil. The tick infected Digger with the plague and drew out a thick quaffing of blood. Digger let go a blast of his blinding musk, making Detheron, the tick, and Norris sick – while blinding King. The ape grew nervous and swung out wildly, hitting Detheron a few times before relaxing.
As for the tick we hit it a few times (including the use of contact poison!), Norris actually grabbing one of the legs, but it jumped away, leaving its prickly chitonous appendage back in the bard’s hands. The last wight went down and the battle ended. More healing and curing was done.
We bandaged wounds and passed out what cures we could, eventually just relaxing a bit longer. We ate lunch and then drew ourselves back into marching order. Of the two doors in here, we forced the northern one open first finding nothing but a small closet. So we instead opened the other door and there was a hall that went some distance and then turned north. We carefully went, keeping care of where we were going, listening all along.
At the turn, the passage went north, a side branch about half way down to the left and at the end of the passage was another left turn. We went to the first passage and looked, 10 paces to a closed and locked door. Norris broke out his lock picks and spent a few minutes on the door, eventually opening the lock. We opened up, and it was what would have been the thane’s private chamber. Bed, chest, drawers, mosaics on the wall. We did confirm that the mosaic on the wall showed the helm, shield, and bludgeon – the helm of which matched the one on Havic’s head.
From here we followed the original passage out and kept going, eventually getting to the last left turn and walking down with care. The passage had a door on the right hand side about half way down, and there was another door at the end – which Detheron and Norris surmised went back to the original room that we had faced the tick in. So it was this rightmost door that we forced opened and looking in and around.
This was at one point a barracks, sleeping chamber. It had been sealed up so although it was in ruin, there was still enough organic material in here to give us a sense of what was here before. Two other doors in here, one on the far eastern wall, the other on the closer western one. And the eastern door was partially ajar.
Norris went to check it out. Nothing special. Did we want to open it? No…no we didn’t. So he closed it. And when he walked away, it opened again on its own. Alright, not cool. So Norris leaned his weight against it while the rest of the group gave the room a fast once over.
It was towards the end of our search that Norris noted the door “bumped” him from behind. Bumped? Something pushed slightly from the other side. Quickly we drew up into battle formation and got ready. And then Norris swept the door opened and two wights, dead dwarves, came in. We struck a few quick blows but it was Ludwig who called to Freya, asking for the power to send these undead spawn away that turned the tide and the two wights fled back the way they came.
The latest meme is a deal that our druid made with his animal companion, an albino carnivorous ape that has already killed one party member and tore the arm off another. It's mate had died and the beast was lonely so when it was asked to carry the frightened wolverine down 30' of rope it balked and wanted what any red blooded male wanted - an opportunity to get laid.
Our druid informed the ape that although he could turn into an animal, it would be a male animal so there would be no recourse there. He offered to then teach the ape various ...self pleasuring techniques. But the master stroke came when the ape who had seen our mage, Thurin, practice the various polymorphing spells, asked if HE could turn into a female gorilla for him, and the druid without pause said, "Yes" without pause. And without informing the mage of his decision.
Since then we've had many jokes about this and I suspect that at some point a polymorph spell will go awry and our dangerous gorilla will get the chance to have some sweet sweet loving.
Write up follows:
Getting down the rope was fairly easy for everyone in question except for Detheron’s companion, Digger, the dire wolverine. The 140 lb wolverine had no way of traversing the 30’ drop or the rope. Detheron cast a reduce spell on Digger and then spent some time talking with King on how to bring the other animal down (knowing the carnivorous ape would be able to climb without issue).
Then the conversation turned into some strange discussion where King was lonely since his mate, Kong, had died and he wanted a female gorilla companion. Would Detheron be willing to transform into a female gorilla? The druid said that he transforms yes, but not into a different sex. Then there was some pointing to Thurin, the transmuter mage making no secret of his ability to polymorph himself when need be. King wanted to know, if he risked bringing Digger down, would Detheron get Thurin to transform into a female ape for him?
Without hesitation, or even explaining it to anyone else in the group, Detheron heartily agreed.
Satisfied now, King picked up the reduced Digger and the two of them went down the rope to the floor of the cavern, the druid shaking his head and wondering how he was going to explain this deal…and even if he should explain this deal.
Once down here, Detheron cast Log of Everburning on a pair of torches and between Mebali and himself, we had enough light to see clearly. Norris volunteered to explore the 4 passage choices, Havic going with him. The two westernmost ones that went north and south only travelled about 40 feet before coming to an end. Each one ended at a blank wall but we did learn that some time in the long ago past, they were trapped (spear traps) and the traps had gone off.
As for the two easternmost ones, the entire complex was at a slight angle running north east, so the water running into the place from the hole above due to the rain ran in that direction and after 20 paces or so, we noted it began to pool up, about 2-3 inches of the foul water covered the ground. Looking down there, the corridor turned to the right but even at the limit of our torch range the passage continued and it continued to deepen.
This left the southern passage so we lined up into marching order, taking care of the 7’ ceiling, and walked on with care. At the end there was an archway on the left, most likely at one point a wooden door was there, and the passage did turn to the right. Norris volunteered to check it out. It was when he was looking to the passage that something burst from the dark archway and drove him to the ground.
He screamed as whatever it was shoved its head into his back and began to SUCK blood straight out of him. Giant tick. Huge. About the size of a small pony and weighing well over 60#. We tried to drive it off, but most of our weapons just bounced off its thick carapace, before it disengaged itself from Norris and screaming shrilly, jumped back into the dark of the archway.
As for Norris, he was shivering, sick, pale, and staggering – and to both Detheron and Ludwig, it was obvious he was infected with the plague. And infected as if it had incubated within him for almost 3 days unchecked!! We did not see the tick in the next room and we dragged him in there where Detheron spent some time binding his wound as well as asking Frey to remove the disease affecting him.
A quick look at the room, it was some sort of gathering and it was filled with bones, well over 60 skeletal remains of dwarves, dwarves that had died over 1200 years ago, died from the plague. We did notice blood smears in three places: roughly even with the portal we entered, near the south end of the room by another passage, and near the north end of the room, by a third passage. Also there were 2 other doors on the right hand side of the chamber.
While we were clutching weapons and trying to get a bead on the tick and any other issues around, we did hear a shrill warbling scream from the north, followed by some splashing. The tick had gone north.
After 10 minutes of guarding every portal and the tick not returning we took better stock of the place and our choice. The two closed doors on the right were stone, heavy, unlocked but stuck, and we heard nothing on the other side of them. The portal to the south opened to a short hall with a door on one side and another portal on the other. And finally the archway to the north did open to a short hall and then some larger room, most likely a kitchen.
There was treasure scattered about the room, but a fast Detect Magic revealed three items, a set of silver spectacles, a craftsman’s hammer, and an iron rod like a truncheon. We spent some time deciphering what they could be establishing that the spectacles would aid in reading, the hammer in some sort of blacksmithing, and the rod was some sort of magical truncheon with a button that when pressed caused the next hit to be VERY impactful.
And according to Gwyn, to his infravision the kitchen room was a good 15 degrees warmer than the room we were in. We decided that since the tick went this way, we should check it out. Carefully we approached the room: table, counter, old oven, stone cabinets, some chairs. And it was warmer. Was it the over? Not too sure. A fast Detect magic spell was fired off and something magical was glowing from within the cabinet. Nice.
And the cabinet opened a short 3’ tall lizard looking figure with vestigial wings came out holding a helm that was glowing with a detect magic spell on it and began gibbering in some sibilant infernal tongue. No one knew what he was saying and then 4 others came out. Havic beheld the helm and knew it to be Kysoth’s Helm. It took him a moment to rage and then the barbarian stormed forward, spear out and at the ready and he flung one of the little men away, barreling him into the table and chairs.
The creatures all burst into flames and then they charged around Havic, one of them racing towards Gwyn. They scratched and swung and bit, but didn’t do any real damage to the group. And then Detheron called to Frey and unleashed a Quench spell on the group of them, dousing their flames and killing them in the process. The battle was over before it began.
We looked over the cabinets, it was a nest of some sort for the demonic figures and we took a smattering of gold ingots and a few other stones before going back to the other chamber.
From here we opted to go to the south passage and check out the door on the right, noting that it was partially open. Norris carefully explored it and saw it was a blank wall beyond the door with a spear trap already fired off some time ago. The spear head was silvered steel so we took that with us and moved on.
The other choice to the south was a larger chamber with another door out of it, and was at one time used for pottery or ceramic. A large kiln was still here and there were shards on the floor but nothing else of value. There was also another passage out of here on the north wall which we verified met up with the other corridor we had originally came down.
The door on the south east end of the room was looked over, declared to be untrapped and unlocked. But it refused to open after being unused for 1200 years. Gwyn and Havic spent a few minutes bashing their shoulders against it until it opened. A short corridor ended at another door further down. However, Detheron’s warning spell against snares and pits was blaring at him and the druid made everyone stop as he pointed out (to his eyes) what was an obvious pit trap.
It was closed, stone lidded, and most likely according to Norris’ observation be triggered on 50 lbs or so of weight upon it. However, about halfway across, there was a locking point where the two sides of the lid meet up and with a bit of luck, a skilled engineer could force the pit locked with a spike and hammer. So our bard crawled across, rope at his waist, braced against the wall and keeping his weight back and well distributed and disarmed the pit. Well done Norris!
We travelled across the surface (no issue anymore) until we came to the door. Again it was closed and stuck and Gwyn and Havic did their dwarven run and bash at it, forcing it open. This revealed a smallish chamber with 5 very dry papery skinned wrapped dwarven bodies in here as well as two other doors on the other side of the chamber. What were they? Sir Guyus, our paladin, informed us that two of the bodies were decidedly evil – which we took to mean undead.
Guyus, Havic, Norris, and Gwyn were in there, getting ready to hack off the dwarven skulls when the stood up and attacked. A hit was blasted against Havic and the dwarf howled in agony as the undead not only hurt him, but also sucked live force and energy from him! Damn it – wights! Quickly the party tried to run back and make room, no one being eager to do battle with the debilitating undead. Sir Guyus felt safe as the undead would be hard pressed to touch him but Havic was struggling to keep his back with the end of his boar spear.
Norris kept moving backwards through the party, allowing the rest of the group to step forward. Detheron called to Frey and a flaming Sphere appeared, just missing Sir Guyus but easily hitting the wight. Thurin crept in and made his way to the corner of the chamber.
And then something big, black, and screaming shrilly barreled into the back of the party, just missing Norris and sinking its head into the dire wolverine, Digger. The damned giant tick was back. We fought both sides of the battle line now, two wights at the front, one of them already going down from a smiting of evil. The tick infected Digger with the plague and drew out a thick quaffing of blood. Digger let go a blast of his blinding musk, making Detheron, the tick, and Norris sick – while blinding King. The ape grew nervous and swung out wildly, hitting Detheron a few times before relaxing.
As for the tick we hit it a few times (including the use of contact poison!), Norris actually grabbing one of the legs, but it jumped away, leaving its prickly chitonous appendage back in the bard’s hands. The last wight went down and the battle ended. More healing and curing was done.
We bandaged wounds and passed out what cures we could, eventually just relaxing a bit longer. We ate lunch and then drew ourselves back into marching order. Of the two doors in here, we forced the northern one open first finding nothing but a small closet. So we instead opened the other door and there was a hall that went some distance and then turned north. We carefully went, keeping care of where we were going, listening all along.
At the turn, the passage went north, a side branch about half way down to the left and at the end of the passage was another left turn. We went to the first passage and looked, 10 paces to a closed and locked door. Norris broke out his lock picks and spent a few minutes on the door, eventually opening the lock. We opened up, and it was what would have been the thane’s private chamber. Bed, chest, drawers, mosaics on the wall. We did confirm that the mosaic on the wall showed the helm, shield, and bludgeon – the helm of which matched the one on Havic’s head.
From here we followed the original passage out and kept going, eventually getting to the last left turn and walking down with care. The passage had a door on the right hand side about half way down, and there was another door at the end – which Detheron and Norris surmised went back to the original room that we had faced the tick in. So it was this rightmost door that we forced opened and looking in and around.
This was at one point a barracks, sleeping chamber. It had been sealed up so although it was in ruin, there was still enough organic material in here to give us a sense of what was here before. Two other doors in here, one on the far eastern wall, the other on the closer western one. And the eastern door was partially ajar.
Norris went to check it out. Nothing special. Did we want to open it? No…no we didn’t. So he closed it. And when he walked away, it opened again on its own. Alright, not cool. So Norris leaned his weight against it while the rest of the group gave the room a fast once over.
It was towards the end of our search that Norris noted the door “bumped” him from behind. Bumped? Something pushed slightly from the other side. Quickly we drew up into battle formation and got ready. And then Norris swept the door opened and two wights, dead dwarves, came in. We struck a few quick blows but it was Ludwig who called to Freya, asking for the power to send these undead spawn away that turned the tide and the two wights fled back the way they came.
Friday, July 22, 2011
2nd Campaign, Meet 2, 7/17/11
My daughter and I were alone this weekend and she wanted the opportunity to play D&D again, even though my wife was currently in Florida. So we took out the original two characters, the ones that had gone into the guard tower in the back of the basic red book, and continued where we left off.
In my desire to keep it simple and still true to the same sort of fun adventures I had done when I was first playing, I this time took her to the dungeon below the guard tower - which I used from the AD&D ruined monastery found in the DM's guide.
I did not prompt her on what to do or where to go or how to do it, trusting in her to make critical decisions. She decided to burn the webs overhead. She jumped into the pool of water to get the scroll tube. She recognized that her character was immune to ghoul paralysis. And she came to the conclusion that if the goblins had bags of flour and grain, then someone in the town above was working with them and is a traitor.
I could not have been any more proud. :)
Write up follows:
Lina Inverse, elven warrior-mage and Thimbles Mooserider, Halfling fighter, both went to the general store the next day and geared up on fresh arrows, oil, and other sundry required goods. By 9 AM they had stowed all their gear into their backpacks and headed off to the old keep on the edge of Brevoy in an effort to find and bring the “General”, a shadowy figure controlling the goblins and their latest kidnapping schemes against the townsfolk, to justice.
We had already been to the guard tower of the keep before and it was only a few minutes to verify that nothing new had been set up there since our foray into it yesterday. We worked our way to the back and once more went down the hole in the floor to the basement. To the north were a series of cells that we had already cleared and to the south was a locked door that went to a set of wide steps running down. Thimbles lit a fresh torch and we went down the steps with careful feet.
At the base of the steps was a largish room with a vaulted 20’ ceiling where cobwebs hung in heavy sheets. A dozen or so thick bags were in the south corner and there were three decently wide corridors that allowed exit from the room, one to the east, the south, and the west. Lina looked at the ceiling with a squinted eye, untrusting of the many webs hanging there. She held Thimbles back for a moment and then asked for his torch. Climbing back up two of the steps she reached up to the nearest thick canopy of dusty webbings and ignited them.
The fire crawled with surprising speed across the ceiling, sweeping up with a faint “whoosh” as it moved across the room. Clods of cooling ash filtered down, along with dozens of tiny charred spider bodies. However it was with some surprise that the two friends beheld a huge spider, just about the size of a cat, hit the ground just ahead of the racing flames. It turned towards the two of us and scampered forward eager to bite us.
Thimbles was just a split second faster as he tugged his short sword free and speared the arachnid with a single blow, killing it. Lina looked the spider over and said, “That’s the biggest spider I’ve ever seen! I want to get its fangs!” She then proceeded to spend a few minutes struggling to get the spider’s fangs free using the edge of her sword, rope, even her boot, but it was when Thimbles said that if she slipped she could wind up getting poisoned that she gave up trying. We did pick through some of the crud on the floor, finding a goblin skull that Lina turned over to dislodge a garnet from within. The Halfling shrugged, “I guess he was swallowing the gem when he got his head cut off?”
We then went towards the bags and the elven warrior prodded them; nothing came out to assault us. It was obvious after a short look that the bags were filled with both ground flour and grain, and there were many of them. Lina said that there was no place to grow the grain down here and it was obviously the goblins’…so someone from Brevoy must be working with the goblins and most likely the General. There was a traitor somewhere above.
Filing this information away for now and knowing that once we leave we’ll take care of this problem, we looked over our situation. Lina took one of the torches from the wall and helped her Halfling friend check out the exits from the chamber. Three other ways out, and looking down each of them, the east and south went as far as our torch light while the west ended at a stout oaken door. We decided to check out the door first.
Listening to it we both were able to faintly hear some sort of low moaning beyond. She lowered her torch to the ground, readied her sword, and pulled the door open. A stiff breeze blew in, making the torch dance wildly before guttering out, plunging us into darkness. Lina’s infravision kicked in and she beheld the rough walls of a cavern beyond with a swift flowing stream coming from one hole in the wall, ponding, and then flowing out another hole. There were some barrels of some sort in the middle of the room. Other than that, the room was uniformly cool.
They could not get the torches relit and Thimbles was nervous not being able to see. Lina remembered that she had oil and we had a plan, going back to the entrance room we set a few of the bags of grain and flour on fire and tossed them into the windy cavern, allowing us to see. While the light lasted Thimbles checked over the barrels and Lina looked at the water.
In the middle of the pond was a skeleton of some sort, lying flat, very rough and craggy looking. And in its hand was a scroll or map case. As the light was fading, Lina stripped off her packs and weapons, waded into the water, and dove down for the case. She grabbed it and came up cold and sputtering, the cotton gambeson under her platemail was soaked and freezing. The two friends left the chamber, shut the door, and returned to the entrance room.
Once there Thimbles ignited a few more sacks and made a small fire while Lina took off her armor and cotton under clothes, doing her best to wring them out while she dried herself off. Thimbles looked over the case and broke the seal, unfurling a single piece of paper. It was a map of some sort and after showing it to Lina the two of them recognized the entrance room as well as the stream and cavern chamber. It was a partial map of the dungeon they were in.
The noted that the path south led to something marked ghouls, which Lina informed Thimbles were dead people that attacked you and paralyzed you. She didn’t have to worry about that since she was an elf and could not be paralyzed. Thimbles retorted, “They can still attack and eat you. I won’t go towards any room where the people within can attack, paralyze, and eat Halflings!!” The map did indicate the eastern path had a few turn offs, something referred to as the crypts, and then eventually a goblin sign with two marks underneath it. Thimbles pointed to that and said, “That mark means someone important.”
They decided that that area was where the “general” was and should go there to take care of him. On the way they would pass the crypts and Lina suspected that if they were undisturbed, the two of them might find a little treasure in there. They went east, watching where they were going as they walked along. The passage turned to the left and there was a “T” to the right. The map indicated that to the right was the direction they wanted to go (even though looking further down, they did see two doors at the end of the corridor).
After 20 paces they came to a passage to the right, and 20 more paces to come to another one. Even though the corridor did continue on, it was this right option that led to the area marked as the crypts. Torch held high and sword at the ready, the two friends walked on. A stout door was here on the right, and then 4 more paces another on the left, and the same 4 paces beyond that on the right again. Lina pressed her back against the door, but even her considerable strength wasn’t enough to budge it.
They went to the next door, this one giving way. The crypt beyond was about 10’ square, with a stone sarcophagus on the far wall. Tentatively they approached the box, noting that it seemed undisturbed. Thimbles stepped back, his bow out and an arrow at the ready while Lina shoved the cover off.
SNAP!
A hairy black claw snapped out, just barely missing the elven warrior. A large back and red carapaced spider with two humongous crab claws scrambled out, trying to bite Lina’s arm. She snatched it away barely in time. Thimbles fired, hitting the spider and causing it to skitter sideways. She poked it with her sword and another crab spider came out from the casket.
The two of them were grabbing at Lina, pinching her armor, snapping at her wrists. Thimbles shot again and again, causing the spiders to stagger and weave dangerously as they took damage from his arrows. At one point Lina got a lucky blow and her sword sheared one of the spiders in half, turning the tide of the short desperate fight and in a hail of sword cuts and arrows, the last spider went down with a shudder.
We checked Lina out, finding no real wounds to worry about, and then looked in the sarcophagus, snagging double handful of silver and copper coins. Bagging them up, Thimbles picked up the wavering torch from the floor, took out a new one and lit it, and the two friends turned to go further explore the crypt area of the dungeon.
In my desire to keep it simple and still true to the same sort of fun adventures I had done when I was first playing, I this time took her to the dungeon below the guard tower - which I used from the AD&D ruined monastery found in the DM's guide.
I did not prompt her on what to do or where to go or how to do it, trusting in her to make critical decisions. She decided to burn the webs overhead. She jumped into the pool of water to get the scroll tube. She recognized that her character was immune to ghoul paralysis. And she came to the conclusion that if the goblins had bags of flour and grain, then someone in the town above was working with them and is a traitor.
I could not have been any more proud. :)
Write up follows:
Lina Inverse, elven warrior-mage and Thimbles Mooserider, Halfling fighter, both went to the general store the next day and geared up on fresh arrows, oil, and other sundry required goods. By 9 AM they had stowed all their gear into their backpacks and headed off to the old keep on the edge of Brevoy in an effort to find and bring the “General”, a shadowy figure controlling the goblins and their latest kidnapping schemes against the townsfolk, to justice.
We had already been to the guard tower of the keep before and it was only a few minutes to verify that nothing new had been set up there since our foray into it yesterday. We worked our way to the back and once more went down the hole in the floor to the basement. To the north were a series of cells that we had already cleared and to the south was a locked door that went to a set of wide steps running down. Thimbles lit a fresh torch and we went down the steps with careful feet.
At the base of the steps was a largish room with a vaulted 20’ ceiling where cobwebs hung in heavy sheets. A dozen or so thick bags were in the south corner and there were three decently wide corridors that allowed exit from the room, one to the east, the south, and the west. Lina looked at the ceiling with a squinted eye, untrusting of the many webs hanging there. She held Thimbles back for a moment and then asked for his torch. Climbing back up two of the steps she reached up to the nearest thick canopy of dusty webbings and ignited them.
The fire crawled with surprising speed across the ceiling, sweeping up with a faint “whoosh” as it moved across the room. Clods of cooling ash filtered down, along with dozens of tiny charred spider bodies. However it was with some surprise that the two friends beheld a huge spider, just about the size of a cat, hit the ground just ahead of the racing flames. It turned towards the two of us and scampered forward eager to bite us.
Thimbles was just a split second faster as he tugged his short sword free and speared the arachnid with a single blow, killing it. Lina looked the spider over and said, “That’s the biggest spider I’ve ever seen! I want to get its fangs!” She then proceeded to spend a few minutes struggling to get the spider’s fangs free using the edge of her sword, rope, even her boot, but it was when Thimbles said that if she slipped she could wind up getting poisoned that she gave up trying. We did pick through some of the crud on the floor, finding a goblin skull that Lina turned over to dislodge a garnet from within. The Halfling shrugged, “I guess he was swallowing the gem when he got his head cut off?”
We then went towards the bags and the elven warrior prodded them; nothing came out to assault us. It was obvious after a short look that the bags were filled with both ground flour and grain, and there were many of them. Lina said that there was no place to grow the grain down here and it was obviously the goblins’…so someone from Brevoy must be working with the goblins and most likely the General. There was a traitor somewhere above.
Filing this information away for now and knowing that once we leave we’ll take care of this problem, we looked over our situation. Lina took one of the torches from the wall and helped her Halfling friend check out the exits from the chamber. Three other ways out, and looking down each of them, the east and south went as far as our torch light while the west ended at a stout oaken door. We decided to check out the door first.
Listening to it we both were able to faintly hear some sort of low moaning beyond. She lowered her torch to the ground, readied her sword, and pulled the door open. A stiff breeze blew in, making the torch dance wildly before guttering out, plunging us into darkness. Lina’s infravision kicked in and she beheld the rough walls of a cavern beyond with a swift flowing stream coming from one hole in the wall, ponding, and then flowing out another hole. There were some barrels of some sort in the middle of the room. Other than that, the room was uniformly cool.
They could not get the torches relit and Thimbles was nervous not being able to see. Lina remembered that she had oil and we had a plan, going back to the entrance room we set a few of the bags of grain and flour on fire and tossed them into the windy cavern, allowing us to see. While the light lasted Thimbles checked over the barrels and Lina looked at the water.
In the middle of the pond was a skeleton of some sort, lying flat, very rough and craggy looking. And in its hand was a scroll or map case. As the light was fading, Lina stripped off her packs and weapons, waded into the water, and dove down for the case. She grabbed it and came up cold and sputtering, the cotton gambeson under her platemail was soaked and freezing. The two friends left the chamber, shut the door, and returned to the entrance room.
Once there Thimbles ignited a few more sacks and made a small fire while Lina took off her armor and cotton under clothes, doing her best to wring them out while she dried herself off. Thimbles looked over the case and broke the seal, unfurling a single piece of paper. It was a map of some sort and after showing it to Lina the two of them recognized the entrance room as well as the stream and cavern chamber. It was a partial map of the dungeon they were in.
The noted that the path south led to something marked ghouls, which Lina informed Thimbles were dead people that attacked you and paralyzed you. She didn’t have to worry about that since she was an elf and could not be paralyzed. Thimbles retorted, “They can still attack and eat you. I won’t go towards any room where the people within can attack, paralyze, and eat Halflings!!” The map did indicate the eastern path had a few turn offs, something referred to as the crypts, and then eventually a goblin sign with two marks underneath it. Thimbles pointed to that and said, “That mark means someone important.”
They decided that that area was where the “general” was and should go there to take care of him. On the way they would pass the crypts and Lina suspected that if they were undisturbed, the two of them might find a little treasure in there. They went east, watching where they were going as they walked along. The passage turned to the left and there was a “T” to the right. The map indicated that to the right was the direction they wanted to go (even though looking further down, they did see two doors at the end of the corridor).
After 20 paces they came to a passage to the right, and 20 more paces to come to another one. Even though the corridor did continue on, it was this right option that led to the area marked as the crypts. Torch held high and sword at the ready, the two friends walked on. A stout door was here on the right, and then 4 more paces another on the left, and the same 4 paces beyond that on the right again. Lina pressed her back against the door, but even her considerable strength wasn’t enough to budge it.
They went to the next door, this one giving way. The crypt beyond was about 10’ square, with a stone sarcophagus on the far wall. Tentatively they approached the box, noting that it seemed undisturbed. Thimbles stepped back, his bow out and an arrow at the ready while Lina shoved the cover off.
SNAP!
A hairy black claw snapped out, just barely missing the elven warrior. A large back and red carapaced spider with two humongous crab claws scrambled out, trying to bite Lina’s arm. She snatched it away barely in time. Thimbles fired, hitting the spider and causing it to skitter sideways. She poked it with her sword and another crab spider came out from the casket.
The two of them were grabbing at Lina, pinching her armor, snapping at her wrists. Thimbles shot again and again, causing the spiders to stagger and weave dangerously as they took damage from his arrows. At one point Lina got a lucky blow and her sword sheared one of the spiders in half, turning the tide of the short desperate fight and in a hail of sword cuts and arrows, the last spider went down with a shudder.
We checked Lina out, finding no real wounds to worry about, and then looked in the sarcophagus, snagging double handful of silver and copper coins. Bagging them up, Thimbles picked up the wavering torch from the floor, took out a new one and lit it, and the two friends turned to go further explore the crypt area of the dungeon.
Tuesday, July 19, 2011
Addon, Adv 12, Glittercap History
The tome found in the temple to Odin was in poor shape, most of it was unusable, but the last few pages were still legible and covered the final three entries of the dwarven settlement.
In my milieu, I have the world created by the various god with the races being created as well and each one doing their own specialized niche. Then the gods leave the prime material plane to those followers and the dragons take over, demanding horrific sacrifices from everyone. A coalition (eventually!!) of dwarves, elves, giants, and ogres eventually band together and using god born magics and divine power weaken enough of the great dragons to allow all races to rise up and become free.
As usual, elves take it upon themselves to take over from the dragons after a few centuries and when the dwarves try to curtail the elven ascendancy, they are declared anathema and the elves wage and almost 1100 year genocidal campaign to destroy the dwarven people; a time I refer to as the Kinslayer wars. Eventually peace is made but only because the great elven and dwarven kingdoms are shattered and with their slow birth rates and millenia of lost magics, there is no reason to continue warring. And in this void, the barbaric races of goblin, orc, halfling, and man begin to flourish.
This is a glimpse of the dwarven point of view from about 1200 years before the current time of my campaign:
Watermonth 11th, 225th year of the 26th Age.
Reinforcements from Hammerheld have not arrived as expected or promised. We are running dangerously low of our food stores.
Seven month, 4 days, and as of this penning 11 hours now, Prince Malifys Goldenborn and his army has made their attempts against us and they have been rebuffed constantly. The walls of Glittercap have held not the least in thanks to the weave blocking effect of the Asgardian crystals. No elven sorceries can hit the walls or come past, their dweomers die at the perimeter, their magics fail. And as the great Wyrms from ages ago taught us when we rose up against them, when spells and magic fail the tyrants are nothing more than mortal.
We are of the earth and to the earth we will return, but not until Prince Goldenborn pays for his desire of dwarven genocide.
Thane Kysoth Beldenstone, Glittercap.
Watermonth 18th, 225th year of the 26th Age.
Prince Malifys Goldenborn made a tactical error today. Calling upon the unseen magics of his race, he sought to awaken the entirety of the Eastern Woods against us, trusting in the might of oak and ash to batter our walls. Twice thirteen of his people drew blood and chanted and the sun did dim and the air tremble. They cut the throats of hundred of orc and human slaves to empower their spell, the earth drinking deep of blood and gore as the barely conscious primitives ended their mortal moments beneath elven blades.
The power filled the woods, the leaves burned bright as silver and as one the trees bent as giants and lifted their trunks and roots free of the earth to walk towards Glittercap. The Prince cackled like Loki, lightning forming a halo about him as he guided the arboreal army forward to bury our walls.
He had forgotten about Filcher’s Tower above, suspended in the heavens below the gabled arches of the Bifrost Bridge. As the trees marched overland and came our way, we sent forth a dozen of our terrible rockets to burst in the sky in the pattern agreed upon with Subthane Filcher Skystone before he and his clansmen lifted the tower heavensward at the start of the siege.
It roared and burned and howled as it broke free of the Rainbow Bridge and the Filcher’s Tower struck down like Mjolnir at the heart of the marching trees. The blossoming explosion charred the earth like black glass and destroyed the entirety of the treant threat and a material portion of Prince Malifys’ thralls. Our prayers go with the fallen 134 clansmates who go now with Reorx to sit with the All Father in Valhalla.
Thane Kysoth Beldenstone, Glittercap.
Watermonth 22nd, 225th year of the 26th Age.
The treachery of elves is beyond mortal ken. Spells, arms, spears, arrows, slings, stones, and strength did fail to breach Glittercap. The unholy desire of elvenkind to eradicate dwarves knows only irresolute horror and mystery to me and mine. But it is something they have not relented in and now I know that we here will also fall.
Poison. A horrible contagion concocted by the foulest of the elven spellmeisters was brewed and set at the borders of our wall, delivered by thousands of arrows each bearing a single drop of the diseased taint, plunged into the soft earth to fester into the stones, earth, and soil of our home. I can hear our dying on the walls, I can hear our dying in the keep, I can hear our dying under the ground. Their dirge fills the space between the rocks like mortar.
Prince Malifys does not want our treasure, our belongings, or even our servitude – he only wants our deaths. And our deaths he is getting. I can see beyond the walls that his troops are already leaving, moving on to other places and other strongholds to take out our people. He spares not a single glance back at us, ignoring the fever and pestilence that consumes our forms, the black diseases that take root in our flesh. We are nothing to him.
And if to him we are nothing than I shall return the favor. As the last of my people die I leave this journal in our most holy shrine to the All Father as testament of we who were here. I shall leave afterwards and drag myself to the spire of Tallkeep and let fly the final weapon. The burning fires will consume our bones, the plague within the soil, and reach out to engulf the elven horde. The light will be seen in Asgard and Heimdall himself with sound the clarion call on his silver trumpet to mark our revenge.
Thane Kysoth Beldenstone, Glittercap.
In my milieu, I have the world created by the various god with the races being created as well and each one doing their own specialized niche. Then the gods leave the prime material plane to those followers and the dragons take over, demanding horrific sacrifices from everyone. A coalition (eventually!!) of dwarves, elves, giants, and ogres eventually band together and using god born magics and divine power weaken enough of the great dragons to allow all races to rise up and become free.
As usual, elves take it upon themselves to take over from the dragons after a few centuries and when the dwarves try to curtail the elven ascendancy, they are declared anathema and the elves wage and almost 1100 year genocidal campaign to destroy the dwarven people; a time I refer to as the Kinslayer wars. Eventually peace is made but only because the great elven and dwarven kingdoms are shattered and with their slow birth rates and millenia of lost magics, there is no reason to continue warring. And in this void, the barbaric races of goblin, orc, halfling, and man begin to flourish.
This is a glimpse of the dwarven point of view from about 1200 years before the current time of my campaign:
Watermonth 11th, 225th year of the 26th Age.
Reinforcements from Hammerheld have not arrived as expected or promised. We are running dangerously low of our food stores.
Seven month, 4 days, and as of this penning 11 hours now, Prince Malifys Goldenborn and his army has made their attempts against us and they have been rebuffed constantly. The walls of Glittercap have held not the least in thanks to the weave blocking effect of the Asgardian crystals. No elven sorceries can hit the walls or come past, their dweomers die at the perimeter, their magics fail. And as the great Wyrms from ages ago taught us when we rose up against them, when spells and magic fail the tyrants are nothing more than mortal.
We are of the earth and to the earth we will return, but not until Prince Goldenborn pays for his desire of dwarven genocide.
Thane Kysoth Beldenstone, Glittercap.
Watermonth 18th, 225th year of the 26th Age.
Prince Malifys Goldenborn made a tactical error today. Calling upon the unseen magics of his race, he sought to awaken the entirety of the Eastern Woods against us, trusting in the might of oak and ash to batter our walls. Twice thirteen of his people drew blood and chanted and the sun did dim and the air tremble. They cut the throats of hundred of orc and human slaves to empower their spell, the earth drinking deep of blood and gore as the barely conscious primitives ended their mortal moments beneath elven blades.
The power filled the woods, the leaves burned bright as silver and as one the trees bent as giants and lifted their trunks and roots free of the earth to walk towards Glittercap. The Prince cackled like Loki, lightning forming a halo about him as he guided the arboreal army forward to bury our walls.
He had forgotten about Filcher’s Tower above, suspended in the heavens below the gabled arches of the Bifrost Bridge. As the trees marched overland and came our way, we sent forth a dozen of our terrible rockets to burst in the sky in the pattern agreed upon with Subthane Filcher Skystone before he and his clansmen lifted the tower heavensward at the start of the siege.
It roared and burned and howled as it broke free of the Rainbow Bridge and the Filcher’s Tower struck down like Mjolnir at the heart of the marching trees. The blossoming explosion charred the earth like black glass and destroyed the entirety of the treant threat and a material portion of Prince Malifys’ thralls. Our prayers go with the fallen 134 clansmates who go now with Reorx to sit with the All Father in Valhalla.
Thane Kysoth Beldenstone, Glittercap.
Watermonth 22nd, 225th year of the 26th Age.
The treachery of elves is beyond mortal ken. Spells, arms, spears, arrows, slings, stones, and strength did fail to breach Glittercap. The unholy desire of elvenkind to eradicate dwarves knows only irresolute horror and mystery to me and mine. But it is something they have not relented in and now I know that we here will also fall.
Poison. A horrible contagion concocted by the foulest of the elven spellmeisters was brewed and set at the borders of our wall, delivered by thousands of arrows each bearing a single drop of the diseased taint, plunged into the soft earth to fester into the stones, earth, and soil of our home. I can hear our dying on the walls, I can hear our dying in the keep, I can hear our dying under the ground. Their dirge fills the space between the rocks like mortar.
Prince Malifys does not want our treasure, our belongings, or even our servitude – he only wants our deaths. And our deaths he is getting. I can see beyond the walls that his troops are already leaving, moving on to other places and other strongholds to take out our people. He spares not a single glance back at us, ignoring the fever and pestilence that consumes our forms, the black diseases that take root in our flesh. We are nothing to him.
And if to him we are nothing than I shall return the favor. As the last of my people die I leave this journal in our most holy shrine to the All Father as testament of we who were here. I shall leave afterwards and drag myself to the spire of Tallkeep and let fly the final weapon. The burning fires will consume our bones, the plague within the soil, and reach out to engulf the elven horde. The light will be seen in Asgard and Heimdall himself with sound the clarion call on his silver trumpet to mark our revenge.
Thane Kysoth Beldenstone, Glittercap.
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