Prelude
He remembered that day about a year ago when those demonic bastards had rode into town. Robbed folks blind, they did, lying and cheating, as demons do. Finally the town’s protectors had put a stop to it. The Red Angels had needed a much bigger and stronger fire to burn that tiefling bastard alive, but they were doing Pelor’s work, so it was no trouble. His shiftless demonic partner Vash had fled in terror. Now, however, it seemed like a ghost had returned to take revenge on the masked defenders at night, when Pelor’s protection was weakest.

As the sunlight shone down on the villager, he paused to feel the Sun’s protective warmth on his face… until he saw several figures walking towards town from the west. At their head was a face he’d never thought he’d see again. A tiefling who looked all too familiar, though he’d shaved the beard and had a bit more spring in his step. In a shock of panic and hope, the villager wondered if that horned devil had returned to stop the ghost, or to join it in it’s unholy revenge quest. Unsure, he slipped off to warn the others as the strangers came closer to town.

Sunday, September 30
[Due to various factors, Jenn/Art, Valarie/Akara, and Lisa/Praxis were unable to attend. Their characters were present for the first part of tonight’s adventure, but elsewhere for the rest.]

Emerging from the temple after defeating the Yuan-Ti, the party was face-to-face with a large unit of elite genasi soldiers with Dambrathi symbols on their armor. They eventually discovered that this was the Popess’s personal retinue, who had happened upon the carts down at the bottom of the hill while on their way north to visit Father Oman Ra in Verdant Fields, as he was an old friend of the Popess.

After some explanation, the Popess made two things clear: the temple still needed cleansing, and the crystal thing in the party’s cart was not a good long-term solution. She said that while a crystalline matrix could redirect energy, it could not transform one energy into its opposite. Thus arcane could not become divine, nor chaos become law, nor light become darkness. Instead it redirected the energy around the many facets of the gem, slowly creating a vortex that, while diffusing the original energy type (and making it appear to “go away”) actually strengthened it over time, until the point where, like a whirlpool, it would draw like energy nearby to it, and shatter the crystal. This was all a bit above the heads of Nulath, Nikolai, and Scout, but the other (nonpresent) PCs all nodded in some semblance of comprehension. The end result, though, was clear… they had to destroy the crystal and attack the Spider Queen’s energy directly.

The Popess rolled up her sleeves and said she’s always wanted to take on Lolth directly, and asked the party to help. The 3 background PCs all made support checks to add +2 to the final check. The 3 present PCs made support checks, but also contributed healing surges to aid the ritual. The Popess herself (an elderly deva) managed to summon four previous incarnations of herself to help with the ritual, and also called upon her lifetimes’ memories. In the end, the DC of the Spider Queen’s power in Kyone was 60… and the ritual result was 69. As the Popess called out “Get the behind me, Lolth!”, the crystal shattered into tiny spiders, which were burned away in a blast of sunlight radiance. As the party’s vision slowly returned, the Popess’ former selves were gone, though she for a very brief moment had radiant angel wings. And Kyone, bathed in sunlight, was lying on the ground, cured of the Spider Queen’s infection, and looking decidedly more Eladrin and less Drow than she did initially.

The Popess, exhausted, still needed to cleanse the monastery of Zehir’s influence, so she asked Art, Akara, and Praxis to remain behind to help her. She asked the remaining 4 party members to go on a special mission to investigate a group of zealots in the nearby trade hub of Raske whom she believed were taking orders from one of the Cardinals… orders that might contradict the loving, forgiving Pelor that she preached and promoted. The party was to be discrete in their investigation, not mentioning that they were there as agents of the Popess. Seven days later, a military transport was to head through Raske towards Solaria (the capital), and the party was given paperwork to get them on that transport when it came through. Meanwhile the 3 background PCs would travel with the Popess to Verdant Fields, then back to Solaria. The party split, and the real adventure began.
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Heading into town, the party met with a departing merchant half-elf named Joxer, who explained the basic lay of the land in Raske. The town had a secret team of zealots known at the “Red Angels” who dealt with unpleasant outsiders in a most overbearing fashion. Most notably, about a year ago they’d attacked a pair of tiefling scoundrels who’d been cheating townsfolk, burning one to death (with LOTS of fire) while the other was made to watch. The partner had then been run out of town. Recently, the ghost of the murdered tiefling had returned to kill all five of the Red Angels out of revenge. So far it had killed the captain of the town guard.

Entering town, it soon became clear (after a rug-shaking-at, a drunken swing, and a lot of other unpleasant attention) that the “partner” had actually been Scout’s dad, Vash (who, it turns out, is actually a half-elf) using a Hat of Disguise to look like a tiefling, and that his murdered partner had been a very inconsistently minded other tiefling named Charl.

A lot of investigating and interrogating followed, and the party completely split-up without suffering any horribly ill effects (a rare occurrence in D&D, I assure you). The following night, the inn was set on fire and a female dwarven spear-fisher was murdered by the very real tiefling, who disappeared after a succubus claimed him just before dawn. Fortunately, the heroic (and fire-resistant) Scout was able to bound in-and-out of the burning inn, saving the innkeeper (obviously the target, with a red cloak & mask near her not-quite-dead-yet body) and two others trapped in the blaze. This made the party heroes, and caused the mayor (and majority owner) of the town to give them his blessing.

With the Mayor’s support, the party tracked down the remaining two Red Angels, who were visiting with their injured innkeeper friend at the temple to Pelor, and learned that there was a strangely ensorcelled cave nearby that the Red Angels had not been able to enter, since they had no arcanists among them. The party sought out the cave, with Kyone doing some counter-ritual on the cave’s enchantments, and inside found the succubus, her imp servant, and the caged tiefling, who was actually the twin brother of the one who’d been killed a year earlier (“Charl” was their family name). It appeared that “Charl” had made a deal with the succubus: if he could kill all 5 Red Angels before the full moon, she’d resurrect his dead brother (whose corpse was also there in the cave). However, he could only act at night, and during daylight hours was trapped to be tormented by the succubus. The combat that followed was narrated (it was pretty late at night by this point) but involved destroying all three enemies in the cave. The murdering “ghost” defeated, the party returned to tell the new captain of the guard, who was not a supporter of the Red Angels’ tactics. She asked that the body be buried in the woods in secret, and that the official story be that the party had “banished the ghost”. The party was okay with this misdirection, and were soon being hailed as exorcists of the town. Eventually the military transport came through, and the party jumped on and headed to Solaria.

Meanwhile, Art, Akara, & Praxis had some face time with the supreme leader of the nation of Dambrath and the highest mortal authority of Pelor on the planet… but we’ll deal with that separately.

Treasure: None per se, though Nulath got a new foppish hat. Also Scout now has a crappy homemade tattoo image of himself on the bicep of some guy in Raske. Oh, and Nikolai recieved an offer to have a fire-breathing canary tattooed on his own flesh, though he did not take the young man up on that offer (don’t ask).

Experience: For solving the mystery, the party got 200 XP each. For keeping 3 of the Red Angels alive, they received another 150 XP each. Total: 350 XP (totals should be just shy of 5th level at this point… it’ll probably happen after next game.

Speaking of next game, I’ll send an email about that to folks in a week or two. Micah & Casey’s space was awesome, though cat issues caused Niki to not be able to breathe, and Johny was saying that the commute was beyond what he could do casually… so we’ll also see if we can get our new apartment up-and-running as a venue before the next game as well.

Game Date: Sunday, August 26, 2012

When last we left our heroes, they were resting after a tough set of battles in the Dambrathi town of Verdant Fields. They helped the mayor/priest of the town, Oman Ra, in his slow recovery from massive injuries. They read-up on many texts in the library (overseen by librarian Egremont Barrington III). They interacted briefly (and awkwardly) with Sunquartz, the shardmind arcanist/hermit who helped the party regrow/repair the containing magical crystal around the infected drow Kyone Velve. They listened to tales and tried not to get swindled by the town’s innkeepers, the Thenardiers. And they spoke further with Ssussun Beluth, who apologized for his earlier mentality and tried to make amends while burying his brother.

Word came from the capital after about a week and a half. Given the extent of Father Ra’s injuries, Ssussun was to serve as interim town priest (and mayor) until a permanent replacement could be found. Also, the party was invited to join several cardinals from the Pelorian Church leadership at a special dinner honoring their contributions to the nation, fighting the enemies of the Sun. To that end, three messengers/cart-drivers/lackeys were sent to assist the party in getting their carts to the capital city of Solaria (about 2-3 days’ travel south).

Heading south, the party was treated to extensive conversation with the three human cart-drivers, all of whom were soon-to-be up-and-coming hopefuls in the lowest levels of the church, but were True Believers in all that Pelor had to offer. The most vocal of the group, Jimmy, seemed to possess an endless supply of statements about Sun-related blessings, and how all other gods somehow owed their power and place in the world to the Sun. These were not spoken with any malice, just with the ignorance of a very singularly minded zealot.

The non-stop solar infomercial was interrupted on the second day of travel by a barefooted young sun elf girl, who looked quite relieved to see the party. Her name was Sora. She told the party that her martial arts monastery, the Monastery of the Sunning Stones, had experienced “something strange”. She said that the grand master had been in seclusion for several weeks, and that the other monks in the monastery had all begun strange chanting, which made a “fiery snake” that they didn’t seem able to see (though she could). Sora wished her father was there to fix things, though she said he had left her at the monastery years ago so he could go fight evil (he was called The Lone Wolf, by the way). Sora was left with the cart drivers (and Nulath/Casey, since Casey wasn’t yet here), while the party climbed the mesa to investigate the monastery.

Outside the monastery, several monks were indeed meditating and chanting atop super-heated stones, though they did not seem to be burned by them. In their midst appeared a psychic flame snake, which taunted Scout/Johny into a one-on-one combat of sorts. The rest of the party arrived, though, and took out the chanting monks, whose psychic energy appeared to be fueling the snake, and it disappeared. The party also quickly realized that they might still be able to save the monks who still physically looked like elves, but that if they killed them, the serpentine nature would take over and release a monstrous snake.

Moving into the monastery, the party wound through several crystalline hallways, exercising stealth of body and mind to prevent detection by the inhabitants, and also realizing that a Zehir-related item had tainted the water supply used by the men of the monastery (Sora, the only female there, used a different water cistern, which must have prevented her from being infected). The party removed the cursed token (a coin-like item), and Scout was able to wrap it up without letting the dark energy infect him. The party snuck into the main room, where the grand master (whose shed flesh they found in the previous room) was a full-on Yuan-Ti abomination, and several other monks and Yuan-Ti were meditating on their dark god, Zehir, trying to create more of the snake monsters.

The battle was fierce, with Praxis/Lisa almost going down several times, and quite a lot of ongoing poison getting passed-around, and a blessing from Pelor helped the party barely hang on a few times. The tides finally turned when (Casey arrived and) Nulath came charging through the doors, tipping the scales in the party’s favor. After the battle, the central disk of Peloric symbols glowed strangely to Akara, who saw a shield glowing in the middle of it. Strangely, she seemed to remember this shield as once being hers (in a previous life), and as she reached out for it, the item reforged itself to match the wing-style shield on her arm.

The game ended with the party resting at the temple, trying to figure out how best to deal with the unconscious bodies of the semi-infected monks.

Experience: 300 XP (total should be at 4900 right now… level 5 is at 5500)

Treasure:
- Gem of Colluquy (supernal)… purchased by Scout in Verdant Fields
- 100 GP
- 6 containers of Sun Balm (50 GP value, +2 Endurance vs. sun exposure for 12 hrs)
- four 50 GP gems [Scout]

Quest/Plot Items
- Zehir’s Flame Serpent Token [Scout]

Game occurred on August 12, 2012

Location: Verdant Fields, Dambrath

Racing towards Ssussun’s house after being rescued from the cemetery fight by the two Avengers, the party faced off against The Unknown Soldier, his animated cart drivers (and their horses), and the slain orc spirits and whatever bodies they could animate (including the body of Boomer, Nikolai & Nulath’s old war buddy). The battle was pretty fierce, though the party received some “help” from the rakshasha Kalarel, whose illusions tormented the horses and The Unknown Soldier in somewhat sadistic ways.

When the battle was finally over, the party investigated the body in the coffin that the spirits appeared unable to animate, and discovered that it contained a vampire named Righteous Fist of Harmony, who was part of a super-secret Dambrathi strike force known as “Glare Unit”. As it was super stormy & cloudy, she rushed off to the cemetery to help defend Dambrath. After a short rest with some healing and replacing of dead soldier bodies, the party also headed to the cemetery.

They arrived on the scene just in time to see the ghost of the orcish exarch about to destroy both avengers and the vampire, but at the last minute an elderly human stepped up, raising his solar holy symbol high, and used holy power to turn undead in a burst around him. This set the vampire ablaze with radiant energy, but the ghost only turned and backhanded the old man with his axe, shattering bones and knocking him into a pile of ghouls (who proceeded to begin eating him). The party fought off the ghouls, while the two Avengers took the opportunity of the brief distraction to put their last energy into an attack, which called down the sun’s fury and exploded the ghost in a cloud of ravens.

Some of the party helped the vampire get to cover (since it was now sunny), while the barely conscious human handed a rare pouch of phoenix down feathers to Akara, asking her to save the boy. Realizing that Sikel, the Death Avenger, had cast the Final Rite ritual on himself and might not be able to come back from death, she used it on Ssussun, the Solar Avenger. She also used her holy power to cleanse the priest of the undead disease eating away at him, and took him to be healed.

In the aftermath, the town was super greatful, offering several magic items and some gold as thanks for saving them. The party met the reclusive shardmind mage Sunquartz, who eventually figured out that she could regrow Kyone’s cracked crystal, if given enough time (at least a week). The old cleric/mayor has been in bed, healing from his many wounds, but it appears that he will not walk again. A day later, an owl arrived with a scroll that was a message for Nikolai from Axeblood Steelshovel, back in Ionia.

The party took their first break here, resting for at least a week while waiting for the crystal to be repaired.

EXPERIENCE: The party gained 500 XP for this and the previous fight

TREASURE:
- 1000 GP
- Battleaxe of Shared Wrath+1 (Akara)
- Robe of Scintillation+1 (Art)
- Sunleaf Hide Armor+2 (Nulath)

In the darkness of the forests north of The Line, Ssussun was not having a pleasant time of things. The orcs had retreated, but had sent trolls in to keep the Alliance from advancing. Even Ssussun’s elite scout team was having difficulty making any tactically significant hidden strikes, as the damned things kept regenerating any wound not caused by fire… and it was hard to hide a flame’s light. The moon was a mere sliver of its former self, providing enough darkness for a perfect raid… if only he could find a vulnerable target. Suddenly, in a flash of pure radiance, a being of fire and elegance stood before him, a symbol of pure white light blazing on its forehead. Before it had fully formed, Ssussun had his weapon out.

“Be still, warrior of light,” said the creature in a celestine tongue that any would understand. “I mean you no harm, but bring a message from the Lord of Morning, who dwells with Pelor in splendor.” As it spoke, Ssussun heard a distant call of trumpets echoing from a far-off realm.

Though its arrival had destroyed any hope of a surprise attack from this location, the drow felt an inherent trust of the angel before him. He sheathed his sword and knelt before the trumpet archon. “Speak your words, messenger. I will hear and obey.”

“When Lathander’s light reaches your home, it will see an orcish attack on your nation, and a specific strike against your family. The perpetrator is one of your victims, returned with Gruumsh’s blessing to destroy your land. But you will need to face a larger foe while he is dealt with. Go now if you hope to stop them.”

. + . + . + . + . + . + . + . + . + . + . + .
Sikel slept uneasily in the cheap tavern next to the City of the Dead. It wasn’t the many bodies nearby… no, those often gave him comfort. Nor was it the rituals he would help perform on the grave of Mirt the Moneylender after the burial… there were more than enough death priests in the city to handle that task without him. It was something else… a nagging in the back of his head that something was not right… that something needed his specific kind of repair. Unable to determine what it was, he allowed himself to drift off to the land of dreams.

In his dreams, Sikel saw a dark elf racing through the darkness, rushing south towards Waterdeep with more haste than seemed possible. Sikel recognized the Drow… he fulfilled a similar role to Sikel’s, but for the Church of Pelor. Ssussun was his name, and he and Sikel had worked to destroy a cell of Kargatane assassins about a year earlier.

Sikel’s vision jumped, and he saw a sign welcoming visitors to Dambrath. He saw a guard house near a graveyard by the border. Then he saw what was in the graveyard, and what was manifesting in that graveyard. The shock of what he saw woke Sikel in a panicked cold sweat.

Moments later, he was outside the door to the inn in the pre-dawn light, speaking to one of the Raven Queen’s altar boys, an elf known for his speed. Sikel handed him a small figure of black stone in the shape of a horse, the twin to one in his other hand. “You must go to the north gate with all haste, and then continue northward. You will pass a Drow rushing south, a soldier of the Sun. You are to give him this, tell him it is from me, and tell him that I will hold it off as long as I can. Tell him to hurry.”

With that, Sikel used the remaining figure to conjure a steed of smoke and magic, and began racing south, hoping that he’d reach Dambrath in time.
====================
[NOTE: Due to several factors, Mike/Karath, Micah/Nicolai, and Casey/Nulath were not present for this game. As Micah & Casey’s absence was unplanned and last-minute, we had their characters “in the background” for this session, and used simplified versions of them for the combat. Mike’s character, as you’ll see below, wasn’t around for long, but that was a planned absence, so I had a story reason set up to remove him.]

The devil “Lee” sat casually with Akara/Valarie and Karath, chatting pleasantly while the rest of the party was off in the Elemental Chaos (see previous session). Lee was very inquisitive about Akara’s Deva nature, as he’d had little chance to actually speak with deva in casual conversation. He also mentioned that if she ever got tired of reincarnating, she could sign a deal with him which would guarantee her soul went elsewhere. He also spoke of the ritual he’d traded to The Unknown Soldier, claiming that it was a more advanced necromantic spell that didn’t just raise random undead, but allowed the caster to call forth specific dead souls of creatures whose names he knew. Since it looked like the Unknown Soldier had been some kind of general in the orcish army, this did not bode well for the people of Dambrath, who might soon be overrun with undead orcish hordes.

While Akara tried to be noncommittal in conversation, Karath outright rude, holding tomes in front of his face as he pointedly ignored the devil (the D&D equivalent of rustling a newspaper & doing the crossword puzzle while someone is speaking). When Karath finished fake-reading the first tome, he reached for the next, not realizing until it was out that it was the Vecnal tome they’d taken off the necromancer… the tome that had somehow turned the Warforged Mecha Unit Delta comatose back in Cormyr.

Lee noticed the book before Karath could put it back, though, and seemed very surprised and started asking questions, saying that it was quite a dangerous item. Karath casually said that there was nothing on the pages now, opening the book to show the blank pages. Unfortunately, THE PAGES WEREN’T BLANK, and after looking down at them, the words swirled and Karath’s body went limp. Lee was fascinated, in a clinical way, to see the item working. He said it looked like a rare Vecnal magic item known as a “Book of Ultimate Amnesia”, a tome said to be so full of powerful secrecy magic that it could make a body forget the soul that was in it. Of course, Lee said, that rumor also hid another secret… that in fact what the tomes did was transport souls elsewhere. Lee had no way to track the souls, as he said his people didn’t really deal much with safely transporting souls to non-Hell areas.

As Lee & Akara spoke about the item and the likely location/condition of Karath’s soul, a rift in the dimensional fabric appeared, with a haggard-looking Eladrin ghost family holding the rift open. They asked Lee if he’d been able to save Serenity (see “The Elf-Slaying Storm” on the Bard’s Tale page), and he casually shrugged and said “Sorry friends, it just didn’t work out that way.” Utterly defeated, their spirits dissipated.

The rest of the party emerged just after that, and quick updates were given. Lee was very happy with the progress the party had made and with all the contracts they’d managed to copy, and he rewarded them with a bonus: 5,000 GP and a bag of holding (lvl 5). He further offered a magic item to keep Karath’s body healthy until the unlikely event of his soul’s return, a Belt of Sustenance (lvl 7). He then went on his way north towards Waterdeep, whistling as he left [OOC note: the tune was “Time is on My Side” by the Rolling Stones].

The party set about trying to make wheelbarrows or other carrying devices for the now three unambulatory forms they had to carry (Kyone in her crystal, the warforged M.U.D., and the comatose Karath). As they tried to scrounge wood from the rotted stables and nearby forest, Scout/Johny heard hoofbeats coming from the north. While the rest of the party hid, Scout stood in the middle of the road, waving his arms. Soon a huge (2 lanes wide, 2 stories tall) carriage pulled by 8 Clydesdale horses met him in the road. The carriage was manned by 10 very attractive elven & half-elven men & women. The double doors to the carriage opened with flair, and a very flashy elven pirate captain named Blackheart Deathclaw emerged from the carriage.

Of course, Akara remembered the “elven” pirate from the Murder Machine audience, and knew that he was actually a Rakshasha named Kalarel. Kalarel offered the party a ride, including cargo space for their bodies (which he seemed to think they’d use for some nefarious purpose), in exchange for two things: 1) a conversation with his old business partner, Arkara-el (Akara), and 2) a statement that his carriage was part of Akara’s retinue, protected under the Church of the Raven Queen, so that Kalarel could avoid lying in an oath of loyalty to Pelor at the border of Dambrath. After an intra-party pow-wow, it was decided that they needed the lift to get the 10 miles south to Dambrath to stop The Unknown Soldier, so they agreed.

Kalarel told Akara about the joys of being a Rakshasha, how it gave him access to all his memories, and allowed him to enjoy the fullness of life and power, unfettered by morality. He also told a few stories about Akara’s past. According to Kalarel, he and Akara used to be angels of Lusemnee, the chief assassin goddess and daughter of Zehir, god of snakes & assassins. He said they had been on many murder missions together, but that Akara had disappeared just before “things got strange with mother”, that is, when Lusemnee rebelled against her father and began becoming a goddess of redemption. Kalarel said that when Zehir killed mother, they all “fell” and became Deva. His words, however, failed to strike up any memories with Akara, and she stayed silent through the narrative.

Soon, the servants (each of whom appeared to have an illusion-based romance with Kalarel’s pirate alter-ego) told Kalarel that there was a problem up ahead, and it became clear that someone had killed the guards at the border station to Dambrath (right next to the radiantly glowing sign letters “Dambrath welcomes all under the Sun”. Cresting the hill that the guard houses were on, they could see down to the village of Verdant Fields, and the graveyard next to the village, which appeared to have some activity going on inside it. Kalarel offered to hold onto the bodies while the party dealt with these “local politics”, claiming he’d not touch them “as a professional courtesy to an old working partner”, but the party instead took their unmoving friends from him and stashed them in the guardhouse (which they locked) before rushing down to the cemetery.

The fight in the cemetery was rough, to say the least. Slain orc spirits would sometimes attack the party, and sometimes sink into the ground to animate a body there as a Slain Orc Ghoul (which could immobilize with its touch, then eat you alive). Also, there was a ghostly Eye of Gruumsh shaman who began a ritual in orcish that involved storms and the word “Broxigar”. To make things worse, there were two portals through the veil of death open on the battlefield, and each round they spit out more slian orc spirits or shaman ghosts. The party got pretty bogged down by the ghouls and spirits, and never managed to get close enough to the portals to disable them, nor did they get close enough to the summoning ritual to cast a counter ritual. As a result, the ghost of Broxigar, a famous Exarch of Gruumsh (from the Elf-Slaying story), appeared on the battlefield, with the party still fighting lesser undead and uncertain of ever escaping. Broxigar held up his axe as every dark stormcloud poured lightning into it, and the death of our heroes seemed fairly certain.

Fortunately, at the last moment, Avengers assembled to help the party. One was Sikel, the half-elf/half-shadarkai Avenger of Death the party had met in Waterdeep. The other was Ssussun Beluth, the drow Solar Avenger the party had met at the Many Flagons. Ssussun had an extra tie to this adventure, since the party had determined it was likely he who murdered TUS’s family of orcs way back when, and TUS had likely come to this town, Ssussun’s home, to slaughter his friends & family and desecrate the body of his brother (which was among the dead bodies in the caravan) in a vengeful rage. Ssussun marked everyone on the battlefield as an enemy of the Sun, altering his declaration slightly when Sikel told him that the party were allies. The two Avengers then started to hold off the forces in the graveyard, telling the party to rush to Ssussun’s house on the eastern edge of town to find the caster, because if they didn’t stop him, he could do this to every cemetery in Dambrath.

The session ended with the party racing off to a second battle.
The next game will start with a new combat encounter. Mechanically, your encounter powers will have reset, but you’ll have no chance to heal in-between fights. Due to the simplified way we handled the characters, to make things easier Nulath & Nikolai will start the fight at their bloodied value for hit points, but all encounter powers will still be recharged. Any daily powers spent in the Elemental Chaos or during the cemetery fight are still spent. If you were present for both the Elemental Chaos adventure (3 encounters) and the cemetery fight, you’ll start next session with one more action point.

We’ll email about timing for the next game.

Stay tuned for episode 18: “Old Friends”

Experience: to be determined after the next fight
Treasure:
- 5,000 GP
- Bag of Holding (lvl 5)
- Belt of Nourishment (lvl 7) – Karath

[Due to some last minute player cancellations from Valarie & Mike, this session was hatched-up in the 2 hours before game, and involves a somewhat forced side-quest with only 5 of the players.]

When last we left our players… they were resting somewhat uncomfortably in the remains of the stables next to the gargantuan Mimic-disguised-as-an-inn that they had bloodied as it tried to devour them. It was during the last watch, Jenn/Art Zoe’s watch, that our episode began…

The rain had settled to a light drizzle as a traveler in a brown leather coat & hat approached the fire in the pre-dawn hour. He appeared as a tiefling, though Art Zoe’s trademark paranoia would have none of that. Eventually it was revealed that he was a devil, an “independent contractor for the Nine Hells” named Lee (actually Le Ralak Ahsah-skar E’ht Y’lter’ces… but “Lee” is much easier for all concerned). Lee noticed a familial resemblance between Art and her father, and after some conversational gymnastics she finally revealed herself to be her father’s daughter.

Lee told of a family curse invoked by an ancestor of Art’s, an infernal-pact sorcerer named Keziah from one of the high houses of Bael Turoth (before the Cataclysm… so over 1000 years ago). Keziah had made a deal with a demon lord named Ehkahk, who called himself the Smoldering Duke and lord of the Choking Palace. The problem was that some part of the deal (a hidden part that was disguised under a faulty contract) apparently gave access to all of Keziah’s descendants, so in the centuries since then her family had suffered a tendency to be tempted by fiery/smokey demons and to die horribly in burning-related incidents.

Lee said that the forces he worked for did not like Ehkahk, because he was a chaotic demon who lied in his contracts… totally unlike a proper devil’s contract, which always followed the agreement to the letter and made sure all parties had a chance to read every word. He said that the forces he worked for would love to take out Ehkahk, and that the best way to do that was to examine the contracts he’d made over the centuries, as those were how he garnered most of his power. Unfortunately, his contracts were held in a Fortress of Smoke on a massive coal mote floating in the Elemental Chaos, and Ehkahk had enchanted this fortress to immediately identify any incursion by immortals or creatures native to the outer planes.

This did mean, however, that most of the party would be okay to go on an infiltration mission. Akara/Valarie and Karath/Mike couldn’t go, since Akara is a deva (an immortal) and Karath was born in the Outlands (also because Valarie & Mike couldn’t make it that night). However, due to a time discrepancy, the party could spend an hour or two in that part of the Elemental Chaos and only pass 5 minutes or so in the Prime Material Plane. Lee gave the party a book that would immediately copy any contract touched to it and a special trans-dimensional teleportation gem (empowered by crystallized eladrin souls) to bring the party back when they were through.

In addition, Lee (who had been travelling north) had information about a very upset revenant caravan driver (The Unknown Soldier) with whom he had made a deal. The caravan driver had wanted a ritual, and he had traded a list of recently “available” souls… the List of the Dead that described all the bodies in the caravan. Lee had “looked into” the souls on the list, and said that all were already spoken for. However, he said that if the party succeeded in copying as many contracts as possible from Ehkahk’s warded contract room, he’d give the party the List of the Dead, which he believed had directions to where TUS was going (the next name on the list was the brother of Ssussun Beluth, with whom TUS wants revenge for the whole family murder thing the Pelorian Drow Avenger did to TUS’s family in his last life). He also said that if Art was able to copy the contract Keziah had signed, that he and the forces he worked for would do everything in their power to find any loopholes or ways to use the contract against Ehkahk. These agreements, in conjunction with the knowledge that they’d be freeing the trapped family of eladrin souls (though Lee assured them that "they were not exactly GOOD people who made the deal that resulted in their getting trapped there) in the gem when they activated it, convinced the party to go on this devil’s errand. Lee said he’d discuss the specifics of the ritual he’d given TUS with Karath & Akara while the rest were gone.

In the Elemental Chaos, there was a lot of smoke, as the massive earth mote seemed to be made entirely of coal, and was orbiting perhaps 50 miles away from the Choking Palace, a huge floating cloud castle composed of glowing orange smoke and bursts of blackness. On the coal mote, the party first was attacked by a medium smoke dragon and some flamesoul lance creatures (afterwards they found a magical bottle… see below). Reaching the Fortress of Smoke, they engaged in a number of skill challenges to maneuver into a building of sometimes-solid smoke, filled with smoke creatures that might trip alarms. Eventually they found their way to the stone-floored Contract Room, but were so busy examining it that they missed out on the enemies sneaking up to attack them. The party fought against some smoke-fire bats and enhanced versions of the flamesoul creatures from before… but some of the flamesouls entered the walls and turned them into expanding masses of combusting gas. The party grabbed and copied as many contracts as they could, not reading any but just smacking them against the book and dropping them. Both Art and Scout felt strange sensations upon grabbing one of the contracts each. When they finally activated the portal to leave (seconds before they were burned alive by the white phosphorous-like clouds), the party had copied 11 scrolls, and had taken 3 of the originals with them:
- One was the contract signed by Keziah (the one that made Art’s blood tingle when she grabbed it).
- One was a contract signed by Zira of the assassin’s group Kargatane (the one that made Scout’s shadow tattoo feel like it was burning).
- One has not yet been opened (Scout had mentioned to Karath that he’d try to bring him back a book or something from their trip).
[I’ll have these contracts posted in the Books section of the site in the next few days]

The next game will begin with a five minute conversation between Lee, Karath, and Akara, followed by the return of the scorched five.

Experience:
For two fights and a skill challenge, as well as getting 11 contracts, each party member receives 150 XP.
NOTE: To keep everyone even, all characters will get this, even folks who weren’t present.

Rewards & Treasure:
For their travels in (and survival of) this particularly unpleasant area of the Elemental Chaos, the five who participated in this adventure received the free feat Born of Elements (from Heroes of the Elemental Chaos… it gives you a +2 to Endurance & Intimidate, and is a prerequisite for a lot of other cool elemental feats from that book).

The warm brass bottle found on the coal mote is a lvl 7 wondrous item Bottled Smoke. Lisa/Praxis has this item currently.

Next game will hopefully be in 2 weeks, on Sunday, July 15. We can email about specifics. Stay tuned for episode 17: A History of Violence.

“Wyrm-grampa! Tell us the story about the tower again!” The many little dragonborn children seemed for a moment to the ancient bard like the swarms of monsters he’d fought in his youth. He shook off that impression, though, knowing that these days his mind sometimes saw things that were not there.

“Haven’t you heard the bards sing those songs enough already?” Though he had made his life entertaining, the withered old man felt a weariness that was becoming all too frequent these days. And while his great-grandchildren were cute, he hoped (in vain, he knew) that perhaps he could avoid revisiting that night for their entertainment.

“They never tell it right! And they skip the parts they don’t believe!” The children were unrelenting in their demands, and the old bard reached for a pitcher of water to refill his glass before settling down for the tale he knew he’d have to tell.

“Well, I suppose I can’t argue with you, Ioun help me. Truth must be told to those who ask.” Nikolai wetted his parched mouth and called upon his oldest memories to make the tale live again in his mind. "We had just departed Waterdeep for the first time, having laid the great hero Mirt to rest. My friend Scout had just received the title of Trap Master of Ionia, warding off nefarious interests from the City of Splendors for another decade, and again upsetting the dark fey forces that we know had such an impact on his ultimate destiny. We were riding south towards Dambrath aboard what history would call the Caravan of Dead Soldiers. The weather had gotten quite unpleasant as night fell, storming fiercely. Just as we thought we could go no further, we looked up to see a lantern-lit building ahead… a tower-like inn that was exactly what we needed. We all took this as a blessing, a safe shelter from the storm. If only we had known that the night would mean the end of one of us…

Sunday, June 17, 2012

Our session began with some bookkeeping, as everyone showed off their spiffy new level 4 feats. We also settled the last of the conversations that had happened in Waterdeep, with Artania inviting the party to her home in Kislev, when their train got that far, and Mike/Karath verifying the conversation he’d had with the Red Wizardess Lich Valindra Shadowmantle, and the offer she made to turn Kyone into an undead creature to stop the Lolthian transformation. We also verified that Karath had been taught the Simple Automoton ritual that TUS used to animate the cart-drivers.

Then we jumped to the present, as the party was on the wagons heading out of Waterdeep. The road started off calm and uneventful, though The Unknown Soldier refused to talk about the rather ominous and upsetting reading he received from Centauri the previous night. The weather soon turned foul, however, and was soon a raging storm. When all seemed lost, and the storm too great, a tower was seen in the distance, and suddenly the party had an inn to save them from the storm.

Of course, not everyone was happy with this seemingly perfect arrangement. Jenn/Art did not stop voicing her concerns, and Karath hid in the carts in the stable while the rest of the party went inside. The inn had several unsettling factors… like the fact that there were only 7 beds set when they arrived (the 8 of them, minus Karath), plus a pile of rags for the puppy. The hotel proprietor, “Mr. Lipman”, kept speaking of his “Mother”, who was asleep downstairs. There was also the incredible magical investment in the inn, with lights that went on when people approached, its revealed ability to teleport to places it was needed, and the strange collection of rare and lost artifacts in the top floor.

After making sure the carts were not going to be robbed by the two stablehands (“Toby” and “Armand”), Karath animated MUD to shamble behind him, then put Kyone’s crystal on his floating disc and entered the inn as a “separate traveler”. While he was downstairs having gruel pushed on him (and noticing a shiny half-heart used to prop up a table), the party upstairs was making some difficult discoveries. TUS saw an axe on the wall, and Mr. Lipman told the story of an orcish chieftain who came to the inn, whose family and soldiers had been murdered in their sleep by “the sun’s murderer.” The party had told Mr. Lipman about TUS’s undead condition, and the idea that his god had sent him back to accomplish some task. Mr. Lipman knew that Mother was not interested in undead flesh, and handed the axe back to TUS (whose muscles had grown big and whose lower teeth had extended to orcish proportions). TUS charged a wall, which strangely opened-up, letting TUS leap out into the storm. Mr. Lipman said that he could not allow the rest of Mother’s snacks to escape, though, and as the wall closed, a combat began inside the giant mimic known to bards as the Wandering Tower.

Mother’s arrival in the downstairs revealed that the large oven was in fact her, the core of the tower. The entire tower continued to attack the party, with walls doing acid damage and Mother grabbing and chomping on those it grabbed. The smaller mirror mimics helped out their mother, copying the image of party members they hit before creating doubles of themselves to confuse the battlefield. Also, the paired half-heart to the one Karath saw downstairs activated, creating a portal between the 1st and 3rd floors.

The party eventually defeated the lesser mimics, grabbing all the treasures upstairs before rushing down to help Karath with Mother. The spear from upstairs roared when Johny/Scout tried to grab it, but seemed pleased when Casey/Nulath took it. An unfortunate overloading of weight on Karath’s floating disc caused Kyone’s crystal to crash to the ground (damaged, but not shattered). Once Mother became bloodied, the entire tower started to bleed acid, as the core of the tower moved to another floor and began a ritual to teleport it back to the Far Realm, where Mother could heal. Taking excessive ongoing acid damage, the party focused their attacks on one section of the wall, breaking free in just enough time to dive out and escape the bleeding ancient mimic.

When it was all over, the rain helped to wash the acid off the party, though all that remained were the somewhat acid-burned wooden stables… with no horses or carts in them. The party realized that TUS likely wanted to complete the job he was sent to do, and probably took the horses & carts so that he could have an excuse to get close to the family & home of his enemy. The PCs also realized that the brother of a solar Avenger they had met was on their List of the Dead. Taking shelter in the meager remains of the stables, the party rested until the next morning, unsure of how to proceed.

CLUES YOU MAY HAVE MISSED
Among the clues that something was amiss:
-the huge oven in the first floor had no fuel anywhere for the fire;
-Mother’s “children”, Mr. Lipman, Toby, and Armand, were all former polyps of Mother, and served jobs of body parts, with Mr. “lip”-man doing the talking, and “toe”-by and “arm”-and doing the manual labor;
-the toilet on the second floor had nowhere for the waste to go;
-There were no beds or quarters for the staff of the inn
-Though “Mother” was “sleeping downstairs”, there were no stairs going down below the 1st floor
-Mr. Lipman did not actually know the gossip from Waterdeep or any current news, as the tower had only recently arrived;

Experience: The party each received 200 XP for this harrowing battle. Next game will start after an extended rest, though everyone in the party will be down one healing surge to represent the difficulty they had sleeping the previous night.

Treasure:
1 Map of Unseen Lands (lvl 7) [Casey/Nulath]
1 Hungry Spear +1 (lvl 2… part of Golden Lion’s Battle Regalia set) [Casey/Nulath]
1 Healer’s Brooch +1 (lvl 4) [Valarie/Akara]
1 Collar of Recovery +1 (lvl 4) [Micah/Nikolai]
1 Amulet of Life +1 (lvl 5) [Johny/Scout]
1 Scroll Case of Arnd (story item) [Micah/Nikolai]
1 Holy Book of Lusemnee the Dark Slayer (story item & rituals) [Mike/Karath]

EPILOGUE…
“And that was the beginning and end of a lot of things. The tower disappeared and left a giant pond of acid just after we dove out… and to this day there’s a large swath of emptiness near the road about 10 miles south of Waterdeep, where nothing grows and no birds sing. It’s not magic… just acid and the lingering smell of the many deaths that creature caused. But enough of these old stories… it’s time for you lot to be off to bed!”

“But Wyrm-granpa, we want to hear about your undead crazy orc friend!”

Nikolai sighed, the memory coming on stronger than he’d wanted. “Let’s save that story for a different night. Sometimes the lives of heroes don’t fit nicely into happy bard’s tales. Good night, my little wyrmlings.”

This episode was a flashback to what happened at the Murder Machine with Johny/Scout during the morning of the concert.

Things began with Scout looking to patch things up with his dwarven “friend”, Sonia Stormcaller. When that failed (miserably), he noticed that three of the elvish lasses from Lady Azalea Moonbow’s Academy for Young Ladies were paying special attention to him. After a bit of (allegedly) innocent flirting, Scout took a sip of one of the girl’s drinks, which turned out to be spiked with a sleeping potion. He awoke the next morning, fully rested, in a nice bed in a secret room in the first floor of the Yawning Portal. Lady Azalea Moonbow herself was there to greet Scout as he woke. In the course of conversation, she revealed that she was one of the Lords of Waterdeep, and that she needed Scout to be ready for what lay ahead of him that morning. She said that he should head upstairs to his friends to learn more.

When Scout got upstairs, Lady Artania was there, revealing that 1) Mirt was dead, 2) the Murder Machine’s results would determine thieving guild rights in the city for the next decade, and 3) she would be using her innate shapechanging abilities to pose as Mirt and represent his interests at the Murder Machine that morning. She also mentioned that she had spent some time in the ruins of the great Elven city of Myth Drannor, where she’d happened across some ancient elvish items. She casually left a bag of them on the table, claiming that they weren’t exactly hers… so no magics could say she was unjustly interfering with the contest.

Outside the venue, the party ran into some protesters, including well-known rabble-rouser Marius Commonman, who surreptitiously leg Scout know that the traps he’d face involved water, distractions, and greed. Inside the venue, Scout was introduced to the 5 guild leaders who would be betting on the competition:
- Eyenaught, representative of The Gaze, one of the 13 Skulls of Skullport
- Fernando Clutched-of-Scorch, a half-dragon rep of Tiamat’s Red Wing
- William “Whistler” Sawyer, gentleman from the Coin & Card Society
- Zira, Unseelie Fey and representative of the Shadowfell assassin’s guild Kargatane
- “Mirt” (actually Artania)

Zira, it seems, had some previous dealings with Scout, and made an additional wager with him regarding “gifts” from her to him.

Once Scout was in the prep area, the rest of the party met the wealthy patrons in the audience whom they could petition for extra money to buy “gifts” for Scout during his trials. They were:
- Valindra Shadowmantle, a red wizardess lich from Thay
- “The Widow”, a drow woman representing “Underdark interests”, though something about her seemed a little… off… in the same way that perhaps other faux Drow the party had met were “off”. However, no one interacted with her, so her truths were left undiscovered.
- Blackheart Deathclaw, who appeared as an elven pirate captain… but whom Valarie/Akara seemed to recognize/remember as being a deva named Kalarel. She decided that this being was likely now a Rakshasha using illusion magics, and decided to avoid him, though he flashed a (pointed) toothy smile at her from across the room.
- Zebulon Carver, dragonborn media mogul, owner of several pubs & inns throughout Waterdeep, owner of Waterdeep Community College (go fighting tradesmen!), and publisher of 2 Waterdhaivian newspapers.
- Oristus Caldera, a shadar-kai human wizard & Mage of Saruun, with his brass golem bodyguard (which looked like a large minotaur).
- Skeksi, slimy dragonborn merchant who runs the “no questions asked” shop outside of town.
- “The Crowd”, every other wealthy noble & miscreant who could afford a seat, who together represented one source of potential income to be lobbied.

In addition to lobbying the wealthy for support items (a la Hunger Games), the party could also send one member into a sound-proofed force bubble to support in each room. No attack powers could pass through, but supporting utility powers (like healing, boosts, movement assists, etc) could. The “assistant” also had a chance for some skill usage to help in some way.

CHALLENGE 1: METAL FLOOR & FLAME HALLWAY
Scout’s first challenge involved disarming a two-tiered mechanism in the center of a metal room which was struck with lightning from a statue of Sturm (dwarven god of storms) every round. Nikolai was in the “force bubble” support position, where he was able to soak up some of the lightning damage coursing through the floor. Fortunately, Scout had been given a potion of lightning resistance prior to starting this room, so (even though he failed many of the disarm checks, resetting the device) and also ended up drinking a false potion sent by a wealthy observer with a sick sense of humor, he escaped the room taking very little damage. After that was a hallway with flame cannons, but Scout’s clever use of a crowbar and an acrobatic dive under the last cannon got him through the first challenge almost completely unscathed.

CHALLENGE 2: THE DEEP ROOM
In a room that took inspiration from Dagon, abyssal Lord of the Deep, Scout carefully balanced on a tiny path to the center of the room, where he stepped on the activation square, which began filling the room with water. Tentacles then appeared from the four Dagon icons hanging at the mid-point of each wall (just above boxes that Scout presumably needed to fiddle with to disarm the room). Casey/Nulath was in the support bubble, where there was a valve to turn. He quickly realized, though, that righty was not always “tighty”, and that thievery checks were required to see which way would actually slow the water down (as opposed to speeding it up) before an Athletics check could be made to turn the valve. Scout got pretty beat up by the tentacles, which could also slide him into the rising waters, which caused ongoing cold damage. Some desperate petitioning of the crowd got Scout both a magic key (which disabled one of the three lock boxes) and a potion of extra healing (which gave him the most bang for his buck in terms of his dwindling healing surge supply). In the end, it came down to one roll with barely any hit points left… and Scout succeeded!

CHALLENGE 3: THE CLASSIC TRAP
The next room looked to be completely empty, with Mike/Karath in a force bubble on the opposite end. Karath noticed some arcane energy around the floor, though, and also realized that he could summon his familiar to appear outside the force bubble, in the room itself. Having his dragonling familiar Yig dip just below the floor wherever he could, Karath was able to show Scout that the floor was full of pit traps. A quick look through the floor revealed that they were filled with rot grubs, a particularly nasty thing to get infected with. A quick usage of Karath’s psionic flight ability, followed by a running jump from Scout got Scout to the hallway beyond the room… where an iron boot trap caught his foot, threatening to cut it off. Thankfully, his acrobatics check to escape was successful, and he made it through the rest of the hallway safely, feet intact.

CHALLENGE 4: THE CHOICE
The final room featured 3 chests: one of gold, one of dead wood, and one of a swampy-looking wood. Beyond them was the exit. Scout knew that his old foe, Zira, had bet that he would die in this room, so while he thought long and hard about the three chests (conferring as best he could via mimery with Akara/Valarie, in the force bubble spot), he eventually decided to pass them all up, jumping over them to end the challenge. Trumpets blared, lights flashed, and Scout had survived the Murder Machine, winning major thief guild rights for the next decade for Mirt’s organization.

As a prize for winning, Pirelli Gearloose, the Murder Machine’s creator, had his friend Khelben “Blackstaff” Ahroun enchant one item of Scout’s to be +1 better than it was before. He chose to have his nonmagical leather armor enchanted to be +1 magic armor. Meeting with Zira, Scout claimed a second prize from the Unseelie Fey, gaining the lvl 2 theme utility power “Unseelie Eyes”, which gave him “flashlight eyes” and darkvision as an encounter power.

Karath had to follow-through on a deal he’d made with Valindra afterward, taking her to Kyone’s crystal and letting her examine it. Valindra was very pleased to see the “theoretical” paper she’d read put into practice, and told Karath that she could easily remove the crystal if necessary. She also said that while she couldn’t stop the spider magic directly, she was pretty sure if he let her make Kyone a lich, that would stop the spread of the divine spider magic. He said he’d take that under advisement as Valindra told him to look her up in the Neverwinter area should he ever be in that region. She then tried to recruit him into the Red Wizards. Karath took the literature, though he made no commitments.

==============
The rest of “what happened” after that can be read about in the Session 13 recap. To clarify a little bit, the dark figure watching the party leave the city was Zira, who smiled as she watched Scout’s caravan depart. She spoke aloud, though none were there to hear her, “I may have lost again, young ”/campaigns/joelastowski/characters/kaitzer-scout-sorah" class=“wiki-content-link”>Kaitzer, but you are now one step closer to being thrice-gifted by the Fey."

As the caravan drove off into the night in the south, eventually the weather turned worse, beginning to rain. The Unknown Soldier looked up ahead to see an inn on the side of the road, just when they most needed a place to get in out of the rain. He paused, though, saying that something was odd. For some reason, he said, though he had not been to Waterdeep in this lifetime, he had strong memories of this inn…

Experience Points
500 XP… which should put everyone at 3,750… exactly what you need for level 4

Treasure (I know Artania’s Elven Battle Armor got passed to Lisa. Not sure what happened to the rest of it… whether Scout kept it all or if it got distributed to other party members, but let me know if I got it wrong here)
+1 Elven Battle Armor (leather) – Lisa/Praxis
+1 Elven Cloak – Johny/Scout
Feyleaf Sandals – Johny/Scout
+1 Magic Armor (leather) – Johny/Scout
“Unseelie Eyes” power – Johny/Scout

Next game will be (likely) on Sunday, June 3: “The Tower”

Sunday, April 13, 2012

When last we left our heroes… they were returning to their rooms at the Yawning Portal after attending the 80th birthday party for Mirt the Moneylender. Before reaching the inn, they bumped into Nulath/Casey, who had realized that Fisherman’s Wharf was no place to be raising 20 kids, and had connected with the husband of Natalie Mirtson (sister to the deceased soldier William McBride) and had brought the kids to Waterdeep to stay in Mirt’s orphanage there.

In the Yawning Portal, as Scout went off to pursue the dwarven woman he’d somewhat insulted earlier in the evening, the rest of the party engaged The Seekers, a group of 4 fresh adventurers seeking to make their first victory in the halls of Undermountain. The party had a chance to talk to the Seekers (and to bet on them), and as a result better prepared them for the challenges ahead. In the end, their survival came down to a roll of the dice, and only 2 of them survived.

Akara/Valarie also made the acquaintance of Sikel, the raven-cloaked dancer from the party. He is an Avenger of the Raven Queen, and was offering to perform rituals of “Eternal Last Rites” on the Seekers before they went into Undermountain. Sikel explained that the ritual prevented your body from being raised in any way (as undead or via resurrection), and that it was a great way to ensure that you’d be free to travel to your proper place after death. Akara took some issue with this, but Sikel took her aside to assure her that these folks would never be able to afford a resurrection spell anyway, so he was just ensuring that 4 fewer undead entered the world. He also said that he’d had a similar ritual performed on himself when he took the Oath of the Feather, the pledge to be an Avenger of the Raven Queen.

Upstairs, the party sat-in as Centauri did a stellar reading for TUS about his previous life, and revealed a tale of apparent cowardice that sent The Unknown Soldier into a rage, causing him to storm off in fury. Centauri warned the party that he had also seen a potential dark decision in TUS’s future, and that the party would have to watch out for him.

That evening, Akara had a troubling dream, which both Lisa/Praxis and Jenn/Art were somehow viewers of. In the dream, a raven was trapped by a magical bush. When Akara freed it, the raven flew up to the bedroom of Mirt the Moneylender, and took his soul off beyond the veil of death.

Early the next morning, the Eladrin woman Lady Artania Silverlight knocked on the door of the party’s room. She explained that the spell had been hers, and that Mirt had convinced her to cast this spell to keep a natural death from finding him so that he could continue to do good work for the people of Waterdeep. Artania, the party learned, is one of the last of a line of dragons, the Deep Dragons, known for their abilities to polymorph and their access to racial memories. Artania herself is only a half-deep dragon, the other half being Purple Dragon, from which she inherited her psychic powers. After a somewhat abbreviated memoir, the party understood that she was an old and powerful spellcaster who generally had the good of the world as one of her objectives.

However, she had another objective that day: Mirt’s death came at an inopportune time, as he was supposed to represent his “criminal organization” at a meeting that was happening that morning. This meeting, which happened every 10 years, involved betting on the outcome of a competition known at the Murder Machine. Mirt’s side had won for the 40 years that the competition had existed, and other large criminal groups had therefore been forced to sign agreements not to operate within the city for a decade. Artania informed the party that she would be there polymorphed to look like Mirt, and that his sudden death would be announced around noon. The “benefit concert” would then become largely a funeral for Mirt, with mention of the other fallen afterwards.

====================

“”/campaign/joelastowski/wikis/session-014" class=“wiki-page-link”> SOMETHING" happened at the Murder Machine, which we’ll learn about next game.

====================

The concert/funeral was epic, as one might imagine, and the ritual of Speaking for the Dead, lead by famous bard Bo Palabram, left many very drained and overwhelmed. Afterward, Nikolai gave a beautiful song about the train of death the New Altairan Heroes brought with them. While many in the crowd were too overwhelmed to pay lots of attention to his song, the more robust veterans in the crowd all heard it, and silently nodded, as they joined Nikolai in paying respect to fallen brothers in arms.

As the party left the city, with an exhausted but victorious Scout on-board, a shadowy female watched them leave (it was Zira, though we wouldn’t learn that until next game). They made their way south through stormy weather, stopping as TUS looked up to see an inn/tower in front of them… one that looked strangely familiar to the revenant.

Next game would normally be on Sunday, May 13… which is Mother’s Day. We may have to push this off another week until Sunday, May 20. We’ll email specific details as the dates get closer.
Next Episode: “The Murder Machine”

Treasure: None, though Praxis bought some replacement adventuring tools and Nulath bought a magical Familiar Pocket for Frodo, her fey puppy.
Experience: 200 XP each. Everyone in the party should be at 3,250 right now (lvl 4 = 3,750)

When last we left our heroes, they were in the midst of Mirt the Moneylender’s 80th birthday party in Waterdeep. Their interaction so far had included a crazy dwarven mosh pit, an awkard moment with the son of a man they’d killed, lots of overheard conversations about magical theories and trade disputes, and some introductions to the money-lender himself.

Segment two of the party saw some criminal-types confronting Scout/Johny, offering apologies and a return of his “dropped” money pouch (plus a sizable bonus). Over by Mirt, Nikolai/Micah and Akara/Valarie were witness to a tense confrontation between the head of Waterdeep’s Bahamut church, members of the international Dragonslayers’ Guild, and a human-looking representative of a group of red dragons (Fernando Clutched-of-Scorch) who still held a grudge against Mirt for what the Wheels of Progress did to Infyrana some 60 years ago. The confrontation was broken-up by some calm words from an eladrin woman named Lady Artania, though most present had different memories about what had happened afterward. Nikolai tracked her to the balcony for the third segment, and gained enough of a sense of her to consider sharing information. She also offered him information about the Spider Queen’s servants (like the fact that of the 43 Handmaidens she has active right now, Yaxavanda is the youngest and weakest, though she puts on a big show).

Praxis/Lisa ran into a githzerai ship captain who was very drunk, and (after much gesticulating) got Karath/Mike’s attention to bring him down to meet the man. By the time Karath caught up with him, though, he was passed out behind a bush outside (which was just as well, since he seemed to have very racist ideas about Karath’s githyanki branch of the racial tree). Praxis had heard that the captain’s fancy hat had come from a ‘yank he’d tortured & killed, so Karath had little problem liberating it from the unconscious githzerai (and getting a lvl 3 Circlet of Second Chances in the process).

Scout had quite a night for himself, beginning in the kitchen/drink area, where he was approached by a larger, well-dressed gnome named Anthony Tenor, who said two of his “associates” had a message for him. The gnome & pixie who had stolen from Scout on his way into Waterdeep gave him back his stolen coin purse (with 500 GP extra in it) as the pixie recited a somewhat lower-class verse about not realizing Scout was one of Zira’s people. The kitchen area also held The Seekers, a band of low-level adventurers who were getting well and drunk before heading down into Undermountain later tonight. Their “genius” plan was to attack the monsters while they were sleeping.

Scout next chatted with the female dwarven Stormcaller (Sonia) who had controlled the dwarven dance that he had been a part of in section 1. They seemed to have a connection of sorts, and seemed to be getting quite friendly. They set up a sort of “date” for later in the evening at the Yawning Portal, where Sonia and her clanmates had to be for the rest of the night (to keep “things” from coming up from Undermountain).

Scout then moved on to a new woman… a very sexy and barely clothed drow woman who seemed to be dominating one side of the dance floor with her sensual moves, which attracted male and female eyes of every race. Scout learned that her name was Lilith, and that she was a priestess of Ellistrae. He then challenged her to a very metaphoric dance competition, which included all the violent thrusting and passionate grasping of… other activities. Though he eventually “won”, Lilith seemed happy that such an intense dance had been achieved. Scout also sort of missed the stares of Sonia from the sidelines.

The dance floor also had a few more interesting individuals, including the head of the church of Erathis in the city (Alexander Granitesoul), around whom people seemed to just work more efficiently; and a cloaked pale-skinned man of some elvish descent whose wild & leaping dance style seemed almost like a combat encounter. On closer inspection, his cloak seemed almost to be made of raven feathers. Art/Jenn also made the acquaintance of a female shade here, a very politically-minded woman named Abigail, who referred to Alexander as a “heretic” because he supported a shadow government like the Lords of Waterdeep.

Mirt received a great many gifts from a great many people, including some magical marvels from a circle of Red Wizards, a “rod of six parts” from Nueva Turotha tieflings representing Mestiza Ferana, a magic mirror from the Alexandrian Championship Wyvern Jousting Team (including Primus Imperius, grand-nephew of the king) representing King Titus Imperius of Ionia, a trollhide recliner from Hammerfast dwarves representing Jadzia Hammerfast, and a mithril statue of Mirt picking the pocket of a monstrous illithid from a human group from Pax Humana.

Other major events that night included the stepping-down of Dagault Neverember as the Open Lord of Waterdeep (so that he could go care for the poor victims on the other side of the world in Neverwinter), the elevation of Piergeron Paladinson III to the post of Open Lord, and a massive performance by famous bards.

Of course, the wily actions of disgruntled dairy farmers caused the “accompanyment” of the performance, the bard No-Flute Harry, to lose his voice, so Nikolai had to step in. Interrupting the ho-hum introduction he received from the other bards, Sonia Stormcaller stepped up to give a very dramatic introduction to Nikolai, helped by thunder noises from the rest of her clan. As she left the stage, she told Nikolai to “tell Scout his drow bitch can’t do this”. Nikolai’s performance was aided by tips from Praxis & Scout, and the show (a retelling of the dramatic moments from the adventures of the Wheels of Progress) was so great that it pulled-in Lark, a famous wilden bard, from the outside balcony, to add her birdsong-like voice to the final verses.

As the party ended, Karath had somehow arranged a bardic performance/benefit for the dead soldiers they were returning home, which somehow will also be a benefit for the victims of Neverwinter that Neverember is supporting, which will somehow also be a death ritual overseen by the bard Bo Palabram, which will also be performed on the stage in front of the Paladinson Mansion. This party will happen at sunset the following day (that is, next game).

Oh, and also there was a gnome named Pirelli Gearloose who managed to convince Scout to try out his new “ultimate dungeon defense” system, known as the Murder Machine, the following morning (quite near to the Paladinson stage).

Experience Points: 600 XP for the 2-sessions of the party

Treasure:
- 500 GP to Scout
- lvl 3 Circlet (Hat) of Second Chances (Karath)

Tuesday, March 27, 2012
When Last We Left Our Heroes… they were sitting under the stars with Centauri, at a travelers’ stop a couple miles outside of Waterdeep. Centauri had offered to read their fortunes.

After players decided which sign they were, they asked questions of Centauri, who did his best to answer according to what he saw in the sky. Many of his answers were a bit vague, and sometimes incredibly troubling (like the message that Akara/Valarie may not have a next lifetime, which is kind of terrifying to a deva), but he made up for it with some quick-thinking and “practiced bedside manner” (like when he suggested heavier pastas to calm Art/Jenn’s inner turmoil). That night Art had another prophetic dream, this time about Krup & Vandemaar cheering and running north with some kind of Baphometish artifact in their hands. The artifact, which looked like a sphere (about softball-sized) with a maze running around it, also looked like it had their old friend Nulath trapped inside, with something dark chasing her. The next morning, as Art discussed her dream with Praxis/Lisa and Akara (who had awoken to find that her body was disease-free), Nicolai/Micah happened upon a lizardman merchant who was looking to unload a “cursed maze bauble” that conveniently matched Art’s dream. After some arcane inspection, Karath/Mike was able to determine that the item was probably a portkey of some sort, but that it was shiftable (in a rubic’s cube type fashion), and that to unlock it he’d have to spend time studying it before each move. Thinking that whatever it was, it was better to keep it out of the hands of their enemies, the party took the artifact and headed to Waterdeep.

===============
MINOR QUEST: UNLOCK BAPHOMET’S MAZE
Each extended rest (after time spent contemplating the intricacies of it), the primary can make an Arcana check, which can be assisted, to manipulate the sphere. The total number of successes and/or failures is unknown, but you have been able to determine several things:
1. the sphere will track individual successes, and one user has to hit the required number of successes to unlock the item
2. overall success will mean opening up some kind of teleport/portal to somewhere, likely a maze, where something powerful is
3. overall failure will result in the primary being whisked away, likely into the maze, to be trapped and hunted.
===============

In the City of Splendors, the party got rooms at the Yawning Portal and set about their actual task, delivering the body of a dead soldier to his parents. The McBride family was obviously not happy, and it took a bit of finessing, but the party did about as well as you can in such a situation, and William McBride was returned home. Afterwards the party went back to the Yawning Portal for some heavy drinking, then did a little bit of site-seeing around the city, visiting a shrine to Melora (where they got troubling news about the sample of the World Tree they’re carrying) and the City of the Dead (where Akara had some personal reflecting time to ponder the dead Deva druid’s obliterated soul). Scout also managed to get hussled into thinking he was being poorly hussled in a fiendish double-cross by a clever thieving crew.

Fast-forward to the party, where our group of heroes had six different areas to explore…

In the first segment of the party, Art/Jenn observed the outer courtyard, where members of the elite justice team the Gray Hands kept all guests from causing problems. The Gray Hands were watched by a Shade woman who was possibly a holy person of some sort.

The party left the foyer empty for part 1 of the party.

In the main hall, Karath/Mike met with Mirt himself, and seemed to get on better with him than many of the Waterdeep nobles who were actually trying to impress the birthday man. Karath then spoke briefly with Mirt’s attendant, the deva Elanna Mirtdaughter, who answered some of his questions about a deva reincarnation. She also shared what memories she had of the warforged, which wasn’t much.

The balcony area was where Praxis/Lisa followed Centauri. Out there, under the night sky, Centauri went on about stars to anyone who’d listen, until his conversation was interrupted by a human male with a black staff (apparently an old friend), who was eager to discuss the thaumaturgical possibilities put forth in a paper he’d just read (the IT Crowd’s paper about the arcane/divinity matrix theory that is, in fact, manifest around Kyone right now). This blackstaffed man seemed to understand far more of the concepts than anyone listening, and Praxis got the sense that if anyone could recreate that effect, it would be this man. Apart from that, there was a scantily-clad drow woman who had no qualms about speaking ill of the Spider Queen, even openly using her name and insulting her. General feelings were that this lady was either very strong, or very stupid.

The kitchen/prep area is where Akara/Valarie and Nicolai/Micah chose to go. They observed an altercation between the dessert mistress, a Halfling Chocolatier named Sweetness, and several men dressed in overalls. It was later learned that they had been members of a cattle ranchers union, and were arguing with Sweetness over milk prices. She would not budge, though, and they vaguely threatened that she’d “be sorry” before they stormed off. Nicolai then spoke with a Halfling boy who looked to be a “special helper” in this area. The boy’s name was Halfpint, and he spoke about how Mirt had adopted him after his dad had to sell him to pay off some gambling debts. But Halfpint was determined to make lots of money doing legitimate work so that he could help his dad stop being the criminal head of the bandit group Tantalus. Neither Nicolai nor Akara had the heart to tell the boy that his father was, in fact, dead… but I’m sure that won’t ever come back to bite them. Halfpint also hinted to Nicolai that they should stick around for a big chocolate surprise later on, because there would be, in his words, a “chocolate dragon.” The only other excitement in this area was the arrival of several well-groomed humans who off-handedly told a human server that they were just “getting some food that hadn’t been contaminated by any lesser races.” These guys were from Pax Humana, and neither Nicolai nor Akara tried to engage them.

The dance floor was the final area, and Scout/Johny decided to make this his home. There he observed the antics of No-Flute Harry, a sound-effects Halfling bard who would occasionally add instruments to the orchestral arrangement with his voice. The conductor, a human referred to as “the Dude”, recovered nicely, though. On the dance floor, Scout found himself in the midst of a literal storm of dwarves: wildly raging dancing dwarves from Clan Sturmhammer. The tempest of dwarves was kept in check by a female dwarf who looked like a cleric of sorts, and seemed to be directing the dwarves like the clouds of a storm so that they didn’t hurt anyone. At the end of the dance, she had caught Scout’s eye, and struck his raised chalice with a superficial lightning bolt, as he was clearly the highest point in this thunderstorm. The dwarves then left to drink, and Scout considered following.

Part 1 of the party ended with Mirt on the main stage, thanking everyone for coming, and beginning to talk about old times… until he was effectively heckled off the stage by the senile old archmage Vangerdahast.

As it was approaching midnight, and many folks were less than fully conscious, we called game at that point, so we’ll begin our next game mid-party.

Quests
Accepted minor quest: Unlock Baphomet’s Maze
Research done into major quest: Revive the World Tree

XP, Treasure, & Whatnot: We’ll wait till the party actually finishes before we deal with this.