Campaign Journal - Xervous's e8 campaign

[ddude987]

Forward: This is the first campaign journal I've ever written. I decided it would be fun to try it out. Xervous, who is on these forums sometimes, is the DM of this campaign and it is with some of our friends irl. I decided this would be a good way to have fun and get better at writing so enjoy. I wrote the first three sessions without really incorporating an author's voice so I decided from here on out I'll make what I write more interesting. I also apologize for anything people find offensive, if I write something like that, which shouldn't be happening, then I will change it.

Meet the characters:

Rolen – Elf longbow wielder. Played by yours truly. Rolen is an interesting character with a mysterious backstory. Just when the other players think they have him figured out is when I know they couldn't be farther from the truth. Rolen chose to leave his elven homelands. He made a living growing a small garden and doing research on plants and animals. There is a lot more than that, but spoilers come later.

Dieter – Half-Elf tank. Dieter makes it quite clear at multiple points that he doesn't trust magic and doesn't like magic. Other than that, he is a quiet person and keeps to himself. He starts as a guard on the caravan.

Nobunaga – Human Samurai. Nobunaga starts the campaign not knowing common and only speaks elven and a dialect from his homeland. His homeland, the Breth isles, are very similar to ancient Japan. He is actually in the Samurai class and does some pretty amazing things with ijitsu focus. Also he has a pretty deep backstory with his family and rival families and legendary weapons. He refuses to take his family sword out of its sheath unless absolutely necessary, which has not happened yet. We, as players, think the sword is probably magical in some way.

Drogmar – Dwarf Warblade. Drogmar is extremely racist against orcs and elves. He also hates the Gasians because they took over the dwarven stronghold hellgrind. The things Drogmar says are generally not suitable for a forum site, but I will post some quotes if there are any interesting, and appropriate, ones.

Mortus Strider – Human Warlock. Mortus Strider, originally noname, didn't have a name for 2 sessions until he found a Magic: the Gathering card with a name he liked. This group has a history of picking names with trading card game cards. He is very mysterious and claims to be on a path for redemption. He clearly enjoys killing people and gathering loot. On the surface he is just your average murderhobo.

Snelpy Delpy – Half-elf Bard. Snelpie is an albino bard who has no friends. He latches onto Rolen pretty tightly and is a loyal friend. Sometimes the group calls Snelpie by his character name from last campaign because we ended up calling him that in everyday life by accident. Snelpie has some interesting roleplay and some fun stuff happen later so be sure to stay tuned.

Retired! Mr. R. Kane – Tiefling Sorcerer. R. Kane is pretty mysterious. He speaks draconic and casts spells but other than that I don't know much about him.

Eva - Human Alchemist. The DM allowed the Alchemist pathfinder class to be transferred into our 3.5 campaign. Eva is a little insane and loves to experiment with things, even if they are living. She always wears goggles and a dust mask.

Relevant campaign stuff: The campaign is e8, we get 1 feat per level, and at level 5 and up we get 2 feats per level. Also there are rules to reduce the christmas tree effect and there are no +stat items that exist. The campaign is set in the DMs homebrew setting. There are several major areas that I will mention so let me detail them. Marin is in the northwest and has plenty of sea fairing people who care way too much about their beards. Gaisa is in the northeast and is full of assassins and has weird secretive stuff. The Gaisians took over a dwarven stronghold named hellgrind some time ago. Southwest are the midlands which are quite varied. This is the area the caravan is traveling through, specifically traveling west to east through a forest. Corinth is the paladin area, northeast on the main continent, and they are considered the horselords. There is also an archipelago named the Breth isles which is just like ancient Japan.


Session 1 - The Caravan

The campaign starts with the party not being well acquainted with each other, but traveling with the same caravan. The caravan is part of the mages guild and is headed east through the midlands. Most of the carts with the caravan are regular carts bringing alcohol, herbs, and the like. One notable cart is in the direct center of the caravan and nobody has seen what is inside of it. Three of the party members, Drogmar, Dieter, and Nobunaga, are with the caravan as guards while Rolen is traveling with the caravan to sell his wares.

The day goes by uneventfully, meeting a few NPCs, Drogmar has a rivalry with a short man who we called Tiny. Drogmar covers Tiny’s clothing with itching powder and that sets off a chain reaction of comedic pranks throughout the session. One of the NPCs, fat Tom, is thought to be filching food from the food cart when people aren’t looking. That night Rolen, Nobunaga, and Dieter catch him in the act and bring him to the head guard who thanks them and takes Tom into the woods.

Tom, who was known to never miss a meal, was not seen at any of the meals the next day. After some investigation Nobunaga and Rolen follow tracks and soon come across a large freshly dug mound of dirt. To nobody’s surprise, fat Tom’s bones were buried there, picked clean. The two also find a thin pointed metal rod on the ground with dried blood. Rolen leaves to tell Dieter while Nobunaga keeps searching around.

Rolen arrives back at the caravan and suddenly all hell breaks loose. Arrows fire from the trees slaying several guards around the caravan. There is a mass of confusion as guards begin killing other guards. We slay all the traitor guards on the ground and Drogmar goes over to the trees the archers are in and starts hacking them down. A guard jumps out of the mysterious center cart with a box and begins running for the woods. Rolen notices him to late and the man disappears into the woods.

While that was going on, two ninjas had jumped out of the trees and began attacking Nobunaga. One critical ijitsu focus of nonlethal damage later the ninjas are unconscious. One of them awakens and reveals being a Gasian assassin but says nothing further.

A loud boom sounded off in the distance. Dieter heads off in that direction to find a large circular area of the forest completely turned to stone. Cautiously he walks towards the center and finds the box opened and the man that stole it frozen solid, his face twisted in agony. The party reconvenes at the caravan and talks with the head mage, who we named Licorice Beard.

Drogmar had already been speaking with the head mage. He found a back sap like substance leading in a trail away from the caravan and brought a sample to Licorice Beard before the rest of the party got back. Licorice Beard said he had never seen such a substance and told Drogmar he would study it. Licorice Beard then thanked us for our services and told us we should do whatever it was the taskmaster needed to get the caravan back on schedule.

Rolen sees one of the guards injured and leaning against a tree and goes to talk to him. The man’s wound is bleeding a black sappy substance. The man coughs up an object and drops it near his foot. After their conversation Rolen picks the object up and sees it’s an arrowhead covered in black blood.

General thoughts: An interesting mystery is brought up right at the start of the campaign. What was in the real box and who are these people? Why were Tom's bones picked clean and what is with the black blood?

[ddude987]

Session 2 - New Players
We reconvened and after a short recap of last week we sat down to play. There are two new players and Dieter is not present. The new players are not doing anything in the beginning of the session as they were busy with character creation.

A detour was made to a town north of the regular route traveled by the caravan to resupply and tend to the injured. The town had a waterfall with a tavern, formerly a mill, next to it. There was also a graveyard with many freshly placed tombstones and very few townspeople walking around town.

It’s always said players in a town always gravitate to the tavern. Rolen walks in the tavern and sees Drogmar offering Nobunaga a drink and replying yes to Nobunaga’s asking if the drink was sake. Of course it wasn’t sake, it was dwarven ale, and Nobunaga would have choked the dwarf if he wasn’t busy choking on the ale.

Rolen mentions the large amount of fresh graves to the innkeep and the party discovers there have been mysterious disappearances of townsfolk and livestock. Thanking the innkeeper, the party heads back to the caravan and runs into a mysterious fellow named Drew. Drew tells the party he is a monster hunter and will kill the creature terrorizing the town if the mayor makes a good offer.

The party decides they will deal with the monster themselves. Drogmar goes to stake out a local farm, keeping watch on the barn where the livestock are. Rolen sets his tent next to Drew’s and plans to follow Drew if he leaves his tent. Drogmar, half asleep, is startled as a blur rushes across the field and into the barn. Drogmar picks up his axe and hurries over to the barn. The door has been ripped off its hinges and from out of the blackness comes…a cow. Drogmar gets cow smacked and lands on his backside, disoriented. He turns around to see the mysterious blur and a cow racing off northward, the cow mooing loudly. Back at the caravan, the echoing moo is heard with a Doppler effect before dissipating into the distance.

The next day the party decides to go north and find the monster, now nicknamed something by Drogmar that I can’t write but will say has to do with the birds and the bees…and the cows. There is an abandoned castle to the north where the monster is likely residing. On their way out of town, they see a procession leaving the local temple. On the other side of the road is an albino half-elf playing an instrument. Rolen goes over to the music player, while the rest of the party is approached by a man who leaves the temple after the procession.

The man who left the temple reveals himself to be Mortis Strider and says he would like to help destroy the monster. The albino half-elf is a bard named Snelpy. Rolen invites the man to join him so the journey to the castle is filled with music instead of Drogmar’s racist comments. The bard happily agrees and proclaims to Rolen that he will serve him forever as Rolen is the first person to ever befriend him. Drogmar, to this day, still does not know Snelpy is a half-elf, due to a roll of 2 on Knowledge (Nature), and thinks him human and makes no racist comments towards him.


Session 2 - M-m-m-monster!
After half a day’s journey the party arrives at an abandoned castle. The portcullis is rusted away making entry into the courtyard easy. Inside the perimeter are several low buildings adjacent to the walls and a large keep in the center.

For some arbitrary reason, the party heads over to the leftmost building. Rolen’s sharp elven eyes spot a bear trap and he pulls Snelpy out of the way. Snelpy gave Rolen his praise and began singing and playing music but was immediately shushed. The party continues into the building with Drogmar taking the lead. Inside is empty except for some splintered furniture and a wooden door imbedded in the floor. Drogmar smashes the trapdoor with his foot and quickly finds the door slowly engulfing and crushing his foot. The mimic was pretty easy to clean up after that.

Under the mimic is the real trap door which leads straight down into the castle basement. After traversing a few tunnels the party stops at a crossroad and Nobunaga spots something shimmering down one of the paths. He began to walk down the hallway as the rest of us just mulled about. Suddenly he leaped back slashing at what we thought was nothing.

By this point I realized we were about to fight a gelatinous cube and I had better shoot an arrow down the other hallways on my turn to check for more. Before I got a turn however, two more gelatinous cubes showed up and Rolen got stunned. The party began to retreat, Drogmar grabbing Rolen to get him out of the way. Drogmar force fed Rolen with the strongest and worst tasting alcohol an everfull mug could produce and Rolen snapped out of being stunned. The encounter went pretty quickly after the initial surprise.

The party explored more of the hallways and eventually came back together in a room full of barrels with a ladder leading up and out. Inside the barrels were various body parts of the missing villagers. Nobunaga and Rolen went up the ladder to scout ahead. They ended up on top of one of the towers. A tanning rack with stretched human skin was the only feature in the room. Down below, the lit torches flickered and went out. A deep laughter was heard echoing throughout the castle. Nobunaga and Rolen hurried back down below where the party was scrambling to relight their torches.

Suddenly a blur rushes past the party from a hallway and disappears up the ladder. Blood wells up from several new slash marks on exposed skin. One lucky bardic knowledge check later and we knew the monster was a wendigo. As the monster rushes past a second time, the party attacks. The monster is not phased and after several repetitions of this someone suggests a new plan.

Drogmar pours ale on the floor and lights it on fire. When the wendigo comes back the archers fire arrows through the flames. The wendigo keeps charging we braced ourselves. The wendigo lights on fire as it runs through the flames and Drogmar, by sheer luck, shoves a torch down the burning creature’s throat. Suddenly there was an explosion of fire and the wendigo was no more.

The battered and bruised party left the dungeon and began exploring the rest of the castle. They found loot listed in the spoiler below. There was also an exploding dragon egg that Snelpie set off and a locked chest with a dwarven mouth and beard on it. The chest opened up after a few drops of alcohol were poured into the mouth.

While exploring the castle, a strange floating tower appeared. Pitch black with hundreds of boulders swirling around the base of it. One of the boulders fell down towards us. After it disappeared, Rolen examined the boulder and discovered it to be extremely cold to the touch. The party promptly returned to the town.

The mayor greeted the party and revealed he used to be an adventurer too. He gave the party some gear, detailed in the loot spoiler below. After mentioning the tower the mayor explained that he had been to the tower during his adventures. He was the only person in his party who made it out of the tower. The man in the tower seems to be collecting powerful artifacts as well as keeping an eye on any notable events going on around the continent.

Rolen, wanting to compensate the mayor for the gear he received, pulled out a tree from his backpack. The tree looked ancient, but fit inside a glass sphere several feet across. It had pink leaves that had a faint glow to them. The sphere was made of clear glass and any imperfections in the sphere only seemed to add to the tree’s innate beauty. The mayor refused the gift, saying he could not accept this of all things. Nobunaga, recognizing it as a bonsai tree, also stated that if Rolen was given this as a gift he could not give it away. At the time I had no idea what the tree could be, I actually just made it up on the spot but after several discussions with the DM we decided what the tree did and what it represented.

The loot the mayor gave us was
-Boots of Uncertainty – they give uses of jump, feather fall, and spider climb as well as something about uncertainty. Rolen claimed these.
-Magic Shield – Able to reflect attacks and deal damage back at the attacker. Drogmar claimed this
-An ornate glass flower – Created sparks when going near Nobunaga’s sacred family sword. Also allows Nobunaga to be stealthier.
-Mysterious black orb for Mortus Strider
-Self playing harmonica for Snelpy
Loot from the dwarven strongbox was
-Replenishing potion of bull strength
-Adamantine dagger
-Vile of dark liquid and notes on a mysterious lake
-Dwarven letter about a master blacksmith
-Brown liquid that we are pretty sure is ale
-Wand of cure light wounds
-Whistle of shatter

Other NotesJust some thoughts or things that didn’t make it into the story. From what information we could gather, the water from the lake is “made of shadow” and can cause things worse than death. There is a clear mystery building about the lake but it’s mostly unknown. There is also the locket, which is in my possession and I have yet to be able to open, and no the locket is not secretly a phylactery. It was mentioned by the mayor that the flower is from a family opposing to Nobunaga’s family which is why there are sparks between the two.
The boots of uncertainty originally improved my hide and move silently by making opponents roll twice and chose the lower but that was scratched for some more interesting abilities. There are a lot of jokes made about the boots. Some things about people who see the wearer forget who he is and sometimes the wearer forgets he has the boots on. It makes for fun roleplay.
There is also the mystery of the tree. If you want to know what it does, look in the spoiler below otherwise it will be revealed at some point. As of this point the DM and I have not decided when to reveal the power of the tree or what it did. The tree was given to Rolen by a man he helped cure from death with his knowledge of plants. The man gave him the tree, glass sphere included, and disappeared. Rolen awoke later after falling unconscious and doesn’t know it but was sent 100 years into the future.

[ddude987]

Session 3 - Player1 has joined your party; the chase is on!

We got back to the caravan. Someone severed the cart axels of all the carts leaving the caravan stranded. As the party mulls about asking about what happened, Rolen hears two guards talking behind a caravan. He sees the hooded guard whose blood bleeds black and another guard arguing. The hooded guard asks the other man if Drew is dead and the other man responds positively. After hearing this, Rolen sneaks over and into Drew’s tent and begins taking stuff. He finds a locked box, about the size of a large book, several silver knives, and other various tools. Rolen sneaks out of the tent as he hears people approaching.

Mortus had also heard of Drew’s death. As Rolen snuck out of the tent, Mortus went in. After rummaging around and stealing a few items Mortus leaves and comes face to face with a strange horned man. The man appears rather frail and is in fact a sorcerer tiefling. Mr. R Kane introduces himself and tells Mortus he is looking for adventure and entertainment. He is promptly invited to join Mortus on his adventures.

All of the party members are summoned to a meeting with licorice beard. He tells the party of a powerful artifact called the map of ages. For full details check the spoiler below. Licorice beard explains their runner was intercepted and the container he carried with him has been stolen. He provides us with provisions and elvish horses and asks us to retrieve the stolen container.

After a bit of discussion and planning our future route, the party decided to track the hooded man that killed drew. We follow him for a few days and soon see him stopped in a clearing near a fire. After some time he is joined by a very fat man. Rolen keeps watch for the day but the hooded man does not move from his place near the fire.

That night a mysterious figure approached our campsite. It was another of the caravan guards, Shamus. He tells us our mission is vital as the map is a dangerous artifact and would be better if it were lost, never to be found. He reveals himself as working for an organization named the Shadow of the Omniscient Eye, a group dedicated to hiding things that should never be found.

Snelpy, who stayed at the campsite instead of going to meet the mysterious man, suddenly finds a tree flying at him. After the loud crash is heard, the party quickly runs over to find the fat man at the campsite. His name is Louie, he isn’t the smartest person around, and he has a strange aversion to silver. Louie informs us the hooded man left sometime this morning and that the decoy he left behind worked as he thought it would. Louie works for “the family” as he puts it and tells us of a few things that don’t really make much sense. The notable thing is “the family” does kill people who oppose them.

After all the disturbances, Rolen takes his watch as the others go to bed. Shamus appears next to him and invites Rolen to join the Shadow of the Omniscient Eye. Rolen signs a contract in blood and the contract turns to shadow and snakes up his arm. After the magic dies down, Rolen has a distinctive tattoo on his left arm which he covers with a sleeve and his cloak.

The next day the parts heads out following the hooded man’s tracks. Sometimes the tracks are human, other times a large lizard. After several days the tracks lead to a town, Lumberton. As parties are wont to do, we headed directly to the nearest inn. Inside are several hooded figures all looking exactly like our quarry. After talking to them we discover they are of an order called the sunless monks. One of them is significantly larger than the others and never talks. When he does talk, everyone in the bar goes silent and gives the party a look that says “you made him talk!?” A little while later most of the monks depart and one of them goes to the bar to drink.

The party gives him a few more drinks and starts questioning him about their order. The large monk is very powerful and is only visiting their order in Lumberton checking on them. The monk also tells the party the man behind the sunless monks is the man in the tower. Then Rolen has a great idea. He asks R Kane and Mortus to create a distraction, which they do by starting a bar fight, and during the commotion he shanks the lone monk. He puts the blood into a vile and sneaks outside.

Outside Rolen views the vile and sees the blood to be black. The conclusion that all of the sunless monks are the same sort of creature is then drawn. The big monk finds Rolen in the street and without a word tells him to give the vile over. Rolen tosses it to him and the large monk crushes it. Nobunaga sees Rolen being threatened and attacks the monk. During the futile attempt to subdue the monk, a large bolder begins to fall from the sky. As Nobunaga runs, the monk draws one of Nobunaga’s wakizashi. With a graceful and fluid motion, the monk slices the giant bolder in twain. The large monk tells the party the container they seek is in the mines to the north before him and the other monks pick up the two pieces of the bolder and walk out of sight.

While making their way around town gathering supplies for the mines, Rolen and Snelpy run into Louie. Louie tells them he has seen a lot of turban wearing foreigners around as well as some hooded figures (Gehasian). He also tells Rolen and Snelpy the mines are abandoned because of kobold invasion. Rolen and Snelpy thank Louie and realize fighting with three other groups for the map isn’t going to be easy.


The map of ages is an ancient artifact. It is a map of knowledge. To use it one must think of something they wish to know and if the map knows it, it will show it. If one uses the map their knowledge is imprinted onto the map. If the map is split into two pieces then both pieces retain all knowledge the original piece had. If one piece is destroyed then all other existing pieces of the map gain the knowledge of the destroyed piece. If two pieces are conjoined together then the new single piece has all combined knowledge of both pieces. The number of pieces currently in existence is unknown to the party.

[ddude987]

Pre-notes: I'm actually very proud of this writing. Instead of being a mindless robot who just reiterates everything that happened, I actually put a bit of a voice and a narrative into this session. I really hope people are willing to read it for enjoyment. I don't recommend reading more than one part at a time, unless it really isn't that much reading for you, in which case awesome!


Session 4 – Into the depths; that’s not a Belrog!


Following the trail of information given from last session, the players begin to ask around the town about the mines. The mines were abandoned 100 (or was it 10?) years ago due to a kobold infestation. That was also around the last time the townspeople saw a dragon nearby.

The players decide to buy some supplies and head deep into the mines. A short ride from town and the players arrive at an abandoned entrance. A multitude of signs covers the entire vicinity warning passersby to not go near the mines. Now most people might find it logical to adhere to signs warnings in an effort of self-preservation but adventurers are wont to do that and PCs even less so. An equivalent message to PCs would be a large neon sign with a large comedic arrow displaying the words “Inn” or “tavern” if that suits your fancy. Someone even remarked as such.

After getting to the entrance of the mines it was notices some boards were broken and scattered on the floor, probably the remains of boards covering up the entrance. The message was clear; we weren’t the first ones to get to the mines. After traveling down the entrance a ways the players came to a large open cavern. Torches illuminated the cavern and on the other side were stacks of mine carts and 4 sets of tracks. Between the players and the tracks were burly men with turbans on their heads.

They were speaking some strange language none of us understood, Drogmar told us it was towelese or something like that. Racist dwarf comments aside, the turban wearing foreigners standing guard over the spare mine carts sent a clear message. After attempting to speak common to them and asking them to please move and after hearing their responses of lolno, Rolen decides to fire a warning shot over their heads. You might be thinking what could go wrong, that’s a pretty universal sign, or you might be thinking something along the lines of ‘oh noes here cometh the natural 1.’ In reality, neither of those likely, or unlikely if you consider 5% an unlikely event, events happened. Instead the they took it as ‘this archer really sucks as shooting, let’s kill them…’ and charged us.

Now it might be no fun to ruin the mechanics off the bat…so I won’t. These raging, oops one mechanic down, hulks of meat drew curved swords and charged at us. The party’s melee characters held a decent front line as the casters and archers plucked away. These barbarians kept fighting until they were fully dead, another mechanic of theirs covered. After a few went down, health started getting a bit low. Deiter went unconscious but was quickly woken back up with a zap of the cure light wounds wand.

From prone, Deiter’s first order of business was to bluff he was still unconscious and then preps an action to stab the barbarian if he tries to move away from him. The barbarian starts to charge someone else provoking a readied action and an attack of opportunity. Now the proper order of resolution is something we were not completely sure on, though our self-proclaimed rules lawyer (me) argued if they both went on the stack at the same time, the opportunity attack would go on second and therefore resolve first. In the end the DM let Deiter choose. He resolves the prepared action first and then the attack of opportunity, much to the dismay of the DM who then told us he really wanted the mobility feat to do something useful for once.

The guards were all cleaned up and we grabbed a single mine cart and rolled randomly for what track to use. At this point Nobunaga, Snelpy, Mortus, and Drogmar temporarily left the dungeon as they had somewhere to be for the next two hours. The remaining people (Deiter, Mr. R. Kane, and Rolen) pressed on. Turns out the four tracks all converged onto one track so it didn’t matter which we chose. After a few twists and turns, random direction choosing, and two loop dee loos, one of which Mr. R. Kane almost died in, we started heading across a chasm with another minecart traveling parallel to us.

Turns out the cart had a few Gahesian assassins in it. An epic mine cart fight broke out over a bottomless chasm. Alchemist fires were thrown, alchemist fires were caught and then re-thrown, spells were cast, and some people ended up in the wrong cart at one point. After the convoluted and almost fatal cart battle the heroes, if you consider the party members heroes, made it across the chasm and off a ramp into an underground river. Also there was a waterfall ahead.

Quickly the party tries to use anything and everything they have to steer their floating mine cart down the path without the waterfall at the end of it but the river is to strong. Rolen fashions a lasso out of elvish rope and grabs hold of a rock, giving the players a few seconds to think of a new solution. We fashioned a makeshift ore out of a quarterstaff and one of Snelpy’s instruments. The rope slips off a rock and catches on something below the surface, slowing our speed greatly. Using the makeshift ore, the players safely bring the mine cart down the calmer path in the river and finally ashore.

Attached to the rope was a dead body, preserved by the cold water. Inside the dead miners pocket was a silvery stone none of us could identify. If only Drogmar was here, he could roll his Dwarven bull $5@7 check (that is the name he gave his generic dwarven knowledge check).

Traveling down a tunnel, Rolen notices the rock looks unnatural. Upon closer inspection, it appears recently mined and well maintained, though the maintained parts are only about as tall as Rolen’s waist. This be kobold territory. After a few close calls with some traps, the players arrived at a staircase and at the bottom, an opened stone door. The staircase proved to be trapped so I did the logical thing and had Rolen stuff people in his bag of holding one at a time and walk along the walls to the bottom of the stair case.

Sneaking around, Rolen scouted the room beyond the open door and witnessed a party of four Gaheasians fighting four of the barbarian foreigners. The Gaheasian leader was identified by his cloak and the towel head leader identified by the large gemstone imbedded in his turban. When all the party members were at the bottom of the staircase we entered the room and saw 3 Gaheasian bodies, 3 foreigner bodies, and the foreigner leader still standing. The Gaheasian leader was nowhere to be found.

The Foreigner leader turned out to be a spiked chain wielding tome of battle character and the lockdown made some of our party sad, but our significantly higher action economy won the day. The ruby on his turban was, he said, how the great sultan watched him. Rolen, during the fight, shot at and shattered the ruby. Whether it was or wasn’t providing the chain tripper with a power boost, be it morale, instructions, or foresight, or if it was just an expensive scrying devise Rolen broke is still unknown.

After the battle the players continued down another passage and eventually found themselves at a dead end. Well, nothing to do here except jump across the pit we know is here and try to get to the very end of the hallway. Deiter got there, Rolen forgot his boots give him spider climb and he proceeded to fail a jump check, Mr R. Kane had already been known to fail jump checks with a DC of 3, Mortus and the others arrived in time to see some of the players disappearing down trap doors and they joins the bandwagon. Down the shoots we went... into the darkness…

At the end of it we ended up divided in 4 different cages. The first three had rocks at the bottom and those that ended up there were promptly told by some nearby kobolds they were loser. Deiter, who jumped all the way to the end of the hallway, landed on a soft bed of something and was proclaimed winner. Then Mr. R. Kane started speaking in draconic because he remembered kobolds speak that and they took him out of the cage and carried him off out of the chamber they were in, leaving one sad looking guard.

The cages weren’t very strong and soon the other players were racing after Mr. R. Kane. The entire party was welcomed by some head kobold chief who cast a spell to let us all understand draconic. There was something about a “great red” and how he would want to see us and before we knew it, the party was being ushered through massive stone doors, up floating stone steps, and into a giant stone bowl. Inside the bowl we found a red dragon no bigger than the size of a horse. Presumably, though the story was not confirmed, this dragons mother was driven off 10 (or was it 100) years ago by the townsfolk and the kobolds who worshipped her raised her child.

After a bit of chit-chat and paying some tribute to the dragon, we traded the shiny silver rock for a metal canister, a metal canister that looked identical to what Licorice Beard had described. One more problem presented itself, getting out of the mines. The red dragon agreed to ferry us out if we could defeat him in combat. Maybe it was bad rolls, maybe it was relatively easy combat because telling a story is sometimes more important than challenging encounters, the story being a dragon who thinks he is a tough cookie misjudges his own power and is shown humility. Whatever the reason, the combat went quickly and the dragon was satisfied with our power. He opened his mouth and told us to jump in one at a time… yeah this actually happened. After a bit of laughter and then a few people saying they were going to just kill the dragon, the DM told us it was a spell called horde gullet. Down the extra dimensional space inside your friendly neighborhood dragon and up and out of the cave we went. There was even a periscope to see out of the dragon.

We landed in a field, thanked the dragon and he left. As we were walking away, Rolen holding the box tightly, an invisible assailant attacks, ripping the box from Rolen’s grasp before turning invisible again. With quick thinking, Rolen reaches into his satchel; yes it’s a satchel not a man purse, of plant specimens, ingredients, etc… and throws a colored powder around him. The assailant, now outlined in yellow, showed to be the leader of the Gaheasian group sent into the mines. With his invisibility gone, and weak from fighting both the towel heads and the dragon, he fell quickly. People looted the body like murder hobos and Nobunaga grabbed the box and refused to give it to Rolen. His samurai code, he said, bound him to protect the box for Rolen to help Rolen regain the honor he lost from losing the box in the first place.

We headed back into town and were going to sleep in an inn as the end of the session.

Rolen spoke to Nobunaga privately. He told Nobunaga delivering the box to the Shadow of the Omniscient Eye. Nobunaga tells Rolen that this is Rolen’s task and he is to be the decider of where the box should go. Nobunaga says he is only protecting the box to regain Rolen’s honor. With that said, the two sneak off into the night and deliver the box to the regional leader of the Omniscient Eye. If you read this, remember the other player’s fully believe we have the box (complete with a piece of the map of ages) all the way until it is said we don’t. Also keep in mind the task was to return the box to the caravan. Ironically enough we don’t begin to head anywhere near that direction at all. I guess the other players just forgot we had the map because they didn’t mention it a single time in or out of character until the end of session 6. More on that in…well in session 6

[Mr Adventurer]

The phrase 'towel head' is itself tremendously racist.

[ddude987]

Sorry you think so. That's just what the people in Lumberton told us when we were investigating who they were. At that point nobody knows who they represent or what nation they are from, just that they are from very far away and not seen in these parts ever.
edit: also removed that statement everywhere it appeared.

[ddude987]

Session 5 - Here come thy palidonts; this isn't Moria either!

The characters present at this point were Rolen, Drogmar, Mr. R Kane, and Deiter, the others coming a bit later in the session. After the excitement of last session and the recovering of the objet we were looking for, we decided to hang around Lumberton gathering supplies and discuss our next move. Nobunaga heard some rumors of a fair foreigner passing through here. Mr. R. Kane wanted to investigate the sunless monk’s temple but this idea was dismissed as too dangerous. In the end, Rolen decided he would help Nobunaga go East following the trail of the fair foreigner because he owed Nobunaga a debt. The other party members also decided they would also go for various reasons.

As we hung around Lumberton we noticed changes to the town. Inn and shop names were being changed to name that had to do with horses and taverns had stopped serving ale, much to Drogmar’s disapproval. Notices were posted around detailing information about the head paladin coming to Lumberton. That certainly didn’t sit well with the party, seeing as we all had some sort of thing paladins wouldn’t approve of. We saddled our horses and headed out of Lumberton, traveling northeast towards the mountains that separated the midlands and Gahesia.

A few hours out we spotted a group of people, presumably the paladins and their squires. We gave them a wide berth but were ordered to halt. We kicked our horses into a run and began outrunning a few paladins that were sent after us. The well-bred elvish horses easily outran the paladin’s mounts. After losing the paladins we kept heading towards the mountains, reaching the base around dusk.

The next morning Drogmar went exploring saying he remembered some dwarven stronghold used to be around here. He found the entrance and opened it up. The horses and the party headed down the large path into the earth. After a bit of walking we came across some rather large footprints and a destroyed cart with some building supplies. Drogmar noticed a hidden passageway and those present went to explore it, leaving the horses behind.
Down a narrow passageway that lead into a cavernous room the size of a football stadium and around a column with steps carved into it we arrived at the base of a town. This town was made completely of stone and the gates were wide open. Inside were no lights, no movement, and no signs of life. Carefully we walked into the town and headed into the closest house. Inside were small dwarven statues the size of your thumb. They were extremely detailed and looked better than a real person.

After leaving the house, the party headed towards the center of town. At this point Nobunaga, Mortus, and Snelpy joined us. Rolen noticed something behind him just on the range of his senses. As the party moved closer to the center of town, Rolen went back to investigate what he sensed. Back where the party had entered the town were statues that hadn’t been there before, this time life sized. The gates that had been wide open were gone, only a tall stone wall remained.

Rolen hurried back to the party. They had reached the center of the town. In the center of the town square was a well and dotted around were life sized statues, lots of them. Leave it to the intelligent people of the party to do something they shouldn’t but next thing I knew was happening Drogmar cut the chain that held the bucket in the well and down fell the bucket. Then, out of the darkness of the bottomless well, came three chains that wrapped around the winch and began turning. The well fell away, or did it just transform, and now an alter was in the center of the town. The alter was underneath a wooden roof and on top of the roof a black katana.

Out of the hole in the earth came a large black sphere. Luckily it wasn’t a sphere of annihilation, unluckily it was probably going to turn us into one of those statues. Time and space seemed to bend around us. Some party members tried to run away only to discover they were running towards the object again. No choice but to fight it.

Out of one of the sides of the sphere came an eye. From the eye came a large stream of fire singing several people and melting some statues away. As the eye closed, all our torches flickered and for a brief moment the whole area was pitch black. In that instant several statues that were next to the party members grappled the players and began hiding behind them.

Those were basically the mechanics of the fight and it went smoothly after that, except for the temporary negative level people got which scared us all. The eye went down, a bunch of statues withered away, except for two statues which became people again, and the black katana dropped to the ground. One of the two people that came back to peopledom again was a mage and the other a knight. After a brief discussion with what year it was, one that Rolen was 100 years off of the actual current date, the people who had been petrified accepted what year it was. Then the mage withered away as if time had caught up with him. The knight however, didn’t look any different.

The knight told us he wanted the katana and began trying to kill us for it. We cut his legs and head off. Snelpy gave Rolen a leg because he thought Rolen would want to study it. Drogmar wanted to go bowling with the death knight’s head but got a gutter ball. We left the town and headed back into the main tunnel system.


After getting our horses we began exploring some tunnels. In one of the tunnels there was a sign post with the number 9 on it. There was also a newly constructed bridge. A little ways later was a couple guards and some slaves who were bringing supplies via cart down another tunnel. They were talking of building more bridges.

After finding two more signs with numbers, an 8 and then a 7, it was apparent they were markers to tell us how far from Gahesia we were. We traveled down a different tunnel and came into a large cavernous room. We were near the top, a stone bridge spanning to the other side, and below us were hundreds of slave workers and guards reconstructing the main dwarven road.
The side road the party was traveling down began to slope downwards towards the main road. We halted our horses to decide if we should turn back or risk being seen by hundreds of guards and slaves. As we were discussing this dilemma, two messengers started running in our direction. Well, no other choice now but to ride past them. Off we took, our horses riding very fast. As we rode by, the messengers stepped to the side to evade us and one messenger pushed the other off into the chasm below and thanked us.

As we approached the road, guards commanded us to halt, but Mortus rolled up a bluff to bluff being someone of great importance. I guess it worked because next thing we knew the guards not only stepped away but looked everywhere except at us. We kept heading on our way and after a bit of riding approached an underground city. Clearly ancient and of dwarvenmake, but no longer, as the Gahesians had taken it over.

We were halted as we entered the city by an old fellow in the road. His name Gregoryo (greg-or-E-oh). He insisted we needed to get papers for our stay and he would be happy to provide, for a hefty sum of course. He pointed us to a nice inn and told us he would have our papers ready on the morrow. Into the inn we went, got a room, and well people in this town must have thought Mortus to be special for some reason because the room we got had several, obviously, servant rooms as well as one large room that only opened for Mortus.

The commonspace was large and elegant containing a dumbbell waiter in addition to the ornate décor. After people went to their rooms, Snelpy decided to take a ride on the dumbbell waiter to see the chef and ask for dinner. A rather large man, who jested, or was it, about cooking Snelpy told us he would have our meal sent up and in the meantime would like to speak with us.

After being told by Snelpy, Mortus, allowing the special treatment to go to his head, decided he would wait an hour before going. Deiter elected to stay with him, and Rolen and Nobunaga decided to go with Snelpy immediately. The chef was a strange fellow, exceptionally large for a human, and acted quite strangely when I went to give him a silver coin. Since what kind of creature he is was not public information at the time, since Rolen withheld it, see the link below for more on what Drasko (the chef) is.

After a bit of a discussion, Drasko saying he wanted to escape from this town, he has been here 10 years after he went underground trying to escape from a ranger. Then he told us we had a ranger chasing us if we ran from the paladins like we did. Snelpy and Rolen thanked him for the information and Rolen told Drasko he looked forward to the help and that Drasko would provide. Casually, Drasko reached over the counter and picked up a small boy by the head; a spy, hiding in plain sight. Drasko insisted we move this conversation somewhere safe. Back in the room Drasko began cooking the small boy in a pot. The boy wasn’t a boy but some sort of facechanger.
Drasko also had information on the fair foreigner. A lady, as Nobunaga was looking for, who was currently prisoner of one of the masks. The masks are the high leaders of Gahesia, as near as we could tell, and currently people thought Mortus was a visiting mask. The party planned to visit the mask tomorrow and demand an audience, steal the girl, and then escape. Suffice to say, the plan wasn’t the best thought out.

The following day Rolen headed off to Gregoryo’s place while Nobunaga, Snelpy, and Deiter went to the mask’s palace. Rolen was let into Gregoryo’s place by a strange blob of flesh with an arm sticking out. Gregoryo gave Rolen the papers and they got into a bit of a discussion. Specifically Rolen asked about Drew, and Gregoryo advised him to stay away from that.
A little before, since the mask’s palace was closer, the other party members went into the palace. Inside were oranges, purples, and reds all around, a color scheme that clashed and just looked terrible. Farther inside they came to a courtyard in the center of the palace. There, they watched the mask elegantly slaughtering slaves. The slaves clearly were untrained as the wielded swords and other weapons like bumbling fools. The mask, with his rapier, dashed around with fluid motions killing all of the slaves. After all the slaves were killed he began wiping his blade off. Nobunaga approached him, clearly furious, and looked straight at him.

Now, it was hinted before that looking at a mask was not something people did. The mask, clearly offended, swore to kill Nobunaga. Nobunaga noticed the fair foreigner watching from a balcony, Lady Nohime, the person he was looking for. A fight broke out, 1v1, and after a very close battle, only won by two crits in a row, the mask was slain. Guards began attacking the party members and Snelpy cast a glitterdust at them.

Back at Gregoryo’s…Gregoryo immediately knew someone in the city used magic and said so aloud. Rolen cursed under his breath about Snelpy’s carelessness and went to rush off but was caught by Hold Person. Gregoryo was curious about Rolen knowing who used magic but soon let Rolen go. By the time Rolen got to the palace, the front gates were swarmed with guards. The gates closed and barred. Rolen climbed up the walls into the palace and found the other party members. Lady No mentioned something of a secret exit and they went looking for it.

Meanwhile Mortus was outside the front gates where guards and mages alike were asking him for orders. As he stammered and failed to give commands, their suspicion of him not being a mask grew. The mages blasted open the gates and guards and Mortus began entering the palace. As the palace was being searched, a large rumbling was heard.

The party found a trapdoor that was well disguised as a floorboard and went down into a wine cellar. At the back of the room was a large stone door of dwarvenmake, but a switch was nowhere in sight. Snelpy blew the whistle of shatter and the wall crumbled to dust. The party members and Lady No began running down the tunnel.

As the rumbling got louder, a very large humanoid figure with bull-like characteristics appeared, Drasko. He smashed through the guards and found Mortus. Together they found the secret tunnel. Drasko passed out from his wounds, and Mortus dragged Drasko part way into the tunnel but could not drag him for long. He wished him well and began to head down the tunnel into the darkness.


What Drasko is (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=279902)

[ddude987]

Session 6 - To Marine; go on without me!

The session begins with Mr. R Kane leaving the party. Apparently we’re too dangerous or something. So Mortus made it to the end of the tunnel and met up with the party. We were in Gahesian lands, somewhere we didn’t want to be for long, and decided to rest a day before moving on. Well Later that day Drasko showed up and pressed a button or something to make the tunnel collapse. After talking with him, having his face get melted off by Deiter throwing holy water at him because he thought he was a vampire and fixing his face with some water from the lake, we decided traveling at night would be the safest thing to do.

While we hung around the day, a strange figure was creeping around our campsite. A young woman named Eva, who was an alchemist and loved blowing things up with bombs. She happily joined our party as she was lost and looking for adventure. Also, conveniently, our elvish horses found their way out and met up with us. We gave Eva Mr R. Kane’s horse.

As we set off for travel, Drasko got impatient and decided to run ahead instead of travel with us. A little ways later we spotted a campfire around sat two Gahesian scouts. Rolen snuck over and got them from range. We kept going and the terrain began to slope upwards and become more mountainous. Ahead a ways, Eva fell into a pit trap and became entangled in a net. As that happened Rolen investigated a strange wooden panel on the ground he noticed and was soon surrounded by no less than 10 Mariners pointing crossbows at him. They hid under the ground and popped up to capture the party.

Of course they thought we were Gahesians, and anything we said was “exactly what a Gahesian would say.” We were escorted for several days over the mountains and arrived at a fort. Inside we had to talk to the mayor and were to be sent to trial. Once we met the mayor we told him of our quest and soon discovered he was Licorice Beard’s brother. He cursed his brother’s folly and told us we would sit trial on the morrow as the box’s recovery was from orders on the highest.

The next day the party sat around a large table along with several paladins and the mayor. Rolen tells the paladins and the mayor that he was the one who held the box and he is the one that gave it to a source that will remain anonymous to be hidden away from civilization forever. The paladins regret to inform Rolen that he is to be hanged. The mayor tells Rolen he is sorry, but there is nothing HE can do.

Outside the party sees a hastily raised gibbet. Everyone steps outside and gets surrounded by the Marine encampment all wielding crossbows. Clearly the Mariners didn’t take kind to Corinthians passing judgment on their land. The paladins seized the mayor as crossbows began to fire. The party ran for their horses and began racing out of town. The last they saw, the mayor was being killed by the paladins as crossbow bolts rained down.

[Xervous]

Because I absolutely LOATHE terrible grammar and spelling (though I'm helpless with the marks above vowels...), I'm here for some corrections.

Correct spelling and pronunciations.

Ghaesea, Ghaeseans - Guh hah sha, Guh hah she ins
Maryn, Maryners Mare-in, Mariners

Secret organization of secrets: Shroud of The Omniscient Eye
And the desert climate located to the south of the Old World (where everything has taken place so far) is known as Thar making the foreigners [b]Tharians[b]