Desert Island (IC)

[AvatarVecna]

You are an up-and-coming adventurer in the metropolis of Waterdeep. You and your allies were exploring a bit into a weirder part of Undermountain. You got caught between two warring factions among the monsters that call Undermountain home, and stumbled into a few of the displacement traps scattered around. When the light faded around you, you were standing on a large dais of raised bedrock, the smell of the ocean filling your nose. The rock you're on is perfectly circular, as if raised straight up from the sea; in the center where you're standing, there's a smaller circle defined by runes emitting a golden glow.

In one direction, there's nothing but waves as far as the eye can see. In the other, a pair of land masses, each maybe a mile or two wide from your current view, separated by a channel half a mile wide...or is it a river, and it's all one land mass? Difficult to say. This might just be the beach of some other continent, but you've got a bad feeling - rivers that wide on the mainland tend to have a port town, and yet you can't see any obvious signs of civilization. The sun is shining bright overhead for the moment, although there's some unfriendly-looking clouds off in the distance.

[JNAProductions]

OOC Thread (https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?643069-Desert-Island-(OOC))


Dwilla looks back and forth.

"..."

"Crap," she says. She heads for the land-while she's got her cloak and other things that would let her swim with ease, she doesn't want to get caught in an oceanic storm. She sets her sight on the riverbank, using it as a landmark, and begins traveling upstream, seeing what she can find.

[AvatarVecna]

Dwilla looks back and forth.

"..."

"Crap," she says. She heads for the land-while she's got her cloak and other things that would let her swim with ease, she doesn't want to get caught in an oceanic storm. She sets her sight on the riverbank, using it as a landmark, and begins traveling upstream, seeing what she can find.

Fortunately, the stone dais she arrived on (about 50 ft in diameter?) isn't all that far from the nearest part of the land: when you face the two of them, the one on the right curves around like a crescent moon with the point heading straight towards your little dais. It's still a ways to swim (several hundred feet?), but it's much more doable than the closest part of the other island.

The water is fairly shallow here, never deeper than a few body-lengths. The waters are crystal clear, which is good in that they're clean (other than being salt-water), and bad because river water tends to have a lot of gunk floating down. And despite the dais kinda being in the middle of what should be a river, you're not really feeling as strong a current as you would expect for being inside the mouth of a mile-wide river. You're getting the sinking sensation that these are just two islands really close together.

It's not a long swim, and you're not accosted along the way, at least...but then, it was pretty shallow. You come up on the beach at the tip of the crescent. The sand only goes maybe a hundred feet before it gives way to jungle trees, and the foliage grows thick incredibly fast. Logically, you know it'll be much brighter inside when you can see the light coming down through the branches, but staring into it from outside, it looks dark and foreboding.

You could follow the beach around to the left (the side where you can see the other landmass), you could follow the beach around to the right, you could enter the jungle, or you could do...something else?

[JNAProductions]

"Nothing ventured, nothing gained," she mutters to herself, and enters the jungle. She moves slowly at first, giving her eyes time to adjust, and keeps close to the 'river'.

If she happens to spot any tree sticking out larger than the rest, she'll climb it for a good vantage point, see if she can spot anything.

[AvatarVecna]

"Nothing ventured, nothing gained," she mutters to herself, and enters the jungle. She moves slowly at first, giving her eyes time to adjust, and keeps close to the 'river'.

If she happens to spot any tree sticking out larger than the rest, she'll climb it for a good vantage point, see if she can spot anything.

Light streams through the foliage, and while it's not as dark as it looked from outside (as expected), it still lends the whole place a spooky atmosphere. The jungle is dense, and hot, and loud. There's bug everywhere - even if you can't see them you can still hear them.

You find something that seems promising: not too far into the jungle, there's what looks to be a sheer rocky cliff, going up a few hundred feet. You thought the trees just got much taller deeper into the jungle when you saw it from outside, but apparently it's more that the ground just drops off rather sharply as it gets close to the beach. You could probably go around it to the left (river-side) or right (ocean-side), and just hike your way up that high over a longer period of time, or you could climb the cliff and maybe get more information very quickly.

[JNAProductions]

Dwilla tests the cliff-face, seeing how hard it would be to climb. If she's able to get her claws hooked in properly and climb without risk of major injury, she'll go up; and if not, she'll take the river side path.

[AvatarVecna]

Dwilla tests the cliff-face, seeing how hard it would be to climb. If she's able to get her claws hooked in properly and climb without risk of major injury, she'll go up; and if not, she'll take the river side path.

The cliff isn't solid, there's plenty of nooks and crannies to use as handholds, so you can scurry up it pretty easily. You clear the treetops in seconds, and after that it's just a bit of a climb to the top of the cliff. When you reach the top, you've got a much better view of the surrounding area:

First off, the island you're only only goes maybe another few hundred feet up - that one cliff aside, it's mostly just sloping jungle foliage, it looks like. The other island on the other side of the river is much taller, and might be riding that line between large hill and small mountain - the jungle just seems to keep climbing. From this vantage, you can see the river curving around the other island, up until the other island blocks your view of the riverbank. The furthest bank you see has to be more than a couple miles away at least.

You look down into the "river", and barely suppress a shiver: you can pretty clearly see how, just a few hundred feet away from the shore, the ocean floor just drops away into a deep nothing. You're not sure how far down it goes, and if you didn't have your cloak, you'd be loathe to try and find out. Anything could be lurking in those depths, and you'd need to cross at least half a mile of ocean to get to the other island (at the narrowest point!). It's doable, but who knows what would happen.

The storm clouds still look to be a few hours away (you've not been hiking very long, so far). You also see some promising signs: on the other island, on the far far end of this island, and very close (almost immediately north of you, although you're not sure how far), you can see some plumes of smoke rising. That might just mean forest fires, but it might mean people!

[JNAProductions]

"People! Hopefully," Dwilla says, with a small bit of elation. She starts booking it towards the smoke, moving fast.

As she goes, she does take note of the surrounding foliage and fauna, seeing if she can tell what's edible and what's not, just in case.

[roll0] Nature
[roll1] Survival

[AvatarVecna]

"People! Hopefully," Dwilla says, with a small bit of elation. She starts booking it towards the smoke, moving fast.

As she goes, she does take note of the surrounding foliage and fauna, seeing if she can tell what's edible and what's not, just in case.

[roll0] Nature
[roll1] Survival

You barely recognize any of the flora that you can see. You know the default rule for this kind of things: for plants, bright and colorful usually means it's meant to be eaten and distributed through waste, while in animals bright colors are "free death by poison right over here". The stuff here is...probably safe? But you can't really be sure. Locals will probably know better, though.

Unfortunately, in your haste, you weren't quite paying attention to where you were going. As you work your way up a hill, your foot lands on leaves...but not on ground. The net keeping the leaves in place can't support your weight, and you tumble down. It's a surprisingly deep pit, and you barely register the glistening liquid on the tips of spears as you hurtle down.

Traveling fast is -5 to passive perception. You failed to notice the pit trap, and fell in. AFAICT it's not a save to avoid falling in, sorry.

Fall Damage: [roll0] (bludgeoning)
Spikes: [roll1] (piercing)
Poison: [roll2] (poison), DC 13 Con save for half

You are restrained by both the net and being impaled on the spikes. Failure to extricate yourself means bleeding more on the spikes and more poison entering your system.

[JNAProductions]

Con Save: [roll0]
Oh look, I passed. :P

What would the extrication check be? Because I think my Ring Of Free Action should help, right?

I'll roll acrobatics, with advantage if applicable and needed.

[roll1]
[roll2]

[AvatarVecna]

Con Save: [roll0]
Oh look, I passed. :P

What would the extrication check be? Because I think my Ring Of Free Action should help, right?

I'll roll acrobatics, with advantage if applicable and needed.

[roll1]
[roll2]

Extracting yourself from the next takes more than a few seconds, and involves twisting around on the spikes. Nonetheless, you wiggle free soon enough and extricate yourself from the pit without further incident.

Acrobatics is acceptable, and you pass the check. For clarification, the ring of free action has three effects:
Difficult terrain doesn't slow you down
Magic can't paralyze or restrain you
Magic can't slow your speed

This is neither a spell effect, nor even a magic net, so it's perfectly allowed to restrain you. :smalltongue:

You take an additional [roll0] piercing damage from the spikes. No more poison damage though.

[JNAProductions]

Dwilla curses, both whoever laid the trap (since it's clearly not for food-you don't POISON food!) and her own lack of awareness.

She climbs out, and takes a moment to survey the area before pressing on, a bit slower.

[roll0] Perception

And moving at normal speed now.

[AvatarVecna]

Dwilla curses, both whoever laid the trap (since it's clearly not for food-you don't POISON food!) and her own lack of awareness.

She climbs out, and takes a moment to survey the area before pressing on, a bit slower.

[roll0] Perception

And moving at normal speed now.

Thanks to your ring, even the thickest underbrush is no struggle to move through, and you make your way north without any further trouble. You exit the forest and find yourself staring down a very steep hill. It doesn't look quite natural - it looks like somebody took a giant spoon and scooped out a chunk of the landscape. there's no trees, it's just rock here, and it looks like there's tunnels in the western rock face (the direction of the rest of the island). Around the edge where the forest abruptly drops away, there are occasional towers that look over the trees. There's one pretty close to you - unfortunately, between the angle and the remaining pain in your feet, you're not quite able to tell if it's occupied.

There's a small village at the bottom of this canyon(?) close to where the ocean stretches out forever. All the buildings are on sturdy-looking stilts, and what you think is high tide is just barely reaching the ones closest to the beach. The village is definitely occupied: you can see a few houses with smoke emerging from the chimneys, and an awful lot of small creatures running around. Most of them seem to be retreating into the tunnels, but some are heading your way wearing armor and wielding spears.

[JNAProductions]

Dwilla waits. She keeps her weapons sheathed, and makes sure she looks as peaceful as possible.

Provided they don't attack her first, she'll keep waiting till they reach her, and try to establish communications.

I realized I hadn't picked spells yet. Imma do that real quick.