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  1. - Top - End - #121
    Barbarian in the Playground
     
    SleepyShadow's Avatar

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    Default Re: Planescape Campaign Journal

    Quote Originally Posted by JadedDM View Post
    A hunt in Ravenloft? Why do I get the feeling the quarry will not be foxes?
    You'd be absolutely right

    Ashwood Abbey
    In which our Heroes mingle with high society, and find their position is precarious.
    Spoiler: Session Thirty-Two
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    The PCs (save for Tulany) went to the Ashwood Abbey, where they found a colorful costumed party hosted by the hunters, many of whom were the second or third sons and daughters of the Borcan elite. The party were mocked by some for being poorly dressed, and idolized by others for being exotic newcomers. The hunters showed off a few of their trophies (the half-pelt of a werewolf was a real prize), allowed the PCs to indulge in drinks, drugs, and pleasures of the flesh, and even offered a snuff of vampire ashes to the daring. Whilst partying, the PCs learned that each hunter and huntress had their own motivations, ranging from noble ("There are things that go bump in the night, and I'm the one who bumps back") to revenge ("I rescued a girl who had been assaulted by a six-fingered devil, and I vowed that men would die for this"), but each had a reason for joining the vigil. Eventually, the hunters drew lots to see who got to go on the next hunt, and guess who won?

    Of course the game was rigged, and the PCs knew it, but they thought it was a good opportunity to prove themselves to the local hunters and scratch their itch for combat. The Abbot told them their mark was some creature haunting a travelling Vistani circus which had come to Borca from Odaire a few nights ago. The Abbot didn't care about the Vistani, of course, but he didn't want any further innocent Borcan blood to be shed. The party travelled to the circus, and after a brief investigation they learned that the culprit was most likely a carrionette (an evil puppet with paralytic needles). They enlisted the aid of a Vistani woman to help them navigate the sprawling carnival, and eventually they narrowed it down to three tents where the toys and prizes were kept. The party opted to just go through the tents waving torches at the dolls to see if any flinched. One of them did. Of course, Cassius got a 30 on his Perception check, which utterly foiled the ambush the other seven carrionettes had set

    Kharim protected the Vistani woman from the murder-puppets, and the rest of the party butchered them in short order. It turns out the little buggers rely heavily on surprise to take out their victims. Ah well. Sometimes it's good for the players to have an easy win. The party brought the carrionette corpses back to the Abbey as proof of their victory, and the Abbot congratulated them on having passed their entrance exam. He then offered to boil down the puppets to see what kind of high one could get by drinking their lacquer, and naturally offered the first taste to the PCs. Unsurprisingly, they declined. The rest of the night was spent partying it up with the fabulous hunters and huntresses, save for Kharim who left the Abbey and went back to the inn.

    While the rest of the party was living the high life, Tulany was spending quality time at the library with Dilisnya. He was charming and kind, if a bit distant, and explained that he needed her help to uncover the location of the Well of Many Worlds which was rumored to be located beneath the city. He had no intention of leaving Borca, as he quite liked his home, but thought it would be the best way to get Tulany and her friends home (or at least back to Sigil). He had studied everything he could about the Well, and knew that it needed to be properly attuned to a specific destination before it could be used safely. Otherwise, anyone who jumped in would be spat out in a random location somewhere in the Multiverse. Dilisnya suspected he could use Tulany's Tarot card to attune the Well to her home world. He also warned Tulany that they had to act fast, lest Ivana the Black Widow learn of the Well and try to use it for her own dark purposes. He stressed that foiling Ivana's plans was paramount. Tulany wasn't paying too much attention, and was just happy to be in the company of a charming gentleman who needed her. Eventually, the two of them got dinner together at the finest establishment in the city, where Dilisnya talked about his many travels across Borca, his study of the dark arts and the occult, and other such topics. Tulany was fascinated by him.

    The next day, the party met for breakfast briefly before splitting up once more. The majority of the PCs headed off to the Ashwood Abbey again, while Tulany went to meet with Dilisnya again. Kharim declined to join either group, and hung around at the inn asking questions. Of course, asking too many questions is dangerous in a place like Borca. Before he could get himself into trouble, he bumped into a faux-dandy by the name of Sydney Charles. He hauled Kharim down to the lowest-grade pub in town, where the constant noise and roughhousing would provide an excellent screen for conversations best not overheard. When Kharim explained that he was worried about Tulany spending so much time with Dilisnya, Sydney was quick to explain that Dilisnya was the family name of the twin dark lords of Borca, Ivana and Ivan. Since nobody had seen Tulany since breakfast, Kharim assumed the worst had happened, and he (along with Sydney) raced into the night in a desperate search for the missing elf.

    While that little drama was playing out, the rest of the PCs volunteered for another hunt. This time, their mark was a young woman by the name of Camilla Lucille Freeman, who was a waitress at one of the smaller restaurants in town. Camilla, who had been nicknamed "Shakes" by her coworkers on account of her constant shivering, was connected to three strange deaths in the last six months. Each victim had gone missing, only to turn up weeks later with nary a mark on the outside, but all of their organs frozen solid. Each body had been found near a body of water (two by the river, and one by a well), and The Abbot suspected that the girl had something to do with it. Two of the victims had been Camilla's former coworkers, and one had been a regular customer at the restaurant. The PCs agreed to investigate, but pledged not to kill her until they could prove she was the murderer.

    Their plan was pretty straightforward. Aurelius (who had the highest Charisma in the group) and Daegan (who could use his blood hunter powers to sniff out the supernatural) would pose as customers and casually ask Camilla questions. Eirik, Kai, and Cassius would wait outside and watch the exits to prevent her escape if she tried to flee. The plan worked, perhaps a little too well. As if in a dream, Camilla took Aurelius and Daegan to the back room by the meat locker, where she told them her story.

    At the age of twelve, she was taken to another world by an angel made of icicles and frost, and she spent five long years studying at his frozen feet and learning his strange sorceries. Every day, the angel threatened to crack the icy floor beneath her, to entomb her with all the others who had failed in their studies, their frozen bodies still visible beneath the smeared ice. Camilla never gave him the chance. On her seventeenth birthday, she snapped off one of the angel's icicle toes and stabbed herself through the heart with it. When she woke up, she was shivering in Borca.

    She told the story as if in a trance, and she couldn't stop herself. Too late, Daegan realized there was Fey magic at work. Both he and Aurelius failed a Charisma save.

    And the session ended there.

    TL;DR - Nothing is ever what it seems.

  2. - Top - End - #122
    Troll in the Playground
     
    JadedDM's Avatar

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    Default Re: Planescape Campaign Journal

    Uh-oh, trouble!

    Yeah, I didn't say anything but after last session I googled Borca out of curiosity, so naturally I saw the name 'Dilisnya' right away and was like, "Oh, dear. That's bad. "

  3. - Top - End - #123
    Pixie in the Playground
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    This Sidney fellow must be mistaken. Dilisnya has been nothing but a perfect gentleman. Maybe he's just distantly related to Ivan or something. I'm sure it will be fine. Don't worry about it.
    Princess Battle Flower

  4. - Top - End - #124
    Barbarian in the Playground
     
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    The Long Night
    In which our Heroes give pity, and receive none.
    Spoiler: Session Thirty-Three
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    Cassius went into the restaurant to check on Aurelius and Daegan, and found only Camille crying by the meat freezer as she desperately smoked a hand-rolled cigarette. She didn't spot him, so he snuck back outside to get Kai and Eirik. The trio came back and started interrogating Camille about where the other two had gone. It only took a few minutes for them to realize that if they prompted her with questions about where Aurelius and Daegan had gone, she would utter the same phrase in the exact same way.

    "Do you want to share a smoke and hear a story?"

    They concluded that Camille was under some sort of compulsory magic, but none of them were mages, so they couldn't figure out what exactly was going on. However, they were smart enough not to let her tell her story to them, since it was obviously upsetting her to be forced into saying her luring phrase. They continued to question her, doing their best to dance around anything that might force her to say her phrase instead of answering normally. Camille twigged that they might be hunters, and Kai botched the deception check to convince her they weren't. Our brave hunters then proceeded to chase the girl around the restaurant while she used her faerie-given powers to teleport from doorway to doorway.

    Meanwhile, Daegan and Aurelius awoke in a palace made of ice and snow. A Gentry Fae (quite powerful, but a step down from a proper Archfey) with the appearance of an angel made of ice offered to take them into its service, else it would bury them in the icy floor as it had so many others. They decided to turn down the "offer", Aurelius because he didn't want to be forced into the service of a faerie, and Daegan because his Charisma score wasn't high enough to become a Warlock. A battle ensued, and just when the two adventurers looked to gain the upper hand, the angel of ice banished them back to Borca. Eirik heard some commotion from the back of the restaurant, and stopped his pursuit of Camille long enough to find that Aurelius and Daegan had reappeared in the bathroom stall. Once they had disentangled themselves from each other, they helped the others corner Camille where she had tried hiding in the bushes behind the restaurant.

    The hunters dragged Camille back inside, bundled her up in a blanket by the stove, and they managed to convince her they were interested in killing the Fae she was bound to instead of just killing her. She gladly took them up on their offer, and so she relayed her story to them once more. The PCs willingly failed their Charisma saves, and were thrust back into the Feywild where they battled with the "angel" once more. With five hunters suddenly arriving at its doorstep, the Gentry Fae was quickly overwhelmed. Once the killing blow was struck, the PCs were sent back to Borca, emerging from the river just outside of town. When they made it back to the restaurant, they found Camille had fallen asleep in front of the stove, an icicle toe clutched in her hand. Cassius gently woke her, and she apologized for dozing off. She had gotten so warm, she just couldn't help it. Once she realized that she could finally feel warm again, she threw herself at the party in joyful tears, hugging and kissing each of them in turn. Just as a test, Kai asked if she wanted to tell them her story. She was finally able to say, "No, I don't want to", and the PCs called that a win.

    The PCs took the icicle toe back to the Ashwood Abbey and presented it as proof of their hunt. The Abbot congratulated them on dealing with the Fae, and proceeded to use the icicle toe to stir his bourbon. The PCs hung around the abbey long enough for a celebratory drink or two, but soon retired for the night.

    Meanwhile, Kharim and Sydney tracked Tulany down to an abandoned church. Sydney explained the church belonged to Ezra, goddess of the dawn, but Ivana's mother had denounced the church and its followers many years ago when her brother (the prophet of Ezra) had grown more popular than she was. The church was slowly making a return, but Ivan had taxed the church so heavily that the priestess could only afford to hold congregation once a month, and that was held in her backyard. The church was too expensive to maintain, and so it had become abandoned.

    The trail led into the crypts beneath the church, and Sydney spotted a few hastily laid traps along the way, but was able to disarm them without trouble. In the deepest part of the crypts, they found Tulany and Dilisnya examining an ancient stone well while a half-dozen bodyguards stood watch over the area. After much debate, Kharim managed to convince Tulany to come back to the inn. Dilisnya tried to pickpocket the Tarot card, but Tulany caught him in the act. He casually played it off as just groping her. No alarm bells here. Once away from the church, Kharim and Sydney explained their suspicions that Dilisnya was Ivan the Terrible, but Tulany didn't believe them.

    Anyway, the party met up the following morning to hash out a plan of action. The hunters were going to keep hunting, and Kharim enlisted Avilius into babysitting Tulany. The space marine had a quiet chat with her in her room, usual old guy mentor stuff, and then fell asleep in a chair outside her door. The hunters headed back to Ashwood Abbey, while Kharim distracted Arabelle from her Folk Hero background destiny obsession by getting her to help him research binder magic. Sydney went full Sherlock Holmes by pretending to be a singing beggar and patrolled the neighborhood while also collecting spare change.

    The hunters found the abbey formal and reserved when they arrived. After speaking with the Abbot, they learned that Ivana Boritsi was paying the abbey a visit that evening to pay her membership fees. The PCs met with her, a raven-haired seductress that immediately started flirting with them, and she told them she had a "special hunt" prepared for the whole hunt club to participate in. She expected "fabulous results" from the PCs in particular.

    While the hunters were trying to placate Ivana, Dilisnya called upon Tulany once more. She questioned him about the accusations Kharim and Sydney had leveled against him, but he danced around the question of what his first name was, saying that he was "unfortunately related to a Dark Lord" and that "the name Dilisnya gets you farther in life than a name like 'Saint Germain' would". Convinced by his conversational tapdancing, Tulany agreed to accompany him back to the church to finish the activation of the Well of Many Worlds. Dilisnya had already prepared a Teleportation Circle in the catacombs, so no need for any of that pesky walking. Kharim noticed the trickery at work, but it was too late.

    He caught up to them just as Tulany and Dilisnya disappeared.

    TL;DR - There's a lot of tap-dancing going on.
    Last edited by SleepyShadow; 2021-10-20 at 08:33 PM.

  5. - Top - End - #125
    Troll in the Playground
     
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    Default Re: Planescape Campaign Journal

    Wait...Saint Germaine? Hmm...

    Infinite Corridor = Well of Many Worlds?

  6. - Top - End - #126
    Halfling in the Playground
     
    RedKnightGirl

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    Default Re: Planescape Campaign Journal

    In hindsight, teaching binding magic to an "ambitious young Tsarovich" might not have been the brightest idea, especially after Tenebrous was named as one of the dark powers...

    Oh well. Not our plane, not our problem. Right?

  7. - Top - End - #127
    Barbarian in the Playground
     
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    Quote Originally Posted by AllHailthed4 View Post
    In hindsight, teaching binding magic to an "ambitious young Tsarovich" might not have been the brightest idea, especially after Tenebrous was named as one of the dark powers...
    It's "Zarovich". Your background in Russian has betrayed you.

    Bye-Bye Borca
    In which our Heroes finally leave the Demiplane of Dread.
    Spoiler: Session Thirty-Four
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    The Hunt Club PCs went along with Ivana's "special hunt", which turned out to be a vampire with her fangs pulled out. Ivana let the vampire loose into the forest around The Abbey, and assured everyone there that her guards had the forest completely surrounded to prevent the monster (or the hunters) from escaping the grounds. The hunters partnered up into groups of two, and poor Daegan got stuck partnered up with Ivana herself. She was fascinated by his complete immunity to poison, and had designs to keep him around after the hunt was over. The PCs took umbrage with this, so they waited until Ivana was isolated from the rest of the Ashwood Abbey (save for her two personal bodyguards), and they ambushed her in a cave behind a waterfall. Ivana and her guards roughed up the party pretty badly (Cassius had a real bad time with her contact poison, and Daegan even suffered his first death of the campaign), but eventually the party took them out and celebrated a hard-won victory over one of the Dark Lords of Ravenloft. The party was a little disappointed that they had accidentally gotten the vampire killed, but they took the ashes back to The Abbot and quietly explained the situation about Ivana. He promised to keep things quiet, but told them not to go flaunting Ivana's death, as she is/was the more popular of the two lords of Borca.

    Meanwhile, Kharim and Sidney race to save Tulany from Ivan's clutches. They were accompanied by Avilius and Arabelle, who were largely there to balance out the encounter and provide commentary. This little group tripped its way through a few traps pulled from Grimtooth's Book of Traps and managed to not die or even get maimed. Once through the trap gauntlet beneath the abandoned church, they found Ivan guarded by half a dozen flesh golems. Ivan gave the villain's exposition about how he was going to use Tulany's Tarot card and the Well of Many Worlds to drag the descendants of an escaped Vistani tribe back into Borca. Not because he had any particular hatred for them, but merely because he hated the idea that other people could leave Borca and he could not.

    Bravely, Kharim and company fought to rescue Tulany, who was desperately trying to convince Ivan not to do it. I gave the NPCs over to the players whose characters weren't present, and away we went. The fight turned out not to be that hard. Kharim tanked half of the flesh golems long enough for Avilius to ventilate the Dark Lord, and Tulany got the last hit on the bad guy after finally realizing Ivan wasn't going to stop with his plan. Once Ivan went down, the remaining golems went inert, and the group skedaddled back to the surface.

    The party reconvened after their respective fights, and decided to use the Well of Many Worlds to get back to Sigil at long last. They allowed Camille to come with them, and though Sidney was invited, the detective declined, saying that he had unfinished business in Borca. Arabelle wanted to stick around Borca as well, since now the domain was in need of a new ruler, and that Folk Hero background of hers was still unfulfilled. Avilius opted to stick around to guard the young Zarovich for now, or to put a bullet in her should she fall like her ancestor.

    And thus, the PCs finally returned to Sigil, the city of doors.

    TL;DR - The bad guys are dead, and we're back in Sigil!
    Last edited by SleepyShadow; 2021-10-27 at 07:54 PM.

  8. - Top - End - #128
    Troll in the Playground
     
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    Hopefully nothing too big has happened since they were gone.

  9. - Top - End - #129
    Barbarian in the Playground
     
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    The Sting
    In which our Heroes discover what transpired in their absence, and a Paladin is beset by fiends.
    Spoiler: Session Thirty-Five
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    Before I get into the meat of this session, I need to bring up some character backstory stuff. This group's previous campaign was playing through a modified version of The War of the Burning Sky (a campaign I highly recommend), and during the campaign one of the major villains of the story cursed the party with his dying breath. The curse proved to be hereditary, and despite that a few of the players wanted to run the descendants of the previous party for the Planescape game. Specifically, Kharim, Aurelius, Tulany, and Soraya are all having to deal with this curse. With all of that said, on with the show!

    When the party returned to Sigil, the first place they headed was the Brothel of Slaking Intellectual Lusts. They received a remarkably warm and teary reception from their friends, and learned that while only about two weeks had passed for the PCs, they had been gone for about three months by the reckoning of everyone in Sigil. The NPCs thought the party had signed the dead-book. When the PCs explained they had been in Ravenloft for a time, the locals just nodded sagely and said the ebb and flow of time is distorted in the Demiplane of Dread, and that the PCs were lucky to have come back at all. When asked what the NPCs had gotten up to in their absence, Sharwyn told them about how they had to deal with a job from some cranium rats, otherwise Tiny the werebear was going to break Soraya's legs. The job was lending aid to a knight in the outlands who the cranium rat mob boss owed a favor. Barrock complained about how the job forced him to work with his ex.

    "You dated Sharwyn?" Aurelius asked.
    "No," Barrock replied. "Tiny."

    Tulany received a visitor from home. Her father, Ganzorig, had followed her trail all the way to Sigil, thrashing every passing grell he encountered along the way. He had been very disappointed when he first found out she had been staying at a brothel, but then he learned it was really more of a weird coffee shop run by cute monster girls. Tulany was delighted to spend the day with her father, though he had to return home with the good news that she and her friends were still alive. There was some political turmoil going on at home, so he advised her to stay in Sigil for a while longer, and that he'd come to collect her when it was safe for her to come home. He also promised to smooth things over with her mother.

    Daegan and Barrock went to the Bleak Cabal headquarters, and "Octo-Lad" received a similarly tearful welcome from Daria and Hikari. Daria had been particularly distraught, and Hikari explained that Barrock had been coming by to check in on the heartbroken yuan-ti. Most yuan-ti are completely incapable of feeling emotion, so even Daria's relatively stunted emotional range made her an outlier and outcast amongst her own kind. Such a woman would naturally interest Barrock ... at least, those were the excuses he gave for why he had been taking care of her in Daegan's absence. In truth, beneath the orc wizard's exterior of cynicism and arrogance, he had a good heart. I think Daegan was just surprised Barrock had gotten himself involved in anything to do with the party after the Limbo adventure.

    Kai got a visit from his ex-wife and oldest son. His son wanted to enthuse about getting to go to bard college, and promised to become a doctor just like his father. Kai's ex-wife decided to give him an early Christmas present, and gave him the unsigned No Contact Order so he could throw it in the fireplace. The three of them got coffee together, and though the visit was short it was quite heartwarming.

    The next day, curses started popping off left and right. Tulany could now run at twice her speed, but only while loping on all fours. In addition, she grew paw pads on her hands and feet, and also suffered disadvantage on saves against fear effects. Aurelius vomited up spider swarms, and had to eat ten pounds of meat for breakfast to keep the swarm from eating him from the inside out. Soraya now had the ability to cast Seething Eyebane, and it gave her crippling migranes until she used the spell. Kharim's curse was delayed until next level, but he still ended up adding to the confusion of the morning when he botched his Binder check, making a bad pact with his vestige and being forced to speak in half-truths. All in all, it was a heck of a breakfast

    After the chaos had settled, the PCs split up to do their own thing for a while, whether that was visit faction headquarters, wander the city, or just go back to bed. Aurelius and Kharim traveled together, since their factions were close allies. Aurelius was given a magic watch for giving his report to the Fraternity of Order. The watch always kept track of time in Sigil, so that no matter where in the multiverse he was, he always knew how long he had been away in real-time. The two lads then went to the Harmonium headquarters, hoping to visit with Medea and ask her about the Order of the Chalice. They were told by the Hardheads that Medea was going around Sigil, using her status as a local celebrity to drum up support for the Ascension of Fortitude. The lads tracked her down to the Great Bazaar, where they carefully avoided getting conned into buying anything useless. They did purchase a few bowls made of cooled lava from the Elemental Plane of Fire, since the merchant selling them was an honest woman and it felt wrong not to do at least a little shopping while at the Bazaar.

    While there, somebody pulled a pretty blatant snatch-and-grab, stealing Kharim's violin. Naturally, the boys chased after the thief. While running after the fellow, they passed by an alley where they saw Medea, wearing only her fancy black dress but still armed with her holy avenger, getting savagely attacked by a trio of green abishai and a gelugon baatezu. Kharim and Aurelius immediately rushed to her aid, though Aurelius sent Baldwin to keep chasing the pickpocket. Strangely, as soon as they were engaged with the fiends, the pickpocket simply Teleported away.

    The lads got a surprise round on the fiends, and threw the abishai into disarray with spells and maneuvers. However, the gelugon was not to be dissuaded from its task. It grabbed Medea by the throat, tore her swordarm completely off, and dumped her into the razorvine like so much garbage. The baatezu then Teleported away while the lads were busy trying to keep their dear friend from bleeding to death.

    Baldwin was sent to fetch Kai and Eirik, Aurelius ran to get Wooly Cupgrass (an NPC I had honestly thought they had forgotten about, but I'm glad they didn't), and Kharim did his best to keep Medea stable until Wooly could get there. The bariaur helped the lads extract her from the razorvine without causing further injury, and set to work on her shoulder. By the time the rest of the party arrived, a sizeable crowd had gathered around the alley, though like in any big city most everyone just stood around and watched. Kai got her healed enough to stop taking damage from blood loss, Kharim gathered her in his arms, and the party headed straight for Harmonium headquarters.

    TL;DR - A lot of feelgood, a little weird, and a sprinkle of tragedy.

  10. - Top - End - #130
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    Hopefully Medea is okay.

  11. - Top - End - #131
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    The Fires of Dis - Part One
    In which the Heroes are charged with recovering a dear object that has been lost.
    Spoiler: Session Thirty-Six
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    When the party arrived at the Harmonium headquarters, Medea was rushed to the faction clerics to have her injuries treated. Meanwhile, the party was taken directly to Factol Sarin to give their report. Sarin explained that both Medea and her Holy Avenger were vital symbols for the ascension of the gate-town Fortitude. Harmonium bards had been working overtime for months spreading stories of Medea's fight for good and justice down in Baator, and she had become a hero in the eyes of the Fortitude citizens. Without her, and without her sword, the people's faith would be shaken, and Fortitude wouldn't be able to ascend into Arcadia. Factor Sarin tasked the PCs with recovering the holy avenger, but he wanted them to wait a few days. His plan was to send a squad of soldiers in ahead of them, both to verify the sword's location, and to make the Baatezu assume the Harmonium would keep trying to recover the sword through brute force. In the meantime, he asked Kharim and Kai to watch over Medea in case the fiends tried to come back and finish her off. He also provided Aurelius a mentor to retrain his dead warlock levels into levels of marshal. While those three were doing that, Daegan's time was split between his work at the Bleak Cabal gatehouse and keeping Barrok out of trouble. Eirik spent his time with Sharwyn, and Tulany got pressured into going out for ladies' night with Nadia the cat burglar and Detective Montoya.

    Shenanigans ensued, including a half-orc named Dr. Jar Jar and a training montage in the Hyperbolic Time Chamber, but the four days passed without another attempt on Medea's life. The party was summoned back to Sarin's chamber, where he told them that his soldiers had confirmed the sword had been taken to Dispater's Iron Tower. He gave the party a few magic items to help them find and recover the holy avenger and promised them 10,000 gp when they returned with it. He instructed them to go to the gate-town Ribcage and seek out a woman named Shandrala, who would provide them a with a purse of gems and help them get into Baator through one of the safer routes. The PCs agreed, but before they headed to Ribcage, they stopped in to say goodbye to Medea. When they told her where they were going, she suggested talking to the Order of the Chalice on Greyhawk first. The Knights of the Chalice made frequent forays against Dispater's Iron Tower, and she thought they might have some useful information. The party liked the idea, so they hopped through the nearest portal to Greyhawk and headed to the legendary Free City.

    There was a festival of sorts going on when they arrived. It was a celebration in honor of the famed hero Rigby. The PCs took in the colorful rough-and-tumble celebration, sought out directions from the locals, and came to the conclusion that even Greyhawk seemed small when compared to Sigil. They headed to the Order of the Chalice, where they took full advantage of Soraya's puppy-dog eyes to weasel their way inside. Kharim rattled his bone-box to a priest that the PCs knew the chalice was a girl and not a cup, and they were immediately hauled in to see the Lightning Councilor. The Councilor explained that knowledge about the chalice's true identity was top secret, and demanded to know how a bunch of second-rate planeswalkers knew anything about it.

    "Mordenkainen," they all said.

    The Lightning Councilor was enraged that the archmage continued to bungle things up in his quest for "balance" across the multiverse. When the PCs told him they were heading to Dis, and since they already knew half of the story anyway, the Lightning Councilor told them the dark of things. The Chalice was the daughter of Heironeous, and her mother was one of his attendant devas. The angel-goddess had been kidnapped by agents of Hextor and locked away in the Iron Tower, where she had been held in durance vile for the last 1290 years. The Order of the Chalice had been founded with the express purpose of rescuing her, but as the years wore on and failures mounted, the Order lost most of its information about her. They no longer knew her name, nor did they know anything about her powers or domains. The only things they knew for sure was that the silver chalice was her holy symbol, and that she was still alive. They could confirm this by praying directly to her symbol for spells rather than offering prayers to Heironeous. They only received simple magic when they prayed this way, but it was enough to know she had not yet succumbed to the lower planes.

    As far as information about the Iron Tower, the Lightning Councilor could only tell them that the tower always appeared within line of sight, and it always stayed a city block away. He didn't know how to breach the tower, because none of the Knights of the Chalice had ever been able to reach it. He thought perhaps a fiend might be able to get them inside, but the honor and purity of the knights forbid them from consorting with the Baatezu. Having no such restrictions, the PCs considered contacting their old pal Oja, the barbezu knight. He still owed them a favor, and this seemed like a good way to cash it in.

    The PCs then headed for an inn called The Sill, which had portals connected to all of the gate-towns on the Outlands. On their way, they bumped into a Free League member named Kerris, who offered to help them out in Ribcage. However, the PCs caught on that he was just trying to weasel information out of them about their mission, so they politely declined his insistent offer and headed straight to the inn. They were met by a tiefling woman named Cedlie, who gave them the key to a room upstairs. When examined, the key's handle was made out of rib-bone. Cedlie didn't know why it had to be that way, she just knew it worked. The party went up to their room and fumbled about as they tried to get the key to work. With some gentle encouragement from Cedlie, they figured out the portal was in the window, and so the party was off to Ribcage.

    TL;DR - It's a fetch-quest and a rescue mission all rolled into one!

  12. - Top - End - #132
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    I never really thought about it before, but I did some research, and the population of Greyhawk City is about 160k while the population of Sigil at any given time is usually around 250k, so I suppose Sigil really is much bigger than Greyhawk City.


  13. - Top - End - #133
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    Quote Originally Posted by JadedDM View Post
    I never really thought about it before, but I did some research, and the population of Greyhawk City is about 160k while the population of Sigil at any given time is usually around 250k, so I suppose Sigil really is much bigger than Greyhawk City.
    It makes sense that the center of the multiverse is a bigger city than the capital of a country. Sigil locals need the extra space to store their snarkiness lol

    The Fires of Dis - Part Two
    In which our Heroes seek aid from the citizens of Ribcage to ease their passage through a dark and evil plane.
    Spoiler: Session Thirty-Seven
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    The portal from The Sill took the party to the mountains just outside of Ribcage. When they got closer, they saw the town got its name from the earthen spikes which hung over the city like ribs. They had to pay the guards at the gate 10 gp each just to get in, and they were given passes which were only good for a week. The guard was kind enough to inform them they needed to keep the passes on them at all times, lest the Blackguards inside the city imprison, fine, or execute them. Once inside Ribcage, the party found almost all of the citizens were tieflings of the infernal variety. They also found most of these tieflings were barely able to scrape by, between the high cost of living and the constant shakedown for "taxes" by the city's militia.

    Rather than trusting a local tout to show them around, Tulany convinced a vulture to show them the way to the Gymnasium of Steam. On the way, they encountered a few bits of city color, such as:
    • A street urchin selling expired visitor passes.
    • A small band of priestesses of Asmodeus proclaiming the superiority of the baatezu.
    • Two of the five city senators arguing about whether to increase taxes or to keep them the same.
    • Posters which threatened a food delivery strike to the common folk unless a senator's demands were met.
    • Five Blackguards shaking down a grocer for "unpaid taxes".

    This last one got the party to intervene on her behalf, and they paid the guards to stop looting her fruit stand. Daegan also gave the poor woman enough money to leave the city and move to Sigil. The grocer, a tiefling woman named Tora, thanked him profusely, and promised to work hard to pay him back one day. She then fled Ribcage, never to return.

    When the party arrived at the Gymnasium of Steam, they found it was a ritzy bath house built around a network of natural hot springs. They met with Shandrala, a big, beautiful, blue-skinned tiefling who immediately started flirting with Eirik. The Viking awkwardly turned her down to keep Sharwyn from disowning him. Shandrala took them into her private bath, where she gave them the bag of gems Factol Sarin had promised them. She asked the party to send him her regards, and asked if he was still married. The party didn't question how Shandrala and Sarin knew each other, though they had a few ideas. They told her what the mission was, and she suggested hiring a guide to help them across Baator. She made three suggestions - hire a guide from her (reliable but expensive), hire a priestess of Asmodeus (cheap but untrustworthy), or get help from a local spice merchant who was looking to set up shop in Dis. The PCs opted for the third option, and set off to the market district.

    I think they were only a little disappointed when they found out the merchant was actually selling herbs and spices, and not drugs

    The merchant, Dermont, had letters of introduction for the PCs to show the fiends, as well as free samples of spices for any who were curious. He offered them 5% of his first year's profits if they were successful in setting up a shop in Dis, and they agreed to the terms. He also offered to let them take his apprentice with them, to help with wheeling and dealing, but the party declined, not wanting to risk the poor girl's life in Hell (she was only a 1st level bard, so they made the right choice).

    They headed to the portal, paid the guards to let them through, and stepped out into Avernus. As soon as they stepped through, they were stopped by a cornugon, but the party showed them their paperwork, and bribed him a pinch of onion powder and a little gem from their bag. The fiend let them pass without trouble. Sharwyn had made a rough map while the party had been taking care of Medea in Sigil, so she suggested going to Tiamat's lair, and from there take the portal into Dis. Tulany about had an aneurism when she saw the route was called "The Road of Good Intentions".

    The party hadn't traveled far, when they ran afoul of a massive army led by General Bel. The party hid along the side of the road, but they were spotted by a few fiendish scouts. Fortunately, the rest of the army passed them by without notice, but the party was forced to fight about a half dozen black abishai. The fight went pretty well for the PCs, but the fiends concentrated all of their firepower on Sharwyn, and the party had to keep the abishai from flying off with her and tearing her to pieces. The fight ended with the PCs realizing that having an abyssal tiefling in their ranks was going to cause them problems here in Baator.

    TL;DR - Ribcage is one Hell of a place

  14. - Top - End - #134
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    I mean, hey, wars have been fought over spices, so they are a pretty big deal.

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    Quote Originally Posted by JadedDM View Post
    I mean, hey, wars have been fought over spices, so they are a pretty big deal.
    It's true. I just hope they don't go full East India Trading Company Also, I'm sorry for the delay in updating the journal. Holiday trips are terrible for keeping a regular schedule.

    Fires of Dis - Part Three
    In which our Heroes cross the perilous wasteland of Avernus in search of the doorway to Dis.
    Spoiler: Session Thirty-Eight
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    The party trekked across Baator and met some of the colorful denizens there. An amnizu sic'd his hunting yeth hounds on the party, and only agreed to let them pass if they fought the hounds off. The amnizu was entertained by the party's dedication to protecting Sharwyn, and so he let them pass without further trouble. Later, the party ran across a group of ozyluths looking for deserters from the Blood War. As it turned out, a bit of jink and a pinch of cayenne powder was good enough to dissuade the devils from pressganging the PCs. Another encounter led the party to cross paths with some spinagons who were trying to herd some lemures to some far-off destination.

    I was a little surprised nobody made any cowboy jokes

    The PCs decided to help the spinagons out when some of the lemures got loose from the herd. They were drawn to Sharwyn's delicious abyssal blood, but the party just used Eirik's ice hound and Aurelius' noisy robot bird to lure the runaway lemures back to the spinagons. The baatezu ranchers were quite grateful for the party's help. When the party explained what they were doing in Baator, one of the spinagons told the PCs he had a friend in Dis who went by the name of Heji, a powerful tiefling who controlled most of the market trade. He offered to take a jar of spices to Dis ahead of the party to help make a good introduction for them. The party was a little skeptical about giving him a full jar, but they eventually agreed, since having an ally in Dis seemed like a good idea. I don't remember what they gave the spinagon exactly, but he took the jar and flew away at top speed while the other cowpokes led their cattle out to pasture.

    At one point, the party came upon a field of half-buried dead bodies. Amongst their number were the corpses of the Harmonium soldiers who had been sent ahead of them. While the PCs were investigating the bodies, an invisible baatezu struck up a casual conversation with the party. I shan't divulge what the fiend was, since, y'know, my group reads this journal Anyway, the fiend introduced himself as Kri'ik, and he offered "great wealth" to the party in exchange for stealing the holy avenger. Kri'ik admitted he wanted to embarrass Dispater, and perhaps even usurp him. The PCs were understandably suspicious of an invisible scheming fiend, but they made some noncommittal agreement to do what they had already planned to do. Kri'ik promised to contact them with further information once they got to Dis.

    After the suspicious meeting, the party arrived at the pit of maggots outside of Tiamat's lair. The pit was guarded by a powerful looking red abishai. As an aside, one of my players (Aurelius) is running Tyranny of Dragons for a different group, and he used his meta-knowledge to great effect. By that, I mean he did a great job convincing the rest of the group not to fight the devil-dragon
    The red abishai demanded a full jar of spices to allow the group to pass. When they gave it to him, he threw it in the maggot pit just to see what effect it would have on the burgeoning fiends. He offered to keep meticulous notes, but the party just wanted to get across the pit without being eaten. The abishai commanded the maggots to hold still long enough for the party to cross. Eirik carried Sharwyn across in his arms just to be on the safe side.

    Once inside, the party followed Tulany as she guided them through the tunnels with her portal sensing ability. This allowed them to bypass the dragons and head straight for the portal. They even ignored the Chamber of Greed! Oh well, maybe next time. The portal to Dis was guarded by a trio of spider golems, but they were programmed only to attack those who failed to activate the portal correctly. The only way to enter Dis was to crawl through the portal on hands and knees, with head bowed in supplication. A bit humiliating, but the party wasn't going to let that stop them. They crawled through the portal without trouble, and we ended the session as they at last arrived in Dis.

    TL;DR - Not every baatezu is a scheming mastermind. Some just want a fistful of onion powder, and they'll do anything for a few snuffs more.
    Last edited by SleepyShadow; 2021-12-01 at 08:54 PM.

  16. - Top - End - #136
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    Quote Originally Posted by SleepyShadow View Post
    Once inside, the party followed Tulany as she guided them through the tunnels with her portal sensing ability. This allowed them to bypass the dragons and head straight for the portal. They even ignored the Chamber of Greed! Oh well, maybe next time.
    DM: There's a doorway to the left emitting a warm, glowing light. Wanna check it out?
    Tulany: Ominous. What the heck, I'll poke around the doorway and take a peek. What's inside?
    DM: Mountains of glittering gold, shimmering jewels, treasure beyond imagining. More than you could spend in lifetimes.
    Tulany: ...
    DM: Just laying there, unguarded. Feel free to help yourself.
    Tulany:
    Kharim: Hey Tulany, what's in there?
    Tulany: ... Nothing we need to concern ourselves with. Moving on.
    DM: You don't want the treasure and you don't want to fight three ancient dragons. No fun at all.
    Princess Battle Flower

  17. - Top - End - #137
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    Fires of Dis - Part Four
    In which our Heroes find the city of Dis to be as dangerous as the inhabitants, and the Iron Tower is breached.
    Spoiler: Session Thirty-Nine
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    The party headed to the city of Dis, following a winding road of skulls half-buried in the earth. Along the way, they were met by Kri'ik, the invisible speaker from before. No longer hiding, he appeared to them as a handsome but plainly dressed human. He laid out his terms to the party - he wanted them to steal the holy avenger from the Iron Tower, and in exchange he'd give them a ruby the size of an elephant's head. He also reiterated that he wanted to embarrass Dispater and bring him down a peg or two. The party was reluctant to make a deal, but eventually agreed once he promised to let them keep the sword as long as they held up their end of the bargain. Both parties also agreed to a pact of nonaggression, and that seemed to ease the players' minds a bit. Once negotiations were over, Kri'ik gave them a Flower of Holes, which acted as a dispenser of single-use portable holes. He told them it was the only way to move from room to room inside the tower, as there were no doors anywhere to be found. He then disappeared, and the party finished its trip to Dis.

    They took in the sights and sounds of the city for a little while before they made contact with their old pal Oja. He was stuck working as a bodyguard for a comely erinyes named Sauraphine, who was overseeing a work crew of petitioners. One of the workers turned out to be a living human named Rubio, and the party felt sorry for him. Kharim was looking to start a fight, but Sauraphine talked him down, saying Rubio had come with her willingly. Naturally, the party asked him about that.

    "When she said she'd take me back to her place, I thought she meant in Waterdeep!" Rubio said.

    The party bribed Sauraphine to release Rubio at the cost of two magic items, which was just some vendor trash the party had rattling around in the bottom of their bag of holding. Satisfied, she let Rubio go free, and allowed Oja to accompany the party for the next 48 hours so he could pay off his debt to them. She didn't want her bodyguard to be indebted to anyone but her, after all. After they took their leave of her, the party at last explained to Oja what they were really doing in Dis.

    The poor fiend almost had a heart attack.

    The PCs stuck to their guns, and Oja had no choice but to help them get inside the Iron Tower. Before they could, they were met by a group of tiefling thugs who asked if they were the spice merchants. When the party admitted that they were, the thugs invited them to speak with Heji to hammer out business negotiations. Heji was a tiefling with control over most of the market district, and he told them they would have to pay 500 gp up front as a "new business" fee, plus 60% of the profits from the sale of the spices. Kharim did some wheeling and dealing, and eventually Heji agreed to only a 200 gp fee plus 40% of the profits. With both parties equally unhappy, it was concluded as a successful negotiation.

    At last, the party headed for the Iron Tower. Oja told them non-baatezu could only reach the tower by finding it without looking. To facilitate this, he shrouded the whole team in Darkness and led them to the front gates. The party had an awkward encounter with some cornugans at the gatehouse, one of which was named Baalug. He proved to be one of Oja's former lovers, and when he heard about the barbazu's predicament with the PCs, he had a good laugh at Oja's expense, but let the group into the courtyard. Once inside, the party showed Oja the Flower of Holes they had, and he told them they could move around the tower by writing the name of the room they wanted to go to before plucking it from the stem. Since they didn't know any of the room names, Oja told them he had a friend on the inside who could help them move around the tower. Her name was Lilian, and she was an erinyes who had served as a scouting captain on an important expedition to the Prime. Her success had earned her a promotion of sorts, and now she served as a ceremonial guard in the Iron Tower. The party used the flower to navigate to where Lilian was, and they told her what they were doing before she could attack.

    Lilian was puzzled by their honesty, but agreed to help them navigate the tower. In exchange, the party had to agree to take a friend of hers out of Baator. This friend as a very special alu-fiend named Janelle, with whom Lilian had a close working relationship. However, she didn't tell the party what made this particular alu-fiend so special. The party agreed to her terms, and Lilian told them she would arrange for Janelle to meet them at a portal of their choosing. Once the bargain was struck, Lilian told them the chalice was held in "durance vile" while the holy avenger was held in Dispater's personal study. The party was understandably worried about running into the archfiend, but Lilian assured them the study was currently empty. The party figured it would be their best chance, so they wrote the room name in Infernal on one of the petals and stuck it to the wall. It acted as a portal and teleported the group directly there.

    The study was unguarded, and the holy avenger hung from a peg on the wall, the skeletal remains of Medea's hand still clutching its hilt. The party found no traps or wards, so they took the sword down from the wall. As soon as it left the peg, Dispater and 27 of his most powerful minions Teleported into the room. The party panicked, and there was a bit of a hot-potato game played with the holy avenger as Kharim, Aurelius, and Daegan scrambled to get it in the magic sheath the Harmonium had given them.

    Dispater laughed at their antics, and assured the party he meant them no harm. He was glad to be rid of the holy avenger, as it had caused him nothing but trouble since a group of ambitious fiends brought it to him as a present. No fiend could touch the sword without getting blasted with holy energy, so it was more of a workplace hazard than anything else. Of course, the party had broken into his house and connived with some of his minions, and Dispater insisted reparations had to be paid for such trespass. He demanded each party member give him a single hair. The whole party was relieved to find the archfiend so amiable, and most of the party was won over by his deep voice and fabulous fashion sense. Only Kharim and Soraya was upset by the notion of striking a bargain with Dispater, but eventually the siblings consented, and everyone in the party gave him a strand of hair. The party then asked him about Chalice. Dispater dismissed his bodyguards before he spoke further.

    He explained that Graz'zt had snuck into his tower and abducted the angel. He had taken her back to his realm in the Abyss, the triple lair of Aza'grat. Dispater had kept her abduction a secret from everyone involved in her original kidnapping, even Hextor. Only Dispater and Asmodeus knew what had befallen her. Dispater was sure Graz'zt treated her far worse than she had ever fared in Baator. He asked the party to rescue Chalice from Aza'grat, and swore them to secrecy about her being taken from him. In exchange, he gave them one of twelve magic cups he regularly allowed the Order of the Chalice to "rescue" from his tower. The party agreed, and so with a holy avenger and a magic cup in hand, Dispater teleported them to a portal back to Ribcage.

    They were met by a group of barbazu pulling a small cage behind them. Inside the cramped little cage was Janelle the alu-fiend, an alabaster-colored woman with four wings - two feathered and two batlike wings. A sign on the cage read "Scragged for Good Behavior". The barbazu dropped the cage at the party's feet and walked away. Daegan set to work opening the lock, and Janelle was soon free. Before they could ask her anything, Kri'ik appeared before them once again. He was no longer disguised as a human, but in his true form - that of a pit fiend. He was also accompanied by the pincer-clawed gelugon that had torn Medea's arm off. Kri'ik demanded the party hand over the holy avenger, and he'd let them live. When the party argued that he had agreed to let them keep it, he reminded them the bargain only held up if they stole the sword. Since they had been given the sword, and paid for it no less, the agreement was nullified. He moved to attack, but Dispater appeared between the two sides, and was appalled by Kri'ik's shoddy attempt at betrayal. He stripped the pit fiend of all the powers granted by his station, and told the party that many places paid a premium for the jawbone of a pit fiend. The archfiend then teleported away again. The party decided to just bolt through the portal to Ribcage and let Kri'ik fight his own sidekick, who immediately turned on him now that he was a pit fiend in form only.

    The party stopped in Ribcage only long enough to give the business paperwork to Dermont the spice merchant, and then it was back to Sigil. They left Janelle with Fall-From-Grace, who promised to take care of the frightened alu-fiend until the PCs returned. Aurelius met with Rowena's uncle Maddock, and the two of them devised blueprints for an artificial arm to give to Medea once The Ascension was complete. Maddock promised to work on it while Aurelius was gone, but invited him to help finish the project once he got back. With that done, the party hurried off to Fortitude, and found the town abuzz with activity. Everyone there was doing their utmost to maintain order to even the smallest degree. Not a cobblestone nor flowerbed was uneven or unkempt. Most of this looked to be a good thing for the town, but the hard marching Harmonium soldiers coupled with some unnerving graffiti ("Be Good or Be Dead") let the party know not everything was quite so wholesome as it first appeared. They met with Tonat Shar, who took the holy avenger and had it authenticated by the dwarven priests who had forged it. Once it was verified to be the real deal, the party was rewarded and invited to attend The Ascension ceremony, which was to take place in twelve hours. Until then, they could do as they pleased.

    The first thing they did was find Medea, who was being kept under careful watch by a half-dozen Harmonium soldiers while she sat otherwise alone in a city park. She was overjoyed to see them again, and relieved to hear they had recovered her holy avenger. The sword had become just as important to The Ascension as she was, and felt sorry she hadn't been able to help the party in its rescue. She was also saddened that she had no way to properly thank them. However, the party would hear none of it, and were glad to help out their friend. Medea told them Fortitude's people were on edge, and even the slightest disruption to the orderly way of the town was met with harsher punishment than strictly necessary. She wanted to go assure the people she was alright, but she was under strict orders not to speak with anyone until after the ceremony was complete. She asked the party to go around town in her stead and try to allay peoples' fears.

    The party headed to a once-rowdy tavern called The Tears of Tyr, and heard more unsettling rumors from the locals about how harsh things had been lately. Hoping to lighten the mood, the party convinced Sharwyn to play some music for the somber crowd. She needed little prompting, of course, and soon she was up on the bar counter, dancing and playing her accordion while singing a bawdy sea shanty. A few Harmonium soldiers came by to stop the sounds of happiness, but Kharim pulled rank on them, and Aurelius convinced them of music's orderly nature. The guards left, but only after Kharim agreed to arrest Sharwyn if she got too suggestive in her dancing. The party enthused with the crowd, and soon the people had relaxed a bit.

    The session ended with a horn sounding from the town square, announcing it was time for The Ascension to begin.

    TL;DR - I don't want to draw parallels between Dispater and Ted Bundy, but apparently the devious charm is there.

  18. - Top - End - #138
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    Wow, the Hardheads criminalized singing and dancing. Where's Kevin Bacon when you need him?

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    Quote Originally Posted by JadedDM View Post
    Wow, the Hardheads criminalized singing and dancing. Where's Kevin Bacon when you need him?
    My guess is he's with the Society of Sensation

    Fires of Dis - Conclusion
    In which our Heroes must resolve the differing fates of a cunning fiend, a faithless paladin, and a shifting gate-town.
    Spoiler: Session Forty
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    The party had front row seats to the Ascension ceremony as the entire town gathered around the portal to Arcadia. People were overjoyed when they saw Medea alive and well, flanked by a pair of dwarven priests, though there was some nervous talk about why her arm was missing. Because the party was worried about Medea's safety, Aurelius cast Arcane Eye to watch the ceremony with a bird's eye view and to keep a lookout for any magical trickery. Medea began to give her speech, encouraging the townsfolk to join her in hope and solidarity. Fortitude began to ascend. Halfway through the process, Aurelius spotted a little mote of red light emerge from the holy avenger and enter into Medea's head. Because he was viewing the scene through his arcane eye, he was the only one to see it. He warned the rest of the party, and they started toward Medea as she began to change her tone. Before they could reach her, Medea slew the two dwarves and disappeared. The town stopped its ascension, trapped in between the Outlands and Arcadia. Daegan and Aurelius made some great skill checks and realized that planar travel in or out was currently impossible, so Medea couldn't have gotten far. They didn't have to look for her though, since she reappeared at the head of an army of the dead. The town's entire graveyard had been animated as zombies, and the Harmonium soldiers moved to combat the undead while the PCs had to deal with Medea.

    The party nerds once again made some fantastic skill checks and realized Medea was under the influence of an extremely powerful fiend of possession. They got some good hits in on her, but her damage output was intense. She managed to drop Daegan in just a couple of hits, and the fiend inside her was able to cast Fireball on her bonus action. Kai was a superstar in the fight, blowing all of his resources to keep the party upright. Kharim rescued some trapped townsfolk from a Wall of Fire, which gave Aurelius the opportunity to rally the townsfolk into not losing hope. Tulany made his job easier by slapping Medea with Protection from Good and Evil, which while not powerful enough to expel the fiend, did grant Medea advantage on her saves to resist it. Between that and the townsfolk chanting for her to remember who she was, she managed to suppress the fiend to a degree. She still fought against the party like a wild beast, but her will was strong enough to keep the fiend from casting spells or speaking through her. The party chipped away at her defenses, and just when the line of Harmonium soldiers was about to break, the party dropped Medea low enough to force the fiend out of her body. Thinking fast, Daegan trapped the fiend in a silver mirror before it could possess anyone else. The mirror revealed it as a pit fiend, confirming the party's suspicions that it was a Baatezu trick.

    The Harmonium soldiers dragged Medea up for an immediate trial, which the party thought was incredibly unfair since she had been possessed and was barely conscious after the beating she had taken. There was no reasoning with the soldiers, and so Medea was hauled to the town square and clapped in manacles. She told the party she had committed a crime and needed to be punished. Kharim convinced the townsfolk to defend her, and as the party argued for Medea's innocence, the town began to shift once again. The Ascension was complete, and the Harmonium soldiers took it as a sign that the party was right about the situation. They released her into the party's custody just as Factol Sarin and a pair of trumpet archons emerged from Arcadia to greet the newly ascended town. The city was kind of a wreck, and the PCs explained to him what had happened. Sarin believed the party and held no ill-will toward Medea, however, his word was not the final one.

    An agent of Bahamut appeared before Medea and stripped her of her status as a paladin. The party and Factol Sarin both argued against this, but the agent of Bahamut was indifferent. The closest thing to mercy shown was that Bahamut would allow Medea to go on a dangerous quest to atone for her "misdeeds". Once the agent was gone, Factol Sarin started to ask the party for help, but they cut him off and promised to aid Medea in whatever the quest was. They felt it was entirely unfair that Medea was getting punished so severely for something she had no control over, and Sarin agreed with them. Unfortunately, there was nothing he could do.

    The party took Medea, now powerless and armed with an unresponsive holy sword, back to Sigil and went to the Brothel of Slaking Intellectual Lusts for some rest and relaxation. Cassius and Tulany went to speak with Spiral Hal'oight and finally collected their payment for the job they had done for him way back when. He then offered them a new job, but wanted to speak with the whole party before detailing any information. The two agreed to bring the rest of the group back the next day. Eirik took Sharwyn out barhopping, and Aurelius spent the day working with Maddock on Medea's new prosthetic arm. Daegan paid off the party's outstanding bill with Fall-From-Grace, and then spent some time working with Barrock and Daria down at the Bleak Cabal asylum. The rest of the crew spent the evening checking in on the girls at the BSIL and making sure Medea was doing alright.

    That night, Aurelius tried to use his Lucid Dreaming skill, but couldn't manage anything but realize that he was dreaming. Inspired by his failure, Kai, Daegan, and Rowena tried their hand at it as well, and all succeeded in traipsing from their own dreams over to Aurelius to say hello. He didn't find this very amusing, so he forced himself awake and booted them back to their own dreams. Kai then went dreamwalking again, this time to check in on the rest of the crew. When he got to Kharim, he found the poor lad in the middle of a seizure brought on by the worsening of his curse. The good doctor raced to his bedroom and managed to stabilize the boy. Tulany heard the ruckus and did what she could to help. After a solid Medicine check, Kai realized the curse would end up killing his friends sooner or later. He didn't show it, but it definitely bothered him. Kharim was kept under watch for the rest of the night, and we ended the session there.

    TL;DR - Dispater and Asmodeus were watching the entire time through that holy symbol Daegan was wearing. I bet they were eating popcorn, too.

  20. - Top - End - #140
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    Poor Medea can't catch a break. But then again, considering her namesake, that's probably to be expected.

  21. - Top - End - #141
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    Quote Originally Posted by JadedDM View Post
    Poor Medea can't catch a break. But then again, considering her namesake, that's probably to be expected.
    Things won't be getting any better for her, either. At least she got to take a couple days off while the party did a side gig.

    Strange Bedfellows
    In which our heroes seek errant cargo of a most delicate nature, and learn even the forces of good may walk in the shadows.
    Spoiler: Session Forty-One
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    The party went to Spiral's house to find out what he wanted them to do. He told them he had lost a shipment of "Celestial spices" and the buyer was eager to have the goods found and returned to their proper place. He offered the party a handsome purse of 10,000 gp as a reward, and even gave them an extra 1,000 gp to cover their traveling expenses and to cover any bribes they might have to pay. When the party saw the "travel expenses" were all in gems, they started to get a bit suspicious. Aurelius suspected Spiral was lying to them about the nature of the goods, and Spiral admitted the shipment was actually several crates of weapons forged on the upper planes. They party agreed to do the job, and Spiral was eager to help them on their way. He wrote a letter of introduction to let them meet with his associate, Miaoli the Just, and gave them a portkey for the gate to Glorium, which was a town on the Outlands nearest where the shipment went missing. It was also the gate-town to Asgard, which got Eirik quite excited, since he was a priest of the Norse pantheon and a big Viking lad. Kai was also excited about going to Glorium, but he was predictably more reserved in his enthusiasm. The party grabbed Sharwyn and Barrock, and it was off to the Outlands!

    The gate dropped them off just a short hike outside of town, and once in Glorium they spent a while just taking in the sights and exploring the city. It was a decent-sized burg of about 20,000 people, and a squadron of seven beautiful but deadly Valkyries kept the peace. After they had located the best taverns in town, they met up with Miaoli. She was a dark-haired tiefling with very angular features, but the only real sign of her Infernal blood was a pair of horns so small they were still under the skin on her forehead. Tulany correctly deduced Miaoli was several generations removed from her fiendish ancestry. Miaoli used a magical gem to verify the authenticity of the party's letter of introduction, and then she gave them the real chant.

    The shipment of Celestial weapons, forged right in Asgard, had gone missing along a mountain pass which led to a secret gate to Avernus. She had been out to the pass to investigate, but she hadn't found a trace of the shipment or the guards who were with it. The party suggested taking a dummy shipment of empty crates out to the mountain pass in the hopes of luring out whomever or whatever had waylaid the weapons. Miaoli thought it was a great idea, and provided crates, wagons, horses, and even a few "disposable berks" hired from one of the taverns. Thus prepared, the party set out.

    They made it about halfway through the mountain pass when Baldwin the robot-bird spotted fifteen hard-luck brigands hiding in the rocks. The party started the fight before the brigands were ready, and they put the pressure on the baddies early in the fight. There was a little confusion why the bandits were soaking up damage like sponges and resisting lightning damage, but the party reckoned it was just a gang of barbarians and kept on fighting. After all, the bandits were not hitting very hard when they managed to hit at all. Kai caught one with his Spirit Guardians, and the bandit botched his Concentration check on the Disguise Self spell he had running. That's when all hell broke loose. The bandit was revealed to actually be a mezzoloth, a foot soldier for the yugoloths. With his disguise broken, the others dropped their spells as well, revealing that all of the bandits were mezzoloths. As a demonstration that they had been holding back on the party, they started casting Cloudkill, and threatened to dump a dozen more on the party unless they surrendered. Kharim bargained for the release of the surviving mercenaries, and the mezzoloths agreed to let them go. The fiends then encircled the party and herded them to a cave hidden in the mountains.

    Inside the cave, the party was confronted by an ultraloth, who caused the cavern to spin around him with the party inside. It was a disorienting trick, but it was an effective display of his power. The ultraloth instructed the party to tell the archon to stop shipping weapons to the Blood War. He wanted any further weapons shipments to be sent to the yugoloths, who would then decide the dispensation of arms. When the party mentioned that Spiral was an aasimar, the ultroloth got rather cranky. He clarified that he had, in fact, meant "Archon", and that Spiral was of no consequence. He told the party the archon had seven days to reply, then spun the cavern back around to let the party leave. Kharim was quite fed up with having to make deals with fiends, especially after what happened last time the party involved itself in the politics of the Blood War, but the rest of the party was intrigued about the business going on. They returned to Miaoli, who was glad to see them safe. The surviving mercenaries had told her what had happened, and she was surprised the mezzoloths had let them live. The party told her about what the ultraloth said, she suggested talking to Spiral about it. However, the party wanted to cut him out of the deal.

    Miaoli didn't know anything about archons, but she had a meeting with a courier from Mount Celestia the next day, and invited the party to speak with him after the meeting. The courier's name was Braus, and he was a cleric of Mitra. He was also a member of the Fraternity of Order, and apparently one of the nicest Guvners in the whole faction. The party agreed to speak with him, and retired to one of the taverns for a few drinks and to recover from the battle. The party messed around with Lucid Dreaming again that night. Aurelius managed to do a bit of dreamwalking, so he visited Rowena in her dreams for a quiet evening together. Kharim, on the other hand, decided to check in on what Soraya had been up to. He got bombarded with images of The Yellow Sign of Hastur for his trouble. Coupled with a bad binding pact the following morning, there were some breakfast time hijinks. Kharim drew the sign on a napkin and showed it to Daegan, who showed it to Tulany, who showed it to Aurelius, and on it went until Kai cleared the whole mess up with several casts of Remove Curse. Sharwyn mentioned she knew about a play called The King in Yellow and how it supposedly cursed those who read past Act One, but she didn't like to get involved in Far Realm nonsense. Fiends were enough trouble, as far as she was concerned.

    After the breakfast kerfuffle was settled, the party went to Miaoli's house and met with Braus. The priest explained to the party that the stolen shipment of weapons had been Cursed to cause fiends to covet them and make them fight over them. Braus told the party that after their involvement in Avernus, the tide of the Blood War was shifting back in the favor of the Baatezu. While certainly better than letting the Tanar'ri run amok on the lower planes, the archon Zalatian was concerned about the Baatezu's rapid advance. He had wanted to slow them down with the cursed weapons, as the calmest periods of the Blood War are those when the fiends are at a stalemate. Braus offered to let the party speak directly with Zalatian, but only if they made a modest donation to the church of Mitra. They handed over the bag of gems Spiral had given them, and Braus happily led them to Mount Celestia.

    In an ivory tower outside the beautiful town of Goldfire, the party met with the trumpet archon Zalatian XXIII. They explained the situation to the archon and delivered the message from the ultraloth. Zalatian was crushed to learn he had been found out by the fiends, and was at a loss as to what he should do. Daegan used his knowledge of psychology to walk Zalatian through the decision paralysis, and gently coached him into the idea that he should stop shipping weapons altogether. It seems spending time with the Bleak Cabal has been good for the lad

    The party reckoned they weren't going to get paid by Spiral for the job, so they asked Zalatian if he knew of a way to sneak into The Triple Layer of Aza'Grat. The archon didn't, but he knew of an old priest named Father Irynimus who would be able to help them. When Zalatian asked the party why they needed to go there, they told him everything they knew about Chalice. This came as a shock to the archon, as even in Celestia Chalice's existence had been kept hidden. They swore him to secrecy about it, but promised to keep his involvement in the weapons dealing a secret in exchange. Since the information about Aza'Grat was more important to the party than the cash owed, the PCs considered their business with Spiral at an end. Kharim and Aurelius knew selling weapons to fiends was an offense punishable by 20 years hard labor in Sigil, so they resolved to scrag Spiral as soon as they made it back to The Cage. The party decided to treat themselves to some downtime first, and spent the rest of the day hanging out in the beautiful rose-gold town of Goldfire. There, Kharim encountered a lantern archon with the voice of his father.

    It's never easy to find out one of your parents died, but I suppose chatting with their spirit in literal Heaven has to be one of the nicest ways to do so.

    The party returned to Sigil the next day, and the first stop they made was the Harmonium to pick up a squad of cops to help make the arrest. They chatted with Spiral just long enough to get his guard down, then the Harmonium busted in through every available window. His servants scattered, and Spiral went down with a whimper. He was dragged off to the prisons, and the party gave high-fives all around for a job well done.

    TL;DR - It's not often we finish an adventure in a single session!

  22. - Top - End - #142
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    Now that the holidays are over, we return to your regularly scheduled tomfoolery.

    The Illuminated Strikes Back
    In which our Heroes discover that off-screen villains are still active, and a confrontation is staged.
    Spoiler: Session Forty-Two
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    After a longer than usual period of catching up about various holiday activities, the party met with Father Irynimas Sanuire. He told them he had been sent a dream by an angel (whom the party suspected was Chalice), and the angel sent him visions of the party. He spoke at length about a being called Maeldur Et Kavurik, and that this entity was supposed to be the source of all fiendish planar travel. If the party could slay this creature, it would prevent fiends all across the multiverse from using their Planshift, Gate, or Teleportation abilities. Irynimus suspected that finding this creature would put them on the path to rescuing Chalice from Graz'zt's clutches. He didn't know where Maeldur was, but he was certain one of the libraries in Sigil must have something on it. The party agreed to check in out, but first they went to the Harmonium barracks to make sure Spiral hadn't slipped the blinds.

    When they arrived, the Harmonium threw them a small surprise party. The Harmonium had been looking for a way to scrag Spiral for years, and thanks to the party's hard work and Zalatian's testimony, they finally had charges that were going to stick. The party ate cake and drank beer for a while, enjoying the fruits of their labor. After a little while, they went to see Factol Sarin in his office, where he was taking tea with his wife Faith. The party introduced themselves to her, and Sarin offered to help them in whatever way he could. He offered Kharim a promotion, but the young knight declined the offer, since he still wanted to go home after all was said and done. Sarin understood, and suggested instead the promotion be temporary until Medea could atone for her "misdeeds". Kharim agreed, and Sarin and Faith bid the party a warm farewell.

    The PCs headed to the Fraternity of Order next, since Aurelius rolled pretty well on a History check to recall a book called Pihnmid's Translation, a handwritten collection of translated excerpts from the legendary Book of Inverted Darkness. This book likely had information on Maeldur, and it gave him an excuse to check in on Rowena and her family. Bad news on that front. Her uncle Maddock was worried sick about her. He told the group that Rowena had gone out on a date with Aurelius the night before, but she had not come back yet. He also told them that Bosh P. Golem had been deactivated; someone had scratched out part of the old elvish on his activation stone, changing the text from "Life" to "Death". The party explained that they had been out of town for the last two days, and they couldn't have been responsible. Aurelius promised to find Rowena, and Maddock promised to look for Pihnmid's Translation.

    The next stop was the Brothel of Slaking Intellectual Lusts, and when they arrived it was a bloodbath. The girls were all dead. Even Fall From Grace, whose demonic essence was pulled back to the Abyss. Scattered around the brothel were the dead bodies of a handful of Harmonium Grey Guards - the same ones who had betrayed the faction and joined Ashram in The Illuminated, The only survivors of the attack were Medea (just barely) and Janelle (whom Storm Silverhand had died to protect). Soraya was nowhere to be found. Sharwyn was understandably distraught at finding her mother dead in the kitchen. Once the party got Medea conscious and Janelle calmed down, they learned that "Aurelius" had led the Grey Guards into the brothel, claiming it was just a routine inspection. The girls were caught completely off guard by the attack, and only Grace and Marissa the medusa had been able to fight back. During the PCs' search for survivors, they found a letter written in green ink which read "Come to Plague-Mort. Let's finish this." The party raided the cash register and brought Storm and Sharwyn's mother back to life, then headed back to the Harmonium to have Sarin make good on his offer of help. He promised to bring the girls back to life, and only charged them a fraction of what Raise Dead would have otherwise cost.

    Aurelius cast Sending to contact Rowena, and was relieved to learn she was still alive. She told him that Green Marvent had lured her out using his illusion magic, and that Nekrothepta wanted to use her to lure Hogakk to Plague-Mort. She didn't know what happened to Soraya, but she could tell from the noise coming from the floor above that she was being held in the cellar of a rowdy tavern. Aurelius promised to find her soon.

    The party headed to Plague-Mort, armed to the teeth and spoiling for a fight. It wasn't hard to track down Green Marvent; he was handing out in a tavern he had taken over has his headquarters. The other members of the Illuminated were there as well: Ashram, Pirotess, Nekrothepta, Adair, and the two dozen Grey Guards who were loyal to Ashram. Joining them were Ash Mercury (who wanted to prove he was a better warrior than Cassius), Nappa (who wanted to beat up Kai because he was blue), Vanessa Volker (who wanted revenge against Soraya and Sharwyn for what they did during the one-off horror adventure), Rhellyn (the wolf-girl legion fiend who the party had sent back to the Outlands during their adventure in the Field of Nettles), and Benjamin Birdland (who had never left the Illuminated and had been spying on the party the entire time).

    Green Marvent offered the PCs a deal. He wanted the party to go about their business and rescue Chalice, but he wanted them to kill her when they found her. He saw her as nothing more than a bargaining chip in the Blood War, and he wanted to shake things up a bit. In exchange, he offered to release Rowena to them if they agreed, and would release Soraya to them once Chalice was dead. Understandably, the party (especially Kharim) was sick of making deals with the baddies. Weapons were drawn, spells were readied, and The Illuminated prepared to wipe out the PCs once and for all.

    However, we wrapped up the session there. Daegan's player was still on holiday, and Cassius' player had a bit too much huckleberry vodka that evening. Will our heroes stand triumphant, or will they fall to Green Marvent and his dastardly schemes? Tune in next time to find out!

    TL;DR - Cliffhanger sessions are the best

  23. - Top - End - #143
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    Quote Originally Posted by SleepyShadow View Post
    However, we wrapped up the session there. Daegan's player was still on holiday, and Cassius' player had a bit too much huckleberry vodka that evening.
    To be fair to Cassius, everyone had a lot of huckleberry vodka. That bottle should have survived the night, but didn't.
    Princess Battle Flower

  24. - Top - End - #144
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    The Light Goes Out
    In which our Heroes snuff out the Illuminated, and friends are reunited once more.
    Spoiler: Session Forty-Three
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    The battle between the PCs and the Illuminated was a 6 hour slug-fest, and it was one hell of a fight. Since long fights don't make for good journal entries, I'll attempt to hit the highlights of the night.
    • Cassius dumpstered Ash Mercury without breaking a sweat.
    • Green Marvent spent most of the fight running around the bar while trying to keep away from Kharim and Tulany.
    • Sharwyn managed not to die while getting ganged up on by the Rhellyn sisters for almost the entire fight.
    • Nappa managed to bleed to death because he couldn't pass a single death save.
    • Kai more than earned his keep this fight. The party likely would've lost without him pulling out all the stops to keep people alive.
    • Daegan spent half the fight in Banishment, and the other half grappling his little brother Adair.
    • Ashram went on a smite-fueled rampage after Tulany killed Pirotess while the dark elf was unconscious.
    • Aurelius more or less soloed Necrothepta, save for a few arrows from Sharwyn.
    • Green Marvent went down like a chump.
    • It took the combined efforts of Eirik, Kharim, Kai, and Aurelius to finally bring Ben "Big Band" Birdland down.
    • Vanessa Volker straight up murdered Barrack. Daegan shed many tears.
    • Soraya got possessed by Eihort and started attacking the party.

    After Vanessa Volker went down, the party allowed Ashram to leave, taking Pirotess and the Rhellyn sisters with him. Ash Mercury swore a brotherhood with Cassius, Aurelius rescued Rowena from the basement, and Kharim stayed with poor Soraya while she vomited up Eihort broodlings. The party went back to Sigil for some well earned rest and to plan their next move. It was a hard fight, and I'm glad they pulled through. Good job everyone

    TL;DR - The party won!

  25. - Top - End - #145
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    Congrats to the party. Sounds like quite a fight.


  26. - Top - End - #146
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    Squaring the Circle - Part One
    In which our Heroes learn of a way to make a permanent difference in the Multiverse, and all that dream-walking pays off.
    Spoiler: Session Forty-Four
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    After the party recovered from their fight with Green Marvent, they checked in with their old pal Maddock to see if he got Pihnmid's Translations. Aurelius studied the book for a while, and learned that Maeldur was a celestial kidnapped by a baernaloth, Daru Ib Shamiq, during the early days of the multiverse before the division between Law and Chaos, when Good and Evil were the only alignments in existence. Daru used ancient True-Naming magic to warp Maeldur into something unnatural, then hid him away. Daru fashioned a talisman which let the wearer speak the ancient language of the baernaloths, which was the only language Maeldur now understood. Both Daru and Maeldur disappeared since then, with the only clue being a place called "Daubei's Obscure Woe".

    While this research was going on, Tulany met up with Feirefiz at Woolly Cupgrass' alchemy shop. Feirefiz told her that he was heading home soon. His time spent planeswalking made him realize he had a real responsibility to his people, and to the people of the neighboring kingdom which was beset by slivers. There was no point in winning glory for his homeland if he didn't have a home to come back to. Tulany empathized with him, and confessed that she felt terrible about her actions lately. Her mother was a barbarian content to let her subjects conduct raids on their only ally, and she didn't want to follow down that path. Feirefiz admitted that the army of his home was powerful but small, and might prove ineffective against swarms of slivers. The two nobles struck a deal - Tulany would petition the war chief of her nation to lend troops to the battle, while Feirefiz would petition his mother to fund the operation.

    Once Aurelius' research was done, he conducted a bit of Lucid Dreaming to see if he could glean any insight into Maeldur's nature. Instead, he was contacted by Chalice herself during his dreaming. She explained that she knew what he was searching for, and would help in any way she could. She had tried to contact the group many times before, but had only succeeded because she managed to catch someone using the Lucid Dreaming skill. She and Maeldur were being held in the same prison, but she didn't know where it was. Before the dream ended, Aurelius asked her for her real name.

    "Erisiel," she answered.

    Meanwhile, Kharim finally got the chance to tell Soraya that her father was dead. She took the news a bit better than expected, but it still broke the poor girl's heart. Aurelius busted into the tender moment to tell them all the sweet lore he just learned. He then called a conference to talk to the whole party (except Tulany, who decided to bounce) about their next move. While Aurelius had been reading and dreaming, Sharwyn and Barrock had also gotten up to some research of their own. Rule-of-Three had told his "beloved" daughter that her granddaddy Graz'zt wasn't actually a Tanar'ri. His mother was Pale Night, queen of the Obyriths, the fiends which inhabited the Abyss before the Shard of Evil from the previous multiverse came in and wrecked house. He was in league with Asmodeus, who wasn't even a Baatezu himself, to reunite the fiends and wage war on the Upper Planes. Asmodeus had crafted his famed Ruby Rod from a portion of the Shard of Evil before it was lost to the Abyss, which was what allowed him to control the Baatezu. Graz'zt was searching for the rest of the Shard so he could craft a similar item and control the Tanar'ri. He had abducted Erisiel with Asmodeus' full permission, since he needed her power to cleanse the Shard of the abyssal chaos. Once purified, he could command the Tanar'ri, join forces with Asmodeus, and bring the Multiverse to its knees.

    Kai managed to get a Sending spell to work on Fall-From-Grace, confirming she was still alive. She told him she was being held in a place called the Tower of Indifference, a place where Graz'zt threw dissidents who refused to fight in the Blood War, as well as any victim who had yet to succumb to his "charms". The party figured that's where Graz'zt was keeping Erisiel as well, which meant Maeldur was there, too.

    Aurelius, Cassius, and Storm took a short trip back to Faerun to rummage through Elminster's lab for anything useful, but found his estate had been cleared out by Harper loyalists. The Harpers had missed a few things, though, including notes on a place in the gate-town Torch (which led to Gehenna, the home of the Yugoloths) which was referred to as "Daubei's Obscure Woe". The trio went back to Sigil to dig around in the Fraternity of Order's archives, and found a portal to Azagrat hidden in an old Frat safehouse tucked away in the Slags, which were the worst part of the Hive slums. While they were running around collecting information, Kharim and Daegan busied themselves making alchemical weapons for Medea to use until she could recover her status as a paladin.

    With every lead chased down and every scrap of information gathered, the party decided to head to Torch first. They hoped they'd get some useful information or assistance there, which seemed a better idea than waltzing into Graz'zt's home base without so much as a plan. Out of curiosity, Aurelius decided to do a bit more dreamwalking to see if he could glean any insight on the Maeldur, but he was interrupted by a Nycoloth who had been stalking him with a Dream spell. The fiend warned him that he was meddling in affairs that mortals had no business in, then punched him hard enough to wake him up.

    TL;DR - A lot of roleplay and lore gathering, which was a nice change of pace after the session-long combat last week. We've entered the endgame, folks!

  27. - Top - End - #147
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    Squaring the Circle - Part Two
    In which our Heroes find a Guvner safehouse, and a barmy guarding the portal within.
    Spoiler: Session Forty-Five/Forty-Six
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    This is two sessions, because we had two sessions in the same week. We weren't happy with the lack of progress we made on our usual night, so we scheduled a follow-up session a few days later.

    The first session was the party's arrival in Torch. The gate-town to Gehenna was split into two halves: The Spires, where the wealthy and affluent lived in luxury, and The Mires, where the rest of the population lived in abject poverty. The party asked around for help, and a skittish local directed them to The Fountain of Fortune, a tavern/casino run by a drow from the Sword Coast. The party infiltrated the tavern, and found it got its namesake from the enchanted fountain which rained gold coins. Nobody touched the money, and when Cassius asked why that was the case, he was told the fountain would electrocute any would-be thieves proportionate to the amount of money the thief tried to steal. Aurelius inserted himself into a high-stakes game of Three Dragon Ante, and lost a bit of money while gaining a little information about Torch. Kharim made friends with a bariaur named Thassol, who was friendly but unhelpful. After bumming around the casino for a while, Eirik and Shawryn are told the owner wanted to meet the party in private. They were also told it was not a request.

    The party met the owner, a drug-addicted crime boss named B'derth. He told them he knew everything that went on in The Mires. All six gangs that operated in Torch answered to him, and he knew of the party's coming before their arrival. He told them Daru Ib Shamiq wanted to meet with them at his mansion in the graveyard. When Kharim asked how B'derth found out about them, he informed them that Daru told him everything about the party. Unhappy about being spied on, the party headed to the graveyard.

    Tulany led the way, sensing a hidden portal to Gehenna, and to nobody's shock it was in the cellar behind the mansion in the center of the graveyard. Heading inside, they passed through the portal quite by accident. They ended up in a part of Gehenna owned by Daru himself, and the Baernaloth told them about a gem called the vuulge which would allow them to communicate with Maeldur. In exchange for the information regarding its location, he wanted the party to swear that they would free Maeldur rather than kill him. Kharim was very unhappy about making a deal with yet another fiend, but everyone else was just fine with it. Once assured the party wouldn't kill Maeldur, Daru told them the gem was kept in the Tower of Indifference, but Maeldur had been abducted by a third party. Daru wasn't sure where Maeldur was, but he assured the PCs they could use the vuulge to track the wayward creature. The party thanked the fiend, Kharim punched a wall on the way out, and the group headed back to Sigil.

    The second session began with Kharim, who made his first good binding pact in over a month, who blew up at the party during breakfast for casually making a deal with Daru Ib Shamiq. He was sick of cooperating with fiends, and let the party know it. The rest of the party brushed off his concerns. After breakfast, Eirik was approached by the factol of The Fated himself, Duke Rowan Blackwood. He took Eirik for a walk down to the stables, where he showed off his fancy nightmare mount he stole from Nessus, the bottom level of Baator. He then invited Eirik to join The Fated. Eirik jumped at the chance, since he'd been wanting to join the faction for months. He was confused though, since he hadn't done much on his own to prove his personal strength. Rowan told Eirik he already knew about the party's plans for breaking into Aza'Grat. His spy, Thassol, had been watching the party's activities in Torch, and had reported to Rowan about the party's meeting with Daru. Rowan then suggested that instead of freeing Erisiel, he should just "keep" her, as she "performed a unique function" in the Multiverse. Eirik said he'd think about it, and Rowan left on his nightmare mount.

    The party headed into the Slags, the worst part of the Hive in Sigil. Harmonium patrols never went there, because people would garrote and club them to death. It was the worst part of the bad part of town. It was Whitechapel during the Ripper murders, and nobody was there to help.

    The PCs got attacked by a gang of mezzaloth tieflings after only fifteen minutes of travel through the Slags. The tieflings hit pretty hard, but they were wholly outclassed by the party. It only took about three rounds to mop them up. After the battle, the party arrived at the "Dark House" without further trouble. It was a safehouse owned by the Fraternity of Order with a portal to Aza'Grat, but because of its location it was all but abandoned. Its sole occupant was a barmy modron who was trying to impose order on the most chaotic part of Sigil. However, it turned out the safe house wasn't actually that safe. Less than two minutes of being there, the party was jumped by a pair of half-dragon nycoloths who were trying to abduct Sharwyn to use her to break into the Tower of Indifference for themselves.

    Those poor nycoloths only got one turn

    The party rested up, and the cursed party members realized their curses were getting worse. Kai used his Medicine skill to confirm the curses were consuming them, and would be lethal (or worse) the next time the curses took hold. The party was on a race against time to find Erisiel so she could remove their curses!

    TL;DR - Two sessions for the price of one!
    Last edited by SleepyShadow; 2022-02-02 at 03:04 PM.

  28. - Top - End - #148
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    Default Re: Planescape Campaign Journal

    Honestly, what could possibly go wrong when making deals with fiends?

  29. - Top - End - #149
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    Default Re: Planescape Campaign Journal

    Quote Originally Posted by JadedDM View Post
    Honestly, what could possibly go wrong when making deals with fiends?
    Especially when tanar'ri and yugoloths are well known for upholding their end of the deal?

    Squaring the Circle - Part Three
    In which our Heroes travel to the Tower of Indifference, and discover nothing is ever easy.
    Spoiler: Session Forty-Seven
    Show
    When the party stepped through the portal to Aza'grat, they found they were in a network of tunnels beneath the city. The geometry was warped, as the city pulled three layers of the abyss onto itself. The PCs didn't have much time to marvel, though, as they were attacked by a pair of half-fiend loxodons. These buggers weren't much to look at on paper, but they had solid spellcasting (including multiple uses of Blade Barrier) and a breath weapon which wiped out all of a character's prepared spells if they failed the save against it. Fortunately, Kai always passed the save, so nobody died to the magical onslaught.

    Once the loxodons were dealt with, the party followed Sharwyn through the tunnels. She had no real idea where she was going, but she felt pulled in a certain direction, almost as if the city above was calling to her. Along the way, the party was ambushed by a pair of bebiliths, who were none too happy to see mortals intruding upon their nest. During the fight, one of the demons managed to grab Daegan and Plane Shift over to the Astral Plane, hoping to eat its meal in peace. However, Tulany was able to use her horizon walking to track the demon across the planar boundary, and the party proceeded to clown it in combat. Tulany then tracked the demon back to its "respawn point" in the Abyss, where it promptly surrendered. It offered to take the party to the Tower of Indifference in exchange for its survival. Kharim argued against this, but the rest of the PCs took the bebilith at its word.

    The demon guided them through the tunnels, and the party eventually emerged onto a rocky field just outside of Aza'grat, where a lone tower stood amidst a sea of corpses. Many of the bodies were yugoloths, but an equal number were humanoids who wore the holy symbol of Iuz around their necks. As soon as the party started for the tower, the bebilith turned around and headed back into the tunnels to lick its wounds and plot its revenge. When the party got closer to the tower, they saw its walls were constructed of iron bars with prisoners shackled into the very structure itself. The front door to the tower had been smashed inward, and Tulany sensed there were still many fiends inside. The party retreated back to the tunnels to rest up and prepare for their assault on the tower.

    TL;DR - The tower is pretty grisly.

  30. - Top - End - #150
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    Default Re: Planescape Campaign Journal

    ...and a breath weapon which wiped out all of a character's prepared spells if they failed the save against it.
    Wow, that's pretty hardcore for a 5E enemy. I'm impressed.

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