Trouble in the Spine
Summary
Adventure: Trouble in the Spine
GM: ChrisC
Season: Summer 819 wk
Night: Someday
Level: Low - Medium
- Party
- Haedric - our Conflict Resolution specialist played by Stephen
- Mavric - our Team Leader played by Lisa
- Aloysious - our Public Relations specialist played by Nick
- Raseri - our Security personnel played by Ciaran
- Mayhem - our other Security personnel played by Jim
- Celeste - our Hairy Great Haystack played by Dean
- Hemlock - a giant spider
- Borys - a Ratoskyr aka Ratling
- Employer
- Davos, The Baron of Bryshande
- Mission
- There's trouble and strange goings on in Diril Highlands, in the Dragonspine Mountains and things are going awry at this commercially valuable time of year. A party is needed to augment what few troops remain (the rest have been called up for service in the warmer south with the king) and keep the peace in the region and sort some things out.
- Pay
- Lands, Titles, Prestige et al.
Scribe Notes
This is the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. No matter what anyone else may say.
Day 0 (At the Guild meeting) - We meet a man named Gerald at the guild and he tells us we need to go sort some funky weather out in the Dragonspine Mountains, there is also mention of Giant bandits or perhaps it was Giants and Bandits or perhaps it was Bandit Giants? Anyway, we hear the mission and Gerald gives us some time to vote on Party leader and whatnot. Much discussion ensues. A man named Tarahell Alatáriël introduces himself and then tells us of his step-daughter. He says Celeste is a bit feral we assure him we can handle her and all will be fine.
Mavric is elected party leader (only because she has the most experience). Haedric is our MilSci and I am left as the scribe (Lucky you)
Celeste is introduced to us. She is huge, has pointy teeth and sniffs everyone (Except Mayhem). After some extensive discussion Mavric decides we need some party rules. Party Rules: 1. Speak Common 2. Don't kill each other (Mavric thought this needed to be stated clearly, for the benefit of Haedric) 3. Listen to Mavric 4. Listen to Headric in combat
We have passage on the good ship Molly under captain Francis, on the next morning tide. After collecting some supplies we take go drinking and Mavric takes us to see a play. (with much drinking, fighting and fornicating, to the delight of Celeste).
Day 1 - The party boards the ship and cast off heading NNW. The ships navigator is a fool so I correct his mistakes and Magewind us to speed our passage along. The sea is a little rough for this party of land lubbers (myself excluded of course) so they get nice and drunk.
Day 2 - We arrive early morning in the port town of Gerbestadt and depart our ship. Conveniently within minutes of us arriving a large and violent storm appears out of nowhere (The Sudden Wind-Storm)so I promptly summon a cloud and we make a quick departure. On the cloud Mavric entertains the party with a saucy tale, the party (excluding yours truly) drink and enjoy the ride. We fly NW towards Barlton in Western Aladar to meet with the Baron's wife to get her to sign some papers.
---
As we continue to fly we come upon a large storm in the area of Barretskyne we decide to avoid both of these issues, we backtrack a few miles, land and set camp to wait out the storm. During our descent, a large dark shape falls past us at great speed. We identify it as a dead Manticore. When we land we send our "advanced scout" (read as disposable) Mayhem to investigate. He reports back that it was killed by non-magical ice projectile or weapon of some kind. Mayhem loots spikes (8) from the Maticore tail.
The storm intensifies, lots of thunder and lightning, but completely natural as far as I could tell. We settle in for the night in an igloo courtesy of Haedric. During the night mayhem has a conversation with some rats (Hobbits, what can you do?) the party agreed that the chat was a little flirty. Mayhem brings the rat back to the igloo, it seems it is a dark celestial thing as the rat suddenly decides Raser is his new master.
Haedric wakes us in the very early morning, he has seen some humanoids skulking around our loot (Manticore body). Mayhem investigates, identifies them as Gnolls and we form a plan. Mayhem: "Lets give them a good killing!"
They are dispatched quickly. We loot the bodies and find:
- 10gs
- 60s
- 10c
- A ring with the seal of a noble house worth 97 gs
- A gold necklace with an enchantment -3 to percentile rolls
Mayhem's creepy spider eats many eyes.
Celeste and Haedric skin the Manticore. Celeste then disappears for a while. We head back to the igloo and interrupt Celeste and Gerald.
Amendment to party rules Rule 5. No coitus in common spaces.
We finish our rest and prepare to depart.
--- Day 3
We head out into the storm and as we travel it intensifies. I make a call and we land outside of a town called Corce to weather the storm. We find the Inn, eat and drink, Mayhem entertains himself in the usual way and Mavric performs with a local.
Amendment to party rules A new party rule is added; Rule 6: No pets eating other pets.
The bartender tells us that a child is missing in the storm. So like the brave Heroes we are, we set out to find him. Albert, the missing child, was last seen in his family's barn. The barn had collapsed so we searched the rubble and found him wounded but alive. Haedric does some sneaky healing and we return Albert to his family. Mayhem reads his shadow, then for some reason decides to buy Albert (Hobbits, what can you do?) and his father agrees to send him for tuition to Mayhem at Seagate next spring.
We return to the Inn for the night and are lauded as Heroes!
--- Day 4 - White Lotus Day
Deciding that the storm and mountain air currents make flying a little iffy we continue on foot. After a mile and a while we come across some very lifelike statues in amongst the trees and shrubbery. I wonder aloud if they might be the work of a medusa or basilisk, Mayhem reads shadows to confirm this. We then keep a very wary eye out and continue on the the asylum, The Noble Mew of Berghold Wehmeyer,
where the Baroness Lady Margarite Bryshante is currently residing.
As we investigate the statues further we find out that they were petrified at different times, the newest was only 7 weeks ago and the oldest was 24 years ago. Noting this we continue to the large manor, we approach and wait outside the portcullis. I see a bell so I ring it, a lot. Eventually someone comes to let us in. His Name is Neills. Among other thing Neills tells us that a man by the name of Blackstaff, also from seagate, dropped off a Lady Redwater aka Lady Simone Beauchamps, this seems somehow important.
The Manor is an extremely ominous place, it ticks many boxes in the creepy house bracket. I noted:
- Screams
- Shutters slamming
- A musty smell
- A storm outside
- Shaking floors
- Small bones lying around
- BIG SPIDERS
As I note these things, 3 doctors come to greet us. They tell us about the asylum and then when we ask about the Baroness say that she is not in a good state for visitors today and that we will have to wait until tomorrow. They take us to some empty rooms in the staff living area. As we are sweeping the room for anything suspicious I find a lock box under a loose stone. Unlocking and de-trapping I find some teeth, some finger bones and a ring. The ones who can, start looking into the things I have found. Celeste and I stand guard. We are all affected by an ESP which makes us very suspicious. While on watch I spot that one of the nurses has a large growth on her neck.
Some time later I see that someone has left a key on a bench in the common room, so I take it. We decide it's a plant, so someone meant for us to take it. I smell Ozone very strongly in the air, we decide to leave our room and find the Baroness immediately. The key I found unlocks all the doors leading to the women's wing of the asylum, very convenient. On our way to find the Baroness we free 4 women who were tied to chairs and gagged, left to be taken by some unknown monster that comes in the night. It is at about this point we smell smoke, the manor is on fire! With some alacrity we continue.
We find the Baroness, free her and start freeing other women imprisoned here. During all this Mayhem stumbles upon a large hole in the floor, which drops down 30 feet into a large room with some seriously creepy shit in it, altars and other such creepy paraphernalia. We suspect witches or summoners of some kind. The fire seems to be getting worse so we make good our escape. On the way out Haedric sneakily extinguishes the fire. We make it out with about 20 inmates.
We find a barn to shelter in. The barn has 2 wagons and a fully black coach, Mayhem and I are very suspicious of the coach. Mavric hypnotizes one of the women who was tied up, we discover that she has had dreams of creatures in the night and that every time she dreams, she is healed partially of her madness. The second woman who was tied up has a similar story of memory loss and then she feels better. Mavric then divines one of the women and finds out that she was once mad but she had been drained of her madness by a Vampire of thoughts.
Day 5
We awaken the Baroness and she seems a bit loopy and out of it. We discover that she was last visited by the vampire 6 days ago. We ask about getting our papers signed (the reason we came here in the first place) and she tells us that her seal and pen are back at the asylum. We do some general inquiring about the asylum and it seems that all the patients do actually want to be there because they are getting better. As far as we can tell there aren't any political prisoners so we decide to leave it alone.
We encourage Mayhem to open the carriage door, as he does he gets hit by a needle trap and is poisoned. He drinks a potion and is fine (no big deal). Then I (the only skilled party thief) disarm the trap and enter the carriage. I avoid another trap (with my awesome and amazing skillz) and open the large trunk that i find inside the carriage. The party is concerned this is a coffin so they strongly try to discourage me, but I pay those cowards no mind. Inside the trunk is a bunch of swords and daggers. (Ha! Never doubt me again cowardly party members!) Those who can divine the items I found and we find out that some of them are magical.
Celeste, who had been on watch lets us know that there is a search party coming towards us, so we call them over and return to the asylum with them and the patients we rescued from the fire.
At the asylum Mayhem reads a sense undead scroll to put our minds at ease. Thankfully it comes up negative and we all breathe a huge sigh of relief.
We decide to investigate the hole in the ground we discovered earlier. We look in and see a strange zodiac pattern, except it has one extra. We identify it as Ophiucheus. We decide to head down and investigate once no one is watching.
When we head down we feel that this place is incredibly magical. We are in large room with 13 pedestals and a large throne covered in gems. Mavric (being a typical dwarf) can't help herself and she touches one of the gems, she falls down and is unresponsive. We find out she has been translated (whatever that means??)
After a while she comes around and tells us she visited the heavens, before she can say anything else I think that sounds cool so I touch a gem.
I am shot up into the sky and i reach the heavens where I see a large banquet table, around this table sits many Elven gods. I discover we are in the lost temple of Varda an ancient Elven Godess. She grants each of us a boon for finding her lost temple.
We set about exploring the temple, it's bloody huge! It would have at one time supported around 400 people easily. We spend a full day exploring and looting the temple. I find a magical sextant which will help me with my navigating, others find other stuff? We find a weeks worth of elvish bread each, Borus and Hemlock get an upgrade (Oh boy thats a big spider)
After all the exploring and looting we exit the temple and as requested by Varda we crush a gem she gave us and the temple vanishes, only solid rock remains.
We all look 25% younger, which makes some of us look like spotty teenagers again (yuck)
Mayhem uses his shadow portals to take some of our collected stuffs back to seagate.
Eventually with papers signed we make our way by cloud closer to our final destination.
Mil Sci
Daily Pattern
- Sleep/Camp
- Travel
- Meals
- Rituals
- Mayhem:
- Purification
- Weaving Shadow Silk
- shadow glove, shadow wing canopy, shadow line x 3
Hours of sleep for Ft recovery + Hot meal Ft recovery.
Travel Magics
Watch Order
Marching Order
Main body front:
Main body rear:
Tail Guard:
Formations
Single file:
Open area:
Buffs
Buffs listed in the table don't need to be detailed, other buffs not on the table must be mentioned at the time they are cast.
Y means always on, N/- means never on, 'Sit.' means when the party has time for buffs before a fight.
Weapon Spells which weapon/s it is going on normally should be noted also.
General notes.
-
-
Long Duration Buffs
| Magic | Rk | Effects | Dur | Ft / Day | Al | Cl | Ha | Mv | My | Rsr | -- |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Name | ## | Does Stuff | ?? days | ?? Ft | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- |
| Name | ## | Does stuff | ?? hrs | ? Ft | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- |
| Name | ## | Does stuff | ?? hrs | ? Ft | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- |
| Name | ## | Does Stuff | ?? weeks | ? Ft | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- |
| Names | ## | Does stuff | ?? hrs | ?? Ft | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- |
| Name | ## | Does stuff | ?? hrs | ?? Ft | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- |
Short Duration Buffs
| Magic | Rk | Effects | Dur | Ft / Cast | Al | Cl | Ha | Mv | My | Rsr | -- |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Witchsight | 12 | See in darkness as on a cloudy day 150 ft, 75 ft inside, see Rank 12 or less Invisible, Blending or any Unseen | 6.5 hours | 1 Ft | -- | -- | -- | -- | 
|
-- | -- |
| Featherfall | ## | Does Stuff | ?? Mins | ?? Ft | -- | -- | -- | -- | Sit | -- | -- |
| ## | Does stuff | ?? mins | ?? Ft | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | |
| Name | ## | Does stuff | ?? hrs | ?? Ft | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- |
Loot
- Gold necklace, magical - subtracts three from percentile die result
- Gold ring, not magical - 97 gold shillings in value
Calendar
Summer | ||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Moonday | Duesday | W'ansday | Th'rsday | Frysday | Reapsday | Sunday | ||||||||
|
Beltane | |||||||||||||
| Meadow (1) | ||||||||||||||
| 1 | Guild Meeting | 2 | Depart Guild by Boat | 3 | Arrive Gerbestadt. Depart by Cloud. Land E of Barretskyne. | 4 | Travel by Cloud towards Asylum. | 5 | White Lotus Get to the Asylum | 6 | Seagate Light Festival Return to the Asylum. Explore the Lost Temple. | |||
|
7 | Explore the Lost Temple. | 8 | Explore the Lost Temple. Return to the Asylum. Depart late afternoon & tvl 80m by Cloud. | 9 | Travel by Cloud and tvl 270m | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | ||||
|
14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | The Castellan Borderers Ball | 20 | ||||||
|
21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | Seagate Crafters Ball | 27 | ||||||
|
|
28 | 29 | 30 | |||||||||||
| Heat (2) | ||||||||||||||
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | Seagate Guildmasters Ball | ||||||||||
|
|
5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | Seagate Races | 11 | The Duke of Carzala's Summer Ball | |||||
|
|
12 | 13 | 14 | Midsummers Eve (Faerie Day) |
15 | Solstice | 16 | 17 | Seagate Summer Fair Day | 18 | Seagate Summer Fair Day | |||
|
|
19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | The Castellan of Brastor's Summer Ball | 25 | ||||||
|
|
26 | 27 | 28 | 29 | 30 | |||||||||
| Breeze (3) | ||||||||||||||
| 1 | 2 | |||||||||||||
|
|
3 | Day of Death | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | ||||||
|
|
10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | |||||||
|
|
17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | |||||||
|
|
24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 | 30 | |||||||
