GM Bret's PBP GD VI: Masks of the Living God (Inactive)

Game Master BretI

You are still carrying Krant’s dead body. Wasn’t the plan to dump it somewhere?

Oh, thought that had already been taken care of, sorry to jump ahead, then? *pokes Thomas to point us in the direction of snake pit to dump the dead guy who was horrible to us*

Thomas leads the way back to the wall sconce. He checks the keys he got from Krant, but none of them open the door. He then gets out his tools and carefully picks the door.

It takes him a few minutes, but he finally manages to get it unlocked. He holds it open and then uses a scrap of cloth to prevent the door from closing all the way.

Past the door is some stairs down and then the left wall gives way to a large chamber.

Past that is another door.

This tall chamber (T15) is broken into two levels. Loose gravel, dirt, and bones cover the bottom level, while a walkway traverses the upper level from east to west, leading from this room. At opposite ends of the room on the lower level stand a pair of gigantic stone statues, roughly carved in the image of Razmir, his hands held high to support the room's ceiling. Each statue sits upon a pedestal with a large hole in its base that slopes down and out of sight.

"Ugh. Just send him down. I'm uneasy about this as it is. I know his death is justifiable, and I know disposal is necessary. It just feels icky. Let's be done with it."

You drop the body down and it lands with a dull thud and the crunching of some bones.

After a few minutes, you see a large snake come out from one of the holes below the statue. It sticks it’s tongue out and sniffs the corpse. Shortly after that, it stretches it’s jaw and slowly starts swallowing the body.

If left alone, it manages to swallow the body over the course of a few minutes. Then it just lays there a while, evidently to digest the meal.

"Sugoi! Now, with that issue dealt, where shall we go to?"

Well that was thoroughly disgusting...what now before I throw up...Shayna manages to say between gulps.

"Don't remind me....i was climbing for my life to escape that serpent, to avoid that fate."

Looking down at the serpent, Kriklishik happens to notice a glint of gold in amongst the refuse. It looks like a ring of some sort.

Vlazis will see if the ring is enchanted, or if it's simply not worth fighting a giant snake over.

While Vlazis is attempting to determine about the ring, if Ramon has it pointed out to them they will attempt a 'short-cut' way of finding out if it's magical or not, by trying to use Mage Hand to move it.

Vlazis is scanning for magic nd finds a magical aura down in the main chamber.

Meanwhile, Ramon determines that it isn’t coming from the gold ring. He has to stretch, but manages to get the ring. Looking at it, it bears the symbol of the local artist’s guild.

Vlazis determines that one of the bones down there has a faint magical aura. It might be a wand?

Go ahead and make the Spellcraft roll.

Spellcraft: 1d20 + 6 ⇒ (8) + 6 = 14 Pthbbt
Since that won't identify it, can I get the strength of the aura?

Kn: Arcana: 1d20 + 5 ⇒ (6) + 5 = 11 Strength I told you was faint. Type, nope.

Fran’s Kn: Arcana: 10 + 8 = 18

Vlazis isn’t sure about the aura, so Fran quickly checks and says it is Enchantment.

The snake continues to digest Krant.

"Enchantment aura, I'm sure of it," Fran finally determines, thankful to have something else to focus on besides their slowly-digesting tormentor. "With a meal like that to digest, I don't think the snake will bother us if someone wants to try and go down there to get it. But just to be sure, I'll ask!"

Kneeling down, a peculiar expression comes over Fran's face for a moment before she begins emitting an odd series of hissing sounds.

The snake hisses and darts it’s tongue in and out for a while. It coils a bit. Fran seems to understand what is said.

Shayna looks down into the pit...trying to see what the rest are looking at.

What is it?

Fran blinks and looks up. "Um...Mr. Snake says he wants somewhere warmer to rest if we want to take something from the pit," she announces. "He asked if we could warm the stones for him. I think I offended him; he said the others bring him meals and don't ever ask for anything," she sighs.

She glances up at the others and then shrugs. "It's up to you guys though. Personally, I think he's being a bit of a greedyguts."
______

Entirely up to the group on this one, though I imagine Kriklishik could probably heat the stones up with some fire blasting. Fran's also got Burning Hands memorized but she'd prefer to save it for an emergency.

"I think we can warm the stones and make sure they don't catch anything on fire." Ramon offers. "And do it in a reasonable quiet fashion, too?"

Ramon will help as necessary to make this happen.

"Can you tell the snake what I'm about to do? Also, I need to be within 30ft to do it quietly. Otherwise I have to gather power, which, as you've seen, is a bit of a show."

Krik waits for Fran to communicate his intentions, then he blasts several of the rocks, being careful not to set them on fire. For good measure, He's also sure they're a fair distance away from the ring he saw, so that if the snake is basking on the warm rocks, he'll be farther away from whoever is retrieving it.

Want me to roll them?

"Might not be a bad idea to tell him that I can target things that aren't stones, too."

Kriklishik will stand guard at the top in case the snake tries anything, but he's not going to be particularly obvious about it.

"Okay, I will!" Fran nods and turns her attention back to the snake.

Did the snake nod in response to Fran’s strange hissing?

In any case, it moves over next to one of the statues.

I am not going down there, no matter what.

As the snake obligingly moves out of the way and Krik uses his talents to warm the stones below, Fran takes a few minutes to carefully make her way down into the pit and retrieve the glowing bone.

I hope this will be worth the effort...

Fran will use rope and Take 10 on the checks to climb down and climb back up, assuming she remains unaccosted by the snake or anything else.

Once she's safely back up top, she takes a few moments to study the strange piece in an attempt to determine its enchantments.

Detect Magic + Spellcraft: 1d20 + 8 ⇒ (20) + 8 = 28

The snake moves over and rests upon the warmed stones. It closes it’s eyes and seems to just lay there.

Fran climbs down her rope, goes over and grabs the wand. She then goes back and climbs up the rope.

Examining the wand, she discovers it is a wand of Bless with 21 charges.

The snake doesn’t show any signs of moving.

Well. Now that our new ophidian ally is cozy and our edible encumbrance is dealt with, shall we adjourn towards our mission?

Vlazis knuckles his mask, I apologize for getting snippy. These have been trying days.

Aye...at least there was a bonus to coming here...let's go...

Ramon nods quietly and is ready to move along, suppressing a shudder.

Seeing the snake do it's thing made them feel a bit queasy, and there was no way to describe why to anyone right now while they were sneaking around.

Where are you going upstairs?

I can see two obvious possibilities. Past the acolytes into the worship hall (T6) or up into the gatehouse and tower (T25 & T26).

Though there may be secrets hidden there, we have certainly seen quite enough of their worship hall. We should begin with the gatehouse.

"The gatehouse works," Fran agrees as she offers to hand the wand off to someone that can activate it more easily than she. "Besides, if we can take care of the guards there now it will be easier for us to make our escape later," she points out.

Good enough for me...guardhouse it is...Shayna says as she checks for anyone following them om foot. perc: 1d20 + 6 ⇒ (18) + 6 = 24

Should I just march you all into the courtyard? Any specific plan?

Well if I'm reading the map correctly and those guards are actually in T3, I'm planning on using Krik's disguise as a bludgeon to get us past them without fighting.

There are two acolytes at the doors to the Worship Hall (T3). Until there is an alarm, you can walk right past them. Once the alarm sounds, you would need the disguise based on the lesson you got about security.

There are three guards in the tower and gatehouse (T25 & T26) that can see the courtyard (T1).

As Fran thinks about the layout of the courtyard and where the guard tower and gatehouse are, she quickly realizes that they're going to have to move quickly and quietly in order to get the drop on the posted guards before they can sound the alarm.

"Um...so if we're going to get into the tower and gatehouse from here we'll either need to all try and sneak across the courtyard to get to the stairs or send some of us toward the stairs and maybe the rest of us up the wall somehow," she whispers. "It might be easier if we can make some kind of distraction but not anything so big that they'd call for the others."

The young half-elf's brows furrow. "I can sometimes call animals and other creatures to me with the right magic. I could call an eagle and have it attack or distract the guards...unless someone else has another idea?" she asks hopefully.

"I can open the lock, if there is one on its door.
If an animal could distract the guards, it could give the rest of us time to enter the tower and maybe get the drop on them."

Thomas looks to the others for their thoughts on the matter.

That sounds good to me...

"Okay then...Thomas, will you be able to sneak over there and work on the door?" Fran asks. "Then once you get it open, you can give us the signal and I'll call my animal friend while everyone heads for the door."
_______

Sorry for the silence but with the holiday I figure most of us were kinda busy anyway!

Munches popcorn while the players plot.

When you are ready, do the skill rolls and descriptions of what you are doing. Stealth, Bluff, Disguise, Disable Device, whatever is appropriate.

Thomas uses a ki point to turn invisible, lasting 2 rounds, then take 10 on stealth.

Stealth at 39. Take 10 +20 invis +9 skill.

He quietly heads towards the door, and takes his thieving tools.

Here we go..

Take 10 for 20 on disable device.

I count 60’ from the courtyard doors to the door to the tower. Are you moving at half speed (no penalty), in which case the Invisibility ends as you get there? Who opens the door?

I am not trying to make this difficult, I just want to make sure I understand your intentions before I determine the results.

With 39, i could indeed afford the -5 penalty.
But we've got chip & dale in T3 first, before i could get to the tower, if i'm not mistaken.

We should be able to just walk past them with Krik disguised as Fat-in-Black and no alarm raised, if I understand correctly.

Yes, you can walk right past them. They are only there for the Worship Hall doors. Provided no alarms sound, they don’t appear to care where you go.

First attempt at this eaten by web goblins.

Kriklishik walks up the stairs, out into the hallway and out the doors into the courtyard. The rest of you follow along. As he opens the door to the courtyard, Thomas pulls his disappearing trick and moves over to the tower door.

Thomas fails to open the door on his first attempt.

Kriklishik can make out a vague shape near the tower door that he assumes is Thomas.

The guard to the south looks down into the courtyard. Seeing Kriklishik, he hesitates. After a moment he asks “Late night training?”

I’ve placed people in the courtyard. Other than Thomas’s position and Kriklishik being in front, you can move yourselves around a bit if you want.

What do you want to do?

Hesitant to speak up because it really wouldn't be their place given the hierarchy, Ramon keeps their head slightly lowered as if they'd just been given a bit of verbal discipline, tail out of sight as ex-Krant would have insisted upon.

We did, after all, create quite the fuss when we were out in the courtyard and it wouldn't be untoward for some 'late night training' to 'correct discipline issues' without the 'careful watchful eyes' of a more merciful elder, after all, right?

"Eh, Mind yer business"

Intimidate: 1d20 + 7 ⇒ (3) + 7 = 10

"Night Guard training. Apparently one o' you lot's been complaining about the rotations. Were up to me I'd just sack the lot of ya."

Bluff: 1d20 + 7 ⇒ (7) + 7 = 14

I hope one of these keys opens that door! Or maybe Thomas...

Pick lock attempt 2: 1d20 + 10 ⇒ (11) + 10 = 21
Pick lock attempt 3: 1d20 + 10 ⇒ (13) + 10 = 23