1. GM Edwin's Zeitgeist Campaign

Game Master Insnare

Cretien and his turret start shooting the first of an upcoming hail of bolts.

Cretien repeating hvy xbow: 1d20 + 5 ⇒ (15) + 5 = 20
1d10 ⇒ 7

turret repeating hvy xbow: 1d20 + 4 ⇒ (3) + 4 = 7
1d10 ⇒ 3

Round 5

Angus will double move and join the fight topside

Johnathan hits sailor 7

Chretien hits sailor 4
turret misses

Falko hits sailor 10

Naval sailor 1 attacks fourth sailor 1d20 + 1 ⇒ (2) + 1 = 3 miss

Naval sailor 2 attacks second sailor 1d20 + 1 ⇒ (18) + 1 = 19 hit 1d8 ⇒ 8 bringing him down.

Naval sailor 3 moves to attack tenth sailor with his fist 1d20 + 1 ⇒ (7) + 1 = 8 miss

Naval sailor 4 attacks Sailor 7 1d20 + 1 ⇒ (8) + 1 = 9 miss

Naval sailor 5 attacks Sailor 9 1d20 + 1 ⇒ (3) + 1 = 4 miss

Officer attacks sailor 8 with his baton 1d20 + 4 ⇒ (17) + 4 = 21 hit 1d6 + 2 ⇒ (3) + 2 = 5 knocking him unconscious.

Common

Combat Over

Cretien keeps his crossbow and his turret trained on the remaining sailors in case they try to jump.

Angus will do his best to Stabilize (orison) all the sailors that are lying on the ground and bleeding to death.

So we have secured the ship and the captain is on the ground on the lower deck i am not sure if he wasn't killed instantly in our fight but is he wasn't then i have stabilized him. Shall we go and check?

Don't you mean she?

Falko nods at Angus: "I'll stay here and organize the prisoners. -Sailors! Stip those men of their weapons. Check thoroughly but respectfully! Then round them up on the deck. You! Find out if there is a brig on those two ships!"

yup as indeed the Captain is a She :)

The sailors wave, touch their heads, fall over, shake their heads, then simultaneously point to a small foul-looking cabin in the aft-deck. Once Captain Bandia is tied up and placed in the hold, and one of the Royal Navy seamen takes over as acting Captain on the Grifoni, the crew dejectedly turn the craft and loose the sails and head towards Flint, following the Silvo.

You have more than enough time to inspect the three weapon crates with their fancy wax seals labelled 'Crisillyiri Military Heritage Exhibition'. You prise one open: it contains about fifty wands, carefully wrapped in fine fabrics to keep their energies from intermingling catastrophically. A note with them states these are 'Property of the Clergy', and part of a military collection and have been enchanted so they could be easily shown off to visiting nobles and religious hierarchs. Each wand is unique, from any of a dozen different centuries, and an archaeologist or arcane scholar could keep herself delighted for years discovering the secret iconography and histories of these weapons. But for rich Crisillyiri patrons, it’s important to be able to pick it up and shoot it without worrying about command words or magical training.

All of the wands have been enchanted so that they can each be fired once per month by whoever is holding them, requiring only a simple act of will. No training or command word is needed. However, the power level of the spell cast through the wand is minimal, so some flashy effects will miss wildly or do inconsequential damage (I have a d12 table for the effects, which range from Magic Missile, to Fire Burst, Dimensional Vault, Godlasers, and Viscid Globs).

The main haul of 5 crates of wands presumeably to be delivered to Deorn are above decks. However, below decks there are many more crates.

godlasers sound good...

Well an other smashing victory for the RHC. If you don't mind i'll just wait top side while you inspect the cargo. That dam woman fired a pistol at me and nearly killed me..

he says trying to some a comfortable place to sit on the deck

Falko is taken aback by the value of their catch. His head spins as he tries to fathom the meaning of such a discovery and its possible political implications, wondering whether they should after all, just sink the ship.

Knowledge (local): 1d20 + 7 ⇒ (13) + 7 = 20

Johnathan keeps watch on the upper decks, nodding to Angus when he surfaces.

He shouts across, "You alright?"

Falko

If you want to search either of the ships more thoroughly, please tell me where and such

Your little convoy sails through the night until you are not far from Flint, and you pause as you decide what you are going to do.

"So what are we gonna do with all this? I recommend we turn it in. Ought to get us a decent increase in our stipend."

"I was considering if getting on this criminal's good side by sinking the ship would benefit the RHC more than the ship itself. Uh... just thinking out loud. Anyone...else?"

Well i'll live that is for sure Johnantan but i am in to way in shape to be of use to any one today. So have you search this ship from top to bottom?

I'm prepping a recap post, but it might take me some time, for things are busy on my end.

What do you need to have recapped?

If you want to search the ship, give me a perception check

perception: 1d20 + 5 ⇒ (18) + 5 = 23 +1 vs traps

Cretien searches the ship, if for no other reason than he needs some pieces to repair his contraptions. Although, knowledge is power and they seemed to need more knowledge to make a wise decision on what to do with situation.

The ship, the loot, this isn't really my decision to make... Cretien thought to himself.

You search the ship and find nothing exciting until after searching under the captain's desk you come across a note written in fancy Chryssilliri script.

Common + DC15 Linguistics

Anyone has any idea what that fancy note is saying ?

DM was the enemy captain stabilized?

"I don't."

not trained in linguistics. not a class skill.

"I do have a scroll that would solve that problem, but perhaps we should let the RHC translate it via mundane means. It could of course be something time sensitive. Perhaps we can convince someone to translate for us."

the captain is stabilized which is part of your RHC training

Great, so we have prisoners and documents and the cargo. So What now ?

Linguistics: 1d20 + 7 ⇒ (20) + 7 = 27

Flako is deep in thoughts about the last few days and what to do with the ship when the letter is put in front of him. He quickly makes sense of the characters and delivers its message, somewhat dismissive in his tone: "It's just some contact the man has in Flint: 'Flint contact: Morgan Cippiano, Cippiano Coffee, Yearling Street and Healers Street, Stray River East Bank'. It doesn't help with our dilemma..."

Falko paces back and forth, trying to put together his thoughts: "This task were doing is against Deorn's Family serves Lorcan's interests. In exchange, he's promised to let us know where to find the Doc."

"Now Lorcan was under the impression that a lot of money would be handed off. Money we haven't found..."

"About the ship, Lorcan wanted us to either destroy it or seize it, but he didn't want it to be given back. That's where it gets tricky: can we make sure the RHC doesn't give it back? Do we have enough pull?"

"And what of those weapons, those wands? Are they that valuable? Can terrorists use them? Won't the officials ask for their safe return, as they seem to be heirlooms of sorts? And what's in the other crates? Anyone checked?"

I don't think we have enough pull to make sure the RHC is in the position to keep the ship. Those wands are worth a fortune and could be valuable to an underground organization in order to keep a fighting force in top shape. The only way i see it is to sink the ship

"Alright. If we sink the ship, we need to get the cargo to our other ship."

Easily done but then the RHC would still have to return the cargo and that would raise the question as to how it acquired it. The only solution is to sink the ship along with cargo and all

"I'd agree, though it pains me... What of the sailors? They'll tell a story. Can we make it look like the crates exploded?"

It doesn't really matter what the sailor say who is going to believe them on top of the fact that we didn't announce ourselves with banners and such. And in any even if our organization is suspected: Plausible denial

"Works for me then. Let's sink this ship and those boxes! But first, I want to know what they have in the crates below deck..." says Falko as he makes his way down, wondering how one opens crates.

"Bring something to open the crates!"

Cretien laments at the loss of such artifacts, but there isn't much to be done about it.

One of the sailors grabs a crowbar from the hold and shows that there are even more artifacts to be had about twenty-five more crates of wands and 15,000 Platinum Pieces and 5,000 Letters of Mark( Primarily used for large transactions in Lanjyr) You also find a crate full of fey pepper. On the crates is also a Manifest written in Common but with loads of codenames.

"What IS all this?" Johnathan says in wonder, looking over the wealth.

"I-" blurts a speechless Falko as more and more treasure is revealed.

What mad venture is this!!

The naval officer takes a look at the newly found stash and says, "Whomever this belongs to, is most definitely going to miss it, plus those two gnomes did get away."

"We may want to just let the RHC higher ups deal with this, this is more than just sinking a ship," Johnathan says, shaking his head in wonder.

The group pulls all of the unconscious sailors onto the Silvo and then carefully brings all of the crates onto it as well. You then work on drilling holes into the Grifoni and you all safely make it aboard the Silvo as the Li Grifoni Grinyande slips calmly beneath the waves.

About an hour later you return to the wharf where you fought Deorn and you transfer the prisoners to some additional paddy wagons for the combined smuggling group.

If you plan on keeping the platinum, a combination of a sleight of hand, stealth and bluff check to get it by the waiting police and intimidate check for the sailors unless you want to bribe them

Chretien makes no attempt to hide or assist in hiding the platinum.

Bluff: 1d20 + 8 ⇒ (12) + 8 = 20 as Angus helps the cargo bypass the waiting police

Angus will vote for bribing the sailors

During the return trip, Falko thinks long and hard about the treasure found. He sighs heavily ffrom time to time, and starts and stops pacing suddenly, mumbling: "They'll know... They'll know!"

I'm not killing over money! Even Dad never went this low...

To the others, at the wharf gets into view: "All right, I say we hand everything..."

He feels the heavy weight of duty press on him. Yet somehow, he feels lighter...

"agreed. Just turn it in, im sure we will get a good stipend back."

Johnathan just nods, looking relieved.

So sink the ship and turn everything. Good for me too

You finally arrive at HQ and you dump the prisoners off at the station and fill out some of the preliminary paperwork and leave the rest for tomorrow.

Is there anything else you would like to do before we start the next morning?

Cretien will spend some time working on his fantastic contraption to get it back into working order.