Motteditor's Ironfang Invasion PBP (Inactive)

Game Master motteditor

Aramis holds out the bag of gold dust and the aquamarine. "Will you take this for the wand?"

@ Isabella: Wonderful! Add it to your list!

Totally fine with that, Aramis. Get yo' self a wand, girl!

Dregg looks to Isabella and frowns. "You can hunt if you want. I'll be chopping and stacking wood." He hooks his thumb over toward the wood pile Veld had mentioned to Clover. "Someone should head back to the others and make sure they're alright though before we get lost in these chores."

Happy to take the non-lethal and put in some labor.

Non-lethal: 1d6 ⇒ 5

”I’ll help with the wood chopping. It’ll be good practice.”

Arryn goes with Dregg. As the half-orc splits the wood, Arryn floats it away, floating the next piece into place. If the axe doesn’t split it cleanly, he uses his mind to pull the pieces apart. A few times, he tries to lift heavier and heavier stacks of wood, asking Dregg to guess the poundage of the biggest stack he can lift. Throughout the whole endeavour, he is uncharacteristically serious, apologizing if his questions and experiments are a nuisance.

Then there’s the unfortunate incident when Dregg takes a five-minute break and Arryn attempts to use his powers to wield the axe itself. Fortunately, Dregg has good reflexes.

Veld considers Aramis' offer and nods, as Dregg, Clover and Arryn set to doing chores around the shack. At the end, with the sun down, they finish weary but accomplished. 3 hp nonlethal to Clover, 6 to Arryn When they're done, Veld hand over a decent portion of rations +3 PP; you had 31 before, minus the half day's rations (14), leaves you with 17 PP. Don't forget everyone will be at -2 for the next day.

You're at Veld's shack, about a half-mile from the rest of the camp, sun down. Let me know your next moves.

2d6 ⇒ (3, 6) = 9

Aramis finishes trading for the wand and then returns to keep an eye on the refugees, as per Dregg's suggestion.

Dregg sheds his armor before beginning his wood chopping, revealing once again the myriad scars criss-crossing his torso in addition to those upon his face. The work is exhausting, and he's at first oblivious to the danger as he bends over to pick up his waterskin to take a drink. An ominous thunk overhead gives him pause for a moment and he freezes. Slowly, he rises, looking upward as he stands back up, and sees the axe head buried in the trunk of the tree as the handle quivers slightly.

Slowly turning to look at Arryn, he sighs heavily and rips the axe free from the tree before tossing it back with a frown. He takes a drink before dropping down into the cradle of the tree trunk with a huff. "You can have a turn without trying to assassinate me, you know. Just ask."

Did we get clear enough directions from Veld to confidently make for the caves? If so, let's camp for the night then set out in the AM.

But we should get back to our people, rather than camp there.

Yes. It might require a little looking around when you get close, but you think you have some ideas.

You return to camp, ready to sleep -- but as you go to add your new foodstuffs to the previously supplies you notice the food seems noticeably diminished! You would guess at least half your supplies are gone! Down to 10 PP, including the stuff from Veld

Is it the meat? Is the meat from that smokehouse what's missing? If so, Dregg may surpass both his limitations and the rules of the game and manage to rage whilst fatigued!

LOL! Some of it is the meat from the smokehouse.

”This is ridiculous! If I find that fat whiner has been scarfing extra food, I’ll be sending him to Phaendar as an envoy! We need to find out who is in charge of guarding the provisions.”

"Ar," Isabella agrees as she calmly loads her crossbow. "But be wise this might be the next hob-paid killer, only more subtle. Or some freakshow faerie playing tricks. Either way, getcher weapons ready."

Make sure you let me know what you want to do.

Aramis heads over to see Jet, who is in charge of the provisions. "What happened to the food?"

Jet struggles awake.

"Huh? What do you mean?"

Filled in, she is baffled. The food was all there when she went to bed.

"I'll check with the guards."

Aramis wanders over to see Isabella. "Do me a favour. Check for hoofprints around here. And hobgoblins, of course."

Then she goes over to question the guards who were supposed to be on watch. "Did you see anyone approach our storage? Hear anything strange tonight?"

Isabella starts checking for tracks around the supplies... crossbow primed and ready.

Survival 1d20 + 10 ⇒ (4) + 10 = 14

The loss of the food is a huge blow. Clover is flummoxed practically to tears.

It could be that a random thief or some forest denizen made off with the food, but she can't make sense of a connection to the hobgoblins or their allies being behind it. Why would they just take food when they had everyone asleep and at their mercy?

Another, very unappetizing thought comes to her. "We need a head count to see if everyone is still here."

Dregg stands by the stores, staring blankly at the empty spots where the smoked meats had been, his left eye twitching and spasming as the armor he'd been carrying in hand falls to the ground with a dull clank.

"Oy, green genes! Come help me find out who nicked your dinner," Isabella calls over.

Isabella finds plenty of tracks around the supplies, but unfortunately nothing to indicate which is the thief vs. which were Jet's and others who were preparing food.

Clover's idea does bear a little more fruit however, as Edran appears to be missing!

Clover is disappointed.

"Jet, was Edran on a guard shift earlier?"

"He might have been," Jet replies. She thinks he was, but isn't 100 percent sure.

Dregg doesn't respond when Isabella calls for his help and he doesn't react when Clover reveals to the group that Edran's gone missing. He remains fixed in place, his eye twitching sporadically as he tries to will the missing foodstuffs back into place.

Dregg doesn't seem to have the power to materialize smoked meats out of thin air.

Isabella heaves a sigh, and throws a pebble at the back of Dregg's head.

"Oy! Green genes! Come help me look at the tracks, and maybe we can save a cured ham or something."

The pebble is enough to shake Dregg from his shock-induced paralysis and a deep, angry scowl darkens his face. Mistaking the thrown rock to be another of Arryn's telekinetically tossed projectiles, he jabs one meaty finger into the center of his chest, "Not now!"

He then wheels around on Isabella and shouts, "Keep your goggles on." as he descends into loudly grumbled oaths about burning the whole of the forest down and other wanton acts of destruction and violence.

Survival (aid another): 1d20 + 8 - 2 ⇒ (8) + 8 - 2 = 14 Success! +2 to Isabella's results

Two of the remaining sausages rise into the air, form the shape of a mouth, turn to Dregg, and say (with a squeaky voice nowhere near them), ”Dregg! Save our friends!”

It takes some time, but you think you can find some tracks leading south, back toward the direction you came from.

”As much as I would prefer to rest, I prefer not starving more. Isabella, would you be so kind as to lead the way along these tracks?”

Isabella nods and leads the way.

Couple reminders since it's been a while since we've been able to get going. You've had mention of a boot you might be interested in here. You're also all at a -2 penalty because you didn't have enough to eat. (A character who eats only a half portion takes a –2 penalty on attack rolls, damage rolls, ability checks, skill checks, and saving throws until she consumes a full portion. If a person eats half provisions more than 3 days a week, she doesn’t have enough body fat to endure starvation for long, and must begin making Constitution checks each day to avoid taking nonlethal damage. If a person eats no provisions in a day, she takes the –2 penalty on all attack rolls, damage rolls, ability checks, skill checks, and saving throws listed above.)

You follow the tracks as best you can, Isabella, Aramis and Dregg having little issue with the darkness, though Clover and Arryn find they'll need a light source to make their way along.

After several hours -- you don't think your quarry got that long of a head start, but you have to go slowly tracking him -- you find Edran. He, however, won't be providing any answers, as he's dead, his throat slit. There's no sign of a struggle -- or of most of the missing supplies (just a few links of sausage) -- but you do find a number of hoofprints around his body.

Welcome back, everyone.

”Clover, throw away that apple, if you haven’t already.”

Survival: 1d20 ⇒ 7

Aramis collects the sausage links and any other supplies that remains behind. When the others point out the hoof prints, she frowns. "Can you tell if it's a centaur or a horse?" she asks Isabella.

"I can stay up all hours of the night on watch to keep these people safe, but I can't do anything for the fools dumb enough to sneak off with armfulls of food." Dregg, still exhausted and showing every bit of his frayed temper, frowns down at the crumpled form of Edran. "Idiot."

I'll aid Isabella on a survival check. I feel like Dregg's too pooped to take point on anything but can at least be cajoled into helping.
Survival (aid another): 1d20 + 8 - 2 ⇒ (10) + 8 - 2 = 16 Success!

Survival 1d20 + 10 - 2 + 2 ⇒ (10) + 10 - 2 + 2 = 20. (Aid another factored in.)

Isabella looks at the hoofprints - and frowns.
"Need a minute ta make sure of that... but whatever it was took a load off right here. Might be we can still catch up."

"Oh yeah, I forgot about it." Clover fishes the apple out of her bag and tosses it away.

Clover seems very out of sorts, a mixer or anger and pity at Edran, but she helps with the tracks if she can.

Survival (Aid): 1d20 ⇒ 16

As you look around, Isabella realizing that the hoof marks do indeed likely indicate they came from a centaur, an arrow comes flying out of the darkness to the east, about a handspan above Dregg's head!

1d20 + 5 ⇒ (4) + 5 = 9

Party is up, except for Arryn. You can't see anything in the darkness. Also, I'm assuming someone has a light source for the humans? Please let me know who...

I'll be AFK on Sunday, returning Monday afternoon.

Yeah, if it's dark Aramis would have cast light on her shirt.

Aramis lets out a gasp of surprise. She chants a few words of arcane power and moves her hands to form a few esoteric symbols. A glowing green light outlines her for a moment, before fading out of sight. Casting mage armour on herself.

Then she draws one of her wands. Drawing her wand of magic missile that has six charges left.

"Where is he?"

Isabella tries to determine the location of the enemy sniper by the arrow's trajectory...

Perception 1d20 + 7 ⇒ (6) + 7 = 13

...and shoots in that general direction, then reloads!

Heavy crossbow 1d20 + 6 ⇒ (18) + 6 = 24 for 1d10 ⇒ 10 damage.

Aramis casts a spell and draws a wand as Isabella shoots in the general direction of where the arrow came from. She doesn't hear any cry of pain, however, so assumes she missed the creature.

Dregg pulls his own bow as he moves in the general direction of the enemy, and thinks he catches sight of it -- maybe -- but his arrow flies far wide of his target.

Clover pulls and loads her sling, looking around.

From the woods, another arrow comes flying past Dregg, and you can hear the sound of hoofbeats moving away from that position. DC 6 Perception to find the general location, about 50 feet away. Remember it's in the dark so any of you would need to move and have darkvision to see it.

40ft of movement should be enough to get me close enough to see with my darkvision if I'm not near enough already, yeah? If 40 ft is enough to close to melee, Dregg will swing his axe, otherwise he'll shoot his bow.

Perception (DC 6): 1d20 + 9 - 2 ⇒ (19) + 9 - 2 = 26

"I'm just about sick of-" Dregg cuts off his complaint with a low growl as he bolts in the general direction of the shooter, grumbling and growling as loudly as he can so the others can easily follow. "Quit running! Hey! Quit shooting at me too, you piece of garbage! Oh- oh ho ho, that's it! I'm going to enjoy turning you into glue!"

Axe: 1d20 + 7 - 3 - 1 ⇒ (12) + 7 - 3 - 1 = 15for: 1d12 + 6 - 3 + 3 ⇒ (4) + 6 - 3 + 3 = 10

or Bow: 1d20 + 3 - 3 ⇒ (10) + 3 - 3 = 10for: 1d6 + 2 - 3 ⇒ (5) + 2 - 3 = 4

Arryn auto makes that Perception DC

Arryn pulls a flask of alchemist’s fire from his pack, then dashes forward 30 feet into the darkness and ducks down behind a bush.

Perception: 1d20 + 2 ⇒ (9) + 2 = 11

Aramis hurries towards the sound of hoofbeats, her glowing shirt lighting the path ahead.

Moving towards the sounds. If she sees hims she'll use her wand. If she doesn't she'll take another move action.

Magic Missile Damage (if possible): 1d4 + 1 ⇒ (4) + 1 = 5

Isabella spits a curse, swaps her crossbow out for shield and sword, and follows on Aramis' heels.

I automatically make the DC. Will stick close to Aramis and attack as soon as I can get a bead on the blighter.

When arrows start coming Clover's first impulse is to "Eeep!" and hunker down amongst the forest undergrowth. She has no idea what's going on out there anyway.

But, when the others start moving off, seemingly because they're chasing the attacker, she follows as well. Besides Aramis has the light, and Clove rthinks it wouldn't do at all to remain squatting in the dark waiting for other bad things to happen.

Perception: 1d20 + 2 ⇒ (1) + 2 = 3

Arryn pulls out the alchemical weapon and rushes in the direction of the hooves as quickly as he can manage in the darkness, Clover joining him.

Aramis rushes forward, barely able to see him with her better, elven vision, and blasts the centaur with her wand, as Dregg rushes around in the attacker's path, his arrow flying far wide.

The centaur fires again at Dregg, this time the arrow finding its mark 7 hp as it continues to lope around the clearing, trying to stay in the darkness. DC 5 Perception to locate it; now about 50 feet to the west of where it was before as it circles you

Clover hurries over to Aramis. "If you can put a light on him so he casts a shadow, I can try to stop all of his galloping around."

Perception: 1d20 + 2 ⇒ (11) + 2 = 13

"Better idea, set the freak on fire!" Isabella growls as she tries to pinpoint the centaur exactly enough to attack, and swaps her sword and shield back out for her crossbow.

Perception 1d20 + 7 ⇒ (19) + 7 = 26

Aramis frowns. "I can try!" She hurries forward, drawing an alchemist's fire as she goes. Then she winds up and tosses it at the centaur.

Ranged Touch Attack: 1d20 + 2 - 2 ⇒ (12) + 2 - 2 = 12 Assumed I was 20 feet away after my move action so I included one range increment penalty. If I'm further away that's an extra -2 on my attack roll.
Fire Damage: 1d6 ⇒ 4 And if I hit he's on fire for 1 round.
If Miss I hit which square?: 1d8 ⇒ 4 And he takes 1 fire splash damage.