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Part Three: Blackrock Company and the Warrior’s Fall

Part Three of our intrepid adventure begins midday on Hammer the 3rd, the Year of Wild Magic 1372. When we last left our courageous adventurers, they had just defeated a nasty Grell who’d done its best to kill Isi, the party thief. The party takes some time to rest and heads out into other unexplored parts of Jzaridune, still seeking the missing children and the missing familiar of the eccentric gnome locksmith, Ghelve.

After wandering back through rooms already cleared and investigated, the party comes back to a door they can now unlock. They find an abandoned barracks of some kind and decide to explore the tunnel dug out of the back of the room. The Bard, Blackrock, uses his knowledge of maps and dungeoneering to ascertain that this tunnel connects back to the very first side tunnel they headed into. He guides the party in a direction they hadn’t taken before with the Cleric of Lathander, Neocon, at the head. (You’ll recall, Isi vowed never to lead the party and despite Isi’s player being absent from this session, Isi kept her word.)

Neocon rounds a cramped corner and sees that the tunnel finishes under a hole that’s been cut in some sort of closet. He stands up, his head sticking through the hole, and is attacked by one of the tall ones from Ghelve’s shop. The creature tries mightily to stab a rapier through noble Neocon’s head but manages to miss despite having the high ground and standing not more than two feet from the Cleric.

Neocon launches himself out of the hole, deftly getting out of the way of another vicious rapier attack, and clears the way for the rest of the party. The fighter Nameless follows, striking a nearly fatal blow on the foul villain with his staff. The remainder of the party elects to stay below, as the room this battle is occurring in is just ten feet across.

The beast is dispatched in short order, and the party climbs up into the cramped room. They find a secret exit and head out into another dusty and abandoned corridor.

Sometime later, they find a secret door on the north wall of a dusty storage room. Isi and Blackrock open it and step through, activating a spring-loaded floor trap that jettisons them down a flight of stairs. Blackrock lands in a heap, but the dexterous Isi changes her flight into a delicate back flip and lands on her feet, none the worse for wear. The trap clicks three times and resets.

Nameless, thinking ten feet is nothing for a jump, makes a grand attempt at leaping the floor trap, fails, and is also catapulted down the flight of stairs. He lands in a heap as the trap resets above. Allastar, one of the most intelligent party members, thinks Nameless had the right idea with too much armor, and thinks his lightly armored body can make it across. He rolls a one. Catapult. Flight of stairs. Pile of Sorcerer.

Neocon the Wise expresses his hesitance to share the same fate as the rest of Blackrock Company and announces he’ll be going around, somehow, and finding a way back. Nameless silently disagrees and climbs the steps to aid Neocon in his jump. He makes it and then goes about the lonely task of healing his damaged friends.

The bottom of the stairs most of the party landed on empties into a gigantic room with lofty, vaulted ceilings. The room has the appearance of some ancient dining area and the walls are depicted beautifully with dancing gnomes and laughing gnome children. Several lights float about the room and a fountain resides against the south wall.

The rest of the party wanders the room exploring while Blackrock splashes around the fountain searching for anything of value or secret in nature. Out of the shadows come two tiny objects. They land squarely at the feet of the two blocks of characters and explode, filling the room with a dragon’s roar of noise. Neocon, Blackrock, and Nameless are struck completely deaf by the cacophony. Conversations like this ensue:

Allastar: Flank him, Neocon!
Neocon: WHAT?
Allastar: *hand gestures that resemble flanking*
Neocon: …WHAT?
Blackrock: ARE YOU SAYING SOMETHING TO ME?
Nameless: …
Neocon: WHAT?

Despite their handicap, the tall ones that flung the thunderstones are defeated with little to no damage to the party.

Heading west out of the room, they come across what looks to be a prop room for a theater. A menagerie of worthless masks, costumes, and makeup spill from several wardrobes and chests. They find a half open secret door and explore into a side room.

What, they’d taken to be a pile of more costumes in the secret room ends up being some kind of tall one in wolf’s clothing. The black-skinned beast leaps to his feet and attacks; a wolf’s head mask and cloak his only clothing. The party is initially taken aback: they can see right through this creature! Only Blackrock’s bardic knowledge keeps the cleric from a turn attempt as he announces this creature to be under some sort of spell and not an undead.

The party lays into the creature, dealing a bit of damage before the wolf’s head mask and cloak are tossed to the ground and the near-invisible creature disappears from sight and escapes.

Not too long after that the party enters a bath. Blackrock and Allastar realize the water flowing from the ceiling into the tub is an illusion. The spider webs across the ceiling and the body hanging from them, however, are not. Neocon walks up to the tub to take a look inside and is greeted by a medium-sized monstrous spider. The spider strikes at the cleric, misses, and the party charges into the room. Several small monstrous spiders begin descending from the ceiling. The first lands on Neocon’s head, bites, and nearly poisons the cleric. Nameless steps up, his quarterstaff gripped at one end with both hands and swings with all of his might. He smashes the spider off Neocon’s head and grins as it splats into a nearby wall. Meanwhile, the party flanks and attacks the larger beastie. Allastar is bitten but not poisoned by the medium spider as another small one drops onto Neocon’s head. Neocon rushes to the side to escape its bite and Nameless swats this second one into the wall just the same as the first. The larger spider is felled and the party rests and recovers for a short period of time.

After additional exploring of the south and central portions of Jzaridune, the party encounters, fights, and gets a tall one to surrender. The creature agrees to show the party where the familiar is kept as long as they let him go afterwards. He wanders back through the rough tunnels and shows the PCs a secret door off the main stairwell leading down from Ghelve’s shop. Through there, he shows them the location of a trip (disabled by Isi) and then gestures through a set of doors saying the familiar is past them. He then runs off.

The party opens the door and finds an odd room that Blackrock realizes is an elevator. Two hobgoblins stand guard here. Neocon shouts, “Surrender in the name of Lathander!” and one of the hobgoblins responds by trying to through a javelin at the charismatic cleric. He fails miserably, gets the javelin tangled in one of the set of chains holding the floor up, and falls prone. The rest of the party rushes in and kills the hobgoblins.

Blackrock finds a switch, Isi declares it’s free of traps, and after the switch is thrown the party descends into what they can only assume is the Malachite Fortress.

After an unsteady descent, the elevator rumbles to a stop in a room with one door. Isi finds a secret door and a room with another lever used to raise the elevator back to Jzaridune. The party explores through the iron-reinforced wooden door and finds a large room with two empty cages handing from the ceiling. A stone sculpture with several crystalline protrusions sits between the cages.

Once the party comes within five feet of the sculpture it moves and attacks them. Several party members are injured in the opening rounds but they’re just getting the upper hand when a door at the other end of the hall opens to reveal the largest Ogre any of them have ever seen or heard of. The Ogre goes after the nearest target, Blackrock, and knocks him right off his riding dog with one swipe of a large falchion leaving Blackrock unconscious and bleeding to death on the stone floor.

In the meantime, the sculpture takes a huge chunk out of Allastar the Sorcerer and knocks Neocon unconscious. This leaves Isi and Nameless as the only party members standing. Nameless smashes the statue to bits and, by doing this, puts himself between the Ogre and the rest of the party. Isi recovers a potion from Neocon’s belt pouch and pours the contents down his throat, reviving the weakened cleric.

The beastly Ogre roars and charges Nameless. In one swipe of his massive blade he nearly cleaves the mute fighter in half and Nameless’ corpse falls to the ground, blood spewing everywhere. Allastar, weakened but conscious, drinks a potion and dazes the Ogre just long enough for someone to pour a potion in the mouth of Blackrock. The party stumbles back to the elevator, leaving their party member and Neocon’s childhood friend dead on the stone floor of the Malachite Fortress.

Isi activates the elevator and Neocon tries to keep the door shut. The party hears the Ogre roar again as he charges the door and nearly smashes it off its hinges. The moment the elevator clears the top of the door it’s chopped to pieces by the Ogre’s falchion.

As the elevator rumbles slowly upward Neocon cries for the loss of his friend and screams out, “NAMELESS!!!” Blackrock vows, “I will make certain no one forgets the name of that valiant Fighter known as … The Nameless.”

The party surfaces for much needed rest. They report in at the Church of Tyr to give an update and Jadyn says that the midnight service that night will be dedicated to the lost hero of the Blackrock Company, Nameless the Fighter.

The party rests, renews their supplies, and attends the memorial. Neocon gives a very serious and touching speech about his childhood friend and vows to avenge him.

After the memorial, a member of the City Watch named Carlisle approaches Neocon and offers his help. The party agrees to meet him at the Church of Tyr the next morning to head back into Jzaridune.

Until next time …

Memorable Quotes:

Blackrook: You are so obtuse, Neocon.
Neocon: Thank you.
Isi: Do you know what obtuse means?
Neocon: No.
Allastair: For you, it's a compliment.
Neocon: Well, then- thank you.

Jeff: *sigh* I’ll attack the centipede.
Blackrock: You do not attack with your usual bravado!
Jeff as Neocon: It seems wasted on centipedes!

Part Two: Blackrock Company and the Sorcerer Hero

Our heroes descend the steps into Jzaridune and come upon a room filled with giggling laughter. The walls are covered in gnome masks and Neocon, in style, begins attempting conversations with them. He fails. The party realizes all of the rooms in this place have gear-shaped doors on which a single, gnomish rune is carved. The Bard (Blackrock) can read them and determines a key of the same letter is probably needed to open them.

The group investigates a nearby room where another of the creatures they defeated in Ghelve’s shop attacks them. After an easy battle, they head into a series of tunnels that have been dug to connect various rooms and, most likely, bypass the locked doors.

They find an ancient kitchen wherein they are attacked by two smaller creatures that appear out of nowhere, flank, and attempt to take the thief (Isi) down. The party wins the battle but sustains some wounds and has to take a small break to get everyone healed up.

After leaving the kitchen they find a hall full of the rune-inscribed gear-shaped doors. Isi expertly dismantles an acid trap atop one of the doors but is completely incapable of getting the door to unlock.

The party next finds a wilderness room filled with trees, sunlight, grass, and the sounds of twittering birds. They think the room is incredibly creepy considering it was raining up on the surface.

Not long afterwards, the party heads up some steps and into a smallish room with piles of rubble in every corner. A raspy voice calls out something in a guttural language and they hear footsteps running away from them. Isi sneaks ahead to investigate and winks out of existence just a few feet into the room. The thief notices nothing of the sort, but does see a rather damaged robotic-looking construct with a drill for one hand suddenly standing in front of her. Its eyes glow red as it attempts to crush Isi with a hulking drill bit hand. It can’t seem to get moving, though, and the little Halfling is spared.

The rest of the party hears the noise and runs in looking for the thief. Half of them disappear and chaos ensues. It becomes clear that parts of this room are under some sort of invisibility sphere. The unreliable construct manages to disable the Sorcerer, Allastar, with a hideous sonic scream. The party beats on the thing furiously, trying to cease its screams and its knee-buckling slam attack. Most everyone is useless in the fight, but the quiet Allistar fires off several volleys of magic missiles, draws his short spear, and proceeds to thrash the construct from one end of the room to another. He does more damage and hits more often in this combat than the fighter and the cleric combined.

Despite Allistar’s glorious destruction of the construct, several members of the party lay unconscious and dying. Hurried use of a few healing potions gets everyone stable and awake but Blackrock Company knows this dungeon will take more than one foray to defeat. They make their way back up to Cauldron sore, hungry, and bloodied.

Ghelve waits in his shop for the party, curious why they’ve surfaced without his familiar. The old gnome warns the party that more of the creatures will come up and destroy his shop as well as kill him. The party draws up a plan whereby they evacuate the old locksmith to the Church of Tyr with his most expensive belongings. Some members want him turned over to the watch, but others are still afraid that the watch is corrupt.

Isi summons a member of the town guard and tells them that the Last Laugh is planning to rob Ghelve’s shop that night and they should probably keep an eye on it. The guard thanks Isi for the tip and promises to tell his superiors.

After checking in at the Church of Tyr for healing, scroll purchasing, gnome dropping, and a progress report, Blackrock Company heads to Skie’s Treasury to sell a few items they’d found below. After the Bard thoroughly entertains Skie with a song of their exploits, the party stocks up on potions and calls it a night.

Rain continues to poor across Cauldron as the party awakes to head back down into Jzaridune. They find Ghelve’s shop undisturbed and make their way back through the tunnels they’d already cleared with no trouble. After a few new turns, they enter a room with a single lever sticking from the wall. Blackrock’s expert knowledge of Dungeoneering tells him that this lever is a part of the enclave and not some added trap. Isi, convinced this must be trapped, begins to investigate it as the bard strides up and grabs the handle. What ensues can best be described as WWE midget wrestling as the Bard and Thief lock arms in mortal struggle (opposed grapple checks). The Bard wins, the Thief runs, and down comes the switch.

*clack*

They hear a rumble in the distance, some turning of gears, and a large CLANK and then nothing. “I knew that would happen,” says the Bard smugly.

Elsewhere in the dungeon, after some routine exploring, they encounter a makeshift, wooden barrier in the middle of a hallway. It appears as if someone has taken a part a couple of tables and bolted them to the floor, ceiling, and walls to create a wall blocking the passageway. There is some debate over whether or not to leave it there or knock it down and Neocon, in his wisdom, decides it’s best to smash it down than go around. Neocon and Nameless destroy the thing with a few good smashes and the party heads on in.

They find an old foundry, enormous in size, with balconies to the east and west of the room. A gear glowing with magical light is hung from the north end of the room and illuminates everything with the power of daylight. They dig around a bit and end up finding their first secret door. Opening the door reveals a small room that seems to have been a sort of library or study room. The party steps in and activates a warning message from a gnome wizard who tells the party of a great sickness called The Wasting that has infected their magic items.

Taking the warning to heart, the party searches around for magic items and, instead, finds another secret door. This one slides open to reveal a room shrouded in magical mist. Small, monstrous centipedes skitter out of the cloud and attack and are easily dispatched in a few seconds of sword swinging.

The party heads back into the foundry to explore the balconies. They move up a set of ancient, iron stairs that twist into the ceiling, Isi Bramblefoot at the head. Joe fails Isi’s spot check miserably and is rewarded by the tentacle grip of a grell who has taken roost here. The grell swoops, snatches the little halfling, and soars toward the ceiling. Isi is paralyzed by the stings of the grell and can do nothing to save herself. The party spreads out across the balcony, keeping a wary eye on their friend and their foe. Isi is released from a height of 45 feet and plummets to the hard, foundry floor below. She’s sustained a great deal of damage but still suffers from paralyses and is unable to tell anyone she’s hurt.

The grell swoops again, intent on grabbing the other small adventurer, Blackrock the Bard, and ends up being attacked from all sides by the rest of the party. He does not make it out of the melee and falls to the ground in a wet slump of tentacles and brains.

The party rushes down to see if Isi is still alive, heals her, and waits for her paralyses to wear off. It does. Isi sits up.

“I am not leading the party anymore!” she declares.

Until next time …

How about a marketing campaign aimed at bringing more old time gamers back? *snip*

See Dungeon #126, WOTC's "Basement Elf" ad. Someone out there has been reading your mind.

Memorable quotes:

At the Church of Tyr, after Isi had dumped all of the coins she took off the street thugs into their donations box:
Isi: If I find out this money goes to anyone other than the Orphanage, I’ll come find you.
Jadyn (Cleric of Tyr): Uh … I don’t think you really know what we do here.

Neocon (to Jadyn): Are you kidding me!? I am the KING of Adventurers!!
Jadyn: I know a King, sir, and you are no King.

Neocon: *says something incredibly boastful about his position in the Church of Lathander*
Me (out of game): You know that Neocon is the lowest Cleric of Lathander at the Church right? He sweeps floors and scrubs toilets.
Jeff: Yeah, but I’m not going to tell them THAT.

After Neocon makes yet another self-important boast:
Nameless: *scribbles furiously on a piece of paper and hands it to Blackrock*
Blackrock (reads to himself): Neocon is a buffoon, but he means well.
Neocon: He doesn’t do THAT often! Whatever that note says, it must be VERY important!!

At Ghelve’s Locks after poor Ghelve horribly fails his bluff check and gestures wildly into the backroom like the party members should follow him there (instead of staying put) and then gets utterly confused when they all run behind the counter:
Ghelve: W-what are you doing!?
Isi (imagining someone is in the backroom and she’s going to bluff them): Don’t move and no one gets hurt!
Allastair (who just stepped in the door from outside): WHAT IN THE HELL ARE YOU DOING, ISI!?
Ghelve: Uh … *casts color spray*
(Isi and Neocon fail their saves)

Our adventure begins late at night on the 1st of Hammer, the Year of Wild Magic, 1372 in the city of Cauldron. It’s the dry season in the Jungles of Chult but, tonight, it’s raining like a monsoon. The night before was a huge, citywide festival celebrating the end of the year. Tonight, most of our characters are headed to home or inn after participating in 1st Day celebrations. Isi is the exception as she was jumping from roof to roof in search of a bad seed to take donations from.

All of the characters hear the cries of help from Ruphus and a number of angry curses. They all proceed to the scene and arrive just as one of the Street Thugs leans over the battered Ruphus and screams, “Stay away from the orphanage, cleric!”

Neocon orders the thugs away in the name of Lathander, they respond by drawing their swords. Allastair dazes the biggest thug even though he’s not really sure what’s going on. Isi attempts to jump from the roof, fails, and lands on her butt in the mud. She drops her weapon in the fall. At the same time she was falling, one of the thugs – who’d tried to climb up to get her – fell off the side of the building. Neocon, always quick to note the obvious, says, “There seems to be an abundance of the fleet of foot out here tonight!” When the thug tries to stand, Neocon smashes him in the face with his mace and Isi backstabs him – he takes enough damage to be very, very dead. In the meantime, a Gnome Bard comes running up the street singing a tale of great battle. Nameless gets into the thick of things by pummeling the dazed street thug to the ground. The Bard then takes a pot shot at that remaining villain and, though the Bard missed by a mile with his crossbow, the thug drops his weapon and surrenders. Neocon stabilizes the wounded baddy and Ruphus thanks them profusely for their help.

Just then, the City Guard arrives, appraises the situation, and decides not to take the group in for questioning at the behest of Ruphus. There is a moment of confusion when the Guard sergeant recognizes the third thug as one of his squad members. The City Guard takes the body and the two other thugs away and now some of the party members feel the City Guard might be corrupt. (They haven’t heard yet whether or not the men were prosecuted.) Neocon loudly declares he will testify against the ruffians.

Ruphus convinces the group to head to his Church for a reward and conversation with Jadyn. They agree. There is some talk on the way through the rain about who each person is and how that battle was exciting etc.

Arrive at the Church of Tyr. Jadyn thanks the party for their help and then tells them about the missing people and the missing children. She implores them to help and then asks them to witness the ceremony whereby she gets the riddle from Tyr. After she offers gold and gives some potions out in good faith, this glues the party together and they hole-heartedly agree to find the children. At this point, Jadyn encourages the party to register as an Adventuring Group at the city hall so they’ll be less hassled by the City Guard in their investigation.

The party wants to get rocking right that second but Allastair points out the time and they all agree to meet the next morning at the Slippery Eel.

Cut to the city hall: the party has met and arrived early to register. They encounter a dilapidated old man who digs through his mounds of paperwork to find the right form. He offers them a fishing license at first to which Neocon says, “You have to have a license to fish!?” The little old man blinks and says, “Well, yeah, technically …” and Neocon grabs the form, starts filling it out, and declares, “I will end my days of lawlessness here!” The old man blinks again and says, “You’re actually going to fill it out?” Neocon answers in the affirmative, pays his last gold piece, and gets a fishing license.

Moments later the correct form is found, the party fills it out, argues over what to name themselves, and – much to the excitement of the Bard – they become the Blackrock Company. There is a moment of concern when each person has to hold a Rod of Zone of Truth as they dictate their information and Isi isn’t sure if she wants to give her real name but it all passes and the party gets under way.

The party assumed correctly that the first line of the riddle probably had something to do with Ghelve’s Locks. They head there and find Ghelve in the store. The party questions him for some time about the locks at the Orphanage and his behavior gets increasingly more bizarre. Allastair, Neocon, and Nameless go outside to see if there is another way in to the shop as Isi and Blackrock continue to question the old Gnome. This is about the time that Ghelve begins trying to tell the party something with hand gestures, fails his Bluff check, and seems to gesture the party into the backroom. Neocon comes back in at this point. Neocon, Isi, and Blackrock, thinking that Ghelve wants them to come into the backroom, all go behind the counter. Ghelve gets confused (see the quotes below), ends up color-spraying Isi and Neocon, and flees into the backroom. After an odd initiative round where no one attacks each other, Ghelve manages to flee up the stairs.

An odd looking creature leaps from the balcony above and starts attacking Blackrock. Allastair attempts to daze it and fails. Nameless comes back inside, sees everything going down, and fights the creature mano e mano. The creature, wounded, crashes through the window and tries to run for it. Nameless knocks him out with his quarterstaff and drags him back inside. About 30 seconds later, Isi and Neocon recover. Ghelve has locked himself in the kitchen upstairs. Isi tries to pick the lock, fails. Tries to pick a couple of other locks in the place, fails. (These are very good locks.)

After a lot of RP and diplomacy checks, the party gets Ghelve to come out. Ghelve spills his guts (and reveals the door to Jzaridune) and submits to whatever punishment the party wants to dish out. When it seems the creature may be turned over to the City Guard for questioning, Nameless kills it. This shocks everyone but Neocon who says, “You have to expect that from him. I’ve tried to change him.”

The party agrees to deal with Ghelve later and steps onto the landing leading to the darkness of Jzaridune.

To be continued…

*SHACKLED CITY SPOILERS – DO NOT READ IF YOU DON’T WANT TO KNOW WHAT HAPPENS*

Also, for those of you who know what lies ahead, please don’t hint at nor discuss future events, as my players will be reading and participating. :-)

Saturday afternoon I began my Shackled City campaign.

As background, I’ve set my campaign in the Forgotten Realms beginning the 1st day of Hammer, in The Year of Wild Magic 1372. Cauldron’s location is on the northern face of the center-most point of the Sanrach Mountains in the southeast corner of the Jungles of Chult. It’s nearly due north of the city of Samarach. I used all of the typical god conversions as detailed on page 9 of the FRCS but, in the interest of saving time, here are the important ones:

St. Cuthbert = Tyr
Pelor = Lathander
Kord = Tempus
Wee Jas = Kelemvor

The characters are as follows:

Jeff H. is playing “Neocon”, a brazen and boasting NG Male Human Cleric of Lathander who KNOWS that he’s the savior of Faerun. Neocon sees himself as a super hero-type: he’s here to save the world and look good doing it. He speaks in a booming, boastful voice and is quick to flash his charismatic grin and flex his muscles for the passersby. He was raised in the Lantern Street Orphanage and knew from the age of five that Lathander was his calling.

“The Nameless” is an NPC I’m running to flesh out the party. Nameless was also raised in the Lantern Street Orphanage and arrived on the doorstep when Neocon was just beginning to realize his True Calling. Nameless has never spoken a word to anyone but has been good friends with Neocon all his life. Nameless found his calling when a Priest of Tempus came ‘round to the Orphanage to teach some of the teenage boys the use of sword and staff. Nameless is a CN Male Human Fighter who specializes in the quarterstaff. He is intensely loyal to Neocon (even though he thinks the Lathandarite is a buffoon) and rarely communicates with anyone else. He can read and write four languages and uses a pad of parchment to talk to people – although he does this rarely. Nameless has an unhealthy obsession with death and this is probably why the future undead-slayer Neocon enjoys his company.

Eric B. is playing “Allastair”, a quiet and intelligent NG Human Male Sorcerer. Allastair, all his life, has exuded a dark and mysterious air. He’s a good man, but quietly unsettling to folks around him. He spent most of his teen years working for a caravan that brought food up from Redgorge. Just six months ago he began to realize he had natural magical talent and started to train himself to control these new powers. The night before the adventure starts, the Redgorge Company gives a going away party for Allastair as he was leaving Cauldron to seek adventuring fame somewhere else in the world. Little did he know, the adventure he craved was just hours away …

Reid S. is playing “Roodwyn Felkor Blackrock”, a boisterous, thickly accented, NG Male Gnome Bard. Blackrock was raised in Cauldron by parents who’d fled Jzaridune 70~ years ago. He’s a natural singing talent used to wander the streets of Cauldron as a child singing about what he saw. “I SEE/A CHURCH SPIRE OVER THERE!!!/I SEE/BIRDS FLYING IN THE AIR!!!” This, much to the chagrin of the party members, is a schtick he still does. Blackrock left Cauldron for many years to explore Faerun and improve his abilities as a Bard. He has incredible knowledge of the world around him and speaks half a dozen languages fluently. He does have one out of place feature though: his eyes look positively reptilian.

Joe S. is playing “Isi Bramblefoot”, a brooding and sometimes haughty LG Female Halfling Rogue. Isi claims to trace her lineage in the region all the way back to Surabar and, even though she doesn’t like to bring it up, is quick to anger if someone insults or questions her claim. Isi works as a security specialist in Cauldron. She tests locks, window bars, magical alarms, etc and educates her customers on how to make improvements. By night, though, she lives in a sort of Robin Hood-esque fantasy where she believes it’s her “Code” to take from the evil folks of Cauldron and give to the Lantern Street Orphanage and various churches. She’s a very serious character and often makes up for her height with an intense and uncomfortable stare.

Erik Mona: Dead of massive brain injury caused by his inability to handle the massive opposing forces of praise versus all the crap he gets online. Much like matter colliding with anti-matter.

I have it on good authority that Erik stores his brain in a titanium satellite in geosynchronous orbit above Washington State. Inside his skull cavity is a complicated network of fiber optic cable and communications equipment that relays his thoughts to the brain hive poised high above the earth. This allows for many layers of firewall to be installed in order to prevent any sort of massive brain injury derived from a plethora of evil forces - one of those, of course, being "good tidings".

I saw that, Mona. :-)

Non service members would be surprised how many military gamers there are.

I'm certain that there were, maybe, only a dozen or so non-gamers in my last unit. We never had time to play, but there were geek discussions while breaching simulated mine fields. :-)

Is there any way to find out what issue numbers they previously advertised in?

Cloud Kingdom has been in most issues of Dragon and Dungeon dating back a number of years. They used to run 1/3 page ads (the side bar-type ads) towards the front of Dragon with the answer in a 1/6 page ad (Gamer Guide) in the back. Lately, they've switched to a larger ad in Dungeon and a smaller in Dragon with the answer to the riddle located on their website.

In Dragon, you can always find their ads by looking at the Ad Index (typically located near the Gamer Guide in the last 1/3 of the book). At random, I just grabbed Dragon 329 off the shelf and they have a 1/3 page ad on page 15 with the question and a 1/6 page ad on page 83. You can find the Ad Index in this issue on page 86.

Dungeon doesn't have an Ad Index (*shakes fist at Dungeon staff*) but another random grab off the shelf reveals that, in Dungeon 124, their 1/2 page ad was on page 19. Typically, you'll find their 1/2 page in Dungeon towards the front of the book.

Hope this helps. :-)

"Come get me when we get into a fight!" : )

As an active member of Rob's campaign I must say his daughter cracks me up every time we play. She doesn't want any of that namby-pamby roleplay or fancy talk - she just wants to KILL.

With a daughter of my own on the way, I feel much like other posters above: I can't wait to teach her the game.

The relevence of FR to the mainstream of the hobby, on the other hand, is in steady decline.

Not to stir the pot and purely out of coincidence, what are you using as the basis for this rather broad statement?

six times nine

You know... after looking through his guide... $30 for a Beholder doesn't seem so bad after all...

Our gurus were accurate and well-researched after all, it seems. :-)

... and now I can't even buy individual issues if I wanted to. Interesting strategy you have ;).

Individual issues can, as always, be purchased here:

http://paizo.com/dungeon/products/issues

Cheers!

immensely. A mage

funky disco beat.

Josh Frost wrote:

Finally! I can now unleash my Assistant Editor Prestige Class upon the world!

Yay! I have a prestige class! ;D

I haven't quite worked out the foundation for it, yet, but I know you'll have situation bonuses to Saves vs. Spelling Errors. :-)

Man its fustraiting when you try to make them the heros and they kill the damn king amd escape. Uhhhhh. I feel your pain.

As the DM, you have more than enough power to set the level of the game right where YOU want it.

Don't want them to have that awesome Thunder Force of Destruction Great Cleaving +10 Battle Axe of Nuclear Doom? Break it. Don't want them to have their Cloak of +50 Hide Skill? Steal it. Don't want them to kill every single one of your monsters in one room in less than 60 seconds? Hamstring the characters.

And if those subtle hints don't work, set fire to their dice.

Where do the staff at Paizo keep you chained up?

Unleashing Rob is a tricky business. You have to unleash just enough of him to accomplish the mission but not so much that you, say, burn down the office.

*dons his asbestos suit*

I always wanted to look into Car Wars back in the day, but I never got around to it. Was it any good? If so, I may try ebay.

I played Car Wars a bit around '91-'92 or so. I remember it being a nice break from marathon sessions of 2nd Edition AD&D. Certainly nothing you could build campaigns around - but a nice game nonetheless.

More information will be forthcoming. I believe there's something about it in issue #331's First Watch section. :)

Finally! I can now unleash my Assistant Editor Prestige Class upon the world!

Behold, the power of Rob.