h.p. roll
or.....5!
Leveled.
Took fleet for 5 feet more movement in light armor.
"mewwy vumgy, buk bafe."
"We should drag the burnt ogres out of the corridor. The bloodstains probably won't arouse much suspicion, but even ogres are bound to notice a pair of dead guys lying in the middle of the thoroughfare."
Camlo looks up at Alwyn as he feels the wash of healing pass over him. "Th-th-thank you, my friend, I think, I should, ah, acquire one of those, at my earliest, ah, opportunity...."
Vethran retreats to the relative safety of the stairwell they entered from and takes a seat, cracking open his spellbook and begins making furious notations, occassionally muttering some arcane sequence or half-intelligible phrase in some long-forgotten language.
We could try to wait; I'll take position up towards front of that hallway.
At some point while Veth is studying, and after the ogre bodies have been dragged out of the hall and some attempt at clean up has been made, Elisile will ask one of the others to take a spell at keeping watch, and cast detect magic on all three ogre bodies in the torture chamber room.
Alwyn gets bored as Elisile and Vethran fiddle with their incomprehensible arcane magics. Deciding that this is neither the time nor place for a game of craps, he sits down next to Camlo instead. "So, tell us a little about youself, willya?"
Vethran nods, chuckling quietly to himself and stands up, book in hand. Dusting himself off, he ascends the stairs after the studies are completed. "All set and ready to go! I'm eager to try out this new spell I've been working on and I think I'm finally ready to use it!"
Camlo will have a look over the room the ogre was in too, while the others are getting done.
This may have been a bedroom of some kind. It is hard to tell as it has been ransacked and trashed.
A glance up the stairs indicates no further assault. They seem to end at a landing but nothing else can be seen from down here.
"So, do any of you want to go up a floor?"
"Hell yeah."
Elisile shrugs. “There’s a certain sense in making sure this floor is clear of enemies first. On the other hand, anything that did not hear our earlier battle probably isn’t going to hear anything happening upstairs.”
"I just assume the rangers' commanders were housed up there - most likely the ogre leaders took their quarters. So this might be the quickest way to eliminate the ogre leadership. Maybe we'll find this Mokmurian character up there as well."
"Alwyn, we seriously do not want to find this Mokmurian character up there. If he's got it together enough to command the allegiance of those two snake women and a fort full of ogres we don't want to meet him right here right now. You don't command the respect of ogres by witty repartee, I've tried that. They have to know you'd be able to snuff them out if they don't toe the line. If it was just gold they would end up killing you for whatever you had on hand. Generally too stupid to put a lot of thought into long term arrangements."
"Ogres though, we can deal with. Our strategy could use some work though. If we go up there and let them surround us we're finished. Have to choose the field of battle to your advantage when fighting giants."
"Ah, so we should look around for low ceilinged rooms?" Camlo says, trying to be witty. "I suspect that things are large as ogres would have trouble with human sized upstairs rooms. I may be wrong, but I hope there will be few, if any up there."
"Point taken. Let's exterminate anything down here first."
This room is a twenty-five foot square. The ramshackle area is a mess of smashed tables, broken crockery, and rubble. No living thing stirs here. A doorway lies ajar in the opposite wall.
Camlo will sneak over for a listen...
Camlo hears nothing. Peering through, he finds what might have been a kitchen. It is in shambles, as if a cyclone had moved through the room, smashed every bit of furniture, bent every bit of silverware, and partially collapsed the stone fireplace. Beyond another door is a pantry. All that remains in this room is a half-smashed crate and an untouched barrel.
“Perhaps our first instinct was correct; any enemies left on this floor would surely have come at the sounds of battle – these ogres do not seem intelligent enough, or have enough self preservation to hide or set up a complicated ambush. Let us go upstairs instead as Alwyn suggested.”
"Aye...I'm game."
Grinning broadly, Alwyn walks back towards the stairs.
Grinning broadly, Alwyn walks back towards the stairs.
cast detect magic on all three ogre bodies in the torture chamber room.
“Perhaps our first instinct was correct; any enemies left on this floor would surely have come at the sounds of battle – these ogres do not seem intelligent enough, or have enough self preservation to hide or set up a complicated ambush. Let us go upstairs instead as Alwyn suggested.”
Elisile sneaks up to the landing (Camlo probably by her side) and peers carefully around.
Elisile sneaks up to the landing (Camlo probably by her side) and peers carefully around.
Indeed, Camlo follows right behind.
cast detect magic on all three ogre bodies in the torture chamber room.
The stairs lead up to a corridor running north-south, with the stairs emerging at the north end. On the east and west walls are double doors. At the southern end the corridor turns west and on the southern wall is a single door. Muffled ogrish voices can be heard from the the rooms around, though none of the giants come out to greet the new arrivals.
Alwyn pulls Hudak aside while the quieter party members scout out the stairs. "If I'm right, you'll need to kick major giant ass up there. Here's a little something to help."
Following Alwyn's lead, Vethran entones a protective spell as well.
Elisile tiptoes back down the stairs to tell the others what is above, then whisper-weaves a few spells over herself . Then, with Camlo, sneak over to the nearest doors on the east and west walls, and listen .
"Come here you Shoanti brothers." Illes unfurls a scroll and sings it aloud gesturing to one and then the other. "No matter what happens that song will imbue you with some of the skills of your ancestors for the next half an hour. My own songs work only as long as I keep singing them. Facing a fort full of ogres I think a back up plan is in order."
Looking back down at his scroll he says, "Well, I'm not quite sure what this next song turns you into, but I've been holding onto it long enough now and we could use some help." As the others are casting he begins to sing it into life. Mid-song his pupils elongate like a cat or snake and his skin takes on a greenish hue. By the time the song comes to a close Illes is a hairless scaled bipedal lizard with a spiky crest running down his back all the way to the tip of his tail which he has to wriggle out of his pants to let free. He looks down at his clawed fingers and arms in surprise. "I'm part dragon! Yeah! Wonder if I can breath fire or something like that?" He turns away from the others and tries to vomit up some fire a few times. "Maybe not. Okay, just a few more and we take the fort!"
"If any of you want to fight giants as a giant, I can arrange that." Illezard taps one of the wands in his wand holster with a claw.
Elisile tiptoes back down the stairs to tell the others what is above, then whisper-weaves a few spells over herself . Then, with Camlo, sneak 1d20 + 14 over to the nearest doors on the east and west walls, and listen 1d20 + 12.
Camlo mimes a big hulking thing, and then prepares like last time, to open the door for the others to throw themselves through.
"If any of you want to fight giants as a giant, I can arrange that." Illezard taps one of the wands in his wand holster with a claw.
"Hell yeah! Hit me with it once we get to the top of the stairs."