Core or Bust!

Game Master dien

Dulcinea twists around the door frame to stab at the remaining foe.

Attack with Mwk Cold Iron Rapier (cover): 1d20 + 7 - 4 ⇒ (14) + 7 - 4 = 17
Damage: 1d6 + 1 ⇒ (1) + 1 = 2

"Yes, Devgar. You should surrender like your friend. If nothing else, so I don't have to hear more disgusting comments about pissing in ale."

Round 2

Devil's Claw (Red) - 15 dmg, Surrendering
Dulcinea
Devil's Claw (Blue) - 2 dmg, Shaken, end Round 4
Jikan
Shaya
Korum
Yargul - 14 dmg

"Please. We all know you've heard worse" snarls Devgar as he blows Dulcinea a kiss.

Shortsword vs Yargul: 1d20 + 3 ⇒ (18) + 3 = 21
Damage: 1d6 + 3 ⇒ (2) + 3 = 5

"YOU'RE GOING TO GET US KILLED YOU ASS!" roars the other as his blade clatters to the floor. That one clearly want nothing more to do with this fight, in spite of Yargul taking another, possibly fatal wound.

"How about you surrender too?"

Standard Action
Yet another missile from the old wand. This time at the one who hasn't surrendered.
Magic Missile: 1d4 + 1 ⇒ (4) + 1 = 5

“Your buddy’s smart. Follow his example and get the hell away from my hurt friend there, or I’m gonna shove his tower shield so far your butt you’re gonna have a new and exciting life as a table....”

Intimidate: 1d20 + 6 ⇒ (2) + 6 = 8

”Yuh!” yells the big man, (mis)explaining Shayah’s threat, ”She whams you wit dat shield, cuts your bones out, and makes a table from dem!” I figure Klo's oafish 'help' explains Shaya's failure to actually scare him. :D

The epic (in his own mind) threat is punctuated with an equally epic stab.

Stab the guy still on his feet
mwk spear: 1d20 + 5 ⇒ (20) + 5 = 25
crit confirm: 1d20 + 5 ⇒ (4) + 5 = 9
damge: 1d8 + 6 ⇒ (6) + 6 = 12

Trying to leave space to let Dulcinea (with her paladinyness and superior takerosity) stand defensively over the unconscious Yargul. :)

Owwww.... all the big numbers ;)

Yargul crumples to his knees against his makeshift wall as the more tenacious of the two uses his shortsword against him.

Jikan's magic missile strikes him in the face, blinding him temporarily. He still has spots in his eyes when Klo spears through his guts. He blinks and collapses, unconscious and bleeding out.

Combat over!

Without Yargul to maintain the tower shield up, it falls atop the surrendering mercenary, eliciting a howl of pain. "WHAT WAS THAT FOR? I SURRENDER!"

Jikan blows on the top of a wand much like the top of a gun barrel and then sheaths it by his side.

He talks to the surrendered mercenary. "Take a seat for now while we toss the place. It's also a good idea that you tell us what you know about it."

Klo leaves his spear buried in the bad guy’s gut to kneel down over the fallen Yargul. He whispers words that seem to reverberate in the air, and when he jams two thick fingers into the stab wound on Yargul’s skin, the elf’s body jolts for a moment, then calms.

Cast Stabilize on Yargul.

After a second to make sure the power worked, he looks up at the group, ”Anybody got da healing stick?”

Kul’Amon didn’t have the only CLW wand, did he?

You're still in Absalom, so if you needed to get another or two (or six) you can, you are just letting the enemies get ready for you.

"What I know? Bubkiss is what I know! That lady told me, Devgar and Sergeant Janks to guard the top, so I guarded the top!" shouts the remaining guard angrily. He stops, contemplating the situation he is now in and adds in a more subdued tone "he's dead ain't he. Stupid bastard."

Korum checks on the fallen guard. Can he be stabilized ?"Look, we got no beef with you. Take 'im to a healer 'n save his life. Then you should both find a new line of work, cuz this one sucks, for all of us."

Dulcinea has one on her character sheet, so i'll let her decide if she wants to play the hero before we try to go shopping. Plus, Klo doesn't have the resources to pick one up, currently.

The Devil's Claw merc grunts, thinking of a biting comeback but clearly aware of the precarious situation he is in.

He can be stabilised.

Searching through the house, there is little of interest, save perhaps for the mercenaries' gear, if even that. The only element of interest is the trap door in the room to your right.

No masterwork gear or magical potions on the mercenaries. If you want a chain shirt or a shortsword though, now's your chance I guess.

Sorry for the quiet! Just finished a convention yesterday at which both Yargul and Dulcinea were attending (well, their players, anyway). It might take them a day to get to post again, as they each had to travel like 3-4 hours back to their respective homes yesterday. In the meantime...

Pulling a scroll from her pack, Shaya checks on Yargul after Klo stabilizes him. "You don't look great, buddy."

CLW: 1d8 + 1 ⇒ (6) + 1 = 7

Brushing the scroll dust from her fingers, Shaya frowns at the surrendered guards-- the one unconscious. (I'll assume Klo is stabilizing him as well)

"Yeah, you can get your buddy to a cleric... once we're done here. I can't say I REALLY trust you not to go make trouble if we let you walk out right now. Anyway, he'll live."

She moves over to the trapdoor, wrinkling her nose at it. "Korum, this is your area of expertise, right? Think it's safe?"

"Well, let me take a look..."

Perception: 1d20 + 4 ⇒ (12) + 4 = 16

"Should be good. Anyone wanna get ready to poke 'r stab anything on the other side?" Then thinking better of it for a minute, Korum asks the bandit-guard, "Hey buddy, any traps 'r baddies on the other side of this door?"

Apologies, I was out of town for the long weekend and didn't get a chance to post. Yargul has a wand of CLW on his belt if you want to use that instead of your scroll.

Yargul's eyes open and fall upon Shaya. "Many thanks.

Seeing that the party is currently not threatened, Yargul heals the rest of his wounds with his wand.

"Anyone else injured?" he asks.

CLW: 1d8 + 1 ⇒ (7) + 1 = 8

Whilst both interrogation and healing happens, Jikan will sweep around with Detect Magic.

Will also tap himself with his Wand of Mage Armor before moving on.

Jikan looks about, muttering the words of power that will allow him to detect the presence of magic. But after a few minutes it is clear that apart from any magic the party is carrying, there is no magic to be found here.

As the Devil's Claw merc lifts his comrade up to drag him away from you, he replies: "Don't know, don't care anymore. Sergeant Janks was the only one who went down there with our client, and he ain't here. If he's armed any traps, that's on him and you can figure it out."

And without another word, he leaves the building with his buddy in a dead-man's lift.

Unless of course you stop him.

Korum does not spot any traps and decides, as the defeated Devil's Claw hobble away, to open the trap door. It creaks open to reveal a small, stuffy square room, cut from the building's stone foundation. While it is dark within, the half-orc's darkvision has no problem piercing through the penumbra to get a rough look at the room's eastern wall, which seems to feature a large stone mosaic showing several faceless people worshiping at the top, while others are condemned and imprisoned below. A noticeable space between the two breaks the fresco. It also seems that there are some indents in the wall. Three to be specific, each set within one of the aforementioned sections.

Korum also notices two torch-bearing sconces, seemingly only recently put out.

Back to you; and would you mind updating the map link? Thank you!

No objection to letting the dudes go. Updating map link.

Shaya peers around her brother's shoulder as the door gets opened. "What's all that, frescos? Hey, it's art! I know about art!"

There's a pause, then: "--okay I don't know about that art. It looks like creepy cult stuff. Those people don't have faces. Hey, shield boy! You wanna go down first? I'll lower ya." She grins, toothily.

"...or I guess we could just use the ladder," she amends, once her brother points it out. He's the one with the good eyes.

Dulcinea follows behind Shaya.

"Does anyone happen to have a light? It would be rather convenient going forward, I should think."

"I gotcha covered."

Jikan casts Light on Dulcinea's weapon.

perception: 1d20 + 4 ⇒ (2) + 4 = 6

"Looks pretty empty down there."

A few moments later, Klo's own spear-tip catches fire with a heatless, spirit flame. He takes up a position towards the back of the group, squinting into the room.

Perception DC10: 1d20 + 5 ⇒ (15) + 5 = 20

After a moment, he points his flaming spearhead at a particular set of stacked stones. "What's dat?"

Here's the contents of that spoiler...
It looks like there are a few stones that are of a peculiar shape. Namely three stones that look to be circular, stacked upon one another. The topmost one has the image of a female child carved on it.

"The ladder is fine. Perhaps next time I shall play the worm for fishes in darkness."

Yargul enters the room, taking advantage of the lights of his party to scan the area.

Perception: 1d20 + 4 ⇒ (18) + 4 = 22

"Huh. I thought those were kids toys. Nicer than the ones Shay 'n I grew up with actually."

Looking through the disks, the others also have pictures carved into them: One has a brooding devil and the other a grandiose city. Altogether, it looks like all three of these disks would fit in any of the aforementioned slots in the wall carving.

"Someone grab the gnome. We got a puzzle here for 'im!"

No time to study it now, but I will go back and review info before sticking things into other things.

Klo frowns up at the openings in the wall, "So, what? We stick dem in?"

So to make sure I understand. There are two sections of "images" — the worshippers above and the condemned prisoners below — with a space between. That makes 3 distinct sections, each with its own slot?

"Hey, Korum, stereotyping much?" Jikan says with a serious face.

Bluff: 1d20 + 4 ⇒ (15) + 4 = 19

Jikan casts Detect Magic to see if there's any magical auras to figure out.

Any knowledge checks or anything for this?

@Klo: Correct!

@Jikan: No there aren't! God bless those older scenarios that made you work your old noggin', even after a full day's work and other things that crowd your mind! And the object are mundane. (Honestly though, it's not a bad puzzle.)

Aaaaand Paizo ate my post yesterday. Great.

Jikan ponders for a moment. "So we have a:"

• "Girl"
• "Brooding Devil"
• "Grandiose City"

"Can we assume the Grandiose City is Absalom? It may not be a safe assumption but I'm going with it. Brooding Devil is obvious. The girl is maybe a girl from whatever organization or family this is?" He ponders some more.

"So do we think this is in order of importance? If it were Cheliax, I would probably put the devil at the top."

"But seriously... Family, Country, and then Devil? That would be my personal order but I'm not sure that aligns with the former occupants here."

I have played this and GMed it, but that doesn't mean I remember the order lol. But Jikan's thought process is laid out there.

"Cheliax are self-important tools, so I like the Devil, city, girl order you brought up. Let me just check to see if anything'll happen if we guess wrong."

Perception (traps): 1d20 + 4 ⇒ (1) + 4 = 5

"We're good! Guess away mage!"

Whoops. Jikan, you do detect an aura of Evocation. However, you do not know for certain where it is coming from and you cannot spellcraft it. It is a lesser aura of evocation. This probably changes things.

"Whoa, I meant Family on top. You think Devil is on top?"

Also, can Jikan even reach all the slots? XD

Hoping to be helpful, Klo steps forward and picks up teh three 'toys'. The big man is swayed by Korum's confidence, so he slides the devil into the top, the city into the middle, and the girl into the bottom.

Sorry for my silence! Busy work days

Shaya clambers down into the cellar after the others, squinting at the puzzle uncertainly and waiting to see the results of the attempt. "Uhh.... I don't know much about the Chelish other than they worship devils. Let's see what happens..."

As the group contemplates the disks and their meanings... and seem to have some disagreement, Yargul sets his tower shield in the direction of the wall carvings.

Sounds like everyone is down there! Great!

Klo places the stones in the order he and Jikan believe to be best. Unfortunately, it does not seem like the order is the correct one.

Damage: 2d4 ⇒ (1, 4) = 5
Shaya Reflex: 1d20 + 1 ⇒ (2) + 1 = 3
Klo Reflex: 1d20 + 2 ⇒ (2) + 2 = 4
Jikan Reflex: 1d20 + 3 ⇒ (9) + 3 = 12
Korum: 1d20 + 3 ⇒ (13) + 3 = 16
Dulcinea: 1d20 + 5 ⇒ (6) + 5 = 11

From behind his tower shield, Yargul sees Jikan, Korum and Dulcinea get out of the way of the worst of the gust of flame that ensues. Shaya and Klo however, seem to have not dodged out of the way on time.

Klo and Shaya, take 5, the rest of you take 2, except for Yargul who takes nothing.

”AAAH!” Klo yells as he stumbles back, covering his face ineffectually from the flames. After peaking reluctantly out from his sheltering forearms, he looks at the group, ”Dat didn’t work.”

He scratches his bald, still-smoking head with one thick finger. ”Maybe da woman we follow is da girl?” He holds the girl piece at the top spot. ”And she wants ta use da demon to control Absalom?” He holds the city towards the bottom, leaving the demon for the mid-slot.

He holds them in place, waiting for the team’s response to his idea.

Girl - top
Demon - middle
City - bottom

Should I try this?

”Perhaps the demon goes on the bottom, and the woman on the top. An angel and a demon vying for control of the city. Before your next attempt gather around.”

When everyone is nearby the elf raises a blue fist in the air and let’s loose a healing wave.

Channel to heal: 1d6 ⇒ 6. woo!

Then he resets his shield. Just in case.

Well how in Absalom did that happen. I coulda sworn there weren't no trap there!

A bit chagrined, "Everybody okay?"

Jikan's mustache singes from the blast. He pouts slightly and begins to head back from the puzzle area. With staccato, he states "Thank. You. Yargul."

"Whatever happens, I suggest we stand back this time." He twirls his singed mustache with vigor.

Jikan will leave the room, being in the previous room.

Klo puts the disks in a markedly different order... And with a quiet rumble of rock against rock, the engraved portion of the wall swings inward to a torch-lit staircase which spirals downwards.

Would you mind updating the map link with this link? Let me know if you need an actual url. Also, you should all place yourselves in the four squares next to the rightmost staircase, use the staircase and a square next to it for the people still in the staircase.

Klo recoils from the rumble, shielding his head from another blast of flame. Hesitantly, he looks at the wall, and is clearly as surprised at anyone else that his idea worked. He gives a big, dumb grin of excitement ... even a blind squirrel finds a nut once in a while.

After a moment, he squints into the darkness, holding his spear forward for light. "So ... we go down?"

Perception: 1d20 + 5 ⇒ (19) + 5 = 24

"Down."

The elf holds his shield in front of him, heading down the staircase.

"It's either we go down or we are done with the mission, heh."

Per usual, he sticks to the back.

The link in my profile has been updated, place yourselves!

As you head on down, Klo can hear gargling noises. There is someone or something down there. Once you get there, you spot the source of the noise: Two lumps of half-melted flesh which don't seem to have to common sense to hide away.

You have time to prepare if you so wish to, but in the meantime, here we go!

Round 1

Jikan
Lemure (Red)
Klo
Yargul
Lemure (Blue)
Korum
Dulcinea
Shaya

Move Action
Jikan heads down to get into the action.

Standard Action
He begins casting Enlarge Person. Will use his standard action next turn to complete it.

If I'm wrong and we're all in the room instead, then he will use his full round to begin casting it instead and not move.