"I'll take third, I suppose."
C:
M:
The rest of the day and most of the night pass uneventfully, unless there's something eventful anyone wants to do. It's around 4AM, and it's quite dark. The moon is a waxing crescent, so it set a few hours ago. What do you do?
Retsiji kindles a torch and stands it up in the ground next to him, pulls his spellbook out of his pack, and memorizes his spells for the day.
4 AM is the end of the third watch, since you settled down right around dusk. And now that I look at the map again, 4 AM is a bit late for a start given the distance you need to cover. So a correction: you were able to settle down before 6 PM, so you're actually able to start moving between 2 and 3 AM.
With the aid of a hooded lantern, the directions, and some help from Jacyn and Simn, Havrin is able to follow the trail. You're not moving very quickly, though.
The night is cloudy and quiet. You hear owls hooting in the distance, and an occasional stirring in the brush when some small predator encounters dinner. Every once in a while one of you smacks into a branch.
Shortly before sunrise, you reach the Thorn River. The tracks are now easier to follow, leading east along the north bank. According to your directions the camp is around a mile away. If the river bank path doesn't meander too much, it'll take you less than half an hour to get there.
"Interesting. Your horses seem to be used to this sort of thing...travelling at night in this terrain, I mean. Considering the lack of problems we've had with them so far, I'd think they've done this before.", Jacyn whispers to the others in the twilight.
As they continue riding, Jacyn pulls out a small bit of bread from his pack, tears off a piece and passes it along to anyone else who might want some. "Never did like going into a fight on an empty stomach."
Once his appetite is satisfied, he begins reaching into his pack to grab small handfuls of feed, reaching up to allow Smoke a few bites to eat as they travel.
Adam tears off two pieces of bread. One for himself and one for Bea.
"There are two things I never refuse if offered freely. Food and money. You never know when you will be offered them again."
Bea gratefully accepts the bread from Adam and chews silently, straining her eyes to see in the darkness.
Finally as she feels they're drawing close to the camp, she clears her throat. "We'll want to dismount and continue on foot - with the exception of those who prefer to fight on horseback, of course," with a nod at Jacyn.
Retsiji dismounts and stretches, then whispers "If no one objects, I think I'd prefer to walk back."
After he walks around a bit, he says, "You might want to look away for a moment--I need to make enough light to read by, but that's not a reason to dazzle anyone else." He picks up a twig, covers it with his hat, and casts light on the twig. By the weak light it sheds past the hat, he casts mage armor from a scroll. That done, he puts the twig into a pouch.
"If we're noticed before we get into the camp and come under significant arrow fire, I'll cast obscuring mist to give us some cover."
"We'll want to dismount and continue on foot - with the exception of those who prefer to fight on horseback, of course," with a nod at Jacyn.
"Agreed," Havrin rumbles softly as he works to secure the companions' horses. "I'll take point," he offers once his task is complete. So saying, he heads out as quietly as he can, bow held ready with an arrow nocked and ready to fire.
"Shall we go then? I'm as ready for this as I'm going to be."
When the rest of the group is ready, Bea moves on, bow in hand. She tries her best to walk quietly, following Havrin's example, and strains her eyes to see in the darkness.
Adam moves stealthily with the group, albeit slower (due to his speed).
As Jacyn looks about to survey the surroundings to find a good vantage point to charge from, he moves Smoke along as quietly as he can, though he fears it may not be near quietly enough.
Pending Simn sounding off, I'm assuming that you're moving in with Havrin taking point, then Bea, Jacyn, Adam, Retsiji, and Simn. You're keeping around 10' spacing. Despite being shortly after sunrise, it's still quite dark at ground level; the treetops are lit up by the rising sun, though. You're following a game trail that parallels a small creek that runs down to the Thorn. I'm assuming that everyone is keeping to the edge of the open area around the path and the creek, instead of walking down the middle of the trail.
Havrin is a ghost, and considering her armor Bea is also moving extremely quietly. For all his size, Smoke is hard to hear over the background forest noise. Adam has all but disappeared from view.
Havrin, ahead of you and next to the path is what looks like a broken-down wagon. Well past that--over a hundred feet ENE into the forest from where you are--you catch a glimpse of what's probably a fire at ground level. Jacyn, the path continues northeast out of sight.
What next?
Havrin said he was taking point; since the group is single file at one edge of an open space at least 60' across (I'll be finishing the map RSN), Havrin and Bea don't block Jacyn's line of charge for anything that wouldn't already be problematic because of the trees. I'm assuming that no one in the party is talking. Jacyn hasn't yet looked in the right direction to see the fire.
No, that was just an excuse for rolling low on the Perception check. More accurate, now that I think about it, to say that when you looked in the right direction it was behind a tree from where you were at that moment; if you had unobstructed line of sight you'd be able to see it easily. Make more sense?
Bea stops when she sees the wagon and the campfire, puts up her hand to signal to the rest of the group, and motions them off the trail in the direction of the campfire before disappearing off the trail herself. She puts here bow away and draws her sword as quietly as possible, creeping ever closer to the fire.
Bea has seen the wagon, but hasn't seen the fire yet.
I hope this makes it clearer (and that it works, for that matter):
North is to the top of the map, and a bunch of stuff on the east half isn't clear because it's behind trees. Scale is 1 square = 5'.
ETA: Havrin and Bea are the only ones on the map so far.
Havrin stops when he spots the campfire and silently points it out to Bea.
Bow drawn and arrow nocked, Havrin pauses to look and listen for any sign of movement in the camp or near the wagon as Bea moves up to his position.
Havrin silently motions to Bea and points out the location of the elevated platform in the trees.
Simn had chipped in with clearing camp and, with his day's spells prepared, was as ready as he was likely to be for the coming fight. For now, he waited on the scouts' return, holding off on any spells just yet.
Bea nods, sheaths her sword again, and makes her way to the ladder as quietly as possible.
Bea, you're focused on the platform ahead of you. Fortunately, now that you know where to look it's fairly obvious, especially as it's more lit up than the forest floor. You're picking your travel path to minimize the chance that a hypothetical watcher from that platform will spot you, and you think you're actually doing pretty well at that. However--
We're going onto combat time--if you make your Perception check, roll initiative normally; otherwise, it'll be a surprise round. I'll roll Retsiji's here instead of going to another post.
Since he's got Forewarned, he can act in the surprise round; he missed the Perception check that'd let him know where things are happening.
ETA: Bea, climbing the ladder is at most DC 0, the DC to climb a knotted rope.
Havrin whirls toward the whispered exclamation, bow drawn and ready to fire.
Bea is single-mindedly focusing on moving towards the ladder as quietly as possible, oblivious to anything else around her.
If Bea is close enough to him, he makes a whistling sound to catch her attention, then gestures up to the platform.
With their cover apparently blown, Simn set about making for a decent vantage point to shoot from, simultaneously calling on Irori's blessings for his allies.
Initiative order: Retsiji-Havrin/Adam-Simn-Bandit #1-Jacyn
Retsiji moves up to Adam, crossbow in hand, and holds action until he knows what's happening. Adam, you're about 30 feet from Bea; at the same time as you're trying to get her attention, and before the bandit can do more than talk, Havrin plants an arrow in his throat and he goes down. He was apparently moving towards the near edge of the platform, because he falls forward off the platform and plunges to the ground.
As he falls he drops the small object he was holding in his hand, which strikes the ground next to him and detonates with a loud crack. None of you are close enough to be deafened, but the sound echoes through the trees. Simn moves up to Adam and casts bless. He's able to cover the whole party, even Bea.
Adam, you've still got an action, and Retsiji is holding his.
Retsiji tries to make a DC 15 Perception check to get a decent firing solution on the bandit in the other platform:
Nope, so he moves another ten feet up to Jacyn and casts protection from evil on him.
Jacyn, what do you want to do at your initiative?
Adam looks at the fallen enemy with a bored expression.
"How unsatisfactory. I was hoping for a nice combat, not a keel-over. But, with that sound thundering through the woods, I imagine we will have combatants soon enough. This time, on the ground."
Adam funs over to the fallen enemy, slicing his throat open to make sure he's dead, then looking over him for gold or valuables.
Adam, just pulling the arrow out is going to be enough to kill this bandit, and I'll assume you do so. It looks like he's armed and armored just like the four who hit the trading post.
As the round ends, everyone can hear stirring and murmurs in the direction of the fire, and rustling in the tree that Bea is heading towards.
ETA: Jacyn, in the absence of obvious targets, I figure you'll position yourself to charge anyone who comes out of the trees at you next round--that reasonable?
Initiative order:
Retsiji
Havrin/Adam
Kressle
Simn/Bandits
Bea
Jacyn
Retsiji shoots at the bandit in the tree.
Retsiji draws a bead on the second bandit and shoots, dropping him. This bandit doesn't fall out of the tree, though.
Just the one. You can hear people starting to move around, and the fire is being intermittently blocked by moving things (presumably bandits).