Gemel caracoles Nibbly and moves behind the house for cover from missile fire. As he does so, he taunts the enemy "Suck it pansies, can't catch me".
Behind the house, he whispers through the Message spell "Hopefully they chase me. If they do, take the two headed ones with missiles. I want to try controlling the giant - he could be a useful source of information.
Then he listens for the thunder of charging giants...
Relan will fire two more arrows at the nearest ettin before ducking down for full cover.
Relan fires two quick shots and then pops down out of sight. Each strikes an ettin in the heart felling them as they stand. The final ettin and the hill giant see Gemel and move that way.
Andel will target the same ettin as Relan with his shock bow.
Vuloo holds waiting to heal any casualties.
Andel drops the last ettin as it begins to follow the giant who seemingly unaware of the loss of his team, picks up a rock and throws it at where Gemel was just at, blasting the corner of the building and sending shards of rock and wood in every direction.
Relan puts away his bow and prepares to advance with pole arm ready.
Gemel rides nibbly back around the building, getting with range to use the Shard of Lust to cast Suggestion on the remaining Hill Giant. . "Your only hope of living through this mess is to surrender and cooperate fully with your captors"
Vuloo and Andel both hold to see if Gemel is successful.
Gemel rides Nibbly out and casts his spell and the charging hill giant, slows his sprint to a run, and then a walk, and then he stops in front of the wizard with a slack look on his face, a slow baritone voice mumbling out from a wide mouth and badly yellowed and broken teeth.
"Uhh, I gives up? What you want?"
Additionallly, you hear an angry voice cry out from the southwest
"We still sleeping. Not our turns yet! Be quiets out there!"
Whispering a message to the party. "OK, he has surrendered and will cooperate. Let's go over to behind the village and interrogate our prisoner"
Gemel will then ride Nibbly over to behind building 4 , so we won't disturb whoever's trying to sleep... for now.
Braelex nods and follows, keeping a lookout in all directions.
Andel nods at Gemel and follows him. He whispers out of ear shot of the giant.
"Um, wat raiders? We follows Kob-Kogs. Smart 2 heads. He knows da redhats and gets monies for fighting. Small metal elf man pays us ... uh .. I thinks."
"Smash town, burn houses, smash lighthouse and kills priests. Lots of funs!"
"Um, more than twos? Probably hundred? Dat more than two, right?"
"Um, wat?"
"Uh, dispose of raiders in abbey? Um, OK ... we kills sleeping ones and guard ones, yes."
"Dere two more groups. Not more than twos, just twos. Just like my groups, but they day sleepers. Gets all the night burning fun. and then patrols at night and mornings. We gets afternoons ... stupid hot and bright."
Are there any other afternoon patrol groups?
Is there anyone besides the patrols keeping watch?
Where do they sleep? (ie in the buildings along the outside wall, or in the main fort? I want to know where that shouty guy is)
Who leads the redcaps?
What can you tell me about the small metal elf man?
Are there any others in the band who aren't giants, redcaps or two-heads, besides small metal elf man?
After getting what answers he can to next batch of questions, Gemel asks the party "First do we have a scout or a sneak to lead the way? It sounds like these might be the only formal lookouts around, so we might be able to sneak up on the rest of them, but it's going to require a good bit of sneaking. Also, my current plan for getting rid of this guy is to convince him he's cursed by Abadar and has to avoid human civilization from now on and turn him loose. Anybody have any objections, or a better idea? I don't really want to murder him in cold blood..."
"No, that sounds good. Get him as far from here as possible."
"Sneaking? Eh... Its not really our strong suit. I'm happy with finding the next camp and striking while they're still groggy."
Vuloo nods. "Yes, let's take out the other group."
Vuloo slips on his ring of invisibility and follows the others to the camp.
Relan nods quietly and readies his weapon.
Gemel wills spend several rounds chanting at the giant and using prestigidation to make mystical looking marks appear on the giant's hands, and then explain to him:
You see the signs on your hands. The marks will fade in the hour, but the curse will always be there! This is Abadar's curse on you for raiding small folk. If you get within a hand of miles of small folk from now on, your hands will rot and fall off! So go, run away and don't come back!
"One day patrol. Two night patrols"
"Little red men watch from Abbey. Like shooting birds and people if they come near."
His face screws up as he answers this and you see him fight the suggestion for a moment and then succumb.
"Other giants sleep in houses near wall"
He points them out.
He shrugs to most of the other questions, "Me not spend time with others, just giants and 2-heads."
Gemel sends the giant on his way.
"OK Gentlemen, the other hill giants and ettins are resting in some of the houses along the outside wall of the abbey. We can probably sneak up on them without too much difficulty. One challenge is that there are redcaps on the abbey itself - which are probably the bowmen who got Temporary. This suggests that they are quite alert... I would suggest taking advantage of the outer wall to keep the redcaps unaware of us as long as possible. Hit the southern pair of houses outside the wall, and then move to the northern cluster (again outside the wall). Then we figure out how to get inside the wall without being spotted by the redcaps - and of consequence, the alarm going up..."
Vuloo's eyes widen when he hears of the redcaps. "Yes, let's just avoid them."
He then nods with resignation at Gemel. "Good plan, my friend."
We cannot avoid them log term Vuloo. We have to go in there.
"Yes, we will have to go inside, but let's try to do it on our terms, not theirs. Call it my chicken instincts, but I prefer making sure my line of retreat is clear before sticking my nose in... I think we agree - the giants and such outside walls first."
Lets buff up some and hit them.
"Agreed, definitely now, before dark, while the night and morning patrols are still sleeping. All of you, wear these necklaces please, they identify you to protect you from my pre-prepared symbol spells."
Gemel will distribute necklaces to everyone (including Nibbly and the Glass golem), which have 3 wooden holy symbols on them (Irori, Cayden Cailen and Nethys).
He will also pre-cast See Invisibility.
The party moves to the stone 20-foot wide and 10 foot high perimeter wall (a stone belt if you will)and then heads up north, the sun off to the west above the abbey and casting a shadow on your side of the wall. In places it appears to have been excavated for construction material. Quietly you approach the southern set of buildings your ensorcelled giant pointed out to you.
Gemel passes out his holy symbol necklaces. He then casts a spell for arcane sight.
You hear the giants first, their rumbling snoring shaking the few panes of glass remaining in the buildings. Second, you smell them, the rank odor of unwashed bodies, feces and rotten food hits you and nearly makes you gag. It is apparent that this patrol is completely asleep, and as you get up upon it you find a pair of hill giants in the two houses to the south and three ettins smashed in with each other in a tangled sprawl in the northern of the three buildings in the cluster. All are completely passed out.
Whispering into the message spell, "I don't think we'll get any extra information from these - so no need to let them wake up. I'll keep overwatch, while you guys put them down"
While staying alert for threats, Gemel will guide Nibbly in tight against the remains of the wall, using it for as much cover as possible against being seen from the battlements...
Untrained stealth, +2 dex
Vuloo and Andel will hang back and wait for Relan and Braelex to complete the coup de grace.
plus
Braelex moves into the nearest house and shoots the sleeping hill giant in the face. The golem heads to the other room with Relan and elicits a sharp cry for a moment as the golem clobbers the giant in the head, but fails to kill it, before the warrior takes it in the throat.
; fail
; success!
-- unnecessary
A couple of voices cry out from a building to the north, "Its too early yet. Why you trying to wake us?"
Gemel uses the message cantrip to whisper "If it's like the other patrol, there are 3 ettins as well as the giants you just put down. "A Couple of Voices" may only be one of them awake. Just keep taking the sleepers guys, I'll take anybody who actually gets up to interfere...If thy're all awake when we get there, we deal with that then.
Gemel takes his lesser rod of extend in hand, and prepares to cast an extended Murderous Command if a giant or ettin pops up...
Through the message spell Relan notes There are three ettins. Might be harder to catch them. We will wait a moment to let the one who called out settle back down.
After a 5 minute pause Relan will lead Braelex and her golem to the ettin's house and pointing to each creature and a party member in turn move in for the CDG.
Braelex has Number One hold position and waits to proceed.
The voices die down and after a bit, you're confident the creatures are back asleep. Relan confirms 3 ettins in the building to the north.
Relan moves in and readies to attack. With a nod to Braelex he raises his weapon high, pauses, and brings it down.
Braelex and Number One will concentrate on a single foe.
The party methodically moves through the ettins and proceeds to move to the north set of houses and murder the third patrol as well.
With the formiddable but woefully lax outer guard taken care of, the party turns its sights on the Abbey proper.
"Well, that's the perimeter cleared. We have a choice. We either go straight up the middle, through the main gate or we can go in through the rubbled walls in the south east corner. Then we can keep both the Golem and Nibbly with us, but we are going to be obvious and visible as we approach the abbey. In the alternative, if we picket Nibbly and have the golem wait for us, I can Dimension Door us somewhere - say the top level of the lighthouse, and we can start from the inside... Anybody have any other ideas?"
Vuloo nods at Gemel, "Walking in the front door seems like a bad idea. Using dimension door would allow us to keep an element of surprise."
Searching through the giant's bags you find food, detritus and the following things of middling interest:
Sounds like the demension door idea comes up a little short. That leaves a frontal assault and that side entrance with the rubble. I'd bet a week's wages that its watched or trapped, or both.
"If someone here can fly, I can turn them invisible... They could fly up to the top of the tower, and I could dimension door the remaining four of us to join them."