Defense of Brookside

Game Master caster4life

"It could theoretically be a badge, I suppose," Melia admits. "But we haven't had any indication of more than one."

"I, too, prefer not killing him without need, but I don't think we can just let him go. He would know too much about us. Fyrman, what's your read on your employer? Would he be willing to take a prisoner off our hands?"

To be clear, Mel's referring to Viscount Turick here, but leaving his name out of the conversation just in case.

"Happily, following him and jumping him are not mutually exclusive. We can follow him now and jump him later, if we like."

"Sounds the most reasonable. Attacking right away just sounds like a way to get us all executed."

Sense Motive: 1d20 + 15 ⇒ (10) + 15 = 25
Knowledge Local: 1d20 + 8 ⇒ (10) + 8 = 18

"Since this man isn't a nobel I think he'd be happy to hold him as a prisoner as long as we have some sort of evidence that he has committed some crime. He is serious about this, he just can't go locking up his peers though. But a layman... No one would think twice about it."

Melia nods thoughtfully. "Well, that makes it practical," she says. "The trick then is getting him from wherever we confront him to your employer's custody without attracting undue attention."

She turns to Janus. "This magic you mentioned for interrogating him ... could it also be used to induce him to come with us peacefully? And quietly. A fellow walking along with us of his own accord would be much less suspicious than the group of us lugging an unconscious man through the streets."

"Tricky, but possible. There would be simpler ways for that, perhaps. The magic inherent to this kind of spells is...fickle. But I am confident we could achieve such, as well. I don't know if I'd bring this to the Viscounts attention just yet, but I'll trust your judgement on the matter.", Janus responds after considering a moment.

Harold seems conflicted about the kidnapping. "I reckon if your employer finds out who he's with, he'll be free or dead five minutes later. Takes some real..." he coughs "courage ta take on the Reaps."

He smiles "Might be I can help, though. I have a way ta hide an area from sight with mist. Bit strange this time of day, but. We can cosh him, if he's in the mist." A moment later he adds "Maybe as a backup plan? And one of us looks like him, and walks out a few seconds later? Anyone lookin' on wouldn't think much of it."

"Or..." he trails off "We could have someone nick his purse and run off. Might be he'd follow." he shakes his head "Nah. He's gonna see through that - unless someone's cursed him, o'course."

"Well, let's start by just following him and see where he goes," Mel says. "That seems likely to get us a bit more information with very little risk. And if we can figure out where he's staying, perhaps we can arrange an ambush or similar."

Harold nods enthusiastically "We've enough people for a decent shadowing operation. 'Specially with some disguises, and a spell to talk ta each other. Need to keep at least, oh, sixty feet away or we risk him spottin' a spell." he looks carefully to Melia "You, uh, okay havin' a talkin' spell?"

"Potentially," she says. "Where does your magic come from?"

Harold shrugs "All over. Hedges collect tricks, relics and even deals. They get passed down. Not like I went to some school or somethin'."

"Like..." he hesitates, then pushes on. "I know the trick ta talk ta roaches. I hired some roaches to go check out the store. Not powerful magic, but bloody useful. They came back, gave me the layout of the store. Just basics, but helpful - like where the secret room was, and that it had a chest of stuff." Harold scratches his nose "Speakin' of, if I got 'em right, then there's stuff looks like it should be in the treasury in that chest right now."

"What you mean the treasury gold is in the linen shop?! We can't let anyone leave without following them then."

Harold hesitates "Well. It's the right shape for some of it. Roaches aren't great at metallurgy."

Mel considers Harold's answer. "So ... you just sort of ... pull in power from wherever?" she asks. "How do you protect yourself? Power isn't always neutral. There are malicious forces out there, eager to find a pawn to advance their agendas in the world." She thinks of Perrin, wondering miserably where he might be and what he is doing.

"As for the treasury ... if it's in there, that would be pretty damning evidence. And I'm sure Fyrman's employer would be happy to recover the money. But ... I think we're more interested in the people than the money. Specifically, we want to find out who is ultimately responsible for this whole thing, and we don't want to afford them time to get away or cover their tracks. Mr. Falcon is clearly a middle-man at best, not a mastermind."

"So the question is: how can we best use this situation to identify the mastermind? We've got two things to keep track of now -- Mr. Falcon and the treasury, and I doubt the treasury is going to stay here. It's no good to anyone sitting in a trunk at a linen shop. Maybe Mr. Falcon will personally escort the treasury to wherever it's going. That would be ideal. But they also might split up. What then?"

"Seems to me the best thing to do would be to kidnap the Falcon and get the treasury too. Bring both to our patron and let him reap the rewards. We know where he is, right now, and we know where the gold is. So seems right to nab him and then come back for the lucre. Aye?"

"Except that we also want to avoid attracting attention from the guards," Melia points out. "It'd make our lives a lot harder if we were wanted for assault and abduction. Also, for all we know some of the guard might report to whoever is behind this whole thing."

"Don't get me wrong -- it would be ideal to take Mr. Falcon and the treasury to our ... friend. That is, if we can figure out a way to do it blowing our cover."

A worker walks into the linen shop. About a minute later, another walks out.

Harold thinks for a moment "I know I wouldn't want ta get caught with the haul. Even takin' it to the guard - too easy for 'em ta get the idea I nicked it."

"I'm guessin' it's here 'cos they can move it easy. Maybe wrapped up in fancy cloths? Guards don't like messin' with the nobs' stuff."

"As for power - sorta. I mean, the art's knowin' what the strings are, and bein' careful how ya bind yaself. My rule is 'don't go in ta debt'." Harold goes quiet, perhaps thinking about how he's ended up indebted to Mel.

The man Kazador recognizes as the wearer of the falcon ring walks out of the linen shop and begins walking south. He wears the garb of a lesser noble.

I know Kazador is busy right now so assume he shares that information.

Fyrtor casts pack empathy on himself, Mel and Turion.

"Let's go then, Mel if we feel a strong sense of urgency we'll know you need us to join you, otherwise we'll hang back like you said. Sound good to everyone?"

"Right," Mel says.

She eyes Hal. "If you have a spell for speaking back and forth at a distance without being notice, go ahead and cast it. But I'll want to have further talks on that point later."

Buffs in place, Melia begins tailing Mr. Falcon.

Perception to keep track of him: 1d20 + 18 ⇒ (8) + 18 = 26

Stealth to avoid attracting attention: 1d20 + 25 ⇒ (15) + 25 = 40

"Not at the moment, Ma'am." Harold apologises.

He turns to Fyrtor "Which group you want me with? I don't have an aura at the moment."

What's everyone else doing at this time?

Melia tracks the man in the falcon ring, attracting no notice herself, as he walks a short distance up the palatine then several blocks over, reaching a house that seems fitting of a lesser noble. The doorman opens for him and he enters.

Whatever roll is necessary. Bluff, I assume: 1d20 + 6 ⇒ (17) + 6 = 23

Kazador hung back, as was requested. As Mel trailed the man, he walked along, staying far away from the mark but close enough to have Mel be in sight. As he did so he did his best to look nonchalant about it all. He worried that Mel might need help, and if that happened then he wanted to be close enough to offer assistance, but not so close that he would tip off the man she was following.

"Let's let Mel handle tailing directly the rest of us can stick together."

Bluff?: 1d20 + 12 ⇒ (1) + 12 = 13

Fyrtor tries not to be obvious that he is following Mel, but the emotions of Mel and Turion in addition to his own make it difficult for him to keep his cool.

I was not certain if we wanted to intercept him right then. But I guess we first check where he lives...also makes sense. So, should we walk right up and attempt to charm our way inside - doing the questioning at his place may be practical - no need to go somewhere else, no interruptions, and no further caution needed to avoid getting backtraced...

Túrion, in the guise of Janus, walks with Nelly, in the guise of his dog, sufficiently away from the others. He could swiftly send Nelly ahead, pretending to run after her, to close the distance if needed. But unless Mel gave him a sign - ...he waited.

"Okay." Harold agreed amicably.
bluff: 1d20 + 26 ⇒ (7) + 26 = 33
'I used to be quite good at this. Feels like I've lost the knack while I was in the mirror. On the other hand I blend in better as an old man.'
After a while he murmured to Fyrtor "Might need to switch it up soon."

"What do you mean?" Fyrtor asks distractedly.

Melia casually strolls past the house, eyeing it sidelong.

Perception: 1d20 + 18 ⇒ (1) + 18 = 19

Are there guards? Does it look like the falcon crest is being displayed on the building anywhere? Does it have multiple stories?

Passing by, she takes a right, then waits for the rest of the group to catch up.

"He went in there," she tells them. "Could be his place, or it could be he's just visiting to report something. We should find out who lives there."

Problem: Mel got a 40 stealth. I don't think that is selective. To follow her, someone else will need to beat that with perception. Pack empathy won't give you her location, afaik.

Mel notes a small falcon crest over the door knocker but there are no guards visible outside the moderately impressive two story building. The ground floor windows are small and barred while there are some larger windows on the second floor.

Stealth is not selective if you share a point of observation. But in this case, the focus is on not being observed by one specific person. That may e.g. encompass lingering at the edge of a house near a crossroad, before following into an alley(adding some distance for a less crowded space). Someone behind that knows what they are looking for, or even being given signals when it's safe to do so would not have the same difficulty following the agent as the person being followed has to notice they are.
Basically what I'm saying: If Mel was sneaking through a military encampment avoiding everybody, we might have a hard time providing remote guidance because she would vanish "omnidirectional". But if tracking a person, that stealth is focused on a certain target, not an attempt to disappear from the world as a whole.
Counter-example: Party prepares an ambush on a wagon in the woods. We roll Stealth opposed by their Perception. That does not mean we vanish from each others vision until somebody makes the first move. Know what I mean? I may not SEE Kazador behind that trunk on the other side of the road, but I know he's there and if he's shifting position to behind that rock closer to the road perpendicular to our prey(and straight towards me), I'll notice because it's one of the few 'areas'(where are my allies and what do they do?) I visually keep track of except the road approach.

All that said, Nelly can track Mel's smell so yeah, lets roll with that. Typical DC for a fresh Trail is 10. She has 5 ranks, so by taking 10 should auto-succeed even on a trail up to 2 hours old. I'll roll just in case.
Survival DC 10: 1d20 + 5 ⇒ (7) + 5 = 12

As Túrion opts to stay out of sight from their quarry, he quickly loses sight of Mel as well. Luckily, Nelly was not so limited in her available senses. After a short moment to find the familiar smell of the Elf Woman, she followed the trail. It was fresh and easy enough to run along - while following, Túrion made sure the others were not as lost as he was, indicating Nellys activities subtly to any of his allies that seem lost.

Well the ambush example is quite different as Kazador would have a fixed position, not be constantly moving to an unknown location. But yeah you can track her scent. It'll be a little slow but so is stealth so you can be there with Mel now.

Note to self: find ways to get characters scent. Sounds really useful!

Harold glances around "Well, I got taught to mem'rise the people behind ya. Even have places ya can walk past where they check it. If he starts moving funny, he's seen us." he shakes his head "Though I gotta say, that woman's pretty scary."

When the group stops he frowns, then jumps as Melia appears out of nowhere.
"'m too old. Start like that'll be a stop soon."
Swearing quietly he takes off his glasses and rubs his eyes with the dirty palms of his hands. He puts the glasses back on, oblivious to the fact he now has dark circles scrubbed into his skin.

"Want me to see what I can find out?" he offers

Can I get a yea or nay on Harold's idea before I proceed as if he has or has not done it?

”Honestly? I don’t know what ye can do. What it entails or what the risks are. But ye know what? I don’t bloody care. Ye’ve done right by us thus far and I trust that whatever ye do it’ll be yer best. Go ahead, lad. Beats me idea of just clobbering the fool over the head and hoping he doesn’t die from blunt force trauma.”

"Go ahead," Melia says.

Túrion makes sure that Nelly knows she's a good girl. Something she is, of course, aware of - but despite her pride still enjoys being praised even for such mundane actions as tracking someone. And it was so easy. Elves had a distinct smell. A different aroma from the humans so populous in this city.

While focused on his companion, Túrion still looked on at what Harold did. He was CERTAIN the old man was working magic in some way - but managed to hide it with some street charlatan tricks. Doubtlessly useful, but suspect, as well.
He still had little idea what to make of the man, but if the others trusted him, that was good enough for Túrion.

Harold quietly pursues his investigations and has some answers for you shortly.

Harold runs filthy hands through his 'white' beard, cocks his head to the side and begins to wander a circuitous path through a nearby alleyway. A minute or two later he returns to the group.

"Not much, 'm afraid. Buildin' belongs to a nob name'a Sir Rollinsby. Family's only just blue blood, less'n a baron, but the family crest's got a blood... er falcon on it. Sounds like our man."
"Gets a fair few visitors - lot'of'em nobs as well. Recently been gettin' a visit from someone might be linked to the club we're interested in... Not from round 'ere so we'd need to track him down the hard way."

What time is it now? I still need to go and make a report tonight.

I declare it's mid-afternoon, Fyrtor.

"Other than that.... gets some packages delivered - seems to be the same boy - and has a tailor round more'n I can reason. Mostly though, just 'im and four servants; Sam, Sarah, Lionel and Anna."
Harold shrugs "I'd go deeper, but if he's got wards up I don't wanna trip 'em."

"Unlikely to be our mastermind, then" Melia says. "More likely another middle man. We're getting closer, though."

She takes out the book that Count Aral gave them and jots a quick note in it:

We have identified the man with a falcon ring as Sir Rollinsby, a minor nobleman. He was definitely involved in the recent robbery of the treasury, which I am sure you know of from other sources. What can you tell us about Rollinsby? Personal history and abilities? Known affiliations and associates?

"There," Melia says cheerfully. "Maybe our dear friend will have some useful information! Or perhaps a good cookie recipe. So far there's been a distinct lack of cookie recipes in our correspondence."

@Fyrtor: I think most of that got moved to "next day" so we could do this together. I had appointments for morning and evening and a plan for the afternoon - in the interest of getting back into regular game flow I'm fine with the solo parts getting post-poned slightly regardless of correct timeline.

"Aye. But nothing that implicates him. After yesterday, he may decide to be extra cautious - I am not sure if observing alone will bring us any closer."
Turning to Harold, he continues after short deliberation: "We suspect there is part of the Royal Treasury in the shop. Can you use your gimmick to find out information about that as well? When it will get picked up? Who does that? If Rollinsby is just another middleman, we may want to track the goods, rather than hope he will mess up, so shortly after things went south for his colleague."
He turns back to Mel and raises an eyebrow: "Unless you mean to confront him directly and see what he knows?"

"Could confront him. Maybe bluff our way into some information. Ye know...be like. Oi! Fook is wrong with ye, keeping the royal treasury there. Word is already getting out, and the boss isn't happy." He shrugged. "Something like that. Can workshop it. Point is, say just enough to make him think we're on the same time and let him fill in the blanks. I, eh...probably wouldn't be the best one to do the speaking. But could act like hired muscle."

Harold shrugs uncomfortably to Janus. "Used most of what I could just to find the shop in the first place. If we got in, could you put some sort of spell on the goods?" He looks uncomfortable "or, y'know..." he waves his fingers "Rollinsby?"

He turns to Kazador. "As for bluffin'.... maybe. I might be able to pull it off, I know the way it used ta work. But - if they're usin' him as an agent there might be countersigns 'n' stuff. Risky." He looks thoughtful "He might be prepared to snitch, though. Could pretend to be guards. He'd need to believe he was dead anyway, 'fore he would."