Sounds good to me. Not sure how we are going to track them though. I assume they will be staying to the edges of this valley like we are since being out in the open sounds like a very bad idea.
Issuma listens to the kobold's plans and offers advice. "The valley narrows ahead. This may make it easier to find their tracks since the only passage is a narrow forested band between the river and cliff. I will stay back here and watch in case you miss them and they return this way."
"Good. This place makes my scales itch." Drahlneep says, still focused on the hallway, waiting to bring up the rear as the group moves out.
"Drahlneep, you are the best tracker, so you should go first."
The barbarian grunts in acknowledgment and relaxes slightly. "Then let's go."
Jeji silently fell in line, a small scowl on her face. Unaccustomed to not being the first one ahead, she wondered to herself.
Did I do something wrong? Am I not good enough anymore?
The kobolds creep down the side canyon back to the main valley once more and then upstream. Drahlneep leads carefully scouring the land for sign of human passage. Jeji follows with a bit a scowl and Drahlneep trails behind Perrik. As Issuma said, the valley pinches in toward the river which grows a bit faster and louder.
The trees grow thicker here and Drahlneep weaves more to make sure he doesn't miss anything. It doesn't take too long before he finds something. A pair of boot tracks along the edge of the river. It looks like the Technic Leaguers stopped along the river within the past day to gather water. They cannot be too far ahead.
When and if we catch up with them, let me try to blind one of the mages first before we go in, if we can take out the fireball chucker, we will all do much better this time around.
Drahlneep checks his gear and nods at Kricker. "On you then," he says satisfied. "Let's find a good spot for an old fashioned kobold ambush."
"Can we get in front of them?"
Hard to get in front of them until we know where they are. Lets move along quietly.If there are only two of them, there is only likely to one of them standing guard and mages are not know for their perception, but still...
"Jeji, time to be sneaky."
The valley opens up again into a couple branches, but the human's trail follows the river's bank. The moon is gone from the sky and only the stars interrupt the dark night. After a couple more miles, the trail reaches a confluence of rivers and the path enters the smaller of the flows.
A grin replaced the scowl on the little kobold's face as she nodded excitedly.
As they reached the confluence, she asked "now where?"
Keep on following. We want to catch them in the dark.
Though probably hip deep for a human, a kobold would need to swim to cross the flow.
Let us see if we can't find a shallower spot to cross the river. I don't want to get all of my tech wet if I can avoid it.
The smaller tributary flows down from the hill and gathers speed and size until it is about thirty feet across where it meets the bigger and slower flow. There are some large trees on the far side.
[ooc}I think walk around is more to our strength [/ooc]
The kobolds decide that swift running water is a hazard they'd rather not risk and continue upstream until they find a narrow, rocky stretch that they can more safely rockhop over. Then they follow the stream back to the confluence. Curiously, a glance at the magical compass reveals that the needle has shifted from WNW to almost directly west up the bigger river toward a marshy valley. The detour does cost a fair bit of time and the night is waning when the kobolds finally spot a tent in an established campsite near the confluence.
"Jeji, can you see if they have guards? I will look for magical wards."
Perrik casts detect magic and scans for anything like an alarm spell.
Kricker hunkers down and looks carefully at the camp trying to see what kind of mundane protection they might have put up.
Jeji nodded and began to creep ahead, moving slowly and trying not to be seen.
Perrik looks for any arcane traps with his arcanely augmented vision, but doe not see anything outside the tent. Kricker gives an ocular inspection of the area and easily notices a couple trip wires and snares that will be easy to avoid. Jeji creeps up to the tent and recognizes two voices: a man and woman; the voices of the Technic League slavers. They seem to be arguing about whether to head into the swamp to the west of the canyon to the east.
Kricker mimes for Jeji to slip a grenade into the tent and then high tail it out of there.
He will then hold an action to cast blind on the female mage as soon as he can see her.
Drahlneep draws his weapon and activates his shield before giving Jeji a nod.
It was good to know they were all on the same page. Jeji didn't waste another second. She slipped an electro grenade out of her bandolier and made her way towards the tent opening.
Perrik:
Kricker: ;
Drahlneep:
foe:
The sneaky, sneaky kobold slips the grenade into the tent. The conversation continues unaware until there is a strobing light and the crackle of electricity punctuated by shouts!
Draconic: Jeji, burn them out!
With surprise and confusion still on her side, Jeji grabbed another grenade and tossed it into the tent before turning tail and retreating back to rejoin her kin.
The tent billows and tears from the concussion of the second grenade as the human man emerges. Jeji rushes back toward the others. The tall man with a whip quickly casts a spell and a floating translucent disk of arcane force shields him.
Kricker holds his action to see if the female of the species makes an appearance.
Ready to slaughter the humans who enslaved his people, Drahlneep lets his fury boil over. He moves steadily forward with the shield before him and fires at the whip-wielder.
Perrik chants an invocation in the TEK speech, supporting the party and slowing their foes.
Kricker waits, but the fireball hurling woman does not appear. Perrik makes weird technologic noises and Drahlneep closes firing his laser pistol. The burning beam passes through the force shield and hits the man leaving a burning hole.
Kricker gives up and casts Blindness (DC16) at the current target.
Feeling somewhat braver than normal, Jeji turned to face the man, drawing a bomb from her bandolier as she did. She hurled the flask at that man, a grin on her face as the kobolds demonstrated their prowess in battle.
The man flinches from the alchemical fire that momentarily engulfs him, but he doesn't seem affected by the blinding spell. In return, he tosses a handful of glitter toward Drahlneep catching the kobold in a cloud of sparkles.
Kricker
Perrik
Drahlneep
R3
Jeji
Zap
Kricker charges forward flicking on the power to his sword as he does.