Molly shakes off the feeling of nausea, curses, spits to clear the taste out of her mouth and moves south, her grip on her crossbow once again steady.
Once she arrives at a location where she has a clear shot at the lumbering monstrosity, the Witch aims at its center mass and squeezes off a bolt.
Dieter slogs through the undergrowth (AI-15) until he comes within reach of the plant monster.
"The Dandelion in the Wind." His blade slashes at upper torso level in a sinuous horizontal line, weaving around any blocking limbs.
aoo
confirm
The brambleblight was buried in attacks as the group moved in quickly. Arrow, blade, and explosion rocked the thorny vines backwards. In retaliation, the creature lashed out at Dieter as the man closed the distance, then again and again. The fighter's heavy armor turned one of the blows, but his exposed head and arms took a brutal amount of damage.
Dieter takes an AoO and a regular hit for a total of 25 damage.
Initatives:
R2: Mariana, Sander, Molly, Quill, plant, Dieter, Storn
R3: Mariana, Sander, Molly, Quill, plant, Dieter, Storn
Here's the map
All squares are difficult terrain
Storn flicks his eyes to Dieter, deciding he can probably handle another hit before requiring healing. Serves him right for talking about dandelions.
"BLAARGGHH DIEEE!"
"Dieter, to me!" Molly shouts. "Fall back to me!"
Even as she shouts, Molly is furiously reloading and winding up her crossbow. Soon enough, another bolt goes whirring....
HP 41/41 (+10 for mutagen)
AC 17, touch 14, flat-footed 14
Fort +7 (+4 vs. poison), Ref +8, Will +3 (+2 vs. fear)
CMD 13
Bombs: 7/8; Mutagen: 1/1
Effects: +4 Con (+2 Fort saves), +2 AC, -2 Cha, sickened 1 minute, bless
Extracts
1st (5/day): cure light wounds [], expeditious retreat [], true strike [], shield [x][], xxx
2nd (3/day): alchemical allocation [][], invisibility []
Sander edges forward as he prepares another bomb, then lets it fly at the creature's "head."
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Round 3, Init 10
Quill fires twice more at the beast, this time with Bless.
to hit; (+DF,-sick,+bless)
magic electric cold iron damage.
to hit; (+DF,-sick,+bless)
magic electric cold iron damage.
AC 18
HP 33/33
Happies: 2/5 used
Ferves: 2/5 used
SacWeap: 0/5 used (+1,swift)
To Hit: +3 BAB, +4 Dex, +1 WF, +1 Magic +1 PBS -1 DA =+9
Damage: 1d8 + 1 Str +1 magic +1 PBS +2 DA = +5
[ dice]1d20+9-2[/dice] to hit; (-rapid,+PBS)
[ dice]1d8+5[/dice] cold iron damage.
[ dice]1d20+9-2[/dice] to hit; (-rapid,+PBS)
[ dice]1d8+5[/dice] cold iron damage.
dieter PA, OC
mariana clw
Storn moved in and swung at the bramble, but missed completely. The attack was a good distraction though, and Dieter took advantage, slashing deeply through vine and branch. Sander, trying to finish off the creature, lobbed a bomb in, but bobbled the throw. The flask erupted on the ground, coating Storn, Dieter, and the brambleblight in burning goo. Mariana reached in and touched Dieter with her wand, just as the brambledblight exploded into action. Badly burned and missing most of its viny appendages, the creature honed in on Dieter as the source of the worst of its misery. A pair of heavy blows ripped into the fighter, one of which caught him on the side of the head. Losing consciousness, Dieter fell to the ground, bleeding severely from his wounds.
Dieer receives 3 healing
Dieter takes two hits for a total of 29 damage.
Initatives:
R3: Mariana, Sander, Molly, Quill, plant, Dieter, Storn
R4: Mariana, Sander, Molly, Quill, plant, Dieter, Storn
Here's the map
All squares are difficult terrain
Combat hit point status:
Mariana
Sander
Molly
Quill
Dieter -51 (dying)
Storn
Cursing like a sailor, Molly starts to forge her way towards Dieter, furiously reloading her crossbow as she goes.
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Round 4, Init 10
Quill shoots again, hoping for a bit more luck.
to hit; (+DF,-sick,+1)
magic electric cold iron damage.
to hit; (+DF,-sick,+1)
magic electric cold iron damage.
AC 18
HP 33/33
Happies: 2/5 used
Ferves: 2/5 used
SacWeap: 1/5 used (+1,swift)
To Hit: +3 BAB, +4 Dex, +1 WF, +1 Magic +1 PBS -1 DA =+9
Damage: 1d8 + 1 Str +1 magic +1 PBS +2 DA = +5
[ dice]1d20+9-2[/dice] to hit; (-rapid,+PBS)
[ dice]1d8+5[/dice] cold iron damage.
[ dice]1d20+9-2[/dice] to hit; (-rapid,+PBS)
[ dice]1d8+5[/dice] cold iron damage.
Storn groans as Dieter collapses. "I told you to stop getting hit! This is what happens when you fight like a flower."
Realizing Mariana is on healing duty, Storn grimly focuses on the plant and crashes in with Aggrimosh once more.
HP 41/41 (+10 for mutagen)
AC 17, touch 14, flat-footed 14
Fort +7 (+4 vs. poison), Ref +8, Will +3 (+2 vs. fear)
CMD 13
Bombs: 7/8; Mutagen: 1/1
Effects: +4 Con (+2 Fort saves), +2 AC, -2 Cha, sickened 8 rds., bless
Extracts
1st (5/day): cure light wounds [], expeditious retreat [], true strike [], shield [x][], xxx
2nd (3/day): alchemical allocation [][], invisibility []
Sander holds off as long as he can -- wanting to preserve his last bomb -- but lets it fly if it looks like the creature is about to strike again.
Dieter is stable, but not in good shape.
*gurgle*
Quill's shot found its mark in the depths of the brambleblight, piercing what the creature might use as a heart. Whatever the organ, its loss did the trick. The creature fell forward, crashing to the ground to lay partly on Dieter. The big man groaned, but seemed to stabilize, even as Mariana ran forward with her healing wand and began poking the fighter, trying to bring him back to consciousness and heal his wounds.
Once Dieter has been beaten back into consciousness by the wand, Storn extends a gauntleted hand, hauling the big man up.
"Good work. It's a little humiliating to be saved by Quill, but I've gotten used to it now. For such a wimp he's murder with that bow."
Storn's eyes light up.
"Right! The chest!"
Clanking noisily, he scampers his way over to the chest before looking meaningfully at Mariana.
"Uh.. make sure this thing doesn't kill me."
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"Awhhh...it was nothing. I just stand in the back and try to avoid shooting you all in the back," Quill blushes under the force of Storn's praise.
"Yeah, c'mon up, Dieter. If any of this becomes too much, you don't have to stay with us. Sometimes bad things happen around us," Quill reaches down to help Dieter up.
Quill takes a pass by the chest to make sure it's safe.
Perception - traps
After that, he'll go keep watch while Mariana opens the chest.
"Some 'vault' this place was...every single bad plant and hag in the book seemed to be in here," Quill notes. "Worse vault ever."
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After bonking himself in the head with the curing wand, Dieter hands it back with a nod of thanks. "I'm fine, thanks. If I wanted a boring life, I would have stayed in my home village and learned the trade of the gigolo like my ancestors before me." He stands and ambles over to the chest. "See anything, Quill?"
"I think the plants were supposed to protect the vault from the hag and folks like us," Sander observes, waiting to see the contents of the chest.
Mariana
Molly
Quill
Storn
Sander
Dieter
"Step aside and let the professional up there." Mariana handed her wand to Molly to finish up the healing of Dieter, and went to look at the chest. It was locked, of course, and she took out her tools. It took her a minute of fiddling with her tools, and for a moment she didn't think she was going to be able to do it. Finally, the lock clicked and she sighed. Gingerly she lifted the lid and peered in...to find a completely empty chest!
Everyone gathered around to stare in disappointment that someone had apparently beaten them to the goods. Then, a few noticed that the chest bottom didn't seem to fit quite right. Dieter and Quill pointed it out to Mariana, who was already reaching in with a dagger to pry it up. The bottom of the chest lifted free to reveal a shaft going down into darkness. A warped wooden ladder was bolted to the wall of the shaft, giving access to the depths below. The shaft was very narrow, too small for someone with Storn or Dieter's broad frames. Only a thin or very small creature could go down. Sander, Molly, or Mariana could fit, as could Quill if he squeezed.
Sander lets out a long-suffering sigh.
"Well, I guess we need to go down there?"
He listens for a moment, hoping not for a response from his companions, but to not hear anything coming from inside the chest.
Sander got his wish. The shaft was as silent as a Vault...or a tomb.
Sander sighs and, after exchanging a glance with Molly and Mariana, begins descending. Unhappily.
Storn sighs with disgust at Quill's hesitance at... well, pretty much everything.
"Well, time is wasting because I'm already bored. Get down there."
Storn offers a light spell to Sander if he's so interested. After that, Storn takes his time exploring the room while waiting on Sander to find something interesting or die horribly.
Molly gives Quill a flat look.
"Breathe out," she says, heartless, "and get down there, Elf-boy. I'm sure Storn is willing to jump up and down on you a couple times to get some of the unneeded stuffing out."
With that said, Molly follows after Sander.
The ladder descended for a very long ways. It felt like at least a hundred feet, maybe more. After Sander had gone down about twenty feet, he called up that the ladder seemed stable enough, and was followed by Molly and Mariana. Quill quite clearly had no wish to enter the darkness, and remained up top with the others.
At some point, Sander passed through a barrier. The darkness, held off only by Storn's spell, went away completely and he could see a large room, filled wall to wall with racks of items. Above him, he heard Molly and Mariana gasp and start calling out to him. Apparently from their side of the barrier, no light penetrated. He called for the to keep coming, and explained the barrier, then went back to looking around.
The hidden armory, for that had to be what it was, held dozens of items. Some had failed in the test of time, but others looked to be in good condition. One rack had many types of armor, another had swords. There was a rack of archery equipment, and a case that held scrolls and wands. One glass-fronted cabinet was filled with fine looking clothing and accessories, but when Sander opened it, whatever enchantment was preserving the cloth broke and the threads broke down and frayed instantly, leaving only a single cloak hanging there.
"Well now," Molly says, as she looks around at the armoury and unthinkingly cracks her knuckles. "This looks like the stuff we were sent to find. Hmm, scrolls. Kronug will eat well, if we're lucky. C'mon, let's pack it up and haul it out."
Sander smiles and laughs as he realizes that in fact he's not going to die.
"We should go up and tell them there's nothing there. Like a Gozran Fools' Day joke..."
He chuckles at what he thinks would be an awfully funny prank to play on the reticent Quill and overbearing Storn, though he knows they have more important things to do than have fun. Like make sure Louly's OK.
"You can come down and look!" Molly calls up. "And then you can make yourself useful."
The Witch winks at the Alchemist.
Dieter calls down the opening. "We're too big to fit down there! Grab what looks good and bring it up!"
All item auto-identify as part of the magic here
*Gorum's Thorn
This forge-blackened +1 keen greatsword is festooned with religious iconography depicting glorious images of the Lord in Iron. If Gorum is the wielder’s patron, Gorum’s Thorn gains an additional ability: when the wielder confirms a critical hit against any creature with the giant subtype, he can attempt to trip that target as a free action without provoking an attack of opportunity and ignoring any size restrictions related to the target. If the trip attempt fails
by 10 or more, the wielder is not knocked prone.
Sander sighs, as nothing in here is all that useful for him but he's going to have to carry it all up anyway, and starts collecting the scrolls and wands.
Storn paces up top in giddy anticipation, waiting to see what kinds of treasures they've looted to go kill giants with.
"Well, would you look at that!" Dieter hefts the blade known as Gorum's Fang. "A beautiful blade! Excellent heft..." He balances the blade on his finger at the hilt. "Very good balance. A bit heavy toward the blade, but that is expected. Hmm..."
He turns and presents it to Storn. "Here, my friend! I believe this would suit you perfectly. May you hew down giants like wheat."
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Quill takes the arrows of de-orcing, putting them in his quiver, but can't help but wish there was something...more.
"Nothing else down there? This is it? Uhm...uh...okay...I just thought the vault would be more full. It seems like this wasn't the best plan to come here, huh? We almost died...well, one of us did die, and the vault seems pretty empty. Let alone all the dangers in here," Quill notes.
Despite what he feels about the haul, he'll help store the all gold and goods so they can leave.
"Let's get out of here and back to the boat."
Storn pulls off his helmet, revealing his craggy, not-quite-so-bearded face showing a huge, broken-toothed smile. He removes his shield, strapping it to his back and hooking Aggrimosh to his belt before swapping out his old greatsword for Gorum's Thorn.
"Yes I will fight..." he says to himself before slashing up a few brambles and sheathing the mighty sword.
"Well I'm happy, but this is hardly going to arm all of us to destroy giants. Some druid somewhere would be happy. What you said Quill. Also, if anybody wants to wield Aggrimosh, do it. It is a mighty hammer."
Quill's idea of leaving seemed to be well-received, and you packed up all of the loot and headed back out, after divvying up what could be used between you. Getting out of the Vault was easy. Getting back through the swamp, on the other hand, was just as difficult as coming in. The only thing that made the trip easier was that no insane glowing balls of light attacked you.
Quill's sense of direction seemed sufficient to get you going in the right direction, and you walked until sunset, making camp on one of the small hillocks that dotted the swamp. Everyone was tired, sore, and a little disappointed that the Vault apparently held so little, compared to what you had built up in your minds. Mariana and Molly told of the many, many artifacts that had succumbed to rot and time, and wondered at the potential of the objects that had been destroyed.
Mariana, being an archaeologist, was very distraught and sat near the water's edge, flicking bits of mulch and small stones into the water as she thought. When Molly tried to return the healing wand to her, Mariana ignored her.
The next morning, the archaeologist was gone. Her pack containing her mundane equipment was sitting on her bedroll, but none of the gear she was carrying on her person was left behind. Her tracks ended at the water's edge. She had completely vanished.
Nothing brings Storn more joy than actually getting out of the swamp and the Druid-infested hellhole the group has been trapped in for the past while. Although leaving is still not fun and he spends the time grimly stomping on and muttering about rust, he's still pretty thrilled about finding the sword.
As Storn does when any of his companions are distressed, he completely ignores them. He sleeps contentedly, cradling his sheathed greatsword. His snores give away the group's location to every horrible thing in the swamp.
The following day he's nonplussed at Mariana's disappearance.
"I... what?! Well bring her back! Where did she run off to? Damnit!" Storn cups his hands, calling out to the swamp.
""
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.
"Mariana? What? Is she doing that weird..." Quill looks around, realizing that Mariana is no where to be seen so he lets his thought drop.
"She can't have gone far. I'll find her..." Quill helpfully tracks her to the water's edge and doesn't have a clue after that.
"I can track okay, but I can't track in water...or over water," Quill explains, looking around.
"See, Dieter?" Quill looks at the newest companion. "I don't expect you to understand but weird and bad things happen to people around us. You should be careful. Might happen to you too."
As the group sets up camp, Sander looks over the scroll of barkskin, trying to see if he can suss it out enough to copy it into his formula book.
"Maybe a will-o'-wisp got her? We should look ... but we also have to get back to the boat!" Sander dithers, looking back and ahead as he wrings his hands.
"Unbelievable," Molly says, shaking her head at the trove. "About the only thing down here I can use is.... this."
The Witch hefts the gem-crusted cudgel with a look of unvarnished disgust on her face.
"What is this supposed to be? A cudgel doesn't need this many gewgaw gems....! I'll take it, but hopefully we can pawn it for something better."
Shaking her head, Molly stows the cudgel and the ironwood crown on the basis of 'waste not, want not' and 'we can hock it for money later'.
Bleary-eyed, Molly rises when she hears the others start to shout for Mariana. She looks from the archaeologist's pack to the water's edge and back, and frowns.
"This is the bloody same as with that Dwarf! Ugh!"
Dieter rubs his face with his hands, trying to shake the grogginess from his eyes. "Huh? Wha-? What happened to Marinara? Is she gone?" He rouses and joins Storn at the water's edge. "She can't have-... she can't have just disappeared. Look for clues!"
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Quill searches for Mariana about the area and river for a bit longer, still holding out hope that she just stepped out to go find some hummus, and possibly pita bread.
"I think she's gone gone. Not just gone, but really gone. I dunno," Quill rubs his head, confused.
"I think we should get back to the boat. We keep losing people and finding others, maybe Mariana found another group and that group left one of theirs for us or something."
Quill is ready to return to the boat.
It took an hour of searching, yelling, and arguing about it, but you finally agreed to abandon the search for Mariana. It felt horrible leaving her behind, but with no further information to go on, and no magical spells for detecting her location, there was really nothing more that you could do. Perhaps later, if you found a wizard to help, you could scry on her location. Until then, there was little to do but move on and pray to your deities that she wasn't food for the various creatures that called this swamp home.
It was late afternoon when you reached the river, once more covered in the muck of the swamp. As you neared the place where the swamp merged with the river, Quill began seeing signs that looked familiar. You broke through a stand of trees to see the sparkling blue-green of the river, rather than the brownish-green muck of the swamps. Turning to the north, you could see in the distance, the keelboat. You had made it!
As you trudged towards the boat, a group of orcs brandishing weapons moved out to meet you. Weapons were lowered as those in the lead recognized you. Well, most of you, anyways.
Captain Bloodtusk gestured at you and said, "Well met, adventurers! I see that you made it back in one piece." He looked you over and his toothy smile turned downwards. "Most of you, anyways. Where's the orcy fellow that was with you, and the archaeologist? And who's the human? Did trouble follow you? Speak quickly! If we need to prepare for combat, I need to know now!"
The other orcs and half-orcs with him raised their weapons again, looking about with intensity.
Behind the Captain, you could see the rest of the crew of the keelboat grabbing weapons, as well. One held a large dagger to the throat of a halfling, who was tied up and held in front of her like a small shield.
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Legs dangling beneath him. With a some what annoyed look on his face, he looks along the group quickly looking for one person. Upon seeing him "Long time no see Dieter. How have you been? Me? Well... just hangingout here.... Blind Joe from the guild sent me to find you. You haven't sent word back in a bit about about your progress on the job. But before we get to deep into catching up on all that, can you tell your friends here that you know who I am and I am not here to reappropriate any of their cargo. Well not once I knew it was already properly owned and not abandon by this fine crew."
Wiggling some in his binding "Also please inform them that I can be a lot more use alive and attacking something then dead or being used for protection."