Lara takes a step away from her foe and plants an arrow squarely in the back of the chupacabra on top of Trieste ().
Seeing that Trieste was having trouble with the chupacabra assaulting her, but also knowing that he was just as likely to hit her as the beast should he let fly, the wizard instead kept his crossbow trained on the creature that had been attacking Lara, letting loose another bolt at the thing.
The wizard then again went through the process of reloading the weapon, hoping the intense combat training would help improve his aim.
Hengeist will first take care of the creature on Trieste.
Trieste is pinned on the ground, but her animals continue to try to finish off the beast attackign her
Jobert
the creatures manage to kill the chupacabra, releasing Trieste who stands up and moves back
Kragg stabs again with his long spear at the beast fighting with Hengeist
Lara aims at the creature on top of Trieste, but can see that the animal companions have things under control. she shoots the stunned one instead. Thame also hits the stunned chupacabra.
Hengeist is unable to hit the one he swung at
the two remaining chupacabras keep attacking
The whole party may act
Global Condition: None |
Global Condition:
Hengeist HP: 32/40 - AC: 17/12/17 Status:)
Thame HP: 22/22 - AC: 12/12/10 Status:
Lara: HP: 11/28 - AC: 17/12/15 Status: grappled
Kragg HP: 14/31 - AC: 19/10/19 Status: protective aura
Trieste HP: 19/30 - AC: 19/10/19 Status: pinnedNPCS:
Green Chupacabra HP:-17 | AC: 17 |
Red Chupacabra HP: -40 | AC: 17 | dead
Blue Chupacabra HP:-16 | AC: 17 |
Lara struggles to get out of the flying beast's grasp (again).
Trieste directs her eagles to go after the chupacabra attacking Lara.
Meanwhile, she pulls out her longspear and steps up to help against the other one. Jobert follows her to guard her flank.
Having stabbed the chupacabra successfully once and still not distracted it from its target Kragg tried a different alternative. He casts bless on the party hoping to affect eh eagles as well to bring more attacks upon the enemies.
Thame skirted around the chupacabra that was thrashing about with Lara, getting on the other side and then trying to find an opportune time to thrust his dagger at the creature.
Feeling his blood rising Hengeist keeps the rage under control, it won't help in this fight.
He swings hard at Blue.
Lara breaks free, and Thame comes to her aid stabbing for some more damage
Kragg calls upon divine aid to help his allies hit better
Trieste's birds and Hengeist finish off the blue chupacabra
the final creature turns away from Lara and focuses on the new threat that dug a dagger into its side
The party may act
Global Condition: None |
Global Condition:
Hengeist HP: 32/40 - AC: 17/12/17 Status:
Thame HP: 12/22 - AC: 12/12/10 Status:
Lara: HP: 11/28 - AC: 17/12/15 Status:
Kragg HP: 14/31 - AC: 19/10/19 Status: protective aura
Trieste HP: 19/30 - AC: 19/10/19 Status:NPCS:
Green Chupacabra HP:-14 | AC: 17 |
Red Chupacabra HP: -40 | AC: 17 | dead
Blue Chupacabra HP:-38 | AC: 17 | dead
Taking advantage of her reprieve, Lara scrambles away from the chupacabra and plants an arrow in its back.
Thame yelled as the chupacabra laid into him, miraculously managing to not get dragged off by the creature to become a late-night wizard snack. Seeing the others finish off the other beast, the illusionist swiped again at the thing, hoping the others would come along and take its attention off him.
Kragg moves and lays a hand upon Hengeist's arm bestowing him with mighty strength. Abadar strengthen you my companion. Take out your aggressions upon the chupacabra Hengeist. We need to end this now so we can heal and survive.
bull's strength cast
Hengeist lopes over to the last and swings at it eagerly.
The eagles didn't even need direction to know that the chupacabra was an enemy. They both flew at the creature with gusto.
Trieste stepped up with her spear to stab at it as well.
down to only one target, the team makes quick work of the last beast. Trieste lands the final blow, and the life leaves the eyes of the chupacabra.
End of combat. what do you do next?
"Damn, evil little critters. Everyone okay?" she says, pouring a little water on her own wounds.
Thame held his side where the chupacabra had laid into him gingerly, shaking his head. "Not nearly ok...if that fisherman was out here, we might as well write him off as dead. Best check for bones, though, just to be thorough."
The wizard thought about how callous that might have sounded, then shrugged. "I dunno...maybe he got away and is hiding somewhere."
The illusionist gave Kragg a hopeful look, then continued. "Now that these things have been destroyed, do we maybe want to explore more of the island? Or go ahead and report back with success?"
Kragg gathers the others and channels to heal them of the wounds. Abadar heal my companions so that we may continue to do your bidding.
Channel x2
I am thinking we need to find their lair and confirm the man is dead and that there are no more of these creatures out here.
Hengeist looks around carefully, hoping to spot the nest or burrow of these vile pests. "I think you're right. One man on his own against these bastards wouldn't last long!"
Hengeist searches in the rocky outcropping where the beasts came from originally. he finds evidence of creatures living there for some time. there are no more chupacabras inside.
Chupacabras are known to be normally solitary creatures. sometimes they congregate in pairs or even three or four, but they do not gather in larger groups.
These creatures do not eat the flesh of their victims, but subsist off of blood. they often leave their victims as dried-out husks with only a bite mark to show that a chupacabra had caused the death.
you think that if these critters did kill Soren you would likely find his body wherever they found him.
Thame sighed in relief as Abadar's healing washed over him, curing his wounds. When the dwarf spoke of searching, the wizard nodded, if a bit wearily. Being the colony's problem solvers, they had a certain responsibility to verify these sorts of things.
When Hengeist pointed out the chupacabra nest, the wizard thought about the lore he had studied over the past decade. He hadn't remembered much in the heat of the fight with the creatures, but now that things had calmed down, he recalled more details.
"These things subsist on blood, so any corpse would be exsanguinated but otherwise intact. They likely wouldn't drag Soren off anywhere, so his corpse is likely close by, if scavengers haven't savaged it beyond recognition."
If that is the case then if we do not find his body then we can assume that it was a different group of chupacabres that attacked him and we still have work to do.
"Thanks, as always, Kragg." Armed with a little knowledge about the beasts, Trieste helps the others search for Soren's remains.
Lara keeps an arrow nocked to her now as she scans their surroundings for any more dangers.
Scowling at Kragg's suggestion that they may have more work to do, Thame tried his best to help search for the man's corpse, doing a much more thorough job than usual.
Hengeist takes the front while they are in the wilds, looking for more trouble since it seemed the island was well supplied with it!
the group wanders the beach for a while, doing a pretty thorough job of searching for a body. Thame finds a body, but it appears to be a goblin not a human, but it is definitely drained of blood.
Trieste finds ruts in the sand and scrapes on some of the rocks that indicate a small boat was dragged into the water there. it wasn't specified how often before Soren had used this spot for fishing, but it definitely looks like a boat was launched from this point recently.
Thame almost felt excited upon finding the body, before realizing it was just one of the local goblins. As the lengthy search turned up nothing, the wizard's temperament grew irritable. He didn't wish the fisherman dead, but he almost assuredly was and it would make things much cleaner if they could just confirm it.
After the group called it quits searching for Soren, the wizard muttered, "Stupid bird-monsters. What kind of hell is this that would house such things." The irony of his statement, a Chelaxian, wasn't lost on him, and finding the humor alleviated his mood somewhat. Turning to the others, he said, "Let's go back to the colony and check in, then we can go to one of the other hot spots on the island. We don't have a lack of work, at the present."
Unfortunately, none of that work was studying Azlanti history and artifacts, at the present, but the wizard was sure that one day he would have the time for it.
Kragg likewise feels dismay at the finding of a goblin body and not of their missing colonist. I am down some of my gifts from Abadar but I think we might be able to keep exploring a bit. However if you would like to report back that we cleared out a den of the chupacabras I understand. We could rest and return in the morning to pick of the trail and explore more of the shore looking for signs of Soren. With the evidence of the boat on the shore I figured this was going to be it.
Thame is right as well that we have plenty to do at the moment. I just hoped we could search for Soren and explore the island at the same time to discover the natural resources and possible ancient Pathfinder secrets at the same time. Looks like we struck out on all accounts today other than making the island safer by 3 chupacabras.
"We may as well continue looking for our missing fisherman, as long as we're still in good shape. Maybe take a look underwater here where we see the boat launching? If there's wreckage nearby, it'd solve our mystery. But if not, we may not have a trail to follow any more."
Kragg will stay on the shore on guard while others search underwater. If they do not find any evidence then he sighs and hoists his pack ready to move on.[/b]
Thame is happy to cast Touch of the Sea on one or two others to search out into the water and find any evidence that might be beneath the waves. While Lara's words rang true, Kaldan's death and the group's close call with the sea devil's had the wizard a little leery of going diving. Still, if no one else volunteered to go with the lovely bard, the illusionist grudgingly goes himself.
However it goes down, the wizard is ready to move on afterward, like the cleric, going over a mental map in his head. "Weren't we told of a location not far from where we fought the sahuagin? I believe the locathah spoke of it...maybe that's our next stop after we check in?"
Trieste volunteers for a quick dive. ”Between me and Jobert, we should be enough for a quick search near shore. If he was dragged farther out, he’s in Besmara’s care.”
Hengeist will join Trieste in the water, as he has a swim speed and can breath in it.
A decently thorough search of the nearby waters does not turn up any new evidence. No bodies or boat wreckage is found. it appears that this is a dead end.
When the underwater exploration turns up empty Kragg hoists his pack. Veru well, let’s keep on exploring the coast till we find something of use. Eventually we will find something to report back with. We should also bring the boat next time as well to make travel quicker.
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Thame was a little glum when Kragg announced that they should continue down the coast, though it wasn't too bad. They didn't have great news to return to the colony with (beyond the report of the dead chupacabras), and the return would likely be spoiled by the presence of Eliza, anyway. Content to continue, the wizard prepared to make way, glad he had insisted on bringing thick-soled boots to the island instead of the librarian's slippers he had been used to wearing.
Having given up on the hope of finding the fisherman here, the group decides to move on, at least for now. based on the map and information gained from Caver previously, the group decides to check on the closest point of interest: a sunken laboratory located on the very southeastern tip of the island.
In order to get there, their path brings them very close to the colony once more. a decision needs to be made: spend the rest of the day and night in Talmandor's Bounty to recover from the chupacabra fight, or press on to explore the site?
As they make their way back into the colony, Trieste asks the others, "Should we let them hope? I mean, we didn't find a body, or a boat, so Soren isn't definitely dead. But I'm pretty doubtful as this point."
Thame thought about Trieste's question for a moment, then shrugged. "Let's just present the facts as we know them and not lead them down a path of wishful thinking. We investigated, found the creatures, killed them, and only saw signs that the boat had been launched at some point. No body. After this long, it's doubtful he's alive, you're right. But the bird-things probably didn't do it, by the looks of it."
The wizard was a researcher, by trade, so hated to leave anything as murky as this happened to be. But that's all they knew at the moment, so it was best to just leave it open-ended, he thought. When they arrived at the Colony, the illusionist left the checking in with Ramona part to the dutiful Kragg and went off in search of his bed, certain that their destination tomorrow would offer equally horrid things that would try to kill them.
Hengeist will go with what the party wishes, though some more of the taverns ale would be nice. :)
Ramona takes the report of your findings with a grave look on her face. she thanks you for investigating, but clearly agrees with Thame's assessment that the man is probably dead even without the evidence of a body to back it up. she mentions she will try to institute a better system to avoid having any one person go off alone from now on to try to avoid this kind of incident.
after a full night's rest (and possibly some libations at Kragg's bar), the group is ready to move on to the next landmark. a short journey along the coast and around the corner by rowboat brings the party very close to the spot marked on their maps as one of the pathfinder sites of interest.
as the group makes their way half a mile in from the shore, they see an impact crater more than 50 feet across punched into the mountainside. it is shrouded in vegetation and topped with crumbling stone blocks, toppled pillars and shattered statues. several thin streams of water flow down the mountainside and trickle into the yawning crater descending into the earth.
"Besmara's boots. I'm not sure what I was expecting, but this wasn't it," Trieste murmurs to Jobert. She begins to poke around to figure out what this place was.
Thame's eyes widened as they came upon the crater in the ground, whispering, "The remnants of Earthfall..." Seeing the huge depression, it was a wonder that mankind had survived the event to again thrive on Golarion. Shaking off his awe, he helped the others search, taking care to inspect the pillars and statues for inscriptions, pictures, or writings that would not only help them, but also might be historically significant.
"Ya think it's that old, Thame?" Trieste says as they get closer. Out of curiosity more than anything else, she casts detect magic and looks in the general vicinity unsure of what she might see.
Kragg takes the opportunity to stop at the brewery once they got home. The common room was almost finished and he could tell that it would add a lot to the establishment. Yes the necessities were there with the bar and the brewery but a common room for people to gather would be nice. Plus it would be enclosed for those inclement weather days. While at the colony he informs Ramona what they discovered and also inquired as to the security of their captive. She hasn’t tried to escape or cause any disturbances while we have been gone has she?
In the morning he prepares his spells and makes ready to head south to investigate the location of interest. Like the others he was not sure what they were going to find. The crater was cool but smaller than he would have thought if it was Earthfall. Still the statues indicated that this was an important place worth exploring. With as much to explore here this might take a while. After all we have the crater to explore, the mountain side, the pillars and statues, and possible the water as well. Where should we start?
Perception +2 more if stonework applies
Knowledge (arcana) +4,
Knowledge (dungeoneering) +4,
Knowledge (engineering) +4,
Knowledge (geography) +4,
Knowledge (history) +4,
Knowledge (local) +4,
Knowledge (nature) +4,
Knowledge (nobility) +4,
Knowledge (planes) +8,
Knowledge (religion) +8,