Of Kings and Commoners - Kingmaker AP

Game Master RPGGGM

"You spellcasters work out your rest needs and I'll go wherever you lot least like"

Zokon periodically inspects each prisoner and their bindings

I have Low-Light Vision, same as Celyne. We have 3 people with Darkvision(Posh, Numular, Scarlet). Since all 3 shifts may include darkness, I would suggest we split them, with Scarlet taking the middle shift(so the 2 casters have 2 shifts uninterrupted, just because). Low-Light vision will still help with the light from a campfire, but be more useful at dawn or dusk. Plus 2 more casters, so it would make sense to give Zokon the middle shift. That leads to:
Shift 1: Posh/Numular+Celyne/Alia
Shift 2: Scarlet/Zokon
Shift 3: Posh/Numular+Celyne/Alia
While naturally I would like to stay with Scarlet, that would make most sense. I'll leave it up to Posh/Numular/Celyne who of them teams up with one another, and who with me. Since Celyne has Luna, I would tend to team her up with Numular, so the full casters have the Tiger as backup. That would place me with Posh, for a final result of:
Shift 1: Numular/Celyne(+Luna) - Arcane Caster/Divine Caster/Animal Comp.
Shift 2: Scarlet/Zokon - Melee Martial/Ranged Martial
Shift 3: Posh/Alia - Arcane Support/Arcane Melee
Would that be agreeable to everybody?

Agreed

I have Low-Light Vision, same as Celyne. We have 3 people with Darkvision(Posh, Numular, Scarlet).

Posh does not have darkvision; he las low-light. I have darkvision because I took a different racial archetype than Posh (I am a Lava Gnome). It cost me my low-light vision and my +2 to perception.

Shift 1: Numular/Celyne(+Luna) - Arcane Caster/Divine Caster/Animal Comp.

Shift 2: Scarlet/Zokon - Melee Martial/Ranged Martial
Shift 3: Posh/Alia - Arcane Support/Arcane Melee

Would that be agreeable to everybody?

This works for me.

that works for me!

Noted.

Second Watch, ahoy!

After her incredible rope job, Scarlet turns to leave. "Wh-hmm. A little help?" Scarlet realizes she tied herself...somehow.

Scarlet spends most of the day collecting rocks and picking up rocks and various dirt. "What do you think about this? Rich enough in material? Wonder what grows here? She mumbles to one of the prisoners (let's say Faeria.)

During her watch, Scarlet s"Hey Zokon. You like archery, right? Or is melee more your thing? You think I could ever be good at it?"

Zokon looks Scarlet over examining her movement and capabilities with studied target to help.. not admiring her form one bit.. ;-)

"I'm mainly an archer that because of natural ability makes a passable swordsman, but those that practice will be better than me due to the subtleties. as to you being an archer, well you move well and you've the muscle tone to pull a strong bow, I think you'd make a great archer and with your nightvision probably better than me at night."

Celyne did you end up healing anyone in the morning? If so, Faeria is a awake (mostly), and while Golden Boy looks much better he's still out.

That 16 charisma, though! Not that Scarlet will notice your glares.

"Hmm, maybe it would work out. I can at least find one of those bows that take advantage of my strength. When we have free time and aren't escorting prisoners, we should spar at some point."

It's already dark by the time you make camp, due to the late morning start. There was little to see beyond the hills and darkly shaded forest, and a few hunting raptors and wild goats standing on distant hills (which only Alia's and Celyne's keen vision could pick out).

Camp.

After eight hours of travelling, a saddle-sore Numalar directs the party to a sheltered area with a few trees, not far from the edge of the forest.

"This should be a good spot. I don't think I can go much further anyway." Quietly to the other party members, he says: "We can use the trees to secure the prisoners, and there may be enough dropwood for a fire."

As the party settles in to the camp, Numalar makes sure all the prisoners get something to eat. "It's nothing fancy, but it's what we are eating too."

I am deducting 12 days worth of trail rations - 6 for the party (we still have Cyrielle with us but us gnomes only eat half as much as everyone else) and 6 for the prisoners. I am assuming that we ate the onions yesterday.

I figure this would be our travelling schedule:
8AM - get up. Casters take 1 hour for readying their magic.
9AM - get things ready and breakfast, etc.
10AM - start travelling (go for 8 hours, unless we want to force march)
6PM - stop and make camp.
8PM start cycle of watches and rest.

Prisoners should get wandermeal.. nom nom goodness

Zokon wraps himself up in his bedroll muttering to himself " Crazy gnomes... giant guard chickens" and shaking his head

Prisoners should get wandermeal.. nom nom goodness

Should they? One of the advantages of Wandermeal is that it weighs less than regular rations, so I figured we would hang on to it.

Mmmmm biscuity goodness, Zokon is practical not necessarily a masochist.. wandermeal is not the most interesting faire

I agree that the bland Wandermeal may be mechanically useful to "hang on to", but as long as encumbrance is not a problem and we don't need to lighten our load, I would second the notion of feeding it to prisoners. I definitely don't enjoy it. Personally, I favor soft trail bread made of oats mixed with other grains, berries, and nuts and sweetened with honey. To be honest, you being caster Gnomes, I expected you would dine on Gnome Trail Rations-(plus, feeding the prisoners only Wandermeal will eventually make them sickened, which is a plus ;) )

The prisoners are again mostly silent. They eat their food and grunt their need to relieve themselves, some are still unconscious.

The night passes without incident--with nothing bigger than a family of possums sniffing about camp. They stare briefly at Scarlet in the small hours of the watch, before retreating in the underbrush.

As morning approaches, the sky mists cool down upon you. By morning every exposed surface is damp and slippery with dew and all about you is slate white as the fog continues.

Morning. The fog around you is treated as obscuring mist.

Scarlet awakens and yawns. Her hair flares out as she stretches.

"Jeez, this fog is pretty bad. How much longer do we have to travel? One more day? I can't wait to see this Oleg you keep referring to."

"See Oleg? I can't even see you in this fog. It would be both hard to keep track of the prisoners, and to see the path with this sight impairment. Zokon said it would take us a total of 3 days to reach Oleg, arriving there early on the third day. Maybe we should just wait until the morning fog passes before breaking camp and settle for arrival sometime later on the third day?"

Alia will check the prisoners closely, making sure that they are secured well.
Slapping Kessle, nonlethal: 1d3 + 3 ⇒ (2) + 3 = 5 To see if she reacts or just pretends to be unconscious(Walking up, looking at the neighbouring prisoner, looking at her, then surprise-slapping her, then continue looking at the others). I am not fully certain on the rules in this case though. If it would be "converted" into lethal damage when she's already out, obviously I'm just slapping her for a bit for flavor, not actually hitting her with full strenght.

She seems to be out.

Posh remains quiet as he keeps an eye on the prisoners, but doesn't make any actions towards them.

"I can range ahead if you wish to keep moving"

I would second the notion of feeding it to prisoners.

Okay then, I will correct the Loot page.

To be honest, you being caster Gnomes, I expected you would dine on Gnome Trail Rations

Well, it's four times as expensive as trail rations, and if someone invites you to stay for dinner you have to decline. "Sorry ma'am, but I need to stick to my trail ration diet." No thanks. Besides, Oleg is not likely to have them in stock so maintaining that diet for week after week is unlikely. As it stands it wouldn't have helped against the color spray anyway.

"I can range ahead if you wish to keep moving"

"Why don't we wait an hour or so to see if the fog lifts. If that doesn't help, we can decide then. We are in no hurry, so we could always wait it out here for another day. In the meantime, we should keep close to the camp and call out if you witness anything."

If it functions as obscuring mist, we can only see things in the 5' squares around us. That's pretty bad. Normally I would say move cautiously, but with prisoners in tow it would be very easy for one of them to slip away.

The mist clings to the land tenaciously into mid-morning.

What are folks doing until then?

Sense Motive: 1d20 + 2 ⇒ (4) + 2 = 6
Everything seems OK!

Numalar busies himself with making sure the campfires are going well, and actually sets a few other small campfires around the perimeter.

Perhaps the fires will burn away a bit of the mist. At the very least, they will help keep away the chill.

"Keep an eye on these perimeter fires. If something comes out of the fog and passes in front of one of these fires, we will see the light become blocked by something, and you will know something is out there."

The Scots used this tactic in the Bonnie Prince Charlie revolt to shoot enemies at night. :)

sense motive: 1d20 + 1 ⇒ (1) + 1 = 2

Wow another 1..

Suspicious as he is Zokon will walk 100 meters/paces then turn 180 degrees and come back on the same path to see if he can find an end to the fog.

"I'll be back in a few minutes, I'm checking a theory"

Hehe...I doubt we will get many invitations to Dinner in the near future ;) And just to verify: I thought Oleg could stock up on things if requested? Or is it just single-orders and we could not expect him to carry something by request? But you are right, the food boni are negligible. But then, the price becomes too at later levels so why not. Also, at home games we never saw it as a pure necessity to NEVER eat something else, as long as you maintained that diet 6 days a week or so, didn't remember it was that strict :)

Sense Motive: 1d20 ⇒ 2 Everything SEEMS fine. But even if not alarmed, it's still strange.
After Alia re-prepared her spells for the day, the persistence of the fog will be suspect to her. She's lived long enough to know morning mist should dissipate when the Suns out. Also, the denseness of the mist seemed unnatural.
So maybe there was an unnatural source...Alia decides to take another look around after Casting Detect Magic, on the off chance the mist is of magical origin. If it's not magical, Alia will dismiss it as a local meteorological phenomena and sit down near the fire, doing weapon maintainance. If it IS magical, she will stop Zokon from going alone.

Sense Motive: 1d20 - 2 ⇒ (13) - 2 = 11

Posh doesn't notice anything and goes about helping Numalar with making the fires.
"Good plan. We should be able to see anything approching more easily this way." he continues his usual grin as he helps set up the fires. "I'm glad I never got caught in this mist when I was out traveling."

Bluff: 1d20 + 9 ⇒ (4) + 9 = 13

Sense Motive: 1d20 - 1 ⇒ (19) - 1 = 18 Why am I the smart one?

"Hey Celyne? What's up with Luna? Why is she so...nervous?" Scarlet draws her Longsword and Kukri. "The horses know something is up, too. High alert, people."

Scarlet keeps her wits about her. "We should all stay close to the prisoners, so none of us get separated."

Perception: 1d20 + 3 ⇒ (3) + 3 = 6

Celyne casts detect magic to see if the fog is even natural,... then tries a sense motive of her own....

sense motive: 1d20 + 9 ⇒ (16) + 9 = 25

She talks low and soft to Luna, trying to comfort her... though without speak with animals spell, it is all in her voice and calming steady tones.

handle animal: 1d20 + 6 ⇒ (5) + 6 = 11

Perception just in case: 1d20 + 5 ⇒ (1) + 5 = 6

Whats with all the ones!!!!! of my last 7 rolls in this game there's been 4 ones.

[dice=Perception just in case]1d20+5

Whats with all the ones!!!!! of my last 7 rolls in this game there's been 4 ones.

One is just very lonely now. 1 is the loneliest number, as the song goes.

Whats with all the ones!!!!! of my last 7 rolls in this game there's been 4 ones.

Oh, boo-whoo....

Zokon walks into the swirling mist and is promptly erased from view down to the sound of his footsteps a mere moment before Scarlet warns against separating.

The horses close ranks together.

The fat rogue, Wilbur, starts to nervously whistle, his eyes wide with fear as he scans the mist.

What's everyone else doing?

Alia runs up to Wilbur and places her blade centimeters from his throat:"Stop this inmediately. Everybody, be silent!" While Zokon is gone, Alia will be on edge, and wants no noise that could drown out other sounds even if she would never go through with cutting a defenceless man's throat open, she hopes the mere presence of a blade will be enough to make him reconsider.
Plus she is afraid the whistling may be a form of communication with someone hiding in the fog. Assuming he shuts up, she will kneel down, one hand still holding the blade next to Wilbur, the other on the floor, concentrating on any noise she may hear with closed eyes, especially from the direction Zokon left in.

Perception to listen: 1d20 + 7 ⇒ (16) + 7 = 23

"Yipe." Wilbur squeaks and then goes silent.

survival: 1d20 + 5 ⇒ (19) + 5 = 24

Figuring he has a good idea of the way back, Zokon will draw his sword and proceed back that way, not really that interested in investigating a weird tree thing himself without reporting it to otyer knowledgeable folk

I did cast detect magic - didn't see a response to that - is the fog natural or magical?

Scarlet walks over to the prisoners, as she said she would. Seeing Alia with her blade drawn at Wilbur's throat cracks a smile from Scarlet that she promptly tries to hide.

Perception: 1d20 + 3 ⇒ (18) + 3 = 21

Scarlet keeps her eyes and ears open for danger. But this blasted fog...

I did cast detect magic - didn't see a response to that - is the fog natural or magical?

Natural.

thanks

"As strange as this fog may seem, it doesn't detect as anything magical... Perhaps it is just bad fortune that we are immersed in it this morning."

"I'm coming back theres a strange white tree out here"
Zokon says loudly hoping to reach the others

I did cast detect magic - didn't see a response to that - is the fog natural or magical?

I did too, and said I would stop Zokon from going alone if the Fog detects as magical...so kind of assumed it must be natural if not pointed out specifically. Was that wrong? As in, would it be better to re-inquire rather than assume?

Zokon makes it back to camp easily enough.

Celyne wrote:

I did cast detect magic - didn't see a response to that - is the fog natural or magical?

I did too, and said I would stop Zokon from going alone if the Fog detects as magical...so kind of assumed it must be natural if not pointed out specifically. Was that wrong? As in, would it be better to re-inquire rather than assume?

Still natural. ;)

Alia of the Blade wrote:

Celyne wrote:

I did cast detect magic - didn't see a response to that - is the fog natural or magical?

I did too, and said I would stop Zokon from going alone if the Fog detects as magical...so kind of assumed it must be natural if not pointed out specifically. Was that wrong? As in, would it be better to re-inquire rather than assume?

Still natural. ;)

I know, I just meant to ask if in such a case it's ok to assume, or you prefer if we ask for clarification. Handling that is quite different from GM to GM. Some want people to ask, others want them to deduce. As said, I had an conditional action if it was magical, action did not trigger, I assumed it was natural fog. But if you had overlooked it, and it was indeed magical fog, and then something happens to Zokon, it would be bad. On the other hand, too much asking and clarification bogs things down. So it's mostly a question what you prefer. I'm rather new in the group and had less chance to learn your style first-hand so was unsure if I handled if correctly, when I saw Celyne ask-

Zokon describes the tree encounter

"unusually broad white birch tree with black nobs and spayed roots. Closer inspection shows the ghost-colored bark to be reedy, draping over the trunk with a look and texture more akin course hair than wood.

An unexpectedly warm gust of humid wind blew down upon my head.

"Doesn't sound like a natural tree, even if the fog IS natural... I wonder if it is one of those walking trees I've heard of... they are supposed to be quite dangerous. Perhaps we could talk to it if it is sentient."

"unusually broad white birch tree ...

"Hmm. Deucedly odd. I'm afraid I know little enough of the natural world that I could scarce identify it. Unless it was a were-tree. Is it a full moon tonight?"

"But we did stop in an area with a few trees around. Isn't it possible it was there when we arrived and we just didn't notice how it was different from the other trees?"

INT check to remember if such a tree was there when we made camp: 1d20 + 3 ⇒ (5) + 3 = 8
Don't know what the DC would be for that... but an 8 probably doesn't do it.

Numalar turns and looks at the prisoners. "What about you lot? Have you ever seen or heard of a shaggy white tree like a birch, with black knobs on it? If so, what is it?"

Don't know what the DC would be for that... but an 8 probably doesn't do it.

No it doesn't, and you would probably have been one of the few to see since it was dark by the time you made camp, and pretty far away.

Numalar turns and looks at the prisoners. "What about you lot? Have you ever seen or heard of a shaggy white tree like a birch, with black knobs on it? If so, what is it?"

They all shake their heads.

Anyone one else want to do anything in the near future?