PFS by PbP scenario TBD (Inactive)

Game Master Brayden Green

Amnur stays close to Shi as she pokes her head in, whispering to her absently, "I wonder what's so funny..."

EDIT: ninja'd by our GM! Amnurs comment of course took place before whatever Shi noticed... ahem.

earlier I turn my head to one side and present a cheek to Orion after his comment.

now I follow eventually, loathe to be torn from the fascinating cultural curios.

Varian, behind Amnur, waits to find out what Shi has discovered.

Oh the dilemma.. On one hand.. "dammit Jim, I'm a thief, not an assassin".. on the other hand.. corpse.. blood stained cackling guard.. obviously not in his right mind..guilty as charged. *le sigh*

Quietly backing out of the room, Shilyn closes the door softly behind her and holds it shut. "Get something to bar this door. There's a blood-stained guard laughing over a snake eating a corpse. Perhaps if we solve this mystery, the man will regain his senses."

"If he does regain his senses alone in there with a corpse being eaten by a snake, he may not retain them long. We should be prepared to go in and help him if we do resolve what is going on here."

Yes. Let's kill the snake and try to talk to the man. This is all getting strange.

Until we solve this mystery, we may end up killing the man as well," Shilyn says over her shoulder while holding the door closed. "It's obvious something in this place is making people crazy as we've already seen. We stop that.. we could cure the remaining folk without needless bloodshed.. especially ours."

I can easily see the man attacking us in his state, as the others did.

I think that we have to take our chances to leave him with the snake. I have a rope if that helps.

Orion looks around to see if there is anything to tie the rope to (if it is an outside swinging door).

Amnur snaps his fingers, quietly, and outlines a forming idea. "We all saw the wench-loving mist leave the other guards after we brained em unconscious. I'm thinking it'll be the same for that loony. What if we set a trap, a pincer movement if you will. Flori, you could go stand by the first door, over there. The rest of us will lie in wait, and when the crazed man comes charging out, we flank him from two sides, aiming to knock him senseless rather than kill him. I'm not wanting to leave him at our backs. If I were crazy, I'd want you to knock the stuffing out of me!" the dwarf ends his quiet tirade, a crazed look in his eye.

Orion shrugs, That could work too. Can I see that tusk, if we do? I'd like to bonk someone with that...

Having said his piece, Amnur easily accepts the will of the group, readying himself and remembering to use the flat side of his axe if they ambush, but prepared to leave if they decide to board the door close for the time being.

Wondering if he might have come across to zealous as "bonking" guys...

You know, for the greater good... to get him better... you know, right?

he says nervously.

Amnur pats Orion's shoulder with clear understanding and sympathy, having recently bonked a few of you several times trying to get the wand to work.

Just waiting on a greater consensus before updating stuffs; looks like 2 for get 'em!, 2 for ambush, and 1 for locking him up and dealing with him later.

As Amnur is a dwarf, I feel we should all do what he says...

"We should help him, if we can. He might have useful information for us when he comes around."

I shrug, not completely convinced by my own argument but preferring it to others.

"Ok, so we help him.. even if that means smacking him upside the head," she says with a shrug before opening the door again and yelling out, "Hey! Think that snake's funny? Have you looked in the mirror lately?"

Quickly closing the door, Shilyn dances to the left of it and holds her rapier ready.

"Get ready to bonk him Amnur."

mechanically, I haven't puzzled out a fool-proof method of executing the 'door flank' maneuver. It seems like it should be possible to do. I'm thinking that the ambushers (in this case me and Shi, sorta rhymes, teeheehee. *ahem!* sorry) would need to either be stealthed, or we could stand away from the door 5 or 10' forcing the ambushee to leave the protection of the doorway. The readied action would need to be worded something like, 'When the ambushee attacks me or my ambush-buddy, move to flank and try to avoid an AoO'. I don't know if it's possible at all in a surprise round, without being 'pre-stealthed'. Anyways....

Amnur nods and takes a firmer grip on his axe, taking a position by the door and readying himself to bonk the crazed guard as soon as he's in a position to be flanked by Shi or himself. I need to get myself a true bonkin' stick for these situations. he thinks to himself and he rotates the axe to avoid killing the man.

I stand back and watch, ready to cast a magic bolt if more than Amnur's heavy blows is needed.

To keep things moving, I'm going to make assumptions on peoples actions.
Orion: I see him hefting the mammoth tusk to non-lethally bludgeon the guy.
Varian: Same things with a lucerne hammer for reach.
Mylv: Readying an acid dart @ the snake
Flori: Readying an acid orb @ the snake

After some rearranging of the exhibits (with Amnur crammed right below a chimera head), Shi gets the man's attention and closes the door shut.

Almost immediately, manic banging on the door occurs and it only lasts for about 6 seconds before it shatters! The lunatic, howling primal grunts as the others have done, appears before you all as your attacks start to fly!

Varian @ crazy guy: 1d20 + 2 - 4 ⇒ (16) + 2 - 4 = 14
Varian dmg on hit: 1d12 + 3 ⇒ (4) + 3 = 7
Orion @ crazy guy: 1d20 + 5 - 4 ⇒ (11) + 5 - 4 = 12
Orion dmg @ hit: 1d10 + 3 ⇒ (1) + 3 = 4
Shilyn @ crazy guy: 1d20 + 4 - 4 + 2 ⇒ (12) + 4 - 4 + 2 = 14
Shilyn dmg w/ SA on hit: 1d6 + 1d6 + 1 ⇒ (5) + (4) + 1 = 10

Shilyn, Varian, Amnur, and Orion all dogpile on the crazy guy who only gets to let out one howl before he's bashed 4 times. White mist escapes his mouth as he blacks out in front of the ambushes.

A snake then slithers on top of the man, hissing as he's about to bite Shilyn.

Flori @ snake: 1d20 + 2 - 4 ⇒ (12) + 2 - 4 = 10
Damage on hit: 1d3 + 1 ⇒ (3) + 1 = 4
Mylvwara @ snake: 1d20 + 3 - 4 ⇒ (15) + 3 - 4 = 14
Damage on hit: 1d6 + 1 ⇒ (5) + 1 = 6

While Flori's orb just misses the reptile, Mylvwara's dart nails the serpent, who dissolves violently.

Other than mist slowly seeping into the room, everything is still once again.

Edit: Bah, ninja'ed by Mylv: This is basically the same action at least, just different target. :)

Varian quickly casts Cure Light wounds on the fallen man to make sure he doesn't die... and maybe comes back conscious.

CLW: 1d8 + 1 ⇒ (3) + 1 = 4

With the touch of magical curing, the pudgy man slowly comes to his senses.

"The voices... they've finally stopped...", he mutters. He's startled for a second as he squints to see the collection of armed people (you guys), the dissolved remains of a snake nearby, and is shocked at the blood stains on his guard uniform.

"By Desna, what happened?!", he cries out as he begins to panic. "Sheg, where's Sheg?", the confused man asks, pulling Varian close.

"Who is Sheg? another guard? Can you describe him?" Varian asks, hoping the description doesn't match the dead man in the water closet.

"Well, let's see," Shilyn says as she points to the man with her rapier, "that may be the guy with his head in the jacks whom you were laughing at while this little snake tried to eat him one bite at a time. But hey, what do I know right?"

Rotating her sword so the blade rests lightly on her shoulder, she scowls at him and asks, "So.. who the heck are YOU?"

Amnur perks up at the mention of the name Sheg, "I was hoping you could tell us where Sheg is. Friend of yours?"

"Wha-?", he asks confused. He turns around, scampering past the shattered door into the bathroom where he looks on with horror. "Oh Sheg! Poor Sheg! What has happened to you!". Pulling the corpse out from the stall, he gives a blood-curdling scream: half-orc's body was apparently ripped in half, with the torso falling into the cesspool below with a stomach-churning sploosh.

The man openly weeps for his dead friend. "I am Maldroog... and this... is all that's left of Sheg!", is all else he can say before he starts balling at the grusome sight.

Glancing at the dwarf, she pats the guard on the shoulder. "Don't worry, my friends and I will be more than happy to help avenge Sheg, Maldroog. Can you tell us more about what's going on here?"

"I-I-I.... don't know! This mist came seeping in and I panicked! The last thing I remember was Ni- oh Desna Nigel must be dead, too! He was carried away by these apes into the obelisk room. After that... I blacked out."

Apes! Amnur's face scrunches up while remembering the last bunch of apes they dealt with. "We are sorry for your loss, Sheg will be missed more than you know." Amnur steps forward and respectfully pats down the half of Shegs body which is not in the cesspool. "Maybe there is some trinket we can return to his family."

If he doesn't find anything of note on the half out of the cesspool, Amnur will step forward and try to snag poor Sheg's other half with his waraxe, muttering obscenities under his breath.

Is a roll needed for this?

With a sign, Shilyn looks to the others. "What a crappy way to die. Shall we move on and rid this place of this curse?"

@Amnur: As you pat down the lower half, you realize there's no belt or belt-loops on the pants; it appears they were ripped off violently. Please give me a Perception check.

@Shilyn: I see what you did there :P

Gosh Shi, always with the poop jokes.

Perception: 1d20 ⇒ 8

@Amnur: I forgot... dwarf, darkvision... bah, so no roll needed. But you do notice the torso of the dismembered guard laying in a pool of filth. Your darkvision also notes no belt attached to the torso (or its attached suspenders)

"Amnur, what's up? Something else wrong in here, or should we head off to this obelisk room and try to set right this place?"

"Maldroog," Amnur calls out from his position above poor Shegs... submerged half, "Did you see where Sheg's keys went?"

EDIT: He half turns to Varian, "I, uh, remembered he was some sort of important guard and thought we could benefit from the keys he probably carries. No matter, let us continue on and end this threat."

He puts actions to his words and moves to the main hallway before stopping and looking at Shi expectantly. As if to say, Get on with it half-elf!

"Um, Amnur can you come here a second and give me a boost?" The question seemingly comes out of nowhere. She points up to a severed half-orc head hanging from the ceiling. "I want to check this thing out and get it down. Looks like there may be something crammed in its mouth."

Amnur strides right over, "Of course Shi. What are y... HOLY-RED-BEARD-of-TORAG!" The solid stone paladin grimaces and then braces his back against the wall, just wide enough of the severed head to avoid the dripping blood, and acts as a dwarven ladder, or stepping stool, for the nimble half-elf.

Cruel GM would force a Climb and/or Acrobatics check... but to move things along, we'll assume Amnur makes a great stool.

As Shilyn steps up to retrieve the head, Maldroog looks and screams in bloody horror and immediately starts running out of the museum. wuss

Working the jaw carefully, a bloodied keyring falls down, clanking off the dwarf's shoulderplate.

There's a double meaning in that.

Amnur, gentledwarf that he is, refrains from watching as Shi retrieves the head. He almost drops her when the keyring falls down, starting to bend over to retrieve them before remembering Shi is still up there. He settles back and allows her to descend before leaning down to get the bloody keys. "Thank you Shi, I was looking for these. Lets press ahead!" and secures the keys in a handy pouch as he walks back into the hall.

As a GM's note, my first text was 'As Shilyn works the head'. I giggled, then reworded the sentence.

Oh boy. :D

As we move on, I pat Amnur on the shoulder, "Ever reliable, strongheart."

Then I grin, "Although I think my magic has played its part."

Further, this line from DBZA came into mind afterwords. This shall be enough of the GM silliness. One room beckons for you to go. Where is Nigel? Are there monkeys? And will Flori ever figure out who her father's brother's nephow's cousin's former roommate is? Find out by posting more!

"Thanks Amnur," she says as she hops down from his shoulders. Tossing the severed head uncerimonously into a corner, she wipes her hands on her pants. "Well, next bloody head is someone elses.. to retrieve I mean. but then again, I hope it IS someone elses." With a giggle, Shilyn moves to back to the door they left behind..

Well, who wants to check this last door?

Flori stands by the door. I can give a few of you a little burst of strength as you go in. I'll be right behind you.

"Well, maybe Shi should check the door before one of us opens it."

Amnur takes his accustomed place at the door, watching Shi's movements as she does her normal thorough examination of the final door. He gives her a smile, "Hurry up, I hear there's monkeys running around that need killin!"

"And we've SO had our fill of monkeys lately... I'm down with killing a few more." Varian says, flashing Amnur a grin.

Shilyn walks up to the door and spends a moment checking it out..

Take 10: 10 + 11 = 21

Hoping she didn't miss something, she reaches out with her left hand and opens the door to peer inside..

perception: 1d20 + 11 ⇒ (17) + 11 = 28