Clearly this crew knows my strengths to give me such and easy task
Eepers rubs his claws in eager anticipation, and makes sure to hurry in his work so he can explore his new ship a little.
Off to a quick start, onee of his claws gets stuck halfway up, but he easily gets free and continues his climb. One he gets high enough to make the repairs, Eepers easily breezes through the repairs.
In the morning, Grauchi focuses on replacing the lines. A good first impression goes a long way to ensure a save back-stab.
At night Grauchi tries and listen for rumors and get a grasp of the situation regarding the crew and whatever is going on.
He also purifies his own food before each meal, preferable in a non-obvious manner. And drinks his own created water.
Sarag is happy for the break. He tells Fishgut about his experience with the reefclaws, telling him that the food didn't agree that it was food and tried to eat them.
He goes out on the search for more friends. Even though she attacked him at one point, they did give up quick and run away. He goes to find the sole person in the group that doesn't seem to absolutely hate them curious if the others could be talked out of their rudeness.
"I know you was made to attack poor Sarag, but you ran fast instead. Does Sarag really have to be bad guy? Can group forgive Sarag and be nice? Yes?" he asked her curiously.
Later that evening he goes off to find another person to talk to, he finds the swab Shivikah when he brings her her evening grog.
Goes off to find another person to talk to, talks to talk to Barefoot Samms.
Sarag feels good after talking so much today and calls it a night.
Sassarra some rumors on where the ship is heading. But none that sound reliable.
In the hold Skrelznit founds 10 pigs running free, two light ballistas, a disassembled light catapult, and 12 barrels containing 20 gallons of oil each. Owlbear Hartshorn is chained by the stairs to the officers Cabin.
He also finds a Flask of holy water.
Eepers finds the quartermaster, Cut-Throat Grok, going over the ships manafest and store. Along with the ships store, he can also see two large tuns of rum.
Grauchi hears a little better than Sassarra. He hears that the captain is hunting for a ship, and that Mr. Plugg and Master Scourge are trying to turn crew away from the party.
Slippery looks a little off about talking to Sarag after what happen, but he soon takes in Sarag's words. "We were just doing what we were told. Mr. Plugg does not like you."
Both Shivikah and Samms reacts well to Sarag.
Eepers looks around the shop for a few minutes, but leaves quickly as he has no interest in interaction with a possibly dangerous half-orc. Not on his first day, at least!
Eepers goes to find the others from his raft to see what they've learned of the crew.
Swabs and Riggers get a +2 bonus on their job check as Friendly and helpful shipmates aid them.
Cook's mate gets +2 bonus on job check if not drunk as the Cook aids him.
Everyone gets +2 bonus to influence other NPC.
Day 13:
The cooling effect of the storm has went leaving behind a heat wave.
When the party gets on deck the next day, they can feel the thick wet air mix with the hot sun. Seeing the party on deck, Mr. Plugg walks over to them. "You are now a swab," he says pointing at Grauchi. The other two are going to the rigging."
Riggers:
Some rigging has been damaged.
DC 10 climb check for 30 feet.
DC 19 Profession (sailor) or dexterity check to do the repairs.
Lines are needing to be replaced. Eepers is needed to coil and stowing of the old lines.
DC 10 profession (sailor) or dexterity check.
Some rigging has been damaged.
DC 10 climb check for 30 feet.
DC 19 Profession (sailor) or dexterity check to do the repairs.
Cook's mate:
Koop is drunk. So Sarag needs to do a lot of the cooking.
DC 10 Profession (cook)
Swabs:
Lines are needing to be replaced. Grauchi and Sassarra is needed to haul out the ropes and tying the knots for the riggers.
DC 10 Profession (sailor) or Strength check.
DC 12 Constitution check to avoid being fatigued.
Lines are needing to be replaced. Grauchi and Sassarra is needed to haul out the ropes and tying the knots for the riggers.
DC 10 Profession (sailor) or Strength check.
DC 12 Constitution check to avoid being fatigued.
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Skrelznit stumbles on the unfamiliar rigging, but recovers quickly and finds the work not so difficult. He struggles briefly with an uncooperative pulley, but wrenches it free and completes his work.
Along the way, he finds time to chat up Slippery Sly Lonegan, complimenting her ropework and asking about a particular knot (which he already knows how to tie).
Never hurts to have friends-k-k-k among the big people.
That is interesting knot. Very nice-k-k-k. You show Skrelznit how to tie later maybe-k-k-k?
***
That night, Skrelznit attempts to entertain the crew with the story of how his entire dinghy was swallowed whole by a sea monster, but he escaped by climbing out through the gills and hitching a ride on a giant jellyfish floating at the surface. Totally true, Skrelznit guarantees it.
Mopsank works hard, doing his best to try and fix the troublesome rigging... but it's not enough.
Sassarra will work hard to get everything done. She gets a feeling that something is in the air.
At hearing Skrelznit's tale, she responds with one of her own. It's a tale of being caught without wind for three days with a cargo of fruit that wasn't getting any fresher. She tells of how she and her brothers harpooned a whale and leapt on it's back. They pulled open it's blowhole with hooks to keep it from going under and they let that whale drag them off to port.
Tying rope? Ugh, Eepers is almost disappointed to have such an easy task
Grauchi works hard during the day, but puts too much effort into it, he becomes fatigued.
At night, he'll just go to rest and get rid of the fatigue.
Sarag gently pokes poor inebriated Fishguts but gets hardly any response. He goes and takes away all the empty bottles, gets the old man's blanket and puts it over him before he begins his work.
For the first time in the kitchen he seems to be a bit overwelmed and ends up burning the meal a bit.
He squeaks as he smells and runs around the room frantically trying to figure out if he can fix it.
Sarag feels bad for screwing up and tries to console the crew by entertaining them.
He can't really come up with anything for them pirate flavor wise so he proceeds to sing an old song about a Dragon and his mountain in draconian.
He sings his heart out knowing that a beating is likely coming for him.
Sly shows Skrelznit some work with the knot.
Many of the crew look board hearing Skrelznit's and Sasarra tales.
Sarag on the other claw makes some of the crew sing along with him.
Swabs and Riggers get a +2 bonus on their job check as Friendly and helpful shipmates aid them.
Cook's mate gets +2 bonus on job check if not drunk as the Cook aids him.
Everyone gets +2 bonus to influence other NPC.
Day 14:
It is a somewhat cloudly day.
When you get on deck you find that you all have been excused from their regular work today; even the cook. Riaris Krine comes up to the party. You find yourselves dragged off to the jolly boat rocking on the water a short way from the ship.
"You all need to learn more of your new life. Today is boarding training. You will learn how to board a ship the pirate way or drowned trying.
To board a ship you must attach a grappling hook and climb across. Now to make things a little more fun I have some of the crew up their throwing things at each of you as you climb."
Attempt 1 to board:
Sassarra hurls her hook and it lands with an acceptable thunk. The climbing part seems to be an issue as she splashes down. Not one to give up she swims back and begins climbing again. Only to fall in a second time.
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Skrelznit is in luck as his grappling hook lands squarely on the railing.
He casts Monkey Fish on himself and walks nimbly across the rope, dodging and weaving to avoid the hurled objects.
Grauchi looks at the rope and hook and a smile comes across his face, this seems a lot more fun than swapping the deck or replacing the lines. Since it is for practice, he takes of his vest and starts the exercise.
Wait. Yesterday I have to coil rope, today I unravel it across boats? Ugh
No wonder we aren't staying...
GAAAAHH
Eepers hits the water with a large splash and begins swimming back to the boat to try again.
Eepers, clearly upset, stands still for a moment. His face twists into a look of anger. It almost looks as if a small wing lifted slightly on his back, and a spark of flame lit in his mouth.
Soaking wet, Eepers stops a moment to calm himself. His back scales collapse back into his body, and his mouth darkens as the sparks fade.
Once everyone is back on the boat
Sassarra, don't worry. I made sure to drop off the rope a few times so you didn't fail alone.
Sarag looks around confused at first when he's handed a grappling hook and rope but soon sees what the others are doing. This could not go well.
He gives it a little spin before tossing it.
He blinks a bit as he hit his target with precision. He takes a few deep breathes before he latches his claws onto the rope and swings out to climb up.
He plunges straight into the water and screeches as he flails about.
He manages to kobold paddle back over to his rope and start up it again.
With the splash into the cold water he is spurred to get out of it.
Once out of the water he stays the hell out of the water with more grace then he thought he had.
Skrelznit and Sarag ducks around the junk the crew throws at them. Eeper on the other claw takes a box to the face, but holds on the rope and powers up the rope without flinching.
The crew even stops throwing things at Grauchi and Sassarra when they keep falling back in the water.
Riaris Krine shakes her head. "Is this what the crew is reduced to now. Get back in the boat you two."
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Skrelznit cheers for himself, Sarag, and Eepers. To the returning boat he calls out,
Those ropes were slippery. Skrelznit felt it-k-k-k.
***
That night, Skrelznit attempts to sweet-talk Slippery Sly some more. He seeks the aid of his spirit guide for a good topic.
You'se is good rigger, Sly-k-k-k. You'se gonna be a good captain someday, Skrelznit can tell-k-k-k.
Eepers spends the evening finding, and silently (not stealthy, just not speaking) following the crew member who marked his beautiful face
With a flourish, Mopsank hurls the grappling hook. It sails gracefully through the air, and lands firmly attached to the other ship. He doesn't quite get a proper grip on the rope on his first try, and ends up falling on his tail, but after that, he gets back on and scurries his way across... only to fall into the water shortly thereafter.
The crew even stops throwing things at Grauchi and Sassarra when they keep falling back in the water.
Grauchi is able to duck around on the rope and makes it up to the deck with Skrelznit, Sarag, and Eeper.
Riaris Krine drags Sassarra and Mopsank back on deck.
"I won't tell Mr. Plugg how unbearable some of you did."
Later at bloody hour Plugg has the cook come up for his punishment.
"This one cooked one of the worse meals I ever eat yesterday."
Three lashings later Kroop limped back below.
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Swabs and Riggers get a +2 bonus on their job check as Friendly and helpful shipmates aid them.
Cook's mate gets +2 bonus on job check if not drunk as the Cook aids him.
Everyone gets +2 bonus to influence other NPC.
Day 15:
It is a somewhat cloudy day.
Riggers:
Mopsank has to raise and lower the lesser sails for the day.
DC 10 Profession (sailor) or Dexterity
DC 10 Constitution check to avoid being fatigued.
Eepers is running part of the upper rigging with Skrelznit.
DC 10 Climb checks
DC 10 Profession (sailor) or Dexterity check
Skrelznit is running part of the upper rigging with Eepers.
DC 10 Climb checks
DC 10 Profession (sailor) or Dexterity check
Cook's mate:
To try to make up for how bad the meal from two days pass was, Kroop plans for a better meal to be made. But Sarag finds him drunk from drinking off the pain of his beating.
DC 10 Profession (cook) or Survival check to slaughter the animal, clean, cut, and prepare the carcass of one of the pigs.
DC 15 Profession (cook) or Intelligence check to cook the food as Kroop is to drunk to do it.
Swabs:
Sassarra finds herself Hauling Ropes and doing Knot work with Grauchi.
DC 10 Profession (sailor) or Strength check.
DC 10 Constitution check to avoid being fatigued.
Grauchi finds himself Hauling Ropes and doing Knot work with Sassarra.
DC 10 Profession (sailor) or Strength check.
DC 10 Constitution check to avoid being fatigued.
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Swabs and Riggers get a +2 bonus on their job check as Friendly and helpful shipmates aid them.
Cook's mate gets +2 bonus on job check if not drunk as the Cook aids him.
Everyone gets +2 bonus to influence other NPC.
Day 16:
It is a somewhat cloudy day.
Riggers:
Mopsank is Repairing Rigging with Eepers.
DC 10 Climb checks
DC 10 Profession (sailor) or Dexterity
Mr. Plugg moved Eepers to Mainsail work.
DC 10 Profession (sailor) or Strength check.
DC 10 Constitution check to avoid being fatigued at the end of the shift.
Skrelznit is running part of the upper rigging with Eepers.
DC 10 Climb checks
DC 10 Profession (sailor) or Dexterity check
Cook's mate:
Kroop was able to put together some left overs so He could relax today.
Drinking with Kroop forces Sarag to take an additional rum ration, but is able to take an additional ship action during the day.
DC 5 Fort save to not get Addiction.
Takes Con damage from drinking the rum. But gets a alchemical bonus to Charisma of /
Swabs:
Sassarra finds herself Swabing the Decks,
DC 10 Constitution or Strength check to avoid being fatigued.
Grauchi finds himself down in the Bilges pumping out water.
DC 12 Strength check.
DC 10 Constitution check to avoid being fatigued.
On day 15, Sassarra hauls her heart out. She does well, but wears herself out. She ends up falling asleep shortly after dinner.
On day 16, she swabs away, waiting for a chance to get to something different.
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Day 15
Skrelznit clambers up the rigging, his claw catching on a knot briefly, but makes it to the top.
His rigging adjustments catch the wind in a very satisfactory manner. While up there he takes some dried fish from his dinner and feeds it to a sea hawk perched up there.
That night, Skrelznit wakes in the middle of the night. Even though he knows it's against the rules, he sneaks down to the bilges and peeks around to see what's there.
Sometimes they hides treasure-k-k-k down there. Maybe I find it-k-k-k.
***
Day 16
Skrelznit is tired from his exploring last night and struggles to concentrate on his duties.
However, the thrill of exploring and his commune with Looseal has improved his spirits immensely and he climbs the rigging without difficulty.
While up there, he attempts to engage his erstwhile friendship with Slippery Sly, again communing with his spirit guide for help.
You is fearless, Sly-k-k-k. How you learn to do that-k-k-k?
He finds the work easy to complete and takes a moment to enjoy the view.
That night, he attempts to entertain the crew with a bawdy tale of a princess who marries a troll, and everyone feels sorry for the troll.
It appears that princesses are more popular with this crowd than Skrelznit thought.
Grauchi felt good after getting on board the ship, he slacks a little bit and takes his time to get an idea about who of the shipmates on deck is at what time of the day.
In the evening Grauchi is going to talk to Habbly Quarne. He seems like an important guy and Grauchi does his best to attempt to persuade Habbly knows it.
***
When in the morning Grauchi has to go bulge water out of the boat, he wonders about the job Habbly is doing. He takes his time, again exploring the immediate area around his workplace.
He's not doing a good job and gets real tired. He hopes nobody notices and goes to bed early to recover ...
Sarag scurries about and does his best given the last two days terrible meals, he wasn't keen on making it a third after all everyone deserves a good warm meal.
He did perhaps too well at slaughtering the the poor animal but he wasn't the best at telling when the meal was cooked leaving the steaks more to the desire of the kobolds and less to the desire of more civilized palates.
He spent the evening attempting to get Sly to be more amenable to the rest of the group. "Yes, yes see. Sarag is not bad kobold, obviously if Sarag is not bad...others might not be bad either. Sure sure, Scourge is angry but he is red kobold and it is his blood." he says trying to explain it to her.
He scratched his head as he felt everything he did was going wrong today. He went to talk to someone new to see how bad things really were for him.
He goes to bed feeling that he at least finally had done a decent job at something.
He starts to stumble away after drinking away his sorrows with Fishguts over how bad the last few days have been.
He hiccups and finds one of the swabs leaning on her slightly as he talked.
He drinks a bit more later in the night and goes to bed drunk.
DAY 15
Eepers gets a late start and quickly follows Skrelznit up to work the riggings
DAY 16
Eepers decided to get a quick start on his work today, and then go see how his friend Sarag is doing (Ok, maybe not friend, more "kobold coincidently on the same ship", but Eepers is hungry and wants some grub, Sarag or not)
As usual, Mopsank works diligently... unfortunately, he doesn't exactly have the best day, and in the end, he's done a subpar job, even with his crewmates' help.
Over the next two days you slowly see some of the crew that you have not interacted with give you ugly looks. Many of them no longer sit near by. They grab their food and sit closer to Plugg and Scourge.
The tension is only broke after Skrelznit calls seeing a ship late one after noon.
The captain comes onto deck. "Ready all you! That ship is going to be mine. Sharping your blades for battle!"
All throughout the night the ship moves with all speed and into the dawn.
Two hours before intercept the captain comes back on deck.
"Kroop! Cook's Mate! slit half the pigs throats and dump them over the side. We are going to need some sharks!" He cries out. "The rest of you ready to board."
As the ship nears a mile from the other ship, the party finds it self called to the poop deck. There stands Riaris Krine.
"Someone must think high of you six, or someone hates you; maybe both. The ship’s wheel is on the aft deck, just below the stern castle. When the ship comes in range, you’re going to grapple over, kill the guards on the stern castle, take the wheel, and guard the ship’s boats.
Kill anyone who tries to get away on one of the boats. Don’t move from the wheel until the fighting’s done, or you’ll have to answer to me. Oh yeah, as we get close, it’s going to get foggy. Just stick to what I told you to do.
Now the cap was very happy about the reefclaws you got. So you ar't going over there with nothing. He has opened up the armory to you to pick one weapon for each of you; but no fire. He wants that ship in good shape.”
There will be 4 rounds before the party can throw grappling hooks and try to board. So do you want to attack while the ships are closing (make your self targets before boarding), or wait till you cross?
Mopsank immediately votes to wait, retaining the element of surprise. When given a choice of weapon, he greedily eyes the magic dagger, but if not for that, he'll keep his existing weapons.
Grauchi also prefers to surprise. He's not so sure about the plan to attract a lot of sharks prior to climbing to the other ship. I'll just use a club to fight.
Eepers doesn't like using weapons up close and personal, preferring to use his natural abilities for combat. He does, however, take the six +1 arrows and 14 mwk arrows.
Sassara will take a normal dagger and a masterwork buckler.
She's willing to wait to attack. She will prefer to swing over to the other ship so she'll start in the rigging.
Sarag looks at the others, not eager to get out there himself for the battle. When Eepers takes the arrows, Sarag squawks a bit. He titters a bit on his feet and goes to gather up his shortbow and the twenty arrows the quartermaster had given him back. He looks at the others "Sarag will stay on this boat for now, Sarag is coward but can help with voice and arrows." he said nodding.
I just checked and you all should be level 2 at the start of this battle. So fill free to level up, and do anything else to ready for battle.
I will also point out that a knotted rope has a lower climb DC than the unknotted rope you used in boarding training; you just have to do the knotting.
The Wormwood speeds forth closer and closer to the Man's Promise.
As the man's Promise drops sails, they rain down crossbow and ballistas bolts on the Wormword. One ballistas bolt rips apart the sail right by Sassara.
With the rest of the crew firing back they look to not note the party readying to cross.
Riaris smiles. "Now this is the life." She turns to Skrelznit. "You did the best in training. So you are leading the others. Remember clear out the sterncastle, take the wheel, and don't let anyone get to the boats." With a last smile she head to the main deck.
A cloud of mist springs up out of the ships making it harder to see what is happening on the main decks. But you can still see your targets. A few seconds pass before you feel the ships crash into each other. And with that the call goes out. "Boards and hooks!"