The Flaxseed Lodge Core Campaign (Inactive)

Game Master Mike Tuholski

Falco lets Dorvhan deal with the wounded elf, as that sort of pedestrian magic is not in Falco's view respectable worthwhile interesting.

"Well then, we've rescued her lost companion and even suffered under the guidance of this faerie dragon, I hope that's all Ignizi requires of us and I will be glad to see this forest no more."

Thanks GM! Looking forward to the next one, everyone!

By all means, take the time you need to level up to 4, but meanwhile I'll post the introduction to the Overflow Archives tonight.

Pandoor is ready ;)

“I have no love of puns,” announces a peeved Kreighton Shaine, the Master of Scrolls in the Grand Lodge, “Yet it cannot go unremarked that the Overflow Archives have begun living up to their name.” The pale elf gestures across the library’s stone lobby toward a pair of shut double doors from beneath which water steadily seeps. He is only one of the midnight visitors bearing witness to this disaster. Next to Shaine, Paracountess Zarta Dralneen stands with folded arms, glaring at an initiate whose hair and clothes are utterly drenched. All three speak at once, but Shaine’s shrill voice rises above the din. “Magical shenanigans in the archives are prohibited, especially this soon before the Grand Convocation!”

“Let us prioritize,”/[b] Dralneen suggests.[b] “Are the artifacts within the vaults in danger?”

“How should I know?” Shaine barks back. “This delinquent initiate— what was the name? Wormell?”

“Virml, sir,” replies the sodden Pathfinder. “Virml says he sneaked into the archives on a dare,” summarizes Shaine, painfully emphasizing the initiate’s name with scolding disdain. “Presumably, he thought the holdings would be harmless. Instead, in his naivete, Virml triggered some dormant curse or other. So, yes, thanks to Virml here, the archives and the vaults below continue to flood, threatening all the books therein.”

Miserably, Virml holds up an armload of soggy manuscripts. “I salvaged a few, sir.”

Sighing, Shaine leads Virml towards the stairs. “Take them up to the scriptorium. Start making dry copies.” Then, turning to survey the rest of the room, he continues issuing orders. “The remainder of you should wade in there and plumb the origins of this deluge. Stop it, if you can. I must report this debacle to my colleagues and begin organizing the cleanup.” Abruptly, he seems to notice the paracountess for the first time. “What are you doing here, Dralneen?”

Zarta smirks and shrugs. “Unlike you, Shaine, I love a good pun."

Syrak nods, honored to be chosen for a mission by both Zarta and Shane.

Syrak will try and ask Shaine a question before the Master of Scrolls storms off "What sort of dangers should we expect other than water?"

Virml sheepishly relates, “I…I merely picked up a wee scroll, read part of it aloud for fun— some kind of riddle about birds and fish? And then it flew to bits in my hand, and I caught the quickest glimpse of a handsome man…and then ker-sploosh! I washed out here! I... I don't know what else is going on inside.”

Syrak leans in close, trying to see if he can smell alcohol on the man's breath.

Paeter scoffs. "Only a bit of writing for the man?" he asks in disbelief. "My father would have the man flayed by a Kuthonite cleric for his transgressions."

"Either way, Let us make for the Archives as I have no preparations." he concludes

Pandoor bursts out laughing, throwing his elbow at Falco.

"HAHAHA, that's an incredible story! FOR FUN! Isn't it funny, master Falco? BWAHAHA! Virml riddles with... Vermin! Well... sort of."

Falco's face only darkens as he hears of the possible destruction of priceless artifacts and knowledge. He scowls at Virml and addresses the Master of Scrolls, "We should not delay then. Unless you have anything else for us, I expect you to discipline that boy in that harshest way possible and we will set about saving as much of the Archives as we can."

Falco retrieves a wand and covers himself in mage armor before nodding his readiness.

Traveling this weekend and probably won't be able to update Falco until Tuesday night.

Virml sheepishly produces a dripping fragment of a scroll. Shaine snatches the parchment and hands it over, saying “It appears to be one of the rhymes from The Name of the Fox. It’s an odd little scroll of Varisian doggerel, scripted in Sylvan. There’s nothing remarkable about it—”

“Nothing until now, perhaps?” quips Zarta Dralneen.

SCROLL FRAGMENT

Is anyone Drak Archive?

Silver Crusade here.

None of us are Dark Archives.

Paeter looks over the scroll fragment and shrugs. "Why would we carry about some child's fable?" he asks Shaine.

"Ohhh that's interesting! You say we'll find some more inside the vaults? Let's go, then!" Pandoor is quite happy with this new adventure in the vaults of the Grand Lodge.

Having learned the Sylvan tongue for research purposes, Falco reads out the scroll to the party. "Well, it is an interest bit of history if nothing else, but unfortunately the rest of it has been lost. I wonder how many other treasures have been lost by this mishap. We should really move quickly and maybe we can prevent more losses."

Sorry guys, the holiday weekend got MUCH busier than we expected.

The party seems less interested in talk than action, something the leaders can support. Leaving Virml to go upstairs to get to work, they enter the archives proper.

This spacious library is a damp catastrophe. A lake of dark water clogged with books, scroll cases, and a few overturned shelves obscures the floor. Steps descend into the brine from the western doors, while at the east end of the room a spiral staircase rises from the water to a mezzanine above. The same metal staircase must descend into a basement below as well, for the water there burbles downward in a dark, lazy whirlpool.

You can hear some voices, very high pitched, very fast, and bickering.

Check the mp, there's a fair amount to digest. If you move in do stuff, etc make sure you include Perception checks. The entire area is extremely difficult terrain.

Syrak dips his toes into the brine and stirs slightly before calling out.

"Hello!?"

The voices stop bickering, start chatting amongst themselves at a pace and pitch that makes it hard to make out.

The brine is actually a rather comfortable temperature.

Paeter moves with Syrak to the edge of the room, standing on the dry stairs for the time being. "We are with the Pathfinders! Rulers of this domain! Show yourselves!" he calls out forcefully.

"Don't show ourselves!"

"Of course not!"

"Maybe they'll just go away!"

"Only if you SHUT UP!"

"Okay, good call."

It appears they're going to ignore you so long as they can't see you.

Haven't had a chance to update Falco yet; the house is without power now but hopefully it will be back tonight and I can work on it then.

Falco is not normally one to take the lead but with books and scrolls at stake, his attitude has shifted. He bravely slogs through the water into the middle of the room until he can see the source of the voices. "Are you causing this mess? Do you know who is?"

Perception: 1d20 + 5 ⇒ (7) + 5 = 12

I mentioned in my other games, I got unexpectedly busy today and tomorrow. I'll update when I can. Hopefully you get power back!

Falco wades into the room and finally gets a view of the figures talking. The current by the spiral staircase is strong, and the halfling is sure it'd be a struggle not to get sucked downstairs. Additionally, water occasionally falls from the balcony above.

Falco spies two creatures who try to freeze in the hopes that halflings only see motion. When it doesn't work, they try talking, "WE FOUND THIS FISHING SPOT FIRST!"

The creatures are tiny little fey looking things.

"Well, maybe not, but the treasure is mine!"

"That's not fair it's mine!"

"Shut your festering gob!"

"No, YOU shut my festering gob."

They turn back to you.

"Wait, why are you here again?"

Paeter follows his cousin. "Do not supertuscan such foul misshapen creatures, cousin. Perhaps they carry disease. " he warns.

Turning to them, the halfling stands proudly. "We could care not about fishing. Tell us what has happened here. "

-Posted with Wayfinder

Syrak sighs and does his best to hold his nose as he moves up behind Paeter to cover the halfling but doesn't speak further.

They seem VERY interested in what you have to say....

Include Diplomacy with it.

-Posted with Wayfinder

Syrak speaks up further, "Please, answer the halfling's questions."

Diplo: 1d20 + 7 ⇒ (13) + 7 = 20

"Indeed, fey friends! Do you have any informations about what happened? Are you a dweller of these vaults? What do you seek?" Pandoor floods the creatures in questions.

Perform oratory (diplo): 1d20 + 14 ⇒ (17) + 14 = 31

If you can't tell, I talk about wine on my phone a lot... 'Supertuscan' should have been 'Speak to'.

I wondered what a Supertuscan was...

They both begin to answer all the questions simultaneously. It takes some getting used to, but soon you can handle the pace of their speech.

"Nope! Not us! We just got here, taking a rather harrowing journey through the belly of the "the big sleeper.” I think we got here because of some smarty-pants dogcat. He splashed down into the fishin’ hole, scarin’ away the bestest fish. Anyway, all that's left are stupid things like THIS!"

They are both terrified by and obsessed with "the big sleeper", and frequently hush each other “in case she’s listening—I don’t want to get eaten!”

Throughout the conversation they shush each other, "She'll hear! Shut it!"

Lol, that's the funniest autocorrect ever. I have to keep autocorrect off; drives me nuts when I'm not typing English.

Falco sucks in a quick breath when the fey refer to the scrap of parchment as stupid. He doesn't realize until he has read it and calmed down a bit that he has been holding his breath since. "Who is the Big Sleeper? How do we find her?"

"She's the big fish who keeps puking all this water!"

"She's not a fish, she's a BIG fish."

"Shut up you twit. She's upstairs!"

A Super Tuscan is a style of wine that tries to mimic a Chianti, but it doesn't follow the requirements for a Chianti, e.g. it has less than 70% Sangiovese grapes or has more than 10% white wine grapes. Super Tuscans came about when Chiantis were not selling well and the Italian wine producers were looking for a way to get around the restrictions so they could make Bordeux-style wines (Cab. Sauv. and Merlot grapes) that incorporated Sangiovese grapes. Either way, they are Super Tasty. ;-)

"Upstairs, huh?" Paeter says as he looks at the odd pair. "Let's check out this Big Sleeper, Falco." he says with a nod to his cousin as he wades towards the spiral staircase.

Syrak rubs his eyes and punches himself.

"Is this whole thing as surreal to everybody else as it is to me?"

Syrak will also no to Paeter's suggestion and head for the stairs.

Indeed, as the taller members of the party approach the stairs the current is strong, small characters must make a DC 10 Swim check to resist going down the drain.

-Posted with Wayfinder

Syrak will reach out and attempt to aid any of his smaller companions from going down the drain.

Aid: 1d20 + 4 ⇒ (5) + 4 = 9

Syrak can't seem to get good footing...

Swim: 1d20 - 1 ⇒ (4) - 1 = 3

Paeter quickly wades towards the stairs, but he mistimes his step and slips, dunking under the water and getting swept along by the water as he plummets down into the room below.

He does, indeed get sucked down to the lower floor. Someone can catch you with a reflex DC 15, or the party can go downstairs to follow.

-Posted with Wayfinder

A Super Tuscan is a style of wine that tries to mimic a Chianti, but it doesn't follow the requirements for a Chianti, e.g. it has less than 70% Sangiovese grapes or has more than 10% white wine grapes. Super Tuscans came about when Chiantis were not selling well and the Italian wine producers were looking for a way to get around the restrictions so they could make Bordeux-style wines (Cab. Sauv. and Merlot grapes) that incorporated Sangiovese grapes. Either way, they are Super Tasty. ;-)

Linguistics: 1d20 + 11 ⇒ (7) + 11 = 18

Also, finally got Falco updated!

---

Swim: 1d20 + 1 ⇒ (3) + 1 = 4

At Paeter's suggestion Falco turns his face bravely towards the stairs... only to slip and be sucked under the water towards the basement.

Soooooo..... the party goes downstairs?

The map for downstairs is MAP 2 above.

Syrak hurries down the drain after his spiraling halfling buddy.

Flooding from the library above has turned this storage chamber into a treacherous bog. Rising above the black lake, the flat tops of many rows of shelves create a makeshift maze of causeways. A spiral staircase descends from above, a deluge of water cascading down the steps. Four narrow corridors channel rivers of seawater off into the darkness.

The terrain in here is harsh, anything not a shelf is a DEEP BOG.

A square that is part of a deep bog has roughly 4 feet of standing water. It costs Medium or larger creatures 4 squares of movement to move into a square with a deep bog, or characters can swim if they wish. Small or smaller creatures must swim to move through a deep bog. Tumbling is impossible in a deep bog.

The water in a deep bog provides cover for Medium or larger creatures. Smaller creatures gain improved cover (+8 bonus to AC, +4 bonus on Reflex saves). Medium or larger creatures can crouch as a move action to gain this improved cover. Creatures with this improved cover take a –10 penalty on attacks against creatures that aren't underwater.

You CAN walk along the shelves without any dice rolling.

You're currently down here (Map 2) but you can go back up without issue this time so long as you stay on the stairs.

Where to Pathfinders?

Paeter splutters and spits as he surfaces in the lower room. "Bloody whirpool..." he mutters as he climbs up to the top of the bookcase. As he looks around, he decides to draw his trident and shield. "This is probably a trap... Knowing the Society, this is definitely a trap." he remarks as he waits for everyone to get ready to move down the hallway.

Then, once they are ready, he immediately pushes onward.

I'm back!

Pandoor tries to walk along the shelves, holding them as firm as he can.

"Wow, that's even worse than I thought it would be! I'm definitely not fond of profound ponds!"

Pandoor tries his best to accompany Paeter on the other side.

@BS: I'm not an expert in wines but I have "some" notions as a part of my family has always been wine growers, here in Switzerland (chasselas, pinot noir, pinot gris, merlot, sauvignon sémillon, merlot cabernet sauvignon, gamaret garanoir, pinot gamay,... ;)

Swim? No thank you!

Falco, not being very good in the water, finds a shelf to sit on while he retrieves a scroll, luckily protected in a case. After reading it off, a pony appears and the wizard then clumsily crawls atop it, trying to avoid the water. From atop his mount, he detects magic in the room and then follows behind Paeter.

So the plan is to explore downstairs since you're here? Will do. Update later today.

-Posted with Wayfinder

Maybe it's the pony, maybe it's the sudden activity, but something in the water... stirs.

A worm, the same size of a halfling's forearm, emerges from the water. It's no ordinary worm though...

The worm doesn't seem interested in fighting you. It swims quickly between you and out of the room.... almost like it's running.

Suddenly a giant vulture, or rather the corpse of one explodes out of the water. It seems to be after the worm, but there's something between it and its prey.

You.

Falco: 1d20 + 4 ⇒ (11) + 4 = 15 (always acts in surprise)
Pandoor: 1d20 + 4 ⇒ (20) + 4 = 24
Paeter: 1d20 + 4 ⇒ (10) + 4 = 14
Baddies: 1d20 + 6 ⇒ (6) + 6 = 12
Syrak: 1d20 + 4 ⇒ (13) + 4 = 17

Round 1:
Pandoor: Go
Syrak: Go
Falco: Go
Paeter: Go
Baddies: TBD

Pandoor, on his guards, shouts as always a tale to inspire his team!

"Pathfinders and Seeds! Remember the mighty fight where the pathfinders defended the Grand Lodge of Absalom against Charvion Eater of Bones! The agents joined their strength to overcome the sorcerer's images and freed the lodge!"

Inspire Courage is up, folks! +1 hit/dmg, +1 moral bonus to saves vs charm and fear!