The Tragedy of Hero's (Inactive)

Game Master fnord72

Xara is more interested in questioning Grossin's colleagues and underlings than students. She asks:

Were you in the observatory when the phenomenon started?
What were you doing there?
Describe the lights.
What projects did Grossin have on the go?
What was he doing last night?
Did you see him during the phenomenon?
Did Grossin or his projects have any connection to any gods?

Obviously, some of those are only applicable if the person she's questioning was actually there at the time.

who is nosoi and how is he casting spells? Or possessing someone?

Nosoi is Hase's raven familiar, on whom he casts Magic Jar each day.

Xara, you spend several hours coming through the faculty and staff. Here are some of the responses you received:

Were you in the observatory when the phenomenon started?
What were you doing there?
Describe the lights.
What projects did Grossin have on the go?
What was he doing last night?
Did you see him during the phenomenon?
Did Grossin or his projects have any connection to any gods?

If there are no follow up actions, nor any other activities for day 1, we can move forward.

Well I got nothing

Xara gets together with Hase and compares her answers. She's convinced even more that Desna (or agents of hers) took the observatory and probably Grosslin as well, either because of knowledge he had or something he saw or did. She also thinks this book in the Mordent Spire (does Xara know why the faculty guy said It wouldn't have done Grosdlin any good trying to get a look at it there?) might be important. Also the map of the shoreline of Nex.

Xara gets a map of Nex and has student 4 show her exactly which parts of the coast were on Grosslin's map. She also asks this student if he/she saw what happened to Grosslin before the lights led her out (as in, were there lights trying to lead him out too).

Xara knows that the Mordant Spire is a remnant of Azlant and fiercely and closely guarded by aquatic elves.

The student shows you an area northeast of Quantium. He notes that the map he looked at had a different coastline than yours. but he recognized the island off the coast of Nex.

An older coastline, perhaps? Is Xara aware of any cataclysmic events that might have reshaped Nex's coastline?

Knowledge: Geography: 1d20 + 15 ⇒ (18) + 15 = 33

She has the student sketch the map he saw as best as he's able.

I'm assuming Hase has been hanging around with Xara

Hase asks student 2 if he can see what she saw, using words provided by the crown Diplomacy 1d20 + 26 ⇒ (4) + 26 = 30 and casts Share Memory so he can see what she saw, looking to see what it was "with moon and planet lines" that was being studied.

He'd also like to check out the Observatory in Whitethrone if possible - his plan is to use his second greater Teleport (taking Xara and co if they're interested). If it is missing he'll investigate, if it is not missing and he has information on what Grossin was studying he'll ask at the observatory for help understanding it.

He'll get home via a stilled plane shift, and can then use create greater demiplane to open a gate to Xara's realm so she can get home (assuming she's amenable).

She's amenable, but she still has 16 stilled silent gate spells left today, so she can make her own way.

She would, however, appreciate the lift to Whitethrone, as she's never been there before.

Gelein, finding himself stumped by the odd responses he had received from his communing with Nethys' avatars. He knew how the god could be fickle, a matter of course for a deity that held neutrality to such and extreme. He knew he would have to consider the answers that seemed to be in conflict, for the spell should have told him truth, yet how could left and right be correct? It was like two sides of a coin.

With the phenomena in the sky visible day and night, and spreading it's lines, it would probably only be another couple of days before the entire sky was criss-crossed with lines of energy.

Vanshoon had decided to spend the days in the arms of a loved one.

Derric I do apologize for not responding sooner! Casts dysjunction, the residue of the magical aura's he had seen still pervade the courtyard. Crackling energy whips about something standing over the body of the last person killed. The energy sprouts from some sort of medallion embedded in its chest.

Finally the waves of energy wash across the creature revealing it in all it's hideous glory, standing before you is a black-skinned, bat-winged creature that has four arms; a long, thin tail; and a leering, fanged face with dead, white eyes, the creature stands nearly 30' tall. It roars at you and advances, as it does so, you see sickly green lines of energy sprout from the medallion and trace down the creature's arms, legs and circling its neck.

Knowledge: Planes DC 35 to identify the creature.
Please make a Fort save DC is 29, failure is a neg level.

XaraThe mage battles between Nex and Geb changed a lot of landscape, from what you can surmise from the very poor drawing made by the student, it was before those wars started. Once the lights showed up, he didn't notice anything but the lights (this is a common response from anyone led out of the building).

HaseThrough Share Memory you see only the glimpse of a stellar drawing the student had looked at. You see what looks like a conjunction of the planets of the solar system, part of the drawing indicates that before this occurs there will be a smaller conjunction involving the moons and planets of the inner system. Your attempt to teleport to the observatory in Whitethrone fails.

Upon the next day he figures he may as well do something. Thinking upon the Library of Ages, another library of plane spanning knowledge comes to mind. He gave an inner groan of annoyance, yet he prepared the spell. Astral Projection as it was called would allow a quick return and fewer risk. With all his fail safe's and protections in place he cast the spell and headed to Heaven's library known as The Great Library of Harmonious Scripture.

If I jumped the gun let me know, I just hate doing nothing.

Fort Save: 1d20 + 16 ⇒ (13) + 16 = 29
K (Planes): 1d20 + 22 ⇒ (16) + 22 = 38
Woo, made both

Looking at the creature, Derric steeled himself against the monstrous being's attack, shrugging it off. Looking at the creature, he recognized that the creature was not from this plane.

Staring right into the creature's eyes, Derric's visage hardened as he strode towards the creature, transforming into a huge golden dragon as he approached it.

Get off my plane, beast, Derric rumbled, or I'll remove you myself.

Moving ahead a bit and casting Form of the Dragon III- choosing to become a gold dragon.

Throwing in a roll that I forgot to throw in previously, and was too late to put into an edit

Intimidate: 1d20 + 39 ⇒ (9) + 39 = 48

Gelein I hate having players doing nothing! so no problem, it gives me something to work with, without using the rails. Not sure how he will be received on the supremely celestial plane of the Heavens, Geleith casts astral projection and finds himself standing upon a silver plain. Expecting to see a rather featureless void dotted with islands of substance floating about here and there, he instead finds tears in the fabric of this projection of the ideas and thoughts of countless millennia' of beings. Distance has always been difficult to measure in the astral, but they still look quite small.

Gouts of flame shoot from some of the rents while others disgorge fountains of water, there in the distance below him one tear seems to be sucking the plane into it, and above him another is spewing inky blackness. Stretching his hand forward, ready to cast off and head for where he believes the heavenly plane to have a connection, his hand passes through what he thought was a distant rent, only to find that it was only a foot in front of him. His hand feels a momentary stab of ice and he sees a quickly dissipating icicle sticking through his hand. This rent looks to only be a quarter of an inch across.

With no actual damage done, Geleith heads off. He finds his way to be much longer as it looks as though the Astral plane is being twisted and curled, lengthening his journey. Do you wish to continue"

Unless otherwise noted, I assume that all speech is in common

Derric Roaring with glee, the Vrolikai stares intently at Derric as it stretches it's four arms out. Each suddenly bursts into black flames that crystallize and harden it's four fists. The medallian in the demon's chest begins to pulse, the sickly green veins of energy have completed their paths and now form rings around the wrists, ankles, and neck of the demon.

Oh, and you can make two more fort saves, DC remains 29 (once for your turn and looking at the creature, and once for it's turn).

Derric takes 52 damage, and must fort save twice at DC 29, or get a negative level. In addition, a DC 29 will save vs madness.

Will save: 1d20 + 17 ⇒ (17) + 17 = 34
fort save: 1d20 + 20 ⇒ (1) + 20 = 21
Fort save: 1d20 + 20 ⇒ (8) + 20 = 28

Ooph, I take 2 negative levels. Staggered for 1d4 ⇒ 4 rounds

Unable to shrug off the attacks, Derric staggered back a few feet from the assault, obviously weakened.

I told you," the human in dragon form growled, "to GET OUT!"

Magical energy ripped out of the dragons's mouth, launching towards the demon.

vs. SR: 1d20 + 22 ⇒ (15) + 22 = 37
Defensively casting DC 33: 1d20 + 31 ⇒ (8) + 31 = 39 Success!
Heightening Banishment to 9, DC 35 will save to negate. Can cast as a standard action because of Metamagic Adept (at will)

Fort Save for looking at it again: 1d20 + 20 ⇒ (13) + 20 = 33
Failed again damn it

Yep

Gelein cast a spell to make sure he was on the right track, he trusted his knowledge but being careful never hurt.

Cast Find the Path

That should have been four fort saves, 2 vs the gave, 2 for the attacks, and then a fifth on your attack.

Fort Save: 1d20 + 20 ⇒ (11) + 20 = 31 Made
Fort Save: 1d20 + 20 ⇒ (13) + 20 = 33 Made

Your spell creates a whirling vortex next to the demon. It looks at the vortex, looks at you and roars with laughter, one hand idly swiping it's blade through the vortex, dispersing it.

It turns back to you, (yes, that's another fort save).

It rears back to swing it's blades at you once more.

And then it howls in anger as the medallion's green lines of energy flash brilliantly. The rings around the limbs of the demon begin to glow. And the demon begins to twist in upon itself, spiraling into an ever smaller ball until it disappears from view with a tiny pop.

will save 1d20 + 19 ⇒ (16) + 19 = 35 I count 33 for the save dc, but he made it anyway (10+9+13)

Spell Focus gives a +1, 15th level bloodline power gives an additional +2 to a school (stacks with spell focus), 10 base, 13 CHA, 9 Spell level. Oh, and examining it, it should have been a 36 DC because of the bloodline arcana which adds +1 to the DC if you add metamagic to a spell. Damn it. It was my mistake, I won't make you retcon that.

Fort Save: 1d20 + 20 ⇒ (9) + 20 = 29

Shifting back into human form, Derric knelt recovering his breath. That was a brutal fight. Standing back up, he muttered under his breath.

"Have to head to Acadamae. Xara's there, she can help me figure out how we fight this."

When he fully recovered his breath, Derric suddenly winked out from beyond the view of the citizens of Almas, startling the students in the Acadamae courtyard.

Do the timelines match up that Derric is arriving about the same time that Xara and Hase are failing to leave?

Derric has 3 negative levels, one of your saves was high enough (and each neg level lowers your save by one). You arrive in time to see Xara and Hase disappear in their own teleport, only to return a moment later to the same spot.

Gelein casts Find the Path and a golden arrow appears before him, the head stretching off into the distance, corkscrewing through the air. AS Gelein follows, the vanes remain in front of him, with the shaft leading off into the distance. Gelein gets the feeling that the arrow keeps changing direction, possibly because at one point it seems to curl back around and heads off behind him.

Xara and Hase find themselves back in the courtyard of the Acadamae. Derric stands before them, his clothes torn and soiled with dried blood. One long jagged wound winds down his left arm, blood dried to his finger tips. The cloak over his right shoulder looks aged and decayed, with a hole worn to the flesh, another gaping wound displaying bone and muscle torn and rent.

Xara and Hase realized before they attempted to teleport that they have not seen any imps all morning, which is rather surprising, considering the location.

Gelein was getting annoyed, his eyes shifting black. He did not know what was going on but he would find out. He dismisses the spell, once more back in his tower. He went storming to his conjuration chambers. It was one of the most protected rooms in the tower, maybe even thru out the inner sea. He prepared the spell and double checked the protections and wards. Finally when he was ready he cast the spell, a gate to Heaven outside the library proper. He had a good idea of what was coming but then again he was forced into this. He could already feel a bit of the headache that was sure to come.

The find the path was working, but it was not working as simply as expected. Something is seriously off in the astral plane. Unless you wish to, you may choose to continue following the spell.

"Derric!?" Xara says, half question half exclamation. "Fritz, can you-?"

"Already on it. Excuse me, Trig."

Fritz pushes past Trig, who had already moved to interpose his body between Derric and his mistress.

He casts cure critical wounds, and holds his hand out, waiting for Derric's permission before applying it.
4d8 + 18 ⇒ (5, 7, 1, 3) + 18 = 34

He casts a second one as well.
4d8 + 18 ⇒ (3, 7, 8, 3) + 18 = 39

"Damn! If Something is blocking us getting to Whitehrone, I..."

Hase cuts off as he notices Derric
Not sure we have met before. Given the +33 Knowledge: Local, I'll assume at least the basics of Derric (the DC20 level) are known

Is he running here for help? Healing, or taking something down? Lamshtu? If something is kicking him around it is a real threat.

"Is something coming?" Hase asks, rummaging in a pocket for components. "Do you need healing?"

"Nothing's following me if that's what you wanted to know. There was a Vrolikai in Almas, it destroyed the temple of Desna. I fought it for a bit, and it drained my life energy." Derric said, allowing the bard to heal him, "It seemed be be bound by someone or something. It's troubling in a time that's already troubled." Derric looked up at the sky, then continued, "I will need further restoration, can any of you restore life energy back to a person?"

Derric pulled 5 pouches of diamond dust, each worth 1,000 gold, out of one of his pockets of his robe.

"That should cover any material expenses for it."

Hase realizes that he didn't try to port to Whitethrone, but to the observatory in Whitethrone...

"Is the life drain the permanent or temporary kind? The temporary I can remove without any diamond dust."

She concentrates a moment, and summons three ghaele azatas to join them.
"Good day. My friend here was drained of some life energy in battle with a Vrolokai demon. Would you help him, please?"

When they've finished, Xara asks them, "How are things on Elysium? Has the battle on the Material spilt over into the higher planes at all?"

"Did you say the temple of Desna was destroyed?" Fritz asks, giving Xara a knowing look.

Putting the two unused bags of diamond dust back into his pocket, he murmured his thanks to the azatas.

"I wasn't there when it was destroyed, but it was completely destroyed, it's observatory entirely demolished in an incredibly violent fashion. Honestly, I didn't get a chance to get a good look, I was somewhat busy at the time."

Gelein Finding the astral plane twisted and seemingly under attack, it's very fabric tearing, Gelein decides that a more direct approach is called for and returns to the material plane. Casting a gate spell to create a link between heaven and earth, Gelein sees a shimmering portal appear before him. The light streaming into the room from the gate is as bright and golden as expected of the destination plane.

In the foreground the gate rests upon clean white sand, as if from a pristine tropical beach. Further off he finds the outer walls of the lowest level of heaven stretching off as far as he can see to the left and right. The magnificent mountain stretches up as high as he can see in the background.

Standing before the pearly gates of heaven are celestial beings.

A lot of celestial beings.

Standing in ranks before the gates Gelein sees what could only be described as a platoon of hound archons. Flanking them are two squads of legion archons, each has a star archon in attendance with it. And standing behind them all are not one, but three trumpet archons.

Like the playing of three instruments in perfect sync, Gelein hears the trumpet archons speak, "Step forward, Gelein Tathor, servant of Nethys, and speak your business. Fear not, if your quest be true and right."

Derric, Hase, and Xara catch up on the latest news as Derric recovers from his recent battle. One observatory disappeared with only one loss of life (maybe), another destroyed by a demon, and a third unreachable by teleportation.

Gelein stopped himself from slapping his hand atop his mask and groaning. So it started, he silently thanked Nethys his protections were in place. Powerful angels could read minds and his was none to kind at the moment. Stepping forward his staff thumping along side him he gives a slight bow to the angels before him.

"Greetings, I would ask to be allowed to make use of The Great Library of Harmonious Scripture. Their are strange and threating events taking place on my world as well as on the astral. I would seek answers to these questions among Heaven's wisdom so that I might aid in setting things right once more."

"So. Observatories are definitely being targeted. Xara - did those azatas give you any clues? Do you still want to " he starts ticking off points on his fingers "Track down a Desnan? Head to Elysium? Scry on someone in Whitethrone? Start preparing for an evacuation? Check out this student's map?"

Should I tell them about the invitation? Hase ponders to himself.

"I'd say get everybody prepared. I got a letter yesterday at dinner, it warned that this would happen, cumulating over three days- two days from now. I gave the order to Marian to get the Tower ready for the coming days, and to make sure that a constant vigil is kept at the sanctuary while I'm gone."Derric paused thinking.

"I wouldn't prepare for evacuations, as much as I find the arts that they do here... distasteful and dangerous, this college could be one of out best weapons- here are some of the best minds in the world when it comes to the Planes. Get them prepared, protected, but keep them here, we're struggling blind here, we'll need as many people working together as possible, evacuating will undermine that. Oh, and give me a few minutes, I have to grab a friend, he'll want answers and I don't think we all want to repeat ourselves multiple times."

Teleporting off in a flash, Derric returned a few minutes later, a paladin in full plate beside him looking a little dazed.

Gonna go low=bad for any d100 rolls for the teleport rolls
1d100 ⇒ 96
1d100 ⇒ 53

Shaking off the aftereffects of teleportation, Gemmel looked at Derric.

Next time warn me when you're about to do that Derric, it's a little disorientating to go from a temple to the Acadamae in the blink of an eye. I don't know how you damn wizardly folk do it. The paladin said wryly.

"Yeah, they do that," Fritz commiserates. "No respect, sometimes."

Xara relates to Derric everything they learned from questioning the staff and students of the Acadamae. She also tells him about her dream.

The images and visions that passed before you pertained to two doors. Before the doors a poorly minted coin was slowly spinning suspended several feet off the ground. The coin was of some dark tarnished metal bearing two runes that you were not able to identify.

Through one door you saw images of a world in flames. Beings bursting into flame or simply dropping dead where they stood.

The other door showed a beautiful and vibrant world. In the foreground a multitude of people prayed in thanks to a golden casket laid upon a large bier in the center of a courtyard. A giant statue stared down upon the casket. The face was not discernible.

Another pair of images portrays Desna standing within a ruined temple, one of her own. Her raised boot lies on the back of Lamashtu's corpse. With manic glee she looks down in triumph.

In another image she is leaning back against a broken wagon wheel upon a field of a terrible battle, she has one arm around the shoulder's of Ghlaunder.

GM, any response from the ghaele azatas she summoned?

If I am reading this correctly, a master summoner may only have one summon monster SLA active at a time, and only when the eidolon is not summoned may the number of summoned creatures increase up to the number of uses available for the day. (not really sure how that is supposed to work) It looks like you would need to dismiss your eidelon, then use SM IX to get 3 ghaele's. I don't recall a mention of dismissing your eidelon, but will let it go as this is still the opening scene.

The three ghaele's stare at you for a moment, their joyous expressions frozen. Staring just long enough for you to really wonder what can of worms you opened, they turn to each other and stare at each other for a moment before turning back to you with stiffened spines and no expressions on their faces.

Three voices respond to your question, at the same time, and most definitely not harmonious.

"What is coming, must come."
"What was, must be, will be."
"This fight, ours not, be wary."

They jerk in surprise and start to slide towards a point central to all three. You can see that this is not something they expected.

Absalom also has a major observatory on the outskirts of town.

Sorry, I was posting in a rush and wasn't clear at all. My intention was that she summon one, get the spell, ask the questions, and dismiss. Repeat times two. However, that's my fault completely, and we'll go with your version. Trig got dismissed, and then she summoned.

She's never been so glad to be rid of ghaele azatas, and while the rest discuss the strange occurrence, she brings Trig back (takes 10 minutes).

You had a dream too? This was mine.

The images and visions that passed before you pertained to two doors. Before the doors a superbly minted coin was slowly spinning suspended several feet off the ground. The coin had a patina on its metallic surface, each side bearing a rune that you were not able to identify.

In another image he is leaning back against a broken wagon wheel upon a field of a terrible battle, he has one arm around the shoulder's of Brigh.

I fear we may be looking at a godwar

my version has more cinematics, in dolby!

As yuo watch the three ghaele's continue to fight their slide into each other, where they merge. The remaining ghaele starts to fade, loosing its coherence. "They must not be allowed to open the conve...." The ghaele fades completely, minutes before you expected the end of the duration.

Hase blinks twice at Derric

"What the Abyss is a godwar? And when has there been one before?"

A war between the powerful beings that call themselves gods...? Derric looked at the witch as if he seemed daft. "I don't believe that one has happened before, but grudges exist across them. Eventually it's going to boil over, and it could be the warning that we've seen."

Derric paused as he listened to the Azata.

"Did any of you catch what they said there at the end? Something about a Convergence? Convex? Convention? Convent?

Hase still tries to grapple with the concept

"So you're saying this could be an actual war of the actual gods? That's... that's like The End Of All Things! Rovagug breaks free bad! How can you be so calm about it?"

"I'm calm because panicking would be fruitless. How would running in terror be of any use? Gathered here, in this square, are some of the most powerful spellcasters alive. If we show terror, how do you think the general populace will react. In all honesty, I'm damned terrified of the concept, but I've thought about it's possibility for a long time. We have to be ready for any possibility, and that very well could be one."

Derric turned to Xara, a question in his eyes. "I didn't banish those azatas- something called them back or banished them without us detecting it. What we need to do now is try and find out what they were trying to say there at the end. The Acadamae has one of the largest, if not the largest, libraries when it comes to the extraplanar knowledge, we have two days, let's try and find out as much as we can.

"'Open the conve-'? Pretty vague to go on, but obviously important. Before you told me your dream, I thought this just a fight between Desna and Lamashtu, but now...Torag killing Cayden Cailean? What the hell for?"

Hase calms down a little when Derric confides his calm demeanour is a facade and the necessity not to appear frightened.

"Sorry Derric - you're right."

Taking a few deep breaths he gets hold of himself.

"One of the students here saw that the kidnapped astronomer had a stellar drawing. Looked like a conjunction of the planets of the solar system - and part of the drawing indicated that there'd be a smaller conjunction involving the moons and planets of the inner system first. Maybe they were referring to a convergence?"

"Also, it's weird, but when you mentioned your dreams I had the strangest sense of deja vu. Something I dreamed about a coin. Flashes of scenes."

Concentrating he continues

"Shelyn triumphant over Zon-Kuthon. Shelyn and Asmodeus fighting together. A golden coffin and a giant statue - and people praying. A dead god?"

He shakes his head "I'll go looking through my memories tonight, see if I can get more detail."