GM Bret’s Outpost II Doom comes to Dustpawn! (Inactive)

Game Master BretI

"Dalviss" casts light on her rapier.

Should we wait 'till the morning? Tycho has enough spells left to push on if we want, but it seems like we might end up getting there quite late.

"Melody is good for spell slots, so yeah, I think it's whether we want to approach at night."

"Penny's combat ready, an' I 'ave plenty left to go." Tim confirms. Penny rears up at the mention of her name.

At hearing go, Leeara says “Good!” and rushes out.

It is at this point you realize there might be a problem. She moves fast, about twice as fast as a normal human.

You hear from the tunnel “Where are you? I thought you said we go!”

Does this mean 3 hours to her = 6 hours for us? :)

"Dalviss" calls out: I was always slow — remember? Just like a turtle. Don't you like turtles? Try to remember.

bluff: 1d20 + 21 ⇒ (15) + 21 = 36

She said how long it takes her, so yes it will take longer than she said. Since you have horses but she said slightly over three hours, you would guess between 4 and 6 hours.

She doesn’t seem to think much beyond the moment and everything is about how she does it. I hope that I’ve conveyed that in the interactions...

In response to Tycho, she calls out “Who slow? Hurry or it will take too long!”

"Dwarves do NOT move fast, lassie. I can hop on a horse and speed things up a little bit, but still... You do know that many animals are not all that fast - and that includes me."

She comes bounding back into the cavern saying “Forgot!”

She goes over to the next and digs through it, coming up with a 1” diameter basalt sphere. “I took from bad lady, think it important!”

She brings it over to Tycho and gives it to him.

“If you slow, does that mean we wait until morning?”

Dalviss nods and accepts the gift. Thank you. Yes… slow. Wait till morning. Can friends sleep here, share food?

Does the sphere ping as magic, and is it identifiable with a take 10 for 25?

“Alright!”

She goes back over to the nest, rearranges it a little bit, then curls up in it. Her head on her crossed hands, she looks at the group and says “Tell me more of past life!” This is said in about the way that a child might ask for a bedtime story.

Tycho finds that the globe is magical.
Kn: Geography check please.

The orb radiates strongly, but Tycho can not identify what it does.
Kn: Arcana for the school.
Spellcraft is 15 + caster level to identify and 25 is not enough.

With a guidance from Mango Theodric tries his hand at identifying the sphere.

spellcraft: 1d20 + 10 + 2 + 1 ⇒ (12) + 10 + 2 + 1 = 25

Arcana: 1d20 + 7 ⇒ (2) + 7 = 9 Theodric, would the wand of identify have helped you? Tycho would have lent it to you if so!

Dalviss looks at the group. Quite the rock! It's beyond me. If you would better understand it, please… borrow my wand.

Dalviss turns to The One Formerly Known as Leeara and tells her a story.

Pineapple Hamster? I'm so confused.

Mongo, keeps an eye on the entrance to the cave while Tycho weaves their tale. "I'll keep the first watch."

Warpac dabbles in spellcraft and if Theodric can't figure it out, he certainly can't. So he just watches and guards and, eventually, sleeps.

Also casting a CLW from his wand. I forgot about the damage from vicious.

clw: 1d8 + 1 + 2 ⇒ (1) + 1 + 2 = 4

Melody will be so bold as to ask for a guidance from Mango. She'll use a charge off her wand of identify.

Spellcraft, identify: 1d20 + 5 + 10 + 1 ⇒ (2) + 5 + 10 + 1 = 18

No luck!

Is it time to establish watches and go to sleep? Did anyone else want to do anything?

There is still the Kn: Geography attempt to be made as well.

Leeara seems amused by the story, but doesn’t really connect to it. At times, she has a puzzled expression as she looks at ‘Dalviss’ but those are fleeting.

Knowledge (geography): 1d20 + 11 ⇒ (7) + 11 = 18
Knowledge (arcana): 1d20 + 11 ⇒ (13) + 11 = 24

Melody will check the area with detect magic.

Melody determines that the sphere has an aura of transmutation.

Theodric realizes that having already made an attempt, he will have to wait until tomorrow before using the wand.

Warpac will take first watch. He's not all that tired.

When the new day comes he will be swapping some spells. Channel vigor is not needed if someone casts haste.

I didn't mean to rush everyone off to bed, Mongo just doesn't have much to add to Spellcraft/Knowledge stuff.

Dalviss will try to tell more mundane stories, extrapolating from her past. bluff: 1d20 + 21 ⇒ (2) + 21 = 23.

They then go to sleep.

In the morning, Tycho will try to ID the stone again.

If they don't get it they will ask Theodric to use the wand. Going forward, can we retcon that if Theo or anyone else forgets to include the Identification Wand in their check after Tycho fails? It makes sense to use it, as Tycho failing means the DC is over 25. In-character, Tycho is happy to share resources, and as a player I'm really not concerned about saving charges on a level 1 wand! At a live table, I would encourage players to share my resources every time. Theo and I fundamentally crossposted yesterday, otherwise Tycho would have lent the wand, as exhibited by the post where they said as much.

I'd just like to set a precedent going forward, so any crossposting or honest mistakes do not hurt our chances for success.

spellcraft on orb, next morning: 1d20 + 15 ⇒ (8) + 15 = 23

Please, use this identification wand!

Tycho also looks closely at the dead bodies, memorizing their facial features and the look of their clothes in case they decide to disguise themselves as one of them.

I'll update Tycho's slashline when we know we get through the night without incident; Tycho can take last watch.

Missed the geography check. I made myself a note to myself about the identify wand so hopefully we won't need the GMs help to make the timing work.

I generally keep a haste or 2 memorized and Melody casts as well. It will frequently take me until round 2 so I can get off a ranged sneak attack first though.

geography: 1d20 + 10 ⇒ (20) + 10 = 30

spellcraft guidance and ID tomorrow: 1d20 + 10 + 10 + 1 ⇒ (15) + 10 + 10 + 1 = 36

Theodric needs his 8 hours of sleep to memorize spells, I don't think anybody else suffers from this so watch suggestion: Watch order: Warpac 2 hours. Mongo 1.5 hours. Tycho 1.5 hours. Timtenzekil 1.5 hours. Meoldy 1.5 Hours. Theodric 1 hour. This gets everybody at least 7 hours of sleep with Theodric getting an uninterrupted 8. With say an hour for people's morning class feature prep and another hour to break camp that gets us to 11 hours of downtime, that could easily stretch to 12 with an evening meal etc/

Theodric recognizes the sphere as a representation of the planet Aballon.

The night passes with only two minor disturbances. The first is the local scavengers feasting on the frog out on the path. They are no threat to you, but they are messy eaters. The second is that Leeara has a fitful sleep — tossing and turning throughout the night. You are able to get a full night’s sleep, but she is twitching and turning so much it is distracting.

The next morning, Theodric is able to identify the sphere. It can be triggered for Haste at caster level 11, can hold two charges, there is some way to recharge it, and it currently has one charge.

Leeara wakes a bit groggy. It is obvious that her fur isn’t as patchy as it was the night before, it seems to have grown out overnight.

In the morning, Tycho looks over themselves to see if they grew any fur. heal: 1d20 - 1 ⇒ (16) - 1 = 15

Tycho checks themselves out and doesn’t find any fur where they don’t expect it.

Uncurling from the huge bundle of fur she turned into for the night, Penny utters a single "mnar." and pecks at the rocky form next to her.

Sitting up with a sound of breaking shale, Timtenzekil rubs his eyes. The grit at the corners is rough and coase. "Never gonna be used ta tha'." he mutters, composing himself to prepare spells.

Casting extended Greater Longstrider and Greater Magic Fang on Tim and Penny respectively. I don't know that we have any specific spells needed today but swapping in a Fire Snake in place of Blessing of the Salamander sounds good.

Mongo sits upright with a jolt at the crack of Penny's beak on oread skin. "Wazzat! Oh, it's just you, Penny." The big half-orc stretches, rubbing the sleep from his eyes, and begins the slow task of putting on his armor.

Theodric gives his Pharasman prayers in the morning, lining up a small collection of bones in a spiral, laying a small piece of fresh parchment at one end, and a tattered piece at the other end.

With a black scarf trailing behind him Theodric quietly chants in Vudrani as he follows the spiral.

Afterwards he collects his religious paraphernalia.

Warpac rereadies his spells in the morning and is ready to go. He does not cast his magic vestment yet since he does not have a rod of extend. He will wait until they have travelled for a few hours first, wanting it active when they arrive at the new cave.

Everyone gets ready to go, then explains to Leeara that she was going to lead them. After a short discussion covering things you had already said, you get her moving. Then you get her to slow down to a pace the rest of the group can maintain.

You travel back on the swamp path and then the mining road to the bridge. At the bridge you take a different mining road to the west and south. After a total of about five hours travel, you get to the cave where the bad woman is.

“Are you going to steal more of her balls?” Leeara asks as you prepare to go in.

She has brought you to a relatively unimpressive cave opening at the base of a hill that has been widened and braced with timbers. There is a hand-painted sign above the mine that proudly proclaims it is the “NESHER MINES.” The cave itself is relatively shallow, extending only 15 feet underground before it ends.

A hole in the center of the cave allows access to the mine. There is a wooden lift operated by a hand-cranked winch mounted on the platform. It looks like it descends 20 feet into a chamber.

Position of Nesher Mines marked on the map on Slide 4.

Dalviss grins. More than that, Leeara. We hope to take her life, too! Ha, ha, ha.

Tycho takes the guise of one of the dead cultists. They bop themself with their wand of longstrider and heightened awareness. They cast light.

They examine the winch and the lift mechanism, looking to see how old or rusty it is, or if 5ere are any traps. perception: 1d20 + 10 ⇒ (20) + 10 = 30

I once explored a Dwarven monk mine, and the elevator squealed and told everyone we were coming. Silence? Do we want quiet? Tycho can cast silence on this mechanism if the party wishes; their spells are also all silent.

Tycho can’t find any traps on the lift, but it would make a wonderful alarm system! It is in working condition, but you expect that the mechanism and platform would both likely be quite loud. The winch would cause the most noise, but it uses chains rather than ropes to suspend the platform and those aren’t quiet either.

A single Silence spell on the lift would cut down on the noise traveling into the mines quite a bit, but you would want one on the upper mechanism as well to really get down without being noticed. That or drop ropes of your own and skip the whole winch and platform.

"Leeara, does she have more of these balls? Do you know if they're all different?"

Melody droops a little at the mention of silence, but she is willing to go along with it.

Tycho can use 2 silence spells, one on the mechanism and one on the platform. They will cast them when everyone is ready.

Nodding, Leeara says “Take one I could, made her very mad, she shot me, cause fever. Chase too, but I better in wild!”

“The four come each night here. That how I find tall angry woman in shiney dress.”

I’ll assume you retry, having by now figured out that is frequently what it takes with her.

When asked again about how many balls, she says “Many?” She can’t seem to figure out how many.

Theodric uses his wand of mage armor and heightened awareness before the descend.

Theodric can also cast silence twice per day as an SP (so no components)if Tycho would rather keep his spell slots.

Let's do one each, Theodric.

How interesting. Warpac memorized a silence spell too. If I'd have known it was such a popular spell, I'd have had him memorize something else!

Warpac nods approvingly.

"Excellent ideas. I'm no stranger to the need for covering up a lot of clanking and I usually memorize a silence miracle myself. Give me a sec..."

Just before they descend, Warpac casts a bull's strength on himself.

When the first Silence spell goes off, Leeara is puzzled, looking around. She tries talking, then moves around until she can hear again.

Those of you who can read lips know she had asked “What are you doing?” just as the silence spell went off. Then there was some attempted shouting, followed by her leaving the area asking “Where did all the sound go!”

Those outside the Silence get a loud “ND GO!”

“That better!”

She sees you preparing to go down and waves you goodbye.

——

Slide 8

A shaft in the ceiling of this ten-foot-diameter cavern leads upward, while to the north a winding tunnel leads deeper underground. Numerous pickaxes, shovels, buckets, sledges, and other mining gear sit near the walls.

Many of you will need a light source.

Melody puts up dancing lights. Four multicolored orbs float in front of the party.

Tycho waves goodbye! they have light up.

So three light sources: Tycho, Melody’s Dancing Lights, and Penny’s chain.

Getting out of the silence radius, Timtenzekil enchants Penny with barkskin once again. "Do we need a scout or shall we jus' match on down?"

I think scouting would be great if we have someone capable of doing so!

Theodric shakes his head as people inevitably look towards him.

No darkvision, which has just suddenly occurred to me I can learn the spell as an easy fix later.