[Gameday XIII] PFS1e 6-04 - Beacon Below (KS) (Inactive)

Game Master phaeton_nz

"What else can you tell us about this floor? We are set to inventory the contents of the archive, and should inspect each area as we move down regardless. What else can you tell us about the complex? There are three floors, but the bottommost would need to be unsealed by a Sage Jewel?"

Knowledge Arcana for Soulbound Construct, Heightened Awareness: 1d20 + 16 + 2 ⇒ (16) + 16 + 2 = 34

I presume Saruna shows you about the area and helps you preserve any knowledge at this point

A6: A marble statue stands at each end of this corridor. Purple faerie fire illuminates the east statue, which depicts a Garundi man who is healthy and vital on one side and cracked and burned on the other. The other statue depicts a Garundi man wrapped in linen like a mummy and wielding a staff. Knowledge Religion checks please.

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A7: Saruna's Sanctum - Saruna rests and studies in this spacious chamber. A large divan sits in the southeast corner. A bookshelf dominates the north wall, while tapestries and maps cover the others.

Saruna’s etched riddles and rambling notes cover the floor. Pathfinders who study the writing for 2 hours or succeed at a Linguistics check can decipher it. Knowing Ancient Orisani and/or Sphinx makes this easier.

The ancient maps depict Osirion during the Age of Destiny, ranging west into Thuvia and south into Geb. Knowledge Geography to decipher.

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A8: This neatly kept office once doubled as living quarters. A basin in the northwest corner continuously refills with water as a decanter of endless water, and an ancient cot stands nearby. Magical illumination provides bright light. A tidy desk and workbench hold ancient quills and
dried-up ink. The desk drawers are locked (Disable Device)

Also make a Perception check

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A9: Elemental Pools: Pools of pure elemental water, earth, and fire occupy this chamber. These date back to the Pharaoh of Forgotten Plagues, whose forces captured them in a war with Jistka. The elemental presence has warped the stone in the room, giving the surface immediately surrounding the water pool a spongy texture, growing strange crystals near the earth pool, and sending veins of pulsing magma rippling through the flagstones near the fire pool. Several metal scoops and flasks stored at narrow workstations between the pools allow a creature to extract and mix elements, to create outsiders. This is where Saruna created the fire creatures. (Knowledge Planes to learn more)

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A10: Ritual Chamber: This is the room the Amethyst Sage used to perform
several of the rituals he researched, and the architecture still bears the scars of his experimentation. The smell of burnt flesh still permeates the chamber, and now indecipherable runes drawn in blood long since reduced to powder line the floor. The walls are slightly cracked and in several places even seem to bow outward as though pushed apart by a powerful force. (Knowledge Arcana)

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Soulbound Constructs - This is a soul held within a construct. It uses a gem for the soul focus and the soul of a willing spellcaster. who dies at the end of the creation ritual and is stored in the gem to animate the construct.

DR 10/adamantine and magic; Immune construct traits; Spell Resistance.
Weaknesses cemented mind, susceptible to mind-affecting effects

knowledge (religion): 1d20 + 14 ⇒ (2) + 14 = 16 to identify the statue in A6

linguistics: 1d20 + 6 ⇒ (6) + 6 = 12 to decipher writing in A7. He knows Osirani but on Ancient Osirani

perception: 1d20 + 12 ⇒ (10) + 12 = 22 in room A8

knowledge (planes): 1d20 + 6 ⇒ (20) + 6 = 26 to learn more about room A9, the elemental pools

knowledge (arcana): 1d20 + 6 ⇒ (13) + 6 = 19 to learn more about room A10, the ritual room

A6: Katswiri will use her Focused Trance ability to identify the statue.

Knowledge:Religion, Focused Trance: 1d20 + 12 + 20 ⇒ (15) + 12 + 20 = 47

A7 Katswiri knows Ancient Osiriani, though she hasn't studied Sphinx. She will take a look at the diagrams, using her Focused trance to unveil the meaning behind the riddles.

Linguistics, Focused Trance: 1d20 + 17 + 20 ⇒ (1) + 17 + 20 = 38

Going over the geographical notes, Katswiri will activate her Lore Needle to use her knowledge of ancient historical events in Osirion during the age of destiny to help interpret the maps. Lore needle to use Knowledge:History in place of Knowledge:Geograpy

Knowledge:History: 1d20 + 23 ⇒ (20) + 23 = 43

A8 Katswiri leaves the lock to others, though she does have a skeleton key she could try if need be.

She does look around the room with interest. Perception: 1d20 + 14 ⇒ (17) + 14 = 31

A9 Katswiri examines the elemental creation room with great interest, using reference materials she pulls from her Handy Haversack. Knowledge:Planes, Pathfinder Chronicle: 1d20 + 15 + 2 ⇒ (2) + 15 + 2 = 19

A10Katswiri finds the ritual room especially fascinating, and tries to puzzle out its construction how the various magical aspects fit together. She pulls out different reference materials to aid the process.

Knowledge:Arcana, Pathfinder Chroncile: 1d20 + 16 + 2 ⇒ (3) + 16 + 2 = 21

A6 Knowledge (religion): 1d20 + 10 ⇒ (13) + 10 = 23
A7 Linguistics (neither language): 1d20 + 15 ⇒ (11) + 15 = 26 Taresh looks at Katswiri. We're going to be here for a while.
A7 Knowledge (geography): 1d20 + 10 ⇒ (8) + 10 = 18
A8 Disable Device: 1d20 + 18 ⇒ (18) + 18 = 36
A8 Perception: 1d20 + 22 ⇒ (2) + 22 = 24
A9 Knowledge (planes): 1d20 + 12 ⇒ (19) + 12 = 31 This is a strange place.
A10 Knowledge (arcana): 1d20 + 12 ⇒ (17) + 12 = 29 Taresh looks very concerned about this room.

Taresh draws a span of his rapier out of the sheath, showing the dark luster of the blade. "Adamantine. Magical." The weapon clicks back to the sheath.

A6: The first statue is easily identified as Nethys, god of magic. The other one is recognised by Katswiri and Taresh as Ptah, Osirian
god of creation and invention.

A7: Between the two of them, Katswiri and Taresh find that the notes describe how to create a flawed sage jewel using Badru’s soul focus, and how to use it to activate the portal.

A8: Katswiri locates a loose stone under the cot. Meanwhile Taresh gets drawer open which contain library acquisition records.

A9: 26+ K Planes. You identify combinations of elements that might conjure elementals of other types, such as air (fire mixed with water, then filtered through earth), ice (water mixed with air), lightning (fire mixed with air), magma (earth mixed with fire), and mud (earth mixed with water). Combining the raw elements in other ways typically results in an angry elemental that is not bound to the pool being summoned.

A10: 20+ K Arcana: Someone performed potent ritual magic here.

can Katswiri tell whether the ritual requires killing badru, or is it possible to use the soul gem for this with his cooperation without killing him?

I see that the notes have been put on the slides. So we're going to need to figure out which one we want to kill for this.

A8:Katswiri will call Taresh and Gurgle over to examine the stone to see if there is any trap here, then lift it up.

Perception: 1d20 + 14 ⇒ (5) + 14 = 19

Taresh looks at the loose stone. "It'd be a very small trap. But better safe than sorry."
Perception for traps: 1d20 + 23 ⇒ (20) + 23 = 43

"The way I see it, Saruna has been pretty decent to us. If we have to off one of the apprentices here, I'd probably rather take out Badru." He sighs. "I'm not sure these sages are decent people, doing all this to their followers. Anyway. If nobody else can do it and we need to hurry, I can do the curse removal on the stone when we have it. It will take me a moment to prepare, but I'd like to fill up a bit on my preparedness anyway."

Taresh could take 15 minutes to prepare some empty slots, including a remove curse for the sage jewel work if we don't want to wait for an hour to purify it slowly.

No traps. Prising the stone up reveals a cache of tools and a journal.

The journal is written in Ancient Osiriani. It records 20 years of the Amethyst Sage’s work in archiving and recording lost treasures while wrestling to maintain his own identity when exposed to his sage jewel’s memories. Several letters sandwiched between later pages describe, in brutal detail, multiple Qadiran raids in which the invaders killed or captured sages or sympathizers.

The final year of entries is encoded;

knowledge(rligion): 1d20 + 14 ⇒ (2) + 14 = 16

The linguistics roll is beyond his +7, even if he did activate Heroism.

"That does not seem right, having to destroy one of them to escape. Unless one of them volunteers I will have no part in it."

Assuming we can get clear of Saruna before talking about possibly killing her, otherwise Katswiri will save this conversation for a better time.

Also, is information supposed to be disappearing? It was mentioned in the ritual description on the slides, but I don't think we've seen anything of that yet, or any indicators that Tahonikepsu is far away. Maybe we have to go to the library first?

"I think the Amethyst sage may have been desperate. It sounds like this was during the fall of the order, and desperate people tend to do desperate things."

"We haven't heard Badru's side of this story yet. We can at least talk to him, if he's willing, before we make a decision. Saruna is undead, and Badru was sending mummies after her. I don't think there's an innocent here, exactly, and Saruna's soul in particular may rest easier if released from the grip of undeath. Destroying her may be a blessing, in some ways...but also the loss of a first hand account of the time of the fall of the scarab sages." Katswiri sighs, thinking of the lost history.

"Tahonikepsu may be able to unseal the lower level with her sage jewel. We could try contacting her and seeing if we could get her down here to do it, if we don't want to destroy either of the apprentices."

Katswiri will examine the materials discovered.

Knowledge Arcana, Pathfinder Chronicle: 1d20 + 16 + 2 ⇒ (12) + 16 + 2 = 30

"These are mummification paraphernalia. I would guess they have have been used to create Saruna."

Katswiri looks over the notes briefly, then the cipher at the end and nods.
"I feel confident I can crack the cipher using my Second Sight to guide me, but it will still take some time. Should I break it now, or hold on to this until later? We may have more pressing concerns."

"There are more areas on this floor, we should look at investigating them."

Katswiri will find Saruna and ask what is through the doors to the north.

"I don't think Badru would want to parley with us. He would want us all dead."

"We should definitely try to crack that code now. It might contain some useful information. I think we have plenty of time."

If there is a trap on that loose stone (nice work, Taresh!) Gurgle will assist disarming it, if needed.

Taresh listens to Katswiri's report on the mummification materials. "We'll see about Badru when we meet him. This turf belongs to you Sages, and you probably have a better grasp of what to do with their legacy."

"Once you have decided on whether to decode the information or not, let me know and I can try to help." If we want to crack the code, either assume that Taresh is providing an automatic aid with Linguistics +15 or ask him to run a parallel decoding operation, your call which one.

"Alright. I will break the code. Gurgle, can you assist me working through this? If we're going to be a while, can the rest of you look at whether its possible to summon an elemental to assist us in this time? Preferably one that doesn't light our surroundings on fire."

Having a front-lining Ice Elemental we can buff and heal seems like it would be pretty handy.

Katswiri will interpret the journal using Natural Divination to assist.

Linguistics, Natural Divination: 1d20 + 17 + 10 ⇒ (3) + 17 + 10 = 30

"It appears that the Amethyst Sage was researching An-Hepsu XI’s rituals of immortality, including one that involved a canopic jar. He seemed determined to survive in some fashion; if he succeeded, he may still be present in some form."

"...If we're going to be a while, can the rest of you look at whether its possible to summon an elemental to assist us in this time? Preferably one that doesn't light our surroundings on fire."

"I could try the pools, but unless it is a simple matter I may mess up. Anyone care to help?"

"It appears that the Amethyst Sage was researching An-Hepsu XI’s rituals of immortality, including one that involved a canopic jar. He seemed determined to survive in some fashion; if he succeeded, he may still be present in some form."

"Fascinating."

Knowledge planes would be correct.

Saruna tells you that beyond the north door is the catalogue area and also the stairs down to Badru's domain.

The pools can only be used three times a day and Saruna has used them twice, once per elemental. You have one shot at this. You can also use the raw elemental fire to create a splash weapon with a successful Knowledge Arcana or Craft Alchemy check. This also exhausts one use of the pools daily quota.

Best to leave that to someone with a better skill than Guy, then, if we want it to work. Religion is the only knowledge skill he is good at. He is a cleric after all :).

"Or even better, take over. I'm likely to blow us up if I try."

Can Katswiri tell how long it takes to do the elemental summoning, and how long it stay around if successful? If its short she can do it after cracking the cipher, if its long Taresh can take a shot with Guy's help while Katswiri does the decoding.

Most likely an hour or so.

"Taresh, do you want to take point on that with Guy's assistance while I work through the code? I have some reference materials you may borrow that might help."

Katswiri has a Pathfinder Chronicle for each knowledge skill in her Handy Haversack, to give a +2 circumstance bonus.

Taresh nods. "I'll do my best. Guy, I'd welcome assistance. We'll try to summon an ice elemental."

Knowledge Planes: 1d20 + 12 ⇒ (8) + 12 = 20 plus possible assistance

"Alright. I will break the code. Gurgle, can you assist me working through this? If we're going to be a while, can the rest of you look at whether its possible to summon an elemental to assist us in this time? Preferably one that doesn't light our surroundings on fire."

"Of course. Just let me know what you need from me."

"It appears that the Amethyst Sage was researching An-Hepsu XI’s rituals of immortality, including one that involved a canopic jar. He seemed determined to survive in some fashion; if he succeeded, he may still be present in some form."

"Fascinating."

"Indeed. Possibly a lich?" Gurgle muses.

"A liche?!? Was the sage mad? Gods, I hope that wasn't the goal."

assist knowledge (planes): 1d20 + 6 ⇒ (4) + 6 = 10

Guy makes himself (barely) useful at the pools.

Unfortunately the attempt to summon an ice elemental goes poorly. All Taresh gets is a ... rather undrinkable slushy.

"Well, we tried. Tomorrow is another day."

"Maybe. Lichdom, some sort of soul transfer like the soul construct, stasis, other forms of immortality...there are options to persist, but not that many."

After she finishes breaking the code, Katswiri will come and inspect the ice elemental summoning. "Good attempt. Hm." Katswiri pokes the slushy mixture experimentally.

"Well, lets take a look at the other rooms on this floor, shall we?"

UMD: 1d20 + 14 ⇒ (3) + 14 = 17
UMD: 1d20 + 14 ⇒ (13) + 14 = 27
Katswiri activates her wand of Heightened Awareness before entering the northern doors.

Time to see what is to the north, I think.

"So much for that." Taresh pokes the elemental mess he tried to make. After seeing that Katswiri is still immersed in the translation, he looks at the others. "I'm going to take the opportunity to pick up a couple of spells." He finds a quiet corner in the complex, digs out a spellbook and starts flipping through its pages.

Memorizing unused spell slots. Displacement and greater magic weapon to 3rd, mirror image to 2nd, grease and long arm to 1st. Cast greater magic weapon to the rapier straigth away.

Taresh nods to the group, then sets forth towards north in front of the others.

You open the door. This place is foggy. There is also a minor confusion effect in play which makes you think you're going down one branch when you're actually going down another.

Intricate glowing hieroglyphics line the corridors.

Guy holds back a little bit, always a bit on the nervous side.

Which corridors have hieroglyphics? Is the area to the north supposed to be spoilered?

All of them - and no. Fixed

Katswiri will cast Read Magic and Detect Magic, then try to determine what the hieroglyphs say/what they do.

Katswiri discovers that this whole area reeks of abjuration magic.

Could anyone who knows Ancient Osiriani please make a Linguistics or Profession(Librarian) check.

Katswiri makes an attempt to interpret the hieroglyphs.
Linguistics: 1d20 + 17 ⇒ (3) + 17 = 20

"Hm."

Guy will cast comprehend languages on Katswiri. He will also cast a guidance spell if it will help and she is not already receiving a competence bonus, and keep churning out a blessing of the faithful if a sacred bonus will help.

That is just enough.

Katswiri can identify the vast range of information stored below— tomes, furniture, scrolls, art, and more. She also realizes that pieces of the collection are missing and more are disappearing.

Katswiri can speak Ancient Osiriani, so should be good without Comprehend Languages.

"Wait, something is taking pieces of the collection? We have to figure out what is happening to this!"

Katswiri will ask Saruna if she has any idea what is happening, and will try to figure out how the items are disappearing. Do they just pop out of existence like being teleported away, or is something possibly coming and physically removing them?

Does Guy notice a pattern to the types of volumes that are being taken? Are any being returned? This is a library after all.

Saruna has no clue to what is going on. Guy thinks it's random.

I suggest you get down there and check it out. And, if you find a canoptic jar with a heart in it, please bring it to me

"Let's keep moving before everything is gone, maybe we'll catch whatever is taking things."

"Lead on. We can only try."

You find the stairs going down but they are full of webs. ((as per the Web spell))

"Interesting. Items randomly disappearing? We must definitely find out how and why this is happening."

Gurgle follows the group to the stairs. He addresses his teammates,
"Well, folks. Looks like the stairwell is blocked with webs. Burning them is an option, however, I fear there may be flammable items in there. Scrolls and tomes, possibly. Should we just hack our way through with blades?"

"Hacking makes some sense. Go ahead."

"If its a web spell, I can try to dispel it."

Katswiri will cast Detect Magic and try to verify if these are from Web or Guards and Wards and whether this the spell is permanent.

Knowledge:Arcana, Identify Spell Effect (20+Spell Level): 1d20 + 16 ⇒ (10) + 16 = 26

She will then attempt to dispel it, and fail.
Dispel Magic: 1d20 + 8 ⇒ (6) + 8 = 14

And will try again, possibly with more success.
Dispel Magic: 1d20 + 8 ⇒ (17) + 8 = 25

The spell does seem permanent, but your Dispel Magic is able to remove the webs.

Hello everyone! Sorry for the silence on the air. The difficult period dragged on… But I hope it's over. Now I'm trying to figure out what's going on, breaking through hundreds of posts in different games .)

Despite zeye terrible fate of zees sphinx, I don't really like zeye idea of helping zeye undead. Perhaps eet vould be right to destroy them both sequentially. And zeahs send zeyeer souls to eternal rest. Nikita will say this when the companions are alone. And I also coahld uze adamantine bullets, az I understand it. Time after time, for the third or fourth scenario in a row, my character gets into scenarios with robots, constructs and other such things. Every time I promise myself to buy adamantine bullets... Maybe vye should leave zees place for a vheelye, do some shopping and come back.

"No time to shop. The library is being looted and we need to stop it from happening."

Taresh nods at Guy's words. "We press on. If this is advanced abjuration magic, the webs might come back if we dawdle too long. I also don't want the entire collection to vanish on my watch."

He descends the stairs with a sword in hand.

A thirty foot descent later, you reach the Halls of Preservation where Archivists restored damaged artifacts and writing in these workshops.

A haphazard barracade blocks the the last ten feet of the stairs. Acrobatics or climb to get over it easily.