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Karkoran raises one bovine eyebrow at the suggestion of devotees. "It is nice to be treated as somewhat normal at least rather than outcasts and monsters. At your earliest convenience, I would like access to a forge and the assistance of your finest smiths. In addition, access to any alchemical labs you may have. We have been through many battles and need time to reflect upon them and prepare for the next phase, whatever that may entail. As Tayanella suggested, please tell us more of Kao Lor. There is so much to understand here, but I suspect we must meet him sooner or later. Are we to be established here in your monastery or this other plane you speak of? I must admit to having some trepidation about the stability of other planes."
"Greetings Tor Mowshi. It took some time to find you. The others are a few weeks journey to the south. We have sent messages to come here. We escaped the stasis because of Jovar. There are many others, we are just the first to arrive. I assume this is the temple we sought and that Kao Lor or is bloodline exists here?" "We have many of our own questions. First being, what do we do next? If Kao Lor is here, do we talk to him?"
"I wonder what is going to happen." Mentally he prepares for the worst.
"Was it something I said?" "I any event, I take that as a good sign." Gathering the sleigh and all his gear, he moves into the tunnel.
"Eeeeyaargh! So cold." Steeling himself to the pain as the realization of what he has done sets in. Looking at Tayanella, "See, no harm done. Better living through alchemy! *cough* *cough*" As mold puffs come from his mouth.
"Well, lets this wall down, find the temple, find Kaolor and rescue Master Goodwin."
OK, the dispels didn't work. I am trying the zany approach. If nothing comes from the mold, I will smash.
Karkoran nods approvingly at Lump's attempt. "We can only try. We learn from everything we do. I was contemplating this rock and the mold. Do you think it was placed here purposely? Perhaps as a clue or a way in? I am all for smashing our way through but what if there is an easier way or if there is some magical trap? The mold and rock seem strangely placed. It cannot be an accident. It might be a ward of sorts, but the rock mutated the mold, making it less harmless than the mold on the creature, although now through alchemy I have made a tiny blend of the two." Karkoran applies a small amount of flame near the mold, or moves it near the heatstone, if any power remains. He lets the mold grow, and then he cuts himself, and places the special mutant blend patch of the mold close to his warm skin into the cut, then wraps the moldy spot in a rag or bandage. "Either this will do nothing, or will be really bad." There seems to be a gleam of madness in his eye, or perhaps the spark of inventive genius!
Am I in any real danger from this mold stuff?
Well, if the war thing with the dwarves and giants gets resolved by the other groups, we won't need them. Also, not to metagame, but it looks like group 2 is trying to destroy or neutralize them maybe, so it might be in our best interest to vacuum the power out before they are worthless.
"I don't think there is any real danger here. Some of this is somewhat cold and dangerous to work with in large batches, but its just a little amount. What could go wrong?"
"What sounds like a bad idea?" Pouring beakers of reagents together and trying to play mad scientist, the minotaur only half pays attention to what is going on around him.
I think I am ready to level up Kark. We can wait a bit until we get through this wall, although if Lump wants to level up for his increased dispel magic attempts, I say go for it. I am interested in neutralizing the sceptres and making use of their essence. Is everyone on board with going that route on the sceptres? At 47500gp each, we total 95000, split 5 ways is 19000 per person. This is halved, but this amount, if I understand the rules, counts towards the item creation cost, not the base cost. I think in most cases, we may be looking at a tax on the powers added if not normal for the item or as an additional enchantment. Does this all sound correct? What do people think?
"Save your arrows, I can batter it down with blows. I just need to cast a few spells." While we wait overnight for spell refresh time, I will study the scepters more. Karkoran is thinking perhaps to use the scepters to fuel his weapons. "Lets keep these eggs frozen too." Karkoran will keep them next to the icy frozen mold area, off away from the heat stone and people. While we wait, he pokes around his mold cultures some more. Anything additional worth learning? Was the mold on the remorhaz symbiotic in nature? I like how the mold grew on it and used its heat. How is it different than the mold by the radiation rock? Karkoran will try a blend of the two molds in a single dish.
"I think I will go back outside and get my sled and the bear traps while we wait for the ice to melt. There isn't much else to do for now?" If no one objects, Karkoran will make the lone trek back to the surface to retrieve the sled and bear traps that they left behind.
"I think we should wait on the eggs and see what happens. Either they are already dead and frozen. Or they are supposed to be cold, and subjecting them to heat will kill them or cause them to hatch. If they hatch and the larvae are dangerous it will be easy to squash them. I for one am curious. There is food for them. We can also feed them our meat if we don't want to let them eat the corpses. I am for reburying the frozen victims in one of the nests again. " "After we are done with those, lets take all of our loot and get up to the tunnel by Ash and wait for the melt. If it takes as much timeas before, it will be another day, and we can regain our powers and use them to batter through the force wall if the ice melt reveals nothing. We can reflect on the battle, although I want to tinker with the mold and the rock some more. Any other options or ideas? Up in the tunnel we are out of the way and harder to get to since it is vertical, although these things can tunnel. We killed the big mama easily, so perhaps we are fine for now."
While the mold stuff is cooking away, I can smash away the ice with my hooves on the second ice nest or use my weapons even.
"I will take a look at it. I am looking at the mold from the creature and the mold that was near the rock. " Karkoran will do some alchemy stuff on the rock too, pour some chemicals on it and what not.
I'll examine the mold and start culturing it maybe.
Karkoran stands down below as Ash explore the cavity above. "Bring the rock down and some mold too. Be careful though. I want to examine that mold. I wonder how it relates to the mold on the remorhaz."
"What's in the tunnel!?" he booms back up.
With guidance:
Yes, it seems my weapon was nerfed. I wasn't ever excited about it to start with. I had a different plan to throw them and do stuff with my animal companion, but when it died, I went a different route, and several other things were changed in the mean time so I have been sort of floundering with what to do. I would like to reskin my weapon anyhow, I would rather be a samurai I think. GM I will message you about some stuff.
Karkoran looks at his weapons closely and at the dead beast. "Hrrmph." Curious about the cold he creeps closer to examine the being and see what this mold is about. "We should continue our investigation now that the creature is dead."
I did NOT expect that it would be killed. I figured I would miss most attacks or my weapons would be damaged. I guess the fire protection paid off.
5' step and full attack. Initiate Frenzy Strike standard action
Adding 2 for mutagen, 2 for Lumpsong
If any hit, I Mark it as a free action with Armiger's Mark. I don't want to hit that thing with my natural weapons. Hoping my magic weapons survive..
Will hold action until it comes at me.
Round 3 - double move. "Tayanella, let us lure it in more so you can get a clearer shot at it. Hold with your arrows a few seconds."
Oh I forgot, my familiar should be shown on the map too. He is on my shoulder and should be doing his protective thing.
Lump and I move closer to the monster. We should be able to see it now and it us maybe. Karkoran will wave his many arms to try and attract the creature. If it comes over and attacks us I will use a counter to intercept its attack. (Bloody Riposte or Intercepting Shade). I won't use Extended Defense for that counter though, if i riposte I will mark it using Armiger's Mark. Aegis gives +2 AC to Lump.
Round 2 "OK, I think I know what we need to do, we need to bring it closer so Taya can shoot it easier. Lump, come with me, we will lure it close and keep it focused on us. I hope you have your fire protection up. Taya and Ash can do their thing then. "
I will hold my action until Lump's turn and we move together.
Round 1 Karkoran will hold his action and wait for the creature. "Time to get one of these fancy double crossbows I think."
What would your armor class be? I would be worried about getting swallowed whole, which could happen to any of us I guess. Everyone in my Aegis will get +2 AC. If I use Armiger's Mark it also has a -4 to hit anyone but me. I say we let it get close, and let Taya pincushion it. I also have several counter maneuvers I can use to avoid its hits. Lump can you distract it with illusions to buy us an extra round or two? Otherwise I can kite it around the cave, getting it to chase me. I can outrun it easily I think.
We might have a round or two before it gets to us, hopefully Taya can sink a bunch of arrows into it before it eats us. Based on what we learned, attacking it in melee sounds bad for our health or our weapons, but we might need to beat on it eventually. We can see how it goes.
Growling at the monster "There it is, home to its lair. Tayanella, may your arrows strike true."
Lump, I think you are the party trap man. Taya has Ninja, but I don't know if they can do trap stuff. I guess you just need to train disable device right? Lump if you get cleric updated, I think we may need some more protection from energy or resist energy, if we have a fight eventually. Whether its a remorhaz thingy, or like a dragon or some other creature, we are likely to face some sort of cold or other energy related attacks. If it is a remorhaz, we are going to be in rough shape fighting it hand to hand or with natural weapons. Eventually the protections will be eaten away and our hit points or weapons eroded enough that melee is not an option. We might be relying heavily on ranged attacks (Taya). So perhaps any way to enhance her damage would be great.
Karkoran adopts his battle stance, roaring like a dragon. He begins imbibing alchemical extracts, and a mutagen, his body warping and shifting. Primal magic flows through him, and his 4 arms grow to 8. He goes about blessing each of his comrades, inspiring them to glory in battle and quaffs several potions. His weapons darken and he grunts brutishly as his thick fur hide toughens with wood and metal augmentations.
Do we know anything about remorhazes?
"Something big is moving. Let me try to remember if I can recall anything useful about the creatures we may think inhabit this place." Starting to prepare long term spells. Shorter ones if the thing seems real close. "I advise everyone to prepare. Grobly you may wish to go aerial. Hiding might not be a bad idea. Lump of Stones/Ice might work again. Maybe that song where the adventurers didn't all die in the frozen cave in the remote wilderness..."
We may wish to prepare for battle now even more.
We definitely break up the ice as much as possible to help speed up the process and once we are close to the ice below we will smash through it.
"I think Tayanella's preparations are wise, we need to be ready for something if we make more noise."
"I too have a heatstone I can contribute if it will speed the process up." Rather than make a bunch of noise cracking the ice, if we use a heatstone below we can place it near one of the ice areas we think are nests to melt though too. It can double to keep us warm at our camp too. As usual he can cast Keep Watch when it comes time to rest. When it is time to prepare new extracts, he will prepare two blood transcriptions and use them to drink the troll blood to reveal any spells it may have had, and scribe any possible ones to his formula book.
"We should investigate the entire room. It seems empty now. We should scout out the clear ice areas and see if they are nests or what, including the ceiling one. I recommend not splitting up in case something comes crashing home and we need to go nova on it." Karkoran packs up all the climbing gear and makes his way into the room, and starts looking around, weapons drawn. "It might be wise to ready defensive spells or precautions. I will start with these icy nest things."
"Heading upwards seems reasonable to me. Maybe we will come out on top somewhere."
Karkoran will keep track of any twisting and winding tunnels we may go down and ensure we do not get lost. Otherwise he will follow Tayanella or Grobly's leads.
"The elk ran away two combats ago. The sled makes noise, but i can bury it in the ice and snow, and leave some of the more cumbersome gear with it. We won't need a tent in the tunnels, and I can leave the bear traps to guard the sled and camouflage it." Karkoran proceeds to bury the sled further up the glacier under several large chunks of ice or boulders, and then spread the bear traps around the area under a light layer of snow and ice. "I don't think we Ash will leave her raptors behind, but they are reasonably stealthy. If you stay out ahead a hundred fifty feet, you should be free of our noise and we can use the message cantrip to stay in touch. " "Ready to go here. Lead the way."
"Let's just go in. We may need to see what lies deeper inside. I can't think of any way out here to narrow down our choices without serious divination. We can look for clues deeper in or maybe run into some denizens who have information. Maybe Tayanella can scout far enough ahead."
Xanya, now that we know exactly how they work, we are likely to be safe from a gate opening, since they have to see the area to open a gate, and it seems like they need to be scrying one of us to do so. We would get a will save to resist. It also seems easy to avoid it altogether, by just keeping the sceptre in their boxes as I have been doing.
While our stealth team explores the tunnels, Karkoran cracks the secrets of the sceptres, "I have determined how these work. They seem to be linked to other sceptres, lesser and greater. There is indeed the potential for a gate to be opened if they sceptres are brought too close, however it seems they would need to be linked to one of us to do it remotely. Since that is not occurring, we could wait for our kin to arrive. They could attempt to force a scry upon us but we would know." Grumbling to himself, "It also seems the sceptres can be destroyed, hopefully not remotely, as that would cause great bodily harm. I wonder how one would activate it on a local scale since the holder would be dooming themselves." "Ash, would you fly to meet our fellows and inform them of what I have learned, they could come close, but warn them that if they are scryed we may be in danger of a gate. Here, I will write down the details of the staff that way some others have the information and if I perish the information is not lost."
"Oh, by the way, here Ash, have some troll blood. If he was a caster, you can use Blood Transcription to learn some of its magic."
While Taya explores the tunnel entrances, Karkoran will study the sceptres more. There was a key here he was not seeing, he needed more information before he felt the group could make a decision about them. He flexed his new arm. It was a little sore yet. He suspected the primal energy he kept pushing through himself had something to do with it. Probably the mutagens he was consuming for these battles as well. Perhaps even the tumor he had was contributing. Maybe even the magic of the sceptres themselves. It was handy having four arms now. He could wield weapons with the arms, but not all four at once. It wasn't like the primal ones he could manifest briefly. Maybe in time they might become functional. He looked at the vessels of troll blood he had taken. These will be useful. He sat down to inspect the sceptres further, willing his tumor to tear away into usable form. He favored a small dinosaur, perhaps due to Ash's influence of her raptors. The small creature was also able to make use of its foreclaws which was a boon to assisting in various tasks. He prepared an extract of Alchemical Allocation and quaffed his potion of Identify immediately spitting it back into the vial. As the magic auras swam before him, he began to inspect the sceptres as he laid them both out before him on a large rock. Aid Other familiar (DC10)
Spellcraft with Identify and Guidance and Familiar Aiding
Fun to be sure, but who knows what will come pouring through?
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