Siegfried does not relish the death, but he is committed to delivering to the graves all those who wish him and his kith harm. Let them fall.
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Siegfried knew what a good dwarven troop of bowmen could do. Numerous were the tales of dwarven phalanxes covered with shields and loosing missile after missile against their enemies. This was no phalanx. Of them, only Alden carried a shield. And few had any ranged training to speak of. Yet Siegfried was confident in his armor. He was eminently capable of withstanding the weaponry of these fools who sought to throw their lives away. "Torag, guide me," he whispers under his breath, moving forward to the edge of the hill and raising his enormous hammer high in the air. "Come, then, if you are so eager to die!" he cries out in the goblinoid tongue. Dwarven runes of protection glowing red and orange spark into existence around Siegfried's frame as a magical shield begins slowly rotating around him. Let them come.
Attack of Opportunity:
Siegfried is too grumpy to pay clear attention. He isn't usually one to be so easily distracted, but his internal world calls for his attention as he begins considering tactical plans if negotiations proved impossible.
"An old crone thrust out of leadership may not speak for the rest of the tribe," Siegfried grumbles. "I'm still not keen on launching a surprise assault, especially when they may be expecting us regardless. But at least I agree that a hillside approach is best."
Siegfried glowers at Jaxom as he continues to treat Garnet as a common stone rather than an entity possessed of some measure of sapience. "That will be enough of that, Mr. Buhr. We should not be here to make enemies. We have enough of those already." The dwarf does go to retrieve Garnet. As he picks it up, he sighs. "I've no mind to stroke your ego, Ms. Garnet, but I hope you know we're not all as thick-skulled as my friend. If you don't mind, I'll be putting you in my knapsack for now. Just until we deal with this sordid business. If there's a way to help you find a field of rabbits, we'll do what we can." He does as he says he would and leaves Mama Kurg to her curmudgeonly ways. Outside, he takes a deep breath and begins looking once more at the tracks. Trap or no, they clearly needed to end this.
Had the goblins being trying to change their sex to promote the procreation of a new generation? Siegfried didn't remember Passbog doing any sort of gynocide on the goblins, but maybe it had been unintentional. The dwarf crosses his arms and sighs. "I'll sue for peace if I can," he says. "But I've always found my hammer more convincing than my words. So I'll pray that your kin are at least as receptive as you, or that my companions' tongues are sharper that our blades." Thinking for a moment, he grimaces. "If we take Garnet, how do we know that they will not assume that we have killed you? Is there something we can say, or a favor of yours that we can show, to indicate that we have not been violent with you?"
Siegfried changes the grip on his hammer as Mama Kurg stirs. He listens to her hateful words, his face etched as much with vitriol as with pity. Peace was always an option. But most forsook it. Old divisions, entrenched in millennia of warfare, led most of the races of Golarion to scramble for the limited resources they could choke out of a land scarred by the plots of the powerful. The dwarves' own Quest for Sky was brought on by the cataclysm known as Earthfall ten millennia hence, ushering in the endless conflict between Siegfried's kin and the orcs that they drove ahead of them. Few remembered exactly why such conflicts had begun in the first place, and most never asked their kings, gods, and generals why they continued to fight. But they did. Peace was always an option. But most could not bury their hatred long enough for their vision to clear. "Then you lack imagination," Siegfried declares to Mama Kurg.
Siegfried's brow furrows about as hard as Rabbit's. Owner? The dominant party? They had spoken of "the sharding" before, but it was one of those theories as far as Siegfried had been concerned. The world was smaller than it had been before, and none knew exactly why. Passbog wasn't exactly filled with powerful diviners. Siegfried's auguries, back when he had the faith (and incense) to perform them, hadn't given clear answers to the questions he had asked. But the magic still came. The gods still provided, even if the provisions were smaller with each passing year. "We've tried talking with the goblins before," Siegfried says. "Why didn't they mention this...goal?" He presses a bit further, too. "And how did Mama Kurg come to possess you?"
The thin crease of a smile crosses Siegfried's lips as Jaxom declares with great certainty that rocks don't talk. Jaxom just didn't know how to talk to rocks, or have the patience to listen. Then again, neither did Siegfried, not really. He was a Molgrade, not a Grimmark or a Runebinder or--gods forbid--a Vanderholl. Still, Siegfried didn't expect a human to understand stones, even if Jaxom was a respectable smith. It almost brings a certain joy that Garnet announces itself with such ferocity. It makes Siegfried wonder at that distant Runebinder cousin of his who had said once in a drunken stupor that he had coaxed a secret out of an opal. Siegfried had mostly believed him, but this was something else entirely. "Let's leave Mama Kurg alone as Garnet has recommended," Siegfried chides. He steps forward and bows his head lightly in the direction of the brilliant gem. "And let's regard each other instead of talking about each other like we aren't here. It's a pleasure, Garnet. My name is Siegfried of Clan Molgrade, once of Highhelm." He looks at the others before continuing. "You have us at a disadvantage, I'm afraid, in seeming to know more than we do."
Although he wasn't necessarily an expert in magic--not anymore at least--the strength of the item before him was surprising. Siegfried stays back, curious at sights the little hovel. He knew better than to consider age a sign of a lack of strength. But books? In a goblin's home? Now that was surprising. Didn't they have some inane belief that books stole thoughts from their heads and burn them as a matter of principle? It could be that this goblin had abandoned that belief in this post-Sharding world (or even before, to be honest). But that would make her like an outcast among her own people. And yet... Well, nothing was certain anymore.
For better or worse, even Siegfried's best efforts at following Jaxom in were fraught with loud clanging.
Siegfried nods as Rabbit detects the magic, and he decides to try to join the halfling in the assessment of magic.
"Aye, a quick look-see shouldn't be too bad," Siegfried concurs, glad for a moment to not be constantly vigilant about his footfalls.
Siegfried smiles at Kras'tak's story and lets out an inglorious snort. "Many detectives merely think themselves smart, deluding themselves into believing and manifesting their own propagandic marketing. Rather than properly following the empiric methods they espouse, they begin with a conclusion derived from prejudiced assumptions and gather clues to support themselves. That they're occasionally correct merely bolsters their haughty airs and they carry on unawares of their faults and foibles until their aggregated errors catch them in arrears and they confront they faults or die trying." He grins, chuckling ruefully, aware that he was describing himself as much as anything. He was no detective.
"Well, well, look at the forensic investigator over here," Siegfried teases Alden. "And what tales have you heard of murder? Ustalavic romances? Fey tales? Galtan intrigue?"
The old smith's brows raise and then furrow as he takes in the reality. "I don't know if it's so much fought as--" he runs his fingers along the gory serrations around the goblins' necks, "--executed." He meanders over to the burnt corpses and arrives at a similar conclusion. "It could have been ritualistic, too. But that's speculation." Siegfried nods and hefts back up to full standing, his knees cracking. "I'm a halfway decent swimmer, but this armor'll sink me like a stone if I'm caught in a swift draft. We'll need to keep our footing reliable if we can."
Consulting with Jaxom to identify the Frogstump footprints, Siegfried moves carefully forward, taking the lead .
"Knowing even a little magic is a feat beyond what most can do," Siegfried says, rebuking Rabbit's meekness. "It is not the amount of magic, but they way you use it that matters." --- The grisly sight of murdered goblins intrigues the old dwarf. "I take it this is worse condition than they left you in," he asks rhetorically.
Siegfried goes up to the goblins. Although their deaths were clear and the causes nearly so, he wonders if he might be able to glean more information about their final moments by assessing the clues around them.
Then he begins to look more closely at the footprints. More goblins? Or something else?
Setting a marching order sounds like a good idea, but we can probably hash it out OoC unless we want to turn jockeying for position into a scene. Siegfried is pretty exclusively a melee combatant, while Alden and Jaxom seem melee-preferred with ranged options. My inclination is that Kras'tak and Rabbit are both range-preferred. Jaxom and Kras'tak both have 30 ft movement speeds, while Alden, Rabbit, and Siegfried are 20 ft. Jaxom could potentially scout ahead if he wants to, while Kras'tak doesn't quite have the skills for it. --- Speaking of which, you should double-check your skill point allotment, Kras'tak. It looks like you have only put ranks in two skills (Handle Animal and Spellcraft), but you should have six total: 2 (base) + 2 (int) + 2 (background).
Also, you should get a +3 to your Stealth modifier for being small-sized. --- Anyway, I propose moving in a cross-formation when possible, as follows: --J--
Which keeps the PC with the lowest AC well-protected while enabling the melee folks to move forward. Jaxom can scout ahead if needed and has the best Perception in the party by far. A ducks-in-a-row marching order when we're worried about possible traps could probably be:
Jaxom is at the back to protect the squishies from rear problems, and can use his superior speed to get to the front faster if there are no problems behind. Alden's 17 flat-footed AC makes him one of the best candidates to potentially take a hit from a trap. Unfortunately, most of us have crap Perception, so we're not going to see things coming without Jaxom up front. But Jaxom's flat-footed AC is only 13, so he's 20% more likely to get hit by something than Alden and Siegfried. Thoughts?
"We just keep the ones without armor away from the melee," Siegfried responds, noting their smallfolk witch and sorceress. "But close enough to cast spells. Mr. Buhr is likely the fastest among us, save perhaps Kras'tak."
Siegfried snorts once more at the declarations of "unnatural" and such, but lets the comments go along. He had other things to focus on. Like Fogril. As his kith is restored from a deadly wound, Siegfried releases a sigh of relief. He had almost not realized how much he had been holding the muscles in his chest and back taut during the prayer. "A name etched so is worth more than coppers on the Taskmaster's scales," he paraphrases. He lets his arm linger on Fogril's for a while longer before nodding solemnly. Torag was still delivering, it seemed. --- Properly armed and reunited with their little group of scouts and strikers, the dwarf prays for a bit of guidance from Torag and holds low to the ground as he tries to follow the trail of blood back to the goblins' hideout.
But a priest with doubt in his heart was a distracted priest.
"You can tell the difference?" Siegfried asks Tel incredulously. It was an earnest question. He was well aware of the jokes around some folk not being able to tell dwarven men and woman apart, but he had also had a Rivethun auncle when he was younger, so... "Nevermind." He turns back to Fogril. "I dare say that's the worst forge burn I've seen since my cousin Dankrad got drunk and tried to weld his boots to his ass," he says to his friend and co-worker, trying to joke and bring a bit of crass levity to an almost-certainly painful situation. "Here, I think you need the Forgefather's Favor more than I do right now." Siegfried takes a breath and reaches towards the burns. He closes his eyes and reaches his other hand to the heavy iron hammer like a millstone around his neck. "Father of Creation," he sighs. "Look down on we your children, scattered under the Ever-Sky, and show us your favor this day." It had worked before. Hundreds, thousands of times it had worked before. It was one of the few things that kept any sort of hope flickering alive within him. Just one more time. Please.
It's fun to play a cantankerous bastard.
Siegfried waves a hand in the air in a half-shrug. "If you want a philosophical debate on the nature of good and devil, Mr. Buhr, we can do that later." He seems either unaware or uncaring that he had been the one to turn it into a debate, but continues unabated. "I'm not dissuading the motion, just tempering expectations. We don't know their motives unless we ask. But if they don't give us a chance to ask," he swings his longhammer down from his shoulder to his hands, "Then we're not left with much choice, are we?"
Siegfried scoffs at Jaxom's declaration. "They're mischievous," he counters, "Not evil." Then again, he looks at the damage here in town. Mischief or malice, this wouldn't do. It wasn't sustainable. He sighs and furrows his brow, rubbing at a beard now flecked with ash, sweat, and blood. "But I don't mind reminding them to stay the @#$% out of our business."
"I believe, dear Rabbit, that she stayed behind," Siegfried responds. He had liked the halfling from early on in his interminable stay in Passbog. Not strong in the physical sense, no, but Siegfried had long since learned to look past such trivialities. Not all were meant for the forge. Not all were needed by it. And strength came in different ways. "I saw her wave at us as we turned back to town. Like as to not leave the Toomses undefended."
Siegfried reaches up to pat Alden's back. "Cardiovascular activity is very important, Mr. Cooperson," he says, his own breathing scarcely labored. "If you want to practice a bit of running in your armor, I'd be happy to run with you." In truth, the dwarf was somewhat winded, but he wouldn't let it show. He just had literal decades more experience doing this sort of thing, from before Alden was even a twinkle in his parents' eyes. Possibly before his parents were twinkles in their parents' eyes, though he had never met the elder Coopersons to know how old they were. But it was a fair bet. The elder dwarf looks around at the smears of blood all around. No, this didn't look good. And he didn't like being tricked. "If I know what's what about goblins--" "--they're a good bit faster than most of us. We ought not rush, especially if we have injured. But we can track them." If they were going out, he likely ought to save some of his magics for the road. But if his fellow townsfolk were in trouble, he could spare a cure or two.
"You're not bad for a youngster," Siegfried huffs out to Alden, "But the wee one is putting us both to shame."
7 miles per hour in heavy armor isn't too shabby if I do say so myself, and Rabbit is pulling a mean 9 mph.
I also love how almost everyone canonically envisions goblins as being very effective rhymers.
"You'll not beat me if I can help it," Siegfried says, measuring his breathing with his paces as he keeps astride Alden.
The dwarf presses his lips together at the sound of the flute. There weren't many flute players he had ever met, and Milana was usually kind enough to keep her noisome playing quiet enough that it didn't bother. Those blasts weren't calm, genteel playing. That was an alarm. Siegfried swears profanely, nodding at Kras'tak. His delivery would have to wait. He turns, digging his heels into the soil, and begins hustling back the other way as quickly as his legs would carry him. He had been neglecting leg day.
Siegfried has a well-worn rag that he pulls from his back pocket to begin wiping mud, ash, and alchemical goop from the head of his hammer. "Oh I'm sure the young man can handle himself," he says dismissively. "I'm keen to at least make my delivery to Martin before we head back." As soon as his hammer is no longer caked with grime, the stodgy dwarf begins loping back across the field to the Tooms' house.
Since the four of us at the farm are not engaged in combat, but Jaxom and a bunch of NPCs are (back in town proper)...and since you've established that we can't tell what's going on back in town... What should we be doing? I'm a bit stymied.
Siegfried hears Alden but pays him little mind at first. His initial sprint is for naught--a dwarf might be able to persist well in a long race, but the goblins would easily outpace him. There is no shame or pity etched on his face as he jogs back. It would have been smart in hindsight to have prepared an orison to create a deluge of water this day. But lacking that, the dwarf begins stamping his longhammer into the flaming grass to stamp out the fire's access to air bit by bit while the long-legged folk come with tools better designed for the job. Goblins and their pranks...
Cool, cool. It might be useful to have separate Initiatives separated and specified in each post. I would definitely appreciate it.
Siegfried's expression does not change from placid boredom as he warns Alden not to step where he was about to lose a leg. He watches the trajectory of their sudden sprint and takes a breath, lowering himself even closer to the ground. A dwarf in motion stays in motion. His legs begin pumping as he works up to a sprint in the grass at an angle to avoid the alchemical fire and catch up with the goblins before they get too far.
Siegfried rolls his eyes, swinging the oversized hammer back up to his shoulder and beginning the slow, steady march towards the goblins. It wasn't like the goblins he knew to resist verbal sparring. Something was up. The dwarf trusts his own armor well enough to protect him against a trap. And so why not? He didn't have much else to lose.
Siegfried sighs. He had had little patience for subtlety as a young dwarf and had even less now. He takes a deep breath and slams his hammer into the ground. His voice booms as he laces his speech with goblin vulgarities: the sort common in their tittering tongue and which could as easily be used in a greeting of friendship as in a vicious insult contest. Goblin:
Siegfried peers out to the tree line and doesn't see anything. Droskar below, if he needed glasses to fix his vision after all these years... The old dwarf sighs and looks again hard at where Alden's gaze is going. He rubs at his eyes and narrows his gaze again. "All right. So we've got eyes on 'em."
Siegfried keeps pace with Alden, cutting a threatening appearance between the two of them. "I'm sure I don't have to remind you, but conversation is still possible."
Siegfried is about to ask to see the darts that Jaxom had made for Rabbit (since they were passing about both the physical and immaterial spoils of a day's labor) when their calm quietude is interrupted. He takes the horseshoes back from Kras'tak's appraisal and secures them back in his satchel. "Goblins?" the old dwarf asks, his brow not even rising in surprise. He had bloodied enough hammers over the years with his implements, and his latent faith in Torag could lend a destructive potency to even a ball-peen hammer. Of course, he had a better tool these days. "Doubtful we'll finish the job as it were, but we'll do what we can to protect the town." Unlike Alden rushing, Siegfried is patient. He returns to the smithy, asking Fogril for help getting into his splint mail. There hadn't been enough metal available to justify a full suit of plate mail as Siegfried would have preferred, so he had made this suit to protect himself from the occasional goblin incursions. It takes only about 2 minutes to get into the armor with his friend's help, and he grabs the largest hammer he has available--the one he usually uses to break stone--and begins hustling to the Tooms farm to meet up with Alden, Rabbit, and Kras'tak.
--- At the farm, Siegfried nods at the Erastilian paladin. "I'm always ready," he responds, casting his glance out. "If they intend violence, we'll deal with them." The dwarf holds a hammer almost twice as tall as him, slung over his shoulder and balanced against well-honed shoulders. About two years ago he had swung the hammer at an attacking goblin and rendered the offending invader into an unrecognizable tangle of bone, dirt, and tissue. The goblins would hopefully remember the possibility and fear being similarly rendered inside out.
Siegfried drinks the moonshine quietly, his callused hands balancing a chunk of bread with cheese. At the young kobold's question he breathes in the tang of multiple yeasts in his hands and exhales a labored sigh. "Shoes for Farmer Tooms' bay mare," he reports. "Ready for delivery. Would you like to see, young miss?" The dwarf reaches into his bag to pull out the now-cooled, curved plates of iron. They were designed to be easy for Martin to put on and remove so that the mare could be trained with them but still have sufficient bare-hooved time. Kras'tak would likely note several uneven divots. The shoes were not identical, but custom made for each hoof. "What of the day's labor for the rest of you?" He didn't particularly care for the small talk, but there was no reason to be rude, especially when the others had gathered such a lovely spread.
Siegfried is probably quietly irritated by Alden. The dwarf used to be deeply devoted to Torag, but his faith has faltered mightily in the last 3 years to the point that he rarely feels that he receives any insight from his god at all anymore. So on one level he sees Alden's faith as naive. On another, he's almost jealous that the young man could be so naive, wishing that it was as easy for him to hew to his faith and its precepts in the absence of clear guidance. It's hard to say exactly what Siegfried would make of Kras'tak. I suppose it depends on how open she's been.
Horseshoes. The Hammer and Tongs, ancient and revered text of the Father of Creation Torag, said that "There are no small crafts, only small forgers." And yet for Siegfried of Clan Molgrade, once a rising star in the Clan, known as much for the speed of his craftsmanship as the beauty imbued in the runes and filigree inlaid in each piece, horseshoes felt almost like an insult. It's not that there wasn't a challenge to be had there, especially if he liquored himself up enough to make the task inherently more difficult, but that the import of a set of horseshoes in the grand scheme of the world was small. But Siegfried's world was now small. And this was the best use of his once-grand skills. This. With a sigh and a swig of Fogril's latest swill, Siegfried draws a bar of iron near white-orange in his heat from the forge and sets it above his anvil. Each strike of his hammer to knead the bar into shape was supposedly a prayer. And so he clangs a paean through the practiced arc of muscles and joints, imposing his will on that which resisted change. The hard part, of course, was correct shoeing. Siegfried was no farrier. But as he understood it, crafting a quartet of horseshoes was not terribly unlike crafting gauntlets or vambraces. One could size the product out to be approximately useful to a wide variety of people. Or one could understand the joints and contours of the intended wearer, working the plates so that they would fit and flex like well-tailored cloth. In his heyday, Siegfried's best customers spoke of his best pieces like second skins, easily disappearing in the wearer's perception until called on to protect them. And so Siegfried had taken careful measurements of the mare's hooves, as much as she'd let him. Thank the gods, or whatever force still persisted in these dark times, for Rabbit. Siegfried wanted to be kind to the mare but had never had a great touch with animals. So the little halfling had suddenly appeared--the way he often did--and calmed the mare down so that the dwarf could finish taking his measurements. These specifications are hammered into the curve and contour of the metal, held up to the dwarf's naked eye to gauge the closeness, before laying them to the side to cool properly. No quenching in cold water in this dwarf's forge. He'd not risk destroying his careful work by warping its structure in a rush to be done. The day's work done, and with Jaxom and Fogril having already left, Siegfried closes up the smithy and begins walking to the Tooms farm. It looks like Jaxom, Rabbit, and Alden are also there. Siegfried waves to them as he approaches, looking around to see if Martin was around. Rabbit might be needed to calm the mare during the shoeing, so it was a good thing he was here.
Rabbit asked Siegfried to make him some weapons, and although the dwarven smith was happy to oblige did point out the Jaxom had made good weapons, too, and that Siegfried's specialty at this point was armor. He would have been happy to make stuff for anyone else, too. Rabbit's skittish, but Siegfried doesn't mind, and doesn't press. In happier days, he would have made comments about how dwarven smithing was inherently better than human smithing, that dwarves spend so much time learning their craft that a human couldn't possibly learn the nuances of good metal or stonework. But those were the old days. Now? Who cares? Everyone's going to die someday, and even your best creations will rust and be forgotten. Jaxom's a good talent anyway. I'll want to take a look at Kras'tak and Alden's profiles, but if either of you are looking for a surly drinking partner prone to fits of melancholy, Siegfried is your dwarf! |