*casts resurrection*
The PCs are traveling with a young couple. After the second night, he and his mates abduct the pair and then Olangru leaves a programmed image of the two. When the PCs are packing up to head out, the two suddenly sit up, clasp hands and skip headlong over the ledge, smiling all the while. Before they fall, the girl turns her head a full 180 degrees, winks and says, "You should have turned back you know..."
Of course...the ledge itself will be an illusion as well (as someone earlier suggested) :D
PS: Troy, I'm really enjoying your blog. When will you put up updates?
I do hope you, as have others, are properly inspired by the malevolence of ... myself. The journals of a thousand deaths, including my own, are inspirational reading. >:)
Alas, I did try to look for that part in your journal where you used the fabled girdles of masculine/femininity for the better part of this morning, but I was unable to find it. Perhaps my search-fu is lacking...
Alas, I did try to look for that part in your journal where you used the fabled girdles of masculine/femininity for the better part of this morning, but I was unable to find it. Perhaps my search-fu is lacking...
I never did get to use the aforementioned girdles, alas. Others have taken a liking to the idea, but implementing it is a bit trickier. One use is to victimize the abducted NPCs with them (and then it gets worse...). Captured male PCs could be found by the other PCs as captured female PCs as well. I have suspicions that many players are perusing these messages, so one would want to either disguise the devices or alter the precise form that they are encountered in.
PS: Troy, I'm really enjoying your blog. When will you put up updates?
As the original DM from that game and somewhat current player, I have sad news for you regarding the blog. We've fallen so far behind in the writing that it has become a chore to update it. As a result, I think that we're probably not going to get it caught up.
Also, scheduling has been crazy this summer (I got married AND caught mono. And yes...the very same day) so we haven't really been playing regularly.
We'll see what the future holds, maybe we'll try to get it caught up again, but I kinda doubt it.
Too bad, I had just jumped back in as a player (as Malfus the bartender) and had some big plans for him!
What a difference a few hours can make...uncanny timing.
After a few emails exchanged this morning...looks like we'll try to pick the campaign up again in September. I'm going to do my best to get it caught up by then and then we'll try to maintain it.
My players got to know Olangru yesterday evening. At first, when the incidents in camp occurred, they were full of confidence and even bragging about how they wood soon defeat this "creature". When Olangru cast his first darkness spell, they rightly concluded what was the matter, and went searching blindly for an item with darkness on it (the small pebble). This almost cost the life of one of the PCs, since they were camping on the coast road and there was a cliff nearby. It is not a good idea to crawl around in the dark searching for a pebble on the edge of a cliff. She managed to catch herself just in time to avoid falling.
Then they got fooled by an illusion, which lured the rogue away from the camp, so that Olangru could mess with one of the backpacks. The PCs already suspected something was going to happen that night. They set an ambush, which failed because the rogue, who was in hiding, got sidetracked by the illusion.
When they arrived in the Fogmire, Olangru and two mates totally surprised them, and were able not only to kidnap Urol, but also Tavey and Skald (who is still alive in my campaign). This totally freaked the players out.
Now I am thinking about how to continue. I have decided that they can find Tavey in the same room as Urol, intended to be sacrificed. But Skald had some fight left in him and the bar-lgura who abducted him (one of Olangru's mates), was already wounded.
Now there are several possibilities:
1) Skald fights the female bar-lgura on his own, but gets killed in the fight. Olangru cuts off his head and puts it on a stake outside the temple of Demogorgon.
2) Skald manages to flee, and the female bar-lgura follows him through the jungle. Skald arrives at the PC camp, heavily wounded, or dying, probably followed by the bar-lgura who chases him.
3) A variant on 2: Skald is captured by the female bar-lgura, who undresses him, takes of his gear and chases him naked throught the jungle "to give him a chance", knowing quite well that she will catch him in the end (this is based on a scene in the movie Apocalyptica). Then he arrives at the PC camp, etc.
4) Skald is killed, but not sacrificed, since he dies in the fight. However, his soul is trapped in the Fogmire and cannot go to the place where it belongs. The soul transforms in some kind of undead and manages to give some kind of cryptic warning to the PCs.
What would be the best idea to use, with the most impact on the PCs?
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5) Skald is upside down on the cross and tells the PCs they're doomed. (If your party are in the habit of detecting magic or have permanent arcane sight like mine - have it look like one of the party, and when they use a detect or dispel on it let them find Skald. Your choice if the bar-lgura controlling the illusion fights or tactically withdraws when undead Skald is revealed).
6)gruesome, creepy, strong stomach alert, and what I did with a captured cohort...
From your options I like number 1. But then make the guy on the cross be a headless Skald covered with a chatty illusion. Give the players enough hints that they start detecting and dispelling, then reveal a headless Skald. Muhahahaha!
I just love those ideas!
This PC has had some nasty dreams about losing Tavey and Skald.
Reviving this in celebration of my players probably (99% chance) entering Fogmire tomorrow. It will be glorious. I will have this thread open during the session in addition to whatever plans I have set aside, in case I need a bit of extra inspiration.
The players are coming up north from Farshore looking for the Sea Wyvern's crew (having commandeered a third ship and disembarked the whole party onto it on the way), and managed to get a hint (via Divination, Lavinia had a scroll secreted away for emergencies) as to where to begin their search, so captives have already been taken. Olangru will happily be leaving a trail of breadcrumbs for his new visitors.
Have fun!
My parallel universes' representatives continue to perform very well.
^_^
You did quite well tonight my furry fiend.
Had him drop Lirith Veldirose's hair ribbon into the party's camp as they first arrived as a welcome gift. That unnerved the Ninja - who had owned the Sea Wyvern - and the Summoner just a tad.
Had him shadowing the party, using Invisibility and maxed Stealth along with his teleporting, all the way from the Fogmire border. Used the Darkness Pebble thing once.
The first night the group found the Fogmire Ruin, the zombie was Lirith with an illusion of an Olman over it. They interrogated it then destroyed it, then discovered it was actually her in the morning.
He snuck into the ruins camp during the night - gave him maxed Disable Device so he dismantled the Sorcerer's Alarms along the way - and dropped a gunny sack with Thunderstrike's head in it behind the Ninja's sleeping place. The Barbarian and the Warforged Crusader found it but Olangru got away without getting caught. The Sorcerer found out in the morning that someone had disabled his defenses without tripping them.
More stalking throughout the next day, two more uses of the Darkness trick - after the third time the party spotted him unfortunately so had him give a sinister grin before vanishing. That night he used Telekinesis to steal the Sorcerer's pack while the Crusader was on watch duty (since he's Warforged he doesn't sleep). Said Crusader is now quite ticked that - twice - someone has managed to get by him while on watch.
After stealing the pack, he had his mates moved a boulder from the valley and dropped it about an hour ahead of the party, and painted "THE WINGED ONES COME FOR YOU TODAY - DO NOT DIE YET MEAT" on it in blood. (Not sure whose blood, probably Lirith or Thunderstrike, maybe one of the others. They didn't investigate so no reason to bother.) Sure enough the gargoyles came later, the party dealt with them fairly easily. The Crusader also happily pointed out "Clarification: I am not meat. This message was not meant for me."
They're at the mouths of the Temple now. Much fun to be had with my continuing plans. Olangru is Gestalted Scout/GFC|Mountebank (DragComp version) in my game. Should have had him use Beguiling Gaze when the Ninja and Sorcerer spotted him, but didn't think of it at the time.
Got to display the Genderswap Belt and the Brain-in-a-Box today, on Avner (though the party doesn't know it's him yet, and s/he's too traumatized to answer questions) and Tavey respectively. The latter not only nearly made a couple of my players need to run to the restroom to empty their stomachs (and grossed out a few of the characters to boot), but caused an in-party fight to the death when the ninja put the boy out of his misery and the warforged crusader charged him with murder, and now will not stop until he's been executed for his crime.
Somewhere an evil monkey is cackling.
Got to display the Genderswap Belt and the Brain-in-a-Box today, on Avner (though the party doesn't know it's him yet, and s/he's too traumatized to answer questions) and Tavey respectively. The latter not only nearly made a couple of my players need to run to the restroom to empty their stomachs (and grossed out a few of the characters to boot), but caused an in-party fight to the death when the ninja put the boy out of his misery and the warforged crusader charged him with murder, and now will not stop until he's been executed for his crime.
Somewhere an evil monkey is cackling.
cackles gleefully
All too easy ...
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Awesome. The horror...the horror...
It totally freaked out my players too, you could have heard a pin drop when a voice came out of the box when the thief grabbed the shiny gold spoon. They almost came to blowss about exactly the same thing - keep him and carry him around in that state, or put him out of his misery. The VoP druid used her only 5th level spell, Rejuvenation Cocoon, to rejoin the ashtray, I mean the top of his skull. The spellthief used her only 4th level spell, Deep Slumber, to put him under again, and the Wiz summoned an Unseen Servant orde to keep him with them and carry him gently.
They're still saving for a regeneration for the not-quite-vegetative-state ex-cohort. He's been left in a Temple in Sasserine with nice gardens where he can watch butterflys all day.
Somewhere deep in the Abyss, my Olangru is chuckling and plotting his return to the Material Plane.
Well, my group finished up the temple tonight. Epic final combat against Olangru and the golem, complete with a very cinematic ending: the Skarn Barbarian critted and got the "Blown Back" card, so I flavored it that her arm spines (she'd gotten disarmed during the Olangru fight and never bothered to pick her scimitars up, neither pierced the golem's DR) caught the golem's heads beneath the jaw and tore them off. In the words of the warforged's player: "SHORYUKEN!!"
Finished up the issue with Tavey by having a delayed necromancy effect turn him into a Crypt Thing and sent him after the PCs; a couple almost failed the save against its Scatter Defilers ability which would have teleported them off in a random direction; there was a pretty good chance they would have been ported through the wall into the shrine next door, where Olangru and two of his mates (survivors who had fled from the Blood Room fight after one got her throat slashed) were waiting with Urol and would have played merry hell... err I mean merry Abysm with a lone party member or two. C'est la vie.
The group is now leaving the temple with Urol, Amalla, and genderswapped Avner (and still don't know its him) as the only survivors from the Sea Wyvern, with the exception of course of Skald and Churtle who went on the Nightshark with the rest of the party. Yasumoto knows the Wyvern is crashed somewhere and Amalla knows where, but is in no shape to lead the party to it right now, and by the time they get back to Farshore they're going to have their hands full again. Everybody else is dead, Dave.
Well done, Olangru. You were everything I expected and more, and failed to disappoint. See you in another incarnation.
Well, my group finished up the temple tonight. Epic final combat against Olangru and the golem, complete with a very cinematic ending: the Skarn Barbarian critted and got the "Blown Back" card, so I flavored it that her arm spines (she'd gotten disarmed during the Olangru fight and never bothered to pick her scimitars up, neither pierced the golem's DR) caught the golem's heads beneath the jaw and tore them off. In the words of the warforged's player: "SHORYUKEN!!"
Finished up the issue with Tavey by having a delayed necromancy effect turn him into a Crypt Thing and sent him after the PCs; a couple almost failed the save against its Scatter Defilers ability which would have teleported them off in a random direction; there was a pretty good chance they would have been ported through the wall into the shrine next door, where Olangru and two of his mates (survivors who had fled from the Blood Room fight after one got her throat slashed) were waiting with Urol and would have played merry hell... err I mean merry Abysm with a lone party member or two. C'est la vie.
The group is now leaving the temple with Urol, Amalla, and genderswapped Avner (and still don't know its him) as the only survivors from the Sea Wyvern, with the exception of course of Skald and Churtle who went on the Nightshark with the rest of the party. Yasumoto knows the Wyvern is crashed somewhere and Amalla knows where, but is in no shape to lead the party to it right now, and by the time they get back to Farshore they're going to have their hands full again. Everybody else is dead, Dave.
Well done, Olangru. You were everything I expected and more, and failed to disappoint. See you in another incarnation.
So many temporary set backs... all some one needs to do is perform the proper ritual ...
Lights a fat stogey, grinning from ear to ear
After all, a father must check in on his children from time to time. You know, just to make sure the mothers deliver them with minimal complications...
And I need a new ashtray.
So many temporary set backs... all some one needs to do is perform the proper ritual ...
Lights a fat stogey, grinning from ear to ear
After all, a father must check in on his children from time to time. You know, just to make sure the mothers deliver them with minimal complications...
And I need a new ashtray.
Who knows, with the chest they took from that same room maybe you can get this one gold-plated.
The group is now leaving the temple with Urol, Amalla, and genderswapped Avner (and still don't know its him) as the only survivors from the Sea Wyvern ...
Lights a fat stogey, grinning from ear to ear
After all, a father must check in on his children from time to time. You know, just to make sure the mothers deliver them with minimal complications...
Oh dear. Yet another reason for Avner(a) to be traumatised! And were any other female characters in Olangru's vile clutch for even a short time?
The group is now leaving the temple with Urol, Amalla, and genderswapped Avner (and still don't know its him) as the only survivors from the Sea Wyvern ...Lights a fat stogey, grinning from ear to ear
After all, a father must check in on his children from time to time. You know, just to make sure the mothers deliver them with minimal complications...
Oh dear. Yet another reason for Avner(a) to be traumatised! And were any other female characters in Olangru's vile clutch for even a short time?
Amella / Amalla ... the saucy wench whose spirit is nigh-untamable.
Good times, good times.
The group is now leaving the temple with Urol, Amalla, and genderswapped Avner (and still don't know its him) as the only survivors from the Sea Wyvern ...Lights a fat stogey, grinning from ear to ear
After all, a father must check in on his children from time to time. You know, just to make sure the mothers deliver them with minimal complications...
Oh dear. Yet another reason for Avner(a) to be traumatised! And were any other female characters in Olangru's vile clutch for even a short time?
Amella / Amalla ... the saucy wench whose spirit is nigh-untamable.
Good times, good times.
Yup. Lirith had also been captured but she ended up dying and got zombiefied and left in the ruins to taunt the group.
Yup. Lirith had also been captured but she ended up dying and got zombiefied and left in the ruins to taunt the group.The group is now leaving the temple with Urol, Amalla, and genderswapped Avner (and still don't know its him) as the only survivors from the Sea Wyvern ...Lights a fat stogey, grinning from ear to ear
After all, a father must check in on his children from time to time. You know, just to make sure the mothers deliver them with minimal complications...
Oh dear. Yet another reason for Avner(a) to be traumatised! And were any other female characters in Olangru's vile clutch for even a short time?
Amella / Amalla ... the saucy wench whose spirit is nigh-untamable.
Good times, good times.
Ah, but there are certain planar locales that possess greatly accelerated time flow relative to the Material Plane.
They may find Lirith's "offspring" at some later point yet to be determined ... >:)
*waves hand dismissively* Now now Olangru, let us not be hasty in spoiling the surprise.
Epilogue: Olangru, your vileness has been so pronounced, so offensive, so reprehensible that you've actually caused a player to - due to your actions alone - rethink their entire forward path. Shariss, the Skarn Barbarian|Incarnate in my party, was so traumatized by the events that she saw in the Fogmire temple that she's chosen to take up the path of the Hellreaver and devote the rest of her adventuring days to hunting down and destroying fiends.
Well done you dastardly ape you.
Epilogue: Olangru, your vileness has been so pronounced, so offensive, so reprehensible that you've actually caused a player to - due to your actions alone - rethink their entire forward path. Shariss, the Skarn Barbarian|Incarnate in my party, was so traumatized by the events that she saw in the Fogmire temple that she's chosen to take up the path of the Hellreaver and devote the rest of her adventuring days to hunting down and destroying fiends.
Well done you dastardly ape you.
Excellent ... let her know that she will bear offspring worthy of my lineage.
Or not ... surprises are always fun!
Heeeeeeey Olangru....
1–2 Darkness 3/day
3–4 Cause Fear
5–6 Invisibility 3/day
7–8 See Invisibility 3/day
9–10 Telekinesis
11–12 Disguise Self
13–14 Dispel Magic 3/day, Greater Teleport
15–16 Major Image
17–18 Summon monster IX (fiends only)
19–20 Plane Shift
Heeeeeeey Olangru....
** spoiler omitted **
A most worthy contribution to the mortal gene pool.
I must be more ... aggressive ... there may come a time when some scum comes along and rubs out my superior patronage. The sowing of many, many wild oats must ensue!
*leaves a stogey of continual burning behind*
It's a running rule in my games that, even if called/planeshifted rather than summoned, an outsider slain on the Prime is still -poof-ed back to their home plane and thus in my STAP Olangru is very much alive, rather than exterminated as per normal. Easier to get returning demonic baddies that way.
Along with Ammet the Balor (a separate encounter, but same chapter) I'm planning on having him, with several more levels of GFK under his belt and several Half-Lguras at his side, hanging out in the Wells instead of the apes that the book originally planned, lurking in wait with many a plot to exact revenge on the group that defeated him in the temple.
When/if they kill him there, he'll be dead for a while, but he's too good a character for the Abyss not to bring back... eventually. >:)
** spoiler omitted **
*sniffs*
I do miss Ray Liota so ... such a large brain pan ...
Wow, I've been away from the boards for almost a year and was surprised to see this thread still bumping. If anyone is interested, I've detailed our entire story. Here is the beginning of "Here There Be Monsters" and here they start on the mountain pass and begin their encounters with Olangru. I incorporated many (most actually) of the ideas presented here as well as many others that flowed from my own sick mind. Hope you like it!
Wow, I've been away from the boards for almost a year and was surprised to see this thread still bumping. If anyone is interested, I've detailed our entire story. Here is the beginning of "Here There Be Monsters" and here they start on the mountain pass and begin their encounters with Olangru. I incorporated many (most actually) of the ideas presented here as well as many others that flowed from my own sick mind. Hope you like it!
I will be enjoying this read very soon ... *puffs*