1st of Desnus, 4710
With the castle nearing completion, we decided to explore the area around it that we still have yet to explore. We travelled southeast along the river and discovered a hidden trail that led down to a pool. After watching Artemis use Trixie's ring to walk across part of the pool, a giant snapping turtle decided she looked like a delicious snack, and took a big bite out of her. She ran back to the party and we quickly made some turtle soup.
2nd of Desnus, 4710
Today we travelled west along the lake. Had a surprise visit from an eight-headed hydra that came at us from the lake. We made short work of it and continued our exploration. We came upon a foul stench. The noxious fumes emanating from a patch of giant mushrooms was disgusting. The tendriculos that was making the patch his home didn't seem to mind them, that's why we needed to end its miserable existence. Needless to say, we camped upwind and a safe distance away from that patch.
3rd of Desnus, 4710
We tried to explore Candlemere Lake today but found it difficult without a boat. So, we decided to head back to the Castle to buy a boat.
4th of Desnus, 4710
On our way to the Castle we came across a hut with an odd scarecrow outside. The scarecrow was pretty protective of its land since as soon as we stepped past the gate, it attacked us. The owner of the scarecrow was just as hospitable and supposedly just as easy to kill. I'm sure on that last part since shortly after seeing the owner I started running away from her. But, when I got back, I was assured that she was not much of a threat. She made good soup though.
5th of Desnus, 4710
Arrived at the Castle today. Bought a boat, and took care of some administrative duties. On a personal note, I also took this time to get to know the royal consort a bit better.
6th of Desnus, 4710
I'm starting to think nature has some sort of vendetta against Artemis. While riding our boat towards Candlemere Lake, we decided to camp at the hut previously occupied by an odd scarecrow. As we approach the hut a family of bears leaped from its portal and engaged us. The battle wasn't difficult for us, except after the two large ones were killed, one of the baby bears, in a last ditch effort, eviscerated Artemis. So, once more we headed back to the castle.
7th of Desnus, 4710
We arrived at the castle and found someone to reincarnate the bits of Artemis we brought back. However, instead of an elf, she came back as a halfling. Which is unfortunate since her gun now dwarfs her.
8th of Desnus, 4710
Once more we set out on the boat towards Candlemere Lake. This time there were no bears in the hut though.
9th of Desnus, 4710
We explored the lake and the island in the middle of it. We found a crumbled tower that felt extremely spooky. We camped by the beach, and during the night found out why the place had a spooky feeling. Dozens of will-o-wisps flocked to it during night.
10th of Desnus, 4710
We returned to shore but got caught in a storm on the way. Ganon fell from the boat, but we were close enough to shore that he managed to swim the rest of the way. Upon landfall we were attacked by a bunch of sea hags. But they stood as a mere delay to us arriving at the hut.
15th of Desnus, 4710
After returning to the castle we spent a few days exploring the caverns underneath it. Though expansive, they don't provide any clues as to the origin of the zombie curse.
17th of Desnus, 4710
After traveling east from the castle for a couple days, we came across a burial mound. It appeared to be man-made and had a bit of a crack in the middle. We dismounted and explored the caverns. Inside we found a swarm of skeletons led by cairn wight. I was disappointed to find out that all their gear was terribly decayed and broken.
20th of Desnus, 4710
From the mound we headed south west and then stopped by the castle for a night, we then continued west and ran into a gnomish wagon stuck in the middle of a river. They provided us with a nice dinner after we pulled the wagon from the rapids. Since we already have a pretty sweet deal with the kobolds for mining rights in the kingdom, I was not inclined to encourage the gnomes to settle the lands since there would inevitably be conflict.
21st of Desnus, 4710
While exploring a bit of the forest to the southwest we came across a crazy hermit. He seemed amiable at first, though a bit intoxicated. We left him alone after a quick conversation, but later that evening while we were sleeping, he attempted to ambush us. We managed to kill him and one of the two panthers he brought with him. The other skulked away in defeat. We decided this was enough exploring for a while and head back to the Castle.
30th of Desnus, 4710
The castle is now in tip-top shape, and we're starting to get more and more settlers. Earlier this month a couple homesteaders by the name of Rezbin headed off to the west to start settling that area, after swearing fealty of course. We also managed to set up some farmers nearby to start supplying the city with food.
The Prayers of the Wicked
I praise you, Master of the First Vault, with all my heart.
I am glad and rejoice in your wondrous gift of new life.
Though I have been false to you, you did not forget me, creator, on my point of death.
No, what Erastil has destroyed you have remade.
O god, I thank you for this day of life,
for these eyes to see the sky,
for these ears to hear the birds,
for these feet to walk amidst the trees,
for hands to pick the flowers from the earth,
for a sense of smell to breathe in the sweet perfumes of nature.
Ah, but I have been ungrateful for your blessings before!
I beseech you today, hear my prayer and know my heart.
O that I could do more than humble myself before you and promise my undying servitude!
You have given me my own two hands!
With these tools I will perform your miracles.
I pledge myself to serve you and to give birth to a great civilization of men in your name.
A nation of virtue and beauty the likes no god nor man have ever seen.
A great hive will emerge from this dust
The queen, an instrument of order and peace!
The workers, the embodiment of physical perfection!
The hive will hum with songs of admiration!
I will raise a people from the clay they toil to build and create and be, in your image.
Even you will look upon it and think it Aktun!
I will strive, O Lord, for all my lifetimes to perfect the human race.
Each child will be a testament to my devotion!
Every soul a living tribute to your grace!
The whole of Golarion will belong in your vault!
Ah but even in this, I beg more of you.
For even as you have given me these very good hands,
they are not enough to save me from my enemies.
In seeking purity and perfection I have angered Old Deadeye.
He haunts my dreams and hunts my flesh.
His eyes fall upon me and I know fear.
In the day, his vassals gather on the edge of sight.
I feel them watching, always.
O Abadar, be with me and guide my hands
let my aim be true and strike the heart of the Stag!
By your will, we will dine on the venison of triumph and all will be in perfect harmony.
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On a brief exploratory jaunt across the rivers and streams of the Southeastern Greenbelt, our illustrious monarchists freed undead from eternal watery bondage, delivered a sad leprechaun from a precarious position, and delivered death to a hungry, drunk giant.
While in the middle of a (drawn out, since noone could hurt each other for the most part) battle against a certain badger-faced-cat-stag-creature, the Real Life Monster reared his little pink and squishy face.
My nephew Connor came into the world yesterday afternoon, causing our session to be placed on hold until next Sunday.
When next we return to the greenbelt, our heroes are poised at the southeastern corner of the map, ready to explore the last hex over there.
Only a handful (14 or 15) hexes remain, mostly in the southwest and a few in the northwest corner, to be turned over.
Will the heroes succeed in mapping the entire region? Will the get lost and forget how to go home?
Will horrible beasts tear them limb from limb, or monstrous plants squish them with tentacles?
We will have to wait to see!
Stay tuned, for more exciting adventures next time!
I'm rooting for the tentacles! :)
*I got a turtle bed, turtle bed, turtle bed. I got a turtle bed oh the do da day!* (All of this is being sung of course :p) It all started with us going out and further exploring our new land. See we came to a cool pool/diving pool. Artemis wanted to reach the other side. And how does she think that she will cross to the other side? By jumping across! What a silly head. Seriously?! I mean, here is little ol' me. I mean you could just throw me across, or swim, or i don't know, maybe ask for the use of my ring that lets you walk across water?! Hmmm?! Tallies, go figure. So any way, back to my turtle bed. I offered her the use of my ring, to help her, and then half way across she gets attacked by this giant Turtle! Well, anyway, she gets attacked on the water, and of course she has my stupid ring! I really should just do this stuff my self. she was smart enough at least to lure the turtle back to me, so that I could get at it. so long story short, I kill the turtle, gut it, make some nice turtle soup and got a sled and TURTLE BED out of the shell! *I got a turtle bed, turtle bed, turtle bed. I got a turtle bed, oh the do da day!* Later that month we met up with a many headed snake thing!!!!!! Killed it, then went on to a mud pit with a giant plant thing to kill. During our explorations along one of the rivers we discovered a hut with a funny scarecrow and a pot of stew cooking. I decided that it needed some flavoring so i made it into stone soup. Then we killed the scarecrow, and the owner who came a little later. We went back to the keep to get a boat to keep going down the river. Stopped at the hut and four bears had moved in! how dare they! well we cleaned them out, but Artemis got herself mauled to death. Fischer brought her back in a halfling body! Hehe. The rest of the month was smooth sailing, killed a bunch of things, got a new weapon that I named Sparky, and helped some gnomes ford a river. My companions though were a little less than polite to the gnomes. I mean, they got to keep the kobolds! Don't I get to keep some gnomes? The next month we continued. The wolves are still following us, though I think that they are following Artemis, especially since she seems to be the one that sees them all the time. Plus, don't forget she keeps killing all these nature god's friends. We encountered a water zombie when we rang an old ferry crossing bell. All he wanted was the stag lord's body, so we gave him the skull. Then we came across a weepy leprechaun, who seemed to be causing the bad weather we had been having lately. so we had to go find his treasure. Oh boy, did I want to kill the sniveling little greedy guts. But nooooooo. We had to help find his pot of gold to stop the rain. Then when we found it and killed it's giant keeper, he disappeared too quickly for us to do anything about. Oh well, there is always next month. But while we pass the time doing our week of duties in the keep, I get to sleep and decorated my......TURTLE BED!
Life's good here in Kamelot, I gotta give the bosses that.
They set up town right quick, and now we even got fresh produce, meat, and milk every morning down at the market. No one tosses the girls for their coppers, leastways, not while me or the rest of the guard are there, and they pay us right on time every week.
That Councilor Vicis sure had some weird ideas to start, but they're panning out plenty good. Little Molly down at the market has been batting her eyes at me plenty, too. I can't believe I'm actually nervous to talk to a girl, but hey, this talkin' and wooin' bit's still new.
Writing all this stuff down seems weird, too, sometimes, but Mizz Leveton was right; I put it down on paper and then I don't go off and do bad stuff. Man I owe her and Mr. Oleg a tonne. I gotta keep at it.
I heard tell they're almost ready to launch a new watch patrol, too. I been running and keep up with the Captain, lately, me and Topper and Silent, and I think he might pick me to be Sergeant. Nice as Silent is, he ain't gonna be yelling orders no time soon, and if it comes to me or Topper, that's fine. If he gets it, I'll just wait til next time.
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Holy jeebuz, the bosses are plain crazy. It's not enough they go and traipse all over the map, looking for trouble. They find it, all the bleeding time.
This time, they didn't take none of us guards with em, and somehow came up against a 30' tall Owlbear. Just like Beaky, they said, but massive.
I know it must have been a hell of a fight, cuz the scary pink gnome, the headsman girl, she got deaded. She came back all small and pink again, but there's something off about her now. Not that she was all that normal to start with.
They put that huge monster's grape up over the gatehouse, and it's all everyone's talking bout in town. "Did you see it?" "Were you there?" "What's Boss Ganon like?"
Pfft...all these pestering questions all the time, no wonder they split as much as they do.
I think the Baroness is knocked up, though, leastways from what I could see when she rode in. All wrapped up in steel like that, it's tough to say, but I'd judge she's got something brewing up inside.
Oh yeah, speaking of brewing...we're supposed to be getting an honest to god dwarf brewmaster coming through soon. I just hope Councilor Vicis will get at least one good establishment open by the time he comes...maybe he'll stick around!
8th of Sarenith, 4710
The exploration of these new lands continues with expediency. Northeast of the castle we discovered a poor, disembodied soul that seemed to rise right out of the water. Surprisingly, he asked for the body of the Staglord. We headed back to Kamelot to retrieve his remains, which at this point was just his skull. After returning to the river with the poor soul, we threw the Staglord's head in. This apparently put the soul to rest and he left behind a weapon.
12th of Sarenith, 4710
We returned to the castle and explored the lands south of it. There seemed to come a point today, when the weather shifted suddenly for the worse. Dark clouds hung in the sky threatening with rain. It can not be natural.
13th of Sarenith, 4710
We heard some crying coming from a hole in the ground. Turns out there was a leprechaun in the bottom of it. He told us about how he was tricked by a gnomish lady who masqueraded as a leprechaun and stole his pot of gold. Fischer gave him some whiskey, which cheered him up temporarily, and he hopped onto Fischer's back. The leprechaun claimed the lady gnome headed off to a pool, but when we followed his directions to the pool, we found no remains of gnome or gold. So we decided to keep exploring the area, and maybe we'd come across it.
17th of Sarenith, 4710
We continue to explore in a westward direction. When we came to the beach of Lake Candelmere, and crossed the river, the leprechaun instantly perked up. It appears he picked up the scent of his gold. We followed his directions south for a bit, and found a Hill Giant cooking what appeared to be some people in a cauldron. Strewn about the area were several gold coins. We managed to kill the giant without much difficulty, and afterwards the leprechaun snapped his fingers and the cauldron was gone, along with all the gold pieces on the ground. He slipped something to Fischer and then disappeared before my eyes. The weather instantly cleared up and the sun came out. I am not fond of the ability of a single creature's grief to affect so large an area's weather. If this had happened during a harvest, crops could have been ruined.
30th of Sarenith, 4710
We returned to the castle, and found that the whole area has been blighted and a significant number of fish are now contaminated and cannot be eaten. Luckily we caught it in time and managed to cure it before it got out of hand. We also claimed an area of land that contained the Silver Mine. The kobolds remain good workers and it's nice to have a steady supply of their metal.
3rd of Erastus, 4710
We traveled south east and explored some land, and on the 3rd night, while we setting up camp, we were ambushed by a Leucrotta. It tried to trick us by luring us in with some mimicked voices. But, we were not fooled for long and spent the rest of the night undisturbed.
4th of Erastus, 4710
We headed southwest and found a cave opening. It had some giant tracks in the front, but it was too dark to tell how deep it was. Trixie threw in a lit stone which showed a couple passages, but no end to the cave. While arguing over how best to deal with the cave, Trixie marches on in. I follow her and the rest of the party were behind me. Upon entering the cave we were attacked by several giant fungi. A couple of them started screaming, which alerted the creature deep in the cave. With Fischer's web as a hindrance to the beast, we managed to dispatch the fungus before it arrived. It was a giant owlbear. At least twice as tall as the one I saw in the Staglord's keep. We managed to successfully kill it, but in the process we lost Trixie. We decided to finish exploring the cave before we returned to Kamelot and get her reincarnated. In the rest of the cave were some spiders, a couple ettercaps, and a tendriculos. None of them were too terribly troublesome except one of the ettercaps tried to hang me. We also found a baby owlbear, Artemis and I took a liking to it. I would just like a pet, I think Artemis wants breeding stock.
7th of Erastus, 4710
We returned to Kamelot and returned Trixie to life. I must remember never to need to be reincarnated. It seems that all it does is bring people back as halflings. And I'd very much prefer not to be a Halfling.
8th of Erastus, 4710
While at the Kamelot, we heard a few rumors. These included the fact that were are trolls in the south, a strange cult rising in the forest to the west, some lizardfolk deep in the south-western swamps, and that Candelmere Tower is a boundary between worlds. These are all originated in areas that are on my list of what to explore, so it seems that we'll be looking into all of them eventually.
15th of Erastus, 4710
On our way to the northern plains, we dropped the owlbear off at Artemis's Temple of Abadar. We continued on our way, and while exploring the plains, we found fresh tracks belonging to giant bird creatures. We followed the tracks and discovered a flock of Axebeaks. Such a glorious creature. I would love to have one as my mount. In addition, I think a cavalry unit consisting of Axebeak riders would be an effective tool to use to create fear in our enemies. We managed to capture all the chicks and one of the adolescents. Once it's large enough, I'd like to train the adolescent to be my mount.
16th of Erastus, 4710
We dropped the axebeaks off at the Temple and left them in the charge of Artemis's acolytes.
22nd of Erastus, 4710
We did a little bit of exploring of the northern plains before returning to Kamelot.
30th of Erastus, 4710
This month we managed to get a Caster's Tower built in Kamelot. Fischer designed it, so it has a very maritime look to it. In addition, I believe my condition is starting to be visible. I may need to be a little less reckless until the heir is born. Speaking of which, I could really go for an owlbear and moon radish sandwich.
If you want owlbear meat, you might want to consider a breeding program Rilani. Preferably one involving a very large box canyon (as the 'pen') and plentiful walls of stone - or permanent walls of fire if you want to advertise.
I would imagine that moon radishes grow rather well with such uncommon fertilizer as owlbear poo.
Make sure to advertise proper bounties on the leprechauns. Rumor has it that axebeaks find fey flesh tasty ...
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On the morrow, we resume our tale of making kings (or queens).
It looks like we'll have some new PC's taking the places of Trixie & Fischer, and we'll have to see just how the fledgling nation will cope with the job turnover.
Will the Huntsman finally land his prey?
What will they do about scaly neighbors?
How do they taste to giants?
Who will survive the coming challenges?
Stay tuned, and root for the monsters!
On the morrow, we resume our tale of making kings (or queens).
It looks like we'll have some new PC's taking the places of Trixie & Fischer, and we'll have to see just how the fledgling nation will cope with the job turnover.
Will the Huntsman finally land his prey?
What will they do about scaly neighbors?
How do they taste to giants?
Who will survive the coming challenges?
Stay tuned, and root for the monsters!
Hunstman eh ?
Why are Trixie and Fischer leaving again ?
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Re: The Huntsman (aka Old Deadeye), turns out challenging a deity in a temple sacred to him and then murdering an on-the-ropes cleric of said deity is a Bad Idea.
Artemis gets to find out just how bad shortly.
Re: cast changes, F & T took offense at the party's bloodthirsty interaction with a certain Dryad. T also did NOT enjoy seeing the Naryhropple expedition basically shown the door. Especially since the Sootscales are pretty much model citizens.
So, they're gonna split F back to fishing with his crab friend, and T most likely to start an insurrection of Gnomes Against Tyranny.
That should prove most interesting soon.
Re: The Huntsman (aka Old Deadeye), turns out challenging a deity in a temple sacred to him and then murdering an on-the-ropes cleric of said deity is a Bad Idea.
Artemis gets to find out just how bad shortly.
Re: cast changes, F & T took offense at the party's bloodthirsty interaction with a certain Dryad. T also did NOT enjoy seeing the Naryhropple expedition basically shown the door. Especially since the Sootscales are pretty much model citizens.
So, they're gonna split F back to fishing with his crab friend, and T most likely to start an insurrection of Gnomes Against Tyranny.
That should prove most interesting soon.
It could be entertaining to see the GaT packing firearms and fuse grenades in their insurrection.
I expect a body count with The Huntsman then ... that can of mad can do Bad Things to the integrity of one's life span.
Have your characters been making motions to affording phylacteries ?
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Phylacteries and other methods of avoiding dieing are so passe, now that reincarnate can bring you back from old age death...
that seems to be the general tactic for now, and it's worked for Trixie and Artemis already.
I have the stats for the upcoming encounter with Old Deadeye's champions typed up, and will be happy to share tomorrow evening (or maybe Monday)
If they had befriended the Narthropple gnomes (unlikely, given the party's generally LE behavior, hatred of Fey, and mistrust of Gnomes), they would have had an easy shot at steam power, better firearms, and all sorts of technological goodies.
Now, they're gonna have to rely on Kobold ingenuity, which is even LESS reliable and MORE likely to cause horrible casualties amongst the experimenters.
But the birth rate is high, so they do have that going for them.
With the plans to incorporate an Elven Wizard into the party, along with a Dwarf Barbarian (replacing Human Witch and Halfling-reincarnated-from-Gnome Barbarian), I'm not sure where this group will end up...
I can't wait to see the results, to be honest.
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And more heroes fall!
A real whopper of a session last night, with all sorts of high-CR fights and deadly challenges.
\First things first: after the battle with the Druid Dryad Tiressia, Fischer wandered off in the night, unwilling to further adventure or govern with these folks. In the morning, a Human Wizard named Giles suffered a Teleportation Accident, showing up in the middle of the group's campground during breakfast.
His opening line: "Hey, this isn't Daggermark! Damn, now I'm gonna miss the birthday cake!"
From the Grove of Tiressia, the group headed to the Forgotten Tower, for some annoying, but generally not lethal combat with fey. Cold Iron weapons and massive amounts of fire won the day readily, yielding some good bits of treasure, including some nice furniture and a future Castle/Tower out in the middle of the woods.
None of the fey, even Advanced, really stood a chance, especially with a Sorcerer and Wizard who can see invisibility.
Some good laughs were had from the Wizard's danger-close application of burning hands on the Cleric.
much hilarity...
moving on from there (but not before crashing for the night) to the Scythe Tree encounter, the party met a new (potential) benefactor and protector of the forest. Of course, being a Gnome and powerful in the ways of "forest magic," he had to go.
Google Docs Stat Block for "The Green Gnome"
Having spied on the group a little from the nearby hex borders, TGG was aware of their general attitude towards Fey, as well as knowing that Ganon was slinging protection from Good spells and Altrum was channeling Negative Energy and casting deathknell. Deciding to set a little test for them, just in case they were still heroes in the "dark and gritty" vein, he disguised the Scythe Tree and nearby area with a bunch of "mini-climes" from hallucinatory terrain.
That didn't change their actions, much, since the first thing they did upon seeing a huge tree in the middle of a wondrous, multi-climate mini-ecosphere place was pull out the Alchemical Fire and make motions towards the tree. TGG (and the Tree) took some minor offense to that, and since Giles the Pyromaniac Wizard just happened to be in the front, just happened to have launched an Alchemist Fire infused fireball at both Tree and Gnome, he took a phantasmal killer to the face. Failing the Will save, and failing the original Fort save (he negated that with Hero Points - this will be an important theme for the rest of the night) he took some damage and exhaled slowly.
Spells, arrows, bullets, and javelins were exchanged back and forth, and Rilani's massive damage charge on TGG cemented his decision to flee.
He would have, too, if not for energy admixture...an Acid fireball carved out a nice spherical hole from the foliage he used as cover, and dropped his little 1 HP body to to ground. The Tree, still merrily burning from one or other fire spell, succumbed to a scorching ray from Ganon.
Taking stock, the party found all KINDS of nice and usable treasure and set forth for more adventures on the morrow.
One hex southeast of the Scythe Tree, Artemis' sins came calling for her, but she was not the one to pay.
Having spent the last few months followed by wolves and tracked, trailed, and hunted by any number of imaginary Erastil-sponsored foes (possibly imaginary, but remember: just because you're paranoid, that does not mean no-one is out to get you), Artemis came face to face with her named hunters: Ashitaka, Princess Mononoke, and the Children of the Wolf-God.
Wiki Link if those names are unfamiliar to you
Google Docs: Champions of Erastil
This was a wicked hard fight, as I intended, but one with 2 generally easy win conditions: Give up or kill Artemis, and let the take her body with them, or put down Mononoke while Ashitaka was still far away from her.
As I expected, each Wolf got in one or 2 really good bites (Huge + Imp Nat Attack + Vital Strike is mean, especially when Power Attack is coming into play), Mononoke managed a good bit of damage on Rilani, despite her absolutely ridiculous AC, and Ashitaka downed Ganon with ease.
Altrum, Artemis, Rilani, and Giles ended that fight in the single-HP values, Ganon ended up dead-dead with 2 arrows through his lungs, and Trixie took a good bit of chompy damage from a Wolf. They did manage to set alight, then hideous laughter Mononoke, which was very good for them, and with good tactics (obscuring mist from Altrum and good use of on-the-board cover points) they managed to mostly neutralize the full attacks from Ashitaka.
Scoring some tasty Wolf meat, 2 Huge Dire Wolf pelts (properly taxidermied yielding them another +1 Stability for 1 BP) to be stuffed and mounted in the trophy room, and some nice barbarian treasure, they gathered their dead friend and set off back to Kamelot.
Ganon came back as an Elf, which caused a little consternation before they realized with his Hat of Disguise and skill-set, he could easily impersonate his former self without worry.
About that time, they encountered Grigori the Bard from Pitax, managed to defuse his little mini-riot, and talk him down from the stage. Taking him into custody in a fairly low-key way, they managed to avoid Unrest while successfully interrogating him. Artemis got a little ahead of herself, though, and blew his head off just after Altrum applied some Bleed to the foe.
A single "BLAM!" later and they called in the cleaning crew, while everyone looked at the Druid with a WTF? expression.
The exchange afterward had me rolling:
Artemis: "What? I thought we were gonna just let him bleed to death, and this was more humane?"
Altrum: ""Yes, Artemis, but he would have probably told us more stuff before he died, and I COULD have fixed the bleeding."
Artemis "Oh."
Also during this time, Trixie vamoosed with all her stuff, including the Most-Awesome-Turtle-Bed. Spending a couple of days tracking her, Artemis could tell she had a 2 day head start and had most likely left the hex, heading either northwest or northeast. A bounty was placed for both her and Ashitaka, alive or dead.
She was replaced with a hammer-swinging, melon-smashing, hard-drinking female Dwarf Barbarian named Hestia, who was also given the job of Royal Headsman.
During the next month, the party set off to pacify Candlemere Tower.
Ganon, accompanied by Altrum and Hestia, managed to speak with the LG balls of light, and discovered their plight. Not wanting permanent mini-angel neighbors, he talked them into helping them eliminate the evil feelings if they could, provided the Evil half of the group (Giles the Evoker, Artemis the Druid, and Rilani the Cavlier) stayed out of future conversations.
On investigation, Artemis determined the focus for the evil-nastiness lay the old evil alter in the rubble (funny that, seeing as how they got an evil human bane sacrificial dagger from that very sight only a few months ago). On closer inspection, the perfectly spherical Chrysoberyl Cat's Eye gem they pulled out seemed to be the catalyst.
Luckily for them, Giles recognized an Eye of Gyronna when he saw it,and noone in the group wanted to destroy the gem, for fear of the curse. Artemis, especially, put the object down exactly where she found it and immediately washed her hands. She's had enough deific ire directed her way for a while.
Ganon talked the Archons into blasting the object (which they would have done willingly anyways) and they formed into their mini-Voltron forms to do so. Unfortunately, the power resident in that gem proved too great for them to handle safely, and on it's destruction the 3 Gestalt Archons were forcibly smooshed into a Metaconcert Voltron Archon Form of Doom. (Huge Elemental Stats, with the Gestalt abilities).
It also turned red, which as we all know, means the robot switched from friendly to Kill On Sight mode. A brief fight took place, with many blastings laid onto a whirlwind of light and motion, and Altrum being deposited in mid air about 100 feet straight up. Lucky for him, Giles packed a featherfall amd the threat of Candlemere's Hanuting was no more.
After that, the group took some 5 months off, to generate some serious income, do some crafting and traveling (messenger style, not explorer style) and have some babies. Just before the end of the year, Rilani delivered Princess Elizabeth, and only weeks later was back in the middle of combat. A few weeks before that, Svetlana also delivered a baby girl (both with the help of Artemis) named Artemis Leveton (nicknamed Luna).
During the down-time, much item-crafting was wished for, but they're poor. Many rituals and researches were also formulated, but without the infrastructure to support them, the party hustled to build their research labs.
Midway through their "vacation" a few interesting things occurred:
1: All Kobolds must wear a candle on their head while in the city. Ostensibly, this is to make it harder for them to sneak around and steal stuff. In actuality, Giles wanted things on peoples' heads he could light aflame with impunity. Also, his player has played WAY too much WoW.
2: A Cathedral of Abadar was completed, providing banking, minting, loans, office and retail apace, as well as spiritual guidance to the populace.
Finally, at the end of the night (and the end of the first year of Kamelot), an enormous monster attacked the city. Luckily enough, the heroes were there to repel the beast, a Colossal Crab [CR 10].
We have a history with crabs. In White Plume Mountain, the Paladin ran through a threatened square and got snipped clean in two. In Savage Tide, there's an encounter with some Large Crabs, where they almost drowned a couple of PC's. And now the Reef Collapsing Crushtacean came forth.
Hestia the Dwarf was the only one to engage it directly, and was Claw/Claw/Constrict/Constrict-ed right down into the negatives after dealing about 1/3 of its HP in one swing.
Rilani, wisely, decided to mount up and prepare a charge, while Altrum and Artemis used some ranged attacks. Seeing more food (and food that's been stinging it), Peench? clawed Artemis into the negatives in two turns before an incendiary fireball managed to stagger it. The public (those who hadn't fled entirely) saw the Queen bravely charge the beast, her horse horribly clawed, and then slay the beast.
A few more salvos of Scorching Ray and missile fire put it down to -65 or so HP immediately.
Now, the group has to decide what to do with several tons of crab meat and exoskeleton.
Crushtacean, I like it. ^_^
I have retooled a certain clan of Ogrekin for use in Chapter 3 if you are feeling particularly sadistic... the fey suck eggs anyway. A few days and I'll have them all done and ready to go...
That sounds plenty awful....I was thinking that "fort" encounter area would be wicked easy, unless I went ninja-badass with tactics.
A few more easily run, non-fey, critters would serve quite well.
We're on a biweekly schedule now, so there's all the time in the world to make em mean.
Sweet. I'll riff off what I can to you to "share" with your group. Olangru will be proud. ^_^
Address to the Citizens,
Let me begin by congratulating all those involved in the construction of our new Cathedral. While I am not a worshiper of the Master of the First Vault, his presence in our nation is a boon for keeping order and ensuring progress. I ask that all those who come to the Cathedral be respectful, regardless of personal ideology, and know that it also serves as an important economic cornerstone.
It is also with great pride that I'm able to welcome the growing presence of our neighbors, the Soot Scale Kobolds. The level of cooperation I've witnessed amongst our brave traveling merchants truly reflects the understanding with which I've come to expect from you. Remember, both allies and enemies lie in wait within these lands. It is important that we extend them the same opportunity that we've been blessed with.
*Disclaimer* Do not extend the hand of friendship to Giant Crabs. They find hands delectable; consequently the rest of you as well.
Finally, as many of you may have noticed, we enacted our first tax base plan for the region. We have taken into consideration the average home's income as well as the state’s current necessities. We've determined that the following increase will have a net benefit for our kingdoms overall stability. Six months from the start of the New Year, we will run a comprehensive review of the new plan and whether the people are still receiving a better quality of life from it.
Monthly Cycles = 10
Kingdom Assets
Territories = 10
Farms = 5
BP = 35
Completed Projects
Castle
Casters Tower
Cathedral
Pending Projects (order not definite)
Academy
Waterfront
Arena
Market
Garrison
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With two of our usual cast away, dealing with Schoolwork Monsters of their own, I decided to follow up on some side-quest time with Artemis, Ganon, and the new PC's, Hestia the Dwarf Barbarian and Giles the Human Evoker.
The most pressing issue both Artemis and Giles wanted to pursue was Research. Yes, capital R Research. Into dark and secret magics capable of altering the flesh of living creatures permanently or reincarnating people as humans 100% of the time.
Lacking the infrastructure in Kamelot to effect such endeavors, and taking the last month of Rilani's pregnancy to wander and "run errands," our party of 4 set out across the Greenbelt.
Visiting the Temple of Abadar and checking in on Melissa, Artemis's cohort and second in command , Giles got to meet Baby Beaky, shack up with Melissa. Artemis asked around about ancient Druidic magic and got some leads, including east into the Nomen Heights, west into the Hooktongue Slough, or to check with Bokkem; apparently, he had some Druidic connections once upon a time.
So, off they went, schlepping over to the mad potion-maker. At this point, Artemis is still being tailed by a certain bow-wielding, red hat wearing ranger. She has yet to know about that, though.
At Bokken's, they chat him up, drink some tea and buy a potion or two. He points them back southwest, or off into the Heights. At least, he gave them a name and possible venue: A "Snake Druid" named Brak once bragged of doing just what Artemis wanted, only for non-human reincarnates.
Again, the group sets off, this time through the forest. Passing the Temple, they popped in and said "Hi," before reacquainting themselves with the Boggard to the west. Speaking Boggard this time, Ganon was able to learn his sad story. He also identified this poor creature's value to the country; namely, zero.
One more hex west, at the Statue of Erastil, there just happened to be a Standing Stone Circle. Turns out, this area was very sacred to the Druids of old, and the worship of Erastil an offshoot on that faith. Here for the Winter Solstice Druid Moot, the party didn't have to fear combat they didn't start. As holy ground during the holiday, any violence started therein would bring all the collected folks' ire immediately. In a large grouping of Druids, many of whom are either Evil , or Good , discretion was the better part of valor.
Metting Brak, who turned out to be a Naga Druid with an intelligent snake companion, turned out to be very rewarding RP for everyone. Artemis learned of powerful Druidic Ritual Magic, got to assist in the execution of said Ritual, and eventually got to sacrifice her nemesis.
She also received a not-so-subtle clue from Brak:
Said in Aklo to Giles:
"So, I don't find the Evil Fey to be as bad as the Good ones. The Good kind will pick your pockets, kill you, charm you, or possibly shower you with gold and kisses. At least the Evil ones are just gonna try to kill/rob you. They may be unpredictable about HOW, but at least WHAT you know about"
Said in Druidic to Artemis very shortly thereafter:
"You should learn Aklo, for the exact reasons I just told your Wizard here."
They were tasked with bringing a sacrificial victim (at least 1) back before the end of the Solstice (2 nights hence) for the privilege of learning the ritual. Some discussion was made for grabbing the Boggard, some Kobolds, or random bystanders before Giles pipes up with "Do you really need that Ranger guy"
A plan to trap him was quickly struck, with a note penned by Giles and a brief, bluffed fight between Ganon and Artemis. Unsurprisingly, the foresight of the Wizard and silver-tongued performance of the Infernal Sorcerer sold the con easily. Following along like a chump, Ashitaka met them outside the "Holy Ground" and tried to buy Atemis from them.
One more super low roll and he's chuckling on the ground, thanks to Ganon's Hideous Laughter. He then failed vs. Sinking Cloud from Giles. A pair of manacles and a severe kicking soon followed.
Bringing their new human sacrifice (bound, charmed, and still unconscious, mind you) to Brak, Artemis gets to perform a heart-ripping, intellect-stealing Druid Ritual with Brak. She even turns into a soulless killing machine (the hated Bear) to deliver the murderous blow. Now irredeemably Evil (I made that quite clear well in advance), she immediately collected the body and made ready to get reincarnated as a Human.
The very next morning, she laid her head down next to the lifeless, soulless body of Ashitaka. Hestia immediately crushed her skull with her earthbreaker. Brak performed the actual spellcasting, and Artemis awoke as a Human, right next to her (head pancaked) former Halfling body.
Now armed with lots of Evil Druid Magic Ritual in her head, Artemis led the group to track down some Slavers transporting 11 Sootscales and a single Dwarf northerly. Slaying most of them outright (see above re: Hestia & DPR), Ganon was still able to KO and Charm one of them before being dropped by arrows.
After the tussle, and flush with new masterwork weapons and armor, they stopped by Oleg's before heading to Restov to sell equipment and resupply. While there, Giles managed to turn up a unique text, written in Undercommon, referencing fleshwarping and other methods of changing creatures' forms permanently. He readily shelled out the 1000gp for the book. There are sketches of Crab/Bear combination creatures, or Mirelurks.
At the end, Ganon also went "under the knife" and was reincarnated as a Chelaxian Human, returning back to his original form.
Besides the two "serial reincarnates" the party scored some 2000 gps for their efforts.
Nice! You can anticipate an e-mail regarding my replacements for Chapter 3 within the next two days.
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Nice! You can anticipate an e-mail regarding my replacements for Chapter 3 within the next two days.
mwahahahahahaaha. I deliberately stalled the group from clearing either "end areas" in the Greenbelt. They know there's some trolls (or maybe other giants) kicking around in the south, and some lizardfolk in the southwest. I expect we can deal with those areas & get to the "meat n taters" of Book 3 in the latter half of Sunday's game.
whee...I can't wait to murderface them all!
Nice! You can anticipate an e-mail regarding my replacements for Chapter 3 within the next two days.mwahahahahahaaha. I deliberately stalled the group from clearing either "end areas" in the Greenbelt. They know there's some trolls (or maybe other giants) kicking around in the south, and some lizardfolk in the southwest. I expect we can deal with those areas & get to the "meat n taters" of Book 3 in the latter half of Sunday's game.
whee...I can't wait to murderface them all!
^_^ Indeed.
After the clan, the BBEG may be something of a let-down.
Never fear, V is getting a treatment as well. The as-written version just won't do. Also, my pair of "scaled brothers" lair in the area as well...
Which will be in keeping with Kingmaker's principle of "mixed CRs". Some times you could tango with the wrong critter at the wrong time. Most of the time = cakewalk. Once in a while ... TOTAL CARNAGE!!!
Me likey.
Documents sent - the "Hillbilly Varnhold Vanishing" is en route.
2nd of Arodus, 4710
After heading west from the castle for a couple days we ran into a group of prospecting loggers being harassed by a nixie. We listened to the arguments of both sides, and decided the loggers had the rights to the trees. The nixie wouldn't leave and while we persuaded her, she forced us to kill a couple of the loggers. After we succeeded in driving off the nixie, we apologized to the loggers for their losses and then went off in search of the cowardly nixie.
3rd of Arodus, 4710
We travelled west for a day and explored the area. We came across a glade with crying girl in it. As we approached it turned out to be less of a girl and more of a dryad. Taking my passed experience with fae into consideration, I prepared my lance for a charge, at which point the dryad turns the whole area into a giant cloud of fog. Making my way through the fog, I hear signs of combat, and discover the dryad is actually friends with the nixie we encountered yesterday, and they brought a satyr friend along. We managed to kill all three, but I fear I have only scratched the surface of the influence of fae in the Green Belt.
4th of Arodus, 4710
When we awoke this morning, we got two surprises. The first was that Fischer had left in the middle of the night. I figure, we took care of the Staglord which he wasn't too fond of, and knowing the country was in good hands, left to go fish somewhere. No sooner had we realized that Fischer was gone than a man appeared out of thin air. Apparently, he had been trying to teleport to somewhere and ended up in our campsite. He said his name was Giles, he didn't look too threatening, at least, not to the party anyways. With our new member we travelled south west and came across an abandoned outpost. It appeared to be of ancient elven construction. Some parts of it though seemed newer and less refined. The place was infested with rats along with a few other things including a quickling, a baobhan sith, and a grim stalker. Giles apparently could be quite dangerous if in a bad mood, or if there is something flammable like a pile of rats around. Altrum may need a new set of less singed clothes next time we stop off at the castle. We rested in the outpost after clearing it of any threats.
5th of Arodus, 4710
We headed east and found a large grove with all sorts of fruit trees in it. In the middle of the grove was a giant tree that had every fruit I could imagine on it. It seemed like an impossible tree. And, as I later found out, it was. As we approached the tree, it grasped at us with hook-like branches and a very dirty gnome jumped out of it and started attacking us. We destroyed the tree, and hurt the gnome a bit, and it started to run away. It got into the trees, but Giles managed to put a giant acid-ball in the trees and we heard the corpse fall to the ground.
6th of Arodus, 4710
We travelled south and explored the area, in the process we came across a couple of giant wolves, accompanied by an archer and a masked girl. The wolves and girl approached us requesting we hand over Artemis's corpse. Since that wasn't an option, we engaged them. It was a very close battle. In fact, we lost Ganon in the process of killing the girl and the two wolves. At that point, the boy ran away. Looks like we're gonna make a trip back to the castle.
14th of Arodus, 4710
We returned to the castle and reincarnated Ganon. Some time during our stay Trixie ran off without even telling anyone. Artemis went looking for her, but found only tracks too old to follow. We needed a new executioner. Luckily, we found one in a dwarf that was smashing fruit with a giant hammer. During that same day the peace was disturbed by some rabble-rouser sewing dissension among the people. I didn't want to respond with an official response, so I sent Ganon and a squad of guards to go arrest him quietly and try to bring the crowd back into our favor. Ganon successfully brought him in without generating too much unrest among the people. Under interrogation, he informed us that it was Pitax that had hired him to create dissension. Looks like we now have a need to start building an army.
17th of Arodus, 4710
We decided we'd try to take care of the pestilent will-o-wisps that were plaguing the Candelmere Island. So, we prepared to fight them and sailed to the island, only to find that they weren't will-o-wisps at all, but several dozen lantern archons. They wouldn't even talk to me, so once again Ganon did the groundwork and discovered that they were actually trapped here by an evil presence left over from the old days when the tower was an altar used for human sacrifice. We searched the area and found a gem, it seemed to be cursed so we didn't want to personally destroy it. Ganon showed the gem to the archons and they attempted to destroy it. They succeeded but in doing so were altered themselves. Every last one of them merged and they coalesced into a giant swirling lantern archon whirlwind. It almost managed to kill Altrum by picking him right off the ground and tossing him all over the place. I wasn't able to do much during the fight, but, luckily everyone else managed to disperse the enigma. We returned to the castle and I decided that it was time for me to settle down for a bit before giving birth.
30th of Arodus, 4710
We laid claim to the gold mine we setup with kobolds. And spent some time establishing some farmland in the nearby area.
20th of Abadius, 4711
After spending five months cooped up in the castle, I finally gave birth. The labor was excruciating, but there were no major complications. I named the new princess Elizabeth. We held a celebration of the birth this evening, which was interrupted by an attack on the city by a giant crab. Since I was still recovering from giving birth, I was a bit slow to react but I still managed to grab my horse and charge in and deliver the killing blow. I think we should have an annual holiday in honor of the birth of Elizabeth and celebrate by eating lots of crab.
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in a few hours, our merry band of murderous monarchists will once again march madly across the map, making many friends, enemies, and corpses (sometimes more than one of those will apply) of the creatures they meet...
will the Princess remain safe in her tower?
are the other Giant Crabs going to take revenge for the death of their little brother?
when will Hestia finally get to splatter some (Giant) skulls?
all these questions, and more, will be answered anon: stay tuned!
Are they dead yet? I'm very curious as to how the "alternate VV" went for your group.
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Realizing they had left a few hexes unexplored, and a few wanted posters still up (notably, Troll's Blood, Forest Drake Hunt, and Hodag Hunt), off they go, sans Queen Rilani (stuck home caring for Princess Elizabeth, we proposed).
The first thing they encountered turned out to be Vesket and his lizardfolk tribe. Engaging in shouted diplomacy across 50' of river, both Ganon and Giles noticed the invisble, skull-like, flying creature talking into Chief Vesket's ear-holes.
Giles opened up with Magic Missile, but due to lack of communication/lack of concern, the two Blood Caimans with the chief became primary targets.
That led to a brief exchange of ranged attacks. By brief, I mean :
Giles- "I cast [Acid} Fireball over the gate"
Ok, roll bunches of reflex saves, almost every regular tribe member, several of the (advanced & giant) Braves, and both caiman still in the fort fails and dies.
"Well, that was effective"
After some swimming, discussion of how best to use Wall of Ice to block off the shoreline, Hestia the Dwarf Barbarian has been Enlarge Person, Greater Invisible, Bull's Strength, and Protection from Good buffed.
Chief Vesket gets one good round of attacks in, dinging poor Giles (who had moved to get a cone spell off and eliminating the Harem, a spare horse, and wounding the Chief) but then falling prey to the above Dwarf of Doom!
sad to find no eggs or breeding areas (it's winter) the group thoroughly looted the fort and set off for buying and selling at Restov.
Back at Kamelot just in time for administration, they built Graymalkin Academy (for Spell Research and Thaumaturgy) and set out to track down Giants.
Along the way, the Forest Drake hunted the group, with Artemis able to determine they were being stalked and no stragglers presented themselves. Attacking the whole group, Giles luckily tossed another [Acid} Fireball my way, but the beast ultimately fell to Hestia, once again.
Once at Hargulka's Stronghold, my luck swung very hard into the "poor" category. Leading off with a Heightened Charm Person on the first troll seen (at the main entrance), Ganon created "Joey the Troll."
Everyone was very careful to avoid AoE damage, and gave Joey (eventually) Bull's Strength, Haste, Bless, and maybe one or another buff spell. He also rolled like an absolute beast, with 2 confirmed criticals (one on a fellow troll and one on a trollhound nomming on Artemis).
With Joey's assistance, and lots of wall spells from Giles, they were able to force their way into the room. Artemis spent most of the fight tearing trollhounds apart as a bear. She also spent most of her time prone and flanked, as one of the hounds landed an early trip CM. One troll got Hideous Laughter'd and subsequently pushed off the cliff. Ganon chased his friends back into the watchtower and dropped the second to last troll with another Laughter.
The last troll then had to deal with Artemis the Bear, Hestia the raging Large Dwarf, Joey the Super-Troll, and Giles with a CL5 wand of Burning Hands. Needless to say, he went down right quick, with a confused Joey unexpectedly pulling his head off and eating it.
Together with their new buddy, the party moves further in, being told about "scary big Nagrundi, I don't wanna go down that way..." from Joey.
Ganon goes Invisible, sidles up next to the big doofus (Advanced & Giant templates added - thanks again, AK!) and promptly lands another Charm Person. Now with 2 troll buddies, they say hello to Kargadd, again making friends. About that time, Ganon's now-visible & lit form shows up in Hargulka's vision.
Unfortunately, he rolled so very very low in init. Joey, Giles, Nagrundi, and Artemis-as-Human all get licks in before he gets to act.
Wounded, angry, and betrayed, Chief H tosses his big Fireball Bead (really irking the party...how dare he spend THEIR treasure?!?), and lined up a full attack on the traitor Joey.
That was not to be, as Joey, Kargadd, and Artemis all land at least single attacks. Hargulka sagged to the ground, unable to regenerate his grievous wounds. Then, Nagrundi walks over, grabs the prostrate Chief, and eats his head.
They packed up their new troll friends, hauling off lots of treasure, and set off. Kargadd, fearful of the sunshine, balked at the front door. Nagrundi showed him the way out, with a boot in the small of his back. The 150' fall and immediate exposure failed to kill the tough rock troll.
Joey's "Hulk Smash" two-footed jump-stomp finished him off, as Kargadd petrified after hitting the ground.
Now in possession of two "Dungeon Trolls" and a single surviving trollhound, we ended for the evening after an uneventful Hodag Hunt.
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Are they dead yet? I'm very curious as to how the "alternate VV" went for your group.
sadly, no, no deaths.
They need at least another level or 2 before I can run them through the VV encounters, but I think one of em may be making an appearance towards the end of the year.
Some screaming and running is good for the citizenry, no?
Are they dead yet? I'm very curious as to how the "alternate VV" went for your group.
sadly, no, no deaths.
They need at least another level or 2 before I can run them through the VV encounters, but I think one of em may be making an appearance towards the end of the year.
Some screaming and running is good for the citizenry, no?
"Ol' Crowfood needs him some new toys! Meat's back on the menu for Mammy! C'mere you ... *scream, thudding sound .. sounds of chewing on face and massive blood loss* ... aaaahhh, muuuch better ...
"Now, where'd them there hobbits go? Hobbits is always good eatin'... "
I have had enough of going back and forth on what to kill and what not to kill. These people don't seem to have their priorities straight. first they hire kobolds to do the mining. Kobolds! Then they give a very cold shoulder to the gnomish farmers. Here we are trying to start a kingdom, and they turn away some ready farmers. How is that practical? Then to make matters worse they decide to go and kill a couple fey, for doing nothing more than protecting nature and they were ready to be peaceful towards us and asking for our aid. Killing that dryad was the last stall, they didn't kill the leprachaun who controlled the weather, but they go after the kill the creature that wasn't doing anything. that was the last straw. When we got back to town, I tied up loose ends, and placed things in to action. I am going to go and find some allies and go and deal with the den of kobolds. Oh, and to warn all the fey about the new "rulers" in the area that are out to kill all the fey! and by doing that will probably destroy any knowledge of a supposed path back to the first world.
Monthly Cycles = 23
BP = 54
Completed Projects
Merchant District, East Kamelot
Forest District, aka doomedville, or something of that nature
Temple
Waterfront
Mage District, West Kamelot
Market
Black Market
Houses x4
Graveyards x4
Arena
Walls x3
Reflections on the Crapper, Episode 1
Vultures, every single one of’em. Do they think BP grows on trees? That it just comes out of (what’s left of) my ass?
Taxes are too high…
Build more houses….
We want a Staff of Fire….
Well TOO DAMN BAD!!! We’re a little busy keeping you from get eaten by extra planar Cyclopes’.
Giles: Altrum, you finished yet? We’ve got more super gnomes to fry.
Altrum: This would go faster if someone didn’t knock down the fort with the functional restroom!
*screaming in the distance: DUR!!! IMA DORF!!!
Altrum: Pharasma, if you have one iota of mercy, you’ll send the pink one back to us.
I just hope we resolve this hoax, or trap, or whatever the hell it is we’re doing outside our borders. We’re at the cusp of an economic boom that could begin to rival the surrounding kingdoms. My plans for additional districts surrounding the castle are complete; time is all I need. The waterfront and market district have already paid for themselves and are already contributing to exponential growth. The past year was full of one boon after another though. Luck must be on our side, several months we scraped by with nothing in the treasury. One ill-timed plague or bandit raid would have ruined us.
Giles: Hey Al, where do you want us to put your but-buddies corpse?
Your body could not withstand the amount of pain that would be necessary for me to sate my hatred.
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heh...gotta follow that one...(i suppose it's funnier if you know the voices...)
Well, our last game was most eventful for our heroes, even if I couldn't roll a non-positive Kingdom Event if I bribed my dice.
Starting off, they finished up their "Year of Rest" between driving off Hargulka's Clan and starting The Varnhold Vanishing. During that time, the only dangerous thing that happened came in the form of some lost Greek Epic Extras.
Rolling random monsters for Monster Attack events sometimes requires a little "wiggle room," as far as just why and wherefore this creature shows up. Crushtacean, the CR 10 Giant Crab was one such monster.
The 1d6(5) Cyclopses was another.
Luckily, the group had just finished their Waterfront building, so we had a nice, destructible, expensive playground to stage the fight.
Scattered throughout the city (and without a means of direct communication / teleportaion -tsk, tsk you all-), only Artemis and Altrum were in a position to directly engage (or even know what the hell was happening) the critters rampaging and whomping on NPC's. Feeling generous, I allowed for a Stability Check to get word to the other PC's and advise them of the threat. Having a completely twinked out City, they easily passed and were off to the races.
Giles Dimension-Door'd clear across city, eventually hanging back and covering Artemis with "danger-close" artillery blasts.
Ganon and Hestia, both starting from the center of the city (inside the Castle itself), were both Flying and Hasted before engaging the cyclopi.
Altrum, touring a nearby construction project (temple? market? i forget which structure exactly), was able to run flat out and arrive not-quite-winded. Hal, his cohort and bodyguard, kept pace in his fullplate.
Artemis, always the first into a fray it seems, happened to be AT the Waterfront when the monsters arrived. She walked onto a boardwalk lined with stalls selling cabbages, watermelons, newspapers, and other kung-fu-movie staple "Destructible Carts" and packed with civilians.
Wisely, she chose to buff up a little before engaging at range, and was able to keep enough of the crowd between the cyclops patrol to prevent an easy charge - Crit - Dead Druid.
The party carried the day, easily enough. Giles forced me to "waste" several of the critters Flash of Insight to Auto-Save on a Fireball, removing a lot of the "instant death" aspect of Hal & Altrum's foes.
Hestia, once she roared into the scene, made quick work of the poor giant-type-humanoids. Artemis managed to survive a couple of really solid whacks, and Ganon managed to narrowly dodge a thrown-axe-Flash of Insight-Sorcerer Chop Move, with his whopping AC 15 or so.
During the fray, Ganon managed to disable and Charm one of the baddies, learning his name (Lagos, or "Bunny" in common), and the name of his boss (Polyphemus). As it turned out, these 5 were only one of a bunch of scouting parties, sent out to track down, capture, and return a certain "Nobody" who had done Big P wrong. Somehow, the mists of fate and probability caused their boat to sail into Kamelot Harbor on the very day of the Waterfront's Grand Opening.
Funny, that fate stuff.
After that, it was business as usual for the rest of the time spent "crafting" their city. During that time, Giles researched Raging Flame, Rilani may or may not have had another child (player was not present for the "fast forward" session, so will have to determine results later), Hestia got to know the bottom of a good many ale barrels, and Artemis learned a Druidic version of Gravity Bow.
Sometime in there, Olaf Gunderson, a traveling weaponsmith and trader showed up, flanked by Shotgun wielding Varnling Host Merc Bodyguards. Impressed with the PC's (especially Artemis and her Heirloom Double Barrel) earlier when they saved his bacon from some Slavers, he had decided to emigrate, and bring his weapons-crating knowledge with him (Visiting Celebrity Kingdom Event.)
A few months later, he was followed by a sizable contingent of Dwarves (with a few well-hidden Gnomes tucked away) who formed the rest of Clan Gunderson (New Vassals Kingdom Event.)
Once everyone was nice and settled, starting to get a little fat, a message showed up (funneled to the PC's via Olaf via an unnamed trading partner...) talking about a missing colony off to the East.
Off they go a traipsing Eastward, riding new Chocobo mounts and toting a truly worrisome number of weapons. Along the way, there is much discussion over abandoned forts at the Brevoy border, unattended road crossings, and eventually warm beds at Nivatka's Crossing. A brief conversation about settling these hexes and the resulting declaration of War upon Brevoy ensued, but they gave it no time at all.
Setting off immediately to the South, the encountered some random monsters. Again, here's some time for fun continuity tricks...
Roll: 1d8 Worgs. Average CR: 4 or something silly.
My fun addition: Goblin Rogue 1's, riding the worgs. Effective CR goes up 1 or so.
Just for Evil DM kicks: every goblin got 1 Alchemist Fire and 1 Frag Grenade (2 Lbs, 85 GP, Range Inc 10', does 2d6 Fire / 2d6 Slashing in 10' radius when exposed to fire effects).
With 1 good toss (and 1 really bad one) only little Billy Goblin was able to deliver minor bits of damage to the group. Giles then explained (in Goblin, IIRC) why it was a Bad Idea to use fire-based explosives against a pyromaniac Evoker. Only little green bits and a couple of 18" deep craters remained after that lesson.
Surprisingly, they DID manage to drop two of the little buggers before they got their bombs off, walking away from that fight with 2 Frag Grenades and 2 Alchemist Fires. Fair trade, in all our opinions.
Later on, another random encounter had them facing Momma and Baby Wyvern (standard and Young, respectively.) This was a bit more deadly, especially as Momma got a nasty Skull Crush critical on Hestia, dropping her to 6 or so Intelligence. She managed to return the favor, however, knocking Momma out of the sky with several (Hasted, Greater Invisible, Flying) hammer blows.
Baby Wyvern stood no chance, and fell to shotgun blasts and the same hammer that felled his Ma. Poor Ganon (and his Chocobo) ended up taking a bit of ability damage, but Artemis' quick thinking (and Restorative Ointments) kept them on their feet.
Continuing further South, they started encountering empty farmhouses, with nary a soul in sight. No signs of violence or disturbed actions showed, however, and any tracks were long since gone - even to Artemis's keen eyes.
Once at the city proper, Artemis pulled off some very impressive reconnaissance via Wild Shaping into one of the multitude of crows flying about. She was very quickly able to determine Varnbold's emptiness, save for the Stockade the the southwest and a certain big bag piggy in the northeast.
Armed with this knowledge (which was FANTASTIC, as it allowed me to just tape up the Varnhold Poster Map right up on the wall), they concocted a (for them) very subtle plan of attack. Moving under Invisibility Sphere and Fly (for the slow ones), they wound approach the Stockade from the north, scale the outside wall of the structure via Rope of Climbing, and enter from the top.
This worked brilliantly, right up until they Water Walked (or flew) across the river. Mr. Pinchy popped right up, and was very confused to have heard, smelt, and felt a Large dwarf critter, but not see it. That earned him a very hard smack in the head, triggering a short fight. Unable to latch on and paralyze his big, angry prey, the Chuul sank back below the surface, in search of less hurty food.
On the other side, only Giles the Wizard fell into the pit trap. Eschewing his Featherfall, he ate the falling damage and subsequent 3 spike attacks (one of which a crit), weathering it like a champ. Luckily enough, he saved against the poison, but ended up being pulled out of that hols (still invisible, but exposing everyone else due to bringing the Sphere with him) with something like 4 HP.
A few Sorcerer-Cast Invisibility's later, and they set off once again. Lucky for them, none of the Spriggans were that perceptive (not that they were looking north, anyways) and the mishap went unnoticed from the fort.
Moving to the building in question, the rest of the plan went well. Still stealthy, they moved to the top of the stockade barracks. Here, a bit of confusion arose between the various PC's. Artemis, Hestia, and Giles all had a "shoot our way in, kill them all, then maybe kill them all a little more" mission in mind. Ganon, and to a lesser extent, Altrum, wanted to pursue a more elegant, tea-sipping, talk about your feelings kind of goal.
The end result: Hestia began combat with a tossed barrel of lamp oil into the head of the "Big Spriggan" turning his spit of mystery meat. Giles finished that particular fight with yet another Fireball, setting our campfire chef alight easily enough. Covered in a gallon of lamp oil and hit by a fireball is pretty much never a good way to meet company, after all.
Ganon began talking at this point, with Altrum and Hal moving into the building itself (all still Invisible, mind you). Words like "Friend," "Presents," and "Allies" get bandied about between Agai and Ganon for about 4 rounds, allowing Hestia, Artemis, and Giles all the time in the world to finish off the few Spriggans outside and begin working on the the firing line unloading buckshot into Hestia.
{ooc]Having looted the workshops and armories of the city for a couple of weeks, of course they found the Varnhold Militia's stock of Gunderson Scatterguns (mechanically, masterwork heavy crossbows) and had stacks and stacks of shotgun shells laying around.[/ooc]
About this time, Giles decided those guys were too much of a problem. Never one to consider things like "Collateral Damage" or "Friendly Fire" a pair of Acidballs into the first floor removed the firing line's improved cover. Hestia then removed the rest of the supporting external wall via earthbreaker, bringing the whole shebang down around their ears. Unfortunately, Ganon, Altrum, and Hal were all still inside the building, while Artemis was running around on the roof.
None of the PC's were trapped by falling rubble (luckily enough), and that's when Ganon decided "When in Rome..."
He dropped the Frag Grenade he had picked up earlier, along with a Necklace of Fireball Beads at the corner of the building. High enough to escape any blast from his ordnance, his placement was all but a giant target for Giles to bring in the heat. Poor Hal, however, was well within the blast zone of not 1, but 5 Fireball Beads.
Agai had it worse, though, taking Giles' Fireball, the Frag Grenade, and 3 of the 5 Fireball Bead blasts on the chin. The enchantment happy sorcerer managed to pull off something like 80 or 100 damage on 4 enemies and one ally in that trick...
From there, it proved a simple pmatter to mop up. Agai fell to a few shotgun blasts and a Magic Missile, and we ended as the group looted the Stockade's rubble for valuables.
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oh they'll show up.
as is, they're just a bit too much for them to handle.
but a level or so, and ker-powie.
(5 pc's, level 7, managed to almost kill 2 of them with the Fey + Fighter 1 and Agai + 1 additional level)
i love the carnage as much as the next, but "i win" just doesn't do it for me.
I am considering adding certain biopic-challenged baddies to a certain Big V's lair...the irony appeals strongly (and lets me change the "whack them until they die" monsters to actual BBEG-Mook).
oh they'll show up.
as is, they're just a bit too much for them to handle.
but a level or so, and ker-powie.
(5 pc's, level 7, managed to almost kill 2 of them with the Fey + Fighter 1 and Agai + 1 additional level)
i love the carnage as much as the next, but "i win" just doesn't do it for me.
I am considering adding certain biopic-challenged baddies to a certain Big V's lair...the irony appeals strongly (and lets me change the "whack them until they die" monsters to actual BBEG-Mook).
Almost there ... almost there ... augering in noises ensue
It has been an interesting year since that gnome screwed up that teleport. Between the burning random creatures and enemies to death, knocking down buildings and researching into forbidden knowledge I've been real busy.
My goals have been moving ahead quickly now that they gave me a tower. Experimentation on random kobold citizens has been good for furthering my research into fleshwarping.
With all the kobolds around I figure I can make them better, stronger and faster. I dub them draconians and my cohort Klap-Klap shall be my first and greatest creation of them. I strive to make them breed true and like their kobold basis. With these and kobolds the kingdom will be greater.
To fill in for our shock troopers I plan to create a creature that takes the best of both those soul-less killing machines called bears and the mindless power and drive of crabs. I dub them mirelurks. They shall be protected by the crab's defensive evolutions, be stable on the multiple legs they have and take the incredible strength of the bears to create something amazing. Of course, they will be fitted with self-destruct triggers that only I will control.
Lastly, I will make something that causes even the horrible creatures of the Wild cringe. The fey shall see my "Deathclaw" and tremble in fear at their impending death. The ferocity of a wolverine, the power and size of a troll and the speed of a quickling. Unfortunately, my bounties for quicklings and wolverines have not brought anything in. I have a troll in my basement at least.
Unfortunately, this all relies on gold I do not have in mass quantities. I will have to focus on the draconians and their breeding ability first to supplement the population to create greater revenue. My fellow rulers will be happy to have more citizens and I will be happy to prefect my technique.
Mwahahahahahahahaha!!
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Tomorrow, the 28th of November, we resume our Kingmaker game once more.
Fresh off the defeat of a Spriggan tribe and flush with stolen wealth, what will the party do?
Will they investigate the strange disappearance of the whole town?
Where will they travel now?
Who are they going to meet, give presents to, and slaughter (maybe not in that order...)
What is the next step for our lovely band of miscreants?
Stay tuned...
Looking forward to it!
Current Bounties:
Halfling or larger size crabs 25g - Currently have 10 halfling sized crabs, bounty removed.
Bears 30g - Currently only have one medium sized bear, bounty will be doubled to 60g
Wolverines, live, 100g - None, bounty increased to 200g
Quicklings, dead 15g or alive 100g - none, bounty increased to 200g alive, 30g dead
Current job openings
1 Gnome Assistant, 1g a month, sign on bonus of 25g - no takers, not surprising
Spells to research
verbal only AoE from self Fire spell, some sort of fiery burst
Dimensional door with illusion left behind or 1 round invisibility
Alchemical items to consider creating
Acidic Fire - when selling the tag line will be "A troll's worst nightmare"
Fun things to do:
Watch Heista squash more watermelons/peoples' heads
Screw with Rylani with Blur and displacement
Open a real bar-The Test Tube.
Things to do:
Discuss teaming up with Artemis for true-breeding program for draconians
Contact Mom and Dad and tell them I'm fine and set up a time for my cake
Test-run of flesh-warping on expendable kobold
Tests doing flesh-warping with patient awake and unconscious
Create a dough-based treat shaped like a claw and covered in frosting
Catch up on my personal reading with Carri Smotter and the cup of bacon
21st of Gozran, 4712
Over a year. It has been over a year since I've felt the thrill of combat and the exultation of victory. But, had I not secured my line of succesion, this fledgling nation might not have survived the turmoil wrought by the power struggle to fill my position had I met an untimely death in combat. With the birth of my son William last month, and Elizabeth still healthy after celebrating her first birthday earlier this year, I feel it is now time to return to the field. The reports Ganon has been sending me, though informative, are a poor substitute for actually participating in the conflicts and negotiations. I look forward to riding into the fray.
Monthly Cycles = 24
BP = 48
Completed Projects
-House x2
-Brothel x2
-Theater
-Jail
Kamelot GP Value = 8000
Current Merchandise
Minor
-Wand Daylight, Charm Animal
-Scroll Cats Grace, Fox's Cunning, Cause Fear, Fairy Fire, Detect Evil
-Potion Endure Elements, Jump, Enlarge Person
-+1 Frost Light Crossbow
-+1 Greatsword
-Pearl of Power 1
-Stone of Alarm
-Universal Solvent
Medium
-Potion of Heroism
-Headband Int. +4
-Gauntlet of Rust
-Wand of Magic Missle, CL9
-+1 Heavy Steel Shield
-+2 Hide Armor
-Trident of Fish command
Major
-Staff of Fire
-Ring Prot+4
2 Month Projection
-Eastern District
-Guild Hall
-Pier
-Establish Western District
-House x2
-Magic Shop
Net Gain = Economy+4, Loyalty+2, Stability +1, Gold Value +4000
Centaurs! Incredible. Intelligent, reverent, built for combat. We would be insane not to try and incorporate them into our kingdom. Their violent clashes with Varnhold will be an issue, but my confidence in our Grand Diplomat is well deserved.
However, the two tasks before us have conflicting interests. The vision Artemis experienced showed someone that has claimed the souls of the residents of Varnhold. If this proves true then I have no choice. He is perverting their path towards judgement, he will find no peace in the hell I send him to.
Rescuing the citizens of Varnhold will not put us in the good graces of the centaur, even if we do manage to save their leader's daughter from this Valley of the Dead. Small crypt fiends are one thing, but I would feel inifintely better riding in with a batallion of Abadarin Paladins at my back. Halstien will be more than enough though. His brush with death has left him less fearful and more stoic.
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oof...talk about anti-climactic gaming...silly accountants
Dramatis Personae:
Ganon Malfoy. Human Sorcerer (Infernal) 8. Recently came into ownership of Charm Monster
Artemis Gayle. Human Druid 8. Learning the joys of Wildshape.
Hestia. Dwarf Barbarian 8. Hulk smash best describes her.
Altrum Vicis & Hal. Half-Orc Oracle 1/Cleric 7. City planner and moral compass of the group. Hal is a shield on legs, essentially.
Rilani Astin. Human Cavalier (Cockatrice) 8. Charge & smush pretty sums up her combat abilities. Rides an Axebeak (Chocobo); as do the rest of the group.
Giles. Human Evoker 8. Just your typical megalomaniacal pyromaniac evil wizard, with a penchant for melding critters with other critters to make weird amalgam critters.
The group started off after having destroyed Varnhold Stockade. Victorious over the wooden building, as well as it's Spriggan occupants, they looted everything thoroughly. They rested and planned a sweep of the town first thing in the AM.
Taking a few hours to search the whole town, top to bottom, they turned up Gundarson's Journal, revealing some interesting facts about the Nomen centaur tribe and some pertinent geographical tidbits. They also garnered a lead on some kind of bracelet thing, found by Gundarson about 2 months ago.
The grange, with its infestation of rats, received a dowsing of oil from an Invisible, Flying Giles (spells courtesy of Ganon), before he lit the whole shebang with a Spark cantrip. Rats fled every which way, on fire, but no other building caught alight.
Nothing else even stood a chance. The chuul went to nom on a Mount horse, and failed against [i\]Charm Monster[/i]
.
The murders of crows fell to Fireball and some hammer swings.
Piggy, the feral dire boar, caught a 50 some odd HP charge from Rilani and died squealing.
All told, the party walked out of Varnhold with crazy loot, a new tentacle monster pet, and all the militia gear you could shake a stick at.
Nearing the time for administrative tasks back home, they split for Kamelot, encountering Manticores (one murdered before he could really do anything, the other Charmed), a single Cockatrice (charmed again), and finally a Shambling Mound topped with 6 Shocker Lizards.
Despite having some 700 HP, the mound proved all too susceptible to Artemis's Control Plants, while the little Pikachu-wannabes ate a lethal fireball from medium range.
They entered Kamelot strewn with weapons, armor, gold, gems, and magic items (including the incredibly useful Folding Boat), leading a Manticore, Chuul, Cockatrice, and Shambling Mound. Everything got settled in its new home/cage without major hassle, and they got on to the business of running a kingdom.
A week later, Giles had managed to successfully Fleshwarp his cohort Klap-Klap from a Kobold into a Saurian, the group dispensed with almost all of Varnhold's stuff, and they successfully scried on one of the lost citizens.
What they saw proved troublesome, though. Bunches of oddly shaped jars stood on shelves, each sealed with wax and showing a dancing, wavering, multicolored light inside. Between Artemis and Giles, they were able to guess these were some kind of Soul-Trap thingie, and the target of the Scrying was most likely stuck in the jar at the center of the field of view.
Not having any better leads, they took off East once again, bent on exploring the rest of the Nomen Heights. Mostly, they wanted the city of Varnhold and its surrounding grasslands.
Along the way, Artemis and Altrum encountered a pair of green-clad, Elven women late one night. The fields of grass stretch and wave, doing odd kinds of visual tricks. On much closer inspection, Altrum sees flowers, grasses, and prairie plants sprouting under the chick's unshod feet. They converse pleasantly, asking questions about the group's purpose in the land, as well as general plans/goals/intentions.
Very surprisingly, even after the whole group is awoken, these anti-fey folks manage to hold a civil conversation. Artemis even volunteers to receive the "vision" they promised, watching the last 5 minutes of the actual Vanishing. Her reward was a very clear depiction of just who perpetrated the deed, and some Goodberries. I'm pretty sure they tossed the berries, anyways.
The bloduewedd even dropped the clue that the Nomen centaurs may have more info, and promised to be nice to the party, so long as they stayed groovy and hip.
Exploration continued, fairly uneventfully, until they came across the Ettercap Ambush.
I know it's written as a badly executed ambush, but this was still embarrassing. Firstly, the silk-rope-bridge, 30' wide, crossing a 50' wide chasm but leading nowhere? Secondly, there's the "bait"; a glowing weapon and dead guy just laying on a ledge. Lastly, this is intended to happen at least after 7th level. Fly, Levitate, Dimension Door, the list just goes one as for ways to avoid this fight.
So, as one may expect, the party did not get caught in the bridge-trap. Artemis actually summoned something (a Mite, of all things), which then triggered the trap. The ettercaps, themselves, were able to yank Giles off his horse. He managed to save, and grabbed the cliff wall instead of falling, though.
They also managed to land nooses on Hestia and Artemis, but couldn't pull them off their mounts. That was about that, then, with each PC able to down one enemy easily enough. Giles D-Doored out of danger, and so it went.
From there, they finished up exploring the northwest quadrant of the NH map, and headed East, looking for centaurs. Soon enough, the centaurs found them, and brought the group in for a sit-down with the boss-lady.
That went well enough, with Hestia handing over Skybolt when asked, and the group learning about the Valley of the Dead, Xamanthe the Missing Centaur, and lots of history about these folks.
We wrapped there, with the party deciding whether to pursue the quest or take time off to establish a new base of operations on this map.
Where will they go next?
Will the random encounter tables still treat them so nicely?
What will happen at The Valley of the Dead?
Who will learn to squeal like a pig, in Giant?
When will the Pink Haired Doom come calling?
Stay tuned...
I've done it!! I have taken something small, whiny and cowardly and turned it into a medium aggressive humanoid lizard with a poisonous bite. Klapklap, now K-Money, has become something greater. He has been geared and is exacting his tasks as spymaster amazingly effectively.
I am waiting on some more gold to create him a spouse. I can't wait until we can start funding these projects with country money instead of out of my own pocket. My pocket is much too empty for my liking.
On a weird note, we ran across an elf/fey thing and those who I figured would murder them on sight decided to talk to them. Artemis and Altrium had an intelligent discussion with them. I sat there for 10 minutes holding sulfur and bat guano in one hand and my pillow in the other without anyone killing anything. I believe we may need to get an executive order about what fey is killable and what isn't because, to me anyway, everything is killable. Especially if I can light it on fire.
The centaurs are interesting. They are a god's fleshwarping project and I can appreciate that.
I can't wait to find the lab of the undead cyclops thing. If I can find a way to harness his trap the soul jars to power things I can make huge advancements in my research and defense of my tower. I would just need a way to keep Altrium from finding out. He is kinda touchy about the whole not dying or not dying completely. At the rate he is rotting hopefully I won't have to worry though.
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mwahahahahahaha
yes, the bug for NPC / adventure design has once again bitten and afflicted me with poison...cursed, motivating, get-work-done poison.
this Sunday will bring lots of surprises for our intrepid heroes...
what will they do with the changes?
who will not make it back to dinner?
for that matter, who will become dinner?
between the newest Magus release and a certain propensity to go wandering about in extremely hostile area, I predict my Obit-Craving-Fingers will get a much-deserved workout soon.
Get ready to for some blasts from the past, folks!!!!
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Fair warning to my players: you very well may TPK in the first part of the day this Sunday.
That doesn't mean you need replacement characters, though.
All will make sense once the big day comes around.
As a reminder, the PC group left off at the Nomen Centaur camp, having just made nice-nice with the critters. You have a new quest: find and return Xamanthe, the centaur boss-lady's wayward daughter.
Lots of creepy images of jars full of souls, skeletal cyclops dudes, and a general feeling of dread suffuse your dreams while on the plains.
Artemis (and anyone else who actually pays attention to that stuff) will notice the grasslands of the heights are actually WAY more lush and dense than the terrain, climate, and season would suggest. Perhaps those "hippy-prairie-dryads" are worth keeping around, eh?
Take a bit to re-read and familiarize yourself with the history of your nation, folks. Stuff's about to get real, yo!