Olwen's Strange Aeon campaign journal


Campaign Journals

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Mrriaál wrote:
so Bit dropped the golem in a pit and covered the pit with a web and summoned a moo cow to guard it

...and THAT mental image will now never leave my brain...


I have to say, that sounds like a fantastic way of dealing with a foe that's nearly impossible to fight. ^^;;


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so some fishermen in a boat came up to our boat and said hey we are sinking can we get on your boat so Skywin said OK and then they attacked us because they were trying to sacrifice us to their awful god Hotspur and that was rude so Bit and Lorena blew them up

but before they got blown up they put a hole in our ship so I went down to help fix the hole and the others stayed on deck to try to cast spells to fix the hole which didn't work mostly

anyway we made it to shore and were able to fix the boat a little bit with a different magic so it was fixed enough that Skywin thought she could make the next town where a real repair might be possible

also river travel seems ridiculously dangerous how does anyone get from one place to another I guess most people just stay home although the last place we were in where people just stayed home they got attacked by fish people and skeleton people

seriously how is anyone anywhere still alive when that's a thing that happens

once we were on our way we decided to go back into the dream world where we were supposed to pick up the idol of the dread god Bogart

and when we got there we arrived at a party which was much better than that stupid prince's party because there weren't any spiders above us killing people and I was thrilled because I've never been to a party except the stupid prince's party with the spiders and some very nice women took me to a corner and got naked with me and I was a little nervous and had to explain to them that I had never done anything like this before voluntarily but they were very nice about it and that's when the ghosts attacked

and I was VERY MAD because the ghosts were attacking MY NEW NAKED FRIENDS so I drank the potion that makes me big and charged right into them and fighting naked is a lot more difficult so they actually messed me up a lot but at least that kept them from attacking anyone else I guess

but soon my friends came to help and Nez started chomping on the ghosts and Tam and Bit and Lorena threw magic at them and I turned myself invisible with another potion so they wouldn't kill me again because I hate it when ghosts kill me in a dream and the water was pouring down the stairs like the lake was trying to get into the room and once we'd taken care of the ghosts we figured we'd better check that out so Tam and Bit and Lorena cast spells on all of us and we went up

and there were more ghosts and one had the idol of Bogart and cast a spell that nearly killed Nat and then it summoned the HORRIBLE GOD BOGART WHO EMERGED FROM THE LAKE ALL AWFUL AND POWERFUL AND HURT OUR MINDS WITH ITS AWFUL POWERFULNESS

but I was still invisible so I snuck up next to the ghost with the idol and I grabbed it right out of his hands and yelled Come and get me! and I jumped off the roof and Tam cast a spell that let me float down gently

and Bogart was still coming so I woke myself up and this time I stuck the fork WAY in DEEP because I really didn't want to not wake up with Bogart coming and it hurt a lot but I woke up and soon everyone woke up although Nez died in the dream before he could and Tam is acting weird about it

by the way if you have sex in a dream does it count? Tam says yes


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Tam's a guy, and guys are weird when it comes to sex. So just ignore him. ;)

I must say, this is a dark Strange Aeons campaign compared to some I've read. ^^;; But then again, the Reign of Winter campaign I'm in has some twisted things happening in it as well (including the party being blamed for the slaughter of half the people in Waldsby, a slaughter that the White Witches were actually responsible for), so I suppose I don't really have a foot to stand on.

Scarab Sages

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Tangent101 wrote:
Tam's a guy, and guys are weird when it comes to sex.

More to the point, Tam's a virgin, so what does he know...? All he got out of this shindig was some booze sounds like it's rainin'.

Quote:
I must say, this is a dark Strange Aeons campaign compared to some I've read. ^^;;

I'm honestly surprised! Isn't darkness the designated theme of this campaign? But yeah, the vivisection part was a bit much.

BTW, I believe Olwen is simplifying the way dying in the Dreamlands works. I think we'd be much more screwed (and need much more downtime to recover each time) if we used the rules as written. Then again, that vivisection happened because of the particular way Olwen applied his own rules to this situation (an improvisation, I believe), so who knows, this might be the darkest timeline after all. >:)

Quote:
But then again, the Reign of Winter campaign

Heh, I know someone who would happily submit to the Reign of Winter.

OK, no, you had it right, guys are weird.

Scarab Sages

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We'll make landfall in a few days to repair the barge. Might as well post another letter to Winter while we do. I feel like trying a different style this time. Sonnets, maybe?

The Land of Dreams! A Yellow King here dwells
Of ſeven rare and precious gifts he tells.
Take heed, o Dreamer, ſhouldſt Thou wish to ſeek
The Madden'd Poet, for with him to ſpeak
Such gifts to gain his favor Thou must bear
Lest he Thy very ſoul to ſhreds do tear.
Once thus equipp'd, the King Himself ſhall whiſk
Thee to yon place upon the Dream-World's diſk
Where Thou wilt face the Poet's with'ring gaze
And from him, by whichever deſp'rate ways,
Reclaim the life that he from Thee once ſtole
That from the ſhards Thou ſhalt be render'd whole.
— But ſwiftly Thou muſt ſeek, and ſwiftly travel,
leſt from want of wholeneſs Thou unravel.

The firſt of gifts Thou findſt upon the hand
Of an accurſèd Viſcount. His demand:
To clear him of his ballroom honor's debt
And dance the promiſ'd dances in his ſtead.
Thus ſhalt Thou win the Viſcount's signet ring,
and coſt it Thee to brave a vampyre's ſting.
The ſecond gift ſhall be a tail of Pard,
which creatures of the Foreſt may reward
in turn for feline fleſh to ſate their maws.
The third demands Thou join an ancient cauſe
Of war, which Thou betrayſt in turn to ſteal
A royal ſkull from grave's anointed ſeal.
— And while Corruption claims Thee piece by piece
Make haſte, or with Thy grueſome death make peace.

The fourth of gifts ſhall lead to Sarnath's halls
that from the lake a horrid fate befalls.
The waters part and, lo!, they do reveal
A thing too large and frightful to be real
In ev'ry bone the tremors Thou ſhalt feel
TO BOGRUK ALL SHALL KNEEL SHALL KNEEL SHALL KNEEL—

Uh


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so we stopped in Riverton to repair the ship even though Skywin didn't like it because Riverton is run by a crazy helf-elf Hotspur worshipper and she said we had to get out of town by sunset or we'd have to listen to a sermon

but when we got there the crazy helf-elf was already on the dock to give us a sermon and he mentioned the ship with red sails so we told him to come onboard and tell us about it and it turns out the ship with red sails had come by and asked about us and they give him a big ruby and he didn't want it and he gave it to us and Tam was convinced it was CURSED and I don't know why because Bit checked and it wasn't CURSED but Tam kept saying it was CURSED he was really obsessed about it

anyway the crazy half-elf was wasting all our time talking to us about Hotspur so I told him he could talk to me about Hotspur because I hadn't picked a god yet so he did for a long long time and he told me that Hotspur was in everything and everywhere and at every time because time had no meaning and by the end of the sermon it sure felt like that was true but Hotspur is a dumb god who puts holes in ships so I'll pass on that one

there are so many gods I don't know how anyone picks there's Hotspur and Bogart and Gnarly Hotep and Farazma and Besmircha and Dezna - six! six gods! it's so many how can you choose?

later the ship was attacked by a big bat and we killed it and Skywin got mad because she said the ship never got attacked by big bats before we came on board and we thought she was probably right so we gave her the ruby

by then Nat had figured out that we needed to get the heartstone of a nighthag ambassador so we did the ritual and ended up at another party and Tam did a magic to protect us from Bad Evil Magic and everyone at the party moved away from him and made faces at him like oh that's so rude

and Nat and I went up to the nighthag ambassador and asked if we could borrow her heartstone and she asked if I'd trade my soul for it and I looked at the others and they told me to say no so I said no and she was really insistent but I kept saying no so finally she said fine find the person who's trying to assassinate me and I'll give it to you and I said OK do you have any enemies and she said lots so I said that's going to be really hard then and she said well I think it's either that girl or that guy or that other girl go torture them and tell me all about it

so we talked to the other girl first and I said hey can we talk to you in private and she said OK but before we went into the ambassador's room to talk to her she turned off a thing (she was trying to be subtle but didn't do so great at it) so I said since you put a trap on the ambassador's door does that mean you're the assassin and she said um and I said because if you are we'd totally love to help you out because she's awful

and the assassin (she was the assassin it turns out) said yes she's awful she takes people's souls and we were like we know and the assassin said she's terrible and awful and we said yes yes we know so can we lure her into your trap and the assassin said OK

so Lorena and I went out to lure the ambassador into the trap and the others stayed behind and Tam made everything quiet so she couldn't do any magics and Lorena said hey we found the assassin do you want to watch us torture her and the ambassador said sure but I guess Lorena didn't do so great a job of lying because when we got near the door she said ha I knew you were lying and attacked Lorena and did a spell that put me to sleep

if you fall asleep in a dream where do you go?

it turns out that while I was asleep Lorena tried to blow up the ambassador with a fireball and mostly blew up everyone at the party so that wasn't good and then Nat woke me up and Bit tried to catch the ambassador in tentacles and Nez started eating her and I grabbed her and then it was over so now we have the heartstone

and we told the assassin hey if you're ever in the Prime Material Plane stop by and say hi we like you and she said OK so we woke up

when we got back Lorena's hair had turned white and she was all twitchy because she'd done an evil with the fireball so I asked her not to do an evil again because I was worried about her and Bit joked that maybe I should eat her and I told her that no one was eating Lorena

but then that night I guess because it was a full moon I went all crazy and tried to eat Lorena!

Bit teleported me off the ship into the place where the Bad Evil Elves are but fortunately we didn't run into any Bad Evil Elves and Bit dropped me in a pit and Tam did a magic so I'd stop running away and they brought me back to the ship and I felt really bad about it in the morning

I could have hurt Lorena! Or Bit too I guess

and they told me it was because the moon was full so I said next time the moon is full chain me up and Tam said he could do a magic to my mind when that happened and I said sure because I trust Tam I don't think he'll turn evil and kill me again

back on the ship we did some more research and found out that the next thing we needed was the hat of the captain of the ship that had been following us that gave the crazy half-elf the ruby so we did the ritual and it didn't work and we thought it was because the ship was chasing us and was already in the real world so we just stayed in the real world and we went up to ask Skywin if she could see the ship with red sails and she was acting weird so I grappled her and then she turned into a Horrible Monster!

Tam thought it was because we gave her the ruby and it was CURSED but I still think it's just a ruby


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so the Horrible Monster that Skywin turned into was scary and confusing but Tam did a magic that made me stop being scared and confused for a while and the Horrible Monster tried to kill me the same way the Shopkeeper did but this time I guess I was ready for it so it didn't work and we killed the Horrible Monster and I noticed that none of the crew were on board the ship anymore so obviously we were in the Dream World and the ritual had worked

and then a bunch of mercenaries boarded our ship and they were pretty easy to deal with but there was another Horrible Monster and the Captain and they were more difficult but we managed it without a lot of trouble and I took the Captain's hat and then the magic Tam did which made me stop being confused wore off and I was confused so I tried to attack Nat but I missed

anyway I said OK we have the hat let's wake up and Bit was all confused and said what do you mean wake up and I said from this dream and Bit said what dream and really for a very smart person Bit sometimes misses obvious stuff

we tried to sink the ship but it just laughed at us so I peed on it and woke up

Skywin was fine so the ruby wasn't cursed and Bit asked if we could have it back and Skywin said no and the rest of us agreed with her

we sailed to a town so Skywin could pick up supplies and while she was out an Inspector came on board to Inspect the ship and everyone seemed very upset about this but I don't know why and anyway nothing bad happened

Tam tried to contact Winter with a magic but Winter didn't answer and now Tam is worried and I hope Winter is OK although to be honest I don't completely understand what Tam sees in her she's kind of mean?

and then we read more of Lowl's books and another gift for the Mad Poet was the foot of a Womp but Lowls left a note saying that the foot of a Womp was a b%!#+$~! gift and he wasn't going to bother so we didn't either

so we went back to the desert in the Dream World to see the Yellow King and we saw a weird flying thing on the roof so we went in invisibly except for Lorena who might as well be invisible and there was a bad person there with bad dogs so Bit made ice go between us and them and then we were attacked by things that were the same as the thing in the courtyard of the asylum that tried to carry off Lorena but this time they carried off Tam and dropped him but he was fine

Scarab Sages

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Winter is not responding. What does that mean? I believe the spell completed successfully, so that should rule out her being dead. I can well imagine that the first sending caught Winter by so much surprise that she didn't know what to say. After the third attempt, though, that is becoming unlikely. It's also possible that she doesn't want me to resume communication with her, even though she encouraged me to do so upon our parting. And I did offer her the option of unsub-Scribe-ing if my missives were unwelcome. (OK, maybe that's why she's giving me the silent treatment. Virgins have no business making dad jokes.)

She might well be in serious trouble. I'm considering scrying on her, but I am loath to breach her privacy even more after I might already be pestering her with daily intrusions into her life. I've also considered reaching out to someone close to her — at the Cathedral in Caliphas, perhaps? —, but I don't know any such people, which is necessary for sending magic. Perhaps Cesadia Wrentz back in Thrushmoor knows more? It's a long shot, but I might as well take it.

In other news, we felt we were as ready as we'd ever be to face the Mad Poet, so we went to see the Yellow King again. Unfortunately, the caravanserai was crawling with unfamiliar monsters and enemies, and the Yellow King was nowhere to be found. In his stead, we found two more vaguely insectoid non-humans of the kind we'd encountered under Lowls' mansion before. They had a dragon-like creature with them who didn't seem keen on violence, but the creepy people forced it to join them in trying to kill Nez and me. (Bit and Lorena were busy fighting some other creepy person belowstairs, and Mrriaál was busy running away from said person under some compulsion. I would have had the means to stop her, but I'm too slow to keep up with her. I really have to do something about that.)

The insectoid people had a vorpal scimitar (!), but between Nez and my spiritual khopesh, we managed to take them down one. I was going to offer truce to the dragon-like creature after its handlers were dead, but Lorena managed to sneak in behind me and blast it with a fireball before the fight was done. That made my point very hard to argue indeed, and the dragonoid almost killed Nez and me for my trouble. Luckily, Nat succeeded where I failed and got the dragonoid to stand down. After I healed it, it informed us that the mistress of its masters had likely locked up the Yellow King in a prison on the moon, and offered to take us there. See, it had a comfortable passenger platform strapped to its back, and was apparently capable of flying all the way up to the moon with its wings. And unlike what the space fiction of my youth suggested, there is actual breathable air up there. Maybe that's just the Dreamworld version of the moon, though, who knows.

In any case, the trip lasted long enough for us to refresh our strength and magic. Emboldened, we disembarked from the dragonoid in the vicinity of the prison and snuck into it through a sewage pipe. The cell block was empty except for some shady Chelaxian woman, whom we released even though she was rude, and an Osirian woman, who seemed apathic and disinterested in freedom, so we left her in her cell. The Chelaxian informed us that someone fitting he Yellow King's description had been taken upstairs by some «twins» who supposedly run the prison.

The upper floor was full of torture implements, which were unused at the moment but connected with tubes to something like an ominous moaning pipe organ. There was an unassuming woman near the organ that we mistook for a hapless maintenance worker, so our first assault was aimed at capturing her without hurting her. I cast the area around the organ into magical silence for fear it might serve some horrid offensive purpose. However, the woman turned out to be an exotic dragon in disguise, so Mrriaál's first attempt to gain a hold on her failed. Instead, we were bathed in the dragon's acid breath. Nez had more luck with her attacks, and she valiantly tore at the dragon's hide and flesh while I tried to keep her alive with healing magic. Mrriaál then took control over the grapple and
brought it to its knees, which should have allowed us to overwhelm it. However, it resisted our combined attacks long enough to breathe once more and retaliate with tooth and claw, snuffing the life out of both Lorena and Mrriaál in an instant.

I had only just recently discovered the magical means to breathe life back into a mortally wounded creature, but could only do so with one of the fallen friends before the window of opportunity closed. Since Mrriaál was within my reach and Lorena wasn't, my choice was forced. I wrested Mrriaál back into the Dreamworld all while Lorena, presumably, woke up screaming on the barge. Nez and Bit's summoned rhinoceros then dealt the dragon its overdue death.

Weakened as we now are, we still have to fight the other twin, who is most likely no less of a menace than the first. I will endeavor to work some magical protection on our group this time to take the edge off the breath weapon, but I suspect it might not be acid again. I hope I will figure it out in time before the rest of us are melted, burned, or frozen to death.


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so we snuck into the building and there was a scary bad man and we thought he might be scary and bad so I tried to grab him and he frightened me and I ran away up the stairs past two people who attacked me with swords and also they had a monster that they didn't treat very nicely

so I jumped off the roof and by then I wasn't scared and I wanted to get back as quickly as I could so I broke through the wall with an axe instead of going around and the scary bad man had turned into mist but then he turned back into the scary bad man and he tried to do that thing to me that makes you panic and then die but it didn't work so I grabbed him better this time and killed him

and then I went up to the roof again and the two swordspeople were dead but Lorena had burned the monster with a fireball and it took us a long time to calm it down but we healed it and it liked us more after that and we asked where the Yellow King was and it said he was probably up in the moon prison

and Bit and Tam got all nervous because they said there's no air on the moon but that's ridiculous there's air everywhere except under water I guess but the moon isn't under water

so we rode the monster up to the moon and there totally was air there so I don't know what that was all about and the monster said it wouldn't wait for us very long so we trudged into a lake of black goo and down a pipe and then we were in the prison and there was a prisoner who said Hey let me free so I said OK but Tam wanted to know who she was and why she was in prison and she got mad and eventually Bit let her out

there was another woman but she didn't want to leave her cell so we left her in it

anyway we went upstairs and there was a woman next to a machine but the woman was SECRETLY A DRAGON and she breathed acid all over us with her SECRET DRAGON POWERS which was eerie because Tam had made everything silent and I grabbed her but she breathed acid all over us again and Tam saved me but not Lorena who disappeared and I guess is back in the real world now


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...but when the moon goes behind the horizon doesn't it go under the water? Then it wouldn't have air!

Scarab Sages

Ah, so that‘s why the dragon’s in a hurry to leave again!


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oh hey it turns out Lorena didn't die in the dream after all she used that thing where she could suck the life out of a friend to stay alive and she was just hiding real good so we thought she disappeared she does that a lot honestly

but anyway just after the fight with the dragon when we were all looking around two women came into the room and everyone else said they were twins but I don't know I didn't think they looked much like each other and they were very confusing and we were all still wounded from the dragon so it got bad

they confused me and then Tam unconfused me and then they confused me again and I started chasing my tail and grabbed it and bit it and it really hurts when you do that and they sucked the life out of Nez and she fell to the ground and someone threw a fireball but it didn't do much Bit made a buffalo but the buffalo got confused and started fighting with the rhino Bit had summoned to fight the dragon and Tam got knocked unconscious and Bit ran away and no one knew where Lorena was and then I grabbed one of the women and she tried to bite me and that made me mad even though I was confused so I killed her but the other one touched me and sucked my life out and I fell unconscious so I'm not sure what happened next but I guess Bit came back and woke up Tam who and Lorena stopped babbling in a corner long enough to throw some acid at the woman and eventually they brought her down and then we spent an hour in the room confused while Bit made sure we didn't kill ourselves or each other because Bit was the only one who wasn't trying to do that by then

there's a lot more after that but I have to go away for a moment


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anyway we went upstairs and we saw the top of the weird instrument that the dragon was playing and there was someone with a bunch of instruments and I thought oh good a musician maybe we can have a chat for once but he just said You Will Die In Agony and stuff like that in our minds and lashed his tentacles at us and it's not so much I mind that everyone always wants to kill us but it's really boring anyway we killed him and went back downstairs

and in a bunch of cells that didn't make any noise we found the King In Yellow and broke him out and he was surprised and happy that we were there to free him and we went back downstairs and told the woman we had left in the cells Are you sure you don't want to go? Last chance! and she noticed Tam and said Yes Grand Master which was weird but anyway she came with us and it turns out the Monster that flew us to the moon would have waited a much longer time so we really didn't need to hurry as much as we thought

and all the way back from the moon the woman was like Yes Grand Master Oo Grand Master Why Do You Let Your Slaves Talk Back To You Grand Master and Tam was getting very upset and Bit made fun of him so Tam got mad and tried to throw Bit off the Monster so Bit opened a pit on top of the Monster and Tam and the woman and me fell in and everyone took a deep breath and stopped fighting except Tam and the woman because he told her to stop calling him Grand Master and he yelled at her about it and she got miffed but I think Tam was right don't call people something they don't want to be called that's rude

so when we got back down to the desert she left and the King In Yellow took us into the desert and said Are you suuuuuure you want to see the Mad Poet? and we said yes and he said Are you suuuuuure? and we said yes and he said Are you suuuuuure? and we said Yes! so he said OK the Mad Poet is right behind that dune

so we went over the dune and the Mad Poet came out of his house and said What do you want? and we said Here are gifts will you give us our memories back please? and he said Are you suuuuuure you want your memories back? and we said YES!!! so he said OK and that's when things got weird ...


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so I remembered when The Mistress sold me to Lowls and how Lowls treated me better than The Mistress so I did all the Bad Awful things for Lowls and I got worse and worse and hurt so many people and did Worse Awful things and then Lowls took out my memories and left because he wasn't any better than The Mistress really and all those Bad Things I thought were OK because Lowls told me to do it and Lowls was good to me were really Bad Things and Lowls wasn't even good to me he was bad to me I was a Bad Evil person and so was he and I won't do those things anymore

and while I was remembering suddenly the Bad Evil Me that worked for Lowls appeared! and the Bad Evil Bit and Tam and Lorena! and they said we were weak and stupid!

so Lorena made a fireball that hurt me and Lorena and Bit and then I grabbed hold of me and pinned me under the water and I called me a bad name but I didn't let go because even though I said I was the bad one I knew that I was really the bad one and then Bit made black tentacles appear everywhere while Bit ducked behind a tree to summon a rhino and Lorena threw a fireball back at Bit and Tam and then hid and Tam made himself stronger and then Lorena started to fly way up high but Lorena confused her and I told me I was weak and stupid but I was wrong because when I tried to get out of my grip I failed and I broke my neck and dropped me in the lake so it turns out I was better than me which is good because I like me better

but then Bit made a stinking cloud that made Tam and me sick and not able to do much and there were more fireballs and Lorena threw a snowball at Lorena who attacked Lorena back and Bit sent the rhino against Bit but Bit had mirror images and then vanished so the Rhino attacked Tam and by then I wasn't sick anymore so I grabbed Lorena and told her that my Lorena was pretty and good and nice and sweet and I loved her and she wasn't my Lorena she was bad she was bad Lorena so I killed Lorena and then Tam channeled the bad evil energy that hurts but Tam called fire from the heavens down upon Tam and Bit threw another fireball they were just everywhere and eventually Bit appeared again and Bit killed her so we won

take that, evil us!


Ah, I think I'm starting to figure things out here.

Not only is the GM running Strange Aeons, but he's possibly using the Curse rules from Horror Adventures! Mrriaál probably has the Curse of Lycanthropy. There's also a Possessed, but I'm not sure of the other curses.

Sounds interesting! If depressing... take care!


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We started with the insanity rules from Strange Aeons, but they honestly weren't working very well, so the GM switched to those rules without saying anything overt -- we just started getting e-mails informing us of our new ... issues. They worked great within the story! I've been avoiding looking up the rules in question to keep the surprise factor in, but now that we've been cured I might take a look unless the GM says there's a chance they'll come up again.

I might make a note of our observed symptoms here in a bit for those curious.


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I have no issue with you taking a look at the corruption rules. :)


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Woot!

OK, Mrriaál's observed symptoms: sometimes grew fangs; killed things during the full moon. She definitely had Lycanthropy, and eventually got saddled with Feral Senses, Lycanthropic Empathy, and Shift Form. She had hit stage three and went through the killing-a-sheep thing during one full moon and tried to kill Lorena during the one after that.

Lorena's observed symptoms: refused help from others; hair turned white; was able to suck life out of allies when an attack would otherwise have killed her. She was definitely Shadowbound. I'm pretty sure she ended up with Emptiness of the Void and Frightful, and I guess that explains why she tried to destroy that statue of Desna. Huh, that was way early on, before I thought we were using these rules.

Tam's observed symptoms: grew claws which made spellcasting more difficult; grew hideous scars; became angry and fond of torture; was able to turn a death blow into "stable at -1 hit points". Tam, I think, had Accursed, and I suspect had Undying Hatred, Weakening Claws, and possibly Horrific Shock.

Bit's symptoms: suddenly switched to a horrible, mean new personality when she otherwise would have been subject to a fear effect? Bit may have been Possessed, and maybe had Temporary Clarity? I'm not sure.

Scarab Sages

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Quote:
Tam's observed symptoms: grew claws which made spellcasting more difficult; grew hideous scars; became angry and fond of torture; was able to turn a death blow into "stable at -1 hit points". Tam, I think, had Accursed, and I suspect had Undying Hatred, Weakening Claws, and possibly Horrific Shock.

Yep, that's the right ones.

Tam's observable symptoms actually started with his compulsion to deliver messy coups de grâce to enemies whenever possible. The fight against the bag lady was the first time, but it came up quite a lot after that. Maybe it seemed like too sensible a thing to do to register as a corruption.

And yeah, getting a –4 penalty on my best skills, a –2 with weapon attacks, and a 5% spell failure chance is pretty harsh. Luckily, I mostly rely on Nez to do the heavy lifting these days, and Nat does well as the party face. Also, I kept forgetting about the spell failure chance, but that probably evened out with me also forgetting about the daily reroll I got from another corruption. The «cheat death» ability from my first corruption is extremely powerful, but I only got to use it once against the Twins in the moon prison, which was hands-down our hardest fight so far.

Scarab Sages

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Since Tam now remembers everything, here's the rest of his backstory.

A boy is sixteen years old. The desert breeze is surprisingly chilly this early in the morning, but it already carries a myriad of exotic smells and the sounds of the awakening city from the walls behind him. The Sun has just risen above the horizon and is basking the dunes in red brilliance. The boy has never seen anything so beautiful. His previous life in Ustalav seems pale in comparison, like a palimpsest on cheap paper.

«Heartening, isn't it?» The expedition's priest, Akhton, is expertly guiding his camel past, while the boy's own beast appears to care little for his intentions. «At night, we mourn the Sun's absence, and at noon, we cower from its terrible might. But in the morning it grants us vigor, and in the evening it soothes us. Horus is both of these things, the rising Sun and the setting Sun, the horizon behind us and the one before us.»

The boy reaches for the clasp on his cloak. It feels warm, as if it were drinking more than its fair share of the sunrise's light. «It's going to be a long ride. Would you mind telling me about Him along the way?»

A boy is seventeen years old. The mewling is not very loud, but it strikes a chord in the boy's heart. «We have to help him.»

The expedition lead tracker, Yepsut, shakes her head while nocking an arrow. «Vicious beasts they are, second only to dragons. They know no masters. More trouble than they're worth. Best to get it over with.»

«No.» The boy steps forth. «He's just a baby. Let me try something.»

Yepsut fumes at the boy, but he is oblivious to her. He raises his hands, palms out, and approaches the trapped tyrant lizard, half speaking and half whispering the ancient words, like Akhton had taught him. The mewling stops abruptly. The creature's amber eyes fix him as he steps closer, slowly reaching for its bulky snout until he can feel its hot breath on the back of his hand. It flinches only a little as he rests his palm on its scaly skin. Then a tentative purr rises from its throat.

Yepsut lowers the bow and says, «It's a mistake.»

Akhton says, «One does not refuse a divine gift.»

Professor Gorolyushina says to the boy, «Either way, it's your responsibility now, Tamuil.»

The boy says, «I'm going to call him Mister Fluffy.»

Yepsut growls. «You will not. First of all, it's a female. And second, it's bad luck to mock a proud beast like that. You will give her a proper name, or by the gods, she will have your head.»

«Abkhadnezar», says Professor Gorolyushina. «It was the name of Epshet-Hasuf's cat.»

«Abkhadnezar it is, then», says the boy.

A boy is eighteen years old. After two years of gathering clues and following leads in the desert, Professor Gorolyushina is certain to have pinpointed the location of Epshet-Hasuf's final resting place. She has invited a famed local scholar, Dr. Nekepti aš-Šarratum, to join in the discovery.

In the bustle of the two expeditions merging, a girl drops a scroll from a bundle she is carrying. The boy hands it back to her and is rewarded with a radiant smile that puts the desert sun to shame.

«Are you with Dr. aš-Šarratum's group?» He asks her.

«I am», she replies with another smile.

«What's she like?"», the boy asks.

The girl drops into a conspirational whisper. «Oh, she's a dragon, that one. Short temper, long memory. You mustn't offend her, or she won't let you forget it. I addressed her improperly on our first meeting, and she stuck me on latrine duty for a week. Even now—»

Then her eyes grow wide. «There she comes! Don't ruin it!» She ducks away, leaving the boy alone as a tall older woman in well-used riding armor strides straight toward him.

He swallows hard, then bows deeply and addresses the approaching woman in his best Ancient Osirian: «Dr. aš-Šarratum, it is an honor to meet you.»

«What?!», snaps the woman.

The boy freezes and stammers until, finally, he hears the girl erupt in gales of laughter behind the nearest tent. The woman scowls at her and grunts, «You don't pay me nearly enough to take part in your childish games, doctor.»

The boy stares at the girl. She can't be more than a few years older than him. «Doctor?»

She grins. «Call me Nekepti.»

He does.

By the third week, they share a tent.

A man is nineteen years old. The glyphs above the stone door are time-worn, yet he can read them effortlessly now. Here lies Epshet-Hasuf, Scribe to the Pharao; he lived in Light; he died in Darkness. The expedition cheers.

The crypt is too ancient to smell of decay. Some walls are covered in writing, others hold a honeycomb of scrolls preserved through the ages by magic. The scholars gape in silent amazement. Then, a strangled scream.

A shape of pure darkness claws its way forth from the sarcophagus, passing right through the solid stone lid. Its face is too terrible to behold, and as the expedition freezes still with terror, it takes hold of Nekepti's arm. In its other hand, an orb of unholy power blossoms, darker than even the creature and shot through with flickering red flame, a mind-rending flaw in reality. As the creature reaches to touch Nekepti's heart with it, Tamuil lifts his own hand and grasps the orb. The world turns dark.

A being is ageless. It is blind, deaf, disembodied. The void envelops it completely. It is so empty that its emptiness takes form, vast entities of cold absence that move in the dark without regard or purpose. The being has no agency, no voice, no meaning. It exists only to experience terror.

When Tamuil finally wakes, even the light of a candle is too much to bear. It takes hours until he tolerates the presence of others in the tent. They tell him that the curse is broken, the evil spirit exorcized and vanquished, that the light prevailed.

But he knows better now. «The light is finite, but the darkness is infinite. We are all powerless and meaningless before the darkness. The darkness will swallow us all.»

«No», says Akhton. He lifts the clasp from Tamuil's collarbone. It has crumpled like discarded papyrus, its proud brass wings folded in on themselves. It now looks almost like a featureless mask, perhaps a funeral shroud. «The clasp sacrificed itself to save you», Akhton says. «Horus protected you. Horus brought you back.»

A dry laugh erupts from Tamuil. «As the cook lifts the fried fish from the boiling oil. Should the fish be thankful?»

«Your soul will heal», says Nekepti. «It may take time, but you will recover.»

«He cannot be healed who is not sick», says Tamuil. «There is no recovery from the truth. Nothing you say or do will change what I have seen.» He rolls to the side. «Leave me now.»

Later that night, Yepsut appears in his tent. «I, too, have seen a glimpse of the truth», she says. «There are more like us.» She opens her hand to reveal a small talisman in the shape of a featureless mask. «We cannot offer hope, for there is none. But there is work to do, and solace to be found in sharing the burden of knowledge.»

Tamuil rises from his bed. «When do we leave?»

Scarab Sages

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By the way, Nekepti Balaat aš-Šarratum was my main PC in Olwen's Mummy's Mask a few years back. :)

(Most of our standard group was inconvenienced at the time, so it was just Bit's player and I, and we each played two PCs. Worked out well!)


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That is completely too awesome! Thank you for sharing that backstory, and the background behind it! :)

Scarab Sages

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+++SENDING IN PROGRESS+++
From: tamuil.rivers@horus.org
To: ash-sharratum@arch.sothis-uni.edu
Subject: hey
Body: Dear Nekepti: Finally recovered from trauma; returning to Horus and not being total jerk. Sorry for running off like that. How are you? Best, Tam

From: ash-sharratum@arch.sothis-uni.edu
To: tamuil.rivers@horus.org
Subject: Re: hey
Body: Tam! Wow, so glad you're better. Let's catch up someday! Happy but hands full atm. Hugs, Niki, Akhton, Ayat (2 years), Qasim (3 weeks!)
+++SENDING COMPLETE+++


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Miacknian Mun leaves all his clones in a house where a murder has been

all the clonely people, where do they all come from?

but I'm getting ahead of myself so after we defeated ourselves we talked to the Mad Poet a bit more about Lowls and the Mad Poet said Lowls had gone to Catheer to find a book called the Necco Gnomicon which sounds like it would be very bad if he found it and then we woke up

and we sailed the rest of the way to Cassomeer and on the way we saw some dancing lights and we followed the dancing lights and there were some followers of Dezna and that one nice lady we met told them about us and they wanted to know about our dreams and we told them about our dreams and they were very friendly and didn't try to murder us which was a really nice change

and before we got to the city I gave Lorena a gift I gave her Dust of Darkness and I think she liked it I hope she liked it

then we were at the city and we said goodbye to Skywin and thanked her for the trip and she said she'd ask the harbor master if there was a ship that could take us to Catheer she's so nice

we checked into a nice hotel and asked for a room and the other three argued and argued and argued and argued about the room with the clerk and tried to get a discount even though we're ridiculously rich it was weird

then we did a little shopping and went around looking for Miacknian Mun who was the person Lowls came to see in Cassomeer because we wanted to ask why Lowls came to see him and some people told us he was a member of a group that met at a bar and we went to the bar and he wasn't there but the bartender told us to ask a gnome and the gnome said we should try the old abandoned infirmary where Mun was living so we cast spells on ourselves because after the asylum "old abandoned infirmary" sounds like it's probably awful

and when we got there Miacknian Mun said we couldn't come in and when we tried to go in some angel statues spit acid at us and it wasn't Miacknian Mun after all but a clone of Miacknian Mun and the clone attacked us and all the while kept babbling about how we couldn't come in because he was too busy he said it over and over like he was babbling the words of a sermon that no one will hear

and we killed the clone and there was a golem and we killed the golem even though it hurt when you punched the golem and we went downstairs and then we went upstairs and there were murder bees in skin suits and I couldn't do anything about the murder bees so I didn't and then there was another clone who yelled at us and when we killed that one there was another clone who just cried and that's when we found the face that Miacknian Mun keeps in a jar by the door

and the face that he keeps in a jar by the door told us that the real Miacknian Mun had gone to Catheer with Lowls and they were also going to stop on an island to buy slaves to help with their journey and they were going to buy slaves from THE MISTRESS

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

but when we went upstairs again there was a BIG SCARY TENTACLE MONSTER and the BIG SCARY TENTACLE MONSTER hurt us all pretty bad and then collapsed the house on us and we thought we were all going to die but it turns out that if you hit the BIG SCARY TENTACLE MONSTER really hard enough times it dies

so I guess at some point we're going to have to face THE MISTRESS and I'm scared but maybe we can stop her from doing all the evil and she'll die on her island and be buried along with her name

maybe we'll end up wiping the dirt from our hands as we walk from her grave


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It's absolutely awesome that you're going to have some closure with the character in your backstory! And the Beatles song filk was just entirely too cool :) Thank you :)


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so we left Cassomeer to get on a boat to go to Catheer and everyone else complained about how much it cost to get on a boat which I don't understand because to get on the boat we had to pay sixty pieces of gold and I know for a fact that Tam paid thousands and thousands and thousands of pieces of gold to buy a belt for his pet

but not much happened on the boat except for the dream where the ambassador woman who takes people souls tried to take my soul so she could sell it and space went all weird and it was hard to move from one place to another and she had monsters but the others showed up and we killed the monsters and then she vanished and we woke up but I guess it turns out my soul is pretty valuable so that's nice

and Winter finally answered Tam and said she's busy and would he please stop calling and Tam was sad but honestly I think he can do better and I told him so Winter was always kind of rude

then we arrived in Catheer and Catheer is really really big I mean really big and at the docks a lot of people came up and offered to be our guides and I wanted to hire them all but eventually we just hired one and someone robbed Tam and they took us to an inn and I said I would pay for all of the rooms at the inn because I was so tired of hearing the others complain for an hour every time we have to pay for anything

the next day we went to the library where Lowls and Mun went and Bit tried to teleport us into the library but couldn't and got a headache so we talked to the woman who runs the library and she said Lowls and Mun did something awful and now the library is bad and no one can go in so we said we would take care of the awful stuff and she said OK so we went into the library and they locked the doors behind us

and then we were attacked by dogs but we defeated the dogs and then more dogs came out of a mirror so we defeated those dogs and broke the mirror and then we went downstairs through the statue of the angels which I guess is how libraries work here


I'm not sure which adventure I'd love to see you all go on next more, Hell's Rebels or Reign of Winter. Both would be truly amusing, I'm sure! ^^;; Thank you for sharing your journals!

Scarab Sages

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In a way, it's good to have closure on the Winter story. I barely know her, after all, and she just proved I knew her even less than I thought. I suppose I was in a vulnerable place when I woke up in Briarstone and desperately clung to the rock that Winter's cool-headed competence offered. It's time to admit that my crush was for the idealized mental image I had been cultivating of her, rather than for the real Winter.

Mrriaál had been right all along — what I had been interpreting as no-nonsense pragmatism is probably just rudeness. After all, when we parted ways in Thrushmoor, she explicitly encouraged me to contact her, be it in writing or by magic. I don't blame her for changing her mind — I might have overdone the contacting a tad there — but she could have let me down gently. Giving me the cold shoulder for a week and then suddenly snapping at me is just mean.

Mrriaál also says I deserve better. She likes to call herself a monster, but she's clearly the party's kindest soul.

I'm certainly glad this happened after we reclaimed our memories. I suppose I would have taken it harder before that. Knowing that I once won Nekepti's heart certainly helps me keep up the hope, although I probably got inordinately lucky there (would she ever have noticed me if we hadn't been stuck in an expedition of two dozen people for weeks?) and did end up ruining it for us.

Huh, I guess I'm back at ending my notes on a downer.

Scarab Sages

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Tangent101 wrote:
I'm not sure which adventure I'd love to see you all go on next more, Hell's Rebels or Reign of Winter. Both would be truly amusing, I'm sure! ^^;; Thank you for sharing your journals!

Olwen already played Hell's Rebels with some of us (Bit, Dr. Variel and me). It was good fun, but we didn't keep a campaign journal, alas! Here's Olwen's review, though:

Link

I expect our next campaign will be either Curse of the Crimson Throne (since Dr. Variel's player is on paternity leave from our table, and he knows CotCT inside out, so it might be a rare chance for us to play it) or War for the Crown (since we all seem excited to play that one). There's a bunch of other candidates still around, though, and we've been known to change our minds only weeks before the new campaign's start, so...


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so the rest of the library wasn't very exciting it was mostly monsters monsters monsters fight fight fight and that gets boring pretty fast

one level down there were some slimy blobby gibbering oozy things and we fought them and while we were fighting them a dead person stuck its hand out of the wall to drain the life out of Tam and Lorena and it was really annoying because it just stayed in the wall and wouldn't come out except to stick its hand out and I squeezed an oozy thing but the other grabbed me so I squeezed it instead and then Bit summoned a kitty to help me fight them and kitty! and I asked the kitty if it was a relative but it didn't say anything

after the fight I got to pet the kitty

and there was a trap which trapped you in a trap and Lorena and Tam avoided the trap but then I walked right into it and felt pretty stupid about that but the others yelled at Bit until she got me out of it and then the dead person attacked us again and we were really irritated and then there was another trap where someone named Examine Door tried to cover me with fungus and then the dead person attacked us again and this time we redeaded it and by then we were really tired so we went to the meditation room to take a nap and the others were worried that there would be something horrible in the meditation room but I thought that was silly because then how could you meditate there?

and then we went back down and below the level that was below the other level there were more of the oozy blobby things including a really big screaming one but I grabbed the screaming one and squeezed it for a long time while the others fought the little ones after eventually they were dead

and then we went down again and there was a room with a cube in it and Tam rang a bell and I tried to solve the cube puzzle but I got it wrong and was sent to a mazed and Tam was sent to a mazed but eventually we got out of the mazeds and Tam solved the puzzle and we went to the Sole which I think is caused that because it's on the very bottom

and in the Sole there was an angel who had gone crazy because Lowls stole his book and we tried to talk to the angel but he attacked us and I felt sorry for him so I tied him up but when the librarians came they said he was corrupted and couldn't be saved and I was sad

and the librarians were happy that they could open the library again so they paid us some money and teleported us to Okeno so we can track down The Mistress and probably die

but at least I got to pet a kitty first


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so in Okeno we asked around about The Mistress but no one knew where we could find The Mistress and everyone was selling slaves and I wanted to burn everything down but I didn't because we can't fight an entire city

yet

and although no one knew where we could find The Mistress we were told that The Hyena Princess might know so we claimed we wanted to buy some slaves which I didn't like and asked The Hyena Princess and she told us because she didn't believe we wanted to buy slaves and she hoped we would cause a big mess I guess because The MIstress is her business rival

and my friends asked me about The Mistress so I explained about how she had all the powers of all the wizards plus could make herself fifty feet tall and could kill you with a single mighty blow and all that and how we were probably all going to die

but we went to The Mistress' tower and we flew and Lorena went first and confused some of the guards and more came out and I started throwing guards off the roof and then The Mistress came out and I was scared and she attacked Tam and almost killed him while Lorena and Bit were off blocking the guards with magical walls and there was a wizard and someone fired a ballista and they said I had to go help Tam and I was scared but I did and I went in with my eyes closed and threw punches and one landed and I won

?!!!???!!!?!?!?!!

and we went downstairs and there were slaves and I let the slaves free and gave them money and there was a big tiger and I THINK IT WAS MY MOTHER because she purred at me and was nice so I talked with her a long time and let her go free

!!!!!

and there was another prisoner there who was the old woman I saw in a vision who was really from another world and she told us Lowls was going to do a bad thing but she couldn't tell us what it was because the more people who knew what the bad thing was the more likely it was to happen and Bit kept asking what the bad thing was anyway

and The Mistress kept notes about Lowls' trip and we found out where he was going it's to a lost city which I guess he found so now we're going there next to stop him from doing the bad thing

it's been a big day I love you mom


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Awww! Warm fuzzies! (So, Mrriaál is Khajiit and was born under a different moon than her mother? ^^)


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so we went through the desert on some magic horses with no names and we went on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on

we went for a long time

there was really nothing there because there were no plants and birds and rocks and things although there was sand and hills and rings

the Ythian lady told us that the whole bad world ending thing was because of Examine Door so I guess it doesn't matter if we know that or not now because we're already tainted by Examine Door

we found some obelisks with writing on them but I forget what they said

and then we found some giants and I was very happy to see the giants because we hadn't seen anyone in so long and I rode up to say hi and the giants threw rocks at us and at first I thought it was a game but then they through a rock at Lorena and hit her and I got very mad and put one in an armlock and made him apologize and he did and while I was doing that the others killed the other giant and also a very big scorpion

and later on there were some scorpion people and they said they were there to protect the desert and we said great so are we but they said we couldn't pass because it was sacred and we said someone had already passed and was doing bad evil nonsacred things and we were going to stop them and they thought about it and said OK and it was SO NICE to meet people who were willing to talk things through and not just attack us for no reason

and then we met some more giants who wanted to take us to their prophetess so we said OK and while we were going to see her I had a talk with the giants about freedom and tried to explain that true anarchy isn't the absence of order as most people assume but the absence of the enforcement of order by coercive means and they thought about that and told me they thought pooping in the desert was true freedom and I thought that was a cogent argument

when we saw the prophetess she mostly wanted to get a look at us before the world ended because her god Grotesque (another god!) was going to end the world sometime but she didn't know when so that's all right

then we finally (finally!) made it to the lost city which was weird

I mean really weird

like eye-hurty weird

none of the buildings had doors or windows and they were in strange shapes and the streets looked curved but were really straight or looked straight but were really curved and we kept seeing ghosts it was weird

eventually we found a building with a door and two angels were guarding the door and they said they were trying to get the EvIl Book back so they could destroy it so we said Great we'll help you and they said how and we said it's probably through that door and they said what door and then they realized that they couldn't see the door so they asked us to get the Evil Book for them and we said sure

so we went in and we were attacked by adventurers who had gone in before us except they were dead and filled with fungus which probably means they had something to do with Examine Door because Examine Door tried to fill me with fungus once in the library and it was a pretty hard fight and when you killed one of them they exploded into fungus but it didn't do anything probably because we're already tainted


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so if you meet someone you like a lot and then that person becomes a sword and you use that sword does that count as cheating on the person who you have a crush on but who isn't your girlfriend because you never told her you have a crush on her and even if you did she probably wouldn't be your girlfriend unless she would but you don't know because you haven't asked?

asking for a friend

a friend that is me

I am that friend and I would like to know the answer

but anyway we went up or maybe down through a tunnel where up turned into down and we found a camp where there was another person turning into a fungus but he didn't really remember much so we put him in the latrine for safekeeping and moved on

and there was a lot of fungus and we kept going up or maybe down until we found ourselves back on the ground floor which the others thought was weird but i don't know why and there was another camp out there and there was a well with a stone on it and the old woman told us that the polyps were under the stone and there were more fungus people and they tried to kill us and Lorena put up an invisible wall and one stabbed at me a lot with his little sword but he only hit me once and long story short we won and they had the Nekko Nomnicon!

they also had more of Lowls' notes and it turns out Lowls is going to Carcosa to ask the King in Yellow (not the Yellow King that's someone else) to end the world because Lowls is smelly and dumb

we can follow him there and maybe stop him but first we have to do something to three pillars here in the city and then we have to use the Nekko Nomnicon to travel to Carcosa which might be a problem because we said we'd give the Nekko Nomnicon to the angels but on the other hand they're angels so I'm sure they'll be reasonable when we explain the world is going to end and maybe they'll agree to give us a ride to Carcosa if we give them the book

anyway we went upstairs to attune the first pillar and we were attacked by a ghost named Upianshe and she nearly killed Tam but then she was very sorry about it and she turned out to be really nice and she told us her sword might help us keep the polyps from killing everyone

and we attuned the pillar and then we went downstairs to rest and a polyp attacked us and it was really big and it grabbed Lorena and nearly killed her and that made me mad so I grabbed it and pinned it and killed it because THAT'S WHAT YOU GET IF YOU HURT LORENA THAT'S WHAT YOU GET

it turns out attuning the pillar made the polyp come out and the old lady told us there are millions and millions of them down there and I don't think I can pin millions and millions of them so we decided we needed to put the wards back on the city which the old lady thought we could maybe do if we found her body but first we went to look for Upianshe's sword because we figured we needed all the help we can get

so we went to look for the sword and we found a very boring blind man who was all like "blah blah blah you are doomed I am doomed everything is doomed doom doom doom" and never did or said anything useful but he followed us around for a while

and then we met a devil who asked us a lot of questions and he was nice at first but then when he asked if he could see the Nekko Nomnicon and we said no he got all rude

but anyway we found Upianshe's sword and I picked it up and brought it back and then Upianshe became the sword and now she talks in my head

and I'm very confused about whether or not that constitutes a relationship?

but anyway the angels are back now and I'm sure we'll work out this whole book thing


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Mrriaál wrote:
...but anyway the angels are back now and I'm sure we'll work out this whole book thing...

Um... yeah... suuuuuuure...

Scarab Sages

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Quote:
so if you meet someone you like a lot and then that person becomes a sword and you use that sword does that count as cheating

I'd say that depends on how you use it...

Quote:
we were attacked by a ghost named Upianshe and she nearly killed Tam

Yeah, whose brilliant idea was it to give a 70 dmg touch-attack sword to a Magus? >.<


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so we talked to the angels and at first they were very mean and dumb and wouldn't listen when we tried to explain about the horrible evil gods being unleashed upon the world and we explained that we wanted to give them the book and if they'd give us a ride to Carcosa we'd be happy to use that instead of the book but they kept saying we wanted to use the book for evil and I got very mad and said if they didn't care about the evil gods invading the world then maybe they weren't who they said they were and they got mad about that and we almost started fighting but Lorena said we should all take a deep breath and calm down because we're all on the same side here

so I calmed down and told them if they wanted to cast spells on us to make sure we weren't lying or something like that we would let them and they consulted with each other and tried to destroy the book when we weren't looking but they couldn't so they consulted with each other some more and then cast a spell on us so we couldn't lie and made us tell them all over again what was going on

and then they said that they couldn't give us a ride to Carcosa because they didn't know where that was but if we gave them the book right now they would agree to wait around for a couple of days while we made sure the polyps didn't destroy the world either and then we could use the book just to go to Carcosa and nothing else and we all thought that sounded reasonable so we said sure

so that worked out all right

then we went down into the well to try to find Kaklamath's body so she could put the seals back in place and keep the polyps from coming out and we went deep underground and there was a polyp so I said to Upianshe OK show me your stuff and I tried to stab it but I missed and missed and missed and luckily Bit and Lorena were able to disintegrate it and blow it up and stuff

and then we wandered around for a long time and we found the bodies of Kaklamath's people and they were all dead and that's why they hadn't stopped the polyps from escaping and Kaklamath was sad

but then we found Kaklamath's body and some gools were keeping it as a pet and it was all infested with the Examine Door fungus and that's why Kaklamath couldn't get into it and we asked the gools if we could buy it from them and they asked if we had any interesting books so we gave them the Pnakotic Manuscript because I'd already read it (it was boring) and Tam was a little worried about what they'd do with it but oh well too late now

and it turned out we had to kill Kaklamath's body and then bring it back to life so we had to wait until Tam could ask his god for help with that but he did and Kaklamath went back in her body and the woman who had been in Kaklamath's body went back into her own body and went all crazy so we had to knock her out until Tam can ask his god for help with that too

and we went through a door and there were more polyps and they attacked us and I tried to use Upianshe again and missed again and the polyps knocked me out and Bit teleported us back up the corridor but had to leave Kaklamath behind so once I was conscious again I raced back down and finally hit a polyp with Upianshe and killed it but then another one knocked me unconscious again

please don't tell Upianshe but I don't think she's actually very good at this

anyway the others killed the other polyp and we walked further in and there was a cavern that was just filled with millions and millions and millions of polyps and Bit said we should collapse the tunnel so they couldn't get out so we did that and I guess we saved the world

and now we have to save the world again from someone else

really this is very tiring


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Well-played GM. I like what you did.

You're already past it, but it is kind of a GM-only thing:
I hate encounters like the angel one where, "You have to fight or betray the angels because it's how I wrote it!"
I like that you worked in a way around it. Because Lawful Good isn't Lawful Stupid, and I refused to even run that little encounter because of how poorly it was written.

You did better.


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so it turns out that the secret to using a sword is that you HIT THEM WITH THE POINTY END

we went to do the rituals at the pillars so we could do the other ritual that would take us to Carcosa and we went through the city and found an observatory where there was a grumpy giant and some snake ladies came out and we asked if we could do the ritual and they said no and we explained why we needed to and they said no and that they were doing another ritual Lowls had told them to do and we told them Lowls was probably tricking them but they wouldn't believe us and we kept trying to explain but they said no and that we were stupid so finally we gave up and attacked them

and Lorena hit one with a zapping ray and Bit hit one with an explody ball and then I took out Upianshe and she just killed them both dead because when you use the pointy end it turns out she works really well

the third snake lady surrendered and went away and the grumpy giant really didn't care so Bit did the ritual

then we went back and told the angels we needed the book so they came with us to the last pillar and Bit did the first ritual and then we were all doing the second ritual and we were almost done when suddenly WE WERE ATTACKED BY EXAMINE DOOR!

she came out of the lake and splooshed water all over us knocking us over and Nez and Nat were compelled to approach Examine Door and she killed Nat and almost killed Nez and Bit was really upset that Nat was dead and threatened to stop the whole ritual and go home but we convinced her not to and Examine Door sucked the water out of us and we were all hurt really bad but Tam kept us on our feet and Lorena and Bit were hurling spells at Examine Door and I rushed forward with Upianshe and stabbed her and she went back into the lake!

and then we finished the ritual and now we're on our way to Carcosa but the book is coming with us and I hope the angels aren't too mad about that


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NobodysHome wrote:

Well-played GM. I like what you did.

** spoiler omitted **

Players can read the spoiler; it's long past, now.

These encounters are quite common and I almost systematically create a way out with good roleplay. Here, it certainly wasn't an easy way out, but the roleplay was good and that made the Diplomacy check DC reachable (35-40, if I remember well?). But it's not a given: a similar situation happened with the moon nagas the next session and, there, the characters weren't able to sway them with words.

It's always tricky to find the right balance between what can be a cool scripted event and letting the players have an impact on what happens. But, in general, APs have too many "X fight to the death" encounters. And if it's not that, it's "Y allies with the PCs to recover the item and, then, they betray them." It's fine every so often, but it happens so many times in APs that I don't understand why any player would have their character ally with anyone if you play the APs as written…

Ah, well, that's what the GM is for!


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so we went to Carcosa and it looked a lot like the city we had just left and there was an evil tree but Lorena walled it off and we walked away

and then we met a woman who was made of porcelain and she was a Queen and she said we needed to find the pillars that were connected to our world because otherwise Carcosa would eat our world because Carcosa is like a mouth and the pillars are its teeth and she told us there were three places we needed to go and first we needed to find a guy who would tell us where to find a musician who would tell us where to go next

but first we met a man who tried to kill us and he showed us THE YELLOW SIGN and I went crazy because of THE YELLOW SIGN and I tried to attack Bit but I missed and then Lorena disintegrated the man

and we went to a city where most of the people were dead but they didn't know they were dead and we found the man the Queen told us to look for (he was dead) and he said the musician had tried to make his daughter not dead but he made her a different kind of dead instead and could we ask her to come home please and also the musician was in a dungeon now

so he gave us his invitation to the party where his daughter was and also where the dungeon was and we went and the man throwing the party danced with me and I chatted with him but when I mentioned the musician he got all mad and left

and Tam found the dead man's dead daughter and tried to convince her to go home but she said no and then another woman took Tam off for sexytimes so I'm going to try to kidnap the daughter now

Scarab Sages

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Quote:
another woman took Tam off for sexytimes

I found the daughter for us and tried convincing her, presumably while everyone else was chilling and/or doing drugs. I DESERVE THIS.

But do come save me if she turns out to be a flesh-eating monstrosity, I guess. I didn‘t sense any duplicity from her, but don‘t trust my judgment just now.

Also call me if you need help with a fight I guess, but STRICTLY ONLY IN DIRE EMERGENCIES.

Scarab Sages

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Well, what do you know, she did turn out to be a flesh-eating monstrosity. At least we got to spend a decent amount of private quality time in the baths before she started hurting me. That means she, too, must have enjoyed it. That still counts, right?

Good thing I keep Freedom of Movement on myself these days, or she would most certainly have paralyzed and drained me there. When I tried to flee the baths, her brother (?) blocked my path and attempted to force me back inside. I was already half-dead from her bout of biting and claw-stabbing, so my only chance was to reach polite company before they got another chance. Good thing I had included myself in my Mass Fly spell back when I cast it on Mrriaál, and could invoke Grace to escape from the predators' reach unscathed. That allowed me to fling myself across the hall and straight through a window, stark naked as I was. I must have scandalized more than a few guests with that, but clearly I had less face to lose than my pursuers, who didn't care to be seen chasing a bleeding naked lad through their own party.

We later found the coffins of those two in the mansion's basement, right next to Lord Avarik's own. I suppose they were the Lord's offspring. I feel a bit bad about leaving them behind to continue their predations on other guests, but we have a world to save, and there's only so much we can do.


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so I don't remember a lot about the rest of the evening and there seem to be a lot of things I don't remember so I'm really glad I've been keeping this journal which I guess Tam told me to do but I don't remember that

did Lowls steal my memories again?

looking over my diary here are some other things I don't remember at all:

- the time we traded some toy knights for a lantern and brought the lantern back to a dead child who was happy and went away and Bit got her voice back

- the time a shopkeeper did a magic which made the Mistress appear in my head and she killed me and I woke up screaming

- the time a gnome told us to go to an old abandoned infirmary

and a bunch of other things too

but here's what I remember of the rest of the night I broke through a window and grabbed the girl and flew her away and told her I didn't want to hurt her but if I left her there she would become a vampire but when she heard she was a vampire she turned into a vampire because apparently if you tell the people here that they are vampires they turn into vampires and it would have been really nice to know that before we tried to rescue her THANKS ELDARIUS and anyway I kept trying to convince her not to eat people but she turned into a cloud and escaped from me and then invaded my mind and made me come close so she could drink my blood but when she tried to drink my blood it broke the spell and I ran away because I can't keep hold of someone who can turn into a cloud so I guess we failed to save her

and I don't remember much right after that but Tam came running out of the bathroom naked and screaming with a naked girl running after him so I guess he had a good time

and we sent Lorena in as a scout to see if she could find the dungeon and she found a suspicious room with wine in it so we teleported in and looked around and there was a ladder to the dungeon and we went down into the dungeon and there was a temple to some evil gods and stuff down there

we found a jail with a jailer who had lots of eyeballs and we asked about The Musician but the jailer said his jail cells were empty and then he said he was The Musician and he played the violin pretty good so I thought he might be telling him the truth but Tam said no so we left

and there was a mazed and we went through the mazed and on the other side of the mazed there was a teenage girl who came out of the wall and Lorena caught her in a hand made of invisible hand stuff which really surprised her but even caught in the hand she nearly killed Lorena and then she nearly killed me and made me feel really awful and then she knocked Tam unconscious and really really nearly killed him and all the while Lorena was blasting her with magic and Tam was blasting her with magic and I was punching her in the face and it wasn't working until I punched her in the face a final time and she disappeared

past the mazed there were some coffins and I guess that's where the vampires hang out and we found a violin which we guessed belonged to The Musician so we took it but we hadn't found The Musician so we looked around until we found a hidden door and Tam magicked our way past the hidden door and there was The Musician in a hole!

so we teleported out with him but he wrote to us (because he couldn't speak) to tell us that the jailer with all the eyes had taken his memories and he needed them back

so we went back to the jailer and the jailer said he would give back The Musician's memories if he got someone else's memories in exchange

and I don't remember what happened after that but I guess it all worked out somehow because The Musician got his memories back

and The Musician took us to the pillar and Bit started the ritual and then we were all attacked by a big tree

the tree beat me up pretty bad because I was still feeling bad after what the teenaged girl did but I grabbed the tree and Nez bit the tree and Lorena blasted the tree and then the tree got away from my grab by sinking into the ground and Tam healed me and the tree appeared somewhere else and I punched it and Nez bit it and the tree died but Nez ate some of the fruit when she bit the tree so Nez is evil now

and Bit finished the ritual but we have two more to go so now I guess we've saved a third of the world


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so The Musician let us know he would take us to the next city with a pillar or I guess really it was the same city because it's all Carcosa because Carcosa is all the cities that its absorbed so we walked for days beneath the strange creepy black suns beneath the black the sky looks dead but the night was even worse especially when it rained and I thought black hole suns won't you come and wash away the rain

we walked through strange alien cities filled with strange alien people until we came to a mountain and we climbed up the mountain and went through a tunnel in the mountain and it was cold so cold stuttering cold and damp steal the warm wind tired friend times are gone for honest men

at the other end of the tunnel there was a strange city where everything had five sides and there were statues of creatures with their heads knocked off and no one was there but we didn't know where the pillar was so we wandered through the city looking for a map

and Tam wanted to turn everyone into birds he was really insistent about it and got kind of weird but we said no

eventually we found a map that told us where to find an archive so we went to the archive but while we outside it the wind began to howl gibber and shriek but it wasn't the wind and something big came down the road big and hungry and covered with tentacles and eyes and Bit said it was a Shop Goth and we should run so we ran and we teleported into the archive

inside the archive there were a lot of books and some of them were written in Aklo which I can read because when I was a child the ooze in the vat next to me taught me some but I didn't read a lot because the books were very boring so I went upstairs and there were two of the creatures like the statues but these had their heads and they were asleep in boxes so we woke one up

and they told us the Shop Goths had been their slaves but revolted and killed everyone which seems fair and that they didn't know why their world was here but it might have to do with the pillar and they were just about the last ones left of their kind and at first they didn't want to tell us where the pillar was because they thought we would mess up and destroy everything but I remembered we still had the Necco Nomnicon and thought maybe it had a way to not destroy everything so Bit leafed through it and then talked SCIENCE at the creatures (who were called Old Things) and they were pretty convinced by the SCIENCE so they told us where the pillar was and asked us to please not let the Mutant out because it would organize the Shop Goths

the Shop Goth that wanted to eat us was still outside so we teleported away and went to where the pillar was and the building was surrounded by a force field so we turned off the force field and went inside and we were attacked by Evil Old Things who threw confusing bombs at us and I grabbed one and squeezed it and then the Mutant attacked!

the Mutant was a tentacle snake blob thing and it was pretty scary and it grabbed Nez but Tam got Nez free I tried to grab it but it was too fast so I couldn't so I just started punching it and Lorena and Bit were hurling spells at it and eventually it plopped into goo on the floor

and Bit did the ritual so now we've saves two-thirds of the world

we went back to the archive to tell the Old Things what had happened and then The Musician led us out of the cold cold city and through places where the people had no faces and we walked and we walked in my shoes a walking sleep and my youth I pray to keep

and finally he took us to a city which was weirder than any other city we'd been in yet and it was his home city and we ran into a bunch of gools but the gools were really happy to see The Musician so I guess they're his friends


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so I died and it hurt a lot but I'm fine now and we saved the world I guess

The Musician and his goolfriends told us that the pillar we were looking for was in a broken metal tower and they asked if we might also please help them overthrow the bad people who had taken over their city and we said sure but we wanted to quick save our own world first and they said OK

so they took us to the tower avoiding other gools who had strange weapons and the creatures flying through the sky like the one that took us to the moon but these ones didn't seem nice and there were also crazy people who were tearing at their faces and talking about the man in the mask who wasn't wearing a mask and we got to the tower and flew up to the top and there was the pillar

and Bit started the ritual but when she was about halfway through something horrible attacked us just like we expected

it was a Bowl and Upianshe was very eager to fight the Bowl so I attacked the Bowl but it grabbed me with its mouth and I thought this is bad so I tried to grab it back but it was too big and it ate me and I died

it really hurt

I didn't see what happened after that obviously but I guess the others killed the Bowl and Bit finished the ritual and then they were all transported back to Thrushmoor

which I guess means we never helped the gools get their city back just like we never helped that girl not be a vampire I think we're really bad at helping people

but we weren't finished yet so the Doll Queen knitted me back together which also hurt a lot and I was alive again

and she told us that we had to go over to a place and do a thing so we cast all our defensive spells and we went to the place where Lowls' house used to be and there was THE YELLOW SIGN and we saw THE YELLOW SIGN and went crazy

and at the top of a tower was the man in the mask who wasn't wearing a mask and also Lowls but Lowls had become Examine Door! he was all covered with tentacles and mold and honestly I'm not sure this is what he was hoping for when he took our memories

we attacked Lowls first because we were mad at him and he hit us with his tentacles that made us weak and sickly and the man in the mask who wasn't wearing a mask cast spells on us and then he showed us THE YELLOW SIGN which made me go crazy and attack Tam but then Tam cast a spell that made me stop

and I was fighting Lowls with Upianshe and Nez was biting him and Tam was keeping us from dying and Bit was hurling spells at the man in the mask who wasn't wearing a mask but they weren't doing much and Lorena was also hurling spells at him and they did a lot more

and Lowls died so I went and grabbed the man in the mask who wasn't wearing a mask and Bit sprayed him with acid which finally worked and made his mask melt off and that's how I know he wasn't wearing a mask he hit me which almost killed me with one blow and made me turn into a ghost and it was really hard to hold onto him but I managed it and I squeezed him and he died

and then we were back in Thrushmoor and everything was normal

but then! the angels appeared and they wanted the book and I said oh great I'm so happy to see you please take the book but they blasted us with holy fire which seemed rude but I guess they were right because while we were all telling Bit to give them the book she teleported far away instead of giving it to them and they left to chase after her

so I guess Bit is evil now

honestly I'm not surprised if you had asked me "who is going to turn evil" I would have said "Bit" and then I would have said "and maybe Lorena" and then I would have said "and possibly Tam" but Bit would have been first

but now we have our lives to live so I asked Lorena if she wanted to get a coffee sometime and she said yes

!!!!!

and she's keeping the Dust of Darkness I gave her forever as a keepsake and that is so sweet of her

and I think I would like to go and free all the slaves in the world and Lorena said that was fine with her and Tam would like to come along to help which is really nice of him and we are going to try to find Tam a nice girl who doesn't want to suck his blood so maybe a succubus or a shadow? anyway someone nice and he says he will write a story about what we did although he will leave out the bits about Examine Door because we can't talk about Examine Door without Examine Door gaining power so maybe he will say the Briarstone Witch did it

but this is the one I wrote which isn't as good so that is our story of how we saved the world from Examine Door and the man in the mask who wasn't wearing a mask and the polyps under the city and the very bad man Lowls who took our memories and now has learned his lesson because he is dead


That's an interesting ending. :)

So, what crazy adventures do you have in mind for your next campaign? :)

(I soooo would love to see you guys do Hell's Rebels. Or Reign of Winter. Either of them would probably be truly crazy with your group... though Hell's Rebels would be definitely full of roleplaying fun!)

Thank you for sharing your campaign journals :)

Scarab Sages

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Olwen did Hell's Rebels with some of us already.

We're planning on starting a non-Mythic Wrath of the Righteous in a couple of weeks, though!


Olwen's summing-up:

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