This is a little story I threw together to cover my deva avenger's background at the start of the FR campaign my friend is GMing. It was inspired in large part by the Ecology of the Deva article in a recent Dragon issue. Enjoy!

I. THE RETURNING
25 Hammer 1479

Enabria, steward of one of Tempus’s sacred circles, glanced up from her dinner preparations and stared hard toward the clearing outside her modest cottage. Her eladrin heritage had blessed her with outstanding hearing; hearing that hadn’t faded much over all her twenty plus decades of life. She was certain she had heard something different – something unnatural – cutting through the brisk winter breeze rattling off the Star Mounts. Swirls of falling snow brushed against the window. Her still-sharp eyes could make out nothing unusual other than the bright snow and the swaying trees and the rugged mountainside beyond the circle.

“Kendrus? Are you awake?” She glanced toward the bedroom she shared with her fellow steward and life companion.

A grunt of assent reached her ears, followed by the rustling sounds of Kendrus rolling over in the bed and rearranging the sheets around his body.

She let a brief smile tug at her mouth, then called again. “Kendrus. I heard something outside. Something…,” she searched for a likely word, “…unusual.”

Another grunt from Kendrus was her answer, but she heard him sigh and get out of the bed soon enough. He shuffled into the main living area of their cottage as he wrapped a thick bedrobe more comfortably around his shoulders. “Eh, what’s that, Ennie? Sommat outside?” He rubbed his bleary eyes.

Enabria pointed her paring knife at the window. “Out there, somewhere near the circle. I didn’t see anything. Just heard something through the wind.”

Kendrus snorted, then cleared his throat. “Well, all the same. I best go on out and have a look. Can’t imagine getting a visitor in this weather, though.” He waved a hand toward the falling snow outside. “I don’t expect the next supply delivery until Ches. No one wants to make the trip through the forest or up these mountains, not in this weather.”

Enabria nodded at Kendrus’s statements and then turned back to her dinner makings. He was reasonably intelligent, for a human midway through his sixth decade. Over her shoulder, she said, “While you’re out there, bring in some more wood for the stove. We could use a little extra tonight, I think. Feels like it’s going to get colder.”

By now, Kendrus had traded his bedrobe for hunter’s leggings and tunic, and had pulled on his boots and thrown a heavy cloak over his shoulders. “That’s all it does in Hammer, love. Get colder. Won’t feel a warm spell for a few months yet.”

He slipped a dagger into the top of one boot and grabbed his shortbow and quiver of arrows. He pulled the cloak shut in front of his modest belly and nodded at her. “I’ll be but a minute or two. While I’m up, I might as well check the traps too. See if we can get us some meat for that Midwinter stew you have in mind.”

She responded with a nod of her own, then braced herself against the sudden chill as he opened the door and pushed himself out into the cold Grey Vale winter.

~~~

Kendrus moved through the door and shut it behind him quick as he could, hoping to preserve what warmth he could inside the house for Ennie’s benefit. Wouldn’t do for her to get cold as well, even though her fey blood somehow kept her comfortable except in the worst cold snaps. He latched the door shut, hunkered down into his cloak, then trudged out into the inches-deep snow toward the treeline, where he’d set up several small game traps.

Much to his pleasure, two of the traps had borne fruit. He cleaned and dressed the trapped beasts, then reset the traps, using a little salted meat as bait. Kendrus headed toward the sacred circle, careful to nod his head in deference, quietly reciting the litany of thanks to the gods for the bounties from the traps.

He paused in his recital, squinted at the circle. He hadn’t heard anything over the crisp wind, but he could have sworn he saw…

Frowning now, the litany forgotten, he took a few steps closer to the circle. He generally didn’t get this close to it except for when he and Ennie came out every month to ritually purify it, but he was a steward of the circle, same as her, and there was something going on inside it that he’d never seen before. By the blood of Tempus, he had never even heard of it before, not even from the stewards he’d inherited the circle from.

Inside the circle, at roughly chest-height, a whirlpool of silvery light spun at a slow, measured pace. A faint humming sound reached his ears. At first he wasn’t sure what it was, and jiggled a finger judiciously in one ear to help clear it in case he was hearing things, but no. The hum grew in volume as the lights picked up pace, spinning faster in alternating tight and loose circles and swirls. The lights separated into more, smaller, lights, and soon thin strands of silvery energy coalesced within the sacred circle, lengthening to a foot, two feet, more.

The hackles on the back of his neck danced and his teeth chattered, if not from the chill, then from a deep crawling sensation within his belly. Something was happening here, something he’d never experienced before. He didn’t understand it, but he felt it. It had the feeling of something otherworldly, monumental.

He glanced back toward the cottage, but saw little of it through the swirling snow. He turned back to the swirling energies within the circle. By now the silvery strands swirled some seven feet in height, from the ground up, and spun around right at the edges of the sacred circle. The strands were spinning so fast now that he had lost count of how many there were. The strands had become ribbons and the ribbons had morphed into a curtained pillar of bright silver energy.

As he stared at the energies, he felt Ennie’s hand press into one of his own. He glanced down at her, at his side, and offered a surprised smile. She had a long black cloak on, clenched shut against the weather. She stared her bright eyes at the curtain of light and smiled.

“It’s happening, Kendrus. By all the gods and the mighty hand of Tempus, it’s happening.” She blinked back tears. “In all my years, I never thought I’d see such a sight.”

Kendrus stared at her, noted that she had a folded burgundy cloak under her free arm. He focused on the spinning, glowing curtain. “Is it a sign from the gods?”

Ennie squeezed his hand. “It’s a Returning.”

As if in confirmation of her statement, the pillar of silver light reached its maximum spinning speed, and the humming modulated into a howl. Then, with a clap of thunder and a flash of blinding light, the whole pillar exploded in a fireworks display of sound and color, and then, all was calm aside from the falling snow and the constant breeze.

Kendrus blinked his eyes several times, trying to clear the bright spots the explosion of light had created. Ennie gave a sharp intake of breath. Together, they stared up and into the sacred circle.

Standing in the center of the circle, on ground strangely devoid of snow, stood a tall man, naked to the elements. At first Kendrus thought the man must be frozen, as he had light blue skin streaked with darker shades, but no. It was the man’s natural skin color, if such a thing could be considered natural. The man had shoulder length hair, dark blue in color.

As Kendrus stared, the man blinked his iris-less ivory eyes and then turned toward Kendrus and Ennie. In a quiet, almost hesitant voice, the man said, “Greetings. I am…,” and here he paused, as if remembering something from the shadowy depths of time. “My name is Amulek.”

Scribe Ineti

So, after running a nice 12-session arc of a 4e Eberron game last year, my group took a bit of a break from gaming but have been getting back to it of late. One of the players in the group has started a 4e Forgotten Realms game, and I'm really enjoying the opportunity to play the game for the first time as something other than the DM.

I'm playing a deva avenger based out of the Grey Vales, and so far the story has centered around that area. We just hit second level last week, and tonight's session will be the first to showcase our new leet skills. Or whatever.

The game is just as much fun to play as it is to DM, so that's a plus. What's even better is that the online tools (particularly the character builder and the compendium) are much farther along than they were when I was DMing Eberron, so the FR game is just that much better organized.

In the coming days, I'll post some stuff on my character in the the FR game in addition to my notes on getting my Eberron game ready for the next story arc.

To paraphrase Scotty from the new Trek movie, "I love this game. It's exciting!"

Scribe Ineti

For all two of you reading this blog....

The game didn't actually die. We ran a solid twelve sessions and got the PCs to fifth level before taking a break for the 2008 holidays, and then once the new year rolled around the group of players were caught up in life and other things.

One of the players started running a 4e Forgotten Realms game about a month ago, and now I'm in the process of playing that but also getting my notes together to run the next short arc of Eberron sessions. I expect we'll start soon.

As part of the return, I'm hoping to get my session notes from the first twelve sessions together so that I can actually get around to updating this blog!

Scribe Ineti

I had a chance last night to download and mess with the character builder software that's currently in closed beta for DDI. I was quite impressed. It looks like it'll be a great tool once it's fully operational.

Unfortunately, my party is currently 4th level about to hit 5th level, so the builder beta is of somewhat limited immediate use.

However, I plugged in two of the characters and realized that we had erred on some math, so we made corrections to our homebrew sheets.

Anyway, once the builder is fully operational, it plus the encounter tool will more than cover the subscription cost, in my eyes. Getting Dungeon and Dragon free is a bonus.

Scribe Ineti

While I haven't been posting to this blog in some time, the game has been going on since I stopped posting. The players sort of stopped compiling notes for the sessions, and I haven't had time to compile them myself.

We'll be running the eleventh session of the game this week, at which point Book I of the campaign will close and we'll take a short break for the holidays before continuing the story. I expect to use part of the break to revise all the raw notes I have in hand and to bring this blog fully up to date.

I see a lot of my posts have many reads but no comments, so someone is reading.

Scribe Ineti

This session was a lot of fun to run. The PCs had a lot of stuff going on subplot-wise, and I really enjoyed giving each of them a chance to do some stuff. Malkaius had a great conversation with Captain Folston about various and sundry, and that discussion sparked a number of potential plot hooks.

Malakith had a chat with a fellow Blood of Vol devotee, and that also sparked some subplot potential (and indirectly provided possible next steps for the group).

Zenya and Diesa also had something to do, though not quite as much. I need to work on getting them both more involved.

As for the combat encounters, the venture into the sewers went pretty well, but I could have balanced it better. The first encounter was against one dire rat and several giant rats and it was far too easy for the group.

The second encounter, though, with one deathjump spider, two dire rats, and three giant rats, was much harder for the group, partly because the DJS was rather powerful and rolled well on its attacks.

The third encounter with the sewage elemental was easy by comparison. I'll continue to work on making each and every encounter challenging to some degree.

Other than that, I think it was a session that went very well, notably because of how late we played. Coffee around 11:00 for some of the players helped a lot.

Scribe Ineti

Played on Friday, August 15th, 8:20 pm–2:00 am; attended by Jim, Andi, Matt, Jess, Tom

The following morning, the group shares a frugal breakfast as Keddis and his employees clean up the debris from the battle in the early morning hours. As his workers drag the corpses of the rats out back and pile them up to be burned, Keddis expresses his gratitude for the party’s help.

It is clear to all that Zenya is not doing well; she is pale and weak from the filth fever. She explains that there is someone who might be able to help, and the other members of the group offer to accompany her back to the Maisson district to seek aid. As the heroes prepare to leave, Talbot enters the inn. He beckons Malkaius over and tells him that Captain Folston would like to take him up on his offer and wishes to see him. The tiefling states that he will pay a visit in the afternoon.

Our heroes make the trip to Soraia’s, an upscale brothel just a few doors down from Madame DuVey’s, where Malkaius, Diesa and Malakith had searched for Adelbert a few nights ago. Zenya asks her companions to wait outside, and she enters. Inside, Agata greets the young half-elf with a mixture of relief and a scolding tongue. When she learns that Zenya has contracted the filth fever while battling dire rats, the old housekeeper is aghast. “Dire rats?!” she cries out, and a moment later, Malakith, Malkaius and Diesa burst into the kitchen, weapons drawn. “Where are the Dire Rats?” exclaims Malkaius, his hands crackling with arcane power.

Agata shrieks, and Zenya quickly restores calm, explaining that these people are her friends. After calming down, Agata cooks up a nice, full breakfast for everyone and the heroes chow down eagerly as the housekeeper goes to fetch Sister Bertilla, the brothel’s on-retainer cleric of the Sovereign Host (and of the goddess Boldrei in specific). After a moment Bertilla, a large female dwarf, arrives, pulling closed her robes of the faith and brushing her disheveled hair out of her face. Following a ritual of disease curing (which isn’t inexpensive), Bertilla restores Zenya to good health, but not before Malkaius gives away that Zenya has been staying at the Broken Shard Inn. Agata is most displeased to hear this information. Zenya, in turn, is most displeased with Malkaius, and shoos the group out before they can reveal anything else.

As the four heroes walk back to the Broken Shard Inn, they make plans for the day. They all agree that the most logical next place to look for clues is the city’s sewers, since the word on the street is that it’s where the Ratter and his lair can be found. However, Malkaius very much wants to keep his appointment with Captain Folston. Agreeing it would be better to get their personal errands out of the way first, the group splits up.

Diesa makes her rounds at the local merchants in the hopes of locating more of her clan’s lost hoard, but comes up empty handed. Malakith plants himself in a barstool at the Inn and downs one pint of ale after another. While he drinks, he converses with a fellow Blood of Vol devotee named Joval who brings news from the south. It seems that southwest of Starilaskur, near the Seawall Mountains, the Kech Sharrat goblin tribe is growing restless, possibly threatening to rise up against Darguun’s more peaceful ruling caste of goblinoids. Rumors suggest the foul necromancer Naar’kul is a likely source of these troubles. Joval mentions that the Kech Sharrat can be recognized by the sword-shaped brands on their arms, and also mentions that there are rumors of mercenary bands massing in Darguun at the Gathering Stone and around the ruined Cyrean city of Lyrenton.

Malakith listens to the news with concern, and dispatches a message to the Crimson Monastery to pass along the news. In addition, Brother Joval states that he will make the long journey to the Crimson Monastery himself to deliver the news and to inform their brotherhood of the likelihood of impending hostilities. It seems the Last War, while officially over, hasn’t truly ended.

In the meantime, Zenya takes Malkaius to Captain Folston’s house in Maisson (a route Malkaius jokingly claims that he could nearly walk blindfolded by now, though he is grateful for the company). Talbot greets them and shows the warlock to Folston’s room. Malkaius and the Captain converse for some time, talking in part about the Cult of the Black Feather, the Raven Queen, and Folston’s expedition to Xen’drik. Folston rambles on about one of his allies, a tiefling warrior named Keezelbar, who was a ferocious fighter and had lost a horn in battle. Folston recalls seeing Keezelbar fall in a battle while on the dark continent.

During the conversation, Malkaius notes that the Captain is actually a good deal younger than he had assumed, and that, rather than suffering from the ravages of old age, Folston is instead being consumed by a terrible, wasting disease. Folston mentions that all twelve surviving members of his company’s expedition to Xen’drik had the same affliction. Malkaius vows to learn the nature of the illness and if possible, find a cure. Malkaius also pledges that he will continue to search for the Captain’s lost treasures. With that, he and Zenya depart the townhouse and return to the inn.

The heroes decide to rest for the night and venture into the sewers in the morning. That night, Zenya spends some time on the rooftops, watching the city’s nocturnal activities. That clever halfling thief slips onto the rooftop behind her and the two have a brief conversation. The halfling offers Zenya the manacles he appropriated from Diesa, but Zenya passes on taking them. The halfling shrugs, smiles, then scales the wall and slips into Diesa’s room to drop off the manacles along with a yellow rose before disappearing into the depths of the moons-lit city.

In the morning, Diesa discovers the manacles and the rose and falls into a foul mood. After a quick breakfast, the adventurers arm and equip themselves for the excursion into the sewers. The journey is fraught with danger. The party battles through numerous huge rats and at one point, a large leaping spider that nearly ends Malkaius’ life. All the while a mad, cackling laughter echoes in the dank tunnels. It doesn’t take long for the players to find its source: the Ratter himself comes forth, clearly quite insane. He wears a strange ring set with a glowing sapphire, and as the party looks on, he summons forth an oozing, amorphous creature from the depths of a murky sewage pit.

Despite a grueling battle, the heroes prevail and destroy the foul smile elemental and its master. When Malkaius notes the arcane symbols carved into Ratter’s flesh, all doubt is erased from his mind. Naar’kul was behind the theft of Folston’s items, for only he marks his victims in such a manner. With a heavy heart, the tiefling throws the broken body of the burglar over his shoulder, determined that he should receive a proper burial.

Zenya searches the Ratter’s nest and finds two potions with light green fluid in them and the black velvet bag with the crimson drawstring that Captain Folston had lost. On closer inspection, she realizes that it’s a magical pouch of holding, and inside is a cache of gold coins. Also inside the bag is the lost piece of ironwood set with gems: the second of Captain Folston’s treasures has been found! One of the gems is unusual; a diamond laced with golden swirls of energy. When Zenya gazes into the gem, she sees swirling patterns. Malkaius recognizes the strange shapes as the glyphs called dragonmarks. The two potions turn out to be potions of healing, a useful find for the group.

The group leaves the sewers behind for a meal, but Keddis refuses to allow them entrance to the Inn until they’ve all been thoroughly bathed. After a round of hot baths and a meal, the heroes deliver the recovered treasures to Captain Folston. In gratitude, he allows the party to keep the items, including the gold contained in the pouch of holding. He also answers several questions about the origins of the ironwood talisman, explaining that it is one of a set and that several of his allies from the Xen’drik expedition had each carried one. Over the years he lost track of most of his companions, though he does recall that one of them, an eladrin named Davon, recently resided in the Zil city of Korranberg, far to the south from Starilaskur.

The heroes return to the Broken Shard Inn for a well-deserved night’s rest. Their first adventure together has been a success, but it is clear to all that there’s more to come.

Scribe Ineti

Thought it might be interesting to post the house rules I'm using in my game and check out what others are using in their own games...

House rules worth noting:

Luck points will be represented by blue poker chips. Luck points are earned by doing cool game-related things, like making a miniature for your character, writing a story or journal entry or the like, giving the GM good food or other bribes, managing the initiative tracker, taking session notes, etc. Luck points can be spent by a player at any time to provide a +1 modifier to any die roll that player's character makes in the game (attack, damage, skill roll, saving throw, etc.).

DM Comment: I like to have some sort of fate point or the like in my games, to help out whenever players happen to just miss a difficulty check or are having a rough die rolling night.

You may spend three (3) Luck Points to reroll a single d20 die roll (for skill uses, combat, saves, etc.).

DM Comment: Again, an effort to help players when they're having bad dice luck, specifically when they roll poorly when using a pricey daily power.

Scribe Ineti

This session was pretty easy to prepare for and run. I designed the encounter with the goblins and used the MM pdf to cut and paste the monster stat blocks into a Word document, so that was pretty handy--no page flipping required during the session, which continues to be a godsend for the game and for 4e.

I'm continually impressed with how quick encounters pass by and are resolved. Combat is quick and exciting, even moreso as the players and I get the rules ingrained into our brains.

The plot continues to thicken at a nice pace, and the characters are starting to come to life through the players' role-play.

In this session, Matt (playing the tiefling warlock Malkaius) had a nice RP scene that ended with sort of a throwaway line, but I latched onto that line and have a good followup scene for him in Chapter Three.

As a GM, having players do good RP that advances both the overall campaign and their own subplots is a great gift. This campaign is starting to veer into the territory where the PCs are driving the events rather than reacting to events tossed at them.

This is a great thing, for several reasons. Makes it easier for me to plan sessions, gives them a greater sense of ownership of the campaign's direction, and gives us all deeper stakes in the campaign as a whole.

Scribe Ineti

Played on Friday, August 8th, 8:15 pm–12:30 am; attended by Jim, Andi, Matt, Jess, Tom

Chapter Two opens with a brisk fight between the goblins and the party. Zenya is perched on a nearby rooftop, and decides to help the three cornered strangers in the fight.

Though the goblins are many, the skill and luck of the heroes proves more than enough to overcome the foes. During the battle, the halfling thief frees himself and flees. Zenya catches him, but appears to slip as she tries to wrestle him to the ground. The halfling manages to escape, carrying with him Diesa’s manacles, which the Dwarf Ranger had thrown at him while he ran.

Also of note during the fight, Zenya sees something reflected in Malakith’s scales, and later a similar pattern when Malkaius uses his powers of teleportation. She does not share her observations with the group, though they appear to cause her some consternation.

When the battle is over, the characters introduce themselves and agree that the best course of action is to return to the safety of the Broken Shard Inn to get some rest. Diesa, however, asks if the group can detour to the shop where more of her family’s treasure is being held. She purchases the remaining items, and the group returns to the inn.

Over a hot breakfast, the characters exchange information about their mutual employer. Asked about her two-day absence, Zenya explains that Talbot is simply being impatient, and that she wasn’t in any danger as he feared. After reading over Adelbert’s invitation, the half-elf rogue asks if she can come along with the group to meet the Gnome. She knows the city and its inhabitants very well, and everyone agrees that she could be a very valuable addition to the group.

After a quick meal, the four adventurers set out. Malkaius stops along the way to purchase a fine silk robe, and then the party journeys across town to the rich district, soon arriving at Adelbert’s well-appointed town home.

Adelbert meets with the group. He is an older gnome of some wealth, and demonstrates early and often his appetite for half-elven women. He flirts incessantly with Zenya, but pauses long enough to confirm her suspicions that a local burglar by the name of Ratter was likely the culprit in the theft of Captain Folston’s magic items. However, Ratter must have had help to execute such a sophisticated crime; entering Folston’s home from a locked upper-level window without being detected is clearly beyond even his considerable skills.

It is then that Adelbert drops a bombshell. Rumors are swirling that the dreaded necromancer Naar’kul is in the area, which could offer one explanation for how Ratter was able to claim Folston’s artifacts. Malkaius adds that it would make sense; Naar’kul has spent years searching for items of arcane power, though no one knows his true purpose for doing so. If Naar’kul is involved, suggests the tiefling warlock, then the job at hand could be far more dangerous.

The next move is clear: the group must confirm that Ratter indeed committed the crime, and then learn who aided him, and why. This might not be a simple task, explains Adelbert. Ratter hasn’t been seen since the theft. As the group rises to leave, they ask what payment the gnome requires for the information. Adelbert graciously offers it for free, but Malakith agrees to provide his services should a future favor be needed.

On the way back to the Broken Shard, Malkaius asks Zenya to guide him to the local office of House Sivis, so that he can send a report back to the Temple of the Black Feather regarding the rumors of Naar’kul’s presence. She obliges, though she stays far away from the building. After the errand is done, the two resume their walk and Zenya offers the tiefling some advice: he should reign in his religious zeal, as the common folk don’t generally want to hear about death. Malkaius is grateful for the advice, and agrees to make an effort.

When Diesa and Malakith return to the Broken Shard, they find Talbot seated at his usual corner table. They catch him up on the progress of their job, and inform him that they have successfully located Zenya. A few minutes later, she walks through the door, confirming the story. Malakith informs Talbot that their job is done, and it’s time to pay up. Talbot disagrees; it was his understanding that the job was to recover the stolen magic items. Diesa and Malakith press their point, and Talbot reluctantly offers them payment of 100 gold, instead of the agreed-upon 150.

He hands the coin to Malakith, Diesa and Malkaius, but the warlock refuses. He takes only enough gold to cover his expenses, adding that he will find the magic items for 150 gold as Talbot wished, to be paid only upon completion of the task. In truth, Malkaius is more concerned with Captain Folston’s health than with money. He offers to console the ailing Captain, should Talbot wish it. Grateful, Talbot offers his thanks and departs.

Shortly afterward, Zenya departs to make some inquiries about Ratter’s whereabouts. Everyone else decides to hole up in the Broken Shard for the remainder of the day.

That night, the party is awakened by the sounds of crashing furniture and breaking dishes from the ground floor. Someone or something is ransacking the inn! The group quickly equip themselves for action and race out to see what’s going on. The main floor is crawling with huge rats, and they are trashing the place. With a smirk, Zenya quips that her inquiries about Ratter appear to have been answered.

Hissing and snarling, the rats advance up the stairs, their eyes filled with bloodlust. A spirited battle follows. At one points, Zenya bravely leaps down from the first floor balcony into the middle of the tavern room, and is swarmed by rats. She is badly wounded, but Malkaius jumps down after her and helps her pick off the creatures before she is overwhelmed. Meanwhile, Diesa and Malakith hold forth at the top of the stairs, pummeling the rats as they come up. Makakith loses his weapon at one point, but perseveres to the end of the skirmish.

The battle is hard fought, but in the end our heroes prevail. However, it quickly becomes clear that the rogue has not escaped entirely unscathed. The wounds inflicted upon her by the pestilent rats have caused Zenya to contract the foul filth fever.

As the heroes take a breather and weigh their options, the session comes to an end.

Scribe Ineti

This session was run as a solo because the player was out of town and missed the first session. It was a good chance to get to know the thief and how she normally operates.

The fight with the bandits went pretty easily. I think four minions against one PC might be too easy of a fight, but it was fun and fast, so I'm happy with that.

It was also fun weaving in the solo character into the storyline already begun in the first session, and it was fun to see certain moments from the first session reflected in Zenya's eyes as she 'coincidentally' ended up in the same place as the other players.

All in all, a good session which proved to be a good warmup for the second chapter of the game, run on the following night.

Scribe Ineti

Zenya’s stepmother turned out to be a stereotypical Russian grandmother! And the DM does that type of character a BIT too well.

Also turns out that Zenya is something of an Eberron version of Altaïr from Assassin's Creed.

Scribe Ineti

(Continued from Part I)

As Zenya is walking down the alley, she notices a black dragonborn casing Madame DuVey’s. She looks around, and sees a female dwarf and a tiefling also watching the brothel. She stays and watches them for a while until one of Madame DuVey’s servants gives a packet to the dragonborn and the three of them leave.

As she returns to Candlemarket, a voice calls out from a nearby alley asking if she’s looking for Adelbert. Zenya takes a quick glance around, and tells the man if he’s got information for her, to come out and walk with her for a while. As he moves out into the street, she draws a dagger and holds it against her leg while she continues to walk. He walks with her for a short way, and then tries to give a signal, but Zenya stabs him in the throat and begins to run. Three bandits jump out and give chase. She kills one with a well-aimed dagger throw, stabs the second one after he hits her with his cudgel, and grabs the third. She throws him against the wall and puts her dagger to his throat, demanding to know who hired them.

The poor thug is drunk and not very coherent. All he can tell Zenya was that one of the dead bandits hired him, and mentions something about being hired by Adelbert. As she lets the thug go, she catches moonlight sparkle in some of the blood spatter out of the corner of her eye, making a similar sigil she saw in the window of Captain Folston’s. She concentrates and feels the same burning heat between her shoulder blades, and can see the sigil more clearly, but detects no magic nearby. She returns to her room and draws out the sigil on a scrap of paper.

The next morning, as she’s freshening up, she hears a loud crash from one of the rooms on the second floor. She glances out her window to see a halfling race across the street and down through the market as he tucks a packet into his tunic. Following close behind is the dragonborn and tiefling she saw last night, in their bedclothes and yelling for the halfling to stop. Behind them comes the female dwarf, carrying her gear.

Zenya grabs her gear and swings out onto the rooftops to follow the chase. She notes the tiefling makes a few wrong turns as she leaps over his head from rooftop to rooftop, and is impressed with the stamina and determination of the dwarf ranger. The dwarf finally corners the halfling in a cul-de-sac in Little Darguun, shackles him, and takes back the packet. Zenya crouches down on the rooftop to watch. The dragonborn and tiefling catch up just as a guttural shout distracts them. Zenya looks down and sees a dozen armed goblins closing in on the group!

Scribe Ineti

Played on Thursday, August 7th, 9:30 pm–12:30 am.; attended by Jim, Andi

Late one night, the half-elf rogue Zenya is on a rooftop in the Southgate district of Starilaskur, performing a minor surveillance job for a local merchant. The object of her mission is a small warehouse frequently leased out to mercenary bands or traders. Zenya knows that the dwarven owner tends to take lease money first and ask questions later, and as a result it’s frequently the base of shady black market deals. She suspects the dwarf gets a cut of these deals as a part of the leases he makes.

Zenya notes the single guard making a lazy circuit around the warehouse. He looks more bored than alert and Zenya can see his jealous expression—he obviously wants to join in the dicing and drinking. After an hour of watching, Zenya hears a noise on a rooftop nearby. The warehouse door opens and a raucous voice calls out, “Oi! Franken! Time to change shifts!” An unsteady guard takes the place of the first. Over this noise, Zenya hears movement on the rooftop again, and this time can make out a shadow moving closer to the warehouse.

The guard begins fussing with a pipe, and Zenya hears the soft sound of a sling, and the guard slumps to the ground. A slight humanoid figure leaps from his perch to the roof of the warehouse.

Curious, Zenya moves to the rooftop of the building to her left, which has a better view of the warehouse roof. She sees a dark-cloaked halfling open a roof hatch and drop out of sight. She leaps onto the warehouse herself and peeks into the open hatch. It opens into a small storage room. The halfling is not in sight, and Zenya notes the dice game has wound down and it sounds like the group is snoring. She moves to a shadowy corner of the rooftop and settles in to wait.

After about 15 minutes, the halfling hoists himself out of the hatch. He looks a bit heavier than he did when he first entered the warehouse. As he turns to close the hatch, she slips up behind him and quietly twists his right arm behind him as she places a dagger to his throat. Zenya chuckles at his discomfort and proceeds to pump him for information.

She learns that the group is a small mercenary band, likely from Thrane, consisting of eight humans, three half-elves, and an eladrin. They’re decently armed, and one of the humans is the leader. They had a payroll that they’ll notice is missing in the morning. The halfling is pretty sure they were not part of the standard type of business that usually happens at the warehouse.

After Zenya persuades the halfling to give her a small portion of his gains, she lets him go. After he is well gone, she takes up her original position to continue her watch. The only thing of note is the guard waking up, rubbing his head and going in to continue sleeping. Just before dawn, Zenya leaves and moves along the rooftops back to Candlemarket. She quietly drops down through the window into her 3rd floor room at the Broken Shard Inn.

She cleans up and changes, then goes down to the common room. Keddis, the innkeeper, is starting to prepare for customers, and tells Zenya there was a man looking for her—well-dressed with two bodyguards. Even with the backup, the man was nervous and obviously out of place in Candlemarket.

While Zenya eats her breakfast, Larig, the human merchant who sent her on the surveillance mission, sits down at her table. She reports on the lax security, the number of men, and the information she’d gathered. However, she doesn’t mention the thief. She lets him know that it’s all very general information, but he wasn’t paying enough for her to sneak in and get more detail. He agrees, pays her for the night’s work, and leaves.

A few hours later, the aforementioned lordly-type peeks into the common room. He’s well-dressed in blue and silver, and has two bodyguards who station themselves on either side of the door. He tentatively approaches Zenya’s table, and introduces himself as Talbot.

He explains that his benefactor, Captain Folston, had recently moved to the Maisson district of Starilaskur, and had some items stolen from his house. Specifically, the Captain was one of the few members of his regiment to survive an expedition to Xen’drik, and two items from that expedition were stolen: a black velvet pouch with a crimson drawstring and a piece of ironwood with four inset gems. Zenya asks to look at the place the items were taken from, and tells Talbot she’ll make up her mind about taking the job at that point. He agrees, and he and the bodyguards escort her to Captain Folston’s townhouse.

Zenya recognizes the street as a secure, well-lit, and heavily patrolled area of Maisson. Few successful break-ins happen here—it’s a well-protected area. Talbot leaves her in the main entrance and goes to ask Captain Folston for permission for her to inspect the site. He returns to let her know that although the captain is resting in the room, she’s free to take a look around, and leads her up the stairs and down a hallway to a bedroom. The only items of furniture are a curtained bed (with labored breathing coming from within), a large chest of drawers, and a stand containing some long-unused armor and a sword belt. The only entrances are a double-paned stained glass window and the doorway to the hall.

Talbot opens the top drawer, and explains that this is where the items were. The majority of the captain’s wealth is kept in a secure vault, but these items had sentimental value. As Zenya is looking around the room, she catches a glimpse of a strange sigil out of the corner of her eye as the sunlight hits the window’s glass. She goes closer to inspect it, and concentrates. An area between her shoulder blades burns, and she feels the residue of some levitation or flying magic in the area. As she reaches for the window latch, she notices some tiny scratches. She calls Talbot over, and explains that this is where the thief entered—he used a tool to open the window. She opens the window and looks out—the window is in the middle of a smooth wall—very difficult to climb, but not impossible. She recommends they bolt some iron strips to the outside of the windows so a tool cannot be placed in the cracks of the windows of the townhouse again.

She tells Talbot she’ll take the job, but cannot guarantee she’ll recover the items. It’ll take at least a couple of days for her to get even the most basic of information for them. He takes her to another room, and they haggle a bit. She agrees to 50 gold up front and 150 gold if she can return the items.

With that, she leaves and makes a few rounds to some of her better contacts among the fences, thieves, and merchants of Maisson. Knowing it’ll take most of the day and night for the word to spread; she takes herself back to her room to make up for the sleep she lost the night before.

The next day, Zenya checks with her contacts. There’s not much to hear, although “The Ratter,” a local thief who lives somewhere in the sewers, was bragging about a good haul, and Adelbert, a well-off gnome merchant is reportedly in town. With only that information at hand, Zenya decides to track down Adelbert since she knows where he’ll be, and she has no desire to traipse through the sewers looking for the Ratter’s lair.

In the early evening, Zenya heads to Maisson. She walks quickly through the streets, and ducks into a back alley behind Soraia’s, one of many upper-class brothels. She walks through the kitchen door and puts her hands over the cook’s eyes and whispers, “Hello, Agata.”

Agata screams Zenya’s name and turns around to greet her. When she sees Zenya in her practical, dark clothes she sighs. “Zenya, you’re so skinny! Do they never feed you down in that slum you live in now? Sit down! Have some soup! I don’t know why you insist on wearing those ugly clothes! You’re such a pretty girl! What a waste!”

Zenya protests that Keddis feeds her quite well, and Candlemarket is not a slum. Agata, although very pleased to see her, can’t keep from scolding her and insisting she eat. To get her to stop fussing, Zenya sits down with a bowl of soup.

Agata complains that Zenya came by just as the house was getting busy. Zenya mentions she did it on purpose. She’s looking for Adelbert, and knows he stops off at Soraia’s when he’s in town. Agata puts her hands on her hips and looks down at her former charge, “Adelbert! Ah, Zenya, you know his weakness for the half-elf ladies. He commented so frequently on how nicely you were growing up! You could’ve had such a good life…”

Zenya interrupts, saying she doesn’t want to talk about her life choices, she’s trying to work, she just wants to know if Adelbert is here, or somewhere else tonight. Agata tells her that Adelbert has already been to Soraia’s, and is most likely over at Madame DuVey’s, although she shouldn’t be telling her this, because the houses need to keep the clients’ privacy, and she’s breaking so many rules just by saying that…

Zenya interrupts again, exclaiming, “Ma! Enough! I just want to talk to him, really! I won’t tell anyone else, I promise.”

Agata fusses more at Zenya, and then tells her she needs to get back to the food. Zenya asks Agata to tell Shield, the brothel’s resident warforged bouncer, she said “Hello” and slips back out the door and down the alley to Madame DuVey’s.

When she reaches the kitchen door of Madame DuVey’s, she knocks, and one of the kitchen girls escorts her in to speak with Tara, the head cook. Tara looks down on Zenya, and occasionally makes references to “Poor Agata’s failure”. However, she agrees to give a note to Adelbert for her, and once the note is in Tara’s hands, she has one of the kitchen girls escort Zenya out.

To be continued

Scribe Ineti

Stream of consciousness comments about this session...

I bought the 4e Monster Manual as a PDF and using that and a freeware screenshot program, it was insanely easy to cut out exactly the stat blocks I needed and stick them into a Word document encounter sheet for use during the game. With a cheat sheet in hand and the encounter sheets, I didn't have to do any page-flipping in the hardcovers, which was just awesome. Saved a ton of time that was better spent on narrating and role-playing.

The combat encounter went really fast; seven baddies vs three PCs whose players were fairly comfortable with 4e (after two playtest sessions). Total encounter time was under an hour, and it never felt like it slowed down, and was full of good moments.

The players did some really good roleplaying, and one of the players (Matt, playing Malkaius) took really good notes.

I haven't run D&D in any form since 1989, when the second edition came out, so this was a very refreshing change of pace. I think the session went really well and I'm looking forward to running many more to come.

The three PCs each gained 308 XP in the session, so it looks like my initial estimate of gaining one level every three sessions is about right. I had originally estimated 90 sessions to get from level 1 to level 30...

Scribe Ineti