Defenders of Daybreak, The Early Years.

Wouldn't the onion smell after so long? And you actually wrote down an individual onion? Not just food, or fruits, or whatever?

Thats pretty freaky.

I like the binder idea. I may have to switch to that format.

I have a question: why did Maddoc leave? Did he not find your game enjoyable (however hard that may be to believe)

Arcade’s Journal – Nostradis Ghend and the Brotherhood of Night, Part 1

...Cadrienne’s dream-visions are getting progressively more strange. Very concerning. We feel as if we are racing against time. Highdark (the day of Solstice) arrives in a few days....

...passed through beautiful Phorn, a city of many temples. There we met a young half-elven cleric named Glimmer. Cadrienne claimed to have had a vision in which he accompanied us, and he was pleased to join the group at our request. He worships Aliana, Goddess of Beauty. I find him a bit trying, as he never ceases complaining about dirt. He also despises things that are ugly, and is quite blunt in his criticism of all and sundry. After Nolin, Alix, and Glimmer I find myself wishing to meet a pleasant, affable, stable half-elf. Perhaps it is their mixed heritage. Although, Rofan is human....

...stopped at the Inn of the Way on the way to Siryth. There we heard news about a cruel mage named Nostradis Ghend. As the proprietor described Ghend, Cadrienne recognized him from her visions as Maddoc’s kidnapper. He is reputed to steal black farm animals, and is also suspected of kidnapping local citizens. Mikal, village elder of Siryth, spoke out against Ghend's tyranny and disappeared within the last day or two. His young son Bram is still out looking for him. We are making all speed to Siryth....

...Nolin keeps being mistaken for other people: an elf named Reldin at Crellar’s, an old boyfriend of the innkeeper’s daughter named Nilden at the Inn of the Way, and Rindalth, a warrior elf, here in Siryth at the Bountiful Tappe. Most bizarre. Nolin has no explanation....

...encountered Rudra the Wise Woman. She gave us directions to Ghend’s mysterious tower. Sadly, Rofan’s mental grip has loosened again. Today he met a sheepdog and concluded that it was his Goddess, and that it’s fleas were her Messengers. He promptly set about acquiring the fleas for himself. We have no time for this nonsense.

We go tonight to scout out the tower. Tomorrow is Highdark....

Hammerhead said:

Wouldn't the onion smell after so long? And you actually wrote down an individual onion? Not just food, or fruits, or whatever?

Thats pretty freaky.

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Boy howdy, did that onion stink! Saved my life, too, although for the life of me i can't remember what from.

Anybody?

I think something was about to take a big bite out of Dylrath, and he had lost his dagger and was really low level at the time, so not much left in his bag of tricks. I remember frantically searching through the character sheet for anything, anything at all that would save my bacon.

And then I found the onion.

Hurled into the monster's mouth, it did cause the monster to, uh, pause in the bite attack long enough for someone--probably Tao--to rescue Dylly.

(It must have been tied up tightly in a leather bag to keep everyone from noticing it earlier . . .)

The reason he had an onion specifically was that when I brought him in, his supplies and equipment consisted of the shirt and pants and shoes he was wearing, a flask of water, a bread roll and an onion, which was approximately equal to what Oliver Twist was carrying on his journey to London.

I mean, if ya got to bring a first level character into a sixth/seventh level party, ya may as well go for the gusto, right?

Alix

The thing about Alix was, he was one of the two most original rogues I have ever seen played. Tomtom being the other.

No, they were the only two original rogues I had ever seen played.

They gave new meaning to the form, and I adored them for it.

I have always been a player of rogues myself, even though in this case I was running the cleric, Cadrienne. So I really appreciated what they were pulling off.

They destroyed the concept of the rogue as petty cutpurse for me forever. No more risking sticking my hands into people's pockets. No more trying to lift stuff from shopkeepers.
No more wearing dull colored clothes and lurking in shadows. Fuhgeddabout it.


Alix wore cloth of gold suits with ruby buttons. Tomtom dressed in as many clashing colors and patterns as he could find. They hid in ways so unexpected that what they were wearing never mattered. How could you lose sight of someone wearing that? Must not be here at all.

They bribed lavishly. They suckered rubes. They made land deals. They bought low and sold high. They imported items without paying tarriffs. They bargained fiercely and acquired goods in ways legal but more theft-like than outright stealing would have been. When they backstabbed, they backstabbed whole economies.

It was a thing of beauty.

Tomtom is much more workmanlike, detail oriented, even fastidious, about knowing the rules to his own advantage.

Alix was a stretcher of boundaries.

A mind that works like Alix's, well, it was bound to run afoul of the actual rules at some point.

And I can't help but think it was because he got bored without the strong lawfuls in the party to flout. Arcade, Cadrienne, and then Dylrath and Claris, all worked hard to balance Alix, to give him something to push against all the time.

After the players of those characters all moved away at once, for a long while there were only the lawful NPCs to challenge, and that either got dull quickly, or at least it meant that the player was always trying to pull something off on Piratecat, which was bound to get out of control eventually.

It's a pity, really, that he never got to work with most of the current Defenders. He would so have enjoyed driving them nuts.

And I think they'd have had some surprises for him, too.

Re: Alix

Sialia said:

And I can't help but think it was because he got bored without the strong lawfuls in the party to flout. Arcade, Cadrienne, and then Dylrath and Claris, all worked hard to balance Alix, to give him something to push against all the time.

After the players of those characters all moved away at once, for a long while there were only the lawful NPCs to challenge, and that either got dull quickly, or at least it meant that the player was always trying to pull something off on Piratecat, which was bound to get out of control eventually.

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That's a really insightful take on the issue, and I think you're right. The player is really a boundry pusher, and loves to be put in his place. When these interactions were happening in character, it was occasionally irritating, but added a lot of dramatic crunchyness to the party. When the only person to fight against became the DM, the interaction changed and became less fun for everyone.

And as for the onion, I think it saved you from the Feyr, on the same night that the "throw Dilly to the monsters and run" maneuver was born.

In Sagiro's game Sunday, the enemy troops used maneuvers! It was so cool. In fact, he used the Defender's maneuver numbers.

Watch me un-hijack the thread!

The Nostradis Ghend adventure was also from Dungeon (you seeing a theme, yet?) It was a simple little crunchy eeeevil cult adventure, with a cool tower and some neat plot hooks. It ended up being one of the cornerstones of the campaign for years. You'll especially like how they kill Nostradis Ghend himself! It was... err... unique.

This is the point where I learned the "ripple" trick to DMing: everything the PCs do creates ripples. Sometimes they die out, sometimes they cause other important things to occur. You'll see that the next time that the PCs stop by Crellar's Inn, and you'll see it in what happens to the Brotherhood of Night.

Piratecat said:

Arcade died the second time.

The first time (described above), the adventure was taken froma wonderful Dungeon adventure called "Night of Fear" (or something like that.)

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That would be Night of Fear by Mark Lucas in Dungeon 28. ;-)

The Dungeon website nowadays sports an index of all adventures ever published in it, find it at:

http://www.wizards.com/dungeon/index.asp?s=name

The un-hijacking continues. Read on folks! Plenty of meat in this one.

Arcade’s Journal – Nostradis Ghend and the Brotherhood of Night, Part 2

...Ghend’s black tower. It is 60’ high, on a small hill in the middle of a clearing, surrounded by deep woods. There are a few small outbuildings to the northwest, including a large two story barn. The tower has a large double door, but no visible windows....

...upon entering the clearing we were attacked by two large wolves. A timely Sleep spell saved Glimmer from a torn-out throat, and we dispatched both of them. More trouble from the new members: Rofan tried to launch his bola at a wolf and badly entangled himself. While we were still engaged in combat, Alix tricked Rofan into falling into a nearby well where he nearly died. After his rescue all Rofan could do was complain about losing his holy fleas!

We approached the front door. Detection revealed multiple traps. Suddenly, the voice of the mage began taunting us from somewhere above. This enraged Grundo, who tried to charge the door. The acid traps destroyed Grundo’s helm and armor, and we were lucky to escape.

The party was in an angry and vengeful mood. We approached the barn and chicken coop, and the others wanted to kill or steal the animals and burn it down. I managed to talk them out of it, and spent a while trying to find a secret entrance in the barn without success. With no other options, we returned to town to regroup....

...next evening, Highdark, we stealthily returned to the tower. Multiple booby traps had been set, but we managed to avoid them. Guards were spotted on top of the tower. We slipped into the barn, undetected. A brief scuffle ensued with some orcs guarding the barn. Alix spotted one trying to escape up to the loft and chased him. The orc flung open the upper doors to blow his signal horn and had just placed the horn to his lips when Alix tackled him, hurling both of them to the ground and killing the orc. Alix may turn out to be some use after all....

...after a short search of the barn I finally found the secret entrance that I knew had to be there. On a built-in lift, we descended into a dark underground basement tunnel....

...slew the giant spiders in the tunnel and found some valuables in their webs. The hall terminated in another secret door. We found a room full of sheet-covered furniture and supplies, and three well-armed orcs. Rofan hurled his bola at one and connected, wrapping it around the orc’s head. Just as the bola arrived, Nolin swung his sword and decapitated the orc, sending the bola spinning towards the second orc. Alix was in the middle of a tumbling run, but redirected himself in mid-air to catch the head and land perfectly upon a piece of furniture. The third orc managed to grab Glimmer, and held him hostage from behind with a blade at his throat. Rofan wrenched the sword away with one stroke of his bullwhip, and Glimmer raised his legs just as Grundo’s axe swept through at knee height, shortening the orc considerably. The third orc was quickly dispatched, and we congratulated ourselves on a job well done.

Outside the room, behind a tapestry, we found the black, featureless portal of Cadrienne’s visions. We could not get it open, and so proceeded up the stairs....

...searched the first level after killing a few more orcs. We found a speaking-tube. Chanting echoed down through it from somewhere above. We hastened upstairs....

...on the second floor I found the mage’s library. A rapid analysis of his papers reveal that he enjoys anagrams, and that his goal is to obliterate the sun itself. It appears that he sacrifices living beings to power certain rituals that would achieve this goal. I suspect that among these papers is the key to the black portal. But first... Ghend.

...we ran up the next flight, tripping some type of alarm. The taunting voice of the mage beckoned us to our doom. We discovered a large chamber surrounded by a disgusting, sticky curtain of the deepest blood-red. Within moments, most of the party dropped to the floor, victims of a Sleep spell. As we frantically tried to wake the party, a second Sleep spell swept through us. The stairs to the roof were close at hand, and Nolin confirmed for me that the taunting voice was in fact coming from above. I ran upwards towards the voice and onto the roof where I found a giant black rat clad in a waistcoat and hat (quite obviously Ghend’s familiar creature). It taunted me once more and began to flee.

Meanwhile Ghend stepped out from behind the curtain and blasted the party with a black ball of crackling negative energy, nearly killing Nolin. The mage was hit with both thrown warhammer and bola, but both rebounded from him as if from an invisible barrier. Cadrienne began to cast Hold Person, but sadly she (and several others) were struck by Magic Missiles and her spell rebounded upon her.

On the roof, seeing an opportunity, I cast Sleep upon the rat and closed in. Below, Ghend yelled “NO!” and ran for the stairs, bowling over Glimmer in the process. As he reached the top I saw his pale, black-bearded face twisted in hatred. His clawed hands reached towards me.

“Thus do those who serve evil pay the price,” I said, and slew the rat with a single stroke across its throat.

Ghend grabbed his neck, blanched, gurgled softly, and slid down the stairs, landing dead at Glimmer’s feet....

My nasty bad guy, killed through his own familiar's death. I ask you, is there justice in the world?

Reminds me of the cartoon in the 1E Player's handbook or Dungeon Master Guide of the villian holding up the wizard's cat with the caption, "Hold it wizard! One move and the familiar gets it!"