Archade
Azer Paladin
Due to some player shuffling due to real life events, our group's story was rebooted for this campaign, with some existing 1st- and 2nd-level characters. Some elements of the story may seem familiar as I have taken aspects of modules or adventure paths into the campaign plot.
The notable persons of the campaign are:
Sindri, a forest gnome transumuter
Jasper, a tiefling warlock dedicated to the Great Lords of the Elven Court
Mohawe, a tiefling sorcerer also commited to the power of the Elven Court
Lakey, an ifrit jhanndhri fighter
The characters woke up in dark stone pits covered in a fine red dust that smelled like burnt cinnamon, but tasted like old dried blood. They had been unconscious for some time, and some of them were wakened by the biting of small scorpions. After crushing the vermin, they clambered out of the pits to find a blasted rocky plain, surrounded by a burning desert, with racing clouds afire and smoke everywhere.
Exploring the pits, they found a few survivors in the other players, other pits were either empty or contained red-dusted corpses with staved-in skulls. Nearby was a crashed airship, and the rocky outcropping extended for miles to the east and west.
Gathering themselves together, with no weapons or gear other than the clothing and armor they wore, they made their way to the crashed airship, The Queen of the Air, where they found a horrible beast (a Neogi-Thal, a steed for the foul Neogi race), which they defeated with great effort, and recovered some weapons from the dead crew aboard, and later found their gear -- a couple of the characters recalled flying on an airship, as if it were a dream, but their memory was foggy.
Perusing the captains journal and the maps aboard, they determined that they were somewhere within the blasted Theld, a fiery wasteland not travelled by those of rational mind. They also determined that the captain may have been enchanted by a passenger, an elven woman named Ieanna, who convinced them to travel towards the Burning Ford, a trading site the Theldane used on occasion, but all indications showed they had crashed somewhere else, as no living creatures were found.
Girding their equipment, the characters travelled along the eastern edge of the rocky outcropping, and found other crashed airships of various styles and cultures, and other pits containing dust-covered corpses -- they quickly determined whatever had brought these ill-fated ships here, it was clearly a larder for some foul creatures. Defeating ash-caked zombies and camping in axebeak dens, they spent several days travelling south, until they came a landmark -- a large red-hued stone mount southwest. They journeyed there, an on the top of the mount was a stone slab with manacles, and the dark stain of sacrifice. Downhill from the mount, they found yet another crashed ship, this one with a small creature, a smoke mephit named Ecarus that styled itself captain of the downed ship. The mephit told them of a nearby entrance, a magically shut set of doors that could be opened with a ritual of blood. Finding the doors and clearing them of sand and debris, they were covered in carvings of various people in states of agony, while tentacled fiends feasted upon their skulls -- the illithid.
Unable to open the doors, the characters travelled down from the mount, along a trail well-travelled path, and rested for the night ...
(Game notes -- the party found a magic dagger that they have yet to identify, and Jasper took an axebeak egg from a den they stayed in against some of the party's advice. Each character received 225 xp, but no one leveled up).
The notable persons of the campaign are:
Sindri, a forest gnome transumuter
Jasper, a tiefling warlock dedicated to the Great Lords of the Elven Court
Mohawe, a tiefling sorcerer also commited to the power of the Elven Court
Lakey, an ifrit jhanndhri fighter
The characters woke up in dark stone pits covered in a fine red dust that smelled like burnt cinnamon, but tasted like old dried blood. They had been unconscious for some time, and some of them were wakened by the biting of small scorpions. After crushing the vermin, they clambered out of the pits to find a blasted rocky plain, surrounded by a burning desert, with racing clouds afire and smoke everywhere.
Exploring the pits, they found a few survivors in the other players, other pits were either empty or contained red-dusted corpses with staved-in skulls. Nearby was a crashed airship, and the rocky outcropping extended for miles to the east and west.
Gathering themselves together, with no weapons or gear other than the clothing and armor they wore, they made their way to the crashed airship, The Queen of the Air, where they found a horrible beast (a Neogi-Thal, a steed for the foul Neogi race), which they defeated with great effort, and recovered some weapons from the dead crew aboard, and later found their gear -- a couple of the characters recalled flying on an airship, as if it were a dream, but their memory was foggy.
Perusing the captains journal and the maps aboard, they determined that they were somewhere within the blasted Theld, a fiery wasteland not travelled by those of rational mind. They also determined that the captain may have been enchanted by a passenger, an elven woman named Ieanna, who convinced them to travel towards the Burning Ford, a trading site the Theldane used on occasion, but all indications showed they had crashed somewhere else, as no living creatures were found.
Girding their equipment, the characters travelled along the eastern edge of the rocky outcropping, and found other crashed airships of various styles and cultures, and other pits containing dust-covered corpses -- they quickly determined whatever had brought these ill-fated ships here, it was clearly a larder for some foul creatures. Defeating ash-caked zombies and camping in axebeak dens, they spent several days travelling south, until they came a landmark -- a large red-hued stone mount southwest. They journeyed there, an on the top of the mount was a stone slab with manacles, and the dark stain of sacrifice. Downhill from the mount, they found yet another crashed ship, this one with a small creature, a smoke mephit named Ecarus that styled itself captain of the downed ship. The mephit told them of a nearby entrance, a magically shut set of doors that could be opened with a ritual of blood. Finding the doors and clearing them of sand and debris, they were covered in carvings of various people in states of agony, while tentacled fiends feasted upon their skulls -- the illithid.
Unable to open the doors, the characters travelled down from the mount, along a trail well-travelled path, and rested for the night ...
(Game notes -- the party found a magic dagger that they have yet to identify, and Jasper took an axebeak egg from a den they stayed in against some of the party's advice. Each character received 225 xp, but no one leveled up).
