Of Sound Mind the Halfling Way

[the Jester]

The War Wagon

Lundy Goodwheel introduces herself to our heroes. She is dressed in practical traveling clothes, without sign of armor or heavy weapons.

“Lundy here has a problem that you might be able to help her with, as you are halflings.” Monli the druid smiles slightly.

Lundy nods. She explains, “I’m something of a carpenter. I like to build things, and I’m quite good at it. Although this time my talents have been misused!”

“What do you mean?” asks Federico.

Lundy explains her problem to the party. She was commissioned to build a halfling war wagon. Our heroes perk up at that: they have long batted around the concept of getting a war wagon as their mobile fortress.* Sandy and Federico grin at each other. And here is someone who can build one!

Unfortunately, Lundy built the wagon only to have the rapscallions who commissioned it steal it away from her!

“How could they do this so easily?” wonders Federico.

Lundy hotly retorts, “They were halflings. I trusted them.”

“Well, I hope you know better than to do that again!” exclaims Beau.

***

The afternoon is busy. Our heroes have decided that they must move on to Zacradose, to prevent further attacks on Dyshim; and so while the others guard the mayor’s rally, Jawbreaker begins making inquiries into passage. When the rally finishes, in the late afternoon, our heroes assemble, join up with Lundy and begin tracking the wagon. At first the ruts are easy to follow; even without a tracker the party could follow them. But as twilight deepens towards full dark, our heroes stop to make camp not far from the edge of the jungle. The tracks appear to lead inside Sriti’s Jungle.

At the edge of the jungle, as the party begins to set up tents, Lundy offers, “I can make a much better shelter for us a lot more easily.” When they ask what she means, she speaks magic syllabuls in a loud voice, drawing her hands through various arcane forms; and then a Leomund’s secure shelter appears.

“Wow!” exclaims Federico. “That’s neat!”

Despite the shelter, our heroes remain wary. Through the night, our heroes keep a careful watch. The strange sounds emanating from the nearby foliage keep the watchers ever alert; our heroes have been in the jungle before. They know just how dangerous it can be. Anything could spring out an attempt to gain the key ingredient for a halfling sandwich at any moment.

But nothing does, at least over the course of the night, and our heroes move on after some shennanigans involving Naomi’s big mean dog Butcher and Humphrey the druid (who uses calm animals to settle Butcher long enough to put Bogart’s collar of gift of speech onto him). Butcher’s position on two-legs becomes clear; it is obvious that the dog become so mean through heavy abuse. Humphrey’s heart aches for the poor animal, and our heroes vow to do their best to win Butcher over.

The tracks are harder to follow here, but Jawbreaker keeps the party on track. The track leads through jungle areas wide enough to accomodate the wagon, so for now there is not much in the way of choking vegetation. There are plenty of bugs, and no one could possibly complain about the lack of humidity, however.

It soons become clear that our heroes are catching up. As the terrain becomes somewhat more difficult for the halflings, it must have become considerably more difficult for the wagon. The party passes first one campsite, then another, where Jawbreaker indicates that the wagon must have camped.

“We’re catching up,” Lundy says with satisfaction.

“How long ago was it stolen?” asks Federico.

Lundy replies, “About three days ago.”

“Then we must be getting close!”

The party keeps on moving, and suddenly they catch sight of some movement in the brush. A slithering set of scales... men and women, with slightly scaled skin behind them.

“Serpent folk suck!” Federico begins japing. Arthur whips a shot of liquor from his bandolier, wobbling on his feet already. Jawbreaker rushes forward with his axe overhead while Sandy starts laying down covering fire. Beau darts forward and kills the giant snake with a shocking grasp while Naomi initiates her energy retort.

The serpent-folk cry out under the sudden, unexpected assault. Two great lizards are in the brush, as well as a half-dozen of the snake folk. They immediately begin attempting to repel the halfling attack, using fear to try to drive some of our heroes off, trying to dominate the drunken Arthur. However, our heroes are fighting as a unit; their minds are aligned strongly together. They all throw off the initial mental assaults, and the Halfling Action Militia, or H.A.M. (as they are now calling themselves) begins to overwhelm the snake folk. The massive crowd of dogs (Butcher, Bogart, Portnoy, Rider and Hauler) tears into the serpent-folk. Though they fight back roughly, and one of them breaks Jawbreaker’s jaw (oh, the irony!), the snake folk are cut to pieces.

Panting, our heroes reflect for a moment. It’s as is they’re having an unspoken debate.

“They’re traveling slow,” points out Naomi.

“You right.” Jawbreaker nods. “We have time. We stop to harvest snake.”

Next Time: The pursuit continues!


*In truth, the discussion started the very first session of the halfling party.

 

[hippiejedi2]

Beau had come across some unique scrolls which he tried to trade with Lundi, but she did not have much to trade for. Since she is good at crafting they agreed to business in the future.


Also in Leomund's shelter Lundi went straight to bed and Beau followed her only to get shot down.

 

[Brain]

Another example of the many spellings of names based on verbal cues. I spell it Lundey, for the record.

 

[the Jester]

Another example of the many spellings of names based on verbal cues. I spell it Lundey, for the record.

Well, that's the native halfling spelling, but the story hour is written in Forinthian.

It's like John vs. Jean (English/French).

 

[the Jester]

For the record, our heroes are currently:

Phenyl "Sandy" Sandybanks, rogue 4/fighter 4; LE
Federico, kobold bard 6/sorc 2/jester 1; CG
Lundey Goodwheel, wizard 8; N
Beau, rogue 4/sorc 5; CN
Chief Jawbreaker, barb 7/bear warrior 1; CG
Martini Hempflower, ranger 3/ftr 3/order of the bow initiate 2; CG
Arthur On-Tap, monk 5/drunken master 2; CN
Naomi, psion 5/elementalist 2; LE

 

[the Jester]

The War Wagon (pt. II)

The giant snake killed by Beau’s shocking grasp yields a considerable amount of meat for our heroes. Into Chief Jawbreaker’s sack of supplies it goes, shrinking to easily-carried size. The skin is an impressive trophy, too; the snake was easily 15’ long. The corpses of the snake people yield up a few magic items- a wand, two potions and a scimitar. One of the snake folk also wore a necklack of gold set with emeralds. Sandy whistles as he examines it, impressed by its apparent value. “This thing is probably worth about ten thousand gold pieces,” he says in wonder. There are also three greenish stones in a pouch on one of them- malachites, according to Lundey.

As the party prepares to move on, Jawbreaker examines the tracks again. “Wagon is pulled by giant lizards, like those,” he announces, gesturing at the corpses of the two giant lizards that had accompanied the snake-folk in their attack on our heroes. “Let’s go.”

He leads the way through the warm jungle. Sweat trickles down our heroes’ brows and backs as they move along, following the ruts of the wagon wheels. A light misting of rain falls for about five minutes, then stops. The undergrowth gets thicker, and according to Jawbreaker, the wagon looks like it was having considerable difficulty moving along by this point.

Indeed, it is not long before the party finds the wagon at last.

It is half covered in a careless screen of brush. One of the wheels has nearly popped off. It is scuffed and scratched, and several boards are marred or bent. Overall, it is in pretty bad shape. It is along the edge of a lake, with a large hump of rock and dirt shoved up against it. In the side of this, Jawbreaker indicates a cave.

“The lair of the serpent-folk?” wonders Arthur. He belches.

“Those guys are tough,” murmurs Beau. “Let’s just grab the war wagon and leave.”

“There’s just one problem,” Lundey points out. “We need something to haul the wagon.”

Federico suggests, “Maybe we can find more of those lizards.”

Jawbreaker grins and pulls out his magic sword. He walks towards the cave. Sandy groans, “More snake folk,” and follows behind the Chief. The others fall in as well.

The cave curves around on itself almost immediately, and our heroes follow the path of the cave until it widens into a 20’ broad passage. At the far end, Jawbreaker can just glimpse a group of a group of serpent folk crouched behind a low barrier. He laughs and charges, his face lit with joy, twigs falling from his beard. His expression changes abruptly as the floor beneath him gives way and he falls out of view into a pit with a yell. Then he gives another great scream of shock as he hits the bottom, and a great slithering hissing sound rises up as well.

The pit is full of snakes.

Meanwhile, a fireball explodes around the rest of the group, burning and charring all of them, even the evasive Beau! A chorus of halfling screams is followed by a hail of arrows from the serpent-folk. Arthur takes a glancing blow across the head and drops, knocked unconscious.*

Lundey hastes the group, excepting only Jawbreaker, who is in the pit, busily being bitten by a swarm of vipers. Federico rushes forward to the edge of the pit and casts sleep on the vipers, then throws himself flat to avoid the arrows whizzing past. Jawbreaker is now able to begin climbing out of the pit, which he does as quickly as he can, scrambling up the smooth dirt sides of the trap by digging little holes with his powerful fingers and his booted feet.

Humphrey heals Beau even as he casts mirror image, but it doesn’t help him against the enemy spellcaster, who casts the terrible spell bonebreak at Beau. The sorcerer screams in pain as the bones of his face crack and break! He staggers, his head blazing with agony.

Sandy, meanwhile, drinks a potion of cure serious wounds just in time to be caught in a web that effectively captures everyone except Naomi, who has been moving forward, and Jawbreaker, who has to climb into the web to get out of the pit.

Lundey, though entangled by the web, has a card up her sleeve yet. She casts blink and begins circumventing the web by blinking through it.

Naomi moves cautiously towards the barrier and the archer snake folk, but another arrow hits her in the chest, disabling her. She slumps against the cave wall, coughing blood, and works it free; then in a daze, she digs one of the potions the party just got, hoping it will help. She’s in luck; it heals her enough for her to keep going. Better yet, she is just out of the area of the fireball that Lundey casts into the midst of the enemies, fighting fire with fire, so to speak. The barrier the archers are firing behind catches fire, making the lighting a little better. The villains start to fall back.

Humphrey, meanwhile, has turned to call lightning as a way to express his distaste for these snake folk. Bolt after bolt has blasted into the enemy archers. A globe of darkness descends around the characters trapped in the web. With the coming of the darkness, he can no longer see the enemy; so he instead casts bull’s strength on Sandy, who is right next to him.

Jawbreaker surges through the web, tearing his way with brute force. He bellows out a tremendous roar as he finally gets out of the darkened area and the web and begins rushing forward at the foes he knows are waiting for his tender affections.

Naomi, now on the other side, finds a trio of half-serpent, half-human guards. Behind them is what appears to be some kind of dam, with supports propping it up. On the other wall near it is a sturdy-looking stone door.

As Naomi comes out of the darkness, one of the serpent-men, grinning, smashing one of the dam’s supports away. She drops him with a recall agony, but it’s too late. Water starts gushing into the place.

“Flooding!” cries Lundey, suddenly all too aware of her danger.

Laughing, the other two serpent folk rush through the stone door.

Next Time: Will the serpent folk have time to seal the party’s exit? Will the party survive this deadly trap? And who will go to sleep??

Also- if I post the next update before our next session, this story hour will actually be caught up to the game!

 

[Brain]

Also- if I post the next update before our next session, this story hour will actually be caught up to the game!

Do it.

 

[the Jester]

A Bad Situation Gets Better, Then Much Much Worse

Desperately, Lundey casts a mending spell to try to stave off the burst of the small dyke in the back of the cave; then she blinks through the door. She finds herself on a rising stairway, with the two snake-folk above her. They whip out scimitars and start slashing at her. She squeals in fear, blinking in and out, and her spell saves her from a terrible wound. She tries to shatter the door, and it shivers with the force of her spell, but it survives. With a gulp, she ducks another blow and casts a spell of enervation at the spellcaster, who gasps and glares angrily at her as he feels the negative energy ripple through him.

Behind her, Lundey hears a crashing against the door. Her allies are coming! Then there’s a loud roar as Chief Jawbreaker smashes through the door in bear from, knocking it completely down. The flood has rushed past outside, though water is still ankle deep. Taking heart from the fact that she has someone else at her side, Lundey fights on.

Outside, in the hallway, Naomi peers through the ruined doorway and hits the enemy spellcaster with a recall agony. She glances to the left, at the back of the cave; the dyke is going to burst at any-

With a loud roar, it gives way, and water floods into the cave, flushing her back into the web. Several of the others are still caught in them as well, and the rush of water pushes them about as it tears the webbing.

On the stairway, Jawbreaker and Lundey fight their way forward and up, the bear warrior finishing off both of his enemies with massive swats. The two snake-folk are knocked to the ground and die as Jawbreaker tramples over both of them.

Below, the rushing water receeds. Jawbreaker gives a great roar and rumbles, then turns back into a halfling. The party assembles at the base of the stairway, except for Lundey, who remains at the top, where a small landing ends in a door. “While I’ve got my blink up, I’m going to check this door,” she calls, and blinks through to the other side.

On the other side, she finds a room dominated by some kind of huge carved snake head. She doesn’t have time to notice anything else. “Go to sleep,” a hissing voice suggests from the side of the room. Lundey collapses like a rag doll.

Meanwhile, the others take stock of their resources. They aren’t in very good shape; the snake-folk did significant damage in their assault. They elect to go make camp. Sandy and Beau wait for Lundey in the hallway below the stairs while the others retreat. Sandy pulls out his wand of cure moderate wounds and proceeds to try to ‘trick’ it into working for him, struggling with it for a few moments before getting it to work. He taps it on Beau, and though some of the worst of his wounds start to close, poor Beau’s face is still broken, however, and he’s in considerable pain. His head throbs.

“Hey,” says Beau painfully, “do you hear that?”

Sandy cocks his head. From the direction of the top of the stairs, there comes a sound- almost like chanting. Nervously, he keeps at the wand until he finally manages to heal both himself and Beau several times. Then the two of them creep up the steps to the door.

“It’s not locked,” whispers Beau. He pulls out his sword; Sandy pulls his spear, staying several steps below. His dog, Rider, he keeps in front of him.

Beau hurls open the door and gives a choked, horrified gasp. Sandy can’t see into the room from his perspective, but he hears a laughing hiss, and then, suddenly, Beau shrinks and changes, turning into a wee little garter snake.

Oh no, Sandy thinks desperately, and tumbles back down the stairs. Rider starts barking viciously and charges forward as a human-looking snake-man dressed in loose monk’s robes leaps to the attack. There is a brief melee, and then, even as Sandy is retreating down the steps, a large snake with a pair of muscular, burly arms slithers forward into view at the top of the stairs. In its hands it holds a clay jug. It hisses at the dog and the animal whines in fear and runs hurriedly out of the cave. Then the snake turns its yellow gaze on Sandy.

“There’s no need to fight. Come have a drink with us,” the snake suggests.

“I sure could use a drink about now,” Sandy admits. Warily, he lowers his spear and walks up to the armed serpent, who gloatingly hands him the jug. Glancing within it, Sandy grimaces. There is some sort of viscous, yellow fluid with streaks of red in it. It smells awful. “No offense,” Sandy says, “but I’ve got something a little nicer.” He pulls out a bottle of fine wine and takes a big drink, then hands it over to the snake-thing.

“Ah, I see,” the snake murmurs, taking the wine. It leads Sandy into the room at the end. As they walk in, the more human-looking serpent man grasps Beau’s new tiny form and picks the snake up, wearing him like a necklace.

Sandy gasps with horror. At the far end of the oval chamber, dominating the scene, a huge carved serpent’s head gaps open. Blood is all over Lundey, who lies pale in its mouth.

“Drink the fluid in the jug,” the abomination suggests again, and Sandy takes a long, thick pull from the jug.

Next Time: ...uh oh.

 

[hippiejedi2]

In the twice removed uppdate, the bonebreaking left Beau with a broken face and negative hp. The flood knocked Beau to the exclusive -9 club before he was cured by Humphrey.

In the previous update, Beau fumbled his initiative, and rolled almost as poorly on the 2 saves that led to his polymorphing into a snake. Sandy's initiative was not much better than Beau's init. The game was notorius for its super high number of fumbles, by everyone.

 

[weiknarf]

Has anyone ever rolled a 47 on their fumble severity?