Pirates of the Mezzovian Main -- UPDATED May 12th

[Desdichado]

We actually just played again this last Saturday, and had (in my opinion) an even better session than last time (we had one missing player, but we also added a new player to the mix.) So over the course of the next week or two I'll be typing up updates that catch us up.

A few previews: a nasty little fey that scoops out eyes with a spoon, lots of really bad Star Wars quotes (I should have known better than to say "What a piece of junk!" when they saw the ship they were trying to hire passage on) some really great tactics on the PC's part making one combat an unexpected cakewalk; some really bad tactics on the PC's part nearly causing two character deaths, and a character that is seriously considering buying a slave so he can sacrifice him to a diviner that will read the future in his entrails.

 

[LostSoul]

That preview sounds cool.

If I were playing, I would try to kill the King and the Prince and marry the Queen.

 

[Desdichado]

Sorry; I've got a lot of stuff to add and I've just been really busy and haven't done it. Two sessions equals somewhere in the neighborhood of 6-7 updates pending.

 

[Stockdale]

Update already

Hobo, you're on the second page already. Time to update and tell us all about that eye scooping and slave sacrifice. Alright -- I just want to read about what my character did.

Stockdale

 

[Desdichado]

The next morning, the palace staff thanked the group and did their best to hustle them out a small, out of the way backdoor before they had to come within sight of any of the royals this early in the morning. They were bustled off with a cold breakfast wrapped up in cloth that they could take with them, and with a sigh of relief, the palace doors were slammed in their face.

Someone new was with them; Eladcot, a student of arcane lore who was a minor member of the Queen's staff, and a native of her homeland. He smiled and said hello, but the smile did not reach his eyes.

The band of "heroes" stood around rather bleary eyed; some of them went for a spot of breakfast while Jek, the hobgoblin and Eladkot all went to visit the local magic-user to get some of their loot from the pirate captain identified. They were particularly impressed with some of them, including a ring the Teren'Kol had that granted fast healing 5. For those of you keeping track at home, yes, that is too good an item for the PC's level. I knew that at the time; although I let him enjoy it for a sesson or two before the drawbacks started showing themselves. )

They all met again near the docks; determined that they would do their best to follow both the Prince's and the Queen's requests; swinging by Cryx for a scouting expedition before moving northward up to Iclezza and helping them with their druid problem. It proved more difficult than they thought to find passage to Cryx; although if they'd considered it, that isn't terribly surprising. No reputable ship would go anywhere near the pirate haven ruled by a harsh and unforgiving necromancer Dragon-king, so they had to look through the more disreputable captains and ships. The area of the docks that they scoured was increasingly seedy.

Eladkot spotted a face that looked very curious and malicious; Teren'Kol also spotted it and recognized the face of the man they had bested in combat with the carriages. He did not look like he was in the mood to laugh about last night's activities. The rest of the group noticed nothing.

Teren'Kol looked around again and saw a group of orc stevedores unloading mysteriously unmarked (rather; the original marks had been scratched off, burned or painted over) crates onto the dock and walked towards them as the shady man and some of his croneys crept quietly through the alleys towards them. As he passed through the orcs, he muttered under his breath. "Hail, brother! I seem to be in a spot of trouble—follow my lead and I will share the proceeds that we find on the bodies of those skulks behind me."

"Who are you—a hobgoblin!—who wears the clothing of my desert kin and calls me brother?" one of the orcs asked skeptically.

"I am a hobgoblin, but my people were killed or enslaved when I was young and I was raised by orcs. Follow my lead and see if I don't prove myself your brother!"

The orcs still looked skeptical, but grudgingly accepted this explanation. As the men came very close behind, and began drawing weapons, Teren'Kol "accidentally" knocked a crate over in their path and the orcs drew weapons as well. Teren'Kol wheeled around quickly and waved his exotic, dangerous weapon, smashing and slashing through the ambushers.

At this point, everybody finally noticed them. Eladkot showed his nature; casting fear in the area, and then hightailing it back behind the rest of the group. Several of the assailants fled in terror, but unfortunately, so did some of the orcs. Those that remained, including the one who spoke to Teren'Kol, and the hobgoblin himself continued to mow through the thugs who remained. Fairlight the Fair plugged crossbow bolts into those that remained, while Jek manuevered himself for a fatal attack by surprise, catching an unprepared bandit in the back.

Eladkot cast another spell, which slowed those who tried to run at him and Fairlight, which made it even easier for her to continue to pepper him with bolts. He died before reaching them.

Within moments, the fight was over and all of the attackers were dead. The defenders were relatively unscathed. It had proven to be little more than an early morning workout for them. They divided the coins and weapons found on the bodies (the latter didn't interest our group; a handful of low level warriors compared to 3rd level PCs? Not surprising.) Teren'Kol gave his share of the former to the orcs, with his thanks.

Shortly afterward, they found a ship that made a milk run between Jekara and Blackwater in Cryx. The guards stationed at the gangplank had seen the fight and were impressed. The ship itself was a bit less impressive (I do believe the phrase "What a piece of junk!" was uttered by someone. The guards also claimed to have made a few "special" modifications… anyway .) The captain was in the cantina across the street, though—if they wanted passage, they'd have to arrange it with him.

And yes, when they walked in, I did sing the Star Wars cantina number. The bartender did not tell anyone that he didn't serve their kind here, though. They found the captain, and gave him an "offer he couldn't refuse." (Actually, lame movie quotes aside, they did offer him a lot of money—he had just arrived the night before and wasn't anxious to leave so soon, so they had to.) He said that he did have to do some reprovisioning, and despite their best efforts, they couldn't talk him into leaving any sooner than the next morning. The captain sighed, gave the girls on his lap one more peck on the cheek and pinch on the bum, and went off to do all the things he needed to do to go out of town.

The group ate lunch, chatted for a while, drank a lot, and eventually made ready to turn in for the night. Teren'Kol decided to hire a room right here in the very cantina they had found the captain; Caden Bar Harland decided to sneak aboard the ship, check it out, and then crash in a quiet corner, and the rest of them went back into a somewhat safer part of town to find a nicer, cleaner place to stay.

Of course, that's the group that ran into trouble during the night...

 

[Desdichado]

Teren'Kol heard a lot of screaming, fighting and dying in the streets that night… or he would have if he hadn't slept soundly through it all. Caden had a more interesting experience. He managed to board the ship unseen and poke around. It wasn't very large, and most of the crew had a large, communal barracks style sleeping arrangement, hanging in hammocks. Most of them were enjoying their remaining money and night on the town before having to leave again in the morning. The cargo hold had a rank smell, and he found it was full of distended and swollen bodies of drowned sailors, stacked up like soggy firewood. The trade in bodies to Cryx's necromancers was one of the most lucrative import items into the island nation. Caden thought it best not to wonder if this ship found these bodies, or actually sank the ship and killed the sailors first, and then scooped them out of the water.

At the nicer establishment where Fairlight, Jek and Eladkot were billetted (Sven's player couldn't make it this session; his character was just notoriously invisible the whole time) there was a loud scream and continued sobbing and crying in the middle of the night. Eladcot got out of bed… and crawled under it. Jek stayed in his room too, sitting up straight in bed, his eyes wide and scanning the room. Only Fairlight actually went out in the hallway to investigate. A small crowd of guests in their nightclothes was gathered in the doorway to a room nearby. Fairlight covered up as best she could (I like to imagine her in a very small, filmy bit of lace—but I do have to admit that the player didn't exactly describe her dressed in that way. Jek's player did mention that his character was sleeping without any clothes at all, which was kinda funny when he later came out of the room.)

In the nearby room was another young girl, sitting on the floor surrounded by a growing pool of blood. Her eye sockets were empty and her face was covered in blood. Fairlight kept knocking on Jek and and Eladcot's door until they came out. "Did you see this? Isn't that terrible?"

"Yeah, bummer," said Jek. "Be sure and lock your door tonight."

They went back to their rooms. While getting ready to climb back under the covers, Fairlight happened to glance at the dingy mirror in her room and she saw, briefly, a small, ugly little man no more than two or three feet high wearing a coat much too large for him and a tricorner hat. He was sitting on her dresser with a bloody spoon in one hand and popping bloody, red-rimmed beautiful green eyes into his empty sockets. She saw his reflection turn and look at her with a smile full of steelgray, needle-like teeth. When she looked directly at the spot where he should be, she saw nothing; there was only his reflection in the mirror.

She stumbled backwards with a strangled cry and ran out into the hallway, slamming the door behind her, and began pounding on Jek and Eladkot's doors again. "You've got to come to my room with me," she said.

Jek slowly smiled and looked at her appraisingly. "OK" he nodded.

"And bring your sword," she added.

"I never leave home without it," he laughed, hitching up his boxers a little.

"No, your REAL sword!" she punched him in the arm. "That eye thief thing is in my room."

Eladkot's door slammed again and it took a lot of knocking to get him back out. When he came back out, he had a robe thrown over his nightcloths and had his pouch of spell components with him.

They crept quietly into Fairlight's room. The lamp was still swinging slightly on the wall from the force of the door slam earlier, making eery shadows leap across the room. "Look in the mirror," Fairlight whispered.

They gasped; although they couldn't see anything on Fairlight's bed other than a small indentation in the covers, in the mirror, they could clearly see the small, ugly little man polishing an eye on his sleeve and popping it into his last socket.

(Sadly for me as DM; at this point the encounter, which had built very well into this creepy thing, just went downhill fast. Jek and Eladkot both beat me on Initiative, so Jek also had sneak attack damage, and before the poor little eye thief could even move, he was on Fairlight's floor dead. *sigh* I guess that's the way they roll sometimes. Still; no regrets; the encounter was tons of fun even if the combat itself was anticlimatic.)

Eladkot looked thoughtful for a moment. "I've heard of these things. If we recover that girl's beautiful green eyes and take her to any competent local priest, he can pop them back in and cast remove blindness and she'll be as good as new. Better than new, even; she'll have an advantage for having had her eyes in the skull of this eye thief." He looked even more thoughtful for a moment. "Anyway, I'm wide awake now," he laughed, rubbing his own muddy brown eyes with his hands to remove the sleepiness. "I'll get dressed and take her myself."

When he returned he was smiling, and this time the smile did reach his beautiful green eyes.

When I type the next update, the group will head out of Jekara, interesting though it's been as a place for adventure, and head for the even wilder Blackwater, pirate haven of Cryx.

If you think Eladkot stealing that poor young girls eyes was bad, you ain't seen nuthin' yet.

 

[Desdichado]

The group boarded the ship the next morning, perhaps even more bleary eyed than they had been the morning before (except Eladkot, who's eyes looked suspiciously different.) Then rousing John Williams theme music started while the picture faded and a red line moved silently across the map.

However, unlike in Raiders of the Lost Ark this redline trip made a slight detour; it stopped in the middle of the ocean as the ship became befouled in thick, tangled sargasso weeds. Quite conveniently, the Queen had given them each some parting gifts to help with the mission, including a potion of water-breathing for each of them. Unfortunately, the group's union rules specifically forbade them from dealing with transportation issues, so only Teren'Kol and Caden doffed a potion and jumped overboard to free the ship, while the rest of them sat on the deck eating donuts and saying, "Ain't my job."

That proved to be a mistake, because no sooner had they chopped a few weeds with their hatchets, when two very ugly critters came out from a nearby shallow cave, one of these, and one of those.

To be honest with you, it's been long enough now that I don’t even remember the blow by blows of this fight very well, or even what the monster's capabilities were. I do remember that Caden got fairly quickly reduced to negative hit points and floated paralyzed in the water for several rounds, while Teren'Kol got grappled and squeezed very nearly to death (even with his ring of fast healing; it certainly saved his life, and just barely even then) by the khopru. Finally the rest of the group took their potions and jumped overboard too, and with their efforts they were able to turn the tide of the battle, finishing off the two fishy menaces and hauling their wounded comrades back on board to be revived.

After this interruption, their redline made it's way to Cryx without any further problems.

Blackwater itself is an odd town, nestled deep within a cool and shadow-filled fjord. The water is extremely deep and dark and the sun only shines overhead for a few hours a day because of the steep, high walls. The city nestles on the narrow shore and floats out deep into the water on pontoons, rafts, barges and rotting piers, all roped together and attached by rotting bridges and gangplanks.

Blackwater is notorious for having—literally—no laws. The only constant is death and taxes; every boat that approaches pays the taxes, and people die in droves every day. Powerful gangs and pirate captains marshal small armies to protect their interests, and frequently go to war in the streets. The large market downtown is famous as the best place in the entire Mezzovian to buy slaves, but even that brisk trade is dwarfed by the corpse trade. The only thing that rouses the ire of everyone is arson—intentional or not.

For now, the group stayed away from the markets, but they did march straight for a gigantic basalt cathedral, encrusted with the actual skeletons and corpses of sacrificial victims and enemies of the Dragon-god. Fairlight banged open the door and strolled through the vast, dark interior to see the high priest.

"Where are the sea caves?" she demanded (qv Post #9). The high priest turned to her; his face was a mess of rotting flesh, pulled tightly against his skull. His robes were open, and his rib cage showed clearly, a sickly green light thrumming like a heartbeat faintly behind the bones.

Despite his fearsome appearance, he was rather friendly though; or they caught him a good mood, at least. He said that seaside caves riddled the entire coastline of Cryx; was there something more specific they wanted? Before long, they got him rolling on an impromptu sermon on the glories of the dragon-god, which they tried politely to interrupt, but not very well.

After listening to his tirade, he remembered that they were there, and suggested that they visit a local diviner to get their questions answered, and they agreed, since clearly the only thing this guy knew much about was the dogma of his sick, dark religion. He recommends Diellza Batukhan, an old witch who lives on the outskirts of town and has been divining for over a hundred years, and has a reputation as the most accurate and complete of the bunch. Although the high priest also admits that she seems to be crazy. He also says he privately suspects that's why she's so good.

This sounds good to the group until they hear that she also needs someone to kill so she can read her divinations in his intestines. Eladkot thinks this sounds like a cheap and efficient way to get the information they need, pointing out the relative ease with which they can buy a slave here in town. Fairlight (the con artist, remember) takes a stand as the moral compass of the group and says no. Teren'Kol also doesn't like the idea, since his people were enslaved by the hobgoblins of the Leng Empire and he has a funny thing about slavery ever since. Eladkot relents.

Later that night, though, when they're all asleep, he slips out of the inn alone...

 

[grodog]

Sounds good, Hobo. What next?

 

[Quickbeam]

Hey Hobo, thanks for posting our group's exploits here. I began a Story Hour for one of the campaigns I ran long ago...but didn't stick with it. And trying to post one for Age of Worms would have been nearly impossible given the sheer length of time it took us to play through that adventure path

As a player in the game I'd like to add a few observations:
1. You've come up with some genuinely clever and unique twists for the game, which all those reading this SH will enjoy!!
2. Our group's players never let the character exploits drift into the realm of dull. We all spent a fair amount of time on back story, personality and motivations which you've managed to employ quite effectively. That keeps the sessions lively and our collective attention focused on the game.
3. You're mean (inside joke, apologies to non-group readers)

Teren'Kol has been a blast to play and rather effective when it counted most. He doesn't seem to crush large rats or destroy nameless lackeys with the ease one would expect, but he has been hell on many of our primary foes. Keep up the posts!

 

[Desdichado]

Eladkot crept down to the common room of the inn, where he found some guards for hire—trustworthy enough, at least by Blackwater standards, and vouched for by many. Then he slipped out into the evening.

His first stop was by what passed for a local library. He was looking for spells he could transcribe into his spellbook, and found a few minor ones, but not the ones he was specifically looking for. He did however, find references to a where a spellbook should exist that has what he is looking for, located in some sea caves away from town. The book includes a fairly detailed map. With a small bribe he manages to convince the librarian to let him have the book permanently.

One errand successfully accomplished, he rounded up his hired escort and headed downtown towards the "meat markets." The stench was nearly unbearable; although Blackwater is notorious as the biggest slave market in the Mezzovian area, the slave trade pales in comparison to the corpse trade. Ritually scarified and grafted tiefling necromancers buy corpses to experiment with differing animating techniques; and the newest Cryxian fad was creating undead creatures that have some of the qualities of constructs as well. He keeps a wary eye and his distance from some of these shoppers.

Once he's bought the cheapest, oldest, sickest little old halfling he can find, he makes his way to the outskirts of town where the diviner's hut is. The diviner—Diellza Batukhan—is sitting outside waiting for him and jumping rope. She's a little girl with her blonde hair in ringlets, wearing a pink, lacy dress. She smiles, but her eyes are solid black and dead like those of a shark.

The divination works mechanically like such—this slave is a 1st level commoner with rolled, not max, hit points, and Diellza will tie him down and disembowel him with a dagger, bringing him to zero or less hit points depending on her damage roll. The slave will then be "Dying" as per the rules until he hits -10; for each round that he lives, she will be able to make one prediction in his entrails. So low damage (although still sufficient to bring him to -1 at least) is good, as it gives you more to work on. She brought him to -4, so Eladkot got 6 predictions.

"I see you have a plaything for me," she says to him, smiling cutely. "So there's no need to ask why you're here. There's also the matter of payment; the little fella here is necessary, but of no use once he's done."

Eladkot looked anxiously at his waning coin reserve, but as it turns out, she thought his ears were pretty and wanted one of them. Eladkot shrugs and cuts his left ear off, then quickly bandages it up. Deillza is absurdly pleased with it; without even cleaning the blood off of it, she pierces it through the middle and ties a leather cord through the ear, then wears it like a grisly necklace.

I won't describe the actual anthropomancy (I didn't to my player either) but his six predictions were as follows, based on a few specific questions he gave me:
[sblock]

1. Beware your warrior's ring. When it finished claiming his soul, great evil will be unleashed on the world.
   
   
2. The book you seek is the same book the girl seeks. Be careful with it; it is much more than simply a book of spells.
   
   
3. The boy will bring trouble down upon you all.
   
   
4. The expatriate Queen is still well loved by her people at home. Please her and your own worth will rise.
   
   
5. Beware the plotting of the brothers.
   
   
6. Torvald Stanislavson is the power behind the druids.

[/sblock]