Crossed Paths - Part I

[Thomas Hobbes]

Octar curses as he is hit again by the vicious spikes of the Manticore, and nocks another arrow. For the rest of the battle, he'll be ready to use his consumate skill with horsemanship to drop behind his mount to protect himself.

 

[Guilt Puppy]

Wincing at his wound, once under the safety of the mist Nathaniel drops his bow and draws his sword, moving to the edge of the mist, with his blade prepared to defend from any strikes he can see. (expertise for 5) If he happens to come out of the mist within striking distance of the beast, he will take a careful poke at it.

His oration continues: "Come forth, ye wretched beast, who has tried and has failed to contend with my companions! Come, let my blade taste of your flesh, so that it may know the flavor of an arrogant fool, and recognize it in real battles yet to come."

(Note: I just noticed that you had Nat's initiative listed at 6... I was wondering how you arrived at this when he has a +6 modifier? It's not like it changes anything, but I'm just wondering where this discrepancy comes from, in case it might effect other aspects of the game...)

 

[Manzanita]

Round 5/6

Guiltpuppy - sorry. You are correct. I do have Nathaniel's initiative mod at +6 in my PC summary. Perhaps I put that in & neglected to roll? Please continue to catch me on these things & I'll correct them as best I can.

Round 5 concluded
Brioc casts summon nature's ally. A Hippogryph immediately appears and takes off after the manticore.
Dhormuim casts obscuring mist. All PCs lose sight of the manticore, except for Marcus.

Round 6
The Manticore attempts to flee, but is unable to outrun the hawks or the Hippogryph. The hawks are unable to inflict any more damage for disapearing. Marcus fires off another round with his crossbow, but misses badly. The hippogriph catches it, but is unable to get its claws in. Nathaniel exists the mist and sees the retreating creature.

Round 7
The Manticore is forced to turn and grapple with the Hippogryph. They entangle in a ball of feathers, fur, claw, tooth and talon. The eagle/horse's talons rip the last vestages of life from the Manticore, and is graced with seeing its opponent tumble lifeless to the ground, before it fades into nothingness, its victory cry echoing in the valley.

end of combat

 

[Jarval]

Relieved to hear the death of the manticore, Brioc struggles back to his feet and channels his magic into trying to close some of the more painful wounds on his body. (Casting cure light wounds on himself.)

"Thank you." He says simply to Dhormuin as he starts for the wagon.

"How did we all fair? I can try to patch up any of you who are wounded, but by mundane means only. I've spent most of my magic for today." He sways slightly, and grabs hold of the wagon's side for support.

 

[Inez Hull]

Ehldannis hovers around his wounded companions impotently, realising with a jolt that for all his learning he knows little that can be used for such a practical application as tending the sick and wounded. He watches Brioc tending to any wounded but eventually acknowledges that he is just in the way.

Ehldannis then gives in to curiosity and ventures out to find where the body of the Manticore has fallen. When he finds the corpse he rolls up his sleeves and draws his dagger, thinking through the assorted arcane lore and legends floating around his head for any uses for body parts of a Manticore.

 

[Thels]

Dhormuin looks around trying to discover who is injured the most.

 

[Thomas Hobbes]

Octar grunts in pain as Brioc helps him remove the Manticore's spikes from his body. "What was that?" asks Octar once his wounds are tended. "Did anybody understand what it said before it attacked us?"

 

[Jarval]

Brioc shakes his head in answer to Octar's question, concentrating on removing the last spine from his leg. Once its out, he gives the query a little more thought.

"Sounded like Greek to me, but I couldn't be sure. Whatever it said, it seemed less than friendly."

 

[Manzanita]

The aftermath

Brioc cures 6 pts on himself with his spell.

Ehldannis can't remember any particular uses for manticore parts. He does find a plain gold earring on one ear (worth about 100 gps), and around his neck, burried in his dark mane, it wears a medalion. The somewhat gaudy golden disk is supported by a golden chain. The disk states in Latin: ""Meritious award from the Roman Archeological Society"
Upon closer inspection, it is chipped, and is clearly not gold all the way through, but mostly brass, and seems to have been made in a pretty shoddy fashion.

 

[Inez Hull]

"Hmmm, most curious", Ehldannis muses as he puts away his dagger and removes the earring and medallion. "The creature did say something about us not being true archeologists, but from the look of this neither was it."

Ehldannis returns to the rest of the party and begins chuckling as the thought occurs that the creatures' 'manticorehood' was a more likely indicator that it was not a member of the Roman Archeological Society than the shoddiness of the medallion.