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Message: <blockquote data-quote="iserith" data-source="post: 7065192" data-attributes="member: 97077">The tale started in Neverwinter with Beau Fletcher meeting up with a couple of mates at the tavern and meeting a couple more - an enchanter and an alluring feline warrior. The tavern was bustling with patrons because my character was a local folk hero and he was drinking for free tonight. The barkeep suggested we speak to a gnome who was looking for help with some problem or another and was willing to meet us in a shady alleyway named off a street named after a dagger. What could go wrong?We stumbled upon a group of roguish types who appeared to have made a fresh corpse in the alleyway, so we leaped into action. Beau jumped around on crates, kicking swords out of the rogues hands, taking a few shots while the rest of the group did their thing. After knocking out one of the thugs with my iron pot, we were joined by the gnome we sought. She told us this encounter was just a test - the corpse was fake, actually - and that we had passed. She made us an offer to become an intern with Acquisitions Inc. if we would just go to a cloud giant's tower and see about solidifying a truce.That sounded like the sort of thing that would make for a good story and Beau couldn't live on his past exploits forever, so he accepted. The rest of the party followed and soon we found ourselves in an air-rowboat high in the air. Once over the cloud castle, we jumped off the boat and floated down into the gardens using a stone of feather falling. We were noticed, however, by the rotating telescope in the observatory on the way down. This led to an encounter with a shambling mound and a chimera. The druid used speak with plants to make a deal with the shambling mound - we give it food and the chimera's corpse to eat and it leaves us alone. The chimera was a simple matter of beating it into a fine paste which most of the party did while I helped the tabaxi get through the giant keyhole in the gates.Once inside, we explored the castle looking for evidence that we were told would either prove or disprove the cloud giant's alliance with the forces of evil. We spoke to the cloud giant's blind and mostly deaf grandpa in the steam room, a curious gargoyle in a shrine to an evil giant deity, poked around some bedchambers, found some poisoned giants, etc. All the evidence seemed to suggest that the cloud giant we came to see was not in league with the forces of evil, but that his majordomo was. Along the way, we had a few minor run-ins with a rug of smothering and a helmed horror, but these gave us so little trouble that I didn't even need to use my bow.At the climax of the adventure, we confronted the cloud giant and his majordomo and presented our evidence which swayed the cloud giant into believing us. The majordomo attacked, choking the cloud giant nearly to death with a magic amulet as a white dragon swooped in at her command. Finally, Beau Fletcher took out his iconic longbow and made some stories - two attacks, action surge, two more attacks against the majordomo who was awash in faerie fire. Multiple critical hits due to Champion subclass. She took a jaw-dropping amount of damage. The majordomo then grabbed me with telekinesis and flung me across the chamber for some damage and then let me drop from a height as the rest of the party took a massive blast from the white dragon's breath. Everyone was down now except the paladin who with some lucky smites managed to take down the majordomo and save the cloud giant from choking to death.So we succeed in our quest - a truce was forged with the cloud giant and Acquisitions, Inc. Back to the bar we went, so I could further tell the tale of the folk hero Beau Fletcher...Thanks for the help! An archer was definitely useful with this group. But my angle was not to use my bow in a big way until the very end, instead going for disarms, hitting people with iron pots, making deals, climbing up giant tables to avoid attacks, etc. Everyone was asking, "When is Beau going to use his bow?!" So it was kind of a big tease until the very end when he lived up to folk hero status with a big show and this had a big payoff. I did things this way because I recently had a Dex fighter archer in my campaign and it felt kind of like "I loose an arrow!" was the only thing the guy ever did. Even the player was getting a little bored with it. So I wanted to not fall into that same trap and it worked! It goes to show we're not forced to always do that one thing the character is good at, even if it means you're not going to have optimal DPR or you lose a few hit points along the way trying to do fun stuff.</blockquote>

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