NOW LIVE! Today's the day you meet your new best friend. You don’t have to leave Wolfy behind... In 'Pets & Sidekicks' your companions level up with you!

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Message: <blockquote data-quote="the Jester" data-source="post: 2202072" data-attributes="member: 1210">8/15/369 O.L.G., Dyshim’s UnderdarkOur heroes are about two hours out from the trading post when they walk into an ambush.  They are walking up the gradual incline of the long caves they followed downward, hoping to get paid by the dwarves of Ft. Kintax.  Federico is riding Portnoy, his new dog (he still gets all misty when he thinks of poor lost Ethel).  Beau is puzzling over the map they bought at the trading post (being sure to spend the couple of hundred gold pieces to obtain the best one available).  The party enters a long gallery cavern, with a pair of low balconies overlooking the lower part of the cave, and finds to their dismay that both balconies are swarming with orcish archers.  More orcs, these wielding spears, are on the ground, and at the front is a huge ugly ogre gripping a spiked chain in his gauntleted hands.“Good day,” the ogre rumbles, surprisingly, in Halfling.  “My name is Bezzandine Triskelion.”  He seems unusually well-spoken for an ogre.  He gives the party a gruesome smile.  “These are my boys.  Before you can pass, little ones, you will have to pay us our toll.”“Oh?” swaggers Beau.  “And how much is your toll?”“That depends,” replies Bezzandine.  “How much do you have?”It is one of those deciding moments for our heroes.  There are more than a dozen orcs to deal with up here, plus the ogre.  It might be wisest to pay them and go by peacefully.  Yet... yet they are halflings.  If they allow themselves to be victimized now are they not inviting further victimization of halflings later?Perhaps, had they not become so seasoned to danger, our heroes would have taken the easy way out.  But so many adventures they have been on, from the dragonstone and Bellhold’s possession to the Dogtooth Islands to their current adventures in the Underdark, that they have faced death a hundred times and more, and defeated him.  And so now, secure in their might, aware of how strong they are growing, yet aware too of how deadly this could be, our heroes resolve to stand up to the bullying ogre.Federico is a sweet little kobold.  He says, “I suggest you let us past without paying!”  One of the orcs cries out, “Sorcery!” in orcish.  Then there’s an explosion of movement and the battle is on.  Before the ogre can react, Beau blasts him with a scorching ray to the face.  He bellows in rage, whipping his spiked chain up.  Federico squawks and dashes away from the front line, starting to jape and joke about how stupid ogres are.  Meanwhile arrows and spears both are ramming into our heroes.  The dogs are barking and growling as they leap at the enemy, trying to pull them down.The ogre proves that he is not only well-spoken, he’s a cunning tactician and, yes, let’s go ahead and say it: smart.  He’s a smart ogre.  He whips that spiked chain around, flipping Brickneck onto his back with it and then slashing it across the dwarf.  Then he pounds his chain into Brickneck again, and the dwarf spasms into unconsciousness, bleeding and groaning.  Then the ogre trips Jawbreaker, who spends almost the entire battle fighting on his back!Beau flings magical assaults everywhere.  The orcs press their attack, but Jawbreaker cuts them down viciously left and right, laughing maniacally.  Zeke cuts and thrusts, dueling with one orc of particular skill.  He must be a lieutenant or something, thinks the freedom fighter.  Another of the orcs moves up next to Brickneck’s fallen form and begins chanting.  To her horror, Hortense recognizes the spell.  He’s casting death knell! she thinks.  “Stop him!!” she shouts, but she’s too late.  Fortunately the hardy monk manages to resist the death knell.Scowling, the orcish priest rises from Brickneck’s fallen form and begins chanting and making passes through the air before him.  Hortense recognizes this one as a summoning.The orcs are starting to fold under the sustained attack of the halfling force and their dog allies.  Though an orc does manage to break Beau’s nose, they are being pressed back.  The shaman, meanwhile, casts a sound burst in the midst of our already-disarrayed heroes as a fiendish dire ape bounds up and begins tearing into our heroes.  The party focuses on it (except for Beau, who fires another magic missile at the ogre), and soon it scrambles away from Jawbreaker’s furious series of attacks, at least momentarily.For a moment our heroes have some breathing space, and Ezeekiel uses it to lay on hands upon Jawbreaker, who is bleeding from a multitude of orcish cuts and ape wounds.  Beau keeps a steady burn of scorching rays on the ogre, who is starting to grimace.  But now he’s reached Zeke, who manages to draw a line of blood on his chest with his axe.“You’ll pay for that, little man!” Bezzadine roars, and his chain flips out, wraps around Ezeekiel’s axe and whips it from his hand!  Then the other end slashes across the freedom fighter’s head, knocking him away and leaving his ears ringing with the force of the blow.  Then a layer of thick grease, summoned by Federico, appears under the ogre.  Still he maintains his feet.  But another flare of scorching light from Beau fells the ogre at last!  The grease bursts into flames, and Bezzadine twitches only briefly before expiring. Behind him, the shaman chooses this moment to disappear from view.  In orcish, the shaman’s voice floats across the room to his men: “FLEE!”This order doesn’t seem to include the ape.  It fights valiantly against our heroes, but Ezeekiel and Hortense press it long enough for Jawbreaker at last to stand.  With a mighty bellow, he fells the orc.  Federico is rushing around healing the injured dogs, while Beau fires a last spiteful magic missile to slay one of the fleeing orcs.“Whew!” exclaims Ezeekiel.***After looting, our heroes return to the trading post to sell the mundane gear the bandit gang had.  Two items are of particular interest, however: a top hat and a ring, both of which radiate magic.  They get them identified at the trading post, and immediately give the top hat to Naomi (it is a hat of intellect +4).  They are horrified at the ring’s properties.“It’s cursed!” exclaims Naomi.It allows one to live without eating.  “Think of it,” Beau shudders.  ”The horror!  The horror!”“Growing skinnier and skinnier... ugh!”  Naomi shudders.It is ironically called a ring of sustenance.A number of other items that they have already identified are already in their possession, so they decide to dice to divide them up.  In the end, Naomi gets the hat, the cursed ring goes to Ezeekiel, Martini receives a ring of protection +2, Federico a wand of tongues, and Jawbreaker takes the last item in question, a potion of cure serious wounds.Then it’s back up the tunnel, once more attempting to reach the fort and get paid.Next Time: Our heroes encounter a horror they dub- the Leg Holocaust!  Don’t miss it!</blockquote>

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