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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Ralts Bloodthorne" data-source="post: 2924056" data-attributes="member: 6390">So we had our little discussion on the front porch, smoking cigarettes and drinking Pepsi Lime, watching the kids play in the evening sunshine.We pick back up with the Ranger, the Rogue, and the Fighter tromping out of the jungle, having been communicating with the natives. They're walking up the beach, the Fighter's little sister in tow, when they come across some half drowned guy in manacles who somehow managed to get to shore. Nice job. They grab his ankle chains and drag him back, still discussing what to do.There are two factions of minotaurs, and a faction of humans (Ahhh, the African Adventures book is serving the GM well) that we have to worry about. One of the factions is evil, sacrificing, and xenophobic, the other are warm, welcoming, but primitive.They get up to where the rest of the party is working, building shelters for the people who came aboard. The Druid is using water breathing and borrowing Saduul's skeletons to gather the non-perishable hardware supplies off of the floor of the bay. The barbarian is out scouting the area, in particular the ravine where the "good bullmen" have told us there was once a human settlement.Saduul is using his firespells to run the forge without wood. (Concentration checks and start marking off slots) The Fighter walks up, and drops the chains."Hey, Saduul, see if you can get these chains off.""Is he alive?""Yeah.""Blast. All right." Saduul melts the middle of the chain and goes back to working on the forge.(All right, you're awake, you see.... character descriptions follow. Our PC's (with the exception of Saduul) are still wearing the remnants of the military they had been conscripted into)"Aren't you guys supposed to be dead?" The monk answers."My husband wants to know why you aren't drowned." The Ranger replies, holding out the skull. Saduul rolls his eyes and tunes out his comrades.Now, what is going through my head...We have 2 tribes of minotaurs, creatures that didn't exist on our home continent. The maps the Rogue stole from the Captians cabin show that this is the only cove they know of, and ships are routinely lost in the area where we fought the giant squid. The ships I sunk carried powerful nobles and military officers and the "Emerald Guard." This means that we'll be able to recover a lot of military gear.But most of the people that were offloaded are "breeding stock" as the Captian's manifest read. Women, children, former slaves, laborers, religious "heretics" and the like. "To be worked until death" was the watchword.Echoes of Dead Lamb Pass.Saduul silently orders his "warped" blue skeleton to keep an eye on the "new guy" and the skeleton promptly runs over and stares at the Paladin skeleton. Stupid skeletons. I need better minions."My name is Julius Constantine." Saduul hears. "I thought that they burned you at the stake for treason." He looks over, there's the monk with his hand out. Saduul bows, then shakes the monk's hand. He looks at him, giggles, and says: "Say, are you fireproof?" The monk smiles and nods, pointing at an intricate tattoo of a red dragon that covers his entire torso."Yes, all Masters of the Flame are fireproof." He replies. (The player then tells the GM that he's going to tell everyone of his home monastery atop the Bleeding Warrior Mountain)NOW... Right here is where I suppose I could have felt threatened, but I helped him write this up, and he had a choice of Master of Flame, Master of Ice, Master of the Tempest, or Master of Lightning. He chose to follow the Master of Flame PrC, which at 3rd level grants him complete immunity to fire, and one or two other cool abilities.We hear screams from the edge of the settlement we're building (More on this later) and a hail of blowgun darts drops some of the laborers. Saduul runs the numbers in his head (I pass on my turn, making a Knowledge (Tactics) check instead) and decides that the foilage provides too much cover and concealment to cut loose with fireball, fire based lightning bolts, etc. Damn, not my kind of fight.A nasty fight later, and we've defeated the goblin raiding party that struck from amush. We've lost just under 20 people, including a little girl who brought our group bannannas that she'd pick.Saduul argues for a punative expedition, seeing as we have a goblin prisoner."I tell you nothing! The Great Bear is with me!" the goblin prisoner screams. We're able to understand him thanks to the "earrings of tongues" we wear."Oh, you'll tell me everything." Saduul says, stepping forward and stripping off his robe."Wait, perhaps I can be of use." the monk says, stepping forward. He asks the GM if he can do non-lethal damage with his fire-punch, and instead of using it all at once in one haymaker, he can just make his forefinger and middlefinger tips red hot. The GM thinks for a moment, and says: "I'll allow it."The monk interrogates the goblin, using the torture rules from Crimson Contracts.The punative expedition is mounted. We track the goblins to thier hovels and massacre them. Warriors, sows, and kits. This same goblin tribe has been pestering our "Bullmen" friends, stealing cattle, ruining crops, etc.But one thing is found...ALL the dishes, cups, etc, are made of GOLD! That's right! Gold gold gold gold! Golden earrings, golden liprings, golden necklaces, golden glasses!("I couldn't resist." the GM admits, "Having Cortez in the group is just too good to pass up.")"Abhor the crass material wealth." the monk advises. "Seek solace in the divine purity of the flame!""I've always wanted to be plated in gold." the Fighter muses."My husband would look good plated in gold." the Ranger says, kissing the skull. GEEZ, that's creepy!"Man, it's not even going to be worth stealing!" the Rogue complains, dumping the gold nuggets out of his pocket. "I've been carrying this crap around, and stinking GOBLINS have more gold than any of us have ever seen in one place!""I wonder if I could keep my God from dying if I built a 90 foot statue of him out of solid gold?" the Cleric muses."Gold sucks." the Druid complains.Everyone turns to look at me. I smile. The GM looks a little sick right there. See, we've all been playing together for awhile, and he knows that look."I'll have my skeletons gather it all up. We're going to decorate the houses with it, everyone is going to wear it and use it. Check the pool beneath the bear shaped boulder, if there's gold in it, I'll have my bony minions get it. Oh druuuuuuid!""Oh spirits of nature, what do you want?""Have those eagles stop killing the albatrosses that our glorious masters are using to try to spy on us.""Then they'll know what you did!" the rogue replies."Then they know." I smile again. "We'll make sure some of those albatrosses see us buring cache's of gold in the sand. At night, we'll pull the gold out into the edge of the jungle, and during the day, bury 'new' caches.""But that will bring even more of them.... ooooh!""Exactly." I smile."More mass murder, Saduul? Is there enough blood in the world to satisfy your thirst?" the druid asks."I'm catching crap from the woman who wicker-manned twenty virgins in order to rouse a forest to destroy the Kingdom of Marque's knights and got the Emporer's Kiss for it?" I snap back in character. "There will NEVER be enough blood to wash away the betrayals. I will NEVER allow them to despoil this continent! Never shall the Imperial Legions tramp this bejeweled shore beneath thier bloody boots!"Follows is a passionate arguement between the druid's player (in character) and several of us, all in character. The monk settles it quite simply."When a fire produces poisonous fumes, you put it out." (Nicely said. I really like that turn of phrase)We're putting our plan in motion, and several days go by. We get the basic shelters down, and the barbarian returns. (The player was late. We had a pizza break while the GM ran him through his scouting expidition. One the way back, he tries to sneak by a patrol of the "evil" minotaurs, and blows his roll)The Barbarian comes running into camp: "GET READY!" he yells, a flurry of javelins following him. A woman goes down with a javelin through her throat and a man goes down with one through his chest.Twenty "evil" minatours rush onto our beach, screaming thier war cries, painted in blood and wearing scalps around thier waists. Well, we know what happened to the foraging party that vanished last weekend, now don't we?I grin and cook off a boosted fireball. A "Saduul Special" so to speak.It flickers and goes out. Aw crap."COUNTER-MAGIC!" the fighter yells out, taking two javelins in the back as he shields his little sister with his own body. The Rogue vanishes from sight (natural 20 on his hide check) and the Cleric takes a javelin in the side as (s)he rushes to try and save the two injured settlers.Two minotaurs charge the group of children. The children scream, and the monk runs to cut them off. Saduul's magic missiles are snuffed out."WHERE'S THE BLASTED SHAMAN!" I call out. Ten more minotaurs burst out of the jungle. The Druid guts a rabbit and throws the entrails into the air. With a spray of sand, a Dire Lion bursts out of the beach, snatching the entrails out of the air, and charges the bullmen.The Ranger and a pair of bullmen are rolling around on the sand, the Ranger's knives flashing and blood spraying. One manages to grab her arms and pin them, but her wolf bites him and he lets go.I'm still looking for the blasted shaman. The fighter is trying to hold off three bullmen from his sister, and the monk has intercepted the bullmen. *BOOM* all my magic items go dull and lifeless looking. My ioun stone drops to the sand. Where IS he? I blow my turn grabbing and pocketing my ioun stone and drawing my knife. It doesn't burst into flame and scream with the sound of people in pain.Great. We're in trouble now. The cleric cooks off a Cure Light Wounds, Mass, and you can hear the sobbing and screaming of a dying God. I blow my will save, and am stunned from the agony in the sounds. I drop the dagger and the ioun stone and go to my knees.Man, I'm next to worthless in this fight! At least most of the minotaurs are stunned and wracked with grief also. The next round, I make my Will save, and am back in the game.The monk has finished off his two opponents, and there are screams from the jungle (The Rogue caught the shaman's guards flat footed and managed to kill one and severely wound the other) out steps a scar-tattooed minotaur holding a twisted wooden staff, plated in gold, with a gold plated human skull with demon horns on it.This is gonna be bad.He bellows something (MOOOOO!) and shakes his staff, and a smoking, black furred humungous ape with large fangs, drooling smoking spittle, with red coals for eyes bursts out of the jungle and arrows straight for the Cleric.The monk tackles it, and down onto the ground they go. The Ranger is up in a crouch, both minotaurs dead, and the fighter now has his feet underneath him and is taking on 4 of the minotaurs at once. I start "fake casting" hoping to cause the Shaman to blow magical power to counter a fake spell, but no dice, he doesn't fall for it.More minotaurs. The Barbarian wades in with his orcish doubleaxe, laughing and gibbering and frothing at the mouth. The cleric is dragging the non-combatants away. Several civilians are dead, and she's bleeding heavily. I run over to the downed minotaurs that the monk left lying there. One's just dying, not dead. I slash his throat and exhale a huge cloud of firey bees at the three minotaurs that are hard pressing the cleric, taking the backlash of energy as the blood incandesces into mystical energy. The Shaman tries to block it, and bellows in rage (MOOOOOO!) that I overpower his block with the blood magic. I use the remaining energy from the cowman to block his lighting bolt, making my will save to ignore the burn of blood magic trying to ignite my own blood.The monk finishes off the ape and charges the Shaman!"GET DOWN, KID!" Saduul yells, ignoring the brewing spell from the Shaman that's aimed at the monk, and cracking open the second dead bullman's chest.That shaman wants to play dirty, we'll play dirty! It's blood magic time!The monk rolls beneath the lightning bolt (The GM ruled that my warning gave him a +2 bonus) and pops back up.The Ranger stabs a minotaur holding a little baby boy over his head with the intent of dashing his brains out against the side of a hut. The mother is already dead. Critical hit! Adding in her sneak attack bonuses (the player used Unearthed Arcana to build this Ranger, with full approval of the GM) the bullman roars and drops, she makes her Reflex save to grab the baby, and another one to shield the child as another minotaur tackles her.I get the heart free as the monk grapples the shaman, spirits burst from the sand to claw at the monk."NOW, SADUUL, SEE IF COWMEN BURN!" The heart combusts in my hands. The GM lets me know that I can pump 7 levels worth the metamagic feats out with that heart, if I'm willing to take the 7d4 damage, or just not lose a memorized spell up to 7th level and take no damage. "Your spirits and fur can't protect you now, it's dinner-time!" Maximize, Empower, Improved Penetration. BOOM! There's the smoking corpse of the bullman shaman and whisps of spirits. The monk drops the charred corpse and goes to the aid of the fighter.The remaining cowmen howl in despair, and we mop them up.We bury the dead, and Saduul puts the bloody heads of the bullmen on stakes and drags the body of the shaman off for "later reference."The fighter examines the bodies, and tells us that these aren't the same tribe, at least, as far as he can tell. He points out the scarring and paint. The local "evil cowmen" have stylized circles around the eyes, these guys have straight lines from the eyes to the ears.We cook them up anyway, and serve them to the survivors. What do you know, minotaur tastes just like steak! Yum!We notice the rogue is missing, and the barbarian and the monk start tracking him."Green wing albatross." the druid mutters, and we all nod, and start burying the golden plates and icons we took.The rogue, monk, and barbarian return to tell us that they have found a pyramid in the jungle. There are at least 200 of the cowmen carrying javelins and wearing armor, and at least 500 more non-combatants. They have nearly 100 goblins, kobolds, orcs, and bullmen (from the friendly tribe) in cages, and it doesn't look good. There's a fire on top of the "Incan-ish" pyramid, with a good half-dozen of the cowmen dancing around it. There's numerous fires at the base, with more cowmen dancing around the fires.One thing that's worrying, is several of the cowmen have cut thier flanks, fed rope through them, and are dragging skulls on the ropes as they dance."If we wait for them to finish the ceremonies, we're gonna get the crap beaten out of us." the monk says. "They are performing rituals of flame and strength, and the holy flame will bolster them in combat."Greeeat. I've used up half my spells, and am pretty badly injured. Stupid blood magic.The healing spells our Cleric can do are only doing 1d8+1/2 level, and (s)he's lost access to her top tier spells. We're all injured, and (s)he used her healing spells on the non-combatants, leaving nothing for us."Well, we've done this before. Arm the civilians." the fighter says."Meat-bag, if you let them die, I'll come back as a fireshade and burn you for all eternity!" I tell my former apprentice. The barbarian goes out and comes back with a minature deer (about the size of a dog), two monkeys, and a parrot. THe druid sacrifices them, and bind's thier spirits to protect the settlement.And we set off to take on the gathering of the cowmen. We're packing all our best, the Fighter in his platemail and without his little sister, the Ranger with her knives, having kissed her husband's skull and placed it on her bed, the Druid wrapped in furs with bone rattles in her hands, the Monk limping (speed reduced to 45', -1 to jump, tumble), the Rogue uninjured but still worried, the Cleric stuck halfway between male and female, the Barbarian tired and injured, and me, Saduul, down by roughly 1/2 my spells and gravely injured.We slip through the jungle, and come to the great pyramid. In front of us are hundreds of the cowmen. There is a pile of kobolds, all of them with thier chests cracked open and thrown off the top of the pyramid. They litter the side and the base, well over a score of them.A huge semi-transparent minotaur head hovers above the pyramid, looking down with flaming eyes on the chanting and dancing cowmen. As we watch, they drag a goblin up the steps, each step littered with at least 2 broken and sacrificed kobolds, to the top, where they stretch him out and cut his heart out. The heart goes in a brazier and bursts into flame, and the giant spectral head snorts."OK, Saduul, you're going to have to lead off." the fighter says. "We'll all provide cover for you and the Cleric to disrupt the various ceremonies, but hurry, I'm not sure how long we'll last!"[more in a bit]</blockquote>

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