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NOW LIVE! Into the Woods--new character species, eerie monsters, and haunting villains to populate the woodlands of your D&D games.
Sagiro's Story Hour Returns (new thread started on 5/18/08)
- Thread starter Sagiro
- Start date
Piratecat
Sesquipedalian
Oh yeah, that's him! Here he is doing the voice for Scree, Kibi's earth elemental familiar. This is pretty much what we heard when we sent the Xorn down to scoop up the divination sink under Kallor (WHANG!).
http://www.folded.com/defenders/scree.mp3
http://www.folded.com/defenders/scree.mp3
madriel
First Post
coyote6 said:Is that "horrors" as in "indescribable atrocities and offenses against all that is good and decent", or as in "should never have started down the hall without full hp & a full complement of spells"?
Bah, prudence is for sissies.
A true Adventurer pursues evil at all times, even when they're half-dead and out of spells.Old Adventurers never die, they just never live to get old!
KidCthulhu
First Post
coyote6 said:Is that "horrors" as in "indescribable atrocities and offenses against all that is good and decent", or as in "should never have started down the hall without full hp & a full complement of spells"?
Conveniently enough, he means both!
Sagiro
Rodent of Uncertain Parentage
Sagiro’s Story Hour, Part 142b
Flicker bravely volunteers to try disarming the magical traps detected on four of the five of the interior doors, knowing the painful price of failure. He gets the first three, but an ill-timed sneeze while working on the last one sets off the harm glyph. Ernie is waiting with the healing wand, and Flicker’s agony is short-lived.
Dranko first opens the near door on the right – the one that wasn’t trapped. It opens into a small room containing only a cot and a magical pitcher that never runs out of water. After a bit of searching fails to turn up anything sinister, Dranko tries the nearest door on the left.
The room beyond is also not large, maybe 20’ on a side. It is full of shifting shadows, though there is no obvious light source inside. A grey metal cauldron squats in the center of the room, filled with either a black vapor or a black liquid. It’s hard for Dranko to say which, because when he feels the familiar chill and wave of unease indicative of proximate Null Shadows, he slams the door as fast as he can and puts his back to it. "I think I know what’s in there," he says, his face pale. When no Null Shadows come out of the room in the next few moments, the party decides to check the other doors before dealing with the cauldron.
Some thirty feet down the hall, Dranko opens the other door on the left-hand side of the hallway. It creaks open revealing another smallish room, stone walls and floor, slightly larger than the one with the cauldron. There is a small round pit in the center of the floor, perhaps four feet in diameter. Suspended above this pit is a small iron cage, hanging from the ceiling by a metal chain, and in the cage is a chunk of black rock. Dranko doesn’t need to cast detect evil; he can feel that the rock is evil, just by standing there. Greasy vapors waft up from the pit, playing over the cage and the black stone.
There is another chain linked to the cage, and at the other end of the second chain is a metal ring clamped tightly around the head of a man. The man, unshaven and filthy, is curled up in the fetal position in a corner of the room. Around him on the floor are scattered empty flasks, just like the ones filled with green liquid that the party found earlier in the magically-protected cabinet of the alchemy lab on the floor above. Black energy plays along both chains.
The party is hesitant to go into the room, but Ernie cannot stand to see the man suffering. He runs into the room despite the party’s protests. As he passes by the pit, he sees that it is full of a thick mostly-clear oil, and that several objects are suspended therein. But he ignores that for now, and goes to check on the bedraggled victim. Ernie reaches out and touches the man’s shoulder, and the man stirs, turns slowly, and lifts his head. Dranko, watching from the door, gasps in shock. He knows this man. His hair is longer, his bones thinner, and he didn’t have a beard when Dranko last saw him, but there’s no mistaking him. It’s Califax.
The black iron ring is affixed so tightly to Califax’s head that they cannot loosen or pry it, but an enlarge spell causes it to come free. It takes a layer of skin with it, leaving a red band around his head. They carry him out and take him to the room with the cot, where Ernie spends another charge of healing wand, and trickles some water into his mouth. Califax has said nothing coherent, producing only moaning noises and occasional snippets of babble. Morningstar casts detect thoughts, but Califax is deranged. When Dranko and Ernie try to make it clear that the Black Circle has been defeated and that he’s safe, Califax’s tortured mind cannot comprehend it, and he thinks it must be a trick, or that he’s not understanding them. He says something incomprehensible, and Morningstar, reading his mind, says he’s trying to say "You have to stop them! You must stop them!"
While some stay tending to Califax, the others go back to take a look in the oily pit. Dranko drops a magical light source into it, and the light sinks about halfway down before stopping. It illuminates a folded up piece of paper, which Kibi lifts out with a mage hand spell. Neither oil nor paper detects as magic, so they unfold it on the floor of the room. It’s a chart of magic schools; there’s one like it in apprentice wizards’ rooms in mage guilds across the kingdom. Aravis, Grey Wolf and Kibi have all seen numerous posters like this one, showing the relationships between schools of magic, which ones oppose other ones, and what basic hand-gestures form the roots of casting. Grey Wolf takes a closer look, when he sees a slight tear on one corner. The chart he had in his room studying under his master Melido had the same tear. It also had the same discolored spot from a misfired ray of frost, and the same pattern of creases…
There’s no mistake. It is the poster from Grey Wolf’s room as a young student, so many years ago. It's here, now, in this Black Circle den of abominations. But why would they have gone through the trouble of...
The resurrection! Califax had warned the Company that the Black Circle had some means of resurrecting Grey Wolf against his will, should he die. Grey Wolf looks up again at the evil black rock hanging over the pit, and the Company realizes the terrible purpose of this room.
They move on to the door at the end of the hall, wondering if what's beyond it could possibly be worse...
...to be continued...
Flicker bravely volunteers to try disarming the magical traps detected on four of the five of the interior doors, knowing the painful price of failure. He gets the first three, but an ill-timed sneeze while working on the last one sets off the harm glyph. Ernie is waiting with the healing wand, and Flicker’s agony is short-lived.
Dranko first opens the near door on the right – the one that wasn’t trapped. It opens into a small room containing only a cot and a magical pitcher that never runs out of water. After a bit of searching fails to turn up anything sinister, Dranko tries the nearest door on the left.
The room beyond is also not large, maybe 20’ on a side. It is full of shifting shadows, though there is no obvious light source inside. A grey metal cauldron squats in the center of the room, filled with either a black vapor or a black liquid. It’s hard for Dranko to say which, because when he feels the familiar chill and wave of unease indicative of proximate Null Shadows, he slams the door as fast as he can and puts his back to it. "I think I know what’s in there," he says, his face pale. When no Null Shadows come out of the room in the next few moments, the party decides to check the other doors before dealing with the cauldron.
Some thirty feet down the hall, Dranko opens the other door on the left-hand side of the hallway. It creaks open revealing another smallish room, stone walls and floor, slightly larger than the one with the cauldron. There is a small round pit in the center of the floor, perhaps four feet in diameter. Suspended above this pit is a small iron cage, hanging from the ceiling by a metal chain, and in the cage is a chunk of black rock. Dranko doesn’t need to cast detect evil; he can feel that the rock is evil, just by standing there. Greasy vapors waft up from the pit, playing over the cage and the black stone.
There is another chain linked to the cage, and at the other end of the second chain is a metal ring clamped tightly around the head of a man. The man, unshaven and filthy, is curled up in the fetal position in a corner of the room. Around him on the floor are scattered empty flasks, just like the ones filled with green liquid that the party found earlier in the magically-protected cabinet of the alchemy lab on the floor above. Black energy plays along both chains.
The party is hesitant to go into the room, but Ernie cannot stand to see the man suffering. He runs into the room despite the party’s protests. As he passes by the pit, he sees that it is full of a thick mostly-clear oil, and that several objects are suspended therein. But he ignores that for now, and goes to check on the bedraggled victim. Ernie reaches out and touches the man’s shoulder, and the man stirs, turns slowly, and lifts his head. Dranko, watching from the door, gasps in shock. He knows this man. His hair is longer, his bones thinner, and he didn’t have a beard when Dranko last saw him, but there’s no mistaking him. It’s Califax.
The black iron ring is affixed so tightly to Califax’s head that they cannot loosen or pry it, but an enlarge spell causes it to come free. It takes a layer of skin with it, leaving a red band around his head. They carry him out and take him to the room with the cot, where Ernie spends another charge of healing wand, and trickles some water into his mouth. Califax has said nothing coherent, producing only moaning noises and occasional snippets of babble. Morningstar casts detect thoughts, but Califax is deranged. When Dranko and Ernie try to make it clear that the Black Circle has been defeated and that he’s safe, Califax’s tortured mind cannot comprehend it, and he thinks it must be a trick, or that he’s not understanding them. He says something incomprehensible, and Morningstar, reading his mind, says he’s trying to say "You have to stop them! You must stop them!"
While some stay tending to Califax, the others go back to take a look in the oily pit. Dranko drops a magical light source into it, and the light sinks about halfway down before stopping. It illuminates a folded up piece of paper, which Kibi lifts out with a mage hand spell. Neither oil nor paper detects as magic, so they unfold it on the floor of the room. It’s a chart of magic schools; there’s one like it in apprentice wizards’ rooms in mage guilds across the kingdom. Aravis, Grey Wolf and Kibi have all seen numerous posters like this one, showing the relationships between schools of magic, which ones oppose other ones, and what basic hand-gestures form the roots of casting. Grey Wolf takes a closer look, when he sees a slight tear on one corner. The chart he had in his room studying under his master Melido had the same tear. It also had the same discolored spot from a misfired ray of frost, and the same pattern of creases…
There’s no mistake. It is the poster from Grey Wolf’s room as a young student, so many years ago. It's here, now, in this Black Circle den of abominations. But why would they have gone through the trouble of...
The resurrection! Califax had warned the Company that the Black Circle had some means of resurrecting Grey Wolf against his will, should he die. Grey Wolf looks up again at the evil black rock hanging over the pit, and the Company realizes the terrible purpose of this room.
They move on to the door at the end of the hall, wondering if what's beyond it could possibly be worse...
...to be continued...
Plane Sailing
Astral Admin - Mwahahaha!
Sagiro,
I just want to say that I love the thread which has woven through here of the redemption of Califax. I think the theme of redemption is woefully underused in most fantasy where the bad guys remain blacker than black - your plots rise above that, and in no clearer way than the matter of Califax.
Bravo!
I just want to say that I love the thread which has woven through here of the redemption of Califax. I think the theme of redemption is woefully underused in most fantasy where the bad guys remain blacker than black - your plots rise above that, and in no clearer way than the matter of Califax.
Bravo!
Sagiro
Rodent of Uncertain Parentage
Sagiro’s Story Hour, Part 142c
Dranko takes a deep breath, wonders for a minute why he’s the one opening all these doors, and pulls the handle. It opens, and a wave of such malevolent and overpowering evil comes out of the room that Dranko drops unconscious on the spot. The others, standing back from the door, not only can feel the evil pouring from the room, but cannot even look straight at the doorway, as if the evil is a blinding light shining out from the opening. Alarmed, they drag Dranko’s body away from the door and slam it shut. The evil hangs in the air like an after-image for a few seconds.
Perhaps that door can wait until tomorrow.
Dranko comes around soon enough, and describes what he saw in the room before he was knocked out. He remembers seeing walls lined with bookshelves, all heaped with books and scrolls. In the center of the room was a large, thick wooden table. And around the corner to the left, where he couldn’t see, there was… something. Just the memory causes him pain.
The last of the five doors turns out to be much less dire. It reveals a tiny room, hardly more than a closet, with a large crank-handle protruding from the wall. On the floor near the wall with the handle is a pile of crumbled obsidian. Dranko surmises that the broken rock was some sort of construct that turned the crank, and that the crank opened the retractable roof above the Black Circle’s ritual pit. The construct must have fallen apart when the Black Circle "power supply" shut off. Aravis polymorphs himself into an ogre, and turns the heavy crank until the roof draws closed.
The party sends Cobb (now feeling downright spry after being healed and learning the details of the Black Circle’s downfall) to report what has happened to Rhiavonne, and to let her know that there is still some unfinished business that will have to wait until tomorrow. The priestesses of Ell who were dispatched to check the estates come back to report general confusion on the surface. Servants and some guards are milling around, not entirely sure of what they’ve been doing recently, or why. A few servants, finding their lords not at home and sensing that they aren’t coming back, are having an impromptu feast using some of the best silver to eat some of the best stuff from the larders. Three of the Lords – Lord Cosnor, Lady Canterrin and Lord Southinghorn -- have definitely gone missing, and come to think of it, haven’t been seen for days.
The party prepares to spend the night sleeping in the safety of rope trick spells. Morningstar casts a sending to Eddings, giving him a short message to give to Ozilinsh regarding current events. Eddings, who hasn’t been the recipient of a sending in all this time, wastes a few of his 25 words being puzzled, before promising Morningstar that he’ll try reaching their patron archmage on the crystal ball.
Then Morningstar prepares to enter Ava Dormo. Two nights ago she dreamt that she should go to the temple of the Illuminated Sisters in Ava Dormo two nights hence, and now that’s tonight. Aravis decides to watch Morningstar using the Crosser’s Maze, to see if he can learn anything about Ava Dormo. His mind slides into the Maze, and he draws his attention inward toward Morningstar, trying to find her in the dreaming plane.
Morningstar appears outside the temple buildings. Unlike last time, there is not a large crowd of sisters training for dream-battle, but Previa is there having a discussion with half a dozen other Dreamwalkers. She spies Morningstar, excuses herself from the others, and walks across the field to meet her.
"So you are here, after all," Previa says. Her demeanor is calm and steady as always, but Morningstar can tell that something unusual has happened recently that she is itching to tell.
"I had a dream that I should come here tonight, but I don’t know the source," Morningstar says. "Do you know something about it?"
"Yes, I think so. You have a visitor. She is… a priestess of Ell, I think. She is old. And there is something strange about her. She is waiting for you inside the chapel."
Morningstar walks inside the darkened building and straight through to the chapel. At its far end, looking up at a statue of Ell below an inverted black triangle, is an old woman, short, in her 50’s or 60’s at least. Her short hair is a pale white color, which makes her different from all other Ellish priestesses, save for Morningstar herself.
The woman turns around. "It’s all so… overwhelming. And maddening, to think that you’ve been here all this time, and She never told me. But it’s wonderful, too. You must be Morningstar. It is an honor to meet you. My name is Evenstar."
…to be continued…
Dranko takes a deep breath, wonders for a minute why he’s the one opening all these doors, and pulls the handle. It opens, and a wave of such malevolent and overpowering evil comes out of the room that Dranko drops unconscious on the spot. The others, standing back from the door, not only can feel the evil pouring from the room, but cannot even look straight at the doorway, as if the evil is a blinding light shining out from the opening. Alarmed, they drag Dranko’s body away from the door and slam it shut. The evil hangs in the air like an after-image for a few seconds.
Perhaps that door can wait until tomorrow.
Dranko comes around soon enough, and describes what he saw in the room before he was knocked out. He remembers seeing walls lined with bookshelves, all heaped with books and scrolls. In the center of the room was a large, thick wooden table. And around the corner to the left, where he couldn’t see, there was… something. Just the memory causes him pain.
The last of the five doors turns out to be much less dire. It reveals a tiny room, hardly more than a closet, with a large crank-handle protruding from the wall. On the floor near the wall with the handle is a pile of crumbled obsidian. Dranko surmises that the broken rock was some sort of construct that turned the crank, and that the crank opened the retractable roof above the Black Circle’s ritual pit. The construct must have fallen apart when the Black Circle "power supply" shut off. Aravis polymorphs himself into an ogre, and turns the heavy crank until the roof draws closed.
The party sends Cobb (now feeling downright spry after being healed and learning the details of the Black Circle’s downfall) to report what has happened to Rhiavonne, and to let her know that there is still some unfinished business that will have to wait until tomorrow. The priestesses of Ell who were dispatched to check the estates come back to report general confusion on the surface. Servants and some guards are milling around, not entirely sure of what they’ve been doing recently, or why. A few servants, finding their lords not at home and sensing that they aren’t coming back, are having an impromptu feast using some of the best silver to eat some of the best stuff from the larders. Three of the Lords – Lord Cosnor, Lady Canterrin and Lord Southinghorn -- have definitely gone missing, and come to think of it, haven’t been seen for days.
The party prepares to spend the night sleeping in the safety of rope trick spells. Morningstar casts a sending to Eddings, giving him a short message to give to Ozilinsh regarding current events. Eddings, who hasn’t been the recipient of a sending in all this time, wastes a few of his 25 words being puzzled, before promising Morningstar that he’ll try reaching their patron archmage on the crystal ball.
Then Morningstar prepares to enter Ava Dormo. Two nights ago she dreamt that she should go to the temple of the Illuminated Sisters in Ava Dormo two nights hence, and now that’s tonight. Aravis decides to watch Morningstar using the Crosser’s Maze, to see if he can learn anything about Ava Dormo. His mind slides into the Maze, and he draws his attention inward toward Morningstar, trying to find her in the dreaming plane.
Morningstar appears outside the temple buildings. Unlike last time, there is not a large crowd of sisters training for dream-battle, but Previa is there having a discussion with half a dozen other Dreamwalkers. She spies Morningstar, excuses herself from the others, and walks across the field to meet her.
"So you are here, after all," Previa says. Her demeanor is calm and steady as always, but Morningstar can tell that something unusual has happened recently that she is itching to tell.
"I had a dream that I should come here tonight, but I don’t know the source," Morningstar says. "Do you know something about it?"
"Yes, I think so. You have a visitor. She is… a priestess of Ell, I think. She is old. And there is something strange about her. She is waiting for you inside the chapel."
Morningstar walks inside the darkened building and straight through to the chapel. At its far end, looking up at a statue of Ell below an inverted black triangle, is an old woman, short, in her 50’s or 60’s at least. Her short hair is a pale white color, which makes her different from all other Ellish priestesses, save for Morningstar herself.
The woman turns around. "It’s all so… overwhelming. And maddening, to think that you’ve been here all this time, and She never told me. But it’s wonderful, too. You must be Morningstar. It is an honor to meet you. My name is Evenstar."
…to be continued…
Sagiro
Rodent of Uncertain Parentage
madriel said:
No, no, it's not that. Morningstar's mom lives in the city of Kynder Hold, a short ship-journey from Tal Hae. Morningstar has even visited her on occasion.
When I get home tonight I'll post some previously-unpublished archival material that may shed some light (no pun intended) on Evenstar; it's some passages from old Ellish books that Previa found a couple of years ago, when Morningstar asked her dig up anything she could about this whole "Child of Light" business.
-Sagiro
el-remmen
Moderator Emeritus
Catching up. . .
Ok, so I had fallen way behind and just spent some time cutting & pasting what I missed into a word doc in order to print and read at my leisure. . .
The only problem with doing it this way (and this is how I read the thing from the beginning to Part 126) is that I miss everyone’s comments (and it is too much a pain In the ass to paste all that in and read it as well – I’d never get done) – but anyway. I look forward to catching up – and again let me say that I think of your group as the D&D equivalent of Marvel Comics’ The Avengers. The groups works really well and seems like a real team (as opposed to my “Out of the Frying Pan” group which seems more like the Defenders – quarrelling as the world ends around them
I will drop by again and let you know what I think of what I’ve read – but in the meantime Sagiro, you should stop by and read my story hour. . . I think it is great that when you write “And then the party decided to do X…” it would be equivalent of 4 pages of dialogue in my story hour since my party bickers all the time
- but I like it like that (variety is the spice of life) – but anyway, I tend to think of my campaign as “My Own Sagiro "because it really feels like it is the best game I’ve ever run – and your campaign is the best I’ve ever read/heard about.
Ok, so I had fallen way behind and just spent some time cutting & pasting what I missed into a word doc in order to print and read at my leisure. . .
The only problem with doing it this way (and this is how I read the thing from the beginning to Part 126) is that I miss everyone’s comments (and it is too much a pain In the ass to paste all that in and read it as well – I’d never get done) – but anyway. I look forward to catching up – and again let me say that I think of your group as the D&D equivalent of Marvel Comics’ The Avengers. The groups works really well and seems like a real team (as opposed to my “Out of the Frying Pan” group which seems more like the Defenders – quarrelling as the world ends around them
I will drop by again and let you know what I think of what I’ve read – but in the meantime Sagiro, you should stop by and read my story hour. . . I think it is great that when you write “And then the party decided to do X…” it would be equivalent of 4 pages of dialogue in my story hour since my party bickers all the time
- but I like it like that (variety is the spice of life) – but anyway, I tend to think of my campaign as “My Own Sagiro "because it really feels like it is the best game I’ve ever run – and your campaign is the best I’ve ever read/heard about.
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