The Rod of Seven Parts: Kauai Team OOC

[CanadienneBacon]

This serves as a plot device and complements your PC, so yes, sure. To avoid a dead giveaway of the adventure, I need to limit Maelicent's knowledge of the grounds, though. Basically, there's a keep. With multiple networks of outer defenses. The keep is locked up and vacant. The forest is magical but Maelicent (perhaps due to spending part or most of his time elsewhere in the city at odd hours?) has yet to encounter anything truly terrifying on the grounds. However you're able to work in and explain the limitation in knowledge should be fine.

Maelicent's shelter will be near the northern curtain wall. He found a narrow crack in the outer wall and widened it enough to creep in. A medium sized or larger creature won't be able to squeeze in, though, unless the crack is made even wider. I leave it to you to come up with a viable reason why the party passed up trying to go through the crack this morning as they walked around the wall. Maelicent may have wanted to keep his little secret, or he may've tried to say something but got voiced over. Perhaps he simply figured that the crack wasn't wide enough for the others. I dunno. Just come up with something reasonable, please.

 

[Ambrus]

Has Maelicent noticed anything about the forest that would suggest to him that it was magical? Has he noticed any unusual tracks in the forest? Is there any wildlife there fit for him to trap or hunt? Has he noticed any other squatters who make their home in the forest? If strange monsters are rumored to live there (it occurs to me that Mael himself might be the "strange monster" people are talking about) then what is it/they are describing it as?

Also, as a suggestion, considering that Mael took off running as soon as the woman started screaming you might want to change your earlier in-game post to reflect the goblin's sudden departure from the scene.

 

[CanadienneBacon]

Has Maelicent noticed anything about the forest that would suggest to him that it was magical? Has he noticed any unusual tracks in the forest? Is there any wildlife there fit for him to trap or hunt? Has he noticed any other squatters who make their home in the forest? If strange monsters are rumored to live there (it occurs to me that Mael himself might be the "strange monster" people are talking about) then what is it/they are describing it as?

Maelicent has seen ghosts at night on the keep grounds. Sometimes the animal paths in the forest shift. And he swears that the trees themselves move from place to place. There's an old oak in particular that is never in the same place more than three days in a row. Once it leaned toward Maelicent when he passed by and tried to grab him. There is wildlife to trap and hunt, yes. He hasn't seen any other squatters. Various rumors among the city folk describe banshees, ghosts, undead from a battle 60 years ago, pirates who hole up in the keep and have a secret tunnel that leads unseen down to the docks by the Hulks, dark elves, chimeras, a gold dragon wizard who keeps the citadel locked up to keep out thieves, and a coven of witches who sucked out Michel Edain's soul and imprisoned his lich body in the keep's dungeon. Most everyone in the city stays the heck away from the place. Every once in a while a child or curious seeker is reported to have entered the keep but never returns. Small children in Teg's Throat sing of a pack of intelligent wolves who roam the grounds and protect the forest. Maelicent hasn't seen any of that, though.

 

[Ambrus]

Heh. The place sounds kind of creepy, but considering that he's safely spent most every night for the past six months in the place then it's evidently not all that hazardous, at least not for a goblin. If the strange goings on and rumors keep the locals out all the better. As long as the trees are smart enough to leave him alone then he'll limit his campfires to deadfall lumber. Sounds like a great place for Maelicent to call home; he'll just be one more non-descript creepy-crawly amongst the forest's denizens.

In his explorations, did he ever make it to the south end of the forest down to Bathmere or is that too far? I'm just wondering where he would likely have gotten access to water close to home. Does the courtyard have any old wells? How many acres does the forest cover? There's no indication of scale on your map.

 

[CanadienneBacon]

Just saw your edit...

Maelicent didn't make it south down to Bathmere. I'm saving that for something else, later. For water, he probably would have snuck out at night and either gone down to the Tegyrn outside of town or used one of the wells in one of the better homes of the Terraced District. There are also public wells in any of the city's green areas or market squares. Teggest is three miles wide (west to east).

 

[Ambrus]

Out of curiosity, why didn't the group simply head east around the keep's outer curtain wall to reach the East Gate rather than walk all the way around the west and north sides of the keep before circling back south? Seems a rather roundabout choice of route to have taken. Just wondering if there's a logic to it.

 

[CanadienneBacon]

Probably because the Sniffling Pig isn't as far to the south as you think it is. Being a complete fabrication of Gamad's, it's not detailed on the map and came into existence only recently.

Edit: Perhaps I should ask where you all think the Sniffling Pig Inn is? Did I write and then forget some textual clue that places it other than what I have in mind, which is on the western edge of the curtain wall? If no one's answered here in half an hour or so I'll dig in the IC to see if I can find what, if anything, I supplied. It's possible that I originally wrote it in somewhere than where I've lately been imagining it to be and that the confusion is due to my own spotty memory.

 

[Ambrus]

I was just going by the trip you described in your IG post. You mentioned that the group started in the south end of the Guild District, close to the Rivermark area. Looking at the map that would seem to be fairly close to the southern-most point in the city.

 

[CanadienneBacon]

Ah, okay, that's a little bit different, then. Voadam went to the Rivermark to buy a backpack and then went back to the Sniffling Pig after he was done. The group wasn't setting out from the market, they were setting out from the Pig. Or so I had been thinking.

 

[CanadienneBacon]

If anyone is bothered by pronounciation issues, the X in Xylla is a soft "sh" sound. Shilla.