Thirty Minutes & a reply

[Desdichado]

I suggest learning a thing or two about being concise. You don't need to write 5 pages worth fo ask a relatively simple question.

 

[TiQuinn]

What I need are ideas, thoughts on the subject, what should we do?

I think that you shouldn't concern yourself with the attention spans and reading levels of others, and concentrate on improving your spelling and punctuation.

 

[Berandor]

I think it's a lesson in writing. When you start by putting off your readers and follow with an overly long and - simply put - boring text with too many paragraphs and too little structure, you won't get too many responses.

Still, I'd like to help you... without having to read the whole shebang above.
Could you please sum up the most important parts as they relate to your immediate situation?
Thanks,

Berandor

ETA: Argh, I just read the whole thing, in spite of what I said before.
A quick rundown:
---
The group is 8th level and consists of a cleric, an archer, a sorcerer, a rogue and some NPCs.
They fight an evil druid who seems to be allied with a Troll Hag and a tribe of fanatical lizard folk. They also have three or more pet black dragons.
The group has no idea where the lair of the druid and the hag is, even though they used scrying, gather information and questioning prisoners. However, they know that the lizard folk and their dragons have attacked a small village, whose surviving population is now kept prisoner in order to be sacrificed in but a few days.
The group is not very rich; in fact, it cannot afford to buy higher-level scrolls or the like. They do have a scrying mirror, but the druid knows about it.
The druid has also a wizard or sorcerer in her employ.
Time and options are running out; the only viable strategy seems to be just to travel north into the swamp - the group knows the general distance to the troll lair (10 hours from some city) - and hope to get lucky or follow some lizard folk back to it.
Any ideas?
---

I hope that was, more or less correct.
In all, I think it's bad how little information you could gain. After using social skills, interrogating a prisoner and using magic, you should have at least a decent idea as to the location of the lair.
As I see it, your best hope is to move into the swamp and try to follow (sneakily) a group of lizardfolk back to the lair, perhaps even without alerting them.
You don't have access to Teleport in any way, I guess?
Well, perhaps someone has a better idea.

 

[Joshua Randall]

Take off and nuke the entire site from orbit. It's the only way to be sure.

 

[Grishnak]

Take off and nuke the entire site from orbit. It's the only way to be sure.

Only if there be some aliens that need nuking!! My attention was lost as soon as I clicked on the thread sorry so didn't read

 

[Talon5]

I'll give you the benefit of the doubt on your opening remarks. I think they were born out of frustration more than contempt, but I agree with others that they should be changed.

Set an ambush...stop moving around so much. If you pick a spot and defend it, as if you are just resting...your enemy might come to you. They have to know you are following them and would relish a chance to crush you.

Also, if you just wait you force the GM to act. He can no longer just react to you, but must now act on his own...

Cedric

Yes, it was born out of frustration- Saturday is game time and I was getting squat from the other players, and the whole thing felt dammed futal. I appriciate your insight into my situation. I am pretty frustrated, I love the campaign, like the GMs style and build up. He's really good.

A fine suggestion

 

[Talon5]

Very cool. Thank you.

The problem with the tracking- just the Lizard Folk is this- they stick to the water for the most part. Tracks are gone in a hour. A large number of people should help the situation for sure.

Its my feeling that the GM is saying- "you had better get in here and tackle these guys before more helpless victuims get in their way, and get slaughtered," our paladin is already looking to revolt because we bailed on Deep Mud (stilts village).

The dragons are a serious threat. The Grayson (the archer) just got a magic sword and he has 17 magic arrows, this is an example of just how screwed we are when it comes to this fight.

Thanks for your comments they were well recieved.

All right. The survivors of the stilt village are being taken back to the lair for sacrifice. This should be a fair number of folks because you've got the prisoners, possibly a large number, and you have all the gaurds. These will most likely be lizard folk, not dragons as what self respecting dragon would stoop to gaurd duty. This large group should be fairly easy for a well trained ranger to track even in a swap. Keep in mind that while the lizard folk may be hard to track in large numbers in the swap, beaten and wounded humans being marched to their death will not. You'll have discarded clothing, smears of blood, etc etc etc. This plus your new "friend", should be enough to get you there.

Now, the sticking point, as I see it, is that you don't have a plan for taking care of multiple dragons, and an army of lizard folk. This is a serious problem , and by letting you know what you're about to face the DM may be trying to tell you to slow down and this enemey is beyond you at this point.

I would suggest that once you find the lair don't go charging in, but instead evaluate the situation, and if you have to, bring in the calvary. At this stage the local lords are going to be pretty peeved about the loss of two outposts and two garrisons. They should be very grateful for any help in locating the criminals. This could also lead to them sending in the troops and smashing this soundly for you. Not to bad really and should be worth a decent amount of an xp bonus on top of what you gain for taking part in the assault.

Other options for find the lair of these folks would be to ask the local wild life if you have the appropriate spells. The animals will know where the scary place that they avoid is. Even if it just points you in the right direction so much the better. This still leaves you with the problem of dealing with the villians.

Also, try looking at what the lizard men are trying to do. Are they just feeding the Tree? Are they trying to raise the vampire? What? Pump the friend for this information if you haven't already. Knowing the motivation of the enemy can help you figure out where they're going to stike next.

If they're attacking outpost that are weak and undefended, find the next one in this situation and wait there for them to strike. If they're attacking only places where you've been and causing pain and misery in your wake as revenge against you, then go someplace and fake leaving. Then, put a stake in the ground and wait until they show. This will allow you to dicate the terrain of the fight and smash them when they get there. Not my personal favorite option, but workable when all else fails.

Hope this helps in some way.

-Ashrum

 

[Talon5]

Recommendations

1- Gather Information repeatedly.

No one has higher then a 3 skill, and assisting seems not to help enough to get us anywhere

2- Try to find tracks in the North.

Hate to sound like I did when I reposted this a few days ago- The north is a 180 degrees with hundreds of miles of terrian

3- Tell your DM. Don't just let people walk away from this frustrated. Find out what he wants to do and let him know that not helping risks all his efforts thus far.

He actually took my claim of frustration pretty hard, offering to basically let the NPCs handle it. Backing out would be out of character for 75% of the PCs.

4- As mentioned before, insults bad.

Ya, like Cedric said- it was born out of frustration, and for that I am sorry to the readers of it. I am not that much of a dick normally, just tired and this campaign is taking up a lot of thought and I feel very alone in it- which normally I don't (there is at least one other Player working on it, we're just not agreeing).

5- Just a general posting suggestion, start your threads with a brief statement of your problem. I read a few lines then decided that you probably asked your question at the bottom and lo- that's exactly what you did. After reading the bottom, I had an interest to scan part of what you wrote. The 1 line per paragraph thing didn't help- but that's just me, I'm used to paragraphs. ^_^

I was trying to keep it short because there is a lot of history- the GM is into the back story and the building up of plots and such. This is one that has been on the back burner for- well 8 lvls.

 

[reapersaurus]

I have rtesponded to some long posts before in my time here, but I got disinterested in this request only one paragraph in.
When I saw you didn't even bother to say that you were in "Sunless Citadel", you said "Sunless", I knew that you wouldn't be expressing yourself in an easily-digestable manner for the best comprehension.

Then I scrolled, and thought Oh My God, this is ridiculously long.
No help from me - no offense.
Next time make it more palatable and concise to the reader.