Friday, July 28, 2006

Ping!

Still looking for inventory, letters home, etc....I *know* y'all like those extra points :)

Tell you what - first person to write and post a summary of the last game gets 2,000 XP. Seriously. Offer expires by the next game. Which reminds me....

Friday, June 09, 2006

Inventory

If you have property in town, please send me an inventory of items that are currently in that property.
Gammy and Drako - this means you! :)

Tuesday, May 23, 2006

Beholder haiku

All too many eyes
Spying, peering, watching close
The beholder blinks

Monday, May 22, 2006

The Oracle?

What I owe you now is a expanded map of the known world with Landess. If you go back to Treyjack before continuing, I owe you:
  • Org chart for the Treyjack city government (for Gammy)
  • Any further information from Belina
  • Any further information from the temple of Odin
  • Item descriptions

What I need from you:

  • If you leveled up, new stats please
  • List of items for identification - Gammy gave me some, but I know you have others
Also, I am willing to answer any questions you might have about the temple type thing you were in last night. You have one day to explore it (if you choose to do so), while Gammy gets his identification spell back, you go through the treasure, etc. If you want to spend longer investigating the building, let me know.

Tuesday, May 09, 2006

The magic identification spell is sputtering...

Just a note guys - still haven't gotten the list of items you wanted IDed. If I don't get it before I log in on May13th (that's this Saturday), an oddity of magical fields will descend upon said objects rendering them unidentifiable.

Similarly, if I don't get updated character information before I log in on May 20th (that's next Saturday, the day before the game), your level, equipment, etc. will revert to whatever I have on my last character sheet from you, erasing all experience awards and treasure gathered to date. I don't need the whole hairy deal - just your new level, new treasure/equipment, and anything relevant to leveling up (hit points, etc.) - just the NEW stuff, in other words.

Tuesday, April 25, 2006

Reminder...

OK, ladies and gentlemen. I'm going to be working on maps this weekend, so if someone would like to send me the list of goods that need identifying, that would be peachy.

Monday, April 10, 2006

Accounting

From my notes, I currently owe everyone:

  • Gammy: Map of the city with locations of the Water Dog and Gammy temple, architectural diagrams of the Water Dog, temple, and riverboats.
  • Drako: Map of the city with location of store front and architectural diagram of the store front, character sheet for Sparky (or whatever name you and he agree on).
  • Party: Map of the known world with locations of Oracle (as indicated by the druids) and mines, descriptions of all the powers of the magic items you have on hand.
Did I forget anything? I seem to remember I owe Ilea and Tora something but I can't remember what.

I need from everyone:
  • Updated character sheets (updated levels, skills, items, etc.)
  • List of items you wanted identified
  • Any back story items you have not provided
  • If you have property in town, any specific improvements/investments you want to make

Talking to the Temple

Artemis casts her Stone Tell spell and asks her questions. A low and rumbling voice grates from the very depths of the rock, rolling over you like molten lava.

Q. Is there a magical bronze long sword or any bronze long sword in the building?
A. There are many things inside the building but whether they are swords is a question for a beater of metal. And I am not sure what this thing is that you call bronze or swords. There are children of stone here - ores that have been heated and shaped and beaten into shapes by such as yourself. Perhaps that is what you call bronze sword.

Q. Is there a magical gold crown inside the building?
A. Gold...yes there is gold here. I do not know if a crown would be the thing that it is, but there is much gold here, enough to make a mighty vein within the living earth. It is all heated and beaten and molded in ways that are not the way it is.

Q. What force or power could destroy the walls of this building?
A. Destroy? You may break this stone or melt it with your fires, but it is only changed not destroyed. You may carry it away, but it is only made distant from its place of uncovering. Nothing can ever be destroyed, only changed and melted or melded into another thing. You can do this with anything if you have enough heat and pressure.

Q. How many levels are there within or below the building?
A. There are empty places encased in stone below this outcrop that reach a finger into the earth. It does not reach more than a little way to the stone heart of this world, but that may be a very great way for such as you.

Q. How many entrances are there to this building?
A. There is a gap in the stone near where you stand. Other gaps are deep within the earth or come from places I cannot see.

Q. Other than smearing blood on the door, what are the other ways to get into the building?
A. You may move through the gap if you are small enough. Perhaps if you break yourself into pebbles, you will be able to move more easily through them.

Q. How many living creatures are inside of this building?
A. There are many things that move rapidly inside my walls, not like the slow steady comfortable speed of stone. They go here and there, in nearly all of the places in the stone. And they go out too.

Q. How many undead creature are inside of this building?
A. All of the things inside seem the same to me.

Q. Are there powerful magic items or artifacts in this building?
A. There are many types of power inside the walls. Some are old and some are young.

Q. Has anyone or anything come into or out of the building in the last day (warmer/colder cycle) or the last 30 warmer/colder cycles?
A. Things go in and out all the time.

Q. Are there protection spells in place to keep people out?
A. I do not know.

Q. Are there protection spells in place to keep people in?
A. I do not know.

Wednesday, April 05, 2006

Prep for Sunday April 9th

To save time for fun during the next game on Sunday, I have the following suggestions:

  1. Let’s create a list of questions for the druid to ask of the temple with her stone tell.
  2. Let’s then go to the temple and ask the questions. (Hopefully, this can be done before the game.)
  3. From the temple (unless other information gathered at the temple changes things), let’s go to town using the druid’s wind walk.
    In town, let’s:
  4. Check with Drako’s sage/researcher to see what he has discovered.
    Buy any healing, vampire protection, and other general use stuff that we need.
  5. Find out what the crown that we bought really does.
  6. Find out what this stupid tin foil hat does that I bought.
  7. Find out about these amulets.
  8. Get any other identifications done on the stuff we aren’t sure about (Gami can do some of the identifications if not all).
  9. Get some maps of the continent and see if we can find the area described to us by the “big bad”.
  10. Find the exact location of the mines (if possible) that we “know” to be to the North.

Please add to the list or make any other suggestions.
Thanks,

Mike

Tuesday, April 04, 2006

Drako’s Rare Item Recovery Service

Found this flyer that Drako posted around town from last time and thought everyone would enjoy it! I'll post some other bits as I locate them - I love this particular idea :)

Drako’s Rare Item Recovery Service

Are you in need of a rare spell component? Do you need a cockatrice feather or a dragon scale? All out of vampire dust? Drats, that can be a real problem. No challenge too big no monster too fierce.

In the last several months alone, I have recovered many items, including:

  • Giant blood
  • Formian shell
  • Beholder eyes
  • Hydra blood, skin, claws, and fangs
  • Dragon heart, blood, claws, blood, and hide

    Note: Beasts only killed when absolutely necessary. Wildlife conservation is a serious issue which I take seriously.

Are you great at research, but not inspired to trek to Northern Abaronda to scale Mount Nureid, to enter the haunted mines of Khalish to recover that ancient tome? Well, Crikey! That’s what I live for!

Very experienced, honest, highly-skilled, motivated, and professional archaeologist/xenobiologist monk.

Can’t trust anyone to perform the task for you? Tired of rogues and “professional treasure seekers” running off with your items? Do they contaminate your samples? Did they get their gnome’s blood mixed with the troll’s blood? Are they trying to pass-off wolf hairs for werewolf hair? Sleep well, knowing that a dependable lawful-good monk is on the job.

Disclaimer: Legal transactions only; no theft, murder, or criminal activities condoned or performed.

Monday, April 03, 2006

Current Party Location (start of game for 4/2/06)

Currently, our adventurers are standing around a large pit in the ground which they suspect strongly leads to a green dragon, with whom they have tangled often. Assuming it's the same green dragon. Assuming it's actually a green dragon and not something else.

Behind them, a temple with a door that will not open. An evil temple. And a missing village. And an iron golem, that lays rusting in the snow. Did I mention that it was snowing? It's snowing alright. Yep...snow in summer...

Tips from Mike

The following information is not a series of questions, but a series of conclusions (and some assumptions) and/or answers that I gleaned from the DM or other sources. I ask one question at the end. We did not search or investigate the iron golem after defeating it and we should have. There is something about it that is important. It could be something it is carrying or is inside it. It could be something about the actual material or composition of the creature. It could be the mission it was on. Remember that it was coming for or to the amulet - which should not be destroyed! It may be that investigating it could give us clues about the council, the dragon, or one of the artifacts (the iron axe most likely. Perhaps it could be reanimated and used to approach the dragon. Perhaps it could be used to spy on the dragon.

This is more of a clarification and assumption. We had asked (and had been informed before) that we need all 6 of the items to defeat the council's plans. But it has never been stated (one way or another) as to whether or not we can defeat individual members of the council without all of the items. However, from speaking with the DM and by communing with rocks and a nice mixture of tea leaves, I have determined that the individual members of the council (however formidable) are not unbeatable without all of the artifacts.

Warning: When the party found the mithril hammer, it was in an abandoned temple. The markings on the temple were similar in origin (Ancient Ones of Chaos type) to the symbols on the round and mysterious temple a stone's throw through the forest (assuming a clear line of site and one hell of an arm). The important bit to know is that entering the other temple caused a temporary insanity on all party members (who entered). The insanities ended upon leaving the building. Oh joy! Heeeeeere's Drako!

Summary of Campaign

In another place, in another world, an ill-bred, young lady, was given an armed escort of women to take her across the mountains to meet with the prince of that land, in the hopes that he would be pleased with her countenance and take her hand in marriage.
He wasn't.
He didn't.
Point in fact, the bonny prince Herschel is an evil wizard/fighter, whose plans extend far beyond this world. With the help of a number of like minded fellows of varying races, he intends to bring chaos back to it's rightful place on top. The women barely escape his dungeon, stumbly through a series of misadventures until.....


Our brave adventurers lay huddled in the musty library as Estefan, their host, swirls his brandy absently. Brandy that he hasn't touched since he is, afterall, a vampire. Vargoyles circle outside the castle windows, no more than a rustle of bat wings against the dirty panes, a scrabble of claws, a hiss. The night stretches before them, and dawn, and its safety, an eternity away. Estefan offers them a choice - sacrifice one of their party and leave the castle immediately to fight the vargoyles and wolves that roam the grounds or...accept a quest from thier host, a quest he will not describe until they have promised to take it.
They have had better days.
Deciding to take on the quest, they find themselves pawns in an ugly game between the forces of chaos and law - with evil on both sides. To fulfill their oath, they must travel to the southern continent and destroy a portal to another plane - or die trying. Transported far to the south by a portal stone, they find themselves in forbidding surroundings. Dwarven slaves, forced to mine a strange ore by beholders, trudge through the valley below them. A dark jungle beckons to the east. The sea rages at their backs. And a road leads south to a foreign city.


After finding thier feet, the intrepid party strikes off in an attempt to close the portal before *something* get through. But it never seems as simple as all that.


A gnome that looks like an orc.
An orc that looks like an elf, then an orc, then an elf, then an orc.
Two elves that might make the summer Olympic track team.
One really nasty city.
Exploding temples.
The medieval mafia.
A Godfather with a Deliverance accent.
And a tournament that delivered more damage to one poor spectator than to the participants.
Gammy “the made man” and the lovely, unpredictable Sam trick poor slobs into loosening their purse strings, the magic users immolate monsters (and party member), and the party handles a persistently annoying green dragon.


After many adventures, the party discovers that there is more to this wicked chess game than simple politics. The prince and his "counsel" intend to bring one of the Old Ones into the world, misguided in their belief that they can control this awesome power. As they bring in minions from other planes in the form of Slaadi, the repercussions of their actions is already main plain in sweeping weather changes. The only way to stop them and close the portal is to gather ancient weapons - those forged by the metal kings.

A silver ring
A golden crown
A mithril hammer
A copper sword
An iron axe
A bronze long sword
And....

Seperately, each artifact is powerful, but together they can close the portal and send the Old Ones back...if they can be found. And the counsel....who are they? The prince and his lady Mira are simple enough but the rest remain a mystery. And how do the mines tie in to all of it?

Sunday, April 02, 2006

Notes on game play

  • To move the battles along quicker, spell casters must have their spells ready and fighters must have their chosen weapons ready when their initiative is called. If you're not ready, you lose your turn and I still get to hit you. Then the monsters get to hit you.
  • I award a 10% experience point bonus to anyone who writes AND THEN GIVES TO ME a drawing, diary entry, letter home, figurine, diorama, flyer you are having your lacky post, or any other creative piece relating to/about the previous game. I will even accept cakes, assuming they are decorated to depict something that happened in the previous game.
  • Let me know at least 24 hours before the game whether you are going to make it. This is an important courtesy - I do not want end up with one poor soul on my doorstep, 20-sider clutched desperately in a sweaty palm, squeaking “What do you mean I get to finish the bone ooze battle all by myself?!??!?!”

Saturday, March 18, 2006