Mission Accomplished
Oct. 26th, 2004 01:28 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
terryclothTonight we had a session of Jeff's Darksun campaign, continuing our missions for House Vordon. To make a long story short, we finished the mission and got lots and lots of treasure, by darksun standards at least. To make it not so short...
The party's immediate mission was to investigate House Troika, which was linked to the big bad demagoguing enemy, for evidence that it was linked to the recent assassinations. Since they had some trade goods to sell (salvaged from the ruined caravan) they decided to case the joint by going and selling the goods to them.
The volume of goods was enough to get them in to see the head of the house, who was in the back room (out of three) in the tiny office. As they came in, they saw him quickly hide a book in his desk and lock the drawer... there wasn't all that much space otherwise in the building for anything to be hidden.
After selling off the crap, they found an inn within sight and ate lunch there, casually surveying the building. There were lots and lots of guards - 20 guards to guard a 30 foot by 60 foot building. And, oh look!, there was one of the people they assumed were the assassins, going in and out on some business. Brightstone changed into a Kestrekel to follow him.
The assassin headed to a bar in the slums, where he was quickly joined by his fellows. They argued for a while, drew straws, drank a lot, and around nightfall split into two groups. Reporting this through the mindlink, Brightstone followed one group (chosen at random), and suggested the party run around to try to ambush them before they got out of the slums. Two could play at this game!
Not very *well*, unfortunately. The party's ambush was spotted from about a hundred feet away, which wasn't unrecoverable... but their wizard immediately cast an invisibility sphere, and the group moved away before the druid could react with a faerie fire. Having lost track of their 'quarry', the party buggered off to do the House Troika burglary.
The burglary was simple -- since the guards were layered thick outside, April would cast a silence on the psions (Cypher and Saurian) and the dervish (Santino), who'd dimension door inside to search while she and Brightstone waited outside, in case they needed to offer support. The invasion group teleported in, broke open the locked desk drawer, flipped through the book, and found a map with two red Xs marked, with names -- one was the captain of the city guard, the other was their employer. And -- oh look! -- the routes marked matched the direction the assassins had been travelling!
They immediately rushed to try to save their employer, who (after all) hadn't paid them yet. Moving as quickly as they could (it was a loooong way away), they managed to arrive just as she was pitched out her bedroom window, closely followed by a trio of assassins. The assassins hadn't been counting on interference, though, and were quickly taken down -- one by a 'death wish' power from Saurian, one by melee from Peppermint and Santino, and the last by a combination of magic missiles and an energy bolt.
They showed their employer the book and map, and she decided that she had the evidence she needed to overthrow her cousin, with the book, map, the physical evidence of the assassins, and the party's testimony. They rushed to wake the captain of the guard and present their evidence.
The captain was, of course, already awake, having fought off his assassins, although all of them had escaped. Several hours of testimony and evidence passed, after which the party, at the head of about two dozen guards, headed for House Vordon proper to arrest the treacherous merchant.
But when they got there, he was already gone. Still, their employer was now the official head of her household, and paid them what she'd promised -- with the promise of the same amount again if they could bring her cousin back to stand trail. The city also put a HUGE (30000 ceramic) bounty on his head. So it was decided that, with a bunch of borrowed Crodlu and spares, they would immediately rush out into the desert after him, hoping to catch him before he rejoined his army.
Before they could do that, however, Brightstone was assassinated by the halfling assassin -- remember him? -- and instantly killed. Death Wish and various stunning effects kept him from doing anything else before the remainder of the party finished him off, at least, but the druid was still dead. They took an hour or so to contact Laika and have him arrange for Brightstone's reincarnation, while recruiting a half giant brute they knew, Kelt, to aid in the capture.
It took more than a day to chase down Thraxos and his minions, as both groups pushed their mounts. Crodlus were faster than Kanks, though, and so the party eventually caught up to him, just as he was negotiating with a tribe of Thri-Kreen to have them intercept and slaughter the group chasing him. "That's them! Kill them!" Daran (the caravan master) shouted, pointing at the party.
The kreen swarmed the party, who mostly fled with fly spells, invisibility, tumbling, or dimension door spells. Except for Kelt, who stood and fought, dropping three 'kreen in return for a few hits from Chachkas. Before the thirty three remaining kreen could converge on the giant and devour him, a tribe of elves arrived, and opened fire at them -- instantly drawing off all the bugs, who hated elves more than anything else in the world (and thought they were good to eat).
This left Thraxos and his party with no swarm of meat shields to protect them from the party. Kratek, Daran's bodyguard, was the first to rush forwards, and thus the first to die beneath Kelt's maul, although he mauled Kelt somewhat before he went down. The other two meleers were engaged and eventually killed by Santino and Kelt, working together, with some help from another Death Wish. Saurian and April traded spells with the enemy's wizard from long range -- that is, they traded their healing for his ice storms and fireballs, until Saurian got close enough to energy-bolt him, bringing him down far enough for Santino to finish off. Cypher dimension-doored up close and started ego-whipping Thraxos, who was also fighting off some pathetic flailing by Daran's sap.
Yes, Daran, feeling cowardly as always, turned on his master and tried ineffectually to aid the party against him. Once he was the last person left alive, Thraxos agreed to surrender and come quietly. Saurian and April started to kill Daran, who whined and warned them that if they killed him, there'd be no one to save them from his elves, who'd finished off the 'kreen and were coming for them next.
So, grudgingly, the party agreed to give Daran a share of the reward if he'd tell the elves to let them go. Daran, of course, betrayed them, telling the elves instead to kill them. Unfortunately for him, the elves had recovered their wayward wanderer, who'd been saved by the party giving him food and water the LAST time they'd been trailing Daran through the desert. He told of how Daran had laughed at him and left him to die, so the elves killed Daran instead, and let the party gather up their kills and leave.
On the way back, they met up with the actual army of guardsmen sent out to capture Thraxos (who'd been travelling too slowly to actually catch him) and turned him over. He was implanted with 'agony beetles' to keep him from manifesting any powers, and taken back for trial, after which he was executed for his crimes.
The party got the promised 35 gold each from the new head of House Vordon, the 300 gold from the city, half a dozen powerful magical items looted from dead enemies (where 'powerful' means '4000-8000 ceramic'), and the title to the city block on which House Troika's buildings were located, as the house was being liquidated as the sham it was. They diced for the useful, valuable items, and sold the less useful valuables to House Vordon at a very good rate.
last week | next week
Brightstone came back as an elf. Sort of disappointing (yay, less con), but at least he doesn't have an ECL -- the GM's ruling is that reincarnating with an ECL means having to 'buy it off' by spending the next level you get. Yuck!
The party's immediate mission was to investigate House Troika, which was linked to the big bad demagoguing enemy, for evidence that it was linked to the recent assassinations. Since they had some trade goods to sell (salvaged from the ruined caravan) they decided to case the joint by going and selling the goods to them.
The volume of goods was enough to get them in to see the head of the house, who was in the back room (out of three) in the tiny office. As they came in, they saw him quickly hide a book in his desk and lock the drawer... there wasn't all that much space otherwise in the building for anything to be hidden.
After selling off the crap, they found an inn within sight and ate lunch there, casually surveying the building. There were lots and lots of guards - 20 guards to guard a 30 foot by 60 foot building. And, oh look!, there was one of the people they assumed were the assassins, going in and out on some business. Brightstone changed into a Kestrekel to follow him.
The assassin headed to a bar in the slums, where he was quickly joined by his fellows. They argued for a while, drew straws, drank a lot, and around nightfall split into two groups. Reporting this through the mindlink, Brightstone followed one group (chosen at random), and suggested the party run around to try to ambush them before they got out of the slums. Two could play at this game!
Not very *well*, unfortunately. The party's ambush was spotted from about a hundred feet away, which wasn't unrecoverable... but their wizard immediately cast an invisibility sphere, and the group moved away before the druid could react with a faerie fire. Having lost track of their 'quarry', the party buggered off to do the House Troika burglary.
The burglary was simple -- since the guards were layered thick outside, April would cast a silence on the psions (Cypher and Saurian) and the dervish (Santino), who'd dimension door inside to search while she and Brightstone waited outside, in case they needed to offer support. The invasion group teleported in, broke open the locked desk drawer, flipped through the book, and found a map with two red Xs marked, with names -- one was the captain of the city guard, the other was their employer. And -- oh look! -- the routes marked matched the direction the assassins had been travelling!
They immediately rushed to try to save their employer, who (after all) hadn't paid them yet. Moving as quickly as they could (it was a loooong way away), they managed to arrive just as she was pitched out her bedroom window, closely followed by a trio of assassins. The assassins hadn't been counting on interference, though, and were quickly taken down -- one by a 'death wish' power from Saurian, one by melee from Peppermint and Santino, and the last by a combination of magic missiles and an energy bolt.
They showed their employer the book and map, and she decided that she had the evidence she needed to overthrow her cousin, with the book, map, the physical evidence of the assassins, and the party's testimony. They rushed to wake the captain of the guard and present their evidence.
The captain was, of course, already awake, having fought off his assassins, although all of them had escaped. Several hours of testimony and evidence passed, after which the party, at the head of about two dozen guards, headed for House Vordon proper to arrest the treacherous merchant.
But when they got there, he was already gone. Still, their employer was now the official head of her household, and paid them what she'd promised -- with the promise of the same amount again if they could bring her cousin back to stand trail. The city also put a HUGE (30000 ceramic) bounty on his head. So it was decided that, with a bunch of borrowed Crodlu and spares, they would immediately rush out into the desert after him, hoping to catch him before he rejoined his army.
Before they could do that, however, Brightstone was assassinated by the halfling assassin -- remember him? -- and instantly killed. Death Wish and various stunning effects kept him from doing anything else before the remainder of the party finished him off, at least, but the druid was still dead. They took an hour or so to contact Laika and have him arrange for Brightstone's reincarnation, while recruiting a half giant brute they knew, Kelt, to aid in the capture.
It took more than a day to chase down Thraxos and his minions, as both groups pushed their mounts. Crodlus were faster than Kanks, though, and so the party eventually caught up to him, just as he was negotiating with a tribe of Thri-Kreen to have them intercept and slaughter the group chasing him. "That's them! Kill them!" Daran (the caravan master) shouted, pointing at the party.
The kreen swarmed the party, who mostly fled with fly spells, invisibility, tumbling, or dimension door spells. Except for Kelt, who stood and fought, dropping three 'kreen in return for a few hits from Chachkas. Before the thirty three remaining kreen could converge on the giant and devour him, a tribe of elves arrived, and opened fire at them -- instantly drawing off all the bugs, who hated elves more than anything else in the world (and thought they were good to eat).
This left Thraxos and his party with no swarm of meat shields to protect them from the party. Kratek, Daran's bodyguard, was the first to rush forwards, and thus the first to die beneath Kelt's maul, although he mauled Kelt somewhat before he went down. The other two meleers were engaged and eventually killed by Santino and Kelt, working together, with some help from another Death Wish. Saurian and April traded spells with the enemy's wizard from long range -- that is, they traded their healing for his ice storms and fireballs, until Saurian got close enough to energy-bolt him, bringing him down far enough for Santino to finish off. Cypher dimension-doored up close and started ego-whipping Thraxos, who was also fighting off some pathetic flailing by Daran's sap.
Yes, Daran, feeling cowardly as always, turned on his master and tried ineffectually to aid the party against him. Once he was the last person left alive, Thraxos agreed to surrender and come quietly. Saurian and April started to kill Daran, who whined and warned them that if they killed him, there'd be no one to save them from his elves, who'd finished off the 'kreen and were coming for them next.
So, grudgingly, the party agreed to give Daran a share of the reward if he'd tell the elves to let them go. Daran, of course, betrayed them, telling the elves instead to kill them. Unfortunately for him, the elves had recovered their wayward wanderer, who'd been saved by the party giving him food and water the LAST time they'd been trailing Daran through the desert. He told of how Daran had laughed at him and left him to die, so the elves killed Daran instead, and let the party gather up their kills and leave.
On the way back, they met up with the actual army of guardsmen sent out to capture Thraxos (who'd been travelling too slowly to actually catch him) and turned him over. He was implanted with 'agony beetles' to keep him from manifesting any powers, and taken back for trial, after which he was executed for his crimes.
The party got the promised 35 gold each from the new head of House Vordon, the 300 gold from the city, half a dozen powerful magical items looted from dead enemies (where 'powerful' means '4000-8000 ceramic'), and the title to the city block on which House Troika's buildings were located, as the house was being liquidated as the sham it was. They diced for the useful, valuable items, and sold the less useful valuables to House Vordon at a very good rate.
last week | next week
Brightstone came back as an elf. Sort of disappointing (yay, less con), but at least he doesn't have an ECL -- the GM's ruling is that reincarnating with an ECL means having to 'buy it off' by spending the next level you get. Yuck!
