Saturday, February 18, 2012

Another Fitting Conclusion


The prison warden was in fact a strong muscle man, who managed to cripple the totemist’s legs, as well as to do serious damage to the party as a whole. Interestingly the totemist actually pulled out his crossbow to shoot the man, missed, so threw his crossbow, missed again and then promptly gave up, simply too far to actually attack. The party was strong enough to haul him out of there, and with some help from a friendly saber tooth tiger and the engineer’s slow flying abilities they made it out safely.
So yet again the party is ejected from pleasant society and sent out to an unknown world. They didn’t even have time to spend all their ill gotten gains. What a shame. After leaving the city in a hurry they ran into significant trouble with some local wildlife, including a long respected party member meeting his ultimate fate, as well as a recently acquired factotum coming to an unfortunate end.
Before the party quite left the city they had to go to a tavern, because sometimes you just need a drink after a prison break. Some peculiar choices regarding healing after the escape were made, namely the complete lack of it, making what should have been an easy battle into something significantly more difficult. The previous owner of the party’s gold had finally caught up to them, and sent a few demons to deal with them.
These particular demons actually reflect some damage dealt to them back upon anyone in the area, resulting in mass casualties from the patrons of the tavern, as well as fairly large casualties from the party itself. The shapeshifter extraordinaire decided it was best to deal as much damage as possible to these creatures in as brief amount of time, despite his severely weakened team-mates objecting quite a lot.
In the end he came close to killing everyone else, but only killed the engineer and factotum, who were the victims of not having quite enough health, unlike the totemist who had just enough. With the party’s numbers down to 3 they decided it was best to leave the town they were wanted in, and headed towards their employer, the man who sent them after the bow. They were not the only ones sent out that day though, as a bard and his Warblade compatriot were sent off as well, by the crime lord still not known to the party.
This bard infiltrated the party through a few successful bluff checks, not difficult given the collective wisdom of the party is effectively negative, and then they were off together, ready for adventures of all kinds. The bard was very successful in his attempts at subversion, and at the first opportunity gave the large satchel of the money to a devil employed by his employer. This caused notable derision amongst the party, but a Warblade’s chain quickly put a stop to that, effective as it was at putting people down when its owner rolled well.
The party still continue their journey expecting a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, but unfortunately all they would get is more pain and suffering. Not that they weren’t used to it, with so much personal and professional death happening around them all the time it had really become routine. There were several escapades on this journey, mostly involving bodily harm to a variety of wild life, but nothing of spectacular importance.
In the end they ended up at their destination, though it looked a little different than the last time they were there, given that the keeper had been grounded, or destroyed, so the huge animal lay slowly decomposing because a gentle repose just didn’t cover something the size of Chicago. Here they searched for their employer but all to no avail, in the end they decided to head back down towards the dragon egg just to see what would happen. That was when shit went down.
The dragon did not wake up no, so they weren’t completely screwed, but a different dragon teamed with some kobolds was still a significant threat. In the end the party was stuck between a rock and a hard place, with a dragon pelting mind bullets at them from the top of a ladder, kobolds descending quickly, and gnomes on the other side who looked none too friendly.
The bard was able to garner a truce, though with some difficulty given that the resident baboon rapist had bitten a few in two, but he was subsequently slaughtered by the bard as a show of good faith, one PC down. A wall of fire here proved difficult as it so often is, and even a brave man can be devoured by kobolds when there are enough of them. The Totemist here climbed up the ladder, clawing and throwing down numerous kobold corpses, though taken plenty of battle damage himself. In the end it was something not quite in his control that caused his death, but fateful gravity, killer of so many everyday.
He fell quite some way, nearly all down the ladder having killed dozens of kobolds, ripping them to pieces but it just wasn’t enough, because a dragon simply has too many tricks up its metaphorical sleeves. The truce with the gnomes however worked spectacularly and a battle plan was set up with a pincer formation. Unfortunately the enlarge person wand had broken again, just as it had done the three previous days. In the Warblade’s insanity he ripped apart a few gnomes in the hope the blood god would give him strength, but it did not, and simply resulted in a few pissed off gnomes.
The battle worked out in the party’s favour, with one of their new members having infiltrated the kobold’s ranks, and erupted to eat a few of them. He was truly the master of the forbidden feast, with a bag full of arms and a taste for flesh of any kind, as a part raven man. The gnomes took heavy losses, but just when things looked most dire and the dragon was advancing on the slowly dying party a miracle dropped through the sky.
First a strange gentleman calling himself Saxton Hale dropped through, creating a gap for the new party member who spoke only Gol-Ka, and who would subsequently be known as Penis-Man due to his introduction about home and a picture of a penis. Saxton Hale defeated the dragon with his bare hands, and then ran off never to be seen again, as is his way. Now in the after battle mop up the party is left tired and unsure of what to do next, but is quickly commissioned for some murder, as is their typical plan.
The party was recruited by a local leader of the church of Helio, the god of law and order, to go and investigate some necromantic happenings down below the city. This leader is actually a devil in disguise, who is planning for them to be murdered in this task, but they don’t know that quite yet. So they investigate the necromancer, who is actually building a nice little city for him and his undead buddies, but they can’t let that happen, because all undead are evil, so they begin the fight to end all fights, one way or another, but probably in TPK.