The return of the D&D campaign: This time it's potatoes

Exciting adventures IRL.
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Raid
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Re: The return of the D&D campaign: This time it's potatoes

Post by Raid » Sun May 19, 2019 4:25 pm

Can't do Monday, but the other two days are fine.

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Re: The return of the D&D campaign: This time it's potatoes

Post by Sly Boots » Sun May 19, 2019 5:03 pm

Tuesday for preference, Wednesday should be fine though as well.

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Re: The return of the D&D campaign: This time it's potatoes

Post by Sly Boots » Mon May 20, 2019 10:27 pm

So... Mantis?

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Re: The return of the D&D campaign: This time it's potatoes

Post by Mantis » Mon May 20, 2019 10:39 pm

Tuesday only for me this week I think. Pretty sure I'll be away Wednesday and Thursday.

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Re: The return of the D&D campaign: This time it's potatoes

Post by Wrathbone » Tue May 21, 2019 7:08 am

Nice one, we'll aim for tonight then.

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Re: The return of the D&D campaign: This time it's potatoes

Post by Sly Boots » Tue May 21, 2019 5:04 pm

Had a pretty busy (but in a good way, lots achieved) day of work, about to stick a pizza in the oven ahead of a night of D&D with the chaps... is it sad how happy this makes me? :lol:

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Re: The return of the D&D campaign: This time it's potatoes

Post by Wrathbone » Tue May 21, 2019 5:31 pm

:)

I spent lunch prepping something which may never come up, but if it does... god have mercy on us all. :lol:

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Re: The return of the D&D campaign: This time it's potatoes

Post by Mantis » Tue May 21, 2019 9:07 pm

Curious as to whether we actually came close to discovering the nature of your sinister prepping. We certainly uncovered a lot that thickened the plot today!

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Re: The return of the D&D campaign: This time it's potatoes

Post by Sly Boots » Tue May 21, 2019 9:11 pm

The spooky dream stuff certainly caught me off-guard, I spent a good few minutes wondering if I'd missed part of a session somewhere along the line :lol:

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Re: The return of the D&D campaign: This time it's potatoes

Post by Wrathbone » Tue May 21, 2019 9:12 pm

Mantis wrote:
Tue May 21, 2019 9:07 pm
Curious as to whether we actually came close to discovering the nature of your sinister prepping. We certainly uncovered a lot that thickened the plot today!
Kind of, but not in the way you think! It was actually an innocent but terrible side-joke about the Winged Wyvern proprietors - Gilbert and Saluvian - and a play they’d been rehearsing called the Corsairs of Cormyr.

I wrote a harrowing parody song for it. :lol: Singing was the true threat of that session.

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Re: The return of the D&D campaign: This time it's potatoes

Post by Sly Boots » Tue May 21, 2019 9:16 pm

:lol:

Didn't pick up on that at all, I don't know whether to be relieved or disappointed!

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Re: The return of the D&D campaign: This time it's potatoes

Post by Mantis » Tue May 21, 2019 9:19 pm

I think I missed any hints towards that when I was on the phone, gutted.
Sly Boots wrote:
Tue May 21, 2019 9:11 pm
The spooky dream stuff certainly caught me off-guard, I spent a good few minutes wondering if I'd missed part of a session somewhere along the line :lol:
Nah, that was relayed to me ages ago by PM. To be honest it was a good minute or so on the scene of the fire before I even remembered that it was anything to do with me!

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Re: The return of the D&D campaign: This time it's potatoes

Post by Wrathbone » Tue May 21, 2019 9:21 pm

Sly Boots wrote:
Tue May 21, 2019 9:16 pm
:lol:

Didn't pick up on that at all, I don't know whether to be relieved or disappointed!
I’ll tease the first stanza.

I am the very model of a Neverwinter mercenary,
I've information plentiful on taking down adversaries.
I'll kill your enemies for gold or jewels or other recompense;
Your payments must be legal or I'll have to sell them at a fence.
I'm very good at scaling trees, especially if they're platanus,
I understand that dungeon halls are cleaned by cubes gelatinous,
About demonic lineage I'm teeming with a lot o' news
With many cheerful facts about gnoll worshippers of Yeenoghu.
I can steal requested valuables from noble knights or oligarchs,
My skills at bluffing guards who want to question me are off the charts,
In short, in matters pertaining to taking down adversaries,
I am the very model of a Neverwinter mercenary.



Sorry-not-sorry. :lol:

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Re: The return of the D&D campaign: This time it's potatoes

Post by Sly Boots » Tue May 21, 2019 9:22 pm

=D>

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Re: The return of the D&D campaign: This time it's potatoes

Post by Wrathbone » Wed May 22, 2019 12:08 pm

The recap:
The Unmentionables awoke to the hammering of General Sabine's fist on the door. She had found that the band - the Ribald Rapscallions - had been hired from a local tavern/playhouse called the Winged Wyvern. They set off to investigate the lead, hoping to uncover some clue as to how the fiends had infiltrated the gathering in the Hall of Justice. The Wyvern was closed, but our intrepid heroes were no strangers to breaking and entering and promptly sneaked in via the kitchen without so much as a knock on the door. In the bar they found the severely hungover bartender, Gilbert Greenhill, soon joined by his equally inebriated employer, the theatrical Saluvian Siltheer. Disguised as General Sabine, Sage interrogated them regarding the band, and Gilbert explained how they had played at the Wyvern for years but that the twin brother and sister, Derren and Sally Dellweather, had been living up to their band's name in recent weeks, seducing strangers from the crowd and taking them back to their room which they rented upstairs.

The party were given access to the room by Gilbert. It was a rank mess, with a lingering rank smell that emanated from a large trunk. With some effort, the trunk was unlocked to reveal the mutilated corpses of the real twins inside. Several other curiosities were found about the dresser: numerous pouches of coin, presumably stolen from the fiends' victims; a magical sending stone which allowed the bearer to communicate with a companion stone; and a metallic blue brooch in the shape of a cloak, quickly identified as those worn by the wizards of the Cloak Tower.

With nary an apology or an explanation, the party vacated the Winged Wyvern before they were dragged into helping with corpse-disposal. With questions about tracing the companion sending stone and how the Cloak Tower brooch had fallen into the hands of fiends, the logical course of action led the party to talk to Brior Felhim at the Cloak Tower. On the way, they were distracted by a burned down orphanage with one survivor - a little girl, only six years of age, lamenting the death of her old guardian, Patricio, along with all the other orphans. Upon hearing this news, Sage dragged his friends out of earshot and confided that he had received a dream from an unknown entity a while ago who asked him to make a choice as to which of an old man or a young girl should live. Far be it from this storyteller to suggest that one of our heroes was responsible for the death of many, many orphans and their master - indeed, I need not make such an allegation, as Sage himself suggested it. But still, what price is the death of unknowns compared to the sweet, sweet magic that comes from unquestioning servitude to an obfuscated and otherworldly entity of unfathomable power and intent? As recompense for her troubles, Sage ensured that a guard escorted the girl to the Hall of Justice, where she would receive lodgings and care by order of the Unmentionables.
I'll have to continue the rest tonight as I need to get back to work! :)

EDIT - Part 2:
Arriving at the Cloak Tower, the Unmentionables were met outside the gates by the eccentric gnomish Council wizard, Brior Felhim. He first presented Slythe with his newly-enchanted bow, now more powerful and with a button on the shaft which would cause an additional effect which even Brior wasn't sure about. He advised only to use it in dire need. With secret matters to discuss, the party departed with Brior to the more private corners of the Fallen Tower - a collapsed tower renovated into an open-air watering hole. There the party asked Brior about the sending stone. He examined it and declared that he would need to spend a few hours scrutinising it to figure out how to trace the location of its companion stone. After some debate in private about whether to simply hand over their main lead and evidence in their investigation to the wild-eyed, cackling gnome from the mysterious and secretive Cloak Tower, they decided to first try speaking through it. There was no response, and so handing over the stone seemed their only recourse. The party also enquired with Brior about the brooch, and after close inspection he determined that it was genuine and therefore gravely concerning that it had fallen into the hands of the fiends. Brior resolved to get to the bottom of the matter and departed for the Cloak Tower with the sending stone.

The Unmentionables remembered that Tombstone, the tiefling shopkeeper and private investigator, had asked if they could stop by to answer some questions about Iarno Albrek. Upon arriving at Cases and Curiosities, he asked them about their business with Albrek, when they had last seen him, what they knew of Sildar Hallwinter and, strangely, what they knew about runestones. He then showed them the runestone which the party had unknowingly delivered to him in the package from Phandalin and explained that it was most likely bad. Very bad. He believed it to be a summoning stone, though what it summoned he couldn't say. He went on to tell how an investigation had uncovered the theft of the runestone from the Cloak Tower which somehow ended up in the possession of Iarno Albrek, who he found out had set up a band of ruffians in Phandalin. When he learned that the Redbrands had been annihilated, he asked his friend and contact in Phandalin, Linene Greywind to recover the runestone. Given the circumstances of the troubles around Neverwinter and the supposed mole in the Council, Tombstone was convinced that the runestone was immensely dangerous and not at all safe in his possession. As such, he convinced the party that they should look after this terrifying instrument of probable catastrophic doom and promptly offloaded the responsibility to them. He declared that he had to find Iarno Albrek, dead or alive, though for what purpose he did not say.

Seeking information about runestones, the party headed to the House of Knowledge - a temple to Oghma, the god of knowledge, where a library of substantial size and quality was available for public consumption. Little did they realise that the taxes used to fund the Unmentionables on the orders of Lord Neverember meant that important public services such as this library would probably be axed due to budget cuts, leaving the populace an illiterate and ignorant rabble. Nevertheless, they made good use of the library for their own immediate needs and soon found a suitable book describing the nature and usual purposes of runestones similar to the one in their possession. The news seemed bad - such runestones were generally of nefarious intent, and it was rumoured that one was responsible for the eruption of Mount Hotenow many decades ago which destroyed most of the city. Another passage mentioning how the Drow had historically used runestones to summon terrors triggered Slythe's memory and reminded him that he had an untranslated note written in Undercommon, found in the quarters of the Black Spider in the Lost Mine. Sensing a possible connection, the party enquired with the monks if they could translate it, and a master linguist was brought forth to read the note. After a few moments of the translator looking increasingly concerned, he announced that he knew what it said...

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