3 Flamerule, 1368: Back again

3 Flamerule 1368.
Dawn. Finwocket prepares a gnomish feast for breakfast, and the party readies itself for the trip back to Bug Tussle. The trip back is uneventful in the pleasantly cool morning.

Stago, Selina, and Routunious make their way to a shop called The Halfling's Gems to sell the black opal and then split up the proceeds. Outside the shop, a silent and disciplined guard stands steadfast. He wears splint mail and doesn't respond to Stago. Two snarling wardogs are chained nearby.

The party meets Ola Larkspittle, a female halfling, who appraises the opal. She makes an offer of 500 gp. Selina says the opal is worth 1000 gp.

Ola responds, "Oh, that's right, I think you could get as much as 1000 gp if you found the right customer, but if that's what I buy it from you for, and that's all I can sell it for, then what point is there in the transaction for me? A girl's got to make a living, after all. I've got my overhead, my guard and his mutts...I never pay more than half what I can resell something for or it isn't going to do me any good. I'm a merchant, not a banker."

They haggle. Selina tries to sweeten the deal by offering Ola exclusives for future booty. Ola is willing to go as high as 750 gp, but Selina is stubborn and refuses to part with the gem.

The trio go to the The Fighter's Own and meet w/Elessaria who appears to have suffered from a bad night. Haunted by terrible dreams of her own death, she was unable to sleep for more than a few minutes at a time. She awakes feeling fatigued and irritable. She was completely unable to concentrate, and though Thunderstorm agreed to take her on as a pupil, he will not begin lessons until she is able to put these nightmare visions behind her.

Selina and Elessaria discuss logistics and inventory about supplying the party...which isn't easy given that Elessaria spends more time talking about the vision of her own death she exprienced than what the party should be doing to ready themselves for a life of adventure. Exasperated, Selina convinces everyone of the wisdom of selling off all their unneeded items.

"How much is a magnifying glass worth?" Stago asked.

"It doesn't matter. The question is how much will someone pay for it?" Selina answered bitterly.

"Isn't that the question I asked?" Stago returned.

Selina answers, "No."

The party stops at My Father's Blade, a pawnshop that deals with used weapons. They meet Christo Lackey, Proprietor. Selina sells dagger for 50 cp, short sword w/scabbard for 2.5 gp. Routunious sells a battle axe for 1.25 gp. He tries to sell a large shield, but Christo only deals with weapons, and declines.

Stago asks Christo if he has anything special. Christo offers a magical buckle knife -- suitable for those who need to pull a knife from a belt -- for 1000 gp. Stago says that's too rich for his blood.

The party goes to Gonthur's Armory, run by a swarthy, very enterprising dwarf named Gonthur Truesteel. Pit and Brandy, his two human assistants, enjoy the dwarf's tales of adventure as much as the hard physical labor of the smithy. Routunious sells his large shield for 7 gp and a breast plate (made by Gonthur,coincidentally) for 100 gp.

"Now, where'd ye come by this piece of work, I wonder?" He asks.

Routunious explains that it was part of the plunder they brought up from the Undertavern. "Ah, that's why he never finished paying fer it then." The dwarf grumbles, "That'll teach me to harden my heart to tales of need from adventuring folk. Risky business, being soft hearted. Nearly as dangerous as jumping down holes trying to stick pointy things into creatures with long teeth."

Next stop on the tour of Bug Tussle merchants is Isaac's Potent Potions, the apothecary. It costs 100 gp to identify a potion. Stago is further convinced of the value in memorizing an identify spell. He inquires, as per his mother's advice, for a potion of stoneskin. Isaac doesn't have any in stock, however.

Healing potions cost 200 gp. Extra Healing costs 400 gp. Selina trades the opal for 2 potions of extra healing, and one of healing. "With merchants, barter is best." She says, "Everyone thinks they got a good deal when you don't have money as a means of measuring worth."

The party divvies up the potions. Selina and Routunious carry the extra healing potions; Elessaria carries the healing potion.

Considering Selina's advice about bartering, Stago proposes that the party have Isaac identify 2 potions and then let the apothecary keep the one we don't want as a fee. Selina doesn't like the idea, and offers gems valued at 150 gp to identify the two potions. She realizes that this isn't a very good deal for the merchant, but uses her charisma on him and he doesn't seem to mind losing a little money on the deal. Selina purrs as she hands him the jet and carellion stones in exchange for the potions' identity.

Isaac tells her that one potion is another extra healing, which is given to Stago to carry. Routunious has a vial of thick clear liquid that Isaac mulls over for a loooong time before saying he believes it to be holy water.

Routunious is irked that it tooks so long to identify holy water. Isaac explains that part of the trouble was attempting to identify a potion that isn't really a potion. Still charmed by Selina, he offers to identify the next potion for free.

Routunious has some scrolls that he wants identified. Isaac suggests going to Alzador's Magical Emporium. That's where some of the group purchased tickets for the Bug Tour, so they know the way. When they get there, though, it is locked up tight. A sign on the door says to go to the Tower. When they knock, the pleasant (if strange) face of Marty greets them through a security panel in the door.

"You're in luck! The wizard is in!" Marty says as he unbolts the door. The party starts to enter, but Marty blocks their progress. "Nobody allowed inside. He'll be with you in a moment!"

Alzador, an elderly mage with long flowing beard, ornate staff, and jewelled crown steps out of the tower and bows to the company. A fee is negotiated through Marty, and the mage agrees to identify 6 scrolls and a possible magical item for a topaz worth 650 gp.

The items:

A cleverly made "spear" that a mage or some sects of priests would be allowed to use as it is simply a silver knife on a stick. Worth about 30 gp.

Scroll 1: Identify
Scroll 2: Sleep
Scroll 3: Spider Climb
Scroll 4: Detect Invisibility
Scroll 5: Know Alignment
Scroll 6: Web

All are 1st level spells (save Web, which is 2nd), but scrolls can't be written by a wizard that is not of at least 9th level, so all spell scrolls are of at least that level or higher. All six are written at 9th level. The one who reads the scrolls would cast them as a 9th level magic user. Alzador adds, "The Spider Climb spell lasts 12 rounds. Be done climbing by then, you're you're going to want a Feather Fall spell handy."

Selina asks Alzador about Shandar the Ashen. Alzador is a little uncomfortable, but replies that Shandar had his job as company wizard in the Hopeful Seven before him. "Shandar...left before The Hopeful Seven made their fortune. He left, I believe, over an issue regarding the splitting of treasure and now lives out in the Dagger Hills. Personally, I don't trust him, but to be honest, I haven't had many dealings with him. He's a lot more powerful than I am. I heard he's setting up some kind of shop out in the Hills to prey on traffic tween here and Daggerdale. Safe place to stay, re-eqiup, get hirelings...that sort of thing. I doubt he'll make a go of it, but then he probably isn't doing it for the money."

Routunious asks if there are and Gondsmen around. Alzador says, "There's a shrine to Gond near Anathar's Dell. I'm the wrong person to ask...other than nodding to Mystra, I'm not overly religious."

Selina gives the scrolls to Stago after deliberating with the rest of the party on who should carry them.

Noon

The party heads to the general store, The One Armed Bandit, run by Thom. Selina figures out and makes a list of what everyone needs for provisions. All get bedroll or blanket and share two large tents.

Stago gets a second wardog with its own panniers and 1 week's worth of dogfood. He calls it "Spike".

At the big message board in Bug Tussle, the PCs see notices and messages for a variety of odd jobs. The only notice of real interest for them reads:

REWARD FOR MONSTER HEADS
In light of increased incursions by wild denizens and monsters, Colonel Putnam of the Guard of Fort Aumry offers a reward in gold coin for the heads of monstrous beings which threaten the safety and security of our region. The entire head must be brought to the fort, and only monsters killed within one day’s ride of Bug Tussle are eligible for the bounty. The more dangerous the creature, the greater the bounty. In the case of multi-headed creatures (such as ettins), only one head may be presented.

The reward is an amount in gold equal to 10% of the total experience points of the monster killed.

While the PCs debate returning to the Dagger Hills to get the heads of the slain ogres, they are approached by a female ranger. The same ranger who provided Shandar with the map at the Fighter’s Own. She speaks little, and only hands the PCs a letter and a map. The letter reads:

My friends, who helped me so much in regaining the map I'd lost in the Undertavern, I now seek again your aid and ingenuity. I wish to hire you for a series of adventures to our mutual profit and gain. The map which you rescued for me shows the way to a place where a piece of my property is hidden and guarded. Several other items which used to be in my possession have been scattered about the Dales. It is my belief that as each item is recovered, clues to the whereabouts of the next item will be obtained.

My associate has tokens of my good faith, which you may keep even should you decide not to assist me in my quest to regain my possessions. Among the tokens is a map which will guide you to the location of my secret tower.

Be warned, however. Should you decide to accept my offer of employment, you will need to pass certain tests. Between where you stand today and the door to my home you will meet with many trials. If you fail to pass them, you'd never be able to accomplish what I intend to ask of you, and therefore discussion of the terms of your employment would be moot.
I am certain, however, that you are much more than capable of finding your way to my table, where the contracts wait for your signatures!

Shandar the Ashen One

Routunious reads the letter aloud to the group. It's an invitation to hire the group and as a token, includes 1 pp for each person in the party...including Merle, but not Tick, the dogs, or the cats.

After much discussion, the PCs decided to undertake the trip. Not, however, before doing some investigating of their potential employer and provisioning for the journey. They travel around the town making discreet inquiries.

They discover the basics of the Shandar story, that he was the first magic user of The Hopeful Seven, and that there had been a falling out among the company. Shandar had gone off and done some moonlighting with another company and found some artifacts of great power. He refused to share these with the other members of the company, not feeling as though he were obligated to. There is some debate as to whether Shandar left the party in a huff or if he was thrown out, but however they may have parted, part they did. Alzador was the replacement wizard.

Though there is no enmity between them now, there is also little love. The general feeling is that if those things were stolen from Shandar, serves him right for not sharing them in the first place as he should have.

Galen and the others, when asked, all say pretty much the same thing...all they know is that after leaving their company he has apparently followed them like a camp dog and finally set himself up a home in the Dagger Hills. He seems to have found some other adventurers with whom he has been making a comfortable enough living to construct himself a tower out there. Beyond that, little at all is known.

After collecting as much information as they can and buying as much equipment as they can afford, the PCs set out on the trail and into the Dagger Hills.

2 Flamerule, 1368: Fleckstone

5pm.
The party arrives at Fleckstone, the mining town where Stago's mom, Finwocket Wimsicalamity, lives.

Stago brings everyone to the homestead. Routunious finally ends his quest to deliver the gold to Stago's mother. Finwocket gives Stago 1/2 of her new treasure (500 gp) as a grubstake. Stago tips Routunious 150 gp from his own share as a tip.

Routunious asks if there any Gondsmen around, or a Temple of Gond. Finwocket bristles, because she heard that her late husband stayed at a Gond temple or shrine after he left the family. She says she doesn't know the whereabouts.

Stago interjects and encourages Finwocket to help and assess the black opal Selina took from the hill ogre. Finwocket values it at 1000 gp and makes an offer to buy it. Selina declines the offer, saying they'll sell it in Bug Tussle.

Seeing Merle's wounds, Stago's mother gives her a healing potion to administer to the girl. Routunious asks if there's any more, but this was the last of all the household's available healing potions.

Though she hasn't partaken of the adventurer's life herself, she has some valuable advice. Finwocket suggests that instead of setting off and allowing fate to decide their course and fortunes, they ought instead to consider adventuring a vocation.

"She wants me to get a job." Stago said.

"And a steady paycheck with resonable benefits sounds so horrible to you? The people who do this sort of thing the smart way seek out a patron who will equip them and pay for their training in return for a portion of the treasure. Would it hurt to have someone with power and money as invested in your success as you are? No, I don't think so." His mother returned while putting on a vat of mushroom stew.

She continued, "And if it should be that you find such a person in the area...well, then maybe a mother won't lose a son the way she lost a husband. You could kill your monsters and find your treasure during the week and then still come visit your poor gray haired mother on the weekends....who knows how many weekends a gray haired mother has left to share with a son?"
Routunious smelled the stew with consumate interest, and said, "I'm returning to Lantan as soon as I can, but I have to admit your advice sounds as good as your cooking smells."

"How would we get a patron? Especially a local one? You can't just go door to door asking if someone wants to pay you to risk your life." Stago grumbled.

"I've been to Bug Tussle once for every 100 times you have and even I know there's a message board in the Market Square where people advertise for this sort of thing. You could look there for starters. And, speakign of starters, let's have a nice salad, blackbread, yak butter, and Vilhon Blanc cheese."

After dinner, over drinks and pipe weed before the fire, Stago’s mother tells Routunious that there is a shrine to Gond located in the foot hills of the Desertsmouth Mountains, not far from the edge of Spiderhaunt Wood. She doesn’t know if it still exists, but that is where Stago’s father began his adventuring days.

Finwocket convinces the party to spend the night. She tells Stago that if he's set on a life of adventure, he should use his gold to buy lots of healing potions and a stoneskin potion.
Selina offers Finwocket the gold ewer, saying "It's always nice to have a friend in the mining business."

"Our family motto," replies Finwocket.

2 Flamerule, 1368: To Mother's House We Go

Compiled and extrapolated from the travel journal of Stago the Gnome

10:47 am
After the group divided their spoils, Elessaria tells Galen that she is determined to be a ranger. He gives her a letter of reference to a highly advanced ranger who lives in the area who might take her on as a pupil and provide her with the training she needs. The ranger's name is Thunderstorm. She departs in search of her new mentor.

One of the patrons in the bar is a dour, cigar smoking dwarf in broad brimmed leather hat and thick poncho, fingering a medium crossbow on the table. The dwarf never speaks and to all of the locals he is known only as the Dwarf With No Name. As the only dwarf in the room, Selina clandestinely shows him the medallion that she picked up from the dead (undead?) dwarf in the Under-Tavern. He silently takes the artifact, and with a withering look, leaves the tavern. Knowing that the dwarf never speaks, Selina wasn't expecting any real explanation of the item's potential powers, but she likewise wasn't expecting it to simply walk away. Deciding that if the item had some great religious significance to dwarves, she's better off without it...though it might have been nice to have been paid for "liberating" it from the dungeon.

While they eat and discuss the events of the day, Routunious figures out Selina's culpability in the zombie attack earlier in the morning. He suggests that a wedge of suspicion will keep him from trusting her in the future...she responds by implying that he might be wiser than she thought.

12:00 Noon.
Stago arrives back in Bug Tussle, but before going to the Fighter's Own, he stops by the Green Rajah's bookstore and finds... nobody. The shop is closed. Shrugging, he heads to the tavern.

The gnome and the priest of Gond have contentious talk about lowering the encumberance of the gold Tick-a-Tick is carrying. Routunious wants half the gold to be converted into jewels to relieve the weight burden on Tick-a-Tick. Stago insists that ALL the gold gets hauled back to his Mom's house.

He declines jewels, noting that his Mom mines gems out in the Dagger Hills and wouldn't be as impressed by them as she would the gold they represent. Routunious finally relents to make Stago shut up and get things going.

The distance to the gnome village is approximately 10 miles over rocky terrain. 3 hour walk minimum.

2:00 pm.
After walking into the badlands of the Dagger Hills for over an hour, the party is startled when they come upon a a figure lying prone on the ground. The party bickers a bit about what to do next.

"There's obviously nothing we can do, what has been done is already done. We should continue on. Aiding this person is an unnecessary diversion from my mission to deliver the gold to Stago's Mother." Routunious complains.

Selina sends her two cats ahead and creeps closer herself. Selina is able to sees that the figure is a woman in leather armor, much like her own, with a mask and cloak. Selina's knowledge of the East helps her realize tightfitting battle robes of some sort of monastic order--the type usually found in Kara-Tur. The woman is unconscious and looks as if she may have been in a tussle, though there are no obvious wounds. Stago tells Selina to check the woman's belongings, which she does, without revealing what she found in the pouch.

Selina argues with Routunious about reviving the woman. "She can afford it," she tells Routunious. This argument finally persuades him to take the effort to work some healing magic on the masked victim of violence.

Routunious casts a healing spell (2 hp) which revives the woman, just barely. Selina entreats Routunious to make a healing potion and give it to the woman which has some positive effect (1 hp). To drink the potion, the woman had to remove her mask and appears to be of an exotic race unfamiliar to the party. She doesn't understand Common, or any of the Native Languages that Stago knows.

The woman looks warily on the party. Selina pulls a gold piece from the woman's money pouch and gives it to Routunious. He cries, "One gold piece? That potion's worth more than that!"

Through a long and difficult effort to overcome the language barrier (the woman does not seem to comprehend the Common tongue of the western lands), it is revealed that her name is Merle (Mee-yoo) Hitomi.

Through mime, the party tries to find out what happened to Merle that would leave her unconscious on the trail. Stago comments that it had to have happened within the last two hours because this was the route he took to come into town. Merle draws a picture of stick figures in the dirt with a stick. The picture indicated three figures with large heads. Two are larger with bigger circles for heads and circles indicating large bellies. One of the large figures appears to hold an ax (or flag or spatula or...) and a big nose. Routunious indicates Merle should come along. Probably out of sheer desire to get things moving again rather than any motivation which might include caring for the safety of the young woman. Regardless of the priest's motivation, the young woman accepts the offer and joins the party, at least temporarily.

2:42 pm
The party discovers a big green form, fallen on the ground. It's a monstrous looking fellow holding a kind of mace and wearing a chainmail loincloth. Selina and Stago look more closely. Intuitively, Stago guesses that this is an ogre. "This must be the one Merle drew holding the stick," says Stago.

"So, there's another one this size and a smaller one around." Reasons Selina, who starts to rifle the ogre. Closer inspection shows that the ogre was pommelled to death. If there was any treasure, Selina didn't reveal it. The party resumes the walk, anticipating what's ahead.

2:58 pm
The party detects movement over the hill, and they move to take cover. That is, except for Routunious and Tick-a-Tick. Routunious reacts by pulling his knife. The party hears an ogreish sound, but low and belchy. A large head peeps over the hill, a much larger ogreish looking bipedal monster w/a giant axe comes over the hill toward the party. Rocks from behind he hill come flying over the monster's head. Routunious attempts to dodge and only suffers half-damage from a glancing blow of a flying rock.

Tick-a-Tick gets hit full on, but suffers only light damage. The monster makes it to Tick-a-Tick by the end of the round. Another giant ogre crests the hill but doesn't rush, just watches.

At the beginning of this round, Stago casts the spell color spray. Dazzling lights stun the monster. Routunious throws daggers, misses, throws once and hits. Merle gasps a lot from her hiding place some 25 feet away. Selina lassoes the creature, binding it, but is too small to bring it down. Tick-a-Tick hits the creature and does some damage. The round ends and the creature is still stunned.

One of Stago's war dogs attacks, but misses its mark. The cats attack and one manages to claw the monster. Tick-a-Tick strikes and kills the giant ogre with his next blow.

The other giant ogre at the top of the hill runs away, howling in fear.

The downed ogre is carrying 11gp, 60ep, 1 gem (black opal that only Selina knows is worth 1000gp), and a gold ewer which resembles a greek vase with curves handles. All earn 293 experience points.

It's a little after 3:00 pm and the group continues to the gem-mining town of Fleckstone.
(played May 22, 2006)