Most humbly written is this ode
To heroes who fearlessly rode
On wings of glory and steel
Into dark and danger most real

They broke through the huge door
And made their way floor by floor
Into to frozen sky as the stairs led
To bring death to the undead

They began in a twisted sanctuary
With more death than a mortuary
Then classrooms and prayer rooms
Nearly brought them to their dooms

They found bright Pilato's Flame
Dark and silent it became
The undead had made caskets
Vampires' most valuable assets

A beautiful tower of weather
Standing high above the heather
Each floor marble of different color
Balance and neutrality to the scholar

Acolytes and masters both were turned
Into undead by the daylight spurned
In coffins on their beds they healed
To stakes and sun undeath did yield

Helvin the druid was found in the tower
With Snelledge the wolf he did cower
Until he joined the battle against the master
A man no longer suited to be a pastor

With the light of the sun waning
And yet no voices complaining
The eternal struggle of evil and good
Began again where the heroes stood

Eisen turned the unholiness back
Brenaed launched a magical attack
Silver and speed were Francois's allies
Alestair struck down evil and its lies

Though bravely fought, Livid fell dead
The gift of Irminsul to her was fed
She rose again, was cursed by blindness
Yet the curse was an unlikely kindness

Her arrows hummed through the air
Of the undead she was keenly aware
In rolled silence and chilling fog
As though lost in midnight's bog

The heroes vanquished the vampires
Cobham would not fall to dark empires
They returned the temple to the light
From a small room at a great height

Let their names never be forgotten
Lest ye be low and misbegotten
Rewarded for risking their soul and skin
They were named Order of Elalynn

~Willet Sutler, 384 BE


After saving the temple on the 13th day of Winter's Breadth, the party was invited to join the priests of Asigrola for food, warmth, and company. It was a long day in a cold, dark temple, and while good cheer was unattainable after finding so many dead on the top of the tower, it was still a wonderful opportunity to relax after a tense day. In the morning, they were invited to join Duke Nalrome Plonnit in the keep on the 15th.

The party went to return to the temple of Pilato to train, and they were met by Brengar the Half-Orc, who runs the Mystic Monkey. He was eager to reward the party for saving the city in his own way, which was to offer them lunch. After a morning spent training, they did indeed return for that lunch. It was simple but good fare, and Brengar was a cheery fellow. Sitting at a table by himself was a Treliman named Gengrit. Livid approached him first and explained things about color and why she wasn't angry. Gengrit said that he was hoping that Sir Ulster would come back in here, though he was suspecting that the man's name might not be Sir Ulster. Gengreit was a servant of Sir Boltan Vinnix and Lady Joyla Vinnix, and while they were away from home, he had dinner here. He met Sir Ulster, and he was very friendly. He did mention that his masters were away, and he knew he wasn't supposed to, but he did. Sir Ulster invited him and his fellow friends to Orlenna's Rose Stage and Tavern across the city later. That was a couple days ago, and he and the other servants didn't see Sir Ulster there. It was an amazing show of women dancing in very exotic ways. When they got home, they discovered the guard had been tied up and the manor robbed.

Francois of Navroz noted a good description of this Sir Ulster, and they began looking for information. First, they learned that another name for this fellow might be Sir Ernest, and then they called it a night. In the morning, they finished their training before meeting the duke.

The duke had needed a day to learn more about these trusted men of the Hero of the Red Rose. He discovered that Baron Filton Mears had expressed pleasure at their services when he was threatened, and they were also responsible for somehow healing Irminsul. Their services to Thormond were incredible, and the queen give him authority to award them the Order of Elalynn, who was the first queen of Thormond. An ancient half-elven druid named Trilsellen pinned a small red gold shield with the crest of Thormond on it onto their shirts. They were also given 2,000 gp each.

Unfortunately, the duke also let them know that Baron Filton Mears had been killed by his son and servant. They are awaiting trial, which will be overseen by the queen.

With their wealth, they went shopping. They found a small magic shop in an alley. It was run by a man named Gerard, and it was called "Gerard's." However, they found that getting things enchanted was a good plan, and Gerard said he "knew a guy" named Elstever.

After shopping they searched for more information about Sir Ernest, and they believe that he may frequent Orlenna's Rose Stage and Tavern.

In the evening, they attended a banquet in their honor. Francois Villion managed to do very well with the women. He first found an experienced waitress named Gabby, short of Gabberella. Then he moved on to the daughter of a wealthy merchant named Shallendy. She was in her thirties and a bit portly, but she had a very pretty face. However, they also heard some rumors. First, earlier that day a party of skeletons was seen not too far to the northeast of the city. To the south, in Plonditon, some people are building an air ship.

After the banquet, they headed to Orlenna's Rose Stage and Tavern to look for Sir Ulster/Ernest. They did not find him, but he was known by a bartender named Gregor. He thinks his real name might be Harlen. Or at least a more common fake name.

The next morning, they set off to follow the undead outside the city. They were taking an erratic course, as if following something that the party could not be seen. There were enough skeletons and something else not identified that Livid could easily follow the path. Plains gave way to trees, and in the afternoon a Treliman in a tree spoke to them. His major concern was whether they might be attempting to get into the village. His name was Kenjat, and he was not directly threatening, but it seems that he chose to reveal that he was in the tree. Perhaps there were more. He eventually decided that the party was probably safe enough to go into the village. Still, the party chose to go on even as darkness approached. Their horses traveled faster than skeletons, and they wanted to catch up to them soon.

As the sun was dropping behind the horizon, they saw the skeletons spread out in some sort of search pattern. They attacked, and the skeletons fought poorly for a time. Eventually a sort of druid lich appeared and threw lightning at them while causing the trees and grasses to grab hold of them. It was ultimately not a difficult battle for the party as Brenaed hurled fire and Eisen shot light at the lich, but the lich just seemed to laugh as he dissipated. In the bright, searing light, they could see he wore a holy symbol with a red bat hanging from a willow branch. This is most likely an indication that he is a druid of Galeaso, and he is also of the Willow Concordance, which would indicate he is not a nice druid lich.

The party picked up the search, and after a few hours Renee found a wyrmling green dragon. This little dragon had clearly been wounded. Still, he proudly lifted his head and said, "So, you are here to kill me." Renee explained he was not, and then Alestair and the others approached. The green dragon, upon seeing the paladin, knew his short life was over. Instead, Sir Alestair healed him.

The green dragon was named Nogi, and he said that though he probably cannot say that they are friends of green dragons, they are certainly friends of his. He would not harm them nor their descendants. Further, he explained that these undead had been chasing him for several days. He did not know why. He could get away, but then he would need to rest and they did not. Eventually they shot him with enough arrows that he could no longer fly, and he was trying to hide here.

He thanked them again, and then took flight for home.

It is the end of the 16th day of Winter's Breadth. It is nearly midnight, and very cold.


Oh, I was being a smartass when I said no, and then I forgot. You should get 1000XP for the last battle.

Things I learned during this session: much like Sex Panther (which, 60% of the time, it works every time), trying to hit something with 20% cover failures 100% of the time, 4 times in a row.

I should've just joined Eisen with the turning.

I could not figure out how to put this into terrible verse while watching TV. I suppose I could have just mentioned the confounded paladin in some way. I was thinking about making some edits to it today.

20% > 50%

Yeah... dice hate you. And love the bald monkey.

I'm a little sad that the tale of Willet Sutler and its rhyming but with questionable meter was not better received.

I haven't had a chance to respond in full. I think the poem is absolutely 10/10. Don't think your literal poetry goes unnoticed lol

Upon rereading, I love everything about the poem even more, except for assets / caskets. Fucking bards, man.

"Unlucky Kindness" remains my favorite, but it's about my character, so I'm hardly neutral on it.



Not that we have an asshole paladin, but I'm curious- what if Alastair had been very pro-slaughter on Nogi? I think there's a lot of valid points that a paladin could make in that direction, and more to the contrary. I'm glad it's theoretical, because adventuring with that sort of paladin is more like pvp than anything else.



Eat dem turnin feats up boy! Make you gud an strong againssum un-life.

It's a tough call that doesn't have total basis in our society today - you need to start with the assumption that all green dragons are evil, which we don't really have a good model for in our society (except for maybe cats or Raiders fans). I had Alestair choose to look at it as "he's still young and perhaps won't be TOTALLY evil, especially if we can show him some kindness". If, however, it's known that ALL green dragons are always evil, then yeah, slaughter that mothafucka.

I honestly had no idea who would do what. That's sort of my theme. Why the fuck not generate two completely separate parties of wild elves who have a very high chance of killing you? They don't all have unique names, tribes, and history. They certainly don't have carefully crafted magical weapons that speak of their personality and history. No, no, none of that. And I certainly didn't spend time generating two high level arcane casters and their guards, a trap to a hidden basement, and all sorts of treasure and knowledge to be gained after a grand battle.

Kill a dragon, don't kill a dragon... meh. The catch is when the consequences of an action include an immediate response that I haven't generated. So if you have an audience with a duke, please don't suddenly decide to attack him, you know?

In terms of the paladin's alignment, either action would have been fine. Mercy for a small dragon is good, and killing an inherently evil creature is good.

Do not ask "Then why wouldn't holding it hostage until its mother gave us a portion of her hoard and then cuttings its throat be good?"

It does, but you need to roleplay. Most of them are unpleasant, of course, but all Muslims are evil... if you are a low tier crusader who has learned nothing else. From his perspective in history that works great.



The alignment option is also a bit subject to some depth. For instance, an evil dragon could cause more good in the world than evil. An evil person could have a plan that causes a great deal of good as well. By the book, green dragons rule parts of a forest as a tyrant, but they don't just go pick out people to fuck with. Just by the book, Nogi could be ruling some uninhabited area and never fuck with anyone (a tyrant to deer!), and his presence could disrupt or destroy undead or cruel barbarian tribes. But we aren't told that the book stuff is precisely 100% true either. Further, the green dragon is lawful, and sometimes that could cause more overall good than not having one there.

If you further add complexity like "just because he's tagged evil in the monster manual doesn't mean he's always an asshole anyway", then you get to your position almost always.

I definitely feel we have a great deal of choice in this. I'm a huge fan of those games, and they are bear to run.

Well, now I feel bad for being all paladiny.

Well, Livid certainly couldn't justify just opening up on people who had never hurt her (and who weren't even planning to fuck over others- not that we know of, of course). If anyone could justify rushing into a house at night and just killing some bitches for some greater good, it would likely have been a lawful type to fuel that shit, and there's no guarantee of that. Doing that with a short amount of hostage taking and enchantment was pretty aces- that's a good amount of mileage out of Silence and Sleep, for damned sure. I also like how Brenaed had some solid answers in his kit of tricks- that's a lot to ask of a sorcerer whose focus has been "find a way to at least hurt any enemy type". I do sorta think that we need to step up a little bit on the social skill checks- most of the crew has some skill points, but unless we want to "build a skill monkey" (ex: medium/high Int bard or rogue) we need to be assisting each other on whichever rolls we can, because some of it is just going to become a lot more reliable as a team effort. I think we may actually see *more* of that in E6, because the DCs aren't going to keep scaling, and we are almost at the point where our combat feats are almost all in place. I'm looking into Open Minded and Skill Focus in a few feats- I think we'll get some mileage out of that sort of thing.

Yeah, I've tried to put some skill points into things I don't think other have really increased (Sense Motive and Diplomacy, since they're charisma-based). So far, they've been marginal in terms of affecting things we're doing, but we have a lot of campaign left.

Also, yes: applause for Brenaed making that bloodless infiltration possible.

Yea, those are 1-for-1 skills for you too, and you have good Charisma.

I think at this point each feat is still a huge offensive or defensive gain, and we quickly run out of those (except Brenaed, who will be chasing throughput and resource feats forever, as casters are wont to do)- and after that, we will probably want to look at some more of the "wide" feats instead of just the "tall" ones.

Certainly on my side I was happy to have good Survival and Spot checks. We are pretty reasonably well off overland, it seems.

YES IT CERTAINLY WASN'T PLANNED AS AN AMBUSH, YOU FECKLESS TWAT.

elfs are frends