Shadowdark: Bloggah's Blog Part 9 - Wherein Bloggah Becomes an Archer

Hey Bloggah, nice bow. Hadn't noticed you carry it before.

What do you mean? I've always had this bow. It's an old family heirloom.

Are you sure? And why do I smell roses?

****

Ok, so we woke up, good and early, and recovered from the skullchildren adventure of the day before. Something told us that we needed to venture back into the Harrowing, but we weren't really in the mood yet...

Columbo was already out the door, off shopping, probably. We might as well do the same. I was still curious about that spell cast on the creepy kids. Only one place in town that might be able to help with that, so I took Nigel's advice and went down to the Guild of Arcane Knowledge. Tarin and Dremont, not having anything better to do, tagged along. 

The place is pretty snazzy. Tower (of course) surrounded by a wall pierced with arches. People milling around, looking like they're on business. I go up to a guy in a robe with a bad cold, ask him about the spell. He doesn't know, sneezes into his sleeve, asks if I'm a member. Nope.

Ok, I gotta sign up. Go down the hall, turn right, not left. That's cause left looked something like this:

Bigger on the inside and all that. 

Ok, right was the recruitment office. Got the spiel, signed with the bloody thumbprint, turned over a few coins. Asked them about the spell, got sent back across the hall. You guys got a scroll for this? 

They go looking to see what they can find. In the meantime, I look around. What's on the counter over here?

Interesting, a bow. Too bad it's not my thing. Hmm, smells like roses. Interesting. I'll just take a closer look. 

Interesting. This is my family's heirloom bow, originally owned by my seven-greats-grandfather Bagwell. It has never left my hand. 

I walk out. The clerks are making some commotion behind me. Maybe they mislabeled something in their card catalog.

Campaign Journal: You're Sailing Back to Where?!?

 Let's see, who's standing on the beach?

• Slick: Thief
• Fred: Thief
• Fulvus: Halfling
• Jax: Barbarian
• plus various extras

The party stood on the bloody beach as the carrion birds began to circle and dusk approached. Xandra Ironhide's surviving dwarven marines dragged back to their ship, where the rowers, exhausted by Rondel's haste spell awaited. They were not moving until at least morning.

Fine. Slick had a roll-call to make with his newly pressed crew, and we might as well take advantage of the camp. Slick counted out the eight surviving sailors of his new ship. Six were normal humans, and two showed signs of mutation (scales and beast-eyes, respectively). A couple of the crew also had some useful skills, such as sketchy portside contacts and questionable surgical skills. A fine start to a seafaring life...

The camp was tossed a bit more prior to bedtime, revealing logbooks, a spellbook, and a couple of jars containing mysterious substances. Probably nothing to be concerned about, here in a Chaos mutant camp...

The party slept. As they slumbered, Jax had a vision. She found herself looking over the shoulder of an armored knight. From the surrounding fog emerged a veiled figure accompanied by three great cats. She addressed the knight, and Jax found herself a mere observer. “I see Chaos rising again. Not since I intercepted part of Medeg's comet has it been this active.” The knight nodded. “And you have a new bearer. This one's not a knight, but seems honorable... They are seeking to recover the Barrier. That is good. I feel that my followers in the north also are seeking this knowledge, but something had fogged my vision of them. 

"Two things to remember. First: remember where the armies fell. That may be of aid. And when reconstructing the lenses, remember the shards. For like finds like, and some Chaos may be necessary..." With that, the vision ends. Nothing like a god to be helpfully cryptic.

The rest of the night passed quietly, except for a pair of scavenging monitor lizards. Slick was going to leave them un-accosted, but when they lost interest in the battle dead and began to enter camp, he decided murder needed to happen. Fulvus and others joined, and the two reptiles were slain (+1 head for the brewery wall).

The two ships sailed back to the dwarven island of Thaehaspho in the morning, uneventfully.

The Potato Barons, A Shorts Interlude

Damnit Tim. 

First of all, you tempt poor Bloggah in the Guild of Arcane Lore, then you post up this perfectly cromulent little map, complete with the descriptive sentence: "Two potato farmers, brothers Burke and McHale, have several acres of potatoes. They have titled themselves the Potato Barons."

Fine, a brief bit of freewriting to occupy my evening and expand upon my flippant comments on your Reddit posts...

***

Two potato farmers, brothers Burke and McHale, have several acres of potatoes. They've dubbed themselves the Potato Barons. A decade ago, they homesteaded the acreage under a land charter from the local baron, Ser Erasmus Cludge. The land has been generous to the two farmers, and they easily raise a surplus of tubers to support themselves beyond the baron's annual tithes. Their groaning carts of potatoes are a welcome sight at the local markets in the summer and autumn, particularly as winter begins to set in and folks stock up their root cellars.

Their homes are set up along the trade road on the north shore of the local stream, Bruderware Creek. The stream provides irrigation water (and the occasional giant frog). Burke, a lifelong bachelor, has a compact house. Out front are his storehouse/tool shed and private distillery, in which he concocts a reasonably good vodka for sale, gifts, and bribes for the local tax collector. McHale's home is a larger two-story structure, which also incorporates a stable for the brothers' draft animals. McHale, his wife Lizzy, and their son Arejay sleep in a mezzanine over the stable. Both homes are surrounded by low walls of mortared river stone.

Several years ago, an ankheg was causing problems for the farmers. A group of wandering heroes were able to defeat the beast. In reward for assisting them, Burke and McHale, gave the adventurers a cart full of potatoes. Surprisingly, the party was very happy with the reward. 

In defense against any other ankheg incursions, as well as roaming ruffians/adventuring parties, Burke and McHale have contracted with local conjurer-artificer Skandeleous Krank to create guardians to fend off threats. Krank, always a proponent of “Conjure Locally,” produced for them a pair of potato-golems to watch over their fields... 

Hey, you work with what you got...

Say Hi to Burke and McHale here

(Complete with monster stats and a bit of surprise artwork)

Shadowdark: Bloggah's Blog Part 8: Children of the Scorn

Title blatantly stolen from Joe and Paul.

Whoa, you look rough. 

Tell me about it... Damned kids...

(Note: Bloggah has missed a couple-few sessions due to work and travel)

***

So there we were, standing on the edge of the Harrow. We looked at the decrepit and collapsed buildings as the fog cleared. This place needs some urban renewal...

Creeping through a vacant lot, we find ourselves surrounded by a bunch of kids with skull faces, or skull masks. Is it a holiday?

source

One approaches with another of those accursed cards. Columbo lets the kid slide it onto his shield, in case it explodes. Nope. I look at it. Image of the Forest Spirit on one side (lot of good it will do here) and an old, complex sigil on the back. Something to do the the Ash Elves, I hear.

Are they going to attack us? Of course they're going to attack us...

Fine.

D66 Ways to Die

Howdy all,

Out of town on family matters, so delayed on posting up various game session reports and other meanderings. But I did plan ahead and stashed a couple of new lists for placeholders and postings in the meantime:

Oh what could this be about?

Oh, the myriad ways for out PCs to die - some glorious, most ignomious. A preliminary list of deaths and demises. A few of which I've experienced or witnessed in game sessions of yore. 

Download it here

And don't worry, if you don't find your PC's chosen doom, I've got another list floating about.

Surprise!