Episode 16

Things have settled down a little for my group.  They have hit their stride in a number of ways, they know some NPC's and have relationships with them, they know the areas in Wisthaven and are developing a good reputation.  So tonight was following a little more in that theme.  Things will begin picking up again shortly in terms of pushing the party and I wanted to give them time to wrap a few things up and remind them that things are dangerous out there.

Episode 16:

At the end of the last adventure the party had just slain a powerful demon who had been brought into the world through a rift between Proveria and the Abyss.  Now they are still there standing in blood, rancid wine, and demon goo.  Chara- the Black Guard cleric- tells them that the rift is closed and gives them a stone that will indicate where rifts between dimensions are.  At this point they all head south back towards Sunlight Keep so they can tell Lord Argus what was happening up there.

On their way back Leanna, the Assassin, and Athis, the Graveknight, catch them on the road.  The party is not rested, low on spells, and in some cases well under 1/2 hitpoints.  Leanna laughs at them and begins to move forward saying that she needs to get rid of them so they stop interfering in her masters plans.  Nervously the party gets ready for a difficult battle.

As initiative turns, out pops Vlaad the anti-paladin Bounty hunter.  He shouts at Leanna to stop, he needs the party alive so he can collect the full price.  Over the next several initiatives the rest of his bounty hunter crew intercedes and tries to stop Athis and Leanna.  His crew consisted of an Elven Witch named Wrinn, an Orc Ranger named Gru'Utch, and a Human Monk named Giarra.

I thought that this would be an interesting turn of events.  I knew that if the party stayed they would get killed. I hoped that they would not stay.  But I wanted to do a few things here, I wanted to show the rest of the bounty hunters and let the party get a feel for what they were capable of.  I also wanted to show what each groups motivations were.  The bounty hunters are interested in the money and were willing to let the PC's get away so they can get another shot at them later.  Leanna and Athis are done messing around and now know where the party is and were taking steps to eliminate them.  I also found the idea that an Anti-Paladin coming to their rescue was a funny, especially an Anti-Paladin that has aims to take them out.

The party quickly realizes things are bad and decides to haste and high-tail it.  They manage to get away and get back to town where things are much calmer and the people around them are glad the Heroes are there.  Urz recieves a message from Ismana and from Duke Arlington.  Ismana says that she may have figured out how to make the dragon wings he left with her fly- but she needs something.  And the Duke has invited Urz to participate in a tournament of arms in a couple of days.

Urz read the word invitation and insisted this mean he could go and see the Duke immediately.  So he storms the castle where they don't want to let him in.  He tries to scale the walls and eventually is left sitting on the drawbridge until he is let in.  Several hours later Sam realized Urz was still there and gently convinced him to go back and train for the tournament only 2 days from then.

Urz had been trying to get an underground fighting ring going for a couple of sessions at this point, unfortunately he lacked the social skills to do anything but frighten people.  So I decided to do this to let him get the result he wanted.  The tournament was pretty simple, and it qualified him for the next round of more difficult fights.  I had several events they could compete in, and ultimately Urz did melee combat, unarmed combat, and the team did group tactics.

After a couple bouts they qualified for the next round of games and decided to go and see what Ismana wanted.  She said she needed a Bebelith's abdomen to harvest the silk, and with that she might be able to make Urzs' dragon wings fly.  The good news, she said, is that the fabric of reality is tearing so a Beblith has slipped through and taken up residence in some nearby ruins.

The party went in to the ruins the next day.  The ruins were in poor shape and a good amount of it had collapsed, but side tunnels were built to allow movement around the collapses.  Traps had been set up in the cave by a couple of tricky imps who had made a deal with the Bebelith to exchange fresh food for safety.

The party wound its way through the traps and had a difficult encounter with their first Huge size catagory monster.  It had reach on them and cleaved the hell out of them.  It was a difficult encounter, but not as hard as the demon the week before.  We wrapped up the fight and they found the imps secret lair in the back that had the collected treasure from the unfortunate souls who they had led to the Bebeliths lair.

The week again wrapped up nicely.

Until next time!

-Ubercroz