Post by Dungeon Master on Nov 16, 2016 15:14:13 GMT -8
Session 01 - 12th November 2016
The adventure begins, with the assumption that all of the characters already know each other.
They're in the north, it is the evening of the winter solstice (the shortest day and longest night of the year).
There is knee deep snow, pretty much everywhere and it is both windy and cold.
The group comes across a frontier town called Rybalka.
The town is a mix of Vikmodere peoples and normal people as well.
The Vikmodere used use this town, as a staging point for their raids into the civilized lands.
Around 20 years ago, thousands of soldiers came here and took the town from the Vikmodere.
Many of the non-warrior Vikmodere are living in town, and tolerated as they provide essential services like fishermen and blacksmithing.
There are numerous Vikmodere in the nearby wilderness, who want nothing more than to take their town back.
As the PCs arrive in town, it is mostly empty.
They encounter several villagers, who are heading towards a religious ceremony in the cathedral at the edge of town.
The villagers are friendly, and invite the PCs to come with them to the ceremony.
Despite being strangers, the villagers try to make the PCs feel welcome.
Space is created amidst the pews for the group to sit.
The High Priest is of a militant god, but he accepts all faiths within the cathedral provided they're respectful and tolerant of others.
The high priest enters and the ceremony begins.
Apparently, without the ceremony, the village will not be safe and creatures will attack it.
The ceremony was originally done by the Vikmodere, but has been adapted by the current High Priest.
As the ceremony begins, another group of adventurers enter, badly wounded and close to death.
They have a petrified friend, upon a sleigh outside.
Trump, the party healer does what he can to see to their ailments.
The party investigates the sleigh outside and are attacked by a strange humanoid creature whose flesh oozes, as if melting, off of its body.
The creature is not a pushover, but the PCs emerge triumphant.
As the battle rages on, the weather is getting worse, and it looks like a blizzard is starting.
The high priest attempts to restart the ritual.
He has a magical item, which in hushed whispers around them, the PCs hear, 'the moonshard'.
As the ritual progresses, the Moonshard opens a portal to somewhere.
A pair of strange electrical glowing creatures comes through this portal, and attack the High Priest.
From the panic of the villagers, this is not a regular occurrence.
Many of the villagers panic, and rush outside into the heavy snowfall and rather windy conditions.
The PCs have a lot of difficulty in hurting these creatures.
Angus is reluctant to fire into a melee, for fear of accidentally striking his friends.
Most of Aeternus's attacks and Spartan's attacks do not harm the creatures; none of Darius's attacks do.
Trump manages to convince one of the adventurer's who had been poisoned to aid in the battle.
While calling on the aid of Mitra, the Shining Lord, the knight's attacks land consistently.
The majority of the healer's resources are spent at this point, but the PCs have emerged victorious.
As the glowing lights had assailed the High Priest (Juriendor), his magical item fell through cracks in the floor.
Villagers had run out the door.
Some kind of undead creatures had appeared outside and were biting the panicked villagers.
The group decided saving the villagers was the priority.
There weren't too many of these creatures, but there were still several.
Trump attempted to get the other adventurers to join in the battle through his convincing words.
He managed to guilt one of the other adventurers into going, but the warrior grappled Trump and took him outside with him.
He said, I'll aid the battle but not unless you do as well.
This adventurer wasn't aiding that much, but each of his turns he would drag Trump further out (with him).
Eventually, but with the loss of several of the villagers, these biting undead were all slain.
As the PCs come back into the cathedral, they can smell smoke coming from the Bell Tower.
The stairs wind around the outer wall of the tower, ever upwards.
As the PCs climb towards the smoke, strange flying creatures come down at them and attack.
These creatures attack with both of their claws, and are aflame with a fiery aura which hurts just being in close proximity.
Trump figures he cannot handle this, so backs down the stairs and calls that if anyone needs heals they should come to him.
But he also mentions that he's basically out of heals, with only a couple left.
The four fire creatures are dealt with, but the Paladin of Mitra has falled unconscious, but not dead.
There are more fire creatures further up the tower, who are still setting it on fire.
The party doesn't figure they have it in them to continue this battle and decide the cathedral can burn down.
As the party comes down the stairs, acolytes are coming up from a trap door beneath the High Priest's altar.
They let the group know, the High Priest went down that way reasoning that without the Moonshard the village would be lost.
They give the party several potions and scrolls, and beseech them to rescue the High Priest from the catacombs beneath.
The party uses these potions to revive the Paladin.
They decide to organize a fire brigade, to put out the flames above, reasoning that they can run if the fire things are still there.
When it is apparent the fire things were just a diversion, and are no longer there, they decide to head back down to the main area.
The acolytes want the party to find the high priest, but they decide they're done for now.
So break the pews to barricade the doors and to place a weight atop the trap door, so nothing can come up from the crypt beneath.
The party plans on spending an entire day within the cathedral to mend up and prepare for the catacombs.
Early into the morning, villagers come to the cathedral and appeal to the party.
It seems that a lot of their number have been kidnapped by something.
There is a trail in the now melting snow, leading to the west -- out of the town.
The party decides that rescuing kidnapped villagers has priority over searching through catacombs or wasting a day to recover.
The party takes the Paladin with them, but does not want the rest of the adventuring group.
They reason, they need to grow in experience themselves, so want to do most of the rescuing themselves.
The Paladin however, did prove himself useful, so they take him as a sixth member of their party.
A short distance out of town, the party comes across a group of five darker skinned elves.
These are a rear-guard, who basically were positioned to delay the party so their main group could get away.
They were calling back and forth between themselves, unaware that some members of the party understood their tongue.
The Dark Elves were not particularly difficult to deal with, but they did raise an obscuring fog thing and used it to prolong the battle.
Eventually most of them fell, and when Trump promised to spare her life, their leader (and last standing member) surrendered.
The party ascertained, close to a hundred of these 'Drow' came to the surface, but many of them were weak members who were given a last chance.
The objective is to kidnap a few hundred surface dwellers, for sacrifice to a demonic being the drow leadership has allied with.
This group of drow, were given the choice... delay the pursuers or be put to death.
Coming to the surface was a similar choice for them -- they had failed the queen on a previous mission and could either serve on the surface or be slain.
The cleric did not know what Naberius is/was, but was told to delay the party until Naberius came as that would ensure their escape.
The hostages, around twenty from the village, are an unknown distance ahead of the group.
It is early morning, and the delay group has been dealt with...
The tracks are relatively easy to follow, but the snow is beginning to melt...
The adventure begins, with the assumption that all of the characters already know each other.
They're in the north, it is the evening of the winter solstice (the shortest day and longest night of the year).
There is knee deep snow, pretty much everywhere and it is both windy and cold.
The group comes across a frontier town called Rybalka.
The town is a mix of Vikmodere peoples and normal people as well.
The Vikmodere used use this town, as a staging point for their raids into the civilized lands.
Around 20 years ago, thousands of soldiers came here and took the town from the Vikmodere.
Many of the non-warrior Vikmodere are living in town, and tolerated as they provide essential services like fishermen and blacksmithing.
There are numerous Vikmodere in the nearby wilderness, who want nothing more than to take their town back.
As the PCs arrive in town, it is mostly empty.
They encounter several villagers, who are heading towards a religious ceremony in the cathedral at the edge of town.
The villagers are friendly, and invite the PCs to come with them to the ceremony.
Despite being strangers, the villagers try to make the PCs feel welcome.
Space is created amidst the pews for the group to sit.
The High Priest is of a militant god, but he accepts all faiths within the cathedral provided they're respectful and tolerant of others.
The high priest enters and the ceremony begins.
Apparently, without the ceremony, the village will not be safe and creatures will attack it.
The ceremony was originally done by the Vikmodere, but has been adapted by the current High Priest.
As the ceremony begins, another group of adventurers enter, badly wounded and close to death.
They have a petrified friend, upon a sleigh outside.
Trump, the party healer does what he can to see to their ailments.
The party investigates the sleigh outside and are attacked by a strange humanoid creature whose flesh oozes, as if melting, off of its body.
The creature is not a pushover, but the PCs emerge triumphant.
As the battle rages on, the weather is getting worse, and it looks like a blizzard is starting.
The high priest attempts to restart the ritual.
He has a magical item, which in hushed whispers around them, the PCs hear, 'the moonshard'.
As the ritual progresses, the Moonshard opens a portal to somewhere.
A pair of strange electrical glowing creatures comes through this portal, and attack the High Priest.
From the panic of the villagers, this is not a regular occurrence.
Many of the villagers panic, and rush outside into the heavy snowfall and rather windy conditions.
The PCs have a lot of difficulty in hurting these creatures.
Angus is reluctant to fire into a melee, for fear of accidentally striking his friends.
Most of Aeternus's attacks and Spartan's attacks do not harm the creatures; none of Darius's attacks do.
Trump manages to convince one of the adventurer's who had been poisoned to aid in the battle.
While calling on the aid of Mitra, the Shining Lord, the knight's attacks land consistently.
The majority of the healer's resources are spent at this point, but the PCs have emerged victorious.
As the glowing lights had assailed the High Priest (Juriendor), his magical item fell through cracks in the floor.
Villagers had run out the door.
Some kind of undead creatures had appeared outside and were biting the panicked villagers.
The group decided saving the villagers was the priority.
There weren't too many of these creatures, but there were still several.
Trump attempted to get the other adventurers to join in the battle through his convincing words.
He managed to guilt one of the other adventurers into going, but the warrior grappled Trump and took him outside with him.
He said, I'll aid the battle but not unless you do as well.
This adventurer wasn't aiding that much, but each of his turns he would drag Trump further out (with him).
Eventually, but with the loss of several of the villagers, these biting undead were all slain.
As the PCs come back into the cathedral, they can smell smoke coming from the Bell Tower.
The stairs wind around the outer wall of the tower, ever upwards.
As the PCs climb towards the smoke, strange flying creatures come down at them and attack.
These creatures attack with both of their claws, and are aflame with a fiery aura which hurts just being in close proximity.
Trump figures he cannot handle this, so backs down the stairs and calls that if anyone needs heals they should come to him.
But he also mentions that he's basically out of heals, with only a couple left.
The four fire creatures are dealt with, but the Paladin of Mitra has falled unconscious, but not dead.
There are more fire creatures further up the tower, who are still setting it on fire.
The party doesn't figure they have it in them to continue this battle and decide the cathedral can burn down.
As the party comes down the stairs, acolytes are coming up from a trap door beneath the High Priest's altar.
They let the group know, the High Priest went down that way reasoning that without the Moonshard the village would be lost.
They give the party several potions and scrolls, and beseech them to rescue the High Priest from the catacombs beneath.
The party uses these potions to revive the Paladin.
They decide to organize a fire brigade, to put out the flames above, reasoning that they can run if the fire things are still there.
When it is apparent the fire things were just a diversion, and are no longer there, they decide to head back down to the main area.
The acolytes want the party to find the high priest, but they decide they're done for now.
So break the pews to barricade the doors and to place a weight atop the trap door, so nothing can come up from the crypt beneath.
The party plans on spending an entire day within the cathedral to mend up and prepare for the catacombs.
Early into the morning, villagers come to the cathedral and appeal to the party.
It seems that a lot of their number have been kidnapped by something.
There is a trail in the now melting snow, leading to the west -- out of the town.
The party decides that rescuing kidnapped villagers has priority over searching through catacombs or wasting a day to recover.
The party takes the Paladin with them, but does not want the rest of the adventuring group.
They reason, they need to grow in experience themselves, so want to do most of the rescuing themselves.
The Paladin however, did prove himself useful, so they take him as a sixth member of their party.
A short distance out of town, the party comes across a group of five darker skinned elves.
These are a rear-guard, who basically were positioned to delay the party so their main group could get away.
They were calling back and forth between themselves, unaware that some members of the party understood their tongue.
The Dark Elves were not particularly difficult to deal with, but they did raise an obscuring fog thing and used it to prolong the battle.
Eventually most of them fell, and when Trump promised to spare her life, their leader (and last standing member) surrendered.
The party ascertained, close to a hundred of these 'Drow' came to the surface, but many of them were weak members who were given a last chance.
The objective is to kidnap a few hundred surface dwellers, for sacrifice to a demonic being the drow leadership has allied with.
This group of drow, were given the choice... delay the pursuers or be put to death.
Coming to the surface was a similar choice for them -- they had failed the queen on a previous mission and could either serve on the surface or be slain.
The cleric did not know what Naberius is/was, but was told to delay the party until Naberius came as that would ensure their escape.
The hostages, around twenty from the village, are an unknown distance ahead of the group.
It is early morning, and the delay group has been dealt with...
The tracks are relatively easy to follow, but the snow is beginning to melt...