The Player Characters
Eula: leveled up her hunter to a wizard
Lisa: new player rolled up a thief
Eric: rolled up a warrior
Josh: leveled up his halfling money lender
Joe: rolled up a wizard
Spoilers below
After sailors the survivors were on a cool magic boat headed to the next adventure. I had the boat sail into a fog bank and come out at the New Port docks early in the morning. The local dock workers thought that pirates were about to raid the town and ran crying for help. After some tense negotiations and paying a docking fee the adventurers are allowed to go into town. While getting the lay of the land a group of urchins runs past the party playing a game of tag. The thief however notices that her purse is 5gp light and gives chase. The warrior runs around the block and cuts the urchin off before he can escape. Grabbing the kids ear the thief asks to be taken to the guild in thieve's cant. I used F. and G.M. for inspiration here and Lisa's thief joined the guild and got some supplies before meeting up with the rest of the group. The other players were buying weapons armor and gear out of the book while I role played with Lisa. After the group was back together I used the dead mage hook. While the group chases off the pirates the thief pockets the map to the tower without anyone seeing her do it. Eula's wizard takes a liking to the mages boots and helps herself to them. After casting detect magic and finding nothing the group heads into the Blade and Bottle to ask some questions. The group goes right up to the bar and orders a round of drinks and starts asking the bartender rapid fire questions about pirates the dead wizard the town and if you can name it they asked it. Mostly they got that the bartender believes that the only good wizard was a dead wizard. Finally they are directed to the sleeping drunk at the end of the bar. Lisa buys two of the strongest drinks the bar offers and slides down a couple of stools to make friends. After a couple of minutes of talking to the drunk Lisa gets a couple bits of info and an invite to go for a late night cruise on his boat. Eula's wizard tries to help the thief out and ends up with a horrible roll to smooth talk the drunk. He is having none of it knows what these two women are all about. Just as he is about to leave in a fit of anger Joe's wizard casts charm person on him. A ton of mouse sized demons pour out of the wizards clothes and run around the bar. The locals stampede towards the door as the bartender dives down yelling No Magic! No Magic! The drunk is completely charmed and tells them everything he knows about the tower the pearl and the town. After a quick stop at the inn that the mage was staying in and finding nothing the thief comes clean about the map. Shmee is able to read it and navigate for his new friends who prepare to leave that very night to raid the tower.
1-1 Rowing up to the tower the group takes the oars and sail out of the other boat. Shmee takes his boat and rows off planning to return in a few hours to pick up his new friends before the tide swallows the tower for another ten years. The thief falls trying to climb the tower and alerts the pirates. They throw daggers down at the pc's in their boat. The pc's throw the daggers right back. This goes on for a few rounds before Joe's wizard cast rope trick and has a multi colored rope grow out of the tower and bind one of the pirates. Taking advantage of the distraction Lisa throws a grapple up on the tower wall and the warrior and Halfling climb up. While they fight the pirates the thief uses the rope to position herself for a backstab. missing badly she tries to tumble and hide behind the rum barrel. It doesn't matter the two pirates are quickly handled and the bound one is taken captive. He has very little information to give and after some debate is spared for now. Eric's warrior breaks open the trap door with a crowbar and a natural 20. Josh's Halfling heads down first.
1-2 No immediate danger the rest follow and come down. Everyone looks at the book but Joe is the only one to find his name and candle. People joke and ask if the cow from the last session has his name in the book of heroes.
Eula is attacked by a flaming hand from a candle just as she is about to cross out a name. She quickly puts out the flames and the party decides to head down the stairs.1-3 Josh leads the group again and when they get to the gap Joe casts rope work again and they start to climb down to the next level. The fetishes launch their ambush now. Blows are traded back and forth with no effect on the fetishes. The group escapes to the next level and destroys the rope.
1-4 Eric sets up an ambush of his own and attacks the first fetish to come down the stairs. A critical that hits the head and finally kills one. Joe's wizard casts comprehend languages on the sigil on the floor. Unfortunately this regresses him back to a prehumen state for three rounds and he can't communicate with the rest of the party. Meanwhile Lisa's thief goes down then Eula and Joes's wizards follow. The Halfling burns luck and makes an untrained roll to bandage Joe's wizard to prevent him from bleeding out. Eric is able to kill one more fetish while Eula and Lisa die. After a bunch of luck burn by the Halfling the last two fetishes are destroyed. I try to drop hints about the candles without being to obvious but it doesn't work. The party decides to use the pirate prisoner's blood to activate the portal. I tried describing the smoldering wicks of the candles hoping this would get them to try and relight them. They didn't get it. I think they thought I was bragging about my kills.
1-5 Josh leads the charge through the portal and is cut down by the pirate ambush waiting for them. The last two Pc's turn tale and run upstairs. I try the candle description one more time but they climb the ladder and realize that they can't close the broken door. They quickly set the pirates boat on fire to signal Shmee and dive into the sea to swim out and meet him. With drowning pirate curses ringing in their ears the survivors watch the tower sink beneath the waves as Shmee rows back to New Port.
I can't believe I forgot about the recover the body roll. I guess I got so focused on the candles that it slipped my mind until I started to write down my session notes. The survivors will each get 10 XP next time.
Things they enjoyed:
The group liked the mercurial magic effects and how they changed the game. Bleeding out of your pores to cast detect magic was just crazy. The warrior tried several mighty deeds but failed every time. He did like adding the deed die to attack and damage rolls. Once the Halfling started burning luck he couldn't stop. With out a doubt rope work always gets a groan when rolled up as a spell but by the end of the first session it becomes the wizards new favorite spell. The thief enjoyed the role play at the guild and the bar. Eula also got a kick out of her wizard making an untrained pickpocket attempt as the bar cleared out and scoring a free flask of whiskey. That's all for now folks.