A Tale of Time Travel and Aliens: 3 Nights in One (player post [annotation by Carl])

Heya all!

So…I’m going to try and wrap up a bit of what’s been going on after the last couple sessions. I didn’t really have time to stop and write about the last few…

So, where to begin?

TIME TRAVEL

After sinking the tower that Akili and Ghoudy lived in on accident, thus dispelling the whirlpool that was at the outlet of the two great rivers from the mountains, we had to deal with a very ANGRY Akili and Slotek.

[The party managed to dispel the whirlpool by sucking its energy up into the meteorite metal battery that powered their magical airship - I had already described how the magical energies of the two rivers that met at the confluence were being caused to rotate against each other, so when the party navigated the ship (in the water, not the air) into the whirlpool and started trying to suck up the energy I gave them a chance... and also warned them that if they failed their ship would be smashed to smithereens.  Of course, they had a great string of luck rolling the dice, as they are wont to do, so I ruled that they had succeeded in stopping the whirlpool.  What the party didn't know is that the stone spire that Old Man Gootie and Akili lived in was not actually sticking out of the bottom of the river, it was sticking up out of a large portal powered by the whirling water.  So when the whirlpool was stopped, the portal closed and the top of the stone spire that protruded into this dimension was severed and began to fall over into the river. - Carl]

 Akili had Slotek poised to leap at our ship and destroy us. However, Beautiful Bob managed some awesome diplomacy and kept her from destroying us right out. She was currently sated, but worried because (although she didn’t say it) we had sealed Ghoudy in the portal that was at the bottom of the whirlpool, allowing the tower to come through and causing the whirlpool to begin with. Apparently we also sealed all her food stores in there as well. She was slowly reverting to her most insatiable self, and we had to think fast! She wanted our big meteorite battery that we had just fully charged on whirlpool energy because it would sustain her for months! Well, we weren’t about to give up our awesome air ship just yet….so, Antillia quickly offered her a lightning beetle (powerful magical creatures that they are) and she was sated for the time being. That gave Bob and the rest of us the opening to negotiate a cease fire and Antillia said she had the means of traveling through time (using some fungus she found early on in the adventure), however, it could potentially be fatal if consumed. Antillia had learned of the first weave of shadow from Ghoudy and decided with Akili’s help (who had a mass amount of knowledge) that she might be able to create a portal in the shadow realm, using the fungus in the weave, which stretched back in time. So, with Beautiful Bob’s help, Antillia had Akili attach a pseudo pod to the albino minotaur’s head. (These pseudo pods allow her to control anyone they are attached to and basically take control of all their actions. Antillia was gambling that she could also transfer her knowledge/memories through the link). Beautiful Bob busted out his Tower of Iron Will to filter the transmission….Antillia cringing (having tried this before on the alien space sphere and failing) because she thought her head might explode. Antillia took this chance to bust out her d30, hoping for the best….rolling 23 she sighed with some relief, but then Carl rolled for Akili…………NAT 20! Antillia’s player (me) jumped with delight and let out a yelp of joy! Beautiful Bob was able to keep the minotaur’s head from exploding and Akili was able to transfer her vast amount of knowledge into the mind of Antillia. Now, this allowed Antillia a nice bonus on making the portal…which turned out to be a DC50 Arcana check. (Holy Cow! No pun intended!) So, with Akili’s help the minotaur was able to meet the DC. We entered the portal…but messing with time is never easy…..

Our first attempt was to simply have Akili go into the temple and let the old version of herself know the outcome of leaving the temple early. Antillia shot her with a dose of meteorite energy to last her a week, so that the old Akili wouldn’t go crazy and eat everyone. Meanwhile, we also gave her a lightning beetle to breed inside the temple over the thousand years or so….and Antillia set up a regular meeting time in the shadow world (because time flows strange there) so that she could keep the old Akili company every year or so. (This would turn out to only be a passing of a few moments in the shadow world to Antillia) After some debate on whether to change anything else….Antillia arguing that we should save some other historical flops we had committed, but it was concluded that we shouldn’t mess with much of anything else. So, we zipped back through the portal and left the Akili of our time in the past, after instructing the Akili of the past on what to do. Coming out of the portal we noticed Slotek, wondering where his mother was…but looking remarkably different. Still mentally delayed, but a bluish color and a different power keeping him from being the great river spirit he needed to be. Through some handy psychic investigation by Bob we found it was the spirit beetles, that the Akili of the past had decided to start eating them and had binged on them for hundreds of years, not needing the dolphin consumption ritual to gain the power to give birth to Slotek. However, she was now addicted to spirit beetles (lightning beetles) and so was Slotek. We all let out a long sigh, trying to puzzle out ways to fix the problem….we thought if we could put her to sleep she wouldn’t go crazy from being alone and find Ghoudy and used him to do crazy things…then it hit us like a bolt of lightning! We had taken the rest of that sleeping potion from the temple! (The potion that Beautiful Bob took a sample of and it almost put him into a coma for 1000 years!)

[This potion was from the 1e adventure "The Hidden Shrine of Tamoachan", from the room where two monks slumber eternally unless attacked, and a potion vial with dust in it can be reconstituted to form a potion of eternal sleep.  I had a ton of fun making some 4e monks to kick the party's ass with, which is exactly what happened when they decided to decapitate the sleeping monks before they could do anything to the party!  At least the party ended up with the potion after getting their rear ends handed to them, as it now came in very handy. - Carl]

 So, Antillia went to her first meeting with the Akili of the past and gave her the potion to drink! She then stepped out to see that Slotek was gone, the Ghoudy of the past was met with the Akili of our time and that wrapped everything up nicely. The Akili of the past was still asleep in the temple and we were able to convince the dolphins to remove the curse from Akili of our time because they didn’t know what she had done in the first place to get it. (Seeing that we had removed that happening from the time line) Ghoudy and Akili went off to live happily ever after and we were set with a new mission….go to the temple and wake Akili so she could create the true river god being.

[I was pretty sure the party could not avoid a combat with Akili and Slotek, which would have ended very badly for the party.  However, once the idea of travelling through time was brought up and the characters told Akili that they could journey back and prevent the terrible curse of gluttony from ever afflicting her, she was all ears.  This session was very tough for me to DM, because Antilia's player (the writer of this blog post) wanted to go back in time and change all sorts of things the party had done, most notably releasing the elder jellyfish god Kariki Kalos from its temple prison.  I didn't want to just use DM's fiat to say "No, you can't do this", but I did hint around that the more the party messed with time, the more unintended consequences would happen and the crazier the results would be.  In the end, Beautiful Bob's player managed to convince Antilia's player that they should limit their messing around with time to one brief mission and get back.  Phew! - Carl]

That ended the first of the three sessions…on to the next!

A SINKING FEELING(OF DEVILS AND COWS)

So, having successfully (or at least, it seems that way) helped Akili, we were all patting each other on the back and trying to decide whether to approach the island or not when a jolt went through all of us. We felt a disturbance so profound it rocked Bob’s psyche. Antillia immediately went into the spirit world to see what was going on, being more perceptive there to the disturbance. She followed it to it’s source and found out that Kariki’Kalos (the giant jellyfish squid elder god thing) had sunk the entire continent that it had been attacking. Basically half the known world was now under water!

[I had been rolling some dice at the beginning of each session after the party had released Kariki Kalos, to represent the battle between the elder squid god and the cadre of lich priests that had originally imprisoned it, and who set out after it as soon as the party released it.  I rolled a d20 for each side, and whichever side won, I recorded it as a minor victory.  When a natural 20 was rolled, I rolled a second d20, looking for a second natural 20 to represent a total victory.  At the beginning of this session, I finally got two 20's in a row for Kariki Kalos.  Game over, man. - Carl]

The disturbance was the profound loss of life and some strong souls were trying to cling on in the spirit world. Antillia approached one of these powerful ones and attempted to feed it some of her energy to help it materialize, hoping to help at least one or two people. However, much to her surprise, it turned out to be a devil! It laughed and possessed her (by continuing to absorb the force she was feeding it and increasing the flow!), which caused her to go crazy on the boat. Her eyes began to glow red and she began speaking in a demonic tongue on the boat, cutting her hand with a longsword and etching a rune of summoning on the boat’s surface. Hammer, always quick to the draw, wrapped his arms around her and bear-hugged her into submission so Chmee (our Artificer) and Beautiful Bob could figure out what was going on and de-possess her. Carl was quickly reading through the effect, learning it was permanent with no save, until he caught the line “the only way to break the possession is by grappling the opponent”. We all laughed, but even with the devil expelled, the summoning rune pulled two ice devils into existence to fight us with the disembodied humanoid dragon-like devil. Chmee quickly threw down his all-seeing eye artifice that allowed everyone to see the dragon-like devil, which Beautiful Bob and Hammer made quick to weaken by pounding him pretty good. Antillia decided to try something, since she had felt the draw of energy during her spirit travel and had felt him sucking away her energy, she decided to try reversing the effect on the dragon-like devil with a malevolent nut!

[The malevolent nuts are the product of a twisted tree that grows on the site of a terrible wrong. The nuts suck in the soul of anything that dies nearby, preventing it from travelling to the afterlife, instead imprisoning it in a hell-like subdimension.  This was the first attempt to use a nut in combat to suck the soul out of a creature in combat, and as I am wont to do, I allowed it to happen, albeit with a slim chance of success.  Subsequently, the party tried to use the nuts to just one-shot every powerful creature they encountered, and I ended up ruling that the nuts could only be used on a creature that was already defeated. - Carl]

With a battle of wills, Antillia successfully sucked the dragon-like creature’s energy, using the nut to filter out his personality so she could directly absorb his power. This left Hammer, Chmee, and Bob facing two ice devils and they immediately set in on one of the two. Hammer made a ridiculously good roll and cleaved into it, his damage flowing like a river to wash away it’s hp. Chmee had a bit of trouble hitting and Bob attacked it’s will causing it to attack itself! Needless to say it was feeling the pain, bloodied and then some. The other devil made a break for our power core and tried to attack it, failing to do any significant damage to our relief. Antillia ran to that one and managed to use the same tactic, sucking him dry and storing his personality in a malevolent nut. She let out a cackle using the power to infuse her voice and the other ice devil looked disturbed by this turn of events. Hammer, Chmee, and Beautiful Bob managed to knock it unconscious and Antillia repeated the “soul suck” on it. She handed one of the ice devil nuts to Beautiful Bob who interrogated it psychically and found out who it worked for, why it was there, and left it with a warning for the Great Devil it worked for. He then opened a portal to the layer of Hell it was from and sent it through. After this, we were all pretty winded…but we decided to put some of the power we had gained to use. Antillia used the power of the ice devils to imbue her Winter’s Herald with extra strength, allowing the difficult terrain to expand out to five squares from two. She also gained an Aura 2 slow effect that persists outside of the form. Beautiful Bob decided to use his d30 to see if he could gleam some insight into the malevolent nuts and what would happen if you ate one with a soul trapped inside. (such as the devils) He lived up to his reputation and rolled a natural 30, giving him the insight and ability to eat a nut and substitute one of his powers of equal or higher level for powers from the being inside the nut. However, each nut that you consumed also lowers your will defense by 2. A hefty price to pay, but worth it if you find the right nut!

So we rested up and ended the second of three gaming nights that I am catching up on….and so the last night came.

ALIEN ISLANDS AND WHISTLING NATIVES

We had come back to the game shortly after Beautiful Bob had learned the secrets of the nuts. We decided it was time to try and approach the mysterious island with the temple that held Akili of the past and wake her up, then figure out how to help her make the great river creature. So, we kicked our air ship into full blast and shot for the island…as we approached Antillia noticed the black and white clay sphere she had began to vibrate. It turns out the white monkey statue in the middle was harmonizing to an unseen and unheard frequency. As she was puzzling over it, Nima appeared with Dwarmel on her shoulder.

Now, taking a side step from the story to introduce Nima, because some of you probably have no idea who she is. Nima is an interesting person…she can apparently physically enter and leave the spirit world and travel wherever she wishes. We first met her in the fierce people’s village and according to Ti’tsua (Antillia’s shi’bori teacher) she has been able to do so since birth. When we first ran into her in the spirit realm she had a strange lemur-like creature on her shoulder that she called Dwarmel. Apparently he accompanied her in the spirit world at all times. We still aren’t sure where she falls into things, but she is an outsider to everyone and only seemed to converse with Ti’tsua on a semi-regular basis.

[I have used Neema and Dwarmel as a sort of DM's cheat, a couple of NPCs that can appear and give insight to the party and drive the story along in interesting directions.  I have a back story for them that has never really been fully discovered by the party. - Carl]

So back to the story….she appears on our ship, much to our surprise with Dwarmel on her shoulder. This being the first time we’ve seen him outside the spirit world. Antillia studied her for a moment with her new-found spirit/shadow sight lenses she created and discovered that Nima is actually blind and Dwarmel works as her eyes. Antillia was a bit shocked by this and was mulling it over, meanwhile the subject of the vibrating statue came up and the worry that something was approaching. Nima laughed at us a bit and held one up to Dwarmel's eyes, saying it wasn’t a ward but a lens. Antillia strapped one to her head over her left eye and used it to look around. Everything seemed dark, but when she looked upon the Baddy-Baddy island it suddenly came into focus. (Previously being completely chaotic and full of random imagery and energy) This gave Antillia and the rest of the party the ability to look upon some large albino four-armed cyclopean apes, who we learned were the Gadoro. They stood in a triangular pattern, one ape taking up each corner and they sang in a chorus. One would start up a vibration/hum of a certain tone, then stop as the next picked it up. When they made their sound the area around them on the island would become lush Amazonian landscape, but when it faded it would turn dark and almost barren for a split second. The party tried to decipher the sounds of their song but failed.

As soon as we crossed the threshold of the island everything suddenly went silent, Antillia got a strong sick feeling of being pushed away like we didn’t belong (a natural feeling at that) and we were assaulted by a pack of small Gadoro images. It turns out they were projections of some other Gadoro we didn’t see and they kept coming by bunches of six at a time! They were minions, but they could do a nasty attack where they turned into a beam of energy and blasted into you. It would kill the minion, but put a nice hole in your body. They could also shove you around with a normal attack and they managed to throw Beautiful Bob off our boat, who made a daring athletics check to catch himself in a tree. Antillia used her “shield-like” flying device to fly to Bob and blow him a floating bubble from the Horn of Kariki-Kalos, which gave him a way to move around unless the Gadoro images popped it. Shortly after that Hammer was thrown from the boat as Antillia flew back up, leaving her the only one on the vessel. With some lucky rolls she managed to maneuver the flying ship to swoop down and pick up Hammer with the attached side nets, before flying away from the island. She then left Hammer to recover from his ordeal (having been thoroughly punched with holes from the Gadoro images beam attack) and used her flying shield to head towards Bob who was persistently trying to tap into the trees with his psychic powers and find out what was going on. Suddenly the landscape began to change and the Gadoro began gathering on a cliff face and singing a mournful dirge. The trees began turning into these pink fleshy tentacles with a metallic coating, the ground made up of the same metallic coating. Beautiful Bob not one to miss a beat, tried to tap into the tentacle to make it his friend but it rejected him and he got an image that the thing the tentacle was connected too was much older than our universe. Surrounded by walking tentacles that were getting ready to pummel them to death, Antillia and Bob were stranded. Antillia used her shape shifting powers (sacrificing one of her dailies) and attempted to commune with the Gadoros and become one of them. Using her d30 she rolled a 25 on the nature check that Carl let her make. Success! (Thanks to her high Nature skill) Antillia changed into a Gadoro, but it didn’t have the effect she hoped for though immunity to falling damage would be handy! Antillia then used her Burst of Nature to convert two of the tentacles back into real trees and the area around Bob and herself, buying them both time to get the hell out of that crazy place! So she grabbed Bob and flew up to the Gadoros, telling them their reasons for being there. The big Gadoro told us we needed to seek those who still knew the old songs to prove we were worthy of being on that island. So taking a hint, we left…though we did learn there was a ritual performed daily by the Gadoro that was a sort of key to the island. Anyone in on the ritual would be able to enter the island without triggering its defenses. Apparently the metal tentacle, barren, alien landscape was only one version of the island and thanks to Bob tapping into it we could tell there was another reality to the island locked away from us. So Antillia and Bob returned to the air ship and we left the island, our heads hung a bit low as we were humbled by such a display of power and unable to make much progress on the island. However, we knew where to go….and it was actually where we had planned to go before going to the island in the first place.

We were off to see the Song People that Ti’tsua had told us about. They supposedly had some knowledge of the island and might even give us some insight into the songs of power the Gadoro said we should learn. So we follow the river that the Song People supposedly lived along and stopped at the first village we came to. First thing we noticed is that the Song People all looked emaciated and had smoke rising up off of them constantly. The older they were the more emaciated they looked. When they saw us they all made some sharp whistling sounds to warn the other villagers. They also had some well tended to gardens of small white peppers and some berry plants. They seemed extremely friendly and outgoing and Beautiful Bob got us off on the right foot with his gleaming smile and charming demeanor. Antillia asked them about their peppers and even had a chance to look them over. They were happy to show her their gardens and were incredibly proud of the well-tended plants. It turns out the peppers drew a lot of nutrients from the soil and the berry plants replenished those nutrients and kept the soil fresh. The soil also seemed to be imported from somewhere else, as this was not the natural growing area for these peppers. Hammer asked if he could try one and the villagers warned him of the heat, but Hammer chomped down on one with confidence. Soon after he spewed gouts of flame from his mouth and took some fire damage from the pepper. We all had a good laugh and Hammer mentioned making pepper spray out of the peppers to blind our enemies. However, we were soon greeted by the village leader who was dressed in finery and had magical rubies in the holes in his teeth that produced different tones of whistles. Apparently all the villagers had holes cut in their teeth and by plugging certain holes with their tongue they could create different song-like tones. We also discovered that the chiefs, or leaders, of the villages got in that position based on the “Big Man” principle of leadership. Basically, the person who can call on the most resources (Most men during a time of war, most food during a time of starvation, etc.) at one time became respected and elevated to a position of leadership. The session ended shortly after they invited us to a feast they were planning for the evening where some of the boys of the village would be elevated to adults. Though we did manage to pick up the fact that these people consumed the peppers on a regular basis and it was a sacred plant to them. We all were left with a sense of awe and determination to find the secrets of these people. Not to mention a mighty hunger for some super peppers…

Well, that was a lot to write up…but it wraps up the 3 sessions I was behind! Thanks for reading and I hope you enjoyed it as much as we all did playing it!

-Mike P.

To Win and Lose Some: Recapping Our Adventures in the Amazon

Hello everyone! It's me Mike again...I know it was forever since my last post, but I wanted to post my weekly email recaps here, so any who are interested can keep up on the crazy situations Carl keeps throwing our way!

This way he doesn't have to post it for me...although I do enjoy laziness to some extent.

Anyways, on to the recap!


So we start off with Old Man Goudy disabled before us. We take his pouch of powder and ask him about its contents. We discover a pouch of white deer fur, sewn shut with gold thread, at which point he tells us that it is a powder he paid too high a price for. Apparently, it allows you to see anything, anywhere, anytime, without knowing exactly where you’re looking…awesome stuff! However, he also told us a story of his past once I helped him feed Akili his “wife”, who was cursed for eating a magic River Dolphin. He told us a sob story of how she was jealous of him fathering all these children in his Pig were-form and that she wanted a child, so she performed this ritual to summon the powerful river spirit and mate with it….which involved eating the dolphin flesh. He further stated that the powder in the deer skin pouch was made from the ground bones of a river dolphin and their son was cursed by the dolphins as well, into being this hideous, mentally unstabled/delayed creature. Akili kept their son calm by using one of her pseudo pods that she shoots out from her flesh that has accumulated from her curse and mass eating to blobdom, apparently these attachments burrow into the brain of the person they are fired at and allow control. Also, Goudy said his mother was from a sacred temple on the island of the Bady Badys (the temple of the Bady Badys) and his father was a spirit from one of the protective statues on the temple. Apparently immortal until they leave the temple, she had left the temple to seek a life of mortality and the spirit had basically seduced her and gotten her pregnant. As it turns out….GOUDY IS A DAMN LIAR!

Argh! Was Antillia furious! The rest of the party was keeping Akili distracted while I was helping him grow food to feed her (because she is sustained by shadow food where as no other food will “fill” her hunger) and she was riding their son (the hideous river creature) and headed for the air ship where Goudy was located. Using our magical portal coins (amazing little ritual devices that work as a portal focus and are the size of a coin…in sets of 2) we were able to get ‘Tillia into the shadow world and bring him along with Bob’s portal ritual. Now…I was more than happy to help someone in need, who dropped a sob story on me of how oppressed they are by their insatiable wife and his crazy son and how it takes him FOREVER to grow the food etc. etc. etc. However, once we finished up with Akili and Goudy for the time being, we went down the river and thanks to Bob’s awesome idea to put his feet in the river water and try and commune with the spirits of the rivers, he managed to get us blessed by the light-hearted sprite of the river. This resulted in us having a bunch of the River Dolphins show up and bless our boat! Bob is the man! I should also mention that we discovered these dolphins while Hammer was using himself as a fishing lure and trudging the bottom of the river for useful items, while being tied to our boat. This to me, is an amazing use of the ability to go without breathing and I am just amazed at how useful it is! While trudging Hammer managed to uncover some spheres of black and white clay that were along the top of a low wall in the river. They were placed there long ago by what we think might be the ancestors of the “Song People” and are warding against the Bady Badys, which are apparently some sort of eye sphere abominations. They are spheres with 4 eyes circling the center of the creatures. They aren’t very big, but they incite one to remove their own eyes upon seeing them. So, of course the first reaction of the party is to now hang onto these warding devices. Through some Arcana checking we realized that the clay sphere was much newer than the trinkets inside warding against the Bady Badys and, to our amazement, something else! So with Bob’s ritual to look into the past of an object, we found out the trinkets inside are a preserved human eye from a powerful sorcerer (which is coated in a clay, shaped to look like an eye) and a small white, four-armed ape statue. (Oh Great. These guys again…) We found out the eye wards against the Bady Badys. The clay sphere is enchanted to be hardened (Clay Pot +2!) and is set to always return to its spot on the wall in the river. We couldn’t figure out what the white ape statue does, beyond the fact it wards against an ability. Having run into these apes before, we made a knowledgeable guess it wards against them returning from the dead, or perhaps keeps them from raising up the dead as stone guardians. What it does, none of us want to tear our eyes out…so Hammer immediately made a necklace out of his to hang around his neck stating, “If we encounter these things I’m going to hold it above my head and close my eyes.” Sensible to be sure…so we decided to hang onto them for now and hopefully we can learn more with further study.

So, I know I side tracked a bit…but back to the River Dolphins! So after Hammer kicked up these trinkets and notice the Dolphins we decided to have a chat with them. Antillia (thanks to her Hekura) was able to talk with them and they seemed super friendly, happy, joyful, and cherished nothing so much as their river. Similar to Unicorns (Unicorn of the Sea! Dolphin Safe!) in their care-free, happy-go-lucky manner it gave us a good idea why the curse upon Akili, Old Man Goudy, and their son was so bad. After chatting with them for a bit and them telling us they were blessing and guarding our boat, I asked them about Old Man Goudy. They immediately picked up on who I meant, saying that he had coerced a temple guardian to leave her temple and forced her to perform the ritual. He couldn’t produce an offspring powerful enough, so he used her love for him to get her to perform this horrible ritual. So, the River Dolphins, had all come together to curse all three of them. (Originally Old Man Goudy had said he was impotent and unable to bare offspring in human form) So they cursed him with impotence, her with the insatiable hunger, and their child so he was unable to grow into the powerful creature and fulfill the destiny Goudy wanted him to. They made their son mentally delayed and with the urge to kill his mother and father. This is why Akili was using her pseudo pod to control him and why Goudy strived so hard to keep her happy and fed. It created a dependency circle that I’m sure Goudy despises and hence his want for a cure to the situation. The deceiver. After finding this out Antillia was enraged! Hammer and Bob weren’t as surprised, and I have to say that deep down Antillia didn’t expect him to be honest, but he did teach her a weave she could use in the shadow world to make a structure that would stay the same shape and endure the shadow world’s influence without changing. This is a HUGE find for her. I suppose Antillia was angry with herself for being even slightly moved, more so than she was surprised at him being a liar.

At this revelation we were getting dangerously close to the joining of the two rivers into the one great river, where Bob had discovered a flow of chaotic energy created by a whirlpool at the center of the confluence. In the exact middle of this whirlpool was, go figure, Goudy’s tower home. Well, to displace the energy of the whirlpool and get us through it safely (because we wanted to show the River Dolphins we could navigate it without fear) Antillia retrofit some of our “Rail Cannon” insect legs to absorb energy and store it in the meteorite piece we use as a battery. She began sucking the chaotic energy in the area out of the whirlpool. Luck! It seemed to be working splendidly, however, it was settling the whirlpool and causing the Goudy tower to rock on its base. Apparently, the whirlpool’s forces were keeping his spire upright. So came the choice….suck out the energy, destroying the whirlpool forever, and topple Goudy’s tower….or stop and let the whirlpool continue, leaving his tower intact. Antillia was busy manning the battery and blasters, Bob was on the helm, and Hammer was keeping the rigging in line. All three of us looked around at one another, eyes making contact, measuring our own motivations. Hammer exclaimed, “FUCK YA! Screw that tower!”, Bob shrugged his shoulders and mentioned something along the lines of, “It’s an abomination of nature.” Trying to convince ‘Tillia that this action was more just, than not. Meanwhile, ‘Tillia was worried that she had just found the best teacher for some new knowledge of herbs, the shadow world, and overall new talents…and would already make him an unwelcome enemy.

Over went the tower, away went the whirlpool, and powered up was our meteorite battery to such an extent that we’ll not have to worry about running out anytime in the next forever. And thus…Antillia gained and lost a master within an hour…..

-Mike P.

Alligator Staffs and Shadow Pterodactyls - guest post

A while back I posted about the weekly email one of the players in my 4e group sends out after the session; he usually puts a brief recap in the email and puts out the next date for group confirmation.  I have to post this weeks email - it picks up right where my last post left off, and Mike does a great job of describing all the crazy twists that happened last session.  So I will sign off here and let Mike (Tilia's player in my 4e group) take it away - Carl

Heya all!

Wow...what a session!

So, it all starts with us sitting around deciding on what to do? After a lot of debating over island, other cities, inventing things, we manage to make our air ship a hover ship with some of the rituals we learned from the golden flying shield Antillia received. We also managed to mount some of the insect leg rail cannons we created on the sides. Then we used a huge chunk of battery meteorite metal and attached lightning rods to charge it in the upcoming storm! Shortly after that we headed out to meet the Song People who supposedly know a lot about the island we need to head to. Tit'sua told us that it was their spirits that inhabit the island and keep the Fierce People away. Talking with these people is our number one priority, because they are also responsible for some of the celestial magic. However, on the way to them we ran into a patch of forest where the trees appeared dead and they had huge burls growing in the middle of them. The only remnants of life were three shadow peacocks, which we appropriately dubbed "Shadow-Cocks" and some grass shoots that came up out of the ground when we touched down. ‘Tillia, being the ever curious botanist, decided to touch one of the shoots and try communicating with it. (Rolling a Nat 20) She was sucked in to the Shadow World, inside one of the burls, and found out that the plants in the area had all their roots in the shadow world, twined together into those huge burls in the trees. Amazed she began to examine them and found out the burls were the control center for all the plants in the area. She immediately stopped the shoots of grass from growing, as they apparently grew into creatures that would attack the party.

While messing around in the shadow world however, Antillia began to feel a presence. It was trying to shunt her out of the shadow, how rude! It turned out to be an old looking man with an alligator staff. He apparently owned this section of trees and was offended someone was “trespassing” into his creations in the shadow world. So, ‘Tillia used one of the dark nuts to unleash a Bor along the line he was trying to force her out with and attempted to use the nut to suck him in, kind of like a trap. The party had begun to wonder where ‘Tillia had gone, so Bob touched one of the shoots of plant and began to work on making a psychic link with her. She got it and everything he thought to her was SUPER fast. ‘Tillia’s return responses were incredibly slow, this gave us an idea that time moved different in the Shadow World. ‘Tillia had thought herself gone only 12 seconds, but it had been 10 minutes on the real world. This gave us excellent insight to the time changes and also let the party know ‘Tillia was ok. She was then pushed out of the Shadow World and realized our loveable Chmee had set the nearby trees on fire. She looked around the burl and noticed all these crazy plants growing up into it, so she harvested some. (The coolest description being the corn, with each kernel being a face in either extreme agony or pleasure, twitching like a Hellraiser movie) She then harvested as much as she could, coerced one of the Shadow-cocks (with Beautiful Bob’s telepathic help) into being her friend so she could jump down onto it and ride it away. Meanwhile, Bob and Hammer rocked the other two Shadow-cocks and Hammer managed to harvest their feathers. ‘Tillia put out the fire with her ice form and we all quickly hopped onto the air ship with out new shadow-cock pet. I told them of the old man and we all decided we should confront him, so we turned the ship in order to do so…and WHAM! He was coming straight for us! Slightly worried we moved towards him in a calm pace, Hammer and Chmee sighting him in with rail cannons as soon as he was in range. It turns out he was riding a mind-controlled shadow-pterodactyl. After Chmee and Hammer let loose with a mighty blast, he leaped off the beast and began using his staff to fly around us, attempting to flank us with the pterodactyl.

Whew…what a fight it was! Chmee (having fallen asleep) was down and out. The pterodactyl was destroying us from one side and the old man was on the ship doing crazy knife fighter maneuvers. He took Hammer and Bob to extremely low health (actually knocking Hammer unconscious at one point) and his staff dominated ‘Tillia for a few rounds and made her pop her Kariki’Kalos horn bubble that she was flying with. She plummeted and the old man managed to continue tearing up our crew, but Hammer lit into him with some mighty swings of his electric charged axe and had him running. Bob had used his coercive strikes to keep the pterodactyl chewing on it’s master. It turns out the old man’s dagger was draining life, so thankfully we got Hammer back to his feet before the old man could suck out his soul. With one mighty swing, Hammer got the old man fleeing for his life. He leaped over the edge onto the staff…at which point ‘Tillia had used her golden shield to keep herself from making a new indent into the earth and flew up within range of the air ship to blast her Kariki’Kalos horn’s call to battle effect. She did so and managed to stun and knock prone the staff, the pterodactyl(who fell onto the ship) and the old man. He saved just before hitting the ground and ‘Tillia dropper herself with the shield, trying to land on top of him. Even Hammer threw the unconscious pterodactyl down to try and hit him with no luck. He ate some of that wicked corn, turned into a little pig, and lunged at ‘Tillia with his evil dagger for one tooth. However, just before he reach ‘Tillia, Chmee’s player woke up…and sate those fateful words. “I fire the rail cannon at the pig. Nat 20.” And so…the pig took 110 damage and was burnt to a crisp before it could touch ‘Tillia. There was a huge release of tension and many relieved sighs let out, but ‘Tillia had a feeling something might be up so she grabbed his dagger and stabbed it into his chest, sucking out his soul before it could escape.

This being done, we all sat around and realized that…we may want to talk to this guy. The alligator staff flew off to get his wife, the pterodactyl was set free as a good friend, and let us know he HAD a wife for the staff to run to. We sat around with the soul sucking dagger, pondering how to bring the man back to life to chat with him and had a discussion on if he was REALLY evil and not just misunderstood. Also, there was talk of who shot first…us or him?

Well, we decided, in the end, to use the dagger as a focus for a raise dead and bring him back to life. So…awesome dagger in hand, was now pounds of residuum and a much weakened old man. We told him his staff had flown off to find his wife and he immediately freaked out…so…that is how the session ended. Us with weakened old man, answering questions, and suddenly being panicked when he learned his wife was on the way. If she’s tough enough to scare him….well…I’m shacking in my boots a little right now.

What did we learn?

The Shadow World time moves slower than real world time.

Alligator staves with giant white glowing spheres can dominate and ruin your life.

Air ships that can levitate are useful.

Falling hurts.

Shape-shifting were-pigs are deadly.

Wives of shape-shifting were-pigs are deadlier than their husbands.

When one of our healers is asleep, someone falls unconscious.

Rail guns are the new way to cook pork.

Knowing is half the battle, unfortunately, doing things right is the other half.

So….who’s on for the 4^th of February?! Whew…that was a lot of writing and a damn good session last time. Let’s get some answers and gtfo before his wife goes crazy on us.

-Mike P.

Amazonian Escapades: Day One: "Welcome to New Haven!"

Well hello there! I’m Mike and I am stepping in to write on this blog because Carl asked me if I would provide a perspective for his 4e campaign from the player. First off; I have to start by saying that I am amazed by how Carl was able to step in and start his own campaign so quickly. As some of you may have read already in: This Post he kind of had the job of DMing dropped into his lap at the last minute. His first words to us were, “It’s going to be a jungle setting and you’re fresh off the boat.” How much that line would change our lives, we never knew….

I plan to write in installments if possible, cataloging our exploits as the adventure unfolds. I am also going to try and use this as a place to record the history of the party and the world as we explore it. Not only will this give you, the reader, a good insight from the player’s point of view, but it will also help myself and the party call up relevant information when needed. It will also help us reminisce some day when we’re all heroes of the Amazonian landscape…..if we survive.

So, it all began with a ragtag crew of adventurers seeking fame and fortune promised us on far away continents. There is Antillia the female albino minotaur warden(me!), Hammer the male warforged barbarian, Vomarr the male bugbear cleric of Kord, Rhaziel the male eladrin rogue, and Beautiful Bob the male half-elf ardent who joined us later on in the mines. So, the story begins…

Antillia, Hammer, Vomarr, and Rhaziel caught a ride on a local slave ship headed to a new and unexplored continent with promises of fame, fortune, artifacts, and the raw knowledge of new landscapes and fauna. We all exchanged our greetings as fellow passengers on a long voyage across the sea and became fast friends. (convenient!) We landed on the foreign beach and disembarked the ship, having also gotten to know a slave, Zoggins, and his thoughts of a revolt, we kept an eye on him. Meanwhile, governor Sir John Laymen, greeted us and informed us of how happy he was to see us and how welcome we were. When asked about the area he filled us in on some of the local events. Apparently not everything was going so well in the new world…he did however tell us of the three mines in the mountains and how the slaves were there to be sold to the mine managers. He also mentioned the “White Death” which was a disease that had infected the village and killed many of the people. Apparently a local Doctor had helped cure the disease by traveling across the mountains, which was thought impossible, and collecting herbs that he brought back. Fourth on the list were rumors of the local hunters, Dornal "The Swift", Elijah Silver, and Martin Treebreaker who had found a city made entirely of gold in the middle of the swamp. To top it all off the town was vacant and housing, land, and most tools were completely free.

So, what does a group setting out for fortune, fame, ancient knowledge, and power do with their first day in a town chock full of adventure hooks and plot twists? They claim a house, start a farm, and go fishing! No, seriously, that’s what we did! Well, we DID ask around about some of the rumors pertaining to the “White Death” and the city of gold. We decided to split up to make the best work of it. Antillia and Vomarr went to talk to the Doctor about herbs and the “White Death” cure. Meanwhile, Rhaziel and Hammer went to find the hunters in the local tavern (where they displayed many of their trophies) and inquire about the city of gold. We decided this was the best course of action while waiting for the slave auctions to start later on in the afternoon.

Antillia and Vomarr met with Doctor John Lock and realized almost immediately that he was on some pretty heavy self-prescribed “medication”. He was huddled up in the back of his office mumbling about the great serpent and held out a spoonful of some brownish-green looking paste that he had made in a bowl. So of course, Antillia ate it! Let’s talk about amazing! Antillia began to hallucinate and time seemed to slow down around her. She saw a great green serpent fly up from what seemed like over the mountains, and into her chest. After that Antillia could see life in everything around her, detect spirits that she couldn’t before, and could literally FEEL nature in everything living. She walked outside and gazed upon this ancient stone head and saw shadows of people performing a ritual around it and it seemed to glow in an amazing wash of light. A beam shot from the head in the direction it was facing, towards what we later discovered was the center of the swamp. She was able to make out some of the glyphs on the ancient head, but not what they said. After the trip-tastic fun time they were finally able to talk to the Doctor and determine that this concoction he had made was the product of the Great Serpent that taught him how to mix the right herbs/fruits/youdon’twannaknow/etc. so he could be lead and perceive the great pass (as well as the Great Serpent) in the mountains that opened on a certain celestial alignment. He told us he would be leaving in a week, because the alignment would happen again and he would be able to cross the mountains to get the herbs, that could only be gotten to cure the “White Death” on the other side. He said he had tried to grow them here, but something in the earth allowed some healing spirits to enter the herbs over the mountains and give them their curative property. Also, that something in the region we were in was hindering and killing plant growth. Many of the locals attributed this to the “White Death” as well. Another thing we made note of was that supposedly the Great Serpent was the “One God” of all nature. We bid him farewell in hopes of traveling with him in a week to see this pass through the mountains.

So while Antillia and Vomarr were having their little acid koolaid test, Hammer and Rhaziel were seeking out the hunters at the local tavern "The Engorged Serpent". The hunters turned out to be a trio called "The Jungle Boys" and they asked them about their tale. The hunters were glad to tell it, with a few free ales in their hands, and soon the two adventurers were enthralled. Apparently the trio had once been a quartet and had lost one of their hunters to the “serpent-like guardians” of the golden city/temple. They said they had adventured into the swamp, in search of new found glory and trophies. There was a wall of vegetation around a specific area that seemed impassable, but they had managed to find a way in. Once inside the wall the land before them sloped quickly down into a crater so large they couldn’t make out the other side. Immediately they noticed that the crater’s walls were covered in what seemed like a black glass and the obvious giant wall made of gold around the city/temple in the center of the crater. They slid down for a closer investigation when they were ambushed by a group of serpent men. The hunters ran for their lives, but one of them was set upon by the snake-men. (You only have to run faster than the slowest hunter!) Their jaws dropped as the snake men, right off his still squirming body, ate their friend’s face! It was all they could do to gather themselves and make for the passage in the wall. They have never been back to that place since… Well obviously this story had the intended effect upon Hammer and Rhaziel, warding them from ever going to the deadly temple of gold, right? Right?! If anything it only whet their appetites. What could be better for a rogue and barbarian? Plenty of evil creatures to slaughter with the promise of so much gold you can build a city out of it. Not much tops that!

So as the group gathered info the sun slowly waned towards later afternoon. It was nearing time for the slave auction so we pooled our gold and all went to attend. We knew we wanted Zoggins and, borrowing from our knowledge, we decided to stack the odds in our favor. Antillia went separate from the group to bid on the slaves, while Hammer, Rhaziel, and Vomarr spread rumors about the slaves we wanted. It turns out we were against Seyra, Grobin, and Picktooth. They were the representatives of the local mines; "Steaming Pit"(Seyra: Red Headed Beauty), "Yellowbrick"(Grobin: Fat Man), and "Snorter's Sluce and Slurry"(Picktooth: Half Orc). In the end we had scared off many of the potential bids on those slaves and acquired Zoggins, Er’ekt, and Blister. We promptly pulled Zoggins aside and told him how we’d like to set them all free, but employ them working on our farm and keeping up our house. Being a natural born leader, we put Zoggins in charge, and he was thrilled. Antillia showed them all how to farm and Er’ekt was a natural born cook and housekeeper. Meanwhile, night was falling and Rhaziel and Hammer decided to go fishing! We gave Hammer a sunrod and Rhaziel snagged a boat on shore. Rhaziel passed a rope down to Hammer (who doesn’t need to breathe) and Hammer waded around the bottom of the small gulf, searching for lost relics and fish. Hammer had amazing eyes that evening and managed to bring up 2 ancient pots full of a nectar similar to honey. He also managed to get in a fight with a giant halibut and Rhaziel dived in to help him finish it off. When they came to shore Rhaziel brought in the jars and a net full of about eight pounds of fish. The other fishermen were mocking him as they were bringing in their hauls, until Hammer came wading out carrying a 300-pound halibut on his shoulders. All the other fishermen were speechless after that as their jaws hit their decks. We all had a hearty laugh at the tale and set our workers to cutting, cooking, and glazing some fish on a stick to prepare to sell it in town the next day.

While the fish was being prepared for the next day we were approached by a messenger asking us to attend Seyra, the red headed beauty, at the tavern. We were curious who she was, so we asked around some on the way there. It turns out she was one of the people bidding on the slaves and the lady who had won almost all of them. We were intrigued so we went to meet her, at which point she laid a proposition at our feet. She said we had been seen around the town and had heard we were the seasoned type. She said she didn’t have enough guards of her own to escort all the slaves up to the "Steaming Pit" mine, but would pay us to help guard them along the way. First, we asked her a few questions about the need for so many slaves and that began a new tale….

Seyra began her story telling us that her company had lost many of it’s miners recently and production was almost halted completely. When we asked her if it had anything to do with the “White Death” she told us that the disease didn’t reach anyone in the mine. We assumed this was due to the fact that most miners avoided the town during the epidemic, even though local rumor had suggested the "White Death" might be the cause of the mine's shortcomings. So, this naturally raised our suspicions. If it wasn’t the “White Death”, then what could kill so many miners so quickly? She simply told us it was an unforeseen accident and she needed the slaves. We eventually bargained out a price, getting more than the original offer due to the lack of answers, and bid her farewell until the morrow.

We returned to our farm to see that our workers were well settled and then went back to our home where Er’ekt had dusted, cleaned, and put things back in order. We bedded down for the evening with adventure on our minds and a long trip up the river to the mountains ahead….

I’d like to also note at the end of this that we had wondered if the “White Death” might be spread by flying insects, similar to mosquitoes, so we found a local spider webbing that is coated in sap to strengthen and preserve it. It made for a very light netting that was stronger than steel and served as a great way to keep insects out of our sleeping areas.

Places and people of note:

New Hope - Starting Port with a tavern, whorehouse, general store, and blacksmith.

Engorged Serpent - Tavern in New Hope.

Silken Thigh - Whorehouse in New Hope.

Sir John Laymen - Governor of New Hope.

Dr. John Lock - Doctor who lost family to the "White Death". Came back from the far side of the mountains with herbs that can cure the "White Death". Had a religious experience with the "Great Serpent" and is looking for help to gather herbs within the week. The only person to ever cross the mountains.

Jungle Boys - The three best hunters in the area.

Elijah Silver - One of the "Jungle Boys", botanist.

Dornal "The Swift" - Leader of the "Jungle Boys".

Martin Treebreaker - One of the "Jungle Boys", the muscle.

Easter Island Heads - One known to exist in New Hope, suspected that there are many of them that form a circle. The faces all pointing towards the "city of gold" in the middle of the swamp. Antillia saw a beam of light shooting out of the face of the one in New Hope during her experience with the concoction Dr. John Lock fed her. They seem to be guarding something, or sealing something in the swamp.

Matt Humphreys - Farmer in New Hope. The only successful farmer still working a field.

Seyra - Representative of the "Steaming Pit" mine. Red headed beauty.

Grobin - Representative of the "Yellowbrick" mine. Fat man.

Picktooth - Representative of "Snorter's Sluice and Slurry", a river sluicing operation just south of the mines. Half orc.

Zoggins - Hobgoblin leader of our workers.

Er'ekt - One of our workers, cook and housekeeper.

Blister - One of our workers, half orc. Dumb as a sack of rocks, but works like an ox.

Antillia - Female Minotaur Warden (Player)

Vomarr - Male Bugbear Cleric (Player)

Hammer - Male Warforged Barbarian (Player)

Rhaziel - Male Eladrin Rogue (Player)


Thanks for reading and I hope I gave you a good look at what we’re up against! I think the sheer amount of plot hooks and story background made sure we would be busy for some time to come. I’ll post the next bit of our adventure as soon as I can! I also apologize for any naming differences between my post and previous posts, I am going off my notes where names are spelled how they sounded to me.