Full Metal Alchemy
Game System | Blood & Treasure Complete
Setting/World | The Lost Lands by Frog God & Necromancer Games
Dramatis Personae
Blitz Dunkelsturm | Mountain Dwarf Cleric of Jamboor 4 [Death domain] | Berndt
Haxxel Rosethorne | Wild Elf Duelist 2 | Berndt
Hoder | Ogre Fighter 3 [Brute variant] | Flan
Fenrir the Vain | Human Barbarian 2 [Thane variant] | Flan
Angelina d’Monica III | Human Assassin 3 [Acrobat variant] | Djuro
Alba Dayanite | Half Elf Psychic 1/ Magic-User 1 | Djuro
Rektolas | High Elf Fighter 2 | Mats
Nitrolas | High Elf Magic-User 2 | Mats
Meatshields & NPCs
Men-At-Arms | Darkwolf | Fuldo | Garfield | Garfunkel
Torchbearers | Ranulf | Wee Dingwall
NPC | Runar Asbeard
Absent this session
The Old Sleaze | Human Sorcerer 3 | Martin
Make Me | Human Paladin 2 | Martin
Session Eight – Working for da man
WARNING – SPOILERS!
This session saw no new PCs entering the scene. Also, all PCs leveled except: Blitz, Angelina, Old Sleaze and Make Me.
Last session ended in the creepy caves of the Feather-Pig. Our heroes (at least they think of themselves as such) had just discovered a dried dead man in a creepy looking black metal armor in a narrow cave cul-de-sac. They also simultaneously realized that the only way out of the cave complex is through the three hostile trolls outside…
They laboriously drag the dead guy out of the tunnel and decide to remove the weird armor – “It’s probably worth a lot!” After a gross removal and cleaning session the armor lies on the ground. Blitz casts a Detect Magic spell which indicate that the armor indeed is of the magic kind. However, after describing the weird details of the armor no one wants to try it on. At last, Rektolas the elf fighter volunteer and put on the armor. Immediately after doing so he experiences the worst pain ever in his groin and butt area and around the nipples. It is as if the armor actually grabs his body and adapts to it’s shape. The others try to remove the armor but it is not possible due to the intense pain! Looks as if Rektolas and the Armor are inseparable. Literally.
Despite a second search of the caves, the PCs fail to find another exit and they realize that they must handle the trolls somehow. While planning, they scan the packs and things found in the caves and find a map describing the way to the Stoneheart Dungeon tucked away in the spellbook recovered from Wilhelm Esmond-Womald’s pack. They also discuss the next course of action and decide to try to break out of the cave and then head for Crimmor and try to find Unraga Praag, the alchemist who sent the now dead adventurers to retrieve the Feather-Pig cysts in the first place. After all, they now have some cysts and maybe they can sell them with a nice profit.
The PCs realize that a fight with the trolls will end up with many dead so they plan to use one of the dwarven iron balls and see what it does. From Blitz’s knowledge and what they heard from Elspeth Montesqieu the balls are some kind of magically or alchemically explosive device. Blitz has also figured out that the dial-thing on the side ought to activate the balls.
A Ball of Iron (with the dial arbitrarily turned about 1/3 around) is wrapped up in a blanket and thrown out to the trolls (by Hoder the ogre), under the pretense that they are returning Kagrigor’s head (that Alba Dayanite stole last time they fought the troll. Coosin the troll picks up the bundle and turns to Kagrigor with a victorious grin when the device blows up in his face, engulfing the troll in a black, slow burning and almost solid fire. The troll runs off screaming in fear and pain, making Ma loose her cool also. The only one standing fast is Kagrigor, looking somewhat bewildered, looking at his hated enemies and back on his running kin. Finally, he decides to follow them and runs away promising that they will meet again…
Our heroes slap their hands in victory and returns to Crimmor-on-the-Lake to meet up with Unraga Praag. However, the man isn’t easy to find. After a fruitless search at the Iindriarog’s Tent Market and The Blessed Net tavern, the PCs finally find the elusive man at The Merchant’s Wagon inn. A very tanned body guard type finally admit them into Praag’s deluxe suite (complete with porta-laboratory) at the inn. Praag turns out to be a man of foreign (southern?) descent, talking with an unknown accent and dressing in very bright and colorful garb, wearing a strange pill-box hat. The PCs lie, claiming to be part of the original adventurer group that Praag tasked with going to the Feather-Pig cave. If he suspects foul play, he doesn’t say anything and after some haggling the PCs manage to sell the cysts (9 of them?) for 1000 gold. Praag also offers further work in the form of going to a place called the Stoneheart Dungeon to retrieve an item for him. The adventurers will get X gold upon returning the item and moreover they can keep whatever they find there. The PCs agree to the contract and get instructions to travel to the great city of Bard’s Gate where they will get further instructions from a business associate of Praag’s.
Runar Asbeard, furious that the PCs have abandoned the search his love Arialle, leaves the group in anger to keep searching for her himself. [Did you keep the 5 hirelings, or did they stay in Crimmor?].
After travel preparations, the PCs leave for Bard’s Gate via the main road, the Tradeway, going east. After almost 4 days of uneventful travel they reach Bard’s Gate, jewel of the Stoneheart River and home to about 25000 souls (large city). Following Praag’s instructions, they find the Outer Quarter (a quite seedy neighbourhood) and The Eye and Scrotum occulte shoppe, where their contact can be found. The contact, Manchego the gnome is found in the back room, with a very scantily clad half-elven lady whom Manchego refers to as his niece, Misty. She leaves the shop with a “Same time tomorrow then, Uncle” and a flirty wink to Fenrir… Showing Praag’s letter of introduction to the gnome, he swiftly provides them with brief instructions, a crude map to the dungeon and sends them on their way to adventure.
The map shows that dungeon is located some 80-90 miles to the northwest of Bard’s Gate, in a place called Valley of the Shrines, in the Stoneheart Mountains. There’s an old pilgrim path, marked by two ancient white monoliths that leads to the valley, winding through the densely forested and hard-to-navigate foothills leading up to the mountain valley. After about 2 days of travel the PCs reach the pilgrim path and start the ascent into the mountains. The terrain is treacherous, forcing them to dismount and lead the horses often, slowing down travel greatly. The trek alont the path takes about a day, on which they hear many sounds from the dense coniferous forest. At one instance a huge Stirge emerges from the forest. Before it can fly back it is shot down by a volley of arrows and crossbow bolts (of which most miss in a most embarrasing way).
Finally, the path opens up to a lightly forested valley with a small lake. There is a sense of calm in the valley, as if the ancient gods of good still have some power here. Beside the lake are two ancient temples to Thyr the Lawgiver (to the east) and Muir the Lady of Paladins (to the west). They are now in a sorry state of disrepair and neglect and the white marble is blackened as if they have been burnt.
The PCs decide to enter the eastern temple ruin, dedicated to Thyr. Inside the Greek style temple, the sitting statue of Thyr has been beheaded and his regalia has been shattered to pieces. The walls of the temple is covered in evil glyphs and smeared with blood and feces. The fonts for holy water are likewise desecrated and befouled. The PCs carefully search the ruin and Blitz the dwarven cleric finds a text in Celestial on the base of the statue: As you obey the commands of Thyr so does this figure obey your COMMAND.
As he reads the text, he triggers a spell trap which explodes in his face. However, casting a Command spell and saying open, the statue swivel around to reveal a dark stairway into the darkness below. The PCs go down the stairs, and find themselves in a square room with chairs, tables and books. They search the west and north walls and find secret doors in both walls. The secret rooms contain a wealth of lawful spell scrolls and books with holy text on Thyr.
In the middle of this, Haxxel hears a sound from above and goes up the stair to investigate, where he is attacked by four armored and unusually fast skeletons. The skeletons are all covered in fresh blood. Haxxel backs down the stairs, trying to warn his friends and to create a choke point. The skeletons attack relentlessly and advance down the stairs, where a chaotic battle ensue.
In the battle, Haxxel (who has the 2-weapon fighting feat) manages to score one critical hit (natural 20) and one fumble (natural 1) simultaneously. Rolling on the fumble table he scores a 12, which means that he must roll twice on the fumble table and take both results. So Haxxel smashes a skeleton to powder with a solid hit for 20 points of damage. Next, he manages to hit Hoder for 16 points of damage AND he mysteriously manages to cut himself on his own blade for 8 points of damage! Fun times 🙂
The battle is hard, but at last our heroes prevail, having slain 4 of the strangely powerful skeletons.
And here we had to break for the day. To be continued…
With a Fistful of d20's 