Log for Rise of the Runelords 1 & 2 - COMPLETE

[Zyraen]

Edit: Ran from 15 Sep 2015 to 29 Feb 2016. Total 15 Sessions

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[Zyraen]

1.1 Goblins Galore
18-Sep-15 (Fri)

When goblins uncharacteristically raided the human town of Sandpoint during a celebration, it was a handful of heroic individuals who courageously held up against the brunt of their attack, and two of them almost paid with their lives.
For their heroics, they had an invitation from an appreciative noble who intended to celebrate their victory in his estate. After some blessings from the priest and a good night's rest in the inn, they were in relatively good shape when they claimed their reward from the town's sheriff.

It was at the sheriff's office they met an elf ranger who had been keeping an eye on the goblins of Thistletop, and told them how they were 5 disparate bickering tribes, yet recently they seemed united under some leader. Since then they have made some aggressive moves against the farmsteads in the area, although raiding a well established town like this was their boldest move yet, and one that boded ill.

One of the heroes - the halfling who took responsibility for the heroics and the newly formed party - also noticed there was a cloaked human that left with some goblins some distance outside the gate. The sheriff told them it was near the town cemetery, and they decided to investigate the lead further. The elf also informed them that if they should wish to investigate the goblins directly, she would be in town for a while and able to guide them to the goblins' territory.

Attendance - Party Level 2 / Level Up!
Aelfwin Thraxilliron III (Gabriel) : 2 / 2 1
Ash Phoenix (Clement) : 2 / 2 1
Blade Farstrider (Ufuk) : 2 / 2 1
Eddard Himmel (Lucas) : 2 / 2 1
KERHS (Justin) : 2 / 2 1
Tristan Sutekh (Nicholas) : 2 / 2 1

Loot
All except Blade - 80 Gp Reward
Blade - 200 Gp reward, 9 Gp / 1 strange coin from Aldern Foxglove, 1 CLW potion

(CLW - Cure Light Wounds / CMW - Cure Moderate Wounds / so on so forth)

[vanlaser]

Blade Farstrider: First Session

"Luck must be on my side", I thought when entering Sandpoint and finding myself in the midst of an ongoing festival. Apparently, the townsfolk were celebrating the reopening of the local church. At least, that's what a noble snob in fine dresses announced from atop a podium. He was one of those sleazy types: not a damned care for anything but filling their own purses... which I promptly relieved him from. 4 gold, and the odd mysterious coin! "Luck is on my side, indeed."

Yells and screams. Too fast. My luck quickly turned sour on me when the town was suddenly attacked by a goblin raid and turned into a battle ground. "Typical... Just typical...". 

I made my way towards the nearest turmoil, where a rather unremarkable guy was setting goblins afire. Odds weren't in his favor. But fortunately for him, a man in heavy armor and a weirdo with a conical hat and great sword joined the fight. I was surveying the situation, when suddenly the city gates broke open and three goblin riders came rushing through. The middle one immediately caught my attention. He was chanting and appeared to be the leader of this small troop. Instinctively, I threw the dagger I was holding and felled his mount, successfully throwing him off and interrupting his sing song. "That should give them some respite." I thought to myself contemplating the situation the other three defenders were in, which - to my horror - grew worse and worse by the second!

It was at that moment, when a raving lunatic rushed into the midst of the remaining riders and was torn into pieces!

The fight went on for a while, but eventually we managed to repel the intruders. In the middle of it, however, far in the distance atop a hill, I noticed the silhouette of a strange man accompanied by a few goblins, slowly retreating in a leisurely pace. "Odd", I thought, but didn't have time to investigate.

A little later, I joined the group of fighters crowding around the fallen goblin riders. I made my introduction, flowery and inspiring as always, and was rewarded with little but gaping, drooling faces. "What did you expect?", I chided myself, "These are the fighting type. Not really the most sophisticated.". The Sheriff, who had finally deemed it fit to show up, expressed his earnest gratitude for our heroic deeds and  - after a bit of persuasion - promised to reward us with a fair share of gold.



"That went reasonably well, I suppose." I admitted to myself while heading back to the local inn. Frightened, people had sought shelter there. And upon my arrival they insisted that I should explain all that had happened. So I obliged. I might not have told the story exactly as it is, leaving out a few bits, embellishing some others. But I did as I was requested.

It was a lovely night, it was! My blood was high, my mood was good, my pockets full and the ladies... ...lewd. "Well, who can blame them? Nobody can resist the charms of an amiable fellow as myself." I mused while escorting two lovely young ladies up the stairs into my rooms. What can I say... Nobody shall ever accuse Blade Farstrider of not knowing how to spend a night!


The next morning, the tavern was mostly empty. The fellows who had fought the goblins the day before, were seated at a table near the corner and were enjoying their breakfast. I contemplated joining them, but the weird coin I had lifted from the sleazy noble man during the festival kept nagging me. Eventually, I decide to spark up a conversation with the Inn keeper and incidentally asked her if she knew anything about such a coin. She said something along the lines of the coin being from a nearby city, but not being in use anymore. I can't rightly remember. But aside from that, I couldn't glean any useful information. I tipped her a silver.

Nothing much else to do, I decided to pay the Sheriff a visit and collect my well earned reward. I announced my intentions to the company sitting at the corner table, propelling them to heel, and left the Inn with a bunch of strangers in tow.


The visit at the Sheriff's office went rather smoothly and was uneventful, all things considered. I collected my reward and was about to say my goodbyes, when the Sheriff decided to broach a new offer. On his invitation, a lovely Ranger Elf strode in, whose name, I must confess, escaped my poor memory. But being both a hero and a gentleman, I listened to her melodic voice explaining the growing troubles Sandpoint had with Goblins roaming wild. Unable to resist, I found myself offering my services, and with it at the head of the ragged company I was so very unfortunate to have found myself in.

"Let's meet at the city gates within the hour." I announced. "We are investigating the situation immediately."

[Noobinated]

Ash Phoenix:

Kuso. Don’t know what’s crazier the town, or the people in it… Scratch that definitely the people. But I’m getting ahead of myself.
Sandpoint, the first decent town I come across in my travels, well that’s what I thought first arrived. There seemed to be some sort of festival going on, some guy was giving a speech I didn’t care too much about, lots of people in the streets. One of those half-orcs giving flyers with no real information on it other than a picture of some guy. Seemed that my time would be peaceful here…

Oh was I wrong… Goblins decided to raid the city, setting fire to whatever they laid their beady little eyes on. At least, I’m glad I’m not responsible for fires… This time. I could have ran like all the other cowardly townsfolk, but I decided maybe I should stop running for a change. Running from the ones I loved, running from my responsibility running from my powers…
I don’t know what compelled me to charge at the goblins head on, it was like some god in the sky had his fingers on me, moving me. But I found myself head on with a full goblin assault. Thankfully I wasn’t alone, a guardsman, that half-orc, I think I saw some Halfling? And also a guy dressed as a wizard in armour. Chaos ensued, a burly man was struck down sadly. A villager that overestimated himself? I don’t really know.

Managed to take out a few goblins, before I was knocked out by some goblins that chased a man that ran past me. Kuso, I should have been more careful. I need to get stronger…
Thankfully the battle was over shortly and a kind priest tended to our rag-tag gang of defenders’ wounds. That Halfling that was hiding in the shadows claimed all the credit, typical of them. I stayed silent mostly. Was still mad at myself for losing consciousness.

There was a celebration after that, I kept to myself and slept the night away.
The next morning, I got to know the bunch that defended the town a little better. I had a coffee… Sweet coffee… We were told the day before to meet the sheriff, so that’s what we did. During our visit to the Local Sheriff’s office I learnt that the Goblins are becoming a problem, we were introduced to a lady that seemed to be keeping tabs on the goblin menace and that some humans might be involved. We then decided to head out and deal with them, I had some payback I need to give those little buggers. And of course the coin would make it sweeter…

[Zyraen]

1.2 Behind Enemy Lines
24-Sep-15 (Thu)

The heroes decide to follow the trail of the cloaked human, and the Sheriff met them at the cemetery to open the place for them. There they found a desecrated grave of the previous priest, and one of them came close to being unpleasantly surprised by a pair of skeletons left there. They then used the halfling's new dog to try and follow the scent, and when the scent ended the dog brought them back in direction of its former owner, causing the heroes to terminate the wild goose chase.

Returning to the inn, they found the elf Shalelu drinking with the innkeeper Ameiko. With her guidance, they came to the territory of the goblins upon Thistletop. There they captured some goblins for questioning, and found they were from the Dogsquisher tribe who knew nothing about why the raid on Sandpoint was done by the Birdcruncher tribe. They also learnt about 4 humans within the goblin territory - a dark skinned woman in white, a white skinned woman in black, a sword and shield bearing warrior and an agile half-elf. The paladin who lived in Sandpoint recognised the description of the fair woman as the missing daughter of the previous priest, who had died when the former church was burnt down.

The Heroes also obtained rough directions to the Birdcruncher tribe, and daringly sneaked behind the tall thistle wall through goblin tunnels and found themselves on the other side deep behind goblin territory. From there they surprised and all but annihilated a small camp of 10 goblins.

Attendance - Party Level 3 / Level Up!
Ash Phoenix (Clement) : 2 / 2 2
Blade Farstrider (Ufuk) : 2 / 2 2
Eddard Himmel (Lucas) : 2 / 2 2
Tristan Sutekh (Nicholas) : 2 / 2 2
AFK-KERHS (Justin) : 1 / 2 2

[Zyraen]

1.3 Cunning Stalkers
01-Oct-15 (Thu)

They interrogated the surviving goblin to learn where their leader was, and were pointed to the thistle-covered island fortress just nearby, separated by a rope bridge. They left the goblin to tend to his few surviving family and friends. Prior to crossing the rope bridge, the heroes checked out a seemingly empty small makeshift hut with a nearby fire, and were ambushed by what turned out to be a goblin druid and his panther pet. It took the heroes a while, but they managed to best the creature and his pet.

The druid's name was Gogmurt, leader of the Dogsquisher tribe, and he seemed to care a lot for his panther. They learnt he was against the raid on Sandpoint to begin with, but the overall leader that had united the goblins - one called Chief Ripnugget - was apparently under the influence of the humans mentioned earlier and went with the stupid, wasteful plan, as Gogmurt put it. After Gogmurt cooperatively drew the layout of the first level of the goblins' fortress for the heroes, the heroes suggested that he lure out Ripnugget for them. In return, with the current Chief gone Gogmurt might have a chance at being the new leader of the goblins and also be rid of the humans, provided he did not attack Sandpoint in future, and so Gogmurt agreed.

From there, Gogmurt lured out a very suspicious and tense Ripnugget, a goblin who rode on a giant gecko. He seemed suspicious and took care to bring a fairly large retinue. Nonetheless, the wary goblins were not able to detect the well-hidden heroes lying in ambush, and they managed to engage the goblins in favorable terrain as well as spring a Sleep spell on them. It was just as well, for the goblins put up a fight which almost brought their courageous paladin down, but soon all the goblins were all laid low.

Attendance - Party Level 3
Ash Phoenix (Clement) : 2 / X 3
Blade Farstrider (Ufuk) : 2 / X 3
Eddard Himmel (Lucas) : 2 / X 3
KERHS (Justin) : 1 / X 3
Tristan Sutekh (Nicholas) : 2 / X 3

Loot
Masterwork Breastplate, small (350 gp)
6 CMW potions
1 CLW potions
40 gp