Sunday, April 24, 2016

Far Isles Session #30 - In Hot Pursuit

DRAMATIS PERSONAE:
Kwinsea (Aquamancer 4), with familiar Hermes, and henchman Xavier (Swashbuckler 2)
Chaff (Vivimancer 4), with henchman "No. 7" (Halfling 1), familiar Pretty Bird, and riding hound Stinky Dog
Torak (Cleric 4)
Beuford Bumbletoes (Halfling 1)

The "Purple Haze" continued to slog forward against the stubborn wind, in pursuit of the zombie raft. Thanks to the wind, they made very little headway day after day. They did notice that the raft now appeared to be disintegrating, as bodies and parts of crocodiles started to drift past them as the days wore on. Chaff (now fully recovered), flew high above the ship on the ebony fly to see if there was any sign of the rafts' ultimate destination. He saw nothing in that south-easterly direction. Behind them to the north-west he spied the Magic Isles from whence they'd come, noting there were still a lot of isles they had not explored for wizard towers. To the north-east was a cloud bank that looked to lay over distant land, while due west was a long (15+ mile) sandbar.

Attack!
In spite of there being no destination in sight, the party decided to push on another few says. Eventually, the raft disintegrated completely, leaving them sailing blindly on it's previous course. At one point, Pretty Bird flying cover spotted the "Divine Providence" coming up behind them, but it turned away to the west when it spotted the "Purple Haze". On the fourth day, just as the raft completely disintegrated, they finally spotted something ahead. Not land, but a fleet of 4 huge outrigger canoes manned by garishly outfitted jungle tribesmen. Upon sighting the "Purple Haze", these tuned to intercept. The party didn't like the idea of  letting 20 fierce native warriors get too close to them, so they had the captain turn the ship about as they manned the catapult. A ball of flaming pitch smashed into one canoe, catching the vessel on fire and flinging a couple of burning natives overboard. It veered aside, but the other three canoes came on, and were soon too close to use the catapult. While the crew worked the sails, the party lined the rail and opened fire with muskets, pistols and crossbow. Kwinsea dove into the water and, keeping below the surface (thanks to Hermes' water breathing ability), came up below the two lead canoes and tied them together with attach rope. These two slowed, and lost direction and momentum as a result, but the fourth one still pressed on. In this canoe was what appeared to be the leader or witchdocter, so the party focused their fire on him. Chaff tried to meld flesh without success, but did use instinct to good effect, causing several of the tribesmen to turn on their fellows and try to eat them! This was all too much for the raiding party, and the canoes all now turned away in retreat, but not before the party splatted one with a final ball of burning pitch.

The Golden Barge
On the next day, they party finally decided to abandon the 'chase'. Rather than head straight back to the Magic Isles though, they headed due west to the sandbar. Now with a more favorable wind, they reached the island in the afternoon. It was indeed a long sandbar, anchored at one end by a rocky bluff, and at the other by a low, marshy island. Sailing about they spied only two notable structures. One was a perfectly square black building, on low knoll on the marshy island. After the ship had been in view for awhile, a trio of figures emerged to watch them sail by. They were humanoid, dressed in outlandish armor. The other structure was a massive golden barge, run aground on the sandbar. There was no sign of life around it, but the party decided to wait for nightfall before landing, unsure who or what they might encounter. Lynessa also didn't want to risk bringing the "Purple Haze" too close to shore, especially given the crew shortage. So the party went ashore in the ships boat, landing just down the beach from the barge. The two halflings were sent to scout ahead, but were challenged when about 40' from the barge. "Halt there, you hairless monkeys! Stand back or face our wrath, you useless wastes of protein!" The rest of the party rushed up, and now they could see three figures, much like those they'd spied earlier in the day; tall, skinny, vaguely elf-like, dressed in outlandish armor and armed with wickedly barbed pole-arms. They stood under the prow of the barge. After some further trading of insults, swords were draw and a fight begun. Kwinsea tied up the leader with command rope, while the halflings and Xavier closed with weapons. It was proving to be a tough fight, so Chaff dropped a web, trapping the leader and one other (plus No 7 and Beuford), while the third fled into the darkness. The halflings were cut free, the two elf-things  dispatched, and everyone's attention turned to the barge ...

TOTAL XP
895

GAINS
None

KILLS
9 cannibals
2 Freakish Space-Elf Things 

LOSSES
None

Tuesday, April 19, 2016

Far Isles Session #29 - The Zombie Raft

DRAMATIS PERSONAE:
Abdul el Abdul (Fighter 4)
Kwinsea (Aquamancer 4), with familiar Hermes
Torak (Cleric 4)
Beuford Bumbletoes (Halfling 3)

The party had Lynessa turn the "Purple Haze" about to chase down the raft. Once they were close enough, Abdul el Abdul and a few sailors latched onto the squishy edge with rope and grappling hooks, joining the raft and ship together. The could now see that the  mass of dead crocodiles, humanoids, and assorted swamp life that made up the raft was not still but quivering with movement. In fact, as they watched, a quartet of moss covered, half rotten bodies untangled themselves from the bulk of the raft and began to shuffle towards the ship. As the crew retreated to the rigging and the stern of the ship, the party unleashed a rain of missile fire and paralyzation rays to take them out. That done, the party passed over the ropes to the raft, and proceeded to the grass hut. Seeing no door, Beuford stuck his hand through the grass hut, only to have it grabbed by something on the other side. He pulled his hand back, and the party proceeded to tear the hut down to get inside. Inside were three more of the moss covered zombies, which were quickly dispatched. That done, they looked around the remains of the hut. There was little to see except for some creepy bone and grass charms hanging from the ceiling, and a 5' wide hole in both the floor and ceiling.  Tying a couple of coils of rope together, Kwinsea then used attach rope to secure it to the ship, there being nothing else on the raft solid enough to hold it. And then down the hole went the rope, followed by Abdul el Abdul and Beuford. About 40' down they entered a chamber deep in the raft, with walls and floor and ceiling an undulating mass of bodies. Also in the chamber were a trio of deathly looking wolves, who fell on Abdul el Abdul and Beuford with a vengeance, paralyzing both. Torak and Kwinsea then dropped into the chamber, and between the borrowed paralyzation wand and a lot of stabbing, the three wolves were defeated.

Once Abdul el Abdul and Beuford were brought back to normal using a couple of potions of healing, the party headed for the only unique feature of the room, a stout oak door. After several attempts to open it failed, Abdul el Abdul noted the door was just built into the mass of bodies which formed the walls. So he proceeded to cut away around the frame, and soon the door was removed and the path free. On the other side they found a passageway writhing with arms and hands, trying to grab at them. There were also two stairs built out of the quivering flesh, on leading up and one down. The party headed down, with Beuford in the lead. Their exploration ended after about 30' in front of a wall of flesh. And a pit trap, into which Beuford fell. Luckily he avoided the spikes sticking out of the fetid water at the bottom.

Iron Rose
The rest of the party hauled Beuford out, and headed back to take the upper stairs. This corridor was longer, and was similarly alive with clutching hands. Beuford again triggered a trap, this time the rib cage of some huge beast which sprang out of the floor. Luck was with the halfling again, as he managed to dodge the sharpened bone. His luck shortly ran out though, when the passage opened into a small room. At the far end they could see, hiding behind what appeared to be a 10' iron rose, the mysterious figure they had battled above. Between the party and him, however, stood two desiccated and undead guardians. They leveled their cold blades at Beuford, who stood alone in the front rank, and the halfling shivered as they drained away much of his vitality and power. Kwinsea once more whipped out the borrowed paralyzation wand and froze all three opponents, who were then dispatched by bladed means. The party gathered up the silver coins scattered about the writhing floor, and looted a dagger (which cast a circle of light when unsheathed) and a bone staff from the mysterious figure. Abdul meanwhile, pulled down the iron rose.  It was unadorned, but subsequent investigation showed it to be magical. That was good enough reason to take it along, so the party dragged it back through the tunnels of clutching hands to the chamber below the hut. Where they were dismayed to find their rope was missing. Abdul tried climbing up, but the writhing walls did not allow good grip, and he fell before making it halfway. In the end, the party hatched a plan to send Hermes up the shaft with the ebony fly attached to some more rope. Once above "ground" they summoned the fly, and everyone climbed up the rope as it hovered overhead. And hauled up the iron rose.

Everyone looked about for the "Purple Haze", which now stood off several hundred yards to the west. There was a commotion on deck, a fight of some sort. Leaping aboard the fly, Beuford launched himself at the ship, finding the crew battling a quartet of the moss covered zombies from the raft. He leapt  into the fray, and the fly returned to the raft to ferry the others over. They soon destroyed the last of the zombies, but not before four of the crew were also dead. This put the rest in a bitter mood, and they made no move to listen when given the order to raise sail and pursue the raft. Abdul el Abdul brought them around, however, by offering the thousand silver coins they'd just recovered from the zombie raft. That got the crew to work, and the "Purple Haze" was soon in hot pursuit of the raft, which had continued on it's previous heading roughly east south-east.  Well, slow pursuit, as they were sailing directly into the wind, and Lynessa had to continuously tack the ship back and forth to keep the raft in sight. This continued on for days, and they left the Magic Isles behind, still following the raft in the hopes it was leading them somewhere interesting ...

TOTAL XP
1588

GAINS
1000sp
magic dagger & staff from the Zombie Master
Iron Rose

KILLS
11 zombies
3 ghouls wolves
2 wights
Zombie Master

LOSSES
4 sailors
Most of Beuford's levels

Sunday, April 3, 2016

Far Isles Session #28 - No Rest for the Weary

DRAMATIS PERSONAE:
Abdul el Abdul (Fighter 4)
Kwinsea (Aquamancer 4), with familiar Hermes, and henchman Xavier (Swashbuckler 2)
"No. 7" (Halfling 1)
Torak (Cleric 4)
Beuford Bumbletoes (Halfling 3)

With Chaff out of action, they party decided to first sail about the Magic Isles, looking for the Cloud Tower and any other sights worthy of exploration. But only after No. 7 captured a few of the three eared bunnies for Chaff to cuddle while he recovered. Raising sail, the "Purple Haze" headed north-east, and after passing several small chains of islands, soon hauled in view of a place they recognized; the Blue Tower. There was some talk of going ashore to see if they'd missed anything on their last visit, but then someone remembered the two 'guests' they'd robbed and abandoned there. Figuring they wouldn't be welcomed with open arms, the party had the crew turn the ship about. Now that they knew where they were, they headed back to the Lightning Tower to recovered the silver they'd had to leave behind. This was done with no interference, so they turned about once more and headed in the direction the tribal chief had told them the Cloud Tower lay.

Cloud Tower
The party found the Cloud Tower without much trouble. They found an island, over which floated a large black cloud dumping rain on an abandoned town below. That was odd enough, since otherwise the sky was clear and a brilliant blue. Doubly odd was the lower half of a tower that stuck out of the bottom of the cloud. The "Purple Haze" circled the island, but nothing else of interest was observed. Again, reluctant to tangle with any danger without Chaff, the party decided to anchor here for the night and then continue exploration of the Magic Isles, coming back to Cloud Tower at a latter time. To speed up the process, Kwinsea volunteered to seasong the vivmancer to sleep each night to aid in his recovery.

The Aquatic Horror
However, the rest for the remainder of the party was not as complete and pleasant. Just before dawn, No.7 was on watch. The halfling was observing the tower, and noted a few shapes emerged from the cloud, flew around it and the island below, before returning from whence they came. At about the same time, she heard a scraping sound on the rail behind her. Turning, No. 7 saw a dripping horror climb onto the deck. A demonic visage topped a body covered in spikes and barbs, a body the colour of old bronze and covered in seaweed and slime.  The halfling raised the alarm as the beast fell upon her. Luckily, No. 7 was both quick on her feet and  armored like a tank, and held off the thing while the rest of the party rushed up from below deck to help. They found, however, that most of their weapons could not hurt it; only Abdul with his magic sword could seem to do it any harm. So the two heavily armored halflings, No. 7 and Beuford, held the creatures' attention while Abdul chopped at it, finally cleaving the thing in half. After a quick investigation of the remains, it was dumped overboard. And with the sun coming up, the crew was roused and the "Purple Haze" got underway, the party having decided this was probably not the best place to stay anchored while Chaff recovered.

Mystery Figure
They sailed north again to explore and find a quiet place to anchor for a few days. They passed though another chain of islands, with a few notable locations (a pair of islands, one a blistering hot sandbar, the other a mountain obscured by a raging snowstorm; another sandbar that shifted under the effects of wind and waves such that it's location was never the same twice). But the ship moved on,  finally dropping anchor off the island that floated 1 foot above the waves. For some reason, this seemed to the party like a safe spot. And for the most part it was, except when Xavier spied a raft of some sort drifting down the channel from the north west. As it came closer, they could see it was about 100' across, and at one end was a small grass hut. The raft was also not made of logs or any other normal material, but appeared to be a mass of dead crocodiles! A lone figure stood on the roof of the hut, a cadaverous human dressed in dirty robes. He/it stared at the party, who tried to communicate but received no response. At least until someone decided to cast a spell at him, at which point the figure cast a spell of it's own and started to levitate above the raft and the ship. A duel ensued, with pistol fire and spells from the ship countered by more spells from the mystery figure. The figure was able to confuse the party, such that Kwinsea turned to attack Xavier and Beuford attacked No7. Beuford quickly battered his fellow halfling down, while Xavier jumped into the rigging and climbed away from his employer, while at the same time trying to swing out towards the levitating figure to slash at it with his sword. That unfortunately did not work, and Kwinsea was able to use her prismatic ray gem to blast her henchman out of the rigging. By this time, the rest of the party had blasted away at the  levitating figure, such that it had descended back into the hut and disappeared. They then turned attention to subduing Beuford and Kwinsea before they could so more harm. Luckily both No. 7 and Xavier were not dead, but would be joining Chaff in the sick bay for some time. Meanwhile, Lynessa and the crew had gotten the "Purple Haze" underway to put some space between them and the zombie raft while the remaining party members decided what to do next ...

TOTAL XP
2328

GAINS
18283sp


KILLS
1 aquatic horror

LOSSES
No. 7 (temporarily)
Xavier (temporarily)