Dalnor/Campaign1/session-1
Introductions
Session Date: September 27, 2008
Delighted to meet you, sir. Overjoyed, enraptured, entranced. Are we ready? Yes, good. In we go. - Willy Wonka
Harvest 1, 53
Over the course of several days a dwarf named Thorin had been recruiting and interviewing random travelers who had the look and demeanor of "mercenaries", "problem solvers" or "soldiers of fortune". Thorin needed people to investigate the disappearance of merchants traveling on the roads north of Mormoon. As Thorin screened and approved each person, Thorin directed each of them to assemble at the house owned by the mortician just outside of the cemetery.
Each member individually arrives and is ushered (by the mortician) into the sitting room. While waiting for Sir Baylon to arrive Alex, Safiria, Elrohir and Lucius cautiously feel each other out for a couple of minutes.
Sir Baylon arrives with an entourage consisting of Thorin and Varien and is immediately led into the sitting room. He immediately sets the tone with his question: "So this is my mercenary band?" This gets under Safiria's skin and leads to no end of friction between her and Baylon.
The party is given details on the missing merchants. Recently merchants had been disappearing from the roads north of Mormoon. There hadn't been any explanation and the local rangers hadn't turned up any leads. Yesterday several corpses of merchants had been found near the road and brought back to the town. Baylon heard about the corpse and decider to organize a group of mercenaries without telling the town rangers.
The party then bargains hard for an 'acceptable' pay rate. Elrohir has minimum participation in the negotiations.
Rate:
1 gold/day per person
1 gold/left ear of a bandit
2 gold per living merchant rescued
After the negotiations are complete, Baylon states: "I expect great things of you. You will bring good news and the town will give you a heroes welcome upon your return". He makes some comments about not being needed to look at some corpses and makes his exit.
The party expresses an interest in examining the body that had been recovered. The party is ushered from the sitting room into the morgue. The party has the opportuinity to examine the corpses that had been recovered. The bodies had had all of their internal organs removed with a very sharp knife. During the examination of the corpse, the mortician is quietly efficient but a bit unnerving.
After the meeting concludes the party agrees to meet in the morning and breaks up for the night.
Harvest 2, 53
In the morning the party meets at the north town gate. They start walking north on the road toward the Division Mountains. After several miles, the party finds the point where the latest merchant group was ambushed. They follow the trail about 100 yards off the road. The party then finds where the eviscerated merchants had been previously found. From there the party starts buch-whacking deeper into the forest looking for the bandit base. As night falls, they stop and climb a tree to reconoiter. From the tree they see signs of a camp fire in the direction they had been headed.
Safiria, in a fit of allergic sneezing from being outdoors attracts the attention of the bandits who hear her curses and cussing as she continues to sneeze. Thinking quickly, the rest of the party takes up position in the trees to set up an ambush while Safiria continues to suffer with now faked allergic reaction. As the bandits arrive, Safiria plays the 'poor defenseless girl' routine to bait in the bandits. Several bandits come out looking for her. The rest of the party ambushes the bandits from the trees. Safiria curses a bandit which dies a moment later, and a dark spiral aura forms over her. The remainder of the bandits do not live long enough to be intimidated though one of the bandits escapes with an arrow protruding from his shoulder.
Party creeps up on base and reconnoiters it. Safiria attempts to parlay with the bandits and attempt to get the bandits to surrender. The bandits are not interested in negotiating after hearing that several of their comrades had already been killed by the party.
The party then raids the bandit base. Lucius, Alex and Varien attempt to scale the outer walls. The sound of bandits hammering away at a flagstone and being told to "release it" causes immediate concern from the party. As Alex, Varien and Lucius clear the roof, the bandit leader comes out to confront Safiria and Elrohir, who both deal a flurry of blows onto the bandit leader. The bandit leader goes berserk and promptly cuts down Elrohir with his axe. Safiria flees from the axe wielding berserker and toward the bandit base. Once there she teleports up onto the roof of the base as Lucius, Alex and Varien finish wiping out the men on the roof.
From atop the roof Safiria, Varien, Lucius and Alex pick off the berserking leader with arrows and magic.
Meanwhile, inside the base, the party can hear several of the bandits working with tools to cut into the floor of the base. After the party storms the base they discover that the bandits had uncovered a trapdoor to a lower level of the dwarf base. One of the bandits was already climbing down and when dispatched, falls to the bottom of the ladder. The party checks and it appears that all of the bandits are dead. The party then begins to evaluate the situation.
Outside Alex and Lucius work to revive Elrohir. After several minutes he slowly comes around.
Inside the base, Safiria, Alex and Lucius work to free the merchants found in the base. As the merchants are freed they start exiting the base into the clearing around the base. Afterwards, Safiria and Varien take a quick look in the lower level of the dungeon and find an antechamber to a dwarven military complex.
Continued in: A Little Time Below
