Summary LXVIIIb: A Xavier and Rangorn Interlude
From the notes of Rangorn, bowman of terror:
As you may recall, just prior to the attempt to defeat of Tellah by Orimaxes,
Xavier and Rangorn went to get trained and pick up henchmen. As a note:
RANGORN FAILED HIS PLAYRATING GUESS. I guess 2.0, it was 2.1. Drat-- 1000
gp down the tubes.
After stumbling out of the training hall embarrassed, but 6th level,
Rangorn rejoined the now 8th level Xavier, and summoning his henchmen Han,
Luke, Sam, and Brogan, they marched back to Middle.
(By the way, I continued my crazy hit points streak-- I rolled a 7 on a d8.
Xavier has 45 hp, and Rangorn now has 56!)
Fortunately, there was an encounter.
Nine ogres jumped the party on the road. The urgency here was if we lost
horses, thanks to Rangorn's miss, we would be late and miss the ceremony
destroying Tellah, which would not do. Another opportunity to use
Gruntender could not be left unexploited (for those who don't know, Rangorn
wields a +2 falchion called Gruntender-- it becomes a +4 double damage
weapon against ogres, and when they fall to 0 hp, they just die instantly.
Combined with the 6th level woodsman bonus, Rangorn feels confident about
fighting bands of ogres with trusty allies).
Four boulders flew at Rangorn, all missing. Arabica, Xavier's 2nd level
cavalier henchman, charged and swiped at an ogre, injuring it. Rangorn
then shot it to pieces. Unfortunately, his henchmen had to dismount, and
Luke was knocked to the ground by several blows by a vicious ogre. In
addition, Brogan barely escaped death, running to hide behind Rangorn.
Meanwhile, several people missed Xavier, who was in full plate. Xavier
yelled "Die!" and one fell over, then he yelled "Die!" again and another
fell over. Having wrapped that up tidily, Javin, the 2nd level
fighter/mage henchman of Xavier, looked for something to do, but could not
avoiding hitting allies. Xavier then shot one with a permanent +3 bolt,
doing quite a lot of damage for a non-specialist!
Following Xavier's example, Rangorn vaulted off his horse, yelled "Die!"
and sank Gruntender into an ogre, who promptly obeyed and fell over. He
then stomped angrily toward the one attacking Brogan. He sliced him in half.
The ogres noticed the systematic slaughter of these comrades by the two
heavily armored people, and tried to withdraw. Until Xavier threw the
_Hold Person_ on them.
Demanding vengeance, Rangorn strode toward one of the "dead" ones, who
recovered from the spell and stood up. Then his limbs went flying as he
suffered massive damage and a double wound. Of course, he died instantly.
Then Arabica went flying at the other standing one. Finally, since
Arabica's honor forbid him from striking a helpless opponent, Rangorn
turned and sliced up a few frozen ogre popsicles.
(Note: Never has Rangorn killed so many things in one battle, much less
never missed. Of course he was wielding an ogreslaying sword, but hey, it
was fun.)
Since the horses were untouched, and Luke was successfully Death Doored by
Xavier, we proceeded to Middle with five days to spare.
Joel/Rangorn