October 1998 | The World of Telvar

Defenders Adventure #41: The Island of Dr. Piggy Moreau

So, we figured we had won. Kaal Na Ka would have difficulty in setting up his operation, but were had recovered great treasure and really mangled his operation. And we had rescued Maryanne….
Where was Maryanne?

Party Roster:
Felix, 5th level fighter, 53 hp, played by Alex
Balinor, 5th level fighter, 50 hp, played by Joel
Kodo, 3rd level woodsman, 36 hp, played by Rob
Morgan, 5th level fighter, 27 hp, played by Alan
Quentin, 6th level druid, 25 hp, played by Jeremy
Donald, 4th level mage, 21 hp, NPC
Alduin, 4th level thief, 15 hp, played by Vic
Nakumanu, 2nd level fighter, 14 hp, henchman of Felix
Kain, 1st level cleric, 6 hp, played by Jeff
The party had just been left wandering confusedly about the tunnels. We had just defeated three pairs of crystal golems. Sadly, the hoped for exit was not beyond the door, and we continued wandering around. We discovered a rubble filled room, with a weird natural tunnel coming out of it. We had some hopes that it might lead out, but of course, this being our favorite compound, things just got even more bizarre.
We went down the tunnel, Balinor in the lead due to some nice healing on him. Suddenly, Alduin noticed a rumbling sound. It became much louder. We turned to run…
And a huge worm came whipping up the tunnel, opened its mouth and swallowed Balinor whole. Felix, Kodo, Morgan, and Nakumanu turned to fight the creature. Morgan yelled “Thunderstruck” and pounded it, and the fighters began ripping at it. The creature was enraged with Morgan and tried to kill him. Take a wild guess what happened.
Nakumanu discovered while swinging the magic falchion that it was +3 vs. regenerating creatures, which the worm was.

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Defenders Summary #40: Interior Decorator from the Lower Planes

We opened one door, and a blast of heat hit us. Inside were a bunch of little fire creature things dancing around, and a weird lizard guy, on fire, working at an anvil at the edge of a pool of lava. He looked up at us.
We shut the door.

Party Roster:
Felix, 5th level fighter, 53 hp, played by Alex
Balinor, 5th level fighter, 50 hp, played by Joel
Kodo, 3rd level woodsman, 36 hp, played by Rob
Morgan, 5th level fighter, 27 hp, played by Alan
Quentin, 6th level druid, 25 hp, played by Jeremy
Donald, 4th level mage, 21 hp, NPC
Alduin, 4th level thief, 15 hp, played by Vic
Nakumanu, 2nd level fighter, 14 hp, henchman of Felix
Kain, 1st level cleric, 6 hp, played by Jeff
Our party had just trashed a trio of bad guys, an elven fighter/mage or thief/mage, a human cleric of the Queen of Grottos, and a human warrior.
We became un_Slowed_ and did some exploring. We still had an hour and a half of buffer time for the orc forces to swing around the mountain and cut us off. We intended to leave within a half hour or so to be completely safe (since neither the orcs nor the Defenders were crazy enough to wander around the Trail of the Dead at night).
The rooms coming off the weird lit room were quarters for the trio. In one was an insulting and highly intelligent, and bloodthirsty crow. It appeared to be the pet of the mage. Talking to it revealed that all three had been charmed by the fat guy (Piggy). He was apparently a powerful wizard of some sort. The fact that the elf had been charmed was rather disturbing, given elven resistance to charm effects.
The cleric’s room was glyphed, which Felix set off, and was paralyzed. He recovered a few minutes later.

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Defenders Adventure #39: Feline Loyalty

Balinor, Alduin, Felix, and Kodo poured out of the doors into the orcish ceremony. The eight drummers raised their mallots, but looked panicked. The Pig Avatar spoke a single word in Human, a word that Quentin understood, not as the Word of Power we were expected, but a simple and yet elegant phrase that summed up his feelings about the situation:
“Sh*t!”

Party Roster:
Felix, 5th level fighter, 53 hp, played by Alex
Balinor, 5th level fighter, 50 hp, played by Joel
Kodo, 3rd level woodsman, 36 hp, played by Rob
Morgan, 5th level fighter, 27 hp, played by Alan
Quentin, 6th level druid, 25 hp, played by Jeremy
Donald, 4th level mage, 21 hp, NPC
Alduin, 4th level thief, 15 hp, played by Vic
Kain, 1st level cleric, 6 hp, played by Jeff
Special Thanks to Chester, Quentin’s bobcat, and Lenore and Morris, Quentin’s crows
When we last left the Defender saga, the party was planning to take out some orcs. A shaman and 8 of his servants were in a room through which we intended to go. First, we decided to finish exploring, and we moved through the dark room with the pits—in one was 3 Kara-kara, but they were blue instead of green, and were cowering, starving in the corner. In the other were some bones.
Ignoring them, we noted two exits. One, we suspected led back into the shaman room. The other led somewhere close to the ceremony. To confirm, we opened up the first door a crack. Unfortunately, the perceptive shaman noticed the movement, and motioned for us, who he thought were servants (the door wasn’t fully opened yet), to come in.
Oh well. Donald began a Sleep spell, while Balinor, Kain, and Quentin rushed around to block their escape from the other side. Morgan continued to slowly open the door.

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Defenders Summary #38: Impudently Walking Down the Forbidden Path

There were hundreds of orcs across a rope bridge, clearly the “mob” of the setting. We had come out behind the drummers, who were loudly banging them, though they shielded us from view. There was a giant bronze throne, and perched on it was some sort of pig being. It had some weird spectral appearance, and Donald told us that it couldn’t be reproduced by a Polymorph effect.

Party Roster:
Felix, 5th level fighter, 53 hp, played by Alex
Balinor, 5th level fighter, 50 hp, played by Joel
Kodo, 3rd level woodsman, 36 hp, played by Rob
Morgan, 5th level fighter, 27 hp, played by Alan
Quentin, 6th level druid, 25 hp, played by Jeremy
Donald, 4th level mage, 21 hp, NPC
Alduin, 4th level thief, 15 hp, played by Vic
Kain, 1st level cleric, 6 hp, played by Jeff
Welcome to the Island of the Kara-kara! See… tangled jungles filled with Morgan loving bugs! See… lightning give Morgan a special greeting! See… an orcish party! See…
The Defenders do the island!
When we last left, the Defenders were plotting an ambush against an unexpected obstacle—actual guards. Donald threw a nasty sleep spell, catching all but one of the 6 orcs, and everyone fired their missile weapons while Felix ran madly at them. Of course, all six were grunts and the one we all shot fell over from damage. We quickly dispatched the rest, dropped the bodies in the swamp for decomposition purposes, and moved on.
We reached the village at about noon, and discovered that we had a big problem. The drums were quite loud and being played by large numbers of orcs at the temple near the other edge of the town. The temple was in a cave dug into the volcano, supposedly dormant for hundreds of years. However, there were still about a hundred guards ringing the village, making it impossible for us to sneak inside without the aid of invisibility effects, which we don’t have. So we decided instead that, being adventurers, why not walk down the Forbidden Path, also known as the Trail of the Dead, presumably where the shadows had come from? This seemed perfectly logical, and we walked down the path, cheerfully ignoring the many statues with upraised hands in a “Halt!” position.

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