Author: Joel

Party Roster:
Felix, 7th level fighter, 70 hp, played by Alex
Balinor, 7th level fighter, 70 hp, played by Joel
Cassian, 7th level cleric, 45 hp, played by Katherine
Kain, 6th level cleric, 43 hp, played by Jeff
Morgan, 7th level fighter, 38 hp, played by Alan
Quentin, 8th level druid, 37 hp, played by Jeremy
Donald, 7th level mage, 37 hp, NPC
Albee, 5th level monk, 31 hp, NPC
Bogomel, 3rd level fighter, 31 hp, henchman
Nakumanu, 4th level fighter, 30 hp, henchman
Chiaro, 4th level illusionist, 8 hp, played by Aaron
(Chiaro was reinserted into the adventure.)
The party had discovered an open space behind a lava flow past the cursed bone statue. First we Stoneshaped through the hole, and found a second lava flow, broke through that, and then found ourselves in a long corridor. We quickly discovered a large complex.
Strangely, in the corridor there was a jet of poisonous gas coming out of the wall, which everyone in the front saved against. We avoided it for the moment.
We found a number of rooms, including one that detected as entirely magical. There was a high magic book in a corner, a statue in another corner, several “drill bits” (large twisty bits of metal) hanging from the ceiling, near a black section of the ceiling. The drill bits were also highly magical. The floor was made up of connected lizard things. There were also two high magic frescoes on the wall, both of a sandy beach. In one it was day, the other night.
There were also three rooms with doors with runes of “names” on them. One was cracked open while the other two were sealed shut. We checked out the open one and found a number of niches with bones in them. After a brief argument, Felix picked up three gems from the bones. Nothing detected as magical or evil or anything.

Continue reading “Defenders Summary #74: Thank You For Not Killing Us”

Party Roster:
Felix, 7th level fighter, 70 hp, played by Alex
Balinor, 7th level fighter, 70 hp, played by Joel
Cassian, 7th level cleric, 45 hp, played by Katherine
Kain, 6th level cleric, 43 hp, played by Jeff
Morgan, 7th level fighter, 38 hp, played by Alan
Quentin, 8th level druid, 37 hp, played by Jeremy
Donald, 7th level mage, 37 hp, NPC
Albee, 5th level monk, 31 hp, NPC
Bogomel, 3rd level fighter, 31 hp, henchman
Nakumanu, 4th level fighter, 30 hp, henchman
The Defenders reorganized slightly and rejoined in Barnacus in January 2183. Quentin, the original party druid, decided to rejoin the party once again, while the fatigued Chiaro took a well needed rest. Balinor found himself with a new intolerance for bad weather.
It didn’t take long for something to go wrong on Lendore Isle. On the section of road between Restenford and Garroten that travels through the Dead Wood (our old favorite place, with the undead infestation) was being taken over by a group of giant spiders. Evil and intelligent giant spiders. We were supposed to get rid of them one way or the other.
The party traveled to the site of the attack and promptly stuff went wrong. Albee, Felix and Morgan got tangled in the web spread across the road, while another web dropped from overhead on Balinor and Nakumanu, snuffing out Nakumanu’s torch.
Two spiders the size of a large sofa descended on the middle of the party, one successfully biting Donald and the other being held back by Bogomel’s spear. Balinor slammed the one on Donald, while Felix tried to cut his way out and have Morgan light a torch. Nakumanu lit a torch and brought the web around him and Balinor up in flames, injuring both of them. A third spider descended from above and grabbed the hapless Albee and began hoisting him up.

Continue reading “Defenders Summary #73: Miss us?”

Party Roster:
Felix, 7th level fighter, 70 hp, played by Alex
Balinor, 6th level fighter, 56 hp, played by Joel
Cassian, 7th level cleric, 45 hp, played by Katherine
Kain, 6th level cleric, 43 hp, played by Jeff
Morgan, 7th level fighter, 38 hp, played by Alan
Donald, 7th level mage, 37 hp, NPC
Albee, 5th level monk, 31 hp, NPC
Bogomel, 3rd level fighter, 31 hp, henchman
Nakumanu, 4th level fighter, 30 hp, henchman
Chiaro, 4th level illusionist, 8 hp, played by Aaron
The party was spellshifting in preparation for launching the Plan. Morgan and Albee searched for secret doors and found one in one of the walls of the lower part of the complex!
The party decided to investigate it after an Augury revealed that “A narrow chance of great loss overshadows an otherwise good venture.” We intended to be cautious, but we’re risk takers, so hey.
We walked in and found a long corridor that branched. In one direction, the corridor had collapsed in rubble. In the other direction was an archway. Through the archway we found a room covered in spider webs and containing strange desiccated wood poles in it. The party looked but saw nothing inside through the webs and muck, so we decided to check with infravision, which was also fruitless. Chiaro then cast Detect Invisibility.
Crouched in the corner of the room was a five foot tall humanoid with angular features and scraggly hair. He was clutching something in one hand and the other was empty.
A drow elf!?

Continue reading “Defenders Summary #72: Butt-kicking for Goodness!”

Party Roster:
Felix, 7th level fighter, 70 hp, played by Alex
Balinor, 6th level fighter, 56 hp, played by Joel
Cassian, 7th level cleric, 45 hp, played by Katherine
Kain, 6th level cleric, 43 hp, played by Jeff
Morgan, 7th level fighter, 38 hp, played by Alan
Donald, 7th level mage, 37 hp, NPC
Albee, 5th level monk, 31 hp, NPC
Bogomel, 3rd level fighter, 31 hp, henchman
Nakumanu, 4th level fighter, 30 hp, henchman
Chiaro, 4th level illusionist, 8 hp, played by Aaron
We last left our valiant Defenders of Good healing wounds and scouting the orcs.
In accordance with our plan, we agreed to blow day 4 and 5 on exploration of the ruins, pending results of course. Among other things, we really wanted to kill that vampire once and for all.
First we checked out the weird spire (which stood about 100 feet up, by the way). We entered through the main door using the Passwall cloak from Orc Isle and found ourselves in a room with four statues of something like steam, lightning, and some other elements. The reason I don’t remember is that this was probably a riddle of some sort, but we never figured it out. Light flickered on and off in the room like a strobe, a phenomenon we had also seen on Orc Isle.
On the floor and ceiling (15 feet up) was an asterisk symbol about 10 feet in diameter, which we eventually hypothesized would unfurl into a spiral staircase, presumably upon solving the puzzle of the statues. Oh well.
There being no exits, we poked around and discovered that the asterisk in the ceiling was some sort of illusion and it was possible to climb up to another floor. We threw a grappling hook up and climbed. Up there we discovered a whole new room with about a thousand weird glowing bricks of all colors stacked in the corner. There was also a staircase leading up and a door with a single rune on it that Kain identified through Runic Literacy as an abbreviation for something. Great.

Continue reading “Defenders Summary #71: Be Vewy Vewy Quiet, We’ah Huntin’ Vampiahs”

Party Roster:
Felix, 7th level fighter, 70 hp, played by Alex
Balinor, 6th level fighter, 56 hp, played by Joel
Cassian, 7th level cleric, 45 hp, played by Katherine
Kain, 6th level cleric, 43 hp, played by Jeff
Morgan, 7th level fighter, 38 hp, played by Alan
Donald, 7th level mage, 37 hp, NPC
Albee, 5th level monk, 31 hp, NPC
Bogomel, 3rd level fighter, 31 hp, henchman
Nakumanu, 4th level fighter, 30 hp, henchman
Chiaro, 4th level illusionist, 8 hp, played by Aaron
We had just left the party standing near the weird spire reminiscent of Orc Isle. We had also checked and discovered that the weird grimy old guy who kept spouting nonsense when we talked to him was Chaotic Evil. We were unsure of what to do, so we left him alone, despite the wolf smelling an noticeable rotting from his direction.
Hey, it could have just been dirt or something. We didn’t entirely take this on faith—we did leave holy water vials all over the place when we camped for the night in the dead mutant creature’s cave. It was supposed to be HAUNTED ruins after all.
Well, if there is a new undead for the Defenders to meet, they find it.
Right on schedule, things went sour. Balinor, Kain, and Nakumanu were on watch when the creature snuck up invisibly behind Balinor and ran his bamboo pole through the hapless fighter. This inflicted grave damage, three wounds, and double level-drained Balinor.

Continue reading “Defenders Summary #70: Balinor Makes a New Friend, and the Defenders Actually Have a Plan”

Party Roster:
Felix, 7th level fighter, 70 hp, played by Alex
Balinor, 6th level fighter, 56 hp, played by Joel
Cassian, 7th level cleric, 45 hp, played by Katherine
Kain, 6th level cleric, 43 hp, played by Jeff
Morgan, 7th level fighter, 38 hp, played by Alan
Donald, 7th level mage, 37 hp, NPC
Albee, 5th level monk, 31 hp, NPC
Bogomel, 3rd level fighter, 31 hp, henchman
Nakumanu, 4th level fighter, 30 hp, henchman
Chiaro, 4th level illusionist, 8 hp, played by Aaron
Other magic items I forgot to mention: we picked up 9 +2 arrows for Morgan and Cassian, and a Shield of Healing (20 charges) for Nakumanu.
We picked up lots of oil and other items in preparation for our raid of the orcish island. Dunstill and Illic realized that since we had experience with this sort of situation before, we were ideal for the job. In fact, the ruins on the southern part of the island were of the same civilization as the ones on Orc Isle. There are rumors of drow elves having been in these islands—perhaps these are their ruins.
The plan is for the party to trash the island as much as possible while the high shamans are away. Dunstill and Illic will be trying to mess up the meeting of the high shamans.
Some stats about the island—there are about 5,000 orcs on the island clustered in three coastal villages in the center of the island. There is also a palace in the middle of the villages. There are haunted ruins (see above) and a dormant volcano and orcish burial ground on the south end. On the north end is an active volcano and another set of ruins, as well as a prison slave camp.

Continue reading “Defenders Summary #69: It’s Good to Be Back”

Party Roster:
Felix, 7th level fighter, 70 hp, played by Alex
Balinor, 6th level fighter, 56 hp, played by Joel
Cassian, 7th level cleric, 45 hp, played by Katherine
Kain, 6th level cleric, 43 hp, played by Jeff
Morgan, 7th level fighter, 38 hp, played by Alan
Donald, 7th level mage, 37 hp, NPC
Albee, 5th level monk, 31 hp, NPC
Nakumanu, 4th level fighter, 31 hp, henchman
Bogomel, 3rd level fighter, 30 hp, henchman
Chiaro, 4th level illusionist, 8 hp, played by Aaron
Reign of Felix the Dwarven King: April 2182- June 2182. I will explain.
This confusing chain of events begins with the Defenders returning triumphantly from the Sentry, having conquered one of the mysteries of Lendore Isle. The party returned to Restenford and had stuff identified in Barnacus. Felix, Morgan, and Albee dispersed to train. We picked up a number of minor magical items, including thread with incredible tensile strength, several spellbooks, a longsword+1, 9 first flight arrows +2 and dwarf sized platemail +1. Donald gained Write and used it to put several spells in his books and also learned Polymorph Other, Dimension Door, and Wall of Ice. After selling off some magical daggers, crossbow bolts, and pawning our puzzle box temporarily to Peltar, the party managed to pull out of debt with literally no money and a 3500 gp loan.
Augman, the Sage in Barnacus, was unable to identify the hammer and crown that the undead dwarf was bearing, so we sent them via Turney’s Journeys (a delivery company) to Zalk for eventual identification. For those who don’t know, Zalk is the premiere identification sage in the New World, and he resides at the School of Wizardry in Dunador.
Felix spoke briefly with the Nevronian Church to check on the implications of the kingship to his soul. The Church was not sure what would happen.

Continue reading “Defenders Summary #68: Ambassadorial Emissary, My Fat Ass!”

Party Roster:
Felix, 6th level fighter, 59 hp, played by Alex
Balinor, 6th level fighter, 56 hp, played by Joel
Cassian, 7th level cleric, 45 hp, played by Katherine
Kain, 6th level cleric, 43 hp, played by Jeff
Donald, 6th level mage, 37 hp, NPC
Morgan, 6th level fighter, 35 hp, played by Alan
Bogomel, 3rd level fighter, 31 hp, henchman
Nakumanu, 4th level fighter, 30 hp, henchman (Aaron this game)
Albee, 4th level monk, 27 hp, NPC
Chiaro, 4th level illusionist, 8 hp, played by Aaron
The party had just finished the rainy season of 2181-2 and hoped to begin adventuring once again. Near the end of the season we received a letter from our old friend Keldarin from the Caxathoros adventure, basically a hi, how do you do letter. So we sent one back about how we killed another one of those demons.
We discovered that on New Years Day a crazed hill giant claiming to be the ruler of the world had attacked Benct. Well, it is no longer coincidence.
Chiaro left for Koralgesh to train to 4th level. Sadly he gained 2 hp—we were disappointed, and wanted him to roll either a 1 to keep the streak going or a 4 to break it in style. So Chiaro has 8 hp. And he acquired Mirror Image, from an illusionist named Jay.
Meanwhile, on Lendore, the Defenders had traded the morning star+1 for 2300 gp, and the bastard sword+1 with extra coolness for a retractable spear +1 for Albee.

Continue reading “Defenders Summary #67: The Return of the King”

Party Roster:
Felix, 6th level fighter, 59 hp, played by Alex
Balinor, 6th level fighter, 56 hp, played by Joel
Cassian, 7th level cleric, 45 hp, played by Katherine
Kain, 6th level cleric, 43 hp, played by Jeff
Donald, 7th level mage, 37 hp, NPC
Morgan, 6th level fighter, 35 hp, played by Alan
Bogomel, 3rd level fighter, 31 hp, henchman
Nakumanu, 4th level fighter, 30 hp, henchman
Chiaro, 3rd level illusionist, 6 hp, played by Aaron
When we last left our valiant party, it had split up. Donald was stuck training with Wicker on the mainland, and the rest of the party was in rainy Restenford. Donald learned the spells Minor Globe, Charm Monster, and Polymorph Self over the winter.
Meanwhile, in November 2181, the party was asked by the Baron to take on a mission. A group of bandits were harassing Garroten, and had slain a patrol, and needed to be taken out. They called themselves “The Fabulous” and were led by a woman in banded mail.
We disguised ourselves as a caravan traveling from Restenford to Garroten. Signs such as “Sale on Fist-Sized Diamonds” or “Year End Blowout on Platinum” were considered, but dismissed. Cassian rode as the caravan drover, with Albee, Morgan, and Bogomel on top, while Balinor, Felix, Nakumanu, and Chiaro rode inside.
While this would normally be easy, our options were rather limited since we were lacking the party wizard, the party’s main source of area of effect spells. We were essentially limited to Entangle and Hold Person.
Nothing happened, and we arrived in Garroten, where we discovered that a group had been attacked only half a day ahead of us the day before. We set back out, and then turned around at the halfway point.

Continue reading “Defenders Summary #66: Bow to the Emperor, and His Dog, Sput”

Party Roster:
Felix, 6th level fighter, 59 hp, played by Alex
Balinor, 6th level fighter, 56 hp, played by Joel
Cassian, 7th level cleric, 45 hp, played by Katherine
Kain, 6th level cleric, 43 hp, played by Jeff
Morgan, 6th level fighter, 35 hp, played by Alan
Donald, 6th level mage, 33 hp, NPC
Bogomel, 3rd level fighter, 31 hp, henchman
Albee, 4th level monk, 27 hp, NPC
Nakumanu, 3rd level fighter, 25 hp, henchman
Chiaro, 3rd level illusionist, 6 hp, played by Aaron
A few logistics from last time: Quentin’s cloak+2 was given to Donald, his Ring of Toad Control was put on Chiaro, and his Belt of Many Pouches went to Kain.
The party had just decided to accept an 8 year old mission from the Nevronian Church in Benct to deal with demon-worshippers in Trun, a small village to the north of Benct (on Lendore).
A Divination performed in 2170 had revealed weak to moderate monsters, significant treasure, and great chances of drawing the wrath of the forces of chaotic evil. Demon-worship clergy is significant here.
Now we had no way of knowing if the situation had gotten worse, but hey, why not give it a try anyway? We thanked Father Filner at the Church and set off for Trun in early October 2181.
We traveled through the wilderness, and for some reason there were NO random encounters (thank you, thank you very much). We dodged Trun and traveled through farmland, passing by a hill called the Sentry, from which no one has returned. We made a mental note to go there later.

Continue reading “Defenders Summary #65: New Party Members, Same Old Result”