01 Owlbears and Goblins
General Summary
Aramys arrives in Arcadia and immediately starts going towards the GGG, to look for an Orc. She asks the barmaid for help and is sent towards three others, who are also waiting for Argon. The tavern seems lively. There is a Kenku playing a lyre, smells of delicious foods are going around, many people are sitting behind tables, listening to Guild members talk about their adventures. Argon comes downstairs to greet the party, and explains the way the guild works, and offers the four a mission. There is a forest ranger family that lives in the forest between Arcadia and Overstand. They came to the GGG for help getting rid of a family of Owlbears, who had taken residence in their shed. Due to being forest rangers, they wished that the Owlbears do not get hurt in the removal process.
The guild has different membership levels. If you pass the first mission with a positive outcome, you become Apprentices of the Guild of the Green Gorgon. After a few missions you become Junior Members. From there you can proceed to become Trusted Members, and after that, Senior Members. And then there's Grandmasters, like me, who are the leaders of the Guild.After rolling a Nature check, Chip remembers reading a book about Owlbears. They usually live in caves with nearby access to water and food, they don't just decide to leave their home and live so close to someone else, especially humanoids. A few racist comments later, the group decide to take on this mission. They are offered magic items in exchange for a taglock from each of them, preferrably blood.
The magic items offered are these:
What kind of smoke is it? Don't tell me it's the weed smoke!
While deciding which magical items to take with to the mission, Belladonna gets incredibly drunk. They decide to take with them the Ring of Animal Influence and the Bag of Beans. Shenanigans ensue with Aramys not wanting to give her taglock. Bug, a Tabaxi chef, was called to take the PCs' blood and other taglocks. Bug sounds like an american dudebro. She then uses Blood Magic to gather Chip's and Belladonna's blood.
Could sell this blood as a shot.They share their motivations for joining the Guild. Elzador joins for the resources, Chip wants adventure. Aramys wants to get access to the books on fish species. Chip 100% believes that Aramys cannot read and offers to read her Investigator Vale novels while adventuring. They get to the stables and get the two horses that Argon promised them. Chip and Elzador are on one horse and Aramys and Belladonna are on the other. Aramys hasn't ridden a horse before, so it's very difficult for her, plus she has to keep Belladonna on the horse at the same time, so they fall behind a bit. Elzador sees a Dryad in the forest and investigates by making a cookie glow and moving it with his mage hand. Later, Aramys notices tear tracks on Belladonna's face, but decides to not bring attention to them. They finally get to the forest rangers' house and see the little hill shed where the Owlbears supposedly are. The house looks like an adorable cabin. There's carrots and potatoes growing in front of the windows, where other people would have flower bushes. Elzador and Belladonna fight over which of them gets the master bedroom. Chip is the one who actually checks out the house's layout. There is a walkway into the house, to the left there's the main room with a fireplace and couch. To the left of the walkway is the kitchen with a stairway to the second floor. On the second floor, there are two bedrooms, one is a big bedroom with one double bed, and the other has two smaller beds. They go to check out the shed. Elzador goes in, using invisibility, and Aramys goes in using her stealth. This goes badly when Elzador steps on a creaky step on the stairs, after which Aramys tries to run up, but crashes into an invisible Elzador. Chip has a conversation with the owlbears, and finds out there are three of them - the female he was talking to, her mate, and their cub. They said that their cave was taken over by goblins and if the Party clears out their cave, they would move back there. The owlbears then decided to go hunting and leave their cub with the Party. They have a night of good sleep, and start moving in the morning. At first they overshoot the cave and need to go back. Once they find the cave, Elzador decides to go exploring with the use of Invisibility. Sadly, our dear noble wizard is incredibly bad at being quiet. Cave: Quite deep in, the cave splits. To the left there's an area where goblins are eating, and to the right there's a forge with a carved up hole going up with the smoke. The smoke dissipates about half-way up. The cave keeps going from there. The goblins notice Elzador('s footprints in the dust), and after running to the cave entrance, combat ensues. Elzador casts the Fear spell and afterwards hides the goblins' weapons.
Character(s) interacted with
Arlayana, barmaid at the GGG
Argon, leader of the GGG
Notes
Elzador's uncle owns a zoo, apparently. There's a druid who makes sure that all of the animals are comfortable there.
There is a Full-Blooded Orc in the Guild.
Aramys has beautiful fish-scale earrings.
The names of the horses are Betsy (beige) and Chip (brown, with white spots). Chip the Horse likes Belladonna.
The forest around Arcadia seems to be the home of Dryads.
The players learned about Elven Sushi, a lost art.
Owlbears seem to have a higher intelligence than what is commonly thought.
"Archibald VS the Great Goblin King" is a known adventure book.
