Session 24 - A Brush With Death And A New Hire

Plot points/Scenes

On To Ambervern pt. 2

• DM realizes he hasn’t written anything remotely regarding Ambervern sooo
• Drant keeps watch regarding the signs of previous ambushes and we’re fine, approaching the edge of the city we see watchtowers lit with guard fires, they call out
  • Introduce ourselves as the power people
  • They’re super grateful, but warn us that the economically lower part of this town (like Stonedeep’s) is not entirely happy about the change
• They open the gate and we start to go behind the walls
• Drant hears a bird whistle that sounds just a bit off, and we all of a sudden get hit by a hail of arrows
  • Zavala, Isabelle, and Meghan go down instantly
  • The guards scream at us to get behind the walls, two guards charge out, Drant and Fritz run out, Jalan says ‘fuck no’
    • DM: “...well I didn’t expect you to do that.”
    • J: “does this mean I have to come with”
    • DM: “yes.”
    • J: “god damn it guys there’s a perfectly good wall RIGHT THERE”
    • D: “I took damage from that, I wanna see who these fuckers are”
    • (Fritz is following Drant’s lead and also sparing the DM from improvising an entire city)
• Run into the woods, ROLL INITIATIVE

COMBAT - Hard Losses and a Brush With Death

• Round 1
  • We are only aware of the multiple groups of six clustered way back, but there are smaller pairs and trios scattered behind trees that we can’t see (except Drant), almost the whole forest is difficult terrain and everyone we can see is an orc
  • Jalan stealths forward
  • Clusters at the back fire off a volley, can’t hit Fritz just by default because they’re inaccurate but everybody else dives out of the way (except the two guards, who get absolutely mowed down)
  • Fritz just runs, doesn’t see anyone, isn’t in range to attack anyone
  • Another cluster at the back fires for our troupe minus Fritz and Jalan
  • Hear some hellish voice barking orders, groups start rushing forward, a sneaky boi3 in a flowing purple cape rushes forward and Darkness envelopes one of the back groups
  • Drant Summons 10 giant centipedes and he and Nymph charge forward
  • Archers in the back shoot and miss
  • Archers up close throw javelins at Fritz, she now knows where the two groups flanking her in the trees are, one crits, two crit fail
    • One falls out of a tree and breaks his arm
    • The one who crit succeeded dealt 12 damage and made Fritz suffer LEVEL 4 EXHAUSTION which welp we’re fucked she’s fucked goodbye guys
      • she/DM guilt Jalan into using one of his luck, he rerolls and CRIT FAILS oh thank god everybody praise Jalan
  • Gregory runs up to one of the dudes who fell out of the tree and chops his head off, and almost attacks one of Drant’s giant centipedes until he argues that Gregory’s not that stupid and Drant was verbally giving them orders so we’re cool
  • More archers fire, hit Fritz by ignoring her AC (mother fuckers) and deal damage to her and Gregory
• Round 2
  • Jalan moves up in the (somewhat metagaming) hope of seeing how many enemies there are and convincing us to abandon the combat
  • Gregory shoots and misses for a guy in a tree
  • Fritz barely kills the one guy prone on the ground under a tree
  • We hear some weird feral noises coming from the Darkness in the forest
  • Drant’s centipedes take out the two dudes left in the trees around us
  • Some archers now have line of sight on Drant’s closest centipedes and kill two of them
• Round 3
  • Jalan sees a big souped up scary mutated orc thing lumpy boi (his plan was to kidnap somebody off by themselves and take them with him but he doesn’t see anybody less scary) so decides to just casually shoot at him
    • CRITS
    • J: “oh but I should’ve had advantage. Oh well”
    • DM: “roll again! See if you can crit again, if you can then-”
    • CRITS
    • F&D: “Jesus Christ how-”
    • Deals 90 damage (just barely killing him)

• The first arrow slams into his chest, like peeling apart the skin and flesh around it, he looks up suddenly realizing Jalan’s there, and shoots another arrow slicing the first arrow in half and pushing his heart through the back of his chest
• Archers in the back move forward
• Gregory moves up slowly
• Fritz (eager to test out her new technology but not optimistic that it’s gonna work) SUCCEEDS on overdriving Adrenaline, charges forward taking javelins but killing one of the dudes
• Darkness around the leader falls and reveals a Giant Ape who steps forward and chucks a rock towards Gregory, through a tree with two of his allies in it, misses Gregory but hits the two dudes
• Another lumpy boi comes out of the forest and crits on Fritz, dealing 49 damage (fucking ouch)
• Drant and his centipedes move forward
• DM attacks Fritz with more arrows and bringing the grand total of crits dealt against Fritz to fucking SIX BY ROUND THREE he realizes maybe he should roll for mass archers differently, he rerolls and they miss
• Archers in the far south do sketchy fun secret things (apparently just holding attacks)
• Round Four
  • Jalan crit fails his acrobatics check to move without half movement, falls prone very obviously, a group of nearby archers see him, take a held action - and crit fail and every single one of their bowstrings snaps
  • Gregory goes to attack someone but slips on the foliage and incapacitates himself for a round
  • Fritz (scared and almost dead but not about to flee) tazes the lumpy boi and he fails by so much it overdrives - she proceeds to (with the help of crit chart rolls because paralysis and action surges) hit him 6 times and overkills him by 53hp, troops around her fail a morale check after seeing her literally turn a lumpy boi into pulp and turn to run
  • Giant ape goes up and attacks one of their own archers (apparently they don’t have control
  • Another lumpy boi (in Gregory’s space) attacks him but misses
  • Drant’s centipedes go up and attack the lumpy boi between Fritz and Gregory, Nymph comes into range/combat with the centipedes assaulting a group of four in the north, Drant himself Thorn Whips the archer above Fritz out of the tree and right into his waiting fist, clotheslining him to death
  • Nearby archer dude throws but misses javelins at Gregory
  • Archers in the north kill Drant’s centipedes, more in the south kill off another two centipedes
  • Archers in the far south are once more doing sketchy fun things
• Round Five
  • Jalan (who is so far across the battlefield from Drant/Fritz/Gregory) decides the Ape is a pretty scary opponent, sneak attacks it but the archers see him and release their arrows but miss, Jalan tries to stealth forward and crit fails but Luck makes that not so
  • Gregory stands up and redeems himself with a crit! 37 damage
    • J: “smooth out that lumpy boi! Smooth him!”
    • F: “ew what”
    • J: “he’s lumpy”
  • Fritz throws a noisemaker and after some argument it doesn’t break, then goes to hide behind a tree (after some more argument about hide mechanics)
  • The Ape hits Gregory real hard
  • A wave of magic travels into the ape from the spellcaster, the captain rallies the troops that started fleeing
  • Drant’s centipedes attack the remaining nearby archer that fell out of the tree, and he goes up to attack the ape
• Round Six
  • Jalan goes to shoot at the Ape - once more revealing his location and taking damage from held attacks - and just moves
  • Gregory (not feeling too hot) decides he ain’t going down without a fight and deals a bit of damage
  • Fritz moves up, tases and hits the Ape (just barely) then disengages and moves back
  • Sneaky boi takes a shot at Gregory, magic boi casts another spell on the ape, Ape is un-stunned
  • Drant Rends the Ape, sees some sort of magic prevent him from doing the full damage nevermind because his fists are magical, Drant’s centipedes kill the remaining prone archer, Nymph comes back to join the group
  • More archers throw javelins at Fritz and she has to use her shield to deflect them
    • F: “alright guys that was my ace in the hole I’ve got nothing”
• Round Seven
  • Jalan Dispels Magic - the protective covering over the skin vanishes, there’s a crown that visibly falls off the ape, and it staggers a bit as something happens with its heart (although he doesn’t know exactly what he then tries to persuade the monkey (although it cannot understand him), and makes three observations
    • This monkey has been tortured
    • The shackles have chaffed, making it pissed
    • Pissed off monkeys tend to attack whatever is around it
  • Gregory master-boops twice
  • Fritz moves by Jalan in an attempt to not draw attention to herself, takes a dodge action
  • Ape downs Gregory and goes for Drant, he loses concentration on the four centipedes that were remaining
  • Sneaky boi in the back shoots for Fritz and she goes down, the other two leaders don’t do anything
  • Drant turtle-punches the Ape into unconsciousness, he’s still alive
  • A bunch of enemies who see the ape going down decide to bail, a few others pass a morale check and keep running forward; the enemies who’d been frightened by Fritz earlier decide to just fucking peace out after seeing the ape fall
• Round Eight
  • The enemies are in disarray and retreating, the leaders retreat with their troops but we don’t get the feeling that this was a victory
  • Jalan runs over to Gregory and uses his cloak to feed him a healing potion, runs back to Fritz and crit fails his medicine check and Fritz loses two death saves
  • Fritz fails her last death save and dies
  • Jalan begins to die...his heartbeat slows, he has trouble breathing…
  • He pulls the Revivify patch off of his cloak
  • They both take two levels of exhaustion
  • Jalan levitates the ape with us back to the city to try to make him a friend nevermind because apes are huge not large
  • Drant gathers Brother Gurp and the Holy Cattle and stays behind with the ape (the rust monsters rust away the chains/shackles on him) while Jalan Fritz and Gregory limp back to the city

Into the City and Recruiting Vincent

• Drant trains with Nymph with some web tactics stuff while he waits for the ape to wake up
• Jalan secures lodgings at the Camel’s Refuge
  • Kind of ironically named because there are no camels here - but it is run by someone who is originally from the desert
  • 10gp/month, not the best place in town but not a dump
• Fritz searches for a temple to hire a cleric
  • Shīrudo
    • Protection
  • Heimdall
    • Healing + protection + necromancy
  • Píngbì
    • Healing
  • Temples to the two unfamiliars are huge and ancient, Heimdall’s temple is new-ish and smaller - about the size of a studio apartment, off to the side, but well kept - surprising amount of money put into such a small simple place - the people really care
• Heimdall’s Temple
  • On display there’s a small piece of his angelic armor retrieved and encased by a piece of glass, flanked on either side by portraits of this angelic figure, other paintings of him slaying necromantic beings, etc.
  • There are a few mercenary looking dudes wandering around in splint armor, flail, shield and a few people in humble robes
  • Fritz doesn’t see anybody who looks like they’re in charge so she just kneels down somewhere (there’s nowhere to sit) and starts contemplating, not praying exactly but definitely thinking
  • She’s approached by some monk acolyte looking dude
    • He’s really insightful, offhandedly mentions that she looks like she had an all-too-close brush with death today
    • Fritz is nervous/bumbling/out of her element, talks about how religion’s not really her thing but she thinks she needs help and she heard that temples sometimes hire people out
  • Monk calls over an earth genasi in acolyte’s robes, as he approaches he’s super stoic and uptight but the moment the monk says “at ease” he snaps into this fun loving super bubbly guy, who introduces himself as Vincent
  • The lead monk dude talks about how Vincent’s recently graduated his studies and can now negotiate long-term contracts for himself (sending back a percentage to the temple, of course), and there just so happens to be a potential client right here
  • Vincent has no idea how to negotiate a contract so offers 20gp/month, 15 for the temple and 5 for him, Fritz counters with 30 gp/month doubling his personal pay to 10 and leaving 20 for the temple, he’s super excited and agrees
  • Vincent suggests getting drinks to celebrate at the nearby Feelin’ Froggy bar
    • They get wasted together, Vincent mentions he’d go back to his rooms at the temple but Fritz offers that since he’s in our employ he’s welcome to stay in our rooms at whatever inn Jalan secured
    • Speaking of…
• Back at the inn, Jalan’s getting wasted at the bar and telling everybody who will listen that we he single-handedly fought off an orc invasion
• Performance check because it’s hard to believe - CRITS - they’re buying every word - they buy him drinks and pay for the first month’s lodging

• People: “What is the name of our savior?!”
• J “Jalan Kendith!!”
• F: “Have you learned nothing?”
• DM: “Take your inspiration dice” (he’s got three now)
• Takes Crocodile Tears (hard drugs)
  • Lives through like two months of perfect life
    • Paid off his debts, invested in things and got shit tons of money, shit tons of women…
    • But then over a week things downfall and everything goes wrong, debts return...at the end he gets stabbed in the chest and dies and wakes up back where he started like two seconds later
  • Bartender is watching closely: “So?”
  • J: “I just lived every dream I ever had”
  • Tries another hit, fails his con save this time and permanently loses 1hp, has another even more extreme trip where his grandma/family praise him and he’s even richer than before, this time the downfall is one day not one week and he’s back
  • Apparently 100gp per hit but free for this time because he saved the city
• Fritz/Vin return to the inn, Jalan enters the room
  • (Vincent had liked Fritz’s name cause it’s short and sweet, she countered by calling him Vin instead of Vince or Vincent)
  • J: *audibly offput/disappointed* “oh...Fritz, is this your new boyfriend?”
  • Fritz makes some suggestive comments, brings up that Vin is a holy man and asks if he’s celibate
    • V: “One of Heimdall’s tenets is ‘live life to the fullest,’ how could you possibly do that when you’re celibate”
  • J: “I didn’t think you’d go in with a lightweight”
    • Fritz gets touchy, they’ve both been drinking at a bar for a few hours and they’re both clearly drunk (Vincent mentions how futile it was to try to drink Fritz under the table) - there’s a little catfight about who can take alcohol the best
  • Jalan fires off: “Well come on Fritz, you died today.”
    • F: “I’m drunk, I’m trying to forget that, don’t remind me”
    • Vin gets super touchy about how she’s alive then (nEcRomAnCY) and starts crawling towards his stuff asking how Fritz came back to life, very quickly changes character when we tell him it’s revivify
  • Jalan introduces himself as “Prince Jalan Kendith” and strides out of the room, Fritz clarifies that he’s been disowned so take the ‘prince’ thing with a grain of salt and Vin swears to keep it a secret between them

Drant Earns A New Friend

• Night falls before the huge ape wakes up - very nervous, about to attack, but notices its wrists and neck are free - looks quizzical and looks at Drant and points towards him - Drant nods
• Ape finds the remains of his shackles and they’re rusted - seems to ask “how” - and Drant demonstrates with the rust monster and one of the enemy’s swords
• Ape challenges Drant for control over his troop (FIGHTING PIT ROUND 2), wrestles him so hard into submission (31 v. 17), gets confused about what he’s doing and puts Drant down, then hands him a rock to lift to prove himself
  • Drant fails pretty badly and the ape starts leaving, unimpressed
  • Tries again and succeeds, barely, ape still leaving
• Drant casts Giant Insects, summons Nymph, and points to his tattoos - ape begins to understand and points towards his own forehead - Drant nods, the ape sits down
• Drant asks if he’s hungry, then summons Brother Gurp over (he and ape bond immediately over chest-pounding)
  • BG: “I don’t make food….I guess I will go kill something”
• Ape rips an entire tree out of the fucking ground and starts eating the leaves on top of it, seems to be waiting for Drant to do something
• Drant draws a crude tattoo on the ape’s forehead - he now has a weak and inefficient telepathic link with the ape that allows them to convey basic ideas
  • A: “You save life me. I save life once. Call when need.”
  • D: “What do I call you?”
  • A: ……*shrugs*
  • Drant gives him a goodberry, ape makes the pikachu face
  • A: “best food ever. I stick around if feed those”
  • Drant tells him to stay outside of the city, he agrees wholeheartedly
• Drant has also made some basic progress with training Nymph with web stuff

Regroup Over Breakfast

• Jalan once more throws shade at Drant/Fritz’s fighting capabilities
• Fritz is actually somewhat humble and apologizes, she was cocky and didn’t realize that they were in over their heads
  • Thanks Jalan for trying to save her and forgives him for basically killing her
• Fritz introduces Drant/Vin
  • Vin is impressed Drant can even talk, he’s never met a tosculi before
• Vin is also impressed with Jalan (he heard stories last night around the bar of Jalan single-handedly fighting off the threat)
  • F: “which one of us looks more dead to you”
• Drant briefs us on what happened with his new ape friend last night

Plot type

Session

Parent Plot

Act 2: Uprooted