Tuesday 23 May 2023

Trollopulous Adjusted Session 19 (Machodor #7); A walk in the Black Forest

    

A few surprises in store

Introduction


This session saw the party go back to the "dungeon" of the crashed Sky City, once again trying to find the lost treasure of Ron Ragnar. This will sound familiar to those who read the previous session report. Faced with the stark choice of confronting the huge and ancient red dragon Lord Inferno, or continuing to gather the power required to take him on in the future, the party chose the latter option.

Timekeeping (Aus)


This session took place on 19/May/2023,  and the PCs adventured for 4 days.

Player Characters Present


Giuseppe (Level 4 Paladin from Rome, Brovenloft, E)
Sever (Level 4 Pegasus Corps Ranger of Machodor, E)
Sheamus (Level 3 Irish Fighter from Dublin, Brovenloft, E)
Slippery Pete  (Level 3 Thief, E)


Downtime Summary

The two Hawkman helmets the party captured last session proved to be troublesome, it turned out that that they enabled telepathic communication and opened up the unwary user to having his mind read... 

a rude shock for Sever

At least one character was able to train, and another was kept busy with his subdued Firedrake. There was also some scheming about ambushing Lord Inferno with ballistae, but it came to naught. 

One piece of news was that a new patrol between Schloss Ragnar and Castle Irish(ish) had been established, Leopold (fighter level 3) was now working the route during his downtime. This should make the trip for the PCs easier; but, shockingly, already one patrol has disappeared without a trace.

Session Report


As before, the players confidently set out to return to the crashed Sky City and explore further in than last time. This time they had the goal of meeting with the Hawkman, Luro, who was supposed to be on the third level. The spring weather was cloudy, but good, and they decided to break their journey from Schloss Ragnar and check in at Castle Irish. Things were much as they had left them. Bumblebore had been here for the last week or so training his Firedrake, O'Malfoy, under the watchful eye of his new friend, the Magic User Sarumin the Beast Master. What he discovered, lizardman footprints in a passage under the castle, was a mystery that the PCs would later solve in session.


The Volcano 

The players returned via their previously travelled route to the western most extent of the base of the volcano. Once there they left their riding horses, holy war horse, and Sever's Pegasus (now fully grown), and started the long climb to the top. 

"You appear to have come up in the centre of the city, a circular gap that passes through the interior. The cathedral like cavity is very large, about 600 feet wide, above is a huge amount of rock displaced by the city's travel through the volcano wall. The way up is completely blocked by this debris; but, the arrangement appears to be relatively stable, although the sound of the occasional rock falling into the ice around you can be heard."

They finally got one
Passing the still frozen body parts of the strange creatures they had discovered in an earlier session, they remembered they had agreed that the parts could be worth something and if they brought them back to civilisation.

Last time they had been too encumbered so now a discussion broke out as to whether it was worth the effort to bring some of these back right away, or wait until they were returning without make a special trip. Shaemus spent a minute activating his Drew Sword, but only got a boost of 1 to his strenght.

Finally it was decided to do the former, and so they gathered up enough frozen parts to constitute one of the creatures, and made the trek back down the stairs and loaded the reluctant horses.

Getting back to Castle Irish at dusk, their load aroused the attention of the Eddy the Ettin and his pack of dogs, the latter barked loudly but would not approach them. The gate guard however was obviously used to the smells of travelling adventurers and was happy to let them stay in the courtyard. The night passed uneventfully, and by early afternoon the following day they were back at Schloss Ragnar and had transferred the remains to the Sage, Professor Dorol, who rewarded them with 100gp and the promise of more, if, when he got them back to his facilities in St Raul, the remains proved to be as interesting as they looked. Content that there could be no disastrous repercussions from all this, the party immediately returned to Castle Irish and were able to again spend the night there.

Getting a nice early start, they were able to make good time and made the climb up into the Sky City; they were heading for level 3 and full of wonder at what they might find there. Shaemus thought the whole side trip had been worthwhile as he flexed the Drew Sword and this time added 8 to his strength (now 18:30 ). Heading east into the city proper they retraced their steps along the first 240 feet long corridor. Everything was much the same as before as they reached the room in which they had first encountered kenku hatchlings.

As before, all three exits to the room had been filled with pieces of metal and somehow melted together to form a barrier that restricted the space to a narrow 3' diameter tunnel for a distance of 10'. They guessed this had been done to give the hatchlings an advantage against intruders.

Sever disliked manoeuvring through this area without Dusty the dwarf, or a similarly small character, to go first; so he flexed his powerful muscles to try and pull the metal out away from the walls. His first effort was quite successful, leaving just a few feet still attached; but, from here on followed a series of failures as the PCs each gave it a try, but could not get that last bit to budge. They did, however, make a lot of noise and finally this was enough to attract something's attention.

From the south they heard the approach of many kenku feet, and they moved to surround the southern entrance to the room, two on each side. It was big a bunch of hatchlings accompanied by two fully grown kenku. The party won initiative and Slippery Peter leaned forward and shot a full powered bolt from his Hawkman hand crossbow. These work like a scaled down javelin of lightening, and, though the bolt itself only wounded the first hatchling, the follow up electrical blast - 3' wide and 15' long - mopped up all 18 hatchlings, the eggs they were carrying, and the two kenku that had neatly lined themselves up to go through the barrier they themselves had created. Bad luck for them.

With a new respect for the Hawkman weapons, and Slippery Pete, the party stepped through the remains of the barrier to the north and into the corridor beyond; only to find that around the next corner, which lead to the access tube, there was another such barrier. Fortunately, this one they managed to dismantle in short order and with no further interference from monsters.

The end of the passage terminated in a circular room that was an access 'tube' to the next level up. 


A section of Level 2 of the Sky City

The new level was clearly built with the same technology as the rest of the place, but here there was no sign of the mess made by hatchlings as on the first level. The ceilings were also much higher, twenty feet compared to ten feet. Having been tipped off by Luro the Hawkman of the location of a secret door, the party easily found and opened it, then followed the corridor beyond south into another access tube. This tube was much the same as the others, but with one difference; the ceiling appeared to consist of strange swirling patterns of clouds and must have been hundreds of feet up above them. 

"swirling patterns of liquid like clouds of many colours"


Slippery Pete climbed up and found that he had to pass through some sort of tingling energy field to do so. It had no apparent ill effect and he forgot about it as he saw the soring trees that surrounded the hole. It looked like they had emerged into a forest.

This was unexpected and so, unsure what to do, Sever prepared his mind and donned the Hawkman helmet. "Luro!" he thought. Soon the other's voice was in his mind and assured him that there were other hawkmen there ready to carry the party to his stronghold.

Giuseppe detected no evil in them, so the party were happy to let the hawkmen carry them through the air, it required two for each PC, and from above the tree line they could see that the entire 1-mile diameter level was one big forest, filled with 100' tall trees! To the west they could see a huge stone shaft had filled the cavity in the centre of the level, and around this stone was flying the biggest eagle they had ever seen (it was actually a Roc). Luro's base was on a small hill four hundred yards to east, and in only a few minutes and they were arriving at the metal tower. Obviously constructed from materials scavenged from other levels of the city, the tower was big enough to accommodate hundreds of hawkmen and their lizardman slaves who could be seen working around the base of the structure.

Once seated on the strange perches favoured by the hawkmen, Luro and the PCs exchanged information. In short:

The hawkmen had broken into factions since King Vultan, who yet lives, was wounded by Lord Inferno and the Sky City crashed. There is the Pro Kenku faction - who the party had fought already and who control the city's west Quadrant (visible from Castle Irish) - and the Anti Kenku faction, lead by Luro, who control the east Quadrant. There is also the Royal Guard: much smaller in number but better armed, and they have custody of King Vultan in the north quadrant of this level. 

Luro knew that the PCs wanted the treasure of Ron Ragnar that King Vultan had with him, and he wanted to get control of the King and thereby win over the hawkmen in the pro kenku faction. However, their forces were evenly balanced, any attempt to reach the hunting lodge castle on this level - where the king was being held - was easily pushed back by the combined force of the other two factions. The PCs were a wild card, one Luro intended to use.

The castle, visible from Luro's tower, was one that King Vultan had commanded his lizardman slaves to recreate based on one that really existed outside in the bandit mountains; one look from the PCs confirmed it was a dead ringer for Castle Irish. They were by now familiar with its layout, and Luro confirmed there was rumoured to be an underground tunnel leading into the basements of the castle, the entrance to which was somewhere in the forest; neither place would a hawkman willingly go, but the "grounders" could. 

Additionally, although Luro accepted that the party had won their hawkmen equipment by combat and recognised their ownership, he explained that the gems were required to relaunch at least one quadrant of the city, and offered to pay them double if the party returned them to him. They considered this seriously but put off the decision to later.

One last thing, in addition to the Royal Guard, the King was also protected by an enigmatic being known only as THE KENKURIAN. Luro didn't know much about him, only that it was from him that the race of the Kenku had sprung.

Luro then suggested that the "wingless apes" start at first light, as the ground was even more dangerous at "night" on this level. If they were to find themselves running out of daylight, they should look for a way back down to level 2, or return to the tower. There were lift platforms and access tubes scattered across the whole floor; though he only knew the locations of a few in the quadrant his faction controlled.

He also offered to teach the PCs the basics of Hawkman technology; weapons, helmets, and - in Sheamus's case - rocket cycles. This allowed them to spend the rest of the afternoon in a useful pursuit. 

Now, at this point, I guess I had not quite conveyed the danger of the forest adequately, since Sever decided to make an initial exploration of the area. He even removed his field plate armour.

Sever only made it a short distance before falling into a 'pit trap' (I was using appendix A (with modifications) to work out the route).

Nasty!

Alone and unarmoured, Sever was in big trouble. He could reach his spear, and his Hawkman helmet. He placed the latter on his head and stabbed out with the former, all the while thinking "LURO!!!". He took more damage and then the creature started to descend into the ground, with the ranger along with him. Two more rounds passed before Luro arrived at top speed and shot the monster with his zapper hand crossbow. Immediately the thing convulsed and ejected the badly bleeding ranger, before descending out of reach into the ground.

Now suitably impressed with the danger at ground level, Sever returned to the tower with Luro and two body guards who had belatedly arrived. With no cleric in the party he was only able to heal up with a combination of Giuseppe's Lay on Hands and an application of Keogh's Ointment. His story convinced the other three players of the danger, and they got up before dawn to prepare. But they weren't they only ones who had gotten up early.
hundreds of 'em


Klaxons sounded, the tower was under attack! Hundreds of kenku, with sixty pro kenku hawkmen, were approaching from the north west; and Luro lead hundreds of his anti kenku hawkmen out to attack them. At this point it was on the table for the party to participate in aerial mass combat; but they (wisely?) chose to stick with their mission on the ground instead. 

As they were passing down past the level of the canopy, they saw that their hawkmen were in trouble, a second force of kenku was approaching from the south west and they were screening a giant Roc carrying what was obviously some kind of bomb.

They stayed on mission and once at ground level the sounds of combat were muffled by the trees, and covered by the constant hooting and screeching and cawing of the many birds, natural and unnatural, that lived in the forest. At one point they may have heard an explosion, but they could not be sure. They intended to push through to their objective, but that was going to be harder to achieve than they thought.

This level was created in imitation of the lands one of King Vultan's enemies; Arboria. He had collected bird species from all over the galaxy and, in happier times, had hunted them here. Now they were out of control and posed a significant threat to any who ventured near.

I had created a Monster Manual 2 style random encounter table and filled it with bird creatures, lots of them from the Fiend Folio. Now with a customised DMG appendix A and standard encounter rules, the party tried to run the gauntlet to get to the Castle. It was a tough slog and they had many close encounters and evasions. They also ran into another clawed bladder creature, this one caught Sever and Giuseppe together in the front rank. Both the doughty warriors survived the initial damage from the disgusting creature, and Slippery Pete saved the day again with his hand crossbow; causing it to retreat into the ground. 

avoided, avoided, avoided, avoided, & evaded

I actually cackled out loud when I rolled up the details of the Griff encounter (Fiend Folio page 48, check it out), very unlike my usual mild DMing manner; but, sadly, the party avoided them. They also came across a harmless seeming group of female kenku, laying eggs. Yes, they were "Henku". After a time, the henku eggs could be seen being sucked down into the ground (perhaps to be transported to the incubator racks on level 1?)

Night, or what passes for it in this strange place, was approaching; and the PCs calculated that they had not yet reached the halfway point in the 900 or so yards of forest between the tower and the castle. There was no avoiding the conclusion that they would have to find a way out or head back to the tower. They chose to retrace their steps, and even this required quite some time and many encounter checks (all negative, lucky for them), but they made it back and were happy to find the tower still intact and a get warm welcome from Luro. While the PCs were disappointed, the Hawkman could scarcely believe how far they had managed to travel without getting killed.

At this point it was getting late, but then Sever had a flash(!) of inspiration: since the hawkmen had defeated the kenku-controlled Roc in their battle, there might be treasure to find in the Roc's nest, which they had seen earlier. Not only was this correct, in the dying light they could see a possible alternative exit to this place where the massive shard of rock meet the ceiling. They returned to Luro's tower and schemed adventurous schemes.


Treasure and XP


Cash

Roc nest Jewelry: 2000 gp Coffer, 2000 gp Buckle, 2000 gp Fob. Total Value: 6000 gp.

Strange Coins on the Kenku: 10 gp

Monetary XP total = 6010gp

Monsters

Kenku Hatchlings: 18
Kenku Eggs: 11
2HD Kenku: 2

Monsters XP Total: 303   
Monetary XP Total:  6010
Total: 6313

Total of 6313 XP Weighted by Level 

Giuseppe (Level 4 )  1803 XP & 1717 GP
Sever (Level 4 )  1803 XP &  1717 GP
Sheamus (Level 3)  1352 XP &  1287 GP
Slippery Peter (Level 3) Stuck at level 3 XP & 1287 GP






Sunday 7 May 2023

Trollopulous Adjusted Session 17 (Machodor #6); A Fistful of Gems

   





Introduction


This session saw the party go back to the "dungeon" of the crashed Sky City, once again trying to find the lost treasure of Ron Ragnar.

Timekeeping (Aus)


This session took place on 05/May/2023,  and the PCs adventured for 2 days.

Player Characters Present


Godleve (Level 5 Cleric of Machodor,E)
Giuseppe (Level 4 Paladin from Rome, Brovenloft, E)
Sever (Level 4 Ranger of Machodor, E)
Sheamus (Level 3 Irish Fighter from Brovenloft, E)
Slippery Pete  Fluid the Druid (Level 7 Druid, E)
Dusty (Level 1 Dwarf Thief of Schloss Ragnar, E)


Downtime Summary

With only a week between Machodor sessions there were only a few downtime days available. Bumblebore used the time to train the captured & subdued Firedrake. 

Professor Dorol
Professor Dorol of the St Raul Botanical Society arrived in Schloss Ragnar, having persuaded the Pegasus Corps to give him a lift over from St Raul. 

He thanked Giuseppe, Sever, Godleve, Slippery Pete, and Sheamus again for their work in bringing him the mutant giant skunk (in Machodor session #1). He had with him 5 flasks of potion made from the blood of the creature;

Potion of Mutant Giant Skunk Strength: When a Mutant Giant Skunk Strength potion is consumed the individual gains great strength and bonuses to damage when he or she scores a hit with any hand-held or thrown weapon.

Weight Allow. +6000
Damage Bonus +9
Bend Bars/Lift Gates 70%

In addition to fantastic strength the potion has another, not altogether desirable, effect on those who imbibe it; they begin to excrete a vile musky sweat. Although not directly harmful to the user, other creatures will shun them for the duration the potion is in effect. Enough sweat accumulates on the extremities that a single attack can be made that; if it hits a vital region such as the head or face, and the opponent fails to save versus poison, it will be blinded for 1 hour, and, in any event, the musk will cause the creature to retreat a full move and lose 50% of both strength and dexterity due to nausea for 1 turn. Creatures such as undead, as well as others as decided by your DM, are not effected by this aspect of the potion.

Session Report

The return of the prodigal Druid
Slippery Pete, a mere 30gp short of his training funds, managed to come up with just the required amount from Professor Dorol in trade for the Kenku eggs he had pilfered last session. This meant he was now busy training and his player would need to player a different character; which in a fit of madness I suggested should be the (in)famous Fluid the Druid.

The players confidently set out to return to the crashed Sky City and explore further in than last time. The spring weather was good, and they decided to break their journey and check in at Castle "Partially Irish". They found that Connor McGregor and Sir Troland had come to an arrangement to share facilities, but negotiations for a more permanent deal were still ongoing. Here Bumblebore took his leave to train his Firedrake, O'Malfoy, under the watchful eye of his new friend, the Magic User Sarumin the Beast Master.




The Volcano (again)

The players returned via their previously travelled route to the western most extent of the base of the volcano. Once there they hobbled their horses and started the long climb to the top. 

"You appear to have come up in the centre of the city, a circular gap that passes through the interior. The cathedral like cavity is very large, about 600 feet wide, above is a huge amount of rock displaced by the city's travel through the volcano wall. The way up is completely blocked by this debris; but, the arrangement appears to be relatively stable, although the sound of the occasional rock falling into the ice around you can be heard."

They'll bring it back next time
Passing the still largely frozen body parts of the strange creatures they had discovered last session, it was universally agreed that they could be worth something if they brought them back on the way home.

They went east into the city and found the long corridor, made entirely of metal and with flickering lighting, stretched away from the entrance for 240 feet. Everything was much the same as before. Finally a door broke up the monotony. Beyond the door, which was still open was the room in which they had first encountered kenku hatchlings.

This time the room was different to how they had left it, all of the bodies were gone, and the lights were out. The latter did not bother them since they had a plethora of Continual Light gems that Godleve had prepared during downtime. They soon found that all three exits to the room, formerly simple archways into corridors, had been filled with pieces of metal stripped from elsewhere and somehow melted together to form a barrier that restricted the space to about a 3' diameter tunnel.

As the smallest member of the party, Dusty the dwarf thief volunteered to go first. He got through with no issues and signalled the party to join him. Whatever its purpose the obstacle only served to slow them down a little, and they made for the access tube they had discovered last week; which, they knew, went up one level.

However, rounding a corner, they ran into a bunch of hatchlings accompanied by two fully grown kenku. Both sides were within striking distance and neither were surprised. The battle went much the same way as last week, with the hatchlings being mowed down while raining eggs on the party. The difference this time was a barrage of Magic Missiles from the Kenku. They concentrated their fire on Giuseppe, a pattern that would reoccur throughout the day.

In the aftermath some of the hatchlings manages to flee into exposed ductwork, they left behind the eggs they were carrying and Dusty snagged one of these (which was important later!).

The end of the passage terminated in a circular room that was an access 'tube' to the next level up. There were barely discernible rungs imbedded in the walls that the party could use, they believed that the native inhabitants used wings instead; except for emergencies. There was a short delay as Fluid sorted out a means of lifting his pet, Petunia, via rope, and then they were set to explore.

The new level was clearly built with the same technology as the rest of the place, but here there was no sign of the mess made by hatchlings as on the first level. The ceilings were also much higher, twenty feet compared to ten feet. Corridors lead from the circular room at the top of the access tub to the north, east, and south; and the party investigated the east first. Here they soon found a similar 'access tube' room, but it went down, back the to level they had come from; and, as they could clearly see without having to go down there, the room's three exits had been completely blocked in a manner similar to how the corridors on the first level had been narrowed.

Back to the circular room and then north, they found several corridors that had also been blocked off. Sever was unable to make an impression with his bend bars/lift gates attempt, so they continued on and found a large room with some sort of life support water treatment plant. The thing radiated a faint and indefinable magic, and Dusty collected some pure water from a spigot. 

They returned again to the circular room and went south. They ignored a corridor heading west and continued south, here finding that the corridor terminated in a shut door (the doors on the first level were all open enough to get a finger hold and open them manually). Dusty went to examine the door; but, as soon as he got close, it slid open with a "woosh" sound; revealing a very large hexagonal room beyond. Dusty scampered back and the door soon slid closed again with another "woosh".

The situation gave the party pause, and Fluid went up to examine the door. This time it did not open at his approach, but it did open when he touched it. Taking no chances, they stuck a metal spike into the gap between the open door and the floor and also braced it with Dusty's 10' pole (where the dwarf was keeping this I did not enquire, but will in future!)

Now the party filed in and examined the well lit, 100' wide and 30' high room. A single machine dominated the area, made up of tubes and funnels, it was clearly of a different function to the water treatment machine, and they could hear some sort of arrhythmic clanking from somewhere above and out of sight.

They circumnavigated the room, which was more than enough time for the the kenku on top of the machine to notice, go invisible, and investigate. The PCs set up back at the door way opposite an area of the machinery that appeared to lead to an area containing rungs and steps for climbing up. That's when the kenku struck.

One cast Magic Missle, the other, a 5HD Kenku, cast Web. This latter spell was devastating, catching 5 out of the 6 PCs within a silky, gooey, mess. Fluid alone made his saving through and began to turn into a giant eagle.


A sticky situation (can't help myself)

Several of the players had Strength between 13 and 17, this meant they were effectively out of the fight for 10 turns! Sever was also stuck, but with his 18+ Strength could rip through 1' of webs per round. I rolled a d6 for each stuck player to determine how deep within the webs they were. Everyone got a 5 or 6 except for Sever who got a 1. This meant he could break out in 1 round (lucky!)

Now the rest of the kenku, and two Hawkmen, who were also up on top of the machinery, stopped what ever they were doing up there and attacked as well.

Winning initiative (the party got some crucial initiative wins today) Sever raced into the machinery, found his way up through the interior, and surfaced at the top of a platform to see a bunch of kenku and two Hawkmen flying his way. I ruled he had a chance to surprise the nearest kenku as he popped out in front of them, and he ended up with one segment. This was enough for the ranger to slice through first one opponent and then the other, which was pretty impressive to the captive audience of the rest of the party stuck in the web.

A spell casting kenku hit Fluid, now in giant eagle form, with Magic Missiles while he returned the favour with a claw/claw/bite routine on another. One of the Hawkmen zeroed in on Sever while the other flew out over the trapped party aimed a sort of hand crossbow at them and fired. The shot turned into a bolt of lightening which actually missed his intended target (Giuseppe) but did hit the web itself and I was suddenly faced with the question; does lightning set fire to a web? I decided to give it an item saving throw, which it failed, and the whole web went up doing 2d4 of damage to everyone; but the resulting 4hp was universally agreed to be a good trade off for otherwise being stuck.

I shook my head and rationalised that this was exceptional role playing of the fact the Hawkmen and kenku were not actually accustomed to fighting in combination, and so such a mistake was not out of character for them.

Wing Damage rules DMG pg 53
The next few rounds offered plenty of practical applications of the "Wing Damage" rules. Since both sides had fliers with feathered wings, they had more HP for the purpose of hitting the threshold at which they could continue flying, and this came into play. Sever sliced a Hawkman and forced him down before he could fly past. The newly free Giuseppe returned fire with his shortbow (and Machodorian leaf arrows, don't leave home without them!) and knocked the Hawkman flying above him past 75% damage, causing him to fall 20' down and taking another 2d6 falling damage which finished him off with a splash.

The other kenku now dived onto the 4 party members on the ground and I rolled for which kind of attack they would use; since the FF states they can use Claw/Claw/Bite, Staff, or Samurai sword. They all got staves or swords; which really is a lot weaker than their body weaponry, and this allowed Dusty to barely survive an attack. The thief backed away and held the egg he had picked up earlier out in front of him; which resulted in the kenku picking another target. Since the hatchlings showed no empathy with the eggs at all, this was quite unexpected.

Fluid was being a Magic Missile sponge, and so was Giuseppe, but the druid was also fighting two high HD kenku. He clawed the wings of the first, then started on a second, tougher, one. Both sides took damage until neither could keep flying, but each stayed just on the right side of the damage limit to maintain control as they fell. As this was the first time I have used these typically Gygaxian hyper specific rules I was very happy to see so much turn on a few hit points of damage.

Meanwhile, up on top of the machinery, the Hawkman had drawn a longsword to swing at Sever, and, though his sword did not penetrate the other's armour, somehow a zap of electrical damage went through the field plate armour and damaged the ranger. The Hawkman himself was too damaged to withstand Sever's return blows and he soon fell.

Now that all combatants were dead or grounded, the next few rounds saw the party grind down their opponents and score what initially seemed an unlikely victory.

They looted the bodies of a few coins, strange weapons, and helmets with odd attachments that proved to be some sort of scopes for aiding missile fire. 

The Hawkmen also wore badges on their leather armour and the players collected these as well.

However, the real prize was on top of the thruster machinery; row after row of glass "gems" similar to what they had found last session in a hatchling nest; but these were clearly more valuable, and within them contained some sort of glowing power. It was clear that their defeated enemies had been systematically removing the gems with special clamps and storing them in large backpacks. Already they had collected about half of what was available. Some trial and error showed the party that it would take about 10 hours to collect the remainder, and this proved too much for them to risk. They grabbed what was available; which at 100 pounds each was nearly as much as they could carry, and, confirming there were no other exits from the room, they headed back to the tube room. They made a quick detour into what proved to be an armoury that earlier was the scene of a battle between Hawkmen and kenku. The place had been cleared out, but they did find another hand crossbow, apparently without power; and a dead Hawkman, who they noticed was not wearing a kenku badge.

From here they made an orderly retreat, regretfully leaving the frozen creatures where they were since they did not have spare carrying capacity; and they did not notice any other encounters on the way out (but did one notice them?)



Treasure and XP


Cash

Gems: The weird glass-like faceted gems filled with a strange energy were worth 5000gp in Schloss Ragnar (this means the party left 5000gp worth behind!)

Strange Coins on the Hawkmen: 15 gp

Monetary XP total = 5015gp

Monsters

Kenku Hatchlings: 10
Kenku Eggs: 10
Kenku:
  • 2HD * 4
  • 3HD * 4
  • 4HD * 1 
  • 5HD * 1
Total 1,792 XP

Hawkmen * 2 =  220XP

Items

3 Hawkman "Zapper Hand Crossbows"  900XP









Considered equal to a +2 magic weapon, although it has neither “to hit” nor damage bonuses. When fully charged it fires a "bolt of lightening" having a range of 9” and whenever it strikes, the bolt then becomes the head of a 3' wide, 15' long stroke of lightning. Any creature hit suffers 1-6 hit points of damage, plus 10 hit points of electrical damage. Any other creatures in the path of the back stroke take either 10 or 5 hit points of damage. 

The hand crossbow needs a full turn to recharge, otherwise it will deliver only a d4 bolt of electrical damage and no lightning bolt, and the the recharge time is reset. Unlike normal hand crossbows, this Weapon has no adjustments vs AC.


2 Hawkman "Zapper Swords"  200XP












These function like a normal longsword unless a button on the hilt is pushed during an attack round. This function causes the recipient to take 1-10 hit points of damage, with no saving throw, when struck in melee combat. Any “to hit” score discounts metallic armour and shield (giving opponents armour class 10) but not plain leather or wood. Magic bonuses on metallic armour do not affect armour class, but such items as a ring of protection do. The sword requires 1 turn to recharge before using this ability again.



2 Hawkman "Scope Helmets"  200XP













These helmets have a scope which telepathically interfaces with the wearer and reduces the range penalty for ranged attacks by one step for any missile weapon (i.e. medium becomes short, long becomes medium) and also removes the penalty for firing at or from a flying creature. For Hawkman hand crossbows, these scopes remove any ranged penalty for the entire 9" range of a full bolt or the 6" range of a normal bolt.

Monsters XP Total: 2012   
Monetary XP Total: 5015 
XP Item XP Total: 1300

Total of 8,327 XP Weighted by Level & Bonus/Penalty

Godleve (Level 5 ) 2081XP  & 1253 GP
Sever (Level 4 )  1665XP &  1003 GP
Giuseppe (Level 4 )  1665XP &  1003GP
Sheamus (Level 3)  1249 XP &  752 GP
Fluid the Druid (Level 7 but scoring as 3) 1249 XP & 752GP
Dusty (Level 1)  416 XP & 250 GP (and one Kenku egg)




Trollopulous Adjusted Session 82 (Machodor #43); From Saint Raul to the Dungeon

     The Machodorian City of Saint Raul Timekeeping This session took place on 15/08/2024, and the PCs adventured for 5 days. Player Charact...