Tales from Ternis, Mustard's Pathfinder campaign log Options

[Colonel Mustard]

Because it's probably not fair of me to hijack Rohirrim's thread, I have decided that I'm making my own thread for the RPG campaign I'm currently running. The setting is a fusion of D&D-esque high fantasy with the Wild West, on the continent of Ternis, an arid desert land that opened up for colonisation only a century ago after powerful storms and arcane barriers that once circled it flickered out. The full history/detailing of the setting can be found right hnyah, but that's the core of what you need to know.

Me and my friends are playing the Pathfinder system, a pen-and-paper RPG that's based off Dungeons and Dragons 3.5 edition's Open Gaming License. We meet up weekly (originally Thursday mornings but now Friday afternoons), play, chat and generally get up to the ridiculous hijinks that you can read all about below.



Dramatis Personae

Wirran - A male elven monk
Ace Calhoun - A male human rogue, played by Josh
Rosalynd Brindinas - A female half-elf druid and her animal companion Buttercup the ankylosaurus
'Demon Eyes' - A female tiefling gunslinger 'napping' for most of the initial session as her player had to leave halfway through character creation for a seminar
'Charisma 10' - A female human ranger serving as a deputy in the Order of the Shield and Star, (who is yet to pick a character name, but whose character has charisma of 10). Introduced in the second session
Aewenor - A male elf wizard, introduced in the second session


Session 1 - The Wrong Side of the Tracks

The PCs were on an overnight train between Yular and Austis, which pulled in to the town of Red Creek in order to restock on water and coal. The town was quiet, with most locals seeming in bed, but the passengers were informed that the saloon should be open and serving drinks if any of them fancied anything while the train refilled.

Upon entering the small town, it appeared to be deserted, and Wirran found the saloon completely empty. Ace investigated upstairs, and finds one of the rooms has had its door broken down and signs of a struggle within. When the pair went to the sheriff's office, they found it was deserted aside from the town's drunk, who, when woken, started raving and jabbering in incoherent fear. When they unlocked his cell he attacked them out of sheer panic only for Wirran to knock him unconscious with a headbutt. With that done, they headed back to the train to tell the driver about it.

Meanwhile, Rosalynd investigated the town's barber shop and general store. The barber's was devoid of life and locked up, but the general store's door was open, though there was nobody about. As she entered the street, she saw a group of people approaching the town from its road, though in the dark she could make out no more details. She told the others, who were puzzling over the town's emptiness, and as they approached they made out a group of skeletons were approaching fast.

Ace lead the defence against the undead, aided by Karris Albert, one of the passengers, and the train's shovel-wielding half-orc stoker, Big Johnny Brahg. Rosalynd and Buttercup joined the defense not long afterwards as Ace, Big Johnny and Karris clashed with the undead, and Buttercup proved his effectiveness in a fight by killing a good deal of the undead and the skeletons unable to actually harm him unless they rolled criticals. Wirran decided to be an arsehole and watched proceedings from the train while having a smoke, but intervened when several of the undead made to attack the passengers. Towards the end of the combat, Demon Eyes finally woke up long enough to shoot at the final skeleton and miss.

The defense was short and spirited, but in the confusion of combat Big Johnny Brahg and Ace were badly injured, the train was sabotaged and two of the passengers were kidnapped. One of the other passengers was a trainee cleric and managed to heal the heroes back to full health, while Ace sent off a telegram to call for help. He got a reply from the Order of the Shield and Star telling them that help would be there in a few hours, and hold tight on the train until they got there. Realising that nobody would be coming to rescue the kidnapped passengers and that there was no guarantee of them surviving until the Order of the Shield and Star arrived, the PCs resolved to set out on the trail of the undead and deal with the problem themselves.

Demon Eyes did a quick round of looting before they went, nabbing a bottle of whiskey from the saloon and getting a masterwork dagger and two healing potions from the general store. She also tried to use some of her musket's gunpowder to blow open the general store's safe, but her player's roll of a 4 ended up gutting the safe and rewarding Demon Eyes with just $1.53 in recoverable cash, along with some severely singed eyebrows.

Aided by Karris, who worked as a tracker, the group followed the skeleton's trail across the nighttime wilderness until they found them camped out in a gully, along with a huge glowing green crystal and the kidnapped passengers and townsfolk. Along with the regular undead, there was also a skeletal champion wearing an ancient suit of armour, and wielding a sword, in contrast to the other skeletons who looked like they had been dug out of the local graveyard.

Wirran decided to make a dynamic entry and jumped off the side of the gully to smash a skeleton to bits on landing. At the same time Karris drew her sword, declared "Death to the heretics!" and stabbed Ace in the kidneys.

Rosalynd cast Magic Fang on Wirran, improving his unarmed attacks so he had a better chance against the mob of skeletons, while Buttercup, Demon Eyes and Ace turned on Karris. In Wirran's next turn, he parkoured/frontflipped over the skeletons to go toe-to-toe with their leader in an act of insane badassitude and extremely lucky rolling, while Rosalynd cast Summon Nature's ally and called forth an eagle that she dubbed Mr Snugglesworth, who she promptly sicced on the champion to give Wirran a hand. Meanwhile, Buttercup, Demon Eyes and Ace attacked Karris.

In the next turn, as the lead skeleton took a good chunk of Wirran's hitpoints off, Ace half-climbed, half-jumped down the gully's side to deal with the skeleton mob who were advancing on the rest of the group (obviously confident in their leader's ability to deal with Wirran). Demon Eyes hit Karris in the gut with a bullet, Rosalynd set her eagle on Karris and knocked her down to zero hp with a good eye-gouging, letting Buttercup finish her off with a thorough trampling. Before she died, Karris managed to grab Rosalynd's ankle and gasp out; "The stone rises."

Assisted by Mr Snugglesworth, Wirran continued his duel with the skeletal champion while the rest of the party dealt with the main force of the undead, Buttercup proving himself an unstoppable avatar of asskickery. Demon Eyes sniped at the enemy mob while Ace, Rosalynd and Buttercup dealt with them up close, quickly dispatching them. Buttercup and Rosalynd moved to assist Wirran in his fight against the champion, while Ace broke off to free the townspeople. Outnumbered, the champion took several hits before Demon Eyes finished it off with a critical hit and a damage roll of 24 (the critical multipliers for firearms are insane), blowing its skull clean off.

They freed the townsfolk, and Rosalynd recognised the crystal they were fighting around as a Wyrdstone, one of the stones of power that dot Ternis. Normally they are inert and magically passive, and as far as she was aware this was the first time one had ever been active like this. Demon Eyes looted the champion's armour and sword, realising they were surprisingly ancient things to find on a continent that had only been accessible for a century, and decided to sell them on to a collector.

A few hours later, a heavily armoured war train from the Order of the Shield and Star arrived. The sheriffs and marshals who dismounted took an account of what happened and promised to investigate the stone, and towed the train onwards to Austis.


Session 2 - Seeger's Last Song

The Order of the Shield and Star pulled the PCs' sabotaged train into Austis early the next morning, the PCs dispersing shortly afterwards to go about their day, having briefly met Charisma 10 who was a member of the Order.

Rosalynd took the opportunity to report in to the Guild of Druids as soon as she left the train, which meant she was tied up for the day (her player was only there for a bit at the very beginning).

Ace and Wirran left to go and hunt bounties, and, after seeing a $10,000 poster for a half-orc bandit warlord named Hagrash Gra-Kallon, decided to settle on the much easier quarry of a petty local criminal nicknamed 'Two-Toed Jack'. After Ace posed as a would-be criminal at a dive saloon, searching for Jack in order to get his help with a 'job', the barman pointing the direction of Jimmy's Boarding House. Wirran also took a diversion to a customs office in order to see what he could find out about Brin Llwellyn, a rival of his from the old world. Wirran believed Brin murdered his wife and framed him for the crime, fleeing to Ternis while Wirran spent a century in jail. Unfortunately, due to his uncertainty on exactly when Llwellyn arrived and a lack of money to bribe the clerk, his search was fruitless.

At the same time, Charisma 10 handed in her report on the goings-on in Red Creek. While there, the Marshal she handed the report into suggested that she try her hand at bounty hunting in order to earn some extra income and increase her prestige at the Order of the Shield and Star, and mentioned that she might want to go and bring in Two-Toed Jack.

Charisma 10 ran into Ace and Wirran at Jimmy's Boarding House just in time to overhear them asking about Two-Toed Jack. Ace and Charisma 10 spent some time bickering over who got the bounty while Wirran decided to do the prudent thing and place a barrel of water under Two-Toed Jack's window in case he tried to escape. After more argument, Ace tried to kick down the door, failed miserably, and after a brief scuffle Charisma 10 managed to finally subdue a very surprised Two-Toed Jack, securing the $150 bounty for herself.

Meanwhile, Demon Eyes set off to the University of Austis in order to sell the breastplate, helmet and sword to an expert who would want such a historical artefact. She made her introduction by kicking down the door of the professor she wanted to sell to, because it seems her player had forgotten how selling things worked. After history's most bizarre sales pitch, Demon Eyes and the professor eventually settled on a price of $300 for the set.

Aewenor came upon the destroyed door just as Demon eyes was leaving, and the professor directed him to stick with her in case she came across any other interesting historical artefacts, adding that she seemed 'a dangerous type' who would satisfy his desire for a more interesting life outside of academia. Aewenor managed to follow her back to a saloon, where she met up with Wirran and Ace.

At the same time, Charisma 10 was summoned to the office of Jane Liddy, Grand Marshal and founder of the Order of the Shield and Star. Liddy explained that she wanted Charisma 10 with her to talk to the rest of the PCs about what happened at Red Creek.

Once she found them at the saloon, Liddy explained that she wanted the PCs help with looking into what happened at Red Creek, saying that she was extremely worried by the activation of the Wyrdstone there. In return for the PCs doing tasks she wasn't sure the Shield and Star would be able to do, Liddy would reward them; Ace, Demon Eyes and Aewenor all asked for money, while Wirran said he wanted any information the Shield and Star could get on Brin Llwellyn. Charisma 10 would tag along and report back to her, as well as working with the group in order to assist them.

Their task was to find the world famous folk singer Arlo Seeger and inform him of what happened at Red Creek, as well as to tell him that Jane wanted his part of 'the key'. Jane said that Arlo wouldn't speak to any members of the Shield and Star, but she hoped that if the PCs would talk to him and explain what had happened, he would be willing to help.

Knowing that Arlo was staying at the high-class Ritzchester hotel, the PCs made their way there. Wirran broke off to keep watch outside, figuring his ragged, vagrantish appearance would mean he would be barred entry, while Demon Eyes went off to do some shopping. Ace managed to charm his way past the receptionist through the combination of some smooth talking, some swift forgery and the pseudonym of Lorenzo Pope, managing to convince her that he was a good friend of Seeger's and he had left a note asking them to be let up.

Meanwhile, Wirran decided that he could do more interesting things than watch the door and instead hit up a blacksmith in order to see if he could get the manacles he wore reinforced. After it became clear that Wirran would not remove the manacles, and that reinforcing them with steel bracing would not be possible without giving Wirran third-degree burns, a compromise was reached and the smith set about making Wirran a brand new set of manacles.

Ace, Charisma 10 and Aewenor made their way up to Seeger's room, but after knocking they received no answer. When Charisma 10 tried the doorknob, it came off in her hands (lol) and the door swung open; within was Arlo Seeger, his throat cut open and his room ransacked, gripping a the cord of a broken pendant of green crystal in his hands. The PCs grabbed the pendant, closed the door and hurried out in a wee bit of a panic.

Running back to Jane, they reported what had happened. Jane was worried, and when asked why she wanted them to speak to Arlo she revealed that she and Arlo had been part of a small band of heroes who had repelled an invasion by the orc warlord Murlag Gutswallor 50 years prior. The group had disbanded, and she knew where only one former member currently is, Halris Sawyl, currently serving as the Archmage of Yular's Tower of the Esoteric. The whereabouts of the other two members, a dwarf gunslinger named Oil Brazzack and a tiefling rogue called Hari Anna, are currently unknown.

Hooking back up with Wirran and Demon Eyes, the group decided to investigate who murdered Seeger. The hotel had already been locked down by the Order of the Shield and Star, and Jane Liddy put the PCs in charge of the investigation. Checking around the back, the group found a back entrance where the hotel's staff got in and out, marking that as a potential escape route. While there, they also found a tramp sleeping in the alley, who was willing to tell them what happened. As soon as he was found, Demon Eyes pinned him against the wall for no real reason, causing him to be greatly upset and meaning he refused to talk until she went away.

Once he had calmed down, the tramp said he had heard the sounds of a struggle coming from the room the PCs identified as Seeger's, and after that he saw three figures descend from the window on a rope. One of them was large enough to be a half-orc, one was either human or an elf and was clutching their face as if injured and the last was a gnome or halfling.

The PCs investigated Seeger's room, and after examining the body discovered that Seeger had taken a blow to the head before his throat had been cut; they concluded that he had been ambushed in his sleep, dazed by the blow before he could put up too much of a struggle and then killed. As well as this, Aewenor managed to detect residual magic that had been left by the summoning of an Eidolon, an extraplanar creature that spellcasters of the summoner class bind to their will to use as servants.

The PCs finally questioned the hotel's staff, and after quizzing the head chef discovered that they had a half-orc on staff as a kitchen porter, one who had been working there for a few months. His name was Rhogor, and the head chef remembered that he had been in that night even though he wasn't on shift; at the time, he hadn't questioned it, occupied with serving an event and assuming that Rhogor had just forgotten something. With that name, and the information that Rhogor was currently staying at Mrs Mol's Boarding House, the PCs set out onto the streets of Austis once more, ready to catch a killer.

This post has been edited by Colonel Mustard: Nov 1 2014, 11:49 AM

[Rohirrim]

Charisma 10 and Demon Eyes. What, did you just come up to a bunch of people sitting in a cafe, throw the Pathfinder book at them, and yell "WE'RE PLAYING IN FIVE MAKE A CHARACTER!"?

Also, aren't you Ben? Are there two Bens? Surely you're not GM-PC-ing. I know you'd never do that.

[Colonel Mustard]

Charisma 10 and Demon Eyes. What, did you just come up to a bunch of people sitting in a cafe, throw the Pathfinder book at them, and yell "WE'RE PLAYING IN FIVE MAKE A CHARACTER!"?

Also, aren't you Ben? Are there two Bens? Surely you're not GM-PC-ing. I know you'd never do that.

Yes I basically did. I still haven't let them out of the cafe

To be fair, Demon Eyes is riffing on Angel Eyes from The Good, The Bad and The Ugly, a film which Ben (another Ben, not me. There are two Bens) quite likes. Charisma 10 came about from the fact that the player playing her is very new to Pathfinder and couldn't think of a name, and was derived from a running joke in our gaming group from the D&D 3.5 campaign we played, ribbing on our group's ranger who also had a Charisma of 10.

Edit: I also feel it's prudent to add that the guy who played Charisma 10 last year is now playing the very charismatic Ace Calhoun, quite possibly as a direct response to this treatment.

This post has been edited by Colonel Mustard: Oct 21 2014, 12:09 PM

[Colonel Mustard]

Session 3 is here, in which one of my players gets dumb.

Session 3 - Hunting down the hunters

With a lead and a name, the PCs set out to Mrs Mol’s boarding house. Along the way they were joined by Rosalynd, from where she had been reporting the events at Red Creek to Elder Le Guin of the Hall of Druids. At the boarding house, they were greeted by Mrs Mol, an elderly woman who was concerned by the presence of 5 guests saying they were on an investigation. When they asked for Rhogor, she said that he had stayed for only two weeks before he had left again, claiming he had found work elsewhere in the city and had been there. She said the only visitor he had received was a young man named Javier.

Following that lead, the PCs made their way to Austis’ town hall, Leon Hall. There, with the help of Deadeyes authority as a deputy in the Shield and Star, they convinced the clerk to check the records and see if any gangs of three criminals, with the name Javier, had been locked up any time soon. While there was nobody of that description recorded as arrested, the clerk found out that a trio of bounty hunters had brought in several criminals over the years. He recommended they try a saloon called the Hanging Man for information, knowing it to be a popular hangout for bounty hunters.

There, Ace attempted to talk to the barkeep for information. At the same time Rosalynd took the approach of calling out Javier’s name; it didn’t get her a response from the man himself, but she did attract the attention of Olwen, an elf of indeterminate gender and in possession of an awful lot of knives. Olwen said that Javier (full name Javier Solastro) was the youngest member of a trio of bounty hunters, the other two being a halfling summoner named Saraid O’Connor and a half-orc called Harrack Ag-Klazach, and they operated out of a small house in Crane Bend. Finally, Rosalynd checked if Olwen was interested in doing some bounty hunting work with her at some point in the future, Olwen agreeing and instructing Rosalynd to look in the Hanging Man if she ever wanted to meet.

At the same time, Demon Eyes entered the bar with the $10,000 bounty for Hagrash Gra-Kallon, declaring she was going to hunt him down. After she got laughed at and told to leave that sort of job to the professionals, she attempted to stab the nearest man who mocked her, but earned only a broken nose for her trouble. Vowing revenge, she took up position outside of the Hanging Man with musket in hand, waiting for her new nemesis to emerge.

At Crane Bend, Rosalynd, Ace, Deadeyes and Aewenor tracked down the house that Javier was supposed to be staying at. Ace knocked on the door to try and talk to whoever was in there, while the rest of them waited around the edge of the house to see what happened.

The door was answered by a young man sporting a black eye, who revealed himself to be Javier Solastro after a few questions from Ace, who was posing as a client wanting some business taken care of. Javier told Ace that he and his team weren’t taking jobs at the moment, but when Ace dropped the name of Mrs Mol’s boarding house Javier attempted to pull a knife on him. After a brief scuffle, Javier fled indoors, pulling a dresser across the front door in order to block the entrance.

After a brief scuffle involving Buttercup bashing down the front door, Ace, Deadeyes and Aewenor flanking through the back door (and Aewenor trying but unfortunately failing to use the hilariously awesome spell Pants) and some pretty disastrous rolling all round, Javier was finally subdued when Rosalynd summoned Mr Snugglesworth, with him and Buttercup battering Javier to the ground and Ace forcing him to surrender a rapier-point. After a brief interrogation, Javier confessed that he and the other two members were acting on the orders of the Grand Master. Harrack and Saraid had left town, but he didn’t know where they had gone. So far, his orders were to hold the fort at their headquarters, collecting further instructions from a dead drop on a weekly basis.

Meanwhile, Demon Eyes finally spotted her target emerging from the Hanging Man. She took her shot and missed, alerting the man she had shot at to her presence and causing a small gang of bounty hunters to spill out of the saloon in response to the noise. Scrambling across one rooftop and using her powder horn as an improvised grenade to stagger her enemies, Demon Eyes managed to drop to street level and charge her target, sticking him in the guts with her trident. Her target responded with cutting her hand off, throwing her to the ground and finally killing her with her own trident, thus ending the short few days of Demon Eyes’ existence as a character.

Ace went to the dead drop in disguise, and managed to retrieve Javier’s latest orders, a note saying; “Hold current position, be aware possible interruption by outside agents, same ones who interfered in experiment at Red Creek. Will provide description and names, await further orders on how to proceed in their termination.

Go to Mr Maxwell for supplies and manpower if needed. We have mutual friend in him.

GM”

The PCs realised that the ‘Mr Maxwell’ referred to in the letter was likely Eugene Maxwell, a wealthy rancher who lived just outside of Austis. The PCs decided to pose as a group interested in purchasing cattle, assembling their disguise in preparation for their visit to Maxwell’s ranch.

This post has been edited by Colonel Mustard: Oct 25 2014, 12:11 PM

[Renee]

"Players roll of four".... are you rolling dice?

[Colonel Mustard]

"Players roll of four".... are you rolling dice?

Yep, we're working off the Pathfinder system, which is a d20 game system based of D&D 3.5 Edition. It's a really good system, actually, manages to nicely polish a lot of 3.5's rules but still gives you an 'essential' D&D experience.

[Rohirrim]

"Players roll of four".... are you rolling dice?

whoooooosh

[Colonel Mustard]

"Players roll of four".... are you rolling dice?

whoooooosh

Oh be nice.

[Renee]

I still roll dice sometimes too, with Oblivion and Skyrim, especially if some sort of decision needs to be made. Sometimes I like to leave such decisions up to fate.