Campaign Logs/D&D/The Lonely Coast Campaign

The Lonely Coast Campaign – Wherever It Is Going Part 2 (Session 16)

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When we last left the party, they had, well, they had pretty much become rather alienated from the authorities and townsfolk of Swallowfeld. Possibly with hopes of at least doing some good and to save the Warden’s nephews that had been taken by the goblins, they set out to follow the tracks. They had found the goblin compound and had begun their exploration/raid of it and that’s where we’ll pick up after the break.

This is probably going to be a bit more abbreviated than many of the session write-ups. Not because little happened but because the last session was almost three weeks ago, I’ve put off writing this until now, and it is getting late on a Friday night. We had a full table with all players in attendance and a bit of a twist near the end of the session that I think kind of threw the players…mwah ha ha!

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General

The Lonely Coast Campaign – Wherever It Is Going Part 1 (Session 15)

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When we last left the party, the village of Swallowfeld had been attacked by a force of goblins. The PCs had, with the Warden’s blessing, gone out to fight the goblins. After the battle, in which the forces of “good” had prevailed, the Warden and Bay had spoken. Bay had suggested that the Warden, who was still a bit concerned about the party, could trust to Pounder’s sense of honor and duty and that the paladin would make sure that the adventurers would not bring additional danger to the peoples of the Lonely Coast. Pounder then discussed this with the Warden and agreed. He and Feng had gone off to find Thalimor–for whom the Warden had reserved the vast majority of his concern–to inform the bard of the situation.

This is where we pick up after the break. We had a full table this session with non one missing. By the end of this session, the status of the PCs on the Lonely Coast will have significantly changed and the Warden’s concerns shown to be quite well-founded.

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Campaign Logs/D&D/General/The Side Quest

The Lonely Coast Campaign – Seeking Cynric’s Folly Part 7 (Session 14)

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When we last left the party, Thalimor had gotten himself arrested by the Warden of the Lonely Coast while the rest of the party had blatantly disregarded a direct “request” from the man appointed by the Baron to see to the safety of the Lonely Coast. Rather than return to the Wolf’s Head Inn and remain there, they followed the goblin tracks in the hopes of finding the abducted children. This group remained just a bit ahead of the troops led by the Warden and the manacled (and gagged) Thalimor. When the heroes arrived back at the ruins, they found the children in the “temple” area along with Aerlium, a badly tortured Malvenos, and four of the wrath creatures. They were unable to rescue the children at this time and, after fighting a large number of goblins in the woods, were hustling towards the sounds of a combat…presumably between the goblins and the Warden’s force.

That is where we pick up after the break. Rachel and Muse were missing this session and, unfortunately, Thomas had to cancel at the last minute due to illness. So we were missing half of the players and so everyone played two characters. In addition to their normal characters, RJ played Isenthorne, Miles played Osric, and Todd played Thalimor. Rachel’s absence, unfortunately, also means that the group’s note taker was missing. I rely pretty heavily on her notes when writing the recaps. Because I make up so much of this on the fly, I can’t always keep track of what happened in what order. So it is quite likely that this recap might have more mistakes and less detail than those when she does take her five or six pages of notes.

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Campaign Logs/D&D/General/The Lonely Coast Campaign

The Lonely Coast Campaign – Seeking Cynric’s Folly Part 6 (Session 13)

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No, really, the heroes really are seeking Cynric’s Folly…they just keep getting caught up in other things.

In our last session, the heroes returned back to Swallowfeld to deliver Berangar to the authorities and to make various preparations for seeking out Cynric’s Folly after having gained some additional clues as to its location from the elderly priest, Godric. However, nothing is ever quite that simple. Instead, various hijinks ensued that ultimately resulted in Thalimor engaging in some cross-dressing and expressing a strong interest in an alternate sexuality to avoid, well, an engagement. After all that hilarity, Pounder was woken early the following morning by a pounding on his door and someone shouting, “The children are gone!”

And that is where we pick up after the break.

I’m going to add a little something that I haven’t done before with the session recap. I’m going to add the days that the action takes place. Things are now getting to the point that I need to keep track of the calendar or it will get a bit too confusing for me. So, I had to come up with a calendar for the setting. It is a 13-month lunar based calendar with four weeks per month and seven days per week. Each month starts on the full moon. The campaign is currently in the month of Plognath or Plow Moon in the old language (Elderspraech or Reorde) of the Thioda, the Thaeden cultural ancestors. The days of the month are notated not by a number like we do nowadays but as the first, second, third, or fourth Haelfdag (or whichever day it is) of Plognath (or whichever month it is).

So with that all out of the way…

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Campaign Logs/D&D/General/The Lonely Coast Campaign

The Lonely Coast Campaign – Seeking Cynric’s Folly Part 5 (Session 12)

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When we last left our heroes, they had been investigating a purported suicide at the Temple of Vélen when additional bodies started to be found dead. The priest, Aethelric, who was reported to have committed suicide had come back from the dead for vengeance against those who had wronged him. The heroes had just “killed” the creature with repeated and repeated and repeated and repeated attacks (i.e., it took a LOT of damage to drop). Fortunately for them, the thing had been solely focused on slowly squeezing the life out of one of the other priests rather than attacking them. When we pick up after the break, we start to learn about what had actually happened to Aethelric and a bit of other things about the temple.

The Southern Shakespeare Festival (with a production of A Midsummer’s Night Dream) also returned to Tallahassee this past weekend after a 15+ year hiatus. There must have been something in the air as we had elements of secret identities, cross-dressing, arranged romances, cross-dressing to avoid arranged romances, and the like. I made a comment the next day to one of the players about how I kind of felt like some of the session was inspired by some Shakespearean elements and she had been thinking the same thing. It wasn’t really intentional but it was pretty fun. I had actually prepped something for this session but we never even got close to it.

RJ was missing this week and so Todd played Bay. Spoiler Alert: This session is partially based on and largely inspired by the old Dungeon Magazine adventure, Unhallowed Ground, from Issue #54.

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Campaign Logs/D&D/The Lonely Coast Campaign

The Lonely Coast Campaign – Seeking Cynric’s Folly Part 4 (Session 11)

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In our last session, our heroes had made their way to the Temple of Vélen to both deliver the package given to them by Galden Hearthtop in Wolverton and to seek more information about Cynric’s Folly. Their arrival was marked by spotting a relatively fresh grave outside of the temple complex and with significant suspicion…bordering on hostility…from the gate’s guard, Malvenos. Once inside, they completed their delivery, learned that little of the famed library and, more importantly to them, no writings on Cynric’s Folly remained, and met the largely dysfunctional “family” of priests who still resided in the complex. They also learned that the fresh grave was that of a young priest and promising scribe who had recently committed suicide and, as a result, was not interred in the temple’s catacombs.

When we ended the prior session, the party had retired for the night in some of the many vacant cells in the temple’s dormitory and were awakened by the sound of the temple’s bell ringing…though somewhat muffled. And that’s where we pick up after the break.

Miles missed this session and so RJ played Magnus. Spoiler Alert: This session is partially based on and largely inspired by the old Dungeon Magazine adventure, Unhallowed Ground, from Issue #54.

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Campaign Logs/D&D/The Lonely Coast Campaign

The Lonely Coast Campaign – Seeking Cynric’s Folly Part 3 (Session 10)

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When we last left our heroes, they were rising from their sleep at the Wolf’s Head Inn in the village of Swallowfeld. It had been a pleasant evening particularly in comparison to their last couple of days involving undead, a malicious imp, and a “blessing” for one character, Bay, from the imp’s mistress…whoever she might be. The hospitality of their host, Kettle, was quite welcomed. Their intent for this day was to head out for the Temple of Vélen and see if they could find any information about the location of Cynric’s Folly as well as deliver the pouch that Galden Hearthtop (at the Fellowship Hall in Wolverton) had tasked them with giving to the head priest at the temple.

Fair warning for those that like action and combat, there wasn’t much during this session. Well, actually, there wasn’t really any…except a rather one-sided sparring match between Pounder and Thalimor. This was another one of our crappy sessions that was pretty much all in-character roleplaying [yes, crappy is tongue in cheek]. It was also a bunch of setting building via the roleplaying. Swallowfeld got a bit fleshed out as did the Temple of Vélen.

As you read this, keep in mind that the temple has fallen from its glory days and is dilapidated and underpopulated. There is also an element of dysfunction that I hoped started to come out as the PCs had the opportunity to interact with the PCs. In some ways, perhaps at least in terms of the “mood” of the temple as a setting, I had the movie, The Name of the Rose, in the back of my mind throughout this session.

Muse was missing this session and so RJ played Osric in her absence which, I’m sure, probably has Muse wondering, as she reads this, just what kind of trouble RJ got Osric into this session. The last time he played Osric, he had the big fighter go and hug a zombie which, of course, earned Osric a few nibbles on the neck as a result. Rather than keep Muse in suspense any longer, the session recap is below the break.

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Campaign Logs/The Lonely Coast Campaign

The Lonely Coast Campaign – Seeking Cynric’s Folly Part 2 (Session 9)

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Things had gotten a bit dicey and complicated for our party at the end of our last session. Thalimor, apparently, had released some sort of demon or devil type creature that had been trapped in a magical box for untold centuries. The party took to calling the thing an imp and it introduced itself as Aerlium. The imp had found the two children that the heroes had been searching for and had also released the various undead that were in the complex. Various bargains had been offered by Aerlium for the lives of the children and safe passage through the complex. Eventually, the bargains struck left Bay running from the complex carrying the two unconscious children (with one of the vicious creatures found in the complex hot on his heels) while the rest of the party prepared to fight their way through a long line of undead as Magnus had refused to even give his name to the imp, let alone agree to any bargain, and was thus not party to the safe passage of the others. We pick up with this action after the break.

Todd has rejoined the group for the next few months. He is playing a half-orc paladin named Pounder. With a Strength of 20 and a big warhammer, the name seems pretty apt. After some catching up and a bunch of pizza, we got to playing.

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Campaign Logs/The Lonely Coast Campaign

The Lonely Coast Campagin – Seeking Cynric’s Folly (Session 8)

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Yikes! Zombies! Again? Really?!? Yes, zombies again but at least these aren’t pirate zombies like encountered on the Nydam (or pibies as I started to call them). In out last session, our heroes arrived at Wolverton. They rested, restocked, and sought out some information before deciding to head west towards Swallowfeld and the Temple of Vélen to discover if any information about the location of the lost keep of Cynric the Ironwolf. During their travels they, of course, found adventure in the form of dead charcoalers and a recently unearthed complex of some sort. The complex looked like it might be Dracmosi in nature…a civilization that predates the Thaeden (the current dominant culture) by at least two civilizations.

In their explorations of this complex, they had opened a door and loosed a zombie.

And that is exactly where we pick up this session’s recap after the break. Thomas was missing this session and so RJ played Thalimor in his absence.

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Campaign Logs/The Lonely Coast Campaign

The Lonely Coast Campagin – Wolverton At Last (Session 7)

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Wolverton at last! When we last left our heroes, they had survived their adventures in Brea’s Garden and had returned from the Feywild, with Danu’s help. Along with the two surviving sailors, they were in the Nydam’s landing boat with Stansig Point in sight and the sounds of Wolverton’s docks coming from beyond the point. Unfortunately, there were no oars in the boat and Danu and their new faerie friend, Olive, were nowhere in sight. Relief at having survived was mixed with concern for what their actions in the Feywild might lead to. Things certainly did not seem to have ended well.

We pick up with this session with the party in the landing boat after the break.

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