ToEEPlayers / ToEE-Session6


We pick up again as the party rides into Verbobonc. For the sake of sanity, we gloss over the shopping. Various people bought weapons and gear of various qualities. The big purchases were a handy haversack (Diren), a bag of holding (Pire), a ring of protection (Gnarsh), and a pile of utility scrolls and spell learning (Moth).

After shopping, Gnarsh and Pire swing by the temple of St Cuthbert so that Gnarsh can make a donation - gold and the scalp of an enemy - and offer prayers to St Cuthbert.

Then the whole party heads off to Jylee's Inn for some drinking. It's a decent place, frequented by adventurers and mercenaries. Diren tosses some silver to the kids on the street who wait to run errands for the inn's patrons. There is bragging from several parties, regretably the best we can come up with is that we killed crawfish this big *stretching arms wide* and tragically there was no butter. Gnarsh confronts another guy who's bragging about slaying a dragon. The guy produces a tooth, which Gnarsh suggests came from a souvenir shop down the road. Really the tooth is that of a slurk, a giant frog beast. So they end up bonding over having both killed giant frogs.

Diren directs the group to a luxurious inn for the night - the Maroon Mon, costing a whole 10 gp each. Moth decides to meditate in the woods in the elven quarter instead. In the night we're attacked by thugs led by some dark cleric. Diren is awake and entertaining a couple ladies but is magically paralyzed as he grabs his dagger. Pire ends up spending most of the combat in manacles after being surprised while sleeping. Diren is poisoned and weak, but still standing at the end. Gnarsh was scared off for over 30 seconds by more dark magic. And Elmo proves his value once again. That boy's earning his keep.

After the fight, Gnarsh stomps down to the inn-keepers room. Pounding on the door he tells the man, "Need the guard. And chambermaid with mop. Blood everywhere." A woozy Diren sends Elmo to get Moth; he doesn't trust the zealous Pire or simple Gnarsh to handle everything. The Maroon Mon's guard had been quietly killed or bought off. The city guard agrees we were obviously assaulted in our own quarters. We get a new room at the Mon, and ale for Gnarsh, and tea for Diren. Diren slips the maid a couple gold for the mess she has to deal with.

The next morning Pire casts a couple lesser restorations (rolling 4 on a d4 each time) and Diren is fine. We decide on a buddy system for the remainder of the day.

Moth and Diren head to Beltham the sage, who als oruns a coffeeshop. Gnarsh and Pire hit up the priests of St Cuthbert. Both teams are seeking information on the Temple of Elemental Evil. We get a long story and a brief summary of their beliefs involving Elemental forces opposing man and destroying him and his works. They divided them into three, progressively more severe, categories - Fire, Water, and Earth/Air=Void. After the Temple was assaulted, the worst parts were sealed rather than purged of evil. The holy symbol from the evil cleric last night is identified as of Zuggtmoy, a deity often associated with the Temple.

Moth is spending the day writing in his spellbook, and Diren wants more information. So he leaves Moth in the coffeeshop and heads across town to the temple of Pelor. On the way he tries to blend into crowds and cuts through dim alleys, covering up with his elven cloak in the alleys (but not otherwise because it's hot). There he talks to a priest about the temple, getting little more information. But he asks for and receives Pelor's blessing as he's headed into the dark to fight enemies of man. He also gives a large donation for the temple's charity programs, saying that the temple fed and helped him when he was young and he'd like to repay that now.

As Gnarsh and Pire are leaving the temple of St Cuthbert, Gnarsh spots a small half-orc girl staring at him. He's seen here a couple times before, but she's always run off. When Diren heard of this, he chided Gnarsh that he's supposed to have small coins for the beggars. This time Gnarsh is ready and tosses her a silver. Her eyes get big, but rather than running off she approaches and asks "Are you my daddy?"

It turns out her father is a half-orc named Carguk who left town a fwe months back and Mommy is so sick. Gnarsh tells the girl he's not her daddy (he wasn't in Verbobonc a few years back) but has her lead him to Mommy. Pire warns she could be leading them into an ambush, to which Gnarsh responds "I can take a little girl." Pire goes along with Gnarsh, and they are lead to a sick, petite human woman. She apologizes and says the girl has been doing this. Gnarsh feels pity and carries the woman to the temple of St Cuthbert, where the priests heal her - for another 50 gold piece donation. She thanks him profusely and asks him to stop in when he's in Verbobonc; she'd like to cook for him.

Meanwhile Diren has gotten back to the coffeeshop and has grown bored watching the people go by and Moth scribe spells. Diren and Elmo head over to the temple of Rudd, in order to gamble away some donations to that god. He figures Moth will be safe in a coffeeshop in public, and seems to be right.

That night as they're all heading to meet up again as a party, Diren has his group stop in the Cathedral of Trithereon to make another offering - a gem from the moathouse in offering to Kuroth.

After meeting up, it's decided to head en-masse to a scummy tavern to get info on Nulb. So it's across the river to the Blind Beholder. As we head in there's some question of whether Moth's dog can come in, "If the dog pees on the floor, I'll gut it!" We decide to risk it. It's established the same rule might not apply to Gnarsh due to the difficulty of gutting him.

After ordering a bucket of ale for our table, it comes in a literal bucket and we're all glad of Pire's Purify Food & Drink spell for once, Diren heads up to the bar. He strikes up conversation with some scummy looking travelers, saying we've got business in a city past Nulb and asking how the place is since we'll be passing through. we find out that there are river pirates based in Nulb, some 40 or 50 of them, and their leader is named Tolub. Great place, Nulb - it's a real hole.

Mission accomplished, we head to nicer taverns for drinking and end up at Jylee's Inn for more drink. It turns out they also have good security and will post a guard outside a room for just a gold. While that guard might not fight off any offenders all on his own, his death might buy you some time to prepare for battle. So we stay the night at Jylee's.

The next day we get our horses from the stable and head out of town. Binky has the poor stable boy confused - huge, war trained, ridden by a half-orc, and so nice and friendly. At the bridge on the way out, Diren dumps the last of his silver at Fharlangh's shrine as an offering.

The ride to Hommlet is uneventful except for one attack by a pack of wolves which are quickly dispatched. Though it is then discovered that Binky is scared of wolves, but Gnarsh keeps him under control.

At Hommlet we find 100 gold waiting in reward from the gnome merchant we rescued from the moathouse basement. Very nice. Rufus says that everything is fine in Hommlet, no trouble in the last week. So after a night at the Inn of the Welcome Wench we head to Nulb.

It's a half day's ride with the wagon. Despite fears that the way to the Temple may have been lost it soon becomes clear that one of the few roads in town heads south into the hilly forest terrain and leads to the temple. The crude roadblock is obviously circumvented at times.

We look around the small town of Nulb a bit. On the way in, an old woman hurls a small rock at Moth. He responds by firing a ray of frost over her head and she disappears back behind her rock wall. The town is dirty and ramshackle. The hostel appears to be in slightly better shape, but we're wary of it - especially after the attack in Verbobonc. We'll be setting watches to sleep, no doubt, leading Gnarsh to comment that inns aren't much different than camping in the rough - particularly when you sleep beside the bed as Gnarsh does.

We see the tavern where we've heard the Nulb pirates hang out, but choose to avoid it for now. We do decide to check out the smithy/stable to see if they can make or repair weapons. As the big, bearded smith comes out, Elmo cries out "Otis!" and they embrace. It turns out this is Elmo's missing brother who ended up in Nulb after going off (with some adventurers?) Apparently he couldn't be bothered to walk the half day to Hommlet so his family didn't think he was dead. Though, based on how Nulb looks, it's likely his whole forge would be looted and stolen if he took the full day needed for a round trip.

Otis seems to be OK, and tells us Old Man Morris may have rooms to let if we want to avoid the Hostel. He also agrees to hold our carts for us while we check out the temple. If asked, he'll claim he's repairing it for us, and over charging us too, to make it go better with the locals.

We end the session riding up to the temple. It's a short way off into the woods, maybe less than an hour. Gnarsh rides Binky and Moth is seated behind him as we lack enough mounts. Spit and Elmo each ride a light warhorse. Pire and Diren each ride a normal riding horse. And brave Keg the Mule brings up the rear of the party.

Page last modified on November 28, 2011, at 01:49 PM