AAR (7m) Between two Ferns (2020-08-08@20.30)

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Aegharan
Posts:439
Joined:Sat Oct 14, 2017 2:58 pm
AAR (7m) Between two Ferns (2020-08-08@20.30)

Post by Aegharan » Fri Aug 07, 2020 4:51 pm

LFG: Between two Ferns
Time: 2020-08-08@20.30
GM: Aeggy
Circle: 7
Difficulty: Medium

Rumor: Zivilyn wants to get access to some of the special plants near Irondelve and seeks to achieve this by establishing a trade agreement between Irondelve and Skyreader Islands.
Last edited by Aegharan on Tue Aug 11, 2020 9:27 pm, edited 1 time in total.

sigfriedmcwild
Posts:335
Joined:Wed Nov 13, 2019 6:59 am

Re: LFG (7m) Between two Ferns (2020-08-08@20.30)

Post by sigfriedmcwild » Fri Aug 07, 2020 5:28 pm

Name: Norg
Last played on: 2020-07-30
ECR: 7 (127995lp)
Discipline: Gauntlet 7 / Air Sailor 3
Quote/Unique: Endure, in enduring grow strong
Notable Abilities: PUNCH! JUMP! some awareness, some navigation, some wilderness survival, the worst physician this side of the mountains
Downtime: none

bronzemountain
Posts:606
Joined:Fri Feb 21, 2020 10:02 pm

Re: LFG (7m) Between two Ferns (2020-08-08@20.30)

Post by bronzemountain » Fri Aug 07, 2020 6:41 pm

This is a secondary character. Please prioritize primaries.

Name: Temur Tengerkhan
Circle: 7/4 (ECL 7)
Discipline: Spirit Rider / War Rider
Quote/Unique: "Those are good thoughts for thinking."
Notable Abilities: I ride an imaginary horse. I do the tracking and the survival and sometimes navigation.
Downtime: Wine, women, dancing.
Last Played: 2020-07-21 (High Plains Drifting)

Sharkforce
Posts:527
Joined:Thu Feb 28, 2019 8:39 am

Re: LFG (7m) Between two Ferns (2020-08-08@20.30)

Post by Sharkforce » Sat Aug 08, 2020 12:40 am

Name: Zivilyn
ECR: 7
Last Played: Jul 25
Discipline: Shaman/Wizard/Elementalist 6/5/2
Notable Abilities: Spells, mostly buffs and heals. Good with animals.
Downtime: Downtime: Animal Training (Talent) - Step 17 including karma (Rank 7) (can train up to 7 commands total, or improve non-combat skills by +1 per command used on it)
Research - Step 24 including karma (Rank 5). +3 to the step is available at a cost of 20 sp for access to the Great Library of Throal, if for some reason you need it.
Item History - Step 15 including karma (Rank 4)

LadyDragoon
Posts:143
Joined:Wed May 27, 2020 2:11 am

Re: LFG (7m) Between two Ferns (2020-08-08@20.30)

Post by LadyDragoon » Sat Aug 08, 2020 1:15 am

Name: Azurea M.D. (S.O.A.P)
Circle: ECR 7
Discipline: Shadow 6/Purifier 3
Quote/Unique: I am the soap that cleans the dirt between the toes of the world from the shadows.
Notable Abilities: Shadow blades and SURPRISE!!! Oh wait let me heal you.
Downtime:
Last Played: July 28, 2020

Sharkforce
Posts:527
Joined:Thu Feb 28, 2019 8:39 am

Re: LFG (7m) Between two Ferns (2020-08-08@20.30)

Post by Sharkforce » Sat Aug 08, 2020 7:27 am

Norg, Temur, Azurea, come join me on an adventure tomorrow :)

(I realize there's only 4 signed up and thus everyone who has applied so far is going, just wanted to confirm to those people that they're in, in time for them to make sure they don't plan something else with their time in case half a dozen others sign up out of the blue. and also to be in the habit of just letting people know in advance in general)

(I'm guessing Aegharan is not completely opposed to a 5th adventurer, so if others are still interested, go ahead and apply and you may very well get in; I'm just saying, I'm not going to kick those above to make room).

Reyntrannin
Posts:270
Joined:Mon Apr 23, 2018 3:59 pm

Re: LFG (7m) Between two Ferns (2020-08-08@20.30)

Post by Reyntrannin » Sat Aug 08, 2020 9:07 am

Name: Langren
Last played: 7/21/2020
ECR: 7
Discipline: Circle 6 Shaman / Circle 5 Master of the Hunt / Circle 2 Spirit Rider
Quote/Unique: This land is a wonder, simply waiting for us to embrace its lessons.
Notable Abilities: Support and offensive magics, healing, good with animals, some investigative abilities.
Downtime:
  • Animal Training (20)
  • Research (14), may pay 20 sp for +3 steps due to library access

Aegharan
Posts:439
Joined:Sat Oct 14, 2017 2:58 pm

Re: LFG (7m) Between two Ferns (2020-08-08@20.30)

Post by Aegharan » Sun Aug 09, 2020 1:14 am

Between two Ferns
Time: 2020-08-08@20:30 GMT
GM: Aeggy
Circle: 7
Difficulty: Medium

Player Rewards:
Temur: 3 TIPs, 13,000 Legend, 775 Silver

Journal Rewards:
650 Legend, 193,8 Silver

GM Reward:
Karl: 39,000 Legenbd, 1,000 Silver

Downtime Actions Available:
Temur: Wine, women, dancing.
Zivilyn: Animal Training (Talent) - Rank 7 Step 17
Zivilyn: Research - Rank 5 Step 24. (+3 with Library)
Zivilyn: Item History - Rank 4 Step 15
Langren: Animal Training (Talent) - Step 20
Langren: Research step 14 (+3 with Library)

Further Information:
Return of the Dopplers - Irondelve has Dopplers (again).
Trade between Skyreader Island and Irondelve has been settled.
Thundra Beetles are mean.

Sharkforce
Posts:527
Joined:Thu Feb 28, 2019 8:39 am

Re: LFG (7m) Between two Ferns (2020-08-08@20.30)

Post by Sharkforce » Sun Aug 09, 2020 4:20 am

From the Journal of Zivilyn, Windling Magician: Between two Ferns

It is good to finally have resolved something that I had left unresolved for far too long. Over a year ago, when I was just starting out as an adventurer, I visited Irondelve for the first time. They have the most marvellous materials there; the plants in a grove right where the kaer used to be was infused with metal because a wood spirit was trying to eat the kaer, which had a great deal of true earth in it. It must have in some way reacted with the nearby iron mine that the area was named after, and this created a flexible material that can produce woven products that are both beautiful and strong.

At the time, I had thought that I must secure a steady supply of it for use in making homes and to convert into high quality baskets, wicker furniture, and sundries which could be traded up and down the river and even to Throal after a short cross-country hike to Clear Creek Crossing (or ship it up to Kampung Gajah and send it from there). The difficulty in this is that the materials are quite rough on tools to harvest the metal-infused plants, and as such Irondelve had not created an industry for it yet. I had intended to arrange for it to happen, but so much has gone on this past year, what with Grakor and the re-discovery of the cities of Syrtis and Throal and what seems like a host of horrors showing up all about. At long last, however, I have had both the time and opportunity to get the job done.

For some time, Irondelve has been trying to secure their iron mine again. It is most unfortunate that they have had difficulties with horrors in the benighted place, and then more horrors, and then yet even more horrors with some sort of corrupted liferock full of horror-tainted obsidimen that share their torturous misery with others or some such thing. All this was only discovered after several expeditions, most of which I was not present for, but the upshot of it is that Irondelve needed a new source of paying jobs, badly, and Skyreader Island needs those plants (they just didn't know it yet).

Of course, nothing worthwhile is ever easy, and I expected there was some persuading to be done, and probably favours to be paid to seal the deal. As I was in Throal on business anyways, further opportunity struck; I came across Norg and Temur, and they mentioned that their friend Azurea (the one who really likes baths) had recently moved to Irondelve to set up a bath service much like the one down in Lake Ban, and was in Throal on business as well. I paid a visit to Langren as well, to exchange knowledge once more, and he was interested in joining our little expedition as well, with Howler and his new stone lion companion Lucien rounding out the group.

It pays to have friends in high places, and Norg has friends with an airship, which is about as high a place as you can get. We were able to catch a ride down towards Skyreader Island with the Aeronaut Club on the Arngeir, and the fine people of the club threw Norg a surprise Naming Day party! We enjoyed some good feasting, with cake and everything, and it goes without saying that we were not the most sober group when we got off the airship. We had the presence of mind to at least wait until morning before presenting our case to Kananaea. Come morning, we were a little more well-prepared for courteous discussion. I must have still been a little bit foggy, because I forgot that I have a spell to help me present my thoughts in a logical and persuasive manner in my Grimoire, but thankfully between the community knowing of myself, and the presence of Azurea to help persuade the folks in Irondelve, we were just barely convincing enough to win approval from the settlement... in exchange for a favour, of course. Always favours.

Well, we signed up for an adventure anyways, so off we went; some ranchers on the east side of the river (well, east of the Island, anyways; it's actually east, north, and west of the river all at once because it's within one of the bends) had been having trouble with cattle being eaten by something. They were a little cagey on exactly *what* that something was. Still, as a group of Journeyman Adepts, we felt up to the task. I mean, it's not like something was ritually slaughtering the beasts and attaching parts of them to Namegiver bodies, or creating undead cattle, or anything like that. It really didn't sound that bad.

Well, it wasn't as bad as Horrors, but it wasn't that great, either. We were doing our best to track down the source of the trouble when Azurea noticed something up ahead: a small group of very large beetles. It's hard to make an exact comparison since I don't spend a lot of time around thundra beasts, but I presume they were about the size of thundra beasts because they were thundra beetles, and not much else about them really suggests "thundra" to me (unless thundra are supposed to have wings, gigantic mandibles, and six really thin legs). So yeah, really big. Also extremely annoying. They were able to use their wings to blast powerful gusts of wind at us, which did a number on the local vegetation, and also led to us spending almost as much time rolling around on the ground as we did fighting. They also liked to throw people around. Norg especially hated them, as his usual technique of waiting for the right moment to land a devastating blow didn't seem to work as well on creatures that would send him flying just before he was ready, and Temur got yanked off of Tulaani Egch a couple of times, which made it hard for him to apply his usual hit-and-run tactics. Maaya, Langren's riding huttawa, took a nasty bite that halfway killed her! It was rougher than expected, but thankfully not beyond our capabilities. Also, on a related note, I learned a lot of Trollish swearing during that fight. I'm not certain what the words meant, but I'm pretty sure if I said them to a Troll I could get my teeth taken out for free, without even needing to see a dentist.

In any event, we took care of them, and the threat to the cattle (and ranchers) had been dealt with, so that was one settlement down, one to go. Now, I should note at this point that I had made the assumption that Irondelve would be unlikely to have difficulties with Horrors at this point. I mean, they've had multiple recent expeditions to clear out the accursed things, right? Surely they couldn't be having problems with *more* of them that nobody even knew about... could they? Well, it turns out that assumption was poorly made. We arrived in Irondelve, much more sober than we had arrived at Skyreader Island. This time I remembered to put on a Bedazzling Display of Logical Analysis, and was much more convincing. And, as expected, they would arrange for the trade deal to be made in exchange for a favour (you'd think that providing them a source of income would already be a favour, but it turns out that is not the case). They had been sending expeditions out into the area around the settlement, some of which had not returned, and they wanted us to investigate.

Thankfully, we had some skilled trackers with us. Less fortunately, Howler must've gotten distracted by rabbits or something, because he wasn't one of them... but thankfully Langren stepped up and pointed us in the right direction. Or, depending on how you look at it, the wrong direction, because we walked right into the middle of a pride of stone lions. Now, stone lions are not the *worst* thing to fight; they don't paralyze you, or grapple you, or curse you, or poison you. Pretty much the big worry is avoiding an ambush, otherwise they can really do a number on you. Well, we didn't get ambushed, but they were close enough to jump right on top of us, which I would have preferred to have had some time to prepare for.

Everything was going fairly well (they were having a harder time hitting us than the thundra beetles with their annoying wind blasts); Langren had provided us with Ferret Reflexes and I had enhanced our Ferocity, up until one of the lions just tore into poor howler. Before he could get away, the beast had severely wounded him, and I wasn't sure for a moment if he was dead or not! Azurea managed to put a few good daggers into his back side, and I seem to have lost my temper quite badly, as I only vaguely recall charging the lion with my dagger before I came to my senses and went to see that Howler was alright. I woke him up as gently as I could and sent him home; with Quicken Pace, I knew he could outrun most anything, and he was in no shape to keep on fighting after that.

When I looked around again, the others were shouting about traitors, and I could see that two people who were with the scouting party that Irondelve had sent with us were attacking my friends! I believe their names were Ukran and Randroch, a Human Swordmaster and a Troll Beastmaster, respectively, and there were also a couple of metallic stone lions attacking (this was the first time I had seen such creatures, though I had heard stories of metal-infused beasts in the region before). I quickly got back into the fight, granting Azurea tremendous size and strength to strike down these new foes, and after a bit more fighting we were able to put an end to the two who had turned on us. Their companions didn't seem to know anything about what was going on, and when we examined their corpses, we found a weird stinger on their body, below their arms.

Temur says he's heard of these before, they're some sort of horror that disguises themselves as Namegivers that they have captured or something. That does sound vaguely familiar, and I shall make a point of researching them so that I can better protect Skyreader Island, especially now that there's a trade route between our two communities. Perhaps we shall modify our greeting rituals accordingly; I imagine Irondelve will want to, considering they have no way of knowing how many of their people who disappeared may have been replaced by these Horrors.

I just hope this doesn't become the next Grakor.

sigfriedmcwild
Posts:335
Joined:Wed Nov 13, 2019 6:59 am

Re: AAR (7m) Between two Ferns (2020-08-08@20.30)

Post by sigfriedmcwild » Sat Aug 15, 2020 7:10 am

From "The Skies of Barsaive", as penned by Norg, Brother of Earth and Sky, Corsair of Throal

Zivilyn asked for assistance in his new endeavour: set up a trade route between Irondelve and Skyreader Island. Had a long spiel about access to materials, something about weaving houses, and more but I will admit I tuned most of it out and went along because I was itching to deal with something I could punch instead of the spirit nonsense, as Dvarim would put it, that I had encountered in Trayckid.

I you are wondering why I would go along with a trade mission when I wanted to punch things, you should know the answer by now, oh reader of my journal: Crystal Raider diplomacy is always an option and all too frequently the only option.

Zivilyn had also conned Azurea, Langren, and Temur into this trip. Temur has a new ghost horse he calls Tulaany Egch and unlike his previous one this one talks. Directly into your head. I would like to say that was disconcerting, but sadly it is not the first time or the most unexpected.

As we were leaving Throal, we saw the Arngeir moored and Helga calling us over, the Aeronaut Club was throwing me a surprise name day party! I was so happy someone remembered, sixteen years old is an important point in the life of any troll. The carousing went on for the whole flight from Throal to Skyreader, there was much singing and drinking, boasting and eating. I made sure to consume as many honey rolls as I could to make it an appropriately sweet sixteen, and since I neither Sandrin nor Icarus were present I was pretty much the ranking Air Sailor on the ship and got to hold the helm for a few hours.

Once we arrived to Skyreader we were still sober enough to realise we should not seek out the elders in our condition, which arguably means we had not partied hard enough. What can I say, it is hard to fit enough mead on for a proper party for the whole crew on a drakkar. The next morning we were considerably more sober and most of the food stains had been cleaned from our gear, so Zivilyn took us to an acquaintance of his, Kananaea, who holds some authority in the village.

Skyreader Island hosts both t'skrang and windlings, a good thing, I came to realise once we reached the windling section, as everything looked tiny and fragile. I spent most of the time there feeling like the proverbial dyre in the alchemy lab, worried I would step on someone's house or worse. Kananaea seemed hesitant to commit resources to a trade mission, but agreed to do so if we helped with some vermin the local farmers were having issues with.

The vermin turned out to be dire wolf sized beetles with wings strong enough to knock down a troll with their wind. The fight dragged on for an irritatingly long time as the beetles kept throwing us off our feet and then skittering away. Can someone the size of a dire wolf even skitter I see you asking? Turns out they can, looking far too smug for an overgrown arthropod. The others ended up getting beaten up quite a bit, but the Rune-Carved Citadel did its duty as always.

We made our way back to Skyreader with the news of our deed and Kananaea honored their word. The next day we set off escorting a small caravan toward Irondelve, where we arrived a few days later. Once again the leaders seemed dubious even after Zivilyn broke out the thesaurus and spent twenty minutes extolling the virtues of additional trade. Meanwhile I had a look at Azurea's bath house, which is most impressive.

Eventually the leaders of Irondelve gave in, probably just so Zivilyn would shut up and agreed if we did them a favour: several of the settlers had disappeared in the jungle and we had to figure out what happened to them. Thankfully Langren is a skilled tracker and so we did not just wnader blindly in the Sevros. No we wandered the Sevros with direction and conviction!

A few people from Irondelve joined us on the journey, which was helpful when we stumbled on a pride of Stone Lions. Howler, poor puppy, got horrifically mauled, which sent Zivilyn into a rage and he started trying to kill a lion with his dagger. A sight that would have been comical if I had not been worried about both of them ending up as Stone Lion food. As we were about done with the lions, two more jumped out of the vegetation showing clear signs of metal infusion. Just a we started trying to deal with this new threat, two of the adepts that had joined us from Irondelve turned on us which was the last mistake they would ever make, my fists ensured that.

The real troubling part though was that they seemed to have some unnatural powers, and once we examined the corpses they both had a 2ft stinger growing out of their body. Temur recognized this as some kind of horror spawn, that reproduces by killing namegivers and injecting the corpses with their stinger, so that the corpse comes back to life as one of them.

Needless to say we "politely" asked the other two settlers to demonstrate a lack of stingers at their earliest convenience, by which we mean right then and there, we do not care you are in the middle a jungle full of horrible insects, snakes, and worse. Wisely they complied and demonstrated that they had in fact no attachments a namegiver should not have, so we made our way back to Irondelve to deliver the grave news.

The settlers seemed to take our warnings seriously, and I hope we managed to contain the problem before it got out of hand. I would hate to have to destroy something Azurea holds dear.

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