Lonesome Wanderings, Session 65

 In which Badger...

• Helps a clan of mountain dwarves return to their ancestral home from giants and gargoyles, and gains another ally in them.
• Attends to pre-wedding events of King Ericall and Princess Christina Marie Alanira.
• Escorts Christina one night for a walk at the King's command, when kidnappers arrive to take her - agents of Thyatis, Alphatia's rival empire.
• Manages to escape with the princess by using his Spare the Dying Waters bracers and grabbing her and running, much to the king's relief.
• Is faced in the dining hall one night - along with King Ericall and the rest of the Lords of his court, by the Black Avengers, a group of knights there to test the king's resolve by challenging 4 of his lords.
• Avoids being one of the 4 lords chosen for the challenge, and watches as the Bear Tribe Shaman, Orik the lazy warrior, Longtooth the Thief, and Max the 1st - all of his rivals - are slain at the cost of only 2 Black Avengers, humiliating the king.
• Offers to give it a shot, only for King Ericall - unable to stand more humiliation - forbid him from challenging the avengers, accepting defeat and retreating to his throne room to wallow.
• Badger, risking the king's wrath, goads the remaining two avengers, much to the shock of the guests, and starts fighting them strategically.
• Guides them to where the ale and wine are stored in the side of the dining hall, and secretly snakes the Rope of Climb upwards to wrap around a bar above.
• Has the rope pull him up quickly and then lights a molotov he had on him, dropping it onto the pile of alcohol below causing a massive explosion as guests flee in terror, and the black avengers are consumed in flame - only to both remain standing, if much weakened, such was their strength.
• Drops down and with some difficulty finally drops the two avengers - officially beating them, but by doing so disobeying the king and causing massive damage to his hall.
• Is stripped of his rank of lord and exiled by the King, and sent from his wedding once the events of the night are determined.
• Is called to the king's chambers secretly, and told that, despite disobeying the king, for putting down the Black Avengers, he will be granted one favor from the King.
• As the wedding goes on, dreams of an oncoming war between Alphatia and Thyatis taking place in Norwald, and hears that some "crones" appeared in a vision in the wedding warning the king of the same.
• Travels north to the reputed lair of the crones, and manages to sneak into their mountain cave.
• Is attacked by the 3 crones, ancient mystic seers, as they each take a magic item - his Broach of Freedom, his Bag of Holding, and his Ring of Spell Turning.
• Surrenders to the crones, who offer him a deal - 5 years as their servant and the magic items they stole, and they will protect him from the oncoming war and give protection to his Keep...he accepts. 
• Serves the crones for 5 years as he sees his Keep and Ericall's lands and armies, tens of thousands strong, plunged into war, a pyrrhic victory for Alphatia over Thyatis, but with Ericall's armies crippled.
• Is released from service in 5 years, returning to his Keep and Kebi, only to discover it has become the defacto palace and capital of King Ericall and his new vassal - Lord Tino, who over the last few years has grown the only army of any note in the land and serves as the real ruler with Ericall as his puppet keeping Alphatia proper off his back.
• Manages to sneak into his Keep with the Rope of Climb and enter into Ericall and Christina's bedchambers, where the now hollowed out king is shocked to find his former vassal still alive.
• Offers to let the King rule as a proper ruler and deal with Tino as well...if on the other side, he holds up his offer of a favor as he formerly note - the desperate king accepts.
• Recruits the dwarven forces to attack Kebi and the Keep, attacking weak points and other known fallacies of the Keep and forcing Tino himself out into the open.
• Reveals himself to Tino, and slays him in one on one combat, as the dwarves take control of the Keep. 
• Gathering information from the locals discreetly, discovers that Tino was a beloved leader who had stabilized the keep and grown Kebi, and that the fact that the former errant and irresponsible lord Badger was back could foment a revolution in the population.
• Decides that, since he lacked interest in ruling anyways, he would hand over the keep as promised to Ericall for him to deal with the mess, taking his favor - to meet the Empress of Alphatia herself, which Ericall gladly arranges, alongside re-ordaining him as a noble Lord.
• Travels by ship to homeland Alphatia, across the seas to the East, where he witnesses the heart of an Empire run on magic.
• Is escorted to the throne room of Empress Eriadna the Wise, and is given an audience, arranged by her son Ericall.
• Requests the Empress to give him access to the Empire's archives and resources for future endeavors - which she rebukes, saying the offer of an audience was gift enough - why should she offer him more, few have even had the opportunity to meet the Empress herself.
• Reveals to her of the dwarven "allies" supporting the king at the moment, and Barbarian "savages" surrounding the king's lands lead by Barkal the Red, and even an old red dragon lairing nearby that, while not guaranteed to win, could be a real thorn in Alphatia's side.
• Is surprised that Eriadna is not angered but amused with a positive reaction by the gall of the man to come into her throne room and directly threaten her, as well as not wanting to deal with the headache that is her son's kingdom any longer after a long and costly war, let's Badger access the archives and do his research in the great archives of Alphatia.
• Badger researches and learns the information he was searching for - about how to start down the paths to immortality!

Current Level: Badger 13

Lonesome Wanderings, Session 64

 In which Badger...

• Travels to the court of King Ericall with levied forces to fight a troupe of levied frost giants (along with other members of the court), only to find out that one independent King Yarrick of Oceansend had negotiated a peace deal with the giants...and made an ally with them in the process.
• Heads to the Ruins of Alinor with the bugbear death squad of 50 bugbears, an ancient dungeon with hidden treasures.
• Hides from some freeing frost giants, and discovers the corpses of others.
• Avoids some giant scorpions munching on a frost giant corpse.
• Finds a bronze golem guarding the entrance to the palace and manages to, using his Rope of Climb and the bugbears, destroy the golem.
• Discovers a large golden dragon guarding the palace, and collapses the palace roof onto the creature burying it. 
• Loots the ruins for 2 large, expensive golden doors and a hefty pile of gold.
• Explores the Dungeon of Kyell, another old dungeon with hidden loot.
• Teams up with the red dragon Old Smokeynose to take out a beholder guarding the loot, and splits the take with the wily red dragon, gaining an ally.
• Flees from various frost giants and trolls in the rest of the dungeon.
• Is chased out of the dungeon itself by the wight of one Kyell, the namesake of the dungeon, fleeing and hiding in the wood.
• Meets up with his bugbear squad in the woods, when he happens upon one barbarian chief Barkal singlehandedly holding his own against a massive earth elemental.
• Directs his troops to help the barbarian, and they manage to bring down the earth elemental.
• Discovers the elemental was conjured by a magic user, tracking them down to discover one Madeira, vizier in the court of King Ericall.
• Learns from her that she was trying to eliminate the barbarians to gain favor in the king's eyes without him knowing.
• Blackmails her to silence and gains a secret ally in the barbarian horde of the woods.
• Returns to his Keep with instructions to start developing the small village of Kebi into a larger town, which will take many seasons.
• Receives invitation of King Ericall to one Christina Marie Alanira from Alphatia, with the wedding to be held over the summer.

Current Level: Badger 12

The Kingmaker's Cairn, Session 5

 In which the party...

• Travels west from Oleg's to stumble into the bandit camp of the bandits who had been harassing Oleg.
• Try to bargain with them, only to completely put their foot in their mouths as they accidentally say too much and reveal they were the ones who'd killed the bandits at Olegs.
• Try to flee only to be corralled in by bandits who pile onto them.
• Sybil the thief, Yslin the ranger, Cannora the elf, and Amiri the barbarian are slain by the cuts of many bandit blades.
• The remaining party attempt to flee again - but run into a dead end of a sheer stony cliff leering down over some rapids.
• Linzi the halfling and Jaethal the elf both fall in combat with the bandits as well, and Ethex takes the Ooze form to try and escape the bandits, which he barely manages falling into the waters below.
• Ethex wakes up on the banks of a river miles from the bandit camp - only to come face to face with a raging wild boar.
• Attempts to flee once more fail, and the boar gores Ethex, who - now out of spells having not rested - falls.
• Thus the party is TPKed.

This session turned south quickly with multiple failed escape attempts and lost initiatives, along with stumbling into an encounter with a large group of bandits (and the lone survivor rolling a particularly brutal encounter with a wild boar). 

After consideration of whether I wanted to reset the session or events, I figured I'd rather be true to the dice and the party be laid to rest here. With my interest being pulled with other new settings and supplements, I'll consider this experiment complete for the moment with the possibility of returning to it in the future.

The Kingmaker's Cairn, Session 4

In which the party...

• Travels past Crooked Falls to one Bokken's hut, and discovers hermit Bokken fighting off some wild thylacines.
• Kills the thylacines and saves Bokken, who lets them rest for a few days. 
• Agree to help Bokken find some Fangberries.
• Travel on to arrive at Oleg's Trading Post, where they meet gruff Oleg and his kind wife, Svetlana.
• Ambush some bandits who come to attack Oleg, but none of them break and reveal where their camp is before they die.
• Travel southwest to explore and discover a radish patch - and some kobolds guarding it.
• Slay the kobolds and take the Radishes back to Oleg to sell. 

Party: Sybil the thief, Yslin the ranger, Cannora the elf, Ethex the magic user, Amiri the barbarian, Linzi the halfling, Jaethal the elf.

Current date: 15 Pharast, Early Spring.

The Kingmaker's Cairn, Session 3

  In which the party...

• Travels to the city of Restov from Lady Jamandi's keep to buy supplies and a wagon with 2 mules to carry their goods on 25 Calistril, the late winter month.
• Heads west along the road from Restov to the southwestern most village of Nikita's crossing.
• Discovers some barrels smashed and contents emptied along a bridge over a small stream.
• Runs into some Thylacines, starving marsupial wild dogs that the party is forced to slay.
• Arrives at Nikita's crossing where Maegar Varn and his party also rest up and set up camp.
• Shares stories with Varn, who buys them that night's meal and invites them to visit his holdings if they manage to survive.
• Overnight, are ambushed by 3 bandits and forced to fight them, with Amiri and Cannora getting infected by their rusty blades during the battle.
• Remain in Nikita's Crossing for 5 days, use up some rations, and work odd jobs to earn enough to get by as the infected heal, as late winter rolls into early spring.
• Set out again to the west along the road in 2 Pharast, aiming to reach Oleg's trading post, with rumors that bandits continue to harass the trader.

Party: Sybil the thief, Yslin the ranger, Cannora the elf, Ethex the magic user, Amiri the barbarian, Linzi the halfling, Jaethal the elf.

The Kingmaker's Cairn, Session 2

 In which the party...

• Explores the western wing of Lady Jamandi's manor.
• Uses Ethex's bandit puppet as a scout before he chokes on smoke and dies to get a layout of the wing.
• Quickly follows Ethex, who uses his spell Ooze Form to lead them safely through the smoke quickly.
• Discover Tartuccio lying presumably dead, and takes him to a restorative shrine they discover, where he wakes and starts seizing before going unconscious, but alive.
• Leave the gnome to rest as they discover Jaethal tied up and gagged by a contingent of bandits.
• Take out the bandits, including the second in command of the bandits and free Jaethal, who joins the party.
• Discover Lady Jamandi facing up again 2 giants and help her fend off more bandits.
• Face down the bandit leader of the "Black Tears" and her minions in combat.
• Nearly lose Linzi, Ethex, and Jaethal in fierce combat against the Black Tears leader's forces before the leader and her minions are finally slain.
• Heal up with numerous healing potions and aid as they accompany Lady Jamandi out of the wing.
• Receive a charter from Lady Jamandi to explore the Stolen Lands, and told to go meet with one Oleg to deal with his own bandit problem.
• Watch 3 other parties - the Iron Wraiths, arrogant warriors; Baron Hannis Drelev and company, a cruel noble; and one Maegar Varn and company, an optimistic knight receive their own seperate charters to explore.
• Discover Tartuccio alive and with the 2 other hostages left from last night, Harrim the dwarf and Valerie the paladin, taking the charter and breaking off from the party to deal with the Stolen lands' problems on their own.
• Set out from Lady Jamandi's manor into the wilds to explore the Stolen Lands.

Party: Sybil the thief, Yslin the ranger, Cannora the elf, Ethex the magic user, Amiri the barbarian, Linzi the halfling, Jaethal the elf.

The Kingmaker's Cairn, Session 1

 In which the party...

• Is invited to a dinner at the hall of one Lady Jamandi for a quest to colonize the wilds.
• Chat up other guests at the dinner, other hopeful adventurers: 
• Sybil the thief slips the rings and valuables off one sorcerer Tartuccio, who waxes tales of his own heroics oblivious with the thief's flattery.
• Yslin the ranger impresses one barbarian Amiri as they bond over hunting and tales of dangerous travails in the wilds.
• Cannora the elf plays her with against another elf Jaethal, as the iterant gambler tests her wit against Jaethal's as they proceed mock the other guests at the party.
• Ethex the magic user endears himself to one halfling Linzi, who finds an intriguing character for her travelogue as he nerds out over various magic spells and books with her by mistakenly assuming her writing relates to magic.
• Head to rest up for the night only to be awakened by the shout of a guest being cut short.
• Realize that bandits are attacking the tower, and set up traps at the entrance of their room - including a bear trap by Yslin and Caltrops by Sybil. 
• Manage to slay 2 bandits with traps, as Ethex takes control of a third with his Command spell.
• Use the controlled bandit to send other bandits in the wrong direction as they make their way through various rooms. 
• Discover gold, gems, healing potions, and even a tanglefoot bag of tar by looting corpses.
• Save hiding halfling Linzi, who is being attacked by a blinded ogre, by entrapping the ogre with the tanglefoot bag before fleeing.
• Run into one giant Jurginder, who takes a hefty bribe of gold, gems, and healing potions to let them through to the great hall.
• Find 3 tied up guests of the dinner - one of whom is Amiri, who they revive with a healing potion and joins the party, leaving the other 2 for the moment.
• Enter the great hall to discover the captain of the guard holding the fort, while Lady Jamandi has gone to the opposite wing to save other guests while it is on fire.

Party: Sybil the thief, Yslin the ranger, Cannora the elf, Ethex the magic user, Amiri the barbarian, Linzi the halfling