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[Nihal]

That's it. After botching a number of new spellcasting rolls and getting a 20 in a silly DEX check I've came to the conclusion that Mauve's true calling is becoming a ninja!

 

[Legendary Sidekick]

And Baldy rolled her 4th consecutive successful INT after all of Nissa's WIS fails (which are suddenly awesome).

Also, I edited my Baldy post to keep Nissa moving. I saw SP posted after I posted Baldy's useless INT check, so I edited Nissa's intent, which is to get a better look. I couldn't have her hear *clink-clank* and fly away. I thought it might be too "Whaaaaah! Scary noise! Run away!" for a fearless half-halfling who died castrating an orc. Not that I'll have her take on 15 lizards without calling for help, but at least I think she should attempt to find more useful info from scouting.

@SP, if there's no one to talk to or bomb with fire, Nissa will fly out with whatever info she has. She won't explore other rooms without the party.

 

[Nihal]

It might be the class change! Monks are wiser and presumably more intelligent than barbarians. Technically speaking, anyone should be more intelligent than barbarians.

 

[SeverinR]

Does lvl get added on to ability checks? Aliron is L3, so +3 to checks? If so I barely missed my trap check.

Barbarians think with their muscles, monks think with their mind. It could be a simple change of thought process, rather then ability change. Chop slice, hack versus thinking it through to its final reasonable conclusion.

I think we should assign duties for watching the youth and inexperienced.

I think in situations requiring stealth, Bressel should remain back and Monks charge ahead.
Charging into battle, I believe the armored should take the lead and Masama stay back, maybe even have Aliron stay back with the group shooting arrows, but later moving in when he can do so unnoticed. Charging head long into battle isn't something he looks forward too. Unfortunately, Aliron is usually in the lead or flanking the leader, so maybe a tactical retreat to where they are?

I think Roderick shouldn't stay back all the time. I have battle experience, he needs to get in the thick of it.

 

[Steerpike]

Yes, you would add your level to that check. Also, just for the sake of clarity let me point out that the entrance to the underground structure is quite a long way from where Bressel and Roderick are waiting, and are not in visual distance of one another. The group with the kids never moved past the first hill, and once the get around that hill they get to the farm, and beyond the farm is a second hill where the opening is. I'll reset that in my next post, because it looks like people think the two groups are close together, or relatively so.

 

[Legendary Sidekick]

Does lvl get added on to ability checks? Aliron is L3, so +3 to checks? If so I barely missed my trap check.

Barbarians think with their muscles, monks think with their mind. It could be a simple change of thought process, rather then ability change. Chop slice, hack versus thinking it through to its final reasonable conclusion.

I think we should assign duties for watching the youth and inexperienced.

I think in situations requiring stealth, Bressel should remain back and Monks charge ahead.
Charging into battle, I believe the armored should take the lead and Masama stay back, maybe even have Aliron stay back with the group shooting arrows, but later moving in when he can do so unnoticed. Charging head long into battle isn't something he looks forward too. Unfortunately, Aliron is usually in the lead or flanking the leader, so maybe a tactical retreat to where they are?

I think Roderick shouldn't stay back all the time. I have battle experience, he needs to get in the thick of it.

My characters would generally agree with this. The only reason they have a problem with going in the caves is that the battle would be over before Nissa can even get close enough for the other characters to see her.

@SP, Can we have a rough amount of time it would take for one group to travel to the other?

 

[Steerpike]

Yes, in terms of rounds you're looking at probably twenty rounds each direction at the best speed the party members can make. You're basically running a 4-minute mile at that point. Branwen can't go nearly that fast, so someone would have to fall back with her.

I'll try to include more explicit distances in these posts. I usually try to describe it more organically, but I can see where that leads to some confusion. Bressel and Roderick are about half a mile from where Aliron and Ankari are heading into the mountain, and around the other side of a hill. Between that, the tree cover, and the fact that the opening into the mountain is inside a ring of huge stones and other debris, if you get even a little way from the top of the hill there's no way you can see what is going on up there. Nissa could if she's flying high enough, but that makes for longer flying time, and even she won't be able to see the opening or what is going on there by the time she gets above Bressel.

When we're not keeping track of time in rounds, I hand-wave things a bit just so we don't have five posts in a row of "Baldhart and her group are still running," which is why you guys caught up to Aliron and Ankari quickly. I made the assumption that Ankari and Aliron were waiting for however long it took you guys to reach them and just jumped ahead. But I can see now that this caused confusion in that people thought they could get there faster than they could. If you go back to the original post, you'll see the first smoke was coming distantly from the other side of a hill, and then the trail led from a farm up a second hill on the other side of the farm. No one in the group with the kids ever went beyond the first hill to the burned out farm, so they're quite a ways back. In my own mind, it was probably more like a couple of miles, but I'm going to just say it's about half a mile away since my description led to the misunderstanding, and two miles each way would take forever.

I'll clarify in my post, but since we're doing things now that take place in terms of rounds, like checking traps, lets assume Nissa is still on her way to Bressel and the others. She's looked back and seen Aliron and Ankari heading in, and she's not yet out of sight of them, but she's got a ways to go. It's not going to be twenty rounds or anywhere near it, if we can assume the others are waiting for her to return. If the group on the hill is going to wait, we can kind of wave hands and say Nissa gets to the others, tells them what is going on, and leads them back to the hill.

If the enemies are engaged, however, we have to drop into actual rounds and everyone should be aware that the portion of the group with the kids are a long ways off.

If anyone has questions, post here. When the group splits in the future, I'll try to give explicit distances where I can.

 

[Steerpike]

A post will be up in a moment, which should clarify things

 

[Legendary Sidekick]

I'd rather we don't split the party that much. It leaves too many characters out of battle, which is no fun for the players that can't possibly reach the battle.

Now that I'm clear on that… well, I'll wait for the GM post.

 

[Steerpike]

I'd rather we don't split the party that much. It leaves too many characters out of battle, which is no fun for the players that can't possibly reach the battle.

Now that I'm clear on that… well, I'll wait for the GM post.

Yeah. I'll try to warn you guys in the future if it looks like the party is being split by a good distance and the group doesn't seem to realize it. I assumed everyone realized they were pretty far apart until this last rounds of posts showed I'd made a mistake). In any event, I'll take some short cuts to get people around faster. Just FYI to everyone, I've also got PMs going, so I don't want to overrun any of that activity

 

[Nihal]

I'm waiting to see what people will do now the distance is clear. Maybe Mauve will just watch people getting their asses whooped, that will teach them!

 

[Legendary Sidekick]

Break's over. Assume Nissa's on the move until Bressel can see her.

It was nice out, so I spent most of my break outdoors, hence the hasty lunch break post. Considering it would take a very long time for the party to catch up, the only way I could justify Baldy entering at all was for her to see why Alin (who she assumes is among the least suicidal in the party) would follow Ankari. I don't think she'd have reason to stay, since her presence is likely to alert the enemy…

But to make sure my own post is clear: I'm assuming Baldy just crawled in a few feet, confirmed the glow rock works and heard Alin's thoughts about staying in stealth mode.

 

[Keitsumah]

I just got my laptop for college!!! its a purrrrty silver mac 12

 

[Legendary Sidekick]

Hope it's okay I played along with Nihal's liberties. I assume "and co." means Masama and Batos, which makes sense.

Baldhart would try to get Masama and Batos to follow her out. If need be, she'd whisper she's trusting the elves will both listen as Alin said.

@Keit, congrats on the new Mac!

 

[Ireth]

Arg. Someone have a TL;DR version of recent events so I can catch up quickly? D= That's a lot of text to scroll through.

 

[Legendary Sidekick]

There's a hole full of lizards. Lizards is about to die! Shut up, Gauntlet guy.

But he's right, y'know. Those lizards are breaking a dwarf statue. Oh, and they killed a woman two boys (Brion's age!) and maybe five other people, unless they survive being in an icy cave all night, in which case we might save some lives in addition to ending some.

Right now we have half the group near the tunnel, with Ankari and Alin inside. The other half may or may not arrive in time for battle, depending whether Ankari's actions trigger turn-based combat.

 

[Nihal]

You all charged and left the children behind with Dalla, Roderick and Bressel (and presumably Mauve). Nissa went to get them now, I think.

Top of the hill where this tunnel sits description:

Ultimately, Ankari and Aliron find themselves just short of the crown of the hill. There is some structure there, large, standing stones, most of which have been long since toppled, weathered by wind, and cracked by ice. But there is still the vague sense of a perimeter, as though these stones are remnants of some structure that once stood here. Two particularly large pieces form a triangular opening onto the top of the hill, and may once have been part of an arch.

The stones, in combination with trees that grow in and around them, prevent any view of what lays beyond, at the top of the hill. It is clear, however, that the trail Ankari and Aliron have been following leads through the small, triangular opening in the stones.

Tunnel description:

Mauve, from her vantage point, sees Nissa head into the opening in the mountain, and also see Baldhart creep up to the opening to watch what is going on with Nissa. Mauve remains unseen.

Nissa flies down far enough to be able to see into the room beyond the stairs, and notes that there is some light source from within the depths, though it is dim. She sees a large room, rectangular in shape - or at least what she can see of it. It is a good one-hundred feet from side to side, with smaller corridors heading off to the left and right. Nissa can't see the far end of the room. The stone of the walls are carved, and Nissa has seen enough to recognize dwarf work when she sees it.

Dead center, ahead of Nissa, are the remains of a statute stretching more than halfway up the ceiling, which looks to be just a bit under twenty feet high. All that remains of the statute is one stout leg and a thick arm raising a hammer. It isn't hard to see that this is also dwarf work.

Scurry around the base of the statute are eight lizard-like creatures, each falling somewhere between three and four feet in height. Half of them are hacking away at the statute with small picks just the right size for their diminutive bodies. The other half are grabbing bits of stone as the statue is hacked apart and carrying them away down the corridor to the right. After a moment, the stone-carrying creature (or one looking just like it) re-emerges from the right to grab another stone.

The creatures are not speaking to one another. It is too dark to make out any coloration, though their scales look dark. Piled along the wall on the left side of the room Nissa sees dirt, rock, and other debris, including ice, which hasn't melted because the room is quite cold.

 

[Ireth]

Woo, fun stuff. I'm still posting in Act III with Cadell and Biorn, so my actions in Act IV might change depending on what happens with them -- mainly whether Biorn ends up going with Cadell or not. (If he does, Liadan will insist on Biorn riding with Cadell while she goes on foot. Less of a weight for Llucheden to bear, and it'll be faster.

 

[Legendary Sidekick]

Since my character brought him up, I want to say how relieved I am that Ghendra didn't join the party.

I didn't have a problem with that out-of-character… until approximately 8:10 this A.M., when I saw THIS. After seeing that artwork, no gnoll avatar drawn by my hand could ever be good enough.

 

[SeverinR]

love that pick.

So where is everyone?
Aliron and Ankari are in the hole, Baldhart and Massama have joined them?

We know Bressel and Roderick are with Della, Burnbright and Branwen.

Edited per Mauve:
Mauve is on the hill near the hole(not hiding).

I think it is important to know where the rest of the party is really soon, before we fight, and it would seem the fight isn't too far away.
I believe Aliron has cleared the path to the stairs of traps(or at least tried to check for them)