MorsCerta, HoraIncerta
Summary
Adventure: MorsCerta HoraIncerta
GM: ChrisC
Season: Spring 823 wk
Night: Monday
Level: High
Place: Chez Martin?
- Party
- Everan - Scholar Macabre - Dean MilSci
- Rahne - Enchantress of the Stars - Stephen Scribe PL
- Serendipity - Lady Dark - Lisa
- Mortimer - Renaissance Scholar - Martin
- Cher - Blade Dancer - Sean
- ? - Michelle?
Party is full
- Employer
- The Unified Western Church
- Mission
- An emissary from the Unified Western Church has come to the guild. A threat to the realms has arisen and a capable party is sought to deal with a sensitive matter and is requested to attend Tomas Xerxes, the Archbishop of Mordeaux for a briefing.
He will be in the village of Dell Aristeas (in the See of Montpon-Ménestérol - Mordeaux) in a weeks’ time on the 8th of Thaw and would like to discuss the matter with the party there. The party is also asked to guard some church artifacts being taken (by boat) to the new port of Chestyr in the Viscounty of Nouveau Zumalar (Aladar) on the good ship Mare Ditat.
- Pay
- Usual Loot, salvage and the occasional pie!
Scribe Notes
Sailing to Chestyr
- Duesday 1st Thaw
We seem to have drawn a junior guild security agent as he seems nervous and gives us his name, Artemis. Cher sends him for the wine he forgot to have laid out. Then we get into the usual introductions.
Alesandro Deborgia (middle aged human, former soldier, now a scholar/administrator), emissary of the Arch Bishop who will be available to meet us in a week's time. They'd like us to scout Jurgenmark. Scouts have been in up to 15 miles, seven of the 23 scouts returned. Plague started in NW of the realm, mostly killed people with magical skill. Population before the plague was 400,000. Approx. 15,000 square miles. Borders Drakenburg, Aquila, Dragonspine Mountains.
They initially want us to escort a ship with 40 tonnes of blessed stone and funds for constructing a church in Chestyr.
Alesandro is authorised to engage us with a retainer of 10,000sp each to escort the ship and meet with the Arch Bishop. He also blesses us - -1 on dice rolls stacking with Lesser to -2.
The usual rituals and shopping for healing potions.
- W'ansday 2nd Thaw
We fly down to the docks to join the ship to set sail after dawn. We are met by Captain Roderigo de Mare & Chartered Water Mage Zigmund Nordburg. Holy stone in the hold counts as consecrated ground, strong room in the bow for the chests of funds.
We set sail out into the bay.
- Th'rsday 3rd Thaw
Sailing north about 160 miles.
- Frysday 4th Thaw
Sailing north about 180 miles.
- Reapsday 5th Thaw
Sailing about 90 miles north into Chestyr about midday.
Dark Circle Ambush in Ormond
The shiny new port of Chestyr is so new it is still clean. Mortimer and I head up to the cathedral construction site to expedite receipt of the goods, Brother Ortho returns with us and accepts the delivery. Lunch at the dockside tavern, Golden Anchor. We then check into the Golden Ruby Inn for the night, Innkeeper Bryan Maynard.
- Sunday 6th Thaw
Midmorning departure after a leisurely start, we walk out of town then take flight SE towards Ranke and then to Dell Aristeas in Mordeaux.
The only accommodation in town is the Holy Sheaf Inn, Innkeeper Ivan, we settle in.
The Chapterhouse up the road is the Order of the Sanctity of Knowledge. They have a library available to 'qualified' scholars, access from 11am to 3pm for 1sp per day.
- Moonday 7th Thaw
Reading, training, passing time.
- Duesday 8th Thaw
Early afternoon while waiting for the Bish, we see a house on fire (The Schimmelpennick Estate) and we fly to help, on route we see that tThe Archbishop and his squad is also going to help with the fire.
There are undead lurking and this fire has clearly been intentionally set to attract the Archbishop into an ambush, just across the border from Mordeaux and its defences.
- These are equivalent to Dark Circle Enhanced undead. They attack the Bishop's carriage and men with 6 rank 8 TK Rage Grenados; drain adjacent entities FT & EN, have rat cloaks to ablate damage, and a portable 'Dark Circle' rock. A Skeletal Lord, 2 Skeletal Knights, and over a dozen lesser undead.
Damage enhanced Black Lightning & Hellfire wreak mayhem; the Dark Circle rock sundered by the Sword of Solomon; a safe stone (dust & sand) walled coral for the rescued children, a bone ladder descending to it from the upper floors; flying and smashing through the upstairs window to rescue the residents. Melee battles: Cher vs the Skeletal Lord, Rahne vs one Skeletal Knight in the burning building and Arch Bishop Xerxes and his remaining men vs the other Skeletal Knight. The big 3 explode in shards of lethal bone when their rat cloaks are burned through and they are finally put down.
Everan's interrogation reveals they were sent by Loras from Jurgenmark who sent them and 6 other teams to kill various military and political targets across the Western Kingdom.
They are allied with Murkul death cults, one chapter of which is based in Ormond and their living cultists participated in this attempt on the archbishop.
Skeletal Lord's evil dark sword is associated with Murkul, a Death God.
The butchers bill is large but the party save 8 adults and 12 children from the burning house.
Debriefing with Xerxes
Useful undead loot:
- 6 rank 8 TK Rage Skulls, 80%
- 6 Greek Fire Grenadoes
The targets of the undead hit squads are:
- Bernhard, Lord High Marshall of the WK - Killed
- Gerhard Schneider, Admiral of WK - Survived
- AB of Mordeaux - Survived
- Bertram de ?, Constable of Schiefield, fort on the border of Jurgenmark - Survived
- Jann ?, Constable of ?, fort on the border of Jurgenmark - Killed
- Charlemagne Martel, Major General of the WK - Survived
- Katerina, Governor of Innesburg - Killed, Innesburg is on fire.
- Duke Baltman of Aladar - Killed
We fly one of the Bishop's guards to the chapterhouse to send messages warning the other targets.
The Gold & Mithril Darksword is Sentient, +SC, + damage, cumulative dice modifier in combat, curses non-evil wielders. We destroy it with a Dark Sphere, the resultant explosion is about 200' radius and levels the remains of the building.
We then use the Dark Sphere to destroy the remains of the Dark Circle stone.
From the remains of the Bishop's carriage, Everan rescues:
- a sceptre of seeking witches, paralyses them, makes them flammable, ignites them.
- a Black Diamond of Consumption - Dark Sphere bead
- a Red Ruby of Life - 3 resurrections (also affects undead)
- an Emerald of Growth - miracles of restoring terrain, 10 charges of rank 20.
- a grenado (Light Sphere)
- a pouch of teleportation dust, 6 charges, one per entity, travel up to (PC x 20 miles)
- 4 books (Demons vs Denizens, Ascending vs Descending, Book of Horrors, The 71)
We fly the Bishop and his knights back to the chapterhouse.
- W'ansday 9th Thaw
We meet with the convalescent bishop in his chambers & brother Adolphus his deaf/mute attendant, returning his things from the carriage. He gives back the pouch, loans us the books for a season.
He wishes to employ us to scout Jurgenmark, checking in on church properties (chapels, monasteries, churches), assess the undead military capability. His Seers had visions of a dark rain falling on the land and pooling. Many of them died or were possessed in attempting to scry the area.
He gives us:
- 5 x Amulets of Jasper - resistance
- 5 x Amulets of Lifeforce cloaking - makes us a bit harder to detect by undead
- An enchanted Writ of Authority
- The Emerald & Ruby
- 50 x Holy Water Grenados (megahex)
Payment is 20,000sp each in coin or knowledge.
3 weeks ago, a hidden cellar in Novalar was accidentally found containing the bodies of 40 knights who have been dead for 5 years and have also been seen around the WK in that time. We are given their names and heraldry, a general order to detain them has been issued. The 40 were crusading together around the time they died.
We leave just after lunch.
The Amber Room
We fly north-west across the water, over Aladar for a while, camping by a lake in Aquila.
- Th'rsday 10th Thaw
Fly on, landing and walking the last mile to Shifield Castle.
We're met by Simiam, son of Bertrand who escorts us in to meet with his father.
As requested by the Bishop, we meet at a local tavern (The Red Apple) with Zawysza, a scout. He and his children are some of those who scouted the area and returned, they went in through the high mountain passes in the east. They seem to have a family affinity for stealth.
He tells us of the network of mountain towers, every few miles at the edge of the mountains:
- The blackened ruin of Tower of St Columba, Saint of Books & Poetry, supposed to have a big library.
- Mezerkim's Tower
- Ghost Tower
- Charlotemburg Tower. 60' tall, white stone. Created by 'Xandor'.
Radu was a town of about 7,000 people before the infestation.
We fly south from the castle, loop around a bit, camp and rest until a few hours after sunset then fly into the mountains as a constellation of stars.
Carefully approach the nearest tower, Charlotemburg, area near it is magically protected from death/undead (forgetfulness & repulsion). Entity mages need to resist to enter. 4 floors above ground. Stairs descend through caves down about 500' to a cavern with natural hot springs with transformative healing properties. A room made of amber, eternally burning chandelier - a healing room. Stops aging, entropy, decay. Cures madness, bleeding. Nobody in the tower can be located.
The Cloister of St Columbo
- Frysday 11th Thaw
We fly north about 3 miles to the next closest tower, a smaller one. Erdkelley Tower We pass into a life detection area about 900' out from the tower, go to ground approach slower and detect them back: 3 Greater Skeletons, 30 Zombies. 3 levels below the tower. 13 ravens fly up from the tower and start circling. Everan senses the effects of a Dark Circle stone when we're close.
Staying invisible & hidden we fly on to the next tower, about 3 miles west. St Columba Tower, ruined tower and out buildings on a high mountain ledge. Burned out about 9 years ago, looks like it burned out from the inside, possible magically started.
We scout around a bit, cellars under a couple of the out buildings have hollow spaces, the mountainside behind it is protected from scrying and has a magical door and window. Wards and protections vs 'evil' (undead/demonic). We open the doors from the inside using the key that is there.
Extensive and magically protected/preserved library in multiple rooms, large dining hall, indoor atrium, thermal pools. 5 (long-lived) Human monks wearing robes with ancient Elven runes (order, patterns, pathways) - St Columba's Order of Preservation of Knowledge. Library golems copying tomes, dusting. Some monks are permanent residents, others work shifts (7 years on, 7 off).
- Ignaceous
- Symon, stooped, bald, 6' tall.
- Byron
- Brian
- Zelda
Jurgenmark region is now controlled by a circle of 13 unscrupulous mages:
- Loras the Necro
- Eris, Earth/Land mage
- Samos, Shaper. May be resident near Nodvest, in the north-west corner of Jurgenmark.
- A Rune/Portal Mage?
Jurgenmark has a thin border to the lands of the dead, has many tombs/reliquaries/prisons/middens. Simon believes it was just a matter of time until something like this infestation happened.
Ancient ruins under some of the lakes.
Black stones at the corners and around the boundaries of Jurgenmark - Dark Circle Stones. Hidden under towers.
'Safe' preserves/farms for the living to replenish the undead ranks and power evil rituals.
We should be wary of the Order of the Cannons Regular of Prymontre - The Prymons. Arrived in the area about 808wk, acquired land in the NW, were helping with the 'civil works'.
Raiding Tower 51
St Columba Tower only has the one way in (that they admit to) but it does have two alternate exits:
- A large Mechanician 'Canon' that can fire people 30 miles east before they start to fall. Most survive the launch.
- An underground river, about 40 miles underground before exiting. Averages 3' clearance above the surface.
We invisibly sneak out the front door after dark, set up a long door in the ruined buildings.
Then fly the long way around the outside to the south-west corner of Jurgenmark avoiding a Black Dragon and exchanging greetings with Captain Ferrous of the Ion Queen, a patrolling Beltan ship.
We prepare a Darkwall in an abandoned cavern-dwelling a few miles from our target.
An hour before dawn, we approach a tower occupied by undead, ravens on the roof, wolves in burrows outside, 3 Greater Skeletons, 20 Zombies in a circle in the basement, blood magic powered crystal bell-cauldron with fetuses floating in acid. We kill the ravens to stop them sending messages, kill the skeletons and zombies, then smash up the cauldron magic.
While Everan fortifies the tower, we start divining the Dark Circle Stone:
- AKA Masada Stone. Shaper made, diminishes sunlight.
40 minutes later, the rapid response team arrives: 2 Lords, 1 Knight, 3 Greater Skeletons, 12 Skeletons
Under Siege
They start trying to break through the warped and barricaded trapdoor, we start fortifying in the basement, setting up to protect Cher for the last 20 minutes of her Divination.
We almost make it 1 minute then Tunneling spells break through at ground and basement levels. Seren's Elemental plays murder in the dark at ground level, slowing their entrance; Everan blocks the basement tunnel with bones; 4 TK Rage grenados are tossed down the tunnel but we're expecting this and their troops take a lot more damage than we do.
We get eyes on the outside and see there are now more of them:
- A bat swarm overhead
- 2 squads of 3 linked human mages surrounded by 6 unusual mummies that they band damage to.
- A nightmare drawn carriage with a vampire on a skull thrown on top and over time it disgorges skeletal knights, lords, 4 Spectres, and a human woman (E&E) with lots of bling.
We give up on the Divination and interrupt Cher so she can join the fight.
They lose two Greater Skeletons trying to explode Everan's blockade in the tunnel. We ablate the mummies away from the mages, the mages start a concert-cast earth tremor which starts collapsing the tower above us, the Spectres fade underground to approach us. We fight on but Mortimer is sure the bone constructions won't hold off the collapsing tower much longer, we start our evacuation out through Seren's Dark Portal, making it out as the Spectres arrive with a Dark Sphere to break down our fortifications.
12 miles away at our prepared evacuation point, we decide to fly back and hit their flank while they're focused on investigating the basement.
Chapter 8
- Reapsday 12th Thaw
- Sunday 13th Thaw
- Moonday 14th Thaw
- Duesday 15th Thaw
- W'nsday 16th Thaw
- Th'rsday 17th Thaw
- Frysday 18th Thaw
- Reapsday 19th Thaw
- Sunday 20th Thaw
- Moonday 21st Thaw
- Duesday 22nd Thaw
- W'nsday 23rd Thaw
- Th'rsday 24th Thaw
- Frysday 25th Thaw
- Reapsday 26th Thaw
Buffs & Mil Sci
Long Term (assumed always on)
| Magic (caster) | Rk | Effects | Duration | Ev | Mo | Rn | Se | Ch | ? | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Greater Ench. (Rn) | 20 | +21% to Res, Mag, Com, and S&S. | 5 days | Y | Y | Y | Y | Y | Y | |
| Witchsight (Rn) | 22 | See Invis | 12.5 hrs | Y | Y | Y | Y | Y | Y | |
| Ench Armour (Rn) | 20 | +42% Def +1 AP 14 DR vs Phnt/Nmare. | 10.5 hrs | Y | Y | |||||
| Familial Defence (Mo) | 19 | +43% Def +3 DR | 10 hrs | - | Y | - | Y | |||
| Str of Darkness (Se) | 20 | +11 PS | 200 min | Y | Y | Y | A | Y | Y | |
| Instil Flight (Mo) | 15 | 80 mph, 800 lbs limit, item 20k+ sp to enchant | 16 hrs per 24 | Y | Y | Y | ||||
| Ice Traversal (Ch) | 20 | Travel over ice and/or snow without slipping or sinking in. (+7 TMR on flat ice) | 7 hrs | |||||||
| Self Only | ||||||||||
| Mind Shield | +10+2/rk% vs M.Att. | 1+2/rk hrs | 8 | 12 | 13 | |||||
| Navigation | Extra Navigator ranks as listed and safer travel | 1+rk Hrs | +4 (12) | |||||||
Short Term
| Magic (caster) | Rk | Effects | Dur | Ev | Mo | Rn | Se | Ch | ?? |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Enchant Weapon (Ra) | 16 | +17 BC%, +6 Dam. +7 vs Phn/Nm | 21 min |
| Capability | Rk | Effects | Dur | Ev | Mo | Rn | Se | Ch | ?? |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Sense Danger (%) | Mind Talent (or equivalent) | 71% | |||||||
| Detect Ambush (%) | Ranger (-5/rank of opposition) | 136% | 114% | ||||||
| See Invis (Rk) | Effective rank for seeing invisible | 22 | 22 | 22 | 22 | 22 | 22 | ||
| Stealth (%) | Standard / Ranger Outdoors | 165 / 182% | 121 / 98% |
Misc
- Enhance Enchantment
- (Ra) rank 11-13: 65-80 seconds
- Herbalist Lunch/Broth
- Everan rk 5, Meal 4 FT or Broth 4 FT
- Rahne Ranger ring (Highlands)
- +7% Def, +7 IV in Melee and Ranged
- Everan - Protection from Evil (10 ft radius from Everan)
- +30% MR, +4 FT AP, +4 Spell AP
- Dance (Cher)
- 5 mins dancing every morning for Reroll 1 failed MR or ignore 1 stun
- Snail Shell (Cher)
- 1 each, crush to undo one terrible consequence
Watch Order
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cher | Everan | Serendipity | Mortimer | ||||||||
| Rahne | |||||||||||
Marching Order
| Skirmish Formations (Front) | ||
|---|---|---|
| Default
Rahne Cher |
Double File
Rahne |
Single File
Rahne |
Astrology
| Everan | Mortimer | Rahne | Serendipity | Cher | tba |
| 59 | 75 | 13 | -- | 34 | __ |
Calendar
| Spring: Thaw 823 (10) | ||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Moonday | Duesday | W'ansday | Th'rsday | Frysday | Reapsday | Sunday | ||||||||
|
Candlemansa | 1 | Guild Meeting | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | ||||||
|
7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | |||||||
|
14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | |||||||
|
21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | |||||||
|
|
28 | 29 | 30 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | |||||||
| Spring: Seedtime 823 (11) | ||||||||||||||
|
|
5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | Rites of Thunor | 9 | 10 | 11 | ||||||
|
|
12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | Equinox | 16 | 17 | Eostre | 18 | |||||
|
|
19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | |||||||
|
|
26 | 27 | 28 | 29 | 30 | 1 | 2 | |||||||
| Spring: Blossom 823 (12) | ||||||||||||||
|
|
3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | |||||||
|
|
10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | |||||||
|
|
17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | Floralia | 22 | 23 | ||||||
|
|
24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 | 30 | Walpurgisnacht | ||||||
