Erif's story - Part 8

Erif's story is the story of a D and D character that I am playing in a campaign. The story is told from his point of view, with the occasional "out of game note" from me, to help clarify a situation or explain what certain in games things are. No more explanation is needed, because I have included a link to the post where I explain Erif's backstory in this post, as well as all of my previous posts! So go catch up on that first, and then you can read this!

Also, for those that care, this post is actually covering the events of two different game sessions - one of which had me, Etchers player, and Sairon's player playing, while the other one had me, Olivia's player, Rhaugox's players, and Etcher's player playing. Additionally, just so I do not have to keep mentioning that her player is missing in every blog post after this one, Enigma's player is taking a break from the campaign, for an undetermined amount of time.

From the journal or Erif Hcrocs:

Quick update - I probably won't be joining a cult anymore - turns out it was just a phase (everyone has phases where they want to join cults, right?), our team is getting a team name (that is not the fists of flame, the sons of stabbness, the undefeatables, the company of awesome, or the destined champions - but it is still actually a good name), and I am totally going to get a broom of flying - and if any of my teammates try to take it from me, I will make their lives as miserable as possible. 

Longer update - we had finished our two-part mission to solve a missing people problem, and to retrieve a reliquary, and then proceeded to head back to freehold. On the way back, the ship got hit buy a massive storm, which we only barely made it out of alive.

Doing the storm, part of the ship caught on fire, and I had to put it out - it was really, really, sad. that fire had only just started, and it had to be put out.  It was like killing a baby! Unfortunately, I had to commit this small act of cruelty - putting out one fire - so that I could survive to light many, many, many, more fires in the future.

The ship ended up crash-landing on an unknown island - and we have to remain there a for a while while the ship got repaired. Luckily, we managed to avoid doing any hard work by instead scouting out the area. We end up not finding anything dangerous - there was an undead minotaur, but it was protecting a graveyard, and I had to make the decision that it was to big of a risk to try and set it on fire, since I might get cursed in the process. In the scouting process, we also find some healthy forest (the island was weird in that half of island was covered in dead plants, while the other half was covered in live plants, and it wasn't a gradually shift either - it was very abrupt), which allows us (and by us, I mean Etcher and Sairon) to collect materials to help repair the ship. 

After the ship gets repaired ,we are able to return to freehold without any further difficulties. Upon our return to free hold we get the idea for a potential team name - the Stormborne (I thought of the Stormborn, but everyone else seems to think that it is better with an E at the end of it).

Back at Freehold, a few things happen:

Firstly, we are promoted to the next rank of in the Freemen! This means that we can doing higher ranking (meaning more rewards, and more danger) missions,

Secondly, we socialize a bit with another freemen team (we kind of got to a higher paying mission  first, forcing them to taking a lower paying one, but they don't seem to be to bothered by it),

Finally, I do some research on this Karsis god, to decide weather or not I really do want to join his cult or not. After reading up on his religion, and what it's all about, I kind of felt disappointed. The two reasons why I thought that this whole religion things was interesting to me was because I could religiously justify anything that I set on fire, and that I could make fun of other priests I met by saying that their gods are fake. However, the truth of the matter seems to be that to become a priest of Karsis, you have to do a lot of studying first, which sounds completely boring to me. I have things to do, and stuff to set on fire. Also, Karsis does not appear to care about there being people who worship other gods, because it is believes that in the end, all will fuel Karsis's fires. And that sounds like not fun at all. What is the point of being part of a religion when you can't make fun of other peoples religions? Finally, a Karsis seems to be interested in fact that fire need to be used for both destruction and creation, but honestly, I have no interest in creation. And I do know that creation is needed to keep the world going, circle of life, birth and renewal, blah blah blah, but that is the kind of stuff is for boring people to do. I plan to cause as much fiery destruction as possible in my life time, and let other people clean up whatever is left over.

After all of this, we take a look at the new, higher ranking contracts that we could take.

Number one - go into a dungeon that a wizard used to live in and find research. We will get payed based on the amount of stuff that we bring back

Number two - rescue people who have been capture by a group of gnoll sky-pirates. We get paid a lot of gold, and we get to take any of the stuff that the pirates have.

Number three - investigate who has been destroying the water farms. We will get paid a bunch of platinum as well as a magic wand, and a broom of flying.

Trying to find research sounds boring. Number two seems good, because it seems the most simply, and I get to set a lot of things on fire. The third contract seemed like a lot of work, since we would have to investigate something, but the reward makes it seem more worth it - a broom of flying. With that, I could fly above my enemies and rain fiery destruction down upon them! It would be awesome! Of course, some of my traveling companions also want the flying broom - and that cannot be allowed. If anyone is going to get a broom of flying, it is going to be me!

(out of game note: this is approximately where the first session ended and the second one began)

Eventually, after a lot of voting , and revoting, and revoting, it is eventually decided that we will take contract three. It has not yet been decided who will get the broom of flying though (but it's going to be me!)

We get to the island where the water farms are by an unusual form of transportation - by Roc 
(out of game note - the rest of this blog post needs a bit of explanation. Firstly, one of the species that exist in most D and D worlds are Aarakocra, who are bird people. The creation of the floating isles has actually been a good thing for them, scene it allows them to take advantage of their innate ability of flight. The aaracokra have formed into a fighting mercantile empire, and have made a large profit transporting various goods between the islands. One of the main goods that they transport is water, which they are able to harvest from rain and dew. Their island (because the they are so rich, they have bought an entire island to use) is mostly just filled with "water farms", which are large pink sheets that they use to collect water. The contract that our group has taken is to discover who has been destroying these water farms, and to put a stop to it. also, the Aarakocra have domesticated several Rocs (gigantic birds, usually eagles), which they have trained to carry what are essentially giant wooden boxes, to either transport non-flying people (such as our group), or large quantities of goods)

After a few days of travel, we arrive at the Aarakocra's island. After arriving, we are introduced to one of the Talons (the Aarakocra's leaders are called talons, I guess), Who explains what has been happening more in detail. This case is apparently interesting because normally, people would just try to steal parts of the water farms because generally they can be sold for a lot, but whoever has been doing this is just destroying the water farms, and has not been taking anything. Other important information includes the fact that the destructions have been happening more and more often, and that no potential culprit has been found, even through the Aarockra had searched all of the surface of this island. The only evidence left behind are strange disturbances in the earth.

Rhaugox is able to conclude that the most likely option is that whoever has been doing this is probably some kind of burrowing creature, who is living underground, inside of the island itself, which would explain how nothing was found on the surface of the island.

So we start digging. It takes several hours, and most of us end up really tired. Then I end up digging in the wrong place, and we start sinking into the ground. We are all able to escape, although Etcher requires Rhaugox's help - he is rescued from the quicksand by Rhaugox turning into a giant frog and swallowing Etcher.

After that relatively stressful situation (and not the fun kind of stressful situation either-nothing was set on fire!) the quicksand eventually dissipates, leaving us with an incredibly deep hole. To get down we end up using Frog-Rhaugox as a transportation device to get to the bottom.

Once there, we find ourselves in a narrow underground corridor. Following the corridor, we eventually find a much larger cavern. In this cavern we are repeatedly attacked by groups small, burrowing, tentacle-face-mouth-weird-things. If I had to guess, they are probably what is destroying the water farms (although that is mostly because we have found nothing in these caves). We have now killed several groups of them, but now the have grouped together into a larger mass and are now headed toward us...

And that is where the session ended. 

Next time, on Erif's story...

I have no clue what will happen next time, because I am not the game master. But I am sure whatever it is going to be it will certainly be interesting.

Erif's Story - Part 7

Erif's story is the story of a D and D 5th edition campaign that I am playing in, from the perspective of Erif, the character that I am playing (with the occasional out of game note)

I have been falling behind on my writing, so this post will actually be the overview of the events of two sessions.

In both of these sessions, all of the players (including Enigma's) were able to make it. Yay!

Now, that is all of the essential information that needs to be established, it's time to get on with the story...

From the Journal of Eric Hcrocs:

We have completed what I am pretty sure has been the most satisfying contract yet! There have been no "no killing" orders, no diseases that cause you to be kidnapped by beings from beyond space and time, and most importantly, no acid rain!

Also, I may or may not choose to join a cult, if I feel motivated.

Backing up a bit, we where completing the second part of our 2-part contract - the part where we need to find a reliquary in a ruined temple, and bring it back to the person who hired us - Seeker Andronis, a priest of Karsis (out of game note: in the floating isles setting, Karsis is a god of fire, creation, and destruction. What makes his followers interesting is that they believe that Karsis is the only god, which can sometimes prove to be difficult, as this is a fantasy world where other gods are known to exist, and actually give their followers magic powers).

On the way to the temple, we are accosted by a group of bear-riding kobolds, who demanded that we pay a toll. For a while, Rhaugox and Etcher try to trick them into accepting a smaller amount of money than they demanded. However, it eventually became clear that they weren't going to fall for it (also, I was getting bored). So, I decided to set them on fire.

A fight Ensues!

The fight did not prove to be that difficult - we end up killing all of them with relative ease.

Also, during the fight, Enigma and Sairon rejoin the group (out of game note: this was the game master way of bringing the whole group back together. a detailed explanation was nit needed or provided)

After the fight, the remaining days of travel to the temple are uneventful (which also means that they are incredibly boring)

Eventually, we reach the temple which has a courtyard full of swords. It was weird, but I did not give it too much thought. There were also some gnolls (out of game note: gnolls are bloodthirsty hyena-people. Also in the floating islands setting, they are skyship pirates!). We fight them and we kill them, and they all burn.

We explore the rest of the temple, and eventually find the reliquary in a underground and partially underwater section. There are also some more gnolls there, but we are also able to kill them all fairly easily as well (although it was not as enjoyable as the first fight, because of all of the water.  

(out of game note: this is where the first session ended, and the second one began)

After retrieving the reliquary, we proceed to leave the temple, at which point all of the swords in the courtyard animate. 

Apparently, the original priests who lived at the temple had used magic to cause these swords to animate if anyone tries to take the reliquary. The swords tell us to put the reliquary back, but since taking that reliquary is going to get us a whole bunch of money, we attack it, and

A fight ensues!

After a slightly longer, and slightly more difficult fight, we are able to kill it / destroy enough swords / disrupt the magic stuff animating the swords? I really don't know what the best description would be.

The journey back is mostly uneventful, with the exception of a detour into a forest that the whole group went on, trying to solve a puzzle that involved statues and gems and matching the correct pairs. I really didn't care that much at all - I spent the time looking for something to set on fire that wouldn't cause a forest fire (not that a forest fire wouldn't be awesome, it's just that I feel that people shouldn't approve of me doing so, and their disapproval might be dangerous to my health)

Eventually, we arrive back in town, just in time to see the leader of the cult that we had defeated get burned by the stake by seeker Andronus. It was pretty satisfying to watch, although not as satisfying when I discovered the flames where only that impressive because there where lots of flammable materials placed under the wood.

After the burning, we go to see seeker Andronus, who provides us with our reward. In addition, he talks to me privately, having noticed my similar interests in flame, and asked me if I would consider joining the crimson dawn (the church of Karsis). I told him that I would consider it, and he gave me a symbol of the cult that I could show to any member to get myself initiated.

I've never really felt the appeal of worshiping any sort of deity - the most I ever do is occasionally feel grateful toward them for creating the world and everything in it, etcetera, etcetera. However, worshiping Karsis does have a certain appeal to it - since he is apparently the only god, I would only have to worry about praying to him, instead of having to pay respects to a bunch of them (I could also make fun of any other priests that I meet and make fun of them by saying that their god is fake). Plus, Karsis is probably one of the few gods that would be okay with me setting random things on fire, and I don't think I would want to worship any god that didn't let me do that. I haven't made up my mind just yet, and I think I will need to research Karsis more in detail when I gt back to freemen headquarters be for I make my final decision.

After receiving our reward, we are about to leave back to Freemen headquarters, when a commoner asks us if we can find her missing husband. After quite a lot of dissension (out of game note: It must have been quite distressing for the lady - "please, can you help me?" "hold on, we have to spend 30 minutes auguring with one another, and then we'll get back to you"), we eventually decide to help her.  Ugh. Everything up until this point had been great, and now we have to end out adventure with this downer!

We are eventually able to determine that the lady's husband was captured by gnolls, who took him back to their airship. We find the airship, but from a distance, there does not appear to be anyone in it, so I set it on fire. After setting it on fire, Rhaugox and Sairon both decide to go into it (why?), and discover that while there are no gnolls inside it, there were prisoners, which they attempt to rescue (although it became increasingly hard to do as the ship is both burning and sinking, since I set the balloons that were keeping the ship floating in the sky on fire).

The boat ends up falling into the mists, and the people inside it are only able to escape by Rhaugox turning into a giant spider and using himself a a web platform.

(out of game note - the web platform thing was awesome. So very, very awesome)

With some help from the webs, everyone is able to make it to safety.




Ands that's were the session ended.
I enjoyed the game, as always, although probably not as much as Erif himself, who thought this was the best contract yet (because unlike him, I actually enjoyed all of the previous adventures!)

Erif's story - part 8 will be coming when ever I find the time to make it.

Erif's Story: Part 6

No long, Flowery explanations this time! Short description, then on to the story!

Erif's story is the story of my character in a Dungeon and Dragons 5th edition campaign that I am in. More information can be found in other Blog posts. 

In addition to me, the players of Etcher, Rhaugox, and Olivia were able to make it to this game (meaning that Enigma and Sairon did not take part in this session.

Now - it's story time!

From the Journal of Erif Hcrocs:

We have taken a new contract! And it is not the one where we have to kill someone's imaginary friend. Instead, we have been hired by a priest of Karsis (a god of fire and creation - I like the fire part, but I'm not to sure about the creation part. Also, the priest says that Karsis is the only god, which is confusing to me, because how does that explain all of the clerics and paladins of other gods out there?).

Our contract requires us to fulfill two tasks before we receive our reward - first, we have to find out why people are disappearing from town - but then reappearing, with no memory of what happened - and also aged several years. The second part of our contract is to receive a reliquary from a ruin. 

We have completed the first part of our contract, (the disappearance problem). All of the people had been abducted by a cult, which was stealing years of their life and then giving them  to other cult members.

We found the cult hiding out in a weird building outside of the town. We cautiously entered the building, and eventually found the cult, doing cult things to an abducted villager.

At which point, a fight ensued!

And we win the fight, killing everyone except the villager, and the leader of the cult (although I wanted to kill him), who we turn over to the Priest of Karsis (although the authorities then take him away from him).

With all that finished, I think this was actually a really enjoyable contract! Nothing particularly annoying happened, and I got to set fire to some people! I even set fire to the strange house that the cult was living in! It did turn out to be an illusionary house, but it still got to be set fire to it!

Next stop: A ruin that hopefully contains a reliquary!

And that was that game session! It felt like not as much happened this time (nothing is wrong with that though), which probably made this my shortest blog post yet, as opposed to my previous one, which I am pretty sure was my longest.

Erif's Story: Part 7 will be coming "soon" (and by soon, I probably mean 2 weeks), and it will probably be longer! (weather or not a longer blog post is a good thing is all a matter of perspective...)

Erif's Story: Part 5

I think that, by now, everyone reading this blog should know what Erif's Story is about (it's a session by session report of what has been happening in a Dungeons and Dragons 5th edition campaign that I am playing in, from My character, Erif Hcrocs's point of view, with the occasional "out of game" note. And you really should not start reading Erif's Story here -you should start at the very beginning, with my first blog post. However, If you have already read all of the big posts in Erif's story previous to this one, you really don't need all of this pre-story babble, so on with the story!

From the journal of Erif Hcrocs:

When I originally joined the freemen, I was filled with a sense of hope and confidence. I felt that joining the freemen was my best shot at trying to achieve my destiny, since being able to travel to a large number of islands would increase the chances of me figuring out what my destiny actually is.

However, In my time spent as a freemen, every single mission has proven to be, for the most part, unenjoyable. 
On our first mission, we are told it is better if we keep the thing that we are trying to defeat alive.
For our second mission, we aren't even told to fight anything, (although we did end up fighting things, and that was fun) instead, we had figure out how to deal with Acid Rain! (stupid acid rain)
And now, for our most recent "mission" I was infected with a potentially fatal disease (I got better) and was almost trapped in another dimension, both of which are things I am sure are not congruent with achieving a great destiny.

I'm going to keep working as a freemen, of course, because I still feel it's my best chance at actually achieving my destiny, and where I came from before joining the freemen was worse. But I would really, really, like a contract that says:

"Help! I require a freemen team that contains at least one fire genasi to deal with a (insert monster (that is not immune to fire damage) name here) threat. I would like you to kill all on the (same monster), preferably with fire, and take all of their treasure. If you do this, I will give you a giant chest of gold, and provide you with a cryptic clue that might give Eric Hrocs some idea to what has Destiney is, other then the fact that it involves fire, because everyone already knows that. Sincerely,
(some random name that isn't important)"

Chances are, I will never get a contract that looks like that. However, I can hope to get something close.

Returning to the topic of what has actually been recently happening during my time as a freemen, before we are able to return to freemen headquarters after the conclusion of our acid rain adventure, a group of much more experienced Freemen known as the BannerBrand (out of game note: statistics wise, our party is currently 4th level, while I believe it was said that the BannerBrand were equivalent to 12th level characters) have issued an emergency contract (because apparently veteran freemen members can receive and put out their own contracts). I, for once, did not want to immediately jump from one contact to another, and would have been actually fine with taking a few days off before finding out what other contracts there were to undertake. 

But NOPE! Apparently everyone else wants to take part is this mystery contract, which we have no clue what it will be about.

(out of game note: it is fairly important to note that this session, the only other players who were able to make it were Etcher and Rhaugox's players)

We are teleported to the island that the BannerBrand are on. the BannerBrand consist of:

Sana, a human cleric,
Varin, an elf rouge,
Cassilius, a teifling fighter,
Dornum, a half-elf warlock, and
Lodimmia, a halfing wizard.

Once we  arrive, it is revealed that they do not actually have a contract for us - they want us to help them with a personal problem. However, they are also willing to pay use a large amount of money to convince us to help, and to not tell anyone that they did not actually have a contract for us.

The problem is that they believe that Lodimmia has contacted the whispers. Since none of us have a clue what that is, so we are informed - the whispers is a kind of sickness of unknown origin, that seemingly affects people at random. the fist stage causes people to hear voices and whispers. this first stage lasts of a few days, after which patients progress to stage two - were they fall into a catatonic state. This stage also will last of a few days after which the infected will just disappeared. No matter how well guarded the infected are, something happens that distracts those guarding them long enough for the infected to disappear without a trace.

So the reason that we are here is to provide extra sets of eyes, so that we can potentially study what happens to those that are infected, and also see if we can prevent her from disappearing. Also, we cannot tell Lodimmia about this, and we cannot return to civilized lands just in case the whispers turns out to be contagious. Oh great, I might start herding voices, become catatonic, and disappear as well. SOUNDS LOVELY.

Over the next few days, a few things are happen:

1.  Lodimmia enters stage two the very next day, so we do not have to worry about not telling her. Hooray!

2.  Some of use start hearing whispers (including me) but luckily, in the early parts of phase one, healing magic is actually able to get rid of the infection. Hooray! 

3. Rhaugox manages to find out some clues about the origins of the sickness: it is being made "below", and someone is making it it for a reason, but the person who is making it isn't the person who thinks they're making it. What I got from it was that was someone is making this, so I can direct my anger and desire to burn things at a specific person, rather than a sickness (because being angry at a person seems like a more intelligent thing to do). Hooray!

(out of game note: Rhaugox obtained this information by contacting Dornum's patron, which was actually some thing Sana told us specifically not to do. the interaction between Rhaugox and the patron was interesting, but Erif has no clue about what specifically happened, so that is why this is an out of game note)

We continue to watch over Lodimmia, and nothing seems to happen - for a while. Then, one night, Rhaugox spots a bulette (out of game note: for this who are not aware: bulettes are a kind of burrowing monster, and as such, are a rare sight in the floating isles, since many of them dig too deep and end up falling into the mists). After reporting this sight to the rest of the party, the BannerBrand decide to go and attempt to capture the bulette, seeing as it is an endangered species, and it might be safer in captivity (personally, I don't see the reason in trying to preserve the bulette species, but the BannerBrand do, so they're going out to do it). Of course, it is when they leave when the bad stuff starts happening.

Lodimmia starts talking to someone, saying that she will come to them, with prompts Rhaugox to tie her up. After that, Lodimmia asks if "you can come to me" at which point, a dimensional rift opens up and a horde of small creepy monster things come bursting out of it.

A fight ensues!

I fight them with fire, Etcher fights them with lightning, and Rhaugox fights them with wolf (as in, he turns into a giant wolf and tears them into tiny pieces).

The creatures are not actually focused on us that much. Instead, they focus on trying to grab Lodimmia, and try to take her back through the portal. However, we stop them from doing so, and kill most of them, which is when a second creature, much larger, uglier, and more powerful than the others, also emerges from the portal. We also see, within the portal, an orange, robed, figure, who appears to be keeping the gate open.

The fight continues, but begins to turn against our favour. The new, larger creature manages to get a hold of Lodimmia, and gets her through the portal, at which point the orange-robed figure begins closing the gate. A race ensues to try and get lodimmia out before the gate clothes and we manage to do it (although the BannerBrand also arrive to help us at the last minute). Hooray!

I don't think that I actually worried about loosing Lodimmia, I feel that getting her back was more of an attempt for me to get back at whoever made this disease, by denying them one victim. It doesn't seem like much, but at least it's a start.

After that, we are finally given our (well-deserved) reward, and I even get to learn a magic trick from Dornum. (they were originally going to give us armour and weapons, but none us really wanted or needed them, so I got to learn a magic power instead!). Then we travel by airship back to Freemen headquarters, and it is BORING. I am okay with a day or two of quiet and rest (especially if the action that I was involved with previously was not particularly fun - for example, acid rain), but any period of time that contains no combat, excitement, of large fires that last longer than a week is a sheer nightmare.

Eventually, we arrive back at freemen headquarters, and decide to do some shopping (since we did just get a bunch of gold, and we have a bunch of money saved up from our previous missions). I by a magic orb which increases my magical power, and Rhaugox and Etcher both purchase armour.

Then, we check the mission board, and find that there is only one currently on it - the one where we are supposed to kill someone's imaginary friend. So the decision is wether or not we want to go on this mission, which will involve a long (and boring) journey, or wait a few days (which will also be boring) for other missions to arrive...

And that's where we ended that session, because it was decided it would be better if more players was around  to decide weather or not we wanted to take the only available contract or wait for more options to arrive.

So, with the end of this session, I came upon the realization that there is something secret gaining on, but Erif has no clue about it (either that or he doesn't care), which means I cannot talk about this "in the Journal of Erif Hcrocs".

A thing that Erif did not mention (because he was not aware of it) was that Etcher had, at one point tried to cast detect magic on Lodimmia - and saw nothing. It was not that he saw no magic, but that there was such a lack of magic affecting her that that he went temporarily blind. What makes that interesting is that one of the facts about this setting is that underneath all of the floating islands, there is a mist that absorbs magic, and cannot be effected ay magic in any way (which means that wizards cannot use magic to find out what is underneath the mist). 

So obviously, there is something going on underneath the mists, and one or more entities are using "the whispers" for some kind of... secret thing, that I have no idea what it is. And now I really want to find out what it is. Apparently the last few sessions before this one have also contained small reveals of potential things to come, it just happens to be that this is the first time I have noticed it. And all this means is that I am even more exited for this campaign!

That's all for now!

(wow, I am pretty sure this has been my longest blog post yet!)

Erif's Story: Part 4

This is the 4th part (technically, it is the 5th, but the first part is called part zero) of the continued story of the main D and D 5th edition campaign that I am in. For this session, only the players of Etcher and Sairon could make it, so instead of immediately carrying on with the adventure where we left off, we flashed backward a few days before we went on the current freemen mission that are undertaking, and instead played through a private adventure that, Erif, Etcher, and Sairon went on...

From the journal of Erif Hcrocs:

Olivia is trying to help other freemen scholars determine what has happened to Enigma, and Rhaugox is inspecting injured freemen, to determine if he can help them, (and if they have character, and if so, if it has been injured), but that doesn't stop the rest of us from going on our own adventure!

We found a cave, and we decided to explore it!      

Inside of the cave, we found a hidden room, with a shrine and stone tablets covered in self-contradictory gibberish, but most importantly there were zombies in there, and they BURN!

Then, we find a another room, in which I get blinded with a blast of radiant light! And then we get attacked by something! I'm not certain what they were, but I have the sneaking suspicion that they were angels. I don't know why they were after me, and frankly I don't care, but I made sure to inform them before I burnt them to death (because we did kill them all) that I did nothing to provoke them into attacking me, so what I was doing was SELF DEFENCE (just to make sure other angels don't come after me for killing these angels!).

(out of game note: Erif and the others were not actually attacked by angels, they were attacked by undead shadows. However, Erif has refused to believe this, and so now he thinks that he may have done something to anger some angels. And it seems fairly logical to him - he has probably done things that angels, being beings of pure law and good, would not approve of) 

The final notable fact about this little trip is that we found some valuable items that we can sell - and we don't have to split it with the others at all!

After this side trek was finished, we returned to the time in the adventure that we had left off last session, and we just continued to play, without deciding to explain the lack of two of the members of our group.

Returning to the present day journal of Eric Hcrocs:

Alright, so as it turns out, the bugbears that were running at us were not happy - they were scared. And they were not running at us - they were running away from yet another storm of acid rain. I can't blame them for that, acid rain sucks. What I do blame them for is that they still attacked us while they continued to run away from the acid rain, and they got away before I could burn them all to death!

Then, the acid rain hits us (acid rain is just the wort!). This acid rain is different, though - it's much more thick and sticky, and when it hits the ground, it forms into two black ooze monsters, which attack us.

A fight ensues!

And we destroy the both of them, and then manage to find shelter from the acid rain until it passes. I actually felt really good about that fight - I was finally given the chance to get back at the ABSOLUTELY STUPID ACID RAIN, by burning the ooze monsters that it made to death.

Once the acid rain passes, we continue our journey for a while longer until we finally reach the source of the (absolutely horrible) acid rain problem - the tower that rose from the lake (out of game note: when it was described in this session, it did not sound like a tower. So I either misheard the description of what the "tower" looked like for this session, or I misheard what the structure looked like in the previous section. I am not sure which though) 

The main challenge in getting to this tower is the fact that the lake surrounding it is filled with black, semi-acidic liquid.  There is a boat, but it looks to be in a very bad condition. Sairon tries to fix it up - and it manages to get us to the island with the tower, but not before it collapses and is wrecked beyond repair.

Inside the tower, we find one sole occupant - a lich (or other similar undead spellcasting creature) named Kalumadin Al-amad. Apparently, he was imprisoned here long ago by a god when he questioned the god's right to use their power. He created the acid rains in the attempt to lure a team of adventurers (such as ourselves) to his prison/tomb, so that we could free him, and says that if we do, he will put a stop to the acid rains (It is admittedly a really clever plan, although if there is a next time, could he at least try to make it rain something other than acid? Like fire rain? Fire rain is better than acid rain in every possible way!).

(out of game note: I am not certain that Kalumadin Al-amad is what the character's name is. I have been taking less actual game notes in many of the roleplaying games that I have been playing in. I reserve the right to change this character's name if it turns out that this is not actually this character's name, and my notes are mistaken)

In fact, freeing him is surprisingly easy - all that is needed to be done is to destroy four runes inside of the tower, which I do - each one only needs one small blast of fire! After he is freed, Kalumadin Al-amad ends the acid rain (finally!) and leaves with his undead army (because apparently, all around the edge of the lake, there is a whole lot more undead buried there).

(out of game note: wow, Erif. You just released a lich (or a being with a similar power level) and his undead army free from their prison. I'm sure that won't have any negative consequences for the world at large. I'M SO VERY SURE.)

Once he leaves it becomes apparent while the acid rains are gone, the poison death lake still remains - and will not clear itself out of the poison for several weeks. And the boat that we used to get there is now wrecked beyond repair. I try to swim it figuring "what's a little bit of poison going to do?". And then I almost drown. Luckily, my traveling companions are less selfish then I am, and manage to rescue me out of the lake.

Luckily for us, we managed to acquire some magical items in our first adventure (the one with the goblins, the bugbear, and the manticore) and one of the items is an oil of etherealness, which would allow one of us to escape the island. It is eventually decided that Sairon should be the one to go (because she knows this region best, and is probably the most trustworthy and dependable among us), and so she goes.

She is gone for several hours, and so I have to wait with Etcher on the island, where there is literally nothing to do. I try to play eye spy, but that turns out to go terribly as well (out of game note: this has been mentioned in a previous part of Erif's story, but it will be mentioned again - Kenku (which is the kind of creature that Etcher is) can only produce sounds that they have previously heard)

Eventually, Sairon comes back with a shark person and his boat (out of game note: this island is inhabited by 3 different tribes, each of which consists of a different kind of animal people - there is a tribe of reptile people (which is the tribe that Rhaugox comes from), a tribe of mammal people (which is the tribe that Sairon, as well as the centaurs that hired our group come from), and a tribe of fish people (which is the tribe the shark person that Sairon managed to convince to help the group came from), and we are able to finally get of the island. 

Finally we return to the centaur camp - and we have to wait a few days for our reward, because they need to wait for actual proof that the acid rain has stopped. The wait is annoying (even with he acid rain gone, I have too many bad memories of this place to ever really like staying here) but eventually, we receive a huge chest of gold, and also a set of magic bracers.

The first two missions as part of the freemen have not been the best experiences I have ever had, but there will be many more in the future, and the future has more than unlikeable missions in store for me, I am sure of it!

Unlike Erif, both halves of this session (the flash backward adventure in the caves, and the finishing of the current mission) where really fun and interesting adventures. One of the "themes" of this campaign has been that every adventure involves some sort of choice:


(In the first adventure, we were given the option to not kill the bugbear and let him keep the freemen initiates as manticore food.)

(In the first freemen mission, we could have just as easily decided to kill the Girallon and his family.)

(And in this mission, we could have tried to figure out some other method for stopping the acid rain other than releasing a lich (or similar magical undead being) and his undead army into the world.)


and it has been interesting to see what my character - and the other characters decide to do ing each of these situations.


(in the first adventure, Erif really didn't care to much either way, it was other people who wanted to fight the bugbear - and he had no problem with that, since he got to burn things that way)

(in the first freemen mission, he was actually totally fine if he happened to kill any of the girallons - it just also happened to be that other people were able to non-lethaly defeated them first, and he isn't enough of a jerk to try to kill them while they were knocked out)

(and in this mission, Eric just didn't care enough to think about the consequences of freeing a powerful undead creature and it's army. It seemed like the quickest and easiest way of getting rid of the acid rain, and everything seemed to work out fine!)


Erif's Story: Part 5 will be coming soon!

Erif's Story - Part 3 (Alternative Title: I Hate Acid Rain)

Once again, we return to the D and D (5th edition) campaign that I am in, continuing the story form my character (Erif Hcrocs)'s point of view with the occasional extra "out of game note" from me.

Now, on with the story!

From the journal of Erif Hcrocs:

After we defeated the big ape-monster and took it's fangs, I suggested that we head back to town, claim our reward, and get out of here.

But for some reason, everyone else thought we should go investigate the monster's lair! Why?

What were they expecting to find in there? Ape poo? (I bet that Rhaugox was after ape poo. Druids are weird like that).

Anyway, while we're investigating the lair, we do not find anything of actual value, but instead, find the entrance blocked by another ape-monster and three smaller ones! Obviously, Ape monster #1 has a family. and that family does not seem to be happy that we knocked ape monster #1 out and then stole it's teeth.

(also, do I even really have to mention that this whole encounter would have just not happened if we had just left instead of heading into the lair to search for monkey poo?)

Anyway,

A Fight ensues!

And we win the fight, and actually manage to not kill all of them! It's kind of incredible how we are able to not kill people if we really try.

Another fairly important thing to mention about the fight is that during it, Enigma was hit really hard and just... shut down. Apparently she isn't dead (although I wasn't aware she was alive in the first place), she just isn't conscious, or functioning, and nothing seems to be able to wake her up. (out of game note: the reason this happened to enigma is that her player won't be able to come to the next few sessions, and this weird thing that happens to her is an in-game reason for why she will not be participating in the next few missions).

After winning the fight, we travel back to town (slowly, because we have to carry a shut-down warforged with us), claim our reward, and make our way back to the ship, and travel back to the Freemen headquarters.

After receiving a speech form the master of the path (out of game note: the master and mistress of the path are the two co-leaders of the freemen) about how we have to be more careful and how we need to keep our allies safe, we go to find out what the available missions for people of our rank in the freemen. The options are:

1. something has been killing someone's livestock, and they think it is their kid's imaginary friend.

2. There is acid rain, and the centaurs want it to stop.

Now, I was much more in favour of option one, because the solution is much more simple - find the imaginary friend and kill them!

But for some reason, everyone else in the group seems in favour of solving the acid rain problem! Why! What makes Solving a problem that involves acid rain any more interesting the and imaginary friend who kills people!

However, all my arguments are in vain, so we have to go help some stupid centaurs with some stupid acid rain.

As it turns out, the next ship that is supposed to be headed to the island where the acid rain is is not due for almost a month.

Hey, maybe that means we could do something other than go to a place filled with acid rain!

Oh wait, the freemen has access to teleportation circles that connect to a teleportation circle on the island, so we can just go there right now!

So we arrive on the island, and then we set off to meet the stupid centaurs (I mean really, can't they deal with the acid rain themselves?).

AND THEN IT STARTS TO ACID RAIN ON US!

I hate this place so much! It's warm, but not the nice kind of dry, volcanic, warm. Instead, its the sweaty, swampy, watery warm. And it Acid rains! I don't know how we're expected to solve this problem. As far as I know, you cannot burn acid rain to death (unfortunately).

Eventually, the acid rain stops, but it does not do anything to make this adventure any less unpleasant.

We run into some angry sabre-toothed tigers, but we fight and kill them fairly easily.

Then, we finally arrive at the centaurs camp, and they give us their hospitality (you know what would have been really hospitable of them? If they never asked the freemen to help them with their acid rain problem!). They also tell us about this tower that rose out of a lake shortly before the acid rains began. Now this actually sounds promising! Maybe if we kill all of the people who live inside of this tower, the acid rain will just go away (that sounds way to easy to be true, but I can be hopeful!).

Lets go!

As we are headed in the direction of the tower that was provided to us by the centaurs, a group of bugbears comes running at us! But they look happy for some reason? Who cares! Time for some things to burn...

And that's where the session ended!

Who knows what lies in wait in the next session (which is coming up soon!)? What lurks within the tower? Is it causing the acid rain, and if not, who or what is? Why are these bugbears happy, and are they actually connected to anything important, or did they just happen to be in the area? What other things lie in store for the still unnamed team? All or none of the Questions may be answered.....

Erif's Story - Part 2

This is the 3rd instalment to Erif's story which tells the story of my character in the main D and D (5th edition) campaign that I am currently playing in, telling it from Erif (my character)'s  point of view, with me occasionally adding in out of game notes to help clear this up or add parts to the story that Erif himself was unaware of.

From the journal of Erif Hcrocs:

A freeman at last! Except this time, we actually are freemen, not just "initiates" like last time. It's official, and we even had a signed piece of paper to document it!

I mean, before all this, we had to listen to more of the same "these are the things you can't do" and "these are all of the rules that you have to follow" but I really wasn't listening that much, but I'm sure it will be fine (out of game note: Will it though Erif? Will it?)

Backing up a bit, we were able to successfully bring the initiates that had been taken prisoner by the bugbear, and it was explained to us that we had passed our test and all we had left to do to become Freemen is to listen to the big long list of important rules and then sign the paper that contains said rules. And we all did that!

Now that we are officially a group, there has been some discussion as to what our "team name" should be. Some of the names I have suggested are:

The fists of flame

The sons of stabbness

The undefeatables

The company of awesome

The destined champions (out of game note: this last name was mostly included because it is a reference to the previous D and D campaign I played with this same group. In that group my character really wanted the group to be called the destined champions but none of the other characters agreed. Even after the group did get it's official name (the Titanslayers) my character still maintained his belief that the destined champions was a better name)

Other members of the group have suggested names as well, but they aren't as good as mine. Sairon has suggested "the Daybreakers", Rhaugox suggested "rhaugsox's bitches", which prompted Enigma to suggest "Enigma's Bitches",  followed by Olivia suggesting"Rhaugox, Enigma, and Olivia's Bitches"
(I mean, sometimes I can get a bit arrogant, But I would never suggest a team name like that! (probably because I don't know how they would react: Rhaugox can turn into a wolf, and Enigma has a really vicious looking flail!))

Another team name name that has been suggested (and has become fairly popular) is that we use all of our first initials to create a name (those initials being E, E, E, S, O, and R) to create a name, but nothing specific has been made up yet.

And last thing to mention, but definitely not least in importance, we, the (Insert a totally cool team name here) have gone on our first official freemen mission!

We have been tasked with retrieving four fangs from a large, four-armed, white-furred ape monster that live on the island of splendour. (out of game note: this is a Girallon, which is exactly what Erif describes it to be). The only downside to this task is that we are supposed to attempt to keep this creature alive, so that when it's fangs grow back, they can be extracted again at a latter date. But whatever, At least it promised to be a somewhat interesting fight.

Actually getting to splendour took over a week, which turns out to be incredibly boring at best (because you can't set fire to anything without risking plummeting into the mists), to really disturbing and annoying (when Rhaugox tries to find out what having "character" means and starts asking me if I have it).

Eventually, we arrive on splendour, and we travel to the town where we are supposed to meet the person who hired us for the job. On the way, we encounter a baby bear, as well as an mother bear, which would have been fine, if Rhaugox hadn't also turned into a baby bear and left with the two other bears. He eventually came back, and I remain very confused about the whole thing (then again, Rhaugox is a very confusing individual, so at this point maybe I should expect these things from him). (out of game note: one Rhaugox's character traits is that before he joined the freemen, he was the doctor for his tribe, and is constantly trying to medically check on people and operate on them. The reason for him turning into a bear is that he was under the impression that the baby bear was suffering from an injury, and thought that turning into a bear would make it easier for him to medically examine the baby bear. However, this ends up being a lot more complicated than originally anticipated for him (due to the involvement of the mother bear), and leads to him going on a small adventure of his own before rejoining the group. However, Erif was not aware of most of this happening, so that is why it is an out of game note.)


Finally, we meet the contact, then set off to find the ape monster.

And we find it!

And we fight it!

And we defeat it! Really, for that incredibly long travel time, the actual action I got to partake in was surprisingly little. I only got to burn the ape-monster just a little bit!

On the plus side, the others were able to defeat it non lethally, so we should be getting a bonus reward for that.

Well, this first official job as part of the Freemen may not have Been the best experience I have ever had, I can always look forward to the future!

And that was Erif's perspective on the second session! Unlike him, I had a really great time (there was a lot of really great roleplaying in this session), and like him, I am really looking forward to the future (the next session will be coming up in the next few days!).