[This begins the next story arc, wherein the adventuring party attempted to scout out the arrival of the invading Goblinoid Horde. Things will quickly get out of hand.]
Player Characters
Dangar Stonekleaver - male dwarf from the Northern Dwarven Kingdom
Mikal Torvaldsson - human male, of the Uplander Clans
Darian Kyle - human male, formerly of the Imperial 7th Legion [deserter]
NPCs
Session 1 Begins, July 30 IC
The newly formed unit, Tim's Outlanders, left the city of Freegate and headed south to scout out the approach of the Goblinoid Horde, believed to be heading towards the city.
The Outlanders rode south for over a week, following the Greater Tabor River. Leaving the lands claimed by Freegate, they entered the lands of the Bayern District, the next principality to the south. There they saw abandoned villages and farmsteads.
Once in the proximity of the Horde the Outlanders were spotted by a unit of goblin batriders [goblins riding giant bats]. The batrider patrol attacked, strafing the Outlanders using magic wands that fired bolts of force. During the fight, Mikal was able to catch onto the riding harness of one of bats as it flew by on a strafing run and climbed aboard. He then climbed up onto the bat despite the goblin trying to fling him off by having the bat do acrobatic flying. Once on top of the bat, Mikal easily overwhelmed the goblin and flung him off the bat to his death. Mikal spent the rest of the fight attempting to gain control of the bat and tame it to be his mount. The rest of the Outlanders killed the remaining goblins and drove off the surviving bats.
Several hours later Mikal finished taming the captured bat and named it Meep. He had Meep fly back to where the Outlanders were waiting for him.
The team decided they needed a base of operations, preferably one not on the direct path of the oncoming Horde. They left the river and set up camp in a farmhouse about a mile away. Mikal and Meep scouted ahead but they were spotted after a couple hours by a second patrol of batriders. Mikal fled the patrol, which pursued him [they wanted to reclaim the obviously stolen bat]. Mikal led them back to the farmhouse where the party was camped. The Outlanders attacked and killed all but three of the goblins, unaware of the survivors who fled south.
During night, Tim and Casvia used equipment and supplies found in the farmhouse, notably a still and a hidden supply of moonshine, to develop a batch of magically distilled and magically infused alcohol. Tim expected the group would be facing masses of goblins and orcs and wanted something that would explode "with some extra oomph" when lit and thrown at a target. He wasn't entirely certain how successful he and Casvia had been but was hopeful. [Tim's player rolled a critical success on his skill check, forcing me to decide how much more oomph this meant. I decided on "a ludicrous amount of oomph" but did not tell the players. They had to discover this by trial and error.]
August 8, 17 IC
In the morning a large ground patrol of goblins riding giant, ferocious-looking lizards moved into the area started to surround the farmhouse the Outlanders occupied. Tim loaded up Mikal and Meep with multiple bottles of his "double-distilled" liquid explosives so they could attack the patrol from above.
In his hurry to get into the air, Mikal forgot to bring a source of flame to light the wicks in the bottles before throwing them, so he was forced to throw unlit bottles. The first bottle thrown detonated with such force that Mikal and Meep were knocked tumbling through the air and into some trees. Luckily, none of the other bottles detonated. [Mikal had bought some dice of Luck and they came into play here.] The cluster of goblin lizardriders where knocked around on the ground like billiard balls, killing the goblins in the blast radius and sending the wounded lizards fleeing. The Outlanders quickly killed the goblins in the patrol but the riding lizards were of sterner stuff and they fled, only wounded.
Once Mikal and Meep were located and healed, the Outlanders discussed their next steps. The double-distilled alcohol was significantly more explosive than anticipated. Used correctly, they could switch from scouts to attackers. The Outlanders sent Casvia to Freegate via her transportation spell for the following supplies:
- Quarrels for Dengar’s crossbow [he was now running low]
- A request for guerilla orders to go after the Horde’s supply train
- Materials for explosives: containers with fins and certain raw materials
- Something to stop Mikal from falling
- Reports from other groups in the field
As the transport spell was one use per day, Mikal, riding Meep, flew ahead to reconnoiter the city of Ingolstadt, capital of the Bayern District. He arranged to meet up with the rest of the team at an old campsite they agreed upon. The rest of the party settled in to await Casvia's return.
Game Session Ends
Happening Off-Stage
The Horde is besieging Ingolstadt at this point.
The University Farseers have been trying to spy on the Horde but are unable to spy anywhere the Horde actually is, one of the reasons teams like the Outlanders have been sent to scout the area physically. This level of magic use by the goblinoid shamans is starting to cause concern. What else might the shamans be capable of?
DM Discussion
[So the notes for this session were minimal to say the least. I remembered enough to double the size of the posting, but not much else. Somewhere here Tim and Dangar decided that a good psy-op would be to strew the battle field with the entrails and heads of the dead goblins. Aureme, a PC, was OK with it but Casvia was horrified when she returned. I'll include that in the next session notes.]
Clouds Gather
Against the Horde
