[Finish exploring the entire temple and made contact at the Altar on top.]
[This session took place May 18, 2002. We were playing Champions 4th Edition with the Second Edition Fantasy Hero supplement.]
Player Characters
Tim, a Wizard - male human from the Free City of Freegate, graduate of Outlands University
Dangar Stonekleaver - male dwarf from the Northern Dwarven Kingdom
Kyle Logan – male human thief and stowaway on the Yardbird
Wendell Dorshield III – male gnome, Captain and Architect of the Yardbird
Malwyn – male High elf fighter and military expert
Darkfox – female human thief from Freegate, secret ID of socialite Karlyn Gryphshaw
Session Begins:
[The notes for this session are exceedingly sparse – a single paragraph summation. I’ve expanded it a very little and added some paragraph breaks, but it has been 24 years since this session happened so I remember very little of what exactly happened.]
The Outlanders finished exploring the middle and upper levels of the Temple, nearly dying twice, once due to a soul jar trap in a statue with Darkfox’s face. [My notes do not indicate what the second near-TPK involved, but it was likely something Tim or Dangar did.] The Outlanders finally exited out the top of the temple and found themselves in the ruins of the Altar of Camazotz, on top of a hill near where the Yardbird was anchored.
Camazotz himself appeared to the Outlanders when they disturbed a trap along the back wall of the Altar area. For reasons of his own, Camazotz talked to the Outlanders. The Outlanders asked the deity if he knew the location of an Aetherstone Anvil, one of the items they desperately needed to unmake the orb and save the world. Camazotz told them the location of the last Aetherstone Anvil – the Temple of Baharat.
After a pause, the Outlanders asked where the temple was located as it too had been lost.
Camazotz sighed. He then made a glowing dot appear on the Outlander’s map. The dot appeared deep in the center of the Great Nef, a desert made of magic-nullifying sand. The Outlanders thanked the deity for his assistance and politely said goodbye.
Back on the Yardbird, the Outlanders discussed the location with Wendell. The route to collect all the items they needed required the Yardbird to fly by the Great Nef a second time to pick up the enchanted hammer they were going to request be crafted in the Northern Dwarven Kingdom. They decide to investigate the Temple of Baharat on their second trip by the Great Nef due to time constraints now.
Session Ends.
NPCs Met
Camazotz – the bat-winged god of Darkness and the Dead. Considered a Lost God as no one in the present day remembers him. [Campaign Secret: Camazotz was part of the pantheon belonging to the first humans on the continent, the Anunnaki, whose descendants are the nomadic Horse Lords, not the rest of the humans on the continent, who arrived later.]
Happening Off-Stage
[Still the same day, so nothing new.]
DM Discussion
[Past me got super lazy here and wrapped up a full day of roleplaying in a single paragraph. Shame! Shame on Past Me!]
[The PCs did finish exploring The Hidden Shrine of Tamoachan. While I have notes on how I modified the dungeon for the campaign, I have no notes on how the PCs actually interacted with it. This was early in my career as a GM and the importance of record keeping had not yet landed. I think it was a year or so later in 2003 when I realized I was starting to forget the details of past adventurers that I started typing up session summaries, which is what these blog posts are based off of. I didn’t start blogging until 2007, so the summaries were just to track what happened in a way that I could reference back to for later adventure writing. Once I had the blog, it occurred to me that maybe I should keep better notes of what happened each session, then I could type things up. Gradually my notes, and the write-ups, got better.]
[Oh yeah! I keep forgetting to add that the PCs had a list of various things they needed to collect for the ritual and where most of them could be located. Those known locations were scattered and the rare and powerful magical herbs needed to be very fresh. Luckily the Outlanders had discovered (and claimed) a small set of magical Stasis boxes on their first adventure and did not destroy all of them when trying to force them open.]
Flight of the Yardbird
Previous session: Session 4
Next Session: Session 6 [not edited yet]
