[Age of Wyrms] The Boyz are Back in Town

[Jareel [GM]]

Folks,

 

Now that you are back in the Capital, there will be a great temptation to "divide & conquer" to get many things done in a short period of time.  From an in-game perspective, that is all good by me.  From a game time around the table perspective, I would like to do such things "off camera", wherever possible.

 

To aid you in your collective planning, you know that you have about a day, maybe two days, before Volcanus/Nightmind will be in any shape to face y'all again.  Additionally, you feel pretty confident that the "Blackbirds" won't come gunning for you until they have secured the Keys that the Queen possesses.  (All of this information is based mostly on WIS/INT rolls and some low level divination magic.)

 

Things that you can get relatively easily, but not particularly cheaply, are:

= Healing and Divination Magics from the Temple of the Sun - cost is 1,000gp per spell level in spell components, plus you foot the bill for any additional material components required beyond a holy symbol.  This means that for a Raise Dead (for Gnaw, perhaps), you have to give them the diamonds for the spell plus 5,000gp in spell components.  The spell components do not have to be for the spell in question.  For example, the meta-magic pink pearls would be acceptable as would emerald dust.

= Scrolls, Potions and Wands from the Magic Quarter.   

 

In case I have poorly conveyed a couple of facts during the game, I shall state them clearly here:

1. Your time in the Age of Wyrms is rapidly coming to an end, you have a fortnight at a maximum.  The Chronotyryn and his Kenku minions are going to force the issue regarding the keys.  Nightmind has another agenda, but it, too, is rapidly heading for its culmination.

2. The Bad Guys are going to be fighting smarter, not harder, from here on out -- coordinated attacks, battle plans, etc.  Prior to this point y'all have been a fairly unknown quantity in the world.  However, you have successfully whacked enough Kenku Assassins to warrant closer inspection from that quarter.  Plus Nightmind went into the first fight with the usual mind-flayer arrogance of inherent superiority over you non-mind flayer types.  Following the beat down y'all gave him in short order, he will be coming back more aware of your capabilities.  He may be a lot of things, but stupid ain't one of them.

 

All of that being said, if your characters have personal errands that they want to run in the city, just let me know and we'll take care of them off camera as much as possible.  If your character doesn't, just let me know which characters they will be hanging out with or following around town.

 

Thanks.
--
I doubt, therefore I might be ...

-Kenji

[Jareel [GM]]

Just because it is easy enough for you to figure it out ...

• Yes, all 15 Keys are in the Capital at the moment (as far as your map can tell).
• Y'all have 5.
• The Queen has 5.
• Cacophony's folks have 5.

That's all for now. :)

-Ken

[iKitten]

Well, raising the dead's not even a question.  The only question there is "Can we afford it?"  To such affect, someone's got to root around in Breela's pockets.  Yew, perpetually oblivious to societal concerns, volunteers.  Being equally straight forward, he'll leave little I.O.U. notes for everything he takes out.

Question:
How viable is the possibility of us going on the offensive?  They know we've got keys, presumably in the same manner we know they've got keys.

How detailed is the map on the scale of the Capital?  Is it enough to tell when they move from one district to another (or, say, into the Castle)?  Or is the Capital just a dot on the map?

Tactically speaking, I'm thinking somewhat of a two-pronged manuever.  When they go for the Empress's keys, we crash their plans and go for them at the same time.  I very much doubt they planned to storm the castle and take them by direct force, so prompting a confrontation with the castle's defenders might prove advantageous.

Nightmind's a wild card.  We don't know if he'll be directly involved or if he's merely a facilitator.  We could try to unearth him and take him out first, get the Device from the Temple, trade the Device for the Queen's keys, and then move the keys to a place of our choosing, rather than keeping them on us.  Perhaps under the guise of the Empress still being in possession of them.

Any one else got thoughts?

[Kylar Longstrider]

Kylar will be most likely following Lod or Jaden, acting as bodyguard/lookout (via his glowiness and general knowledge of aberration actions). Other than that, he'll be in a rather focused mood, specifically due to Nightmind "runnin' like a pansy" and wishing a rematch to finish the job.

--
- Adam C.

"Weagh teagh peagh!" - Dorothy

[dull...@bellsouth.net]

The High Marshall, who did the Ressurrecting on Breela said that the service would be handled by a favor to him. Just to get Yew caught up...

"I can believe anything, provided that it is quite incredible." Oscar Wilde--The Picture of Dorian Gray

[iKitten]

Oh, then Breela can root through her own pockets.  Although the attempt would be humorous to watch.

[Jareel [GM]]

The Breela ressurection has already been accomplished.

On 7/20/07, dull...@bellsouth.net <dull...@bellsouth.net> wrote:

[Jen Manuel]

Yeah, how much do I owe him for that?

[Kylar Longstrider]

A favor.

[Jareel [GM]]

Not sure if any of the questions were aimed at yours truly ... so I will only answer the questions that woudl fall under my perview as the guy who tells you what your characters know/perceive.  The rest is up to y'all.

On 7/20/07, iKitten <ikitten....@gmail.com> wrote:

Well, raising the dead's not even a question.  The only question there is "Can we afford it?"  To such affect, someone's got to root around in Breela's pockets.  Yew, perpetually oblivious to societal concerns, volunteers.  Being equally straight forward, he'll leave little I.O.U. notes for everything he takes out.

 

Sure, you can afford to bring back fellow party members, most dragons take coins, gems, magic items or oaths in payment.

Question:
How viable is the possibility of us going on the offensive?  They know we've got keys, presumably in the same manner we know they've got keys.

 

Viable?  Hmmm ... good question.  Consult Sun Tzu. :)

How detailed is the map on the scale of the Capital?  Is it enough to tell when they move from one district to another (or, say, into the Castle)?  Or is the Capital just a dot on the map?

 

The Key location map just shows all of the Keys being "in" the Capital, it isn't exactly the uber-Marauder's Map.  It was built for skyship navigation.

[Jareel [GM]]

Which one will you be following/guarding should they decide to pull the patented Scooby Gang manuever of we'll go this way and y'all go that way and we'll meet back here after y'all get chased by the monster ...

[Jareel [GM]]

Which can be repaid by the elimination of Nightmind, since he was originally offering you an exchange of favors for that task.  Now, y'all owe him one.

-Kenji

[Kylar Longstrider]

Probably Jaden, as he is more likely to need Kylar's assistance than Lod would, based on historical evidence. ;)

--
- Adam C.

"Lets not shoot the crazy end of the world machine just yet" - Jack Carter

[Jareel [GM]]

If at all possible, please try to figure out what y'all's "plan of attack" will be prior to the game on Friday, unless you are going to "role-play" it out at the table.  If it is going to be OOC scheming, which is equally fine by me, I would prefer it be done "off camera" , as it were.  Plus, I can answer some of the questions or whatever pre-game.

 

[Kylar Longstrider]

My first question is what we have in terms of information resources. Kylar spent his time in the city a'hunting, so he'll be trying to gain any info about the kenku and Nightmind and such from the Hall (can't remember the name). But, that's probably not going to be a whole lot of help in the long run. I'm assuming Nightmind and the kenku both have plenty of info sources in the city and our group tends to stick out a little bit. Thus they can track us better than we can them. So, we need to be smarter, or at least less conspicuous.

In other words, we need to start choosing our battlegrounds instead of letting luck (or the GM) do it for us.

And maybe we can start using that teamwork thing. :P

On 8/7/07, Jareel [GM] <jareel.w...@gmail.com > wrote:

If at all possible, please try to figure out what y'all's "plan of attack" will be prior to the game on Friday, unless you are going to "role-play" it out at the table.  If it is going to be OOC scheming, which is equally fine by me, I would prefer it be done "off camera" , as it were.  Plus, I can answer some of the questions or whatever pre-game.

 

[Jareel [GM]]

You mean the Guild Hall with the color-coded "missions"?

 

Hmmm ... you have the following obvious information resources ...

Breela - The "Red" Minotaur (at the Mapworks) and the Head of the Imperial Secret Service, Shadow, plus her prodigious people skills.

Lod - "Fernia", the Hellfire Wyrm Clan, and what ever divinitory magicks he wishes to use or employ.

Jaden - The House of Ixtilton, the Temple of the Sun, and what ever divinitory magicks he wishes to use or employ.

Kylar - The Guild Hall, plus whomever Mors might know... 

Yew - His tracking ability ...

The Party - The Empress, the Amethyst Dragon Clan and the Gold Lanterns (if you can figure out how to get a hold of them).

 

Teamwork?  Choose your own battlegrounds? Why for you speak this "crazy talk"?  Who are you and what have you done with "Kill 'em All" Kylar? :P

 

-Kenji

[iKitten]

On 7/20/07, iKitten <ikitten....@gmail.com> wrote:

Tactically speaking, I'm thinking somewhat of a two-pronged manuever.  When they go for the Empress's keys, we crash their plans and go for them at the same time.  I very much doubt they planned to storm the castle and take them by direct force, so prompting a confrontation with the castle's defenders might prove advantageous.

Nightmind's a wild card.  We don't know if he'll be directly involved or if he's merely a facilitator.  We could try to unearth him and take him out first, get the Device from the Temple, trade the Device for the Queen's keys, and then move the keys to a place of our choosing, rather than keeping them on us.  Perhaps under the guise of the Empress still being in possession of them.

Any one else got thoughts?

 

This is what I'm still thinking, though obviously the Device thing's a little pointless unless we're just gonna steal it.

 

The only question with this approach is the variable of the Mind Flayer.  Do we deal with him before?  If we don't, will he be participating in the assault?  My gut says not directly.  His task may have just been to gather information and pass it along, and now he's doing his own shtick.

 

Otherwise, we let them take the keys from the Empress, let her deal with it, and we hold up somewhere advantageous (but preferably not visibly so) and prepare to be attacked.  Which begs the question of how that would be accomplished.

 

[Jareel [GM]]

Only one tiny hitch in the "Steal the Device" plan is that you don't know where it is.  The Grand Marshall said that he would give y'all the Device (Shield), if you took care of Nightmind.  He never said it was in the Temple.  Rathgar is in the Temple awaiting "pick up".

[iKitten]

The bigger hitch is that that was a grand not-plan, at least from Yew's point.  I mentioned it only to give credibility to my original scheme.

[Jareel [GM]]

<nods> I think I get it now ...

[Jareel [GM]]

I have now answered every online question that I have rec'd for the game this weekend.  From this point on it will have to wait until game time, because I will be off-line until Sunday.