Hill Cantons - Session 06

Like with session five, this one was also jam-packed with action and fraught with danger. Once again I have split up the action report into two parts as the party was split for essentially the whole session. Let's see how the party fares in the dungeon of Lady Szara!

Characters

• Asim "Ace" Bakir - Level 4 Mountebank
• Lasryn Thunderhammer - Level 4 Cleric
• Luka Winograd - Level 3 White Wizard
• Frankopan Vladislav - Level 2 Psychonaut
• Paula Puddlelob (New) - Level 2 Gnome

Followers

• Nosewise - Old but loyal dog
• Mojo & Mavi - Baboons
• Sir Duke - Squirrel Monkey
• Tom - Trained Badger
• Fifi (New) - Chihuahua Familiar

Action Report

Waking up to knocks at the door of the party apartment, Luka discovers that Ace and Lasryn have yet to return from last nights round of carousing. Frankopan awakes also, yet with an immediate feeling of sickness and fever. After answering the door the party are introduced to Paula Puddlelob, a gnome gemstone enthusiast and illusionist. Paula introduces herself and her familiar Fifi with a letter of recommendation from Glamdalf, after which the remaining party then turn their attention to the feverish Frakopan. 

After scouring the city for remedies to Frankopan's condition, the party eventually end up at Irenka the herbalist. Purchasing a salve with supposed healing properties, Frankopan begins to feel better immediately after it's application to one of his wounds (which had begun to turn gangrenous). 

Seeing that it is now close to midday the party fan out and begin to look for any traces of Ace and Lasryn as the two of them have still not returned from last night. Deciding to ask around marlinko's various bars for clues to their friends whereabouts, the party set off into the city. 

House of the Vampire Boyarina

Waking up together in a cell, both Ace and Lasryn struggle to remember the events of their previous night out on the town. Both find themselves sore yet also strangely pale, in addition they find nearly all of their gear has been taken from them! By a stroke of luck Ace finds he still has his thieves tools, whilst Lasryn is happy to find her holy symbol has not been taken from her. 

As the two are coming to terms with this new situation, the door to the cell is suddenly opened. Ushering them out of the cell and into the room beyond is a man whose facial expression seems frozen in a sort of resigned agony. As the party enter the room they are ushered to sit down onto a plush sofa. Although their seating is comfortable the room itself is filled with various torture devices which makes our two intrepid partygoers begin to feel increasingly worried about their situation. 

After a short while of waiting, another door is opened and stepping through comes a slightly older and brittle looking - yet voluptuous - woman. The two recognize her from the night before as lady Szara, yet they cannot recall much of their time together. 

With just a look Szara ushers Ace to sit down next to her on a nearby chaise longue. Whilst making smalltalk Szara suddenly reveals fangs, which she then plunges into the neck of Ace. As Szara begins to drink his blood the charm put on Ace fades, yet he still does not dares leave her embrace as she seems freakishly strong. 

As Ace is realeased from her grip, Lady Szara begins to make small talk with her two captives. The conversation veers from topic to topic with the characters scared to say anything that would upset their captor. Szara seems aloof and happy to flirt with both the characters, whom at one point she offers to turn into vampires themselves. 

A little while passes and a new figure enters the room; he has a powdered face and fancy clothing, yet his expression is frozen like that of the previous man (now known to be called Kugel). Without having heard any word from the man, Lady Szara hastily directs the newcomer and Kugel to lead Ace and Lasryn back to their cell as she excuses herself, leaving through a different door than the one she came in through. 

After waiting for the sounds of the servants leaving the room beyond, Ace decides to use his thieves tools to break out of the cell. Even though Ace is most certainly a roguish character, lockpicking is not one of his skills. He is able to force open the cell door albeit making quite a lot of noice. Funnily enough the first door they open seems to be some sort of storeroom, which by a stroke of luck has a chest containing all of their missing gear!

As the characters finish kitting themselves out, they suddenly hear a strange alarm going off further into the complex. Ignoring this, the former captives decide to try and investigate the way from which Lady Szara originally entered the torture room. 

The two pass through a long hallway, successfully detecting and jumping over some sort of pressure plate. At the end of the hallway the two find a new chamber. Lying in what looks like a birds nest is a large coffin. Dressers and cabinets also line the wall with a big bear rug placed right in the centre. The characters begin to furiously loot the room as there does not seem to be anyone else present. Some finds include: some of Lady Szara's fine dresses, a porcelain bowl full of gems, and what seems to be Lady Szaras spellbook. 

As they begin to finish up their looting the characters are startled by the door they came in though opening. Entering the room comes Kugel who immediately reaches out to attack the pair. After a couple of rounds of struggling Kugel has manages to suck some of the vitality out of the two through the use of his necrotic touch. Lasryn brandishes her holy symbol and prays to the Sun Lord for deliverance. Her prayers are answered as Kugel flees heedless of order at the sight of the symbol. Running through the corridor he passes over the pressure plate, accidentally stepping on it and causing the roof above him to give way. Large stones tumble from above and crush him nearly to death and before he can get to his feet Lasryn is upon him, ending his unlife. The characters do not have time to recover as a few seconds later they hear their names called out from the other side of the wall... 

Townhouse Thrashers

Searching the city for any trace of their compadres, Luka, Frankopan, and Paula decide to try and trace the places visited by the other two the night before. After some digging at the flaming goat inn the party can conclude that the pair was last seen in the company of the enigmatic Lady Szara. The barman directs them to her townhouse, though he warns the party he suspects she is a witch and to be wary of sorcery. 

Arriving at the house the group find it to be quite unassuming aside from being a floor higher than the neighboring buildings. After a quick discussion the party concludes that their friends must be inside and decide to attempt a break-in. 

Luka uses magic to turn invisible (which also dismisses his monkeys), whilst Paula creates a distraction for any bystanders and passers-by by performing dog-tricks with Fifi and Noswise. Whilst standing on Frankopan's shoulders Luka is able to open one of the ground floor windows and leap inside. 

Had it not been for his invisibility Luka would have been discovered then, as right in front of the closed door stands a man with a powdered face, fancy clothing, and a thousand yard stare. The man proceeds to close the window and then goes back to his position behind the door. 

Hoping to cause a distraction, Luka sneaks up the large central staircase to the second floor. Entering a large salon with fine furniture and paintings on the walls he knocs over a vase and starts a small fire, sneaking out of the door as the doorman comes to investigate. As the man leaves the room Luka observes him walk down the stairs and enter a hidden door behind the staircase on the first floor. Luka pounces on this opportunity and hurriedly opens the front door, ushering the rest of the party inside. Any bystanders are at this point distracted betting on an impromptu dog race as Paula sets Fifi and Nosewise running down the street. 

Anticipating the return of the doorman, the party sets a snare tied to one of the planks in the roof just outside the secret door and await the mans return. Luka also reenters the upstairs room and just for good measure relights the fire he had set before. 

Exiting the secret door comes a brittle-looking and older yet still beautiful woman who the party immediately recognizes as lady Szara. As luck would have it she does not spot the snare laid out for her, stepping right into it and then getting strung up from the ceiling. The party immediately jumps into action with Luka hurrying down the secret passage whilst Paula and Frankopan unsuccessfully attempt to stake Lady Szara. 

As Luka runs down the stairs he arrives at an intersection of three doors. Heading through the middle one he hurriedly runs along the corridor past the door. With his quick stride he fails to notice that one of the flagstones he steps upon seems to have a strange crack through the middle. In a split second the flagstone has parted in half, leaving Luka tumbling down a pit and setting the alarms off in the complex as he falls to his doom... 

Lady Szara meanwhile escapes the snare through turning into a giant bat and wriggling out of her bonds. Paula and Frankopan engage her in combat and attempt to cut a ring of her finger which seems to make her unaffected by the sunlight. As their weapons seem to have no effect on her, Paula attempts to blind her with a light spell. To the characters amazement the spell takes full effect after which by a stroke of luck Frankopan manages to stake Lady Szara through the heart, paralyzing her. Frankopan then takes the ring off of Szaras finger and pushes her into the sunlight. He and Paula does not need to wait long before Szara's body burns away, leaving only a cloud of gas to float down into the floorboards. 

There is little time to celebrate as running up from the secret door comes the doorman charging at them. Before a true fight can start the creature is suddenly blinded by a similar spell to before, this time though not cast by Paula. As the two turn towards the front door they see Luka standing in the entrance, monkeys crawling about him! Luka has little time to explain, though seems to have no memories of any events since the tree-maze. Having little time to ponder this, the party descend down the secret entrance into the dungeon below. 

Arriving at the three-way intersection the party first head right to discover a room filled with bricked up alcoves. Finding no way out, the party return to the intersection to head through the middle door. They are shocked to find the dead body of Luka in the pit. Both Luka (the living one) and his companions are deeply disturbed and the paranoia is immediately increased tenfold. The party avoids the pit and trying the final door to the left, they enter what looks to be a cellar full of casks of alcohol. Frankopan tests one of the brandy casks by turning the spigot back and forth a bunch trying to see if this is in fact real alcohol. This unintentionally causes the wall behind the cask in question to open up, revealing a long tunnel behind. 

Investigating the tunnel the characters are surprised to hear familiar voices on the other side. After pressing a button at the end of the tunnel the far wall lowers slowly, revealing the familiar faces of Ace and Lasryn on the other side. Now reunited, the party runs out of the cellar as fast as they can, making it out of the house as the fire Luka had started blazes on the second floor. 

Eventually making it back to their apartment, the party spends the rest of the week lying low and resting up. The party finally manage to suss out that this "new" Luka is in fact the actual Luka as he is able to answer all their questions flawlessly as far as relating to any events before the tree maze. As a final hurrah Lasryn decides to go carousing which ends up with her urinating on the door to the local thieves guild - the league of the free handed. 

Good Luka

Evil Luka

 

GM Thoughts

This session might just have been the most action packed one of this campaign yet! The way I ran it I was constantly switching between the characters in the dungeon and the ones outside - which I thought actually worked out great! Any time at which the players of either group were unsure or needed some time to think I switched to the other group which made the session "flow" really nicely with the actions of one group affecting the other. 

This session was characterized by a lot of lucky rolls on the part of the players as they generally rolled really well when it mattered. I have also not mentioned so far, but this game uses a variation of "popcorn initiative" with the player characters generally always getting the chance to make the first move. This was especially important for this session as the party was able to lock down Lady Szara before she could really do much to them. I do have the feeling that this is not the last that the party will see of the vampiress however... 

On the topic of Luka, his death and reveal as a body double was a long time coming (since session three in fact). When I rolled on the tables in the Axian Library way back when, it was determined that Luka had been replaced with an evil clone (after getting the consent of the player of course). The player did a great job of subtly playing a slightly more evil character whilst not screwing over their fellow pc's (which unfortunately doesn't really come across from these play reports). They also get a gold star for playing their character just as they would have otherwise even if they didn't effectively have a second life. The only dud regarding this is that the original version of Luka had not really been around enough for the difference in personality to be apparent. Several of the players suspected that something was up, though they didn't feel that their characters would be able to act on that information. 

Finally I should mention that at the end of the last session I forgot about the rule which mandates that character may only level up once per session. This is the reason that some of the character have leveled up twice since session five. Since the players had already spent a lot of money carousing (and it being my mistake), we will consider last session an abnormality whilst adhering to the rule going forward. I should also say that the reason Paula has started off at level two is that I allow characters to start with half the experience of the previous character. 

PS: If any of my players can correctly guess the reference in either of the two action report headers I promise I will either give you 500 free XP or alternatively if you get both I'll get you a drink next time we're out