Terminus 9.29.13

In the morning, the No Pants Brigade and the Nekhanj prepared to set out, with the Nekhanj speaking of clearing the entrance to the tunnels that would lead them south and the fact that it would take them a couple of weeks.  While the discussion was going on, the group received an SOS call from Gronton, whom they hadn't seen in quite some time.

The stalwart Minotaur sailor had been scouting along the coast of Celton along with other concerned captains from the nearby area and had seen the undead make attempted crossings to Brenna.  Most of these had been foiled by the coastal towns on the mainland, with the added aid of captains who managed to end sea travel to the island nation, depriving the undead of their source of ships.  But things had changed.

The dragon Krathnaraz had joined the fight, bringing flying undead and their Beholder allies to attack the coastal defenses from the air.  This had decimated these defenses, leaving the coast more open for an attack.  Meanwhile, scouting ships had discovered that there was a new invasion fleet, massive and full of undead, prepping,  The undead had built crude but large rafts which were being towed by Beholders and loaded them with hundreds of undead soldiers.  Soon, it seemed, these undead would sail to the mainland, which was now unready to repel them.

One of the last bastions of defense was the town of Polenta, which is where Gronton was asking for aid to come.  The party decided that they'd have to separate from the Nekhanj to get their in time and made preparations to do so.  Once the threat at Polenta was solved, their intention would be to push onto Celton and make for the Forge, to close the gateway which allowed the Beholders to cross into their world.

Vallo summoned flying boars and the party set out, flying rather uneventfully to Polenta.  But that changed once they neared the town.  Quickly it was apparent that the town was under attack.  An immense white dragon had landed on the docks and was rampaging through the town's defenders. Using the boars, the party got in fairly close before launching their assault.

Meggido moved in first, pulling the dragon towards himself and then Adah-kah unloaded with divine wrath, rocking the dragon.  Sardis and Sabriel followed up with theirown powerful attacks, getting the No Pants Brigade off to a good start.  Adah-kah hammered the dragon again with a critical strike, but that's when things started to go downhill.

Krathnaraz began to use his draconic power to stun the party, then dealing massive amounts of damage.  The party was able to get a few more hits in this period, but eventually the dragon put Adah-kah on death's door.  Vallo delivered timely healing, though, and got the Nekhanj back on his feet.  Once more, the party began to trade even blows with the dragon, though Krathnaraz was able to hurt Meggido more than the Warforged had been hurt in quite some time.

Still, the party appeared to have the upper hand and Krathnaraz made ready to escape.  Unfortunately, for him, the No Pants Brigade had other plans, and put him down before he could get airborne.  Upon a quick inspection, though, they discovered that one of his heel spurs was missing, likely taken by Samuria so that she could resurrect her ally should he fall.

The party moved on to another town, hoping to at least delay Samuria's discovery that they'd re-entered the fight against her and her undead forces.  Once there, the party notified Gronton of their location and asked him to come and meet us.  He came, and learned of recent events, including the plans of the Nekhanj.  In return, he gave the party the information he'd gathered in his time scouting, including the fact that undead have begun to count fallen Beholders amongst their number.  That gave the party something to think on as they prepared for their journey to Celton to find the Forge.

Last Recap.  Other posts on Terminus.

Terminus Session ?.? (Calling it 4.14)

Terminus is the campaign of my DnD group and has been running for over two years. We began it not too long after DnD 4th Edition released and have gone from starting level characters to level 16 world travelling heroes. I play Adah-Kah, a Nekhanj (based on the Dromite from previous editions) Avenger of the goddess Ioun.

To give a breif summary of the plot, each of the player characters is the lastor nearly last representative of their respective races. Adah-kah was found on the edge of a desert in the arms of a Nekhanj statue and adopted by a temple of Ioun. Over time, he trained in the teachings of Ioun and the ways of an Avenger. Being always different and ever a subject of study, Adah-kah learned to keep his appearance semi-obscured when in public. He also made it his goal to find his vanished people. Eventually he set out on excursions first to the desert, then the great library in the city of Span to see what he could discover.

Span is a city built on a bridge over a swift moving inland sea called the Scarring. The Scarring also refers to an event in the world's history in which magic users of the Dragonborn race very nearly destroyed the world and broke their continent in two. The Dragonborn had a magi-tech empire that crumbled after the Scarring, leaving a sole representative (the PC Sabriel). The Nekhanj previously warred with the Githyanki, but retreated suddenly and the Githyanki empire went into decline until their former slaves the Lizardfoll began to hunt them down mercilessly. It's possible the PC Vallo is the last Githyanki.

Once, the Warforged race were born at a great factory called the Forge, but the Forge is now missing and the Warcorged are shut down, save for the newly awakened PC, Meggido. It's possible that the Skeshuni, who later became unable to breed, may have had something to do with those events. Their final representative is the PC Sardis. The PCs ostensibly are working for the Watcher, a mysterious godlike being who typically does not interfere with the world but who has gathered this group to face a cataclysmic threat. The Watcher, on occasion, sends visions to the heroes which expand on their powers beyond the normal hero's. The PC's are occasionally aided by Grontonn, a Minotaur ship captain, his crew and a dog Vallo rescued named Kun Kun.

The PC's have helped re-form the Talminar Province, stop a vampire (twice because we avoided her the first time), shut down an army of false Warforged, released a Dragonborn lich (uhhhh...), awoken the lich's dragon ally (UHHHH...), rescued several towns, gathered a war effort against undead forces, crushed a gang called the Firehawks (Firehawks suck!), investigated mines and caves including an ancient Nekhanj city, found two pieces of a device which might save the world, discovered an invasion by Beholders, and most recently maybe, kinda sorta permanently collapsed a demi-plane used for rapid travel (oops!).

This session was focused on getting on to our next objective. We checked in with the folks we'd last worked with and discovered the trolls we'd fought/allied with were moving in to support the other races fighting the undead. The maybe-not-a-Succubus who'd accompanied us was turned over to Sardis' old university for investigation. And Sabriel, using Dragonborn directional senses that the Watcher may be tapping in to, directex the party into a forest to the southwest, quite near to Sardis' home. On the way we fought some assassin vines which put a severe hurting on the party (three or four of us were bloodied within a round and a half). Adah-kah did get a couple good shots in, as did everyone else, but it was a rather unpleasant fight overall.

We continued on riding our magic flying boars (because we're awesome) and came across a Treant (which we immediatelt redubbed an Ent), who told us about a corrupt "pink fleshy thing" (I forget his name) who is spreading kudzu-like Darkwood through the forest, which is increasing the population of plant mosters such as assassin vines. We continued on, flying over an encounter (yeah, our boars are awesome) and then finding overgrown Skeshuni ruins, actually the Skeshuni capital, where Vallo summoned up a guide to help us find the seat of governent. And I believe that's where we left off until next week.