AC 18 HP 12/31
Cat turns back to herself, having delivered her package, and climbs to the ledge. She gives Talis a glare, "Let this play out. This is old Foxglove." I think....

too late,

Glum remains at the entrance to the smaller room.  He stands ready to fight should he need to, but for now, takes Catessa's advice and lets the drama play out.

"The ship for talking has, look out...", as he tries to avoid Tanrov, "...already sailed.  Is there anything you can do to stop him moving or get her up there."
[Private to GM:
any avoidance rolls, natural 15]

ooc: He is moving way to fast in this environment and she is using "brute strength" to climb.  Unless she is faster then him, which seems unlikely, he will (probably) just run away or just keep hopping around attacking those who aren't near his wife.  We need to slow him down or speed her up.  Some ideas;
-Glum; trip, bullrush, grapple him to slide him down the slope to her
-any spells that are useful, maybe ready an action to cast a spell in his path
-anyone have a tanglefoot bag

Sickened: The character takes a –2 penalty on all attack rolls, weapon damage rolls, saving throws, skill checks, and ability checks.
[Private to GM: Zer = Vorel’s Phage took 3 chr 4 con
               ]

Round 17
SickTalis throws and hits, and Aldern becomes the Skinsaw man again.

SickGlum readies to attack.

SickTanrov/Garth does slip this time, right into Iesha.  She is holding onto the rocks so hard, she doesn't even notice the hit.  (rolled a 20 on her freaky high str check, and since he only slid 5', no damage)  Tanrov does manage to stand up, holding onto the wall with 1 hand.

Catessa Fallowfield climbs out of the water as she turns into herself again.

Iesha grabs onto Tanrov and helps him up, a very motherly gesture as she concentrates for a moment then stares at Aldern in his Zer-wedula disguise.  Then she stares at Tanrov for a second and almost seems sad...almost.  In an oddly quite voice, shes says "I always wanted to be a mother.  Husband, I hadn't told you yet, but I think I was pregnant...when, YOU MURDERED ME."  Oddly, she doesn't shriek like she had done before.  She focuses on Aldern.

SickZer-wedula also slips and slides into Iesha.  She sees him coming and braces herself, Zer picks himself up off the ground.

Round 18
Aldern Foxglove looks at Iesha with fear, and in a whiny, ingratiating voice starts "Honey that's great.  If..."  >WHAM<, Talis' hammer hits and in mid sentence the Skinsaw man returns, "...Noooo.  The Skinsaw Man will not be denied.  Particularly not by some woman who won't stay dead."  He whirls on Glum and attacks, again and again.  Glum does get an attack first...
"Lord Skinsaw wanted you dead...you should have stayed dead."

Glum; what attack do you want to make...just a punch, or something else?

[Private to Glum: Make it good, because he is hitting with all 3 attacks and crit with the bite.  My dice got HOT.  You do know that cure spells do damage to undead? ]
.
.
.
This message was last edited by the GM at 17:43, Thu 21 Oct 2010.

As Aldern came close to attack, Glum called from deep within the power of his innate goodness in order to smite the evil that was the undead creature. [ooc - cure light.]

20:47, Today: Glum rolled 13 using 1d8+5. Cure light damage.

Post edited after clarification from DM
This message was last edited by the player at 19:49, Wed 20 Oct 2010.

Tanrov will thank Iesha for the assist will restart his climb towards the room with a dagger in one hand and climbing with the other.

.
.
.
Round 18
As Aldern Foxglove turns to attack, Glum quickly casts a spell and touches him.  The positive energy that would heal a living person is like fire to the undead and Aldern does not like it.  Unfortunately, it does not bring him down and as he stands there smoking from the damage, he hits with his razor, a claw and a nasty (crit) bite.
23 damage
Fortitude DC 19 vs Disease
2 Fortitude DC 19 vs Paralysis


Tactical Situation
slippery ledge, dc 5 climb, 12 balance - please review the rules on climbing and balancing.
At the start of your turn, roll a balance or climb(requires at least 1 hand) check, if you fail, you fall down and start sliding.
Talis, Cat, Zer-wedula and Tanrov are standing on the slope
Aldern is on the slope next to Glum.
Glum is at the entrance to the smaller room and doesn't need to make a balance check.



                 dam     status
Aldern Foxglove - 83

Everybody may post
<<u><b>AND DON'T FORGET TO INCLUDE AC AND HP(CURRENT/TOTAL)>
[Private to GM: Vorel’s Phage
 To most victims, though, the phage causes a painful and hideous outbreak of facial tumors and a sickening deteoriation of the skin across the entire body.
Infection—contact or ingestion; Fortitude DC 20; Incubation 1
day; Damage 1d4 Charisma and 1d4 Constitution.]

"Hey Cat, do you have anymore of those stones to pass out to all of us while we all happen to be here."  Will wait to see what Cat does.

balance 15
This message was last edited by the GM at 20:28, Thu 21 Oct 2010.

Cat shakes her head, What a forest fire. She yells up, "Glum, get away." She looks to Iesha, "Can you talk your husband out again?" All the while, she is handing two pebbles to those who want them. "Just in case."

ooc: tired of fighting and still wanting answers.

Talis will step forward (when he can) and take an offered stone and throws it (when he can).  "Thanks".

to hit 19
dam 14
This message was last edited by the GM at 19:13, Fri 22 Oct 2010.

Tanrov will throw the dagger and then accept the stones continuing to climb in order to get a little closer to the Skinsaw man or Aldern

AC  18
Hps 44
rolled a 10 minus 2 = 8 I missed the skinsaw man.
This message was last edited by the player at 18:15, Fri 22 Oct 2010.

18:50, Today: Zer-wedula rolled 15 using 1d20. Sickened climb.

Zer-wedula clenches his wand of shocking grasp in his teeth and scrambles up towards Glum and the Skinsaw Man.

00:25, Today: Glum rolled 9 using 1d20+6. fortitude v paralysis.
00:25, Today: Glum rolled 25 using 1d20+6. fortitude v disease.

Sickened: The character takes a –2 penalty on all attack rolls, weapon damage rolls, saving throws, skill checks, and ability checks.
[Private to GM: Zer = Vorel’s Phage took 3 chr 4 con
               ]

Round 18
SickTalis waits for an opening to move next to Cat...

SickGlum freezes.

SickTanrov/Garth throws his dagger and misses.

Catessa Fallowfield digs out some stones and hands them out.

Iesha starts climbing saying "I...will..kill..you..."  in the rhythm of her climbing.

SickZer-wedula also keeps climbing.

Aldern Foxglove "Lord Skinsaw wanted them all dead, his messenger gave us a list."

...SickTalis gets his opening and steps forward, takes a stone and throws it...hitting and blowing Aldern into several chunks....



The battle is over, over the weekend I will post the aftermath (I just don't have time right now to do it justice).  I will be starting a discussion in another thread about what we might want to do going forward.

...as Aldern, is blown apart, Iesha stops moving and collapses to the ground, her body sliding down the slope.  With Aldern destroyed, she has no reason to exist.  For a moment, floating in the air above Tanrov's scimitar, you see the shapes of Kasanda and Lorey, hand in hand.  The little girl picks up the scimitar and she hands it over to Tanrov, "Thanks, the nice lady says you might find this useful."  Then Lorey hands Cat the stone she lost when Cat fell into the water, and Cat feels a comforting presence.  The stone vanishes from her hand and reappears in her jade amulet with a symbol of Sarenrae on it, "Your mother would like you to guide those that choose to go on."
   Kasanda gives Talis a hug, and his magic sword glows briefly, "Your Lady is proud of you, whatever you decide."   Then she takes Zer-wedula's hand in hers and the wand glows.  "There is a darkness coming, and the path is treacherous.  You all must choose how you want to confront the darkness."
   Finally, a ghostly Iesha appears beside Glum, "Thank you all for defeating my husband.  My rage was clouding my soul and if vengeance had been mine, my fate would have been sealed.  But you have released our souls from this house, thank you" and she kisses Glum on the forehead.  Then a ghostly Naomi appears and takes the ring off Iesha's finger, "Till death do you part", and ship touches it to the ring Glum wears.  It glows briefly and now Glums ring is different.
   As the moment passes, so to do the spirits, vanishing before your eyes.  The group feels bereft of the other souls they inherited in the Catacombs of Wrath.  Now that an insane Aldern isn't trying to kill you, climbing can be taken carefully.

I will continue tues, with what you found, etc...
This message was last edited by the GM at 19:29, Mon 25 Oct 2010.

Aldern's room is investigated
  This damp cavern contains several items of furniture. A rickety table sits in the middle of the cave, its damp surface cluttered with all manner of what appears to be garbage: empty bottles, bits of clothing, crumpled bits of paper, and more, lying in neatly organized rows.  A closer inspection of the collection on the table is enough to worry Zer-wedula, for this is Aldern’s collection of relics from that his life.  They range from mundane things like used potion bottles and scrolls on up to objects as personal as an  envelope of hair (perhaps harvested from him as he slept or from a discarded comb).  The only objects here that weren’t taken from Zer’s garbage are a stack of charcoal drawings on water-damaged parchment depicting an idealized perfection of Zer.
  A painting leans against the far side of the table, facing a large leather chair that sits nearby.  The portrait is a clumsy attempt to repaint the portrait with blood and bits of runny rotten flesh into a caricature of the Zer.  What the portrait was before is unknown, some person in a room in a city.
  The chair’s high back and cushion are horribly stained by smears of rotten meat and its arms are sticky with blood. A smaller table sits against the southern wall, its surface heaped with silver platters, fine porcelain plates, and crystalware. The “food” on these plates and platters is rotten meat, in some cases humanoid in source, and in all cases writhing with maggots. Thick, rotting blood gels in the crystal.
  Yet the horrific stench of the room seems somehow even thicker and more overwhelming than this gruesome display can account for on its own. The stench seems strongest to the west, where the cave’s wall has been overtaken by a horrific growth of dark green mold and dripping fungi. At the center is a humanoid outline, empty now that the evil that was there is gone. What appears to have once been an exquisite puzzlebox the size of a man’s fist lies smashed on the ground at the fungoid shape’s feet.  The box is the same as the one depicted in the stained glass windows.  Zer relates what he has deduced.
   Vorel Foxglove was a necromancer trying to become a Lich and the box was to be his phylactery.  Somehow his wife Kasanda found out and confronted him, probably at the climax of his ritual.  She disrupted it, which caused a magical backlash, transforming the wizard into the fungus and infecting his wife, their daughter Lorey and all the servants with some unique magical disease, which killed them.  In some strange way, th spirit of the near-lich lived on in this patch of fungus and inhabited the house as well.  It really was a haunted house, possessed by the spirit and evil of Vorel Foxglove.  No wonder the Foxglove family went crazy, they were influenced by his evil.
   Also on the table is an interesting letter from someone in Magnimar.
Aldern—
   You have served us quite well. The delivery you harvested from the caverns far exceeds what I had hoped for. You may consider your debt to the Brothers paid in full. Yet I still have need of you, and when you awaken from your death, you should find your mind clear and able to understand this task more than in the state you lie in as I write this.
   You shall remember the workings of the Sihedron ritual, I trust. You seemed quite lucid at the time, but if you find after your rebirth that you have forgotten, return to your townhouse in Magnimar. My agents shall contact you there soon—no need for you to bother the Brothers further. I will provide the list of proper victims for the Sihedron ritual in two days’ time. Commit that list to memory and then destroy it before you begin your work. The ones I have selected must be marked before they die, otherwise they do my master no good and the greed in their souls will go to waste.  If others get in your way, though, you may do with them as you please. Eat them, savage them, or turn them into pawns—it matters not to me.
                              —Your Mistress, Wanton of Nature’s Pagan Forms
So there is someone behind the runes and the deaths are being "harvested".  There is more to this than just a few deaths in Sandpoint.

In the room
Once cleaned, the portrait of Iesha is worth 200 gp.
A small silver key ring worth 10 gp, with two keys on the ring.
 - a tarnished iron key set with a round opal worth 100gp
 - a bronze key with an unusually long tang ending in a set of three notched
     blades. The head of this key resembles a roaring lion.

A search of the fungus south of the dangerous black patch uncovers a mold-encrusted wand of knock used 60 years ago by Kasanda Foxglove to enter her husband’s secret world.  Zer-wedula's new wand.

Alderns gear
+1 war razor,
ring of jumping,
ring of protection +1,
stalker’s mask,
extravagant noble’s outfit worth 200gp,
cameo (containing tiny portrait of Zer)worth 100gp,
key to the iron door in post 137

These items have been changed, I will update the modifications later
Zer-wedula wand of shocking grasp now looks like this wand
Talis sword has a new rune
Tanrov scimitar is now magic
Cat amulet of jade has a stone embedded in the jade
Glum ring has a new look and a gem stone
[Private to GM: hat disguise, adamantine weapon]

What are you planning to do with the bodies of Iesha and Aldern?
This message was last edited by the GM at 17:56, Thu 28 Oct 2010.

"We will of course, dispose of the bodies in the proper manner", said Glum, "Perhaps beginning in the room I consecrated, where the fungus was strongest."

  After burying the bodies in a proper manner, the group heads upstairs, but find the stairs blocked.  Evidently, the evil spirit WAS keeping the house intact.  With it gone, the house has collapsed.  A little exploration leads you to a chimney up that leads to the well at the front of the house. (msg 8)  At the bottom is the body of a dire bat(killed by ghouls) and 3 humans (previously killed by the bat).  Two of the three dead humans among the bat’s victims are long-dead Varisian nomads with nothing of much value on their remains. Both Tanrov and Talis look at the 3rd body carefully.  There is something about it... and after they consult each other thy declare the third is the corpse of notorious bandit Shaz “Redshiv” Bilger, suspected of organizing the robbery of nearly two dozen merchant convoys along the Lost Coast Road over the past decade. Proof of his demise presented to the law at Magnimar is worth a 500 gp reward.  Of more immediate monetary gratification, though, is his surviving gear, which consists of a pearl ring worth 300 gp, a mw longsword 315gp, and a scattering of 56 gp.

   You can see the sky, 90' overheard, but you look at each other and realize, no one has enough skill to climb it.  You could with a rope, but how are you going to get a rope up there in the 1st place?

Any Ideas?
This message was last edited by the GM at 18:53, Thu 28 Oct 2010.

"So, anyone have any useful spells left?"

"No", said Glum, "But I don't think we're in any danger, so maybe we should sleep here?"

"No spells, no magic, but perhaps Cat could transform and fly a rope up?" Zer-wedula proposes.

Cat is disconcerted with everything. Loosing Garious was like loosing a limb. Then watching the Foxglove family leave in peace. Now ... this. She pauses to reach inside of herself. "I might have the energy for a transformation. But do we really want to waste it on this? Doesn't anyone have a good bow or something?"

The question isn't if anyone has a bow and arrow, the two questions I can think of is one; How much rope do we have? and two; would the arrow be strong enough to hold me as I climb up since I would be the anchor man?

Glum says, "Perhaps, Catessa, you could fetch help, then people at the top could hold the rope.  I imagine this place is safe for them now."

Since Cat is now 6th level. I will let her access the 2nd wildshape a day.  And it is crucial you leave asap.  3 of you have picked up a magical disease that is resistant to remove disease.

  Finding just enough energy to transform, Cat wildshapes and gets a rope to the top, allowing the group to escape in a timely manner.  Once on top, you find the house has collapsed.  Never has the cold salty air tasted so good.  As you stand there, the weather breaks and the sun starts peeking through the clouds.  The Foxglove curse is no more.
  Heading home to Sandpoint takes longer than the trip out, Zer is just not up to a rigorous walk with his lessened constitution.  You take care to keep Zer under wraps, the people would take 1 look at him and cry "Plague".  Talis and Cat both become concerned with their skin, they seem to have also picked up whatever it is that Zer has.
  Back at Sandpoint, Father Zanthus and Madame Mvashti consult and come to the conclusion that you need more magic than they have, so they give you a letter to give to a woman in Magnimar.  They are very careful to keep your arrival on the QT, as they too are concerned about a panic.
  With the help of several friends, enough Mount spells are found to get outfit the whole party and the next 2 days are a blur of travel.  Arrival at Magnimar is just in time, for both Cat and Talis have broken out in boils and tumors (chr and con damage) with Zer getting worse.  The location you seek is a Temple of Pharasma outside of town.  There you are treated for Vorels Phage, a nasty magical disease.

Zer-wedula wand of shocking grasp;
is now an eternal wand of Shocking Grasp (5d6 dam) or Knock.  Instead of charges, you can just use the powers (1/2 you caster level)/day, in any combination.

Talis sword has a new rune

Tanrov scimitar is now;
+1 scimitar made of wood (hard and sharp as adamantine), and is consider adamanitine for purposes of overcoming DR

Cat amulet of jade has a stone embedded in the jade and her magic bag of stones has changed;
The bag is now a type 2 bag of holding and
the amulet can cast magic stone (druid level)/day.

Glum ring has a new look and a gem stone;
It functions as a Hat of Disguise (You can use Disguise Self at will as a standard action).

And this is the end of chapter 2.1, I will start 2.2 after we have finished moving to Pathfider.  Look for specific rules later this week.
This message was last edited by the GM at 18:05, Wed 03 Nov 2010.