I'm with Nolan on the use of the lyre. BB gets to dictate its capabilities. Yes, I have a few quibbles, you all know me too well to think it could be otherwise. But they're not important. Getting the Mariasha repaired in such a short time was already near-miraculous.

I think that arming the prisoners is a bad idea. We have no idea if any of them have scores to settle with each other or who might be thinking they can use the situation to get back on the Centauri's side, or foment a mutiny to steal the ship for themselves.  The last is unlikely, but I put nothing past a DM who thinks he can make a situation more amusing.

I just think adding armed unknowns to the mix is asking for unnecessary trouble. It's only a couple of hours to Elturel. Let's just concentrate on getting them there and let Lord Dhelt deal with sorting them out.

Likewise, open flames on wooden ships should only be allowed under very tightly controlled conditions.

So, let's keep it as simple as we can. Nets and padding for safety in the hold, water and rations (or magically created food) for the short time of the flight.

But we absolutely should have a wand of cure light wounds to make sure the badly injured are stabilized until we get them to the clerics. Maybe a couple cure disease spells or even restoration scrolls just in case. If we don't need them this time, we'll just use them on ourselves on a later adventure.

My more pressing concern is hiring some guards. We, as the adventurers, should be in the mines, killing dracoliches and cult members. We don't have enough people to assault the mines and guard the ship at the same time. BB said we could get a couple of the old party members (whose players have left) to help out and we should be able to hire a few trustworthy hirelings, or even just get a few hunters from Daak to help us out.

As long as the ship stays up in the air when not actively loading (and one of us should be escorting the prisoners out as large groups), it should be safe enough. We just need to do our due diligence.

Plus, we really need to start studying the map Amara and Nolan are making and planning how to actually get the prisoners out and kill all the cult members ... or encourage them to run far far away.

Perhaps we can convince Rufus and Lorrik to help on board as well? We could also ask Gunther to help with trying to find an alternate way inside the mines?

I'm sticking with 1 project per performance, but since posting on RPoL is slow compared to actual table top role playing, I'm going to change the time from 1 week to every 3 days.

Is there anything special anyone wishes to do? If not, I will update the day.

It looks like the group at the ship are ready for things to move on. We're just waiting for the scrying to be done.

Got it. Was trying to give Amara options. I just didn't want to assume.

Sorry... still dealing with healing complications... I think I have a surgical adhesion, but the Dr seems to not want to give any opinion... I'm beyond annoyed... But am often ending up too exhausted after what needs to get done in a day to consider doing anything else...

Anyway, I hope everyone in the path of the total eclipse got a chance to watch it! It was pretty awesome! You could see a giant solar flare from where we are :)

In reply to Amara (msg # 104):

We traveled a bit, but got a great view!
We may have seen the solar flare, depending on what it looked like

We set up a pin-hole system with a board which allowed us to watch in safety.  In our area about 85% of the sun was covered and the light was noticeably dimmer.  But it's quite amazing just how much 'daylight' the remaining 15% was capable of. Seemed more like an ordinary overcast day, even if it did come on and leave a bit quicker.

It looked even better from the desert. I used my welding helmet to look at it, but once you've seen one, you've seen them all.

I guess we're just waiting for the ship to return from its flight testings?

Can somebody help me out with the name of that item?

Would that be sending stones?

Magic Item Compendium pg. 184

The problem with sending stones is that they only come in pairs and can only be used once a day.

The Farspeaker Amulet (Magic Item Compendium Page 99) is more expensive at 6000gp but more useful.

One person has the master stone, and up to four other people have axillary stones.  Three times per day the stones can be activated for up to 10 minutes, allowing all five people to be able to communicate with each other.

Just looked it up and Nolan can make that. It will take him several days to complete, though.

Oh that one does sound much better. It was very hard to keep up with all the different magic items in 3.5

Tell me about it! LOL

OK, I looked up the item and Nolan can build it, but it's going to take some time:

5 days 236 xp 2,400 gold

If Nolan wishes to build this item, what is the party going to do for 5 days?

I'd be building the item. *Laughs*. As for the rest of the group, I'd hope they would be making plans. We still need a way to get all those people on board the ship and we also need a way to get inside the mines without everyone in the area knowing about it.

OK, do you guys want a boring 5 days, or do you plan on doing things for 5 days?

Aliana doesn't mind a short vacation, but will join the others if they get ambitious

Scrying as much as possible - the outside of the mound looking for another way in, the area looking for a good place for the ship to rest, etc.

I'll talk to Timber about additional work on the ship that can be done over the next five days.

1) Gangway that can be extended/retracted from the ship.

2) Shields that can be temporarily fitted along the sides to give any guards we have a little extra protection.

3) Assessment of the spars, masts, and other wooden parts of the rigging to see what needs to be replaced.  Actually, why does a ship that flies on magic even have rigging?

4) Get an estimate (price and time) for a cargo crane to move cargo (and giant metal crabs) to and from the ship.

#2 I hope after the mission is completed.
#3 Probably to make it look less suspicious? I don't know
#4 Cargo cranes on the ship? I don't think it will fit and it might decrease the max speed of the ship.

Installing some shields is to give our people something to hide behind while they're protecting the ship during the raid. Even a +1 to AC is a 5% better chance not to get hit. Depending on how many of our friends volunteer, we can install a few brackets along the sides that we can slip a tower shield into. Certainly not movable and not something we'd want permanently.

I've seen small cranes on ships (real world and fantasy). They're to help get things into and out of the hold.  They don't need to be able to handle really heavy loads, hopefully the port will have a large crane if that's necessary. But smaller places ... or questionable places might not have anything and I don't want to be lifting thousands of pounds of weight on my back while climbing a ladder if I don't have to.  I'll see what Timber has to say about how realistic it might be.  This is definitely something for after the mission, if at all.