Do we need to pry the door open? looks at the door Rael is pointing too...

"Let's see ..."

Turning back into the main chamber Rael points to one of the doors on the top tier. So far every door exiting the bridge has opened at your approach. It is obvious that Rael is making a reference to the Plant of power needing to be above decks. With the spires and towers of the aft-castle, it is likely that any plant would have the best chance of being found in an exposed place.

Berta and Viktor begin to pry and "hack" at the door. After a few minuets of concentrated effort, The two are able to get Viktor's axe blade wedged into the door allowing for them to pry it apart. It is nearly as difficult as getting a mule to move, but their efforts eventually pay off. The door opens to a set of stairs heading down into the dark. You can smell the moisture, just moisture, there is no hint of mold or mildew to the scent.

On the other hand the castaways, known as meeps, had clearly indicated that the mad ones were somewhere down this corridor. The only remaining door is an "unpowered" door opposite the room that Mikkl is working in.

Rael begins to move back into the bridge. Silently the castaways watch in disinterest at the ballet being performed by the group. From down the hall you can hear the voice of Mikkl "The power plant would most likely be in the heart of the ship, Much like on the Mistress, if you want my opinion of what needs to be done first. Not that this is any harder in this crappy light or anything."
This message was last edited by the GM at 04:52, Sun 13 Dec 2015.

Berta is panting hard by the time the pair manage to get the door open, and is unimpressed with the sight ... and smell ... of what lies beyond.

"He's the expert," she shrugs apologetically to Rael.  "If he thinks this power plant lies below decks, then we must trust his instincts."

Mikkl's gripes brings a grin to her lips.  "That's what you were doing wrong," she teases Cirok.  "You should have complained more !"

"After you," she tells Vikor, looking down the dark stairway.

Ladies first my lovely Berta...winks at Berta and chuckles a little and then straps his axe back on and gets his crossbow...
This message was last edited by the GM at 02:53, Mon 14 Dec 2015.

"Clearly," Cirok shot back at Berta, as he rolled his eyes in an exaggerated fashion and cracked a smile of his own.  "He never included that with his instructions, of course."

The sailor made ready to follow with the rest, after their vanguard of Berta and Viktor led the way.

"Lady ?  Never been accused of that before," the warrior woman shrugs as she begins the descent, sword sheathed for the moment as she uses her gauntleted hands to feel her way downwards.  "And you be careful with that," she admonishes Viktor eyeing the crossbow at her back warily.

I will be as careful with this as I am my axe...laughs and makes sure he doesn't have his crossbow pointed at Berta...

Angrboda throws her arms up in exasperation, "Finally!" she exclaims as she makes her way down the stairs, mumbling about ungrateful ships and how a little more assistance would have gone a long way.  She steps hurriedly but carefully down the stairs, watching for any sort of trap.

Berta, with Viktor protectively behind, confidently march down the stairs full of the adrenaline that comes with besting inanimate objects. Shortly followed by an exasperated Angrboda, Cirok, and at the far tail end Rael Gol. The wide and sweeping stairs are barely visible in the pale blue light. All to familiar ivory bone like protrusions sweep the length of the stairwell like some sort of macabre grand staircase's handrail. Halfway down the staircase an eerie greenish glow laminates the bottom of the staircase. From the north wall you see the semi-tranparent form of a goatman step into the room.

The combination of the green and blue light make the rooms expanse easier to see. The walls are made of something else entirely. Where the walls and forms of the upper portion of the ship were made of some sort of hard black substance, this lower area appears to be made of a far more "fleshy" substance. The room's walls are lined with patterns and tubes that give you an uncomfortable look at what the inside of any beast must look like. The textures of the wall remind you of muscle while many of the tubes and ropes remind you of ligaments and blood vessels. The doors themselves have taken on a far more fleshy tone as well. Where the outside appeared to be made of a thin and resilient bone, these doors are made much more akin to stiff flaps of skin that appear to overlap the portal.

The right side of the stairwell, going down, quickly opens up with only the bone handrail as protection from the 15' (4.5m) drop. A door can be seen set into the wall beneath the stairway, a door heading "north" towards the bow of the ship, and a door to the "south" leading to the stern of the ship. The goatman stands in the center of the room staring at the group intently. You can almost feel the hunger in it's gaze as it eyes you up.

[Private to Cirok: You notice that same sickly green glow from behind Rael.
19:42, Today: Secret Roll: The Grey Lords, on behalf of Cirok, rolled 1 using 1d100.  Search tn 70. - Critical]
[Private to Rael Gol: You notice a similar green glow from behind you.
19:41, Today: Secret Roll: The Grey Lords, on behalf of Rael Gol, rolled 16 using 1d100.  Search tn 42. - pass]

Upon catching sight of one of the goat spirits with her own eyes Angrboda thinks back on all her reading to see if she knows what will hurt these things.

OOC:  18:36, Today: Angrboda rolled 75 using 1d100.  million spheres goat things.
sorry guys.

Should I try to shoot or get out my axe? steps in front of everyone so that the goat man puts his eyes on him....starts to laugh loudly to see what it does...

The spiral staircase naturally led everyone to glance down at their destination, especially when the low blue light mingled with the brighter green glow of a goat spectre at the bottom.  Having seen one of the creatures before with Berta, Cirok recognized the chills it evoked, and yet something still nagged at him, an itch between the shoulder blades that was just out of reach.

Despite being a seasoned adult who had traveled between planes of the universe, the sailor couldn't help himself from giving in to the feeling something was watching him from behind.  Turning with apprehension scrawled across his face like a little child, he was almost relieved to see his instincts were right.  Only the fact that another green spectre was behind Rael prevented him from feeling proud of himself.

"Watch out!" he cried to the physician, although he was loud enough all would hear.  "There's another behind you!"

Angrboda curses as she finds out that the group is surrounded.  In desperate hope that the lords of chaos will help her she throws a spell at the one on front of them as she begins moving rapidly toward the door to the right, hopping over the banister as she gets to the bottom or the stairs.

OOC:  Casting Agony, if that doesn't work I do not know what will.  :(

Rael catch a glimpse of something green behind him and turn around wildly when he hears Cirok warning.

He could feel the tickle of sweat running down his back, he was itching on several places and his booth was chaffing him plus he needed badly to take a piss. None of it would help if that specter would get him.

"Angrboda... your dagger is magical... maybe it could hurt the things..." he croaks his throat feeling dry all of a sudden. He still had a mad thought that perhaps these things would want to talk and not fight but even he found this notion dubious at best.

[Private to GM: OOC:
Not sure if the talisman would protect him from spirits or not Rael take full defense ready to dodge any attack]

"The ghost Cirok and I saw earlier made no attempt to attack us," Berta cautions, "perhaps if we ... oh by the Lord of the Seven Darks !" she breaks off as Angrboda launches a spell, drawing her own blade though she fears it will prove useless and hurrying after the Melnibonean.

In a quick motion without thinking moves over so Angrboda can run by and fires his crossbow off towards the goatman in front of him before Angrboda makes her way past him...

Sensing the trap for what it was Angrboda falls into the familiar tactic of immobilizing the foe. Thanks to this, Viktor slides to the side to give a better view for Angrboda as her words of power are spoken. Releasing the potent magics Angrboda targets the semi-transparent goatman with no results. [Private to Angrboda: You feel the power drain from you, the release of the magic, but something is dissipating your power before it can fully form.] Landing just to the right of the stairwell, Angrboda is up and ready for whatever happens.

Cirok's cry of alarm causes the second goatman to focus on him. It raises it's hand with it's fingers wide spread and a sickly green light forms as it outstretches it towards Cirok. Sliding past Rael, is if he were not even there, it stops just short of touching Cirok as a green stream of energy leaps from Cirok's chest. [Private to Cirok: Something cold, almost slimy, grips your heart as you can feel your life beginning to be pulled out of you.] At that moment a blade comes screaming out from nowhere. The pale blue light, combined with the speed of the attack, make the swipe appear to be a slice of the full moon descending. With a howl of pain the connection between the goatman and Cirok is broken as one of the pirates that escorted Mikkl steps from the room to join in the fight.

Berta races down the stairs into the reluctant confrontation as a bolt flies over her head and through the body of the goatman with no effect. It fixes it's eyes on Angrboda the same way a starving man sees a feast for the first time. Sliding forward without moving it's legs it lurches after Angrboda with it's hand outstretched. To fast for the methodical ghost, Angrboda is able to keep out of it's reach, however in doing so she is forced to somewhat back herself into the area under the stairs.


Time for combat everyone. For the new players place your actions into your posts, heroically or simply listing, with your rolls at the bottom of the post (or your action and rolls via PM if you prefer). I tried to make an easy example in my Example of Combat post.

Sees that Angrboda is in possible danger sets his crossbow down and pulls out his mighty axe and rushes towards the goatman with the blade in front of him like a medieval bulldozer...

Angrboda watches as her magic fails to take hold of the creature in front of her, never before has she met a foe that magic could not take care of.  For the first time in her life she feels unsure of what to do.  Seeing the green light that Ciroc was assaulted with spurs her into action however and she continues to move towards the northern door, dagger out, hoping that it leads to salvation for the group.

The "pirate" wasn't truly a pirate.   Just a young woman who happened to be very far from the place she knew as home.

Since leaving that land, through no real choice of her own, she had entered into Maria's service on the Mistress mostly of a lack of other options.   Maria had proven a fair person to work for and, at least, the ship offered some small odds that she might return from where she had come.   She prayed for that nightly...but also wasn't holding her breath, at this point.   And did her best to make peace with her new life.  Her second new life, actually.

She didn't know what sort of beings they faced, here...phantoms, ghosts, some sort of ethereal demon?   Nor did she understand why her heirloom blade was effective, where other things were not. There was silver in its alloy...and she recollected her father saying something about the smith having a fascination with the weapons of the Vadhagh people.   Beyond that, she might only guess.  And didn't care, right now, as long as it worked.

It chilled her to look at these ghastly appartions; but she pressed her small advantage, anyway, and attacked the thing again...

Esyld rolled 71 using 1d100.  attack - rapier.
Esyld rolled 100 using 1d100.  parry - rapier.
Not off to a great start, here!  Yes, I know, that dice roller serves Chaos...
[Private to GM: That's at 113% - normal success for the attack.  I switched the cutlass to a rapier, so you may want to fix the numbers.  If I didn't just break the thing on the wall!  ]
This message was last edited by the player at 23:14, Mon 21 Dec 2015.

A gasp of relief burst from Cirok's lips as Esyld's timely slash broke the concentration of the goatman.  He'd never experienced a feeling like the one the attack had caused and it left him chilled to the core, as though the spectre had been sucking out his very soul.  With wide eyes the sailor drew his cutlass and moved to assist his crewmate in the assault.

Cirok had no idea whether his blade would prove any deterrent to the greenish goatman, but he knew for certain he wasn't going down without a fight!



OOC:

11:15, Today: Cirok rolled 33 using 1d100.  Attack - cutlass.
11:15, Today: Cirok rolled 8 using 1d6+2.  Damage - cutlass.
11:17, Today: Cirok rolled 55 using 1d100.  Dodge.


 

Knowing full well that getting trapped in the corner is no good in any situation Angrboda dashes for the northern door. Easily dodging the clumsy attack she makes it to the northern portal as Viktor and Berta both make it to the apparition who seems to be ignoring them in favor of the lanky Melnibonean. Viktor, finally getting to a wider area, takes a savage swipe with his Lymorian Axe only to have it pass through the greenish specter. All the while the specter keeps it beady eyes focused on Angrboda as it slides forward menacingly with it's hand outstretched..

At the top of the stairs the second ghost has started to pull back. The attention once focused on Cirok now completely on the newcomer with the shining blade. Sensing the hesitation is all that is needed for the pirate to launch her own attack. Thrusting her rapier forward she is able to once again register pain on to the semi-transparent goatman. Snarling and showing it's bravery the apparition turns and begins to melt through the wall as Cirok lunges forward wanting some sort of retribution for the infringement of his soul. Cirok's blade passes through the specter sparking off of the wall in frustration.

Angrboda, feeling something she has never felt before, tries desperately to open the door and get away from this creature, or at least find some sort of defense against it.

Cirok's frustrated growl echoed the sparking clang of his blade, but he spent no time mourning the fact that one of the spectres had been chased away.  "Thank you, Esyld," he said briefly, clapping his crewmate on the shoulder briefly to convey his gratitude. Then he cast his gaze over the railing to the base of the stairwell, where Angrboda, Viktor and Berta confronted the second attacker.

"I think we need your blade down there," he urged Esyld, making way to follow her down the steps.  "Let's go!"