The 19th of Gozran, 4710 AR. You ride south from Oleg's Trading Post, planning to challenge the Stag Lord once and for all. You have no expectation that he, or his men, will surrender and peacefully retreat from your new nation. Your current plan is to pick off a hunting party if it's convenient, then present yourselves as recruits from a distant band, delivering what seems to be the long-expected booze as your ticket through the gates. But you're ready for anything. At least, you hope so.

If you have any 11th-hour errands or requests, now is the time.
This message was last edited by the GM at 03:50, Wed 21 Feb.

Wilkezag goes through the bottles of booze to make sure that everyone in the know can tell which ones are poisoned and which are not.  If the bottles we got from Bokken are different than the bottles of unpoisoned liquor, he swaps some around so that each type of bottle has some of each.  Finally, he makes sure that all the bottles have scratches and look like they seen some travelling, but the unpoisoned ones have a distinct scratch in common which everyone can recognize.

The night before the approach, Will makes an effort to make a hearty meal for everyone, but his nerves get to him and the meal is a bit of a failure.


22:15, Today: Wilkezag rolled 15 using 1d20+9 with rolls of 6.  Lore (Cooking).

GM edit: 15 is enough with Cooking Lore; it's more precisely targeted than the standard Survival roll.
This message was last edited by the GM at 05:40, Wed 21 Feb.

On the night of the 22nd, Telric thinks he hears something scuttling around the camp, but when the sun comes up, all you see is a few thick strands of spiderweb caught on a bush. Whatever it was, it decided you were too tough to bother with. Knowing that you're getting close, Wilkezag goes to a special effort on the next evening to put together an exceptional meal, something to prepare you all for the worst the Stag Lord and his men can do to you. It doesn't come out quite the way he imagined it, but it's still tasty and filling, letting you sleep well that night and get up on the 24th with a new determination, almost eagerness, to prove yourselves.

As you ride south on the 24th, you have no trouble finding the ruined temple that the Stag Lord has turned into his central headquarters. As Venk said, it's perched on top of a hill, clearly visible for over a mile in all directions. You find a dry wash where you can leave the horses, and take some time to observe the regular behavior of the bandits inside from the cover of a thicket atop a neighboring hill. You can see one guard watching out in each of the three covered towers, but Dubh notices that they don't really pay much attention to anything except the path leading up to the gate. The inside of the fort is concealed by a log palisade, clearly a later addition to the original temple.

You're about 300 yards north of the main gates. If you want to wait until a provisions party goes out, after about 3 hours, two bandits emerge and head generally southwest toward the Tuskwater. You can roll Survival to track them, which will take another hour or so to catch them since you're out of position and have to circle pretty wide around the fort if you don't want to be seen.

Will joins Dubh who is watching for people exiting the fort.  "Well, damn, they are going the wrong way.  What do you think?  Should we circle around to try to catch them?  Maybe we should just head into the fort now.  Them being gone is all we were really hoping for; I'm sure we'll either have won or be dead before those two come back."

"As long as there is rock or some sort of stone outgrowth they won't see me, Boyo. Not until they get close anyways. Me making a tunnel for us all would take a long, long time I should tell ya. However, if I could get inside I would be able to open the gate..." Telric pointed out.
This message was last edited by the player at 14:40, Thu 22 Feb.

Will cocks an eyebrow at Telric.  "Hmm.  We already have a plan for getting inside.  It might not be the best plan, but if you wanted a different approach, I mean, we've been talking about it for a while, now.

"Now we're just trying to decide if we stick with the original idea of ambushing down a hunting party now that they went directly away from us.  Circling around and then trying to find them again is probably not worth it.  They are effectively out of the action; by the time they return it will all be over, one way or another." 

"I don't think it's worth the effort. Best case scenario going after them, we waste the better part of a day taking out two goons. Worst case, they are tougher than they look or we screw something up and waste healing and the better part of a day.
Let them go. We have bigger dragons to slay." He puts action to his words and heads back to where the rest of the party is and does his final preparations for the bluff and fight.

Wilkezag nods to Dubh.  "Let's get ready, then."  He starts to put on his disguise to appear human, and much less dangerous.

I'm not sure if I should roll this now, or if you roll it at the time it matters.  My Deception is +9 and I do have a Disguise Kit.

Can we also 'Aid another' on each others' disguises?

I remembered that Sophia is on vacation for the rest of the month, so I'll go ahead and do the thing she needs to do.

Sophia scuffs up the breastplate of her armor, and packs the rest in a sack as ersatz bandit loot. "Bandits won't have anything really nice, but an old beat-up breastplate should be believable. Hopefully we'll find somewhere to put the rest back on before we get into any trouble. Wil, you got the booze? That's going to be a better argument than anything we can say!"

As you walk up the path to the gate, the bandit on the nearest watchtower shouts, "Oi, go on, get out of here before I shoot you full of arrows! Who do you lot think you are, anyway?" The one on the other watchtower, to the west, looks over to watch the excitement. Wilkezag thinks that one seems familiar: you don't think you've met him before, but maybe you've seen a drawing?

Will holds up his amulet as he speaks the password.  He makes an attempt to match the man's accent.  "Oi!  We got this herbal liquor we're supposed to deliver.  We'll go away if you want, but I don't think the Stag Lord's gonna be too happy about it.  We're late as it is, because Kressle fucked up, but we're here now.  Do you want this booze or don't you?"

GM edit: learn to spell NPCs' names!
This message was last edited by the GM at 22:50, Sun 25 Feb.

The suspicious bandit lookout still seems a little uncertain, but the one that seems familiar lights up at the sight of the bottles of booze. "Hey, bossman's been REAL cranky without his drink! Come on, guys, get these gates open so our saviors can get in!" He shouts this last down to the central yard, which you can't see from here. The first guard calls "Eh, Falgrim, who asked you anyway? Aye, fine, go get Akiros to let them in."

You hear some rustling and thumping from inside, then one side of the gate opens. A huge bandit to the left stands ready to put the bar back in the gate once it closes, while a more snivelly-looking one to the right watches the case of alcohol with a gleam in his eye. Directly ahead, you see a stocky man in chain mail glaring at you suspiciously. "So these are the new... delivery people, then. Well. I suppose this will have to do. They brought the booze, anyway. And what did you say happened to Kressle? Or her lieutenant, what-was-his-name. Why have we not heard from them? Why did they not send at least one familiar face?"

Behind this man, clearly a lieutenant of some kind, you see the detritus of the bandits' daily life. A dark, tattooed man dressed in black leather lounges in a corner of the main room, sharpening some of his astounding collection of knives. To the left, you see what must be the bandit armory and the stairs up to the catwalk. You can't see onto the roof of the main hall from here, but you can hear someone big thumping around up there. Beside the building you see a couple of horses hitched to a post, in rather cramped conditions. They seem rather skittish at the noise, or possibly just the proximity of the larger bandit.

The bandit to the right pleads, "Aw,... come on, Akiros, don't... be like that. They brought the... booze, you... really want to keep that... away from the boss?" Akiros nods to grant this point, but still watches you carefully.
This message was last edited by the GM at 06:07, Wed 28 Feb.

Wilkezag starts with a question, to keep them off balance.  "Hey, did Nate and Castis make it back here?  Venk told me that they took off when the trouble started, the chickenshits.  I never saw them -- I had only just joined up, and we got to camp just as some fucking paladin was gutting Kressle.  Sophia here got the paladin, and I skewered his horse, but Kressle was already a goner.  Venk was in bad shape, but he took a healing potion, it was barely enough to get him on his feet, so Charlie took him to go find a healer.

"Anyway, Venk told us to bring the booze here.  We've been hiding from those paladin patrols all the way here -- must be four different groups at least.  You seen 'em?  Every one has some stuck up shit with a white cloak leading.  Good thing they can't track worth a damn, or we'd've been caught.

So where are we supposed to bring this?  And we could use some grub -- you got anything hot and greasy?"

Before travelling to the Gate with Wilkezag, Telric used his hat to appear as a normal, if not rather generic human laborer. No doubt he would be carrying said Booze so Wilkezag could appear to be the official in charge of this 'outing' of gathering the bandit leader's favorite drink.

Akiros sneers at your mention of paladins. "No, we haven't heard anything from Nate or Castis. Haven't seen your paladins either, but maybe they haven't made it this far south. Pushing as close to Rostland as Kressle did was always risky. Typical paladins though, always so self-righteous and arrogant. Bunch of day-jobbing Iomedaeans down from Mendev, I shouldn't wonder. Bloody fools, even for paladins." He stares off into the distance for a second, almost snarling, then shakes himself and comes back to the point. "Well, you'd better come on in. At least you -- Sophia, you said? -- looks like you brought some nice gear," he adds, nodding at your sack of miscellaneous armor parts. "You can go and stash it in the armory, then see if you can get Gorgon to share his turkey." He nods at the larger of the bandit doorkeepers, who doesn't look like he's interested in sharing. Akiros turns back into the main hall, at which point you realize the tattooed man has snuck off at some point while you were talking.

This mystery is solved quickly, as he comes out of the curtained back room in company with what seems to be some sort of giant. As they move farther into the light, you see that it's only a man, albeit some seven feet tall, wearing an antlered helm. He shouts, "Akiros, Dovan says they brought my drink! What are you doing making them stand out in the cold? When Kressle was late, I thought I would have to send one of you louts out to find out what happened! Come on, hand it over! My throat's dry as the Mana Wastes!"

Assuming you do, the Stag Lord tears the crate out of your hands and shouts some more. "Bounties all around! Five mountains to each man -- and woman, right you are -- that brought my drink! Pay up, Akiros! Good luck with this bunch, girlie!" He stomps his way back into the back room, Dovan gracefully dancing out of his way with a smirk. You hear a solid door slam from somewhere inside.

Akiros watches his boss head back inside with an expression you can't figure out. "Well, I guess you're accepted after all. Take a load off and get some grub, then come on back and I'll mark down your bounties in the log book." He shouts up to the two lookouts on the towers, "Oi! Ayles! Falgrim! Eyes out! You're still on bloody watch until Jeb and Topper get back!" Akiros heads back to the curtained room, following his leader, as Dovan resumes his seat and his whetstone in the corner, watching the room. The other two bandits return to their previous activities, Gorgon sitting down in front of what used to be a whole roast turkey (about half is left), while the other one (whose name you haven't caught) returns to what seems to be a game of solitaire, played with an old Harrow deck.

You hear a weird sound from behind the gate on the west side of the main room, sort of a cross between a roar and a screech.

You have the freedom of the fort at this point, although you'll need to make more Deception checks if you spend very long interacting with any of the bandits, especially Dovan or Akiros.

When the Stag Lord demands that the heroes hand over the drink, Wilkezag grabs two of the poisoned bottles and holds them out.  (Does he take all the bottles, or just some?)  As the Stag Lord leaves, he watches to get a glimpse past the curtain to see the building inside.  Hearing the door slam, he considers, That sounded pretty solid.  Maybe we'll get a chance to bar that door and keep the boss out of the fight while we take care of the other guys.  The thought of just murdering these men makes him feel a little queasy, but he forces himself to remember that the group is empowered by law to deal with bandits this way, and these men have never had any compunction against murdering their victims.

Will starts to follow Akiros, as any man eager for his bonus pay would, but drops off when the man tells him to get some food first.  He looks at Gorgon, and nods towards the bird.  (Unless Gorgon stops him) Will cuts off a decent hunk of meat and steps away.  While eating, he looks up to see where Ayles and Falgrim are stationed, and calculates the dead spots from their vision.

Once all the heroes have had some turkey and they are back together, the bard leads them to the curtain.  He pulls it back to look in, without actually entering, looking for the layout of the room, and whether the door that the Stag Lord slammed opens in or out.  If he can see Akiros, he waits for a nod or some sort of permission to enter.  Otherwise, he enters after a couple of seconds of looking.
This message was last edited by the player at 05:01, Tue 27 Feb.