Dragons of Autumn-DL III-Pax Tharkas

[Toliudar]

Spoiler

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Sorry for the delay in posting. I'm still here - just getting through a busy period at work.

Without knowing what Gneiss is actually reporting, I don't think I have any way to respond. Also, sadly, at this point, I don't think I have any idea where we are wrt where we are trying to get to, so have no way to think about tactical movement etc. Any chance of a rough map or short catch-up?

[wxdruid]

The group just left the (old, decrepit) dragon's lair with about 180 children from 2yrs to 16yrs old. You are on the main level and you came from the cellar and the Sla Mori entrance. Right now, you are trying to herd the children downstairs to the cellar and out the Sla Mori to safety. Tygerlilly is currently handing out bowls of soup and spoons for the hungry children, while Maritta is wringing her hands and wondering if they're ever going to get the children moving and rejoin the other women, Gilthanas and a few others wait at the entrance to the Sla Mori.

Gneiss just returned from a scouting mission to see if the way is clear.

Don't forget, there are still two skeletons locked behind the door to the Sla Mori.

[Toliudar]

Thanks, Wxdruid. I'll try to ask a few follow-up questions to that:

• What did Gneiss say that he just saw?
• How close are we to the stairwell down?
• Do we know of any other ways down?
• Do we know of any other routes to the stairwell?

[wxdruid]

You know the direct way to the stairwell down, it's about 10-20 feet from the door Gneiss entered/exited from to do his recon. On this level you've been to the kitchen (ew) and to the children's sets of rooms.

The stairs down are easy to get to and when Gneiss went out to do recon he passed them to look down the nearest hallway. You don't know anything else about this level yet.

[Toliudar]

Cool - thanks, Wxdruid! Once we know what Gneiss is actually reporting he saw, we're off and running.

[Philistine]

Gneiss uses the toe of his boot to roughly sketch a map of the immediate vicinity in the dust and grime of the floor. "We're here," he says quietly, digging his toe in to mark the spot, "And the stairs back down are here. Trouble is, there's a couple of hobb guards right around this corner, here - they won't see us, until they hear the noise of two hundred kids heading down to the cellar and come look at what's causing the ruckus. I didn't see a way to sneak up on them, either. We might have to just bounce them and hope they don't manage to yell for help," he finishes with a frown, shaking his head.

[Toliudar]

Pearl

Grimly, Pearl nodded in agreement with Gneiss' assessment.

"Right. All of you who ar egood with a bow, come with us. We'll try to take out the hobs and drag em back here before anyone sees. If we're spotted, well, the children are probably safer close to that dragon than in the midst of a running battle anyway. Questions?"

[wxdruid]

Tygerlilly pipes up, I'm really good at throwing knives!!! I know I can hit one!!! Can I try?

By now, the children have settled down and they're slurping down the soup, quiet for the moment while their mouths are full.

[Philistine]

Gneiss shrugs helplessly. "She's quick and quiet - when she wants to be," he says, passing the decision back to Pearl. He takes out his crossbow and cranks the string back to load it. "Half of us take the one on the right, half the one on the left?" he asks as he nocks a quarrel.

[Toliudar]

Pearl nodded and gestured for Tygerlily to join the rest of them in moving forward. They needed all the help that they could get, after all.

[wxdruid]

The raiding party is made up of Pearl (longbow), Gneiss (light crossbow), Tygerlilly (daggers), Bryce (shortbow) and Hector (longbow). Surely it'll be enough to take out two unsuspecting hobgoblins guarding a door. Tygerlilly bounces up and down on her toes, all excited for a new adventure.

((everyone going, make your move silently, listen, spot, init, weapons rolls and your actions))

((sorry, the week got away from me and yesterday I had an appearance scheduled at a small store for my chainmail))

[Philistine]

Beckoning Hector to follow, Gneiss heads quietly back down the hallway toward the corner.

Spoiler

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Move Silently: (1d20+8)[21]
Listen: (1d20+9)[23]
Spot: (1d20+9)[29]
Initiative: (1d20+3)[16]

Attack: (1d20+7)[16]
Damage: (1d8)[8]

[Philistine]

Spoiler

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Forgot...
Sneak Attack Damage: (3d6)[15], if eligible.

[Toliudar]

Very aware that she couldn't sneak her way out of a wet paper bag, but hoping that with the intervening distance and corner, any sound from her armour would be muffled, Pearl follows, arrow nocked and ready to fly.

Spoiler

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Move silently: (1d20-4)[15]
Spot: (1d20-1)[7]
Listen: (1d20-1)[7]
Initiative: (1d20+1)[6]
Attack: (1d20+6)[13]
Damage: (1d8+3)[10]

[wxdruid]

Tygerlilly quickly talks to her new friends, assuring them that she'll be back and then they can all get out of this dark, dank place. Bryce and Hector prepare their bows, getting them ready to fire.

Lagri stays to stand guard inside the room, the children are generally avoiding him, he's rather intimidating looking...

Gneiss leads the way out the door and to the corner. He briefly peers down the hallway and the hobgoblins are still there, with their feet kicked up, lounging in front of the door. They don't even glance his way this time. He peeks around again and this time fires off his light crossbow at the closest one (farther than 30ft) and the hobgoblin looks startled as he looks down at his side before toppling over. Before the other one can react, Pearl is around the corner, taking aim and firing. Her arrow just misses as he turns to look at his companion, wondering why he's falling over. Bryce is quick to follow with Hector and Tygerlilly coming around the bend. The last one is feathered and stabbitied and barely gets out an eeeek of surprise at the attack before he falls on his face. Neither of them got a warning out and Gneiss takes a quick look around. There doesn't seem to be an alert or other activity. ((Do you go further down the hallway to check at the door?))

Tygerlilly jumps up and down and she's already starting that way to check and see if they have anything cool on them. She loves acquiring new things. ((Do you call her back?))

---------- Surprise ----------

Gneiss 16
Pearl 6
Bryce
Hector
Tygerlilly
2 Hobgoblins (now dead)

[Toliudar]

Pearl makes no move to call Tygerlily back. Doing so would only draw more attention, and risk a shouted response of some kind. Instead, she gestures for Gneiss and Hector to continue forward with Tygerlily. Then Pearl goes back to gather the kids to get them moving again. The sooner that they were down and in the tunnels, the safer that everyone would be.

[Philistine]

Gneiss hurries down the hallway behind Tygerlilly, trying to remain as quiet as possible without falling behind the kender. "Remember, quietly," he whispers. At the end of the hallway, he risks a quick glance into the room beyond.

Spoiler

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Move Silently: (1d20+8)[9]
Hide: (1d20+8)[19]
Listen: (1d20+9)[28]
Spot: (1d20+9)[23]

[wxdruid]

Tygerlilly pauses in her bounce down the hallway to dramatically put her fingers to her lips shhhhhh Gneiss right back. She turns back around and bounces the rest of the way to the door and she retrieves her dagger before she starts rooting around in their stuff. Gneiss quietly follows her. When he pauses at the door the hobgoblins were guarding, he doesn't hear anything from that side, but the door on the other side of the hallway is another story. Gneiss scoots over to that door for a listen and he can hear sounds of boisterous laughter and arguments. Hector is a bit slower than both of them as he follows Gneiss. He's keeping a wary eye on the hallway, his bow at the ready.

From here, the hallway continues onwards with a set of steep stairs going up on the right followed by another door at the far end. There's also another door on the left hand side. The stairs are about 45-50 feet away.

Pearl is anxiously watching Gneiss and Tygerlilly as they go down the hall. Back in the room with the children, Kalrin and Lagri are keeping watch and working on keeping the children quiet.

[Toliudar]

Pearl immediately heads back and gets everyone moving towards the stairs and downward.

[SilentNight]

Dropping his hands from his readied spell, Kalrin looks to Pearl and nods, quietly sheperding the children forward with his staff like a pack of curious hyperactive lambs.

[wxdruid]

Gneiss decides it's better to leave the doors alone and he retreats down the hallway after quietly telling Tygerlilly it's time to go NOW, not later. Her topknot bobs once in reply and soon she's following him back down the hallway. She's busy counting something she has in her hands as she walks behind him. Hector is herding her along, keeping her moving.

Pearl and Kalrin get the children moving. They each carry their bowl and spoon and the larger children carry the smaller children. They make a small amount of noise with some whining about why do they have to go downstairs into the dark? They thought they were going to meet their parents, not go into the basement. They're tired and want to rest, but with Lagri behind them, they're moving right along. He's a little bit scary...

In the hallway, Gneiss pauses at the corner and stands watch, waiting to see if anyone comes out. He goes behind the corner so he would be out of sight and drags Tygerlilly along with him. She looks up and spots the children and bounces right over to them, humming a little song. She's pleased. She retrieved her dagger and a bit extra. Hector leaves the watch to Gneiss and helps Pearl, Kalrin, Bryce, and the others to hurry and get the children down the stairs.

Gneiss wishes they'd hurry up, there's no telling when new guards will come to replace the old ones and he doesn't want to be there when they see the dead guards, or when someone else comes down the hallway.

[wxdruid]

Gneiss nervously watches the hallway and the Kender. She looks up for a moment at him and then bounces off to join her newest friends, the other children. She grins and waves at them and then runs past a few of them and down the stairs. Once down the stairs, she starts telling them to hurry up and get down, after all, once there, they can play a bit more. The children, spotting a familiar face headed down into the dark, brighten up a bit and they hurry after her, and soon enough, they're all down the stairs and going into the storage room where there is a sudden and joyful reunion at the back of the storage room as mothers connect with children and everyone starts getting sorted out. ((This will take 30 min to an hour)) Maritta rushes to join the other women, she's so relieved that everything went reasonably well. Now for the men?

Upstairs, Gneiss and Hector are the last ones down the stairs and both remain near the top to listen for anyone approaching.

[Philistine]

Taking a last long look around from the head of the stairs, Gneiss nods to Hector and heads down behind the children. "Help me look for anything we can use to close the way behind us," he whispers to the big human. "Sooner or later somebody's going to find the dead guards, or the missing kids, or just head down here to check on the other prisoners, and then the chase will be on. We won't be able to outrun 'em, not with all the kids, and they'll overwhelm us with numbers. But this wouldn't be much of a fortress if there wasn't some way to slam the outside door shut, so let's find it."

Spoiler

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At the top of the stairs,
Spot: (1d20+9)[12]
Listen: (1d20+9)[26]

[Toliudar]

Pearl nodded at Gneiss' wisdom.

"I'm hoping that, with the hidden door closed, it will throw pursuit in another direction, but you're right, Gneiss. Anything more that we can do to help distract will be helpful.

"Our next step, though, will be to marshall the men. Maritta, are the women prisoners used to bring food to the men as well? What's the route you use to get there?"

[wxdruid]

Right before Gneiss and Hector head back down to join the others, Gneiss hears a door slam somewhere above.

Down in the storage room, things are hectic as the children reunite with parents and loved ones. Pearl finds Maritta resting against some boxes. She's very relieved that they all made it down here in one piece. She looks up at Pearl and stutters a little, Well...we, we uh, we feed them in the evening after, you know, the work is done. The children get fed in the daytime. It, it isn't yet time for the men to get their dinner. At least I don't think it's time yet. The guards would come down and get us for dinner.

[SilentNight]

"And no doubt be perplexed as to why you're not there," Kalrin adds. "Which means we'll have to act quickly before they discover you're gone. Unless..." he trails off, "Nevermind, too complicated, anyone got a plan?"

[Toliudar]

Pearl nods in agreement with Kalrin.

"We may have reached the 'brute force' portion of our day. We need to get out of here soon, or we risk alerting the dragon-men to the escape route. We start to take weapons from any of the guards that we take down, and keep an eye out for armouries and weapons storage. If we can fight our way through the fortress to where the men are kept, we can spread the word among them that the others are safe. Which would give them some added incentive to fight alongside us. Maybe we can find a defensible position once we get there, or - if the dragon men aren't organized - fight our way back here and out. As long as we stay in the narrow passages inside the fortress, it'll be harder for any dragons to reach us."

She stops, looking around at the others.

"This is, suffice to say, insanely dangerous. Who's in?"

[Philistine]

"The fun never ends," Gneiss scowls ferociously, tugging lightly at the hilts of his blades to be sure they would come free at an instant's notice. Cocking his head toward Maritta, he asks, "Do you know where the men are being held? Could save us a lot of time."

[wxdruid]

Tygerlilly's right with Pearl, claiming that she can do it, of course she can do it! She can do anything she wants to, well, except maybe grow taller, maybe that wouldn't work so well...

Maritta has regained a little of her composure and stands up straighter. Yes...we know where they are, but it's complicated. They, They're at the mines, and not as close as the children were. The mines are to the south and up dangerous trails. She looks around for a moment and sighs, One of us would really have to go with you.

[Toliudar]

Under happier circumstances, Pearl would protest putting an untrained woman in danger. But all of their lives were balanced on a sword-point, and she had to put some of the more old-fashioned passages in the Measure against the seriousness of the circumstances.

"That does sound complicated. But we can try the robes, which might help with guards who don't know the daily routines so well. And mines are at least better than out in the open."

She looked around at the freed captives, sad to have to ask this.

"I'm afraid that we need another volunteer, to guide us to the men."