Forbidden Scriptures

[Andrezitos]

(Now my char its the epitet of the Vanguard way of life: fearless and deadly as the Death hinself.)

Shortly after the tests, Andros fell very ill. Despite all the magic and care of the members of the academy, his health got poor, until he finaly died. In the morning next of his burial rites, he digged his way out of the grave, reborned as a new creature, nor dead nor alive, a undead. His skin turned thin and pale, his eyes now glows with a sinister reddish light. Despite his physical changes, Andros personality don't changed. The academy members acknowledged what happened as some sort of magical disease, something probably rooted deep inside Andros lineage. More than never, Andros prefers the solitude of his room than curious looks of the living rooms. Looking for guidance, Magnojeba wants to talk about his state with the wise Kain.

[Chimaera]

(I'll work on my character this night and will post when I finish)
Is level adjustment allowed? If so maybe I'll make some character I was waiting to do)

[Chimaera]

Eustacio's is back, this time as a evoker, not an abjurer anymore.
He's a lorekeeper and pratically a walking encyclopedia.
He love magic missiles and is ready to prove his post-doc thesis on Magic Missiles.
Still seventeen years old and very annoying with his old style.

Eustacio the Old.

(Almost done, only spells and equipment to buy)

[Beschoren]

Tanstafaal attends to Andro's funeral, more for respect and lack of intrest on other things then for true friendship or whatever. He takes a look on the records of Meteora Interhouse Tournament and the histories of newly graduated dungeoneers hoping to get an edge on whatever is ahead of him. He also takes some time to get a good list of conjuration spells to learn from Tania.

When andros rises back from the dead and Tastafaal meets him in the corridor he only asks telepaticly "Are you a zombie?"

After the response he only telepats back "Fascinating", but keeps form himself his more personal thoughs - I hope that smell vanishes with a bath or else I'll need to create some new spell just for that particular issue.

[Dudu]

Ok.

Rich, you're the only one left. You still have to decide what you'll do with your free day. Andros will visit Kain, Tanstafaal will visit Tania and hear histories of veteran dungeoneers.

[Dudu]

Andros:

This is your first day of you new life (or after-life, doesn't really matter).
Upon entering Kain's room, you find the kobold sitting, staring at the door. Without letting you spit a single word, he says:

"Yes, my friend, you're rotten dead."

You're familiar with this old habit. He's a powerful diviner, and nothing surprises him. He trained all his life to have the least ammount of surprises as possible. That's what a diviner does, afterall.
He then stand up and starts walking in the room.

"Well, as you probably already know, this is both a bless and a curse. You can sustain more hits now, but can you heal yourself? Difficult. And don't you think that, because you learned a few tricks with the Destruction domain you have this problem totally covered."

He looks at you from head to feet. Then says:

"I have just what you need."

Then he goes to his drawer and grabs an exotic ring.

"This ring. This invaluable ring was crafted by one of the most powerful necromancers I have ever faced. He belonged to the Hel clan and were a expert in corpsecrafting. Corpsecrafters are necromancers who create augmented undeads. Here, take this ring, put in your finger and you'll be considered the creation of a corpsecrafter. That ought to prolong your life. I trust you'll be very responsible with this ring, the implications of wearing this are not yet completely clear to me."



Ok, enough o dialogue. What Kain is giving to you is a ring, the Hel ring, that means, you'll have to reserve a ring slot if you want the effect to work. Whenever you're equiping this ring, you receive the benefits of an undead created by a necromancer who possesses the Corpsecrafter feat. In other words, you receive +4 enhancement bonus to strenght and +2HP per HD you have (+12 HP for lvl 6). This might have some roleplay repercussions.

[Chimaera]

Eustacio will go to his room and scribe scrolls to get a better repertoire for tomorrow. The sheet is essentially done.

[Chimaera]

Eustacio is done!
Prepared Spells:

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0: Light (2), Ray of Ice (2), Detect Magic (2);
1: Nerveskitter (1), Lesser Deflect (2), Transdimensional Magic Missiles (5);
2: Empowered Magic Missiles (3), Repeat Magic Missiles (3);
3: Greater Mage Armor (1), Dragonskin (1), Fireball (3).

[Dudu]

Tanstafaal:

Reading about the Meteora Interhouse Tournament:

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Upon arriving at the library, you grab the “History of the Meteora Interhouse Tournament” subtitled as “Few Champions, Many Loosers”. The book isn’t very thick and tells about the most interesting clashes in the tournament, many of them include the Discoverers and their “everything is possible, nothing is expected” philosophy that usually grants them creative tactics. There were 213 tournaments, all of them biennial. Meteora Interhouse is better knew as one of the Tournaments the qualifies for the Junior Arcane Championship (JAC), one the biggest competition between arcane casters in the material plane.

The Creators are the current house with most victories, followed closely by your house, the Discoverers, with only one title separating each other. Destroyers and Mesmers lag behind and the Keepers are way back there holding only one title. Even though the Creators hold the most victories, the Discoverers brought more victories in the JAC.

Then suddenly the book start talking about the cultural impact of the Tournament, which you promptly skip. You decide to read briefly the most interesting aspects of each house. You read everything but, for now, I’ll post simply the most interesting facts about the Creators, since you’re battling them tomorrow, and, apart massaging your ego after reading so many feats of the Discoverers, reading about rivals is your main reason to read the book.

The Creators are as versatile as their favorite school, Conjuration. When battling, they seem to show great variety of spells. It’s usual that the battlefield is completely changed after the Creators clashed on it. The original flat surface or the arena is suddenly filled with towers, walls, monsters and even the weather inside the arena may change. Mesmers fighting against Creators are sure to wait some Glitterdust spells. Evokers tend to get entangled by webs and intoxicated by conjured clouds, maybe swarmed by creatures summoned by Creators, which turn the blasting more difficult to employ. Keepers usually have a hard time fighting against monsters or dodging their conjured rays since they’re not too much proficient in battle. The Discoverers are their most feared enemy and those two houses promote fights considered by many as the most interesting ones. Against Discoveres is when they employ their whole arsenal of spells. No clash between those two are similar to another as they hone their strategies as the years passes.

You, Tanstafaal, now knows a lot about this tournament and will receive circunstancial bonus whenever you use a knowledge skill inside the Tournamente (remember that!)

Since I wrote so much about the Meteora Tournament, I’ll not write about dungeoneers, but you read about them as well and may receive some circunstacial bonus whenever wandering inside the Arcane Mountains (I’ll write something when you start the dungeon part).


Anyway, your visit to Tania:

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As soon as you enter her room she shifts her attention to you.

“Oh, Tansta. Good. I was collecting those samples of gases.”

You don’t even try to probe her mind, since entering teacher minds is difficult and risky. She’s holding many flasks, each with a different gas. You state the you’re interested in some new spells. However, you take a whole day to study a spell, so she can really offer only one. There are two thing you, Pedro, must do. First, put the character sheet. Second, choose any conjuration spell that can be casted in your level and ask her, she probably will lend a scroll to you.

She does have some advices, though. Against another casters, is always interesting to hamper their actions. Glitterdust and Stinking Cloud are good examples. In fact, the gas inside the flask is identical to the one in the spell. Hampering their movement is fruitless. Conjuring a monster right next to them might be good, let they taste their own poison. Finally, if you have access to lvl 4 spells, Evard’s Black Tentacle may ruin their day.

[Chimaera]

Eustacio's scrolls:

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Scroll of Ebon Eyes (3)
Scroll of Shield (3)
Scroll of Mage Armor (2)
Scroll of Mount (2)
Scroll of Darkness (1)
Scroll of Gust of Wind (1)
Scroll of Resist Energy (1)
Scroll of Protection from Arrows (1)
Scroll of See Invisibility (1)

If there's time left I'll visit Gobadin and talk about the weather, the competition and any transmutation spell he find may be useful in the tourney.

[Beschoren]

Tanstafaal thanks master Tania for the advice and the gift, despite secretly hating being called by "Tansta" as she often does. He hurries to scribe it on his spellbook before the competition.

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Spellcraft DC 18 (1d20+12)[32] to put the Sikening cloud spell on my spellbook (I supose the academy can hand me the 300 gp in writing equipment to scribe the scroll)

Also, I made a little change on his build: instead of forbidding transmutation spells, I'm now forbidding Necromancy spells.

[Kevinho]

Lokopor Tiamerica is a wizard/druid/mystic theurge and is now ready! I just have to think about his background, and read what happened so far in the game. Soon I'll post my spell lists.

[Beschoren]

Tanstafaal meets andros in the corridors. He politelty communicates trought telepaty, as usual
So, how was your day? Is this new form of yours stable?

[Dudu]

As soon as you find Gobadin wandering between the corridors of the college, he greets you:

“Oh... Oi Lad! Hope you’re ready for that showdown tomorrow!”

You state your business, or talk whatever chit chat you’re willing to talk with Gobadin. Soon you start talking about the competition, obviously. For that, he gives his advice.

“Well, Eustacio. They know you, all of you. Don’t ever hope to enter that battle without meeting your opponents shielded from your sure-hit magic missiles. Be ready to dispel them. Maybe one or two will let the shield out, since buffing is limited, but know your enemy, and know your enemy’s buffs.”

He then starts talking both about transmutation and the battle.

“And remember, Never, never, neverskitter!” - he laughs with that sentence – “I know you have this spell ready. Well, save a single slot for that tomorrow and be happy. Again, at least one of them will employ this spell as well, but if not to assure advantage, at least use it to negate their advantage. Oh, whatever, I feel you’re getting way too experienced for my advices…”

“But, if you want something really new, consider Enlarge Person. Transmutation excels in transforming weaklings into fierce warriors, and fierce warriors into juggernauts. Andros has limited mobility, and limited reach as consequence, even with a reach weapon, it’s hard to hit elusive mages. An enlarged Andros has both more power and more reach.”

“I’m a bit surprised with the sudden interest in Transmutation, though. You could transform your friend, Andros, into a killing machine like no one else. Haste might be expensive, since few of you could benefit from extra attacks, or extra mobility. Heroics (Spell Compendium) can give fighter feats to the target. Ray of Clumsiness is key to casters that rely on rays or use it to dodge against attacks. Earthbind can ground flying casters. Many, many possibilities buddy. It’s your call.”

Like happened with Tanstafaal, Eustacio can choose a single scroll from Transmutation. And maybe a duplicate, since you won’t be able to learn a new spell before the competition (you’re tired after writing all those scrolls). You can learn after the battle, though.

[Chimaera]

"If possible, I would like to take a scorll of Fly and Dragonskin, and about the shield mages... well, my old friend, I'm much more older than you think I am and thought about that as well. One can't just rely on a measure that can be easily countered, but I do can use it in my favor even without using it: they'll be expecting me to have such spell since I'm the famous Magic Missile Trooper Mage, so I'll have spells who will damage them that can't be blocked. Anyway, the enemy now much about us I guess, do you have any knoledge of who we'll fight against? Their signatures spells, etc? It would be pretty good to know it in advance. Also, do you know how much buffs we can cast upon us before the battle?"

Eustacio will change his memorized spells for the competition:
Prepared Spells:

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0: Ray of Frost (7);
1: Nerveskiter (1), Ebon Eyes (1), Lesser Deflect (2), Transdimensional Magic Missile (3);
2: Seeking Ray (3), Scorching Ray (3);
3: Fireball (2), Sound Lance (2), Greater Mage Armor (1);

[Kevinho]

Lokopor Tiamerica is an wizard specialized in the study of magical beasts. He and his Cheetah want to meet every magical beast in the world

[Dudu]

The day of the semi-finals arrived.

All of you are in a room, connected with the arena by a narrow corridor. You can hear all the noises and the fuss and everything outside. Right now, you’re among the coolest guys in the entire college, rivaled in coolness only by your… rivals, obviously.

In the room, one of your favorite teachers, the transmuter Gobadin is giving instructions. Something your characters already know (but you, players, don’t) is that in this arena, almost anything is allowed. Arcane casters despise the rigorous limitations of other sports, and try to reward the resourcefulness of their participants. Any animal magically bonded with a competitor is allowed, so it’s perfectly ok to bring Familiars and animal companions. You can cast a single long duration buffing (1 minute/level or more) and a single short duration just before the battle starts (1 round/level, but you can cast 2 long duration instead, if you want). This one of the only limitations in this battle. Plus, you can’t teleport outside the arena, which is pretty obvious (even though Blink spell is allowed). At last, you can’t use an invisibility spell before the battle (but you can use during it).

Your rivals are familiar to you. Everyone in the Creators house loves the conjuration school, even if just a little. There’s a sorceress, specialized in evocations. A druid/wizard, a friend and adversary of Lokopor, who specialized at summoning critters. A warblade/wizard Half-orc, the grunt of the party. The leader is able to telepathically communicate with his teammates just like Tanstafaal, he employs debuffs, summon monsters and, along the sorcerer, likes to fly a lot. He works as the leader of the team.

Gobadin lend to Eustacio a fly scroll and a scroll of Earthbind. “Sorry pal, couldn’t find that Dragonskin scroll. But Earthbind isn’t so bad, not in this battle, trust me.”

After that, the dwarf gives some hints on this battle, to everyone.
“All right, folks. This battle will be difficult. I suggest you hit their leader first, without him, their party crubles. He likes to use some invisibility to defend himself, so take care of that. If you can’t hit him, you can try hitting the most fragile one, the sorceress. The evocations that the Creators enjoy using are more focused damage blasting and summoning stuff, like persistent blade, for example. She uses shield a lot, Eustacio, so don’t even try using your mms against her. The Half-orc is powerful, but he’s less about being a caster and more about being a grunt. In the last battle I noticed he resists fire, so don’t be so eager to burn him. Just don’t forget that he still is a caster, and we all saw him using glitterdust to gain an advantage in battle, he’s pretty clever overall, stay far from him if you can. The druid/wiz is pretty fragile, rather employing critters to defend him. If you can target him before he swarms with monsters, good, because that’s what he’ll try to do. My hint is to leave the half-orc for last, and try to stay away from him as much as you can. If you can avoid the sorceress blasts or the druid’s critters, target their leader. Defeat the druid and you defeated a small army, defeat the sorceress and you won’t worry so much with scorching rays anymore. I’ll leave this choice for you. Now go out there and show why you are the favorites!”

=====================

I’ll let you swith your spellbooks like you knew about all those details when you woke up in the morning (since your characters actually really knew about their adversaries).

In a nut shell, here’s the overall profile of each of you enemies, as far as you can remember:


Conjurer: Party Leader, strongest member. Not so tough in terms of HP. Can conjure lvl 4 spells. Telepathically communicate with teammates. Can use shield, fly, get invisible, and mage armor. Likes to summon powerful monsters. Likes to use battlefield control spells, like stinking cloud. May be either tricky or very easy to put down.


Half-Orc: Grunt, but much more clever than looks. Almost as dangerous as the leader, but much more tougher. Can conjure lvl 3 spells. Enjoys using spells that helps him in combat, like grease, armor spells (including his favorite, Dragonskin). Wields a heavy mace with both hands. Is very proficient in melee, using some maneuvers like charging minotaur and disarming strike.


Druid/wiz: Basically a weaker version of Lokopor. Likes to summon critters and use a quarterstaff. Neither too powerful or tough, he’s not a priority. Can only conjure lvl 2 spells. Has a medium viper as animal companion.


Sorceress: Predicable. Loves flying and launch scorching rays. Can conjure lvl 3 spells. She probably will be shielded against Eustacio’s feared magic missiles. Is quite devastating, but very frail.

All of them teleport a lot via Benign Transposition.

[Kevinho]

Eustacio will keep the spells he memorized and will cast on himself Shield (from scroll) and Greater Mage Armor before the battle. When the battle begins he'll cast Nerveskitter.

Prepared Spells:

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0: Ray of Frost (7);
1: Nerveskiter (0), Ebon Eyes (1), Lesser Deflect (2), Transdimensional Magic Missile (3);
2: Seeking Ray (3), Scorching Ray (3);
3: Fireball (2), Sound Lance (2), Greater Mage Armor (0);

Edit: it was to be Chiamera's actions (was logged on Kevin's account

[Dudu]

And here's the Arena.

[Kevinho]

The two buff spells I'll cast will be Mage Armor [on me and on She-Ha] and Barkskin [on me and on She-Ha].

Inic: (1d20)[18]


Lokopor's Spells:

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Wizard:
0º: Acid Splash [5]
1º: Benign Transposition [1], Mage Armor [0], Stand [1], Shield [1], Ray of Enfeeblement [1]
2º: Inivisibility [1], Baleful Transposition [1], Cloud of Bewilderment [1], Shadow Spray [1]

Druid:
0º: Dawn [2], Cure Minor Wounds [3]
1º: Crabwalk [1], Cure Light Wouds [1], Snake's Swiftness [2]
2º: Barkskin [0], Kelpstrand [1], Animalistic Power [1]

[Chimaera]

Initiative: (1d20+7)[8] (with Nerveskitter)

[Dudu]

Inits:

Tansta: (1d20+5)[7]


Conj: (1d20+6)[15] (Neverskitter)

Half-orc: (1d20+1)[21]

Sorc: (1d20+1)[12]

Druid/Wiz: (1d20+1)[4]

Order:

1 Half-orc
2 Andros
3 Lokopor
4 Conjurer
5 Sorceress
6 Eustacio
7 Tanstafaal
8 Druid/Wiz

[Dudu]

To detect the buff your adversaries just cast before entering the battle, each of you did a spellcraft check


Spellcraft checks:

Eusta: (1d20+18)[31]

Tansta: (1d20+12)[24]

Andros: (1d20+7)[22]

Loko: (1d20+14)[26]


And so did they

Conj: (1d20+16)[35]

Half-orc: (1d20+14)[25]

Sorc: (1d20+10)[25]

Dru/Wiz: (1d20+10)[13]

Since Eustacio know, and your mediator (Tanstafaal) is awake, you immediatelly trade information and all of you know what spells they just cast.

They are:

Conj:Fly

Half-Orc: Dragonskin (red scales)

Sorc: Fly

Dru/Wiz: Shilelagh

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The Half Orc moves forward and cast what Eustacio already know very well. It's a Shield Spell. (I assume Eustacio automactically suceeded, since it's he specialized in magic missiles and was expecting the half orc to cast this).

[Chimaera]

Lokopor walks to V10 and casts Kelpstrand on V3.

Ranged touch attack: (1d20+3)[15] , if hits, Grapple Check: (1d20+11)[25]

If the sorceress is grappled, then She-Ha will chrage against the Orc and will try a bite attack:

(1d20+11)[28] Damage: (1d6+5)[8] Trip: (1d20+3)[11]

If the sorceress is NOT grappled, then She-Ha will attack the sorceress instead.

Spell List:

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Wizard:
0º: Acid Splash [5]
1º: Benign Transposition [1], Mage Armor [0], Stand [1], Shield [1], Ray of Enfeeblement [1]
2º: Inivisibility [1], Baleful Transposition [1], Cloud of Bewilderment [1], Shadow Spray [1]

Druid:
0º: Dawn [2], Cure Minor Wounds [3]
1º: Crabwalk [1], Cure Light Wouds [1], Snake's Swiftness [2]
2º: Barkskin [0], Kelpstrand [0], Animalistic Power [1]

Edit: GitP was logged as Chimaera, but I posted it as Kevinho.

[Andrezitos]

andros will delay his action to act at same time that eustacio and transtafal.

[Dudu]

The Kelpstrand suceeded in grappling the sorceress. She tries to free herself from the kelp, but fails miserably.
She-ha charges at the Half-orc, dealing mild damage. The warblade, however, doesn’t fall with the trip attempt.

Andros hold his position for a bit longer, so he can act in conjuction with his teammates. This however, comes with a cost. The Conjurer casts a spell that your group identifies as the infamous Evard’s Black Tentacles. Those tentacles try to grapple both Andros* and Tanstafaal.

*Since you delayed your action, you’re not actually flatfooted against this attack.

Tentacles damage:

(1d6+4)[8] (bludgeoning)

1 Half-orc
2 Lokopor
3 Conjurer
4 Sorceress
5 Andros
6 Eustacio
7 Tanstafaal
8 Druid/Wiz



The conjurer is flying.
The blurred gray circle is where his shadow is projected. So he is L8, but 20ft (4 squares) above the ground. So, the distance between his avatar and the black shadow is the distance between him and the ground. There's a blurred column linking both. I will use this pattern for this campaign everytime someone is flying, levitating or similar.

[Chimaera]

Eustacio will cast a Sound Lance spell on the leader and hope he die in one shot:
Fort DC 20 for half
dmg: (6d8)[32]

Edit: after, will move to T23

[Andrezitos]

As a swift action, Andros use his magic boots to translocate himself out of the spell area (N18). Afthe this, he moves closer to the half - orc (P14) and unleash a mithy attack with his halberd - charged with some nasty spell (DC 16 to identify [chill touch]) (fort save or take 1 str damage) .

(1d20+14)[19](1d10+10)[14]+(1d3)[1](negative energy)

if hit, the Half-Orc is Entangled (Bracers of the entangling blast [MIC]) for (1d3)[1] rounds (no save).

edit: probably my strike missed the target (the half-orc). I think if trasta can humper the orc's defense or increase my attack chance, he should do it. or just pulverize the leader with a ray...

[Beschoren]

Tanstafall is not quicky enought, despite his best efforts, and pays the price being assaulted by those terrible terrible black black tentacles.

Tankfully, this spell is not failsafe. Tanstafal uses his abrupt jaunt to teleport 10 feet just outside the spell's area (E-18), and then hurries to assassiante the leader Let's keep focusing on him before he turns invisible!

He moves to G13 and sneds forth an energy ray at the conjurer's leader from his palm - "Pi-Ianito!". The ray spits in two, making it twice as effective

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I had a neveskitter prepared! A +5 on my innitiative put's be acting before the sorceress. (total check +12, modifier +10 wins tie)
one of my buffs is Retribuitive Kelgore's fire bolt
the other, cast just before combat, is true strike

swift action using abrupt jaunt to teleport 10 feet to E-18
move action to G13
standard action to cast split (ray-shaped) Kelgore's fire bolt (NOT considering point blank shot bonus):
1º ray: (1d20+30)[37], fire damage (5d6)[16]
2º ray: (1d20+10)[23], fire damage (5d6)[17]

36/44 hp

[Dudu]

Eustacio casts a Sound Lance that hits the Conjurer right in his face, making a big noise that almost deafens the spectators in the arena. However, the conjurer is still up there, with his health in a dire situation.

Andros manages to teleport just outside the dreaded tentacles. Charging at the Half-orc, he seems to possess a nasty spell charged in his Halbert. However, he misses his adversary, the blade just harmlessly slips through his hardened scaly skin.

Tanstafaal also teleports outside the tentacles, a move that makes the Creator's leader looking like a fool wasting a level 4 spell. To add insult to the injury, he also casts one of his signatures ray spells. Two hitting their leader at the same. After he got hit so badly by a soundlance, two rays are more than enough to obliterate the leaders. He vaporizes and is out of the battle.


The last one of the Creators, the druid/wiz. He steps back and summons a...

Dire rat?

Summoning such a weakling quite disappoints the crowd. Could it be that the creators are completely clueless after loosing their leader?

Not exactly. The Half-orc step behind and cast a benign transposition to switch the Sorceress and the rat. Now the Rat is grappled by a kelp while the Sorceress is free, but for how long?

You can hear the narrator describing these events with great enthusiasm. It's becoming clearer and clearer that you are, indeed, the favorites. Their move saved the sorceress, for now, and their leader is down. Could they have a trick on their sleeve, or are they unprepared for this battle?