Climbing the Tower of Babel (In Character Thread)

[cecil1994]

“Hm. Does anyone have rope? We could simply tie the urns shut... unless they contain something we need, hm.”

[Xanyo]

"Whatever we do, we ought to do it quickly. I believe we only have thirty minutes remaining on this hourglass until I get desperate and flip it or have Okoa smash it, which may or may not help."

Jexerie chooses a position in the initial corridor as far back as he can while still being able to see, and be within thirty feet of, the two unopened urns.

[Kaptin Keen]

Hey! Okoa can do more than smash things, says the big man, obviously not really insulted. Propably we stumbled on someone's snake collection. Big snake in one urn, lots of small ones in another.

Cold snake. I guess. In the last one. I mean, sure it sounds strange, but people's hobbies are just weird.

[JbeJ275]

I geuss if someone was living here without anyone else a snake would make decent enough company, but more pressingly it's not my intent to stay here long enough to find the need to develop a hobby.

[cecil1994]

“I vote we evict it.”

[Kaptin Keen]

We're still a man down. We'll be waging a war of attrition, on ourselves. Unless someone has suddenly discovered the healing arts?
I mean ... you do expect me to stay in front of you, when we take our next serpent shower, right?

[Xanyo]

"I was hoping we could all stand at a distance with ranged attacks prepared,
and Ophelia taking the first hit. That way we do not wear ourselves down."

[Kaptin Keen]

Never send a wizard to do a man's job. Or, I mean, a bird. I meant a bird. Also, I haven't a single ranged weapon. But don't worry,
I'll keep my sword in my other hand.

Heck, I can propably tip off the lid with the tip of my sword. What say you?

[Book Wombat]

Well, I going back to the nonagon room and try to open the door. Anyone with me?

Spoiler: Running

Show

Lyle will wait for someone to come with him but will not go unless one other person will go with him

[Kaptin Keen]

We should propably do one, or the other. Maybe even neither. But not both at the same time, that feels like a poor deployment of ressources.

[dextercorvia]

Abramowitz holds his bow down, the scent of damp leaves fills his nostrils. Across the sun dappled glade, a majestic buck rubs antlers against the tree. It would soon be time to shed those antlers. He silently knocks an arrow and pulls back the string. A tiny creak in the wood causes the bucks tail to twitch, and his head to turn. Just enough

Twang

The string releases and Abramowitz collapses to the forest floor. The arrow pierces his own chest. Can you dream inside a dream?

[Meijin]

Spoiler: Abramowitz

Show

Fortunately, this being a dream and all, the arrow to the chest is not fatal. The deer is gone, and in its place, twenty feet away, is a balanced scales, as for weighing. In one dish sits a morbidly obese, evil looking rat, with teeth bared. In the other dish, surreal keeping balance with the rat, a statuette of a goddess or dryad of some sort. The sight of the statuette fills you with hope, and you intuitively sense it symbolizes healing and hope, while the rat guards her with gluttony, which is death. The rat looks ready to fight if it has to, but unlikely to charge without provocation. In your peripheral vision, you see thousands of impassive eyes. Behind you, a road leads away from the statuette and the rat, into the forest.

Spoiler: OOC

Show

You need to make another fortitude save vs the poison. Also, in this dream, you currently have no gear, but you do have antlers,
a natural weapon with which you are proficient and can deal 1d6+int points of damage, double on a charge, use your intelligence bonus to attack. You are unarmored, but have two points of natural armor, a lovely tawny pelt, and four hoofs.

[Book Wombat]

Well? Is anyone coming with me to the nonagon room? I hope I didn't spend all that effort on a door we weren't even going to open.

[cecil1994]

Well? Is anyone coming with me to the nonagon room? I hope I didn't spend all that effort on a door we weren't even going to open.

“Let’s deal with these first, as we’re already here.

And I sincerely doubt inaction will solve this particular problem. If you don’t want to open them, it’s ok, I will.”

If no one says anything, he’ll cloak 10 feet away and have Ophelia open one. What, you thought he would personally do it?

[dextercorvia]

Abramowitz's nostrils flare. His tail switches in response to the danger. There is still an incredible tightness in his chest, but he scrapes at the ground with a hoof and tosses his majestic antlers into the air. He channels the phantom pain, the fear, and his own confusion into his core, calling upon his inner vitality.

Spoiler: OOC

Show

He will attempt to spend 1 pp to manifest Vigor using Wild Surge (1d100)[51] vs enervation (low is bad).
If successful he gains 10 temporary hp for 2 min.

Of course, we are in a dream so it might not be successful for any number of reasons.

[Meijin]

Spoiler: Abramowitz

Show

As you wild surge, you see the dream world shift chaotically, mirroring the disruption to your psyche. The forest and eyes around you vanish, replaced with an unending desertscape all around, punctuated by black obelisks. You are still just a few yards from the balanced scales with the rat and the statuette. The power takes effect in full, and the psychic display angers the rat, which clambers off the scale and rushes toward you, fangs bared. The statuette hangs unnaturally in the air, the scale barely dipping.

Spoiler: OOC

Show

The Dream Rat's Charge: (1d20+6)[12]
On a hit, the Dream Rat's damage: (1d4)[4]

[Kaptin Keen]

With a shrug, Okoa flips the lid off the brown urn with the tip of his sword.

Spoiler: OOC

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Unless that would require a roll - then he'll just sabrage it instead. That will presumably require an attack roll, but those are his favourite rolls.

[dextercorvia]

Abramowitz instinctively puts his head down disrupting the Rat's charge. He snorts at the changing scenery and stamps at the sand. His thickly muscled flanks quiver. He bounds past the rat darting toward the statuette.

Spoiler: OOC

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Withdraw action, double moving to the statue. (I've fluffed it at running past the rat, but that would probably defeat the purpose of the withdraw, so it is more like a circling.)

[Meijin]

Spoiler: Abramowitz

Show

Your hoofs gouge the desert sands as you gallop past the Rat, deftly evading its bite. As you approach the statuette, your hands reach out, grasping towards it. Standing just in front of it, you make out an image of the sun and moon carved into the base of the scale, along with the words "Huginn" and "Muninn," gouged deeply into the silver. Distorted as though underwater, you hear the oncoming charge of the Dream Rat, now endlessly pursuing. *Edit:* The rat tears a thin ribbon of flesh from your flank as it grazes you with a filthy, infected looking fang. Along with the pain, you have a vivid sense of existential anguish; a striking sense that somewhere, in some other world, you are already lying helpless, at the brink of death.

Spoiler

Show

Move action if you want to pick up the statuette. It's a dream, so you get hands as well as antlers.
Dream Rat Charge: (1d20+6)[25]
Dream Rat damage if it hits: (1d4)[1]

[Kaptin Keen]

Okoa tries to get the tip of his blade under the rim of the lid - discovers this to be more fiddly than expected, and instead raises the blade to his shoulder.

Snake champagne for everyone! He says.

Then the big blade sails in a circle, clipping the urn just below the top, neatly shearing off the lid. Or so is the hope, anyways.

Spoiler: Rolls

Show

Attack: (1d20+4)[9]
Damage, if needed: (2d6+3)[9]

[JbeJ275]

As they prepare for this pathos to break, Accalon stands wordlessly at the back of the room. As he grips his dagger in one hand he pulls at the weave of magic with the right preparing himself to throw the Blast.

While these people seem acceptable, and many are practitioners of magic themselves, he knows that many people have a tendency to act irrationally with the knowledge of exactly what he was.

[cecil1994]

Erasmus vanishes. It’s a jagged transition- piece by piece, like someone taking careful bites.

[Book Wombat]

Lyle takes out his short sword in case whatever is inside the urn attacks him.

[dextercorvia]

Abramowitz with his haunches turned to his foe, is unable to fend off this scratch. He feels the trickle of blood and vitality flowing out of him, but still he reaches out, with what, he isn't sure. The dreaming man plucks the statue from the scale.

He turns then, a blur of tawny fur and antlers, retaliating against the foul rodent.

Spoiler: OOC

Show

Move action, pick up statue.

If that doesn't do anything too weird, then he spins in place and attacks the rat:
Attack (1d20)[13]
Damage (1d6)[2]

Vigor 18 rounds (9 temp HP left)

[Meijin]

Spoiler: Abramowitz

Show

The Dream Rat's reckless charge throws it right onto your antlers! Recoiling in pain, it begins circling, then lunges forward for another strike! Deep in the wells of its eyes, there is a looming stone door. On the base of the statuette, the words "Huginn" and "Muninn" are inscribed once again, glowing faintly.

Spoiler: OOC

Show

Attack: (1d20+4)[13]
Damage: (1d4)[3]

Spoiler: Image

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https://giphy.com/gifs/cheezburger-v...-yReqDtUAwWoec

With a mighty heave, Okoa swings his sword, neatly striking the brown pithos at the lip with prodigious force. As it is some sort of ceramic, rather than cleanly severing at the top, the jar cracks and shatters into shards and slivers.

It is as though you had burst a waterskin filled at a particularly un-potable pond. Brackish, mud brown water, along with slime, silt, green-brown algae and scummy froth bursts forth from the container, soaking Okoa and forming a puddle approximately 15 feet in diameter.

Amidst the shards from the pot, there is a hefty leather bag shut with a gold-embroidered drawstring. It is not unguarded. Floating in the air, dripping with the slimy water in which it was (up till recently) immersed, a horrific shape greets you. Three human heads, lashed together tightly by their knotted black hair, with the eyelids sewn shut. One head looks like that of an old woman, tone and deeply wrinkled, frothing at the lips and biting in all directions. A young man's head screams constantly, without pausing to draw breath. The third head is horribly disfigured with scars and burns and drools, its mouth hanging open dumbly. The three heads wheel about in the air.

Spoiler: Okoa

Show

The water is freezing cold, colder than a night exposed on the savannah, colder than the block of precious ice you once captured from a caravan. It chills you to the bone, and you take (3d6)[10] damage.

Spoiler: Erasmus

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If you would like to jump back to one of the squares behind you as the pot explodes and the water sloshes out, you may make a reflex save to do so. View the following spoilers depending on what you do:

Spoiler: If you pass a DC 13 reflex save

Show

As the pot explodes, lightning reflexes drive you back, away from the spreading water and shards of pottery.
As you dart back, you feel a rush of cold unlike anything you've ever known. You manage to fling yourself away from the brunt of it, but still take half of (3d6)[5] damage.

Spoiler: If you chose not to step back, or fail the save

Show

Muddy, brown, algae-filled water spreads around your feet, chilling you with the worst cold you have ever experienced. Take (3d6)[7] damage.

Spoiler: Everybody, OOC

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If you have knowledge: Dungeoneering or Nature, you may make checks about the water. The puddle is centered on the space formerly containing the brown pithos, now containing the three-headed creature, and spreads out to every adjacent square. The bag is in the center. The creature is not charging out to attack just yet, but it it spinning erratically and screaming, and so poses a plausible threat. I'm going to roll initiative for anyone who wishes to respond with violence.

Initiative:
Okoa: (1d20+1)[11]
Jex: (1d20)[17]
Accalon: (1d20+3)[22]
Lyle:(1d20+8)[12]
Erasmus: (1d20+7)[21]
Three-Headed Thing: (1d20+1)[4]

[Kaptin Keen]

A sheen of ice clings to Okoa's hair, eyebrows, beard, and he shivers like a small dog in the snow.

... is very ... very cold, he manages to warn. He raises his sword, ready to strike, but currently leery of going near the water.

Spoiler: OOC

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In other words, on his initiative, Okoa readies an action to cut anything down that moves into range. Unless it's friendly. No!

Deciding that nothing made from the animated skulls of the dead can be good news, he brings his sword back around for a powerful return stroke.

[cecil1994]

Guck crashes against the empty ground. Erasmus (warm and dry, though quite disturbed) takes aim.

(A different Erasmus is pondering the horror, and flying Ophelia in a deadly arc. This does not interfere with the shot.)

Spoiler: Rolls

Show

Crossbow, targeting Flat-Footed: (1d20+5)[17]
Damage: [roll1d8]/roll] (if vulnerable to sneak attack, add (1d6)[2])

Knowledge: Arcana or Planes, on the off chance the creature isn't an abberation: (1d20+5)[9]

Ophelia flies into flanking position with Okoa. If he isn't right next to the creature, they'll attack from a spot that will let him get flanking next turn.
(1d20+7)[8] (vs flat, subtract 2 if not flanking)
Damage: (1d4-2)[1]

[JbeJ275]

As the hideous creature spills forth Accalon acts, in a panic he releases a blast, the thin tendrils snaking towards this monster before impacting into it.

Spoiler: Roll

Show

To Hit: (1d20+3)[15]
Damage (1d6)[2]
Is it possible for this thing to be frightened?

[Xanyo]

What in all that is incomprehensible...

Jexerie reaches his mind out, feeling for the mind(s) of this aberration and, once found, attempting to rend the internal psychic connections. He also tenses his legs, ready.

Spoiler: OOC

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Mind Thrust, expend Psionic Focus for +1 DC. (1d10)[9] damage, will save DC 16 negates. Ready move action against enemy approach.

[dextercorvia]

Abramowitz was not much of a religious man, or else he might have recognized the names of Odin's ravens, thought and mind. However, he is sure enough of himself that he recognizes this as more than just a dream. "I know what you are, Rat. You are the taint on my soul of my Grandfather's betrayal and my fear that I will follow him. I can accept that burden, but I will not let you rule me."

He can feel his grasp on the other world slipping as his artificial vitality continues to dwindle. If I die on this spirit journey, I will die everywhere.

He rears back on his hind legs and brings his antlers crashing down onto Grandfather Rat.

Spoiler: OOC

Show

Attack (1d20)[13]
Damage (1d6)[2]