The Three Musketeers (IC)

[glitterbaby]

"We're hunting, aye, but our mark is different. The winged one and I hunt the same prey, but he for vengeance and I for glory and trophy. Did you say five dragons attacking or five attacks by dragons?"

[antoin]

"We're hunting, aye, but our mark is different. The winged one and I hunt the same prey, but he for vengeance and I for glory and trophy. Did you say five dragons attacking or five attacks by dragons?"

"We've had five separate dragon attacks. The worst one had a trio of younger dragons come in, took down a few dozen of our boys and leveled a bunch of buildings...usually it's just one or two picking off easy targets. They've gotten bolder recently, I'll say that much. I don't know how many there are though, all of 'em look the same to me. As dumb as this outpost is, dragons usually attack from the north, so it ain't so bad."


After a little more idle chatting, you all settle in for the night. About three hours after falling asleep, Leofric and Cayde are woken up by Wroth's hands on your mouths. The fire has been put out and the dwarves are waking each other up and putting on armor as silently as possible. He motions for you to listen (Borb is already awake). The steady, deep sound of drums rumbles through the ground softly. Wroth leads you up near the crest of the hill to where you are just able to peer over to the valley you came from.Trudging across the land directly south of you are at least a hundred figures marching on foot. Behind them are a few dozen wagons, hauled by unidentifiable beasts of burden. Looking to your right, you see another, similar band a half mile or so ahead; likewise to the left as they travel from east to west.

One dwarf on watch looks at Wroth, whose wide open eyes show that he is completely unprepared for this. He looks toward you three. The other dwarf on watch points to your left to show a few figures riding quickly toward the hill you're on, currently a couple miles away but quickly closing the gap. The second dwarf mouths "What do we do?"

[TheKidReaper]

Cayde looks around quickly searching for any available cover and placing a finger to his lips.

He grabs his bag, and quickly moves towards cover using hand motions for the others to follow

Spoiler: OOC

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Stealth Check to hide:
(1d20+9)[24]

Perception to see some loud people running at us:
(1d20+11)[17]

He continues to peer in the direction of the noise and from his bag slowly retrieves one of the vials of black liquid and pours some down the barrel of his gun before loading it. He then silently waits for what the others might do.

Spoiler: Antoin

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My pistol is now effectively under the silence spell for 1 hour

[truk8280]

Borb examines the figures coming up the hill.

Stealth Check

[truk8280]

After weeks of staring down his opponents, Borb decides to get up close and personal with these people.

Stealth Check: (1d20+16)[17]

If Borb succeeds, he will try to infiltrate the army as one of their own.

[antoin]

Borb works his way down the hill, dodging behind bushes and rocks to work his way close to the army. Cayde and Leofric, Borb quickly becomes rather difficult for you to pick out even while watching him as a cloud obscures the moon and darkness. He approaches close to the shapes moving across the ground and between the movement and darkness, you can't see him anymore. They continue on their way. While this happened, the figures ride quickly closer, no more than two miles away now. There are about a half dozen, riding some beast that doesn't gallop like a horse. They seem to be heading directly for your position near the top of the hill, but are otherwise silent.

Spoiler: Borbelous :^)

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You make your way downtown the hill, walking fast, as the shapes pass below you. As you draw close, you immediately notice a few things. First, every figure is shuffling along in armor as if they were completely exhausted. The wagons are pulled by what looks to be oxen, but on closer look you see that the oxen are half bone and half flesh, moving unnaturally precisely. You try to sneak in formation with the figures and one on the end leans toward you, mumbling in Goblin, "bout time you got done taking a leak. cover me while i go." He shuffles away from the group behind a nearby bush. You take his place in a rough goblin formation as they continue shuffling along. You can hear a few very quiet conversations, but you can't make out the words other than them sounding Goblin-ish. They don't carry any banners or identifying symbols. What do you do next?

[truk8280]

Borb drinks an invisibility potion and creeps up behind those he thinks are the generals of the group. Because he is quite .... mentally slooow .... Borb does the "touch the shoulder of one guy and make it look like someone else did it" just to mess around. He also spanks one of the generals. Jajaja

[antoin]

Spoiler: OoC - Everyone

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Guess Borb's previous spoiler doesn't matter, go ahead and read it. Try to keep player/character knowledge separate, please. Just because you can see this doesn't mean Cayde/Leofric have any idea what's happening.

Borb, right as you drink the potion, the other goblin comes back. You dodge around him as he falls back into line without saying anything. The goblin behind him, however, seems very confused and begins talking to those around him.
No one is really wearing anything that would signify them as a higher rank, but as you poke around, you see that the wagons are all filled with more sleeping goblins. One particularly burly one gets out of a wagon right next to you and receives the tap on the shoulder. He looks around, confused and suspicious. Seeing as there's no one else interesting around, he also gets the spank. He turns around to see no one there, and you dodge his outstretched arm. He quickly maneuvers his way to a wagon several rows ahead and climbs in, closing the cloth covering behind him. Many of the goblins near where you entered formation have begun chattering and looking around.

You're still steadily moving away from the hill. You can still see the figures riding on some sort of beast toward the hill where Cayde and Leofric presumably are, closing the gap quickly, maybe 2ish miles away.

Spoiler: OoC

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Cayde and Leofric, you're up. We need an update about what you've been up to for the past 10ish minutes since Borb left to keep the timelines consistent.

[TheKidReaper]

Cayde sits silently looking around at all the dwarves not willing to give away his hiding position. He notices Borb has gone and is hoping to get some kind of recon eventually. Looking around what are the dwarves doing? Is this somewhat a common occurance and they are acting accordingly or is this out of the clear blue?

[glitterbaby]

Leofric patiently awaits the scouting report, drawing his longbow to be ready should he need to be.

[antoin]

Cayde/Leofric: The dwarves were slowly getting their armor on until one of them pointed out the figures riding toward your group. They just finished quickly getting their armor on and weapons ready. 5 of them have bows, the rest (~20) have a variety of swords/axes. There is about a 400 foot gap without cover between the rest of the dwarves and your group (you two, Wroth, two guards). The group has taken positions (rather poorly) behind the bushes and rocks by them.

Borb: The goblins around you are still marching but everyone is talking now. The big dude emerges from the wagon alongside a thin, gangly goblin, walking around staring intently at...air? Big guy calls out, "LINE UP BOYS, TIGHT FORMATION. SWAP IN AN HOUR." The goblins quickly obey, about to squish you against a wagon. What do you do?

Spoiler: Timeline

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We're caught up now. Anyone can respond.

From your various vantage points, you see the riding figures stop and briefly circle around before again riding directly for the top of the hill where Cayde and Leofric are.

[TheKidReaper]

Cayde turns to the dwarves and whispers,


"These guys give you trouble before? We just going to let them pass or take them out?"

[antoin]

Wroth whispers back: "Not quite sure. They look like goblin wolfriders to me, but it's too hard to tell for sure in the dark. Goblins are almost as much of a pain as the dragons, cuz they just keep coming."
One of the guards

Spoiler: OoC

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who absolutely crushed his Knowledge check

pitches in: "Yeah, if they are wolfriders, they're the elite warriors of each goblin tribe. The question is, are the riders, whatever they are, hunting the group down there or are they with them? If those are all goblins...something's not right. The largest tribes are maybe 100 strong, 'least that I've ever seen a round here. Think your friend will be back soon to let us know?"
Wroth peers down the hill. "Looks like my men are setting up an ambush for the riders. I'm no tactician, so do you want to join in, or try to let them pass by, or something else entirely?"

[TheKidReaper]

Cayde curses under his breath and loads both barrels of his pistol before turning to Wroth,

"We avoid a fight unless we have to, we're outnumbered so we have to plan this right."

[truk8280]

Borb makes his way to the wagon in the front and tries to latch onto it somehow and listen to what the goblins are saying.

Stealth Check: (1d20+16)[33]

[antoin]

Spoiler: Hm...

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(1d20)[5]
(1d20)[8]
(1d20)[4]
(1d20)[13]
(1d20)[20]
dat 20 lol

Borbelous! You latch on the wagon with about a minute of invisibility left. Inside, you hear a goblin yell, "I got him!" and a blade cuts through the wagon canopy a few feet away from your hand. The wagon stops, the big goblin yells "HALT" and the goblin staring in the air begins running toward your position, currently 50 feet away. Let's get some init, please.

Cayde and Leofric, the figures are now 1 mile away. You feel like you're pretty well behind cover from your current vantage point, but you're still split up from the rest of the dwarves. Still no sign of Borb, and based on the time it took for him to go down the hill and how quickly the riders are approaching, there's no way he would make it back before you'd meet them unless he's flying invisibly or something.
Speaking of the riders, they definitely aren't on horses, but you're not exactly sure what kind of quadruped beast they're on. All 10 riders are wearing armor. They'll be on top of you in a couple minutes if they continue. Do you wait where you are or do anything else as they approach?

[glitterbaby]

"The man is right. We should not be taking this fight. We're outnumbered and should fall back. Let this band pass and await the scouting report."

[antoin]

Wroth begins motioning to the dwarves you're separated from. The process is...slow, but one of them notices and begins whispering to the rest. They shift to better cover slightly farther away from you, weapons still at the ready. By the time Wroth is finished, the armed figures are about 1000 feet away, riding almost directly toward your position.
Wroth curses under his breath: "Wolfriders. If they keep coming for us they'll smell us for sure. We need to run or distract them to go somewhere else if you don't want to fight, Leo." He half-heartedly draws his axe, crouching next to the two of you. The two guards do the same, less half-heartedly.

Spoiler: lil map

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Hill slopes up from left to right.
Dwarves->500ft->you->50ft->top of hill
Borb+friends are on the other side of the hill, you can't see them from your current position.
The hill slopes down toward and away from the riders.
Hope that makes sense lol

[truk8280]

Roll for initiative: (1d20+9)[28]

[antoin]

Borb, you're up first. The goblin that was staring in the air definitely sees you now and is pointing, and the squadron of about 200 marching goblins has halted and pulled out weapons. Based off what you can see, they know something is in need of stabbing/shooting very quickly. 9 rounds of invisibility left, your turn.

Cayde, Leo:
10 muscular goblins, each wielding a longbow and riding a worg, crest the hill directly between your hiding place and that of the rest of the dwarves. They look and sniff around suspiciously. The leader of the group points to the halted group down below and they seem just about to begin riding down that way. What do you do?