Shipwrecked! Quest: Piggy Hunt

[storyteller]

Once you have decided who'll go on this quest (preferably 4-8 commoners), I'll post a map... and the piggy hunt may begin!

[Grey_Wolf_c]

Once you have decided who'll go on this quest (preferably 4-8 commoners), I'll post a map... and the piggy hunt may begin!

Like with the ship, Ovias volunteers, but is ready to leave his place if enough clearly better hunters come forwards. Or of course people not in the ship.

[lawful_evil]

Epswitch

The smallest of the survivors, Epswitch, offers his assistance, "Assuming I can find someone to tend my flock, I'm in."

{{ I've got a sling! With my STR bonus and -1 damage from using sling stones, and such, I do 1 point of damage per hit. Consistantly! I've got a +2 to hit. }}

[Yeril]

Joseph Bridgeman, The Experienced Hunter.

The thick bearded man clad in a long coat and holding a short-hafted spear, makes himself known.

"'Ello, Grey" he aims at the dwarf.

"I've hunted boars before. Its tricky business we all have to work together on it to bring it down quickly before it can escape, I've seen hogs get away with two or three bolts stuck in its hide and it still lives to see another day. Also be warned 'cause they are ferocious animals, an enraged boar can easily kill a dog, and even bring down a horse and rider. He nods gravely. "Generaly boar hunting requires spears from horseback, or a pack of trained hounds. We don't have either of them so we're gonner have to settle for stabbin it lots until it dies." Joseph cracks his knuckles loudly and chuckles abit.

OOC: With 25 (35 if you include up to -10 and ferocity) hitpoints, 16AC and a deadly 1d8+3 gore attack, I can honestly say somone is going to be seriously hurt here, and maybe even die. Then again it is a young one so maybe not as terrible as it seems.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

Joseph Bridgeman, The Experienced Hunter.

The thick bearded man clad in a long coat and holding a short-hafted spear, makes himself known.

"'Ello, Grey" he aims at the dwarf.

"I've hunted boars before. Its tricky business we all have to work together on it to bring it down quickly before it can escape, I've seen hogs get away with two or three bolts stuck in its hide and it still lives to see another day. Also be warned 'cause they are ferocious animals, an enraged boar can easily kill a dog, and even bring down a horse and rider. He nods gravely. "Generaly boar hunting requires spears from horseback, or a pack of trained hounds. We don't have either of them so we're gonner have to settle for stabbin it lots until it dies." Joseph cracks his knuckles loudly and chuckles abit.

OOC: With 25 (35 if you include up to -10 and ferocity) hitpoints, 16AC and a deadly 1d8+3 gore attack, I can honestly say somone is going to be seriously hurt here, and maybe even die. Then again it is a young one so maybe not as terrible as it seems.

"Good day to you too, Joseph", answers Ovias, "Glad to have your experrience with us. Do you think we should firrst trry and figurre out wherre he sleeps, and set trraps to make him easier to stop? Orr maybe trrack him, and hit him frrom afarr while we can?"

"Whateverr the plan, we should trry and convince Mara to come with us. We may need herr abilities beforre the end of this day," he ends.

[lawful_evil]

Epswitch

Epswitch looks in disbelief at the proposed tactics. Spears? Horseback? Stabbing it a lot? Come on, at like your at the top of the food chain, use your brains. Epswitch finally suggests, "I was kind of thinking about chucking rocks at it while up a tree. That way we can't be injured and we won't need Mara." The whiney wench.

Epswitch looks up at the dwarf and then further up at the human and says, "This beast, while small for a boar, will tower over me. Any tactic that puts me where it can hurt me is suicide. Even you" The tiny halfling gestures at the human, "the boar, as you say, could easily kill you. We've got to use our brains. Keep a tree between you and the boar so it can't charge you. A stand up fight with a beast like this is just stupid. That's why boars have been able to kill horsemen and dogs. They are stupid."

Epswitch says, "We need not take down the boar in one day. Weaker creatures often take down larger tougher creatures by slowly harassing over the course of days." Unless they regenerate.
Epswitch takes a deep breath and says, "Attack it from afar and scare it off. Track it down again. Attack it again. Eventually, it will fall. If it decides to charge at us. Great! We can rain down rocks and sticks on it from the trees while it is unable to reach us."

[jagadaishio]

Maria approaches the group discussing the prospect of boar hunting, sling and fishing net in hand. "We set up a standard net trap. Place down food on a disguised net and hoist it up into the air when the boar stops to eat. Everyone waits in the trees where it can't get us in case it turns aggressive. If we fail to trap it, we can bombard it with slings until it is either stunned or flees. If we do trap it, we slit its throat."

OOC: I'm suggesting we use some rope and the net, taking 10 on the use rope check and assuming that survival is enough of a skill to set up a trap this simple. Never underestimate the value of a carried fishing net.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

Ovias looks at the halfling, and scoffs, "Yes, because the boarr will wait underr the trree forr you to kill it one stone at a time. If that is the extent of yourr plans, you might as well stay behind, because you will not help in this trrip, unless we use you as bait"

Maria approaches the group discussing the prospect of boar hunting, sling and fishing net in hand. "We set up a standard net trap. Place down food on a disguised net and hoist it up into the air when the boar stops to eat. Everyone waits in the trees where it can't get us in case it turns aggressive. If we fail to trap it, we can bombard it with slings until it is either stunned or flees. If we do trap it, we slit its throat."

"Good idea, Marria. I was thinking of a hole in frront of his cave with sharp sticks, but yourrs is much quickerr to set up. What does a boarr eat, though? I hearr they have good sense of smell, so he will suspect the trrap not so much by the look of it but by the lingerring smell of human (and dwarf) on the net and food. Thankfully, we do have hunterrs that will know how to get arround that."

[jagadaishio]

"If the island is uninhabited, it will not recognize our scents as those of a predator. How close it got to our camp would imply that is the case. As for what they eat, they can have almost anything. I would suggest a thin strip of raw fish. It would produce enough smell to draw it quite easily. It is of vital importance to remain in the trees out of sight, though. A wild boar can kill a full grown man with a single attack," she says, already tying the appropriate ropes to the net, along with rocks on its corners to keep it flat. "The amount of fish we would need would not even be enough to take away a full day's rations for a person. I assume we can spare that much at least."

[Yeril]

Joseph

"I'm not an expert on pigs, but I don't suspect a wild pig in a isolated place like this will have the smarts and suspision to pass up a free meal. I mean its not like this is gonner be a common thing he's had to look out for before we showed up."

As the group moves to a more appropriate area, setting up the "trap", he turns to Maria.

"Are you sure a strip of fish would work? I doubt they frequently eat that kind of stuff so Its doubtful that he would recognise it as food if you see where I'm coming from."

[jagadaishio]

Joseph

"I'm not an expert on pigs, but I don't suspect a wild pig in a isolated place like this will have the smarts and suspision to pass up a free meal. I mean its not like this is gonner be a common thing he's had to look out for before we showed up."

As the group moves to a more appropriate area, setting up the "trap", he turns to Maria.

"Are you sure a strip of fish would work? I doubt they frequently eat that kind of stuff so Its doubtful that he would recognise it as food if you see where I'm coming from."

"We could use a bit of raw meat from the small game we've been hunting if you want. Boars and pigs have a sharp enough sense of smell that they can usually tell what is and isn't edible, regardless of experience with it," Maria said, shrugging.

[lawful_evil]

Epswitch

The halfling was used to being discounted and wouldn't stop just because some fat dwarf decided to ridicule him. "It would seem you spent too much time looking at rocks and not enough out amongst the trees. The point was not to hole up in a single tree and hope the pig is retarded. The point was to move along behind the pig harassing it with thrown stones. Should the pig decide to be brave, we take shelter out of its reach in the trees." I should have thought a plan involving stones would have been right up his alley.

{{ I don't think you can make traps with survival, that is what craft(trapmaking) is for. But...}}

Once in the woods and someone starts setting up the trap, Epswitch asks, "Will that net hold the boar? It doesn't look that strong.. and boar have tusks that might slash this to little bits." Wouldn't these humans rather have a consistent source of fish than a one time chance for pig?

All the while, Epswitch remains ready to scramble up a tree and out of harms way. He is sure to pay attention to the nearest 'safe' looking tree.

Seeing the fish, Epswitch just shakes his head and suppresses a laugh. Pigs don't eat fish, they eat bugs and such that they dig up. I'd expect them to flee from such a strong smell. We should have brought the farmer.

[Yeril]

"The Hobbit is right, is it worth risking damage to the net just to help catch a boar? Not that I'm siding with him, his idea of following the boar via the tree's is about as well thought out as us throwing him in the air to catch a bird." he smirks behind his beard.

"Anyone have any other plans?" he asks the group.

[jagadaishio]

"If the pig is young and small, as its tracks imply, we shouldn't risk too much damage to the net. Certainly not more than could be repaired with the amount of rope we have. If we have a better idea to catch it, I wouldn't have a problem with it."

[lawful_evil]

Epswitch

The halfling raises an eyebrow, although it is difficult to tell without any color to distinguish the eyebrow from the rest of his sunburned face. He then says, "Not via the trees monkey man. Via the ground, using the trees as refuge to prevent the boar from eviscerating us." The halfling takes another deep breath and says, "As tall as you all are, you should have no trouble climbing a couple feet up and out of the reach of this small animal. Once it leaves, we climb back down and attack again. Over and over until the boar can take no more punishment."

The halfling, hopefully, has gotten his message across this time and simply watches to see if they abandon the net thing. Given enough time I could take the boar myself, but I'd have no way to drag it back to the fire.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

Epswitch

The halfling raises an eyebrow, although it is difficult to tell without any color to distinguish the eyebrow from the rest of his sunburned face. He then says, "Not via the trees monkey man. Via the ground, using the trees as refuge to prevent the boar from eviscerating us." The halfling takes another deep breath and says, "As tall as you all are, you should have no trouble climbing a couple feet up and out of the reach of this small animal. Once it leaves, we climb back down and attack again. Over and over until the boar can take no more punishment."

Ovias "Grey" Greybeard - Dwarven mason, smith and engineer journeyman

"I wonderr if you even trry to think things thrrough, halfling," says Ovias, "Let us try it. You hit a boarr with a stone, likely not hurrting him and only angerring him, he charrges at you and you climb a trree. You hit him again, once again likely missing, at which point the boarr most likely flees, at a speed twice that of a rrunning man, and 3 times yourrs. Now, explain to me how we then somehow continue to hit him with stones?"

"Moving back to the useful suggestions, if you rreally think that the net cannot hold the 150-200 pounds of boarr, we should rreconsider my idea. Digging a hole in a place the boarr is likely to pass (in frront of his lairr, in his usual path to waterr) can take some time to set up, but once rready it is not something the boarr will escape easily. We would need some time, though, so we may need to distrract the boarr in the mean time."

[Yeril]

"If it is a young boar then it is less of a threat to us than a full grown one, perhaps we would be able to confront it at spear-point and leave with nothing but a few scrapes, bruises and a full stomach."

he looks contemplative and uneasy, pausing for a few moments before adding ".. perhaps."

[lawful_evil]

Epswitch

The halfling says, "Yes, you nearly have it. While I am throwing rocks, the rest of you do the same, or something similar." Epswitch gestures at the various knives, spears, and such. He then continues, "Although the individual hits may be minor, the damage will not be fleeting." After a slight pause he continues, "So, once the boar is driven away, we all pursue. A fleeing beast will leave such a trail that it be easy to follow. Once the beast slows down and we catch up, we attack again, climb again, and so on until the beast collapses from exhaustion."

The halfling pauses and says, "While you may think this plan ill-conceived and not thought out, this has been the traditional way that weaker creatures attack stronger creatures. I'm sorry you are having trouble wrapping your mind around it." Really, I'm sorry I've got to help these... troglodytes.

[Lonna]

Ovias "Grey" Greybeard - Dwarven mason, smith and engineer journeyman

"I wonderr if you even trry to think things thrrough, halfling," says Ovias, "Let us try it. You hit a boarr with a stone, likely not hurrting him and only angerring him, he charrges at you and you climb a trree. You hit him again, once again likely missing, at which point the boarr most likely flees, at a speed twice that of a rrunning man, and 3 times yourrs. Now, explain to me how we then somehow continue to hit him with stones?"

"Moving back to the useful suggestions, if you rreally think that the net cannot hold the 150-200 pounds of boarr, we should rreconsider my idea. Digging a hole in a place the boarr is likely to pass (in frront of his lairr, in his usual path to waterr) can take some time to set up, but once rready it is not something the boarr will escape easily. We would need some time, though, so we may need to distrract the boarr in the mean time."

Mara Herbswife

<Ovias, do not ridicule him,> scolded Mara as she emerged from the foliage behind the group, holding a bunch of herbs. <At least he is trying to be helpful. Given his attitude up to now, you ought to encourage him.> Turning to the rest of the group she continued in Common.

"Two things. First of all, you are talking about using the wrong bait. No matter how good your trap, no boar will come to anything that smells like meat or fish because they don't eat meat. What you need are strongly scented herbs or berries. {{OOC: I'm assuming about here someone, probably Epswitch, gives me a surprised or incredulous look.}} I grew up in a fishing village, but there were boar in the area, and I spent plenty of time in the wilderness. As for whether the net will hold the boar, I would say it's about a 50-50 chance. My family's nets often brought in 150 pounds of fish, but fish don't have tusks.

"And one more thing- I'm coming with you. Those tusks aren't just for decoration; I've seen men killed or crippled by failing to get out of the way of a charging boar. I can climb a tree to stay out of your way until the matter is finished. I don't want to risk anyone dying from blood loss just because there was too much distance between myself and an injured person. Especially considering that our most experienced hunters are on this trip. If one of you is injured, it will hurt the survival chances of the whole group."

[lawful_evil]

{{ OOC : If you are going to post in alternate languages, that is normally done with labeled spoiler tags... You said the rest was in common, but not what the beginning bit was in, so we are left to guess. }}

Epswitch

Epswitch watches the woman and dwarf carefully as the speak in the secret language of love(or whatever it is). Epswitch does concede the woman's point, "While I don't think a trap is the right idea... should we use bait, I don't think fish is the way to go. I've never seen anyone feeding their pigs fish and I've never seen pigs or boar swimming in the ocean to catch fish, so I doubt they'd be attracted to it. As for berries. I don't really know what pigs eat, the farmers I've seen normally feed them vegetables."

{{OOC : I got the impression from the earlier posts that we had already departed and were in the woods setting a trap, but I see some of your characters posting to the normal IC thread, weren't we supposed to depart from there, to come on this? Are we supposed to keep both going during this quest? }}

[Grey_Wolf_c]

Mara Herbswife

<Ovias, do not ridicule him,> scolded Mara as she emerged from the foliage behind the group, holding a bunch of herbs. <At least he is trying to be helpful. Given his attitude up to now, you ought to encourage him.> Turning to the rest of the group she continued in Common.

Ovias "Grey" Greybeard - Dwarven mason, smith and engineer journeyman

Ovias bows his head slightly, in shame <You are right, of course, friend Mara. I am not good at this "leadership", and I do not know how to treat those with unhelpful dispositions, but you are right I should improve my attitude. Thank you for being a good friend, Mara>

[spoiler]

Spoiler

Show

"Two things. First of all, you are talking about using the wrong bait. No matter how good your trap, no boar will come to anything that smells like meat or fish because they don't eat meat. What you need are strongly scented herbs or berries. {{OOC: I'm assuming about here someone, probably Epswitch, gives me a surprised or incredulous look.}} I grew up in a fishing village, but there were boar in the area, and I spent plenty of time in the wilderness. As for whether the net will hold the boar, I would say it's about a 50-50 chance. My family's nets often brought in 150 pounds of fish, but fish don't have tusks.

"And one more thing- I'm coming with you. Those tusks aren't just for decoration; I've seen men killed or crippled by failing to get out of the way of a charging boar. I can climb a tree to stay out of your way until the matter is finished. I don't want to risk anyone dying from blood loss just because there was too much distance between myself and an injured person. Especially considering that our most experienced hunters are on this trip. If one of you is injured, it will hurt the survival chances of the whole group."

"I for one will be verry glad to have you with us, in case the worrst happens, frriend Mara," says Ovias, clearly happy to have her along, before continuing with the discussion with, "Now, I cannot rread the trracks like otherrs can, so I do not know if this boarr is juvenile orr full grrown, but if he is young, a net will likely be enough. Otherrwise, otherr traps like a pit - as I suggested earrlierr - or a rrope loop that tightens arround his neck (with the otherr end securrely tied to a rrock orr trree) might be good ideas."

"Ourr poorr knowledge of this place isn't conductive to long distance perrsecutions. We could end up in verry nasty places, orr lost. Besides, if at any point the boarr surrprrises us flat footed, therre will be no climbing trrees - someone will get gorred, maybe fatally. We cannot hope to always be fasterr than the boarr. Much betterr to contrrol the naturre of ourr hunt by prreparring the land in advance with trraps. I suggest we fetch the human Gil Gil, who I have seen prreparre trraps forr small game, he likely has some useful knowledge and abilities, even if he doesn't have the wits to exprress them, and that those that can explorre gain some knowledge of the naturre of ourr quarry - hiding place, rroutes, even if possible its rroutine, beforre we embarrk in what may be a folly"

OOC: It was agreed in the prolog/recruitment that different speak signs stand for different languages: <dwarfish> /elfish/ and so on. Mind you, only Mara and Ovias seem to talk in anything other than human, so it hasn't come up much, but we've consistently done so.

OOC: We have not yet left, since there is not 8 of us, and we should give others the chance to participate, not to mention that if we end up with 9 or more, the DM will have to say who gets to go and who doesn't

OOC: Finally, optional quests happen "during the week" but are otherwise disconnected from the main thread. You can post in both. I tend to asume that they will happen on thursdays, because it's such a mid-week day in which no-one will really RP anything in the main thread.

[storyteller]

The maximum number of commoners is 8 but there are already 5 of you (Ovias, Epswitch, Maria, Joseph, Mara) so you can get started. More people can join later.

First you should decide which method you're going to use to capture/kill the boar. Each option discussed above sounds good to me. Once you know how you want to do it, I'll give you more details. If you want to find the boar's lair, you'll need someone with the Track feat. Otherwise, it's a good idea to use a bait of some kind. Pigs love fruits, roots, mushrooms and invertebrates. You can build simple traps even without the trapmaking skill. Use Rope may be useful here.

[lawful_evil]

Epswitch

I suppose you can plan whatever you like, but when the boar shows up, I'll be up a tree. The halfling simply sighs and says, "You may dig a hole if you like. I doubt you'll get the boar to fall in unless you chase it or something though."

{{OOC : I saw that prolog thing, I thought you meant to use pseudo html. <halfling>"This is in the halfling tongue."</halfling> You expect us all to remember a bunch of funny symbols? What is gnomish? Halfling? Goblin? Orc? Heck, there are lots of languages. }}

[Yeril]

"First we must awnser this, are we gonner bait him in, or track him down. Then we can decide if we are going to ambush him, lay a trap for him, , dig a trap for him, harrass him." he nods at the respective hunters as he lists the ideas.

"Personaly I think we should track him down carefuly, Baited fruits may bring in other animals, ones more fierce than a boar. compared to tracking him down, male boar live alone so we ain't going to bump into a whole family of angry pigs."

[smartaleq]

The maximum number of commoners is 8 but there are already 5 of you (Ovias, Epswitch, Maria, Joseph, Mara) so you can get started. More people can join later.

First you should decide which method you're going to use to capture/kill the boar. Each option discussed above sounds good to me. Once you know how you want to do it, I'll give you more details. If you want to find the boar's lair, you'll need someone with the Track feat. Otherwise, it's a good idea to use a bait of some kind. Pigs love fruits, roots, mushrooms and invertebrates. You can build simple traps even without the trapmaking skill. Use Rope may be useful here.

As the group sets off, Gil dutifully chases after. He carries his full sack of gear, and while the others discuss the size of the boar, Gil spends his time trying to work out the logistics of bagging a boar. When the dwarf mentions Gil, he receives a cursory glance, bordering on a scowl. Gil returns to his thoughts withdrawing some rope out of his sack, looping it around a hefty tree, and pulling with all his might to verify its strength.

Of course, if it is strong enough he'll whistle the others over to show them.

Spoiler

Show

Use Rope 10+7
Craft Trap 10+4
I'd like to check if I think the nets (we have two) or rope could hold, and to think of the strongest method to restrain an unhappy boar (nets, rope loop, using the block and tackle to magnify our strength, etc.)

when/if we actually craft a trap, others could assist as well - I'll leave that decision to them, as usual

[Grey_Wolf_c]

As the group sets off, Gil dutifully chases after. He carries his full sack of gear, and while the others discuss the size of the boar, Gil spends his time trying to work out the logistics of bagging a boar. When the dwarf mentions Gil, he receives a cursory glance, bordering on a scowl. Gil returns to his thoughts withdrawing some rope out of his sack, looping it around a heft tree, and pulling with all his might to verify its strength.

Of course, if it is strong enough he'll whistle the others over to show them.

Ovias "Grey" Greybeard - Dwarven mason, smith and engineer journeyman

Noticing Gil following them, Ovias turns to him with a smile on his left face, "Gil! Grreat to see you joining us. I had just suggested we fetch you, forr you know betterr than anyone else how to set trraps. We have thrrown about severral ideas: a pit, a lasso, and a net. Which one do you think best? Maybe a combination of the thrree? Some otherr, maybe? I think we should listen to yourr ideas, and whateverr you decide I will help you set it up, wetherr it be digging orr knotting or going forr leaves in the forrest"

OOC: Legal Evil: Yes, remembering one symbol so far is such a hard work to do... Because it's not like it is a convention that has been used before... Or reasonably deduced from context... [/sarcasm]

[jagadaishio]

Maria gives Gil a rare smile and hands him her net. "Gil could show us how to make a good trap. Even if the boar doesn't fall for it, we still have the option of harassing it as Epswitch suggested."

[Daryk]

Tano

Tano was finishing up his last few arrows when he overheard the conversation regarding the boar hunt. With his last arrow complete in his hands, he worked up his courage, picked up his shortbow, and followed after the group as they headed into the woods. Catching up to their rather slow pace, he asked, "Could you use another? I just finished a large batch of arrows, and I think they might be of some use in a boar hunt."

[lawful_evil]

Epswitch

Epswitch sees the man with the bow approach and smiles. Good, someone else who things ranged attacks against this are the best option. Epswitch watches the dynamic and the reactions of the man to see if he truly can make a trap and if so, Epswitch carefully watches the construction, hopeful his keen intellect, and memory, will help him duplicate it at a later time.

[Lonna]

Mara Herbswife

Mara smiles at the two new arrivals but otherwise keeps her own counsel for now, merely following Gil and helping however she can, holding or pulling ropes as he indicates.