Adventure in Eberron: Beyond the Sea

[Karaswanton]

Kyrek

I take it that ADAM, and these...plasmids are both used in some sort of body modification? How do they work exactly?

[Philistine]

QB:

QB watches in amazement as the others in the group follow 'Dorothy' out the round door before he trails after them. Just like that, they're going to forgive and forget the way she was trying her best to kill us all just a little while ago? Gods, I hope someone here knows what they're doing. He reaches behind him and withdraws a curative potion from his pack, quickly quaffing the contents before putting the empty vial away again. He soon catches up with the group and takes up a position on the opposite side of the girl from Vaasth, walking several steps out to the side and a step or two behind her.

Spoiler

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Potion of Cure Serious Wounds: (3d8+5)[26]

[pingcode20]

Irmaet the Black
"Such a thing must be terrible to see a loved one succumb to..." Irmaet sighs, some sympathy showing through his voice. "But, I notice, the things you call splicers did not attempt to strike you down, only us. Perhaps you might enlighten us?"

[The Demented One]

"ADAM is no drug, it was...it is the key to all life. It is of the same matter as your flesh or mine, but it can be bent to the will of man, altered or changed as we please, shaped into plasmids. By altering ourselves with plasmids, we became more powerful, able to harness reality itself to our wishes. Its only those who use too much ADAM, or become overreliant on plasmids that become splicers. Not like me. You'll need to find some ADAM for yourselves, if you want to survive down here." She seems distant as she speaks, as if she was addressing someone other than you.

"And as to why the splicers did not turn on me? Hah, it is simple. I helped them, just as I am helping you now. The splicers are not dumb beasts, not animals...just as intelligent as you, maybe more. Their sanity is what is at question, not their intellect."

[Krimm_Blackleaf]

Vaasth almost sniggers at the word 'sanity' but contains himself for the most part, and just continues walking.

[dyslexicfaser]

Hector

"Not to mention their manners," Hector added urbanely. "Attacking us the moment we enter your city is hardly neighborly."

He peers around at the crumbling city, to see if he can spot this inn they are being led to. Their guide seems much more lucid than she had been, but he wouldn't be surprised if she was not as far removed from her fellow sanity-challenged splicers than she assured them she was.

[pingcode20]

Irmaet the Black
"Can a man be called intelligent if they have lost reason to madness? No, sadly, I'm afraid even if your friends were once the finest minds of the century, madness exacts a great toll indeed, my dear."

Irmaet peers about the surrounds casually, pausing to gather his thoughts before continuing.

"Perhaps we had best steer clear of this 'ADAM' substance, lest we succumb to the same fate as your friends. I do not believe power is so dear to me that I would willingly risk my sanity for it. We have a word for those who do - the Lichmad."

[The Demented One]

"Say what you like. The first few plasmids are positively harmless - it's somewhere around the sixth or seventh when they really start taking their toll, and I doubt you could even splice that many onto your topsider bodies. After all, will you miss that slight edge of sanity when you can call up flames by snapping your fingers, or let fly a swarm of hornets from your veins?" she asks.

"Now come along, you should probably stop at the vending machines before we go, patch up after that little skirmish." She walks into the next room, offhandedly gesturing to the vending machines lining the entrance. The room looks like nothing so much as a lightning rail station, a long strip of metal with occasional benches or tables demarcating it. Running along each side of the strip is a narrow uncovered area, where water flows much as in the first room.

Straight through the entrance, there is a a booth of glass and steel that glows with a green tinge. Glowing, runic letters proclaim it to be a "Vita-Chamber," whatever that is. On the left side, there are two rectangular dispensing machines, each about a foot higher than a man. One has the picture of a clown with rather ghoulish features on it, with the legened "Artificer-in-a-Box." The other has a plain metallic exterior, with glassy tubes running along the outside, full of what looks to be molten lava. Etched into it in blocky, dwarven-esque print is the title "The Foundry." Opposite them, standing next to a table piled high with newspapers, is what looks to be an altar of steel or iron, with a crystalline surface that luminesces blue. It has no title, just a phantasmal glyph of some language that floats in the air above it.

[dyslexicfaser]

Hector

Hector inspects the luminescent blue altar. He's fluent in almost a dozen extraplanar languages, but the glyph is unfamiliar to him (OOC: I'm assuming so, anyway: he knows abyssal, celestial, draconic, and the four elemental languages). "'Vending machines', hmm? Interesting." Wishing I had that Analyze Dweomer spell now.

"I've never seen their like."

[pingcode20]

Irmaet the Black
"It has occurred to me, yes, but then I recall that my studies have won me precisely what you have described, without need for your vaunted 'ADAM'."

Irmaet saunters casually over to the counter with the newspapers, and sits on the edge of the counter, picking up the first paper and beginning to read its decrepit pages.

"Well now, I think here might be as good a place to set down for a while as any. I'm afraid my magics were not prepared for a crash, nor a land of madmen, and I will need time to reprepare. In the meantime, I'm sure we ought to have a look at these 'machines'."

Still reading his newfound paper, Mr Bones carrying the entire pile rather comically behind him, Irmaet wanders over to the 'Artificer in a box' vending machine, closing the paper and popping it onto the pile.

"Artificer-in-a-box, eh? Sounds... somewhat useful."

Irmaet squints and peers closely at the buttons, tapping the front of the contraption experimentally.

[Philistine]

QB

"Vending machines?" QB asks, looking dubiously at the varied devices. "What do these do? And how do they work?"

[The Demented One]

As Irmaet approaches the Artificer-in-a-Box, a crystalline screen extrudes through the surface. Within a few seconds, it illuminates, displaying a small menu of items, each with a price beside them.

Artificer-in-a-Box!
{table=head]Item|Cost
Caltrops|1
Elemental Gem|2250
Dust of Dryness|850
Heavy Steel Shield|20
20 Masterwork Arrows|1
Masterwork Dagger|302
Masterwork Longsword|315
Tanglefoot Bag|50
[/table]

As Irmaet examines the vending machine, Dorothy explains them. "The Artificer-in-a-Box just sells things. Glorified matter compiler is all it is, really. Put the coins in, it sucks up the necessary parts from the feedline and assembles them into whatever you want. Since the Aeon Ball they've pretty much just shown random items, but they tend to be useful." She goes over to the machine, to look at just what it has to offer.

"The Foundry is an Artificer-in-a-Box in reverse. Put a magic item in, and you'll get a nice payout for it. The Foundry breaks up the item, and sends it down the feedline. Same company owned both of the machines; made a good killing off of them." she says.

"Vita-Chambers are healing booths. Go in, pay your fee, and pick what healing spell you want. That one over there, the altar with the bit in Quor over it, is called an Ego Nexus. I kinda helped invent them. They use a multitemporal crystalline array to manifest all probabilistic plasmometric matches, and then uses a solipsistic phase modulator to reverse the polarity of the ne...wait, no, I'm rambling. You put the money in, and you get to alter yourself. Hence the nickname, Alter Altar. You can't go from being, say, mister wizard over their to a big, strapping warrior, but you can tweak what you're good at, what you know, your general skill set. Neat, huh?"

[Krimm_Blackleaf]

"It's fantastic, really, but I'm hungry." Vaasth stands there, almost silent until now. The small mouth on his tentacle whip gnaws futilely on Vaasth's arm.

[Philistine]

QB

"Wait. 'Matter compiler' - you said something about a 'matter compiler' before, just a few minutes ago," QB says sharply, as he examines the 'Artificer-in-a-Box' from over Irmaet's shoulder. "Something about not needing coin to use one because you fiddled with it somehow? Was this what you were talking about? Or is this the same kind of thing, at least?"

[The Demented One]

"Ah, you're a sharp one there, Mister Hatchets. I'm afraid these ones aren't as easily convinced as the inn's compiler. You see, most of these have two separate systems, locks on the feedline to make sure you can't get free stuff. There's the feedline's own security, which is pathetic and can be hacked in a few minutes. But then there's the machine's own security, and that's damn near impossible to beat, because you can't hack it without the machine noticing and shutting down. The inn's owner didn't bother getting security for his compiler, so shutting down the feed security let us compile whatever we want. But these ones, even if we hack them, the best we're gonna get is a discount." Dorothy says. She throws around strange, alien terms - "feedline," "compile," "hack" - as if they were common as dirt.

[Philistine]

QB

"A discount, eh? Better than nothing, I suppose. So how does that work? Not that I especially want anything out of this machine," he says, looking dismissively at the list of items offered, "but I'd like to see how it's done. And does this 'hack' have any effect on other sorts of machines, or just the gear dispensers?"

[The Demented One]

"Oh, you can hack most anything. Come here, I'll show you how." She lies down, stretching her hand beneath the Artificer-in-a-Box. "There's a little indent on the bottom, just snag it with a fingernail and pull, and..." A panel on the underside of the machine swings open, and Dorothy shows Quentin the inner workings of the machine: A labyrinthine system of tubes, crystalline tubes full of coursing gasses and liquids. "Those are the feed lines. See how they all head into the black cube, and then all head up into the machine? That's where the securities are." She depresses a small, almost unseen lever on the side of the security box, causing a panel to pop out, revealing a set of clockwork innards. "The feedline's security is right in here with the machine's own, so it's kinda tricky. They tend to look just a little different so that can help you. And now, all you have to do is..." She sticks a fingernail between a set of gears, causing them to grind to a halt. While a few gears still spin, most have been stopped by her rough hack.

As she stops the gears, the screen flickers, and then changes. Irmaet notices that the prices have changed, and a few new items are now on the menu:

Artificer-in-a-Box!
{table=head]Item|Cost
Caltrops|1
Elemental Gem|2025
Dust of Dryness|765
Hat of Disguise|1720
Heavy Steel Shield|18
Immovable Rod|4500
20 Masterwork Arrows|1
Masterwork Dagger|272
Masterwork Longsword|284
Tanglefoot Bag|45
[/table]

[Philistine]

QB:

From his position on the floor where he's watching Dorothy's demonstration, QB calls up: "What did that do? Anything?"

[Karaswanton]

Kyrek

Kyrek looks at the machines, and seems intrigued to say the least.
Ooh! An Immovable Rod! I've always wanted one of those! And I think I have enough gold. On the other hand, I'm not sure how useful it would be..

George sniffs dismissively at the machines.
Hi don't trus' these...things boss...something jest eh'nt right 'bout 'em.

[The Demented One]

Getting back up on her feet and straightening out her dress, Dorothy responds to Quentin. "It's all just a matter of figuring out which gears are the feed security, and then jamming them. Once you've got that done, the machine'll be a bit more friendly."

[Philistine]

QB

QB stands and looks at the faceplate of the Artificer-in-a-Box machine, noting the new items and reduced prices. Turning again to Dorothy, he asks, "You said you can do that with "most anything" - so if we were to "hack" the Foundry machine here, would it give us better prices on the items we feed it?"

[The Demented One]

"You're a quick one. Now, the Vita-Chamber and the Alter Altar, they're not hooked up to any feedlines, so there's no way you can hack them, but anything that uses a matter compiler, you can hack." She grins, and walks over to Vaasth. "You know, after you took all of my things and money, I can't exactly pay for anything. So could I please have some money to go use the Vita-Chamber?" she asks sarcastically.

[Karaswanton]

Kyrek

I think not. You've caused us some trouble already, and those are our resources now.

If we don't run into any more trouble by the end of the day, either I or Irmaet can use a healing spell on you. Assuming you aren't undead of course, but I suppose we'll find that out when I cast it.

Spoiler

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I don't think I've said so specifically, but it's been in my sig. I'm going camping Saturday and Sunday. Be back Monday.

[Philistine]

QB

"All right. I'm gonna take a crack at this thing, then. Just to make sure I've got the hang of it." Drawing a small, flat case from a pocket, QB kneels next to the Foundry machine. The case when opened reveals a variety of oddly-shaped metal implements; QB chooses a couple of likely-looking tools and rolls onto his side, stretching his arms under the casing to manipulate the machinery inside.

Spoiler

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Disable Device (1d20+20)[31].

IIRC, there was something about these things blowing up if I fail - which I notice Dorothy has not mentioned... So wish me luck!

[pingcode20]

Irmaet the Black
Irmaet ponders the selections for a moment more, then saunters over to QB as he makes his attempt, peering closely at the mess of cogs and contraptions.

"I've had a little experience with contraptions like these, in my artifice classes back in the day. They were all the rage with Cannith for a while. Fiddled with a couple of 'em in my day, too - see, that one's a C42 cog, we used to call them killers because they usually set off the booby traps whoever built it put in..."

Spoiler

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Disable Device Aid Another: Irmaet has a +10 Disable Device Mod, does not need to roll.

QB Receives a +2 favourable conditions mod for Old Fogey Advice

[Krimm_Blackleaf]

"........." Vaasth looks down at the girl, eye to eye. "Heh. Sure..." He hands over the portion of the coins he received from the last battle. "I suppose it only makes sense to treat a girl to things after killing her companions, knocking her unconscious in a most unusual way then thieving from her unconscious body..."

"Geheh..."
"Isaidshutup!"

[pingcode20]

Irmaet the Black
Irmaet laughs unmaliciously as he sees Vaasth handing over money to Dorothy.

"You're being played, loverboy." he chuckles, once the laughter subsides.

[Krimm_Blackleaf]

"You try doing this when someone's looking at you like him all the time." He points to his tentacle whip... which doesn't even look like it has a way to see at all.

[pingcode20]

Irmaet the Black
"That's what my wife said." replies Irmaet, with a smile. "Not getting a familiar was the best decision I ever made."

[The Demented One]

Quentin finds that the security mechanism of the Foundry machine is almost identical to the one Dorothy showed him, and is easily able to jam it. There is a slight whistling sound, and the movement of "lava" through the tubes in the machine seems to accelerate.

Dorothy claps her hands together excitedly. "Very good, very good! Maybe you'd fit in down here, Mister Hatchets."