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Rllmuk Dungeons and Dragons 5e - Ghosts of Saltm... BZZzzzt - The Curse of Strahd!

Clipper

By Clipper
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Clipper

Clipper

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it is an action to use which seems a bit mean as in combat I doubt it would be as useful?

 

I will leave it as is for now but may switch it to a bonus action later.

 

But you do have to say when you use it unless you say you are always wearing it hood up

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14 hours ago, Doctor Shark said:

Excellent write up but you forgot the bit where Sardan died. 

 

There actually was a moment where Sarden rushed....FORWARD!!!

 

Fair write up - but I think it severely fails to represent plays how well Clipper did the "something's off, or IS THERE!?!?!" about a familiar character.

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Clipper

Clipper

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Rough notes for those not present - again v long but I have highlighted pertinent bits

 

We find the party standing around in a wooded copse swearing, Samson punching a tree and Caliban stabbing another. Archibald and Walks jump from the skyship and Archibald casts fly when he thinks they are 100 ft from the ground, they are in fact 60ft from ground and walks is fairly insistent that he cast fly at this point. They join the others and find the tree violence and two dead guards. They quickly ascertain the situation and report back to Neristra.

 

She indicates the assailant is likely a Rakshasa - a fiend that comes from the 9 hells but prefers not to live there. They are hired for sneakiness, assassinations, spying etc. It is likely that the Illithid contracted it to do a more clandestine extraction for the boy Barret. There is much conversation about whether to chase after the Rakshasa and retrieve the  boy.  Archibald has the teleportation circle for the Illithid house on the plane of fire. Sardan could not exactly identify the tone of tuning fork used for the Plane Shift compared to the Illithid use of it but it was "similar". Neristra could take them all there but if the Illithid and Rakshasa were present then that would be very dangerous she indicated. Many options and tactics were discussed and possibilities. With a high persuasion check Neristra was willing to take someone to the plane of fire, Archibald, if there was a rakshasa and illithid present he would banish her and then himself to return them both to the material plane. This was the agreed plan with the party retruning on horseback to Saltmarsh (the ship to be sailed by its crew only).

 

Before casting the plane shift NEristra indicated she had information for two of the party.

 

With the boy gone the Harpers wish to alter their approach slightly and widen their investigations and operations against the Illithid forces. There had been word from the north that a number of Duergar had taken over a dwarven fortress/mine/foundry and was producing weapons as well as firearms (they should have no knowledge of such things). The implication is that the Illithid is arming forces and selling weapons to build a warchest. The Harpers plan to send a small contingent north to investigate and possibly disrupt this operation - to this end they wouild like Walks to accompany this group as his experience will be invaluable. As a Harper operative Walks accepts this and asks when they are to leave, and she says there is a group waiting for him in Saltmarsh now.

 

SHe also tells Caliban that the Harpers are aware of what is believed to be Caliban's home island which is some where in the southern seas between two great continents. They cannot be sure but thee is a colony of Dragonborn there. THere is an exploratory trade ship which is heading out in that direction if he wished to take passage aboard - it will leave tonight. The ship's mission is to explore and , if they find a suitable society to trade with, open that trade route if possible - a high risk strategy that can pay well.

 

And leaving two of the party with a quandry she casts Plane shift and leaves with Archibald for the Plane of Fire. Upon arrival the house is seemingly empty, the same two chairs and table were present and no other furniture although a thorough search turned up a magical dagger attached to the underside of the table (at the illithid's "end" when he confronted Archibald). It is a Dagger of Venom but archibald feels it isnt worth taking. Neristra is also detecting magic and she can sense the presence of a "chain" - there having been talk of the Kraken being controlled and "chained" in some way by the Illithid. She says there is immensely powerful arcane power present but it does not match anything she has seen before - it seems to be a mixture of a sort of spectral chain and Planar binding conjuration. She indicates it would have taken some power and time to construct and dismantling it would take a team of arcane users some time to dispel.

 

Further searching of the house found a simple bedroom and unused kitchen. The bedroom had a desk with a drawer. Archibald opened it unleashing a poison needle trap that damaged him. Within he found a piece of paper and an old partially deflated eyeball. The paper was a fragment of a map with strange markings on it, the fragment did not match anything Archibald knew but Neristra recognised it as being the Blightshore coast , some way off to the West. The markings looked to be a code of sorts possibly indicating locations for the Illithid's base of operations?

 

That is all that was found and the two of them stayed the night in the building until Neristra could cast Plane Shift once more. They left everything as they found it having copied the map fragment although the posion needle trap was reset in a fairly shoddy fashion.

 

Back in Saltmarsh the party decided to visit Welgar to see how Eliander was. THe answer was grim, Eliander was in a serious condition suffering from a poisoning that would have been fatal to many. HEaling magics could only do so much and now he was unconscious and Welgar indicated he would recover ewventually but it was a long road. Caliban expended all the healing spells he had into Eliander to make his contribution. There was some discussion between Welgar, Janore and the party about their plans with regard to Fire Island.

 

As the party returned to the centre of saltmarsh Walks said that it was time to depart with a Harper team heading north towards the spine of the world north of mirabar. THe party wished him well in his journey and hoped to meet him again some day. Caliban was contemplating his future as well as they all went to the pub to eat and drink and await the return of Archibald. The bar was fairly busy and one of the patrons was recognised by Sardan. Gazes at Weasels was sitting at a table with a drink regaling anyone who would listen with tales of vampire slaughter and derring-do. Sardan greeted Gazes who cheerfully called Sardan a coward and said he should run him through with his sword but instead gave him a big hug.

 

The rest of the day was spent with Gazes telling Sardan and the party the WHOLE of the Strahd story (minus any bits that might be personal to Gazes). Sardan in return brought Gazes up to speed on the "eight legged sea dangler" mystery which Gazes found intriguing. But not as intriguing as Rafe (Gazes' sentient rapiers) found it when Sardan talked of the Rakshasa attack. Rafe spoke at  length to Gazes explaining that the little deal they had and the trifling matter he wanted dealing with was in fact to kill a Rakshasa called Galabra who had gotten Rafe into this predicament.

 

Gazes returned to the table and asked "casually" aobut the name of the Rakshasa but the party did not know. In any case Gazes asked if he could join the party on their adventure and weas welcomed with open arms. But as one party member joined another left. Caliban felt the draw of home and the possibility of being reunited with his people was too much for him to resist so he told the party he was leaving that night aboard the exploratory trade ship. He handed over all his money and wished them well in their endeavours. The party rested despite the upheavals within the party.

 

Next day Neristra and Archibald return, and the latter is surprised to see the changes over such a short period of time. They both inform the party of what they found and showed them the portion of the map. Neristra is to pass this to code breakers to try and decipher it further. SHe is asked about this continent and she indicates it is a long distance across the ocean to the West and is called Wildemount and there are other continents also beyond that. The party indicate they have never heard of it - she says that not many have as travel that far across oceans to the other side of the world even are unusual.

Discussion of next steps falls into two plans. Search across the Plane of Fire (or nine hells) to find the Illithid or base of operations there, ask around etc. OR head to the underdark and investigate to see if they can trace/track the duergar forces or the Illithid. The party tend towards the latter and Neristra indicates that little is known but she has the following leads

1) There is known to be a Svirfneblin village in the upperdark not too far from here which may have information on comings and goings. They are friendly if eccentric and if the party befriend them then they may find good information
2) The harpers lost some rather powerful weapons to an unknown party and their intelligence tells them it is being stored in a dungeon or area of the underdark known oddly as White Plume Mountain. IF there is an individual stealing items and keeping them then maybe there is a lot more resoruces to be plundered? Exact location is not known but the Svirfneblin may well be able to help (or others)

With this information the party ponder their next move!

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Clipper

Clipper

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And for those not present an explanation of "the world" given info given in that diatribe above.

 

As I said before a high level campaign needs a wider focus and therefore more world building. According to Forgotten Realms Toril obviously has Faerun which extends east to Thay etc but beyond its shores the West there is a continent called Maztica and beyond that there are also continents called Katashaka and Osse which are also both large.

 

The issue is that there are no source books or backgrounds for these continents so I would have to create a lot - way more than I am capable of currently.

 

So I decided our faerun is part of Toril and our Toril has different continents, ones which I have loads of background information on. Some of you will have realised that Wildemount ( the continent to the far west that Neristra mentioned) is an official 5e source book that originally comes from Critical Role. Using it means I have tons of background on towns and cities and landscape etc. There are other areas and continents that arfe also from Critical role and I have the soruce books for which means we have a cohesive world as our Toril.

 

For those not into Critical role do not worry, I have NO intention of turning this into a "spot the reference" bizarre fanboy tour of Critical Role land :D These sources and continents and regions and cities are being used purely as a space that is alreayd mapped for me and I can fill it with our adventures. It is simply saving me time :D There is no need to know anything at all about it at all and there won't be Easter eggs beyond some of you might notice certain placenames etc. 

 

At the moment your current plan, knowing all this world is out there is to go to the Underdark so it will be a while before you go anywhere near it to be honest :D

 

If anyone has any concerns then let me know, this seemed the best time-effective way for me to expand our world and give us a backdrop that we can play on as the world gets bigger and you can start to move greater distances with spells etc.

 

The party may never leave Faerun but I wanted there to be choice and a wider world to explore in case they do feel like wandering - otherwise it will just be back to Klauth or Hekaton or Slarkretherl or Acererak etc - they may still turn up but its just nice to have options to go beyond our "canon"

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So Phantasmal Killer is more complex that I realised! I might swap it at a level up - think Warlocks can do that,

 

People can't decide when it ends

 

https://www.enworld.org/threads/phantasmal-killer.403865

 

And how the fear thing works seems to be open to discussion

 

https://www.reddit.com/r/DMAcademy/comments/68c2xb/questions_about_phantasmal_killer_and_the/

 

https://rpg.stackexchange.com/questions/137782/does-the-phantasmal-killer-spell-actually-produce-an-image-that-the-target-cant

 

Sage advice is no help!

 

https://twitter.com/jeremyecrawford/status/885973505593954304?lang=en-GB

 

I might swap it at a level up as it's convoluted - think Warlocks can do that,

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