Session 3: Fish-men and a Guardian Spirit

Bitter cold and howling winds did not keep us from playing.

The Party:
Batista, human thief, approximately 310 points
Orivileni, who is called Ori, Wood Elf scout, approximately 310 points
Aquinas, Dwarf cleric, approximately 310 points
William Von Cromberg, human knight, approximately 310 points
Drav Emberstrike, dwarf wizard, approximately 310 points
Aelwine, human wizard, approximately 300 points



The session started with the party in town doing research, gathering rumors, and trying to arrange for a wagon team to accompany them to Castle Falconflight.
 Drav spent time at the Academy researching the guardian spirit discovered near the end of the last session. He learned that the Otoroshi would leave the group unmolested, if they had good intentions when they entered the tomb.
The rumor mill was in full swing. The PCs learned that: 1. A dragon lives in the dungeon. 2. A man recently came into town with four gargoyle heads and a large number of gems. 3. A beautiful woman lives in the dungeon. 4. Some of the trees near the castle are sentient and will attack. 5. The dungeon leads to a lost dwarven city.
After several failed attempts to hire a wagon team, the owner of the White Wyvern Inn took pity on the adventurers. Arrangements were made for the party to take one of the Inn's wagons in exchange for a small portion of any loot returned to town.  The group also rigged up a large wooden crate with long wooden handles, a la the Ark of the Covenant, to transport treasure out of the dungeon.

Once again, the group set out in the predawn hours, over the river and through the woods to Castle Falconflight. They arrived at the edge of the clearing. Here the companions decided to head for the front gate instead of the side entrance they had been using. All was quiet as they neared the Castle gate. Batista made the gruesome discovery that the portcullis had crushed a man when it fell from its rails. Judging by the state of decay, the large number of insects feasting on the corpse and the foul smell, Aquinas came to the conclusion that the deceased had probably already had his last rites. Batista then searched the body, discovered a set of Delver's Webbing and 2 or 3 minor healing potions.

Some talk was made of sending Batista up the wall of the Castle to open the gate from the inside. This plan was quickly rejected by Batista. Instead they made their way around the castle to the larger section of broken wall. They had avoided this area previously because of the large number of footprints in and around the gap in the wall.

Batista was first in. The room, part of one of the cornet turrets, was well used as evidenced by many muddy foot prints tracked in and out of the room. On one wall a mustard colored cloak hung on a peg. Batista investigated, disturbing a large colony of yellow mold in the process. Everyone made their resistance rolls, and a pearl was found sewn into the hem of the cloak.

After getting their bearings the adventurers made some assumptions regarding the layout of the castle.Taking the first staircase they came across, they made their way to the roof.

Looking down into the courtyard Ori spied movement in the waist high grass.  Sadly he was unable to spot anything more. In an effort to lure out whatever was in the grass, Aelwine created an illusion of a weak, yet oddly chubby squirrel and set it limping through the grass. Nothing attacked the squirrel so after a minute the spell was dropped. Still concerned, the idea was struck upon to have Drav set the grass ablaze with a fire ball and then control the fire to force the creature to reveal itself. Soon a grass fire raced across the courtyard. Several chickens flapped out of the grass then into one of the arrow slots on the ground floor of the castle wall.

A quick exploration of the roof revealed four balistas, one on each corner turret, in various stages of assembly. Rather than remove the balistas, and put them in the wagon, the party destroyed the disassembled ones and sabotaged the two still in working order.

The sabotage completed, they headed for the dungeon below the castle. Taking a spiral staircase the group clomped and clanged their way down.  Rounding the last turn in the staircase, Batista narrowly avoided a spear thrust from around a corner.  A school of five Kuo-toa waited in ambush for the party. Batista leaped across the hall, back flipped off the far wall, then came down with a slash of his sword, but his opponent dodged.  Aelwine was the next one off the stairs, he immediately set to casting an illusion. Ori cleared the stairs but was unable to attack. The rest of the group stacked up behind Aquinas. Sadly this position  made them unable to navigating the few stairs to join the fight. Each of the fish-men made an attack, but either missed, or the target defended. Batista flipped and twisted his way through the fish-men to get behind them. Aelwine's spell activated which created thousands of illusory cockroaches flowing from his hands towards the fish-men. This was very unsettling for the Kuo-Toa. All failed the resistance roll so believed the illusion to be real.  As did William who had pushed past the dwarves on the spiral stairs. The Kuo-Toa made another set of ineffectual attacks. Batista took a swing at one of the fish-men sadly it was not injured. Aelwine set the mass of cockroaches to attack the Kuo-Toa. This action sent the Kuo-Toa retreating towards the open well behind Batista. A trio of fish men attempted to shoulder block Batista to knock him into the water. However, Batista was a nimble one so stayed on dry ground. The fish-men all made good their escape, but left 4 spears behind.

A bit of investigation allowed the group to complete the map of the dungeon. Once that was completed the group entered a trap door in the false jail cell to the library below. Once everyone descended the ladder they made a bee line for the room which contained the mausoleum. The room was quite large, measuring 30 by 21 feet. In the center stood a small mausoleum. The floor was covered in a random array of red and black tiles. An exception being  a path of black tiles which lead from one of the doors on a far wall to the small building.  The group dropped from a small balcony to the floor below, much as they had before. Aquinas and William elected to stay on the balcony.
Ori, Batista, Aelwine and Drav  all had to make 3 jumps to remain on the black tiles to make their way to the pathway. Drav jumped with all of his dwarven might but failed to clear the distance. He fell into a 10 foot pit, taking minor damage. The others helped Drav out of the pit then headed for the crypt. As they approached a sparkle of light revealed the spirit guardian on the roof once again. Batista,  failed to see the creature thus headed for the door of the crypt. As soon as he touched it, the Orotoshi jumped off the roof, slashed his claws at Batista then landed. Batista failed to dodge so was knocked below 0 HP in one shot. Ori loosed an arrow at the eye of the creature, but missed. Drav set loose a fireball which was easily dodged.  Here my memory begins to fade so my notes are incomplete.  I know that somehow the Otoroshi fell off  the trail and into one of the pit traps. Once he had fallen , Aelwine cast a Phantasm spell  of a large stone block that fell from the ceiling which also trapped the Guardian.  That gave Ori and Aelwine time to tend Batista's wounds and poured healing potions down his throat. Seeing how terribly hurt Batista was, William and Aquinas made their way to the floor of the room. Batista, Ori, Drav and Aelwine entered the tomb. William and Aquinas stood guard outside the open door. Aelwine was out of the fight because he was down to 1 FP. Batista was just barely above 0 HP. Aquinas had cast Armor on William upping his DR. As the Otoroshi leaped from the pit and onto the pathway, both Ori and Drav let loose with missiles from the open door way. One arrow  to the eye and a fireball, both struck home! Each doing a fair amount of damage. From here the fight turned into a slug fest. William and Aquinas  flanked the creature, while Ori and Drav took shots when they could. The creature fought well but the combined attacks were just too much. It managed to stay on its feet until it was all the way down to -5x HP

It didn't take long for the adventures to loot the grave. Hung on a rack near the head of the grave was a suit of scale armor. The armor definitely had some enchantments cast upon it so the group surmised it had been made by a master craftsman. Since Aelwine needed to rest, Drav used the time to cast analyse magic, which revealed  the armor was enchanted with deflect +1. The grave itself held no treasure.

It was late, so the party made their way out of the dungeon.  They arrived back to town with no problems.

Otoroshi (shrine protector)

ST	35	HP	35	Speed	6.25	Class	Divine Being
DX:	15	Will:	10	Move:	7	Source	GURPS 3rd ed Fantasy Bestiary p 49
IQ:	5	Per :	5	SM:	0
HT:	14	FP:	14	DR:	5
Dodge:	12	Parry:	12
Melee	Level	Damage
Claw	15	4d-1 cut
Tusk	15	4d-1 imp
Traits:	Sharp claws, tusks, does not eat, does not sleep, sense “inpiety” or lack of respect for the place it guards, healing (all HP healed after 24 hours)
Skill:	Brawling 15,
Notes:	Otoroshi will use stealth and pounce from the roof of the building it protects. Otoroshi will AOA if the opponent is unarmed. Otoroshi will fight to the death. If a Otoroshi is slain, a new one will replace it 24 hours later. There will never be more than one Otoroshi per building, but may be more than one if the location has more than one building.

 Notes.
A pretty fun night of gaming. Both fights went well.
I'm not sure why the group trashed the balistas. They could have added up to a nice chunk of change.
An entire floor of the castle walls remains unexplored.
The party is having a hard time deciding if keeping the armor is better than selling it.
They made a profit, and earned 5 xp for the night.