Most AP threads appear to be from the GM's point of view. Hell, I've got one of those too.  However, I figured I'd shake it up and talk about the D&D game we did yesterday from the Player's PoV.

To begin with, the GM [ who looks like, but is not Balzacq, sans tiara] had us make new characters while our other characters are floating around in a subplane of Limbo.  I'm not sure if he's cooking up something special for them, or he just wanted a break from the 11th level madness.  

I almost always play fighters, so I decided to shake things up and NOT use the book of nine swords and made a Cleric of Athena instead... I've been watching 300 in my mind for the last two weeks.  Sheild, spear... attitude to spare... all check.  I got good enough stats, and because I don't mind the heavy armor, I went ahead and made dex my 'dump stat'... again, thinking of changing things up abit.  I tend to play nimble fighters, yo.

Athena gave me the domains of Good and War, so I wouldn't be too hurting on attacks (weapon Focus, Short Spear FTW!) while I got used to being a spell caster.  

There was, however, a miscommunication, as one of the other players ALSO played a cleric, a dwarven cleric of Moradin.  The rest of the party are...

Dwarven warrior (brother of the cleric)
Psionisist Air Gensai (the only non-good character)
Raptorian Scout and general madwoman.

After making characters the GM asked us if we were all old friends or just meeting. We chose unanimously the 'old friends' route.  Without much ado, we started off as caravan guards across a desert.  I proseltyzed to the muleskinner of our six camel caravan, but not much else happened.

The Raptorian Scout spotted Hobgoblins watching us from a hilltop the first day.  

Just before dawn only the Dwarven warrior and my Cleric were on watch (one dwarf on each of the shifts because of darkvision) when I spotted Hobgoblins approaching. I couldn't do much before the Javalins started flying, hitting both of us pretty hard! I chanted a blessing to Athena and set myself to recieve their charge.

On the other side of the camp the dwarf gave a yell of shock as the first javalin slammed into him, which started waking everyone.

There were some 9 hobgoblins, four on my side of the camp, five on the dwarf's. The two that had thrown charged in (we use a map and figures) on each side.  

The Raptorean, quick as all her kind, leapt up and fired an arrow into one Hobgoblin, scratching the beast as it charged me.  Across the camp the dwarf roared his rage but failed to hurt his foe.

I shouted a dire warning to the Hobgoblins that they faced a Athenan preist this night, and (thanks to the double damage for being set against a charge) managed to send one back to his foul gods in a spray of gore.... which proved to be enough to wake the redolent Gensai. (who bitterly complained about having to accompany a caravan, pointing out he was no guard).

Across the way the Muleskinner proved his worth in battle by tripping up one of the creatures with his whip.

The Dwarven preist joined the battle at his brother's side, despite being armored with only his sheild.

With fairly heavy wounds on behalf of the defenders we saw the goblins off, my armor and faith preserving me from all other attacks, the psionisic blasts from the Gensai wounding several of the creatures, the arrows of the nimble scout finishing them off.  The last to fall was the Muleskinner's foe, felled by a flung hammer from the priest of Moradin.  I tended the other's wounds, as did the other cleric, then I gathered the bodies of the slain while my companions looted them.  Despite the fact that they worship foul, heretical gods, I gave them burial rites and burned the bodies.

As the sun was breaking over the horizon I knealt and said my prayers to the Godess, thus I missed the sight of one of the exotic Thri-keen approaching our humble camp.  The Raptorian glided out to meet him, and directed him to speak to the Trader we were escorting.  Naught came from this, and our caravan continued on, only to be hit by an early season sandstorm of epic proportions.  

Eventually it had gone on so long that we could not wait it out any longer and were forced to press onwards, but it was so strong we were eventually seperated, only my faith and the providence of my Goddess kept me from dying of thirst as the days turned into weeks, so long that the rations in my pack were consumed.  At last I came up on a mighty temple buried in the sands, only the top half of a ziggurat and the tips of the walls remained above. Atop the ziggurat were three massive statues, thirty feet and more in height, yet despite my training at the temple I could not recognize the Gods depicted, though I was in time able to determine their portfolios.

The Sandstorm abated somewhat, and as I gaped in awe at this mighty temple, low I spied my lost companions as well, each of us in turn had made it here.  The Raptorian climbed the statues to look around, or perhaps merely for fun while the rest of us examined the corpse of a weeks dead hobgoblin who was stuck halfway through what should have been a hidden entrance atop the Zigurrat.  He had died of poison, the stinger of some giant bee still stuck in his chest.

Inside the ziggurat were three brass pillars, hollow, with an opening facing the door, a ladder plainly visible inside. As the dwarven warrior and the gensai remained outside, the rest of us climbed up each pillar, finding ourselves inside tiny rooms in each statue, replete with levers and bullhorns. Pulling the levers, rusted with age and neglect, proved to make the statues move slightly, and I shouted through the bullhorn that Athena demanded worship.

My prank had the misfortunate result of the poor stout dwarf thinking he was under attack from stone golems and fleeing nearly to the sandstorm while the three of us amused ourselves with the statues.

While the dwarven priest went to calm his brother I went down the ladder to spy a room with more doors below, lit by three huge beetles. Rather than risk engaging three huge beetles alone, I climbed back up.

Prepared for battle the three of us went down. Oops. Huge meant 'two feet long'. and they weren't hostile either. Stupid GM. Huge means... you know... HUGE!.  

This room proved to have been a foundry and repair depot for the statues, long cold. The scout checked the doors for traps (there were three doors) and we exited the room to the south, explorign the rooms along the short hallway as we went. Of course, only the dwarves could see in the dark, but luckily they had brough sunsticks for the rest of us.  Rather than hand it to the Gensai who never used his hands in a fight, I was elected to carry it, which I did by the expediant of tucking it in my belt.

As the dwarven priest explored one arm of the T intersection we found, and began attempting to destroy a gilded statue of one of the three gods he found (and later dragging it down the hall to use as firewood) I opened the second door we had found and discovered a massive (man sized this time) hostile lizard hiding there. The raptorian killed it with an arrow after it had taken a bite out of me and I carved it and purified it in Athena's name for the first meal in days for most of us.

The Raptorian, ever flighty, headed into the dark hallway (san's light) to ask the dwarf what he was doing. As they argued and played, a door opened and six men in full armor and masks exited and took grave offence to his defacing of their God.  The rest of us were oblivious to this exchange.

As a gesture of contrition, he allowed himself to be 'captured' while the raptorian was free to come down the hall and 'explain' events as best she could.  The warrior, worried about his brother, hurried down teh hall and kicked open the door.  While I was most hungry and the lizard was not yet cooked (on the splintered remains of the furniture from teh room) I set my personal concerns aside and followed with him.

There were eleven of these men, and while they were very strange I could not detect the stench of evil about them. Indeed, they seemed to think we were tomb robbers, though I rightly pointed out that unless they were dead, they could hardly claim this was a Tomb.  I learned they called themselves the Saridians, a name I recalled from my studies, a faith that had been lost in the sands of time some thousand or more years ago, barely understood. They seemed not to know of Dwarves, and despite their ability to see in pitch black called themselves men.  We negotiated for food and water, and reparations for the hasty and importune acts of our comrade, and learned that there were three factions in this underground complex, one for each of the three gods, and that they were hostile to one another.  In return their aid, we agreed to seek out and do mischief to these other two groups.

I fear we may have been hasty in our promises, but I am not the one who needs to earn their forgiveness for assaulting their God with a hammer!;)

Excellent update!


The "three factions" setup is pretty cool. I hope you are already planning your betrayal. (haha)

We haven't met the other two groups yet, otherwise we might. Of course, given that there are at least THREE Lawful Good types in the party, betrayal is a bit challenging.

I expect it will go one of two ways: The GM has set up an obviously bad faction (or two) and we just got lucky as to which group we hit first...

OR

The NPC's are blinded by their ideological war, all three sides are nice and humanlike, and I'll be plotting to find a way to heal the breach (preferably if they are willing to allow converts to Athena/setting her up as a new Goddess for them responsible for ending a millenia old war... )

I arrived late to the game by an hour, something that might prove problematic.  What I apparently missed was some looting from a dead guy in a cage and an attack on the giant bee hive that left the other cleric severly hurt.

Exploring led us to a room with a giant Gecko, which was again entirely the province of the dwarven cleric, as he alone entered the room, and aside from a single shot from the scout's bow, he alone killed it.  

Then we encountered some visible Pixies sitting upon some crates.  It turned out that no less than three of us spoke sylvan and thus we were able to converse with the strange creatures.  Despite having the ability to converse, only I seemed interested in speaking.

We learned, in short order, that the tempestous sprites had been court jesters of a sort to a King Alexander of the Sindarins over a thousand years ago.  The desert had come in, destroying the city and driving the inhabitants underground.  Hardly a font of knowledge, but given their capricious natures, I was happy to have learned that much.  

Having been trapped underground for a thousand years the Pixies were craving Dates, once a staple of their diet. For a moment I was distraught, for how could I get dates here?  Then inspiration from my Goddess struck and I asked those of my band who had carried many weeks of trail rations if they had managed to save any of the dates... in the end we came up with nearly three full handfuls of dates, which we traded for a crate of the wonderous devices the priests of old Sindarin had used to impress the laity. The pixies called them 'fireworks'.  I hope to bring these back so that the sages and alchemists might learn how they function and fashion more.  

We left the pixes, having successfuly negotiated with them, to enjoy their dates, but not before they used their whimsy to make the raptorean dance for a few seconds.

Our explorations continued, we found a room with a green slime, then another with yellow mold. Rather than search these disgusting rooms, we left them for later, not wishing to risk a dangerous infection in this strange subterrainian kingdom.  

As we wandered we hear the sounds of goblinic voices coming up one of the stairwells nearby. The raptorean exchanged some sort of banter from hiding, which confused the foul beasts.  Rather than wait in a cowardly ambush, I stepped forward, my spear ready... only to have the dwarven brothers rush past me to engage the quartet of hobgoblins, the raptorean scout step out and fire a bow... I launched by javelin, a prayer to Athena a clarion call that their days were numbered but few and took one through the heart. The fight was over before it had begun and as the others stripped the bodies of all that was valuable, I commended their souls to my Goddess so that they might learn in the afterlife what they had failed to learn during their short and brutal lives. In Her mercy she might send them back to live again as servants of the light, but such things are beyond my control.

Our explorations of where the Hobgoblins had come from led us to a short hallway that was very strange, with buttons that caused the doors to open to different areas. There we discovered a shattered alter and temple room with the name Zarlock scrawled upon the walls, then later a hallway guarded by statues of a warrior woman very much in the image of my own Goddess.  Upon our way back we were confronted by strange men wearing masks in the likeness of bees who offered us honey. I detected no Evil among them, and drank, feeling refreshed.  The injured preist of Moradin found the draught closed his wounds up some, but before I could ask if we could take some of this fabulous honey with us, the trio left by means of the strange corridor.

Our next stop proved the most interesting by far.  We came upon a locked door, and in our haste to explore this realm, we forced it after much effort, discovering to my dismay that it was a temple to the Goddess of these Sindarins. Once again the dwarven cleric foolishly approached the altar, and a large band of warrior women rushed out of a hidden corridor next to our own, pausing at the bright torch he carried.

[this was a reset, originally they swarmed the room, surrounded the dwarf and demanded surrender as they started to cut us down. The GM didn't realize the dwarf was carrying the torch, and had forgotten momentarily that the Sindarins suffer from light sensitivity. Even the Illumian Sigils (only candle bright) were uncomfortable to the followers of Gorm last session...]

As I had intended to speak with these Sindarins, perhaps to forge a peace among them, I took immedeate action, stepping forth with my spear crosswise to bar the way as best I could as I spoke soothing words.  Tensions ran very high as I explained that we could not have known that there lay a sacred temple beyond the door, that we were not theives or desecrators, and that all followers of the good should seek peaceful terms rather than violence.  At first it seemed by words were ringing true, then the Raptorean Scout, always our hothead got into a breast beating match with a young hothead from the warrior band, provoking violence. I attempted to trip the hotheaded warrior, deflecting the blows of her allies with my shield, and the calmer dwarf took a strike when he attempted to bullrush her away. For a moment it looked as if bloodshed was inevitable, as the two women traded blows.  Then I gave forth a cry of righteous wrath, stunning the aggressor long enough to let the Dwarven warrior interpose himself.

[intimidate check, my weakest social skill, with no ranks... good roll, however]

This turn of events proved the moment of truth, and the leader of these warrior women began to trust us, more when her lieutenant reported that we had not touched the altar at all.

We stayed with them some days, learning that their entire community was made of women, warriors all, as they had not spoken to their Goddess in nearly a millenia.  The Raptorean, as the only woman among us, was intiated into their band.  I spoke to them of Athena, and they were amazed that She allowed men to serve her. They were amazed at the minor healing prayers I spoke over their injured warrior, and our own. They allowed that Athena might be another name, another face of their ancient Goddess, and invited me to train with their warrior cult, to join them as an Ally.  I prayed for guidance and taught them as best I could the ways of the cleric.

It seems the Sindarins are one large community still, most of their people lost in a dream state, as the 'bee worshippers' as an example. The bird masked Sindarins were worshippers of Zarlock, a demon God who held power over their people. Without the direct guidance of their Gods they were a dying race, which moved me to compassion, to risk teaching them enough of my arts that they might find for themselves the voice of their Goddess, or failing that, the voice of my own.   They agreed, reluctantly, that peace negotiations between the three cults of the three Gods of Sindarin would be a step towards saving their people.  We were gifted with bangles marking us as allies, and after repairing the door we had broken (an early step towards making a lasting alliance, my mending orison, among the most trivial gifts granted by my Goddess, proved as miraculous to them as my healing magics).

Our next stop the followers of the God Usugi-Magal, the trickster, the magi, the child sage.  This time we waited for them to open their doors, encountering them in their temple as well. Our negotiations went much smoother this time, much smoother, and after a brief parlay, and a short stay with them as well, they gifted us with rings marking us as Allies. All that remained were the priests of Gorm.  I felt less than comfortable, as I could not impress them with my miracles, they being skilled sorcerers and tricksters.  Once again I trusted that the Godess would not lead me astray as I attempted to teach their most devout the ways of the Cleric.

I must have been on the right path, for when next I prayed, I knew the Goddess had allowed me access to more powerful prayers.  A minor benefice, but incredibly warming given the shaky ground I trod religously.  I knew my superiors in the Temple would prefer that I work only to convert them, but I felt that was not the correct course of action to save these people... yet.

[yes, we leveled. Level 3 baby!!! Woot! Of course, I wound up doing ALL the negotiating and talking, not my favorite role at the table at all.  Next time we play... I won't be there for that actually, but if I were it would be difficult in the extreme, as the loot they took before I got there was most likely the temple treasure for the Gormites.... oops.]