Quest to Rescue Lady Barunnas Alant, House of Ballinford

[BackworldTraveller]

Igber switches to dagger and looks for a body to slip it into...
...but drops the dagger as it entangles in his clothing!

[gurusql]

Traesta

Traesta will try and help Conweena by smashing the rat with her mace.

Attack with Mace[1d20]=20, Damage S/M [1d6+1]=2+1=3 L [1d6]=6

[Ithril]

Harker charges the wall, cursing at the vermin that has invaded him. "Die VERMIN!" Meanwhile, Conweena takes advantage of the fact that she can anticipate the rat that is preoccupied with the leather trim of her shield, and strikes it's head clean off with her axe.

Pebble, tries to strike at the rat on Harker, but it moves too swiftly. Pebble cannot get a clean shot at it, and by the time Harker's shoulder impacts the wall, the rat has jumped to his helm, avoiding damage altogether. Undeterred, the rat scrambles down Harker's other side, taunting him with high pitched squeals. Igber pulls out his dagger and looks for a body to slip it into...but drops the dagger as it entangles in his clothing!

Traesta is unable to anticipate Conweena's flurry of strikes, and so just after Conweena decapitates the rat, her mace comes down on it's still squirming body. At the same instant, Conweena's next strike at the creature intercepts the mace with her axe, cleaving a nice wedge from one of the wooden flanges that form it's star shaped head, and putting a substantial notch in the haft.

Dorath attempts to send a sling stone into Harker's rat, but is more focused on not hitting Harker than he is on hitting the rat, causing is stone to harmlessly ping off a wall.

The remaining rat scrambles over Harker. It's swift moves making it nearly impervious to Harker's frenetic dance. Fortunately, it is too busy running to bite him. After a few more moments of Harker practicing his tarantella moves, the rat is shaken off (or possibly jumps off) and is quickly set upon by the group and handily dispatched without trouble.

With the excitement ended, Traesta immediately examines her mace, and finds the damage noticeable, but minimal. It should continue to function well enough for now, she thinks.
You reassemble to resume your journey out of the catacombs.

There is a passage in the Sount wall, and a door in the Wenzt wall. I need to ask: Do you remember which way you came?

Gurusql, please share your dice hack with the rest of the party so they can roll as exceptionally as you have been?
Sunphoenix, your improvised attempted slam attack was creative, and something I did not anticipate. I'll give you credit equal to killing the rat for your creativity. Maybe next time such an unexpected idea will work better.

[Rex]

Conweena

"I am sorry about that Traesta, I owe you a new mace. Unfortunatly I don't have anything to give you now but my axe and bow."

Conweena goes about searching the room.

[gurusql]

Traesta

"Worry not Conweena, it will continue to service me until it doesn't. The door on the west side should lead to a corridor that that after 30-40 ft has some stairs going up."

I had been rolling so bad for months, a little good luck had to come into play

[sunphoenix]

OOC: Didn't we Clearly state we were crudely mapping as we journeyed in the cave system to keep from getting lost?!? Just simple connecting lines on parchement to record when we took a fork or entered a room circle with line exists. Harker would have INSISTED on someone doing that... honestly I thought Dorath was doing that.

[Ithril]

I've mentioned myself that it would be advisable, but I don't know if anyone specifically mentioned that they would be? I'm sure someone will recall if they did, and can link to their post showing those intentions more easily than someone re-reading 35 pages of posts searching for the specific dialogue.
In any case, I won't let you get too lost

or.. would I?

At any rate, once most of you post a consensus, I'll proceed.

[Rex]

Conweena

I don't recall.

[gurusql]

Traesta

I do not recall either

[BackworldTraveller]

Igber
Wasn't me...but given the maps are recorded in the threads it isn't likely we'll make the wrong map choices.

[ravenn4544]

Pebble's eyes shift side to side. "Map? Umm.. I don't have one.."

[Ithril]

Quick investigations remind you of which way you came, as the Sount passage leads to the room with the river, so you know that you must go Wenzt. You follow this passage to the first door on your left, and proceed through it to the round room that is the base of the tower.

The scene of the battle with the snake isn't quite as you remember leaving it. The body of the snake is gone, and it appears that someone has tried to clean up the blood, but a large amount of it still stains certain parts of the floor. Someone has been busy here while you were busy elsewhere. The door at the top of the stairs is shut.

Something important is about to take place, and I need to be sure we are all engaged. Also, I apologize for the stutter earlier. It's sometimes difficult for me to balance player agency with expedience and I dislike making assumptions.
I'm sorry if that causes an occasional delay.

[Rex]

Conweena

"I could see perhaps removing the corpse, but cleaning up the floor? Something odd is going on here."

She looks around to see if anything less obvious has changed.

[gurusql]

Traesta

"By the light of Paldon, we must be quiet the mage as returned to the tower and could have placed additional magic alarms or traps."

Traesta will use the Detect Magic that she has been saving to look for magical surprises from the wizard.

[BackworldTraveller]

Igber
Igber has a quick check of the location. Is there any way to rig a trip rope on the stair? Otherwise, laying pebbles/sling-stones on the 1st step from the top might have the same effect!
He'll attempt to quickly lay such a trap.

[redwarrior]

Dorath looks around complacently for a moment, but then is hit with a horrible thought and runs over to the hole that the snake came out of and feels around for where he hid the spell book in the dark & rubble.

Harker did ask dorath to map, & Dorath brought his paper and pens to do so. Posts 56 & 57 in this thread! Stupid search won't search on "map" btw....

[sunphoenix]

Harker gestures for everyone to gather with him just outside the round room to speak in hushed tones...

"It is as I feared the tower in now likely reoccupied ~ which is WHY I really hoped the shore camp would work, we may have a serious fight on our hands now... I'm not sure we will be able to 'sneak' out of the tower if we meet opposition... fleeing will only give them time to prepare even better defenses! We must decide now. Igber... your our sneak "professionalist"... do you think you can sneak US all past any mundane alarms or guards? Otherwise..we should go in assault minded ~ kick in the doors and attack and subdue all residents until we control the tower!"

[Rex]

Conweena

"We may need to decide once we have some more info."

[BackworldTraveller]

Harker gestures for everyone to gather with him just outside the round room to speak in hushed tones...

"It is as I feared the tower in now likely reoccupied ~ which is WHY I really hoped the shore camp would work, we may have a serious fight on our hands now... I'm not sure we will be able to 'sneak' out of the tower if we meet opposition... fleeing will only give them time to prepare even better defenses! We must decide now. Igber... your our sneak "professionalist"... do you think you can sneak US all past any mundane alarms or guards? Otherwise..we should go in assault minded ~ kick in the doors and attack and subdue all residents until we control the tower!"

Nope - No chance. We have no idea where the guards are, what traps have been set or even where we need to go! As soon as we meet anyone, the place sounds like a mad mallet wielder in a bell foundry. Our best idea may be to set our own traps on the directions we aren't going and clear from the top down. And mind the trap on the stairs.

[Ithril]

Let me address a few declared actions to give you some better parameters for further plans and actions.

Igber
Igber has a quick check of the location. Is there any way to rig a trip rope on the stair? Otherwise, laying pebbles/sling-stones on the 1st step from the top might have the same effect!
He'll attempt to quickly lay such a trap.

There's not really much of a way to rig a rope trap (I'm assuming some kind of trip line that you could pull tight to trip up someone descending the stair). The walls are of mortared stone blocks, and though there may be bits of loose mortar, or loose stone, there isn't anything that will securely hold a rope. The steps are rough hewn, and uneven, and a good portion of the front end is slanted because of their age. Enough bullets or pebbles will roll off it because of it's uneven nature to expose plenty of bare spots. The probability of covering enough of any step to cause someone to lose their balance by slipping on them is very unlikely. A good coating of grease or oil might cause such a slip, but I doubt the lamp oil is thick enough to suffice.

Dorath looks around complacently for a moment, but then is hit with a horrible thought and runs over to the hole that the snake came out of and feels around for where he hid the spell book in the dark & rubble.

A good amount of the serpent's blood had puddled near it's hole. It appears that whomever was trying to clean up the mess also discovered your attempt at concealment; the books are gone. Not to worry though, If their owner is anywhere around, they are likely still here somewhere in the tower above as well.

Traesta
"By the light of Paldon, we must be quiet the mage as returned to the tower and could have placed additional magic alarms or traps."
Traesta will use the Detect Magic that she has been saving to look for magical surprises from the wizard.

Traesta shudders when she sees the results of her spell.