Hey everyone,

Hope everyone had a good time rollin’ bones in City of Perfect Strangers. I had a good time running it and City of Strangers 2 looks better I think. I’m not too enthusiastic as to how the module ends though, so I’m going to punch it up a bit. Before I go into the plot summary, here’s some of the prep materials and other extra stuff. The next Pathfinder game will probably be February 9th.

Also, update your DNDSheets pretty quickly if you can, because I sometimes use the new skills/spells you get to write the challenges.

First, here’s the loot list:

– several potions of Cure Light Wounds
– scroll of Sleep (2) (scroll with the inscription TGHIN TGHIN)
– scroll of Mage Armor
– Ring of Protection +1 (a gold ring embedded with a single emerald)
– potion of Cure Moderate Wounds (2) (a bubbly yellow potion that tastes like lemon)
– scroll of Dimensional Door (scroll with the inscription DOA DOA)
– scroll of Silence (scroll with the inscription TEIUQ)
– Cloak of Resistance +1
– +1 chain shirt
– Cloak of the Hedge Wizard (Enchantment) (a green cloak made of gossamer)
– Robe of Infinite Twine (a coarse robe made of burlap-looking material)
– scroll of Searing Light (a scroll with the inscription ERIALOS)
– Aegis of Recovery (a small spherical pendant made of rose quartz)
– Ioun Torch (a small obsidian octahedron)

Two things about this list:

1) I actually kind of forgot how many CLW potions there were total. Since there are so many and it might be a little broken for everyone to have a lot of them, you can sell them back for full price, rather than for the normal half price.

2) The only thing that’s been claimed so far is the chain shirt (which was going to Bob’s cleric) so feel free to claim stuff on Facebook or whatever. The shirt was listed as ‘+1 chain shirt’ in the equipment list for Wymund, so I’m not sure if that means it’s magic (i.e. armor check penalty goes down by 1 and AC goes up by 1), or just masterwork (armor check penalty goes down by 1 only).

Second, here are the challenges:

I had a few that I made on the fly to replace some of the ones that were impossible to get in this session. I think I’ll probably stick with this setup in future modules (5 for each of you, 15 for the party).

Third, here are the custom character sheets I made for Fulgach and Bessie:

Fulgach the Disturber of Bones, level 5 Cleric of Urgathoa

Bessie the Animated Auroch Skeleton, minion of Fulgach

Finally, here’s the encounter/plot summary:

The party left off investigating the whereabouts of a famous Kaer Magan golem maker named Besel Ardoc. Besel is the head of the prestigious Ardoc family, and he seemed to be connected to the goons that were guarding the murdered Collgardie’s house. Through investigating and talking to various citizens of Kaer Maga, they found out that he liked to drink, he never travelled without six iron golems surrounding him at all times, he liked to drink in the Downmarket, he drank at a pub called the Augur’s Entrails, and he talks to the proprietor right after the pub opened.

As the party tried to stealthily tail Ardoc, they soon realized that this was unnecessary. A clearly confused and inebriated (and well-guarded) Besel Ardoc introduced himself to the group and had a conversation involving Collgardie and the mysterious Shadow Lodge that was seemingly behind Collgardie’s murder. The party learned that he was hired as a middleman by someone named Dakar of the Commerce League to guard Collgardie’s house in case some of the murderers came back. Ardoc then subcontracted out the guarding to a group of hired goons. When the party asked where they could talk to Dakar, all they got was a laugh and a promise that Ardoc would contact a friend of a friend of a friend etc. to arrange a meeting.

Going back to the Starry Night Inn, the party was greeted by five burly thugs and a short man named Upton who introduced himself as an ambassador or emissary of sorts to Dakar. Dakar is a very secretive man, he explained, so certain measures were needed to ensure his privacy if the party actually wanted to talk to him. To that end, he had the party wear a set of bags enchanted with a Silence spell, and made them endure a long wagon ride to Dakar’s private residence.

Once there, Dakar quickly asked the party what they wanted. When they replied they wanted information about the Shadow Lodge, Dakar replied that he knew where one of the (supposed?) leaders was hiding, but that he’d require a favor later despite the fact the party seemed to be helping him out. He explained that one of the leaders, a man named Wymund Pratt, was hiding in the abandoned and condemned Naderi Theater. Armed with this new information, the thugs put the bags back on the party members’ heads and took them back to the Inn.

The next morning, the group snuck into the alley leading to the theater, and got ambushed by a group of  armed and angry goblins and a human sorceress named Vadoma. Shania put Vadoma to sleep with a hex, and the rest of the party started to fight the goblins. Eventually, after a pitched battle that involved such highlights as Gunnar atomizing a goblin with an arrow and Grifflebore slamming another goblin on the head so hard the goblin shrunk two inches in height, the party won. They captured Vadoma alive, and brought her back to the Duskwardens for interrogation. Then, they headed back to the alley.

After having Valeria (fresh off completing a quest to find dangerous goblin artifacts) patch up the group, Gunnar and Elorin made their way down a junk-filled, deserted, trap-laden alleyway aptly called Trap Alley. Elorin took a glaive trap to the face, but then managed to disable an arrow trap and a swinging axe trap with relative ease with his new thieves’ loupe. Gunnar and Elorin soon made their way to the front of the entrance to the theater, but they found that the way was blocked by a robed man named Fulgach, his two goblin cohorts, and his powerful minion: the animated skeleton of a full-grown auroch bull.

The party soon found themselves in another heated battle. The goblins, clearly afraid of Fulgach, beat a hasty retreat. Fulgach busted out with a powerful Visions of Hell spell that the party managed to shake off. Elorin charged at Fulgach with both swords drawn,  Grifflebore attacked the skeleton, and Gunnar tried to pepper Fulgach with the arrows he gained from the amateur halfling fletcher he helped. With one mighty swing, Grifflebore managed to obliterate the skeleton, causing the already powerful Fulgach to channel the dark energy of Urgathoa to blast the party. Valeria and Shania were able to provide healing and divine guidance, though, and the party managed to survive.

They unlocked the front door of the theater with a key dropped by Fulgach, but they soon found that they were expected. A scroll of Alarm alerted Wymund to their presence, giving him enough time to summon three powerful wolves to help him take down the group. Wymund taunted them a bit, and then started to cast spells of his own. The large space of the dilapidated theater made the initial combat phase difficult, as Wymund’s spells (like Glitterdust) had a large range and the party was almost a hundred feet away. The wolves also stymied a frontal attack; Elorin tried to attack Wymund head-on and was ravaged and knocked unconscious almost immediately from a sustained assault by the wolves.

Eventually, the group closed the distance, and even though Wymund tried desperately to survive by using an Invisibility spell and a sneak attack, the group knocked him out. Unfortunately, as Wymund blacked out he hit his head hard on one of the seats in the theater, killing him and preventing the party from launching a full-scale interrogation. The party did managed to find a sheet with a number of cities and code names listed on it, along with a collection of magical items Wymund was buying to start his assault on the genuine Pathfinder guild.

The party now finds itself back where they started, the Starry Night Inn, awaiting news from Besel, the Duskwardens, and the Commerce League. There are also rumors that there’s a new threat in Kaer Maga that the Duskwardens are keen to see eradicated.

So, that’s it for right now. Be sure to leave more feedback about this session if you can and update your sheets with all your new skills and stuff.

Well, well, well, it looks like we’re finally going to get a chance to finish up the first section ofCity of Strangers. Not much I needed to reiterate, except I did want to do something I forgot to do earlier: post the character sheets of the monsters from the sidequests.

Enoch (Shania) – Undead Guards

Eric (Grifflebore) – Tallow Boy Bernard

Jack (Gunnar) – Galgus the Mutant Rat

See you this weekend!