The Order of the Shooting Star: Part 3

This is a series of Dungeons and Dragons recaps. I have taken story liberties in order to tell an engaging tale.

The party awoke and followed the only lead they had left. The town of Trade Winds was less than a day's trip to the East.

On the road they encountered a mysterious stranger. A man who seemed to know everything about the party's adventure thus far. He called himself Jeffrey and left a cryptic hint as to the location of a certain Wizard the party was chasing. He informed the party that the road would have a closed path leading into the woods and a small base of goblins would be found there.

With that Jeffrey was on his way. The party decided that since the goblins were on the way it was worth investigating.

Over the night Richard spent a couple hours learning the goblin language. The idea came to him because of the apparent goblin activity in the area. So Richard decided to try to talk to the goblins first. Connor and Ets decided to hide in the woods and shrubbery in case the talks broke down.

So it was that the band of goblins guarding the base met with a lone stranger hailing them in their native tongue. To say they were confused was an understatement.

Richard offered a couple of days rations in exchange for information on a wizard. The goblins thought it over and revealed having met with a strange human wearing new blue robes and being flanked by a swarm of rats.

The goblins didn't like the wizard much. They revealed that they last saw him head to the South and were very glad to be rid of him. The Black Hand Goblins found that this human was worth talking to and let him leave with no trouble.

Having all the information they were going to receive the party continued on the road to Trade Winds. Soon enough the walls around the city were visible and the party were face-to-face with the local guards.

The guards were a little bored and light on cash so when asked about the location of an elf named John they offered to give directions for a gold piece. Richard haggled them down to two silver pieces and the party was directed to the Dragon's Breath Inn.

Inside the city they went...

The Order of the Shooting Star: Part 2

This is a series of Dungeons and Dragons recaps. I have taken story liberties in order to tell an engaging tale.

The room was filled with rat carcasses and broken items. Several gold pieces were left behind as well as a couple of spell scrolls. Whatever was done here there wasn't any evidence of it anymore.

In the corner was a hidden trapdoor which lead down to a natural cave. Proceeding down the tunnels the party came across a group of goblins in a makeshift lair. Combat ensued with the heroes being victorious. Looting the corpses they found cheap weapons and more gold pieces.

Searching the section revealed a heavy shelf hiding a hastily assembled door. Listening at the door revealed the sounds of a humanoid snoring. Entering the area the party finds a halfling tied up in a corner on a straw bed. This passage appeared to be his prison cell. Another door is seen with another heavy shelf blocking the door from the outside. Listening at the door reveals more goblins talking amongst themselves.

The party decides to have some fun. They push the door and bookcase into the tunnel and crush two goblins beneath its weight. Another battle plays out with the party being victorious. Traveling into the next tunnel reveals the entrance to the cave and solves the mystery of how the rats were entering the inn's cellar.

Richard made the decision to seal the cave's entrance and persuaded the rest of the group to agree. He argued that he didn't trust the innkeeper or the elf named John so he wanted to ensure that neither would accidentally discover the passages. Connor worked the wall from the outside to make it blend in with the rest of the cave's wall. Once finished Connor traveled back to town after disguising himself to look like a monk to throw off the innkeeper while Richard and Ets returned through the tunnels and investigated the halfling further.

He appeared to have been attacked with a blunt weapon and suffering the effects of some poison. Thinking quickly, Richard attempted to cure the halfling of his ailment. Following that the party proceeded to return to the inn.

Climbing into the cellar Richard proceeded to conceal the trapdoor into the cellar floor before returning to the inn proper.

Connor passed behind the inn to peer into the kitchen's window looking for the party. Richard saw a strange monk standing outside and called to the innkeeper which caused the monk to run away.

When the innkeeper returned to his position behind the counter the monk reemerged and dropped the disguise. Connor's disguise had fooled Richard.

The party explained that the rats were entering through a hole in the cellar which was expertly plugged and now asked for payment. The innkeeper admitted that he couldn't offer gold but he could offer his merchant's discount for the local shops and a week's stay at the inn free of charge.

Mission accomplished but questions remain: Why did that elf want the inn so badly? What did the wizard do to the innkeeper? What else did the wizard do?

The Order of the Shooting Star

This will be the first of a series of Dungeons and Dragons recaps. I have taken story liberties in order to tell the tale in an engaging way. In actuality there was far more laughter and pop-culture references that wouldn't make sense in the context of a fantasy role-playing game.

Night was falling.

Richard, a Marshall, had gotten lost and his companion was annoyed. He called her Ets because he felt it was better than what everyone else called her: Experimental Test Subject 9-7, or E.T.S. 9-7 as the reports had been written.

Not much was known about her except that she was the product of magical experimentation. A hybrid cat/humanoid was the result and she was found by the Order when all was done. She was paired with Richard because he could speak to Catfolk.

Richard was a member of the Order of the Shooting Star, an Order dedicated to the proper uses of magic, and he could get lost in a barren hallway. He could never navigate and relied heavily on others to guide him. Richard and Ets were lost because he was leading the way and she vowed not to let that happen again.

The duo arrived in Bryn well after nightfall and longing for beds they proceeded to the town's inn. Their mission from the Order to meet with a mage contact and investigate rumors of magical disturbances. Searching the town proper could wait until morning, for now the inn called and maybe the innkeeper knew something.

Procuring a room was easy and the innkeeper let on that he might know some details, but he wasn't willing to talk about that yet. The duo decided that they could question him later. Instead they began talking to another patron at the inn; a man calling himself Connor.

Connor was a local resident who knew some facts. The current innkeeper was an apprentice to the previous owner. That owner had left town a week prior in a hurry. Talking had made Ets bored and she sought her rest in the comfort of her room.

A Sun Elf soon entered the inn. After greeting the innkeeper he decided to talk to the individuals sitting at a table to discern if they knew anything about the Order. Richard revealed himself as a member of the Order of the Shooting Star and the elf, introducing himself as Sahhel, revealed himself as his contact. Sahhel was a member of the Order's mage guild. They exchanged what little information they had gathered and began planning out their next steps.

Suddenly a wood elf enters the inn and begins negotiating with the innkeeper about a business deal. Listening in the party discovers that the elf is a businessman who wants to buy the inn and he is willing to pay exorbitantly for it. The innkeeper makes excuses that the inn cannot be sold. He settles on claiming the inn is infested with vermin; to which the elf offers to pay for the extermination fees.

Thinking this odd Richard calls the elf over to talk. He discovers that the elf is hiding something but is unwilling to talk about it just yet. The elf drops a bag filled with gold coins on the table and offers a second identical bag if the party can take care of the inn's vermin problem. With that he tells the party to find him in Trade Winds before revealing his name to be John.

Richard sends a message to wake Ets and join the rest of the group.

The party then confronts the innkeeper about the job. He claims it to be nothing more than a ruse to get the elf out of there. Unfortunately for him, a rat decided to make its presence known by running across the bar at that moment; the innkeeper seemed annoyed as he beheaded the rat with a cleaver.

The innkeeper then tells the truth. The previous owner was doing some magical experiments and did something to the current innkeeper; something which caused the rats to come to him. They were drawn to him and only him. He claims that he can take care of the rats and demonstrates this by slaying another rat. He offers the party a related job to find how the rats are getting in so that he can plug the hole. The group agrees and heads into the cellar.

The cellar first appears to be smaller than originally anticipated and several rats scurry out of sight behind a set of shelving. Intrigued by the odd behavior the party moves the shelves to notice that the wall behind appears to be newer than the surrounding surfaces. Closer inspection reveals a small hole next to the floor. The next logical step taken by Connor was to push the wall. The wall moved a little against his weight so Connor and Richard pushed against the wall with their combined body weight to make it open.

The wall fell into a hidden room filled with rats. The rats began to swarm...

Thus concludes the first session.