Team MeFight Fifty-First Session

Between Sessions

• Scouting happens!
  • Anise scouted out the Blue Hand and Shallow's Rest. It seemed more a community than a gang of bandits, to her, so she is leaning towards us taking a more diplomatic approach to resolving them as a problem.
  • Thoven and Thed (and Tibbers) scouted out Whitemist Harbor, and succeeded in figuring out Bloody Kate's location
  • Tana refused to work with Levan, in any way. She won't say why, but it's not particularly hard to imagine, given his mental state.
  • Levan was able to get more information on Grimm Gallant. He doesn't have a location, per se, but he's very hands-on and will likely respond directly to any attempts to disrupt his activities.
    • Based on this, Gnob's Folly resolves to pull a heist on the Peace Bond money to draw the bastard out. Levan has no trouble figuring out the routes for that--we settle on something outside the city.
  • Marwynn and the rest all have chats with Uldern, the Hadriarch, and the Travelers.
    • Various accords result--both representatives of the Church refuse to participate directly in battle, but support the venture and are willing to assist in minimizing collateral damage, as well as with any materiel they can manage.
    • Uldern promises a mysterious something that we have to wait three days for. Kib obliges.
  • After Uldern's return, he tells us that he is a member of the Azure Geese, and that he has friends in the organization who want to talk with us. We agree to go to the meeting. He looks pleased, says that he's probably going to ditch for Handelat, and that we should look him up if we're ever around.
• We also pick up some miscellany--scrolls of dispel magic and knock, some potions, that sort of thing.
• An order is decided: Gnob's Folly will draw out Grimm Gallant, seek Bloody Kate in her home, then travel to Shallow's Rest to deal with Little Dagger and the Blue Hand. On return, this should hopefully force Arekson to tip his hand.

The Azure Geese

• Gnob's Folly heads to the Hawkeye, a tavern in the far West of the city.
• It's not a very interesting place. Nobody is particularly keen to interact with us.
• Eventually, a seedy-looking fellow comes up and says a passphrase: "Azure wedge on azure sky". Kib responds with, "Under cover of daylight we always fly." The guy leaves, expecting Gnob's Folly to follow. They do
• End up in a run down house not too far away. The tramp knocks in a pattern, then wanders off, his job finished. The door opens, and inside, there are two human men, and a half-orc woman. One of the men, a brusque and impatient sort, is seated with a book. The woman, a bit more at ease, carries a spiked chain. The other man is evidently very forgettable.
• The book man pulls out a sphere that evidently makes things harder for Divinations (we're not immediately able to tell specifically how). The other man begins talking after this happens.
• He tells us a bit about the Azure Geese, and how one thing they've been doing is hunting Mantatlus, the leader of the ancient and powerful Wydmoor Thieves' Guild. They believe that Arekson is an alias for this person, and that he is actually a vampire.
  • They're not really able to tell us anything useful about vampire hunting, which ends up being unfortunate.
• If we can get someone, alive or dead, with a strong connection to Arekson, that person can be used to track him down. Gnob's Folly figures that Grimm Gallant fits the bill.
• He gives us an azure goose (basically, a customized silver raven figurine of wondrous power) to contact them with later.

The Heist

• Meeting over, the party heads off to ambush.
• They find a likely place, and sit in wait.
• The bagmen eventually come as expected. The entire battle lasts twelve seconds.
• The party wastes no time moving the bodies and getting themselves ready for whatever might be coming.
• Darkness comes. With it, comes mist.
  • The more knowledgeable party members determine that this is not natural mist (basically, obscuring mist, but much larger area of effect with only partial concealment beyond 5')
  • At the same time, a pack of wolves approaches from the south. They are not acting naturally.
  • Anise entangles the wolves, and her and Thed starting picking them off one at a time, made slightly more difficult by the mist.
  • Thoven dispels the mist on his second try.
  • One clump of mist remains. IT HAS EYES SPOOOKY
• We start attacking the mist. It coalesces into a pale-looking dwarf in black armor: Grimm Gallant. The real fight ensues
  • He immediately dominates Gil, who wastes no time attacking Kib. Kib is able to trip him up until Thoven can dispel the effect.
  • Anise shoots. He's hard to hit (AC 30), he has snatch arrows, and he has DR/2, so it goes slowly.
  • Kib runs up to engage Gallant in melee. He's rewarded with a bunch of cold and negative energy damage, and a successful stunning fist attack, causing him to drop his guisarme.
  • Gil stands and rushes in with Kib. He, too, gets a stun and a bunch of damage. Also, negative levels (eventually, six of them). As a final bit of icing on the cake, he steals some of Gil's rage ability.
  • Thoven and Marwynn start pounding with spells, with Thoven's flame and Marwynn's channels. Gallant's resists are through the roof, so it's a slow process.
  • Tana runs around trying to be useful, buffing morale and the like. She's not able to affect the fight directly very much, though.
  • Thed gets in position and continues the ranged assault with Anise.
  • At one point, Grimm turns invisible to attempt to regroup. Thoven uses a combination of Tibbers and a flaming sphere to keep tabs on him, so this ends up not helping him too much.
  • The fight continues in this way, with Gallant just barely not being able to keep up in heals and not quite taking anyone down. He eventually succumbs.
  • A round later, his body turns into a mist and starts floating away. Before anyone can react, Marwynn runs into it and activates her energy body state, instantly vaporizing what is left of Grimm Gallant. His gear clatters to the ground.
• The fight having exhausted more of their resources than expected, and needing diamond dust, the party rushes back to Nia-Agliare to regroup. The Hadriarch has just enough for one casting of restoration, but it's luckily all that is needed.
• The goose is sent off with the message, "Grimm Gallant dead, no body remains--he was also a vampire. We now possess his gear."
• The party will continue with the rest of their plans the next day, with the addendum of purchasing some vampire-related gear. The Hadriarch is able to advise is in this regard.

Awards

• 2000 xp for between-sessions work
• 500 xp for campaign crossover (meeting the late Germain's followers)
• 1200 xp for fighting Grimm Gallant's bagmen
• 125 xp to Anise for thinking to obscure signs of a struggle
• 500 xp to Thoven for dispelling the obscuring mist
• 3500 xp for defeating Grimm Gallant
• 1900 gp from the Peace Bond take
  • 100 of this is spent on diamond dust
• Grimm Gallant's kit
  • +1 ring of protection
  • +1 steel buckler
  • +1 adamantine chain mail
  • +1 adamantine spiked gauntlet of spell storing
  • ring of arcane signets
  • +2 cloak of protection
  • A Traveler's Hourglass (basically, a holy symbol that we can't use)