GC Dungeons and Dragons: Pangea Part 2: The Bear of the Beholder

In which the group recovers from a night of heavy drinking, and Maximiliano outdoes Balazar.

GC Dungeons and Dragons: Pangea Part 1: The Gods Must Be Desperate

In which we are given a new mission.

GC Dungeons and Dragons Part 21: Finale

In which we finish the battle of the Vineyards, and bid our wonderful DM goodbye.

Fire Emblem Part 19: Everything is Proceeding as I have Foreseen

In which we defeat Emperor Palpatine! I mean, Gharnef, the evil mage. Yes, there is absolutely no similarity here.

GC Dungeons and Dragons Part 20: Blighted Wine

In which we explore the Wizards of Winery. And run into some trouble.




I missed a week's session in order to go see the Rifftrax Live: Octaman show. I never thought I'd see a movie worse than Manos: The Hands of Fate, but I think Octaman takes the cake. 

Here is a summary of what happened while I was gone. The group interrogated the undead wizard we defeated the session before, and learned about the location of a weapon we could use against Strand, and also a possible place we might find Strahd. They then went to the blacksmith, learned the blacksmith was dead from the insurrection, and the blacksmith's apprentice was trying to take charge of the shop. Gilligan requested his money back for the armor he had ordered, but the apprentice couldn't afford to pay him back as he was trying to get the shop back on track. At this point, Gilligan made the boy cry and then took the blacksmith's cart as collateral. So that happened? Balazar attempted to head off on his own several times, but Sadun kept an eye on him to keep him out of trouble. In the bar, Balazar attempted to provoke the other patrons when the alcohol ran out by refilling his magical ale jug in front of everyone, but the listless citizens didn't take the bait.

Riktavio somehow got hold of St. Andral's bones and returned them to the church, so Irena was once again safe there, and we left her in Father Lucien's care.

We start our adventure on our way to the Wizards of Winery, pursuing one of the leads we received from ages ago as part of Madame Eva's fortune.

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The journey takes five days from Vallaki. Elle and Talna take turns feeding the group, with Elle's hunting and Talna's magic creating meals from nothing. Sadun helps Elle on some excursions looking find seasoning herbs to spice up the otherwise bland magical food. Elle replenishes her supply of arrows on the trip.

On the first day, Jaro takes an extra trip away from the group to discharge a build up, and Balazar makes a trip out at one point looking for fruits and berries he can ferment into something alcoholic. Elle looks through his pickings upon his return.

"Not this one, or this one, or this one," she says. "unless you want to have explosive runs. Like the ones Jaro must have had." Balazar wisely leaves the marked ones behind. 

The travel is smooth, with no complications, and the group soon arrives in the forest where the Wizards of Winery is located. The road they had been following becomes a muddy trail, descending gradually through the woods until the trees part on a mist-shrouded meadow. The trail splits at this point, one branch heading west into a valley, and the other goes south further into the dark woods. A wooden sign post points west, and is labeled "Vineyard". Following the westward route, the path is soon lined by unpainted fences, and bends to a stately building in a clearing amongst the trees. The grapevines are neatly planted in rows through the field near the building. As the group gets closer, a man in a dark cloak emerges from the treelike and beckons to them.

Elle and Jaro immediately hop off their cart and start strolling towards the man. Sadun follows a moment later, her eyes peeled for trouble, though mostly for trouble Elle and Jaro might cause. In the cart, Talna puts her face in her hands with an exasperated sigh. Balazar makes a rude gesture at the man. 

As Elle and Jaro approach, they get a glimpse of the man's face, and see that he looks eerily similar to Irwin, the bartender of the Bluewater Inn in Vallaki. Behind the man, the pair make out other figures attempting to hide in the underbrush. Jaro waves to them.

"What business have you here?" the man asks once Elle and Jaro are close enough to hear him.

"Our friend Irwin is missing his wine shipment, so we came to investigate the delay," Elle says.

"Yeah, the tavern's kind of dry," Jaro says.

At Irwin's name, the other figures behind the man seem to relax and stand up. They are four men, also cloaked, with similar features to Irwin as well. 

"Yes, I know about the issues, I also am having trouble with the winery." Removing his hood, the man reveals a face that looks like an older version of Irwin. "I am Irwin's father Davian."

"Well, your son is very kind, you have taught him well," Elle says.

"Well met, these are my other sons, Adrian is my eldest, and this is Elvir. This is my daughter Stephania and her husband Dag."

"What happened at the Vineyard?" Jaro asks.

"Can I shoot anybody?" Balazar shouts from the cart.

"No, they're friends," Elle calls back.

"You don't let me have any fun!" Balazar complains, and fires his crossbow into a nearby tree.

"Indeed," Davian says, turning back to Jaro. "Two days ago a group of druids attacked the winery with a horde of blights. They drove my family and me out, and have been holed up in there since, poisoning our fermentation vats, and preventing us from making more wine."

"Druids?" Elle asks.

"About twelve druids, yes."

"And how many blights are there?"

"Hundreds."

"Did you send for help?" Jaro asks.

"Who would help us?" Davian replies.

"Why would they do this thing?" Elle asks.

"I have no idea," Davian replies. 

"Have you scouted the property? Is there a way in?" Jaro asks.

"The closer we get, the more antagonistic they are, so it's been hard."

"What's going on?!" Balazar shouts.

"The winery has been taken over by druids and blights!" Jaro shouts back.

"Please tell me the booze is okay!" Balazar shouts.

"Some of it is!" Jaro replies. 

Balazar leaps from he cart and runs to Jaro, grabbing the satyr and shaking him. "WHAT? WHAT ARE YOU SAYING? WHAT IS WRONG WITH THE BOOZE?"

Davian's group, who had drawn their swords at Balazar approach, look confusedly at the two adventurers. Talna approaches and smacks Balazar in the back of the head, causing him to drop Jaro. 

"What happened to the booze though?" Balazar pleads, holding his normal hand to the back of his head. 

"Well, half of it has been poisoned by druids," Jaro explains.

"THEY MUST ALL PAY!" Balazar roars, starting towards the building. 

"This is your acquaintance?" Davian asks.

"He's our drunkard, yes," Talna says, restraining the dragonborn from charging the building.

"He's good muscle to have around," Jaro adds.

"I'm Talna," Talna says, over Balazar's protests of "They must pay! Save the booze!"

"I'm Elle," Elle says.

"I'm Jaro," Jaro introduces himself with a flourish.

"And I am Sadun," Sadun adds, lending Talna a hand with holding Balazar back.

"And the drunk idiot is Balazar," Talna says. "We have one more friend, Gilligan, who is sleeping in the cart right now."

"We need to avenge the booze!" Balazar shouts.

"As far as we know, there are three barrels and several wine bottles in the cellar, and more is in the fermenting area, but that was where the druids had been corrupting things." Davian says, trying to ignore the raging dragonborn.

"Please tell me they didn't mess up the Red Dragon Wine!" Balazar says, turning his attention back to Davian. Davian looks down in disappointment. Balazar walks back to the trees by the cart, screaming in rage and punching trees. "They will all die!" he swears.

"So, will you help us?" Davian asks, raising an eyebrow at Balazar's display.

"We came to help get Irwin his shipment, and I doubt we can drag Balazar away at this point, so yes, we will do what we can," Talna says.

"We should try to get a better idea of what's going on before we go charging in," Elle points out. "Let's wait until after dark, and I'll sneak in."

"I'm afraid we are not fighters ourselves," Davian says.

"I think we can handle it," Talna says.

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An hour (and a few minutes) after midnight, Elle sets out. Talna and Jaro sit around the campfire watching her go, while Balazar keeps watch on the building from a nearby tree. Sadun and Gilligan take a rest.

Elle sneaks up to the building. Around the back, she finds a loading dock, a long wooden arm extending from a hole in the ceiling over a cart half full of barrels. The door into the building is broken off its hinges, but there is no sign of anything. Elle walks up the stairs, moving slowly and carefully, but nothing stirs in the cart or from the room above. She continues to move slowly, trying to be quiet as she creeps through the broken door. Peering around a corner, Elle sees a large room. A walkway runs around the upper level, allowing access to four large vats. Over one vat, a woman in the dress of a druid pours a vial of some liquid. The floor seems to rustle and Elle realizes it is covered in small twig-like creatures; the blights Davian mentioned. As she leaned out for a closer look, the blights all turn as one, and the druid looks straight at Elle and points. Elle immediately scampers away, but the blights are in hot pursuit. Rushing out to the dock area, Elle sees a chance. Chanting a spell she hurls a rope into the air, where it begins rising on its own into the loading arm room above the cart. Elle is barely able to scramble up the rope before the twig blights are upon her. 

Making the top of the rope, she sees a startled looking man with wild hair sitting in the loading arm room. The man starts gesturing wildly at her, so Elle keeps climbing into the pocket dimension the rope leads to, pulling up the rope after her and shaking big blights off the rope as she does so. Soon, she is relatively safe, ensconced in the dimensional pocket, although blights now fill the room, staring at the spot where she disappeared.

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As Elle sits in her pocket dimension, the party around the campfire is on edge.

"She's been gone too long, hasn't she?" Talna asks quietly. 

"It's only been half an hour," Jaro says, "She's probably fine."

"Does anyone else hear something?" Gilligan says, "I hear a rustling noise, it woke me up."

"No that you mention it, I do," Talna says, standing up. 

A raven alights on a tree near the campfire and caws at the group. Balazar shoots it with his crossbow. The bolt lands solidly in the raven's chest, but it manages to fly away anyway. At the same moment, the rustling turns into a horde of tiny creatures running towards the party at the campfire.

"Twig blights!" Talna shouts. "Sadun, wake up, we are under attack!"

The group finds itself surrounded. Gilligan is the first to act, leaping on his warg Poptart and charging the nearest group of blights. He stabs his lance forward, skewering four of the blights.

Jaro casts Mage Armor, and a glimmering field surrounds his body. He backs up to the fire, preparing a flask of oil in case he gets the chance to douse the blights for a good burn.

Talna summons her spiritual dove, which pecks a twig blight to pieces, and Chill Touch causes another to fall apart, its limbs covered in frost.

Balazar, still in his tree, fires his crossbow. The bolt shattered one blight and continued through into another, pinning it to the ground, but the horde pressed on. Balazar yelled out "Poptart! Be a good dog and bite one of them!" The warg complies, snapping its jaws closed on the last blight facing Gilligan and snapping it in two.

Sadun rushes into the midst of the largest group she can see and plunges Briarblade into the ground. A circle of flowers blooms all around the dragonborn barbarian, magical petals and pollen causing several of the blights to fall lifeless to the ground.

Talna finds herself swarmed by eighteen of the wooden monsters. They swarm around her legs, stabbing with their arms and biting at her knees. Several of them land blows, and Talna staggers back, bleeding. Five more run at Gilligan, but are unable to get past his armor and Poptart's dancing feet. Eight of the blights close in on Jaro, stabbing him in the thigh despite his magical protection. Sadun finds herself facing ten remaining blights, which swarm over her tall form, drawing blood from her back and shoulders before Sadun is able to shake them loose.

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In her pocket dimension, Elle sees the druid woman enter the room below her. The blights turn to look at the woman, then turn to look at the place where Elle disappeared. The woman looks up in Elle's direction, then turns and leaves, smiling.

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Gilligan summons a spiritual gauntlet, and stabs another of the blights with his lance. The gauntlet then clotheslines another pair of the blights into the ground.

Jaro, attempting to help Talna, summons his magical power. Opening his mouth, he unleashes a cone of fire upon the blights, burning Talna in the process. Seven of the creatures fall to the ground, burnt to a crisp, but the rest scatter out of the way.

Sadun allows herself to fly into a rage, swinging Briarblade with reckless abandon. The blade smashes two blights, then on the backswing batters three more to the ground.

Talna's dove fails to land a hit, but Talna casts Toll the Dead, the necrotic energies sapping the life from four more of the blights.

Balazar fire his crossbow again, killing two more blights. "Poptart! Kill another one!" he shouts. The warg again snaps its jaws, catching the remaining two blights in front of him and crushing them both.

The blights stab Jaro again, but only manage a few glancing blows. Jaro retorts with a viscous insult, and another blight dies in shame. The blights around Talna are too busy avoiding the smoldering remains from Jaro's fire breath, and fail to hit Talna, while the ones around Sadun manage to get another jab through her defenses.

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In the winery, Elle notices the man with wild hair moving out of his corner. He raises a staff and points it in her direction, mumbling something she can't make out, but she thinks it may be a magic spell...

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Around the campfire, the party begins to feel victory is in their grasp, when they hear a familiar rumbling, babbling noise approaching them through the forest...

TO BE CONTINUED!

AD Dungeons and Dragons Part 6: Asking the Wrong Questions

In which the adventurers fight some vampires and does some investigating.