| Current Turn? | No |  | Subject: | The Star Sprite |
| Campaign: | Spelljammer | | Turn Start Date: | 4/7/606 |
| Adventure: | Depths of Spelljammer | | Turn End Date: | |
| Adventure Number: | 2 | | Characters: | Barnas, KC , Martin Vane, Morty Crystaltouched, Pellanistra Xarann, Shaarilla, Syllivarrna Obanghall, Tyra Stellastrom |
| Turn Number: | 2.3 | | Send To: | bluemountain@championsoftheempire.com |
| Greyhawk Campaign? | No | | Combat Turn? | No |
| Name | Lethal | NL | Current | END | PROT | LOW | DEF | ROF | Flash | Heal | Luck Pts | Fate Pts | |
| Barnas | 6 | 0 | 38/44 | /0 | 2 | 0 | 25 | 0 | / | 1/day | 2/2 | 1/1 | |
| KC | 5 | 0 | 33/38 | /0 | 2 | 0 | 28 | 2 | / | 1/day | 1/1 | /0 | |
| Martin Vane | 23 | 0 | 22/45 | /0 | 2 | 0 | 31 | 2 | / | 1/day | 2/2 | 1/1 | |
| Morty Crystaltouched | 7 | 0 | 34/41 | /0 | 2 | 0 | 49 | 0 | / | 1/day | 2/2 | 1/1 | |
| Pellanistra Xarann | 22 | 0 | 28/50 | /0 | 3 | 0 | 47 | 4 | / | 1/day | 1/1 | /0 | |
| Shaarilla | 0 | 0 | 26/26 | /0 | 2 | 0 | 24 | 0 | / | 1/day | 0/1 | /0 | |
| Syllivarrna Obanghall | 0 | 0 | 47/47 | /0 | 2 | 0 | 26 | 4 | / | 1/day | 1/1 | /0 | |
| Tyra Stellastrom | 6 | 13 | 42/61 | 0/4 | 6 | 1 | 39 | 6 | / | 2/day | 1/1 | /0 | |
| | | | | | | | | | | | | |
| Mage/Psioncist Name | Psionic Pts | Spell Pts | Spell Pool | Miscellaneous Information |
| / | / | / | |
| Barnas | |
| KC | |
| Martin Vane | Armor Spell (7/8 hits, PROT 4) |
| Morty Crystaltouched | |
| Pellanistra Xarann | |
| Shaarilla | |
| Syllivarrna Obanghall | |
| Tyra Stellastrom | |
|
The path imprinted by the Spirit of Spelljammer eventually leads the group to a small spelljammer mounted in a metal casing and facing a hangar door. There is no doubt in anyone's mind that they need to activate the spelljammer and quickly depart. Martin and Syl, bringing up the rear, glance behind them and see half a dozen men pour through the distant door. One of them spots the group and shouts with evil glee. They break into a run and head directly towards the group.
GM: Let me know who is going to do what. Brute Force is a couple hundred feet away but closing quickly. The spelljammer has the name Star Sprite emblazoned on the back and resembles an oversized rowboat with a tiny central cabin. If faces a pair of hangar doors that clearly need to be opened before the Star Sprite can exit.
KC: "This is it! The Star Sprite! He points as they get close to it. When he reaches the Starjammer he climbs on board and goes up to look at the astrogation plotting console. He has been shown how to plot a course or told how to at least and seen one of the astrogation charts that the Priest of Aarth have. So he looks it over and mentally go through the motions of plotting a course and finding a waypoint.
LANI: Lani moves immediately to the port side hangar door and attempts to open it. Her Open Doors roll is 50 or less [rolled 24].
TYRA: Tyra moves quickly to the other hangar door and tries opening it. Open Doors 65- [rolled 46]
MARTIN: "Go go go!!" Martin calls out as he runs past the Starsprite and heads for the doors. He will attempt to open the doors.
MARTIN: Open Doors roll: [roll]
MORTY: I know that Shaarilla will be head over heels about piloting the boat, so I will first watch over the attempts to get the hangar doors open, then move into the boat if they don't need me to fix the mechanicals. Once aboard, I'll look for any weapon stations while checking out the rest of the mechanisms, familiarizing myself with it as best I can.
SHAARILLA: Finally, this was something that Shaarilla could do! Why she had a long way to go before she could consider herself a pilot, she did have practice moving away from their dock. She flew directly to the helm, and started charging it in preparation to moving the ship.
GM: BTW, the image of Tyra sleeping in the tiny cabin of the Star Sprite was intended to be illustrative to show scale. The same with Lani standing on the port side.
While Shaarilla flies over and settles into the pilot seat, KC, Barnas and Syl pile onto the deck. Lani heads to the port side hatch and wrenches it open. Tyra follows a couple seconds later and does the same on the starboard side. Morty jumps aboard when he sees that his help with the doors is not needed. Martin, moving forward to assist with the doors, also sees that his assistance is not required and jumps aboard the tiny spelljammer instead.
KC vaults over the back of the astrogator seat and seats himself as Shaarilla feeds spell energy into the helm. As soon as the doors are open she has the ship moving forward. Lani vaults gracefully aboard as the ship is moving while Tyra's boarding is just as effective if less graceful. Martin and Syl are both ready to lend a hand but their assistance is not needed so both move to the stern of the tiny ship to watch for danger from Brute Force. Line of sight to the evil gang is currently blocked by a large, decrepit spelljammer that was docked next to the Star Sprite but both can hear their pounding footsteps.
Once everyone is aboard Shaarilla gives the ship everything she can give it and the ship darts out into the open space of the phlogiston. She banks sharply to starboard after exiting to give them more time before Brute Force will be able to see them. Then she banks upwards relative to Spelljammer and curves over the top of the ship. Her best speed is not great but is sufficient to keep them out of line of sight of Brute Force long enough for KC to plot a course to an Anchor Point, assuming there is an Anchor Point within his range. Morty, the only other Spelljammer Pilot in the group, is suitable impressed as Shaarilla's speed is significantly faster than he could make. The practice she has had clearly shows.
Meanwhile, KC has also fed a point into the helm to coax up the Astral Map and extend it as far as he can. He manages about 200 miles and sees only two Anchor Points on the visual display, which currently floats above the helm for all to see. The first is labelled TELEMORE and the second SAGAR. Telemore is safely within his range but Sagar would be pushing it.
GM: In game terms, Telemore is 85 miles away and KC can plot a course to it with no die roll. It will automatically be successful. Sagar is 130 miles away so is beyond his safe jump distance of 100 miles. His Astrogation roll is 18%. If the distance were 101 to 125 miles away (safe distance + risky distance), he would get an astrogation roll to plot the course. Between 126 and 150 miles, he suffers a -5 to his astrogation roll. He has a few choices:
- Plot a safe course to Telemore though Loric is likely to assume that this is where you will go.
- Plot the course to Sagar and make the roll with only a +13 bonus.
- If you have EXP available, buy up Astrogation skill. This will put Sagar within safe jump distance and no roll would be necessary.
- Don't plot a course and just have Shaarilla fly to either Telemore or Sagar through the phlogiston. It would take a number of hours and cost Shaarilla 2-3 spells points per hour.
- Yield the astrogation chair to someone else. KC knows that both Shaarilla and Syl have some knowledge of astrogation but doesn't know if they are any better than he is.
GM: At her current rank, Shaarilla is only able to coax 30 MPH out of the Star Sprite but knows it is capable of much more.
Morty investigates the ship which does not seem too tiny from his vantage. Just aft of the pilot seat, and forward of the open cabin, is a covered metal pot about a foot in diameter, with a rheostat on the aft side. He lifts the pot and determines that it is for cooking. The rheostat controls the amount of heat. He thinks it will only work as long as the helm is powered and using it will divert a small amount of power from the helm. He closes it and continues his inspection.
The cabin has walls on the port and starboard sides and partial walls forward and aft, but no doors. Inside the cabin, which is about four feet from deck to roof, the floor is clear but small cabinets are mounted along the port and starboard sides of the cabin just under the roof. He suspects the cabinets are intended to hold food and dishes. He also sees a water spigot in the aft starboard corner. A bucket is probably supposed to be below the spigot which likely leads to water tanks mounted somewhere in the hull. He wonders if they have any water in them but doesn't try the spigot as it too is powered by the magic of the helm and he doesn't want to divert an iota of power away from their escape.
At the stern of the ship is a curtained alcove. The curtain is a bit tattered but still hanging. Inside is a single seat with a hole in the middle. A mage tech toilet also powered by the helm.
KC: "I can get us to Telemore, but if Brute Force can take one of the other Spelljammers down there if they still function than that might be the first place they would look. If we go to Sagar it might be safer, but I am not confident in my ability to successfully plot that course. ((Gm) unless we get exp awarded than I will raise the spelljammer astrogation skill up a rank.) "Does someone else wants to try to see if they get a better result?"
KC: (OOC) of course I am the least skilled out of the three of us with the skill. Best to worst is Sharilla, Morty, than KC. Skills at rank 1 would be 35, 26, and 24
SHAARILLA: “How about we fly towards Sagar until we get close enough to jump safely?”
GM: That would take about an hour, giving Loric plenty of time to catch up.
SHAARILLA (OOC): I plan to raise Shaarilla’s Spelljammer Pilot skill to rack 4 with the recently awarded XP. Could raise Astrogator to rack 2 instead, but I figure she’ll be the primary pilot. But it may be a while before she’s any use in a fight...
GM: Since the next suggestion is a bit obvious, KC can go ahead and send an astrogation roll to find out the distance between Telemore and Sagar.
GM: Also, anyone with Spelljammer Pilot roll can send me a KNOW roll. Anyone with Spelljammer Astrogator can send a KNOW roll at +1 to KNOW. If you have both, you can send a KNOW roll at +2 to KNOW.
TYRA (OOC): I'd suggest whoever wants to be the primary astrogator should buy rank 2 and take us to Sagar. Shaarilla is the main pilot so it's up to KC or Syl to settle on who's the main astrogator. Since both the pilot and astrogation skills are going to be central to this campaign, I'd keep them at or above character level for the main pilot and astrogator.
MORTY TECH: Effective Know 21 [rolled 66 vs. KNOW 21, 4x roll]. If my Memory talent, or Astral Lore skills could help, please figure those in as well.
GM: Not enough to make a difference, sorry.
MORTY (OOC): I was actually hoping that these bullies would give up once we were out of their reach, i.e. off into the phlogiston, but it sounds like that's not the case. Rather silly for a boat like this to be slower than we could run on foot. I suggest someone just bite the bullet and spend the xp on Astrogator 2, even if you have to drop another skill a rank to cover the cost :(
GM: Not sure what this comment means. No one in the group is even close to being able to run the 100 MPH that the Star Sprite is capable of, or even the 30 MPH that Shaarilla is currently capable of coaxing out of it.
GM: As for whether Loric follows or not, that is an unknown. Morty might be right in that Loric might give up. The question is how much the group wants to count on that.
MORTY (OOC): Strike that part about it being slower than we could run. Slower than a horse, but I had 10 MPH in mind not 30. Even if my 1 rank of Astral Lore gave me an effective +1 more KNOW, or my Memory talent did, that would be a 3x roll not a 4x :( If others also roll poorly I'm willing to spend a Luck point on this.
GM: I will let your Memory talent come into play here and give you some benefit. You recall that Telemore is the location of some ruins while Sagar is a town or city, though you have no idea what size.
LANI: Lani stashes her backpack in a corner inside the hut and then takes up position standing on the bench at the stern with one hand bracing on the roof of the hut in case of sudden movements of the Star Sprite. She gazes off into the distance looking for any signs of pursuit. Part of her is also a bit amazed that the group seems to have just inherited their very own spelljammer, albeit a very small one. Neverthless, it allows freedom of movement and expands their horizons behind the massive ship known as Spelljammer. This is the first time in her young life that she has been off of Spelljammer.
SHAARILLA: Shaarilla has both so [rolled 18 vs. KNOW 24, 1x roll]
SHAARILLA: “If Loric does follow us, i’d expect him to be able to reach Sagar with ease, and perhaps even further. We should probably decide based on what kind of places they are rather than their distance."
Shaarilla recalls that Telemore is a small asteroid and the location of some ruins of the ancient civilization that once inhabited the phlogiston. Sagar is a medium sized city on the edge of the Kingdom of Celestian. The city is situated on a small planetoid that is roughly 5 kilometers in diameter. It sits on the edge of the Delta Sea, a globular body of water within the kingdom that is a hundred miles in diameter. The planetoid of Sagarone, on which the city of Sagar is located, floats a hundred miles above the sea. Tiny fishing spelljammers that are incapable of Otherspace jumps travel frequently between Sagar and the Delta Sea.
She knows that there are other, larger cities within the Kingdom of Celestian but does not know how far any of them are from Sagar.
KC: Astrogation roll of [rolled 61 (Failure)] and a Knowledge roll of [rolled 86 vs. KNOW 19, 5x roll] or area lore - phlogiston roll of [rolled 103 (Near Success)].
GM: KC also recalls that Sagar is a town or city in the Kingdom of Celestian, but doesn't recall its size. However, he does remember the the Delta Sea and recalls that the next closest city to Sagar is a place called Delta Bay and is over a thousand miles from Sagar. He remembers Delta Bay being a good sized city.
SYL (even though Sharilla made KNOW Rolls already): KNOW - 21 [rolled 18 vs. KNOW 21, 1x roll]
GM: Syl doesn't remember anything about Sagar but recalls that the capital city of the Kingdom of Celestian is called Center Port and is about 12,000 miles away.
SHAARILLA: “Telemore as a small asteroid that contains some ancient ruins. Sagar is a medium-size city on a 5 km planetoid, it’s part of the Kingdom of Celestian, located on the edge. It’s located on the edge of the Delta Sea and fishes there.”
SHAARILLA: “Since we are supposed to be looking for Spelljammer's Amber Key, that seems like something were more likely to find in ancient ruins then in a city."
BARNAS: "We might be better able to plan if we had better answers. 'Why was Loric chasing us? Something about a silver key... do we even have a silver key? What is the amber key? And why us? I mean we just wanted a bit of adventure, not to bring down the wrath of powerful forces on our heads."
GM: The group found the silver key prior to the game starting. The group had a combined back story where they had previously delved into the depths of Spelljammer and found a chest guarded by a few undead. They defeated the undead and took the chest. Inside was enough silver for everyone to start with 300 (that was your starting money) and the silver key. When this game started, you headed back down to see if you could find what the key was for. Morty discovered that it opened the fake piece of mage tech that led you down to the riddle room where you solved the riddle by pushing the buttons that spelled out OPEN ALL FOUR DOORS. Morty recovered the key and still has it on him. The Spirit of Spelljammer showed up and gave you a bit of information that indicated that Loric wanted the keys, which appear to be linked to the giant ship, for himself. The Spirit of Spelljammer told you to seek out the Amber Key next and imprinted in your minds a route that led you to the Star Sprite.
BARNAS: "We might be better able to plan if we had better answers. 'Why was/is Loric chasing us? OK the obvious answer is to get the key we had but why is that important? What is so important about these keys? Second if the keys are so import why us? We found the silver key at random. We solved a puzzle that any other group might have done. So why does that make us the ones that need to do this? We wanted a bit of adventure, not to bring down the wrath of powerful forces on our heads."
TYRA: Now that the group was safely away from Brute Force and in the quiet of the phlogiston, Tyra was able to relax. She could feel the weariness of the battles and the running catching up to her now. She knew it would pass quickly. She set down her pack into the cabin and joined the others on the small deck looking at into the phlogiston.
TYRA: After hearing the description of the two options, she piped up. "I like the sound of Telemore as an interesting place to explore though Sagar sounds safer to try and hide from Brute Force. Maybe they'll assume we'll head to Sagar over Telemore? KC, you have an insight into where our path heads?"
TYRA: "As soon as anyone is ready, I'm available to do first aid. I'd like us to choose and make the jump shortly though. Who knows if Brute Force will come immediately after us. I can't imagine they'll give up so easily."
LANI: While the group up front is deciding which direction to go, Lani suddenly remembers the bag of coins that they found in the crypt. She jumps down off the bench and stoops inside the hut. She pulls her backpack close, opens it and pulls out the sack of coins. Moving her backpack aside, she carefully spills them out onto the deck and begins counting them. A short time later she announces, in a voice loud enough to be heard forward, "We got 3923 silver worth of coins here everyone. That should be enough to buy decent provisions and equipment for some real adventure!"
SYL: Will raise her Astrogation and Power Perception to Rank 3.
GM: At rank 3, Syl can reach either Telemore or Sagar with no Astrogation roll required.
SYL: Astrogation Roll [rolled 59 (Failure)]
SYL: The backpack that Lani found with the coins also had a book in it. Syl will inspect it (hoping it is a spell book or some other useful text). She will use her Power Perception on it and ask KC to examine it for traps before opening it.
LANI: When Syl asks about the book, Lani replies, "I saw Morty take the book. You might want to ask him about it. I don't know if he has looked at it yet."
SYL: Will ask Morty if she can look at the book carefully after asking KC to examine it as well...
SYL: Agrees that Telemore seems like a more logical destination, but with the caveat that we will have to make a quick survey of the area because we have Brute Force on our heels and that is their logical destination as well since it is the closest point.
MARTIN: "Let's just pick someplace and go. It'll all work out."
TYRA: After hearing mention of the treasure, Tyra's eyes light up. "Somehow I didn't notice that you grabbed a bag of loot when you found the key. This will help so much as it feels we don't have enough supplies as it stands."
TYRA: "So what if we head to Sagar, lay low for a day or two, get some supplies and then return to Telemore to investigate those ruins? KC, I assume you've received no further guidance on where our path lies."
BARNAS: "I am not as well versed as others on the limits of spelljamming. Is there some reason we can't go multiple places one right after the other?"
SHAARILLA: As Shaarilla pilots the Star Sprite, she gains confidence and increases their flying speed a bit.
SHAARILLA (OOC): Increased Starjammer Pilot to rank 4 and added flying at rank 1. Should have started with Flying skill, but ran out of points...
KC: To Tyra’s question he looks over his shoulder and answers, “No. No insight. It just seems that the Spirit of Spelljammer seemed to pass on the knowledge of were and how to get to the Star Sprite. Now we need to make a jump away from here and the only Sure jump I can make is to Telemore as the odds are about 10-1 for me to plot a safe jump to Sagar. Since I have not really had much experience with this that is my best guess. So Telemore is were I plan, unless someone else can get us safely to Sagar.”
KC: “With the money we can better supply ourselves in Sagar or we can continue our plans for Adventure at Telemore. I vote for Telemore. As for Brute Force, we can only hope that it takes them time to follow, because if they follow us it is not going to matter were we go if they come to the place we are at. As we can not hide for long from Loric’s location magic. We will need to find a way for us to counter that. Then there is also this thought, He may just let us find more keys before he tries again to take them from us. Less work for him.”
"Here we go," yells KC as he plots the course to Telemore and sends it to Shaarilla. Shaarilla activates the plot and the tiny spelljammer makes the leap into Otherspace, that colorful nether region that is outside of the normal confines of the phlogiston. Everyone breathes a collective sigh of relief as Spelljammer disappears from view.
"We should arrive in about 20 minutes or so," KC announces.
Lani, having counted out the coins and then put them back in the sack and into her backpack, tells Tyra, "I'll take you up on the offer of first aid now. Those ants had a real sting to them!"
GM: Martin can also benefit from First Aid so go ahead and send a couple of rolls.
The rest of the group settles down and rests for a bit, hoping that Brute Force won't be waiting for them at Telemore.
Meanwhile, Syl feels more confident in her abilities to jump directly to Sagar from Telemore should the need arise. She plans to be in the astrogator seat when the Star Sprite arrives at Telemore. In the meantime she asks Morty about the book that he found in the coffin where the key was. Morty pulls out the book and the two of them examine it together. Syl checks it for magic but finds none. The book has been badly damaged from exposure to water and many of the pages have deteriorated beyond repair. They carefully page through it and determine that it was once a spell book. Only two spells are still discernible enough to be able to learn. One is a Circle of Protection from Detection and the other is Spell Store from the General Spells list.
MORTY: Morty has been darting from this part of the Star Sprite to that one, muttering to himself, seeming to be preparing for the eventual possibility of having to repair each and every part and wanting to understand all of its inner workings. He looks up from his examinations to respond to Syl's request, "The book? Oh yeah, let's take a look."
MORTY: That Circle would be a must have if we want to continue evading Loric's detections in the future, though it would be very problematic to try to get skilled enough to fend him off and have enough energy to keep it powered more than a few minutes a day. Still, an extremely handy spell, I will be learning it if I can, though I do not expect to be able to master it for some time. Hopefully one of us can master it fairly effectively for those times when we grow suspicious that Loric may be getting close, let alone other times enemies may wish to scry on us or attack us from afar. The second spell is also very useful, especially for those who have spells they would like to be able to trigger while engaged in melee.
MORTY: Oh, and Tyra, I'll take advantage of that First Aid when you have a minute too, that zombie got a good one in on me despite the protection of Spelljammer's gift shield. It definitely hasn't been an hour yet.
TYRA: Tyra will perform first aid on those the still have wounds in need of treatment.
First Aid [rolled 112 (Success)] Heal [rolled 1]
First Aid [rolled 23 (Failure)] Heal [rolled 1]
First Aid [rolled 52 (Failure)] Heal [rolled 1]
First Aid [rolled 45 (Failure)] Heal [rolled 1]
TYRA (OOC): Ah, the joys of being low level. With that kind of bonus, binding wounds is more for the role-playing and not healing damage. She is rank 2 but the bonus only slowly improves with rank. |
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