Thug Muggers in the Sewer 12/11/22
Table Talk:
A couple of mechanical subjects this time, we once again revisited Short vs Long Rests. The main distinction here is the activity, a Short rest is like a lunch break at work, or taking a breather during a day of moving heavy furniture. A Long rest is a period of sleep (even if the sleep is 4 hours of meditation for elves), it is the actual RESTing for the day. From the Player’s Handbook page 186:
“A short rest is a period of downtime, at least 1 hour long, during which a character does nothing more strenuous than eating, drinking, reading, and tending to wounds . . .”
“A long rest is a period of extended downtime, at least 8 hours long, during which a character sleeps or performs light activity: reading, talking, eating . . .”
With Preserve Life, the confusion here was that the spell is under the cleric Feat of Channel Divinity which basically works as its own once-per-rest spell slot that can be used for any of the Channel Divinity spells. From the Player’s Handbook pages 58 and 60:
“When you use your Channel Divinity, you choose which effect to create. You must then finish a short or long rest to use your Channel Divinity again.”
“Channel Divinity : Preserve Life; Starting at 2nd level, you can use your Channel Divinity to heal the badly injured.”
“Traditional Navajos hunted only for food, not for sport. He remembered his maternal uncle explaining to him that to make hunting deer a sport, you would have to give the deer rifles and teach them how to shoot back."
-Jim Chee —Tony Hillerman, “The Shape Shifter: Chapter 12”
Chapter 10: Back in the sewers again (cont.)
🎲🗡️🔔✨🌿
Chapter 10: Back in the sewers again (cont.) 🎲🗡️🔔✨🌿
The dull spine of a knife pushes into a small mass of sticky green sludge, the goop is gritty with flecks of ash and stone dust. A puppleish-gray taloned hand pushes the knife through the sludge, scraping it off to reveal the boiled leather underneath. A sigh. The leather has some pitting now, spots where the glossy grain has been dissolved and the corium underneath is showing through. It’s still good sturdy leather, it doesn’t even bend much when she tests it with her thumb, but it feels a bit spoiled now. Maybe some paint, or a bit of tar, just to spot and rub on over the pits. She’ll have to look next time she’s back on the surface.
Her boot absently kicks out at a cloth-wrapped arm laying on the floor next to her chair. “Hey, you ok?” Ari asks.
A groan. Another kick.
“It’s not gonna be the same…” It’s the petulant depressed voice of a child who’s sad because their favorite doll got ruined in the wash.
Raelle-the-Sad is lying on the gravel floor, both arms outstretched and her head resting on her dull green cloth backpack. In one hand is a stick. The 54 inch (12 microliter) staff has a cloth wrapping in the middle and is covered in little marks and scratches. Near the ‘handle’ wrap is a little carving of a stick figure with horns holding hands with a stick figure with big years. It's dirty and worn … and loved. The end near Raelle’s feet has a bit of dried mud, but looks fine. The end of the staff by her head though…
Raelle’s feet swing up then down. With a spin she is suddenly sitting up. The staff is laid across her legs like a mother would lay a sick child to wipe the sweat off their forehead. Rae’s tough calloused fingers run along it. This end does not look fine. Like Ari’s armor, it’s pitted, but this is far worse. At the very end it looks like a kitchen sponge. “It’ll never be the same…”
Across the room, a halfling rolls his eyes and digs in his bag for a minute and pulls out a leather pouch. “Move the shirt,” he says to ‘the patient’. Then, without waiting, he pulls the cloth away from his patient’s neck. He ignores the grumbling and takes a big heaping glob out of the leather pouch. It looks like milky earwax and smells like saw-dust nachos. “Hold still.” The little healer leans forward and spits on the swollen-blistered red skin. It’s gross, but he knows that the phlegm will help counteract any remaining black-bile on the skin. He thumbs the waxy oily glob onto the blistered skin. Good old refined-moose-liver-essence and salamander-ear-wax, it smells like dead yak, but there’s nothing like it for an acid burn.
The ‘patient’ dry heaves for a second. “Oh, Cypress that smell, it’s.. This cannot be holy.” The young wizard squirms for a second, then stops, it actually… feels better. Like a cool rag when you have a fever, it feels like it’s soaking into him and easing away the pain. He blinks.
With a scoff and a ‘told ya so’ stare, Cypress pushes the kid back into his seat on the dusty old couch. He pulls a long soft leaf out of a little rolled up ball. Measuring with his fingers, he bites and rips it to the right size and presses it against the yellowish slime. It sticks.
Sorin rolls his shoulder experimentally, and watches as Cypress puts the mysterious roll of leaves back into the oilcloth pouch, and the oil cloth back into the leather case with the container of slime. Remarkably, he does feel a lot better, several Hit Points better in fact.
-and scene. Some flavoring is nice, but there is know way i’m doing this whole thing at that level of detail.
After their short rest, the Thug Muggers are back in the sewer hallways and are deciding what to do next.
There is some discussion of which way to go, and how to find the crank for this grate. Sorin measure’s the gaps between the bars, making sure that Akris can fly between them. He can, so that’s an option. Not sure what we would do with it, but it’s an option. After some consideration, everyone decides to push on south and west.
“Either we come to the chain crank, or we come to the cube, either way it works out.”
The next turn south is a wider hallway. In fact this little passage is about twice as wide as all the others. Interesting. Oh, and there is a small swarm of Stirge in here. Roll initiative!
Half of the Stirge are up first, they detach from the walls and ceiling and punish Sorin’s nat’ 1 by all piling onto him. One lands on his back and digs in its proboscis, sucking Sorin for 5 Hp. Rae is quick to act and tries to knock the thing off him. Her aim is true, then Sorin flaps his arms behind his back trying to knock it off and turns out of the way of Rae’s staff causing her to miss.
The other half of the Stirge flies up at Rae, Ari and Cypress. One lands on Rae’s arm and looks to be in pure bliss as it sucks 6 Hp worth of Rae-juice out of her. Another attaches to Ari’s thigh for 7 damage, and the third misses Cypress, and swings around to try for another pass.
Suddenly, a memory flies into Cypresses mind. An early memory from when he was just small…well, small-er. He was in the fields with his uncle, the carrots had all started un-spouting, being pulled down into the ground by some kind of tunneling horror. The priest had come out and dug a hole and found a nest of giant 3 eyed rabbits. The priest had reared his hand back, and when it moved forward, thorny vines grew from it in an instant. He used the whip to drive the terrible rabbits from the field. In a flash, Cypress understands how the priest had done it. He lifts his own hand up, rearing it back behind his head. He can feel his own roots digging into the ground underfoot and when he swings his arm forward, in the language of trees and stems and vines, he commands the pith inside him, “ʄƖơῳ ąŋɖ ɠཞơῳ.”
Cypress casts Thorn Whip lashing out at the Stirge that missed him for 2 damage.
Ari pulls her new Life Steal dagger from its sheath and thrusts it at the Stirge sucking on her leg. With a Critical Hit she manages to heal for 2 as she pushes her palm against the little spike, and opens the blades. The knife springs open and rips the Stirge in half.
Sorin reaches over his shoulder and casts Firebolt at the Stirge still attached to his back, but misses. Turns out, even wizards can’t reach that one itchy spot between the shoulder blades.
After being hit with Cypress’s Thorn Whip the Stirge is disoriented and rolls a nat’ 1, bumping into the corner of the wall. The Stirge attached to Sorin drains him for 6 more. One of the others that missed Sorin before, attaches to Ari and sucks 3 Hp from her, lapping up the blood of its torn open brethren on the way.
Rae pulls out a dart with one hand and lifts up her other arm with the Stirge on it. She throws. In one clean flick of her wrist she leaves the Strige nailed to the wall and dripping. She summons up her Key and in a Flurry of Blows… misses the Stirge on Sorin’s back for a second time.
A Stirge finally lands on Cypress and slurps 5 Hp out of him. Another tries to latch on to Sorin, but this time, he manages to duck.
Cypress casts Sacred Flame on the Stirge attached to his arm. It flies up and passes its DEX Save, but the heated air is too much for it. It dries up and falls to the ground dead (with Scared Flamed, even a successful save takes half damage).
Ari uses her dagger again and slices apart the one that just attached to her for 5 damage, earning an insta-kill!
Sorin scrapes his back against the wall, knocking the hated thing off, then spins around and blasts it into a gooey lump with a Firebolt.
The rest of the Stirge all swarm on Sorin, but he's ready this time. He ducks and weaves and they all miss.
Rae pulls another dart out and flings it. With 6 damage, she nails this one to the floor as it twitches and thumps against the spike dying.
Not to be out done, Cypress casts Thorn Whip for the second time. The vines encircle the hapless Stirge and fling it to the ground. He pulls the whip back, the thorns cutting into the thin hide like a blunt saw, tearing it to shreds.
Not to be outdone herself, Ari attempts to use her Life Steal dagger on the Stirge by Sorin’s leg. She strikes a cool pose and rolls a nat’ 1. She misses the Stirge and cuts into Sorin’s leg. Sorin, roll a D4. 2. And Ari, roll a D4. 4. The Life Steal Dagger cutts into Sorin four 4 damage as Ari’s palm hits the spike, taking 2 of her own Hp and giving it back to the wizard. Oops.
Sorin gasps in pain and stumbles, rolling a critical failure. He turns in shock as he casts, “ow, what the h-” the magic erupts and the Firebolt glances over Ari’s Shoulder for 4 damage.
Talking is a free action and Rae-the-Obvious uses it to say “Wow, this fight is going about as bad as it possibly could have.”
Sorin turns, “Thanks f-” his eyes roll and he passes out, falling to the ground.
The Stirge that just took his last Hp detaches. And attempts to fly at Rae, but she’s quick. She ducks. She pulls out a dart. She flings.
Akris’s voice shifts to the voice of a 1998 Eddie Murphy, “You missed. How could you miss!? He was three feet in front of you!”
Cypress’s Thorn whip tears into the now-heavy, now Sorin-filled Stirge at the same time as Ari cuts it open with her dagger. It looks like a little red hoovering waterfall as it dies.
With the last Stirge dead, Rae bloodied, (a D&D term meaning at less than half health), Ari bloodied, and Sorin unconscious, I have to agree with Rae. This fight did go about as bad as it possibly could have
With a successful Death Save, Sorin is stable (not bleeding out and inching his way towards death), but still unconscious. Ari sheaths her dagger and runs over to him. Alright Ari, roll a Medicine Check, no idea why you aren’t leaving this for the cleric, but here we are. Knowing nothing about medicine, Ari props Sorin in a sitting position and lightly slaps each side of his face. This has no effect on Sorin’s health.
Ari pulls her hand back for a grand wake-up-slap, and Cypress catches the hand in mid-flight. He touches a few pressure points on Sorin, channeling the will of Life itself into him, and casting Save The Dying (normally this stabilizes a patient who is making death saves, but since Sorin just stabilized, we’ll bring him back to conscious, but still at 0 Hp).
Seeing the wizard's eyes flutter back to life, and his pupils rapidly un-dilating, Ari stands up. She grabs her sword, sticks out her chest, spits out a mouth full of blood, and says, “Alright. On-ward!”
Cypress, Sorin, and even Rae all stare at her in disbelief. Akris starts laughing.
Cypress casts Cure Wounds on the downed wizard boy. Before the shuddering-shivering-tingling waves of the healing spell have even finished going through him, Cypress has spun around to point an erect hairy finger at Ari, “We. Rest. Now.” He stares her up (like staring someone down, but the height difference goes the other way), “and a long rest too. The cubes can wait a little longer, but the whole team, except me, is barely standing.”
The little cleric does his best to help Sorin back on his feet as Ari stammers about stats and Hp and how they really could go a few more rounds and it’s not really that bad. Cypress and Sorin start walking down the hall, back to the Thug’s room where they rested before.
Ari waves in the opposite direction, “but..”
Rae’s hand grips around Aris' horn and tugs as she starts pulling her friend along behind the others.
Normally we use Rests as a way to have a good narrative end to a session but this time it’s really in the middle. Rather than doing a whole scene that interrupts the nice adventuring flow we have going, we’ll just do a propeller wipe and dissolve into the team standing in the hallway at 3 am the next morning, putting the bricks back in the wall. OOOooo or maybe an object wipe where Cypress takes a brick out - zoom in to the black gap in the wall - then a beat of black, maybe a snoring sound effect - and zoom out to see Sorin putting the brick back in… Yeah let's go with that, super cool. And.. Action!
It’s now the 3rd day of Kythorn and a very stiff Sorin is putting the last brick back in the wall to cover the Thug’s tunnel (see, cool). He stretches his cricked neck wondering why he had to sleep on the gravel floor. After all, he was the most injured, shouldn’t he have gotten one of the couches? But, Ari had already sat down and when he had started to say something, she just looked him dead in the eye and ripped off another piece of jerky with her teeth. In his mind’s eye, the vision of her sharp spiky teeth ripping apart the dried out flesh has a soft pink filter and cartoon hearts. Akris’s flapping tail hits the back of his head, and Sorin has a brief moment of clarity in thinking “oh gawd, what does it say about me that I like how she’s been treating me?” He starts nervously biting his lip, and follows behind the others.
At the end of a southbound hallway we come to another junction, to the left (east) is a long dark hallway, to the right (west) is a small room. It’s a simple, plain square room, and in the middle is one of the sewer grate pipes that lead up to the surface, or down to the deeper level of the sewers.
Sorin has an idea, and turns to his familiar “Akris take that pipe and go down to the next level to scout around.”
Akris snickers, and in a hissing chuckle says, “Oh, well Ssshhhure I can sssscout for you.”
After a moment of table talk, Ashley decides to make a Will Roll in a first attempt to overpower and “train” Akris. 19.
Sorin’s normally good natured face turns cold as he stares at the flying snake. “Akris,” he says in a serious monotone, “take that pipe,” all of his good humorous nature seems to have dried up, “and go down to the next level,” Akris is staring at the healing scars on Sorin’s neck and the cuts in his jacket, “to scout around.”
Akris stutters for a brief moment then wilts, “Yes, Sorin, I will.” With that, he slinks to the pipe and descends behind the back of the group.
Ari swallows, “Alright then, I’ll just check for traps down this hall.” She takes some time with her head pressed to the floor and the walls, and when she is certain of her findings, turns back to the others. “No traps, but there is another patch of red-bricks. Probably another Thug tunnel.”
The group waffles for a little bit. Follow their hearts and smash some randos, or do the job they’re getting paid for? Thug Mugging is kinda their whole deal, but Pulgrok sounded like this was urgent. The Thugs might have more answers, but the Cube might lead to a way into the Crypt.
Eventually they land on the honorable path of doing the job they said they would do, and continue down the dark corridor.
A few feet from a turn off, the hallway makes a sharp turn southward. As Ari leads the group, Rae hears a skittering in the darkness, out of reflex, she kicks! But she misses the Rust Monster, as its head emerges from the dark side tunnel.
Cypress’s Hands flair as he casts Sacred Flame. The beast shrinks back, passing its DEX Save and only taking 3 damage.
This time Sorin is not messing around. His hands fly apart as 3 Magic Missiles fly out for him, landing with 2, 4, and 5 damage The Monster screeches, and retreats a step back into the brick tunnel.
As Ari backs away from the Rust Monster to protect her shiny new sword. She hears the sound of hundreds of little legs. She feels cobwebs on her hands. Without a thought, she spins around. One hand is suddenly thrust out, open palm towards the spiders. Her other hand is curled in a loose fist at her moth, like she is holding a small tube. She blows into her empty hand and a spray shoots out from her extended palm. It’s a foul green mist emerging in a forceful cone with a hiss. Somewhere within the mist emerging from Air’s outstretched hand, it sounds like the hiss is whispering “ᕵᓍᓰSᓍᘉ Sᕵᖇᗩᖻ” (poison spray).
The Rust Monster growls and its antennae begin to wiggle. Sparkles appear in the air and Cypress ducks back just in time as a puffy of glittery steam materializes where the head of his mace just was. But Rae isn’t fast enough, the other puff of glittery steam engulfs her bag of darts, rusting all the tips and making them -1. We look on and see the Rust Monster seem to roll its shoulders. The metallic carapace seems thicker and shinier as its natural armor improves with the added metal.
After the cloud of poisoned gas disperses, the Spiders come rushing back, crawling up and on Ari, biting as they go.
“Here, Rae!” Sorin shouts, and tosses her the perfectly good staff we all forgot he was carrying.
Raelle-the Refreshed smiles and swings.
This new staff’s balance feels all wrong. The end just barely misses the rust encrusted mandibles in front of her as Rae’s hands slip on the brand new handle wrapping.
Cypress grips his mace tight, and then lets go. He smiles with an idea. He casts Thorn Whip and in a satisfied voice, watching the rough cut bleed on the monster’s back, he says, “You can’t rust vines can you!?”
Sorin glances over at Ari, all her covered in spiders. Feeling a need to finish this and help her, Sorin reaches into the void between the worlds. His non-hands grab fistfulls of ethereal nothingness, that spark to a wyrd blue flame when he pulls them into the world. He casts Magic Missile again for 2, 4, and 5 damage. The last hollow flaming ball bores through the body of the beast, and burns out of its belly to hit the floor.
The light in the Rust Monsters eyes goes dim, as all its armored legs crunch and click, compressing together as it falls to the ground.
Ari fails her check to try to frantically shake the bugs off her. As she slid her hand down her arm to scrape them off, they just scrambled onto that hand and up the other arm.
Sensing her distress, Rae rushes over to hit the bugs off.
“Wait, don’t hit me!”
“What?”
Ari flinches, and Rae rolls a nat’ 1, hitting her in the face for a single restrained point of damage.
Shaking his head, Cypress casts Thorn Whip again, cutting and splatting the last remaining spiders on the floor and the wall. Now all that’s left are the spiders crawling all over Ari’s forearms.
Standing behind Cypress, Sorin takes a breath and takes aim.
“Wait wait wait.”
He flicks his wrist casting a Firbolt.
Ari instinctively shields her head. The bolt stops less than an inch away, burning up the last remaining spiders, but sizzling out before hitting Ari.
The burning Spiders hiss and crackle and almost sound like a whispered “8 damage.”
With that, now the fight is over and can finally re-light the moss lantern and get a look at where we are.
To be continued . . .
. . .
To be continued . . . . . .
“Are you fond of cleverness when other people do it? No. Nobody is. Cleverness is like bagpipes-a hellish screetch that only sounds good to the person making it"
—Trudy Cooper, “Oglaf: Naja”
Table talk:
With the holidays fast approaching, there was a lot of discussion on scheduling. So to keep things going, but ease the need for all of us to find a common time, i offered to do a couple of individual scenes for backstory, Sorin in the school or growing up, Ari and Rae robbing some hapless town, Cypress growing up in the village, etc. I also reminded players that if they write up any sort of backstory type thing i will gladly put it up here for them under the character in the reference page, and give some kind of reward.
