Caldefor Session in New Haven 3-22-2008 (925 base xp)
Jonathan, Randy, Max
We head east with help from the Hastur to solicit aid from the 1000 Baronies. He teleports us to Dalwan to then travel east via road along the Shadowline. We may find religious allies there.
Three Small bulbous bugs fly at me trying to attack. Giant Stirges try to attack us, but fail against Spring, then Cilorian and Durak drain their moisture and Constitution before they can fly off.
After a few days of calm travel we come across a patrol. Dalwan military patrol at first assumes us to be shadow or undead, but we convince them not to hurt us by reciting saints of Paranswarm. We record some of the canon and personages of Paranswarm in case this happens again.
We keep traveling, going through the night. A panther stalks us for a while, but passes along because it cannot smell us. Later on we observe three wemic males crouched in some trees, with shields, war headdresses and preparing to pounce. We convince them not to fight us, but we try to recruit them to fight for Caldefor. Sadly Spring's diplomacy is not good enough, so they decline. Their liege is the lord of the barony of Croton. The three wemics take us to the barony of their lord, to meet with the noble.
After five hours we get to the fortified manor of baron Adas Rafik, with various wemics around the surrounding lands. We discuss our objective of getting support and commanders for the fight to free Caldefor, and they suggest pursuing allied religions sons of barons.
The baron participates in duels and competitions for status. They do not seem to have any unity among barons, or any sort of council for collective decision making. Some of the Archibolds may give us aide, come to help command our troops. Their sons, young cats looking to make names for themselves, will likely come to ally as our captains.
We head to Archibold Tallstaff's barony, to meet with him, led by a wemic from baron Adas Rafik. Tallstaff is quite old and confused upon seeing three dead sent to him. He is not eager to travel or fight, but he has children...
Sabaquat Tallstaff is the first to accept our plea for help (and glory in battle). If he comes with us, others will become unavailable due to enemies. Sabaquat is an accomplished sorceror, who has fought the Eums, dragonkind, a chaos bore (as a group).
Baron Theymala and Thaqib should be pursued. Even approaching a baron will then alienate the enemies of that baron, so any progress we make limits the future field of recruits. Sabaquat will help speak on our behalf. Thaqib's youngest son is a potent paladin. Theymala examines us intently, quizzing us on catechism even. His son is a priest of Paranswarm of the seventh circle.
More friends of Tallstaff: Laheeb and Malik (another Archibold). Laheeb's son comes with us, a redacter of the seventh circle. Malik's daughter also agrees to come, a redacter of the sixth circle. Her father asks us to protect her honor from the other young male cats.
Baron Hikkim is not convinced we are sane or logical, and refuses to send a son with us. We head back west to reach the Hastur (a week's travel) to teleport back to Tarkhenia. On the sixth day heading back our surroundings start getting darker, mist rising up from nowhere. The rakasha think this is a minor abyssal lord, crossed over.
Some archers hiding in a tree completely fumble their attempts to ambush us. One of the rakasha takes out some archers with a fireball, while the paladin rakasha and Cilorian prepare to flank and attack the lord as it appears. When the lord appears he sheds an aura of negative energy, but it's resisted by the paladin. The archers pin down the mage's arm, but the cleric comes to his aid. The psions spend time buffing themselves, while the paladin hacks into the lord. Durak is climbing the tree to get to the archers.
The minor lord emits a nasty sonic cone at Cilorian, but his huge pool of temporary endurance from a tattoo absorbs it all. After many more fumbles and injuries the abyssal lord flees and the archers fall over themselves and are subdued. The archers surrender and are taken as hostages, perhaps to be used as defenders or squires.