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<blockquote data-quote="prabe" data-source="post: 8299229" data-attributes="member: 7016699"><p>Session 44: The Wizard And His Skinned Assistants</p><p></p><p>Dramatis Personae:</p><p></p><p>Heath - Aldalómiel - Wood Elf Ranger (Hunter Conclave)/Druid (Circle of Stars)</p><p>John - Elama “Lamie” Galanodel- Wood Elf Cleric (Tempest)</p><p>Sara - Vinya Anar - Wood Elf Monk (Way of the Sun Soul)</p><p>Emily - Marxine - Mountain Dwarf Fighter (Champion)/Paladin</p><p></p><p>Note: Elderon's player couldn’t be with us this evening. Elderon apparently got enraptured by some book in the library in the tower and was reading.)</p><p></p><p>GM - Everyone Else</p><p></p><p></p><p>21 Bluzzimin 749 (Campaign day 172)</p><p></p><p>We ended Session 43 in the ancient wizard tower that had been on a floating island that crashed to the ground. We’d made our way through the tower, fighting our way through it from the top of along (since it was lying on its side) down to about where the tower was built into the basalt rock it had been floating on. We’d been pretty badly damaged, and depleted, by a fight with some insectoid creatures and hadn’t had time to take even a short rest. We ended the session with Oda having scouted the last room in the tower and found an extremely obese human, holding a quarterstaff accompanied by two ogre-sized humanoids with transparent skin -- their muscles and ligaments were all visible and twitching.</p><p></p><p>They spotted Oda and came toward us -- the two transparent-skinned ogres through what would have been the staircases down to the lowest level and the obese humanoid with the staff phasing through what is now the wall (and was originally the floor).</p><p></p><p>Before they arrived, Elama cast bless on Vinya, Marxine, and Aldalomiel. Vinya moved a few feet and planted the Rod of Alertness in the floor, to give us all the benefit of the bonus to AC that it gives.</p><p></p><p>Vinya ran to the wall, fired two sunbolts at the transparent-skinned ogre on the right, then ran about ten feet up the wall with her slippers of spider climb and did patient defense. Aldalomiel shot two arrows at the obese humanoid (who we presumed was the wizard to whom this tower once belonged) then took her starry archer form and fired a radiant bolt at it. She got two hits.</p><p></p><p>The transparent-skinned ogre on the left moved up until it was about ten feet from Aldalomiel and attacked her with reach, slamming her with big meaty fists, one of which hit. The other ogre-like entity moved toward Marxine, but wasn’t able to get to her.</p><p></p><p>Marxine moved so she was between that ogre-entity and Aldalomiel and attacked with her hammer. Elama, who was running low on spells after the fight with the insectoid creatures, moved up to stand next to Aldalomiel and cast Thunderwave, hoping to move the ogre away from her (and avoiding Marxine in the area of effect). The ogre-entity took some damage but it was not pushed away.</p><p></p><p>The wizard made a gesture and a weird, color-clashing, bad-smelling blob of stuff hit the ogre on the left (the one that had attacked Aldalomiel) and Marxine, Aldalomiel, and Elama all took psychic damage without any opportunity to avoid or resist it.</p><p></p><p>Vinya ran down the wall and over to the wizard, hitting him once with her quarterstaff (and failing the attempt to stun him) then missed with a bonus action punch. Frustrated with that, she ran around behind the wizard, between him and the wall he’d just phased through to try and draw his attention away from the rest of the party.</p><p></p><p>Aldalomiel, with a transparent-skinned ogre right in front of her, cast Zephyr Strike, which allowed her to get away from the ogre-thing.She ran to a corner and shot two arrows at the wizard -- hitting him once pretty solidly.</p><p></p><p>Both of the ogre-things attacked Marxine and both of them missed her entirely. The ogre that had attacked Aldalomiel got slowed by the Rod of Litrices.</p><p></p><p>Marxine attacked that ogre-thing, hitting it once and whittling it down some. Elama backed away from the ogre-thing that had attacked Aldalomiel, getting out of threat range, and cast sacred flame on it, but unfortunately it saved.</p><p></p><p>The wizard found himself with a monk right behind him and made an arguably bad decision -- because he attacked Vinya with the staff in his hands rather than casting a spell. He missed.</p><p></p><p>In return, Vinya attacked him with her staff and didn’t miss. She was also able to stun him with one of her hits. She followed that up with an elbow to his throat.</p><p></p><p>Aldalomiel cured herself with a spell then fired a radiant bolt at the ogre-thing on the left, the one that everyone was focusing fire on.</p><p></p><p>The ogre-things once again tried to attack Marxine. And once again both missed entirely and one was slowed by the Rod of Litrices.</p><p></p><p>Marxine attacked the one we’d been focusing fire on, hitting it twice. Elama followed Aldalomiel’s lead and cured herself, then moved around the ogre-thing on the left until she was directly opposite Marxine, in order to provide flanking. She attacked with the scimitar of speed (which gives a bonus-action attack) and got a hit.</p><p></p><p>The stunned wizard just stood then while Vinya hit him with her quarterstaff across the temple, stunning him again. Then she hit him again with the quarterstaff and with an elbow to the solar plexus. Aldalomiel fired two arrows at the stunned wizard -- hitting both times, one of which was a crit. Then she fired a radiant bolt at the ogre-thing everyone was attacking, hitting it as well.</p><p></p><p>The two ogre-things attacking Marxine each actually got a hit, against all odds. Even though both of them missed with one attack, neither was slowed by the Rod of Litrices.</p><p></p><p>Marxine got her second wind and she attacked the same ogre-thing we were focusing fire on, the one on the left. She hit once and did a nice amount of damage. Elama edged around through the ogre-thing’s threatened area and cast cure wounds on her, then she started moving back carefully, but didn’t make it all the way. Then she attacked with her scimitar of speed getting a nice hit.</p><p></p><p>The wizard, stunned again, just stood once again while Vinya hit him with her quarterstaff and attempted a stunning strike. He saved against the stunning strike. She hit him again and he saved against the stunning strike. That was the last of Vinya’s ki points.</p><p></p><p>Vinya: Bugger.</p><p></p><p>Her unarmed kick to the back of his knee did hit, at least. Aldalomiel shot two arrows at the wizard, dropping him. Then she fired a radiant bolt at the ogre-thing we were focusing fire on, getting a critical hit and doing a lot of damage.</p><p></p><p>The other ogre missed its attacks on Marxine, getting slowed by the Rod of Litrices. The one we were focusing fire on actually turned away from nigh-unhittable Marxine and attacked Elama instead, hitting her only once. It dodged Elama’s lightning damage in retaliation but was still dropped by the residual damage.</p><p></p><p>Marxine only had one target remaining -- it was slowed, but largely unhurt. She hit it twice. Elama stayed away from it and cast sacred flame -- it failed the save, but the damage was minimal. Vinya shot two sunbolts at the remaining ogre-thing, then moved up to give Marxine flanking and to punch him with an unarmed strike, which hit.</p><p></p><p>Elama: I only have one revivify available.</p><p></p><p>Aldalomiel shot it twice her arrows, hitting solidly both times, but missed with the radiant bolt.</p><p></p><p>The ogre-thing appeared to freak out somewhat at the loss of the wizard and its compatriot, and it did a huge flailing thing, attacking at both Marxine and Vinya at the same time. It missed Marxine, but hit Vinya, knocking her prone but not out.</p><p></p><p>Marxine, now without flanking, hit with both of her attacks and dropped it.</p><p></p><p>Whew!!</p><p></p><p>The room we were in was the remains of a parlor, the furniture all broken and shattered where it fell when the tower crashed to the ground. Vinya retrieved the rod of alertness, then she and Vinya scouted through what were the stairwells to the last/lowest room in the tower.</p><p></p><p>We saw a flickering crystal about the size of a wine barrel about 40 feet (half-way) up the far wall, which was originally the floor. We saw some art around and some other things. Vinya went to get the rest of the party, casting detect magic from the rod of alertness when she was in the parlor getting the rest of the party. She spotted a magical ring on the wizard, which we collected before we returned to the final room. The staff he was holding was not magical--in fact, it started to sublimate when he died. In that room, with the flickering crystal on the wall, we found a cloak and a brass horn that were also magical. We put those in Vinya’s bag of holding.</p><p></p><p>We also found a broken abacus -- some of the arms were broken and a few of the beads were missing. This appeared to be for doing some weird kind of non-decimal mathematics, though it was difficult to tell. There was a pocket with notes attached to the abacus, which is not, itself, magical. Elderron looked at the notes and found that it was the wizard’s spellbook. The one we found in the laboratory had mostly notes and a few basic low-level spells -- this was the one he had clearly developed as he grew in power.</p><p></p><p>The crystal was in some sort of housing or setting on what had been the floor. VInya walked up the wall and looked at the housing around the crystal. It had some discoloration to it and the crystal had cracks or flaws. She couldn’t tell if they were on the surface or deep into the crystal. There was no writing around it, but there did appear to be some marks like orientation marks or compass marks. They looked like indicators so the wizard could steer, at least somewhat, the floating island. The rumbling we’d noticed in the tower appeared to be coming from the gem and the light it was giving off flickered regularly.</p><p></p><p>The rest of the party looked around this last room for anything like writing or papers, but didn’t find any. We had found some in the notebooks we found in the laboratory -- including mentions of places we’d never even heard of, such as Sigil, Draalaath, and Nirama.</p><p></p><p>There were no further exits from this room.</p><p></p><p>As we were going back through the parlor, we noticed that the wizard’s body was decaying incredibly quickly and had already mostly decomposed away, as did the staff in his hands. , Vinya finally figured out that the wizard’s name was probably Triltum -- as the staff we found in the stairway to the library was called “Triltum’s Staff”. It’s a reasonable hypothesis at least.</p><p></p><p>When we got back to the library, everyone got loaded up with interesting looking books -- Vinya grabbed anything in Elvish that she saw. Elderron grabbed interesting books as well. We filled up all the backpacks and satchels in the party, including Vinya’s Handy Haversack, then tied books on the outsides of the backpacks and satchels as well. Elama suggested using the magical cloak we’d found to carry more books, and we did that.</p><p></p><p>Vinya pointed out to the others that we’d heard these floating towers were at least pre-Severance. Maybe older than that. Elderron agreed that the magic to float islands and towers had been lost with the Severance, and the existing implementations had gotten less stable and predictable over the centuries.</p><p></p><p>We got out of the tower without too much trouble, thanks to having left the rope hanging and waiting for us in order to have an exit. We emerged looking beaten up, pretty badly beaten up, but victorious. The tower was still making occasional rumbling/thrumming noises.</p><p></p><p>One of the villagers guarding the perimeter: What’s with that noise it’s making?</p><p>Vinya: I’m kind of worried about that noise, to be honest. There’s a cracked power crystal in there. You might want to enlarge the cordon around the tower, just in case.</p><p>Marxine: Can we talk to your mayor about calling in outside help?</p><p>Vinya: And a librarian.</p><p></p><p>Elderron said that he believed that the crystal was unstable in the long term, but would probably not catastrophically explode in the next week or so. Probably.</p><p></p><p>Elderron: Help can probably get here in time. And if it explodes, it’s probably going to be psychic damage, so the buildings will be okay.</p><p>Vinya: Yeah. If we can talk to the mayor, we’d like to contact some people who might be able to help. But we don’t want to impose that on you.</p><p></p><p>We were taken to see the Mayor, a human man named Torin.</p><p></p><p>Vinya explained that there was a library full of knowledge from before the Severance in the tower and that it should be collected and conserved and made available to researchers. She also mentioned that there was an unstable power crystal in there and that it might explode any week now, maybe any day now. Torin was a little skeptical about the whole thing, but agreed to let us notify someone from Dhaqi to come in and assist with both of those situations.</p><p></p><p>At his agreement, Lamie cast sending to Jorcha Linnolim at the Well of Screams.</p><p></p><p>Elama, through the spell to Jorcha: Hi! We found a crashed wizard's tower in Dortil, with a broken unstable power crystal. Wanna help?</p><p>Vinya: Remember the library.</p><p>Elama, still through the spell: And an intact-ish library.</p><p>Jorcha: That sounds dangerous, and important. We'll get someone there soon-ish. Make sure the people know to keep out.</p><p></p><p>Elama, to the Mayor: Tell people to keep out of the tower. We’ve cleared out the monsters but it’s still dangerous.</p><p>Mayor: Thank you.</p><p></p><p>We headed back to the iv-Nulis, getting back in plenty of time before it left Dortil to cross the lake under tow. We retired to our room, taking a short rest. Vinya started identifying the books we found while Elderron identified the things we’d found. (See treasure list at end of session notes.)</p><p></p><p>Vinya found a book on pre-Severance Elvish religion among the ones we’d found and sat down and began puzzling her way through that.</p><p></p><p>The day passed with reading and discussing the magic items, followed by the night passing. And thereby we had a long rest as we crossed the lake under tow.</p><p></p><p>We ended the session there and will begin again on 22 Bluzzimin 749 (Campaign day 173).</p><p></p><p>Treasure from Triltum’s Tower (Sessions 43 and 44)</p><p></p><p>All of the items we found are in the DMG.</p><p></p><p>Brass Horn of Valhalla (this does not require attunement and can be passed around among the party)</p><p></p><p>Ring of Free Action -- requires attunement. It allows the wearer to ignore difficult terrain, magic can’t reduce their speed and they can’t be paralyzed or restrained.</p><p></p><p>Cloak of the Bat -- requires attunement. It allows the wearer to fly as long as their hands are free and they are in shadow or darkness. It also gives advantage on stealth checks in shadow or darkness.</p><p></p><p>Hat of Disguise</p><p></p><p>Triltum’s Abacus Spellbook -- non-magical but very nice.</p><p></p><p>Triltum's spellbook is in the form of something like an abacus, in some sort of non-base-ten, with a tattered bundle of notes tucked into a leather pocket sewn into the bottom. Arms are broken and beads are missing, and there are pages missing from the notes; but it's clear Triltum was working on magic from a more purely mathematical direction than most current theories.</p><p></p><p>The following spells can be reconstructed from the notes present, using the abacus in its current condition. Someone dedicated enough can plausibly reconstruct the arms and beads, and Triltum's theories.</p><p></p><p>1st: Flash, Gift of Alacrity, Voidslime, Triltum's Forced Learning, Senses of Tindalos, Tasha's Caustic Brew (T), Catapult (X), Illusory Script, False Life, Fog Cloud, Silent Image, Unseen Servant, Alarm</p><p></p><p>2nd: Aegis, Adroit Escape, Acid Serpents, Mind Spike, Dust Devil, Warding Wind, Blur, Locate Object, Magic Mouth, Rope Trick</p><p></p><p>3rd: Triltum's Timeskip, Intellect Fortress (T), Thunder Step (X), Wall of Sand (X), Bestow Curse, Blink, Gaseous Form, Glyph of Warding, Haste, Magic Circle, Nondetection, Remove Curse, Slow, Tongues</p><p></p><p>4th: Wall of Darkness, Sickening Radiance (X), Elemental Bane (X), Evard's Black Tentacles, Confusion</p><p></p><p>5th: Gravitic Crush, Far Step (X), Synaptic Static (X), Scrying, Dream, Contact Other Plane</p><p></p><p>Triltum’s Normal Apprentice Spellbook -- non-magical as well. Mostly theory, but has a few minor spells in it: 1st: Expeditious Retreat, Protection from Evil and Good; Tenser’s Floating Disk; 2nd: Arcane Lock, Detect Thoughts, Phantasmal Force</p><p></p><p>Staff of Triltum -- (requires attunement by a spellcaster) -- This staff is made of purpleheart, topped with a block of clearest feldspar. While holding the staff, you gain a +1 bonus on spell attack rolls. Whenever you score a critical hit with a spell attack, the target takes an extra 3d6 radiant damage. Also, while holding this staff you can cast the Wall of Light spell once; you regain this ability at dawn.</p><p></p><p>Lots and lots of books -- GM NOTE: Information on this to come later.</p><p></p><p>Art Objects -- Worth 750 gp each: silver chalice with moonstones around the base; silver-plated longsword with jet in the pommel; gold comb in the shape of a dragon, with garnets as the eyes; obsidian statuette with gold fittings and inlays, in the shape of a dancing six-armed woman; painted gold war mask, molded and painted to look like an angry storm giant. (This is one art object (or 750 gp) for each of us. Vinya would like the gold comb in the shape of a dragon, if no one minds.)</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="prabe, post: 8299229, member: 7016699"] Session 44: The Wizard And His Skinned Assistants Dramatis Personae: Heath - Aldalómiel - Wood Elf Ranger (Hunter Conclave)/Druid (Circle of Stars) John - Elama “Lamie” Galanodel- Wood Elf Cleric (Tempest) Sara - Vinya Anar - Wood Elf Monk (Way of the Sun Soul) Emily - Marxine - Mountain Dwarf Fighter (Champion)/Paladin Note: Elderon's player couldn’t be with us this evening. Elderon apparently got enraptured by some book in the library in the tower and was reading.) GM - Everyone Else 21 Bluzzimin 749 (Campaign day 172) We ended Session 43 in the ancient wizard tower that had been on a floating island that crashed to the ground. We’d made our way through the tower, fighting our way through it from the top of along (since it was lying on its side) down to about where the tower was built into the basalt rock it had been floating on. We’d been pretty badly damaged, and depleted, by a fight with some insectoid creatures and hadn’t had time to take even a short rest. We ended the session with Oda having scouted the last room in the tower and found an extremely obese human, holding a quarterstaff accompanied by two ogre-sized humanoids with transparent skin -- their muscles and ligaments were all visible and twitching. They spotted Oda and came toward us -- the two transparent-skinned ogres through what would have been the staircases down to the lowest level and the obese humanoid with the staff phasing through what is now the wall (and was originally the floor). Before they arrived, Elama cast bless on Vinya, Marxine, and Aldalomiel. Vinya moved a few feet and planted the Rod of Alertness in the floor, to give us all the benefit of the bonus to AC that it gives. Vinya ran to the wall, fired two sunbolts at the transparent-skinned ogre on the right, then ran about ten feet up the wall with her slippers of spider climb and did patient defense. Aldalomiel shot two arrows at the obese humanoid (who we presumed was the wizard to whom this tower once belonged) then took her starry archer form and fired a radiant bolt at it. She got two hits. The transparent-skinned ogre on the left moved up until it was about ten feet from Aldalomiel and attacked her with reach, slamming her with big meaty fists, one of which hit. The other ogre-like entity moved toward Marxine, but wasn’t able to get to her. Marxine moved so she was between that ogre-entity and Aldalomiel and attacked with her hammer. Elama, who was running low on spells after the fight with the insectoid creatures, moved up to stand next to Aldalomiel and cast Thunderwave, hoping to move the ogre away from her (and avoiding Marxine in the area of effect). The ogre-entity took some damage but it was not pushed away. The wizard made a gesture and a weird, color-clashing, bad-smelling blob of stuff hit the ogre on the left (the one that had attacked Aldalomiel) and Marxine, Aldalomiel, and Elama all took psychic damage without any opportunity to avoid or resist it. Vinya ran down the wall and over to the wizard, hitting him once with her quarterstaff (and failing the attempt to stun him) then missed with a bonus action punch. Frustrated with that, she ran around behind the wizard, between him and the wall he’d just phased through to try and draw his attention away from the rest of the party. Aldalomiel, with a transparent-skinned ogre right in front of her, cast Zephyr Strike, which allowed her to get away from the ogre-thing.She ran to a corner and shot two arrows at the wizard -- hitting him once pretty solidly. Both of the ogre-things attacked Marxine and both of them missed her entirely. The ogre that had attacked Aldalomiel got slowed by the Rod of Litrices. Marxine attacked that ogre-thing, hitting it once and whittling it down some. Elama backed away from the ogre-thing that had attacked Aldalomiel, getting out of threat range, and cast sacred flame on it, but unfortunately it saved. The wizard found himself with a monk right behind him and made an arguably bad decision -- because he attacked Vinya with the staff in his hands rather than casting a spell. He missed. In return, Vinya attacked him with her staff and didn’t miss. She was also able to stun him with one of her hits. She followed that up with an elbow to his throat. Aldalomiel cured herself with a spell then fired a radiant bolt at the ogre-thing on the left, the one that everyone was focusing fire on. The ogre-things once again tried to attack Marxine. And once again both missed entirely and one was slowed by the Rod of Litrices. Marxine attacked the one we’d been focusing fire on, hitting it twice. Elama followed Aldalomiel’s lead and cured herself, then moved around the ogre-thing on the left until she was directly opposite Marxine, in order to provide flanking. She attacked with the scimitar of speed (which gives a bonus-action attack) and got a hit. The stunned wizard just stood then while Vinya hit him with her quarterstaff across the temple, stunning him again. Then she hit him again with the quarterstaff and with an elbow to the solar plexus. Aldalomiel fired two arrows at the stunned wizard -- hitting both times, one of which was a crit. Then she fired a radiant bolt at the ogre-thing everyone was attacking, hitting it as well. The two ogre-things attacking Marxine each actually got a hit, against all odds. Even though both of them missed with one attack, neither was slowed by the Rod of Litrices. Marxine got her second wind and she attacked the same ogre-thing we were focusing fire on, the one on the left. She hit once and did a nice amount of damage. Elama edged around through the ogre-thing’s threatened area and cast cure wounds on her, then she started moving back carefully, but didn’t make it all the way. Then she attacked with her scimitar of speed getting a nice hit. The wizard, stunned again, just stood once again while Vinya hit him with her quarterstaff and attempted a stunning strike. He saved against the stunning strike. She hit him again and he saved against the stunning strike. That was the last of Vinya’s ki points. Vinya: Bugger. Her unarmed kick to the back of his knee did hit, at least. Aldalomiel shot two arrows at the wizard, dropping him. Then she fired a radiant bolt at the ogre-thing we were focusing fire on, getting a critical hit and doing a lot of damage. The other ogre missed its attacks on Marxine, getting slowed by the Rod of Litrices. The one we were focusing fire on actually turned away from nigh-unhittable Marxine and attacked Elama instead, hitting her only once. It dodged Elama’s lightning damage in retaliation but was still dropped by the residual damage. Marxine only had one target remaining -- it was slowed, but largely unhurt. She hit it twice. Elama stayed away from it and cast sacred flame -- it failed the save, but the damage was minimal. Vinya shot two sunbolts at the remaining ogre-thing, then moved up to give Marxine flanking and to punch him with an unarmed strike, which hit. Elama: I only have one revivify available. Aldalomiel shot it twice her arrows, hitting solidly both times, but missed with the radiant bolt. The ogre-thing appeared to freak out somewhat at the loss of the wizard and its compatriot, and it did a huge flailing thing, attacking at both Marxine and Vinya at the same time. It missed Marxine, but hit Vinya, knocking her prone but not out. Marxine, now without flanking, hit with both of her attacks and dropped it. Whew!! The room we were in was the remains of a parlor, the furniture all broken and shattered where it fell when the tower crashed to the ground. Vinya retrieved the rod of alertness, then she and Vinya scouted through what were the stairwells to the last/lowest room in the tower. We saw a flickering crystal about the size of a wine barrel about 40 feet (half-way) up the far wall, which was originally the floor. We saw some art around and some other things. Vinya went to get the rest of the party, casting detect magic from the rod of alertness when she was in the parlor getting the rest of the party. She spotted a magical ring on the wizard, which we collected before we returned to the final room. The staff he was holding was not magical--in fact, it started to sublimate when he died. In that room, with the flickering crystal on the wall, we found a cloak and a brass horn that were also magical. We put those in Vinya’s bag of holding. We also found a broken abacus -- some of the arms were broken and a few of the beads were missing. This appeared to be for doing some weird kind of non-decimal mathematics, though it was difficult to tell. There was a pocket with notes attached to the abacus, which is not, itself, magical. Elderron looked at the notes and found that it was the wizard’s spellbook. The one we found in the laboratory had mostly notes and a few basic low-level spells -- this was the one he had clearly developed as he grew in power. The crystal was in some sort of housing or setting on what had been the floor. VInya walked up the wall and looked at the housing around the crystal. It had some discoloration to it and the crystal had cracks or flaws. She couldn’t tell if they were on the surface or deep into the crystal. There was no writing around it, but there did appear to be some marks like orientation marks or compass marks. They looked like indicators so the wizard could steer, at least somewhat, the floating island. The rumbling we’d noticed in the tower appeared to be coming from the gem and the light it was giving off flickered regularly. The rest of the party looked around this last room for anything like writing or papers, but didn’t find any. We had found some in the notebooks we found in the laboratory -- including mentions of places we’d never even heard of, such as Sigil, Draalaath, and Nirama. There were no further exits from this room. As we were going back through the parlor, we noticed that the wizard’s body was decaying incredibly quickly and had already mostly decomposed away, as did the staff in his hands. , Vinya finally figured out that the wizard’s name was probably Triltum -- as the staff we found in the stairway to the library was called “Triltum’s Staff”. It’s a reasonable hypothesis at least. When we got back to the library, everyone got loaded up with interesting looking books -- Vinya grabbed anything in Elvish that she saw. Elderron grabbed interesting books as well. We filled up all the backpacks and satchels in the party, including Vinya’s Handy Haversack, then tied books on the outsides of the backpacks and satchels as well. Elama suggested using the magical cloak we’d found to carry more books, and we did that. Vinya pointed out to the others that we’d heard these floating towers were at least pre-Severance. Maybe older than that. Elderron agreed that the magic to float islands and towers had been lost with the Severance, and the existing implementations had gotten less stable and predictable over the centuries. We got out of the tower without too much trouble, thanks to having left the rope hanging and waiting for us in order to have an exit. We emerged looking beaten up, pretty badly beaten up, but victorious. The tower was still making occasional rumbling/thrumming noises. One of the villagers guarding the perimeter: What’s with that noise it’s making? Vinya: I’m kind of worried about that noise, to be honest. There’s a cracked power crystal in there. You might want to enlarge the cordon around the tower, just in case. Marxine: Can we talk to your mayor about calling in outside help? Vinya: And a librarian. Elderron said that he believed that the crystal was unstable in the long term, but would probably not catastrophically explode in the next week or so. Probably. Elderron: Help can probably get here in time. And if it explodes, it’s probably going to be psychic damage, so the buildings will be okay. Vinya: Yeah. If we can talk to the mayor, we’d like to contact some people who might be able to help. But we don’t want to impose that on you. We were taken to see the Mayor, a human man named Torin. Vinya explained that there was a library full of knowledge from before the Severance in the tower and that it should be collected and conserved and made available to researchers. She also mentioned that there was an unstable power crystal in there and that it might explode any week now, maybe any day now. Torin was a little skeptical about the whole thing, but agreed to let us notify someone from Dhaqi to come in and assist with both of those situations. At his agreement, Lamie cast sending to Jorcha Linnolim at the Well of Screams. Elama, through the spell to Jorcha: Hi! We found a crashed wizard's tower in Dortil, with a broken unstable power crystal. Wanna help? Vinya: Remember the library. Elama, still through the spell: And an intact-ish library. Jorcha: That sounds dangerous, and important. We'll get someone there soon-ish. Make sure the people know to keep out. Elama, to the Mayor: Tell people to keep out of the tower. We’ve cleared out the monsters but it’s still dangerous. Mayor: Thank you. We headed back to the iv-Nulis, getting back in plenty of time before it left Dortil to cross the lake under tow. We retired to our room, taking a short rest. Vinya started identifying the books we found while Elderron identified the things we’d found. (See treasure list at end of session notes.) Vinya found a book on pre-Severance Elvish religion among the ones we’d found and sat down and began puzzling her way through that. The day passed with reading and discussing the magic items, followed by the night passing. And thereby we had a long rest as we crossed the lake under tow. We ended the session there and will begin again on 22 Bluzzimin 749 (Campaign day 173). Treasure from Triltum’s Tower (Sessions 43 and 44) All of the items we found are in the DMG. Brass Horn of Valhalla (this does not require attunement and can be passed around among the party) Ring of Free Action -- requires attunement. It allows the wearer to ignore difficult terrain, magic can’t reduce their speed and they can’t be paralyzed or restrained. Cloak of the Bat -- requires attunement. It allows the wearer to fly as long as their hands are free and they are in shadow or darkness. It also gives advantage on stealth checks in shadow or darkness. Hat of Disguise Triltum’s Abacus Spellbook -- non-magical but very nice. Triltum's spellbook is in the form of something like an abacus, in some sort of non-base-ten, with a tattered bundle of notes tucked into a leather pocket sewn into the bottom. Arms are broken and beads are missing, and there are pages missing from the notes; but it's clear Triltum was working on magic from a more purely mathematical direction than most current theories. The following spells can be reconstructed from the notes present, using the abacus in its current condition. Someone dedicated enough can plausibly reconstruct the arms and beads, and Triltum's theories. 1st: Flash, Gift of Alacrity, Voidslime, Triltum's Forced Learning, Senses of Tindalos, Tasha's Caustic Brew (T), Catapult (X), Illusory Script, False Life, Fog Cloud, Silent Image, Unseen Servant, Alarm 2nd: Aegis, Adroit Escape, Acid Serpents, Mind Spike, Dust Devil, Warding Wind, Blur, Locate Object, Magic Mouth, Rope Trick 3rd: Triltum's Timeskip, Intellect Fortress (T), Thunder Step (X), Wall of Sand (X), Bestow Curse, Blink, Gaseous Form, Glyph of Warding, Haste, Magic Circle, Nondetection, Remove Curse, Slow, Tongues 4th: Wall of Darkness, Sickening Radiance (X), Elemental Bane (X), Evard's Black Tentacles, Confusion 5th: Gravitic Crush, Far Step (X), Synaptic Static (X), Scrying, Dream, Contact Other Plane Triltum’s Normal Apprentice Spellbook -- non-magical as well. Mostly theory, but has a few minor spells in it: 1st: Expeditious Retreat, Protection from Evil and Good; Tenser’s Floating Disk; 2nd: Arcane Lock, Detect Thoughts, Phantasmal Force Staff of Triltum -- (requires attunement by a spellcaster) -- This staff is made of purpleheart, topped with a block of clearest feldspar. While holding the staff, you gain a +1 bonus on spell attack rolls. Whenever you score a critical hit with a spell attack, the target takes an extra 3d6 radiant damage. Also, while holding this staff you can cast the Wall of Light spell once; you regain this ability at dawn. Lots and lots of books -- GM NOTE: Information on this to come later. Art Objects -- Worth 750 gp each: silver chalice with moonstones around the base; silver-plated longsword with jet in the pommel; gold comb in the shape of a dragon, with garnets as the eyes; obsidian statuette with gold fittings and inlays, in the shape of a dancing six-armed woman; painted gold war mask, molded and painted to look like an angry storm giant. (This is one art object (or 750 gp) for each of us. Vinya would like the gold comb in the shape of a dragon, if no one minds.) [/QUOTE]
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Erkonin (Campaign #2) [Session 45: Rajalmin's Agent]
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