Completed [Play-by-Post] Magic World/BRP: "In Search of the Sorcerer"

[Siveon]

"This is my home, Amon. But enough to demoralize and destabilize a small army."

 

[Llywelyn ap Gruffydd]

"Oh, yes! Of course! We only want to burn what is necessary to burn."

 

[Siveon]

"I'm sincerely glad you're on our side." Marcán gives Amon a look with a wry smile.

 

[Grimgravy]

"We need to make sure anyplace we're shooting or lobbing fire bombs from should be safe from charging horseman. Do we want to wait for the enemy to come again or move against them. Perhaps we can hit their base while they come here?"

 

[Llywelyn ap Gruffydd]

"Or maybe we can do this, I will stay behind with Solon. We will enact our traps and then flee through the boys tunnel. While we are doing that, the rest of you go after their camp. We will meet up with you later. Hopefully they inspect the town and search for us for a while."

Spoiler

How many horses did we have?

 

[nikolokolus]

4 mules and 9 horses. two of the horses are slightly wounded.

 

[Grimgravy]

"We could gag and tie up the prisoners so it looks like there are more defenders. At least from afar."

 

[Siveon]

"I like that plan. Let's see if the others are up to it."

Marcán speaks to Solon first, "Solon, I appreciate you staying around to help with our welcoming gift. If you don't mind we could use your magics to cause some extra trouble when they arrive. After that leave with Amon, and you may do afterwards as you see fit. I thank you." Then to Oona, "You may want to make sure the child gets away safe. Is that alright? He does seem to like you best."

 

[Grimgravy]

"Do you know the way to this ruin, Marcán?"

 

[Siveon]

Spoiler

Er, I do, don't I? I imagine if I've heard spooky tales I know where it is.

 

[Siveon]

"Yup, easily enough. It's not too far."

 

[nikolokolus]

Marcán informs everyone that the area where the bird flew to, is a broken tower that juts out of a meadow. This does not match up with Urash's survey of the place; his raven allowed him to look at the place and from what he could tell there is a tower, but much more around it now. The meadow is gone and the fortress around it is in the bottom of a very broad, shallow pit approximately 500 meters across and about 20 meters deep. When you square the two descriptions together it sounds as though a massive excavation has probably taken place, to unearth and recover the buried walls of some old structure. Regardless, the place is about 20 miles away as the crow flies, so maybe a day and half on foot or a day's ride away if you follow the track that the riders fled along.

Solon rubs his chin and muses on Marcán's words, but finally throws up his hands and shrugs, "Bah . . . if Abazion is at this ruined tower, then chances are his appurtenances, and Ghul's grimoires are with him. So long as you permit me to take possession of these things if we prevail, then I will travel with you and lend my aid. If we take time to prepare and if you are all willing to lend me some of your vitality, perhaps we can perform a great summoning of an elemental that can scour the earth of the miscreant, but we'll need to strike with surprise before he has a chance to raise a demon or some other defense against us."

When Solon finishes speaking, Oona shakes her head, "I will not run, and neither will I play nursemaid to a boy. If the lad's father yet lives then best to turn him over when we find him." She looks down at Bran who also seems equally defiant, "Besides, after a month surviving on his own, he's more man than boy now, plus he's a deft shot with that sling of his. You'll need all the help you can get; we'll support you with stones and arrows from a distance."

 

[Siveon]

Marcán nods. "So be it. Wouldn't be any happier to have you all at our side. I like this plan with the Elemental. How long can you control it? You might be able to aid us in our raid, after the forces attack."

 

[nikolokolus]

Marcán nods. "So be it. Wouldn't be any happier to have you all at our side. I like this plan with the Elemental. How long can you control it? You might be able to aid us in our raid, after the forces attack."

Solon demures, "The process is not without risks, greater elementals are capricious, and arrogant creatures and once brought here it will be necessary to bargain with the thing to extract a service which they are always loathe to do unless properly rewarded; it is possible to bind them through a contest of wills, but the consequences of failure would be catastrophic for all involved. In any event, the process will take several hours to draw one here through ritual and not only that, I will need some great source of flame or water near at hand for a fire or water elemental spirit. I must warn you that the process can be quite taxing for all involved in the ritual circle. I presume you want me to summon a spirit capable of dealing Abazion a grievous blow, and not some petty minor spirit who might be easily countered by one of Abazion's demons? So that brings me to another question, if we summon a thing and can successfully negotiate with it, what do you want to achieve with its service?"

Elemental Summoning Notes

Costs: a greater elemental has a minimum summoning MP cost of 25MP(for D6s of characteristic points)+1MP per 10 percentiles of skills and has a minimum of 4D6 POW; minimum cost for an elemental with one skill at 100% would be 35MP . To draw one forth people need to be bound by a Chain of Being spell which drains Magic Points evenly from from everyone n the circle. Elementals will usually bargain for things they desire. this varies by individual, but they will not act against their nature and their desire is usually to be allowed to exert their power in some way -- causing an earthquake, flooding the land, burning a forest, creating a destructive storm, etc. Once negotiated with an elemental will perform a single task. For perspective, lesser elementals can do the work of 7 men for 7 days and 7 nights without tiring, a greater elemental can do the work of 70 men for 7 days and 7 nights.
Limitations: It's important to note that Elementals do not have magical attacks, they are generally humanoid in shape and have human skills (as defined by their summoning), they are immune to physical attacks, but can be harmed by demons or magic or an antagonistic elemental (water and earth elementals can collide and destroy each other, the same for fire and air).

 

[Grimgravy]

"Do you need willing participants or could our prisoners be made to aid us?"

 

[ERYFKRAD]

"If we must make use of a spirit, perhaps we can order it to defend this place while we lay siege to the enemy camp? Not only will such a move be unexpected, they might even be defenceless. Even if the spirit is beaten, any survivors will have to return to the camp and face us."

 

[nikolokolus]

"Do you need willing participants or could our prisoners be made to aid us?"

"If we must make use of a spirit, perhaps we can order it to defend this place while we lay siege to the enemy camp? Not only will such a move be unexpected, they might even be defenceless. Even if the spirit is beaten, any survivors will have to return to the camp and face us."

Solon listens to Borric make his case and Rhenmyr ask his question:

"Willing participants are the only tenable solution I'm afraid. To tap our prisoners is a dark sort of magic that I'm happy to say I've never dabbled in and is beyond the formulae and forms that I know." He turns to Borric, "Spirits are beyond my knowledge, but perhaps your drune companion Mab knows some trick for coaxing some ghost from Otherworld to guard the hill fort? As for whatever elemental force I could draw forth and assuming I could compel it to serve us, they are known to be fractious and sticklers for following the letter of an agreement; such a thing left out of sight might do more harm than good (at least in the long term). I do agree that it might be better to bring the fight to Abazion. He's always been reckless and prone to act out of pride and spite. No doubt he'll want revenge for the inconvenience of besting his hirelings. I suspect the men who fled here will wish they had abandoned his cause altogether rather than returning to whatever place he has chosen to dig up from the past. Not only that, I suspect he'll bring a potent magic to this place to reduce it to cinders and ash. I am not altogether convinced it would be wise to remain here to make some sort of last stand -- no matter our talents he was able to render an entire hill-fort insensible and put them under his power. So, despite the hardships that will await us in the Coedwyg Cyfnos (the name for the vast tangled forest to the north of Odessos) I agree with the Kurgan that we should attempt to do what he would not expect. Tales of "fire wizards" will suggest to him that we are no simple brigands or scavengers; though I doubt he expects us to be aware of him or his whereabouts."

Mab nods his head speaks, "I can certainly summon a guardian spirit, but I will need to bind it here, and ideally it would be wise to find some sort of fragile receptacle or an object that has a seal that could release the spirit when it breaks. This is the only way for the spirit 'free' itself and perform its appointed task." He snaps his fingers, "Aha, I've got it. I'll summon a spirit and bind it to the gates; when these fellows open the threshold the spirit will be released and perform its appointed task. What sort of surprise would you like to leave for our enemies? Perhaps a spirit of terror, or maybe one of pain, or I suppose we could afflict whomever opens the gate with spirit of disease that would waste them to nothing. Any preferences?"

Second to that, if you do enter the forest how do you proceed? Do you follow the trail the men followed? Overland travel could be quite grueling and slow (and will expose you to more random encounters at the very least). You can make your plans out of character; I'll let you know now that you are very close a possible end (for good or bad) this is your chance to lay out your cleverest plans and contingencies before we proceed any further.

 

[Llywelyn ap Gruffydd]

"Can we just go with our usual method and have a fire spirit? Or If we need more fire, we do have that one summoning spell the Solon so graciously wrote for me and I've worked at learning. It's risky, but might bring another being into the fight. Solon can help guide me through the process."

 

[ERYFKRAD]

Bros, another option to the plan I came up with is that we kill the buggers here, then snatch their uniforms and make our way to Abazion's where we can hopefully bide our time until the time is right.

 

[Siveon]

"That is a lot of summoning going on abouts. I say we summon an elemental of the earth to confront Abazion directly, he shall attack the ruins but will purposefully not go out of his way to destroy it. To destroy it means to put my people in danger (as well as us), and other elementals can set my lands to cinder, or flood it, or send it flying from the roots. A disease spirit bound to the gates, along with a few simple tripwire bombs that we've set up should do the trick for them. While the elemental makes a beeline straight for the fortress, drawing attention, we should follow after it, avoiding the trail and any more of his men."

Spoiler

Bros, another option to the plan I came up with is that we kill the buggers here, then snatch their uniforms and make our way to Abazion's where we can hopefully bide our time until the time is right.

I'm willing to take Solon's advice that Abazion will level the town to the ground with magic. In that case, I don't want to be near here.

 

[ERYFKRAD]

"That is a lot of summoning going on abouts. I say we summon an elemental of the earth to confront Abazion directly, he shall attack the ruins but will purposefully not go out of his way to destroy it. To destroy it means to put my people in danger (as well as us), and other elementals can set my lands to cinder, or flood it, or send it flying from the roots. A disease spirit bound to the gates, along with a few simple tripwire bombs that we've set up should do the trick for them. While the elemental makes a beeline straight for the fortress, drawing attention, we should follow after it, avoiding the trail and any more of his men."

Spoiler

Bros, another option to the plan I came up with is that we kill the buggers here, then snatch their uniforms and make our way to Abazion's where we can hopefully bide our time until the time is right.

I'm willing to take Solon's advice that Abazion will level the town to the ground with magic. In that case, I don't want to be near here.

Spoiler

In that case, rigging the entrypoint with a disease bomb is our best option.

 

[Grimgravy]

Spoiler

Any game trails or or such that could aid us in approaching the ruin undetected? I agree that defending the village is of questionable value.

 

[Llywelyn ap Gruffydd]

Spoiler

If we decide to do any defense of the town, I would only use it as a delaying action. To get them engaged, paranoid, and cautiously moving through the city because there could be a trap anywhere.

 

[nikolokolus]

Spoiler

Any game trails or or such that could aid us in approaching the ruin undetected? I agree that defending the village is of questionable value.

Spoiler

Make a tracking or nature roll, your choice.

 

[Grimgravy]

Spoiler

Track (67): [1d100] = 42