Kingmaker: Stolen Land, Session 3

This session is dedicated to the power of the sleep spell (and entangle).

As the group was planning how to take out the bandit camp, Eagle-Face Dan (who was gagged and tied to a tree), started making some noise – he wanted to talk. He’s had some time to think things through, see, and y’know, he never really wanted to be a bandit. It was just the only job available in these here tough economic times. He’s seen the writing on the wall, and it says that the salad days of banditry in the Greenbelt are over. I mean, even if the PCs all get killed, Brevoy is just going to send some more, y’know? So why not get in on the ground floor?

The PCs are understandably skeptical, but Dan seems sincere and offers up what he knows about the bandits’ operation as a show of good faith. They agree to keep him around, but in the meantime, they tie him back up and get ready to put their plans into action.

First, they agree to flee at the first sign of trouble. To assist with that, the woodsy types set up some traps between the bandit camp and their own camp, in order to slow down any pursuers. Well, they tried to – they all failed their Survival checks to set up effective traps, although I didn’t tell them that. It didn’t matter in the end, anyway.

Next, they waited until nightfall. It was a windy night, imposing a -2 penalty on ranged attacks.* Salar the halfling crept up and spied 7 bandits sleeping around a dying fire, and 2 bandits playing dice near the east watchpost, which presumably held another bandit. After reporting back, Salar helped Mestinous the elven wizard get close enough to use his magic without alerting anyone. The players were all rolling really well on the Stealth checks, not just here but throughout, which really aided them in getting the drop on the brigands.

Mestinous casts sleep on the watchpost, and the guard failed his save. The dicers below fail their Perception checks and don’t hear the guard’s body hit the floor of the platform above. Another sleep spell, and another two failed saves, and they, too, are out. With everyone in the immediate vicinity asleep, the rest of the party moves up.

Now the orgy of bloodletting begins. The wizard, with his elven curve blade, turns out to be scarily good at slitting throats, rolling super-high on his coup de grace damage and dispatching almost half of the sleeping bandits on his own. Satampra takes out most of the rest, without any waking. Salar scales the tree holding the watchpost and slits that guard’s throat. But as he looks out over the rest of the camp, he spots a small A-frame tent closer to the river, and a man pulling on his breeches as he emerges – it’s Happs Bydon!

Up till this point, the PCs had been extraordinarily lucky with their Stealth checks and the bandits’ poor Perception checks and saving throws. Now matters got a little more complicated as Happs picked up his bow and strolled through the camp, hailing another bandit over by the river. As his back was turned, Mestinous and Satampra slay two more sleeping men and Salar, still up in the watchpost, contemplates shooting Happs.

Everyone but Satampra: “Don’t do it!” Satampra: “I think that’s a great idea.” Mestinous: “That’s because it’s insane!”

But Happs does turn around, and after spotting the murderous Mestinous by the fire, he raises the alarm. At that point, several readied actions go off, and Happs gets hit by Salar, Halas the inquisitor, and Iofur’s Storm Burst (Weather domain power). Happs fires off an arrow at Mestinous, but despite his favored enemy (elves) bonus, he misses.

In theory, this was when the party was supposed to run, and Mestinous and Travaris actually do, but everyone else stays to fight. Why flee when things are going so well? Iofur casts entangle, which catches Happs, the bandit by the river, and Kressle as she emerges from the tent, leaving only one bandit free. The last bandit, in the west watchpost, comes down to investigate, but the entangle covers the ford in the river, forcing him to go through it to get to the action.

Mestinous and Travaris realize no one is following them and come back. Happs breaks out of the entangle radius but gets turned into a pin-cushion and then succumbs to an eagle strike (summon eagle to the face!). The entangled bandit spends most of her actions just trying to get free. But Kressle, wearing only her clothes and carrying just her axes, is strong enough to break free of the grasping plants and advances on Halas with murderous intent.

This was the only bit of the combat that got scary for the PCs – Kressle quickly chops down Halas, and follows up by felling Travaris as well as the cleric tries to heal the inquisitor. While the two PCs were still standing, the rest of the group proved ineffective attacking Kressle at range – the wind, firing into combat (no one has Precise Shot), and the angle (she had cover from Halas and/or Travaris) made hitting her nearly impossible, even though she was unarmored. But once she knocked those two into negative hit points, she was a wide open target, and quickly started running out of hit points. Kressle attempted to flee, but a parting shot from Mestinous took her out. Satampra hurried over to her still body and slit her throat, figuring that she was too dangerous to let live.

The three remaining bandits, after seeing Happs and/or Kressle go down, fled into the Narlmarches. Will any of them make it to the Stag Lord’s fort to raise the alarm? Only time will tell…

The party appropriated the brigands’ wagon and their horses, and loaded up the bodies to take them back to Oleg’s for the reward. They found the stolen goods (but no wedding ring for Svetlana) and spent the night searching the camp to ensure that they didn’t miss anything. Finally at dawn, they retreated to their nearby campsite, untied Eagle-Face Dan, and rested for an entire day and night. Happs was still alive, but he was pure defiance and the group wasn’t particularly interested in interrogating him.

Over the next few days, they fully mapped out the hex that contained the bandit camp, and the hex to the northeast that they had passed through on their way here. This all would have been perfect for faerie pranking, but I had forgotten all about Pervalish and Tyg at the time. While in that hex, they had a run-in with an angry owlbear that ate one of their horses, and met a hunter named Piotor who took them to the moon radish patch. Six kobolds were picking radishes in the moonlight, but a sleep spell (and four failed Will saves) and some arrows made short work of them. The party got enough radishes for Svetlana and headed back to Oleg’s.

* I used a weather generator to have the weather for the month prepared in advance.

Next: rain, rain, and more rain.