It's the end of the Plane as we know it and we feel. Fine?
Various groups left the relative safety of our lands to help with the Cataclysm doing what we could to guide it towards an outcome most beneficial to us least harmful to all.
Our group headed directly to Rainbows Landing Waystation to meet up with Lensal Blackbone and work towards returning the Dreadlord to himself from within the Black Pharaoh. This group consisted of:
Driedyn - Neutral High Priest
Sister Mary - Hospitillar
Spark - Sorcerer
Shen Manchu - Sorcerer
Garret - Scout / Sorcerer
Oracle Kiara - Evil High Priestess and Oracle
Kylar - Evil High Priest and (Dread)Knight
Delta - Master Monk / Oracle and party leader
Gob - Warrior
Kyle - Warrior
Kurt - Warrior
Obelisk - Warrior
Lancorrin - Monk (and apparently now 3rd assassin of his House)
Caradac - Scout. Sort of. Ish. Did a lot of scouting and good at it. But. Just but.
Rasc - Sorcerer/Knight?
Malice - Archer Druid
With Sarathan of Darkhome as our occasional guide and main liaison between the Fortunes Keep groups.
Unfortunately I was just too rubbish to take proper notes. As such the below account is based on my memory and will therefore be incomplete. And probably quite bad! And almost certainly overly long (as I just can't shut myself up!) Of course, I'm sure others took notes and will be submitting reports of their own.
Anyway.
On our approach there was some inevitable conflict, most notably including a group of Shadowsfall who appear to have utilised some form of magically trapped panel on the floor, which in the darkness was almost impossible to see until the last moment.
However, we arrived at the Waystation, and there was much rejoicing! Then we found we couldn't get in and the rejoicing faded away (we could see inside it was like the chairs, drinks, food and shelter were actively waving at us). The River People working at the Waystation told us that to enter we had to submit our Tower Key - carelessly we hadn't thought to bring this with us .
Happily, upon checking our collective pouches it was found that our leadership hadn't just sent us off to make camp next to what is simply the nicest Waystation any of us had encountered to date, with both Lazarus Steel and our esteemed Seneschal arriving to pass onto Delta the focal point of all status held within Fortunes Keep the Tower Key! Delta, being a vastly experienced individual took this well in his stride and wasn't at all nervous especially when being told he had to leave it in a box within the Waystation!
Once in we settled down, Sister Mary entering a translation frenzy having found numerous scrolls on the walls. Some interesting points of this Waystation:
There was a soft singing for most of the time we were there. The River People present said it was the Waystation herself singing for us.
While within, no form of attack of casting was successful unless attuned as the River People were (and as we later became to a limited extent).
It's the Waystation that the Tower Leaders go to at each Time of Reckoning, to deposit their symbol (key) that is the focus of their Towers status for it to be taken to the Central Isle. As such during our time there a number of important Towered representatives arrived to deposit their keys.
That evening we found out that at least some of the Shadowsfall are attuned to the building too as they popped in for a chat, then let loose inside, killing at least one member of our group. Although this was Kurt, who seems keen to weaken his spirit strength as quickly as possible (presumably to make his deeds more heroic due to risk? Who knows! Perhaps he feels he can better combat undead if he is nearer their state of being?)
The complete translation which details what you have to do to attune to the Waystation as well as telling the story of the River People, has been included with this report. Worth noting!
We then settled in and waited to see what would happen! Fire? Brimstone? Clashes of massed forces not seen for years? Earthquakes? Killer Hail? Otherwise gentle animal life entering a frenzied bloodlust? Nope it was singing
Well, the River People liked singing and it turned out there was an important song needing to be sung to define the peoples of Orin Rakatha after the Cataclysm. So of course we offered to help and went about talking to as many other tower reps to find what they felt attributes defined their towers best. Then we made up some words, with absolutely no giggling and alcohol involved. We were then instructed to redo some of the words in an attempt to avoid outright war with some of the factions
But we did it I've submitted the song along with this report! Amidst the random bits there is some handy info to be aware of going forward how the other towers view themselves!
So the song was an ongoing thing which wasn't actually sung until right near then end. Lots of others bits happened throughout and to prevent this becoming totally unreadable due to length I'll just quickly summarise most of the rest (not necessarily in order):
We met the Master Of Time and viewed (took part in) the history / story of the Mystics. (Effectively, the Master of Time is the eldest of 4 brothers, the other 3 being The Dark Pharaoh, The Green and The Traveler. Their parents gave themselves up in the distant past to become the Plane of Orin Rakatha itself!) Archivists kept corrupting the story in an attempt to kill us, which is ultimately what set the Master of Time against Shadowsfall Judge Amos.
We killed Shadowsfall Judge Amos. 3 times. In a row. After he surprised us by teleporting in just after we finished a separate fight. Fecker. By the second I was fighting in the front line and by the 3rd Delta was our main healer - it was that draining! But we smashed him! (And I'm fairly certain there may have been some kicking of the body afterwards)
We killed Shadowsfall Judge Hawson. Much more civilised this time as we hadn't chosen to take up his guidance and as a result he had been given a choice of death or exile (I think). He chose death via us tough nut though! He crippled Kylar so viciously the wounds came close to being permanent!
We met a 4th faction of the Shadowsfall The Keepers. They only live (lived now I guess) on the Central Isle, served the Master of Time directly and were seemingly uncorrupted like the rest of the Shadowsfall. Weren't happy with the actions of the other factions of the Shadowsfall and were all in all fairly polite and helpful, if somewhat withdrawn.
We forgot to include the Keepers in the song. Oops!
Did I mention that the Shadowsfall had been corrupted? It came to light that they hadn't actually had the mandate of the Mystics since the last Cataclysm! 500 years of conning an entire plane that's skill that is!
The Dreadlord (yes we woke him up I said this wouldn't be in order!) suggested we should take a side trip and picnic in Maeglor and while there maybe do what we could to break the links between the planes so when things went BANG we could drift apart. So we did. We even brought some souveniers erm locals back together with a promise that we would try to free as many others in the coming years before the Void overwhelmed them and annihilated their souls. or something like that. The important thing is we went there, had a few fights, a couple of chats then we got to SMASH an item (good for the violent types) but we had to SMASH it very carefully / precisely (good for the intellectuals). Who knew that SMASHing could be such an inclusive task!
OK OK so we released our bonds to the Dark Pharoah in the midst of a prolonged fight against some Knights of our Dark Lady and endless waves of various shadowy creatures that seemed to come from the Pharoah. This woke the Dreadlord up sufficiently that he was able to take control, with the Pharaoh sleeping but his powers fully accessible go us! However, Kurt decided he hadn't fallen in combat for a while so made a real effort to go down, losing spirit strength in the process! He's committed, I'll give him that!
The Dreadlord unveiled his plan. Which of course was universally accepted at face value by the party. Sort of. Not entirely. OK there were some dissenters. Curiously (and my memory could be faulty here) I seem to recall that those most vocal were Sorcerers. Red ones in fact. Must be something about the fiery nature of their souls? Or possibly just that sitting around talking wasn't exciting enough while setting the conversation on fire was more exciting? On a side note please don't burn me after reading this!
THE PLAN is that in 7 years we ensure a Good Ascension and that Sir Clavados embody The Traveler in a similar (end) manner as the Dreadlord and the Pharaoh. And ultimately 7 years after that we ensure a Neutral Ascension and a suitable individual of a Neutral bent embody The Green. Malice immediately volunteered for the Neutral embodiment, but not too much was said about that at the time he had to go off and forge some souls in a dark ritual later anyway! In the meantime we needed to put The Green and The Traveler to sleep while we wait for the next Ascension.
To put them to sleep, we had Sister Mary sing them lullabies after giving them warm milk. Sadly they just wouldn't settle so we had to bimble off to nodes dedicated to them on the central Isle and use certain puzzle items we had been given by The Master of Time to summon them to the nodes. Interestingly, only the sphere to which each Mystic was associated could be cast at the relevant node (unless one used a boon we had all been granted by the Mystics previously which frankly I've not brought up before, despite them being of significant use in the Judge Hawson fight amongst others. But hey you want a cohesive report, send scribes on missions!). Which was nice.
At the node of the Traveller we faced Shadowsfall and a decent contingent of Halmadonians (followers of Sir Danus) who were trying to keep us away from a wandering figure (the node) who Healed all who came near him. Unsurprisingly, fighting in such conditions, against Halmadonians who appeared more empowered at that place then we were (constant mass curing) meant this went on for some time. Once we'd won we summoned The Traveler who (being a bit more lucid in that place) agreed to go to sleep.
At the node of The Green we faced Shadowsfall, Pordaradrim, Thissessin and THE GREEN KNIGHT (the Champion of The Green). Having met THE GREEN KNIGHT earlier we were aware that he wasn't a fan of Dark Druids (something about the way he chopped Malice up and threw the remains down a hill) so of course Malice was keen to get in there. The earth quaked, the very ground grabbed at us repeatedly, an evil High Priestess shouted angrily at an over eager Druid and it was all very cramped odd that being in the middle of a Forest. So we won, had a chat, and the Green agreed to go to sleep!
Earlier we went to Faerylund Forest. The Green had been nobbled by some Dark Druids and needed freeing. To get to him we had to pass some tests by some Faery types so the land wouldn't attack us all the time. I'd rather not talk about them too much, it was fairly disturbing although Kurt did step up and volunteer to be a sacrifice type this time he got his throat slit (by extremely eager party members more about this sort of thing later) and fell over! Then we met the Guardian creatures for a Pordaradrim protecting him while he cast. We said sorry when having finished he asked where they were!
Still he was also there to free the Green and seeing as he had no minions any more we agreed to work together us bashing a way through, him following to sort of be a friendly face to the Green! Also there to free the Green was THE GREEN KNIGHT who was chasing some Dark Druids. He chased them right through us, chopped them up then saw Malice. He said he would kill the Heirophant of the Dark Druids while we freed The Green. He left (treeshifted), the various bits of Malice we could find were put back together and we progressed!
Somehow I've missed mentioning the other group of Shadowsfall we met on the Central Isle. They were determined to prevent us going any further so combat ensued. Combat then shook its head and took a step back to see if it was actually going as it appeared. Then it shrugged its shoulders, stepped back in and in a somewhat embarrassed manner finished them off. Geriatric Shadowsfall it was an experience!
We split up one evening and went to have a chat with various representatives of other Towers to see if they would support our supplanting the Shadowsfall as The Law. I went with Delta, Kylar, Kurt, Caradac and Shen to visit the Kalid (other groups went to the Celestial Bureaucracy and The House of the Weaver these three were those with most influence present). There was a True Blood and a Kabati. It was fairly polite, extreme distrust was expressed and arguments given to try and mitigate this we were at a fairly neutral outcome end when a Hepath and some of the former Vanishing Tower attacked us once dealt with we went our separate ways. The overall outcome was that after they had all voted, the other towers agreed to accept us. So a win diplomacy over violence, who'd have thought!
As lets call us administrators of the Cataclysm changes, we came up with a few changes to the Laws. These have already been made public I believe seems we like the Towerless (now Nomads). I'm sure all other Towers/Nations feel the same and we can now all live happily together
We got to pick a Bane (against those that enter our lands) and a Boon (which we benefit from while within our lands) too! Which was nice! I'm sure you've already noticed how much easier casting is now the lands have settled well it will be equally worse for those entering our lands (we liked the idea that to cure a Fatal Disease they would have to cast 6 Heals for example.) I would go on more with the cackling style but we believe all Nations were given the same opportunities to choose so I'm sure other Nations have just as bad (if not worse) Banes for us should we enter their lands!
Oh yes Nations! No more Towers, we're all Nations now, you can't have more than one (no three tower alliances as in the past), size is somewhat limited and you can fight hence the Banes and Boons! But we're still protected from the Mists and Hordelings so once we figure out the exact border line we can stand inside and taunt them with Bacon!
On the list of enemies going forward:
1) We had a visit from some of the former Court of a Thousand Sword bods. Literally bods or Bodies. Our end conclusion was that they were some form of dead / enthralled / possessed victims sent by Calix Wraithspawn to say hi! As a bonus, we got to free Diplomat Kudos, who it seems may have been at the Tower when Calix stopped by / it was destroyed. He fought against us too for some time.
As an aside, it was suggested in a calm and considered manner that perhaps some members of our peoples can be a bit too keen to attack those others who are possessed. When that had no effect it was shouted in a loud, angry and aggressive manner. By a Red Sorcerer no less I might be onto something with the aggressive attitude there you know (reminder no burning me!) This had a better effect but was ultimately after the event. Something for others to consider going forward however as I fully agree with the Shouty Sorcerer some are WAY too keen to batter their friends solely because they are controlled / possessed. There are often other, far less extreme methods that can be used you know!
2) The Kalid! I know shock isn't it! OK so it's not ALL the Kalid probably mainly the Trueblood types. But a group stopped by for a chat (yes we actually chatted and this is separate to the above other chat. Wow we talked to the Kalid on multiple occasions in a single mission!) Over time they managed to express how they accept that the Oracles are real and speak for the Mystics. Their issue was that they just don't trust us. So they tried to steal Oracle Kiara.
Happily having divined their intent fairly early on we were ready for this, although through the use of some form of controlling invocation they nearly managed to get away with her! (Side reference to point 1 above myself and Master Delta managed to restrain her without hitting her once! See it is doable!) However, I wouldn't be surprised if some degree of similar discontent exists and future such attempts may yet be made.
3) The Fortress of Pentarch (formerly the Melnobinaens together with some of the Concilium who have joined them). Umm, we blew up their tower. They don't seem to be very forgiving as yet even pointing out that it was the Wizards Concilium who did most of it, we just sort of triggered the end bit don't seem to go down well.
Anyway my memory is running dry! I may be able to provide some additional points as Master Delta has mentioned he has made a few notes, but in the meantime to summarise:
We went out, had some fights, met some people, had some chats, meddled a lot, forgot some people, remembered and sang about some other people, got carried away changing laws, plotted a bit, laughed a lot, picked up bits of Kurt and stuck them back together again, drank less than expected (it was hot!) but still drank a lot, came home and watched the Plane change around us! And all with only a relatively small amount of OOPS!
Well done all! A cracking group, arguments, debates, fighting and all!
Driedyn, High Priest of the Grey Path.
