He wasn't a rock, he was a rock lobster
Posted by erin at May 12, 2003 02:30 PMI have two warnings for this post:
1. I finally told my mom about this blog, so she might actually start reading it. I told my dad some time ago, but I think he instantly forgot the URL. There's only a 20% chance that my mom will do the same.
2. The following post is about our Dungeons and Dragons game, so anyone who's not interested in reading about it is advised - well, to not read it.
In D&D, in order to cast some spells, one needs a "material component". This is usually some small item, like a plant or stone, that allows you to cast the spell. Since many of the players in our party are not the most experienced, we let slip for a long time that we did not know of, nor did we possess, many of the items needed to cast the most basic of spells. In the party's rule-ignoring heyday, we would make 40 deliciously healing goodberries a night, only figuring out later that the spell could only be cast by Druids (which none of us were), and even then, a Druid can only make about one goodberry a week, or some other ridiculously low and impractical number.
Augury is a pretty good spell, castable by most clerics, wherein a character prays to his or her god (in our case, Hal), and is allowed to ask a yes-or-no question, the effects of which apply to the next ten minutes of game-time. In other words, the player can ask the Dungeon Master stuff like, "If we take the path to the left, will we be in mortal danger over the next ten minutes?" To which the Dungeon Master (Hal) usefully answers, "Yes my child, your lives will be in peril on the left path..." There is a maximum number of times this can be cast in a day, and god doesn't always answer (if the DM fails a dice roll, I think). Augury has gotten us out of trouble countless times in the past... that is, until we realized that the material component for augury is a set of bones inlaid with jewels, or a cross inlaid with gold, or some other similar pricey religious artifact which we did not possess.
Hal gave us a grace period in which we (I) could keep casting the spell. In the meantime, we as a party needed to look for such an item, if we ever wanted to cast augury again. The grace period has long since run out. The party did do some looking for pricey artifacts in a city at one point, but did not find anything worthwhile. We also started running out of money (which is what happens when you buy expensive horses and treat them as disposable).
But our god is a merciful god, a kind god, and a providing god. In Saturday's adventure, we happened across an island of centaurs. The centaurs were kind to us, and happened to be throwing an archery contest. The winner of the contest would get to choose one gift from an array of treasure and valuable items. Fortune smiled upon us, as Thalia won the archery contest by 4 points, narrowly beating out last year's winner.
The treasures were brought before us, and we checked them for magical abilities - as magical items are as rare and valuable as they are useful. We found that we had to choose from a magical potion, magical bracers (leather cuffs for archery), and a gold-inlaid cross, which, although not magical, I could definitely use to cast augury.
Finally! At long last the party would reap the awesome benefits of augury! Wirshen would, once again, be able to speak directly to god! The heavens had opened up and the very hand of god had delivered to this island, untouched by the feet of men for a thousand years, a miraculous treasure to be delivered into the hands of one wayward son -
WHAT??? Thalia chose the bracers?! You've got to be freakin' kidding me!!!
The party tried to calm Wirchen's piteous sighs and whines with the hope that maybe we could negotiate with the half-horse lord of this isle for the cross. You see, the remaining treasures from the contest are given to the centaur king. We tried to strike a trade, bargaining with the king on two occasions, but to no avail. Thalia assured Wirshen that perhaps he could make a rosary out of valuable jewels...
Between negotiations, Wirshen sent an extra prayer to his god to soften the horse-lord's heart. God answered back, "I sent your friend's arrows straight and true!"
The next island our party set foot on, we met two weird sisters wearing veils. We were having a hard time determining if they were friend or foe. Our mages had not taken any "Know Alignment" or "Detect Evil" spells, and neither had I. This would have been an ideal situation to cast augury, as it turned out that the weird sisters were gorgons. We foolishly spent the night on their island and sort of forgot to tell them that we were sleeping in the woods.
They destroyed our boat in the night, then became hostile in the morning. The last thing Wirschen remembers clearly is casting "Know Alignment" on one of them. She turned out to be lawful evil. Then she lifted the veil from her face and Wirschen and Wong were turned into stone.
What happened next? Well, I am not at liberty to say. What can a statue see?
Comments Individual Archive Index
May 12, 2003 03:54 PM, Sam said:
Actually, they didn't destroy the boat. They pushed it out to sea the moment we got there. So we were kinda screwed either way.
And it's true that you'll be able to make a 1000 gp rosary out of the gems we found :P
May 12, 2003 04:07 PM, Erin said:
That is true, but statue-me doesn't know that.
:P'
May 12, 2003 04:28 PM, Sam said:
Wait, so your character has started posting to your blog now? Between this and jerksquad, you may yet have MPD in your future.
May 12, 2003 09:03 PM, Kerry said:
Something about this party and clerics getting turned to stone...
ps- I know Celdrix was a druid, but that is a a cleric sub-class in 2nd edition, so same difference.
May 12, 2003 11:13 PM, Agnieszka said:
Perhaps the DM feels that there is a pleasant frisson in the party not being able to stop to rest and heal.
May 13, 2003 12:34 AM, Maggie said:
Celdrix was turned back to flesh, but now his hand is chopped off and he's stuck inside of a jewel. Poor Celdrix.
May 13, 2003 01:43 AM, thecomicman said:
to be fair, the elven ranger won the archery contest, and the elven ranger has no need for a gold cross. but hey, what good would it have done? you got turned to stone only a day later. but Thalia can still shoot arrows better than anyone else.
also, it seems my mage-thief'll have to step up to the plate and stop sucking. but Reynaldo has already helped the party out with his knowledge of Greek mythology. he's so smart.
May 13, 2003 01:44 AM, thecomicman said:
and i agree, poor Celdrix. man's gonna be very unhappy when he comes out the gem.
May 13, 2003 02:29 AM, Agnieszka said:
I think the implication of Erin's post was that if the rosary had been in the party's possesion, the cleric would have cast augury, and would have known that the weird sisters were deadly and everyone could haver run away.
May 13, 2003 09:24 AM, Erin said:
AK got it on the nose!
Mostly I'm teasing Thalia in this post, because she did exactly what Wirshen would have done, were he in her position. But I thought Thalia was better aligned than that...
Also, I'm more worried about OCD than MPD. A writer must write in many voices, after all...
TCM, you were the whiniest whiner ever in that game, "I'm so sick of this boat! I wanted an overland adventure! I hate Wirshen! Blah blah blah blah blah..." Although you got yours when you had five hit points and took a five-point blow. That was awesome, and by awesome I mean totally sweet.
May 13, 2003 01:17 PM, ET said:
No, no - the funny part was that after getting healed up to 5 points, he had a chance to heal up to his max of 7 points and turned it down, only to get hit with 5 points of damage shortly thereafter.
Also, this scenario where Wong and Wirschen keep getting taken out of the game action is getting absurd.
May 13, 2003 02:06 PM, Halifax said:
Shhh! Don't tell Erin's mom that Erin got "stoned".
May 13, 2003 02:36 PM, Sam said:
In character, I don't know that good alignment has anything to do with the decision. Augury would serve the group well, but shooting well also does so.
Plus, needing an extremely expensive item to "expedite" prayers to God, while appropriate for a Catholic priest, seems really suspect to Thalia, who isn't all that religious to begin with.
Also, as a good aligned character, I'd be more inclined to distrust Wirschin. He hasn't been the trustiest boy scout in the past.
Knowing that the gold cross was necessary for augury is more out of game knowledge than in-game knowledge.
May 13, 2003 03:31 PM, Erin said:
I would support that Thalia would realistically turn down the cross because she's of a different religion - that actually makes a lot of sense.
I could see why Eorl wouldn't try to help Wirchen whenever possible, even if it benifitted the party, because of the whole Baptism incident.
May 13, 2003 05:40 PM, N. said:
Eorl is presently LAUGHING his ASS off, I might add. After rolling out of his feather bed and padding downstairs to a delicious breakfast of cheese pastry and cappuccino - BAM! there it was, right on the front page of The Centaur Plains-Dealer - PROBLEM PRIEST PETRIFIED! He nearly did a spit take. The entire wait staff - including the wine steward - had to be enlisted to keep him from dancing on the table and shouting, "serves the bastard right!"
Eorl was only subdued when the innkeeper arrived to gently remind him of his outstanding accounts. For some reason this suddenly reminded Eorl of pressing matters else-where.
May 14, 2003 11:58 AM, Maggie said:
I think what should be looked at is as follows:
cross - non magical, just expensive
arm thingies - magicalSo, take the magic item, and find the other party who has so much money it's ridiculous! Anyway, as a reminder, you all have those gems that Gur gave ya, so you should be able to sell those and obtain a proper cross or something.
May 14, 2003 01:22 PM, Erin said:
No, see, the last town we looked in didn't have an item even close to what we needed.
We have been selling gems, but as I've said, we're nearly out of money.
Also: We are currently lost in some Odyssy rip-off. It only took Odysseus, what, 13 or 20 years to get home? I figure it'll take our characters at least twice that amount of time to find the other party.
Good plan, Mags.
May 15, 2003 03:35 AM, Halifax said:
And look how many people made it back alive from the Oddysey...
May 18, 2003 01:27 PM, thecomicman said:
while true that i whine like a fine bottle of Dom Perignon, it was only because i don't like being lost at sea on the third (possibly fourth) bloody raft we've built, only to land first on an island of Gorgons, then on an island of Bachanalians (sp?). luckily, i recognized the second ones for what they were and we got the hell out of Dodge, over Jean-Claude's protests. Frenchie probably just wanted to shtup 'em.
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