Dramatis Personae
Beltin (Aasimar Dirge Bard/Cleric 7). Undead master, neutral, only character with a non-negative charisma. He started with four Azanti bloody skeleton archers and a fast zombie griffin under his control. He seeks the mad loot and magics. He joined up with Glira and the Desert Wind in Bard's Gate as a "hireling whose job it is to put our deeds to epic song."
Bol (Tiefling Vivisectionist Rage Chemist/Barbarian 7). Natural attack based abomination that was summoned from the Abyss. He met the party on the road to the Camp and joined up with them because of the Desert Wind; they have a history as rivals apparently. He seeks to steal the power of Tsar for his own demonic master.
Phil (player kept his sheet so his character gets to keep his name; Oread Ranger/Empyreal Sorc 7). Character was half done when we started, so don't know much. He seems to be aiming to be one of those "actively neutral" people, so we'll see how that works out and develops.
Glira Cross ( Human Gunslinger/Magus 7). Played by a guy. Badass mercenary who takes no shit. The Desert Wind respects her strength so they decided to set off together to the Desolation to do some free-lance work. Strictly in it for the money.
Al Kedish Vin, the Desert Wind (Tiefling Weapon Master Fighter/Kensai Magus 7). Essentially a caricature of a medieval Muslim holy warrior. He seeks to spread the word of the prophet and feels the need to be an ass to everyone he meets, as he does have 5 charisma. He constantly mocks Glira for being a woman and acting like a man. He seeks greater challenges worthy of his skill, so he has decided to come to the Desolation and Tsar.
Fitting right in at the Camp, Session 1 - 4/12/14
Upon arriving in town the group quickly dispatched Gurg, the crazed, heavily wounded Hill Giant barbarian, without taking any damage whatsoever due to the Desert Wind's 30ish AC and Crane Wing (using pre-nerf version). Poor Gurg even got souped up with extra levels and Impact on his club.
Upon striking the killing blow, Bol consumed most of Gurg's flesh and then Beltin raised him as a Bloody Skeleton; Gurg gets to keep his club in undeath, but lost his Decanter of Endless Grain Alcohol. Bol seems willing to put it to good use.
After seeing Gurg go down like a punk, one of the townies drew the short straw among his friends and was pushed out to get some money from the group by offering a guided tour. Before he could speak, the Desert Wind would keep interrupting him and he and Glira tried to extort the man for "saving his town." The man got flustered and then Bol, with his massive strength, clamped down on the man's shoulder and asked his friends if they were being bothered.
I deemed Bol's strength sufficiently high to break the man's collar bone. Now crying and rolling on the ground, the Desert Wind was disgusted by the man's weakness and went to kick him in the ribs. Instead he missed that part and kicked the man hard enough in the face to break his neck.
Time in Camp: 5 minutes. Self-defense kills: 1. Murders: 1.
With that issue taken care of and most of the locals still out of sight, they spied the Sip of Blood and decided to go in. Upon ordering a beer they discovered that gold was not the currency, so after being an ass to Lucky Fjork, the Desert Wind departed with Glira to do some money changing. Bol made a bit of an ass of himself by pouring himself a beer in the meantime, but Beltin smoothed things over and made a friend of Fjork, as long as he is willing to pay for any damages caused by Bol and pay his tab.
As Beltin has an item that gives comprehend languages, the wenches did not need to translate and he found that Fjork is surprisingly well spoken. Bol also made a deal with Fjork to sell him hang over remedies (some sort of alchemical item) at the rate of 2 remedies for 1 bit; I don't think the player thought that through, but then again I don't know how much it costs him to make them.
Meanwhile the Desert Wind and Glira make their way to the blacksmith. They see some recent construction off to the side of the shop labeled "Money Changer" and go inside; with the recent influx of people to the Camp the Usurer has created a separate area and hired a townie and 2 mercs from Bard's Gate to do the money changing so that he can work in peace. The DW thought a rate of 4:1 with a 1:1 return was bullshit and demanded a 3:1 buy in, threatening the clerk and calling him a thief. The clerk explained that was too bad and one of the guards moved in to subdue the angry customer.
Instead the DW crit him dead with an Intensified Shocking Grasp via Scimitar. The other guard seeing this ran, but Glira shot him in the knee-cap, leaving him to crawl away instead. During this exchange the sound of blacksmith work ceased, but only Glira noticed and she didn't care. As the DW made good of his threat and cut off the clerk's hand (because "that's what happens to thieves where I'm from"). Glira took the initiative and robbed the desk of about 4,500 bits, and then they walked out.
Time in Camp: 30 minutes. Self-defense kills: 1. Murders: 2. Maimings: 2
Immediately before them was an irritated Usurer who promptly Power Word Stunned Glira for 7 rounds, took back his bits, and had a conversation with the DW about how things work in the Camp. He then offered him the new rate of 10:1 and told him he was lucky he didn't charge him for the townie and the guards. DW made a further ass of himself with a negative Diplomacy roll, trying to get the Usurer to hire him as a guard and give a better exchange rate.
Glira got a rather large bonus by actually apologizing, so the Usurer decided to keep her at the standard rate and told her that if she and her group survive a few weeks he may have work for people with their talents. He then turned DW's 33 gold into 3 bits and did the 4:1 exchange to give Glira 25 bits.
Hearing the gun shot, Beltin went to investigate and encountered the Usurer outside, putting up a sign saying "See Blacksmith for Money Changing." Beltin cured the injured guard, but the bleeding to death townie was just shut in the shop, presumed to be dead. After a pleasant exchange, Beltin got his bits including enough to pay off the debt to Fjork.
Back in the tavern, Beltin learning about the players in town, the destruction of the crusader camp*, and about Gurg and his latest job (protecting a Bard's Gate caravan heading north through the Desolation), he and Glira went to negotiate at the Bard's Gate embassy. They found the man forlorn and pretty drunk, but got the details that if they found out what happened to the caravan, as well as cargo and survivors they would get paid. Quest accepted.
After that everyone but Bol got rooms at the Bender Bros Inn. Originally I had decided that one of the misc adventure guests would be the victims of the Bender Bros that night, but the DW being the DW commented how he liked how the lesser races knew their place serving the higher races at dinner. Yeah... he was then the only one to fail the DC 22 Fort save to avoid being sick from the spoiled food, as per the Benders' strategy for isolating "guests."
The party failed to spot the trapdoors in their rooms and went to bed. DW got sick in the night as planned and went to the privy, sword in tow just in case. As he was doing his business he noticed it suddenly got super quiet (but his Spellcraft wasn't high enough to recognize Silence) and then a stab in the back of the neck later and rolling a 1 against the DC 12 death attack, he was paralyzed and got to watch as one of the smiling Benders finished him.
Cut next morning. Beltin asks where DW went to one of the Benders. Smiling and sweeping up, the Bender explains that he left early, muttering something about revenge. Huh, well that fits him and he was an ass thought the party, so they left into the Desolation without him. They were pleasantly impressed with the Bender Bro Inn and the hospitality, so they are sure to visit again when they need to relax and recover from their time in the wastes.
Cue out of game laughter. Glira was excluded from the following and the Bender Bro exchange as the player had to leave early.
Following the road north, the party got cocky as they found nothing but the desolate wind (and maybe the sounds of screams on it far away), but eventually a Bone Storm happened which promptly wrecked Phil, but their skeletal Gurg did a decent job acting as cover and digging them some impromptu shelter, and then Beltin made the survival check to know about wet cloth. Phil would have died on his own, but the party made it through alive.
A bit later down the road the party encountered 3 of the spiders from the Ashen Wastes; they did minimal damage and went down easily, but unfortunately for Phil he failed against poison: 5 rounds into the poison duration he finally ended it but was down 11 strength. He got 6 back from Beltin. About of a third of the way to the crossroads, visibility suddenly improves. Off to the east they see buzzards circling, then visibility drops. They decide to investigate.
Phil hops on the zombie griffin with Beltin and Bol flies along side and they eventually encounter A1, Screamer Sign. They notice that the people are very freshly dead (maybe those were the screams they thought they heard) and they see that the wounds appear self-inflicted. They notice the tracks of a survivor and follow for a while, but after it becomes clear it is banking away from the road, they head back as Gurg and the 4 non-flying minions that were left on the road, plus these guys obviously weren't from the caravan. So screw them.
1 Casualty: The Desert Wind. Cause of death: Rudeness, 5 charisma, and the Bender Brothers.
*The Crusader Encampment - Rumors and DM notes
There will also be talk around the town of the fate of the first official group of Muir/Thyr crusaders; it seems that their leader was none too impressed with the iron bits currency in the Camp, and was even less so when the Usurer offered him the special crusader rate of 7 gold per bit. The crusaders set up their own camp a few miles away from THE Camp, but it seems it didn't end up so well for them. Some sort of massive creature (almost like a level 16 Eidolon, wink wink) from the Desolation slaughtered most of them, leaving the survivors to limp back under the Usurer's protection. To show he had no hard feelings the new crusader rate was adjusted to 8 gold per bit... which was readily accepted.
