Session 48: "Gee, Brain. What will we do tonight?"

[demonlei]

"The same thing we do every night Pinky..."

OK, we need a plan. If we can agree on one here, we can get cracking on it next game session. (Kiyoshi is technically outside the planning room at the moment, but I presume it would be easy enough to fetch & brief him).

www.geocities.com/wheresmy6bucks/Jun2206.htm

Us: 5 party members, 1 useless NPC, 1 competent NPC, 1 anti-anti-magic field medal.

Them: 50 or 100 or 1,000 dragon cultist guards, 1 secretery who may or may not be a dragon cultist, 1 dragon cultist priest/nobleman, 1 evoker lich possibly in his home dimension, 1 enchanter lich who Valletta hopes has gone home for the week.

Valletta is strongly inclined to focus on Sygnus for now, given that he poses an immediate threat to Uzinia's remaining guards and their families. It's likely just a matter of time before he locates the Uzinian Guard Safehouse and completes Project: Uzinian Guard Genocide. Then we'd have to face an army of undead Uzinian Guards. Woo.

Now that Valletta knows the city guards and their lord worship Siliskor, she no longer has any reservations about killing them if need be. Whether they are "evil" or not, by willingly serving Siliskor they are an immediate threat to the continued survival of life on this continent. Above all, Siliskor must be stopped.

[wardragon]

As I see it, we have two potential methods of dealing with the AMF. 1) Waylay a number of guards equal to (number of PCs minus 1), get us all amulets (except Zal, damnit), and go after Heath, then the lich. Or 2), head immediately to kill Jakkon and hope it collapses with his perma-demise.

[demonlei]

Problem 1: Need more shiny black dragon medals.

Possible solution: Either Valletta or Seonia could don our one medal, use Valletta's Wand of Expeditious Retreat (I wish that wasn't self-only) to increase speed and Wand of Disguise Self to look like an Uzinian guard, and lure some dragon cultists to the city wall, since they seem eager to chase fleeing enemies that far. Then the others ambush 'em.

(This is assuming no NPCs are eager to volunteer to be bait. Hm, why wouldn't an NPC happily say "Sure I just met you guys 10 minutes ago but I trust you with my life! You're sparkly!")

Problem 2: Need Uzinian Heirloom Portal Key Thingy

Gotta review the logs and double-check what Seonia, WD, and Victar would know. Or alternatively, get a divination either by Valletta or in another city. Third option: take Lord Heaton alive and question him under Valletta's zone of truth (probably the most difficult).

Problem 3: Lord Heaton Must Die

The bastard.

Given all the guards in the city, we'll either need a mass riot to distract them or stealth (wand of disguise self for Valletta/Seonia, maybe invisibility for Zalajin, maybe one of the Uzinian guards knows some disguise tips and can make Perun look like a fishwife?). Lord Heaton himself is almost certainly a spellcaster, given his excellent manicure. Bruiser types tend to get more callouses.

Problem 4: Sygnus Must Die

And he's an evoker bastard. How screwed are we?

Problem 5: They Might Be On To Us, Dammit.

We played the role of a dupe well enough to walk out of the city alive... once. But the moment anyone notices some dragon cultist guards are missing (because we yoinked their medals)...

Also there is a fair chance Sygnus' lacky has reported our visit to his boss by now. (Sygnus: "WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOU JUST LET THEM WALK OUT OF THE CITY ALIVE???" *kills Lord Heaton* *animates Lord Heaton's corpse*)

Problem 6: Even With A Medal I Can't Use Summon Monster V, VI, or VII in this Damn Anti-Magic Field.

Well it's not really a problem. It just pisses me off. ^_-

[demonlei]

Regarding Jakkon...

If we do go after him and leave the Uzinian guards (and Vincent!) to Sygnus' and Heaton's tender mercies (Valletta feels that would be heartless, but the world is at stake and she will accede if it's the majority choice), Jakkon is very likely to have a copy of that anti-magic field over his demiplane. Without more anti-anti-magic medals we would be badly handicapped.

Also, there's no guarantee the anti-magic field on the city will poof with Jakkon's destruction. He could have made it long-lasting or permanent somehow.

[drkultra]

Problem 1: Waylaying guards is easy. We lead them to an alley and Kiyoshi does the rest.

Problem 2: We can do that one first thing once we get out of the city.

Problem 3 & 4: Evokign just means a lot more Ref saves for us, Perun can sacrifice his Melee power to give the most needed in that area a +6 to it for 24 hours. Heaton at best is a Noble/Cleric at worst he is a straight cleric.

Problem 5: Jakkon can be dealt with easily once we have the most combat oriented ones out of the way (Sygnus is the last one, Abujuration, Enchantment, and Transmutation arent as powerful on combat, but I would like to leave Enchantment for last)

Problem 6: Kiyoshi is an Emo samurai, and that gets in my nerves >_>

[demonlei]

Couple more thoughts...

I asked our Evil GM, and he ruled that the anti-anti-magic medals have no intrinsic monetary value and can be worn by Zalajin, same as his hobo rags. (Quote: "Plot device item. I'll allow it.")

If Valletta gets the chance she wants to cremate Lord Heaton and scatter the ashes so none of his cultist friends can resurrect him. The bastard.

I'm guessing we will want to take action before dawn, but if anyone has specific spells in mind for Valletta to pray for when dawn comes, please let her noob player know.

[muk1000]

Sygnus does not worry me very much. Yes, he can deal a lot of damage in a very short amount of time, but if we can keep the healing constant and make sure he doesn't get a chance to focus on one of us, we'll be fine.

I do wonder what type of cohorts he'll have, though.

Heaton should be even less troublesome. He is not, as far as I know, a BBEG. ^_^