Scroll to the bottom for a short summary of game session

Meta notes: I am not using the standard pathfinder setting so while I stole the term “Starstone” from the standard pathfinder mythos, it is not as described in the standard lore

Pre-game

As promised, Gareth did some praying while Bedip and Trina were off trying to get to her homeland. (See last paragraph of the previous session log for details on what they found). His praying involved some divination spells as well as fasting and praying at a shrine to Iomedae in the Paladin’s tower. He reports the following:

He saw several times, a dark stone, pitted and rusty. He believes this is the Starstone, an object of pure metal that fell from the heavens. It played a roll in Iomedae’s ascension to god-hood but is holy to all but the most evil of the gods. Unfortunately, it is also behind the shadow curtain now.

Gareth also claims that the party is not worthy of the crown at this time but does note that’s its powers can be separated by dividing it into its constituent parts, when and if the time comes.

Each of you should have a player-only note as part of this page. Let me know if you can’t see it.

Game Session

Gareth and the order of paladins were very thankful for the party’s timely aid and provide both gear at not cost and served as brokers with other sources of gear (for a big discount). Equipped, including with mounts and even a squire for Avondale, a paladin who joined the party at their request, the group headed out.

They made good time through the still settled lands but with the shadows only 70 miles away now, they soon came to abandoned farms and towns. They wisely skirted a swam of what sounded like wasps. They camped for the night in an abandoned farmhouse near the road where a hungry green fog set after them, a foe they dispatched without too much trouble.

The next day, they were assaulted by a warped bear- much larger than usual and with strange growths. The party also encountered a dryad near Ubeck, pleading for help relocating from the encroaching fog. It seems she might have tried to use some of her magical allurements but was unsuccessful. The party did promise to aid her on their return.

At the city of Ubeck, they found the walls and buildings in good shape- no sign of battle or fire, but abandoned. The castle tower, the count’s home, had strange iron protrusions ringing its top.

They road to the city gatehouse and found the gate open. Just inside, they heard a heavy, shambling creature which turned out to be a beast, taller than a man, looking like it was stitched from many bodies. They dispatched this creature without too much trouble but farther into the town, they catch a glimpse of another such creature (at this time, it does not appear to have noticed the party).

Some of the last refugees they passed on the way to Ubeck stated Count Steen was going to fight to the end. He swore he would not be the one to lose a 1000 year old patrimony. The count, who goes by his first name Francis, even with commons, also claimed he had some sort of method to battle the forces of shadow, although none could say what that was other than that it has something to do with the strange metal protrusions from the count’s tower.

Second Session

As the party began to scout the town they found a weapon smith who was a bit of an alchemical genius, with unfortunately for him, an over-fondness for explosives. Blasty, as they called him, had set some traps against the golems and prepared a number of other explosives from grenades to a large 40 pound bomb. After agreeing to work together, he gave them shelter in his armory where they passed the night. He also gave them an adamantine blanch that coated their weapons with a one-use adamantine resistance penetration.

The next day they tried to go as stealthily as possible to the count’s castle (within the city walls). They were just short of the plaza before the castle when a golem sensed them. Blasty set the 40 point bomb he had been lugging, destroying the golem, most of four houses and himself.

The roar sent other golems charging toward the party. They just managed to close the castle portcullis before the golems arrived, also setting some charges outside the gate and destroying a number of golems.

In the castle keep, Blondie found a very large golem to be alert. This was the count, turned into a golem himself (along with many other body parts). The golem leaped down the stairs partway (damaging himself) and charged out of the keep. Blondie had intentional acted as bait and he lead the golem to his companions.

While Blondie and the others battled the golem, Dagda went invisible and made his way to the tower top, where Maria’s locate object spell had indicated the staff lay. After a little hunting around, Dagda found the staff in a cabinet with a human impaled on it (possibly the person who turned the Count into a golem).

Dagda recovered the staff and bolted down the stairs in time to give it to Maria during the battle.

Thanks the mirror-image spell that Maria placed on everyone and Blasty’s grenades, whose fire did not harm the golem but slowed it, the party was able to ultimately kill the golem, although it was a much more difficult creature than the other golems. (Ref note, I did not introduce Blasty for the purpose of giving you a fire attack— he was just comic relief. But if you did not have the fire to slow him, his two attacks probably would have killed one of you because if 2 blows hit in one round, there was extra electrical damage.)

Once the count was slain, Iomedae blessed first Maria (who had called on her aid and held her staff) and then the rest of the party.

See the forums for notes on your Mythic Ascension.

Pre-game

Angel Eyes has a new contract and convinced the party to help him out with it, since it seemed to be a bit of old-fashioned looting of abandoned buildings, instead of an assassination contract.

On the way there, the group dodged a city patrol that appeared to be press-ganging folks for an invasion of the shadow lands. Scooting down a side street, the group was about to head back toward’s Angel Eye’s tower of loot when most of you noticed smoke in the direction of the temple to Iomedae. Blondie was pretty sure it was the temple itself on fire.

With little discussion, the party decided to race towards the temple. At the corner of the plaza, the group sees:

• The chapter house that is part of the Temple’s walled lot is in full flame.
• The pillared temple itself is damaged: the roof is partly down, the cult statue in the middle is on its back in pieces, several pillars are down and others have their drums out of line.
• The temple hearth used to stand on a platform on the front steps. The main slab on which an “everburning fire” is missing. THere’s a good chance the cracked stone slab sticking out of the burning chapter house is the hearth slab.
• The statue of King Jormund, that used to stand on a pedastel in the middle of a fountain at the center of the plaza is standing on top of Iomedae’s state, clawing it with its hands
• Five creatures have Father Gareth and 4 Paladins ringed between the temple and the burning chapter house
• A sixth creature, larger than the others is perched, unmoving, on top of the temple

The creatures are about 7 feet tall, very solidly built, winged. Their skin looks to be a mottled grey-red. They have long, curled horns on the head, and viciously clawed hands and feet. The one on the roof is noticeably larger, with a long chin spike. Except for the roof top one, their eyes glow red.

There are wide roads running into the middle of each side of the square plaza. Aside from the temple, the other structures (a merchant’s tower with walled plot, a ruined tower that has long been a pile of rubble, and on the fourth side, a large stone inn (only part of which is in use), are unaffected by the turmoil.

If multiple players have the oracle level, while they will be babbling the same language they will be doing so essentially unintelligibly until they have lots of practice (i.e., some distant future). Therefore, oracles cannot use the language to communicate with each other in battle.

The Session

The party members each woke this morning from a powerful dream. At first details were hazy but as the morning wore on, they remembered more until just before the battle started, they could recall the full dream.

The party let the paladins focus on defending Gareth and occupying most of the creatures, who turned out to be demons. Instead, they turned their attention to the king’s statue, which seemed to be trying to excavate the torso of the fallen statue of Iomedae.

Angel Eyes and Maria. destroyed the King’s statue, The demon on the roof then flew down and pulled a silver crown from the ruins of the torso of Iomedae’s statue. Though the crown burned the demon’s hand, it seemed determined to carry it off but was unable too, thanks to a chaotic fight that involved the entire party, a lucky Command spell from Dagda followed by a mage hand by Maria on the crown, some strategic webs from Maria, some brave hand-to-hand from a grapple from one of the paladins, some telling arrows from Blondie, Dagda’s use of an epic brilliant sword and the aid of another paladin, Trina, who turned out to be a young silver dragon.

The demons the party fought were stone demons with the one going for the crown an especially potent one (you might even call him mythic.)

Just as they dispatched the demon, Blondie, Dgda, Angel Eyes and Maria started to experience a vision that began with a voice saying “Do you want to see” and a vision from afar of the curtain of shadow that has been slowly creeping from the east. Accompanying the vision was a piercing headache, which, as the vision progressed, caused temporary and then real damage. Next they saw Iomedae standing by the shadow curtain gesturing for them to enter, then their vision passed through curtain without Iomedae following and the voice (not Iomedae’s repeating “Do you want to see?”. Dagda healed himself and lost the vision.

The vision continued into the shadow desolation where vegetation and creatures are warped to a place of shadows so thick, it was like fog. Here Maria passed out and also lost the vision. Only Angel Eyes and Blondie say the final piece:

A demon was caged in iron, some of which pierced its body. It was alive though judging from the ichor that seeped from its wounded and feed a vast mat of slime crawling with vermin, it had been there for ages. The voice asked again “Do you want to see?” They realized now that, though they could understand the voice in the vision, it was speaking some alien, ancient language unlike any they had ever heard (not celestial). The two remaining party members said yes and in return gained one level of oracle and the curse that they speak in this mysterious language during combat. While they would be able to understand anyone speaking this language, they cannot understand any other form of communication and they cannot understand each other (because they can’t speak it very well at this time.)

After reviewing Maria, the party questioned Trina and discovered she was sent by her father from the west. The party decided it would be worth learning more about her father, especially since it seems that he figured in a dream that Angel Eyes experienced the night before.

Bedip and Trina flew off to find her father. They returned 6 days later, both exhausted because they did not find her ancestral home: when she first flew from the west to your land, she flew through a curtain of shimmering rain. At the time, she thought it was just a rain squall. When she tried returning, she found no island and about where the rain was, she saw endless ocean and had a sending from her father saying “You are of this world now.” Based on this, she now wonders if she was raised in the heavens and that her parents might be some sort of demi-god, angel, or the like. She does have an older brother whom she last saw 20 years ago.

Iomedae’s Sword
The Crown of Iomedae

Just some quick notes on where things are:

• The Temple to Iodemae gave you a heal scroll to cure the Guardian Naga Minolus and Dagda did a bang-up job of casting it, despite it being far above his current Inquisitor abilities
• On LInko’s corpse, you found a scrap of paper that proved to be a key code for deciphering a block of text you found on a scroll you found earlier on LInko’s body (at the time you killed him).
• Father Gareth has been very helpful but he seems to be withholding some information from you (various sense motive checks)
• The black pit apparently contains something called the Tears of Asmodeus. Apparently, these are large, glassy black objects (Minolus said they were too large to move) that are a focus of Asmodeus’ evil. You don’t detect any evil in the pit but Minolus claims that is because there are magic seals over them and they are also buried under lots of dirt and debris.
• Minolus agreed with your suggestion to wall in the passages that lead to the mummy chambers. He has the kobolds working on this.
• The kobold Bedip is currently traveling with you. He seems honorable (for a kobold) and not too whiny. You don’t detect any evil on him. While he doesn’t do a lot of damage, he is well armored and has proven very useful in holding the line with Clem.
• On your request, Gareth asked an order of knights to send some support to Minolus. Two paladins and some men-at-arms showed up and promised that the order would maintain a guard for now in the pit.
• Bedip showed you some of the other passages near the Black Temple that lead to the sewers, where you found signs of ghouls and other creatures. You followed these and defeated many skeletons, ghouls and one half demon minotaur. Loot from the Minotaur battle.

Gareth has translated the scroll. You can find what it says in the forums (ask any questions about it there). The forum post is here.

He is reluctant but he eventually allows you to copy the code from the Necronomicon and explains how it works. (It’s a form of a Vigenere polyalphabetic encryption.) The most direct way to use it is to have the encoding phrase but there are other ways to decode it and (from the forum post) you do have enough information to actually crack it, if you are clever. (You don’t need to actually do the work of cracking the code, you just need to tell me how your character would approach it. You might be able to use some knowledge checks for some hints.)

Note: Suchet has the royal background, which as a reminder, was available to all of you. One thing to remember about the royal family is that it is very large and other than the palace guard, every duty in the palace is carried out by a royal from the actual king and queen to the librarian, cook, and stable master. Suchet is also a kineticist from the Occult Adventures supplement, which is also available to everyone. I’d also recommend checking out the Advanced Class Guide which offers another take on multi-classing that is far more powerful than the standard method. Both of those guides are available at no cost as web pages on the Paizo site (or a $10 pdf download).

The party had reason to believe there was an evil temple beneath the city and the party was determined to find it. On the advice of Gareth of the temple to Iomedae (LG Goddess of valor, rulership, justice, honor) where they sold the necronomicon, the party planned a return to the dungeons beneath Tavia, but first they wanted to expand their ranks,

At the temple, they hired a warrior named Clem, to put a little stiffness into their front line. They also met Magda, a person tainted by demonic blood but one who seemed especially keen to fight demons. Finally, the temple priest Gareth seemed all to eager to push a young princess, Suchet, on them. Something a refugee from the royal palace, ostensibly for her ability to sit things alight with the flick of a finger, but perhaps more because she was a moodier than usual teenage, Suchet had come to rest in the temple.

Geared up and with a much larger group, the party headed back to the ruined tavern where there was a chasm that lead to the underground passage. Here, they found 20 of the city guard and stern warning from Captain Dellina that looting ruins without a permit was forbidden.

Legalities aside, when one of the guardsmen crawled from the chasm stiff and nearly frozen with some sort of poison, and the next bunch refused to enter, Dellina took the better part of valor and offered the party 50 gold per cockatrice beak, which Maria negotiated to 80.

Below, they found the 3 cockatrice and 2 ogres that had caused them trouble before. It proved a long fight against the cockatrices but the ogres fell swiftly since they had to squeeze through passage that were narrow for a hulking ogre. Everyone was duly impressed by Suchet’s fist’s of fire and even Blondie was thinking of a change of profession especially when his arrows proved much more useful for pock-mocking walls than skewering cockatrice.

Clem was the only one affected by the cockatrice paralyzation and he was quickly cured with fresh cocktrice blood. Angel Eyes ran the three cockatrice beaks and some blood (to cure the paralyzed guard) to Captain Dellina and she gave the party a bonus- paying 300g.

Pushing on the party found a natural passage that lead to another section of worked stone. (Note: we did not play that part but as part of that exploration, you did come across some side passages that you did not explore. Linko Phan almost certainly came from one of these side passages, not the path you have been using so there are clearly other ways into the underworld.)

In this section of the dungeon, you found a large circular room with a huge pit in the middle and side chambers. The place was strewn with fresh corpses: human guards wearing the livery of the Phan merchant family and kobolds, some of which were kobolds of unusual size (KUS). After taking out a few kobolds and Magda’s tango with a mummy he unearthed in a sarcophagus, the party came to terms with the kobolds who had Linko Phan pinned in a side chamber. A kobold was able to force a mummy back into its crypt with a holy symbol.

Linko, as it happens, was Angel Eyes’ assassination mark. While Angel Eyes does not know for sure that the assassination contract was a result of the Linko dealing with the dark arts, it seems quite likely because by all appearnces, Linko was in the dungeons to create a temple to Asmodeus.

Pretending to be a rescue party, Angel Eyes tricked Linko into coming out. While a powerful wizard with some fairly strong body guards, Linko and his surviving companions were very injured by the earlier fight with the naga and the kobolds. Linko and his guards were swiftly dispatched by the party.

It turns out that the kobolds serve a guardian of this place: Minolus, naga. The pit is an ancient source of evil and Minolus guards it against dark forces, which in this case turned out to be Linko Phan.

Game session stopped here since it was late. We’ll discuss loot and follow-up by email or forum, and I’ll try to remember to finish this thread out after the email discussion.

After finding a fellow adventurer in the scrapper camp- a haunted Oracle named Mersalene with a thirst for vengeance, the party went back after the half demon ogre. They made short work of the ogre’s goblins but fought a very close battle with the ogre and his hell hound, with Mersalene a breath from death, Angel Eyes knocked unconscious and the others badly wounded. Maria saved the day by heroically moving within reach of the ogre to figure out how to get Mersalene’s healing wand to work and using it several times on Angle Eyes.

They found an iron chest with the key on the ogre. In the chest was a large quantity of copy, a fair amount of gold and gems, a book bound in human skin, and a hidden compartment in the bottom with a +2 ring of protection.

Following the last fleeing ogres, they found a passage to a different section of the dungeons. Here they found a skeleton chasing a cockatrice, which they killed, finding a cage with three more cockatrices. Before they could explore it, 4 zombies set on them, proving much more resilient than the skeletons. Behind the zombies, they heard something larger- something that sounded like ogres, although they could not tell if they were more normal ogres or half demon ogres like the one they had dispatched.

Taking the better part of valor, the party fled after killing the pursuing zombies.

Both Blondie and Mersalene read the book before selling it to a holy temple for safe keeping.

The 80 page book had instructions on how to setup a temple to Asmodeus. Judging from annotations on these pages, these instructions appear to have been used. The second half has instructions on how to encode messages and use several drop boxes in the city of Tavia itself. It seems there are demons or their agents communicating among the citizens.

Angel Eyes, Blondie and Maria explored the catacombs beneath the ruined tower where they met, uncovered a chest of gold, a few healing potions, and rescued a tavern princess.

Once the golems and half-demons moved on, the party returned to the ruined tower. The tavern keeper was calling for help rescuing his daughter, who had disappeared into one of the crevices but that crevice seemed choked with debris.

The crevice where Blondie had, briefly before it was covered with more debris, seen a broken chest spilling gold coins seemed to offer a better way in. Using Blondie’s rope (which was recovered later), Angel Eyes worked down a slope of debris and found himself in a room of huge spiders, which with zaps from Maria, arrows from Blondie and a surprisingly effective, very non-Mannix monk, they rapidly.

While hunting for the chest, some goblins attacked through the door to the north. The goblins were easy but the half-demonic ogre was another matter. For one thing, he kept put out Maria’s light spells.

The party beat back the goblins and had the ogre quite bloodied when the ogre summoned a pillar of unholy darkness that badly wounded Maria and Angle Eyes, while bringing Blondie to the brink of depth. They found some liquid from some broken potion bottles at the bottom of the broken chest. Maria checked it and it seemed to be beneficial so they mopped up some with a cloth and dripped it into Blondie’s mouth, who temporarily recovered.

Angel Eyes also heard a woman calling for help to the south. In a room there, choked with rubble, they found the tavern keepers daughter with a badly broken leg. Angel Eyes set it and they exited to find a thankful tavern keeper.

The keeper led them to a scrapper tower, where the young-priest Clarko healed the party for some gold and a promise to some healing water from a nearby spring.

The party now has 4 flasks of d8+1 healing water and healing water in their water skins (each hold 2 doses). The healing power starts to fade after a few days.

Angel eyes went off to the Phan tower, where they talked their way into seeing Ivaso Phan, who seemed to glean that they have his map. He took Maria aside and told her to return it or he would send someone after it. On the way back out of the Phan tower, they say Linko Phan. Angel eyes revealed that he has a contract to kill Linko.

The Phan tower is 30 or 40 floors high, abuot 100 feet across. The first floor is a ‘working floor’. Second floor has high ceilings and at least part of it is for receptions, where the family wealth is on display. The third floor seems to have small offices and is where they met Ivaso.

On the first session, Angel Eyes followed Ivaso Phan, from the Merchant Phan clan, to a tavern in a ruined tower. Maria and Blondie, new to the city, happened to separately journey there as well.

In the ruined tower, there were the usual scrappers (unaffiliated, poor folk) plus some more mysterious, heavily bundled people speaking an unknown language. Later these were revealed to be demons or half demons, although they weren’t terrible strong and were killed by single blows from the golems.

Four golems (later a fifth) and a mage showed up, apparently after the demons. The golems crashed after them, killing most but also knocking out pillars and arches in the ruins, causing the ceiling to collapse and crevices in the floor to expand, swallowing up scrappers, golems and demons.

Blondie noticed a cut room in the floor below and a chest that broke open to reveal what looked like gold coins, which was covered by more debris but doesn’t seem too deeply buried.

Ivaso was knocked unconscious by a golem and on his body was found what seems to be a map showing several tower sections and some non-magical writing in either an unknown language or in code.

The wizard, remaining golems, and some guards that hung back and watched the destruction have cleared away. Blondie, Maria and Angel Eyes are at the edge of a chasm, contemplating going after the gold. It is nearing sunset. Ivaso remains stabilized but unconscious in the ruins.

A dwarf is hanging around the edge of the tower, just watching for the moment.

The bar tender has returned, wailing about his daughter and offering a reward for her recovering. He saw her fall into a chasm but does not know if she is alive or dead.