I cannot believe those idiots.
A quest to save the world. The sort of thing that heroes are made of and that cements your name in the history books, that inspires future generations of paladins and other aspiring heroes. Yet even over a year after they have set out--with the gods themselves taking a hand in their training--they are still acting like a bunch of rookies. I have followed their progress from the beginning, yet they seem to make the same mistakes again and again and again.
It is almost like they do not learn from the deaths of their party members and from their past mistakes. I wonder if this is a unique failing of humans and dwarves, or if it is a sign that adventuring parties generally accomplish their goals more through luck and divine intervention than they do through their own skill and bravery.
First after I last left they evidently--and for some unfathomable reason--get tricked into going on this quest to help one of the Deep Ones. With the item they went to retrieve, the Deep Ones could have amplified their already significant psionic ability with a magical lens, and extended the range of their abilities indefinitely. Not merely planetwide, but to the stars themselves.
In the process of retrieving it they brought out part of the Rod of the Whispered Ones, crafted by the lich Vecna so that he may communicate with his forces, which is now in the hands of a young girl with no moral compunction and limited sanity (how, precisely, did she end up with this group?). She is now out by herself in the ocean, slowly being corrupted by the rod's influence. Thankfully, by the time she is fully corrupted by the rod she will be unable to enter the temple to retrieve the remainder, and I do not believe the gods would have been so foolish as to put *all* of the parts of the rods in one vault, no matter how secure.
Then they manage--through some combination of luck and skill--to take down one of the Deep Ones. This I must give them credit for: it was A teleportation specialist and very difficult to kill, yet they managed to lock it in one place so that it could not escape. That, thankfully, was a mighty and heroic thing and I can only presume that it was the result of having Arcadius back. There are now only 5 deep ones remaining outside of the sunken city, but I fear for what their attempts on the Shaper will look like, especially since it has a Master Abjurer under its control.
Which, on that topic, their botched invasion of the Deep One's keep. They didn't try and scry what they would face. They didn't try to figure out what the situation might look like beyond depending on a few rumors. They just charged on ahead into a series of fights they weren't going to be able to win, and nearly went charging to their deaths.
They managed to escape and survive the night, but have now split the party. At best this is a risky gambit, and the poison constructs following them are going to be too much for the team that remains to fight alone. Hopefully the team that went deep into what is now enemy territory in İzmir will return quickly and safely, but if not I fear for the future survival of the party.
I cannot leave Stone Keep without arousing suspicion and putting my mission here at risk, and even the long-distance scrying is becoming riskier by the day, but maybe I can lend the smallest nudge to help them when night finally falls and the waning moon is out. It won't be much, but I can only pray that it will be enough.
May Odin grant us victory in the battles ahead.
Tuesday, August 17, 2010
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