[OOC] Oct 21 - Nov 3: Thistletop Fell

[Mike]

New thread to sum up and start over. Original discussions to be found in the .


Okay... do we need a vote here?

The only move up in the is me talking to Gunrus to find out more about how/when/if another strike force might be coming. That's still taking place the same evening we left off. I'd like to start doing stuff for the next morning, but it depends on what everyone else wants to do.

So... options...?

1) More Sandpoint stuff before we make any final decisions.

2) Trip to Magnimar/help Sandpointans plan defenses/tidy up loose ends/leave for Jorgenfist in a few days (exact number to be debated).

3) Start making plans to leave for Jorgenfist right away...
---a) with the 2-3 day teleport option for expediency.
---b) with the overland Lampblack River/Storval Stairs option in order to intercept any invading force that may already be on its way.

4) Arrange to defend Sandpoint. Don't make any plans for leaving until we have more concrete information.

5) Other options.

Help me out here. We either do this now, or we spend our entire Thursday session hashing out these exact questions.

[Tahlvin]

I'm up for doing as much as we can on the boards before the next session.

The plan Eldthor is working from is that we do a trip to Magnimar, leaving the next morning and returning as soon as possible; he has to be back to Thistletop on the night of the 3rd day to try to meet Gogmurt. Beyond that, I'm down with searching around the old lighthouse, doing some research, Dothan talking to Gunrus, or generally hanging out around Sandpoint, and then starting for Jorgenfist within a week.

Also, the evening everyone got back together in Sandpoint, we were going to have the discussion about changing the group name. I'm not sure if everyone wants to play out that session in a thread here on the boards, or we just wave our hands and say it happened; I'm fine with whatever.

[Mike]

That is the plan I like as well. Some or all of us take a trip to Magnimar. We gather some more info and solidify our plans. Make sure the defense/protection of Sandpoint is as solid as we're going to get it. Then we head out for Jorgenfist (overland) in 5-7 days (maybe sooner or later depending on what we learn.)

[Zen]

[Tahlvin]

Eldthor's shopping list is arrows of giant bane, as may as possible. It should cost 18,301 GP and 5 SP for 50 arrows. He currently has 1,400 GP, so his share of any loot that gets sold in Magnimar will be combined with that to purchase as many arrows as possible.

I'm fine with only a few people going to Magnimar to do the shopping. I know we talked about not splitting up the party, but if it's just to Magnimar and they're teleporting (eliminating the risk of an ambush along the way), then I'm less worried about it. Eldthor is fine remaining behind in Sandpoint, where he'll help discuss positions for watch towers, searching the old lighthouse, etc. Dwyn is welcome to stay in Sandpoint with Eldthor, or if she wants to take a girls day to go shopping, and check in with her boyfriend real quick to see if she can convince him to head to Fort Rannick or something, that's cool as well.

[Mike]

As far as releasing Gunrus goes, I say we be honest with Sandpoint about it. He's been in lockup for four days, plenty of curious onlookers have gotten a chance to come by and gawk at a real stone giant. They've seen Dothan and others of us talking with him and being on friendly terms. Hopefully, we can give the impression of an ordinary Joe Giant who's nothing more than a reluctant soldier caught up in a war not of his making. He obviously wants out, AND he's been very open and helpful with us. Using that, I'm sure Dothan can convince Hemlock and Mayor Deverin first, and then a meeting of "interested parties" afterwards, if needed.

Otherwise, if we make a show of "taking him to Magnimar" and then release him in secret, it will eventually come back to bite us in the ass. After we came back we'd need to start making up stories of how he escaped from us, or else an elaborate tale of how the people of Magnimar reacted, etc, etc. Eventually someone will figure out that no giant ever got brought to Magnimar for justice. Plus, if we ever do build a working relationship with him later in the Rannick region, then we will forever have to lie about who our giant contact is. Too much trouble.

[Elle]

I was thinking not that we would tell lies about Gunrus, which Dwyn would not be ok with, but that we would take him along with us as our prisoner and then let him go when we decided it was a safe place to let him go. I worry that people in the town can't help being terrified of him after what just happened, so it would be less of a worry if he were safely out in the countryside when he walked away on his own. Anyway, given Dothan's immense powers of persuasion, I trust her to explain our plans to the people of Sandpoint, since we're obviously the ones saving their town and lives from destruction.

By the way, I really like the new setup with threads, which helps me have a place to spout random OOC ideas without cluttering up a place that is marked off for items needing Darcs' attention. (And how awesome is DMDarcs? Check out the latest trivia video where he's like, BAM! I know all monsters!)

Dwyn has two reasons to go to Magnimar: one, she thinks we DO need to directly report what happened to the Lord-Mayor G, solicit funding from him to help bolster the town defenses and specifically hire someone with Engineering knowledge to help us both in Sandpoint and at the Fort. Dwyn would offer to match any of the Mayor's Sandpoint defense and urgent hiring funds with her own funds, up to about 800 GP. If we do talk to the mayor, it wouldn't hurt to sort out our obligations relative to Magnimar when it comes to the Fort. Is it a GIFT or an ASSIGNMENT? Either way, he needs to know we're not going there; we need to figure out this Stone Giant threat first. I don't think we should tell him anything about where we think the giants are coming from or where we are planning to go; just that our efforts might delay us in reaching Fort Rannick and helping there.

Two, Dwyn wants to see her friend. This is a question I might ask Darcs at some point, but I will also ask the rest of you: what should we do going forward when it comes to adding in NPCs? Even if Darcs was ok with it, I don't want to push NPCs onto other people that they don't really want cluttering up the stage, y'know? Like I want a Construction Engineer who knows defenses and buildings and mines and bridges and dams, and it's fine if we don't spend any time with that person (I want to hire her/him first to help in Sandpoint and then to help in Fort Rannick). Is it okay with people to start populating our world like this? And of course, the place I left the last little story about Dwyn was that she invited her friend to come to Fort Rannick. Of course, heaven knows whether that will ever happen, given that I expect to die in a few weeks in Jorgenfist (!!!! still, people). But if we survive, is it a good idea for us to throw our own NPCs into the mix that way? Should they remain part of the backdrop only accessed in random fiction, with no other effect on the game? I ask because at some point it's reasonable we would actually attract followers, or hire employees to help us restore the Fort and surroundings, and so forth.

If others want to Teleport, that is okay, but it only takes a day to ride there on horseback, right? And a day back. So I can either be Teleported or not, as you find convenient. But I shouldn't be the one doing all the talking with the Mayor, no matter what. Poor talker. Though I CAN with total sincerity flatter him as an adventurous gourmand! Dwyn still remembers that lovely dinner everyone else found repulsive. Once all this is settled, her plan is to spend the rest of the time helping in Sandpoint. Prior to leaving for Magnimar, she hopes to have the town meeting where people are assembled into rapid-response teams. We can also get started on building watchtowers before securing additional funding, if any is coming.

[Tahlvin]

I don't know about the rest of you, but Eldthor is definitely, STRONGLY against talking to the Lord Mayor about anything. If anything, his attitude is "Fuck him!" If Dwyn wants to hire an engineer and other contractors to help beef up Sandpoint and repair Fort Rannick, Eldthor's behind that, and will chip in money to help (at least whatever money doesn't go towards giant bane arrows for our immediate need). But he doesn't want shit from Lord Mayor in the way of "help", and doesn't want to give the Lord Mayor any more input on what we do (or don't do) with Fort Rannick. He's a petty, greedy man (as evidenced by being on the lamia's "to harvest" list) who is just looking to take advantage of us however he can. So there has to be a REALLY good reason for us to use him to further our own ends before Eldthor will get behind it.

As for bringing in other NPCs, that's certainly up to DMDarcs. But you're asking for feedback from the person who ended up with a pet tribe of goblin NPCs? I'm fine with anything that makes for a good story, as long as it doesn't distract too much from the overarching adventure path.

[Elle]

You could probably easily talk Dwyn out of seeking an audience with the Mayor. I would say she is stubborn about things she really has her mind set on, but self-aware enough to realize when other people might have better advice (i.e. iron will, average intellect, and pretty decent wisdom). She feels a sense of duty to him because of our previous work and this latest business with the Fort, and because he's supposed to be the authority for this whole area. But she's not Lawful good so is perfectly willing to accept that working outside the Mayor's expectations is okay. She would definitely NOT be in the "fuck him" mode, however. He just gave us a Fort -

[Mike]

Dothan doesn't care if we talk to Grobaras. She can't stand the old phony. Dwyn makes a good point about asking him for assistance/funding, but I don't think anything substantial is coming. I mean seriously... "Sure. I care spare... hm... twenty of my best soldiers." And then WHICH soldiers does he send? The dregs. The layabouts and scoundrels that he'd just as soon be rid of anyway. That's what he does... he pushes his problems out of Magnimar as quickly as possible.

Also, Dothan is going to be working to head off any potential image problems. So far, people seem to love us here, but I want to compose songs that frame this entire building conflict up to this point and ends on a spirit of hope, etc etc. But also these songs make clear that this is something that is happening because of the evil that is out there and would have destroyed Sandpoint at least a couple times if we hadn't been here. I want to make sure no one gets the impression that we are magnets for trouble and that it is our presence that has put Sandpoint in danger. "Y'know, things were pretty nice around here before those 'heroes' showed up." WE understand that we're not the cause of any of this. We need to make sure that everyone else understands that as well.

That's one of the reasons I am reluctant to talk to the Lord-Mayor: if he sees political gain in it, he will gladly change this story to make us the troublemakers who have brought all this on the region. So if we start making demands on him and explaining how he needs to take responsibility for Magnimaran holdings on the frontier, he could easily try to shift the blame to us so that WE are responsible for fixing things without him having to give up precious resources or do something that might get his hands dirty. He would gladly throw us under the bus if it kept him smelling like a rose.

[Eliahad]

[I'll have more to add later. Just a heads up that I won't be able to make it on Thursday.]

[Elle]

I get what you're saying personally and agree; but as far as Dwyn goes, I don't think she's going to follow any of the hypotheticals about what Grobaras might do or not do. Surely he wants us to defend his holdings, right? And surely Sandpoint is one of them? So obviously since we just defended the town from a terrible attack, and we're worried another one could be coming, he will want to donate a small amount of money (800 GP is nothing to this dude, given what he gave us before) to help us handle constructing defenses. We're handling a problem for him - that's how Dwyn would see it - and she assumes that if she's willing to put up some of her own money (earned from same Mayor), he'll know he can trust her to invest the resources. She's an idealist; she's not a politician at all.

However, Eldthor and Dothan can talk Dwyn out of things, so if they're actually trying to talk her out of going to the Mayor to report what happened and seek some help, she won't do it. She's fairly deferential to Eldthor because she thinks he's smarter and he knows about important Erastil-approved stuff like how to manage in the woods, even though she doesn't always agree with him about what to do. Dothan can easily dazzle her with obviously-huge intellect and charisma. However, I'd bet she is aware that Dothan has a bit of a wisdom-deficit, even though she gets tongue tied and can't figure out how to talk her way out of whatever it is Dothan wants. It's kind of like when I used babysit for these very clever and appealing kids who would talk me into doing things like letting them make a big messy fort or letting them ride me around like a horse to the point of knee and back pain. I knew I would have regrets and I wasn't thrilled about it, but they were such clever, appealing children and I wasn't sure how to talk them out of their unwise schemes. That's kind of how I assume it is for Dwyn when Dothan talks her into stuff.

That brings me to the big one: Jorgenfist. Dwyn realllllllly does not want to make an assault on Jorgenfist. She definitely thinks y'all are being imprudent to the point of totally crazy, and this makes no sense, and we're all going to die. But you're going to be able to talk her into it, so... she's going to grumble about it the whole way and be really unhappy if (when) things go wrong. Hundreds of giants, potentially? Like the crew of a half dozen that nearly killed Illian just because we were a little bit disorganized and didn't use our full powers of preparation? SCARY. I dread it.

[Bluedevyl]

Anna doesn't have much (if any) experience dealing with the Lord Mayor. If he is amenable to it, it would be nice to have Magnimar take responsibility for the defense of Sandpoint, if Sandpoint is indeed a vassal or holding of Magnimar. However, if the citizenry of Sandpoint would rather handle the defense of their town on their own, I defer to the local leadership.

Anna would only caution going to see the Lord Mayor in that if he "gave" the Troubleshooters a fort the last time, what might he saddle the group with this time around? We are fairly certain, after Dothan's conversations with Gunrus, that a magic-wielding giant is gathering forces in the Iron Peaks for an as-yet undetermined reason. This seems like a vague yet serious enough situation that it most likely warrants our attention, but if an audience with the Lord Mayor is sought, could he actually FORCE the group to handle another situation that he deems more pressing? I don't really understand the dynamics in terms of who is a citizen/vassal of Magnimar, and who could he press into service? Certainly, Anna is not in favor of splitting the group, but this Lord-Mayor person certainly has no claim to directing Sam or Anna in any way, short of their own inherent desires to assist their new companions.

As for Jorgenfist itself, Anna certainly understands Dwyn's reluctance, especially in light of what nearly happened to Illian the last time we encountered stone giants. I think we can certainly take a more strategic approach to the encounter. Perhaps we could consult with Gunrus. Are there caves? Tunnels? Is there some way we could gain access to Jorgenfist without wading through half a thousand stone giants? Can he make us a map?

Anna is not interested in forcing anyone to do anything against their wishes. She's never seen that ultimately end well for any group. Let's all talk out this week our concerns and see if we can straighten out the information we have about Mokmurian, Jorgenfist, and the giants as a whole.

As for teleporting, Anna would love to go shopping with Kay. We can go any time.

[Tahlvin]

If Elfthor knows Dwyn is planning to talk to the mayor, he'll try to talk her out of it. In our last encounter with the mayor, he gave us the Fort because it was expedient for him. It allowed him to push the responsibility onto someone else. Ask him for help with defending Sandpoint, and we probably will not like the result. It could be they need to quarter a significant Magnimarian force, or more likely he'll just tell us that it's Sandpoint's responsibility to defend themselves. There will have to be something in it for him personally before he'll agree to help. And Eldthor would rather not be indebted to him in any way.

[bralbovsky]

Not a fan of the mayor, don't know what happened with Ironbriar, don't have time right now for politics. I expect Sandpoint has normal channels of communication with him. If there's to be some official action, let it go through those. Reward/scolding/whatever can wait. If we want to hire an engineer (there may be sufficient talent in Sandpoint, just no sufficient political will, given the tone the Lord Mayor has set) fine. But it should be for an escape plan. This is the part of the RISK board where there's only one army in every spot, and rehab on our schedule is unlikely at best.

Really meta: I expect the game has driven us to this inevitable stage. The giants have attacked, may/will attack again. They have already leveled a place we thought was stable and safe. The thing about defining a sphere of influence is that you have to define it carefully and defend it vigorously. This isn't even the boss boss, and if we falter here, we are lost. (Seven points, seven stages, and probably a chewy center too.)

Attacking the giants can go pretty much one of four ways:
We stage a frontal assault and get obliterated.
We find a cagey way in, or at least a quiet way in, kill the Magician and sneak out.
We get in, do the job, but die trying to get out.
We find a way in, convince the draftees to leave (either before or after the magician is dead) and continue to try to get to the bottom of this mystery.

My inclination is to plan carefully, get sketchy maps if possible. Gear up. Maybe raid the dragon's lair if it's on the way. Move quickly and deliberately (and carefully). We're dangerous. If we can keep from fighting them all at once Hal and Dwyn deal enough damage to take down all 500 if necessary, especially if we deal with them one at a time. Now, that's not gonna happen, but unless the giants have a huge, open camp of a hundred tents (not stone giant style) we'll be in tunnels that we can at least bottleneck.
BTW, if someone has to stay behind and cover a group escape, it's the paladin, no questions asked.

[Mike]

Alright! Darcs is getting some answers in. Let's figure out what we're selling and what we're buying.

According to Gunrus, we have two weeks before Mokmurian even suspects anything might be wrong, and possibly longer than that before he gathers any kind of retributive force and sends it on its way. We have the ability to do our shopping in Magnimar and be at his door (stealthy and secretive and scouting) before he even knows anything is up. That's ideal. If we get up there and we don't like what we find or we find that we (or Sandpoint) are in danger, we can always take the multi-day teleport option and be home with two weeks to spare before his force can get there.

Dothan's vote is: A-Team goes shopping for everyone. B-Team stays back to tidy up and to help Sandpointans with plans for readying themselves in case of another attack. We can leave them with plans and money and a good start on whatever they're doing. And then we head out for Jorgenfist.

Dothan feels a course of action, and so she is now in "sooner is better than later" mode. She can be talked down from this if someone can give some good explanations of other stuff we need to do before deciding to make a trip like this.

Dothan will be doing research on late-fall/early-winter weather in the Iron Peaks so we'll know what we need to pack. Warm weather gear, climbing gear, anti-giant weaponry for sure.

[DMDarcs]

[Zen]

[Bluedevyl]

So it's getting on towards the tail end of Neth, which means it's likely to snow on us when we get into the mountains, especially if we're into the early days of Kuthona when we get there.

One thing I would LOVE to find in Magnimar but I'm not even sure if it exists in the Pathfinder setting is a couple of scrolls of Mass Snowshoes or something of that ilk. I LOVED that spell in the FR games that I've played, and it's indispensable in winter settings.

Can we get a ruling on whether or not we could possibly find something like that when we go shopping?

[bralbovsky]

Hal would put in for the gloves, especially if a Magga is in our future.