On The Sea 1

Preparations

[Managaratha and Nesh fade out] [Salamander 3]

Gale and Stella buy a combination of rations, supplies, and takeout for the trip to Melmane. How about presents? Melmane is pretty idiosyncratic. Merfolk could be excited about well-smithed stuff, or fancy pearls/shells. Lots of practical waterproof tools and some shells

Scout scouts some ingredients; Diomarche goes to the pub.

[Salamander 4]

The next day, Vidan goes to see the Queen! Or the Regent Queen. Vidan says he believes, in light of recent events, that opposing the slith is important, and allying together to that purpose would be helpful. He offers that we are headed towards Blue, hoping to help arrange alliances between Red, Blue, and the merfolk, against the slith. Are there messages, if not promises, we can bring along?

The Regent says that she obviously cannot speak for Red, but she is willing to provide a letter indicating her willingness to coordinate against the slith, and open discussions.

The next day, we start out.

Onto the Sea

We decide to sail on the ocean rather than in the air, so that we have more chance of running into Merfolk. Diomarche takes sailing lessons to distract himself from the unending, inescapable water that will surely swallow him whole…

[Salamander 5]

Vidan keeps poking at the ocean. He rolls a 17! There's a Melmane ship sailing westward. We decide to hail it. “Ahoy the ship!” they call. “Where do you hail from?” “We’re from Middlesea. Have you heard what happened?” “We thought they were all… trapped?” “Most were; we escaped due to Complicated Magics.”

We find out that they haven’t had much news yet in Melmane, and they’d be interested in hearing more about either that or King Olafson’s court in Berana. Ah. Well, we counter that Queen Wendy’s court is in good stead. They decide we should talk in person.

It’s a military vessel– a man and woman in uniform fly over so we can talk. Captain Hector and a Blue mage, Apprentice Sephoni.

Vidan leads the conversation.

Admiral Philippa should obviously be briefed on anything to do with slith matters. Any major port / vessel should have a way of contacting her.

The orc invasion is not likely to draw much attention to anyone unless Purple is offering significant concessions for assistance. Perhaps you could interest a Mage in going to help deal with it, but unlikely while the slith are invading Melmane.

There is an invasion underway?

There have been incursions, and assassinations of two Mages.

Stella offers that we were hoping that alliances could be made. Well, speaking to the ruler of Berana was part of the remit of his mission. Also in his mission is finding out what happened to Mage Marek, and bringing two Saurians who are interested in trying to free General Petrov.

We give him a Tarn Evidence Packet!

What news of the merfolk? They have definitely been engaged with the slith. Anywhere in contact with them in particular? Not so much. They're... difficult. How so, Scout asks. Technically, they don’t count as people, but as “magical beasts”. They don’t think like people, which makes long-term interactions less productive.

They fly away back to their ship.

Day 2 [Salamander 6]

Stella rolls a 2! But adds her karma, instead getting a 6. Noticeably better…

Vidan, Stella, and Scout notice a squad of merfolk swimming across our path; they’re heading NW where we’re going east.

Gale casts Breathe Water and then hails the merfolk. But also only gets one success on Charisma, so they seem to notice but not change path. Gale passes out Breathe Water and Underwater Action runes.

Vidan tries, using his Oratory, invoking our mutual enemy the slith, and is mighty! 8 successes means they pay attention, and 3 Fortune means at least someone seems to understand it. Some of them break off and head in our direction, tridents out. (Where would they put the tridents, anyway…?) We await our doom.

“What you say slith.”
“We fight slith. You fight slith.”
“You fight slith where.”
“Coast.”
“Coast not our problem.”
“You follow?”

We agree to follow. After a day [Salamander 7], we run into the slith army combat! There are five mer units, and 3 slith units. We are also a small unit. Huh. Apparently we will engage.

• Stella heals a unit
• Gale coordinates some merfolk units
• Vidan makes it clear what we're doing
• Diomarche shatters the wounded slith unit
• Scout catches us up to the slith, and drops a recon miracle on the merfolk

The slith start retreating deeper, pursued by the merfolk.

At the end of the day, the speaker mer comes and finds us: “Good work. We win, they lose. What you name? Tell King.” “Conclave Free Rangers! What king name?” “Pike.”

Gale wilds up a protect-paper-from-water spell, and we give them a Tarn Evidence Packet to give to the King. We tell them that the coast wants to help fight slith.

The slith had metal weapons and armors– swords and the like. The merfolk were using tridents but were using items of weaker materials, e.g., shells and stones, maybe?

Day 4 [Salamander 8]

Diomarche rolls 8.

We see a ship coming up from the stern, flying Rinyan’s flag. Stella recognizes it as a ship that Captain Anna Maria helms; she works with Stella’s uncle. Stella seems a bit dubious. They will overtake us momentarily. They hail us. Stella comes out and greets them; the Captain does a double-take. “Stella, what brings you out here in… that? Do you need assistance?”

“We’re good. Yes.” She is looking the ship up and down with a level of That Is Not an Ocean-Going Vessel. She reiterates that she could help.

What news?

She’s mostly carrying cargo for Stella’s uncle and Master Tivoli (Stella gives a little tsk). Master Sandra is focused more on internal Guild affairs right now. She hasn’t heard anything from Diane or Mereldi recently. Scout asks Stella what kind of business they’re in. Well… her uncle is a priest. Of Jord.

Day 5 [Salamander 9]

Scout rolls 16.

Stella notices that DI has become harder; Scout notices that we’re SAILING THROUGH A WATER SPIRIT. That’s cool. It’s big, if not as big as Middlesea (and nowhere as big as the Oasis). Stella thinks that it’s unusual for being near a spirit to make miracles harder. Spirits are often tied to places, but not to nowheres… and this seems to be a nowhere…

Scout looks at it more closely; it is mostly surface, it doesn’t go terribly deep. But it does have an Area to it. Maybe there’s a tie to something deeper? But it’s mostly surface– a couple of miles. Scout thinks that it mostly wouldn’t notice too much if we just wandered through.

Scout asks his spirit to talk to it a bit; it’s a spirit of Calm? Still waters, something like that. We warn it about the goblins trying to Break spirits; it thinks it would be hard to bring it to the Broken Lands.

Gale notices the waves are smaller than expected.

It’s been here a long-ish time, since the War Between the Lord and Lady. It used to be a lake, and then the land moved. It used to be bigger; it’s been shrinking for a long time. We can call it Celebration; it wouldn’t mind being a lake again, but it doesn’t seem to be wanting much. Maybe we could help restore its ecology? It’s fresh water so it doesn’t have much plants or fish as it used to. Okay, that’s something to put on Scout’s todo list.

Day 6 [Salamander 10]

Gale rolls… a 20! And a bonus one from karma.

We see a small ship coming in our direction– too small to be out this far— and not flying a flag. Everyone makes Per rolls:

• People with 5s see a small ship with Jabarans on it.
• People with 7s see a small ship with illusions of Jabarans and something hiding on it.
• People with 6 (Scout) see a small ship with illusions of Jabarans at least one of whom is a shaman.

It starts changing course to avoid us, so we chase!

It goes invisible and sends us after an illusionary boat, but Scout sees through it. We close; Vidan dispels all Yellow on one hex, which happens to be the hex with the Cataur in it. Who Diomarche recognizes. “You are totally cheating.” “Wait, you’re cheating!” “Do we need to fight about this? I don’t think we need to fight about this.”

WHAT IS HAPPENING. Everyone except Diomarche is confused. They're just going to find some Saurian that people want to talk to. Apparently they’re the key to getting into somewhere. Scout’s spirit says they have an Oasis shaman, and we probably don’t want them to sail through the Calm Spot.

(Darmok and Jelad on the Ocean...)

Are they… good… cataurs?

Diomarche says his herd is pretty close to the mountains, and sometimes there’s trade and communication.

“Heave to and prepare to be boarded.”

"Here's the thing. I went to go be a juggernaut of Rush."

We board the boat (except for Gale, who gets hit by "not your problem" but has made everyone fly). Scout can see the Oasis shaman, and shoots him; Diomarche chops him after that. Vidan fails his "don't hit me" spell.

Stella puts a bunch of people in time out, including Cataur Friend.

Someone is Witnessing this fight. (We are always on the battlemap with Oasis and Middlesea).

Battle diagnostics: 1 named guy, two semi-named guys, six mooks.

Defense against the Yellow Arts!

Scout talks Gale into showing enemies, but is shortly thereafter hit by the yellow mage for Not My Plot. Vidan dispels that.

Vidan: "I'm calling down lightning. SANCTIFY GALE!"

Gale zaps four of the cataurs as the boats pull closer together, as Scout flies above and holds his fire; Diomarche suggests the cataurs surrender.

"We definitely surrender. Can you give us a ride?"

Only Diomarche’s “friend” and two mook cataurs survive. Vidan notices there was a Yellow communications point; who was that to? Probably to the Pride leader? The remaining cataurs aren’t sure.

(20 was treasure, 21 is the cataur, so they have some loot; Charles will figure it out.)

Diomarche apologizes to his friend, but he’s not too put out by it. It was a fight, things happen in fights.

Diomarche’s friend gets a Name: Rashkar.

Loot

• Magic compass, which is "busted" - it doesn't point at the guy any more.
• Yellow Mage has a ring which makes Yellow area of effect spells become easier. Probably counteracts the area-of-effect difficulty modifier, but you have to know the spell, and not out to miles of range.
• 1 Loot worth of loot in the hold– gold and random jewelry in the hold.
• Necklace of +1 Dodge pool. (Ooooooh. Aaaaaaaah.)
• +1 Recurring Frenemy and two cataur minions
• 7 EPs
• 10 SPs