Battle at Moonmist Begins, Wed. & Sat. Merge

Following prior victories (see last two entries), two growing pro-human warbands joined forces at Moonmist, where the Elves of the Purple Order first landed on Aarde from Sonaeed, and established their base settlement. Though thinned of troops by visions of world conquest the elven city is still well-defended and presents a terrible risk for the party, but the rewards of success are too enticing not to make the attempt. Black-Eyed Bill, Devatof Can Bob, Rivet, Aiko, Captain Fergus Dowrimple and Nightsong Sharpfang arrived with their crews from Hydra Island, beyond the Western horizon aboard the Ugly Maiden, Golden Torch, and Fist of Hubris.
Fighting to Telpin's newest tune, The Battle Song of Shady Cliffs, Revan, Taito, Flegol, Joseph Prax, Timmy Darkwind, Socrates, Gendar the Magic, Lola, Geena, Thumbs, Buddy Nagel, Henderson and Mick the Gangley fought a huge number of elven archers and spellcasters at the northwestern tip of Moonmist, working their way east from the docks through the trees and hills, building to building. So far, the party is prevailing. But it hasn't been easy. Joseph Prax was trampled by eight Eldritch Moon Knights, who rendered him unconcious. Devatof Can Bob was slain by arrows just beyond the wall of wind. And Timmy Darkwind lost conciousness under a hail of arrows as well. Experience was better than average at 3,500 xp, and treasure was excellent (pillaging rich elven buildings) at 7,000 gp worth of valuables per surviving character.
Please note that at least for now, the Wednesday group is on hiatus and has merged with the Saturday group, which is now meeting twice a month (instead of once a month) until further notice. Everybody (including me) tells me they are happy with this arrangement. I will allow up to a maximum of two characters per player, but no more, no exceptions. To speed game play, I am going to reduce the amount of attention spent on NPCs a bit; I'm not going to kill them off (unless that just happens), but I really don't want to take too much PC time away with my NPCs. Story-wise, with everything that needs to be accomplished, they will each have important contributions to make in the future, enhancing the things the characters are best at, and representing the fanatical devotion generated by heroic good deeds.

Rust Spitter Saturday

The elves of the Order of the Purple Moon, headquartered at Moonmist on the western coast of Anciena have discovered a new weapon, to their delight. Followers of Jaramon's Temple of Transformation, using the plentiful rust monsters decended from Tenneous' Iron Golem War, have created a new generation of rust spitters.
A single rust spitter gave the party fits. As they explored the catacombs beneath an elven lighthouse, they heard a great wheezing sound and saw saw the giant, insectlike creature expelling a great quantity of a misty gas from its hose-like mouth. Almost instantly, nearly every character in the room watched in horror as prized magical weapons, armor and even simple items like the metals from flint and steel sets were reduced to orange dust which apparantly serves as food for the strange creatures. Among the adversely affected were Revan (Roddy's 8th level human paladin), Socrates (Phil's 8th level human fighter), Geena (Penny's/npc 8th level dwarven fighter/archer, played as an npc), Henderson (npc lizardman fighter/rogue, 4th/3rd level), Telpin (npc gnomish bard, 8th level), Mick the Gangley (npc human stilted polearm fighter/archer, 8th level), Lola "Kick-Butt Girl" (Bella's/npc human monk 1/fighter 7 swordswoman), Flegol (Shane's human ranger, 9th level) and Joseph Prax (Robby's human cleric/inquisitor 7th/2nd level). Completely unaffected were the monks, Taito (Carson's human monk/drunken master 5th/3rd) and Henko (Phil's Aardish elven monk, the 6th level cohort of Socrates). As a result of this encounter, the party decided to return to Rotalia to re-equip, though the trip was expensive in time and money.
Cavern explorations quickly resumed after the group returned to where it had left off, hoping to find replenishing treasure within the catacombs. An illusionary treasure over a 30' wooden-spiked pit was easily dealt with by Taito. Three glyphs of Mass Toad were dispelled by Joseph Prax. The party defeated a group of nasty giant stag beatles which were eating provisions intended to feed 500 elven soldiers for a month. A fountain filled with potion of polymorph self was appropriated by the party and filled a 10' x 10' bag of holding. A honeycomb of beatle caves led to an encounter with elf-modified, upright-standing 4-armed giant stag beatles. Soon after this encounter, Socrates turned the corner alone, only to be baleful polymorphed into a black widow spider by a spellcasting dryder, and his psyche became that of his new form as well. Henko, close at hand, was able to gingerly pick up his friend for safekeeping. Soon afterward, the party had defeated the dryder and a couple more rust spitters nearby. The party camped and afterwards Joseph Prax was able to return Socrates to his human form, and restore his original psyche as well. Now in a life debt of gratitude for this great service, Phil's fighter converted to the religion of the party cleric, and committed to ever after tithe 10% of his income to him and/or the church of St. Cuthbert. After thorough exploration of the caves revealed nowhere else to go, the party headed out, and on the way encountered an elven warband who tried, but failed, to charm, and mass charm the party into submission, cooperation or non-action. Many more elves awaited the party on the surface in and on the buildings near the lighthouse, but these were mere settlers and green troops, easily dispatched by the smaller, but battle-proven party.