Basic Fantasy RPG Forums

As for marching order, the two best rangers are in front with torches and swords (axes, maces, ...) out; everyone else has bows to start. Anna and Talin will wear their blue lights if they're working. Kilian will be bringing up the rear because he's loud and clanky.

OK, down you go, leaving Ysa, Caradoc and the dog Corsa up top. Fido is with you. Coll is also with you, I gather.

You get past the second set of runes and Anna's sense that something is "missing" is increased. However, this seems to have no effect at all on the blue lights or any other visible magic items you may have.

The tunnel goes for about twenty feet and then opens out onto a large rocky chamber. At one end, there is an opening onto the river bed and you could step out onto stones in the rapids. You couldn't see the cave clearly when you came up the river but you now have a rough idea where it is. There is another small set of runes carved right around this river entrance.

One the opposite side of the chamber is a roughly oval shaped area (about 15 square feet) that has been encircled by yet another set of runes. These are thicker and more heavily engraved into the rock, but otherwise identical to the previous sets. There is a large set of manacles on the floor in this area. It looks as though they were set into the walls, but were then ripped out. Crumbled fragments of rock and iron chain life on the floor. There are also strange marks on the wall and floor, as though at some point something was chained up inside and spent a great deal of time pacing about, and hacking away at the rock.

There is a nasty smell in this room generally, like faeces and offal, and something like rotting peat.

Fido howls with terror as soon as he lies eyes on the area that has been encircled by the runes. He flees back up the stairs. Talin has never seen him so frightened.

Congratulations for the surprise round!

Kilian reacts first. "Back to the stairs, quick." The party will take a defensive position at the base of the stairs, arrows pointed all over the place. They'll see if they can determine what was there (tracks, but no one is leaving the stairwell) or whether there was another way out.

You find no tracks other than your own. In fact it doesn't look like anything much at all has been down the stairs past the first set of runes in many years.

The river side also yields no tracks. Now you have seen the river cave entrance you can locate t on the outside. There are no tracks in that area either.

No one knows what was in there, if anything. Fido just reacted in terror when he saw the area enclosed by the larger runes.

Your move.

Talin will scribe the runes best he can in case Tiana later can decipher them. After that, it's back upstairs.

How defensible is this place? Can the patrol find a tower to encamp within, ideally one with a working (and quiet) portcullis? They aren't relishing the idea of whatever that creature was, coming home.

There's a perfectly functioning portcullis defending an entertainment area with snooker tables, leather couches and a bar.

Either that, or you could camp in one if the semi-intact rooms and make the best of it.

I figure somebody would keep an eye out on the river and the stairs, to make sure nothing comes in or out, while everyone else sleeps?

"Snooker is a childish game, fit for elves. Let's take that ramshackle, beaten-down guard post instead. It looks to rain, and those large holes in the roof will give us a good view of the raindrops as they strike us... assuming the hellbats don't get us first." observes Caradoc.

They'll try to find something in one of the towers, ideally where one guard can be on the roof and another on the second story, both with line of sight to the "interesting areas." Standard watch order. I can dig that up if you need it. It's in a prior post.

I don't really need the watch order. I'll just say that it's Kilian who notices that uneven area of ground outside the castle, but within the circle of trees. Looks like it's pretty old, but certainly there's an indication that it has been dug up at some point. Something has been buried there, or retrieved from there.

That happens as you are setting up camp. Do you investigate or leave it alone?

If it's during the daylight, they'll check it out. Everyone, including the pair of Swiss mercenaries lurking in the background, will go investigate.

Talin will see if Fido and (other dog) will go investigate first. If it's safe (and possibly if it isn't) then Kilian will be next to check out what's going on.

It's right at the end of daylight.

Kilian found it because he walked right past it, so he and the others can investigate right now.

It's an area about 3x3 where a hole has been dug, quite along time ago (maybe over a decade), and no one else would have noticed it but he is a dwarf and knows his stuff.