[Steve Dubya]

Three in a row - must be some sort of record. For the year, anyway.

Let's see...mechanical fiddlinesses. There were some additions/removals to Hero Point usage, and there has been talk of limiting any Hero Points to a max of 20 before they start to just get lost - thus encouraging players to use them, which we've been doing more frequently.

Egeo's player also made some Windows application called the "Encounter Management System" to keep track of PCs, NPCs and monsters during combat; stuff like initiative tracking, VP/WP, the like. It's still quite in its infancy, but it seemed to make combat flow a little easier once the DM got the hang of what it could be used to do.

Oh, and I was informed that the Warlock Invocation that Edrik has been using to swim around like a madman is the Least one, "Swimming the Styx" from CMage:

By channeling the fiendish and infamous river, you become an aquatic creature. Your hands and feet become slightly webbed, granting you a swim speed equal to your base land speed (and all other benefits derived from a swim speed, including a +8 racial bonus on Swim checks; see MM 311). You gain the ability to breathe water as well as air. This invocation lasts for 24 hours.

Makes sense to me.

With the XP from the previous adventure that put just about everyone within spitting distance of 7th level (Huff was the low man, being ~1700 away).

This brings us to the start of...

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"I Cast Summon Bigger Fish"

As we left our party, the Sea Wyvern had gotten stuck on a reef in the middle of a hurricane, and as the party attempted to get the process started of freeing the ship and getting the hell away from the reef, a big eel-fish creature (10x30) did the previously mentioned Free Willy over the boat.

As Rafe braced himself against the steering wheel, Amella shouted out, "It's a masher! They're poisonous and really aggressive!"
Of course they are. And as some of us made Profession (Sailor) checks, we also remembered hearing that they tended to live together.

As Amella headed to assist Rafe in timing the freeing of the ship to coincide with the swells of the ocean, the masher struck out and attacked Lirith...and swallowed her whole. This caused a flurry of action to attempt to save her, which resulted in a whole lot of nothing; well, I take that back. Edrik managed to get up 5 Mirror Images.

The attempt to free the boat didn't go so well, and then the attacks on the masher began in earnest, with Egeo and Huff leading the charge with their respective signature moves (Blistering Scorching Ray and lots-o-arrows). The masher responded in kind against Edrik - and owing to various player jinxing ("Don't roll a 1") Edrik managed to take quite a chomp; thankfully for him, he wasn't also swallowed.

Another blast of Scorching Ray killed the beast, slicing it cleanly in twain; this allowed the party to see Lirith's body fall out of the creature, also divided in two. However, the damage done to Lirith seemed to be mostly owing to sharp teeth, so that made Egeo feel a little bit better.

Urol had headed below decks when the fighting had commenced, and as the crew had been previously informed that the ship "had holes in it," Edrik headed down to assess the damage.

The ship had taken damage in the form of three large holes, two immediately port and starboard of the bow and another starboard amidships. Egeo came down to "assist", Edrik sent Urol topside with this information to get damage control efforts underway and while delivering this information Urol managed to distract Rafe...which then caused the ship to roll heavily into a wave.

Water poured over the deck and the only ones not washed overboard were Skald and Rafe; Urol, Amella and Huff all headed into the drink.

Edrik went topside to inform Rafe of the damage to discover that a good chunk of the crew had decided on a swim, and he dove in after Amella and Urol. Skald had thrown a line over to the side Urol and Amella went over, and Rafe made a similar attempt to get a line to Huff (and then lashing himself to the wheel).

Huff made consecutive failed Swim checks - despite being able to see something to grab onto, and then hatched a plan of desperation: remembering he had a potion of Levitate, he reached into his sack of 5 potions to chug this and then float to safety - in theory.

Now would be a good time to bring up that Int isn't one of Huff's strong points, and Huff's player has a blast thinking up these harebrained schemes. As Huff was basically pulling a potion at random (with the other possibles of Magic Fang, Cure Mod, Invisibility...and another one that escapes me but was otherwise equally as useless in the situation), the DM had him roll percentile - Huff got a 13. Since he needed to roll low, this crazy idea worked and Huff popped out of the water like a balloon.

Meanwhile, Skald had managed to haul in Urol somehow, and Edrik then began a search for Amella. Belowdecks, Egeo directed the terrified colonists to start patching the holes as best they could.

Rafe made a series of lowered Profession (Sailor) checks but no one else fell off; at some point Huff managed to get his grappling hook into the rigging (and then tied himself off) and then basically spent a couple more rounds bobbing in the air as he got pulled along by the ship.

Edrik came across Amella's hat, but as the ship began moving away from him he was forced to abandon his search. Huff climbed down and started to untie the lifeboats...and I believe it was about that point that the ship took another really good roll - and it capsized.

Huff and Rafe both made Con checks - and failed, drifting off to unconsciousness. The ship smashed into yet another reef and split the hull open, banging around Egeo and he too lost consciousness. As Edrik could swim around with some impunity and went into the sinking vessel to retrieve some of his stuff (seeing that the ship had wrecked not far from land), he as well was struck by breaking-ship-pieces, and drifted off to unconsciousness as well.



All aboard - woo woo!

The party regained consciousness on a beach with the sun shining down on them. A quick glance around showed that eighteen people had washed ashore; of that 18, eight were alive - Edrik, Egeo, Huff, Avner, Tavey, Urol, Amella (go figure) and a colonist that the crew remembered being called Luthar.

Thus enters: Luthar van Zon

As the survivors gathered their wits and looked around, they saw that they were on a beach perhaps 30' deep that then led to jungle - from the jungle came a deafening roar.

As the party faced the direction of the source of the noise, out from the jungle tromped...well, you know.



Egeo snapped to action, casting Touch of Fatigue and designating Ein as the method of delivery. Edrik responded with a whopping 2 Mirror Images, and Avner ran screaming back into the surf.

Luthar stepped front and center between the party and the T-rex, invoking the Blessing of Pelor onto his allies.
Apparently in T-rex language this is an invitation to be eaten, as that's pretty much what happened next; Luthar got the "Chompity Chomp" and was stuck in the T-rex's maw.

Huff unslung his bow and directed Cherpa to attack, which she did quite well. As Amella was in the line of fire, she attacked to little avail with her rapier.

Edrik then cast Vertigo - from the PHBII:

Vertigo
Illusion (Phantasm) [Fear, Mind-Affecting]
Level: Bard 2, beguiler 2, sorcerer/wizard 2
Components: V, S
Casting Time: 1 standard action
Range: Close (25 ft. + 5 ft./2 levels)
Target: One living creature
Duration: 1 round/level (D)
Saving Throw: Will disbelief
Spell Resistance: No

The subject of this spell becomes dizzy as the ground seems to drop away beneath its feet. The subject must succeed on a DC 10 Balance check at the start of each turn to take a move action.
If it fails, it cannot move. If it fails the check by 5 or more, it falls prone. While affected, the subject also takes a –2 penalty on attack rolls and saving throws.
Airborne creatures receive a +4 bonus on saves against this spell and do not need to make the Balance checks.

...and the T-rex fell down, popping Luthar out of its mouth.

Then there was the Big Beatdown™ with just about everyone dishing out some damage, and the creature turned tail and ran, not expecting prey to be nearly this much a pain in the ass.

This was not to be, as Edrik decided that - since we needed to eat - T-rex meat was just what the chef ordered. Thus, he and Huff took off after this thing into the jungle and eventually felled it.

Egeo and Luthar got to the business of disposing of the dead, and after a brief discussion as to whether or not to have them buried at sea or burned, the decision was made to burn (as the party didn't want to have the fun that Gob did attempting to rid himself of a letter, 14:52).

Leaving Urol to help Huff, Edrik then took off to see what he could salvage from the Sea Wyvern wreckage.

After getting direction from Urol (Health Inspector Extraordinaire) as to which parts of the T-rex would make for "good eatin'," Huff dragged back a big chunk of T-rex thigh for cooking.

As Edrik's player engaged the DM about what could be retrieved from the wreck, there was a great bit of roleplay between Huff and Luthar; paraphrased because my memory sucks:

Huff: Hey, you're one of them religious guys. How come we're burning the bodies if flames are supposed to be from Hell and stuff?
[After a moment collecting thoughts] Luthar: Well, it's because you are confusing the metaphorical and the literal. The literal flames that are burning the bodies are a metaphor for returning them to the shining glory that is Pelor; in the case of the fires of the infernal planes, they are...
[Egeo's Player, OOC]: Huff, make a Will save vs. Sleep.
[Huff's player, OOC]: Six! [IC] < snore >
Luthar: Pelor be praised.

Urol then informed everyone that he believed that we were definitely close to Farshore, just not on the right isle of the Greater Isle of Dread Metropolitan Area. He explained that we needed to head south through the jungle, over some mountains to eventually hit the village of Tamaroa (sp?), where then we could arrange to get a boat to Farshore. As he had previously been to said Isles before, and he had a map, he seemed fairly believable.

As Edrik was about to head back into the water to start hauling out the fair amount of stuff that was worth getting, Luthar cast Water Breathing on pretty much the rest of the party, thus making the job significantly easier.

And thus we left it, where the party was settling down for the rest of the day to rest before starting out on the trip over the mountain and through the jungle, to Tamaroa we go...

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It's not as cliffhangery and ending as we've been used to, but somehow I think we'll muddle through.