Ok, here's the setup for the next session, which went down last night. Ganex and Vork's players are back from vacation.
Ganex's body is 'meditating psionically' in his room, but his energy matrix is questing around in the Dream Realm.
We decided Vork was out carousing with his 'kinda girlfriend' Guinevere Vartagnan.
Owyn and Bernhard are still on the Shadow Plane.
So basicly we have split the party:
Shadow Plane: Owyn and Bernahrd
Dream Realm: Ganex
Home City: Vork
* * *
We open on Vork. Vork was supposed to meet his ladyfriend but she hasn't shown up. He searches for her in town, and eventually hears that she was looking for him, and may have gone to meet him at the Guild Hall where they all pretty much live.
So he goes to the guild hall, and hears that she is indeed waiting for him in his room.
He goes up to his room. There she is. But as he enters, he fails a critical spot check. He's walked into an ambush. The party arch enemy, Vincent, an undead cleric of Zumaloken shuts the door. He has with him one of the Lost Servants of Zumaloken.
Ok: more background:
The Lost Servants were the final cult of Zumaloken. They were wiped out by a flood, so what's left are these super-zombie guys called Drowned (see Monster manual 3). They can turn on a 'drowning aura' that most adventurers can handle for a few rounds, but civilians pretty much will die of, quickly.
Coincidentally, 'Vincent' is a former PC belonging to Bernhard. After he was killed, became undead, and then subsequently became just way too evil, he was turned over to me to use as a villian. However, the player still gives me tips and direction every once in a while about "What Vincent would do".
Ok, Vincent, and his drowned goon are in the room. Captured Guinevere. Vork is right there.
Vincent taunts Vork a bit. Vork weighs his options. He decides not to fight.
Vincent explains: "I have noticed that nearly everyone is off plane except for you. So naturally I was .. concerned.. heheh. Now, I must know where Mr. Glydd is."
(Vincent wants revenge againmst Owyn Glydd, but even more, he is afraid Owyn will sabotage his plan to revive the cult of Zumaloken. Thats his motivation).
Vork answers honestly "I have no idea where he is."
Vincent bares his teeth and says "care to submit to a spell?"
I did not have Detect thoughts memorized for Vincent, but I did have 'Dominate Person'. I expected Vork to resist, and it to come down to maybe some fast-talk or bluffing or even a will save.
Surprisingly, he did not resist. "Cast what you like. I am not sure where he is.. let the girl go.."
Vincent casts. Vork doesn't recognize the spell. I offered him a save, but he said "I submit to the spell". His thought was he would pass the brain scan of a
detect thoughts with no problem.
Vincent instead cast 'Dominate Person'.
Vincents command: "You will track down Owyn and bring himto me at the docks. My ship is the 'Mother and Country'. I will be taking the girl with me. Do not fail. Do not bother with your friend Ganex in the next room. I have already killed his body..."
Vork goes "aww man!"
Game note: Ganex was 'meditating' next door, but as I said, he is an energy matrix creature, and his real self is on another plane, at the end of his rebuild quest. So Ganex was actually in the process of 'creating a new body' when we last left him.
Vork goes and tries to track down Owyn. Since he missed the session where Owyn started out on his rebuild quest, he actually didn't know OOC where Owyn was. So this was kinda fun.
He goes and tosses Owyn's room, and finds a few clues: the receipt from the jewelers for the ruby shards. Books about the shadow plane, the forge of Pascion, etc. Bernhard's room yields a lot less clues.
He asks around and hears about Owyn & Bernhard going to visit a historian in town and borrowing a mysterious ancient sarcophagus.
He finds the sarcophagus in the exhibit hall of the Guild. He tracks footprints going in but not coming out.
At this point the dominate person spell wore off. He was still curious where his friends had gone.
We switched to Ganex, finishing up his quest, along with Kismet, his Elan companion. They return from the dream realm in their new bodies. They see that their old bodies have been murdered.
They pass Vork and do not reveal their new identities to him at first, at Kismets insistence. Instead they follow him to the jewelers shop where Owyn bought the ruby shards. They eavesdrop on Vorks attempt to get information from the jewelers.
The jeweler is not forthcoming with info: Game note: The Jewelers guild is a criminal organization run by a gnomish criminal syndicate of which Owyn is secretly a member. So when Vork comes around asking about him, and he fails his diplomacy-- the jeweler clams up.
After seeing the exchange fail, Ganex decides to help out. He telepathically reveals himself to Vork. "It's me, Ganex. I am wearing a new body..". He then uses psionic charm on the jeweler and gets the info: Two specially made ruby shards were bought. A clue was dropped "but our precious stone supply from Jemro is running low- shipments have stopped coming in, so if you want some like those, it'll cost extra'.
Game-note: Jemro is Owyn's home town-- A gnomish mining town. This is important as a clue because Vincent has actually enslaved the entire town, and the PCs haven't found out yet.
So now I have Ganex, Vork, and (npc) Kismet) together.
next up: back to Bernhard and Owyn.