Tag Archives: arcadian

Samaritha the Serpentfolk

Second Session (18 page pdf) – “A Birth and a Death in Riddleport” – Samaritha finally comes to term serpentfolk style and the crew entertain themselves by fighting in Zincher’s arena, but then they find one of their long-time crewmates murdered!

That’s right – Samaritha, Serpent’s wife, who got pregnant back at the end of Season Two, finally gives birth!  Well… Lays an egg, really, she is a serpentfolk. I think Golarion serpentfolk are supposed to do live birth but I’ve admixed the Freeport serpentfolk in instead and they definitely do the egg thing. Quite the milestone! So the first half of the session basically revolves around that. I’m really happy our campaign is in-character roleplay enough that a PC getting married and having a baby is absorbing for all the players.

Clegg Zincher

And how better to celebrate than violence. But it’s not even the PCs’ violence! No, instead they get to watch Mase and Gareb, two of their crewmen, fight fish-men in the arena. They lose, but live through it.

Then they hatch a “clever” plan to hand off their captive Ulfen to the orcs, so that they don’t garner White Estrid’s revenge should she track them down. They wisely decide not to provoke the monkey that comes along for the ride – last time they provoked a monkey in Riddleport someone came close to losing a nose. Word to the wise. (It’s kinda like Costa Rica in that way.)

And then – beloved crewman and second mate Little Mike’s body is found on the streets of Riddleport. BAM! Downbeat and cliffhanger for next time.

Twenty-Sixth Session (16 page pdf) – “The Cursed Earth” – The group hacks their way through frisky vegetation and use the druidic shrine to regenerate everyone’s missing parts! And then their relations with the local werewolves break down. But in the end… It’s back to Riddleport!

In the dungeon, they muse on their spectacularly bad luck – Sindawe hasn’t admitted that he killed Jaren and got his curse, but he does allow that “he was around when he got killed and maybe it jumped to him.” After mulling that over, it’s into a festival of bizarre vegetation the irate shrine is growing.

Mase says, “My mother used to make a dish called ‘blood sap’. It was awful.”
Not to be outdone, Serpent replies, “Samaritha’s people made it from slaves.”
The other pirates fall silent and stare at Serpent, waiting for a punch line, because they don’t know that Samaritha is actually a serpentfolk and her people probably did convert human slaves into  exotic dishes like “blood sap”.
Sindawe covers by saying, “That’s Ulfen pillow talk, you guys. The snow men are a weird bunch.”

Serpent’s player insists that he never casually gives away clues as to his wife’s true monstrous identity.  You be the judge.

Anyway, they reach the altar.  Bloodsuckles!  Canopy creepers!  Time for me to pull out all the new plant monsters no one’s ever heard of! And like last time, it reanimates the dead, in this case Peg-Leg Pete. Lefty, Orgon, and Bel all just about buy it.

But they finally calm the shrine and regenerate everyone!  Huzzah!

When they leave, Mythra is waiting for them – just to betray them!  Actually, it was a doppleganger, the escaped sister of the doppleganger they killed on their last visit.  This ploy works beautifully; the enraged pirates blindly follow her into the forest and attack all the werewolves; they get jacked up so bad they break off but won’t believe Mythra’s protestations of innocence. They announce a cease-fire and hole up in the shrine until the ships return.

Sindawe sees his crew safely aboard the ships and then bravely heads back to get the curse removed, with every expectation that he was going to get killed instead. She removes his curse “like in the deal.” He is grumbly about it. They bury Peg-Leg Pete at sea and sail to Riddleport!

That night in their cabin, Serpent and Samaritha indulge in a little pillow talk involving “squeezing the slaves” for “blood sap”.  In the next cabin, Sindawe buries his head further under a  pillow.

Twenty-Fifth Session (13 page pdf) – “Wrath of the Lost” – It’s deeper in to the shrine to regenerate people’s lost parts. The pit of flesh-eating locusts they bypassed neatly last visit becomes quite the encounter – think Nic Cage from The Wicker Man. “BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEESSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!!!!!”

Things start to get complicated in the dungeon.  The shrine a) stimulates growth of all kinds and b) is very sensitive to emotions. Having a bunch of wrathspawn around is doing it no good, hence a shambling mound coming from the remains of the cave bear they killed last time they were here. They finally take it down during a fighting retreat. They ignore another overture from a talky raven that lives here (it wants them to kill the dwarf – it wanted that last visit, too). An ambush on some sinspawn using the “Han Solo gambit” goes well.

Then it’s time to cross a rope bridge. This went fine last time so the swarm of flesh-eating locusts went undisturbed.  Not so this time – in fact this becomes an hours-long fight, capped off by Wogan summoning a fire beetle with the thought that it must, you know, have fire or something. They don’t, of course. “STUPID FIRE BEETLES!!!”

Finally they come across the main wrathspawn arena area and decide to just bring the pain. It’s an epic battle – the pirates they brought with, since they’re all crippled, aren’t as effective as they are usually but they fight with heart. It’s vicious and Peg-Leg Pete is slain in the combat; most everyone else is felled at least once and brought back by timely healing from Wogan. Next time – the Season Three finale!