The following is a recollection from Vralino Hammer-Shield, currently living in Trayckid. The text remains unaltered to maintain its authenticity (Certain terms and names written wrong to keep in character). It is written in Or'zet.
So I was asked by Zivilyn to help track down Soben Tarl. We had several rumors on where he or she or whatever they were were doing, and I was asked by Rangi to look into the merchants to see if there was any news from Travar. After what had to be my most successful seduction to date (small pun intended), I found that Travar had a massive tower built as a shrine to Chorrolis. Atop this tower was the Chamber of Vaults, which was where Soben was expected to strike. From there, Rangi, with her infinite deductive prowess, had me go flirt with a Questor of Chorrolis. Great idea, going with a flirt instead of a seduction. The merchant from earlier had begun to stalk me around Throal. I had to lose him before approaching the Questors of Chorrolis, which is harder than it should be when you don't have Stealthy Stride. I convinced a Questor to contact his Passion, which cost me 10 silver pieces. About four hours later, he starts banging on my door. I thought he wanted a booty call, but he said we needed to get to Travar immediately. I rounded up the Zivilyn, Rangi, Thorkell, and Norg and we set out to Travar! We gonna catch a bad guy!
Arriving at Travar, we made liaison with the Questors of Chorrolis in the tower. Zivilyn had the bright idea to get a letter of introduction before we left. We attempted to go up to the second story, where we were stopped at the stairs. I asked them where to turn in the letter of introduction and we were given a tour of the tower. There were massive vaults at the top story, which all supported the cieling. There was also a large strong room, where all the valuables were held. Offices, and thrones, and a currency exchange. By the description, it seemed impenetrable by illusionary tricks, so I elected to check the other floors to see if there was anything else worth stealing. After a short while, I got one of the clerks to give me a private tour. Odd thing to call it, as I saw no privates, though it wasn't through lack of trying. I just didn't want to see them. I had important other things to do. We inspected the adornments, which looked like they cost a pretty copper, we checked out several offices, and we bumped into each other a few times in a few conference rooms. Clumsy oaf. Nothing really stood out as a potential target for the heist, though. After that, I went to the Air Docks and the Docking Tower to see if there was much air traffic over the tower. Seemed the skies inside the city wall were kept clean. We stood guard over night with the normal watch, near the strong room.
The next day, I went with Zivilyn to interrogate a recently apprehended thief to see if there was any new game in town. It was a long shot, but we didn't have any real leads to check out. When we returned, Rangi discovered that one of the guards was reported on duty three days ago, but claimed she was at home. After following her tracks, it was determined that there was no way that she was on duty. Soben had been here and conducted recon on the heist site! Norg came up with the idea to mark each guard with Wizard's Mark so this wouldn't happen again. Rangi continued her investigations into the other guard shifts. Nothing outstanding really happened that day.
The last day was so awesome! We woke up after sleeping in the tower again, letting our rather expensive room go to complete waste, when the Night Guard Captain sent us a letter indicating that Soben was outside our inn! We debated on whether this was an illusionary trick or not, and decided to split our party. I went with Norg, mainly because he can take care of himself and Zivilyn, our only other spell slinger, didn't need an extra spell slinger to stick around. So with Thorkell, Rangi, and Zivilyn guarding the Strong Room, Norg and I pursued the suspected Soben, accompanied by another Swordmaster and a non-adept, both guards. We didn't so much find Soben as Soben found us. Spells began landing all around us. As I was retching on the ground, Norg picked me up and dragged the guards and me out of the spell. The guards darted towards the tower to get the rest of our group. My right hand tried to throw away my weapon. I heard the faint sound of shutters closing above us, and instructed Norg to attack the second floor as I launched a Shattering Stone at it. Norg, in his typical Norginess, tried to jump into a window just to find bars. That didn't stop the incredible hulk for long, as he just punched through the wall. Soben left out of the door and into the building. Norg shouted out as he left, and I entered the lower floor. I sent another Shattering Stone at the floor in front of where I suspected Norg to be. It chased out Soben and he left. Norg blamed me for losing track of him, but I started tracking her footsteps through town. We went through many, many doors just to come to a thread that was cut. A magic carpet? This guy's thought of everything! The rest of our party flew in to where we were. I wasn't sure if they had spotted Soben, but they thought that she would easily outrun them on the carpet. Instead we tracked his steps back to find her hidey hole and waited in ambush. It was a swift end to the heist! Victory everywhere! AND I HELPED!!! Thorkell even offered to make me a special ring! I love this job!!!
And when I got back, I had discovered that a fan club began to build around me. How did this even happen!?! Rangi was able to offer some insight into how this monstrosity began. The founding president of the fan club was the merchant that I had seduced before we left Throal. I suppose it's about time that I enjoyed the same amount of fame that Thorkell, Norg, Zivilyn, and Rangi had. I'm just not sure it should be a throng of love struck thralls. Eh, what could possibly go wrong?
AAR: [10H] The Truth Points to Itself 2021-6-5 @ 1700 gmt
Moderator:etherial
Re: LFG: [10H] The Truth Points to Itself 2021-6-5 @ 1700 gmt
Thorkell's Journal:
Zivilyn was tasked with tracking down the Scourge's illusionist: Soben Tarl. In pursuit of this goal, he recruited Norg, A'horangi, Vralino, and myself. Sadly, our trail had gone cold after the events in Kampung Gajah. That meant we first had to put in some time hunting down rumors and chasing leads. For my part I talked to weaponsmiths and found that the missing ore wasn't important or in large enough quantities for this to be Tarl. I also set up shop just inside Throal offering free repairs to any merchants who could give me information on the salt cellars. This rumor also proved to be less than fruitful, but narrowing down our options is important as well. Vralino had met with a questor of Chorollis and asked them to commune with Chorollis about the Chamber of Vaults, a large bank and essentially shrine to Chorollis. After communing the questor came to us flushed. Chorollis required our aid immediately to deal with a plot of Soben Tarl's. We got a letter of introduction from the questor and set out for Travar.
After getting affairs in order (lodging and such) we left for the Chamber of Vaults. It's construction was magnificent to behold. Of course this was dedicated to Chorollis, so to call it opulent would be an understatement. We spoke with the head of security and let them know our intention. We then set about understanding security and protecting as much as we could. I studied the construction and found their measures to be adequate except on the vault door which had two guards to compensate for this. Zivilyn and I also spoke with the enchanter's guild to make sure nothing of interest was made that could either be stolen or used for the theft. Nothing came of that, but I did have some rousing conversations on the methodology of enchanting. *pictures and schematics follow*
A'horangi used her skills to look into the backgrounds of all the employees. She found one discrepancy where an employee had been sick three days prior, but the rest of the shift reported her there. We were fairly certain this was Soben Tarl making preparations ahead of time. He must be planning to strike soon. We set up more strict watches. Zivilyn started marking the guards before they left to make impersonation more difficult.
A few days later we received a report that Soben Tarl had been spotted. Being very wary, we decided to send Norg and Vralino to check on this claim while Zivilyn, A'horangi, and I stayed behind to guard the Vault. From what I heard in the after report, they did find Soben and proceeded to chase him through ever more intricate means of escape. The trail finally ran cold where they believe he took flight with a carpet. The one thing he didn't plan for was using his tracks to his location and following him back to his hideout. We were able to lie in wait and catch him.
Zivilyn was tasked with tracking down the Scourge's illusionist: Soben Tarl. In pursuit of this goal, he recruited Norg, A'horangi, Vralino, and myself. Sadly, our trail had gone cold after the events in Kampung Gajah. That meant we first had to put in some time hunting down rumors and chasing leads. For my part I talked to weaponsmiths and found that the missing ore wasn't important or in large enough quantities for this to be Tarl. I also set up shop just inside Throal offering free repairs to any merchants who could give me information on the salt cellars. This rumor also proved to be less than fruitful, but narrowing down our options is important as well. Vralino had met with a questor of Chorollis and asked them to commune with Chorollis about the Chamber of Vaults, a large bank and essentially shrine to Chorollis. After communing the questor came to us flushed. Chorollis required our aid immediately to deal with a plot of Soben Tarl's. We got a letter of introduction from the questor and set out for Travar.
After getting affairs in order (lodging and such) we left for the Chamber of Vaults. It's construction was magnificent to behold. Of course this was dedicated to Chorollis, so to call it opulent would be an understatement. We spoke with the head of security and let them know our intention. We then set about understanding security and protecting as much as we could. I studied the construction and found their measures to be adequate except on the vault door which had two guards to compensate for this. Zivilyn and I also spoke with the enchanter's guild to make sure nothing of interest was made that could either be stolen or used for the theft. Nothing came of that, but I did have some rousing conversations on the methodology of enchanting. *pictures and schematics follow*
A'horangi used her skills to look into the backgrounds of all the employees. She found one discrepancy where an employee had been sick three days prior, but the rest of the shift reported her there. We were fairly certain this was Soben Tarl making preparations ahead of time. He must be planning to strike soon. We set up more strict watches. Zivilyn started marking the guards before they left to make impersonation more difficult.
A few days later we received a report that Soben Tarl had been spotted. Being very wary, we decided to send Norg and Vralino to check on this claim while Zivilyn, A'horangi, and I stayed behind to guard the Vault. From what I heard in the after report, they did find Soben and proceeded to chase him through ever more intricate means of escape. The trail finally ran cold where they believe he took flight with a carpet. The one thing he didn't plan for was using his tracks to his location and following him back to his hideout. We were able to lie in wait and catch him.
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sigfriedmcwild
- Posts:335
- Joined:Wed Nov 13, 2019 6:59 am
Re: AAR: [10H] The Truth Points to Itself 2021-6-5 @ 1700 gmt
From "The Skies of Barsaive", as penned by Norg, Brother of Earth and Sky, Corsair of Throal
Zivilyn got into his head that tracking down Soben Tarl (the apparent head of the Scourge and annoyingly competent illusionist) would get the attention of one of the Illusionists in Throal and convince them to train him. A'horangi, Thorkell, and Vralino also joined on the wild goose chase which started with trying to figure out where Soben even was.
Turns out a lot of people thought they knew, we heard:
- that they had taken over the tower or Tamerlan the self aggrandizing (a quick messenger bat to Dubhan disproved that)
- that they were stealing ore from Irondelve (Thorkell checked with the blacksmiths and ore merchants and there was no connection)
- that they were haunting an old mansion in Throal (A'horangi and Zivilyn found no evidence of a haunting at all)
- that they were pretending to be a money changer in Salt Cellar (seriously, get better imaginations people)
- that they were a spy for some great power to the west (Zivilyn and I checked and none of the traders and sailors actually dealing with people in that direction had anything)
Vralino spend the first day "investigating" merchants about a rumour of a plot to steal from the Chamber of Vaults in Travar, which really meant getting laid and occasionally remembering to ask questions. However by the second day she got in touch with a questor of Chorrolis who communed with the passion and all the alarm bells started ringing.
Onto an airship and off to Travar we went, armed with a letter of introduction to the people running the Chamber. We were introduced to Aldrac Honeytongue, Exemplar of Chorrolis, who, having been warned by his passion, hired us as "security consultants" to investigate and help with stopping the heist.
Several days of investigation did not bear much fruit, until we noticed that one of the guards had been impersonated, probably by Soben. We stepped up our efforts and started marking all the guards with Wizard's Mark to prevent further incidents.
In the end all of this was pretty much pointless as Soben showed up in an alley making a mess. Vralino and I went to investigate while the others stayed behind just in case it was a distraction. Soben tried to use magic and trickery to throw us off, but despite making me punch myself in the face (extremely painfully I may add) failed to conceal their location well enough... Well... I burst into the building they were in, lost sight of them, opened a door at random and there they were cowering in a corner.
Then Vralino tried to blow up the floor and in the confusion Soben took off running. We gave chase while the guard that had come with us went to get the others. The chase lasted until Vralino lost the tracks, probably because our quarry had taken off on a magic carpet. Some backtracking and head scratching later we managed to figure out the tracks back to their hiding place. There we found them and were able to... vent frustrations.
Let us just say that no amount of disguise self will ever make that face pretty again.
Afterwards it was just a matter of listening to the Exemplar prattle on until we got paid and on an airship back home.
Zivilyn got into his head that tracking down Soben Tarl (the apparent head of the Scourge and annoyingly competent illusionist) would get the attention of one of the Illusionists in Throal and convince them to train him. A'horangi, Thorkell, and Vralino also joined on the wild goose chase which started with trying to figure out where Soben even was.
Turns out a lot of people thought they knew, we heard:
- that they had taken over the tower or Tamerlan the self aggrandizing (a quick messenger bat to Dubhan disproved that)
- that they were stealing ore from Irondelve (Thorkell checked with the blacksmiths and ore merchants and there was no connection)
- that they were haunting an old mansion in Throal (A'horangi and Zivilyn found no evidence of a haunting at all)
- that they were pretending to be a money changer in Salt Cellar (seriously, get better imaginations people)
- that they were a spy for some great power to the west (Zivilyn and I checked and none of the traders and sailors actually dealing with people in that direction had anything)
Vralino spend the first day "investigating" merchants about a rumour of a plot to steal from the Chamber of Vaults in Travar, which really meant getting laid and occasionally remembering to ask questions. However by the second day she got in touch with a questor of Chorrolis who communed with the passion and all the alarm bells started ringing.
Onto an airship and off to Travar we went, armed with a letter of introduction to the people running the Chamber. We were introduced to Aldrac Honeytongue, Exemplar of Chorrolis, who, having been warned by his passion, hired us as "security consultants" to investigate and help with stopping the heist.
Several days of investigation did not bear much fruit, until we noticed that one of the guards had been impersonated, probably by Soben. We stepped up our efforts and started marking all the guards with Wizard's Mark to prevent further incidents.
In the end all of this was pretty much pointless as Soben showed up in an alley making a mess. Vralino and I went to investigate while the others stayed behind just in case it was a distraction. Soben tried to use magic and trickery to throw us off, but despite making me punch myself in the face (extremely painfully I may add) failed to conceal their location well enough... Well... I burst into the building they were in, lost sight of them, opened a door at random and there they were cowering in a corner.
Then Vralino tried to blow up the floor and in the confusion Soben took off running. We gave chase while the guard that had come with us went to get the others. The chase lasted until Vralino lost the tracks, probably because our quarry had taken off on a magic carpet. Some backtracking and head scratching later we managed to figure out the tracks back to their hiding place. There we found them and were able to... vent frustrations.
Let us just say that no amount of disguise self will ever make that face pretty again.
Afterwards it was just a matter of listening to the Exemplar prattle on until we got paid and on an airship back home.