What Happened in the Previous Session?

Moonstair, Messages and Justice

Once the party finally reach Moonstair they decided that they would check out the local scenery and they checked in to the renowed "Trolls Head Tavern", where they meet up with a forward young Halfling Bard by the name of Bree. Bree decides to throw his lot in with the group, as he has little else to do at the moment, and a life of adventuring had taken some time to come in his direction.

The Troll's Head is well known for its food, entertainment and drinking. The entertainment appeared to be a big draw for the adventurers, and the mischevious side came out in both the halfling and the gnomes. They had a lot of rollicking fun using a Mage Hand spell to de-tune the musician's lute and pluck random notes - this was the last straw for the publican who asked the well know Prender the Pretender to leave his establishment for the last time! What was he to do etc.... followed by the offer of a bard who happened to be passing - Bree - to pick up where Prender had left off.

More mucking around in the bar occurred - Bree had some magical assistance with his "surround sound" performance and Frug was asked to leave the bar having seemingly made a smell that would have embarrassed even the smelliest cow (a trick played by the gnome sorcerer).

Eventually the party settled down a little and tracked down some information. They:

• Visited the Mayor of Moonstair - Kelana Dhoram - and enquired about conditions. They let her know that her messanger had fallen and the message requesting aid had not therefore been delivered. Frug (the gnome swordmage) then offerred to use magic to get a message directly to the Baron. He took the message and it magically disappeared. What was not plain to the Mayor or her advisors was that Frug had merely teleported the message 30 feet away into the street..... (more on this later).
  
• Found out that the Baron's son Etheran - who had been killed whilst out on an expedition into the Trollhaunt - had lost his ancestral magic sword when he died, and that there was only one survivor of the raid into the trollhaunt - a dragonborn called Bax.
  
• Bax appears to be a broken man - he blames himself for the deah of his brother in arms and thinks himself a cowardly failure.
  

Early the next moring the party had decided to head out into the Trollhaunt, when Frug - the gnome swordmage - was arrested by the town guard, who take him to Gaol for his little stunt with the message Dhoram had asked him to send through to the Baron - the one he teleported into the street.....

Again the party rallied around the little chap trying to ensure he wasn't summarily executed. Frug even tried to fool the Mayor again with the same trick - teleporting a key she gave him supposedly to her desk, and getting Grunge to try to pretend to find it there. Mayor Dhoram spotted that the key was not the same one as she had given to Frug to send. It took a real and HONEST plea to save Frug's miserable little neck - that he was more use in the fight in the Trollhaunt than dead before he had fought....

Off they go into the marshes having been marched there directly from the prison.

Into the Trollhaunt

The party managed an almost perfect navigation through the swamps of the Trollhaunt, thanks in large part to the phenomenal skills of their Earth Warden Goliath - Orillo. His +19 nature rolls made the skills checks almost meaningless, and they could find and follow the roads of ancient Vardar with ease.

The party had a small run in with a large two headed Ettin - a man-monster withh two brains and therefore two attacks per round - who had three of trolls in tow. They had waited for the party to walk directly into their trap and then leapt out from their prepared pits and attacked from each corner of the compass.

A fierce battle ensued and the party finally started getting their combat tactics co-ordinated and using good powers in an integrated fashion.

The party managed after a fierce battle to subdue and eliminate the trolls and the Ettin. This was made considerably easier by the fact that BAX had leapt through the undergrowth, having been shamed by the party to return to the fight in their brief conversations in Moonstair.

They then rested - uneventfully luckily - until the morning and when they had all recovered. They then pressed on, and using their extensive knowledge of local and regional history, their understanding of the local landscape and some keen observation, they found their way to the base of a valley, wherein lay the foundations of an ancient road, which led into the hills, and into a cave.

The Great Warren

The party found a large cave with a stream flowing through it. There was a door and a grill, looking into something akin to a cell for animals.They tried the door, and managed to spring it open quite easily. Torvi - the Dragon born Paladin, led the way into the doorway, whereupon he was hit by a large green troll for his troubles.

There ensued a major conflict between the party and three large trolls plus up to three troglodytes - being a common companion of the trolls - using some clever tactics. The trolls did not bunch up together - they have clearly encountered dragonborn before - and the troglodytes stayed at a distance and threw poisoned javelins at the party.

After much hack and slash, the party had again learned to work together well. Bree had evolved a new tactic - use initially against the Ettin, but more effective on a single headed Troll - of magically lighting up the creature's nose, thereby restricting its vision somewhat...

The party should once again be grateful to Bax, as he inflicted a substantial proportion of the total damage caused.

However, one of the troglodytes managed to escape from the party and thre down a bridge over the stream that led off to the South. They party could try crossing the stream (more of a raging torrent really) or use the passage to the East, which leads to who knows where....

The Adventurers

Frug - Gnome Swordmage - with an evil tinge to his character
Grunge - Gnome Sorceror - with a sense of humour
Torvi - Dragonborn Paladin (whose player wanted him to be a bit more evil)
Orillo - Goliath Earth Warden - with a deep love of nature and a cracking understanding of it to boot.
Bree - Halfling Bard with lots of magic skills too (or at least ones that help his act).
Bax - Dragonborn Warlord with a point to prove.....to himself