#[ and no one has thought to ask a drow or survived to spread knowledge- ]

[spiderwarden]

Your muse: returns from the Underdark, bearing forages plants and mushrooms, and is asking everyone what is what and there is a pale carrot-turnip shaped thing everyone is trying to figure out in particular. No one knows, everyone thinks it’s poisoned or unhealthy, everyone is theorizing, making jokes.

Minthara: the ONE canonical hobby Gardener in camp marches up and RIPS it out of their hand and glares at them, holds their eye, takes a bite and walks away eating it like they are an idiot.

Everyone is too shocked to say anything.

[out-there-so-it-isnt-just-me]

Hey guys...I have an idea if you aren't sad enough yet. I was struck by a painful comparison sort of crossover idea. It would never be canon, but  I'm mourning the end of Campaign Two, and I want to be sad and over-dramatic. Essek, but as Eliza from Hamilton in “Who Lives, Who Dies, Who Tells Your Story.” But, it’s for the entire Mighty Nien. Some of the lyrics are so on point for a poor Essek who will probably outlive all of his friends (Elves still generally live longer than Firbolgs by a good 200 years). Anyway, enjoy.

MN

Every other founding father's story gets told

It occurs to Essek, during one of the many periods without one of the Mighty Nein (the time that he dwells on them the most), how unfair their whole situation is. They saved all of Exandria, and no one knows. They are amazing, and odd, and frustrating, and no one knows. They will die loved deeply, but not widely. He knows they prefer it that way, all things considered. But, everyone else who saves all of Exandria becomes legends, while the people he loves best will be forgotten, remembered only by him.

And that. That sounds unbearable. 

So, in-between the times he sees the Mighty Nein, he begins to gather accounts. He writes down stories from those they helped, or simply left an impression on.  The people who have met the Mighty Nein have an air about them that he gets good at detecting. They attracted the oddballs and the outcasts. And if they're entirely normal (whatever that means), then they usually get a certain twitch if you ask for stories about interesting strangers. About half the time, a certain blue tiefling pops up in them. He almost has a heart attack when he hears  “go fuck yourself,” in Jester’s cheerful voice, when he knows Jester isn’t anywhere near there. He ends up getting the kenku’s story, and the voices of his friends are weaved into it. Essek thinks the Mighty Nein are the best people in the world, in their own rambunctious way. Part of him wants the world to love them as he does, or at least have the option to. Everyone should have a chance to get to know them, even if it's just through tales. The world would be a better place for it.

...And when you're gone, who remembers your name?

Who keeps your flame? 

Who tells your story?

Who tells your story?

Who tells your story?

Once there is only him and Caduceus left, this becomes a more prominent part of how he spends his time. After...after a long, long period of mourning. He has so much life left to live without most of the people who made it worth living.

I put myself back in the narrative

I stop wasting time on tears

I live another 50(0) years

He stops hiding his past and bears his sins and his story to the world. Essek tells his story so their story can be appreciated to the fullest; his part in their story emphasizes the depth of their compassion and chaos. He tells his story, but not as himself. Essek continues to drift from town to town under a vast number of aliases. Everywhere he goes, he spreads his stories of his friends, some serious, most silly. He disguises himself so he can stay alive to do a little more good, tell a few more stories, to truly live the life his friends wanted for him.

...I try to make sense of your thousands of pages of writings

You really do write like you're running out of time.

Eventually, he gets his hands on some of Beau’s journals, Jester’s diaries, and Caleb’s research. Well, he always had the research, but he gets to the point where he can share it with the world. He slowly begins to share and explain their thoughts and personalities with excerpts from those. Maybe he also has letters that he shares parts of (though most of those, those words specifically for him, he keeps to himself, for himself). He wonders if they'd be angry at him for spilling their private thoughts. But neither Beau nor Jester filtered their thoughts very much in the first place, and he keeps anything truly painful out of the public eye. Caleb, well, Caleb was always about sharing his knowledge and research, provided it wasn't dangerous. And they were all dead anyway.  One of the last things they told him was to be happy. And talking about his friends, learning more about his friends even after they were long dead, that made him the happiest he'd been in a while. So he hoped they wouldn’t begrudge him this small joy he’d managed to grasp and forgive him, should it be necessary.

I rely on Angelica

While she's alive, we tell your story

She is buried in Trinity Church near you

When I needed her most, she was right on time

Caduceus isn’t particularly interested in being well known or famous, but he never shies away from telling a story about any of his friends. Plus, he thinks it’s a good project for Essek. It's a way to continue to show his love for them and keep them alive in the only way they can be now. When Caduceus eventually passes away, he joins the eight other graves (Veth refused to be buried apart from Yeza) that lay in a tucked-away corner of the Blooming Grove. There is one space left, nestled between where Caleb and Jester lay, but it will be empty for a long time yet.

And I'm still not through

I ask myself, what would you do if you had more time...

...You could have done so much more if you only had time

And when my time is up, have I done enough?

Will they tell your story?

He keeps adding to his tale; he stretches it longer and longer with every shred he can remember. But, even his memory, as long as it is, runs out eventually. And their story finally ends, but he doesn't. He throws himself into activities that remind him of them. He does a lot of gardening ( mostly tea, poisonous plants, and flowers). He teaches children some rudimentary dunamancy in his spare time, for Caleb. He messes around with alchemy a little. Eventually, he publishes the last of the research that he and Caleb worked on together; ones that took him decades to solve by himself. He even finds himself drawing a surprising amount of dicks on random surfaces near the very end.

Oh, can I show you what I'm proudest of?

...I help to raise hundreds of children

I get to see them growing up

The time that doesn’t go towards his now worrying amount of hobbies, he spends doing what he has done since the beginning: caring for the Mighty Nien’s true legacy. He looks after and visits their children. He takes care of descendants of Luc, of Jester and Fjord, of the random teenager that Beau and Yasha seemed to adopt completely on accident, of TJ, of the Clays, and of a lovechild of Kingsley’s that found out who his father was and then somehow found Essek himself to learn about him. In an embarrassing show of sentimentality, Essek always keeps at least one offspring of Caleb's very first cat. There is a very funny story about Caleb thinking the animal was spayed when it was, in fact, not. He visits the different generations every couple of years or so (he has a schedule). The drow makes sure they know the stories of their ancestors, the adventures of the Mighty Nien; he tells them it's all real. He gives them ways to contact him if they’re in danger, or need any kind of help really ( he has funds to spare at this point). Every once in a while, a few of them will get it in their heads to write him yearly updates. It’s nice.

In their eyes, I see you, Alexander

I see you every time

And when my time is up

Have I done enough?

Will they tell your story?

It is strange and painful to see the attitude and mannerisms of the Nein in the descendants who have never met them. It is wonderful too. His stories of the Mighty Nein have become well-known tales that no one can decide how much is truth and how much is fiction (it’s true, it’s all somehow, hilariously true). He preserved them in his own way, in the right way (time travel is something he thinks of with a growing hunger the more years pass between when he last laid eyes on his friends). But in these men, these women, these children, they are truly alive.

One little half-orc girl has Jester’s mischievous eyes and infectious joy. Another halfling man squints just like Veth when she's trying to figure out if someone is bullshitting her. There’s a boy who charmingly bumbles his way through most social encounters, as Fjord did. A firbolg woman who has Caduceus gentle smile. A tiefling girl with all the audacious bravado of Kingsley. A man with eyes just as piercing as Beau’s, and a tongue just as sharp. Even Yasha’s kind and gentle demeanor somehow shines through in one small boy, despite her having no direct descendants. He gets to see these flashes of his friends in those who survive them, and it thrills him as much as it cuts him. (Sometimes, when the current cat has ruined some item of his, the pleased look it wears resembles the quiet glee Caleb exuded after he pulled a successful prank, but he’s pretty sure that’s just fanciful thinking.)

One of the last things Essek does before he dies is fully publish, in print, the entire tale of the Mighty Nein. How they came together, every person they helped along the way. The love, the loss, the kindness, the chaos, every moment he could recall or record was put into this one account (necessarily stretched out into several separate books). There is only one set, and he hands it over to the Library of the Cobalt Soul in Rexxentrum. Then he goes on his lonely way.

Oh, I can't wait to see you again

It's only a matter of time

There are now ten graves, each one as unique as its owner, nestled in a small corner of the Blooming Grove. One grave has the dirt still fresh around it. And somewhere, beyond the Divine Gate, there are cheers and laughs and cries of joy as the Mighty Nien become the Mighty Nine once more.

fin.

MN

It’s my head-canon that by the time Essek dies he’s practically a mythical figure among the select families he looks after. It's  to the point that in certain locations ( that have a lot of Nein remnants) he becomes a local legend, the guardian angel of nien (no spelling specified and with no real distinction of what that means), with skin like the night sky who drifts (literally) through towns and helps those who meet a certain requirement, unknown to the general populus. There are rumors that certain people have bestowed upon them a token they could use to call upon the angel’s aid. Of course, the people who have the tokens (sending stones or something similar. IDK how he would get that many wondrous items, but I focus on satisfying narrative not, like, plausibility) know Essek and know that he has died and that the tokens no longer work, but for a while they keep them as heirlooms, to show the love of one drow wizard for the friends he had long, long ago. Eventually, one of Veth’s descendants sells off their set because sending stones are worth A LOT, and the money seemed more practical. They have their stories; those are enough. 

And before anyone complains about the Kingsley bit, I felt compelled to add a smidgen of Kingsley content because Essek loves Jester and Jester’s with Fjord and Kingsley is with both of them for years. I’m sure they get to know each other well enough that seeing traits of Kingsley is vaguely nostalgic and warming, even if it lacks the depth and love he feels for everyone else. Also, there’s no convincing me that Molly/Kingsley doesn’t have at least one illegitimate child running around from various trysts, he was basically the Scanlan of this campaign. It goes with the hedonistic vibe he gives off.

Also, is it normal that I completely designed the Nein’s burial site in my head because I did? Like I imagine they’re all spaced out in a circle. It’s almost like a stone gazebo but there’s not really a roof; it’s just a group of nine pillars that support a stone circle. The entrance is the Traveler’s door with dicks around the edge, and each of the nine pillars/supports is designed to look the knowing mistresses staff. The stone circle is covered in carvings of storm clouds and lightning. Wires are strung across the center of the stone circle to form the symbol of the Cobalt Soul. Not that you can see the wires, because vines have been grown all around them. Once you step through the Traveler’s gate, you’ll find yourself on some kind of rough mosaic floor, with depictions of a peacock, a pyramid, a snake, a sun, a moon, and (oddly) a pirate ship. The mosaic is made up of buttons of various materials and shapes. In the center is a saltwater pool/spring (depending on how magical we can get idk) and floating above it is an eternal flame encased in some sort of dunamancy magic that doesn’t  actually exist that keeps it floating and eternal. Look I'm running out of ideas.

I can’t imagine what everyone’s grave marker would be, but I’m pretty sure Yasha’s is a simple stone that says "YASHA NYDOORIN: wife of Zuella and Beauregard Lionette," and the place where’s she’s buried is just covered in wildflowers that spread outside of the gazebo to encircle the structure entirely up to the gate. Also, everyone has a stone tarot card by their grave with the picture and designation that Molly gave them. Beyond that grows a weirdly dense thicket of trees and bushes that make finding the Nein's resting place rather hard. It’s said only the descendants of the Nein’s family or those favored by the Wildmother (or Traveler, Or Ioun, or Storm Lord) can find their way to them. And one tree, directly behind Yasha, is dead, struck by lightning who knows how long ago. 

And they’re buried in this order: Yeza/Veth, Caleb, Essek, Jester, Ford, Kingsley, Yasha, Beau, Cad. I know there’s a good chance that a) Kingsley would just eff off and die somewhere unknown and b) Cad would probably want to be buried with the rest of his family, but shhh let me dream.

[diceprophet]

D&D 5e Game #3 Notes

Session 3: “Castle in the Sky”

Three games ago, we brought together an incredibly mismatched party with conflicting moralities, personalities, and motivations. By now, it appears that this is the beginning of a long and beautiful...acquaintanceship. Give us some credit; at least they haven’t tried to kill each other yet.

Over the course of the starting trials, the party has learned a great deal about the world and are struggling to find their place within the unforgiving maelstrom of schemes, battles, and deceptions. Also, some amusing interactions between party members has led to burgeoning friendships, or at least amicable rivalries. And most importantly, the actual plot of the module is beginning to creep into their realities, signaling the coming of great changes and tribulations. Link to Previous Session Notes

All the while, each individual attempts to hold onto to their ultimate goal, no matter how impossible they may seem. The drow outcast Tebryn seeks to liberate his brethren from the oppressive matriarchal structure of the Underdark. In order to do so, he must form the network required to recruit and rescue all those willing to share his vision of a more egalitarian drow society. But is this even possible, when trapped between two worlds that despise and distrust his race and gender? The half-orc vagabond Vakgar seeks to regain his father Krelock Cleftjaw’s approval. However, assembling a warband will be a harrowing challenge, and his trueborn kin will not stand idly by as their bagra durl (“lesser brother”) attempts to steal their birthright from them. The aarokocra hatch-mates Cheed-it and Kweh have set their sights upon reclaiming their homeland, the Star Mounts, from an ancient green dragon. The wingless aarokocra paladin Folkien, a member of the Order of the Gauntlet, may be their first step in gaining the allies necessary to aid them in this monumental endeavor. The human monk Lao remains aloof, hesitant to disclose the details of his life before his pilgrimage. But half a world away to the east, people from his past continue searching for him, drawing ever closer. And finally, the aasimar bard Lyra continues to ponder her cryptic Deva visions, fruitlessly attempting to decipher whatever destiny intends for her.

Part 1: Level Up!

Nightstone remains standing after a brutal clash with a branch of the Cleftjaw Clan called the “Ear Seekers.” Their leader Gurash, his new ogre wife Thogg, and less than a dozen of his raiders lived to spread carnage another day. Folkien briefly reunited with an old comrade, a quirky aarokocra ranger named Krel-wick, who also used to hail from the Star Mounts. Over the years, through separation and drastically differing life experiences, the two had drifted apart and barely recognized one another. Krel-wick respectfully departs after his offer to join his faction, the Emerald Enclave, is rejected by the paladin.

Between healing their wounds and preparing to return to the road once more, the party took some time to acquaint themselves with their newfound special abilities. Lao gained the power to bend whole trees with his bare hands, as well as inhuman reflexes. Vakgar learned how to further unleash and control his fury, giving him unprecedented strength and agility. Lyra acquired her ancestral wings, along with enhancements to her already mesmerizing bardic abilities. Chee-dit discovered how to manipulate and control plant matter, making her even deadlier in the wilds. Kweh trained herself to sling magic and sword in each hand, improving her prowess on the battlefield. And lastly, Tebryn learned more about anatomy in order to enhance his already deadly knifework, and developed a propensity of adopting disguises.

Part 2: Northbound

The innkeeper Morak had beseeched the party to send word to Waterdeep requesting further aid, and that a new member of the Nandar family come forth to assume leadership. Lyra decided that would be best for their current situation, given the township’s ravaged state and the oncoming winter, so she agreed to be a messenger for them. She had greatly endeared herself to the residents, so the Summerhawk family sent her off with a gift of appreciation. Lao agreed to tag along, acknowledging that a party of six had higher odds of survival than going their separate ways. Tebryn agreed to the errand, but more because he wished to explore a Zhentarim lead in the gambling dens that could prove beneficial to his ambitions. The aarokocra duo figured that following Folkien back to Waterdeep would grant them access to more information regarding their homeland and the nefarious dragon that occupies it. 

Vakgar, however, though it was a stupid task and wanted no part in assisting weaklings, but the party dragged him along for the ride, regardless. Lyra combined her vast knowledge of the region along with Tebryn’s playful goading to entice the brute with the promise of a good fight in the “Kraken Pits.” This renowned brawling arena was located on the docks of Waterdeep, so Vagkar reluctantly agreed to journey northward beside the band of weirdos.

Before leaving, Kweh insisted on learning more about Folkien’s backstory, specifically how he lost his wings. He gave her an ultimatum: defeat him in a friendly martial contest, and he would divulge the details. Kweh fought valiantly with longsword, bow, and fireballs, but Folkien’s immense strength and prowess with his greatsword eventually overpowered her. The more experienced bird emerged victorious this time, and his Tragic Backstory™ was tabled for another day.

Part 3: The Mad Giant

Two uneventful days on the High Road passed. But on the eve of the third day, the party was suddenly caught in a life-or-death situation as a massive tower from the sky began plummeting down upon them. Without time to ask any questions, the party had to flee as the sky-borne structure crashed into the earth, almost crushing the entire party in a shower of debris and stone.

Bruised and battered, but thankfully still breathing, the party investigated the large structure and found it occupied by a belligerent but friendly cloud giant named Zephyros. After a mind-clearing bonk on the skull by a thoroughly frustrated Vagkar, the giant welcomed the party into his half-destroyed tower to explain the whole potentially world-threatening situation.

The Ordning, a caste system that kept the giants in check, had been shattered, and the multiple clans subsequently declared war upon each other and the smallfolk. If allowed to continue, these raging sects threaten to tear the North apart. All the while, the stoic but benevolent Storm King Hekaton had gone missing, leaving their rampages unchallenged. The storm giants once stood at the very top of the social ladder, but now their authority was being questions at multiple fronts. 

Zephyros attempted to contact the outer planes for guidance, and after several failed attempts that frazzled his brain, he managed to sight-jack into Lyra’s deva dreams, and beheld the wingless angel before his mind broke altogether. The party briefly shared ale with the crazy old cloud giant and acquainted themselves with his gryphons, as he attempted to regain his memory and sanity. The lapse in lucidity had caused him to lose control of his floating tower, leading to their chance encounter at the outskirts of Waterdeep. But unlike Lyra, who believed the wingless angel to be Folkien, Zephyros assumed that Lyra was the angel herself, given how he detected her angelic heritage with his magically-attuned eyes. Although their interpretations differed, both realized that they would need each other in the events to come. 

Unfortunately, the Navigation Orb that powered the ship’s flight had been damaged in the crash, and thus the kindly giant requested that the party go to the nearby city and procure the spell components needed to repair the damages. Since they were already on the way, most of them agreed to the additional detour. To thank them for their assistance, Zephyros gave them a great deal of coin (500 GP each) to aid them in purchasing the listed ingredients, as well as to compensate them for the trouble. He also promised a special item for each adventurer with the completion of the ultimate task. With their pockets much heavier, the party ascends to Waterdeep.

Part 4: Dungeon Master’s Closing Thoughts

This was purely a character-building and exposition-centered session, but we had a blast nonetheless. The training montages were funny as hell, and even though there was no real danger this time, it was exciting and gripping to play with these people, as always. I’m learning more about the individual characters as well as what makes them “tick,” so I’m getting slightly better at motivating them to go where I want them to go, with minimum railroading. In regards to the vast world-building of the Savage Frontier, I’ve been slowly drip-feeding them the details of the factions, locations, and the overarching giant threat, and it appears to be working. The party is having an easier time recalling important details throughout the games, moreso than if I gave them a glossary’s worth of explanations at the offset. The next game, they’ll finally get to see their first big city, filled with even more characters, factions, calls to adventure, and dangers! So excited to see how they handle what I’ve go cooking for them!

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