"Go back to sleep, they're just burning the jungle back," said one of the crew dismissively. "We'll be at Paradiso in the morning."
Our party consisted of three people: Scoria Stoneturner, a dwarven archaeologist who was coming to find her missing thesis supervisor, Professor Alfonse Stonescribe; Pico de Gallo, a foppish changeling swashbuckler with delusions of glory; and Quetzalcoatl, a brightly coloured tengu ranger who would be our native guide.
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| Pictured? via poohadventures.wikia |
Regardless of our personal goals, we (well, we two non-natives) had been drawn to the New World with the promise of streets paved with gold, glory and riches free for the taking, and, most importantly, absolutely no snakes or spiders. As we stepped off the dock that morning, we realized that the New World might have been oversold a little. Paradiso was a grimy town dominated by massive smelting furnaces constantly belching acrid smoke into the air. No matter how many Perception checks we made, we couldn't detect a single gold paving stone. But we did see an army of downtrodden workers collecting charcoal from last night's jungle burn to feed the insatiable furnaces. The main conflict in our homeland and its colonies was between the rationalist mages, who want to study the treasures of the New World and investigate the natives' magic system, and the Church of Horus, which seeks out native magic items, disenchants them, and melts them down into relics for the glory of the Church. It was clear which party held sway here in Paradiso.
We made our way into The Bar, the only pub or hotel in town, and our Sense Motive checks immediately told us that it was a wretched hive of scum and villainy. The bartender, however, seemed completely trustworthy, and when Pico started flashing his gold around, he offered to sell the adventurers a treasure map he just happened to have. Pico and Scoria jumped at the idea, and purchased the well-worn scrap of paper. Scoria also inquired as to the whereabouts of her thesis advisor, and discovered that he had been investigating some ruins a day's hike up river to the north-west. Pico, however, convinced everyone to head south and follow the map that he had just obtained for a bargain from his close, personal friend the bartender. The map showed some ruins marked with a big X about half a day's walk down the beach. Easy pickings, just like we were promised! Maybe the New World wasn't so bad after all.
We followed the crude map as best as we could, and finally spotted some ruins just a few hundred yards into the jungle from the beach. The archaeologist took the lead, completely failing to detect two crude dart traps. We were then ambushed by a group of seven savages wearing large masks, shaking spears, and shouting "Oogidda-Boogidda!" a lot. Scoria and Pico closed with them while Quetzalcoatl opened fire with her bow. We quickly discovered that the natives strangely had steel spears, a mystery we had little time to ponder as the other six fled after we killed the first one. Scoria took the large mask off the corpse and discovered that the "natives" were, rather suspiciously, white. We investigated the ruins and discovered they were only a single wall, behind which was a campsite with seven bedrolls and the remains of a campfire.
Disappointed and beginning to suspect that the bartender who sold us the map may not have been entirely on the level, we headed back to town along the beach. Before long, we were ambushed again by the remaining savages. Our blades soon revealed that the "natives" swore and spoke in fluent Common. We killed a few more of them and drove the rest of the racist caricatures off into the jungle. By now it was getting late, and the sun would set before we could make it back to Paradiso. We started to make camp, but Quetzalcoatl squawked panickedly and told us to head back to town as fast as we could instead. Apparently, the jungle isn't safe at night.
As soon as darkness fell, we heard a rustling from the bushes and a hideous beast leapt out of the jungle and blocked our path back to town. It was a large alligator scurrying forward on eight hairy tarantula legs. After some debate as to whether we should call it an alligantula or a tarantugator, Pico decided the best thing would be to run past it and get to town as fast as possible. However, despite his prowess at such maneuvers, he was caught mid-leap in the jaws of the tarantugator and brought down to 3 hp. Seeing no other option, the other two party members leapt into the fray. Quetzalcoatl stabbed it with her rapier, causing the beast to unclamp from Pico's leg and chomp hers instead. Pico heroically backed the f*** away and drew his shortbow, provoking an attack of opportunity that missed, thus freeing the bird from the beast's hissing jaws as well. Quetzalcoatl proceeded to critically hit the alligantula, running her rapier through its eye and into its brain. As it rolled over and curled up in its death throes, we beat feet back to Paradiso.
We returned to The Bar, feigning ignorance about the fake treasure map and the ambush so as not to provoke another fight that night, and purchased a fine hotel room:
"We'll take your best room!" Pico said, pushing a gold piece across the bar.
"Top of the stairs, it's the one farthest away from the shitter," the bartender said, placing the gold piece in the register, pulling out nine silver and dropping them in the tip jar.
The next day, we took Quetzalcoatl's night-time blanket off her head and went downstairs for breakfast. There we met Tulijo, a tough-looking half-orc conquistador who had come to the New World to win gold for his king. Given our harrowing encounter with the tarantugator last night, we decided we could use the extra hand. We ventured out into the jungle north-west along the river, in search of Professor Stonescribe. Along the way, we passed by a shack and talked to its owner, who wanted to sell us some magic amulets to protect us against the evil spirits of the jungle. Most of us were able to tell that he was conning us, but Tulijo bought four. Shaq, the owner of the shack, also told us that he would buy alligantula skulls from us for export (or just alligator skulls, because you can't tell the difference). Then he dunked.
We kept following the river until we came to a rope bridge strung precariously 80 feet over a river swarming with alligators. At our end, we spotted a sketchy-looking halfling crouching behind a bush. We questioned him as to his intentions, and his replies were vague and dodgy, so we decided to cautiously cross the bridge one at a time, keeping a close eye on him. On the other side, Pico discovered a gnome crouching behind a rock, further increasing the party's suspicions. As soon as Tulijo, the last one to cross, stepped out onto the bridge, the halfling ran up to the ropes and told him to throw over all his money or he'd send him into the river. While Tulijo debated what to do, Pico grabbed the gnome and pinned him, disarming him of a poisoned dagger in the process. Pico hoped to use the halfling's obvious accomplice as a bargaining chip, but Tulijo opted for the safe route and tossed his coin purse to the brigand. As soon as he got back on solid ground, he sicked his hawk on the thief, but the halfling escaped into the brush with most of the gold.
Once the party was all on the far side of the river, they spent a long time debating what to do with the captured gnome. Tulijo insisted on killing him, while Scoria and Quetzalcoatl were very against murdering a helpless prisoner. Pico didn't want to kill him, but was also very against releasing such a cad and a bounder. He suggested leaving him unconscious or binding his legs together, but Tulijo made it clear that he would kill him in those cases. Ultimately, it was decided to release him for expediency's sake, and to keep an eye on Tulijo.
Further on, they came to an ancient stone pyramid which Scoria identified as being of dwarven make. They ascended the steps to the top, where they found a room containing the recently deceased Professor Stonescribe, bearing all the scars of a tarantugator attack. As dusk was approaching, and Quetzalcoatl warned us that alligantulas tend to return to their kills to feed, we began searching for a way into the pyramid. Pico cleverly detected a secret door outlined in chalk with the words "SECRET DOOR" written across it, and they ventured inside. They came upon a long, smooth stone staircase that led far below the pyramid itself. The archaeologist detected a trap on the fifth stair down and we all hopped over it, but at the base of the stairs she failed to detect a pit trap (one of a truly absurd number of natural 1s she rolled whilst detecting traps during this session) and narrowly avoided falling in. Everyone was able to leap over except Tulijo, who found the spikes at the bottom less than pleasing.
Beyond, the room was full of ancient runic carvings. Scoria the archaeologist was able to decipher them, discovering that this pyramid was the burial place of a great dwarven king whose name was an unpronounceable series of Xs and Qs. She also noted a number of references to the foul Bat God and to the fabled El Dorado, City of Gold. Beyond were two doors, one leading to more stairs and one to a altar room. A golden bat idol stood on the altar, and Scoria and Tulijo got into a lengthy argument over what to do with it, with Tulijo wanting to melt it down and Scoria insisting that "that belongs in a museum!" Ultimately, the party decided to let Scoria be the bearer of such loot, not the least because, as a dwarf, she wouldn't get encumbered by it. As she took the idol off the altar, a rumble echoed through the pyramid and water started leaking slowly into room. Panicked, the party ran downstairs, hoping to loot the pyramid before it flooded, only to trigger another trap. The stairs turned into a slide, launching us into the waiting pit below. Scoria cast feather fall on herself, Tulijo, and Pico, assuming that Quetzalcoatl could fly. She couldn't.
The corridor ahead was very obviously trapped - holes all along the walls for darts, and four big slits just the right size for swinging pendulum-axes - but we weren't sure what would set the trap off. We cautiously made our way through the hallway and opened the door at the other end, revealing a burial chamber stacked with literal tons of gold bars. As the archaeologist pried open the sarcophagus, the hallway behind us erupted with the noise of swinging axes and firing darts. The dwarven corpse within was clutching a black stone box. Pico wrested it from his skeletal claws and opened it up, discovering that it was a lot bigger on the inside. As he defiled the tomb, he heard the Bat God in his head, angry and threatening (rolled a 99 on the d%).
We spent a long time down in the base of the pyramid, loading the magic box with gold. By the time we were done, there was a steady stream of water running down the stairs from the altar room up above. We crawled through the corridor to avoid the dart traps, and had to make a series of reflex saves to get past the swinging axes. Pico the swashbuckler was incredibly well-suited to this, and was the only one who made it through the corridor unscathed. The others took a good beating from the axe traps. We hopped over the flooded spike-pit trap and waded up the stairs, but unfortunately we forgot the trap at the top and the whole party ended up riding the waterslide of doom down into the belly of the pyramid, back into the swinging axe traps.
When finally the adventurers crawled out of the pyramid, they did so much wetter and much, much richer. And, most importantly, they had confirmation that the lost city of gold was not just a myth...
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Why am I writing about this game session?
1) It was fun, and I wanted to get back into the swing of writing accounts of gameplay, plus I wanted to write about a game where I was a character rather than a DM (I was Pico de Gallo).
2) I wanted to talk about the taratugators. I've written about re-skinning monsters before; this was a different and interesting take on it. Tarantugators (or alligantulas) are just regular alligators with an added climb speed which lets them pursue you through the jungle with frightening ease. That simple change, combined with the way the GM describes them and makes them act, creates a whole different dynamic.
3) I wanted to tease some of my upcoming stuff. Pico de Gallo is a changeling swashbuckler, but he's not the half-hag changeling from the Advanced Race Guide/Bestiary 4, and he's not the swashbuckler from the Advanced Class Guide. Both the swashbuckler and the changeling are homebrewed classes and races that I have created because I don't really like the way they did the swashbuckler and I really don't like the way they did the changeling. My swashbuckler is purpose-built as a swashbuckler, not kit-bashed together from a fighter and a gunslinger (and I've mentioned before how I don't like the gunslinger), and my changeling is, as a changeling should be, half-fey, and done similarly to a tiefling or aasimar. I hope to get both of these player options illustrated and up on my site soon, but currently they are only available on my Patreon page (the changeling is in my playtest document, visible to $3+ patrons, and the swashbuckler is available to $1+ patrons).
-your piquant d20 despot
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