The sun rose from the jungle’s steamy canopy, and the first rays fell on this note, written in Ja’Deir’s hand, addressed to CrIsis. The scribe himself read aloud to those that were awake -mainly the flora and fauna.
My bestest friends, CrIsiS!
My heart has been made heavy among you! I do not wish to leave you, or force change, but there is something I must say! We have fallen, O Scions of Light! We have been brought into the depths of despair, and have let the Beast, the Enemy of Isis’ love, into our hearts!
I swelled with joy and excitement when we reached this accursed island. ‘One step closer to victory!’ I thought. We came across the wreck, and my concern was distracted. I did not care for the fallen, only for the Piece of Osiris, and the wealth of the Dragon. My avarice blinded me. We sailed into the bay, and beached in a lifeboat; all the while my eyes never left the forest, imagining its wealth.
The anticipation clouded my judgement, and I barely blinked when the six chosen vessels of the Gods nearly destroyed a franticly fleeing pod of hippos! I was able to avert disaster in the nick of time by calming their fears, and telling them to run around us. The weight on my heart grew, but I did not notice, so great was my drive for bounteous booty. I think now of the future. If we are ready to accuse Hippos – innocent, sub-sentient, simple, albeit aggressive hippos – of being instruments of the Agent and Taut, what shall we think a week from now, or a month? A year? The scenario might play like this;
Overkill heroickly stands behind the helm, leading the flagship of Isis’ Navy into the stormy tides of the unknown. At midday all of CrIsis stands at the ready. Twelve eyes scan vigilantly the calm, tranquil, blue horizon. ‘AAack!’ the cry is heard from midship. ‘Darkfriends aboard! CrIsis to the battle!’ Lightning cracks the skies, hurricane winds blow across the bow, swords ring. ‘A MOSQUITO ATTACKED MY NECK! STAY ALERT, THERE WILL BE MORE! THE DARK’S INSECT MINIONS HAVE ARRIVED! DESTROY THEM ALL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!’
After the ‘animal attack,’ we were set upon by an invisible foe, most likely a construct of the mind of the squirrel race on the island, and it merely irritated me. While saving the lives of the senior members of Crisis, all any of us could think of was, ‘My, how annoying! Why couldn’t this have happened after we got the piece??’ Our annoyance and impatience only grew after being set upon the second time seemingly by the same foe. We, the champions of Patience and Virtue, showed our mortality and embraced the Dark’s victory.
Three days we journeyed in the jungle. Three days, and nothing passed our lips or minds aside from the Ancient Wooly Dragon. We reached his clearing, and launched into the assault. I readied my psionic disabling blow, and the Warlock took matters into his own hands. Dragon restrained, and him flying free, he liberated the foot from the lair, and returned to the boat. Mission accomplished, and all that was left was to disembark! Except none of us at the dragon’s feet knew about it! The Dragon employed his minion, a Hytril named Abu, and prevented our escape.
We negotiated our freedom, saying, ‘We are here to help all good peoples and creatures! We need one simple item that your master has. Forgive us for being so blinded by fear, but we started to attack the dragon out of assumption that he would kill us unless we defended ourselves. Could you please help us with our quest to save all good peoples and creatures, by bringing us this item, or let us get it? If we fail in our quest, given to us by friends of the Dragon God Kym-Nark-Mar, all will die to the gods of death and destruction! The short one has spoken with the Dragon God Kym-Nark-Mar, and we are good friends with him. If you help us, not only will we leave your home in peace, but we will leave a small offering of shinies, and I will heal the dragon, if you want. We would need safe passage off your island, though.’
Even now I shudder to think of the lies I unfolded. We attacked out of avarice, not out of fear. What have I become at the hands of the world? Is the world so depraved that merely traveling through it has tainted me? I feign to think it true, if just to avoid what it would say of the group.
The selfish little Hytril led us to the Dragon’s Lair, confident that we would follow through on our half of the deal. When they saw our duplicity, they did what their natures required – exact vengeance. As if it were the plan all along to goad them into a fight, CrIsis roared gleefully a battlecry. Bloodlust filled me, and in the haze I slew my good friend and companion, Overkill. It stopped me not, and I brought the dragon to its knees psionically. Victory was ours, but the attack didn’t stop.
The Priest saved us all from any problems by invoking sanctuary upon the name of She of Many Names. Immediately my soul lifted, and I wanted to sing. In fact, I started to sing the Lady’s praises in the lyric of Mantra and Mudra. In the middle of a sonorous chorus, a squelching crack sounded through the jungle.
The Dragon, defenseless, immobil, innocent of any crime, earned the vengeful wrath of the Holy Priest. His two mauls beat into its skull again, and again, and again. He swung out of disgusting hatred. Hatred for the Dragon, for the Hytril, for anything not flying the banners of the Pantheon of Ra. I emptied my stomach for the sight of it.
It was then that Jarel Diya, Mind Mage acolyte of Apis, member of CrIsis, awoke from the dream. In horror I listened to the plottings of the Warrior Wizard and the Priest. They planned to raze the island to the ground, to destroy a neutral Hytral, and a mother and child. Thousands of innocent deaths, needlessly doled destruction.
So I ask, CrIsis, What have we come to? What has made us fall so far, avatars of justice?
>>Letter written on the ship Rogtilda on Set 28th, in the 3rd year of CrIsis. Events spanning several days in the Dragon’s Roost Entry by Ja’Deir, Ashada Mind Mage, disciple of Apis.<<
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Comments
I agree & disagree with this viewpoint.
I agree the manner in which the Dragon met it’s end was murder. I also feel that the Priest was terrified about having an ancient dragon on the warpath.
Patterns of Behavior:
The Hytril said quite clearly they were planning to waylay us, and given the size of it’s hoard clearly we have a pattern of behavior. A single member of CrIsis went off to try and get the foot, while we were occupying a dragon with a Hytril that made it clear had we not display strength they have killed us or taken everything we had as an offering to let us live. Had this member not gone off on his own JaDeir’s deal would have worked.
Had the deal gone down as planned we would have gotten gold off the ship and left it. More importantly had one been listening to this “deal” it was clear (to me IMO) that JaDier was agreeing to a deal, but from the GM’s / NPC’s replies Abu the Hytril was agreeing to nothing of the sort. When they accused the remaining CrIsis members of cheating them we knew all bets were off. We did what we had to do in order to make sure an “ANCIENT WOOLY DRAGON” could not seek revenge.
All of CrIsis:
I did not participate in the Hippo incident (transformed as a bird) check out the other ship, so it was not “all of CrIsis.”
Plottings:
Some of this was discussed out of character, and some in character. I can’t say much to either after talking with the GM about communication issues I can’t argue objectively for or against this point. Though I would take umbrage that this particular Dragon was innocent of any crime. His hoard is a testimony to the contrary and mystic drain ward on the ship with dead crew speaks to bait and lure scenario.
In Conclusion:
I would like to think that logs are designed to evoke a response in the reader much like a good story. You love some parts and hate others depending upon what you feel at the time of reading. This is likely one of the most successful logs to get me up at 1AM to respond and it absolutely evoked a response. WELL DONE! While this journey for the PC’s is rough (KillerVP and I spoke at length regarding this) I would not trade the friendships this group has granted unto me for anything. I can’t wait for the next go around!
I am happy that a member of CrIsis has objected to the violence.
From an in-character perspective I think the folks who saw Overkill and Tyvernos get invisibly attacked TWICE (first time we didn’t know who it was, but the second time Tyvernos, Otto, Tranny, AND INDARIS got a really clear look at Darksong) “could” make the logical association of Darksong to Abu or the Hytril or the Dragon. Out-of-character we might know otherwise but our characters were all speaking INDEPENDENTLY without an official spokesperson to a being who was invisible most of the time and the only evidence our characters had to go on was what we saw:
a ship being looted, dead sailors, members of CrIsis being attacked, magic-draining ward, invisibility / illusion, etc.
CrIsis had absolutely no reason to believe the deals being offered would be honored, kept in good faith, that Abu was speaking on behalf of the dragon, that the attempts at assassination weren’t subterfuge, etc.
I would strenuously disagree with ANY in-character sentiments to the contrary. Our Priest of Isis having his powers purloined for a month seems a little extreme. But it seems about as extreme as calling the Wooly Dragon “innocent of any crime.” Hehe! If you don’t witness someone raping your sister does your sister still have a bloodied hymen? Of course, if a Wooly Dragon falls in the woods does it make a sound? CrIsis was on a mission. I think, again, out-of-character everyone witnessed Tyvernos enter the dragon’s hoard and not take a lick o’ treasure — not even one cent.
We were there to liberate the foot of the Lawgiver. Killing the Wooly Dragon was NOT an integral part of the quest at all…it never was. We listened to Victor and Tag and Chris give us out-of-character information about the last time and who died and how brutally it went, etc. I think we all blurred the lines and I’ll be the first person to admit culpability. IN-CHARACTER we felt extremely threatened by creatures we couldn’t see who had access to some kind of mystical paralysis poison and invisibility and an ancient wooly dragon master. IN-CHARACTER it is 100% justifiable and plausible for a Priest of Isis to, upon seeing CrIsis cornered in a cave, a comrade die under his fellow’s blade, a dangerous and deadly foe in closed-quarters …INVOKE the BFG of MIRACLES.
The gestalt of this entire piece is a singular act of misguided violence that is just as justifiable, again — in my opinion — and merits a MINOR slap on the wrist from his goddess as a warning. The act didn’t even cross the boundaries of Isis’s code of conduct — it defied the PRINCIPLED ALIGNMENT description as written in PFRPG2nd. Will never harm or kill an unarmed foe. I can see a “stretch” for Isis to incorporate that into her Priesthood Code of Conduct but unless that’s written out somewhere or explicitly inherent (LOL) then it should definitely be a slap on the wrist / “warning.”
Personally, the only reason Ja’Deir got the opportunity to kill Overkill was because the Dragon rolled poorly on damage. Overkill should have been dead on the first hit. Would that have changed the situation? The next person to get deaded would have been the squirrel probably. Without the HEROICS and GAME-ALTERING ACTION our Priest of Isis took this would be the Tyvernos show and we’d have 5 new members of CrIsis.
During that moment of time he made a choice based on information readily apparent / available in-character:
- we have witnessed the results of the Hytril / Wooly Dragon waylaying ships / travelers / magic-draining ward (dead bodies, piles of loot) — clearly not honorable, or keep their word, or not back-stab / double-cross.
- we have witnessed their tactics (invisibility, paralysis, poison, subterfuge, divide and conquer through manipulation, talking deals with different members, etc.)
- Tyvernos is missing. He’s been attacked twice, nearly killed twice, by an unknown / unseen perpetrator.
- This dragon and Abu are accusing CrIsis of stealing the foot and are acting out violently towards CrIsis. We are stuck here in this cave with an immediate threat that is deadly and could kill all of us. If we do ANYTHING except leave the island (without the “missing” foot) we’ll face the repercussions of leaving this ancient deadly foe AND all his Hytril minions alive.
Are there any other pieces of information pertinent?
Given this IN-CHARACTER information would any of us have made a different decision? Knowing full well that Tyvernos could be dead or kidnapped and that the foot could have already been stolen AND ON TOP OF ALL THAT the only recourse available to CrIsis is to FLEE THE ISLAND EMPTY HANDED unless we deal with the Wooly Threat. I look at Indaris’s actions as ensuring that CrIsis can scour the island for Tyvernos — your LONG-TIME COMPANION AND CRISIS MEMBER and the FOOT OF OSIRIS (the only fucking reason we’re on this goddamned island in the first place). Indaris’s actions ENSURED that CrIsis could complete the mission. Out-of-character I fully endorse the decision he made based on the information he had, the roleplay he used to support the course of action, and the consistency with which he’s been playing his character.
I would agree with the sentiment that Indaris’ actions were justified, except for one thing: A defenseless creature was killed.
I’m not saying innocent. There was nothing innocent about that dragon.
I said defenseless.
Under the auspices of the Sanctuary spell the only creature that can make aggressive action is the priest who cast it. Said priest did not talk to his captives. Said priest killed them.
It is equivalent, in my mind, to smashing a basilisk egg because of your knowledge of what the creature becomes when it hatches.
Or using time travel to kill Hitler before he started the Nazi party and lead Europe to war.
If CrIsis begins judging people on might have beens then we are screwed.
I won’t get involved in the politics or morality but I enjoyed reading the account and love the picture of the toothy squirrel!
twigs
Who invited the Trolls to CrIsis?
Bravo, Crisis. I like the moral dilemma, its handling, and the internal and GM-inflicted repercussions. Any game where the argument is less about whether a character can do something and more about whether or not he should meets my definition of a good game. It also makes for good reading, log-wise.
I regard the Giant Wooly dragons as being animals by virtue of their intelligence and demonstrated behavior. Since I have no problem seeing a butcher/slaughterhouse worker as being principled, and I have no issue with a trapper of wild animals being principled, I don’t see a moral issue with slaughtering a “helpless” wooly dragon.