Session 9 Recap: An Exploration Explosion

Time for our first recruitment drive! We had lots of towns to visit for the first time and lots of faces to see. We visited the town of Prymount first, where our only discoveries were a Tomato Seed and Recipe #31 “Nachos”. A stop by Lorin Castle won us a Potato Seed and Recipe #24 “Omelet”, but also a barkeeper named Rosalita who was looking to open up her own place. The dangerously placed town of Delon contained only Recipe #5 “Clams” and some Whiskey, our first item for Rosalita. The town of West Hollow had Recipe #39 “Eggroll”; we also met a farmer named Zelda who seemed inclined to join us, but still needs to finish up some chores before she can join (i.e. need castle level 2).

In the kobold village of Highcrest, we discovered that Monty the trader has no interest in joining yet. We had no incentive for him, so we decided to leave him be for the time being. Also, the mayor/elder kobold may be missing; this bears more investigating in the future.

Coldwall Castle was a colorful stop, and not just because of Recipe #20 “Lasagna”. Harold made the acquaintance of another fancypants Narcissist, Roxie, who we found harassing some uniformed Harmonian soldiers about their lack of fashion sense and color. Harold hammed it up with the flamboyantly dressed woman and impressed upon her our need for a fashionista in our drab new castle. She seemed intrigued, but insisted that she can’t be tied down to one place while the whole world still needs her fashion advice and ran off. I wonder how many times we’ll meet her before she gives in?

The small town of Marid appeared to be in very poor shape. A small child sold us a duck for a high price, thanks to Harold’s soft-heartedness. We were also awarded Recipe #26 “Pie”. One of the villagers told us her daughter June is missing, and Harold remembered the name from one of his investigations. Nathan helped a girl named June escape from prison about two years ago, but all we know is that she may have gone north from there and was originally imprisoned for pickpocketing. We will be keeping an eye out for this young woman.

Our return to the Crystal Valley was brief but very entertaining. We found Ramza the drunk beggar exactly where he was sitting the first time, drinking away his troubles on the street. It didn’t take much for Daisy to persuade him to join us (free room and board tends to do that), but he still wouldn’t tell us what he used to do for a living or how he ended up where he was. Daisy assured him that he would find something useful to do around the castle soon enough. We were about to leave when we noticed a gathering near the Academy, where a woman named Lilly was regaling the crowd with a story of how she stabbed Yuber in the face. The lady adventurer and her bodyguards Reed and Samus agreed to join our effort because Lilly and Harold were old friends from their grassland days (apparently that was one crazy party). Plus, when she found out that Viktor’s daughter Daisy was involved, Lilly guessed that something big and exciting was probably going down.

With all possible exploration completed for the moment, we finally made our way back to the Sindar ruins to name our new castle. After some debate, we flipped from Unity Castle and Liberation Army and settled on Liberty Castle and the Union Army, because we “would make this war as severe as possible, and show no symptoms of tiring till [Harmonia] begs for mercy.” – William Tecumseh Sherman

After handing over the whiskey to barkeeper Rosalita and confirming that our prized healing fountain was still in place, we decided to pursue the plot and flew to Lindermill. Everyone in the factory town was talking about the disappearance of little Sam, the young son of Katherine and Luther. We learned that he had been missing for several days now, and neither the worried parents nor the one-eyed detective Xander had found any trace of where he had gone. Royce did some scouting and found tracks leading from the child’s window to the largest factory in town, which had been barred to us before. The goon guarding the door was most uncooperative, but he ran inside screaming and kindly left the door open for us when Royce threatened to feed him to his dragon. There was plenty of treasure to find and few guards, just the way I like it. We claimed a Mega Med x3, Rum, Medicine x6, Bandana, Old Book Vol. 7 “Intro to Trading” by J. Collins, and a Mega Med x3 before running into the bandit from the front door again, who was trying to steal some treasure for himself in the commotion. We started to kill him, but Daisy took pity on the single bandit and convinced him to surrender to us before he got himself killed. And that’s how Bandit Bill joined our team, not one to be held back by the absence of a face. He explained that “Bandit Bill’s boss is Bandit Bob” and that their group had kidnapped young Sam for ransom money, but the kid kept getting away from them.

With Bandit Bill in tow, we fought some bandits and collected more treasure:a Thunder God Hat (+1 MAG, +1 Lightning)(Sciath) and a Sticky Fingers accessory (used by bandits/thieves only, increases all talents by +1 grade). In the final room, we found about a dozen bandits and Bandit Leader Bob trying to capture little Sam again. One massacre later, we took Sam and the rest of the bandit treasure as our prize (Meg Medicine x3, Trickster Rune, Phoenix Plans #2, Bandit Tunic (+1 Steal skill)).

Katherine and Luther were more than happy to assist the war effort when we returned Sam to them and explained who we were, so the two of them are now recruited. Recipe #30 “Picnic Lunch” and the Play Script “William Tell” were discovered. Finally, we tracked down Xander the detective and paid 2000 potch to hire his services and recruit him to the team, in spite of his irritation that we had solved Sam’s case before he did. We will now be paying him 1000 potch per week (session) to get five extra investigations on top of what Harold gets to do, which will make gathering information on our stars that much easier.

Before ending the session, we spotted a deserted building with the name Renaldo’s Architecture posted and made a note to come back. And Harold begged a lady named Amelia to design our castle bathhouse, which we will hilariously pursue next Wednesday. You better get ready!