Spoilers for Hoard of the Dragon Queen.
We've just finished clearing and looting the cave at the cult/bandit camp, and within we found no less than 3 dragon eggs. with a LOT of ingenuity we have managed to pilfer these man-sized eggs, and get them back to town (they've been buried for safekeeping).
Now we've run into a problem: What next?
My character's vote is to sell them and be done with it, but the hard part of that is finding a buyer. I also have no idea what kind of price to demand for a dragon egg, or any of the other logistical issues that inevitably rise from such an item. I'd like the community's ideas on both how much a dragon egg would be worth and to whom (currently thinking of selling to either a wizard or a rich eccentric who might use it as an entry statement/pet/omlet), along with other possible uses for a dragon egg.
For the record, our other PCs want to A) hatch a dragon, then raise it as a mount (which I consider a staggeringly bad idea, but am having no luck talking the PC in question out of) and B) use one as a component in a ritual to become a half-dragon.
Thoughts?
Well back in 3e the draconomicon noted that dragon eggs generally need to be maintained in a type dependent environment. Unless you've got blue or browns they may already be dead. Although again that's from the 3e draconomicon so YMMV.
I don't think you can become a half-dragon via ritual with the eggs. You need to bathe in the blood according to the 5e MM. I mean if you have a mad wizard on hand maybe you could do somehting with the eggs. Now in Dragon lance there's a ritual that when applied to a dragon egg spawns multiple draconans from the egg and their natural alignment will be inverted on the good-evil axis so a draconian derived from a red dragon egg will be inclined towards good. This is important because draconians have a an accelerated maturation rate and there's less time for nurture to take hold.
Hand raising the dragons to a rideable age will take years, unless your a small race because you have to get them to the young stage not just wyrmling. Furthermore you have to raise it to control any nasty inclinations towards arrogance or slaughter. Furthermore with the possible exception of white dragons th whole raised to be a mount thing isn't gonna work. Dragons, except possibly whites, are highly intelligent and willfull creatures with an overdeveloped sense of their own importantance, like really smart elves, but actually half as cool as they think they are. Getting one to accpet placement as a partner is amazing, as a mere mount is off the table.
As far as finding a buyer, well good luck, the only reliable organizations with an interest in dragon eggs are the kind that frown on that kind of slave trading, at least when applied to important people like dragons. Ther emight be some mage guilds that'll pay but otherwisre you're talking individual rich jerks and evil organizations neither of which are good business partners.
FuelDrop wrote:
Ramzour wrote:
After getting the three eggs, my character had to, on several ocassions, stop my friend's barbarian character from eating an egg.
We house rule that only adult dragons can lay eggs 2-20 with more eggs being laid as they get older and larger. Of these eggs only 1 in 20 will contain an embryo capable of becoming a full sized dragon. The other eggs will contain a variable amount of embryos that will be born and able to grow into smaller sized non fire breathing, acid spitting, venom producing drake. Be they the size of ferrets to the size of a "horse" like creature that can be ridden after growth and training.
These smaller drakes serve as a food source as the "baby" dragon grows and learns to hunt.
The smaller drakes also serve a role in the "exotic" pet trade that exists in parts of our game world.
The eggs need to be in a sutiable swampy and murky eviroment to hatch. So you could just hold onto the egg it's a week away from hatching but it can't hatch unless you put it in a swamp for a week. I would just hold onto it and ask someone important what to do with it. People like the Harpers will probbaly like the egg.
Also the guy who wants to raise a dragon will probbaly have bad luck. Blacks are the cruelest of all dragon types.
Destroy them.
You do not want to meet anyone who will buy them
They are horribley evil. You are not. If you are you are in the wrong campaign!
If you don't mind committing something like infanticide, you can render some 'enhanced spell components' out of the contents of an egg. Wizards may be interested. House rules required (so maybe not AL-legal) to decide the effects. Something that motivates the Wizard to save them for an Alpha Strike on BBEG.
I want to get an embryo and take it to a taxidermist: I am going to have the world's most unusual footstool. And when I get more cash, I'm going to enspell it so it appears to rock back and forth, checking its aim and getting ready to blow its breath at you.
There is another thread somewhere - I think in the Adventurers' League forum - with more "what did YOU do" ideas. You are not the only person with visions of Dragonriders in their head.
edit: P.S. IIRC, the Cult of the Dragon was begun by somebody with the same attitude towards dragons as your friend. Reincarnation?
TheNovaLord wrote:
Ramzour wrote:
Yes, and no. It makes certain aspects easier but it also works against you because the dragon will pick up on any injustices or slights against them uch more quickly than a normal child, and will not tolerate being treated like a second class citizen or even the way people treat their children because of it's own intellect and power putitng in more on par with the adults around them than a humanoid child would be. This becomes an especial concern when they realize just how big a difference ther eis between themselves and their caretakers. You're gonna have to sell life among humanoids early and often in order for them to not just follow the exxample of other dragons and hole up somewhere with all the treasure they can find.
Shasarak wrote:
Ramzour wrote:
Ulitimately it's up to the DM to decide what happens. Moving the eggs likely killed them (there's a reason they weren't taken with the loot when the raiders broke up camp) anyway. You could potentially find a wizard interested in them as research and components but if word gets out about their location you'll have looters going for them, cultists trying to recover them (and probably kill your party), and being as they are large eggs with a scent you'll have to deal with scavenger/predator animals trying to take advantage of an immobile meal.
As others have stated though training for a mount won't work. In 5e even the stupidist dragon is still above animal intelligence even at hatching (white dragon wyrmlings have 5, animal intelligence is assumed to be around 2) and whites are overall the least intelligent dragon type, though they are still cunning and strong-willed (wyrmlings have 10 wis, 11 cha and it just goes up from there). White's are the only dragon with any stat below 10 ever (and 10 is considered human average in all regards). Compare a black dragon wyrmling with a riding horse (in these lists, the horse is first, dragon second, and the young dragon which is the earliest it could be used as a mount third).
STR: 16 / 15 / 17
DEX: 10 / 14 / 14
CON: 12 / 13 /17
INT: 2 / 10 / 12
WIS: 11 / 11 / 11
CHA: 7 / 13 / 15
Even at birth the black dragon is better or equal to the horse in all but strength, and far more intelligent. By the time it's big enough to use as a mount it's stronger than the horse, tougher than the horse, and an average human's intellect higher than a horse with a much stronger personality (as reflected in CHA). It's also innately evil, there is no nurture element ot the alignment of dragons, they are born with the evil or goodness in their blood because of a dragons primal nature that puts it closer to it's divine progenitor (Tiamat for chromatics and Bahamut for metallics). The only way a dragon can ever be a mount is if they choose to allow a rider, and the only training is for the rider to be able to stay on a dragon.
Unlike 3e there is no real requirement for an egg to hatch (the cave they're in in HotDQ wouldn't be suitable according to 3e draconomicon but it works in 5e). However being close to hatching it's dangerous to move an egg (and in-character most characters should have guessed that's why they were left behind with a guard rather than moved). Chances are your party now has 3 now-lifeless dragon eggs buried outside of town that'll be gone one way or another before you finish your main quest, or failing that (likely to happen if you linger around town long enough to try to get them to hatch or sell them) Tiamat is freed from the Nine Hells.
So.....if you have average intelligence and/or evil alignment then you can not be trained..... 
Shasarak wrote:
Talked to my GM.
One of the eggs is viable, the one for captain I-can-train-a-dragon. The others were killed off during transport. It will hatch at the beginning of next session in front of the good captain, and shenanigans will ensue. Having just read up on the description of black dragons in the MM... Let's just say that I'm glad my character is in a completely different city at this point.
Should be hilarious to watch though!
Alignment stupidity aside, it is entirely possible to raise a dragon to be a boon companion. YOu just have to treat it like an exceptionally powerful and competent child, which basically it is, rather than a beast or a servant.
rampant wrote:
In that case I suggest you get popcorn and tell us what happens. Dis gon be guuuuuud!
It's a shame you'r ein a different city you could conspire with the dragon, to make the other guy's life miserable.
Well we're not playing this week due to other commitments, but I shall do what I can to tell the story. Stay tuned and I will give you some background.
In the City of Neverwinter, the dwarf Gundran Rockseeker hired two hearty adventurers to ensure that his cargo of mining supplies were successfully delivered to the town of Phandalin. And so our tale of failure, disgrace, negligance, manslaughter, 3-stooges impersonations and facepalmworthy shame that we shall call adventure begins.
Our cast of Heroes and Hirelings, in order of appearance:
Lia Harrowthorn, a wood elf druid of the circle of the forests and former smuggler, who fled from her native Silverymoon after her father discovered her illegal activities and now seeks to put her criminal talents to use in the service of good. Lia is my character, and fills the roles of Tank (High AC and decent melee skill, plus wild shape for extra HP and attacks), Healer (Healing word, Goodberry, Cure wounds), Rogue (Stealth, Perception, Thieves tools), Crowd and Battlefield Control (Entangle, Spike Growth), and most importantly Voice of Reason. Chaotic Good, emphasis on Good.
Vairos (no last name), AKA Sir Blasts-A-Lot, Sir B.A.L., Captain Trigger Happy. Vairos is a Tiefling Warlock who sold his empathy to Hastur the Unspeakable in order to gain the power needed to bring down his nemisis, a former friend of his who murdered Vairos's young love in order to prove his loyalty to the Cult of the Dragon. Vairos's story is a key part of this as his player is the one who wishes to get himself a pet dragon. Vairos fills the group's need for a Blaster, a Healing Sponge (seriously, this guy uses up most of my healing!), and a Leroy Jenkins. He has a wisdom score of 9, and is Chaotic Neutral with an emphasis on Chaotic.
Garn Woodstrider, an NPC ranger who accompanied us during the early adventure when we were short a player. He likes flowers, long walks in the woods and killing goblins.
Edward "Lance" Lancus, a halfling barbarian/brewmaster who rides his combat dog Silver into battle with wild abandon, spiking foes with his lance. Little is known about his past except that it contains some mysterious tragedy that he refuses to talk about. His roles are Damage Dealer and Leroy Jenkins. He is Chaotic Good, with an emphasis on Chaotic.
Tryst (no last name). A Dragonborn knight templar paladin with a hatred for the drow. He replaced Edward when the player got bored of him. His role was damage dealer.
Inigo Montoya. A half elf bard with no clear personality beyond an accent. He replaced Tryst after one session when the player got bored of him, and vanished shortly thereafter as the player decided that D&D 5th wasn't for him. Ironically, he was the one who instigated the jump to 5th from pathfinder in the first place.
(Name deleted because horribly racist) AKA Healbot. A human cleric (Details deleted due to being horribly racist) rolled up in 20 minutes by Vairos's player when Vairos died. Unsurprisingly, he lasted about half the session before being abandoned due to lacking any defining characteristics beyond healing and being a racist steriotype.
Randal (no last name). An NPC fighter added to the group to cover for the lack of a third player. Was handed over to a player when someone came near the table and wasn't fast enough to avoid conscription, resulting in a sudden shift in personality. Lawful Good, at least initially, taking over my role as group Tank.
Roran. The replacement for Healbot, Roran is a human barbarian who hails from the city of Hethar at the Bay of Dancing Dolphins (Dambrath). Roran was a farmer's son who's parents were slaughtered by bandits. After being raised in an orphanage he left to seek his fortune and protect the weak. He wields a maul and his character sheet says chaotic good. Whether this is accurate remains to be seen...
The story of our grand adventure begins in the next post. All my sins laid bare... oh gods, why did I say I would do this?
rampant wrote:
See, if you raise the dragon right, its entirely possible it might not be evil. Remember Black Dragons are basically dumped in swamps and left to fend for themselves, it is no wonder they turn out to be right proper jerks
On the other hand as a kid its basically a large acid-spitting lizard that doesn't quite understand what's going on and is being lead around by these doofy adventuring folks who seem to get up to all sorts of weird mischief
(I highly propose the GM goes with that thing in a few dragon stories that it can talk right out of the egg. Cause it heard people talking, y'see, before it hatched)
"Oh, you want THAT story. The one about the dragon eggs?" the red haired elf across from you sighs deeply.
"If we're going to go there I should probably start from the beginning. See, ever since Gundram, gods rest his soul, hired me to get that wagon of supplies down from Neverwinter to Phandalin I've found myself travelling in the strangest of company. The first of a long string of individuals I found myself unable to escape was Vairos, a tiefling arcanist who I later found out had a standing pact with some being from beyond reality that granted him magical abilities. Well, on our way we find the site of a goblin ambush, get ambushed by goblins ourselves, and then meet up with a ranger by the name of Garn. I'm sorry I'm glossing over all this, but if I gave you a detailed description of everything we'd be here all night. Suffice to say the goblins knocked Vairos out before we finished slaughtering them, but I got him back on his feet fairly easily so no harm done. We followed the goblin trail back to their lair and took them apart piecemeal, eventually rescuing Sildar Hallwinter, the man Gundram had hired to protect him. We also had the opportunity to question the goblin leader, who said he was working for an entity calling themselves 'The Black Spider'."
"After that we headed out to Phandalin, which we found to be under the thumb of a group known as the Red Brands, along with having issues with both the undead and orc raiders. To keep a long story short we killed the orcs, sniped the necromancer, re-killed the zombies and shattered the Red Brands. We encountered several magical items through this, including a magical ring, a glass staff that was the namesake weapon of the former lords alliance wizard leading the Red Brands, and this." She pulls out her scimitar and lays it on the table for you to see. "The sword's name is Talon, and it has served me faithfully. Vairos laid claim to every other magical item we came across, saying that their defensive nature will help compensate for his light armor. As a light armor wearer myself and more often than not on the front lines I felt that this was somewhat unfair, but I was willing to let that slide in the name of unity. With the town secured we escorted the wizard Glass-Staff to Neverwinter for trial before heading out to Thundertree to contact my fellow druid Reidoth to see if he could help us find Castle Craigmore, where our information suggested that Gundram was being held. Now of note here is that Vairos bought a warhorse and barding at this point. This'll be important later. We also picked up a mercenary by the name of Edward. Reidoth gives us a map and also tells us that a green dragon had taken up residence in the ruins of an old watchtower nearby, which was an inconvenience for him. Vairos, delighted at the chance to speak Draconic, marches off to tell the dragon to go away. This is the first time his fatal flaw became apparent: Vairos never respected dragons. I respect dragons. Even evil dragons. I respect the fact that evil dragons are extremely deadly and ruthless, and that while they have massive egos they are at least somewhat justified due to their significant physical and magical might. So, while Vairos goes off to tell the dragon to take a flying leap I start putting together a backup plan to get him out alive. Specifically, I turned into a giant honey badger and burrowed a tunnel under Vairos and Edward, ready to drop them in at the first sign of trouble. This proved to be a wise move as Vairos decided to convince the dragon to leave... by threatening it. This did not work very well. At all. Fortunately, I was able to drop them under the poison breath of the dragon, and after a long and deadly fight where Vairos doubled back to get the dragon's horde while we tried to survive the wrath he'd unleashed. Of course, since the dragon wasn't an idiot he'd collapsed the tunnel after we fled down it so Vairos ran straight into a wall of collapsed rubble coated in dragon poison, where he sat out the fight. Edward fought heroically, but he was horrifically outclassed and was soon left bleeding out. So yes, I was left alone against the dragon. I did the sensable thing, using a word of healing to bring Edward back from the brink then grabbing him and burrowing to safety. Luckily the dragon was done with our **** and grabbed his treasure before flying off to a better neighborhood, somewhere. Still, we had the location of Craigmore, so off to save Gundram we go. I was able to travel faster than the others so I arrived with almost a day to spare, which I put to use scouting. After poking around a bit I found a back door into the castle, then went off to meet up with the others." she pauses. "The fight doesn't go well. The plan was simple: decapitate the hobgoblins by taking out their leader, then find Gundram and escape in the confusion. So we go in through the secret door, and a couple of goblins jump up from their card game. I get one, my companions completely fail to take down the other and he runs into the throne room, shouting that adventurers had come. I'm running after him, but stop when I hear the head gnoll yell 'Stay where you are or the dwarf gets it!'. Upon hearing this..." she takes a deep breath. "Upon hearing this Vairos lunges forwards, shoves me aside, and fires one of his spells at the Gnoll."
She rubs her forehead. "Sorry. So yeah, he misses. Misses by miles. Gundram's throat gets slit from ear to ear, the Doppleganger ambassator from the black spider leaves and the other two run off chasing it, leaving me to deal with every other monster in the room. I survive. Just. They get the Doppleganger. We beat a hasty retreat back to camp, and... see, here's the thing. I owed Gundram a lot. a LOT. He bailed me out of a bad situation a few years back. Then this moron comes along and gets him killed because of his reckless attitude. So yeah, I yell at him a bit, call him a complete nitwit for both this and his stunt with the dragon. It turns out that Vairos couldn't handle criticism very well as his response is to charge up shocking grasp." the elf facepalms at the memory of the incident.
"I'll finish this story later. Right now, I need a drink."
Mecheon wrote:
Hoody Hoo! I smell a trainwreck! *Grabs popcorn*
Lia grabs a handful of your popcorn.
"Where was I? Ah yes, Vairos and his electrical fixation. Well I wasn't having any of that so I grabbed my stuff and left. I made my way to Neverwinter and reported to Sildar, who was... unhappy with the turn of events. Still, he asks me to check out wave echo cave and see what this Black Spider's deal is. On the road back, guess who I run into? Yup. Vairos makes a transparently forced appology, but I'm willing to accept it as if the Black Spider is as dangerous as I think he is, I'd rather have someone disposable around to hold the line if things go to the hells."
"So we head over to the caves and poke around for a bit. The first thing we find is the body of Fardin Rockseeker, who apparently died some time ago. After that we take down some hobgoblin guards, encounter a flame skull which kicks our asses, an ooze which kicks our asses, and some stirges which bite our asses. While the others rest up I do some scouting and locate the Black Spider's main hangout. So with everyone fully rested we make a bee line for the place. He's expecting us, but seems willing to talk and, given he has the last Rockseeker brother hostage I'm all for that. He says that if we go and clear out some ghouls for him then he'll give us Nundro... but since he's a Drow, I don't believe him. Still, I agree to his conditions as it's a good excuse for us to back out and come up with a plan. Edward decides that hostage negotiation is for lesser mortals and proceeds to throw a cask of ale at the hostage takers and charge right in. By now I'm expecting this sort of thing and I'm ready to cast Hold Person on the guy with the knife to the hostage's throat the moment anyone does anything stupid. This works far better than dousing them in ale and trying to set it alight did, so the fight is now on. We have Vairos blasting people with bolts of raw magic, Edward riding around on his dog screaming death threats at the top of his halfling lungs, and myself wondering how I managed to find myself stuck with this group of morons. So naturally everything in the chamber instantly charges me, minus the one guy already locked in combat with Edward. I don't even bother trying to strike back in any meaningful way and focus on keeping my shield between myself and my attackers, but I'm outnumbered seven to one at this point and between Edward fighting off a pair of giant spiders and Vairos being unable to hit a barn from the inside relief is slow in coming. Still, I manage to keep everything occupied long enough for Edward to come in and start prodding stuff before finally collapsing from being hit one to many times. I get woken up to discover that the Black Spider escaped in the confusion and Nundro had survived. So we head back to Phandalin to rest up and heal. I get in contact with the local priestess, sister Garaele, to try and find out some information about the flame skull we encountered. You know, to see if it had any weaknesses we could exploit. We got talking, headed over to the tavern to discuss her findings over dinner, and she mentioned that she was trying to locate a spellbook that was lost to the ages. Fortunately, a local banshee known as Agatha might be able to help. Unfortunately, that requires asking for help from a banshee. Still, I volunteer to go and ask her. I don't bother to bring the others, as they were both more likely to start a fight than help get an answer. It takes a few days to make the trip and return, but I succeed and Sister Garaele rewards me with a few healing potions and... well, I'm not going to talk about the other stuff." she smiles briefly at the memory, then continues. "anyway, while I was away Nundro vanished, though neither of the others seemed too concerned about it. Since they were literally leaving town when I got back I didn't have a chance to investigate, and so we head back to the cave. I spot some goblin lookouts and suggest we quietly eliminate them before continuing. Edward agrees, while Vairos says he'll wait with his horse. I should have been suspicious right then: Vairos would never pass up a chance to kill something. Sure enough when we get back he's gone, horse and all. It doesn't take much to work out that we've got a doppleganger."
"Yes, Nundro had been a doppleganger the whole time, and had at some point while I was out of town he'd taken out Vairos and replaced him. So we headed back to town in the hope that the real Vairos was alive and being held somewhere. The smart money was on the Red Brands old hideout, and sure enough there were new Red Brands there, along with Vairos. Well I was fed up with this by now and insist on taking them all alive, frogmarching them into town, and having them publically apologize. After a bit of investigation we find out who had organized the new Red Brands: Halia Thornwood, the owner of the miners exchange. We go in, confront her, and run into a problem. The town doesn't exactly have a guard or watch to bring evidence to, and flat out killing her feels dangerously close to murder. So we strongarm her into turning her organizational powers to the greater good and task her with forming a town guard. We also find out from her that the Doppleganger was heading north with a caravan of miners to assassinate Sildar and replace him."
Lia stops for a moment at this point.
"Yes, I know that there were some astonishingly bad judgement calls made there, but in our defense Vairos was furious at having his horse stolen, Edward was drunk, and I was tired from travelling for what amounted to almost 15 hours straight and fighting besides that. So we head north and catch up with the caravan. sure enough, there's Vairos's warhorse and atop it is the man we've been told the doppleganger was impersonating. He charges straight at us, and gets a face full of magic for his trouble. He goes down, but doesn't revert to doppleganger form. We'd just murdered some random guy. Now things get interesting. As I said I wasn't exactly on the top of my game, but if the doppleganger had gone north past the caravan then I was the one with the best chance of catching them. The others decide to head back and talk to Halia. It dawns on me after about two minutes what had actually happened: Halia had been replaced by the doppleganger and this whole thing had been a setup. So I circle around and head back to town. Sure enough, I run into Edward fleeing town, who accused me that the group had been accused of murdering Halia Thornwood. Vairos had been arrested, and Edward had no incentive to hang around. I also learn from him that the townmaster is acting conspicously out of character."
"So I figure I should get some rest before dealing with this. After all, my judgement was demonstratably impared by fatigue at this point. So I make a cold camp near town and in the morning I'm fresh and ready to deal with the problem. I head over to speak with the person in town I trust most: Sister Garaele. I slip through town easily by taking the form of a housecat, then meet up with the sister. While initially somewhat suspicious of me, what with the whole wanted for murder thing and all, I quickly convince her of the truth and ask for her help convincing the other townsfolk. She agrees, and I head over to Vairos's cell to find out what's happening to him. He's being dehydrated, starved, and generally ignored, and has been shackled and gagged to prevent him casting any spells and escaping. I remove the gag and ask him to stay put while I bring him food and water, in order to avoid blowing our cover. Vairos being Vairos he isn't having any of that and teleports out of the cell, making a run for the Red Brand hideout. Naturally, he gets spotted and someone comes in to tell the newly formed town guard about the escaped prisoner. The doppleganger decides that it's time to leave at this point as it knows that for all his sins, Vairos is most closely associated with wrath and his vengance would be better avoided. So the doppleganger flees town with Vairos's ring of protection as a prize, while the drow-hunting paladin who's come into town to follow up on our stories of the Black Spider stumbles over the dead townmaster's body. After setting up a few more things to ensure we're cleared of the crimes we didn't commit I turn myself over to the town guard. They try restraining me in the same manner as they had with Vairos and have someone standing guard at all times, but I decide to demonstrate that I'm only being held because I'm letting them hold me. So when the paladin comes down to interrogate me and gets into an arguement with the guard I carefully transform into a rat, run between the bars, return to my normal form, then tap the guard on the shoulder and ask for a glass of water. His expression was priceless."
"The paladin works out that Vairos probably headed over to the Red Brand hideout and goes over there to ask him some questions. This being Vairos, the encounter somehow escalated to the derelict manor burning down and Vairos escaping into the forest. He rests up to regain his spells and heads into town, in theory to surrender himself. Meanwhile, the town guard have pretty much given up on trying to keep me locked away and are letting me roam around town with an escort. Naturally, I head over to the tavern to meet up with Sister Garaele and this new paladin, who's name it turns out was Tryst. So we're talking, one of the villagers mentions seeing a guard leaving town on horseback, the guard says he didn't, and it pretty much confirms to everyone that I was telling the truth about the doppleganger. So in walks Vairos, and the guard are NOT happy to see him. Still, all he does is call out Tryst for a duel in the main street... or was it the other way around? One of them called out the other, and a duel began. Sister Garaele and I took out chairs to watch."
"The boys stand back to back, walk out 5 paces, and turn around. Vairos acts first, botches his shot, and is taken down in a single stroke by Tryst. Tryst, being a fair soul at heart, uses his paladin powers to heal Vairos and gives him a hand up. Vairos takes it, then sucker blasts Tryst with this agonizing whisper spell he's got going and, as Tryst is now staggering back in agony, Vairos declares himself the winner. Now I'm all for fighting dirty, but there's a time and a place. Blasting the guy who just healed you out of pettiness? That's not exactly proving how good a person you are during the leadup to your trial for murdering a caravan guard!"
"Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that. I'd admitted to our screwing up and murdering that guy, and had requested a proper trial. Because I own my mistakes, damn it! So a few days later Sildar arrives with a host of knights to deal with the whole wave echo cave thing, and to get some preliminary groundwork done for the trial. I explain what happened, and how sorry I am about the misunderstanding. Vairos chips in completely unprompted with 'I'm not!'. Well it turns out that the Justicar they're sending down to conduct the trial is a powerful cleric, and part of our penance is to pay for raising the guard. I'm happy with this, as it's a chance to set right my mistake. Vairos is pissy, because it means he'll have to sell his horse to cover the cost. In the mean time, we're to clear out wave echo cave."
"We head over to find the cave virtually deserted. Nundro, the real Nundro, is still there, tied up and starving. So my first order of business is to get him back to town to heal up, while the others poke around and find out what happened. From what I heard afterwards, they dealt with the Flame Skull and doused it in holy water to prevent it rising again (yay research!), then found the depleted spell forge. Then they stumbled across some kind of wraith, which was not happy at its rest being disturbed by the living. So naturally Vairos insults it and hides behind one of the knights when it attacks. He's almost killed, but the spirit is defeated and there's some treasure to gain. Then they stumble across a room full of glowing green mushrooms. Vairos suggests having one of the knights go in and see what happens, which is instantly shot down by reason of the knights not being idiots. One of them makes some comment about Vairos going in if he's so tough, so like a moron he does just that and is almost killed by poisonous fumes. Luckily Tryst pulls him out in time."
Lia pauses. "I think that's enough for now. I'll tell you about the trial next time."
So, was that a big enough train wreck for you so far?
No this is still in that stage where the trains are going to crash, everyone knows it, but they're slamming the breaks and cutting the engines anyway. Exciting and you can't tear your eyes way, but not the climax where metal is being scattered accross the country side at high velocity and everything's on fire.
We all know this will end in horrible acidic death and permanent disigurements.
"The trial. Trust me when I say that being put on trial for murder is when you learn who your true friends are. The Justicar arrives in town with his entourage and commandeers the town hall for the murder trial. Vairos and I are brought before him and placed in a zone of truth. Since we paid to have the guard Ralph raised from the dead and paid compensation to him for, you know, killing him the Justicar wanted to get an idea of who we were before further sentencing. In effect, we were asked to call character witnesses to speak on our behalf and show that yes we murdered someone, but it was with the best of intentions! Run that sentence through your mind a few times. Anyway, I have a laundry list of people to call upon such as Sildar, Garn, Nundro, Sister Garaele, and a few others I'd helped besides. Not at all hindering my case was the fact that I'd turned myself in to the authorities without a fight and had shown genuine penance for my crime. Vairos on the other hand..."
At this point Lia takes a sip of her drink.
"Vairos's character witnesses consisted of Garn, who didn't really have much to say about him one way or the other, and Sildar, which backfired rather impressively as he started calling out Vairos on all his misdeeds. My own statement, when asked, was a request to be tried seperately. I wasn't about to be executed because of that moron, not if I could help it. So the Justicar begins asking Vairos about the source of his powers and, while he tries to hide it, the shocking truth comes out: He has a pact with some entity called 'The King In Yellow'. Now I like to thing of myself as a forgiving person, but even I tend to be suspicous of anyone who makes a pact with the dark powers. Suffice to say that the Tormish Justicar was less than amused by the revelation. So, intending to solve the problem in the same way that he solves every other problem, Vairos attacks. The Justicar. Who's trying him for MURDER. In full view of the court."
Lia rubs her forehead tiredly.
"Words cannot express how bad an idea this was. You know the best bit? He MISSED! Then Tryst cut him open with one swing of his greatsword. Fortunately for Vairos and unfortunately for me the Justicar was big on forgivness and revived him, and this somehow broke his pact or something. The guy becomes this total nervous wreck and has to be led out of the courtroom in tears. Skipping ahead to the next day we get sentenced to two tasks apiece. One each to prove our intention to atone, the other a service to the realm to be named later. My loyalty task is to ferry a stay of execution to Neverwinter. Vairos's is to go and collect some taxes. When I get back from the trip I find out that Vairos somehow managed to pick up a cursed item during the tax collection run. For anyone else I'd say that's amazing bad luck, but I suspect it may have been part of the test. In any case the Justicar breaks the curse and mentions to Vairos that there are rumours of an ex-warlock in waterdeep who managed to reclaim some of their power through meditation and soul searching, so he's off to check that out. Unfortunately, I am also heading towards Waterdeep in order to help a friend I met through Sister Garaele. We get there and I get in contact with this friend, who directed me towards the town of Greenest to the far south, as troubling rumours had reached his ears about this area. Meanwhile, Vairos has regained arcane power and decides to visit his grandfather in, guess where? Greenest. So I'm stuck travelling with him again, with the only alternative being to take another boat and lose half a day on a rather urgent mission." she sighs.
"So we reach the town just as it's besieged by dragon cultists, bandits, kobolds... oh yeah, and a dragon the size of a barn! We rally survivors and lead them to the safety of the keep, where we meet up with keepmaster Esterburt. He asks us to secure the sally port where the attackers have broken through, and sure enough there's a bunch of kobolds, a few cultists and a drake waiting for us. Vairos uses his newfound powers to throw fire into the room then duck to the side, while I wait on the other side of the door in ambush. Sure enough the drake rushes through the door, mighty angry at being set on fire. I take a swing, but it hits a spine and deflects. The drake takes a bite at Vairos, who throws fire at it again. Can you remember who's standing on the opposite side of that drake, about to be engulfed in flames with it? That would be me. He then charges into the room when a cultist yells a challenge at him, and guess who ends up having to bail his sorry ass out of there. Next we get asked to secure a secret tunnel leading from the keep, and to help us we get one of the guards tagging along. His name is Randal. So we head off down into the tunnels and clear them out. I'm running dry on magic at this point so when Vairos is badly injured I give him one of my healing potions and tell him he owes me for that. He says something to the effect of 'Why? I need it!' and quaffs the thing, and were it not for the fact that we needed his magic to help save the town I'd have knocked him out cold right then and there. Biting back my reply we make our way to the keepmaster to inform him of our success. He asks us to head up to the top of the keep and help deal with the dragon who's wrecking stuff up there. It's getting close on midnight by this point and we'd been travelling all day, I was out of magic and Vairos was being a jerk. So yeah, being eaten by a dragon was starting to look like my best escape from that damn tiefling. I had no idea how close I was to being right."
"We reach the top of the keep to see about 20 guards with crossbows pinging shots against this dragon. It's not helping. The dragon's circling around, occasionally frying some guys with lightning. Vairos steps out onto the wall and casts a spell. I recognize it as the one that makes his voice really loud. I also recognize that something monumentally stupid is about to occur, so I grab Randal and drag him back inside the stairwell.
'Dragon! I am Vairos! Flee this place or I shall destroy you!' booms out across the town. Now the dragon is getting peppered with bolts and arrows from the guards already. Adding a few more shots to the volley isn't going to attract its attention. Calling it out, however... Vairos had this cocky grin on his face right up until the dragon obliterated him with its lightning breath. I mean, the only thing left was his boots and the little whisps of smoke that were wafting out of them. We managed to drive off the dragon through sheer weight of fire, or possibly it just got bored. I'd honestly believe either. After that we go out and save some people who were holed up in the local church. By this point I'm dead on my feet in more ways than one, have absolutely no magic remaining, and the keep is secure. I head over to the barracks and enter a trance. Shortly after that some half-dragon calls out the best fighter in the keep for single combat, but they decide not to disturb me and instead send out some poor guard, who gets cut in half for his trouble. That pretty much wraps up the tale of Vairos the blast-happy, and after that I need a drink. I'll tell you of the next crazy person I was tasked with baby-sitting in a bit."
Should anyone have any questions about this game or comments thereon they shall be most welcome. Phrase them in or out of character an either Lia or I shall answer you.
You may be fine with BD mount, if you meet another draconic species things may change.....
"The next day I met the subject of this entire story: Roran. Roran is... Roran. He's a human, close on 6 foot, brown hair, brown eyes, heavy tan, incredible build. I mean, he's got to be among the strongest humans in the world who aren't using magic to boost their strength. He goes around in fairly normal clothing even when he's expecting a fight, in fact I don't seem to recall seeing him wear any armor. His weapon of choice is a massive two-handed hammer, which I suspect he likes because it's simple and low maintainance. Actually, 'simple and low maintainance' describes Roran fairly well. No offence to the guy, but bathing never seems to be a priority for him and you can tell."
"Roran wanders into town the day after the attack, and upon seeing the damage immediately volunteers to help find the men that did it. This was good as we were just getting ready to track them back to their base. Long story short we found the camp and snuck in, then split up to see what we could learn, with a plan to meet up in an hour. This worked out fairly well, as I managed to locate the prisoners they'd taken and work out how to stage a prison break while Roran was busily joining the Cult of the Dragon. Hey, that's one way to learn about them right? Well, when we meet up he says he wants to stay and undermine them from within. Not entirely without merit, except this is about the time that the cultists were getting suspicious about their rear guard not turning up. I stow away in the form of a rat to break the prisoners free at a later time, when we can escape under cover of darkness. Imagine my surprise when I find Roran chained up in a prison tent. I break him out along with a monk called Leosin who we'd been asked to keep an eye out for and the rest of the prisoners, and we escape using magic to conceal the group and cover our tracks. The next day Leosin asks us to go back and try to learn more about the cult's plans. Fair enough. So we go back and the cult have gone, with only a few hunters in the abandoned camp skinning game. I leave the others to question them while I follow the tracks for a bit and get a feel for where they're going, which is towards the coast. I get back to find Roran badly wounded and the hunters all dead. Apparently after talking to them he decided to kill them for working with the cult. That doesn't make me feel happy, particularly not knowing the circumstances surrounding their employment. It also means that I have to use up a lot of my magic healing wounds from a fight which could have been avoided. Apparently they were hunting to feed some cultists who'd stayed behind in a cave at the edge of the camp."
"I transform into a spider and scout the place out, we work out a plan and then assault the place. Most of the resistance was pretty much kobold fodder and the like, though a couple of the higher ranking cultists were a more serious threat. The nastiest fight was undoubtedly with the half dragon and his henchmen. My companions faced down the berserkers he had with him while I squared off against the dragonkin himself."
Lia stops and takes a sip of her drink.
"Now I know what you're thinking: You couldn't take a half-dragon warrior! and you're pretty much right. FIGHTING FAIRLY this guy would have cut me to pieces. Unfortunately for him, I'm a cheating bitch who'll use every dirty trick in the book to get an edge. In this instance I used a rather nasty spell I know to heat up the metal in his armor. So he was cooking in there, and that was throwing him right off his game. On top of that he was nice and predictable with his breath weapon. I'm not going to pretend that it didn't hurt. On the contrary, that lightning breath of his was nasty as all hell, not least because he kept just spamming that thing with every chance he got. However, he wasn't exactly subtle with it so I didn't have much difficulty keeping out of the way of the worst of the blast. I take him down moments after his last henchman falls, one companion bleeding out and the other on his last legs. I was lucky to survive that fight, and we had to rest up before pressing on, but in the end we got some maps and more importantly, 3 dragon eggs. Which we promptly stole."
Lia shrugs.
"What? There are plenty of adventurers out there who spin epic tales of stealing this that or the other, but how many can legitimately say they pilfered dragon eggs? I didn't care what happened afterwards with them, I just wanted to be able to say 'I did that. That was me.' So I head up north to deliver the message while the others put together a wagon of some kind to get the eggs back to Greenest or somewhere, discussing all the while what they'd do with the dragon eggs. I believe that one idea was to hatch the eggs and open a dragon brothel, which kinda squicked me out. I mean, making sure they're not a threat then selling whatever's left as spell components or the like is one thing, but hatching them for the sole purpose of enslaving them? That's just wrong, even if they are evil. I didn't mention that it'd be quicker to just head back to Greenest and buy a wagon because they were so enthusiastic about their woodworking project that I didn't want to spoil it. So I headed out and that was the last I saw of them for quite a few days. What happened next? It's your round. Pay up, then I'll tell you what I found out when I got back in contact with the group."
And so the story ends for now. The conclusion will have to wait until monday, because it hasn't actually happened yet.
There will be pain, and horrific scarring, and much chewing of bones.
Step 1. Steal Dragon eggs.
Step 2. RUN!!!
Step 3. Die.
Profit???
rampant wrote:
for a round of drinks + 
GP for the barkeep's tip. (So this should bring out The Good Stuff)
All right, man, let's hear you !
"I found most of this out after the fact, supplementing what Roran told me with information from various citizens of Greenest and a little bit of deductive reasoning. Just as Roran goes to bury the dragon eggs one of them begins to hatch. So he sends Randal away and takes the egg to a secluded spot a few minutes off the road. The egg hatches and inside? Black dragon baby. Now communication at this point was apparently a bit difficult as it didn't speak common very well yet, but it managed to communicate that it was hungry. So Roran goes into town, buys a pack horse, and kills it for the dragon to eat. Now I can't prove anything, but about twenty minutes after buying the horse Roran comes back into town and buys some puppies, the majority of which were never seen again. Black dragons are infamous for their sadistic cruelty. I'm fairly sure you should be able to put two and two together there. So the dragon's eaten its fill and wants a drink, and sends Roran into town to get it a bowl so it can have a drink of water. Now it needs somewhere to sleep, so it sends Roran off to scout for a nice home for it nearby."
Lia rubs her forehead. "At this point I should add that Roran went to the grave believing he'd manipulated a dragon into doing his bidding. He was so proud of himself. Looked at with any kind of objective viewpoint, however... no, he really didn't. I should also note that those hunters that Roran killed for associating with the dragon cultists? They were locals who'd pretty much been coerced into working for them with threats to their families if they tried anything. Because of their deaths and the cultists stealing livestock during the raid, the town was now facing a crippling food shortage."
"Back to the story. Roran finds the dragon a cave near a marshy bend in the river. At this point he asks if there's anything else it needs. Well naturally, the answer is that it needs a hoard. So Roran gives the dragon all the money he has on him in order to appease it, about 100 gold pieces all up. He then goes back to town to sleep. The next day he convinces Randal to keep quiet and give him the benefit of the doubt, talks to the mayor, picks up some more puppies and heads out to meet with the dragon."
"Now a quick note about the puppies. Roran left these out of the tale when he told me what he'd done, which we'll get to later. I only found out about them because the next time I was in Greenest the stablemaster took me aside to have a stern word to me about running an illegal dogfighting operation. So in order to cover up his crime, Roran implicated me in a completely different crime!"
"Now that it's got a nice new home and a good steady supply of puppies to horribly torture to death and devour in sight of their kin, the dragon decides that it has a new goal in mind: a bigger hoard. Fortunately Roran was expecting this and had asked the mayor if there were any bandits or goblin tribes causing trouble in the area before leaving town. It turns out there was a small bandit camp nearby that had raided the town now that its defenses were demolished and taken their few remaining valuables. Roran convinces the dragon to go and hunt down the bandits with him in order to loot their corpses for the hoard, and the dragon agrees. The fight goes badly for Roran who gets knocked out, but the dragon manages to drive off the bandits and save him. After which it solidifies its relationship by starting to openly refer to him as 'slave'. Roran returns to town with the news that the bandits have been driven off but they'd managed to stash their takings before he arrived, and he'd been unable to locate them. It's at this point he gets a message from me informing him that we have business up north, and he should come as soon as is practical. So the next morning he goes off to inform the dragon that he'll be going north to find it more loot and bring it back, though he may be gone for some time. The dragon isn't in its cave, so he waits around for a few hours until it returns... with a group of kobolds in tow. He tels it that he needs to go north and they part on a promise that he'll bring it treasure when he gets back."
Lia sips her drink. "This is good stuff. It's kinda funny, when you think about it: Roran was helping a young orphan establish themself, giving them food and money, finding them a home... in almost any other circumstances, this would be a laudable story of good deeds done. However, he decided to do this to the one creature in the area which would make things exponentially worse by helping it establish itself."
"So he heads north, we meet up, and he tells me an edited version of the above story. I am informed that my expression throughout the entire ordeal was priceless, but in truth it was all I could do not to grab Roran and search his head for signs that a mind flayer had eaten his brain. This did leave us in a bit of a dilemma, as the information we'd gathered pointed towards the cultists passing through Baldor's Gate within the tenday and if we went back to deal with the new dragon threat that someone we will not name had created then we'd miss the cultists and possibly allow the end of the world. This would be bad. So Roran decides to head south and deal with his mess while I headed over to Baldor's Gate to stop the end of the world all on my own. No pressure. Still, knowing that Roran had gotten in WAY over his head with this I informed Ontharr Frume, a paladin and member of the Order of the Gauntlet, of just how badly things were getting screwed up down south so if Roran failed someone else could nip the problem in the bud."
"And so we approach the end of the tale. Roran recruits Randal to help him deal with the dragon threat and together they head down to the lair. The dragon had been busy in the last six days or so and has amassed a tribe of 20 kobolds to its service, a long with a few cult of the dragon cultists who'd apparently gotten lost from the main horde when they passed through this area. Roran, being Roran, manages to start a fight with them and Randal, not being Roran, flees back to town to report what he's seen. The last anyone saw of Roran was him flipping the bird at the dragon before being cut down by its servants. Many heroes have been cut down in their prime fighting an evil dragon and its minions, but few can claim to be so directly responsible for the threat they were fighting in the first place."
Ok now start calling it Roran's Dragon and make sure the appelation sticks. Th elitle blighter will hate being identified by his association with an idiotic human.
rampant wrote:
I feel certain that a tale of such epic failure will spread even without my aid.
Hmmm, how many times must the same player's PC get killed by dragons for it to become a running gag?
3
Once is happenstance
Twice is coincidence
Third time is enemy action
- Goldfinger (James Bond) section headings