Mid Summer Festival

September 17, 2020

We start after the fight between Gorstag and Troy and it is time for the horse race to begin.  Rolen is going against several locals and the first lap doesn't do very well.  Then Gorstag has to fight the next person without a weapon.  He wins but it is close.  

For the second lap, several start faster and all feel more comfortable about the track.  Rolen feels comfortable enough to attempt a shortcut.  It's slower than he realized, though, and while finishing better than last, Rolen still wasn't doing well in the race.  

Gorstag makes it to the finals and is fighting a local who has trained as a monk.  Gorstag grumbles about not being able to have his glaive while his opponent has his "weapons" as normal.  While he gave a good showing, Gorstag can't keep up with his opponent and does get knocked down first.  

In the last lap of the horse race, Rolen takes a big chance and tries to cut out half the trail.  That's when he realizes this is rough farm land and some work must have been done on the path to make it as nice as it was.  Trying to cross the rough pastures leads to fences, dried up river beds, or worse deceptive mud areas, and places that slowed him down.  In the end, like another racer before him, he decides to give up and go have a drink and see who wins.  

The archery was supposed to be for the next day and Rolen was feeling much better about that.  There is a minor celebration for this and the group has food and drink and talks to many in the town.  The Brother, Troy, is gracious and buys Gorstag a drink.  Gorstag likewise buys a drink for Rory, who defeated him.  The group has a good time.

They are awoken after barely two hours of sleep.  Even Rolen is tired and stifling yawns.  Arthur, a page from the manor, has come to get them for the Countess.  They want to get in armor and have a full bath but Arthur says they need to come now.  After some hemming and hawing, they do so.  

The Countess has some bad news.  First, in response to her warnings sent when the group first arrived in town, she has been told that Elkwall has fallen.  That hits the group hard.  Even as they are trying to recover from that, the Countess continues with the second item.  It appears a force of giants and the winged elves are a day from Westhold.  In the middle of this, the Countess has heard that there is a giant council meeting tomorrow at midnight in a valley.  She wants them to scout it and find out what she can.  After some discussion, she does wonder if they should go to Ashriver.  There are ... complications going to Ashriver, as Ashriver is not a signatory of the treaty.  Going to get them and bringing back even a small army could be seen as arming up.  Or should they go to Westhold and see what the situation is there?  Eventually, after some discussion, they decide to get some rest and then go to the council to learn what they can.  

They do send word back to Westhold with the tokens in case Westhold doesn't know.  Then get some sleep.

In the morning, they pack and arrange to keep their rooms for a tenday.  Besides the scrolls, they have been carrying swords, bows, and extra armor from some of the conquests.  They don't want to be bogged down if they have to run quickly from giants.  They store everything in a room and get going.  

It's a long day of riding and finding the valley.  When they get there, they decide to hide to the south and spend hours getting an area ready.  Rikard sets up some spells so they can hear and understand the giants when they arrive.  Gorstag and Rolen prepare an area to look as natural as before but providing them cover and a way to view the council.  

The Stone Giant arrives first and prepares the table.  He checks the chairs and moves them around.  Then casts a spell to move around the table.  It must weigh several tons and he moves it like an inn table.  The group looks at each other.  Well, as best they can look at each other, since they are invisible and hiding.  Eventually, the Hill Giant arrives.  He's not what Rolen expects.  Hill Giants are supposed to be the most feral of the giants, not even civilized but this one does not fit that bill.  He's wearing worked leather and carrying rocks as ammo, instead of foraging for them as needed.  He nods to the Stone Giant and talks his place at the table.  The Fire and Frost arrive next and the group wonders how they interact.  With opposing elements, do they like each other?  Hate?  Tolerate?  Surprisingly, the Fire Giant waits for the Frost Giant to get there and they both honor the Stone Giant before taking their places across from each other at the table.  Is this normal for Fire and Frost to arrive at the same time?  Are they rivals?  They don't have too much time before the Could Giant appears from the sky on a cloud, levitating down.  The Cloud Giant honors the Stone Giant before saying that he isn't sure if Polina will be there and they should start.  

It soon becomes apparent what they are talking about.  Whether or not to dissolve their alliance with the humans and rule them or not.  The group can tell the Fire, Cloud, and Stone Giants don't want to dissolve the alliance, where the Frost and Hill Giants do.  Before a formal vote can happen, Polina appears in a blast of lightning.  After confirming no vote has happened, she says it is time the giants rule again.  The Stone Giant had already confirmed that a tie means they keep the alliance, so even thought Polina sides with the Frost and Hill, nothing would change.  

Then Polina asked if council business was done and she might bring forth an ally, an ally who would turn the tide in their favor and make sure that the Stone Giants would not bear the burden as they did last time.  The other giants nod and Polina creates a portal.  A beholder floats out.  

Rikard freezes, not wanting to breath.  Kaji had the wild idea to drop as many fireballs on the Giants as he could, hoping they could finish the ones that he didn't immolate.  This stopped him from doing that.  They could only watch as the Beholder came forward and promised to help the rule.  Further, he would bring slaves to help dig and once he had conquered Sundabar, would get them a steady supply of slaves.  They are still talking about details as the group watches.  

4500 xp  (8th level!)

GM Notes

• I'm really down playing the race and fights.  They took much longer than this with the way I ran it.  
• I did it that way to hopefully engage the players more than if they just watched a player roll a skill challenge to see if they won. 
• I think that part of it worked.  The first lap was too long but the rest were about right. 
• I think I used too much PF1 in this, thinking that Animal Handling skill would be higher. 
• When modifiers are low, the roll matters more than the skill, or modifier. 
• I expected mods of the ranger PC to be higher but not sure why since he hasn't done much with animals.   
• I was surprised how hard the players took the fall of Elkwall. 
• It's my perception of it but I expected snark and they were quite serious when they heard.
• I was happy with my accents and voices on the giants.  Not perfect, always more to do, but the players could tell for the most part, which giant was talking based on the voice I used. 
• The beholder also got his own voice that worked well. 
• I was happy with how this session went. 
• We start with some frivolity and the games, which take time to run but wouldn't have been long in real time. 
• Then some time to carouse afterward. 
• Then they get awoken in the middle of the night for some serious news. 
• And the council, and later special guest, only made the group even more concerned.  It worked out well. 

BACK