Joined: Jul 2007 Gender: Male Posts: 2,503 Karma: 57
Re: (011) The Expedition North « Reply #45 on Aug 17, 2010, 11:44pm »
Venturing as close as he can to the center of the copse, Dieter gathers up some fallen twigs and sticks. As sodden as they are now, the will at least form the basis of a fire.
He dumps a half a flask of lamp oil on them and lights it. At the very least, we'll have warmth for a few minutes. At best, the flames will dry out the sticks and form a decent fire for a while.
Joined: Sept 2008 Gender: Male Posts: 1,209 Location: Melbourne, Australia Karma: 195
Re: (011) The Expedition North « Reply #46 on Aug 18, 2010, 5:00am »
The company decides to investigate the copse and to establish a camp site as they march through the wet heath toward the thicket. It is agreed that Olaf, Anwyn, Padrig and Flewellen will continue on in the hope of some good hunting and gathering, while the remainder of the company head right into the waist deep thicket...
Joined: Sept 2008 Gender: Male Posts: 1,209 Location: Melbourne, Australia Karma: 195
Re: (011) The Expedition North « Reply #47 on Aug 18, 2010, 5:13am »
The Camp Makers
Dieter, Gustave, Ulric, Mads, Caine, Taines, Victor, Boris, Fix all struggle mightily with the cart, having to haul it and the exhausted, resistant mule through the tangle of waist-deep, wet heath, until at last they force their way through the worst of it and under the patchy canopy of the low, gnarled trees.
There is little space too speak of, and trees are so low that they have to duck their heads frequently to squeeze between the twisted, thigh thick trunks. When branches and leaves are necessarily pushed aside, the often drop a spray of collected pooled rain water, further increasing the misery.
Finally, when the effort of pressing further in just seems unreasonably, Ulric declares that "Here will have to do,". It is a conjunction of four small spaces that could scarcely be called clearings, but one space is large enough for the cart, and if a single twisted tree were felled, two of the remaining spaces would more or less become one. The ground is covered in a thick bed of leaves, which provide a comfortable surface, and what is more, when the top half inch is scraped aside, it is more or less dry beneath.
Joined: Sept 2008 Gender: Male Posts: 1,209 Location: Melbourne, Australia Karma: 195
Re: (011) The Expedition North « Reply #48 on Aug 18, 2010, 5:24am »
Gustave soon locates a few dozen black stones and boulders that might be used to circle a campfire, and hauls these a few at a time back to the site. They would ideally be positioned exactly where the tree is in the middle of the four-leafed-clover shaped camp-site, observes Fix, without getting up off the ground.
Meanwhile Dieter gathers up a pile fallen twigs and branches. These are plentiful, but in the main rather small and damp. It seems unlikely they will burn at all in this state, and that they will quickly be consumed if a blaze can indeed be encouraged with lantern fuel... he returns with an initial wet armload of the stuff.
Mads circles back out of the copse to check the surrounds once more, and notes that signs of the company and cart forcing its way into the thicket are as plain as day.
Ulric weaves his way somewhat further into the copse, and makes a wide circle around the camp site to see what else he can see... and another score of yards in he finds himself standing at the edge of a rocky ridge gazing down into a gully which is about twice a Mans depth below him, and runs further away into a gloomy, smelly quagmire...
Joined: Sept 2008 Gender: Male Posts: 1,209 Location: Melbourne, Australia Karma: 195
Re: (011) The Expedition North « Reply #49 on Aug 18, 2010, 5:41am »
The Hunters
The hunting party proceeds further on from the campsite, figuring to get far enough from the camp site that any game has not been frightened off already.
They soon adopt a plan where by Olaf and Anwyn stalk along a ways out from the copse with their bow and arrows at the ready, while Flewellen and Padrig push into the thicket and then make a good deal of racket in order to flush game out toward the waiting archers.
[1d6=2]
While it seemed a sound strategy, it fails to flush out any game larger than small birds, which are almost impossible to shoot down, and would scarce make a mouthful in any case. Anwyn [wisdom=6] wastes a few arrows on these, only laughing when she misses.
After an hour of exhausting (for Padrig and Flewellen) attempts at this, it is surrendered, and Olaf and Anwyn instead make for the stream and hole up in a hidden spot in the hope of catching an animal as it comes to drink. Meanwhile, Padrig and Flewellen continue to search the heath for edible and otherwise interesting vegetable matter.
The hunters again have ill luck [1d6=1] seeing only a few small snakes and water foul which they cannot bring down. Eventually Olaf decides that with all the recent rain, few animals will come to the stream to drink, and the pair grumpily head back to the camp, empty handed.
Meanwhile Flewellen and Padrig [1d6=6] have fared better. They have discovered a large patch of wild mushrooms and field pumpkins, and have gathered up quite a bundle of the stuff; enough for all.
Happy enough with this, they head back to the camp as the afternoon is just beginning to fail...
Joined: May 2008 Gender: Male Posts: 307 Location: Ohio Karma: 27
Re: (011) The Expedition North « Reply #50 on Aug 18, 2010, 4:33pm »
Mads the Fair
Mads reports back to the rest of the group. "We stick out like a sore thumb here, but being poorly disguised is better than being out in the open . . . I think. Anyway, we came here for protection from this gloomy weather and we've got it."
Joined: Sept 2008 Gender: Male Posts: 1,209 Location: Melbourne, Australia Karma: 195
Re: (011) The Expedition North « Reply #51 on Aug 18, 2010, 5:41pm »
When Dieter arrives back at the campsite with a second armload of twigs and brambles he finds Gustave has arranged a circle of stones around the trunk of the central tree, and is attempted to ignite some of the drier leaf litter, supplemented with his own tinder, but he is getting only the smallest flame before it hisses out.
Dieter dumps his bundle of twigs and splashes some lantern fuel liberally over the wet twigs, and almost immediately Gustave's next spark takes to the fuel hungrily, and soon there is a neat little cracking and snapping blaze giving off as much steam as smoke as it dries out the fire wood above it.
Joined: Jul 2007 Gender: Male Posts: 2,503 Karma: 57
Re: (011) The Expedition North « Reply #52 on Aug 18, 2010, 6:45pm »
"It won't dry us out," Dieter says, "and it might not even cook us our supper. But I like it." He holds his hands over the fire, rubbing them occasionally.
Joined: Nov 2009 Gender: Male Posts: 517 Location: Corvallis, OR Karma: 13
Re: (011) The Expedition North « Reply #53 on Aug 18, 2010, 8:24pm »
"It looks like we won't be having venison for super tonight, but we did get many arm loads of mushrooms and pumpkins," says Flewellen. "Come. Let us join in a feast of these edible delicacies. Even if it isn't meat, at least it will be warm."
Re: (011) The Expedition North « Reply #54 on Aug 18, 2010, 8:35pm »
Ulric plods back to the camp, muttering under his breath about wet, cold, and mud.
"There's a deep gully behind us leading in a rather foul-looking swamp. We'll want to keep a sharp eye out tonight. Hey, who found the mushrooms? Let me take a look at one."
Ulric inspects the mushroom carefully, noting it's shape, color, texture, and smell.
Ulric plods back to the camp, muttering under his breath about wet, cold, and mud.
"There's a deep gully behind us leading in a rather foul-looking swamp. We'll want to keep a sharp eye out tonight. Hey, who found the mushrooms? Let me take a look at one."
Padrig says, "While the hunt was not fruitful we did find food. Come and try some Ulric. Though I wonder why there seems so few animals around here. Tonight we should have at least 2 people standing guard just in case there be unfriendly beasts out there in the swap! I will take first watch with one other."
After eating Padrig will look for some dry wood under underneath things like trees or rocks.
Padrig will look for any vantage point like up in a tree where it would be best to stand watch over the camp during the night.
Joined: Sept 2008 Gender: Male Posts: 1,209 Location: Melbourne, Australia Karma: 195
Re: (011) The Expedition North « Reply #56 on Aug 18, 2010, 10:52pm »
The mushrooms a smooth skinned, tawny brown in colour, and varying in size form the size of a hand to the size of a thumb. The undersides are dark, earthy brow. They smell fresh and appetising. The pumpkins are rather like half to one foot long pears with a hard, brown shell but you find the flesh within soft and yellow-orange and fine smelling.
"How are we gonna cook 'em?" grunts Victor, and spits.
Boris, rather dubiously, take a small bite of one of the small mushrooms raw, and doesn't complain too bitterly, but declares "Think I'll stick to pack rations,"
The weary mule must be hungry too, for still tethered to the cart as he is, the poor beast has his nose in the ground and is chewing on the wet leaf litter.
Joined: Sept 2008 Gender: Male Posts: 1,209 Location: Melbourne, Australia Karma: 195
Re: (011) The Expedition North « Reply #57 on Aug 19, 2010, 8:48am »
Michele.
Your treasure-hunting career begun poorly this morning when you discovered that the company who were rumoured to be looking for handy sorts around Ket for unspecified adventures were no longer anywhere to be found.
But you exchanged hasty word with a few prime gossip mongers and quickly learned from a couple of farm boys on Bow street who appeared to have overmuch silver that a company including Elves and Dwarfs may have taken the north road early this morning.
You decided it to risk this one last chance, and hurried after them despite the poor weather. As luck would have it, the recent rain had softened the road in places enough for you to discern the recently made wheel ruts of a cart or wagon and you followed after the company who had apparently taken the smaller river trail rather then the main road.
You made good time, striding out alone in the rain, and by late afternoon the drizzle had eased and you came across a dense copse of low trees which the company had plainly beaten a path into for shelter.
Despite the failing light, you spy a thin waif of smoke from a campfire rising from within the thicket. Plainly, the company is ensconced within...
The mushrooms a smooth skinned, tawny brown in colour, and varying in size form the size of a hand to the size of a thumb. The undersides are dark, earthy brow. They smell fresh and appetising. The pumpkins are rather like half to one foot long pears with a hard, brown shell but you find the flesh within soft and yellow-orange and fine smelling.
"How are we gonna cook 'em?" grunts Victor, and spits.
Boris, rather dubiously, take a small bite of one of the small mushrooms raw, and doesn't complain too bitterly, but declares "Think I'll stick to pack rations,"
The weary mule must be hungry too, for still tethered to the cart as he is, the poor beast has his nose in the ground and is chewing on the wet leaf litter.
Olaf looks at the mule and frowns shaking his head, but doesn't say anything as he sees to the mules feeding and provides it with some water as well. As he tends the mule he speaks softly and kindly to the beast, patting it on the neck and then does his best to brush its coat down with a handful of dry twigs.
After he has seen to the animal, Olaf will eat and then take a turn on watch during the night.
Kelmult Dwarven Fgt-2 Olaf, the very lucky...so far! Human Fgt-2 Yusuf Kamal(Chainmail & Shield: AC 4, MV 6, HD 1, XP: 0, hp 6. #AT 1. 1d8 Sword, 1d6 Bow, 1d4 dagger x 2. Lucky Amulet, rations, waterskin x 2. GP: 0. [gold necklace & jewelry case with a few silver rings & bracelets...est. 70 gp])
Despite the failing light, you spy a thin waif of smoke from a campfire rising from within the thicket. Plainly, the company is ensconced within...
"Hail, fellow travelers!"
A massive, marginally well-dressed stranger appears at the edge of camp. By way of greeting, he hoists a pair of plump, juicy rabbits. Uninvited, but flashing a winning smile, he moves within bowshot.
"More meat than I can eat myself, if you'll let me share your cook fire? The name's Michele deGrasse, treasure hunter."
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