I just see the image of the hero challenging Vee on her mount, having a version of Foresight/Danger Sense running:
"Mount: full red bar. Rider: full violet bar with gold star"
When challenging Viserys:
"Human: no bar, big gold star"
That's kinda my point. It would be narratively rather neat if Vee would go into work overdrive to whip up something that she can use to eat Golden Company Wyverns and their riders in an act of petty revenge. So research action to make something truly terrifying in the Fungus Forge, which doubles as the research to break the CR 10 limit.
That's kinda my point. It would be narratively rather neat if Vee would go into work overdrive to whip up something that she can use to eat Golden Company Wyverns and their riders in an act of petty revenge. So research action to make something truly terrifying in the Fungus Forge, which doubles as the research to break the CR 10 limit.
About to go to bed but while we are on the subject of Fungus Forge Creatures I really want to make some Gigantean Deep Badgers, Colossal Burrowers that can chunk through stone. One of these babies with a Legion could take the Vale in an afternoon, The Rock would literally be done by breakfast.
SRD says Colossal is 64ft or more, that's just about 20m and burrowers leave a hole the size of their body.
These are 20m wide sinkholes, just imagine the Badger was coming up from below.
"Viserys?"
"Yes Yss?"
"Now, I know you've got a really good relationship going with the Old Gods, but - did you notice that, in your empire, there are only baseline humans left in your reservations?"
"Sure, that's why I set them up. Fleshforged creatures are so much more efficient, you see."
"Just asking, just asking ..."
That's kinda my point. It would be narratively rather neat if Vee would go into work overdrive to whip up something that she can use to eat Golden Company Wyverns and their riders in an act of petty revenge. So research action to make something truly terrifying in the Fungus Forge, which doubles as the research to break the CR 10 limit.
That is going to take a significant investment of time, I assume. Now that we have the fire-proof Weirwoods unlocked, let's finish up the fungal bio-reactors before working on something so comprehensive as an upgrade to the Fungal Forge itself.
Realizing that you would be here along while discussing matters great and small the Children of the Forest come forth with plates of stew and cups of goat's milk to setup on the table Bloodraven shapes from the stone of the cavern. Though you need food no more than the Last Greenseer upon his pale throne there is still something comforting about the habit of it.
Varys meanwhile is rolled onto a small pile of rough-spun blankets, more kindness, rather than the floor, but you do not speak against it.
One of the Singers suddenly gives a startled cry and draws his hand back as though burned, sending you, Dany, and Vee to your feet in an instant. Clearly visible between his shoulder blades is the mark of Mammon, a devil-faced coin, etched in knotted white scars glowing with a faint pallid light.
"Be at ease," Bloodraven calls out. "The devil's bargain cannot be called due while my will is upon him. Powerful are the Princes of Hell, but not yet so mighty as to match the voice of the Old Gods in the place of their greatest strength. He will not die at the pleasure of the Lord of the Third."
"So Mammon could just call on Varys to die whenever he wished?" Dany asks, startled. "How could he ever hope to be rid of such a bargain?"
"The spiral amulet you took from him, the one that shed your spells in battle, it guards from more than mortal magic, anchoring the soul of the bearer against even the pacts of Powers and Principalities. Should the Lord of the Third have chosen to call in his due while Varys bore it the result would have been as a coin-toss in the dark, even odds that he might perish or that the contract be undone." Something between a cough and a laugh passes his lips. "Devils are not much fond of such wagers."
"So what's the catch?" Vee asks between mouthfuls of stew. "There's always one on magic that sounds too good to be true, sure as barbed hooks hidden beneath a fisherman's lure."
"Indeed..." comes the faintly approving reply. "The hook in this instance is that one may never willingly accept any enchantment from any hand save one's own, nor can it simply be donned on the eve of battle and set aside once the peril is past, for it can taste the magic and know if the would-be bearer has submitted to magic not of his own making. The Spider has ever been mistrusting of others and mages most of all, so when he claimed it from the corpse of the maegi who mutilated him as a child he counted it a bargain."
Wand Bracer (Swift action to draw):
Resilient Sphere (41 Charges)
Reach Shivering Touch (32 Charges) x2
Dimension Door (47 Charges)
True Casting (43 Charges)
Scrolls:
Heart of Water (3)
Heart of Air (3)
Heart of Fire (3)
Heart of Earth (3)
Divine Insight (4)
Air of Nobility (2)
Greater Mage Armor (3)
Passwall (5)
Teleport (2)
Greater Spell Immunity [CL 16] (1)
Conviction (3)
Superior Resistance (3)
Disjunction (1)
Rings: Twice Cursed Circle
Description: Forged of oily black stone that seems to drink in all light, this ring is forever just hot enough to almost burn the hand that wears it, emanating from the blood-red stone with which it is adorned. Should one look carefully into its depths, the watcher might even glimpse the spark of hellfire trapped within.
Description: The letters upon the ring's edge show it to have been a token between lovers long ago, perhaps the mark of some illicit tryst, or merely a fondness for trickery and surprises. None now may know.
Description: Thin threads of silver, gold, and adamantine twined together in this simple spiral that seems to catch and hold the eye almost against the onlooker's will.
Abilities:
May turn one spell per turn back onto its creator as per Spell Turning as a free action (2/3 charges)
Anchors the soul to the body against external magical influence, with an even chance to negate even divine will (though doing so destroys the amulet)
May be recharged by the sacrifice of a mage (3 charges) or a mage's ability to cast spells for a month (1 charge)
While the bearer wears the amulet he must make his saves against all spells cast by anyone other than himself. If he has accepted a spell within the last three days the amulet will not function
Bracers: +3 Saves
Headband: +4 Intelligence
Cloak: +4 Charisma
Boots: +3 Dexterity
Much of the remainder of the meal is spent picking through Varys's web of agents, particularly the poor mutilated children he called his 'Little Birds'. Most of them are present in King's Landing, though a few can also be found on the bustling streets of Lannisport, White Harbor, Sunspear, and even Tyrosh. With the information you have it should be easy enough for the Inquisition or your allies to capture them before any of the Spider's other 'assets' can sink their claws into them.
"I can understand why he has fallen back on child spies in White Harbor or why he would not wish to use devils in Tyrosh and show his hand, but does not Varys fear the Golden Shields equally that he would afford the same status to Lannisport?" you muse, half to yourself.
"Ever since the conquest of Tyrosh he had become convinced that the greatest peril to his lands was in the east, not the west," Bloodraven explains. "He commanded all hid spies in the Westerlands to wait and watch only, even making use of the chaos of the destruction the Alchemist's Guild to pass on lore to the Golden Shields through the use of surviving Pyromancers as unwitting messengers," Bloodraven recounts slowly. "A not wholly inauspicious circumstance given the games the Lannisters' pet mages have been playing."
"How so?" you ask intrigued.
"Ever since the new Lord and Lady of Castamere took Tywin's dwarf son under their wing they have been subtly measuring the support for his succession among the lords. This could of course be no more than foresight in the event of the Old Lion's passing, but it might also be the beginning of a deeper intrigue. History has accounts aplenty of a son usurping the father, and the view from Castamere looking east to your new conquests must be bleak indeed."
"From what I have heard of him Gerion Lannister does not seem the sort of man to sacrifice his brother for his own gain," you reply, doubtful of such unlooked for good fortune.
"Not now certainly, but should it come to lord's head or his lands burning, he will sing a different tone I wager," Brynden Rivers says, with the air of long experience in such tactics. "Regardless, I do not imagine that it is mere happenstance that they are looking for properties in the east in Qarth or even further afield on the shore of the Jade Sea."
"So they must have made some alliance with the warlocks?" Dany asks
"That I do not know for I have no eyes that far in the east, and the Spider knew but a little more. His spies glimpsed Castamere's ledgers but not it's arcane laboratories or libraries," comes the reply, not bothering to hide the edge of frustration.
As you delve further into the politics of the Westerlands you become convinced that at least some of the lords had indeed been bespelled in the aftermath of your attack on Lannisport. House Jast for instance had gone from an outspoken critic of the Golden Shields, fueled in part by Lanna's broken betrothal, to meek silence. House Banefort likewise has seen its lord become a recluse in recent months. By contrast Houses Farman, Lefford, and Marbrand have been the greatest patrons of mages in the Westerlands.
House Farman has even gone so far as to send an expedition to the lands beyond the Wall in search of arcane treasures or lore among the wildlings, which Bloodraven subtly guided with dreams and portents to help protect the Thenns against restless dead risen from their barrows to the call of Winter. "The Thenns hold much lore of the First Men, which would be lost if the Magnar clings to his vale into the teeth of Winter. Now they have learned that southerners can be trusted, a lesson on which more can be built," he finishes.
"You think the Farmans can be trusted though they support Casterly Rock ungrudgingly?" you ask, though you have fair idea of the answer. You have little doubt Bloodraven could have driven them to sail into the teeth of a storm if he wished the expedition broken.
"They are supporters of their own prosperity. Give them more with an open hand and they will support dragons as easily as lions. Marbrand would likely be more stubborn in his principles, and the Leffords could go either way."
What do you ask next?
[] Write in
OOC: Hopefully the link between the two matters discussed here does not seem forced.
That is going to take a significant investment of time, I assume. Now that we have the fire-proof Weirwoods unlocked, let's finish up the fungal bio-reactors before working on something so comprehensive as an upgrade to the Fungal Forge itself.
"Be at ease," Bloodraven calls out. "The devil's bargain cannot be called due while my will is upon him. Powerful are the Princes of Hell, but not yet so mighty as to match the voice of the Old Gods in the place of their greatest strenght. He will not die at the pleasure of the Lord of the Third."
have to fight a pissed of nine year old and five hundred tornadoes!
