The rutted track emerges from a wooded hillside, and you catch your first glimpse of Phandalin. The town consists of forty or fifty simple log buildings, some built on old fieldstone foundations. More old ruins — crumbling stone walls covered in ivy and briars — surround the newer houses and shops, showing how this must have been a much larger town in centuries past. Most of the newer buildings are set on the sides of the cart track, which widens into a muddy main street of sorts as it climbs toward a ruined manor house on a hillside at the east side of town.
As you approach, you see children playing on the town green and townsfolk tending to chores or running errands at shops. Many people look up as you approach, but all return to their business as you go by.
Sildar seems much more at ease. "My friends," he says, "let us secure lodgings. I’m told the local inn is very quaint."
** We'll role play the Inn scene in Chapter 2 thread, this thread is just for the downtime activities. I'll do 1 post per PC. **
Chapter 1.5: First Night in Phandalin
- Shurijo
- Admin
- Posts: 13979
- Title: Scourge of the Jedi
- User Class: Sith Lord
- Shurijo
- Admin
- Posts: 13979
- Title: Scourge of the Jedi
- User Class: Sith Lord
Chapter 1.5: First Night in Phandalin
Note - I didn't want to spoil the actual story lines and quests, so there's no work/business talk here, just causal conversations. You do get introduced to all of the "Important NPCs" in town, so you will be familiar with their names and faces when I post them in Chapter 2 thread.
Arveene - Carousing
Based on conversations they shared on their way from the goblin cave to town, Sildhar knocks on Arveene's door and invites her to a special event held by Phadalin's townmaster Harbin Wester. Sildar expresses his thoughts that the townmaster is trying to impress him because he might see Sildar and the Lords' Alliance as a threat to his power (or control) in the town.
During the event, Arveene sits down at the piano and plays a beautiful song that would make her Neverwinter teacher very pleased. Afterwards, Sildar compliments her on her music and invites her to dance. The two chat and Sildar mentions how she reminds him of his daughter and that she should consider joining the Lords' Alliance.
Sildar introduces Arveene to townmaster Harbin Wester, a middle age male human banker, who continuously praises himself at managing the town. Arveene easily sees that he has greatly exaggerates his achievements in town.
Next, she is introduced to Sister Garaele, an elven priest of Tymora, the goddess of luck and good fortunate. Sister Garaele is young (for an elf) and quite scholarly with a deep knowledge of Phandalin's history. The two women converse for a while about Phandalin's origins and its destruction. Sister Garaele also operates the only temple in town, the Shrine of Luck.
She also meets Daran Edermath, an aging silver-haired half-elf, who served as a marshal for many years before returning to the west. He now owns a apple orchard in town. Arveene gets the impression from Daran that he was once an adventurer and quite a warrior when he was younger.
Sildar also introduces her to several more prominent members of town before he excuses himself to rest and recover. As soon as he walks way, Harlathan Reginald Hillbelly III introduces himself and spends the next three hours talking to Arveene about his theories of magic. The young male human does nearly all of the talking and Arveene quickly becomes bored, but rather than insult someone that she doesn't know (he might be important in town or he might be nobody) she continues to listen to him. As the other townsfolk steer clear of their conversation, Arveene is forced to stand and listen to Harlathan for hours. Harlathan never reveals his occupation nor role in town, as he is too busy discussing his interpretation the Weave, the way magic is accessed by spellcasters.
As the night draws late, Arveene finds a moment when Harlathan isn't talking and finds a way to escape the conversation. Before she is able to leave, Harlathan insists on meeting her again tomorrow to discuss his theories on the origin of magic.
Arveene - Carousing
Based on conversations they shared on their way from the goblin cave to town, Sildhar knocks on Arveene's door and invites her to a special event held by Phadalin's townmaster Harbin Wester. Sildar expresses his thoughts that the townmaster is trying to impress him because he might see Sildar and the Lords' Alliance as a threat to his power (or control) in the town.
During the event, Arveene sits down at the piano and plays a beautiful song that would make her Neverwinter teacher very pleased. Afterwards, Sildar compliments her on her music and invites her to dance. The two chat and Sildar mentions how she reminds him of his daughter and that she should consider joining the Lords' Alliance.
Sildar introduces Arveene to townmaster Harbin Wester, a middle age male human banker, who continuously praises himself at managing the town. Arveene easily sees that he has greatly exaggerates his achievements in town.
Next, she is introduced to Sister Garaele, an elven priest of Tymora, the goddess of luck and good fortunate. Sister Garaele is young (for an elf) and quite scholarly with a deep knowledge of Phandalin's history. The two women converse for a while about Phandalin's origins and its destruction. Sister Garaele also operates the only temple in town, the Shrine of Luck.
She also meets Daran Edermath, an aging silver-haired half-elf, who served as a marshal for many years before returning to the west. He now owns a apple orchard in town. Arveene gets the impression from Daran that he was once an adventurer and quite a warrior when he was younger.
Sildar also introduces her to several more prominent members of town before he excuses himself to rest and recover. As soon as he walks way, Harlathan Reginald Hillbelly III introduces himself and spends the next three hours talking to Arveene about his theories of magic. The young male human does nearly all of the talking and Arveene quickly becomes bored, but rather than insult someone that she doesn't know (he might be important in town or he might be nobody) she continues to listen to him. As the other townsfolk steer clear of their conversation, Arveene is forced to stand and listen to Harlathan for hours. Harlathan never reveals his occupation nor role in town, as he is too busy discussing his interpretation the Weave, the way magic is accessed by spellcasters.
As the night draws late, Arveene finds a moment when Harlathan isn't talking and finds a way to escape the conversation. Before she is able to leave, Harlathan insists on meeting her again tomorrow to discuss his theories on the origin of magic.
- Shurijo
- Admin
- Posts: 13979
- Title: Scourge of the Jedi
- User Class: Sith Lord
Chapter 1.5: First Night in Phandalin
Lorenzo - Work
While Arveene mingles with the "upper-class" of Phandalin, Lorenzo uses his cards and tools to entertain the townsfolk. The magician quickly impresses the townsfolk who hasn't seen a real performance in years. While there's no native Phandalins, with the town just starting to rebuild over the last few years with new settlers, most attending the event fondly remember shows such as this from their previous cities, such as Neverwinter or Baldur's Gate.
One particular trick leaves the audience stunned and breathless. As they hold their breath anticipating the magician's reveal, they are surprised when the disappearing volunteer knocks on the door and enters the room from outside the townmaster's house. The audience clapping from his trick soon overpowers a wonderful song being played on the piano in another room.
As the first performer in years, Lorenzo the Magnificent quickly earns a well deserved name and many compliments along with a couple glasses of local wine. As the night goes on, Lorenzo notices several gold pieces in tips as the townsfolk are eager to reminiscence about magic tricks and shows they remember from before they moved to the frontier town.
Seeing Arveene engaged in a deep conversation with a young man, Lorenzo decides to head back to the inn and rest.
While Arveene mingles with the "upper-class" of Phandalin, Lorenzo uses his cards and tools to entertain the townsfolk. The magician quickly impresses the townsfolk who hasn't seen a real performance in years. While there's no native Phandalins, with the town just starting to rebuild over the last few years with new settlers, most attending the event fondly remember shows such as this from their previous cities, such as Neverwinter or Baldur's Gate.
One particular trick leaves the audience stunned and breathless. As they hold their breath anticipating the magician's reveal, they are surprised when the disappearing volunteer knocks on the door and enters the room from outside the townmaster's house. The audience clapping from his trick soon overpowers a wonderful song being played on the piano in another room.
As the first performer in years, Lorenzo the Magnificent quickly earns a well deserved name and many compliments along with a couple glasses of local wine. As the night goes on, Lorenzo notices several gold pieces in tips as the townsfolk are eager to reminiscence about magic tricks and shows they remember from before they moved to the frontier town.
Seeing Arveene engaged in a deep conversation with a young man, Lorenzo decides to head back to the inn and rest.
- Shurijo
- Admin
- Posts: 13979
- Title: Scourge of the Jedi
- User Class: Sith Lord
Chapter 1.5: First Night in Phandalin
Meanwhile on the other side of town...
Grogg - Pit Fighting
When the half-orc and dragonborn enter the inn, a seedy looking individual immediately recognizes new blood and invites them to tonight's pit fighting. Grogg accepts this challenge.
The pit fighting arena is located in an abandoned building on a hill on the far side of town. At one time, this might have been a nice mansion, but the building is now in ruins. Being the newcomer into town, the half-orc is sized up by the pit manager and placed as the challenger for Trystan Six Fingers.
The "pit" appears to be a basement room with the ceiling above it open for onlookers to watch and place bets. As Grogg enters the cellar, he watches as they drag away a young and unconscious human. Across the room, he spots another human with a sinewy and lean build wearing a red cloak. The man takes off the cloak and tosses it up into the air which is caught by someone watching from above.
As the rules are explained to Grogg, Trystan Six Fingers does a backflip into a handstand as the crowd applauds and cheer. He continues into a one handed, free standing handstand push up and then flips himself back up. The rules are explained to Grogg as, "Rule number one - don't kill anybody. Rule number two - don't get killed."
In this barefisted match, Grogg surveys the room to find it littered with debris and potential trip hazards. Also, he's watched previous fights so he understands just how rowdy the audience can get. Meanwhile, various insults and race-related derogatory comments are hurled towards Grogg, but nothing he hasn't heard a thousand times before. With Phandalin being originally destroyed by a orc horde several centuries ago, his heritage only adds to the story and promotion of the fight leading the room into betting more and more to see whether Phandalin would fall again to an (half) orc.
When someone above shouts, "Fight!" rather than run towards Grogg, Trystan runs towards the wall, jumps on the wall and does a backflip towards Grogg. Hoping to land on top of the half-orc with a scissor choke hold. However, having mostly faced humans in the ring, the acrobatic and nimble fighter misjudges Grogg's height of 6 feet and 5 inches. Instead of landing his opening move, Trystan bounces off Grogg's chest and falls onto the floor.
As the man begins to recover, Grogg quickly stomps on Trystan's head and takes a defensive posture. Trystan falls back to the floor and doesn't move again. After a second, Grogg kicks the man in the stomach and discovers him unconscious. The half-orc then rolls the man's body over to find his face covered in blood and a broken wine bottle on the floor. Trystan's blood covered face has broken glass shards lodged across his cheek and forehead and his nose bent and broken. Grogg's quick footwork smashed his competitor's face into the stone floor and rendered him unconscious with a single hit.
The crowd is deathly silent as the they begin to realize that the fight is over after a few seconds.
Soon, the announcer enters the room and raises Grogg's hand claiming "THE ORCS HAVE RETAKEN PHANDALIN!" Grogg is treated to mostly boos, most likely from his unexpected win against a well known competitor known to take down bigger competitors with his nimble actions and quick defense. The pit manager hands over a bag of money and tells the half-orc to leave through the back door and don't come back.
With a bag of coins in hand and without breaking much of a sweat, Grogg makes his way back to the inn. Along the way, he notices Lorenzo exiting a party at one of the nicer houses in town.
Grogg - Pit Fighting
When the half-orc and dragonborn enter the inn, a seedy looking individual immediately recognizes new blood and invites them to tonight's pit fighting. Grogg accepts this challenge.
The pit fighting arena is located in an abandoned building on a hill on the far side of town. At one time, this might have been a nice mansion, but the building is now in ruins. Being the newcomer into town, the half-orc is sized up by the pit manager and placed as the challenger for Trystan Six Fingers.
The "pit" appears to be a basement room with the ceiling above it open for onlookers to watch and place bets. As Grogg enters the cellar, he watches as they drag away a young and unconscious human. Across the room, he spots another human with a sinewy and lean build wearing a red cloak. The man takes off the cloak and tosses it up into the air which is caught by someone watching from above.
As the rules are explained to Grogg, Trystan Six Fingers does a backflip into a handstand as the crowd applauds and cheer. He continues into a one handed, free standing handstand push up and then flips himself back up. The rules are explained to Grogg as, "Rule number one - don't kill anybody. Rule number two - don't get killed."
In this barefisted match, Grogg surveys the room to find it littered with debris and potential trip hazards. Also, he's watched previous fights so he understands just how rowdy the audience can get. Meanwhile, various insults and race-related derogatory comments are hurled towards Grogg, but nothing he hasn't heard a thousand times before. With Phandalin being originally destroyed by a orc horde several centuries ago, his heritage only adds to the story and promotion of the fight leading the room into betting more and more to see whether Phandalin would fall again to an (half) orc.
When someone above shouts, "Fight!" rather than run towards Grogg, Trystan runs towards the wall, jumps on the wall and does a backflip towards Grogg. Hoping to land on top of the half-orc with a scissor choke hold. However, having mostly faced humans in the ring, the acrobatic and nimble fighter misjudges Grogg's height of 6 feet and 5 inches. Instead of landing his opening move, Trystan bounces off Grogg's chest and falls onto the floor.
As the man begins to recover, Grogg quickly stomps on Trystan's head and takes a defensive posture. Trystan falls back to the floor and doesn't move again. After a second, Grogg kicks the man in the stomach and discovers him unconscious. The half-orc then rolls the man's body over to find his face covered in blood and a broken wine bottle on the floor. Trystan's blood covered face has broken glass shards lodged across his cheek and forehead and his nose bent and broken. Grogg's quick footwork smashed his competitor's face into the stone floor and rendered him unconscious with a single hit.
The crowd is deathly silent as the they begin to realize that the fight is over after a few seconds.
Soon, the announcer enters the room and raises Grogg's hand claiming "THE ORCS HAVE RETAKEN PHANDALIN!" Grogg is treated to mostly boos, most likely from his unexpected win against a well known competitor known to take down bigger competitors with his nimble actions and quick defense. The pit manager hands over a bag of money and tells the half-orc to leave through the back door and don't come back.
With a bag of coins in hand and without breaking much of a sweat, Grogg makes his way back to the inn. Along the way, he notices Lorenzo exiting a party at one of the nicer houses in town.
- Shurijo
- Admin
- Posts: 13979
- Title: Scourge of the Jedi
- User Class: Sith Lord
Chapter 1.5: First Night in Phandalin
When the shady character talked to Grogg and Pandjad about the Pit Fighting contests, the Deep Gnome's ears piqued up. Sneaking along behind them, he easily found the Pit Fighting contest and entered the seedy and shady looking establishment. The nearly all humans there gave him a stare or two, but they mostly continued to drink, shout, and punch each other and didn't seem to care about anything or anyone.
Sunny makes a few bets on the fights and he loses some and wins some. When Grogg enters the ring, the Deep Gnome makes ones of his bets and then watches as the acrobat does his flips and handstands to the crowd's delights. As Trystan Five Fingers tosses up his red cloak, an individual standing next to Sunny grabs the cloak and holds it out so it blocks his view. Pushing the cloak aside, he steps in front of it for a better view.
From his vantage point and experienced eyes, he begins to notice a pattern - the room is basically all humans except for him, Grogg, a surly looking female dwarf, and another half-orc who is listed in the main event - "Krusk the Beast". Also, many of the humans are wearing the same red cloak as Trystan - maybe they have the same tailor or a box of red cloaks just happen to fall off a wagon in town.
The Deep Gnome stays until the final bout and makes his last hoping for a final win. Seeing the other half-orc enter the pit, he quickly bets in favor of the half-orc. "Krusk the Beast" opponent is finally brought into the ring... by a chain... an angry black bear. Suddenly, Sunny has regrets betting for the massively muscled and rough looking half-orc. However, once the fight begins, the half orc immediately lunges forward and begins wrestling with the black bear. After being tossed against the wall, Krusk quickly recovers and charges back towards the bear with his half-orc tusks bared for all to see. The two fight for several minutes, but eventually the half-orc wears down the black bear and finishes it off by snapping its neck with his bare hands.
With Grogg no where in sight, Sunny believes it's time for him to leave. So he quickly shuffles through the crowd, collects his winnings on the main event and sneaks off back to the inn with a pocket full of extra coins. As he walks back, he considers that he lost several bets and won a few. Counting his coins, he discovers that he actually made a good deal of gold in winnings.
Sunny makes a few bets on the fights and he loses some and wins some. When Grogg enters the ring, the Deep Gnome makes ones of his bets and then watches as the acrobat does his flips and handstands to the crowd's delights. As Trystan Five Fingers tosses up his red cloak, an individual standing next to Sunny grabs the cloak and holds it out so it blocks his view. Pushing the cloak aside, he steps in front of it for a better view.
From his vantage point and experienced eyes, he begins to notice a pattern - the room is basically all humans except for him, Grogg, a surly looking female dwarf, and another half-orc who is listed in the main event - "Krusk the Beast". Also, many of the humans are wearing the same red cloak as Trystan - maybe they have the same tailor or a box of red cloaks just happen to fall off a wagon in town.
The Deep Gnome stays until the final bout and makes his last hoping for a final win. Seeing the other half-orc enter the pit, he quickly bets in favor of the half-orc. "Krusk the Beast" opponent is finally brought into the ring... by a chain... an angry black bear. Suddenly, Sunny has regrets betting for the massively muscled and rough looking half-orc. However, once the fight begins, the half orc immediately lunges forward and begins wrestling with the black bear. After being tossed against the wall, Krusk quickly recovers and charges back towards the bear with his half-orc tusks bared for all to see. The two fight for several minutes, but eventually the half-orc wears down the black bear and finishes it off by snapping its neck with his bare hands.
With Grogg no where in sight, Sunny believes it's time for him to leave. So he quickly shuffles through the crowd, collects his winnings on the main event and sneaks off back to the inn with a pocket full of extra coins. As he walks back, he considers that he lost several bets and won a few. Counting his coins, he discovers that he actually made a good deal of gold in winnings.