This game was with Halumi, Kopek, Catanaya, Zeek (DM) and Grynn.

(Lee was missing, Lucky was with an old girlfriend, the Dwarf was drunk, and Merrick the Bard was working at the Inn for some gold.)

The party cased out the pirates and determined a time when they were vulnerable due to most being drunk, and then promptly forgot the plan and went with a different plan.

While in the Pickled Pepper Catyana talked to some of the pirates, while her and Halumi pretended to be in a disagreement about money. Eventually, Halumi made a deal with hostile 1st Mate Her-man of the Whorehunter to “sell” her. Meanwhile Grynn and Catanya determined each pirate had a tattoo showing which ship they belonged to.

So the party talked with their Paladin Kopek and came up with a plan to “arrest” or capture the slaverunning Captain Horik using non lethal damage. Zeek insisted he would heal them to prevent death so they planned to capture them and turn them over to Captain Lark.

Grynn went to Captain Lark to tell him the plan. He met the 1st mate, Red Robin. They agreed to the plan to meet them with the captured people in a peasant hovel just after 3am. However, Red Robin told Grynn there was no way they could defeat Captain Horik in open fight. He gave Grynn some poison (which Grynn did not tell the rest of the party about)

The party met early behind the Whore hunter Inn. They took out a crewman so Grynn could copy his face with Disguise self.

When Her-man came out, he brougth Slimy Sally and a plant creature with him. The party pretended to have Catanya tied up on Hallumi’s Riding Dog, but when the ruse was discovered the battle started. The summoned plant creature grappled Catayna and tried to pull her into the inn. She went into a rage and cut the creature to shreds. A tough fight followed, while Grynn ran around the building and into the front door disguised as the crew member.

The Fight outside was going hard, Kopek running away at one point, but the party managed to drop Her-man at which point Zeek used heal minor to stable the pirate. Before being defeated though, he had poisoned Catanya who fell unconscious. Feeling desperate, Sally cast Obscuring Fog and ran into the Inn where Grynn was lying in wait for the pirate Captain.

Zeek managed to heal the poison but Catanya remained fatigued through the rest of the battle.

A fight with all the drunk crew in the inn followed. The Captain made for a careful escape out the front, but Grynn around the inn again, and in a freindly gestured slapped the Captain on the arm with the contact poison. The first time did nto affect teh Cpatain, but a second , awkward hand on the shoulder did the trick. Grynn moved off into the fight still pretending to be a pirate.

The poisoned and slowed Captain left the building with three body guards. Fearing he would get away, Halumi and Grynn followed, but by this time Halumi’s dog had taken a lot of damage and Zeek had been very busy casting heals on Kopek, Catanya, Halumi while they fought in the battle with the crew.

Kopek killed Sally with such a vicious blow there was no saving her. Zeek was upset, but Kopek had detected evil in her Clerical magic and felt justified. Due to fatigue , Catanya tried her bow inside the inn, but gave up with frustration and charged in cutting pirates to pieces too small for Zeek to heal. Zeek was now out of cure lights and only had minors left.

Halumi and Grynn delayed the Captain, while the fight inside played out. The poison was having a big effect on the Captain, but his fighting skill still came through, and their lives almost ended a number of times. The Captain used his Feint and bluff skill to set up a deadly sneak attack multiple times but the poison kept cramping his arms muscles and he failed to deliver the killing blow. The dog escape certain death, and Grynn avoided it twice.

Kopek and Catanya finished up the fight inside and came out of the inn with Zeek, just in time. The party defeated the three body guards and chased down the Captain. The Captain had been moving out of melee range repeatedly, but the missiles were wounding him and wearing him down. He closed with Kopek, feinted and delivered a killing strike, the rest of party could only look on as Kopek dropped to the ground.

They fought on, and the Captain closed again with the same plan for Catanya, but she struck first and hit him with a deadly blow. As Zeek prepared to heal him so they could capture him, but the Captain grabbed Catanya and pulled himself further onto the sword, spitting blood in her face, saying he would “see her in hell.” He was beyond Zeek’s healing.

They took Her-man and the two bodies to the hovel where Red Robin was waiting. They left them there with plans to go the ship and take out 2nd mate Das-turd-Lee.

Before they could do that, they were ambushed, and knocked out.

The entire party awoke, naked and chained up in a dark, dank dungeon. Even Kopek was there, inexplicably alive. They were beat up rather bad, but an unchained Zeek was walking around providing minor heals. All were there except the Bard, even Dagic.

The Head pirate Captain Ragnar came in with his 1st mate Bjorn and Cleric Athelstan. He offered them a deal. Work for him, under a geas to ensure their loyalty and after a certain number of missions, he would set them free and perhaps even reward them. They had skills that he needed to accomplish goals he had.
He told them he preferred they willingly submit to the geas and the missions, but his Cleric would cast the spell regardless. For any that proved resistant, they would stay behind in the dungeon as insurance for the others. The spell would ensure they did nothing against the interests of Ragnar or the Eye of the Storm Crew. Althelstan explained that they may not be require to do acts that would go against their morals, but he couldn’t guarantee that.

All except Kopekk willing accepted the mission and geas, but Kopek failed the will save so is under a geas as well.

This is an abbreviated telling of this adventure because i didn’t sit down to do this until now, months later.

The Captain of the Seafin task the party to travel across the jungle infested island to a small port town to rent or buy a small ship to take them and the cargo to their destination.

The party chose Dadgric, the Cleric of water and weather to join them across the island. It was very hot and the group grew fatigued quick, but between Zeek and Dagric’s ability to cast a magical endurance to Elements, the party was able to manage.

A swarm of centipedes was in the path but attacking them proved ineffective. Eventually the party figured out to use splash weapons and area effects, but not before some were poisoned.

Next a group of python’s attacked, pulling the last character in the marching line, up into the trees. The party managed to notice in time to save him and fight off the snakes.

They came upon a Lizardfolk encampment. The Lizardfolk were unfriendly until they saw Kopek. They worship dragons and Kopek’s dragon heritage proved very influential. In fact, the LizardFolk Chieftain gave many favors in return for Kopek publicly acknowledging this Lizardfolk Chieftain as blessed by the Dragon-kin and the preferred leader of the tribe. Kopek struggled with the wording until it was something he could say truthfully, but did make a speech that satisfied the Chieftain.

Unfortunately after they left the village, many lizardfolk warriors who did not share the Chieftain’s view sprang an ambush on the party. It was a tough fight, but party defeated the lizardfolk without loosing a single character.

They arrived at the town only to find it overrun with pirates. Lucky was able to bluff them using his family name, that he was a Pirate Captain and had brought his crew here after shipwrecking on the island. The guards let them all in. After exploring the town a bit, and learning no ships could be obtained due to a ban by the Head Pirate Captain Ragnar.

The party went to the Pickled Pepper Inn on top of the hill land learned that his was neutral territory among the 10 pirate crews. They also met a friend of Lee’s, JustJim. JustJIm told them his Capt Lark of the Rum King was a good Capt to talk to about a ship. Grynn also made acquaintance with the owner of the Pickled Pepper, a retired halfling adventurer. They obtained a room from the Inn Owner. The halfling owner was an old companion of Ragnar and had established this inn as neutral territory when Ragnar took over the town.
He told the party a few Captains to stay away from. (Captain Blade of the Blood Pool and Captain Horik of the Whore Hunters)

The party went to talk to Captain Lark who said he would provide a ship, the WhoreHunter, after the party killed Captain Horick and his Officers. They party said they would think about it.

The party all boarded the Seafin to journey south to the city of Luskan after hearing the King of the city there put out a call to hire adventures, warriors, healer, wizards, clerics and others to support his war effort.

Capt Fravek gave a welcome speech to the party leaving no doubt he was against piracy. Lucky Harding got off on a bad foot withe Captain by making jokes during his speech..

First mate Malglorious handed out work assignments for the duration on board ship. Lucky again made rude comments and Malglorious assigned him night shift guard duty.

Catanya conflicted with a crewmen named Almeric . He was arrogant and haughty, telling she wouldn’t be able to catch a few rats. Later after he claimed responsibility for catching most of the rats, she tried to poison his food with rats meat. Unfortunately, he is paranoid as well and switched plates with Druid Zostick,. Priest Zeek however intervened after noticing the slight of hand and magically purified the food.

Grynn’s bad attitude got him in a confrontation with a few crew members as well, but Grynn was assigned cargo duty with crewman Dadaband.

Hallumi was assigned sail and rope maintenance with crewmen Zubin. He seemed to get along with Zubin, and leaned about his true love for his daggers, especially the one he got from Siron.

Malglorious welcomed Zeek back on board and assigned him healer duty. He asked Norin the Dwarf to take guard duty as well. Lee Harvin volunteered for night shift

Norin talked with Zostick briefly who remarked strangely that he knew Norin was having nightmares., nightmare related to the fate of the Dwarves and their recent mass exodus.

That night three Saugiun attacked. Dadaband died right away. Lucky scored a good hit, but one hit from the huge fish beast dropped him to the deck. Lee battled against one well, but eventually also fell to the deck. N the meantime the others awoke and joined the battle. Zeek’s healing saved Lucky’s life as well as Lees. Catanya and the Norin helped take the first Sauguin, and Hallumi’s war dog dispatched another. The third fell after being wounded by Lee and finished by Kopek the paladin. Who during the battle breathed a steam of fire on the beast to everyone’s amazement, before being critically wounded and saved by Zeek’s healing. [Zeek says that the Great Protector wants added that his Bless allowed three hits that would have been misses]

Afterwards the Captain thank everyone, and told them, the Sauguin attack have been getting worse lately. They held a burial at Sea for Dadaband. Lucky suspected the Captain of having something the fishheads wanted, but was told to mind his own business. Lucky sneaked down int he cargo hold but found only Fruit, barley and whiskey.

The next night was uneventful, but the third night the ship ran aground on a reef. It was taking on water barley and everyone began unloading the cargo crates to try to float them to shore. During that process a gang of pirates attacked.

The sorcerer Amerith knew the Captain and told him the ship was hers now. A pitched battle ensured on deck with Amerith cast sleep repeatedly on the crew and party. The Party managed to kill all the pirates, losing Alemeric to them and almost losing Zubin, if not for Zeeks healing. Almerith almost escaped with the row boats due to an invisibility potion, but Lee took her out with a well placed shot at the spot she should have been in the rowboat. Lee had also taken out the first pirate who had been pretending to be a rescuer, but Zeek’s healing saved him for later interrogation. We saw the War dog combat skills as well as Kopeck breath play a role in the battle. Lucky at one point save Norbin with a well timed back-stab of a pirate about to attack him.

The crew and party too the two row boats and all the cargo to shore, and set up camp. The Captain promised pay for the party if they would take out the rest of the pirates at their camp the prisoner told them about. Grynn and Lucky tried to scout the camp but were spotted as the pirates knew the party was there and were on the lookout.

The party debated nd planend for long time but arrived at plan eventually and attacked the camp by sneaking Grynn, Lucky and Catanya around the back and sneak attacking while Hallumi summoning a monkey in middle of the camp and Kopek setting the lookout tree on fire. Zostick helped by casting a special guidance spell on everyone.

The sneak attacks worked well, but the rain of arrows proved deadly , Kopek was critically wounded only to be saved from death by Zeek’s healing again. Hallumi and his dog and Norin charged in and fought off a the first mate of the pirates and assisted with other pirates while Catanya and the rogues moved in form the back. Catanya at one point tried to knock over a pirate in her rage filled charge, but was tripped instead. She was saved by a well timed attack from Lucky.

With all the pirates defeated they took stock of the STOLEN goods, and estimated about 1100 gold worth of meat, spirits, wine, cloth, copper ingots and other goods.

The Captain thanked them again, paid them each 5 gold, but told them the situation was dire. IT was long dangerous walk across this island to the only town and port. He asked them to make it while he stayed he and guarded the cargo. He did offer to send Dagaric or Zostick as they know ships and are knowledgeable enough to hire one.

They spared the prisoner life (to Lee’s dismay) in exchange for his swearing to join the Captain’s crew. He was handed of to the First mate Malglorious for “training”.

The party decided to rest up, recover, hunt for critically needed supplies, train a bit before setting out. Luckily there was plenty of “fresh” water in the barrels saved from the Seafin.