PCs

  • Youte Haire (he/him) - human - rogue - Ron
  • Nerali (she/her) - tiefling - bard - Kae
  • Vaeris (he/him) - elf - warlock - Aaron
  • Torrin (he/him) - half-elf - rogue - Sammy
  • Tala (they/them) - half-elf - wizard - Nick
    • Tisk - rat familiar

Names / places / gangs

  • Jalester - runs the Yawning Portal - tall, lanky, sad
  • Yagra - half-orc - Zhentarum (snake mercenary) who got assaulted
  • Volo - foppish man who gave us first mission
  • Floon - red-haired man who was kidnapped
  • Ranaer Neverember - son of former open lord, was there during the kidnapping
  • Berca - bartender @ the Skewered Dragon
  • Places
    • Yawning Portal - our initial hangout
    • Skewered Dragon - last place Floon was seen
  • Gangs:
    • Zhentarim - snake mercenary company (aka Black Network)
    • Xanathar - thieves’ guild with eye symbology (bad)

(Excerpt from Youte’s journal)

Yawning Portal

Yagra

So there I was, having a drink at The Yawning Portal, when who should walk in? Vaeris, of course. He put a drink on my tab and started into one of his money-making schemes. The usual.

New server today. Somebody called “Torrin” who calls and styles himself a “cow boy”. He seems cool, I think he “gets” the lifestyle.

After awhile, Ta-La walks in again, looking for a job, but it sounds like the mercenary market is a bit dry right now.

Nerali, a tiefling, also came into the bar and somehow got mixed up into our adventure!

But then, Yagra (a half-orc with snake tattoos - Zhentarim?) is accosted by a bunch of human males with eye tattoos (Xanathar)! Vaeris bet 1gp that the half-orc would win, so I won another gold off him (as usual, it just barely covers his tab so it works out). I think she was hoping somebody would jump into the fight and help, but retrospect (looking at the rest of the day), Yagra’s probably happy we didn’t help.. we don’t know how to fight!

Monster from the Well

As Yagra is recovering, a Dragonborn dips down the well, folks make bets. He survives, but is followed by a Troll and a bunch of Stirges (bats) with him. Jalester took care of the troll and asked us to deal with the stirges. I killed one of the Stirges, then suddenly fell asleep. Magical sleep, how embarrassing! They tossed the sleeping Stirges back down the well, and that was that. Some day we’ll convince Jalester to get a cap for that stupid well before somebody gets killed!

Meeting Volo

A foppish man, “Volo”, saw the fight, and for some reason thought we’d make decent mercenaries. Vaeris was excited, he’s always talking about Volo.

Volo asked us to help rescue his friend, Floon, who had disappeared (presumably kidnapped). We assumed it would be some investigation and negotiation, not fighting! I guess he didn’t know any better, but we ended up being the wrong group. Who in the right mind would ask us to fight?

Us, the new(ly fired) barmaid (Torrin), and the other new folks accepted the mission with 10 GOLD (doubling my life savings!), and went off to find his friend. He also offered us a second, unspecified reward - honestly, I was just happy for something to do, to help somebody in need, and to make good with somebody higher on the social ladder - you never know when that’ll come in handy.

Skewered Dragon

Approaching the Skewered Dragon, we saw a crimescene where it looked like some Zhentarim and Xanathar fought it out. Two Zhentarim survived and are being looked after by the watch, but we ignored them for now. I’m still not 100% sure which, if either, we are supposed to like? They all seem like dicks, though Yagra was pretty nice..

We headed to the Skewered Dragon, even though the shop next door - Zablah, I think? - had a really cool stuffed Beholder in the window! We should have checked it out.

In any case, The Skewered Dragon was an interesting place. It has an anchor lodged in the roof, windows are smashed, and it stank like stale beer - a full assault on the senses. I could see coming back, honestly!

The bartender, Berca, was actually pretty helpful. She told us that Volo left with Renaer Neverember, and some Zhentarum (snake tattoos) followed. She didn’t have much further information. I thought about questioning some of the folks in the bar, maybe offering a game of cards for the information, but Torrin and Vaeris set a brisk pace and marched right back out! I was having too much fun just tagging along at this point

On the street

Out front, Torrin or Vaeris (I forget who!) somehow talks the Watchman into letting us question the prisoners, and then talks them into helping. I guess we excel at social situations, not combat!

They revealed the location of their safehouse, but they didn’t know why they had taken him.

The warehouse hideout!

We arrived at the hideout and spent some time discussing what to do. People walking by were wondering what the heck was going on. We ended up jimmying open the window and Ta-La sent his rat familiar (Tisk) to scout. It was full of bird people (kenku!)! We still kinda held out hope that we could negotiate when Vaeris - being his usual impulsive self - tried to climb into the window and got shot TWICE as a reward! I quickly picked the lock on the door, and Torrin rushed in, trying to calm everyone down. Certainly we didn’t want to fight!

But then a beaten and battered Renaer Neverember brust out of a closet and punched one of the kenku. We tried to fight the kenku, but of course we messed it up and ended up scaring them off instead.

Neverember told us that the Xanathar had broken in and taken Floon to their hideout. He also told us that they were after his locket, which they had broken in half to find a green gem inside. We inspected the locket, but found nothing else unusual.

By then the Watch had showed up, and they looked after Neverember. They apparently didn’t have time (or common sense!) because they suggested that we go find him. All they knew is that the Zhentarum operate out of the sewers.

We searched the warehouse and found:

  • 4 paintings
  • A magic paper bird
  • Several bodies with nothing of value on them

The sewers!

Thankfully, Vaeris knew how to work the bird. It’ll deliver a message to anybody who isn’t behind a door.

We climbed into the sewers, which is where I realized I’m the only one who can’t see in the dark! Seems unfair IMO.

We wrote a message to Floon and sent it off in the sewers. We chased it for some time before finding a door, guarded by what appeared to be a miniature beholder (they really take their “eye” theme seriously). When it saw us, it decided to run off (maybe it alerted somebody?)

Tisk scouted ahead again, but all we found were sleeping goblins. We found some other interesting stuff as well - a yeasty smell - but didn’t spend time to check it out.

We eventually find Floon, but he’s being guarded by a half-orc and a MINDFLAYER! The Mindflayer took off with the green gem, he obviously didn’t care about us.

Once again, the half-orc wasn’t willing to listen to reason and we had to fight! I shot him with my shortbow, then Torrin lunged and fell over while Vaeris attempted a spell which hit Torrin (LOL). It was sad, once again, and thankfully Ta-La once again scared it off with an illusion. Very happy that somebody seems to be looking out for our best interest!

We got outta there FAST!

Return

We returned with Floon, apparently they kidnapped him because they thought he’s Lord Neverember? Seems like they aren’t super smart.

But, apparently we were pretty charming after all, because Volo rewarded us with a Manor!

It’ll be interesting to see what’s wrong with it…