Tuesday, August 12, 2014

Martyr King 26: Ending Maladrok's Reign

The twenty sixth session in the "Legacy of the Martyr King" campaign.

After some brief chatter, Maven accepts Maladrok's challenge. Maven will be using armor (which is frowned upon) but will be beating Maladrok with his fists (which is awesome). The rest of the heroes have their hands tied.

The group is led upstairs to the top of an immense ziggurat overlooking thousands and thousands of screaming orcs. Maven quaffs a few potions from Castor (which Maladrok plays off as alcohol), and then strides in and begins beating his father to death. Maven's smites, combined with some crit "successes," are mighty, and Maladrok, initially in a joking mood, quickly realizes that he his getting his ass handed to him. Maven pushes his father back to the edge of a step of the ziggurat, and lands one more mighty punch. Maladrok teeters on the edge, winks at Maven, then falls to his death.

Aymeric hastily casts tongues on Maven, and a rousing speech is given! The crowd is mildly enthused, though some heckle the half-orc. The more powerful orcs on the ziggurat are less happy with the turn of events. When Maven orders them to kneel, only about half do. One goes off in a huff, claiming that he will never bow to a half-orc. A few embarrassing and unsuccessful attempts are made to stop him and a scuffle breaks out. Eventually, Maven explains that there is no such thing as "half a king" and the upstart kneels.

Maven and the rest of our heroes aren't quite sure how to proceed. Nobody is reporting to them, except a small handful of royal guards who attach themselves to Maven in the next few hours. Maladrok's room is checked - nothing except for hot orc women (wow, do not google search that).

Then our heroes head to the treasury. Filled with gold. Castor, Avaryn, and Nut begin plans to Ant Haul princess sparkles and load her up with 155,000 gold pieces, but Maven objects, saying they may each only take 10,000 gp from the treasury. After much bickering, Castor, who just wants to buy things after wandering in the jungle, pledges a guerrilla campaign against innocent orcs until his needs are met. He storms out, followed by Nut and, for some reason, Avaryn. Aymeric stays with the king.

Maven and Aymeric sigh, then head out to go see Maladrok's corpse. They cast speak with dead on it, but the answers they get are likely effected by Maladrok's high will and bluff checks. Maladrok does say that he wants Maven living the life of a king, rather than the life of a selfless adventurer. Then, Maladrok's corpse is burned in typical fashion.

Aymeric and Maven head back to the ziggurat, where, after much deliberation, Maven sends Aymeric to go retrieve the others. Aymeric finds them sleeping in a hobo camp, covered in bugs. Maven at first says that they must either choose between him and the gold. At this point, our heroes seriously consider the later. Maven, having lost all respect for Castor, Nut, and Avaryn, sees that they are no longer dedicated to the quest and relents - 10,000 gp a person (except for Maven, who takes none).

After all this is decided, they go to sleep.

The next morning, they decide they must continue on their quest, and that Maven must abandon his new kingdom. Without any clear successor, our heroes slip quietly through the jumpgate to Breya.

The wind up inside an underground cavern where they are immediately attacked by some small goblinoids. Our heroes dispatch of them without too much difficulty, though Nut nearly dies when he fails one out of two saves vs Phantasmal Killer.

It is May 11th 2001 A.F. This session took 1 day. Both Maven and Aymeric got a point of heroic favor: one for causing roleplaying trouble, and the other for solving it. Our heroes are level 10.

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