Realmtrotter's Guide to Zobeck/The Stories So Far

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The session-by-session breakdowns for the Realmtrotter's Guide to Zobeck can be found here. This page is titled "The Stories So Far," because there was no intention for a cohesive, single "Story So Far."

Fight at the Museum

Date: 8 Dalsk, 1250 PR

Characters: bard Nick Rivers, halfling barbarian Jo, rogue Moyra Gray, wizard Veras Langford, and warlock Dorothea Doubtice. 8 Dalsk, 1250 PR. Offline, PA.

Five people were hired to be night guards at the Zobeck Art Gallery for the duration of a travelling exhibition: Ancient Art: Alive! However, the owner had an ulterior motive: to turn them into statues with a magic pedestal. The heroes were drugged, removed of their weapons, and bound. They managed to escape with tyrannosaurus teeth, looting the Arms and Armor hall and fighting through a handful of animated statues. In a climactic battle against a statue of a tyrannosaurus rex, Nick Rivers brought the mummified corpse of Paelias Amenruta into the moonlight. Revived by a blessing from his god Sehanine Moonbow, Paelias summoned his manticore Koronet and rushed into battle. Before he could get a swing in, though, the night watch finished the dinosaur on their own. They then did what night watches do best: loot the very gems they were hired to guard and drink the night away at The Lion's Paw. During the celebrations, old Dorothea snuck away to deliver the necromantic pedestal to her fiendish patron and make another deal.

What Lies in Shadows

Date: 15 Dalsk, 1250 PR

Characters: elven wizard Veras Langford, human warlock Dorothea Doubtice, half-elf assassin Lia Darksbane, centaur ranger Egosa, human rune knight (Lorenzo) Cain. Offline, PA.

Dorothea Doubtice and Veras Langford (after briefly visiting Elliot Lackmann at his new café location) went to The Lion's Paw for supper. While sitting with three strangers, a Shadar-Kai child (Baenrae) approached them and asked for help. She and her mother (Olra) had been scouting in the Shadowfell, when they were beset upon by zombies and a wight. Baenrae escaped, but her mother was taken. Strangely, where zombies stood in the Shadowfell, guards of Theodosia Catchford stood in the material plane, as if they were in both planes at once. The party of five, with Baenrae tagging along, fought their way through Catchford's manor, shifting between planes using blackstones and echo stones. The wight/Catchford was killed, Baenrae and Olra were reunited, and Dorothea bequeathed the wight's head to her patron, Belial the Devourer. Belial and Dorothea then signed a contract for Dorothea to harvest souls for the devil.

Well-Conveyed

Date: 17 Dalsk, 1250 PR

Characters: AL3K-Sander the Warforged blunderbuss barbarian, Droth the dream elf repressed sorcerer, Parker Heryon the half-elf mechanic and his raccoon-autom Martin, Phyllite the gnomish druid. Online.

Able Scraps, a recycling plant in the Grinding District of Zobeck, held several automs and other proprietary magical inventions of Pendergras Industries. Five guards were hired to protect the plant while Victor Pendergras visited to check on the bluestone furnace that controlled much of the plant. Victor and the plant owner were ambushed by fire toads that had made their home in the hot subbasement, and the furnace began to overheat. The guards defeated haywire automs, rescued the owner's pet automaton panther, cracked a vault, and stopped the furnace from exploding. They received gold and job offers to work with Pendergras in Sneerwell.

Ride the Rails

Date: 8 Kentgannon, 1250 PR

Characters: firbolg anti-gun way of the elements monk Creel Stusher, Aasimar arcane archer Dipuc Legna, elven wild magic sorcerer Droth, elven wizard Veras Langford, human warlock Dorothea Doubtice. Online.

The Baleah Express was journeying from Zobeck to LaCroix across the dangerous Baleah Crossing. Its cargo included an ancient pillar covered in lightning runes, the suspected target of a heist by The Stripes Gang. A motley crew of five passengers sought to protect the pillar and stop the gang, inspired by the large bounty (and perhaps the goodness of their hearts). They befriended cows, helped true love, and got a lead on two Stripes Gang members. When confronting these members, the wild magic of Droth unleashed a blinding light, and - claiming to be Pelor - Droth and the others eventually got a confession. The Stripes Gang weren't here to steal the pillar; they were here to crash the train off the bridge and into a whirlpool to Stygia, ultimately delivering the souls to Belial. In the final confrontation, Dorothea flipped-flopped between sides while Varis pulled the emergency brake in time. Creel Stusher succumbed to wounds from the very thing he hated most: guns. His last words were memorialized with what would have been his portion of the Stripes bounty, founding the "Guns Kill People" Foundation.

The Wereforged Experiment

Date: 17 Kentgannon, 1250 PR

Characters (all Warforged): forge cleric Forger Forging Ramirez (weretiger), Ur-cleric Spigot (wereboar), berzerker barbarian Terry Byte (werewolf), college of the maestro bard Orgo (werebear). Online.

In the bowels of Zobeck University lay the Center for Monstrous Studies. Dr. Lagrange sought to understand whether lycanthropy was a pure curse or partially a disease. By testing on four Warforged, naturally immune to disease, Dr. Lagrange discovered it was a pure curse: the Warforged metal shifted into animalistic forms, while Spigot grew boarish hair that burst out between his armor plates. The biologist's plans to dissect these volunteers went awry as they killed her guards and escaped into the sewers. After a harrowing encounter with a black pudding in the abandoned Gelatology ward, the Wereforged resurfaced through a dormitory, Hollaway Hall. Fueled by revenge and/or a desire for a potion of curse removal, the team returned to laboratory, rested and ready to fight. The mechano-animals slaughtered the remaining guards, some of whom also transformed after biting into vials containing werewolf teeth. Spigot cornered Dr. Lagrange, who in desperation injected herself with two strains of lycanthropy, losing all control and turning into an enormous beast. The crew managed to finish off the monster with a final dissonant "ha-cha-cha" from Orgo. While they all left the center with potions of curse removal, only Spigot consumed his that evening. Some say you hear the occasional metallic howl in Zobeck to this day.

A Sparklesmas Summoning

Date: 15 Ches, 1251 PR

Characters: human pact of the fiend warlocks Lorelai Aloysius and Dorothy Doubtice, human shadow magic sorcerer Dort Doubtice, lapine saboteur rogue Clover, and leonin oathbreaker paladin Scar

Four villains had made deals with Belial, but since the devil hadn't appeared to them in 13 days (see item ii of the contract) they were in peril of losing their souls by midnight if they couldn't give him harvested souls. Dort Doubtice could summon Belial, but needed the blood of a great hero slain in the last 24 hours. They teamed up with a leonin who held a grudge against Simba the Undefeated, a paladin of Pelor, and a lapine who had snagged his itinerary for the day. Alongside a cold-hearted art collector, they killed an innocent transmuter, took her appearance, and suggested Simba come back to the Doubtice household. By isolating the hero, the team quickly finished off the hero, though his pegasus escaped. The group summoned Belial, Scar joined his army in the Blood War, and the villains disbanded to plot another day.

It's About Time

Date: 19 Eleint, 1250, 1052, 1102, and 1293 PR

Characters: human gunslinger Tex Arcana, human rogue Moira Mabarin, elven wizard Veras Langford, Parker Heryon the half-elf mechanic and his raccoon-autom Martin

Clockwork throughout the city went haywire due to something awry within the Clockwork of Chronepsis. Daring to venture inside, the adventurers met a child, Inga Whitlock, charged with taking care of the clocktower. After collecting a key near a monster magically trapped in the basement, the adventurers ascended the tower. They surpassed puzzle boxes, giant clock handles and pendulums, and steam mephits. Along the way, they met Inga and her blink dog Parker Jr. fifty years later: the floors were connected to different times. When they arrived at the floor corresponding to 1250 PR, Inga was missing. Veras and Parker set the clockwork back in motion, and the group solved the mystery. Parker Jr. had escaped to the floor above, and while trying to retrieve him Inga had overdosed on oil of etherealness. The gang saved her from being trapped in the Ethereal Plane, but while stepping out of the clocktower landed in 1293 PR. The fracturing of the weave unleashed the monster below, and the city was steeped in chaos.

The End of Zobeck as We Know It

Date: 19 Eleint, 1293 PR

Characters: Altix the Levinkan, gnome artificer Ratchet and his steel defender Clank, human rogue Moira Mabarin, elven wizard Veras Langford, lapine saboteur rogue Clover

The city had descended into chaos, as magic had fragmented and shattered in its districts that morning. Destructive monsters and opportunistic criminals were loose, and a gargantuan chimera had destroyed the Clocktower of Chronepsis, Able Scraps, Axel Station, and Zobeck University. Altix the Levinkan summoned a team, The Cool Chimera Killers, who recruited a revived Paelias Amenruta before taking to the skies in The Second Strike. From the airship, they fought Simba's daughter and pegasus, swarms of steam mephits, and cut off a wing from the red-glowing chimera. It crashed down into a train intersection, where the Killers solved the puzzle of its glowing auras, hit it with a train, and finished it off. Meanwhile, Veras removed the curse of lycanthropy from Terry Byte and two other Wereforged. With the chimera finished, the city eventually returned to peace, and would rebuild itself with a new name: Scranton, the Electric City. Altix rewarded the group and commissioned them to hunt down more lycanthropes, so this may not be the final story from the city.