A good campaign is not all about picking daisies and handing out alms to the poor. Here's a few reasons why Karish and Glimar were not winning popularity contests.
After hearing John's explaination, I was tempted to place this in the "Random acts of good" section. This session was played at John's cabin sometime during the winter of 1984. My creativity may have been enhanced somewhat during that evening.
This was yet another incident in which the party was totally blameless. In a small town to the North of the Tower, the name of which escapes me, we decided to visit, with no ill intention having been formulatted prior thereto. As background to the incident it is necessary to know that Karish (after reading the Hobbit again) decided to create a belt purse that would cry out "thief" if opened by any but him.
We decided to enter a small establishment to break our morning fast.
After several hours of enjoying the company of the locals the bar had become quite crowded, Karish's purse cried out "thief". Well, the bar being so crowded with people, (Karish continues to blame this incident on the barkeep for not abiding by even the most archaic fire safety standards), was unable to ascertain who had pilfered something of his and said aloud "Fire in the hole" which was fair warning to the party members to activate whatever fire protection devices they had. Short seconds thereafter the room was engulfed by fire well, actually, the ground zero detonation of 6 3d6 fireballs, compliments of the Staff of Kings. Again, this was the fault of the barkeep for not keeping crowd control, as Karish had no way in which to identify the culprit by a discriminating Disintegrate or Power Word.
Of course, the bar was starting to burn and people were
screaming and availing themselves of every exit. The party decided to vacate the building, as we were not protected from failing debris. Karish even forgot to attempt to recover what coin the thief had stolen. Shame on that.
Once outside, we collected in front of the building. The Druid, whose
name I do not remember, but who was annoyed at the Tower, the Akars and the rest of the nasty creatures we had in our employ decided to avail himselves of the opportunity to attack. Apparently he had been following us and this town was under his protection. Fine job he was doing.
(The context of the evening on which this session was played will
remain secret as some laws may have been bent, right Dave?) [A gentlemen never tells dpj]
Kevin had advised that a flaming chariot was streaking towards us from
a height at a great speed. The problem was we were in a wide street with no cover. What to do? A somewhat incoherent voice (being that of a one David Janes) calls out: "Cast a Wall of Force across the road". Brilliant!!!!.
With haste this was done after much arguing, checking of spell times,
distances, etc., our spell was off bare seconds before the streaking inferno of a chariot, with gleeful riders estatic at the prospect of riding down the infamous Karish, Glimar and Daemon, crashed headlong into the Wall of Force. Needless to say the Chariot of Sustarre was instantly annihilated and the riders sent spinning through the air to tumble most humbly at our feet.
Of course, of the three occupants, ony one, a fighter is stunned, the
Druid and another fighter are unhurt and combat ready. We lose the initiative as we have to rush around the Wall of Force. By this time the Druid has summoned a fire elemental compliments of the burning building which makes the DM laugh hahahaha. The fire elemental interposes itself between Daemon and the Druid. "Hahahahahahaha," cries Daemon, "I run through the fire elemental". "You'll be hit automatically for max damage," laughs the DM. "Hahahahaha," cries Daemon, "I don't care", as he leaps through the fire elemental, to the dismay of the fighter and the Druid who have looks on their faces of "These people are insane...."
Within seconds the fighter is subject to multiple magic missles and an
arm loped off by the vorpal blade of Daemon. The Druid, seeing his cause and soon his life will be wiped out, decided to flee. He quickly shape changes to an eagle and gets the hell out of there. So ends the event.
Once again it was the fault of the occupants of the town, as was the
case at the elvish town, that caused this unfortunate event. It was through the lawful protection of property and the flagrant overcrowding of the bar which lead to this result. We were blameless.
I have to add that I don't see our actions as particularly evil in this particular case. I mean, we didn't even try to kill anyone. We just wanted to have some fun in the spirit in interdenominational (or perhaps interdemoninational) understanding.
We had learned through scrying that a Order of Paladins were transporting an object of great significance. We intended to find out what. We headed for a city (again can't remember the name damn we need the southern map [see maps]). Anyway we saw this procession headed along the street while we flew along invisibly on the carpet and for fun decided to see what was going on.
We landed on the roof of the building into which the procession was entering. After several minutes of preparation (we were never ones to enter a situation unless we have various globes, resistance, and detection spells going) a human appeared up some stairs and we quickly subdued him. On the top of the roof was a massive bell which we later discovered he was coming to ring. Karish placed his Explosion spell on the bell (when the bell was stuck it would explore causing damage in a 10' radius).
We then went down the stairs where we subdued 3-4 acolytes who were tended an enormous rack of candles. We donned their clothing and proceeded to watch the procession and the ceromonies taking place. We then proceeded to start putting the candles out, several at a time. This was noticed from down below as the candles had some significance for the ceremony. Voices from below berrated us to keep the candles lit. We continued our antics of lighting and putting out the candles. The voices down below became more annoyed. Daemon and Glimar grabbed the rack and decided to throw it down over the rail into the crowd. Just as we tipped it over edge laughing, the cleric leading the ceremony turned and looked up and too both our surprize it was the cleric we had been scrying upon. Oops.
He screamed at the Paladins present to kill us, calling us...US evil... He started chanting ..."Angel of.....come to our aid..." We didn't like the sounds of that and decided to get out of there. We looked back and a supernatural looking creature with wings had appeared and was headed out way only to be intercepted by the Type V demon Karish though prudent to summon upon hearing the word angle. We never stayed to see the outcome of that battle. Onto the roof, on the carpet and then out of there.
I wonder how the old man made out with the bell afterward?
I thought it was very trendy these days in eco-circles to allow fires to burn out of control. They call it natural forest management. Karish was merely restoring the natural balance of things that the Druids were neglecting in their tree-hugging arrogance.
Remember during our army ruling days Kevin had this big army of orcs, ogres hill giants, trolls, human fighters and some minor MU's etc marching against either us or someone we were helping (for pay of course). Kevin was all happy because he thought (foolish him) that Karish could only kill several hundred. Well Karish being Karish thought long and hard (well for a few minutes anyway) and came up with an idea to destroy the army. It's important to remember that we were playing under the old Players Handbook.
He cast Wall of Fire in a ring at maximum distance. The old MU version followed the MU, this was followed by a Haste spell and then a Polymorph Self spell to eagle shape. Another important fact was this was summer on a terrain of low hill, sparse trees but lots of shrubs and grass.
So off flies Karish at 96" surrounded by a ring of fire. What a sight this must have been to the hapless invaders. Cruising over the ground the ring of fire paced over them twice in addition to starting natural fires. Within minutes the air was full of flames and more importantly smoke which clouded the air and filled their lungs. The poor trolls what were they to do. Well burn of course. Stinging eyes and no air to breath the army was some consumed. A pity. So ended another of Kevins glorious plans against Karish.
In retrospect I believe this was one of the reasons why the Druid (see the Chariot of Sustarre Incident) may have been mad, as the fire did spead over a large area including further afield some forest.