Session 00 - The Prelude

[avisarr]

The Jaidor Talisman

Prelude - A brief refresher on the last campaign:

Introduction
This group of characters, who call themselves the Conclave Defiant, went through the Avisarr Campaign last year. It was a grand and noble quest to gather the skulls of six long dead wizards in an attempt to prevent a dreaded demon lord, named Draxorith, from entering the mortal world through a magical gate. (Full details on the Avisarr campaign can be found on the Khoras web site under DM Tools – Full Campaigns). They collected 5 of the 6 skulls. However, during the quest for the sixth skull, whilst they were deep in the Citadel, they were discovered and captured. All of their equipment was taken from them (including the 5 skulls, the Codex of the Infinite Planes, the Cherokzul wand, some alien technological weaponry, a veritable host of useful magic items, several powerful magical weapons, the Avisarr, the Avisarr map and the Avisarr box). Needless to say, this swung the balance in the favor of the enemy, the nation of Duthelm devoted to the worship of Draxorith. The heroes did manage to escape, but they did not prevent the return of the dread lord Draxorith.

Two years have passed since the last campaign. The characters failed to prevent the return of Draxorith and when the last anchor glyph collapsed, the gate opened and the dark one arose. With the return of Draxorith, Duthelm was greatly strengthened and began amassing troops in a prelude to war against the northern kingdom of Kitar and the Empire of Rukemia. Meanwhile, the characters had returned to their lives. In the east, especially Kitar and the Empire, the legends and stories of these characters spread. The stories were told and retold about the campfire each night (becoming more fabulous and inaccurate with each retelling) The heroism of their acts was magnified and the fact that the characters failed in the quest was all but forgotten. Rather it was seen that these brave men and women were fighting an unseen war before the empire even knew it was in danger.

Now, two years later, Draxorith rules over Duthelm. The dark armies have swelled in size, the orc tribes of the mountains have come down and united with them and a full scale war is now raging between Duthelm and Kitar. Should Kitar fall, Duthelm will march on Rukemia and war will spill across the eastern lands. The empire is slow to react to external political pressures and is only just slowly starting to send aid to Kitar. Kitar, however, has already taken a beating from Duthelm.

The capital city of Kitar, called Myranor, has been under siege for over a month. Thousands of orcs, ogres and human bandits are camped outside Myranor's stone walls.

And this is the state of affairs when the Jaidor Talisman Campaign begins...



The Characters

Callister Draabyn - Existing Character (being run my Mark Price)
A human mariner. Fighter class, about 10th level or so. A genuine hero. His name is known to both gentry and commoners. Indeed, Callister has spent a career out of making himself well known. He hogs the spotlight at every opportunity. You'd think that such a character would have a glib tongue. Not so, Callister is actually quite bad at giving speeches. But he's good in a fight. During the intervening two years, Callister got his entire body covered in magic tattoos – a gift from the priests of Ynthar as a reward for his part in the Avisarr Quest and for adopting the worship of Ynthar. These tattoos protect him from magical attack. They also just happen to make him very easy to spot in a crowd. The biggest advantage of these glyphs inscribed in his skin are that they make him very difficult to track by spell.

Martin Langstaff - Existing Character (being run by Eric Weakland)
A human assassin/mage. About 7th/7th level. He is a master of herbalism, alchemy, poisons and drugs. He is always on the look out for a new toxin to add to his arsenal. He has studied magic and can cast spells, but thinks of himself as an assassin first and foremost. Martin tends to be laid back most of them time, but on occasion, can be frightfully ruthless. Like the time he ran an innkeeper's wife through with his sword.

The Myrian Brothers - New Characters (being run by Nathan Sherman)
I will simply refer to these two as "the myrian brothers". There actual names are Ugita and Mutaki. I don't think I'm spelling them right. In any case, they are almost always together. There are from Myria, a primitive jungle land in the distant southwest corner of the continent. They are the two most powerful spell casters of their tribes. One is a shaman (priest) and the other is a witch doctor (wizard). Ugita, the shaman, is a necromancer of sorts. Most of his magic is Death Magic and deals with undead. Their tribe worships a death god. Mutaki, the witch doctor/wizard has magic box which allows him to magically transport objects back to his village in Myria (to an identical box there) and vice versa. Nothing living will go and it only works between his current location and the land of his village. This has been sort of a running joke. The first few sessions involved the characters getting invited to the empire and getting wined and dined. The brothers mistook most of the luxuries about them (fruit, wine goblets, towels, robes, slippers, silver platters, pillows) as gifts from the empire. They have been "faxing" many of these items back to their jungle home.

Katharana - New Character (being run by Beth Dupke)
A human female. Come to think of it, I'm not sure what class she's running. Which I kind of like. Katharana is a sage/linguist/historical expert and translator. She's the brains of the group. And her character will come in very handy because this group is constantly going to be running into ancient scrolls written in other languages, strange glyphs and such. Katharana hails from Normidia and is related to King Sendel.(A niece I think).

Rothgar - Existing Character (Non Player Character)
Rothgar is a phellysian (feline humanoid) and a skilled archer. Probably the best archer in all the lands. His deadly accuracy is legendary. He was with the group through all of the Avisarr campaign.