Session Report: Jackal of the Hateful Sands

Ran a game today using my following rule hacks:

• Mancy
• COMMANDMENT Spells
• Psionics & Disciple Class
• Commandment Character Creation
• The Sphinx Class

Players were a Sphinx (Tamunos), a Magic-User using Commandment spells (Hakim), and a Disciple (Nehab). All were 4th level.

This was the interest post I put up for the session:

God-King Ishgal, Who Swallows Seas, has grown tired of bandits hunting the borders of his glorious Asur, the City of Twisted Metals.

Heading these bandits is the Jackal of the Hateful Sands--a mysterious warlock who has communed with strange daemons to learn the secrets of arcane spells many.

He has sent you lot to go and find the Jackal, take the head from his shoulders, and to bring the Jackal's spellbook back so that the Radiant Ishgal may consume its many pages of knowledge.

A guide has led you through the Mirror-Shattered Mountains and to the treacherous Bloodstone Pass. She will take you no further; the jackal rules everything in the pass and beyond. But your mission is granted and you have no choice but to follow through or die

Tyler Smith 

SESSION REPORT

They started at the Bloodstone Pass, a camel each, with the guide--an elderly woman, seemingly blind but a savant of this area--leaving them to do what must be done. The players came up with a plan: travel down the pass and let themselves be bait, trusting in their spells and powers to save them and to reverse track the Jackal's agents.

As they traveled, Nehab at the front, Hakim behind her, and Tamunos flying in the air above the pass, Tamunos noticed the stone by an outcropping ruffling. Thinking it dangerous, he began to fly lower. At the same time, Nehab used a wild talent to see danger in the future, and saw bolas and bandits descending on them from the ravine's lips. This prophecy proved true, as a bola missed Tamunos, and a whistle echoed along the pass. Nehab told Hakim of this vision and used another wild talent to project the memory into the sphinx's mind. Tamunos grabbed spell components off of his camel and ascended again.

Both Nehab and Hakim hit on the right side of the ravine, opposite where Tamunos had seen the "ruffling stone", and hid with their camels in front of them. Hakim cast a spell as well. Taking a skull anointed with sacred oil, he hid it behind a cut of rock veiled in shadow and covered it with his cloak. This allowed him to cast the commandment spell Anointed Skull's Midnight Whispers. The whispering of the dead oozed from Hakim as a protective field, and he went to hide alongside Nehab.

Tamunos foolishly ignored the vision projected into his mind and flew to the ravine lip to cast a spell. From behind an arrow struck him, interrupting the casting. Then three bolas flew at him. Two were dodged, but one wrapped around his wings, causing him to fall 40 feet to the ground, taking near fatal damage. Then the bandits reached the ravine's lip, bows and bola at the ready.

Nehab looked to the sole bandit on the right side of the ravine and used a psionic ability, Persona Swap to switch her mind with the bandit's own. As the bandit was put into Nehab's body and was hostile towards Hakim, the whispers of the dead fucked with his head, sending him into a horrible fight and thus unable to act. In the same breath, Hakim put a crown of twigs and feathers on his head, casting Begut the Nest of Crowns. A massive murder of crows was conjured forth by this, blotting out the sun and descending on everyone involved. The chipping made it impossible to communicate, the black wings beating made it near impossible to move and see, and nothing anyone had could deal with this super-murder. During this, Tamunos mixed the blood of his wounds with strange ointments, beginning the casting of Gift Them Their Misfortune.

One bandit did nothing. The one beside it tried to whistle, but the sound was drowned out. The third jumped into the ravine. They disappeared, teleporting to the ground safely, before throwing back their hood. Inscribed on their forehead was a disciple's tattoo, glowing with light. The bandit's eyes were sewn shut, but their third eye allowed them to know where its prey hid. Nehab, in the body of the other bandit, jumped off the ravine, committing suicide. Her persona then smacked back into her body, and the bandit's back to its corpse, killing it. Hakim than began to move towards where Tamunos fell.

Nolan Brewer

Tamunos stood, as only his wings were bound, and reunited with Hakim amidst the murder. Hakim used a bronze dagger to cut the bola off, and Tamunos strode forward. Here, he ran into the Bandit-Disciple, who took a step back and cloned himself. The clone drew forth a bronze scimitar and, surrounded by the endless murder of crows, prepared for battle. But Hakim's aura of whispers was still working, infecting the Bandit-Disciple's mind. They dropped their scimitar, allowing for Tamunos to move past them and apply his spell to the clone's originator.

It dealt 22 points of damage, doubling the hit points Tamunos had lost. The bandit's head, not its neck, turned like a dish rag being wringed out. Then the entire body exploded into a blood smear, the equipment destroyed, and the clone dissipating. The two bandits, psionically sensing their friend was dead, fled. 

Hakim removed his crown, dissipating the murder of crows. They searched the suicided bandit's body, finding a dagger, some food and water, and a bronze necklace incribed with a love poem. Hakim used his geomancy to see the past of the Bloodstone Pass. He saw:

1. Bandits hunting caravans.
2. Bandits riding out to war against Azur.
3. Three merchants being sacrificed by the Jackal of the Hateful Sands.
4. The Jackal of the Hateful Sands summoning forth daemons and angels and imbuing them into the stone.
5. A perfectly hidden location just outside the entrance of the Bloodstone Pass.
6. A great opening at the mountain's summit that bandits used as a second entrance into their base.

They returned there to lick their wounds and plan. At the same time, Nehab used a psionic power to stalk the earlier bandits. She discovered a massive complex of caves where the bandits hid, alongside countless women, children, and elderly.

The made no plan the first night, but at dawn they heard the Jackal's voice booming through the Mirror-Shattered Mountains, calling for Ishgar's dogs to show themselves. Obviously, they did not.

The next day, they made a plan. Hakim and Nehab would stalk up to the mountain summit for recon, while Tamunos licked his wounds.

It worked, for the most part. Hyenas, strangely enough, almost found Tamunos but did not and ascended the mountain. Night fell and Hakim/Nehab hid behind massive boulders, 30 feet or so away from the broken mountain's peak. All rocks had been cleared for that 30 feet, making it impossible to approach without someone somehow seeing them. At night, too, the cackling of hyena could be heard, and their loping shapes seen in the darkness. Nehab hatched another plan.

She bound her arms and legs, and had Hakim gag her. Then she Persona Swapped with a hyena. The gagged body of Nehab could not move, and Hakim cast Bare the Slave's Heart on her, enslaving the hyena's mind and keeping her quiet. Hyena-Nehab stalked to the mountain's peak, only to see the Jackal of the Hateful sands floating above the secret entrance, rotating slowly in the air. The Jackal attempted to cast some spell on Hyena-Nehab, and was satisfied in thinking it worked, though it did not. Hyena-Nehab raced back down and saw, now that the eyes of the hyena in this pack were all gold in color. They were bewitched. Nehab, not wanting to fall under this curse, returned to her original body.

During this, Tamunos affixed a stone stele to the ground, casting To This Point, Bring the East and Move the Warlord's Statue, creating a protective zone for himself as well as an ornate statue in the God-King's image with which to protect himself.

Martin Deschambault

Meanwhile, Hakim cast Nail to Them the Nomad's Curse. On it he wrote the sacrifice of each merchant, thus giving the spell three wrongs, onto a scroll of papyrus. Then he nailed it to the territory of the Jackal, and the two fled back down the mountain.

Strange, they found it, when they saw the Jackal floating over there hideout! They hid, and Nehab tried to use False Input to trick the Jackal into seeing something in the distance. The Jackal turned, and they moved to get back to their hideout. But the Jackal's head turned 180* back towards them. FOOLS! he screamed. Dust began to rise into the air, and battle began.

Tamunos took the sphinx's lion shape and bounded out of the hideout with the statue close behind. He commanded it to attack, and the statue reared back with its spear.

Hakim had in his possession a lighting-rich opal. He crushed it in his hand and sent a lightning bolt hurtling at the Jackal alongside the spear coming from the other direction. The Jackal rose both hands, one towards each attack. The lightning smashed against an invisible barrier and scattered, but not before singing the entirety of the Jackal's left arm. The spear stopped mid-flight and turned to dust, alongside the statue.

Though hurt, the Jackal of the Hateful Sands was not defeated. And he showed the party how he earned his name. Sands stormed around him, then coalesced into a massive swarm of scorpions, scarabs, hornets, and spiders, as he cast Transfigure Dust to Vermin. The swarms lashed out. Tamunos's stele attracted many of them, protecting himself. Nehab was able to fend many off psionically, and thus only took 6 points of damage. Hakim, however, was overtaken in a flash. When the swarm scattered, all that was left was desiccated flesh, torn clothing, and devoured bones. Haki was dead.

Nehab hid, going into a psionic attack mode but failing to break through the Jackal's mental defenses. Tamunos spread his wings and went to attack the Jackal. He did not get close. The Jackal moved a hand in a circle, carving a moat into the ground under him that would have to be flown over. In the moat coalesced the forms of countless man-eating crocidiles, courtesy of the Set Loose the Crocodiles spell. The Jackal also tried to place a curse on Tamunos, but the magic-resistance of being a sphinx protected him.

Nehab appeared, let loose another psionic attack. This one broke through, but just barely. Tamunos conjured forth another Warlord Statue underneath the Jackal. But before they could clash again, the sun rose, and the Jackal's phantasm faded, ending combat.

Hakim dead, the two decided to flee, knowing their secret location had been compromised. They were hounded by mustang-riding bandits and a clan of hyena. However they found reenforcements from God-King Ishgar, Who Swallows Sea, and the bandits were repelled. When they finally returned to the capital, expecting punishment, they found Ishgar beside himself with joy. He had been scrying on the battle, after all, and saw that Nomad's Curse take effect. Weakened by the lightning bolt and psionic attacks, the Jackal of the Hateful Sands died on the third day, his soul curse-blackened and his flesh dessicated. With the Jackal removed, his forces put the bandits and the people they cared for to the sword, and Ishgar bound the daemons and angels to his service.

Blake Rottinger

Thus ended the one-shot.

Overall went well! The "looseness" of the spells and powers led to some creative works, and the combats were fun, as were the little stealth missions the players attempted. Can't wait to do another!