The Cursed: Imprisoned One

[Part of the Cursed story line]

As the lone survivor, Catharina descends into the final cage of the Watchers Keep where the disembodied voice of the invisible Imprisoned One warns her that the Knights of the Vigil are just trying to trap her too. She uses the seal repair scroll anyway and finds it was telling the truth.

Fortunately the Imprisoned One has enough power to open a small tear, just for her. In exchange, it wants vengeance and she readily agrees. Outside, she lies to the knights that she killed the Imprisoned One and they all go to look. Upon their departure, the Helmite ghost reappears and gives her a new scroll of sealing. This one to doubly secure the entire keep and lock the treacherous knights within.

The "oh shit" moment is awesome!

Feeling slightly guilty, she goes to check on them and finds they have all been slain by the Imprisoned One: Demogorgon! Since he's a Marilith summoner she high tails it out of there and uses the ghosts scroll - locking down the Watchers Keep once more and truly damning Valygar, Raven and Neera to enternal imprisonment.

Insight: Clearly the Watchers Keep is the Durlag's Tower of this game.

The Cursed: Forever Alone

[Part of the Cursed story line]

Using gems from the defeated demon lords, Catharina assembles the portal key that lets the team descend to Level 4 which is centered around a huge machine and the crazy mage trapped within it. The machine is a reality warper, and for his own amusement he has summoned various warring monsters.

Some people just have too much time on their hands.

Obviously it's up to the team to clean up this mess, so they start with the Githyanki area and manage to eliminate them with no hassle. A red dragon they guard is quite amiable and tells them the machine is the key to the next portal. Since it's clear the dragon likes being trapped in here (his hoard is safe), they leave him alone.

Less amiable is the demi-lich that they randomly bump into. The floating skull is tough and clearly has a favorite spell called "Imprisonment". Those hit by this suffer a fate worse than death, being  trapped in a tiny sphere far underground where they will remain, magically alive, aware, and alone until the end of the planet.

It does this to a planetar and a few mord-swords. Then to Valygar who seems to be a curse magnet. And Raven. And Neera. The floating skull is destroyed but at the cost of half the team.

Insight: These Githyanki are nice enough to carry loads of health potions, handy for parties without healers.

The Cursed: The Old Gang

[Part of the Cursed story line]

Needing to assemble a melee team to tackle the maze in the Watcher's Keep, Catharina gets the old gang back together: The Paladin Keldorn, now more grim faced after imprisoning his wife and executing her lover, Werewolf Cernd - who is more than happy to abandon his kid with the druids, and Mazzy the hero who somehow escaped Spellhold asylum and the island solo.

With Neera's help they also finally get Valygar un-squirreled, and also un-petrify Raven Skinnybastard to fill the thief role. With the squad ready, Catharina leads them back into the demon filled maze and hands out potions of haste (since spells are wonky) before entering the first demon base.

You'd need way more figurines if this had been a board game.

It is a tremendous battle, requiring the use of many healing potions and Catharina's demon form for victory. Even so, at the end of it Cernd and Mazzy are dead. The next demon base battle goes much better, as thanks to the hard fight, she can now summon a planetar! They win with no losses, and no demon form required.

Insight: Finally someone gets to use that +5 two hander I've been lugging around - Keldorn! His Protection from Evil thing is also annoying to use since it is one by one, but is very useful against evil things. They get -2 to hit!

The Cursed: Druid Duel

[Part of the Cursed story line]

The druid grove is home to spiders, trolls, and druids being turned to the extremist shadow druid way by their new leader, Faldorn! It seems she survived that flamestrike after all. Fortunately, the druids chose leaders based on ritual duels so Cernd steps up.

To everyone's surprise, Cernd is actually a greater werewolf and rips Faldorn to pieces and subsequently staying to redirect the druids back to a more peaceful path.

It's like fighting a random tribesman only for him to turn into this.

More problematic is the rogue rakshasa who is found hiding nearby, as the team has no weapons capable of killing it. They retreat and opt for the other solution instead - killing all the djinn in Trademeet instead. This works out better, though it does leave Raven Skinnybastard petrified.

Since he's pretty safe here in that form (even used as decoration in town), the team take Rasaad to fill his spot.

Insight: Cernd's greater werewolf form is awesome, but he can't equip/use/cast anything while in that form.

The Cursed: Trading in Problems

[Part of the Cursed story line]

The next stop from the De'Arnise keep is the city of Trademeet which for some reason is under attack by wild animals. In addition to that, a number of djinn have set up camp outside and have basically stopped all trade to the city (through charm buying everything) until the rakshasa they are hunting is killed.

You have it backwards - the genies make the wishes and you are the slaves!

Because not enough is going on, a recovered Rasaad is spotted here as well - fighting and defeating others of his Sun Soul monk order. When questioned after, he claims that this is a ruse to infiltrate a new monk cult. They leave him to do that and go chat with the mayor who has a druid scapegoat locked up for trial.

This druid, Cernd, claims to also be investigating the animal attacks, and with a little diplomacy the team secure his release and in return he shows the way to the nearby druid grove, the likely source of these problems.

Insight: You won't be able to trade with anyone here other than the Djinn who have terrible prices. Sell your stuff back in the city before coming here!

The Cursed: Troll Fort

[Part of the Cursed story line]

The closest stop outside Athkatla is the De'Arnise Keep, where the daughter of the household, Nalia De'Arnise was encamped outside with a few guards. The keep itself had fallen to troll and yuan-ti invaders, and she was trying to reclaim it.

Having had experience in sieges before, Catharina agrees to help. Much like Dragonspear Castle, there is a secret tunnel to access the fortress and unlike Dragonspear, the enemies here are weak and easily wiped out.

It was no hassle what so ever.

Nalia is thankful for the assistance, but now faces the reality that if she takes ownership of the now empty De'Arnise throne, she would be stuck to a previously arranged marriage to a douche bag. Catharina suggests a life of adventure instead, and directs her to the Copper Coronet to make her own group of explorers.

Insight: In case you forgot, you need fire or acid to finish a downed troll. Leave them long enough and they get back up at full health.

The Cursed: Breaker of Prisons

[Part of the Cursed story line]

With the cult of the Unseeing Eye destroyed, the team decide to check up on Haer'Dalis and his theater troop - only to find them being abducted by inter-planar bounty hunters! The party follow into the planar prison, and defeat the demons in charge of it. Of course, most of the slaves actually die during this but the theater company is fine.

These two also made it out. They always do.

They opt to teleport on to Sigil, but Haer'Dalis returns with Catharina's team back to Athkatla in hopes of adventuring with her (specifically Lu Lingqi) one day. Keldorn, happy with recent events, invites them all to his house to meet his wife and daughters. This doesn't go so well as his wife is upset at the job hours he keeps and admits to having a relationship with another man! Distraught, Keldorn leaves to report this to the courts, leaving the party one member down again.

They decide to visit Jaheira at the docks and find a Harper inquisition waiting for them! Unwilling to be magically imprisoned for eternity the team slay all the Harpers present with the exclusion of Jaheira who wisely decided to side and rejoin with her old team. Having had enough of the city, the party decides to leave it to follow one of the many quest hooks outside but before doing so, they pay a quick trip to the adventure mart to gear up properly. At this point they had 94k gold anyway.

Insight: The Robe of Vecna at the Adventure Mart is very handy as it reduces spell casting time. Instant skull traps? Yes please!

The Cursed: Looking and Unseeing

[Part of the Cursed story line]

Having had enough of the Graveyard, the team heads into the Temple sewers next to hunt down a new cult forming below. An encounter with a well equipped band of brigands sees Minsc getting killed by a magical throwing axe which Korgan claims for himself before kicking Minsc's corpse down one of the many shit pipes. Taking his place is the paladin Keldorn, who is also looking for this mysterious cult down here.

Instead, the group finds the secret lair of a wizard who has enslaved the local actor Haer'Dalis. After rescuing the hapless actor the team goes deeper into the sewers and finds the base of the Unseeing Eye cult. It doesn't take much to learn that these self-blinding crazies worship a beholder who is looking for half of a powerful artifact, since it already has the first half.

The team finds it first in a long forgotten temple even further down before hopping into the beholder's lair to face the monster. There are a surprising number of undead servants here too, but most of the trouble comes from the random beholders and gauths (little beholders) in the area. Catharina makes use of all the summoning scrolls she has been hanging onto, letting her own skeles, efreeti and fire elemental handle all the dirty work. As for the Unseeing Eye, Korgan uses the assembled artifact (it's a plasma rifle) to almost one shot it, making it the easiest enemy in the entire place!

Beware of dwarves with plasma rifles!

Insight: Buying the Shield of Balduran at the Adventure Mart would have saved a lot of headaches here as it reflects beholder rays, but summoned fire elementals are a good fall back as they are immune to most of what the eye tyrants can throw.

The Cursed: Thief Lesson

[Part of the Cursed story line]

The mystery of Montaron is not much of a mystery. The Harpers killed him since he was spying on them for the Zhents, just like they kill Xzar when the team goes to report back to him. Jaheira decides to leave the team to work for this Harper branch, so Catharina finds a replacement in the somewhat crazy lady Hexxat at the Copper Coronet. Hexxat has a burning desire to revisit the graveyard so that's where they go.

They also kept his corpse in a chest. Nasty.

As a thief, she is much better than Raven at detecting traps (and she teaches him a bit) which is handy as she leads them down into one particular crypt and right to... the vampire that's mind controlling her. The vampire "Hexxat" kills her thrall and begins making demands of the party, which isn't really great for first impressions so Catharina and company just end up killing her too.

They hire the dwarf fighter Korgan nearby, who is hunting for a tome in one of the crypts but finds that his old crew have beaten him to it. These vagrants seem to also have raided the house of the collector who wanted the book, killing all inside so Catharina has no qualms in tracking them down and ending them in the same fashion.

Insight: Detect traps never turns on automatically for Raven as he is player generated, which is why Hexxat seemed to be so much better at finding them. Simply remembering to press that button makes him much more useful.

The Cursed: Graveyard Visit

[Part of the Cursed story line]

The team is invited to the graveyard by a mysterious woman, so they go during the day but still find the tombs teeming with undead and giant spiders. The spiders in particular have built a massive hive that connects a number of the deeper tombs in such a way that triggers my arachnophobia. Good thing the party has no such problems, since gassing them with cloud kill is pretty effective.

They do take a bit of damage down there so are forced to surface to regroup - finding that night has now fallen. A vampiress named Bodhi appears and tries to get the team to side with her against the Shadow Thieves and in return she will help find Imoen, all for the low price of 15,000 gold! This offer is turned down because vampires suck, and Bodhi leaves disappointed.

Bonus points for trying to charm the party.

On the way back to an inn the party comes across a man almost beaten to death in an alley way. At his request they carry him all the way to the docks where he is delivered to a large building which turns out to be the local Harper base. The necromancer Xzar, who was once believed dead but is better now, then appears and tasks the group with infiltrating the base to find out what they did with his buddy Montaron. Jaheira is unhappy that the group agrees to do this.

Insight: The tombs in the graveyard are painful. Lots of strong, draining undead and the lower levels are riddled with traps.

The Cursed: Copper Coronet

[Part of the Cursed story line]

At the docks district the squad is employed by the Shadow Thief guild to investigate a possible rebellion within their own ranks, and sure enough with the surprising assistance of Edwin, they find the splinter group which Catharina deals with solo. Invisibility lets her get past the guards, then the usual cloud kill and skull traps with an ice storm on top.

"Feel the backhand of Justice!"

Outside, Jaheira runs into an old enemy of hers, who curses her with some wasting disease before fleeing. The team gives chase, looking for clues at the Copper Coronet tavern where Minsc gets into a bar brawl and Raven discovers that the place is run by slavers! They slaughter the scum and free the slaves who take over the establishment. This also involves traipsing through kobold infested sewers to hit the nearby slaver base. Jaheira's curse giver is among them and his death lifts her curse.

Insight: Jaheira's stats drop by the day if you ignore the curse for too long, so don't do that.

The Cursed: City of Problems

[Part of the Cursed story line]

Athkatla is a city of problems, the first being a circus tent being toyed with by a djinn. The team investigate, killing a number of illusions and the illusionist posing as said genie to free the people within. This includes the wingless elf Aerie, who is eager to go adventuring one day. Soon after they meet a thug called Gaelan who offers aid of a "large organization" to assist Imoen, for the price of 20,000 gold pieces.

Needing to do some "fund raising" the team explores the city finding many opportunities of work, but first Catharina visits the government district and buys a license to cast spells in the city. While there they also witness Viconia being put to the stake, and Catharina watches with glee as the deserter is immolated into ash.

Burn baby burn!

They also find Dorn who is openly plotting to murder one of the high priests so the team kill him before he does any damage, and are subsequently hired to deal with some fallen paladins. An easy task with a few skull traps and cloud kills.

Insight: Buying that license is super handy, do it early and don't worry about the gold. There's lots of it just lying around.

The Cursed: Lab Rats

[Part of the Cursed story line]

The prison transport never made it to Baldur's Gate, as Catharina was abducted by the mage Jon Irenicus. Deep in his dungeon, she endured his experiments for sometime until the location came under attack by some rival faction. With Irenicus distracted, Catharina is freed by fellow captive Imoen! Hey she's not so useless after all. The pair also rescue familiar faces Minsc, Jaheira, Elizabeth, and Lu Lingqi as well as the pair of thieves Yoshimo and Raven Skinnybastard on their way out, all of whom were lab rats to Irenicus.

Irenicus thinks too much, look at all those veins.

Alas both Khalid and Dynaheir were also prisoners here but they did not survive the torture. Reaching the surface they find themselves in Athkatla, Jewel of Amn. Irenicus is nearby absolutely annihilating the opposition which draws the attention of the local enforcers, the Cowled Wizards - a number of whom he slays as well. During this Imoen takes a cheap shot to magic missile Irenicus, and since magic is outlawed in the city the Cowled Wizards eventually capture both of them and whisk them away.

Yoshimo, having had enough of this shit, peaces out and leaves to go to the pub. The rest of the group, Raven Skinnybastard included, decide to try help Imoen from her legal issues.

Insight: Don't rush to escape the prison. There's lots of EXP in there and you can camp as much as you like.

Battle Brothers: Retirement

Part of the Fate of Heroes series - spoilers ahead!

Retired as a rich man, Sahkarov purchases a keep and pretty much buys his own little fiefdom near the sea where his allies of House Ruhmolt are glad to have him. Scribes visit regularly to notate the impressive adventures he and the Spears have had as the remaining members all went their own ways.

Ragner and Rollo took to pirating on the seas, Sir Erland left on a quest to hunt down a "dragon", while Sunbro became a champion of the noble house tournaments. Sir Winfred Steinhart, Wilrech and Ulfert joined another mercenary band to try destroy a goblin city but never returned.

Too bad I never ran into a Lindwurm.

The last surviving member, Raven Skinny Bastard would visit Sahkarov often - still with a mind to build up a company strong enough to reach the Black Obelisk. Whether the ex-juggler would actually achieve such a goal would have to be a tale for another time.

Battle Brothers: The Ruins of Kragenheim

Part of the Fate of Heroes series - spoilers ahead!

After rescuing the survivors of Stakendorf, Stargazer injures himself while training as the Spears are sent to clear the Ruins of Kragenheim. The resident goblins have superior positioning and a shaman to boot who continually casts AoE root spells. The magic and the net throwing skirmishers makes advancing an arduous task. Hakon is pretty much useless the entire fight as he never succeeds in freeing himself.

The fleet footed gobbos get to work dismantling the rest of the team, dismembering Sir Wilhelm, cutting down Arl Eamon, Reimund, and Gaius, removing one of Raven's ears and breaking Sunbro's elbow before Gander finally reaches the shaman and impales it with the company battle standard. The remaining enemies are subsequently cut down easily.

And their corpses put on display.

Weakened and in low morale, Gander pulls the Spears back to the safer Eastern cities for an easy nachzehrer hunt and to resupply rations. While doing this the horde advances and destroys Gerworld village.

Battle Brothers: Many Masks

Part of the Fate of Heroes series - spoilers ahead!

The Spear's banditry continues as they do the same ruse at Kielseng, before moving on to guard caravans and hunt more dire wolves. On the road, Sahkarov convinces a "war" band of children to disperse shortly before running into House Grimmund soldiers who attempt to arrest Emile. Using their legendary renown, Gander makes them back off.

The very next day they are side by side with the same troops, led by Sir Wilhelm Erkenbrand of House Grimmund (previously of House Ruhmolt, guess they pay better up North?) to successfully defend against more marauding greenskins.

Afterwards the Spears do a bunch of easy envoy escort missions, with Harlech taking the opportunity to learn some moves from Arl Eamon. Gander also spends a bit of coin on upgrading the Spears equipment, including a magic helm, and accepts a task to defend Wiesendorf from roaming bandits - who turn out to be undead!

The Spears still honor their contract, and despite Arl Eamon losing an eye and the enemy necromancer having an undead hero who manages to stand up even after Stargazer beheads him, they undead are no match for the mercenaries. Raven gains a few more coins afterwards by using his juggling talents in the village.

Happy times among all the killing.

Fighting a headless foe takes its toll on Stargazer though, who drowns his nightmares with ale. He is now a drunkard.

Battle Brothers: Skinny Brigands

Part of the Fate of Heroes series - spoilers ahead!

The peace after the invasion is pleasant, but coin hard to come by once more for a mercenary band. Harlech tries his hand at a tournament, jousting against Sir Albrecht but only wins himself a broken shoulder. Raven and Sir Erland also injure each other again when quarreling about status, Emile continues thieving, and Stargazer pockets a magic knife from a corpse in the woods.

To keep them busy, Gander returns the Spears to hunting dire wolves and courier work, as well as "posing" as bandits and raiding Erzberg, slaying a good number of peasants as part of an extortion racket for House Folsach. Gander feels guilty about this afterwards, with Sid consoling him saying money is money.

The ultimate motivator.

Almost right afterwards the Spears are back at Erzberg, defending it from rampaging green skins with the Hungry Hounds and soldiers led by Sir Wilhelm Erkenbrand. There are a few allied losses, and Corynx suffers a broken elbow thanks to a goblin pike. On a more positive note, Sir Erland manages to get a traveling troupe to perform for free upping morale, and Raven Fat Bastard is no longer fat! Needing a more appropriate name, the Spears re-dub him Raven Skinny Bastard.

Battle Brothers: Relative Peace

Part of the Fate of Heroes series - spoilers ahead!

The days after the war are peaceful, with the roads patrolled by various House soldiers once more. The Spears help clean up the wandering brigand and orc groups, getting paid per head as well as hunting more direwolf packs.

In their down time, Mole helps a boy get a ball out of a tree, Raven's juggling entertains the troops, Big Mike plays more dice with Pioyer and Emile, Faltran manages to break his nose while training and Fanatic converts R4W3C to the cult of Davkul. Majorn also keeps busy burning random witches he finds in villages.

Sir Donatus Donbert of House Folsach then invites them to go on a nachzerer hunt with his legion and showcases how overwhelming numbers can handle even a swarm of over 20 of the ghouls. Big Mike is impressed.

I love the large scale battles!

Afterwards the company holds a meeting about what they should do next, and Emile comes up with the idea of exploring the Western wild lands, since some maps he's been stealing this whole time are not sufficient for cartography purposes. As maps might be valuable to the right person, Big Mike agrees and the Spears begin purchasing supplies for their adventure.

Battle Brothers: Good Times

Part of the Fate of Heroes series - spoilers ahead!

Despite the mounting injuries, the Spears take on a contract to eliminate a small orc encampment. On the way Majorn finds a necromatic site he declares they must cleanse, so the Spears take on the usual zombies and necromancer, but this time with two fallen heroes flanking the mage.

They are quite sturdy which is bad given the lesser zombies keep standing up, but Raven manages to axe the shield off one which enables the Spears to pincushion it to death. The other is peppered with arrows until Bes singlehandedly defeats it  - much to Sunbro's amazement.

Useful when you actually have people that can shoot.

At the orc camp the team encounters berserkers leading the regular orcs. These scary creatures don't wear armor though, making them prime archery practice. Fanatic was foolish enough to let one get close and knock him on the head, leaving him with permanent brain damage (ironically one of the best permanent injuries to have in this game).

Apprehending some thieves afterwards, Big Mike is happy to report to the company they now have over 50,000 coins in funding. Gander further cheers everyone up with a cow tipping session (lol) and as icing on the cake, Sunbro reports the nobles are discussing terms. The war is over!

When he asks with true concern if the Fabled Spears of the Church are now going to disband, he is met with laughter and cheer. "Not bloody likely!"

Battle Brothers: Davkul is Coming

Part of the Fate of Heroes series - spoilers ahead!

Finding another necromantic ruin in the swamp, Majorn is pleased when he and the Spears wipe out the zombies and their necromaster while suffering only minor wounds against a force twice their number. While camped, Fanatic converts Kamots to the cult of Davkul which leads to blows against Sahkarov who still had hope for the poor fisherman. Not anymore.

I'll beat the heresy out of you!

By happenstance the company also runs into a blood sacrifice to Davkul on the way back to town. The man, another cultist named Mole, is bleeding and speared to the ground but not yet gone. Gander removes the spears while Fanatic urges him to join the Spears so he does.

To combat the growing number of cultists in the ranks, Big Mike recruits Raven Fatbastard - a merchant business acquaintance of Sid as well as Emile the thief and Bes, a retired soldier. Together they defeat more bandits and wolf packs. On their journeys Faltran notices House Grimmund forces taking Wiesendorf village from House Folsach. Mike reminds all of them to march on and to not get involved.

Luckily they run into a troupe of traveling performers whom Sir Julien convinces to perform for free. This greatly raises in the morale of the troops.