Eye of the Triger (Nordlond Campaign Recap)

Setting the scene:

We started off On A Boat (knar, technically, a big ol fat cargo vessel with no on-deck buildings or fortifications) sailing down an extremely big river (half mile wide) to Aienferill. We were hired on by the knar captain (Einarsson) to protect it from being raided, there having been problems with raiding on this particular route.

Chuff was trying to fish off the deep-water side, and failed, because at least one of her heads kept trying to catch dragonflies and another liked the sparklies of the sun on the water. Natalie the boarfolk hung around with Chuff in hopes of getting a share of fish, should any be caught. Daingean the elfard is hanging out on the prow of the knarr, refusing to say he’s king of the world. Georg the ravenfolk is is playing card games with crew, and confusing everyone with an ever-changing series of “rituals” he apparently has to do before taking a seat, dealing new cards, eating, etc. Rollo the Himneskur (god-blooded) is sulking as far away from the crew as he can get because they won’t stop asking for his signature.

The captain sighted a longboat sailing upriver towards us at full sail, packed with heavily armed warriors (almost 20), and called us all together to do our dang jobs. The approaching raiders either didn’t have missile weapons or were total crap with them, I’m not sure which, but we weren’t threatened at range. We, on the other hand, are lethal at many ranges. Chuff was particularly proud of nailing one with a sling bullet before they threw out the grappling hooks and pulled up along our knar as a prelude to boarding.

As mentioned, we’re deadly at many ranges, but particularly at close range and I don’t think the raiders were expecting a “defensive” group about a quarter their size to start the fight by boarding them. There wasn’t really any room on their longboat to board them, to be fair, but we sorted that out by murdering raiders until we cleared out space, via melee and spell. Georg snuck up invisible and stabbed a raider right in the eye.

The bandits also helped us clear themselves a bit by slipping and sliding on Daingean’s grease spell, tripping over their own spears, and generally doing a Laurel and Hardy bit, but with pointy things. Chuff shatters one bandits knee, and while she tries to avenge herself on Chuff from the deck, she only manages to throw her axe away in the process. George later claimed the axe was clearly a cursed sword. She follows this up by dropping her buckler too.

Axe Bandit cries out in frustration and curses the gods
Daingeann: Oh, I would NOT have cursed the gods. Sometimes they listen.
GM: clearly weren’t listening to broken leg self disarming bandit up till now
Chuff: Oh, they might have been listening. And laughing.
Daingeann: “Make him whiff again!” “Father, haven’t you tired of this?” “Never, Loki. Never. Make him whiff again.”

Finally Chuff spots a raider who managed to set one foot on the knar and completely loses her composure. Screaming a nightmare chorus of “MY ship! Mine mine mine!” (pees on the ship, like any cat would) “MINE!” she brings her Morningstar crashing down onto the offenders skull, for a critical hit doing 40 (!) cr and splattering his head.

After this the fight winds down rapidly, although Chuff does take a solid hit from an axe in the mess, and Georg finishes everything off by grabbing a bandit from behind and slitting his throat quite dramatically.

After the dust settles there’s almost immediately a bit of conflict over who owns the longship of the unfortunate raiders.

Rollo: Their ship is mine!
Chuff: “Just the little one! The big one is MINE! I peed on it!”
Chuff has exactly zero interest in actual ownership.
Georg Svangeirsson: “Chuff, you can’t have the big one, it was already peed on by the captain here.”
Georg Svangeirsson: “The little one’s ours, though.”

Captain Einarsson, on the other hand, clearly feels he has a financial stake in it as well, like any good merchant. He points out that the raiding longboat is a piece of crap Pinto of a longboat, which might be why they were taking such risks to get another vessel. And we aren’t exactly sailors. Negotiations follow hotly, as Rollo and Georg go back and forth with Einarsson over towing the longboat to Aienferril (and lending us enough crew to keep it afloat while we do so), and settle on paying Einarsson 1/6^th of whatever we sell the thing for, but he gives up any claim to the raiders equipment. Einarsson also will be helping us get the best deal possible, as of course he has a vested interest now.