What speed a battle can develop with. From the dogheads appearing there has been but a few seconds, and the battle seems almost decided. Callum leaping into the attack has killed one of the DOGHEADS in a single blow, and then hacked its head from it body. Rolf, reacting just as quickly, hit a doghead with an arrow and then put a second into the wolf that was attacking. Madelyn wheeled her horse and rode down the side of the par away from the dogheads to get a clear attacking run at the enemy. In the process she had to dodge and weave slightly as Peter and Mandrake, diving from his mule, both went for the side away from the enemy. Smilo leapt from his mount and hit the deck running, he was last seen entering some low lying bushes between the part and the enemy. Elsbeth, with great presence of mind, leapt from her horse and called upon the plants to aid her - catching a doghead and a wolf in the area of entanglement.
There are still 2 dogheads and two wolves attacking the party. Callum leaps to the closest doghead to get involved in hand to hand combat. The other takes a step or two towards the party but then seems to stumble for a step or two as a voice from the bush next to him calls "Yazool dez fa atax ma frez!" - but then continues on towards the party. He occasionally glances back towards the bush. One wolf, slowed by the arrow in it, heads for Elsbeth, the other for Kerim.
Peter moves over to take the reins from Kerim, and glances over to check on Mandrake. Suddenly he screams "They're behind us!"
Rising out of the bushes behind you are more doghead accompanied by wolves. One doghead has a long bow, which he fires at Aenis, hitting with his both shots. Aenis screams in agony. Another Doghead has one hand raised above his head and screams a single word "Atamar". A glob of blackness leaves his hand and flies over the top of the party to strike Callum in the middle of the back, before dissipating into a cloud of black smoke! It leaves a vivid red mark on Callum's skin.
From the rear of the party a wolf each heads towards Peter, Kerim and Aenis
OOC1: Sharon: describe your attack on the doghead using last weeks combat rolls.
OOC2: Here is a map, of sorts. I had real trouble getting spaces to stay as spaces - guess I'll have to take lessons from Jim and Brad. Sorry
..A.B.C.D.E.F.G.H.I.J.K.L.M.N.O.P.Q.R.S.T.U.V a|........bbbbb..............................| b|.......bbb.................................| c|.................................bbbbb.....| d|............bb........-D-..D........bbbbb..| e|..........bbbbb.....D.-wbb..d..bb..bb......| f|.........bsbbb.....w.bb--.w..C.............| g|...........................................| H|...........................................| I|.........................E.................| j|.......M....x.x.x.x.d.K.A.h.....R..........| k|...................p.......................| l|...........................................| m|...................bmb.....................| n|.......bbb..........bbbb.w.................| o|......bbbbb.w..............w....bbbbb......| p|......F...D...................bbbbb........| q|..............................D............|
b Bush; - Entangle area
D Doghead; F Doghead with metal bars;
w Wolf; d dead doghead
h Horse; x Mule; d Donkey
C Callum; R Rolf; E Elsbeth; A
Aenis; K Kerim; P Peter; m Mandrake;
s Smilo; M Madelyn
Callum howls in pain as the black orb strikes his back and then leaps forward over the beast's corpse at the Doghead in front of him, swinging his sword in a huge overhead blow. The Doghead tries to parry but it's attempt has no effect on the massive sword. The thud of the club being knocked aside is followed by a sickening crunch as the blade passes down through the creatures skull and smashes it's ribcage. With a flick of his wrists he rips the sword from the torn body of the doghead and looks around for his next victim.
OOC: Modified 20 to hit, 19 points of damage. Apologies if I've stolen your prerogative by describing the blow (especially if it has more than 19 hps), but I'm having a bad morning, and describing that hit helped a lot. BTW, try hard coding a fixed width font for the map - that should sort out the spacing problems.
OOC1: No, it died. Although its other claw might just get a hit on you as it dies. :)
OOC2: Tried that - I was using Courier, but it kept eating all the extra spaces (leaving just one space)when I posted. I even went into Word and used non break spaces (still in courier) and saved the HTML and posted the HTML source straight in. That would have worked if Word had actually coded all the NBSs properly. :)
I didn't turn the Courier off, and I don't know which font to go back to. Help
OOC: I put the combat calculator at the top of the page. I used it and you can see that my hobbit missed in the log. Smilo moves to Df. Knowing that he'd make a tasty snack for a wolf, Smilo puts some bush between them and him. Hoping the bush is thick enough to conceal him. Spotting the monster with the metal bars [Dp], he spins the leather thong overhead until it hums. The bullet clips the leaves in the bush the gnoll was standing behind, sending a little shower of leaves up in the air, but misses. He scrambles to get another lead shot out of his pouch and into the sling...
Peter sees the doghead with the bars cast the spell, and his eyes widen. He quickly holds up a sprig of holly and chants "Pilan bo fremer bata, may aster, may gordaq". The bush next to the spell casting doghead starts to grow rapidly and entangle him. He then hurries over to take the reins from Kerim and draws his dagger.
OOC: Hey John, when it comes to ASCII art, I find using Microsoft Notepad with the
andindicators works quite well.
At Peters shout, Rolf takes in the scene with a quick glance. "Kerim!" Rolf calls, "Ware the flank. Madelyn, ward Callum." Spinning, towards the charging wolves, he puts himself in the path of the wolf charging Aenis.
OOC: Are things close enough for me to worry about "to hit" rolls?
The wolves continue to close on the party ...
OOC1 Jim, thanks for sorting the fonts and the combat
calculator.
OOC2 Brad - Please engage in combat
OOC: Okay, I caught my stupid, novice mistake. I tried to show the "preformated" codes in my earlier note and what did I end up with, the word "and" in a preformated format. :)
OOC2: I'm not sure which wolf is charging Aenis, but I'm guessing it's the one at nM/N, which means Rolf should be about mN. If I've got the wrong wolf, just adjust Rolfs position accordingly. Also, I'm assuming these are normal wolves, AC 7.
Rolf leaps to intercept the wolf charging at Aenis. Holding his heavy sword in both hands and slashing downward, his slash flies wide (rolled a 9 to hit). Recovering from the hasty blow, he prepares for another assault.
Elsbeth allows a smile at the quick response to her plea to the plants, then as quickly ceases her smile as the wounded wolf charges forward. Her back against her horse, she hesitates for but a moment before drawing her scimitar. She quickly takes the stance she was taught and awaits the attack.
The creature is at her all to soon and she swings (18 to hit, AC 2). A tremor runs up her arm as her steel bites into the wolf's flank, but her strike only wounds the beast (2HP damage).
"Goddess help me," she whispers as she faces the animal's snarling visage.
After Peter Takes the reins, Kerim draws his Cutlass, pulls out his punch dagger, and leaps into combat with the two wolves charging towards them.
Shouting a battle cry in Midani, he attempts to hit the nearest wolf .
He gives a great shout as the cutlass bites into the wolves fur (sadly only for 2 damage) and flails wildly with the dagger (missing).
Mandrake stays as still as possible in the bushes, risking only a look behind to see what is coming.
He stays still, waiting as the wolves rush past, waiting for the Dogheads to close with those by the pack animals. He then attempts to come up behind and attack any Doghead that come past close to the bushes.
OOC: assuming one does pass close by, Mandrake misses (unless they are real bad!) with an unmodified roll of 5.
Madelyn will set her lance to charge and push Keldon on with her heels to attack the far left dog headed figure (eK)
OOC: Rolled a 19 to hit armour class –5 (strength bonus of 3, charge bonus 2). If that hits :o) do 18 points of damage (double damage with lance)