The Original Heroes

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The following early scenarios were played by my group of players and the various PCs they built over the years. Although their various characters changed over that time, the group always played under the party name of Isil Ia Dom, which is elf for "Party of the Holy Stone". This name came about at the very beginning of the campaign, when the party learned of an ancient relic that was referred to as The Holy Stone. Like all artifacts and relics, it had a mystery that appealed to their adventurous spirits and its acquisition quickly became the aim of their first quest, and the party name took its place. Little did they realize at the time that this would embroil them within a plot that would take them to both the past and the future, to foreign lands and even beyond their own plane of existence. And least of all did they realize that their actions would bring about an entire change to the way magik was used and even bring about a new era upon Althéa!

 

The Past Overview

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While the initial adventures focused upon trying to locate a relic called The Holy Stone, the heroes eventually found themselves drawn into a deeper plot that involved four wizards, time travel and more ancient treasures: The Time Key, a Life Orb and Life Crystals. As they continued to follow leads, they eventually tracked Terrell The Red (one of the wizards) to another plane of existence and confront him there about his involvement in the events they had uncovered along their travels and how he might be able to help them. After gaining information from Terrell, the heroes return from the planar realm now knowing what must be done ... and also knowing that Althéa will have been drastically changed due to the events in which they have been involved with while upon the spiritual realm.

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BARD COMMENT: The new series of modules with NWN2 start from this point. When entering The Scroll for the first time, a player must choose whether they are starting with the knowledge of past events (including what happened with Terrell The Red from the Soul Shaker module) or start as if unaware of past events altogether: As if an adventurer about to start their adventuring life. No matter the choice, the player will soon pick up on what it is they are expected to do, but their PC's background knowledge obviously differs in game play. For those players who like to assume they have played every adventure prior to this series (and choose this option for their PC), then they can read the background to events and NPCs in more detail below to help them understand what it is that their main PC already knows and how they might react in certain encounters and situations. NB: This extra information is not required to play, but does add flavour.

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The adventures that took place in the era previous to when The Scroll begins can be divided roughly into five chapters. These chapters start from when the party first formed and end at the point when they return from Dagad-Nor, when the new era begins upon Althéa.

 

Chapter One - Humble Beginnings

 

The peaceful world of the Borantan Plains has been turned into a state of political unease - but it has not always been so. The heroes were first introduced to potential political upheaval when they were asked to escort some Monks of Adoneki to the Town of Mixed Races (properly named Milk-Zarek). The monk's plan was simply to give the town a statue of their holy symbol (the sign of Infinity) as a gift of peace, that represented their infinite God: Adoneki. At this time, someone by the name of Morcoss, who was later revealed to be a servant of the evil god, Dragnol, tried to prevent these peaceful monks from achieving their undertaking through using the party to bring suspicion upon the monk's mission. Fortunately, the heroes saw through the evil cleric's plans and Morcoss was brought to trial and found guilty of slander. Unfortunately, Morcoss escaped his cell shortly after he was incarcerated.

 

Soon after, in the nearby Holy Mountains (in which the town of Milk-Zarek rests), the party witnessed suspicious activities by clerics of the evil god, Talan. It turned out that the evil "Brotherhood" were seeking the very same Holy Stone as the heroes. The common interest of the party and the evil Talanthians was sure to come to conflict sooner or later, but for now, it would not be the case. Instead, the party decided to withdraw their search from the mountains for the time being, knowing they were no match for the larger number of clerics at this time. And as their information regarding the location of The Holy Stone was shady at best, they decided the search could wait until they were more certain of its actual whereabouts.

 

Traveling west, towards the capitol city of Boran, the heroes stumbled upon an abandoned village (which they later discovered was once called Edgeton). Within the village was an interesting building that stood out among the others by the nature of a magically locked door that barred their entry. After eventually gaining entrance to the building, the heroes learned it was once the residence of a wizard named Terrell The Red. Furthermore, the heroes learned that the wizard was one of four wizards that held secrets of magik from a time before the Debacle and of a powerful magik device referred to as the Time Key. The others being called Dearm (The White), Kurzell (The Blue) and Durak (The Green).

 

The adventure at Edgeton introduced the mystery of the Life Crystals, the Life Orb and the "plans" of the four wizards. The party succeeded in recovering four Life Crystals from the abandoned building, but were unable to do anything with them due to a strange life draining effect they had. Frustrated, the party hid the crystals in the vicinity of Terrell's house in the abandoned village and decided to move on. They did not find a Life Orb at this time.

 

BARD COMMENT: The above information is the combined synopses of four PnP adventures that took place over about two years playing time. These adventures served as an introduction to some of the main factions, locations, objects and NPCs with which the heroes would be involved with in later adventures. Synopses of the later adventures will show how the heroes manage to learn more about the four wizards and their plans, and how this eventually becomes a focus equal to their search of The Holy Stone.

 

Chapter Two - The Northern Kingdoms

 

While in the capitol city of Boran, the heroes are recruited by someone called Salos to help resolve issues in the Northern Kingdoms. Trade had stopped and news of distrust among the northern tribal nations is rumoured. It is decided that diplomatic assistance from Boran is required and the party are selected to travel north to determine the nature of the problem.

 

The Northern Kingdoms begin north of the Death Hills and continue a further 250 miles north and span 500 miles across. Running through the centre of this region, from southwest to northeast are the Tallethian Mountains, named after one of the tribal nations who live close to them, the Tallethians. To the west of the mountains are the Valron Plains, home to the tribal nation, called Valron. These two tribal nations have spread across the entire region: The Valroni preferring the wide open western landscape and the Tallethians preferring the coastline and water that run around the north and east side of the land. It was to these two tribal nations that the heroes had been sent to, to resolve any issues.

 

Over the course of many months, it came to light that a demonic force by the name of Brendagoth had been causing the two tribes, along with a third (previously unknown) group of people, called the Arkodians, to come into conflict against one another, where once there had been only peace. It was eventually learned that the demon had been summoned by the evil Brotherhood Of Talan as part of an agreement with a wizard called Talara. The wizard Talara, had agreed to acquire the Holy Stone for the Brotherhood, if they would acquire the Arkodian Runes from the Arkodian Tribe within the Tallethian Mountains. (It seemed that the Holy Stone and the evil clerics influence had reached this far north as well.) The Brotherhood summoned the demon for this task, but the wizard, Talara, failed in his side of the bargain, meaning the demon's own purpose was never brought to task. The bargain with the wizard now forfeit, the Brotherhood simply abandoned the demon, still bound to a purpose that would now likely never come to pass. Unable to escape the Arkodian people for whose purpose it had been indirectly summoned, instead, the demon caused its own malice and evil work, and manipulated the peoples that would eventually break the peace across the whole of the Northern Kingdoms, and in turn, draw the attention of the party.

 

BARD COMMENT: This was a large section of the campaign and consisted of much travel and a number of dungeons. It took a number of months  playing PnP (about six) that would probably take, at most, a third of the time on a computer. The party spent weeks travelling between the various tribes of the two nations and learned a lot of cultural background, and eventually became close allies to them. The heroes also learned about Arkodian Runes, which was another system of magik for the last era. The adventure also highlighted the importance of the Holy Stone once more and at what lengths people would go to retrieve it. As the heroes travelled north through the Borantan Plains, they witnessed an explosion on the plains that they later learned was to do with Terrell the Red and the trapped orb designed for the lich: the prime evil character in the adventure, Soul Shaker.

 

Chapter Three - Troubles South

 

After a while, all the leads to either The Holy Stone or knowledge of Terrell The Red were lost and life veered towards simple mercenary adventuring. Pleased with their work in The Northern Kingdoms, Salos arranged for the party to help in another matter: Hobgoblin problems to the south. As the heroes made their way towards the South Tear lake, the area where the troubles had been reported, they came across a settlement of gnolls located at the abandoned village of Frindon. It was soon discovered that the gnolls had been attempting to build a tunnel to the isle in the centre of South Tear. The heroes managed to thwart their plans, but a question remained: What was it about the South Tear lake that was attracting so much attention from the evil hordes?

 

Continuing their quest, the heroes eventually tracked hobgoblin activity coming from an old abandoned tower in the marsh south of the South Tear lake. Morcoss also showed up again here, but apparently as an underling to another priest called Cherun Dale, who turned out to be an even more powerful servant of the evil god, Dragnol. While investigating the lowest depths of the tower (deep underground), the heroes encountered an evil creature known as an aboleth, which was quick to reveal something of the nature of what was going on to help save its own skin. It mentioned the name "Durak" and a connection with Terrell was found once more. Strangely worded prophesies and a diary written by the dark priest found nearby, also suggested Cherun had major plans that required the corroboration of Durak.

 

There were indications that the South Tear held some dark secret that was attracting evil beings to its shores. To investigate the mystery, the party hired the services of an elf, Hazel Silversurf, to help them reach an island that lay in the centre of the massive lake (locally called Drak's Isle). The party never made it to the main isle though, but did manage to beach on a nearby smaller isle that was later revealed to be Kurzell's Isle - named after another member of the group of four wizards from the time prior to the Debacle and friend of Terrell. Somehow, Kurzell had managed to create something called an Alignment Lens: A huge magical barrier that acted like a magnet with positive and negative attractions against creatures of different alignments. It was designed to keep Durak entrapped on the island which was in the centre of South Tear, but, at the same time served to keep those of good alignment away from the dangerous place. Unfortunately, the Alignment Lens was not built to last forever and, according to a diary left behind by Kurzell, was due to fail any time soon. The only advice offered from the dead man's diary was to seek Terrell!

 

The heroes defeated the hobgoblin forces at the tower, and, once again, drove Morcoss away. After collecting their reward from Salos, the heroes decided the search for Terrell should take priority. It was not easy, but eventually the heroes tracked down the latest home for Terrell Breckon. (Breckon turned out to be Terrell's real surname.) Unfortunately, the heroes arrived too late: According to a diary found at Terrell's house, a "great evil" had come up from the Underdark to steal a Life Orb that was in Terrell's possession. After fooling the "evil" being with a fake trapped Life Orb once, the diary mentioned that the creature would most likely return to the house to try again: "I fear now that the evil was not destroyed and will come for me again when it is recovered or considered a different strategy. I am too tired to run. I will destroy my tomes so that it cannot get them. As for the Orb, I will never reveal its secret location." 

 

Searching for Terrell and further clues at his home, the party eventually discovered the wizard's dungeon beneath his house. They failed to find Terrell, but did locate the secreted Life Orb! At the absence of Terrell, the heroes deduced that the wizard had probably been taken prisoner by this "great evil" and was most likely being tortured to reveal the Life Orb's whereabouts, which the heroes would now take back to the authorities in Boran for safe-keeping. During their search, the heroes also found a poem and some ancient encoded texts of the Talanthian clerics that spoke more of The Holy Stone. It was obvious that Terrell knew the importance behind this ancient relic, but had determined his fate too tied with the fate of Durak to be able to do anything more about it.

 

BARD COMMENT: There were a couple of side-quests between the main story adventures mentioned above. They both came just before the heroes did their research to discover the whereabouts of Terrell. Before being released from service, Salos requests that the heroes head to Southstrong to resolve a problem with undead. The city is known for its lack of trust of clerics, and diplomacy is required to resolve the problem. (Bloodstone College.) The second adventure took place at the heart of Southstrong and required the heroes to resolve a murder. They soon revealed there was more to the murder mystery than first thought. (Wererats Don't Go.) The trapped Life Orb mentioned above was the one that caused the explosion on the plains that the heroes witnessed for themselves a few months earlier.

 

Chapter Four - The Underdark

 

The heroes had heard rumours of a "great evil" that fitted Terrell's description once before. Some research they had carried out a while before had spoken of such an evil, associated with an ancient elf tower called Torén Norus, whose ruins protruded from the waters of the North Tear lake, about fifty miles northwest from the house of Terrell. The same research had also mentioned that entry to the tower was impossible from the water, and there were rumours that whatever dwelt there could cause any who saw it to lose their mind. Now, however, it looked as though a way to the tower may have been made open via the Underdark, as a tunnel leading down to its dark depths had recently opened up in the house of Terrell Breckon.

 

The heroes spent over a year making their way through the Underdark, trying to find a way through to Torén Norus, the tower where they believed Terrell was being held prisoner. The task had turned out much more difficult than they first thought it would ever be, as the way through which the "Dark Evil" had come had now been sealed off by the dwarf clans that dwelt in this region of the Underdark. The dwarves had witnessed the evil pass through their realms and after seeing it return, they went to great lengths to ensure the path it had come from was permanently sealed off. To this end, they used ancient Tuner magik: A powerful magik known by only a few dwarves that was capable of hiding parts of a "Kithrain" key in distant locations. Only a complete key could unlock the powerful magikal seal, known as a Death Gate, which would otherwise remain an impenetrable barrier both physically and magikally.

 

After great lengths and proving themselves to the dwarves, the heroes eventually retrieved all the Tuners, located the five parts of the Kithrain key and opened the Death gate. After only a short while longer they reached the tower of Torén-Norus. Here they learned the truth behind the "great evil": It was a lich!

 

BARD COMMENT: This series of adventures lasted many years real time (1998 - 2005) and was the time when I switched from PnP to NWN. Shortly after I switched to NWN, I started to keep weekly synopses for my players, and for those who would like to read the story in more detail, then you can download them from the table below. 

 

 

Chapter Five - The Realm Of Dagad-Nor (Soul Shaker)

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BARD COMMENT: The first chapter of the campaign made available to the public using the NWN gaming engine. No further information is given here, but the player gaming logs are available below.

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