Carrion Crown Chapter 2, Trial of the Beast, Session 2

We continue with Trial of the Beast, the second chapter of the Carrion Crown Adventure Path.

Second Session (10 page pdf) – We testify in court on the Beast’s behalf with what we uncovered in the swamps of Morast, but see no clear opportunity to scream out “You can’t handle the truth!!!” without getting cited for contempt. Then we have to go murder child ghosts for a while.

We also got to meet an old wheelchair-bound author lady, which was lovely.  This session was exciting – the three ladies who lived together just about got murdered by Vladimir on the grounds that “three women living together… It’s certainly a coven of hags!” Good to know we’re getting into the Medieval mindset.

Then we dealt with spooky child ghosts (spectres) in the ruined town.  This was a bit of a bummer.  Even when we successfully negotiated with them, like the main girl Elsa, there was no way to free them from their undead state except “initiate combat and kill ‘em!”. This really bothered Sredni Vashtar’s Girl; she put herself in quite some danger trying to “put down” Elsa humanely (had her lie down, did a positive-energy touch on her) but in the end, it was just combat. Poor form there on the author’s part I think; an alternate way out except for “roll initiative” was merited.

Then we fought “Brother Swarm,” which was confusing because Vladimir was trying to… Well, not sure. He went in there boisterously, relying on his undead-ish nature to protect him while he swiped bodies, and it mostly did, but then he tried to shoo it away, but we tried to kill it… In the end it just hid incorporeal from us, which sucks but hopefully the government will send someone or put up “stay out” signs or something.

Our testimony, bolstered by Elsa’s “the Beast was my friend!” from a Speak with Dead made an impact, but the impact seems to be incurring a lynch mob. Well, we level to 4, so time for some ant-lynch-mob powers!