COS II Session 1

## This Bird Guy Kinda Wacky Though

Session 1 thumbnail, featuring the last surviving Barovian Roc. Sure hope no one

### Campaign

Curse of Strahd 2: Pawns of a Greater Game

## Starring...

* Ezmerelda d'Avenir, adventurer wrangler extraordinaire
* The Barovian Freedom Fighters
	+ Red, not on parole because he illegally left the detention centre
	+ Xadriel Maverran, family man
	+ Tokili, magic item hoarder/expert/bestower
	+ Galia Trey, sworn to purge evil
	+ Stone, Lady of Landscaping
	+ Max von Austrahlung, copyright-infringing monster hunter
	+ Twiggy, who protects nature through excessive force
* The roc from Curse of Strahd, back with a cool new hat

## Reunion

Over the eight years leading up to the campaign, the valley of Barovia flourished, freed from Strahd's overwhelming dread. Towns, infrastructure, and the economy all grew. The land of mist and misery finally knew light, until one day.

Ezmerelda, living in Argynvostholt, saw unnatural fog rolling into the freed land of Barovia. This could only mean one thing: Strahd von Zarovich was back, and the land was a prison once more. She knew that defeating Strahd would be nigh impossible without the experts, the Barovian Freedom Fighters (Side note: she also noticed strange activity by the CLA, who usually alert members to a crisis of this level. This time, however, they've been unusually secretive about the whole ordeal). Thus, she set out to gather them for one last adventure.

### Red

The first Freedom Fighter Ezmerelda contacted was Red. She rolled her cart up to his hideout unannounced and said something to the effect of "Strahd's back and we need your help" (which will henceforth be referred to as the Strahd Spiel). Red accepts the plot hook - he says goodbye to Querk, a wizard who he grew a relationship with over the 8 years, then follows Ezmerelda to the next Freedom Fighter.

(Side note: during the ride over to Xadriel's place and using his insanely high passive perception, Red notices ravens flying over and watching the budding pair during their travels. This is not foreshadowing for anything and should be completely and utterly ignored.)

### Xadriel

With Red in tow, Ezmerelda next visited Xadriel. Mr. Maverran had been living a peaceful life with his family of unknown composition (actually I do know his daughter's named Ireena) and "recovering from the trauma of dying and being hunted". Xadriel reacted to the Strahd Spiel with horror, ultimately agreeing to help.

### Tokili

For more information regarding this section, refer to the Tokili page.

### Galia

With their newly aquired airship, the gang moves on to locate Galia. They find her sitting with 3 other zealots at a camp. After scaring the ever living hell out of them, they give Galia the Strahd Spiel. She has a talk with the 3 other faceless NPCs, ending with her agreeing to come along. The gang then continues on to their next victim.

### Stone

The gang goes to where Tokili thinks Stone is located. Doubt begins to fester as the airship lands next to a clearly abandoned and ruined manor. But they get pranked! Absolutely Japed! Because you see, the abandoned look is simply an illusion. They enter to see a temple full of ~~cultists~~ worshippers with opaque glass masks covering their faces. As the party asks around for Stone, the people there claim they have no idea who that is, but to also ask the party to sit in a waiting room anyway. Already confused, they wait for 15 or so minutes before someone identically dressed to all the others enters and asks the party if they came because of the poster in town. Instantly recognizing the voice as Stone, the party feels continually confused as the person they are looking for tells them that she doesn't exist. Long story short, they give her the Strahd Spiel and she panics, realizing this might be important enough for her to start telling the truth. After some preparations to make sure the Mistshrouded don't fall to ruin while she's gone, the gang boards the airship and continues to their next target.

### Max

The airship next descends into a random location in the wilderness, where Max is finishing off a bodak with the holy light of the sunsword.

### Twiggy

Ezmerelda forgot about Twiggy, but the rest of the gang sure didn't! In the woods outside a small village, \_\_

After picking up Twiggy, the party was in agreement - everyone was there, and it was time to head to Barovia. With (most of) the

## Return to Barovia

- into the mist

- tokili honks the horn

- huh what's that dot

### Roc Rematch

*Before you can react, a huge bird with colourful plumage, a strange metallic dome covering it’s skull, and glowing red eyes dives into view, screeching as it dives for the airship!*

Standard battle, here are some notes though:

-Everytime someone casts a spell, something in the Roc's brain seemed to click and cause it to dive past the caster, attacking it along the way in an attempt to stop the casting.

-Twiggy was sitting in the cargo hold when the battle began. By the time he got to the top of the ship the Roc had perished.

-One of Tokili's helpers landed the final blow as the Roc was diving after him. Unfortunately, this didn't stop the Roc as it flew straight at Tokili, exploding as it collided with him.

### Winding Down

- Tokili picks up the helmet piece

- Short rest

- "What were you up to?"

- Magic items

* Red: a *sword of lifestealing* (made of dragon bone)
* Xadriel: a flute with the properties of a *canaith mandolin*
* Galia: *plate armour of resistance*, tuned to necrotic damage
* Stone: *goggles of night* with the added ability to cast *true seeing* as an action once per long rest
* Max: *+2 half plate armour*
* Twiggy: a *wand of fireballs*
* Alucard: a *+2 shortsword* and a *potion (?)*
	+ It was at this point that everyone realized that Alucard was missing - they never visited him while gathering the party. T'was a communal "oh. oops." moment, but not terribly distressing. Tokili held on to the shortsword.

## Developments

* The Barovian Freedom Fighters have reassembled, for the most part.
* Strahd von Zarovich is alive.
* The party had their first
	+ combat
	+ short rest
	+ debate about rules
* The Barovian Roc is extinct.

## Trivia

* There is one sentence in this session that is the key to Davian Martikov's fate, though it requires "a ridiculous leap in logic" to determine.
	+ As of Session 34, the BFF have learned that Flix Purpleriver killed Davian Martikov and grafted his DNA into every CLA agent in order to grant them wereraven abilities. Pretty simple, in hindsight.

1. ↑ Information acquired by wringing the author of COS II like a dishrag