Nate would explain to everyone in the morning about his Pass without trace. "I just don't see how we are all going to get down that trap door. I can wildshape twice a day... so that'd give me 4 hours, I'd just have to make sure I get into a spot where no one would see me change and then change back. Might take a minute or so. I could explore what's beneath the trap door... but I'd be alone down there."
When Nate told Soar about the trap door, she sits and thinks for a solid minute. "So... if the room's locked from the ground level, then either something is hiding and hissing and scraping under the strong room, or there's another way to get in and out of the strong room. Like another route, from either within the roadhouse, or from outside. If it's a basement room with no exit, then I'm not sure what that gains them. Someone can hide under there and go through the valuables and take what they want and keep it in the room to maybe extract later. More likely there's another way out."
She starts pacing around the room, tapping her chin with her finger. Puzzling through this stuff isn't her strong suit.
"It was an obvious trap door, right? If I were Bog Luck, there's no way I wouldn't know. It's a secret, Mr. Luck's got a side deal going on. I see three options. One, we corner Bog and force him to spill his guts about this. Make it seem like we're blackmailing him, even, though eventually I'd want to tell these poor merchants who might be getting robbed blind. Two, Nate goes in again, now that we know he can get in the room, shifts back to human form, goes in the door, takes the flute, and I can track the flute and we can meet up. Three, we look around outside for the other end of a tunnel outside the roadhouse."
Looking back at Nub, Nate, and Jalt, Soar looks pensive. "But what's going on here? We're tracking the cultists. They came to the roadhouse. They stored all their stuff in the room. So two things are possible. They don't know about the trap door and they could be getting robbed by Bog Luck, which, well, we don't care about. Or two, they know about the trap door, and they're using it to hide more deeply the booty in the crates, or if there's an exit point, move it somewhere. Nate, you said they're not going to Neverwinter. We think they're going to a castle. What if Naerytar is near here? Can you build a castle in a swamp? Maybe this is a way to get their stuff to the castle."
(On the trapdoor, I would say that it was clearly visible to Nate because of his high perception roll, but it was somewhat camouflaged or hidden so as not to stand out, particularly as most of it was covered by a crate. Someone who came into the room might not notice it, if they weren't searching carefully as Nate did.)
(Hmm, so sort of two things there -- Bog Luck's less likely to be in on it if the door's not obvious, but also, he's more likely to be in on it if there's a crate on top of the trap door heavy enough to make it hard for someone to come in from below. As in, Bog Luck or someone with a key would have to move the crate, possibly hissing and scraping, for them to get it open.)
"Hmmm... all good points as usual Soar." Nate smiles at her. Soar may not be keen on this stuff, but it sure doesn't show. "I think Bog F uck is in on this. I thought this from the start. But if we jump him, it could go bad quick. And can we even trust him after we have a chat with him. Bog F uck."
Nate looks to Soar and Nub "If you guys think there's another way out of whatever is beneath the trap door, I'll give it another shot. I will get into the store room, then back to human form, grab the flute and head down the trap door and then see what I see. YTou guys tracking me all the while. I'll be able to wildshape again once more when I am down there for another 2 hours. If I'm not getting anywhere or it seems there isn't a linking point, I'm getting out of there."
Nub says, "I came to the same conclusion as Soar, that the trapdoor likely leads to another entrance and exit to the storeroom. That said, I do think that it is too great a risk for one person to go alone, unless you are confident that you could avoid being seen."
"Nate, would you say that you saw as many crates inside that room that the cultists carried in their wagons from Waterdeep? If there's another exit, they might have taken some away. Let's take a look outside for exits this morning. Actually. Let's try to find Jamna. She might know more. Or less. We could trade information."
(Actually got the timeline messed up - Soar would have cast locate object on the headband and the broken crate the night before this. It’s been two nights since the convoy arrived? Or just one?)
You arrived on Day One, in the late afternoon. All the merchants offloaded their crates into the warehouse, Nub helped out in the kitchen in the evening, Soar cast locate object shortly after sunset.
On Day Two, Nub and others went looking for food, and Nate transformed into a spider to enter the strong room, discovering the trapdoor.
It's now the evening of Day Two, and in my next post, I'll move us forward to the morning of Day Three.
If Soar is casting Locate Object again, please let me know when.
You continue your discussions, but don't come to a conclusion in the evening, so you postpone and head to bed. You all wake in the morning, having completed a long rest. It's now the morning of Day Three in the Roadhouse.
Before or after breakfast, feel free to continue discussions and let me know when a plan is ready to go. :)
[DM question: did the noises happen at approximately the same time each of the two previous nights? I assume so based on the description, but I thought I'd check.]
(They seemed to. It's a little hard to tell for sure - they seemed to start after midnight, when the kitchen cleared out and Pete was settling down to sleep. But then, the place was full of people and noisie before, so it's possible the sounds started earlier and you just couldn't hear them.)
Nate, again, is quite happy with the days plans which would include seeking out Jamna and also checking around the roadhouse for a potential alternate entrance.
I'd say if neither of those turn up anything, that we go for the second attempt as Arachnate tonight.
"Soar, I think I creeped out Jamna back on the caravan, so I won't accompany you when you go to see her. Plus, I think she's a *****."Yep Nate said that.
"I can sneak around the roadhouse today though and see if I can find an alternate entrance. Nub, wanna come with me?"
Right before Nate and Nub (if he comes) leave, Nate's going to cast Pass without trace just in case they have to sneak around when they are snooping around the roadhouse. I'm thinking the guards, especially if any of them are in on it, will be very suspicious if they see a hooded dude and a tortle snooping around the roadhouse, so we might need this enhancement.
Okay, Nate (and also Nub if you are joining) spends the better half of the day searching around the Roadhouse, both inside and around the external walls, looking for secret passages or other entrances that might lead to the trapdoor in the strong room.
Nate, you and Nub make your way around the Roadhouse, spending much of the day snooping around, not talking to anyone, just watching, listening and searching. The key points you learn over the course of your time are:
You get a sense of the whole of the Roadhouse, including where the labourers, merchants and cultists are staying. (In the map below, the Cultists' rooms are marked, and almost every other room has merchants in, with many of the labourers staying in tents in the camp outside the gates.
You visit the stables, and see the four stablehands who work there, though you don't interact with them. The stables are relatively busy, with a number of horses and oxen belonging to the merchants, awaiting the convoy headed north.
There are no signs of any hidden entrance to any tunnel. You search the walls and grounds around the Roadhouse too, and are confident that wherever the trapdoor leads, it is not nearby.
There are fewer cultists than you'd expect. As you observe them coming and going, you estimate that perhaps a fifth of them are missing. The leaders all seem to be around still, though.
At one point in the day, you have the opportunity to enter one of the cultists' rooms - not the one where the leaders are staying, but another that is currently empty you think. You will need to make a fresh Stealth check if you wish to enter, and a fresh casting of Pass Without Trace if you need it.
Nate would explain to everyone in the morning about his Pass without trace. "I just don't see how we are all going to get down that trap door. I can wildshape twice a day... so that'd give me 4 hours, I'd just have to make sure I get into a spot where no one would see me change and then change back. Might take a minute or so. I could explore what's beneath the trap door... but I'd be alone down there."
When Nate told Soar about the trap door, she sits and thinks for a solid minute. "So... if the room's locked from the ground level, then either something is hiding and hissing and scraping under the strong room, or there's another way to get in and out of the strong room. Like another route, from either within the roadhouse, or from outside. If it's a basement room with no exit, then I'm not sure what that gains them. Someone can hide under there and go through the valuables and take what they want and keep it in the room to maybe extract later. More likely there's another way out."
She starts pacing around the room, tapping her chin with her finger. Puzzling through this stuff isn't her strong suit.
"It was an obvious trap door, right? If I were Bog Luck, there's no way I wouldn't know. It's a secret, Mr. Luck's got a side deal going on. I see three options. One, we corner Bog and force him to spill his guts about this. Make it seem like we're blackmailing him, even, though eventually I'd want to tell these poor merchants who might be getting robbed blind. Two, Nate goes in again, now that we know he can get in the room, shifts back to human form, goes in the door, takes the flute, and I can track the flute and we can meet up. Three, we look around outside for the other end of a tunnel outside the roadhouse."
Looking back at Nub, Nate, and Jalt, Soar looks pensive. "But what's going on here? We're tracking the cultists. They came to the roadhouse. They stored all their stuff in the room. So two things are possible. They don't know about the trap door and they could be getting robbed by Bog Luck, which, well, we don't care about. Or two, they know about the trap door, and they're using it to hide more deeply the booty in the crates, or if there's an exit point, move it somewhere. Nate, you said they're not going to Neverwinter. We think they're going to a castle. What if Naerytar is near here? Can you build a castle in a swamp? Maybe this is a way to get their stuff to the castle."
(On the trapdoor, I would say that it was clearly visible to Nate because of his high perception roll, but it was somewhat camouflaged or hidden so as not to stand out, particularly as most of it was covered by a crate. Someone who came into the room might not notice it, if they weren't searching carefully as Nate did.)
(Hmm, so sort of two things there -- Bog Luck's less likely to be in on it if the door's not obvious, but also, he's more likely to be in on it if there's a crate on top of the trap door heavy enough to make it hard for someone to come in from below. As in, Bog Luck or someone with a key would have to move the crate, possibly hissing and scraping, for them to get it open.)
"Hmmm... all good points as usual Soar." Nate smiles at her. Soar may not be keen on this stuff, but it sure doesn't show. "I think Bog F uck is in on this. I thought this from the start. But if we jump him, it could go bad quick. And can we even trust him after we have a chat with him. Bog F uck."
Nate looks to Soar and Nub "If you guys think there's another way out of whatever is beneath the trap door, I'll give it another shot. I will get into the store room, then back to human form, grab the flute and head down the trap door and then see what I see. YTou guys tracking me all the while. I'll be able to wildshape again once more when I am down there for another 2 hours. If I'm not getting anywhere or it seems there isn't a linking point, I'm getting out of there."
Nub says, "I came to the same conclusion as Soar, that the trapdoor likely leads to another entrance and exit to the storeroom. That said, I do think that it is too great a risk for one person to go alone, unless you are confident that you could avoid being seen."
"Nate, would you say that you saw as many crates inside that room that the cultists carried in their wagons from Waterdeep? If there's another exit, they might have taken some away. Let's take a look outside for exits this morning. Actually. Let's try to find Jamna. She might know more. Or less. We could trade information."
(Actually got the timeline messed up - Soar would have cast locate object on the headband and the broken crate the night before this. It’s been two nights since the convoy arrived? Or just one?)
I can help clarify the timeline:
You arrived on Day One, in the late afternoon. All the merchants offloaded their crates into the warehouse, Nub helped out in the kitchen in the evening, Soar cast locate object shortly after sunset.
On Day Two, Nub and others went looking for food, and Nate transformed into a spider to enter the strong room, discovering the trapdoor.
It's now the evening of Day Two, and in my next post, I'll move us forward to the morning of Day Three.
If Soar is casting Locate Object again, please let me know when.
You continue your discussions, but don't come to a conclusion in the evening, so you postpone and head to bed. You all wake in the morning, having completed a long rest. It's now the morning of Day Three in the Roadhouse.
Before or after breakfast, feel free to continue discussions and let me know when a plan is ready to go. :)
[DM question: did the noises happen at approximately the same time each of the two previous nights? I assume so based on the description, but I thought I'd check.]
(They seemed to. It's a little hard to tell for sure - they seemed to start after midnight, when the kitchen cleared out and Pete was settling down to sleep. But then, the place was full of people and noisie before, so it's possible the sounds started earlier and you just couldn't hear them.)
Nate, again, is quite happy with the days plans which would include seeking out Jamna and also checking around the roadhouse for a potential alternate entrance.
I'd say if neither of those turn up anything, that we go for the second attempt as Arachnate tonight.
"Soar, I think I creeped out Jamna back on the caravan, so I won't accompany you when you go to see her. Plus, I think she's a *****." Yep Nate said that.
"I can sneak around the roadhouse today though and see if I can find an alternate entrance. Nub, wanna come with me?"
Right before Nate and Nub (if he comes) leave, Nate's going to cast Pass without trace just in case they have to sneak around when they are snooping around the roadhouse. I'm thinking the guards, especially if any of them are in on it, will be very suspicious if they see a hooded dude and a tortle snooping around the roadhouse, so we might need this enhancement.
Okay, Nate (and also Nub if you are joining) spends the better half of the day searching around the Roadhouse, both inside and around the external walls, looking for secret passages or other entrances that might lead to the trapdoor in the strong room.
Roll a Stealth check (with +10 from Pass Without Trace) to avoid alarming the guards too much.
And roll an Investigation check, with advantage if Nub is joining you.
Nub is joining. Stealth: 15
[If relevant, Nub also has a passive investigation of 16 and passive perception of 15, so he is quite good at finding things].
Stealth: 23
Investigation: 23
Sorry, I forgot the advantage for the Investigation, but it's not needed :)
I also didn't add Nate's normal +2 to the stealth roll, so it'd be 25.
Guards' Perception: 4
Nate, you and Nub make your way around the Roadhouse, spending much of the day snooping around, not talking to anyone, just watching, listening and searching. The key points you learn over the course of your time are:
At one point in the day, you have the opportunity to enter one of the cultists' rooms - not the one where the leaders are staying, but another that is currently empty you think. You will need to make a fresh Stealth check if you wish to enter, and a fresh casting of Pass Without Trace if you need it.
Are Jalt or Soar going to find Jamna? Or do something else?
[Firstly, great rolls Nate, secondly Eep, another stealth roll.]
Wash will follow Nate's lead, assuming we are going in and Pass Without Trace is cast Stealth: 17 (-10 if not cast)
I need to get some new dice!