Stann's First Session

I was excited to play Stann in my campaign last night and it went better than I'd hoped.

Stann Meets The Party

So Stann shows up in the central city of the campaign just in time for his brother Dann's funeral. See, Dann was born a tiefling to an orc family, and they couldn't handle that. After 13 years, they sold him to a passing merchant. Stann is 10 years older, saw this happen and left - angry at his parents for their actions. Just more proof they couldn't accept anyone who wasn't a perfect traditional orc. See, Stann was born weak (his CON is 7). They scraped together enough coin and favors to acquire an Amulet Of Health for him to "fix" it. And now they sold his little brother. But for years he had no idea what had happened to Dann. Stann left his family and joined some monks and druidsto find some inner peace and learn more than just harming others but healing and helping as well. (He's Fighter (1) and Warrior Of Mercy Monk (13) now, with the Guide background that gives him a couple Druid things)

16 years later, he starts hearing stories of a tiefling matching Dann's description, and the name matched too. Powerful. Some sort of sorcerer? He decided to set out and track him down. He reaches the city the rumors are centered on to find it preparing for a large event. A funeral? For a hero?

Asking around, he learns the descriptions of the group that Dann was seen with. He shows up at the funeral and it's then he learns that his brother is dead, died a hero of the city. The whole place turned out for the funeral, citizens and leaders of all types. One of people that by description was a friend of Dann gave a speech (the wizard, Twig), as did the city's military leader.

At that point, Stann feels the point of a dagger in his back wielded by the party rogue (Aria, in disguise) and he is led to a private space to meet the party. They are suspicious. After everything going on they have questions as to why a strange orc showed up asking about them. Given that a member of the council of mages was actually a powerful adult red dragon of the dragon armies they have been fighting, the suspicion was warranted.

Stann tells them he is Dann's brother. The mage of the party looks at Stann (an orc) and says he understands brotherhood doesn't necessarily mean blood. But no, Stann clarifies that they are blood brothers. That Dann was born a tiefling to an orc family. That he wasn't accepted. Was sold to a merchant. The whole deal.

Stann's sincerity convinces them he is truthful (one of the way's I want to RP Stann is that he has a vow of truthfulness, that lies only hurt others and the liar). Turns out, Aria was ALSO sold by her parents. [this was completely unplanned by me to sync up - I wrote that part of Dann's backstory before I ever joined the group]. The merchant who bought Dann matches the description of the person who bough the rogue. Aria asks if Stann would like revenge on him, and he agrees he would very much like that. Aria has a list of people she wants revenge on that also includes her parents, and asks how Stann feels about his parents.

Stann solemnly replies no, his feelings are more pity for them - that they were so narrow minded that they couldn't accept any differences in their children and would resort to that. So no revenge on them. Unless he learns something to alter that.

So Stann agrees to join the party, to hunt the red dragon Ember who killed his brother. Alas, they do not know the location of his lair but there are other allies of his that are causing trouble with friends of the party. Stann will join them.

They prep for going north to where a blue dragon army has been spotted, where they decimated a settlement they had helped before. Twig makes potions of lightning resistance and Stann gets a Ring Of Free Action the party had.

Encountering The Blue Dragon Army

They go to the settlement that was decimated and follow the tracks of the army to where they are - a destroyed ancient city the party had been at before. We end up at a place where some of the army is doing a large excavation. There's a blue dragon army lieutenant on a young blue dragon, a number of officers on smaller dragonelle mounts, and a bunch of solders. It's on.

I won't give a blow by blow of the encounter, but man does Stann fit in well mechanically. Aria, the rogue, flies up on her mount and hurt's Lieutenant's young dragon a lot, then the paladin (Vobo) knocks it out of the sky so it and the Lieutenant hit the ground where Stann kills the young dragon and then does a flurry of blows on the Lieutenant that leaves him Stunned and Poisoned.

So later an officer grabs the Lieutenant onto a dragonelle and flies off a bit but the party is able to keep him from getting away. The Barbarian/Warlock (Silversun) does a Summon Undead and raises a Ghast. This is where it gets awesome.

See, if the undead he raised hits a target that is Poisoned, the target is automatically Paralyzed until the end of its next turn as well. Stann can inflict Poisoned as part of Flurry Of Blows without a save. So that's gonna be an amazing combo.

We wipe out almost all of the ones there. A couple got away though, so that'll be trouble. And we have one officer stunned by Stann and tied up for questioning.

Overall one of the most fun sessions I've ever been a part of both from a RP standpoint and a mechanical/combat standpoint.