CMP

"Worth a shot." Atramor whipped out his lockpicks, kneeled to the shelf the keyhole was embedded in, and got to work.

"I'm alright with bringin' along Bellamont." Atramor eyed the other two Shadeaux siblings. "We'll keep her safe, mates. Swear on the grave of the Golden Dragon. Ya'know, if she's...still in there, and it's still down here."

"You think she's three hundred years old?"

"Aye, we have. But frankly, mates, nothin' these days is as it seems." Atramor turned to Umbra and awkwardly pulled the brim of his hat down a bit more to avoid looking the woman in the eye. "We came lookin' for the tomb of the Golden Dragon. If we don't find a body, then I guess we know that someone's gone and actually reanimated her. If we do find a body.....then, well, that's gonna a hell of a pain to deal with."

Just checked and I got this. Awesome. Beginner's Lockpicks (1/3 chance to grant the Inspired effect at the beginning of each battle. The bearer can also unlock any non-magical locks. Accessory) Atramor pulls his coat on a bit tighter and follows Hoke. As he does so he realizes his gloves are sticking, rather uncomfortably, to his hands. He removes his Sticky Gloves and tucks his Beginner's Lockpicks into his sleeve. He'd had the set since he was a boy, but only now did he realize what a nice accessory they made. Weird.

Sorry to hear that, WBD. Take all the time you need.

"Aye. I think we should."

"Sure thing mate, great fightin' with ya' too, let's catch up in a bit, yeah?" hurried Atramor, snatching up his weapons and ducking into the alley leading to the Dragon House.

Atramor tosses Dyric a pouch of 1240 gold. "Don't spend it all in...actually, aye, mate, spend it all at the forge. Mind comin' with me and Hoke to the Dragon House after? Can't say why, but I feel a fair bit luckier with other rogues 'round."

Atramor will continue his attack. "I say we deal with this here and now. We don't want 'em tailin' us."

"Aye...me too." Atramor turned his shovel on LeStrange, twice from the back row.

Atramor, keeping his eyes focused on Geezard, repeated his swipes.

"This is how rogues do it, mate. Been a lot of things while I've hung around Eubric - witch, regulator, card shark - but ya' can't take the rogue outta the thief," Atramor remarked, repeating his attacks against Geezard.

At least this one doesn't also have NPCs to worry about.

I firmly believe that if it was their intention to kill off Leia, it would've happened in this movie. They said themselves they won't CGI her - she can't die on-screen and I don't think there's any chance they would do something as monumental as killing off Princess Leia off-screen. I think they're going to replace her as leader of the Resistance's armed forces, have her off recruiting or something during the events of Episode IX and leave the character alive for comics/books/whatever comes next.

I think they're going to write Leia out of Episode 9 and have the character live on in the Expanded Universe. Killing her offscreen would just be a tremendously bad move. There's backlash over Admiral Ackbar. Imagine if they did the same to Leia.

"Kiray, ya may as well go for a weapon if you've got nothin' else goin'." Hastened by Germ's smelling salts, Atramor repeats his shovel-swipe at Geezard. Battle Order Kiray Vindsval Germ Hoke Pretzel Throlar Karie Ezeran Torald Eric Petaldan Boomingham Dyric Atramor Atramor Althior Matthias

We have original rogues in the party, so I should be lucky, WBD. Do people looking for weapons still take free hits? As soon as this is clarified I'll put together a battle order. "Alright, old man. You wanna do this, let's do this." Lacking traditional weaponry, Atramor pulled out his Magic Shovel and attempted to wallop Geezard from the front row. "I wouldn't mind a little speed, mate!"

"City's full of madmen, mate. At the moment, you're servin' the crazier ones. Have you thought for two seconds how odd it is that the Founders of Heroica come back from the goddamn dead at the same time the Houses all just fold?" Atramor shook his head and put his hand on the paladin's shoulder. "I know ya' think you're tryin' to restore order, but there are things goin' on here that none of us can see. We need these two to help us piece together what's happened. Look 'round, mate. Every person standin' with us is a hero of Heroica. You'd better believe we wouldn't be doin' this unless we had a damn good reason. Forget ya saw us. May not sit right with ya', but this is for the best." He looked sideways at the Town Watch guard. "That old man and I have worked with Cap'n Patricia more times than I care to count. She still in charge? Or has she conveniently been deposed as well, like every damn leader in the city?" Should his negotiations fail, Atramor is more then prepared to protect the Veterans by force, if necessary.

Atramor narrowed his eyes in familiarity. "Cap'n Fervent, right? Didn't I pull you and your people outta a magic bag at one point, mate?"

-Värtland saga (has anyone else that was part of it talked about it yet?) My part was going to focus on the Cold Circle side of the undead war that was taking place, the end of the cult, and (I think...I don't recall if I trashed the idea or brought it up to Sandy) the origins of the Aurora Nornalis. There were a lot of moving parts behind the scenes and we never quite got it all worked out, but I did have a rough draft for my end. Terribly out of date, probably, but there it is. Looking back, I think I straight up stole one of the best moment from Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. Whoops. Malphien was a Norn and was seemingly abandoned by her fellow norns in her time of need. She turned to necromancy and even darker magic, invoking every aspect of Helvetia and pushing the norns out of her good grace, allowing them to be overrun by vikings and forced out of Vartland. Now she needs a Nornalis and to sit upon the Siege of Helvetia so that she can pass from this world in peace (lying to all her followers and telling them it'll bring them power and whatnot). Summary: orcs, undead, evil norn, good norn, archdemon fight, end of the Cold Circle. The other quests had some very awesome ideas as well. Flaming cultists, Bonaparte dragon slaying, Wolfgang origins, and my personal favorite: orc nordic clan politics! All against the backdrop of an undead war. And the island-sized archdemon, of course.

Few of my further ideas are super articulate. -Next quest was going to focus on dragoons. The Dragon Heart's Flame has been extinguished (would've cleared that with Zepher obviously ) and they think that Heroica recently messing around with it caused it. So the dragoon summit convenes, featuring dragoons from all over Olegaia. The Dragonlord and Smaragdea, Giuiliana and Volmuniix (from one of my past quests, forget which one), Eckmar (from the Spesiala quest), a dragoon-less dragon from Njago, a Summerset Isle pair (but the dragoon was abusive, so the dragon had its owner killed by the Crimson Crown, who's now infiltrating as the dragoon), Daske and Aazy (from Baltarok - only the greatest dragoon from each nation are supposed to go the summit, but Daske is the only one in Baltarok, so...), High Kingdoms pair, and a Vartland pair, the dragon of which I believe I was going to use a dinosaur for. I never got as far as figuring out what the quest would actually entail. But the basic concept was dragoon civil war. The Crimson Crown doused the Flame because, contrary to what everyone thinks, it does not grant life to mortals or immortality to dragons. It is the link between the dragons and the Spirit Pools - and enabled dragon and dragoon bonds in the first place. This revelation causes the already tenuous summit to fracture. Several present, of course, are ready to wreck the Crown, but others present think that perhaps, given what it represented, perhaps the Flame is best left dead. Dragons and dragoons rarely survive when separated, but this is no longer the case. The kinship between them remains, but the Flame is no longer keeping them bound together forever. Everyone starts scrambling and trying to figure out who begat the lie that the Flame is the source of all life - did the dragons lying to protect their tie to the Spirit Pools, or did the mortals lie to keep dragons from running off on them? Probably a bit hard to believe given what we've seen of dragon/dragoon relationships, but like any relationship they can go poorly, and I wanted to push the concept that while some pairs become legendary, others end in disaster. I'm thinking I was directly inspired by Flipz' dragoon quest, and ran with the idea of "maybe these problems go all the way to the top." Anyway, summary: heroes are on trial for dousing the Flame. Crown shows up, says the Flame doesn't do what everyone thought. The dragoon summit fractures over whether they should leave it or reignite. Awesome dragoon civil war ensues. And that's as far as I got.

Figure I may as well unpack some quest things here while I have time. Quest #150: so yeah, the Burning Pilgrim was once a prince of a small, holy kingdom who fought in the Orcish Invasion and was one of Heroica's first recruits. He became a Veteran later, the Adamant Arbalest, and trained heroes much as the Copper Fox does now. He led a quest back to his homeland when he heard it was being attacked, and found the Crimson Crown burning everyone and everything in an effort to erase the kingdom's patron archangel from history. They burned him alive, too, and at some point in the future he was raised as an undead. (Didn't fully think this part through yet, I think I was going to tie into the Cold Circle somehow). He's one of the only witnesses to how far the Crimson Crown is willing to go, and built up his little gang of Boba Fetts to fight back. The Crimson Crown has serious sway over one of the orc clan leaders, and they basically paid for Imaestym to be rebuilt, so he was operating under the impression the Crown had fully taken root in Baltarok. Worse, after he heard about the Battle of the Bridge, he began to suspect the Crown was also manipulating the (seemingly unkillable, which irked him for obvious reasons) heroes of Heroica. Mission 'assassinate all the corrupt leaders of Baltarok' became mission 'get some heroes in there, so I can see if they're actually still good guys and could help'. Rather than straight up attempting to kill the clan leaders, he hires some third parties and sets them up so he can observe Heroica in action. If the clan leaders die, well, mission accomplished. If Heroica actually displays some honest-to-god heroics and saves them, maybe they're not lost after all. After you dueled the Burning Pilgrim you either would've had to help him kill Jaret, who is the one whispering in Baltarok's ear, which the Baltarok leadership really wouldn't like. Otherwise, you'd have to take him and the whole Wandering Silence out in another fight (in which he'd be in his second form and much less tanky.) Which reminds me: I really kind of screwed you out of some (I thought) really neat boss loot. Sorry. Kill Pilgrim: Adamant Treads (SP: 5, the user can teleport away from battle, avoiding damage; the effect ends if the user targets an enemy. The hero can do this a number of times per battle equal to the number of Adamant artifacts worn, legwear) Adamant Bracers (SP: 5, when struck by a Free Hit, the user counterstrikes, dealing equal to their level times the number of Adamant artifacts worn, handwear) Adamant Visage (SP: 5, when attacking, the user has a 1/3 chance to deal the fragile and weakened effects for each Adamant artifact worn, headwear) Kill Jaret: Crimson Inquisitor Cloak (+10 max health, the wearer is immune to the last negative effect dealt in battle, increases to the last two or three effects with multiple Crimson artifacts worn, backwear) Crimson Boots (+10 max health, once per battle, the user can reroll the attack die a number of times equal to the number of Crimson artifacts equipped if they’re the last person listed in the battle order, footwear) Crimson Masque (+10 max health, wearer gains additional power equal to the number of ether users in battle multiplied by five for each Crimson artifact equipped, headwear) Kind of a mess overall, looking back. In summary: heroes think they're stopping assassinations, when the guy pulling the assassin's strings is just testing them to see if Heroicans are still good guys, so they can team up and kill some Crimson Crown.

"Not a bad idea idea," nodded Atramor to the young warden. "Think if there's one thing I think we can all agree on when it comes to the Wolfgang, it's that they're damn good at makin' trouble."

"Aye....aye," agreed Atramor, his mind turning momentarily to a few of his past allies. Hybros, Guts. Skrall, Cronk. Nyx....Ellaria. "Well...ain't no room for thinkin' 'bout what might've been, here." He looked down into his empty mug, briefly, before slamming it back down on the counter. "We'll just have to fight for 'em. Heroica never woulda been what it is today if it weren't for heroes like them. May not be here, but as long as just one hero is still suckin' down breath and fightin' for right, then, well, damn it, they ARE with us."