Monkey Paws and Relics (Threads of Fate, Session II Recap)

Session II of my new ongoing Lamentations of the Flame Princess Campaign. See Session I here.

Boy oh boy was this Session a disaster. First the session failed to fire on the scheduled date due to peeps personal lives(understandable). Then after I managed to pity party everyone into playing the next day Discord managed to bite me in the ass. I don’t know if it was my internet connection or Discord being wack but the first half of the session was choppy and it was hard for me to hear and be heard. Finally out of frustration I moved the game over to Google Hangouts to try to salvage this session but by then the momentum was lost. Thankfully my players are awesome and bore through it. Once we moved to hangouts everything was working as it should and some laughs were had. If my players are reading this(as they should be since I post it in our group) thanks guys for being awesome! Anyways here’s what happened, bullet point style since it was a really short session.

The Cast

Cillian McCleary, Specialist 1:

Irishman in a hostile land.

Aki Ashina, Fighter 1:

A young woman hailing from the far eastern lands of Japan. Wears a eyepatch, speaks broken english and is looking for something or someone...

Otto Kuchin, Fighter 1:

Nobleman's son, turned sellsword, turned monster hunter. From Prussia.

Richard Islands, Fighter 1:
Ex-soldier, now poor mercenary. Looking for work.

Mildred Hubble, Magic-User 1: 

A horny 12 year old girl from a very secretive school for young spellcasters.

Linehart Helsbert, Magic-User 1:
Landlocked pirate looking for treasure and secrets. Extremely violent.

• Party plots to steal St.Margaret’s holy mummified monkey from the crypt under the church. No plans are made to steal the saint’s relic...
• They wait until nightfall then send the irishman Mcleary to scout out the church.
• During the day they had wandered around town and discovered other(old) Nonsbeck was home to a convent behind the church. Seems the nuns are guarding St.Margaret's remains.
• Mcleary rolls a successful stealth skill. He scopes out the area and memorizes the church grounds layout without being see by a nun sentry. Afterwards he returns to the inn and relays the information to his party members.
• Party convenes on church, Mcleary is chosen to open the church doors, due to his roguish skills.
• Mcleary checks for traps, then cracks the door halfway before hearing a voice from inside. A woman's voice. "H-hello?..." she says. "Is someone there?"
• The party begins to make various kinds of animal noises, for some reason?
• The party can hear the woman inside running further inside. Kuchin kicks the door open and sees a nun running towards the altar in the back of the church. He throws his detachable pommel and hurls it at the nun. He hits.
• The woman falls over and the thieves shuffle towards her and gag and bound her, the Islands hides her in the confessional. 
• They swabble a bit then search the church for the donation box. Mcleary finds it and gains +18sp.
• Helsbert finds a musket the nun must have been going for and Islands finds a small bronze bell. (Ref's Note: The bell is rung ever hour to alert the outside sentry's that everything is ok.)
• Mcleary & Ashina light torches and take the point and rear respectively in the marching order. The party descends into the crypt.
• The party sees a well kept crypt with the western wall filled with graves and offerings. They spend a turn searching for traps then hear a rattling of chains before Mcleary almost trips over them.
• More squabbling before Kuchin takes a torch and shines into the darkness revealing a young woman with a long chain tied to her ankle. "Please help me, the nuns keep me down here." she says.
• The girl explains the nuns took her away and believe her to be possessed. They keep her tied down here at night. 
• The party talks amongst themselves(more time wasted) then they free her when she says her parents will happily pay to have her back. She lives in London.
• (Ref's Notes: me when they freed her.)
• With nameless girl in tow the party continues down the crypt and comes across their prize, the holy monkey. 
  
• Mcleary checked for traps(MVP this session) and after confirming there were none, the glass case is removed and the monkey stolen.
• The party moves back upstairs into the church then waste more time squabbling before heading to the church door but the doors open to reveal three nuns with muskets standing before them.
• The head nun questions why they freed the nameless girl then they level their muskets.
• Kuchin quickly shoots the main nun then the other party members scatter behind pews while Islands retrieves the nun from the confessional and uses her as a human shield.
• I decided to simplify initiative by using the opposed d6 roll for each side rule. Turns out this is extremely deadly for the losing side. The party wins initiative and I roll morale to see if the remaining nuns stay to fight after seeing their leader killed. They do. (Ref's Notes: In hindsight I should have rolled a surprise check. Oh well.)
• The two remaining nuns are quickly dispatched brutally and efficiently.
• The party escapes into the night.

-After 3 days travel and no random encounters the party arrives at Nonsbeck.-

• They hide the monkey paws in the woods then return the pawless monkey to the quest giver Lonna. She looks a little disappointed but Kuchin assures her it was like that when they found it. She thanks them and hands them the deed to the manor.
• Ashina inquires about Lonna's younger sister.
• The party looks around and sees the nameless young woman from the church playing in the field with Lonna's younger sister Cremilia. The party is creeped out.
• The party talks to the blacksmith in Nonsbeck for a bit before returning to the woods to reclaim their monkey paws. 
• They gather around in a circle and begin making wishes of the monkey paws.

The Wishes

Each party member states their wish then breaks a finger on the paw.

Aki Ashina wishes to speak fluent english, then silence.

Otto Kuchin wishes to be a millionaire, then silence.

Richard Islands wishes for prosperity for his future brothel, then silence.

Mildred Hubble wishes for spellbook with all the spells, then silence.

Linehart Helsbert wishes for more guns, then silence.

The party waits a moment then concludes the wishes must have a delayed effect...

• Helsbert becomes furious and threatens to shoot people after realizing the wishes were a lie.
• They party argues for a bit, again.
• Then they decided to return to London to sell back the church woman to her parents and the monkey paws to Vespero.
• When they go to speak with the nameless church woman they notice she's gone.
• They shrug their shoulders and plan their trip to London. "I'm sure she'll turn up." Kuchin says.

Treasure gained: 18sp, A bronze bell, Two mummified monkey paws and feet.

Bonus XP: +100 for Session attendance, +5 to each character for the nuns.

Session III here.