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It's been 2 whole years since we've gotten this band together to set off on this meandering adventure. Nothing could have prepared us for the events that were to unfold before our very eyes.

After the incredulous Drummer Dave's secret-dwarven-time-travelling affair, and not to mention, his new found appreciation of self-erected statues, we were more than happy to jump into the offered portal to our initial intended holiday destination. It's been so long since we've had some time off, who knew saving lives were so much effort.

Anyway, so we did just that - only to be transported to the wrong city where every single denizen was brainwashed to serve our heads on a silver platter to none other than that drasted band, Channel Divinity!

What does a bard have to do to get some alone time around here?! Do these people not have lives?


Gwinny Hilltopple 1 moon ago
The demon i accidentally sold my soul to demanded i murder someone. Wasnt going to do it but the target was an arsehole. Oh well

Gwinny Hilltopple 1 moon ago
The evil rival bard band "Channel Divinty" were back, turned a city into an army of zombies to try to kill us. Our drummer got trampled.

Gwinny Hilltopple 1 moon ago
Naturally we broke into their house (using the wookie maneuver, and left a little brown present on their beds. Bards bards bards wins again.

Gwinny Hilltopple 1 moon ago
Then, joy upon joy, after two years of being tormented by Channel Divinity we finally got to destroy them. It's over. We did it!!!

Gwinny Hilltopple 1 moon ago
Destroyed them and burnt down their house and remains. Bad news is they'll never see the little brown presents.

Sir Strumm-a-lot 1 moon ago
I'm sorry, Harmony.

With Benito kidnapped for interrogation purposes, Gwinny had free reign to disguise herself as the beloved italian chef to look around Lord Pendeghast's mansion.


Gwinny maps out Lord Pendeghast's dwellings
From here, we were able to suss out the hypnotic effect the pink gems had on Maelion. The effect quickly dissipated as soon as Gwinny reached out to slice his throat. It all seemed far too easy. Still, her covert operation remained intact as they swiftly exchanged words about some rotten trout and meat served at yesterday's lunch.


Dave reunited with his god awful golden drums
Desperate to stop the ultimate Channel Divinity gig that was looming in the horizon, Gwinny left the manor short of clues but arms filled with muttering masks and a magnificent golden drum set.

During which Leon was busy harassing the real Benito in the dark alley way to no avail, Dave was setting up a protest showing with me helping out. Down with that sort of thing and all that.

Later we reconvened at Aeropose's and requested he set us up a bomb. The Hyperfast Mining Thing was suggested, mostly as he doesn't like it underneath his shop. The plan was for me to use my boots of choir to fly over the stage and use Mage Hand to place and detonate the Hyperfast Mining Thing whilst we were all very much out of sight.

The only condition Aeropose had was that no one was to get hurt. Easier said that done but we agreed.

Pretty soon, a small mushroom cloud appeared over what used to be the stage for Channel Divinity's ultimate gig and 3 unlucky occultists were blamed for the deed when they were caught suspecting each other under hushed tones at the local pub.

To rejoice, we initiated an impromptu gig with our biggest fan who showed up for the protest. Leon worked the crowd like the fabulous manager we know and love, everyone was chanting, "Bards! Bards! Bards!" as we belted our latest and greatest to the tune of Channel Divinity shaking their fists from Lord Pendeghast's house.

There was also the perform-off with Abrigand which lasted about an hour. Just an infinite solo loop alternating between him and Gwinny. Abrigand won with one note over but it was pretty clear Bards! Bards! Bards! was the true winner.


Song List:
1. Hey! We can make you love us without the need for hypnosis!

Ghosts appear and surround us when Leon pours a vial of contents down the basin. Before we pursued the battle, Leon shoves us contracts to sign.

Like, right before the battle. With ghosts everywhere. In the middle of things-like.


What the hell is this, Leon?
Hastily signing the contract, I dismissed the strange black line at the end of the contract as a printing artefact and immediately regretted not listening to my gut instinct.

They call it the fine print for a reason. Even after confirming with Leon that there was no fine print, it was obvious that there was. We will never know what we signed away.

Not long after, I decided to snort a ghost. The pleasant tingly sensation was soon replaced by the sudden realisation that I was now blind and terribly at a disadvantage during the encounter.

Oh, there was also this large room where we found a female drow trapped in a clear bubble, floating in a circle of glowing runes. She seemed very wise but also very tricky and kept persuading us to release her. We did of course, for a price.

Now, if only I could remember what it was ...

Today we faced the infamous gelatinous cube. If we had met it in a corridor, we'd have surely perished.


The gelatinous cube is a ten-foot cube of transparent gelatinous ooze, which is able to absorb organic matter.
It took us a trying 8 hours to arrive at the bottom of the pit. Sure we saved some dozens of dirty, malnourished villagers in cages by hacking away at the captors emblazoned with the cursed swirly symbol but 8 hours felt like forever!

Here we met with some cultists looting the corpses of the drow denizens which we persuaded to cease only to have Leon murder one of them and turn invisible to get the upperhand. Gwinny then turns the remaining cultist invisible thus setting it free, screaming, "You people are crazy!" before disappearing into the ether.

Shortly after, we kill a bunch of drows and stumbled into a sacrificial room with scary symbols on the door. Here, a statue of humanoid nature surrounded by skulls, holds a chalice of blood dripping from the ceiling; a sight not welcoming enough for a short rest or nap.

Later we finally used the tunneling orb and in doing so, accidentally vaporized a drow boy into a shower of blood. Whoopsie!

Another day, another battle. Except this time we were joined by our dear inventor friend, Aeropose.


Aeropose joins us in an epic kill off
When a beam of crackling energy flew towards the Water portal to be turned into Fire, a polygonal stone with runes carved into it appeared to Gwinny and a voice made itself heard in her head, "Would you like more Power? More Fire to kill your enemies?" One wonders what her reply was for she did not say it out loud. One also wonders how one was able to know if this happened, if at all.

Soon, a green jolt of light shot out of the portal and fleshy things with teeth grew out from beneath the ground. Huge tentacles and monsters surrounded us, hungry for action.


"This always happens." - Aeropose
It took a while but before you know it, Aeropose was hitting the machine with a wrench, the tentacle was deaded and we were shopping for a leather jacket, a horned red gem, exploding bolts, smoke bombs, a prank device and an immovable rod at the Grand Bazaar of the Fire plane.

When the signal of a flaming arrow was seen shooting across the sky, we found ourselves in Hermit Wood, fighting side by side the orcs against an army of bad people lead by a tall and lanky sickly-skinned human drenched in greasy, dark hair.


There be no hermits
As we charged towards the camp with our horde of orcs, it was plain to see that the baddies were probably outnumbered and soon, with bolts of lightning everywhere, each enemy fell to their death and the battle was over.


An entire camp full of emos
The tents were mostly filled with food and common armour supply with the exception of one which housed maps of the region, a big pile of papers and a small chest of gold and random materials. From here, we found that the pink gems are actually eyes and the uncovered ones are all in the material plane and no where else.



Ozaridur leaves us with clues
Oh yeah, we also met up with this fancy wizard dude in his fancy house at the end of the village to get an anti-scrying spell for the pink gems. Something about whispers of the damned or voices of the insanity, can't remember the details but see, when we returned to his place, he got all uppity and left us this melodramatic letter and a list of ingredients. Good thing we took the letter with us after a look around cause when we left the fancy house, it disappears!

So then we looked around and did some shopping to get the items on Ozaridur's list, most of which could be found in town apart from the poisonous Ricatra leaves which Leon procured from the Thieves' Guild of which he now owes a favour.

Did I mention the time Leon sneaked into Lord Pendeghast's home to defecate in Abrigand's chest of costumes? Well, now I have.

Apparently, the poor sods who paid money to see the band were being hypnotised during Maelion's violin solo. What are they like? A bit sad really to do all that to get people to like you.


A kobold lair full of nasty little kobolds
Anyway, next thing we know, we were surrounded by kobolds and Gwinny almost gets killed by Leon's stabby ways. The kobolds, also known as geckos with hands or scaly dog people were tricky dickbags but they were soon silenced with our swords.

Later, we found ourselves in another Channel Divinity gig where we noticed that Maelion's violin was covered in the symbol of Sehanin, God of Illusion and Trickery and the Moon. We spoke to the magistrate about this who adviced us to talk to the magical types in Goldenvale. We headed to Aeropose to build us a counter-sound machine, an apparatus with high enough frequency, it should disrupt the dratted violin solo!
Exploring the mostly deserted maze of corridors and rooms greeted us with strange surprises, encounters and beings.

I mean, what do you do when you see a massive painting of a black spider in a room full of bodies? Any adventurer in the right mind would start exploring, maybe there's a bob or two hidden around. Next thing you know, our eight-legged friend came to life and leaped out of the painting! Good thing Gwinny erased its legs. Before you know it, Leon stabbed the prone creature to death and everyone's a happy camper.


All hail the natural 20
Then there was the "floating ring on a pedestal" room which infuriated all of us on the account of it being puzzling and everything. There was this silver surfer person you see; Bob was his name, wouldn't let us go near the thing. We tried reasoning with him but he wasn't having it. Then we met 3 unrelentless masks in another room being totally unhelpful with the ring situation.

Anyway, Bob was totally boss but with a few spells, he shattered into enough silver glitter to fill up a squirrel bag and the ring, now in our possession, turned out to be magical and had this spell storing cast on it. Tidy!

So like, we finally go through the portal and turns out we've been gone for 6 whole weeks! But you know, we saved 600 water elves so that probably counts as something. Sadly, people thought we were dead and all our fans mourned us by being total fans of Channel Divinity. Talk about ungrateful.

Tanalia Embalg, the magistrate gave us our own all inclusive house with a nice big safe in the kitchen. Being professional musicians, we soundproofed the walls and made a dungeon for safe exit across the river. We bought horses and named them Dingaling (Strumm), BattleBob (Leon), Nessie (Dave) and Xybraxis the Defiler (Gwinny). It was a grand old time.

Oh and Gwinny finally got her Dulcimer fitted with the fires of Hell, thanks to the crazy stunt we pulled to steal the Taurimbulator for Aeropose to mod it with. That crazy genius! Speaking of crazy, Gwinny seems not quite right ever since she wielded that thing. Maybe it's just me but her eyes say otherwise. Those eyes.

In any case, for some reason, we found ourselves ambushed by a bunch of orcs after Leon fought the champion, Braff - a wee one in leather shorts armed with an axe, just so that we could have an audience with the orc chief.


"For the chained one!" - Orcs ambush!
Turns out, the chief was innocent and something was amiss in the orc camp!


Song List:
1. Go home, spider! Spider-no-legs!
2. The Ballad of the Legless Spider
3. We're gonna cut your dick off, you fucking fucker.

Well, it turns out the Ganasi Leader was in fact a lady, previously known as that really cool water elf dude with the huge water quiff. This sudden turn of events quickly set a couple of things in motion, namely a new song, "The only king here is Entropy" hastily written down by Gwinny whilst the rest of the group awkwardly shifts around the dodgy exchange between the band manager and his new focus of interest (the Ganasi lady). Hopefully we get a gig venue out of this.

And behold, we actually did perform an impromptu performance some mere moments later. A free one, of course; we're not barbarians. Also we were feeling generous. Also, because it was all subterfuge to get some nasty looking fish people to stop beating up the water elves. Gwinny was super inspired and started singing another new song, "It's Sushi Time!" which I'm sure will be a total hit. This super inspiration must be infectious. The next thing you know, Dave starts throwing his drum sticks into the air, crossbows a fish to death, catches the sticks in mid-air and starts drumming again. Way too cool. You should've been there, man!


Something you want to tell us, Dave buddy?
In any case, we finally reached the lighthouse but not before an almost lethal ending with a freaking water Wyrd. What a curious place this turned out to be; a maze of twisty corridors, all alike. So much so, we had to draw our own map lest we get lost!


Super Awesome Map by Gwinny
On the plus side, we met a totally cool Beholder Spectator who let us in on some excellent treasure after we sang him yet another song, "Quit your fucking job, it sucks." I think it's safe to say he's now a fan of "Bards! Bards! Bards!". We also recorded some decoy messages on this incredible machine (Gwinny drew a picture of this so we can show it to that inventor to recreate), received some blessings of inspiration from Ayoon (apart from Dave who insists we were exchanging parts of our memory for this) and then there was this really annoying silver surfer creature who wouldn't let us touch the tablet with pink gems due to us not being Azalabron (some angel in service of Ayoon) even after Gwinny pretended to be him, wings and all. The nerve!

Oh, and Leon finally used that scroll on himself. I think he saw the apocalypse or something cause I've never seen such fear in his eyes. And nothing fazes Leon. Nothing.


Song List:
1. The only king here is Entropy
2. It's Sushi Time!
3. Quit your fucking job, it sucks.

The Bag of Infinite Squirrels is a lie. Went back to the inn and asked the innkeeper if we could use the kitchen to whip up some interesting recipes for all this squirrel we've procured and the bag literally went limp after the 35th squirrel was yanked out.

Wish we identified the bag at the marketplace! Those damn fiery-plane sellers!

Speaking of planes, we stumbled upon the rather phallic looking aqua plane next where we bumped into Ayoon, the goddess of knowledge. Well, not in the literal sense that is. She came in a form of a scroll; one inscribed with an invocation spell that allows us one question to which we will be shown its implications within a period of 7 days.


Totally a map, not anything else. Also, no dragons so far.

Suffice to say, this was probably the strangest realm we've been to yet - filled with fish people, water elves adorned with water quiffs, a humoungous moose-like creature with 8 antlers and 2 horns which we might have collectively hallucinated and of course, vicious water dogs. Sadly, the acoustics here are a tad warbly. Nice reverb though!

Gwinny Hilltopple 8 moons ago
I didn't get what I needed to make fire shoot out of my dulcimer, but I did get a magical hat that lets me disguise myself as anyone I like

Gwinny Hilltopple 8 moons ago
I used it to pretend to be the lead singer of rival Bard band, "Channel Divinity" destroying their reputation around the village. FUN #DnD

Gwinny Hilltopple 8 moons ago
Oh, and while we were shopping for souvenirs we found a shop selling "The Bag Of Infinite Squirrels". Tip it up, squirrel pops out. #DnD

Gwinny Hilltopple 8 moons ago
We sent some undead imp summoner into a crazy fit of rage by throwing some squirrels at him. Others were merely bemused.

Gwinny Hilltopple 8 moons ago
All in a day's work for Bards, Bards, Bards. World's greatest Dungeons and Dragons slightly-evil-aligned superstar mercenary bard militia.



A somewhat casual encounter with a bunch of mercenaries led us down a dingy hole of twisty passages, all rotating in the opposite direction. Thanks to the Black Knife Mercenary Company, we now own two of those pink gems, a bunch of lapis lazulis, a swimming cap, some strange orbs and ointments. Add to this the decapitated head of a half giant, Gwinny's new obsession with hands, a new manoeuvre we're calling, "The Wookie Doo" and it's just another day in the life of Bards! Bards! Bards!

Collage from session 290315

Did I mention we totally rocked it at the 7 Canarys Inn gig? So much so we've got 4 more booked and this doesn't even include the Fire Spyre one! W000t!
Dear Channel Divinity,
We're not mad. In fact, we're glad. More than glad that you're performing for Lord Pendeghast.

We're here for the people, you see. The people that we save from the evils of this world; the same people that will rejoice in the music of, "Bards! Bards! Bards!".

We're here to stay. To slay. And get paid.

You'll see.

And by see, we mean, to look with both eyes. Because that's what we have on you. Both, if not all of our eyes set on you, dear Channel Divinity.

Much love,
B.B.B.

ps: Hey Abrigand! We can totally smell you from all the way here at Odd's Hollow. And that's really bad cause the village is on fire.
Poncy gig for the nobles down the mines at Ulder. 100 gold, she said. Leon promises a huge crowd, banners and everything. Guinevere keeps giving autographs away. At this rate, no one's going to pay for them in the future. Met a gnome. Says he crafts things and we should give him a visit if we came across any machines down there. Long story short - killed a bunch of skeletons, freed a miner, saw some golems fending an army of undead. Oh and we ended the day by slaying not 1, but 3 massive hellhounds. Thanks, Mage Hand.
The cast banner.
Half Orc on Viol Tone deaf Half Orc on Bass Viol de Gamba "Can I skin that?" Human Lead Dulcimerist 6-string Appalachian Dulcimerist Superstar "What have I become?!" Dwarven Drummer Dwarven Tabor Drummer "The dwaf wiw not betway you."
Rogue Band Manager Rogue Band Manager "Sign here, please." A bit of context: 5 people meet once a month for a game of D&D. These are our "adventures". Our dear DM Dungeon Master Extraordinaire "This dice is cursed!"
^^^^^^