Anarion

Dark Age (playtest): The Lands of Pendragon

Robena
[The azure knight, still cursed, spent 2 on position and lost, doing no harm to you, suffering one in return.]

A bundle of long red hair flies loose from beneath the helm, and beneath that a ruddy face not dissimilar in shape to Cerwen's. The woman in this armor is no priest though, and her arm took the full blow of your axe. She is alive through that, which is no mean feat, but her arm is certainly broken near the elbow and she'll have to spend the next season in a splint doing no work so she can recover. She may not even be able to travel from Lostwithiel without risk of great injury. Still, you are victorious and though this is not the outcome you may have sought, it was achieved honorably and all could tell that the azure knight chose to take the blow head on and suffer its consequences.

For a moment, the azure knight looks stunned. The shock of the blow, her helm being wrenched off, the sudden noise of the crowd and the bright light. Then, she looks at you and a torrent of words starts pouring out: "what in bloody blazes? How did I get hre? Who let a great bear like you into the tournament? Ah! My godsforsaken arm! Nobody said anything about this, they didn't! This was supposed to be an easy tournament, gods, who calls this a knight's penance, I want to know?"

She looks weak and like she's near to passing out from the shock. Above the cheers of the audience, you hear a strangled cry from the stands near the Duchess, Cerwen for certain. The resemblance is far too close, they're obviously family. A cousin, maybe even a sister.

What do you do now?

Constance

Cerwen's attention is not closely enough on you to obtain any reassurance. Instead, as the two knights clash you are treated to Cerwen nearly leaping out of her seat. You see her clutching where her cross would have been and then realizing it's not there in a sudden panic. She must not have had time to fetch a more humble one before the tournament. Was she going to try and do something to manipulate the results? No matter though, you see your champion shatter the azure knight's defense and rip off her helm. An explosion of red hair comes loose and she falls backwards into your champion's arms. She's saying something, and Cerwen has let out a loud, strangled cry right next to your ear. You can tell she's full of grief and fear. The Duchess Marianne and her master at arms are looking over in alarm.

What do you do?

Tristan and Nin

The commotion at the castle happened while you were busy traveling overland. Now, as you let it go, you are treated to the sight of the great badger opening a new tunnel. It's a majestic sight. Discarding the remaining wheat stalks, it uses its claws in two great, sweeping motions to rend away a mound of earth. Then, claws before it, it begins to heave the earth to the side. It's magical, even for all its strength, the creature shouldn't be able to part the earth at this speed, yet the sight as it digs is like nothing more than watching a curtain of soil part at its claws. After a brief moment, it digs away at a speed that belies its bulk leaving only small traces of its tunnel line. You would guess that a trotting horse could keep pace with it, but you'd have little chance on foot, so if you continue to track it now, you'll need to rely on your endurance to catch back up to it wherever it stops next.

One thing to observe, it goes no closer to the forest in its tunnel, instead paralleling the fields based on how you saw it enter the ground.

Speaking of the forest, if you don't care to return to the castle, it holds much of what you need. Finding venoms would be a difficult woodcrafting skill, but certainly within the talents of both of you, especially Nin who has particular experience with the woodlands. Honey is even easier, your biggest fear would be a few bee stings, and you can ward most of that off with a couple smoking brands, but it should take only a short time to find. For a second bow, you'd need to return to the castle, where you'd arrive back around the middle of the night if you made a straight shot for it. You could, though, check with the local farmers, see if someone has a hunting bow. The road has scattered villages lining it, you'd easily hit at least a small group of people within a half hour's hiking. Though be careful arriving at night, they'll need some signs that you're safe and not there to hurt them.

The forest at night may also have other dangers, though none you know of so dangerous as the great badger. Still, it refused to approach the forest even though you, Tristan, know that it wants dearly to have such environs as its surroundings, so that too is a reason for caution.

Dark Age (playtest): The Lands of Pendragon

Nin's plan B, if we decide not to attack/trap it right away, is to send Tristan off to get the stuff they need while she keeps an eye on it so it doesn't get away or cause trouble. I'm fine with saying there's a tree or two off in the near distance, though. I just didn't want to assume it, given the description of the landscape.

@stveje

I searched for some images, and this is fairly accurate except the wheat here is too short (it's summer so you're amid tall stalks).

wheat field

Dark Age (playtest): The Lands of Pendragon

Chalk it up to Tristan getting lost in his own head. Honestly, it's a very in-character mistake.

@Count Numbers

Oh yeah, I can easily see that. Given the misread, does it help to clarify that part of Tristan's vision is that the Badger doesn't want to be here, it wants there to be trees, but there's some reason it's not just going back to the trees that are, like, right over there just a short hike away.

Anyway, you have as many posts as you want to chat and plan in the "talking is a free action sense" but the intent of the timing is that there's time to be like "you hide here and ambush it after I shoot it from here" but not time to go looking for anything or craft anything that takes more than a moment, though letting it go here is perfectly reasonable. You two probably could take it, mechanically, but it might hurt in the process.

Masks: BABYLON MUST FALL

[Potential 4. Insecure]

Set leans over to the sound of linen gently swishing and slides the tablet out from the Seneschal's bound hands. She looks it over, ensures that the orders are in place, no extra guards or wrong locations to deceive her. When she's done, she nods to herself and replaces it at the other end of the desk, outside of the Seneschal's reach. Though perhaps left alone he could scooch his chair over to get it, as long as he's careful not to knock himself over in the process.

Set steps away for a moment and examines the room. The fight was quick, a series of blows and portals, a sudden and decisive win. His retainers would have finished their falls by now. Perhaps a few were still clinging roughly to the roof, others fallen to the gardens and courtyards and now recovering, but still some distance from this office with its commanding view of the city.

Her gaze strays down to the city in miniature. All that jumping about and neither she nor the Seneschal had damaged it. Set wanders over and stands among the buildings, picks up a few trees and admires them. Even her little waterfall garden is there in miniature, and the tofu stall where she had eaten out. This thing was truly spectacular, not just practical for planning, but truly a work of art. It might well be the unique creation of some Annunaki crafter, one of a kind and irreplaceable in its eye for detail. She looked over at the Seneschal. "Truly spectacular craftsmanship. You had this made for you?" She laughs with the dismissal that the Seneschal might make such a work himself. "Did you pay nothing for it? Claim such a thing as the right of your position on your vaunted chain? Pathetic."

Anathet knew what Marianne would do here. She saw the challenge in the Seneschal's eyes. She knew a man like him wouldn't mourn the suffering of a thousand slaves but his heart would break over the loss of a precious toy. Break him inside, make him hurt, let him feel the pain of the masses in his own heart and be scarred by the revolution to come. That was the way of the Phantom Thieves, wasn't it? Anathet almost lifted her foot and with a great golden sandal crushed the Seneschal's palace in miniature like Godzilla himself had come to rampage in Babylon.

Almost.

Something in her heart stopped her. She just...she couldn't inflict that on the Seneschal, not though he deserved it. That kind of pain, that's what they were fighting to stop, wasn't it? The goal wasn't just to gather it all up and throw it back on the Annunaki. They had to be stopped, but Anathet didn't want to do that by destroying all the beautiful things in Caphtor. Then there wouldn't be anything beautiful left and her heart cried for that.

So instead, with an angry grunt, she turns the Seneschal's chair and flings him into a corner so he can see nothing. No jockeying to his tablet for freedom, his men will find him tied and punished like a child and that will be that. The tree though, is on his desk by the tablet, and Set is already long gone before he can see her cry.

Dark Age (playtest): The Lands of Pendragon

Per my previous answer to Stveje, both immediate sources of poison and trees are not available. The trees aren't that far away (and potentially poisonous insects with them) but you'd need to move away from the badger and let it depart the current location.

Dark Age (playtest): The Lands of Pendragon

Tristan and Nin

You have a short time to quietly set some sort of trap. The creature is nearly finished with its meal of wheat and may rest a bit longer before it moves on. Once it does move, you'll have little difficulty tracking it it from here, but it will likely outpace you before it stops if it leaves before you're ready, resulting in a delay into the night or the need to rest and find it again come morning. At least there's no sign of rain this evening, so that is in your favor.

If you wish to attack it now, tell us about your trap and then take action!

Constance

The Duchess smiles at you in relief. "We'll talk later" she says, quietly so as not to draw attention to herself, then turns and waves to the combatants to continue the joust.

After you are seated, the master at arms (we'll say his name is Timothy) takes his place. He looks rather self-satisfied, you might judge, as though he's done his job properly getting you seated. You may wish at some point to correct his misplaced sense of duty. Cerwen, for her part, turns to you. "Are you well?" She asks, with some real concern, but quietly. "If the ceremony earlier was too much..." she trails off not entirely sure what to offer and covers it up with a sip of her wine. Her gaze drifts nervously to the joust as well, her eyes more for the Azure knight than for your champion.

Robena

What you've seen about this curse is that it blocked out the Azure Knight's senses and at the same time drove her to recklessness. From what you've seen in the wider world, these things are not unconnected. Her reckless behavior is a result of her altered perceptions, an inability to judge correctly perhaps. As such, your best route to break this curse is probably to remove her helm. It's both a literal and symbolic way of blocking out her senses and she has yet to raise her visor this whole time. You'll need to manage this decisively, she'll almost certainly lash out and aggressively wrestle you (quite probably even in defiance of honor) if you attempt to remove it slowly, so one swift and powerful move is your best bet.

Dark Age (playtest): The Lands of Pendragon

For the hunting party, here are the stats for the badger

My Hider

Monstrous badger. It attacks with claws, horns, or teeth, though they are not the most suited to combat (3 harm)
Its skin is unnaturally armored for a badger's hide (2 armor)
It is twice the size of normal people (inflicts +2 harm, gains +2 armor when fighting normal sized opponents)
It will ruin and destroy fields of crops and the stores of passing travelers
It can tunnel beneath the ground with unnatural speed

Dark Age (playtest): The Lands of Pendragon

Robena

Revel for a moment in being one of the greatest knights to ever serve Lostwithiel! Your arm is strong, your aim sure. If you were less well-armed or less committed to your skill, the Azure knight would be a terrifying opponent, one who might well slay a lesser knight or unhorse them in an instant. But for you, arranged in your majestic cloak and seated surely atop Apricot, there is little risk even against a cursed knight such as this.

The Azure knight spurs her horse to a gallop, sets her lance, but despite her skill and unnatural stillness, she realizes just before the approach that yours is the stronger charge. You can see that she has a moment to choose, a single instant to decide whether to set her shield and turn the blow, losing her balance in the process, or whether to take the blow head on and try to match you. For a moment, it appears as though she'll do the sane thing and protect herself from a severe wound, but in the last instant, she sets her lance straight and matches yours. As your lance penetrates her mail and strikes what is probably a rib, it breaks and you hear the first sound from her: a rough grunt that makes you think from its tenor that she may be lighter than she appears with her full armor. A small red stain turns her surcoat into a shade of purple. However, she does not lose her balance, but if she keeps up like this, she may well be killed.

Rearm yourself and tell us how you approach the second pass.

[The Azure knight spends 2: both on position. She inflicts 4 harm and has 3 armor, matching your position but suffering a wound in the process. From the tie, she will spend her full 3 on position in the next pass, intent on winning the contest at any cost to herself.]

Constance

You sway and the Master of Arms (what was his name, by the by?) stands and catches you. The Duchess Marianne looks at you with a mixture of frustration and hope. This is obviously the wrong time: you're late, disrupting the tournament, and anything she does to respond to your wild gestures now will force the jousting knights to stop, a deep disrespect to their contest. The Azure knight has not even spoken yet, and they are rearming for their second pass as you arrived. Cerwen is looking at you with obvious worry, the master of arms is trying gently but firmly to press you into your seat. Yet for all that, it's clear the Duchess wants to respond to you. She trusts you Constance, trusts the old ways, the visions, and the magic that runs through her veins. That trust, that faith in her heart is why Lostwithiel noticed the rot and stands against it now.

Press her now for a response and you'll strain that trust, you will be asking a great deal, but she will do it and let you offer a pronouncement to the tournament. Or, wait, sit, question her other advisors, show your grace towards the combatants and you may have a stronger position later. How urgent is your vision, lady?

Tristan

You tune out your surroundings, all your attention at the point of your arrow. You follow that imaginary shot as it strikes the badger, as the creature, surprised and wounded, might retreat into a tunnel. In your mind's eye you follow it underground, to cool mud and deep earth beneath the great roots of trees. If it had the health and the energy, it would dig forever, uprooting the fields and ruining the crops. It wants the weight of great trees above it, that dampness of the roots and the sense of weight that is its heart and home. It would ruin and destroy, make the world into empty, barren land from which new seeds would spread and grow until the forest overgrew it all. It is patient for such things and cares not for the starvation of people in how it wishes the world to be.

But you have not fired that shot, and all this dances only in your mind's eye.

Nin

[I gather the intended move is take stock, so I will answer as to the terrain and your options here]

You are in a large field of wheat. Its primary characteristic is that there is little variation: farmers working the land have made it flat, even, and thick with the stalks, though some are crushed or turned from the great badger. The soil is mostly dry, easy to move quietly and lightly with little sign even for the trained. Slipping away would be the easiest thing in the world, you could bring yourself to safety and further observe or follow the creature in near complete safety. That would be the simplest way to end this encounter, though it wouldn't solve your ultimate problem. Your strength is your surprise. The beast is surely strong enough to do you great harm if enraged, and once it knows itself to be in real danger, it may flee or attack aggressively, leaving you in uncertainty. So the best way to remain strong is to preserve your surprise and use it for the greatest possible effect. Perhaps a trap of some sort combined with Tristan's bow, though even that is unlikely to bring it down in a single blow, more likely to wound it badly and scare it off. That would solve the immediate urgency of the situation, perhaps giving you time to learn more, though you would need to be willing to severely wound the monster to do that.

Masks: BABYLON MUST FALL

[Potential 4. Insecure]
[Directly engage with littlest space bandit: 3+4+3=10. Avoid his blows and Impress him!]

The Seneschal of Marduk is angry. So angry he's stopped thinking, so angry he's going into autopilot, trying to hit as hard as he can. He's confident in his power and reckless of anything that Set can do. He's underestimated her.

As he leaps into his kick, Set simply sinks into the ground, perhaps six inches or so, halfway through a portal. He's committed, it's too late for him to course correct and just like that the fight is ending. She reaches up a hand and grabs the loose skirts around his leg and with a loud riiiiip she tears a long length of Annunaki fabric off his skirts, pulling it all the way up to the hem at his waist. Then he lands and before he can collect himself, suddenly she's reaching out of a portal right behind him and she's wrapping the fabric around and around his ankles fast as you like and cinching it so tight that he can't maintain his balance and topples forward.

Right before he would crash into his lovely model, he falls into a portal instead and Set uses the opportunity to rip another length of fabric and loop it once and twice around his upper arms, pulling them tight to his body and knotting it in the back. She slides right past him, running a hand down his arm ever so gently to his dangerous little fist and slides it right off his hand, then kicks it away with her sandal.

Then, another rip and now the Seneschal is showing quite a bit of thigh as Anathet wraps a knot around each wrist so they're held together with a thick knot in between them. And, as a last gesture to Marianne she rips one more strip off the skirt (leaving most of his leg exposed) and pulls it over his mouth and around his head so he can't talk back any further. Well a gesture to Marianne and payback for calling her Set's priestess. Please. She's his avatar thank you.

Then she topples him through another portal and suddenly he's sitting in his chair and the poor dress yields up one more to tie his waist to the supports so he can't get out of it. And when he focuses his vision after all those drops, she's sliding the tablet under his hands so he can reach.

"Now see, this is much better! I've really improved your look, and now you can do something for us and I'll leave you alone for today! Really, you're lucky it's just me, I'm the nice one and I'm being so gentle, I even left you your pretty little city model. It would have been a shame to break it, even if you made the under-city far too small and boring. You should really fix that, your little chain model is a bit off I think. But you know, Marianne would have you cinched up and hanging from the ceiling in a ball I think, so I hope you appreciate how thoughtful I'm being. So, hurry and do your little tappy tappy thing on your tablet (I'll be looking don't try and cheat) and then I'll be on my way and tomorrow you'll still get to be at the top of your little chain. Doesn't that sound great? Orrrr you could be difficult and I'll have to dangle you like this in front of the entire arena where Shamash was setting up. Whichever one you'd like really."

Set gives him her best crocodile grin and looks expectantly at the tablet.

Dark Age (playtest): The Lands of Pendragon

Nin and Tristan

You make your way first along the roads. It's an easy walk, the sun is shining and perhaps a little too hot, but the fields are waves of golden wheat and it's a beautiful day. You pass a few late stragglers coming into town who wave and greet you warmly. This is a land and a people that ought to be prosperous and strong and you can feel that easily as you make your way down the road.

The first big turning is what's left of an overturned cart. It's not exactly hard to find, more like you can't miss it, but there's a big furrow in the grain leading out from it, so you have to cut into the fields there and trek through the stalks. They're not so thick here, you cut through this field for perhaps 15 minutes and come out the other side, where Nin has to stop and examine some fallow ground where the movement of the beast is still present but less obvious.

The second is when you realize that it cut back through another field and that it has been wending its way back and forth. Sometimes you come out into open space that might transition you into the forests if you were to hike for a few minutes, but every time it cuts back into the fields again.

After your third cutback, it's becoming increasingly obvious that this is going to take a while and the sun is already starting to dip towards the horizon. Gnats and little biting insects are beginning to come out as the sun moves towards twilight, and its as the horizon bathes the field in a grim red that you finally come upon the beast.

The beast seems to be a sort of giant...badger, more or less? You spot it just on the edge of a wheat field, chewing absent-minded on a few stalks almost as though it's cleaning its teeth. You're still in the field yourself and can hide easily, but it's visible from the crushed trail it has once again left. Its got to be ten times the size of a regular badger, with a body that isn't quite the same, broad hulking shoulders that make it look like it can stand on two legs and loom. But it's definitely got the right claws and there's a large fur strike along its back and the top of its head that, along with the shape of the snout puts you strongly in mind of a truly gigantic badger.

Tristan, this is close enough that you may consider yourself as encountering something unnatural and let fate see what insight comes to you, should you wish.

Constance

The ring of steel upon steel resounds through your ears! You lift your head from the cold stone, find yourself standing in the same narrow hallway, but before you at the corridor are a handful of knights arrayed in their armor and with shields held high. Before them, a vast number, a tide they cannot possibly stop though they will break and drown before they give an inch of ground. The defenders before you are arrayed in the forest green of Lostwithiel, the tabards over their mail emblazoned with white unicorns, the elite guard of the Duchess Marianne. The attackers are wearing black tabards with the silver dragon rampant upon them, the colors of King Uther Pendragon.

You hear a sudden sound behind you. The sword that you bear as your birthright is no longer yours! Down the hallway races a flamboyant fae not unlike yourself, his shoulder-length hair loose and flying behind him, wearing a cloak in black and silver, Uther's colors. Merlin, you know somehow, carrying your sword away from you, but for what reason you cannot divine.

You lean your head upon the stone in despair, and there is silence. When you lift it again, you are as you were, the hallway is empty, the distant sounds of the crowd barely reach you through these cool stones.

You'll be arriving to the tournament late, tell us how you make your embarrassed entrance to the seat of honor that the Duchess reserved for you at her right hand.

Robena

The tournament will take place on the green within the keep. Stands have been set up with great cloth banners above them. The Duchess Marianne sits at a place of honor. She is arrayed in a flowing dress of white linen with wide shoulders and a carefully embroidered set of delicate flowers all about the neckline. Her blond hair is styled high and she wears a small tiara studded with diamonds to mark her station. Her master of arms sits at her left, a dour young man with dark hair and a thick black beard that seems to be there to try and make him look older but instead makes him look to be drowning. Cerwen sits two seats down on her right and waives to you with a smile for all her oddness before. The seat for Constance at the Duchess' right hand is empty for the time being.

The Azure knight lives up to her name. Her tabard is a color just a shade deeper than the sky, and so too her saddle and her horse's blanket. Beneath it, she wears polished mail. It's obvious that she has maintained it with great care after her arrival from the road. Yet, there is something wrong, something deeply off about her nature. Her helm is closed and the visor is down even in her preparations and you can see naught of her face or hair. And around her there is an air of darkness. You might wonder whether her tabard truly is a different color than the sky or if it is merely the presence of the woman bringing it down. Where she steps upon the grass of the tournament grounds, it looks as though it wilts and will not spring back.

She ought to introduce herself as you begin the match, or at least to wait and hear your introduction. But whatever you do or say, it is as though she cannot hear you, so still is she as she sits upon her black destrier and awaits the signal for the first joust. You would think her frozen in time, save for the small white handkerchief at her waist with a golden cross upon it, fluttering in the breeze.

[The Azure knight has denied you your right to be known by your reputation though she ought to have heard of you because her curse prevents her from truly hearing or seeing you. Tell us how Robena reacts and then prepare to engage in single combat.]