CoE3 AAR: A Chronicle of the Interregnum

[Edi]

I lost a couple of spearmen and some longdead on my assault on the wraith and its minions. Of my original contingent of spearmen, I have only four left with my army. Two more are guarding the citadel and I shall send these veterans with Manvale when I meet him. They deserve that much, especially after standing up to the wraith without flinching.

The battlefield was just as rich in pickings as I thought:



There is a strong presence of the dead here, which allows me to substantially increase the size of my army. Right then...





I feel a little shaken after reanimating these minions and I must at all costs avoid the need to have to do so again. However, now my forces are significantly bolstered and I can eradicate the annoying nuisances that have made administering my holdings and trying to get anywhere an exercise in frustration.

And very soon now I will have enough hands of glory to summon a powerful ally, which should make things much easier.

However, everything is not well, at all. Pantariste is dead.




A barbarian horde has invaded her lands from the south or southeast and what remains of her holdings are meager indeed. What with the brigands, hostile wildlife and constant harassment by Bakemono and the dwarven allies of the late Commius the Druid, she had no resources to stave off another well organized enemy.

Pantariste herself fell guarding the stone tower she had captured from an unaligned lord, though she did manage to slay all but one of the barbarian attackers. Small comfort, since that force comprised only a third of the invading horde. I only got the news later. Pantariste's apprentice Andromedeia is the only leader the Androphags have left and her troops are few.



The other troops my ally has left are concentrated to the defense of her forest tower.




The barbarians are lead by the chief who gathered the horde in the first place, Jordanes, a battle scarred veteran of many a vicious skirmish. One could almost call him crippled...




This force is moving on Andromedeia and when they catch her, she will die. Were she a full Witch and knew the right kind of spells, she could at least hurt them severely, but as things stand, her fate is already sealed.

And if Jordanes and his warriors are not enough, his second in command, leader of the barbarian horse, is on the move with more troops.





Huml and his men are moving to assault the forest tower. I fear I am soon to lose my ally while facing one intact alliance and the survivors of two more. If I do not manage to gather more powerful forces quickly, my prospects are bleak indeed.

[Edi]

After my successful summoning of the longdead at the battlefield, I retook possession of the mine where the colossus slew the monsters two years ago. I also spotted the band of brigands again, they were still in the hamlet and they would be the next to feel my wrath. The Colossus has discovered the lair of these ne'er-do-wells and as soon as time permits, I will eradicate that nest of trouble.





The brigands fled north before me, to the farm they had looted. My undead butchered some deer that got in our way as we took possession of the hamlet and prepared to pursue the outlaws. However, by fortuitous coincidence, it seems that the brigand threat is no more, for those jungle-born savages that the Colossus saw earlier had passed north but were coming back to take my holdings and they seem to have run headlong into the brigands.

I love being able to kill two birds with one stone and this if anything qualifies. First my enemy takes care of a nuisance that could have cost me troops and weakens himself in the process. And offers himself up for being eliminated at the same time. I love it when a plan comes together!

The only cloud in front of the silver lining here is that I don't have enough funds to hire the apprentice who came begging for employment. I didn't even know there were others of my order left after Childerik's dead, but apparently some texts have survived in secret and there may be neophyte practicioners seeking to learn from a master.


I attacked the jungle savages and in the first charge I lost some of my longdead to the spells of the undead spirit and the toad-like warriors. The leader of the enemy is some kind of priest and he invoked the favor of his gods for his soldiers.




Little good it did him, for despite taking a few more losses, my troops cut his forces down. I was not about to take any chances with that strange woman spirit, so I dealt with it once and for all in the most expedient manner: Bane fire.




The priest in the fancy headdress was the last to go down. He fell to a hail of crossbow bolts and that was that. Unfortunately only one of my spearmen survived the battle, but such are the vagaries of war.

Elsewhere Manvale took the garrison troops out of the citadel to deal with a gigantic preying mantis that had appeared to terrorize the farmers. Apparently winter drove it out of the forest to the plains to seek out prey.




The creature was swiftly dispatched, with Manvale himself striking the fatal blow.

Now I face the tedious task of once more establishing myself in the south. The ethereal spirits roaming the countryside are wreaking havoc with my holdings, so I'm going to station my soulless in the farms and hamlets to take care of such nuisances. The undead are immune to the life-sapping cold of the spirits, which means that they will be able to dispatch any such incursions with ease.

[Edi]

I have no left garrisons of soulless at the hamlet and farm near the colossal base, since the Colossus cannot be relied on to keep watch. I had just managed to retake the coal mine after a dispossessed spirit scared all the workers away and was in the process of tidying things up when the scout alerted me and the undead back to the surface.

At first I had no idea what he was about as he pointed out across the plain toward the Capitol ruins. Then I raised my eyes up from the ground level.





Whatever those things are, they grow from the same twisted root as all the other things I have seen in that benighted place. As they drifted across the plains, it became clear that they were quite large and nothing to dismiss lightly.





However, monsters or not, I have for some time now had enough hands of glory for a more powerful summoning, and I refuse to put it off any longer! It will take those floating things time to arrive and so I made preparations for my ritual.

There is a precise configuration to the patterns one must place the hands of glory, each holding a candle made from corpse fat. A precise order in which to light the candles that will then burn down and ignite the hands in their turn while the summoning incantation is recited.

The preparations took the better part of a week and checking that everything was in order required more time. Finally, the time arrived. As night fell and darkness shrouded the land, my undead servants took positions around my circle while I lit the candles and began chanting.

An hour passed as the candles burned down, then two. Then, in sequence, they burned down to the stubs and the flames ignited the hands, calling the spirits of the Netherworld to do my bidding, to bring me allies. A chill wind blew, laden with the whispers from beyond, then stilled. Followed by... Silence.

The hands of glory were consumed, nothing remaining but blackened outlines on the ground, were there but light to see it, yet there was not, for the night was moonless and overcast. Darkness deep enough not to see your hand in front of your face, the only light coming from the torches at the entrance of the mine some distance away. Silence quiet as a tomb, no sound of nightbirds or anything else. As if the world were dead.

It was faint at first, the sound, coming up from the dark plains. A rhythmic, staccato tapping. It grew to a pounding beat against the ground, accompanied by the jingle of harness and armor. The thundering gallop approached closer and closer, up the road toward the mine then past the entrance and a looming patch of darkness obscured the lights.

The horseman reined in outside the patterned circle of burnt hands, then vaulted off the massive charger. The bulk of heavy armor in outline, a faint suggestion of a horned helmet could be seen against the gleam of torches, a gleam of cerulean pinpoints behind the visor. The warrior stood in silence for a long moment.

Then he knelt, bowed his head and spoke, in a voice hollow with death: "Master. I am Cernetu and I have come to serve."





We spoke of the plans to come long into the small hours of the night, in the light of a banefire kindled in the circle by my art. With the light of dawn, the scout and the remaining spearman ventured outside with the mine workers. One could see them struggle to overcome the urge to run in the opposite direction. Finally their courage and knowledge of my high regard for them won out. It was a different story with the mine workers. I doubt they will peek so much as an eyelash out before we are long gone from here.

It is now time to remove the danger of those floating things. With Cernetu at my side, it will be far less costly than it would otherwise be.

[Edi]

The floating horrors were slain with ease with Cernetu's help. It was a pleasure to watch him wield bane fire against the things, though I am annoyed at the losses they inflicted on the longdead.

Once that threat was eliminated, we parted ways. Cernetu will go south to eradicate the brigand lair and rejoin me later. That black charger of his can move much faster than anything on foot.

At the cusp of summer, as spring was fading, the Colossus once more called my attention to its location, this time east of its pedestal.





It appears that the brigands I thought my rival had eliminated had instead escaped and are still a menace and the Colossus blundered into the midst of their camp on the plain.

I left the giant to deal with these vermin on its own, but soon my stone servant called my attention back with insistent force, accompanied by an unfamiliar note: Distress!

I linked with the statue just in time to receive an impression of resignation and failure. I felt the Colossus lose balance as its foot detached from the statue and the ground rushed forward. Impact...and the link that had been there for these years was...gone.

Somehow these outlaws found a way to harm it and the Colossus is no more. It's ruined body lies on the plain less than a week's travel from the base on which it had stood for centuries beyond counting.





I was not far north when this happened, at the site of the hamlet where that feathered priest met his end. We spotted the campfires of the brigands to the southeast and there are not quite as many left as there were before.





Soon there will be none left alive. If there is a way to snuff out their souls after death, that is what I will do to them!

There would be an opportunity to reanimate more troops at this site, but I dare not do it at this time. It is time to focus the increase of my troops on summons. Cernetu, being an accomplished necromancer on his own, can reanimate things in an emergency and he will do so on his return from the south if it is necessary.

[Edi]

It is the middle of summer and right now things are looking well. Cernetu has taken control of the brigand lair. His return route swings him out east past a lake to get him out of the forest and explore the surrounding environs.

He encountered a band of brigands on his way.





They obviously thought to ambush a lone knight and claim his equipment and horse, but bit off slightly more than they could chew.. It seems the woods down south are positively lousy with brigands.

I also found another apprentice looking for work and this time I had the funds to hire him, even though it emptied the treasury. Then again, it was 74 gold coins well spent. Now I can have him make full use of the remains of the various large battles in and around my territory.

[Edi]

Most of late summer was spent eradicating pests. I slew two bands of brigand stragglers between midsummer and autumn and Cernetu himself ran into another large band of brigands.



He had already been wounded in the first battle and a group of nearly a dozen brigands attacked him from ambush. After slaying three, he managed to disengage long enough to call a band of longdead to his aid. The first few were cut down by the brigands but bought Cernetu time to call more and after that the result of the battle was a foregone conclusion. In the space of two months, Cernetu has singlehandedly slain 14 brigands and outlaws.

However, he needs at least the entire autumn to heal from his injuries. Tough he may be, but not invulnerable. More's the pity...





The soulless I left defending the hamlet out west came under attack by more horrors like the ones we slew on the plain.



Fortunately, they prevailed with the loss of but one. However, being animated undead, soulless lack healing powers and their injuries are permanent. That group is in sad shape and needs reinforcements.


The beginning of autumn also brings with it a surfeit of frustration:



Having just hired a new apprentice, there is nothing but a gaping hole where my treasury used to be and THEN comes a wizard, hat in hand, asking if I have work for him. Yes, yes I bloody well do! Only not quite enough funds to pay him up front and the bastard doesn't accept payment in several installments!



It's especially aggravating, since wizards of the Golden Order usually don't have anything good to say about those of my discipline, so I would dearly have loved to have him as part of my staff. They are very useful and Manvale could have used some help.

(In this recruitment preview, the stats of the wizard can be seen, but his magic and item slots are obscured, since wizards do not reveal their secrets to anyone but those who hire them, nor do they advertise what treasures they may carry. This prevent min/maxing on the basis of what spells a wizard for hire may have and forces a serious consideration of whether to take advantage of an offer. Assuming one has the funds in the first place. Wizards often carry items and quite a few times the item may be more valuable than the wizard himself, depending on the circumstances.)



There was also another scruffy goblin chieftain and his band of archers, who while useful, were given short shrift when there was the wizard to negotiate with.

(The goblin archers appear in green because they are mercenaries who appear along with the chieftain. Mercenaries may only be recruited once, like commanders, even if you have several citadels. Once recruited, they disappear from the list.)


I have planned a rendezvous with Manvale and Cernetu and Mavale is on his way. With all the various wildlife and brigands nearby exterminated, he should be safe enough on his own for this little stretch. Cernetu has taken refuge at a mountain where he can enjoy the advantage of defensive terrain if something should be foolish enough to attack him.

[Edi]

I finally managed to meet with Manvale and take possession of the spell scroll he had. There were two spells inscribed on it, an apprentice level incantation and another, more powerful one. I have now mastered both. The first spell was meager and useless spell for summoning a single soulless in combat. The second...




Soul Vortex is a more powerful version of Life Drain and quite, quite useful in battle, far more so than many other spells in the Necromantic school, even though those others are nothing to roll one's eyes at either. I pronounce myself quite delighted with this turn of events!

Also, it seems like with winter once more in the offing, the middle of autumn sees everyone and their dog scrambling to find shelter. I got two more offers of service, but once more, my treasury hold not nearly enough.




Not sure how much use a Hedge Wizard would be. Their magic has great variety and little focus, though they can provide one with a nasty surprise on occasion.

The assassin, on the other hand, him I would very much like to hire, but the cost is prohibitive. A pity, because I would have found very, very many things for him to do.




(Assassins work as part of a regular army, but their assassination weapons are used at the start of combat before any other attacks take place. The only things that work before assassination are prebattle effects, which only things like demon lords and such possess. The strikes rear attribute means that the attack is made on a random target in the rearmost row of the enemy army, so it is quite possible to kill an enemy mage. Especially if there are no other things in the rearmost row.)


However, there has been a most annoying setback. Apparently Cernetu didn't manage to eradicate every brigand from the south, since someone has retaken the brigand lair and I expect that sooner or later we will see more of them making a nuisance of themselves.