Party

• Lee, Grey Elven Fighter 5, Magic-User 5, Thief 5 (~70k XP)
• Moya, Halfling Thief 7 (~47k XP)
• Oryn, High Elven Magic-User 5, Thief 6 (~73k XP)
  • Henchman Takeshi, Human Ranger 4 (~16k XP)
• Varda, Human Cleric 6 dual-classed into Magic-User 6 (~75k XP)
  • Henchman Rudy, Halfling Druid 3, Thief 4 (~12k XP)
• Vordt, Half-Ogre Cleric 4, Fighter 5 (~56k XP)

Looking over their map of the dungeon of the Temple, they realize there's a couple of rooms in the Water Cult's area that they never investigated, so they start by prioritizing those rooms. The first appears to be some kind of salon, for there are themed carpets, draperies, couches, serving dishes, and a... fishy-smelling incense burning. As they turn the room over, they find an embroidered cloak depicting a decapod sewn in with gold thread, among other things.

They entered from the east, and see a door heading south. Entering, they see a bedroom of sorts, with a writing desk, bronze chest, and an ornate trident hanging from the wall with a massive aquamarine set in it. Upon the desk is a tome that appears to be some rituals the Water Temple would engage in. Rudy notices and accidentally triggers a needle trap within the lock of the bronze chest, but is deftly able to avoid it (between being a druid, a halfling, having a ring of protection, and a high Dexterity, Rudy tends to pass poison saves on anything other than a 1). Well worth the risk, however, as in the chest was a coral box containing many small pearls.

Lee lifts the trident from the wall and then believes it to be a good idea to go for a swim. As a matter of fact, he must go submerge himself right now and begins to walk off. The party exchange quick glances and spring into action; Vordt blocks the door with his robust frame as Moya pulls out her rope of entanglement and commands it to hogtie Lee. After some discussion, the party resolves to finish exploring the last couple rooms and then leave to deal with Lee's presumed curse.

Back in the hall outside the first room, they move to the other door across from it, and it's locked. Moya is unable to pick it, but then Rudy comes along and gets it open. Within is a lounge furnished similarly to the salon, though (thankfully, some said) without the incense and with a desk covered in writing materials. They found a hidden compartment in the back of the desk's drawers containing a scroll with three cleric spells on it: resist fire, neutralize poison, and true seeing.

Similar to the salon, there is a door on the southern wall that they enter through, containing another bedroom. Flanking the bed are a couple of chests, which Moya and Rudy work on picking. Moya fails to pick her chest, while Rudy gets through theirs. Within Rudy's chest was a handful of platinum and a vial with liquid labeled as a potion of water breathing with two doses. Oryn attempted the chest Moya failed at, also failing. Rudy, confident in his ability to come in under the other two and succeed in their stead... also failed. Vordt approaches with a crowbar and pries the hinges off. Within are some books and miscellaneous treasure items.

Done exploring the second floor, they leave the Temple and drag Lee back to town to try and fix his curse. Most of the time he's spent tied up he's been begging the party to just let him take a quick swim, and he even suggested a few times they allow him to use the potion of water breathing. They tried a remove curse and dispel magic on him, but neither freed Lee from his compulsion to submerge himself in water, nor were they able to pry the trident from his hands. They try letting him enter a nearby pond and waiting a few moments before levitating him out, but this did not cure him either. Intending to enlist the help of more powerful clerics, the party packs up and gets ready to travel a couple of days to a nearby city; Vordt sits next to a hogtied Lee and begins to read the ritual tome they found in the Temple. By the end of the day, Vordt learned what the trident is, how the curse works, and how to remove it. It is a trident of yearning, and the curse is removed either via wish or by having some effect of water breathing put upon the affected while they are submerged.

The party reverses course back to town and, at about 2200, are standing near the pond, illuminated by many active continual lights. Varda enters the pond with Lee and allows him to submerge himself while supported. Varda quickly administers the potion of water breathing to Lee and then pulls him back above water as Lee roughly tosses the trident away from himself. They retrieve the trident with a grapnel and Rudy spends about a half hour carefully picking and prying at the gem with their tools, avoiding touching the trident itself, until they've pried the gem free. Oryn then tests whether the trident is still cursed. It is. Another dose later, Oryn is also fine. Unsure of how to dispose of the trident safely, they take it to the local temple of Rook (LG deity) and leave it with them.

All of that handled, the party returns to the Temple dungeon, intending to breach the third floor. They work their way down and enter into a room whose entire floor is coated in fertilizer and mushrooms of varying shapes, sizes, and colors. An armor-clad woman immediately calls out that they should stay still and check on their companions, as some of these fungal growths can cause insanity, and she begins making her way through a winding path towards Lee and Vordt, the ones who opened the door. Unbeknownst to them, Lee failed his resistance to charm, as well as the saving throw, against a charm person she wove into her words, though Vordt succeeded against a suggestion. The woman, glowing short sword drawn, attacks Lee from behind and lands a touch across his head, draining a point of Wisdom, breaking the charm on Lee. She then turns to Vordt and does the same, but between Vordt's retaliation and Moya's timely backstab, the true form of the lamia appears dead before them.

This is where we ended the session, with the date now being Rose 24; we'll pick back up there next week. Notable treasure: trident of yearning, potion of water breathing, a cleric scroll, and some miscellaneous high-value items. Gold shares were about 2.5k each.

What have you been watching and reading this week? You don't need to give us a whole essay if you don't want to, but please write something! Feel free to talk about something you saw that was cool, something that was bad, ask for recommendations, or anything else you can think of.

If you want to, feel free to find the thing you're talking about and link to its pages on Anilist, MAL, or any other database you use!

A mentor and friend of mine has lost his eyesight. I would like to share some music and musicians with him that he might enjoy listening to and help him fight boredom/ find comfort.

I know he likes jazz. I know he likes classical, but he is familiar with all of the obvious suggestions. He formed his musical taste before metal or rap/hiphop were popular. Melodic songs would be welcome.

I'm hoping that some people here can share tracks/records/musicians that he might not have found while he was busy with his career and not actively exploring music.

This is a recurring post to discuss programming or other technical projects that we've been working on. Tell us about one of your recent projects, either at work or personal projects. What's interesting about it? Are you having trouble with anything?

Our discussion at the end of October will cover The Poisoners Handbook. Are you making progress?

I found this nonfiction discussion of the New York City coroners office and the early days of effective forensic toxicology to be a real page turner. I started on the first and I finished it last week. I'm looking forward to our discussion, later this month.

Add awesome game deals to this topic as they come up over the course of the week!

Alternately, ask about a given game deal if you want the community’s opinions: e.g. “What games from this bundle are most worth my attention?”

Rules:

• No grey market sales
• No affiliate links

If posting a sale, it is strongly encouraged that you share why you think the available game/games are worthwhile.

All previous Save Point topics

If you don’t want to see threads in this series, add save point to your personal tag filters.

Update us on your progress so far!

• What did/didn't you get done this week?

• Anything go according to plan?

• Anything go off the rails?

• Any successes or struggles to share?

• Do you need feedback or help on anything?

This is your topic to share anything and everything you want about what you’ve made so far.

I don't have kids, but I'm wondering about success stories parents have had with raising theirs in this sometimes scary world. Online, we hear about brainrot and inappropriate Youtube videos, and social media horror stories, and some of that could be massively overblown, I have no idea

So to flip that around, what are some good ways people have found comfortable having their kids spend their time?

Hey all, some of you may remember me from several months back saying that my psychiatrist put me down as "Asperger's coded" and how I was unsure what that meant.

Well I had another appointment since then where she did say I was autistic but it was left open ended as to whether or not I was diagnosed. At least that's how I interpreted it.

So at today's appointment I just asked point blank if I was diagnosed. And she said not with autism spectrum disorder but with Asperger's syndrome via the ICD 10. Which is weird because I'm in America but whatever. I asked if that was a type of autism and she said according to the DSM V Asperger's was turned into ASD 1 (if I remember correctly) but I was diagnosed via the ICD 10.

So yeah all that to say is that I think it's finally fair to say I'm autistic. I'm not a fan of the word Asperger's so autistic is what I'm going with. Please correct me if I'm being offensive.

It only took 30 years. Though I didn't have to go through any major testing which makes me feel like an imposter. I just answered a few questions.

Ok, so my computer is starting to fail in a way I can't fix (never get an Alienware, folks. It's not easily user serviceable, and the parts are very specific to fit in the fancy case so you can't easily replace things when they fail,) and so I'm back on the market for something new. Given the impending forced transition to Windows 11, I'm thinking this is the right time to also switch from Windows to some Linux distro, so I can have all the fun of figuring out a new OS on new hardware.

Given that I'm stepping into unknown territory here, is there anything specific that the fine people of Tildes can suggest/advise/warn me about when it comes to getting a new computer with Linux? I know there's a bunch of different flavors of Linux, and most of the major computer brands seem to offer Ubuntu as a default OS if desired, but I'm just hoping y'all can help me avoid any really obvious pitfalls.

I use my PC for a combination of work and gaming, but the work is all entirely online, so Firefox is all I need on that end. I play a bunch of games, but from what I can see most games can be played in Linux these days?

I guess I'm mostly hoping to not get caught out by anything I don't know I don't know. Help?

What have you been doing lately for your own fitness? Try out any new programs or exercises? Have any questions for others about your training? Want to vent about poor behavior in the gym? Started a new diet or have a new recipe you want to share? Anything else health and wellness related?

Tildes is a very serious site, where we discuss very serious matters like feudalism.techno, gmail and the oatmeal. Tags culled from the highest voted topics from the last seven days, if anyone was truly bamboozled.

But one of my favourite tags happens to be offbeat! Taking its original inspiration from Sir Nils Olav III, this thread is looking for any far-fetched offbeat stories lurking in the newspapers. It may not deserve its own post, but it deserves a wider audience!

What have you been listening to this week? You don't need to do a 6000 word review if you don't want to, but please write something! If you've just picked up some music, please update on that as well, we'd love to see your hauls :)

Feel free to give recs or discuss anything about each others' listening habits.

You can make a chart if you use last.fm:

http://www.tapmusic.net/lastfm/

Remember that linking directly to your image will update with your future listening, make sure to reupload to somewhere like imgur if you'd like it to remain what you have at the time of posting.