So for those of you who watch  Bismarck you might have been seeing his Pathfinder Shenanigans coming up, talking about his experiences playing and running games of Pathfinder. I'm going to be stealing that this week though; the game in question is the one he's running and I'm participating in, and the results of this weeks particular game pretty much fall squarely on me. And no, not in a good way. Anyway, here's what happened:

A Tale of Caution

So here's the set up: the party is comprised of a ranger with a bit too much of a libido, a psionic wilder with a knack for exploding the heads of his foes, a fighter who wields a giant hammer with incredible destructive efficiency, a dwarven cleric who's as good at providing buffs as he is at holding his ale, and me, a rogue socialite who can manipulate his way out of almost any corner. The group is in the center of the major trade center of the continent, which has hundreds of different businesses and dozens of merchant houses vying for power and wealth. The most coveted position in the nation is a seat on the merchant council, where the heads of the houses - or princes - legislate the goings on in the city. One of the new candidates for a seat is a merchant house specializing in slaving, and the group is hired to make sure that they do NOT succeed.

Fortunately, we've got an 'in' to be able to get inside of the houses'.... house/palace/headquarters/whatever. There's a party one night, where many slavers, merchants and mercenaries are invited to talk business and collaborate with the head of the house. Our group was given invitations, and after a couple days of legwork, spying, forgery and planning, we feel ready to go inside and attempt to find the houses' weakness (and enjoy a party with some booze in the process).

The night starts off rather well. Everyone gets into the party without incident, and the group splits up to meet with the guests and learn more about the place. And also to drink, which has some amusing side effects of its own. After a few minutes of conversation (and one trip to the wash room to clean my mouth of the overly powerful liquor). I discover the location of the bedroom of the head of the house.

On the way to check out the door, I run into a woman who makes an off-handed remark about my identity as a kitsune, which until that point had been a total secret even to the rest of the party. She passes by rather quickly though, so I ignore her and examine the door to the masters' chambers. Finding the area to be clear, I take the moment to turn invisible, sneak up to the door and make relatively quick work of the lock. Excited to make long awaited use of my more stealthy skills, I open the door and make my way inside.

In my haste, I do not check for any traps on the door.

In a burst, an explosion of flame bellows from the door and towards me and two of my companions. Fortunately, I manage to dodge the blast while the other two, although they take damage, are still in decent condition. However, the guards are now full alert, and one of them ends up running right into me, discovering my existence in spite of my invisible state. Instead of engaging him though, I turn and run, figuring that I can hide for a moment, then rejoin the party in the main hall and pretend to have had no involvement in the break-in. And to my astonishment, it almost works. With amazing stealth checks, I manage to weave between all the guards, making my way back to the main room, laying on the ground, breaking my invisibility, and intending to feign innocence.

Remember that woman I mentioned a few paragraphs or so ago? She takes this particular moment to offer her services to the guards. She feels absolutely sure that it must be the Kitsune fellow that she saw before, and immediately casts magic to point me out. And like that, almost all of my work at returning to the party unnoticed is destroyed. Still, I manage to tell a convincing enough lie to remove some of the suspicion, buying me some extra minutes before a wizard comes to force the truth out of me.

However, it is at that point that the last disastrous thing of the evening occurs. The giant hammer that the fighter was carrying, which was invisible as to not draw too much attention, loses its invisible quality and is now visible to all of the highly alert guards. Resigned to no other options, the fighter draws the weapon, and mostly kills one guard and the woman from before. It was at that point that the session had to end.

Here are the lessons that can be gained from this story:

1. Always be more paranoid and careful than you should need to be. In my haste to try to get through the mission quickly, I did not think to check for all of the possible dangers. Because of a single roll I forgot to do, a single step I forgot to take, the entire session was derailed and what was supposed to be a nice and relaxed roleplaying session turned into a set-up for a fight for survival. Just a little lack of caution was enough to completely change the game, and there's a chance that both I and my entire party will not make it out alive. Also...

2. Sometimes, the best work in the world can be overturned by one stupid bitch. Earlier when I was initially evading the guards, my stealth ability felt completely divine. For as nerve-wracking as it was to avoid all of those enemies, I felt that i actually had some kind of chance to turn my luck completely around. However, that one woman came in and completely ruined everything, pointing to the guards my likely involvement and continuing to insist that I was guilty even after I had lowered their suspicions. While I might not have gotten out scott-free if it weren't for her, I would definitely be having a much easier time of it than I am now.

Next session, the group will be trying to fight/escape from the party now gone horribly wrong, and hopefully we'll be able to escape with most, if not all of our lives. Hopefully, you'll be seeing more of these stories in the future. Until then, see ya, and thanks for reading!