Plot Summaries, May to November '00

Love & Money

5th May '00 (1st week Trinity) - Chris R
Alexandria Profundis, Aspen Greyve, Chaff, Galen, Potter & Tharg
A party of adventurers was hired by The Temple to collect a cask of potion from the village of Cantor and carry it to South Bastion, as part of The Temple's convoluted plans to abuse their Guild Head, Alderman Kurt Zelchew (whom they do not like). The party was intercepted by bandits who eventually stole the potion, but not until after Aspen and Galen had been secretly instructed to steal the potion themselves for the Scout's Guild.
The party was later divided in a fairly random encounter with some magick mushrooms, after which Chaff was kidnapped by the Drow and Alexandria and Aspen ventured down into the Drow kingdom to rescue her, where the three of them were given their freedom and guided to South Bastion in exchange for promising to steal for the Drow the Breastplate of Lucia, which was in the custody of the Lorewarden's Guild.
Alexandria, Aspen and Chaff then went to South Bastion, beat up some drunken taverngoers who were trying to pick a fight, managed to track down the bandits who'd stolen the potion, fetched some reinforcements from the South bastion branch of the Scout's Guild to watch their backs, beat up some of the bandits, and stole the potion back from the alchymyst who was in the middle of identifying it for the bandits. They then took the potion to the South Bastion branch of the Scout's Guild, where they lay low for a bit until they could be smuggled back to Outpost.
Meanwhile, the other half of the party (Galen, Potter and Tharg) had been busy burning down and looting a Liasha village, having an argument and fight with the South Bastion gate guards, and other such antics. The two halves of the party never were reunited!

Selwyn & Masrik

19th May '00 (3rd week Trinity) - Huw G
Aspen Greyve, Barnabus the Bard, Elise, Silus of Wittering & Tharg
The party were hired by Duke Selwyn of Tarnsville to find some of his stuff which had been stolen by wood elves in the nearby forest. After stealing a magick ring from a random pickpocket in the tavern and meetings with some bandits and a group of bear-hunters, the party entered the forest, where there was a great deal of trouble with a bad tempered giant bear which half the party and the bear hunters wanted to kill and the other half of the party and a druid wanted to save.
Eventually the party found the wood elves (after some faffing), who demanded they hand over their weapons and go before the elven king. Some of the party refused and attacked the elves, while the rest stood by and watched, whereupon the recalcitrant ones had their weapons warped into uselessness and were entangled and incarcerated with the help of a druid.
They were judged by the king, who revealed that Duke Selwyn was none other than Masrik, one of the evil Knights of the Ariadæ Loren, and that the stuff he had asked them to steal was a ring of mind control which he had been using to manipulate the people of Tarnsville and the elves had taken for the good of all, and the artefact which contained the power of the heart of the wood-elven forest. The king allowed them to leave in return for their promise to slay Masrik / Selwyn.
The party returned to Tarnsville, but on the way Masrik appeared and attacked them with undead and simulacrums of themselves and powerful theurgy before vanishing again. Barnabus and Elise were poisoned and carried to South Bastion, where a priest was fetched to help them - unfortunately this priest turned out to be Masrik in disguise, who ensorcelled Barnabus and Elise so that they recovered and attacked the rest of the party. They were both subdued, but not before the Tarnsville Watch were called in. Everyone was taken to the Watch House, where Masrik turned up and Tharg killed him... or did he?
Masrik seemed unworried at losing limbs and the propsect of being killed, and Silus claimed to have seen Masrik's spirit pass into Elise and Barnabus as he died.

Light & Darkness

2nd June '00 (5th week Trinity) - Matt M
? - Casimir, Galen, Rayvn Hauk, Sali Yat (and 1+ other(s)?)
The party were asked to investigate werewolves who had been raiding Nocturne. They went into Nocturne and found a madhouse whose doctor pointed them towards a church of The One God, where some strange stuff had been going on. Unbeknownst to the party, the church had been taken over by disguised dogmen. They arrived at the church, where the priest told them that he had seen some strange stuff in a cave nearby. He led them to the cave where they found a portal into a shadow Material Plane realm.
In the shadow realm, the party encountered many dogmen - creatures native to the shadow realm - and saw in the distance an area of great light. They were chased off by the dog creatures and many other shadowy type things, but were saved by some Scouts from a city in an area known as Lanturne, Nocturne's counterpart in the shadow realm.
The people of Lanturne gave several of the party mysterious swords of strange white metal, which seemed oddly similar to blackalt, and then returned them to Nocturne, from whence they returned to Outpost.

The Breastplate of Lucia

16th June '00 (7th week Trinity) - Dan S & Becky A
Aspen Greyve, Bob, Rayvn Hauk & Sali Yat
The Breastplate of Lucia is an ancient artifact which had contained the soul of the Drow Lucia, High Priestess of the Drow god of War many centuries ago. It was in the possession of the Lorewarden's Guild, but it had the power to animate the bodies of nearby dead, and so the Guild wanted rid of it.
The party were asked to meet a priest of The One God in Nocturne and escort him to a ritual site deep within Nocturne with the Breastplate so that the Breastplate could be destroyed and Lucia's spirit could be banished. On the way they encountered two warring tribes of goblins, the Tattered Hats and the Nightwinds.
Finally they reached the ancient ruined Temple of Kohalis where the ritual was to take place, fought their way through hordes of undead, were given a scroll and some cryptic warnings by the ghost of an ancient priest and fought off more hordes of undead while the priest began the ritual.
However, the priest revealed himself as a disguised Drow agent, Sali Yat was revealed as having been poisoned by the priest and replaced by a doppelganger earlier in the temple, and the priest perverted the ritual to summon Lucia and a dæmon instead. Rayvn Hauk used the scroll the ghost had given him to summon Lucia's long-dead brother, Dracus Rahl, who had been the one to trap her soul in the Breastplate in the first place. Rahl was able to slay the dæmon and undead and drive off Lucia, who fled into Nocturne. Then Dracus Rahl healed the party members on the brink of death and left, leaving the party to go back to Outpost and admit their cock-up.

The Poisoned Web

14th July '00 (summer vacation) - Serrændipiti
Elise, Galen & Tharg
The three adventurers were hired by the Merchant's Guild to investigate the spate of recent caravan attacks.