Tritherion's Fist: Liberator of the Jeklea |
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chatdemon writes "On Oerth, it's often the least likely candidates who become heroes, and in this case, that applies even to a ship. This former slave ship and her crew prowl the waters of the Jeklea Bay region, fighting an endless war against slave traders and agents of the Scarlet Brotherhood. Included exclusively on Canonfire! are the complete D20 compatible stats for the ship!
By: chatdemon
Tritherion's Fist: Liberator of the Jeklea
Author: chatdemon (chatdemon@hotmail.com)
(Used with permission. Do not repost or redistribute without the express permission of the author.)
Built in 574 in the port of Toli, Tritherion's Fist has seen almost 20 years of service. Originally christened as the Whipping Maiden, this sturdy ship saw use in its first decade as a slave ship, ferrying its grim cargoes from small harbors along the Amedio coast to lawless ports such as Toli, Monmurg and Blue. Her captain, Morgan Flurisk, made a name for himself among his buccaneer peers in the realms of the Sea Princes through his ruthless reputation and his timely delivery of high quality cargoes.
Captured by the Scarlet Brotherhood's navy in 583, the ship was beached on the sandy shores near Monmurg and refitted, to be returned to her dark tasks early the next year. Her Scarlet Brotherhood captain, Thorval Stanch, was amused by the ship's name, and kept it. With the ship now equipped for longer voyages, he made over a dozens voyages along the Amedio coast, out through the Olman islands and onward to the Brotherhood's forts along the Hepmonaland coast, transporting slave troops from the breeding camps there back to the Sea Princes lands to aid the Brotherhood's campaigns there.It was on the return leg of his 12th voyage, in the summer of 587, that Captain Stanch made the mistake of dropping anchor in the harbor of the town of Luscanport after a vicious hurricane battered his ship. Stanch realized that he would find no friendly quarter in the Keoish aligned port, but he didn't expect to meet the likes of Adner Valthin, an experienced seaman from Gradsul and devout follower of Tritherion who had spent the last 35 years of his life in service to the Royal Navy of Keoland, battling the Sea Princes' slavers in the Jeklea region.
Backed by a mob of Olman and Amedi ex-slaves, Valthin attacked the ship under cover of darkness, slaughtering her crew, freeing her cargo of slaves and sentencing her captain to the traditional punishment given slaveship captains by the Royal Navy, a swim in the harbor while tied to a sea chest filled with rocks and sand. Valthin had intended to then sail the ship out into the open waters of the Jeklea bay, but upon seeing the sterling upkeep of the vessel, along with the repairs and modifications given her by the Brotherhood, he envisioned a new life for himself as a vigilante of the seas. After removing the cells and shackles from her hold, Valthin spent the funds gained from selling the tavern he had run in Luscanport since his retirement 2 years prior to have the ship's damage, taken during the hurricane, repaired and commission new sails for her.
Valthin rechristened the ship in the name of Tritherion, calling her Tritherion's Fist and dedicating himself and his ship to the duty of preying on the vessels of the Scarlet Brothers and the few independant slavers operating in the region. He spent the next year recruiting and training a crew of 70 (the standard crew of 60 for this type of ship, plus a contingent of 10 well trained archers). In the summer of 588, he sailed forth from Luscanport amid much naysaying and warning from the locals who claimed he was crazy to test teh might of the Scarlet Brothers.
Valthin's success has been extraordinay however. He and his crew are responsible for a score of confirmed victories over the Brotherhood's slaveships, and almost a dozen triumphs over non-Brotherhood slavers. He has freed nearly 300 slaves, depostiting them in Luscanport to seek their fortunes as free men, and humbly given half of his substantial non-slave plunder over to the now thriving church of Tritherion, The Jungle's Open Arms in Luscanport, keeping the rest to pay his crew and save for his retirement.
In the late autumn of 590, Valthin braved the dangerous waters of the Azure sea, making an almost suicidal run to Gradsul to bring news of the situation in Luscanport to Duke Luschan. On the 8th day of Sunsebb of that year, Captain Valthin and his crew sailed into Gradsul's harbor, proudly flying the colors of both the Throne of the Lion and the Duchy of Gradsul beneath his own banner, a grinning white skull on a black field, clenching a set of broken manacles between its teeth atop a pair of crossed tridents. The ship and her crew were given a hero's welcome in the bustling Keoish port city, prompting a visit from King Kimbertos himself in their honor. At the King's bequest, and with funds from his coffers, the ship was refitted, with state of the art Keoish heavy ballistae replacing the aging catapults on her decks and a crow's nest added atop her main mast. The guild of Sea Mages in Gradsul appointed one of their own as the ship's mage, and in the spring of 591, Valthin sailed south again, now officially endorsed as a privateer in service to the kingdom.
Tragedy befell Valthin and his crew in the summer of that year. After suffering a crippling loss at the hands of a Brotherhood warship he mistook for a slaveship, Valthin was forced to give half his crew, including his ship's mage, burials at sea and nurse his ship ashore along the Amedio coast, roughly 100 miles south of his homeport of Luscanport. While what was left of his weary crew tended to the repairs on the ship, Valthin and a handful of his officers hiked north along the beach, coming to the tiny village of Coralleaf (named for the large mass of petrified coral that protrudes from the shallow waters here, appearing at a distance to be an extension of the massive jungle). It was in Coralleaf, a fishing village that is home to around 100 Olman primitives and a few dozen shore dwelling Sea Elves, that Valthin met Aerin Seadancer, a young but talented girl of half Amedi and half Sea Elf blood whose reputation in town for her mastery of the magic of the sea and the weather was unrivaled. Aerin became enchanted with Valthin's tales of valiantly battling the Scarlet scourge, and when it came time for he and his men to return to their ship with the supplies they had bartered for, Aerin offered to go with them, replacing the lost ship's mage as part of the crew. Valthin now brags in Luscanport about the fact that since taking Aerin abord, his ship has yet to lose a man, or a battle, in the half dozen voyages he's made in the year since.
The crew of the Fist (as she is fondly known by her crew and the natives of Luscanport) are treated as heroes in their hometown, and Valthin and Aerin have achieved an almost legendary status in the tavern tales of the small city. As he is fond of saying, he may be nearing his 50th summer, but his mage is young and loyal (though not romantically involved with her captain, that 'honor' goes to Tobin, the ship's cook, oddly enough), and his crew is valiant and seasoned, so the Fist isn't done writing her page in the ship's log of history.
Tritherion's Fist
Gargantuan Ship (Slave Ship)
Propulsion: Large Sail, Small Sail, Oars
Speed: 35 ft. (sails), 30 ft. (oars)
Crew: 60, plus 10 archers
Cargo: 150 tons
Hull:
Armor Class: 5
Hardness: 7
Hit Points: 50 (per 5 foot square area)
Deck:
Armor Class: 5
Hardness: 5
Hit Points: 20 (per 5 foot square area)
Main Mast
Armor Class: 5
Hardness: 5
Hit Points: 300
Secondary mast
Armor Class: 5
Hardness: 5
Hit Points: 50
Weapons:4 Ballistae, 8 Heavy crossbows (mounted on the railing along the deck)
Ship Qualities: Oceanworthy, Tough old Girl
The stats for this vessel are derived from The Seafarer's Handbook (2002, Fantasy Flight Games), and I recommend that volume to anyone wishing to seriously introduce naval combat into their game. The stats are fairly self explanatory though, being derived from the standard 3e/d20 rules for movement and combat (attacking objects), so they should prove useful even to those who do not have access to that book.
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Average Score: 4.22
Votes: 9
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