Analysis of the letter

I should probably note that this incident took place before we'd had any significant dealings with the West, much less met up with Derdriu or Cambra.

SY: Hey cool! Do we get extra points for hunteds??? :)

EJG: You wish!

SY: Surprising. Most of the types of teams we deal with wouldn't put up with et al. Interesting that only 2 are mentioned.

EJG: Adventuring teams can't all be insanely egotistical...or they could be like us, with different members acting as contacts with different people/orgs. (I could picture something from Minella being addressed to "Tremere et al.") Or, if these are lawful types, DW and FW are in command, so anyone else is "et al".

SY: Warning sounds weird. Suggests that these people are G of some type. Probably western since it's Snickersnake sending them after us.

EJG: Or at least that Snickersnake is worried about them finding out something we might tell them. (And I assume you mean good rather than something else :)

SY: Is this common custom in the west? Could it be an eastern adventuring team? Seems unlikely.

EJG: Two reasons for decapitation: makes it harder to bring us back after we've been killed, and (our personal favorite) you need the heads if you want to talk to us later.

SY: Random communication bullshit.

SY: Interesting. She must know Thorongil's name. Maybe we will recognize someone in this party, or at least Thorongil will (fighter buddy?). If we can get a minute, we might be able to use that.

EJG: Maybe another reason SS doesn't want them talking to us.

SY: Tblade - primary fighter. Hack'n'slash fighter, magic weapon (sonic attack? lightning? [based on guess Thunderblade]) Not fire.

EJG: Backstabbing with magical fire? We want that item...

SY: That's the weird part. Not a strictly LG party, maybe CG? Uses thieves anyway. Possibly a mage, possibly an item (more likely a mage as fireball/ flamearrow + slow is indicated)

This fighter/mage is an active spellcaster with a large repertoire of available spells. Recover the books at all costs.

SY: Greedy slimebuckets. ;)

SY: How long has G had Alyssia? In any case she seems to make a lot of noise during combat so this is not surprising.

EJG: G has had Elissa for about 8 or 9 months (she almost blew him up on 446, which was early in their relationship). And no, she's not exactly low profile.

SY: Not a lot of mage spells based off WIS. Probably priest, charm sphere.

EJG: Also, most protection items are abjuration, so they reasonably expect G to have normal saves (though fighter/mage saves aren't that bad to begin with).

SY: Interesting idea, but not very suggestive. "Stacked maneuvers" unclear.

EJG: Stacking in general refers to combining multiple spells or abilities into a powerful effect; an example would be pouring gobs of nasty touch spells into a spectral hand and then attacking with them all at once. The good side is that when it connects, it blows the target away; the down side is that if it fails, you're tapped. (In the spectral hand example, the earlier precasts might start going down before the thing connected.) I get the impression that Snickersnake's advice is to hit G with a lot of different attacks, some of which will succeed, than to put everything into one big attack which can piffle. She could also be warning them to watch for stacked attacks from G; in this case, stacking would refer to G's method of integrating his mage and fighter skills into his attack (such as combining a dwarven fighter-type item, a bunch of spells [fly, enchanted weapon, strength, detect invis (ethereal), wraithform], a funky sword, and 7th level fighterhood to blow night hags back to Hades).

SY: RO? Suggestions?

EJG: Red One. And nascent rather than dormant...interesting. (G didn't seem to pick up any supernatural powers fighting the balor...)

SY: Streck?

EJG: Could be; Pinnacle fits both Streck's image of himself and his mountain digs (and I could see him wanting to take G alive rather than dead these days). Still, the comma after "beware" seems to indicate that Pinnacle's interest in live capture is related to G being a Red One; how would that relate to Streck? (Or else Snickersnake doesn't write as well as G does. :)

High priestess,

SY: Not any more.

SY: Gee, she doesn't like you, does she? :)

SY: True, but obvious by class & level

SY: At least they've learned something.

SY: Correct.

SY: Incorrect. Ambush on way to temple, or have a big enough ambush to include Clynthia. If these guys are good, playing off of temple association might help. I doubt we would expect to make it to the forest in such a situation.

EJG: Snickersnake probably doesn't want them knowing about our connection to the temple, which precludes mentioning Clythnia.

SY: Interesting, no name again.

EJG: He's an et al.

SY: What's Stealth's level in mage? I thought he had 7th level spells? How does that translate as minor?

EJG: Stealth is still 6th level in mage, and his bag of mage tricks (and fighter/mage tricks) doesn't run as deep as G's. (Stealth uses his bow skills with Melf's and flame arrow, but otherwise basically acts either as an archer or as a mage.)

EJG: Correct -- keep him from sniping.

SY: I've always found this point to be unclear. I assume it's based on low HP, but a lot of most battles is spent keeping St away from the melee fighters. Strategy seems simplistic.

EJG: I don't think they realize that Stealth's AC is as good as it is; since he isn't directly attacked that often, they might not know what his defenses are like. (I thought his AC was better than G's, anyway; maybe I'm wrong.)

SY: No longer true (didn't the new elfin chain come in?), but anyone's an easy poison strike while sleeping.

SY: True

EJG: That's why they want to get him in melee early and take him down.

SY: Hee hee.

EJG: Absolutely. ;-)

Treat as you would treat a snake.

SY: How do you treat a snake differently from something you want to kill?

EJG: Snakes can strike with surprising speed, so you need to be very watchful around them.

SY: Not.

EJG: Stan, I'm sure your "Dates With Hideous Death" list would be as long as mine if you kept one, and G had a big head start. 8-)

SY: True (if I had the spell that day)

SY: On the days I remember

SY: Unless they disarm before the backstab (which would require the item of permanent DI, it would seem), this is not true. Unless they are talking about in the long-term sense.

Again, I am confused at the difference between being happy to use a vampiric dagger, yet vilifying Thorongil for using vampiric regen.

EJG: The vampiric dagger is an item; Snickersnake is trying to pass off Thorongil's vampiric regen as an innate ability. (And technically, Thorongil is partially demonic, as are all elves.)

henchman. Will probably lose morale. Ignore. Do not let TBlade waste time.

SY: Poor Shabana. Shouldn't write her off that easily.

Expect assorted monsters/pets to strike if Silvana is attacked. Hopefully Silvana will die early and you can disengage from her location.

SY: Interesting note, but not current. [No current pets, except non-combat rat]

EJG: Didn't Silvana pick something up when we left the dwarves?

SY: Normal plaudits.

SY: Strange thing to put in the closing paragraph.

EJG: But sometimes true -- remember Kurtani? Again, Snickersnake doesn't want them talking to us.

SY: So bounty hunters. Western trained, not evil, maybe CG/LN;

1 melee fighter (8th? can't be a lord, unless SS has taken a husband)

EJG: Thunderblade -- probably none too bright.

SY: 1 thief (likes poison, darts?, dagger [else vampiric would be useless], min level 7, probably higher. 9th?)

EJG: DeathWhisper -- not a friendly moniker, and probably the one in charge.

SY: 1 mage (slow, fireball/fire arrow, 5th level min [specialist either Alteration or Evoc/CS] or 6th generalist/other specialist unless slow is out of item)

EJG: FireWheel -- no insights beyond the name.

SY: 1 priest (probably includes charm sphere, other things unclear... unless mage has a lot of ench/charm spells, doubtful.)

EJG: Though note that nobody beyond the first three were referred to anywhere; but taking on all of us with three people would be nuts, so there should be more (though possibly hired temps for this mission).

SY: SnickerSnake, I presume?

EJG: Who else?

SY: So how'd I do?

EJG: Looks pretty good to me.

SY: Annotations by Tremere :-)

EJG: And G's two cp. :-)