Hommlet

• Opening Vignettes
• Who’s Who in Hommlet
• Deklo Wood Grove
• The Welcome Wench
• Love and Bliss in Hommlet
• For the Church of St. Cuthbert
• Black Jay’s Quests
• Rufus and Burne
• Odds and Ends
• Maps: Hommlet - Emridy Meadows

RUFUS AND BURNE

Rufus and Burne, a Fighter and Wizard respectively, are semi-retired adventurers who have charged themselves with the security of Hommlet. As such, you can bet that a fair bit of the action will revolve around them. They can be found in the tower located at #15. An important point to remember is that they’re overseeing the construction of a castle meant to bolster Hommlet’s defences.

Arcane Shop

Burne offers a large selection of scrolls. I normally don’t provide detailed lists of items offered by a vendor, but I’ve made an exception here. By listing the scrolls sold, players who use a Wizard can plan out their spell selection in advance. The complete list is as follows:

Cantrips – Ray of Frost

1st Level – Chill Touch, Charm Monster, Color Spray, Detect Magic, Hold Portal, Identify, Mage Armor, Magic Missile, Shield, Shocking Grasp, Sleep, True Strike

2nd Level – Blur, Invisibility, Melf’s Acid Arrow, Protection from Arrows, Resist Energy, See Invisibility, Web

3rd Level – Blink, Dispel Magic, Hold Person, Lightning Bolt, Slow

4th Level – Charm Monster, Dimension Door, Fear, Lesser Globe of Invulnerability, Ice Storm, Greater Invisibility, Remove Curse

5th Level – Cone of Cold, Feeblemind, Hold Monster, Teleport

Rufus and Burne as NPCs

They’re both recruitable NPCs, but only once you’ve discovered the location of the Temple of Elemental Evil. That won’t be until much later. Rufus is a 6th level Fighter, while Burne is an 8th level Wizard. Between the two of them, they’ll devour any and all loot that you find, so don’t bother.

Labour Problems

The first time you speak to Burne, he lets it be known that he suspects one of the construction workers of deliberately altering the orders for supplies in order to interfere with the construction of the castle. He’d like you to uncover who it is.

Go to the workers’ camp at #16. You’ll find a lone cook in the middle of the camp. He indicates to you that the workers won’t be back in the camp until sundown.

In the meantime, visit the construction site at #17. You’ll find a peasant laborer along the east edge of the construction. He suspects that somebody named Jayfie is paying out of pocket for the privilege of remaining on board with the construction crew.

Allow some time to relapse so as to visit construction site during another daytime. You’ll find Jayfie. Some Diplomacy or Bluffing can convince him to let you in on his secret. With some bribery or Intimidation, you can persuade him to spill the beans. He’s been deliberately altering the plans at the behest of the traders, Rannos and Gremag, in order to stall the building of the castle. Bring the news back to Rufus and Burne for 50gp and an experience point reward.

Another way to go about this is to simply speak to Jayfie over and over again until he simply beats it out of town. You can then add the accusation of being a spy as a parting shot. This apparently allows you to go back to Burne for an experience point reward, but makes it harder for the party to solve the Courier in Town quest, described just below.

Courier in Town

Visit the stable located at #22. You’ll find a man named Rocutio. With a little Bluff, Intimidation, or Sense Motive, you can get him to reveal that he’s been spying for Rannos and Gremag.

Now pay a visit to the traders at #21. Whether you perform this quest before or after the Labour Problems quest is up to you, and makes little difference in the end. The goal in any event is to get the pair to admit they’re up to no good. If you haven’t done the Labour Problems quest yet, or did the Labour Problems quest simply by talking to Jayfie repeatedly, you’ll need a character with a high enough Intimidate skill to get them to fess up. If the Labour Problems quest was completed through use of Bluff, Diplomacy, or Intimidation, the natural dialogue option for Rannos will appear. Once you’ve gotten them to admit it, you now have a chance to extract a favour from them. The favour can be a gold reward, a short sword +1, or getting them to divulge the location of the Moathouse, depending on the strength of your ‘social skills’. You also get experience points for it.

It is quite open to the party to pull off a double-cross, and reveal their treachery to Rufus and Burne anyway. Whether or not you’ve already done the Labour Problems quest makes little difference. In any event, they won’t know about any double-cross until after you’ve extracted the favour from them. Suffice to say, they won’t be pleased with you, but its not like they can do a lot about it anyway.

As a sidenote, notice that there’s a man-at-arms in their shop. The party can negotiate with Rannos and Gremag for Rainol’s services as a recruitable Fighter. He works for free, aside from the purchase price you pay to Rannos and Gremag. But check out those stats. Ugh.

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