This is another adventure in my friend's realm, again using Advanced Dungeons and Dragons (Second Edition) rules. We refer to this overall campaign as the "Arctic Campaign," since the bulk of this campaign takes place in the northern arctic regions of my friend's realm. This was the first adventure in this campaign, though, and in this one, we were heading up to these regions by sea. Our party would be sailing on a privateer vessel called the Foul Wind out of Pirate's Cove. The ship was commanded by Captain Starkey.

Our party was an unusual group. One of my friends was playing a Firbolg mercenary who was being hired by a mage in the arctic regions. The other player was playing a druid from a race of arctic barbarians who was returning home. My character was an enchantress of partial noble birth, and her questionable parentage was the reason she was being sent to study under this mage in the north. She was escaping the scandal back home.

We hadn't been at sea long when a ship operated by a rival crew ambushed us. They started firing ballistae at us, trying to kill the crew and passengers, and firing flaming arrows trying to ignite our sails. The crew of the Foul Wind quickly responded in kind, while the two other player characters helped by manning ballistae. After a round of two of firing back and forth, my character, reviewing her spellbook, discovered a spell which would be very useful in this situation.

The Bind spell is an enchantment spell that allows the mage to enchant and control rope within a certain distance. In this case, the targeted rope was the rigging of the enemy ship which my character promptly worked into a mass of knots. This had little immediate effect, as the fight continued with all its feriocity with the enemy crew oblivious of the hopeless tangle of rigging behind them. Things would turn against them very shortly, though.

During our fight, a hungry dragon turtle swam into view. Suddenly, we were not very concerned about the enemy ship any longer, and the crew quickly jumped into motion, putting the Foul Wind's rudder to the creature and leaving with all due haste. We also threw some provisions overboard in hopes of delaying the creature as we were not interested in being its next meal.

This would be the moment that the crew of the enemy ship discovered their hopelessly entangled rigging. This discovery would come far too late for them, as they now had no hope of escaping the large hungry beast. It isn't to say that they didn't try, but their fate was inevitable. They were to become snacks while we sailed away safely.

At any rate, I discovered just how truly useful an enchanter is on a sailing vessel. After all, it's always preferable to let your enemies be the ones to be eaten rather than yourselves. Who knew playing with rope could be so useful?