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Dearest Humanoids,
Daron here, founder and lead designer for Abandoned Arts.
Recently, I've obtained a copy of the 666-page brick that is Rappan Athuk, the Dungeon of Graves. I am, of course, speaking of the latest version of the storied dungeon, by Frog God Games.
After pouring through the wilderness areas and the first few levels (and related areas), my home group of four doomed players has signed on to give the module a playthrough... and this thread will serve as an online campaign-journal-and-obituary-file. Needless to say: spoilers ahead! We've got one session under our belt at this point, and our group meets once a week, so updates will be no more frequent than that.
If you've played, run, or enjoyed Rappan Athuk in any of it's incarnations, kick back and be entertained by the misadventures of my home group (who, despite being a seasoned group of gamers eager for the challenge that such a notoriously difficult module must have to offer, has never played or even heard of Rappan Athuk before).
Feel free to stop in, rub your hands together in mean-spirited glee, and remark about or delight in my party's exploits - but please avoid discussing spoilers about future events, encounters, floors, and NPCs here. My players are welcome in this thread, and I'd like to avoid spoiling anything. Thanks!
I should note that I'll be making a very few tweaks to the module here and there, to suit my playstyle (adding an archetype here or there, for example). By and large, I'm running the module as-is (and I'll be noting exceptions as I go). The first and most significant change is that I've set the dungeon in Golarion. Rappan Athuk is located in Mendev, between the Lake of Mists and Veils and the outskirts of the Estrovian Forest, far from the Worldwound. Some of the names have changed, for example the Forest of Hope is now the Estrovian Forest Outskirts and the Sea Coast Road is now the Lackthroat Road (which runs all the way down to the village of Lackthroat, in Numeria - and, more importantly - on to the Mendevian metropolis of Nerosyan).
I've also revised the Legend of Rappan Athuk to reflect these minor geographical changes.
To date we've had only one session, a summary of which will follow this post (after a quick introduction to the characters and a brief revision of the Legend of Rappan Athuk, as adapted for use in Golarion).
Enjoy!
Daron Woodson
Abandoned Arts
Campaign Journal: The Cast of Characters
Delving this interpretation of the Dungeon of Graves are the following characters. All four suckers - er, characters - start at 3rd level using a 20-point-buy, standard wealth by level, and average hit point rolls after 1st level.
Some (or all?) of these faces may change, but the party begins listing these four heroes among their membership:
Brugard Duerdek; LG male dwarven paladin (stonelord) of Abadar 3
A paladin in service to the Abadar. Brugard and Sansara have journeyed long to reach the Dungeon of Graves. A crusader drawn to Mendev, Brugard grew discontent with fortress-keeping after Abadar called him to Rappan Athuk. Brugard means not only to cleanse the lair of evil, but to return the treasures therein to Abadar’s economy. He finds Farden’s quest exceedingly noble, and is a longtime adventuring companion to the aasimar Sansara.
Brugard relies on a solid Armor Class and his Combat Reflexes and Bodyguard feats to hold the front lines for the party. He wields a dwarven waraxe and a heavy shield. Stone smite lends a little damage output to the mix, lay on hands offers a touch of healing, and stonecunning may help spot traps.
Glitch; N female wayang illusionist 3
A wayang wizard and shadowmancer. Her quest for the Dissolution brought her to Numeria for a time, where she was unfortunately unprepared for the bizarre cultures and phenomenon that haunt those strange wastes. Enslaved by barbarians, Glitch – whose true name is unknown – was eventually rescued by Brugard and Sansara on one of that pair’s earliest adventures together.
Glitch specializes in illusion, with Spell Focuses in conjuration and evocation. Her restricted schools are enchantment and necromancy. She uses invisibility frequently, and prefers crowd-control spells like grease and glitterdust.
Farden Slodovka; LN male human summoner (synthesist) 1/rogue (burglar) 2
An adventurous merchant and a wealthy noble scion dabbling in martial training, stealth, lore, trapfinding, and the arcane practices of conjuring and summoning. An adventuring noble from Brevoy, Farden seeks to make the disused Lackthroat road safe again for travel in order to save his family’s mercantile enterprise after his uncle sabotaged the business for profit.
Farden uses the trap spotter rogue talent and the advantages of his archetype to serve as trapfinder for the party. His synthesis-summoned "armor" leans heavily on the "skilled" evolution. In addition to these skills, Farden relies heavily on wands and scrolls to keep the party healed and prepared.
Sansara-Sensei; LN female aasimar monk (drunken master, sensei) 3
A monk dedicated to Abadar and an esteemed martial instructor. Her wild hair and untamed appearance betray both her Elysian heritage and her mastery of the “drunken master” martial style. Somehow both disciplined and impulsive, wise and carefree, Sansara is almost uniquely qualified to provide advice and counsel to Paladin Brugard, as Sansara’s clarity-through-intoxication, in particular, speaks to Brugard’s dwarven sensibilities. Both consider her the (drunken) “Merlin” to Brugard’s “Arthur.”
Sansara has a very high Wisdom score, which applies to her Armor Class and attack rolls, among other things. In addition to her "advice" ability, Sansara uses her Panther Style and Panther Claw feats to gain several attacks per round. Stunning Fist helps, too.
Daron Woodson
Abandoned Arts
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Campaign Journal: Session 1
Our first session had a few tense moments, though the party hasn't set one foot in the dungeon yet. The party begins their trek on the Lackthroat Road, to the far southern end of the campaign map.
Day 1: The party heads north, up the Lackthroat Road. The group is quick to spot a ruined fortress to the west, overlooking the road. Farden and Glitch examine it with a spyglass, but choose to move on after spotting numerous bugbear guards. Glitch recalls rumors that a red dragon called Aragnak was originally responsible for the ruination of the small fortress, and Farden’s knowledge of the Mendevian nobility that originally built the doomed place lends credence to the rumor. To judge by reports of his age, Aragnak is certainly still very much alive today, the party is loathe to note.
Later in the evening, a brigand leader and her band of five rogues spot the party camping on the Lackthroat Road. The bandit leader, Darla, tries to convince the party that her band are merely adventurers while she sizes up the party in conversation. Darla tells the party of Zelkor’s Ferry, and of the bugbear Ghotan and his ravagers, which the party spotted earlier. Correctly determining that the party is new to the area and relatively inexperienced, Darla's overconfidence gets the better of her. Moments after both groups go on their way, Darla orders her bandits to attack. Glitch instantly renders the majority of the bandits blind with glitterdust, and the fight goes south for Darla immediately. Darla knows that a novice wizard's spell is likely to wear off soon, and orders her thieves to split up and spread out while waiting off the effects. By the time their blindness subsides, half their number are incapacitated. Darla orders the thieves to fight on, threatening to kill them herself if they flee... but flee they do. Farden slays one bandit outright, and the party staggers or routs the rest. Darla surrenders all her weapons but one dagger (and her potion of cure moderate wounds) in exchange for her life, and tells the party (when questioned by Brugard) that she means to head for Zelkor’s Ferry.
The next few days of northerly travel are uneventful. The party speaks to a patrolling sheriff from a Brevoy outpost on the west side of the lake, and crosses a southern bridge along the road.
Day 5: The party encounters an even larger patrol in the dead of night, who question the party thoroughly (expressing concern over their wayang "witch" in particular). Farden puts the patrol's concerns to rest and makes fast friends with Sheriff Scarborough and his patrol. The patrol offers to escort the party to the northern bridge, where they can wait for the occasional ferry going to and from Zelkor's Ferry, if they like. En route to the bridge the next day, the patrol spots a worg scout. There is no attack, but the party learns that worg and wolf attacks are somewhat common in the region.
Day 7: The party meets up with a cavalry patrol, heading the opposite direction. About this time, Sheriff Scarborough asks Farden to walk with him to a spot just east of the Lackthroat Road. The Sheriff points out a marker and a trail, leading due east into the foothills. This is the closest the party has ever been to Rappan Athuk, though they do not head there yet. Sheriff Scarborough and his men tell the party of the rumors surrounding Zelkor's Ferry: the "necromancer," the Mouth of Doom, and so on. The prospect of a exploring a ruin other than Rappan Athuk appeals to the group, though rumors persist that the two places are somehow connected.
Day 8: Several members of the party and the patrol accompanying them spot a band of outlaws moving through the forest outskirts at noon. The patrol moves on, traveling another hour to the northern bridge. After dropping the party off and wishing them well, the patrol heads south to meet up with the cavalry patrol spotted the day previous. Knowing that Darla's escaped bandits have likely joined up with another local gang, the patrol expects strong resistance in the area. Brugard considers assisting the patrol, but the party ultimately decides to remain at the bridge instead. There's no ferry waiting there, so the group decides to follow the river inland until they spot one. After a few hours of uneventful nighttime travel, the party camps, then continues the trek in the morning.
Day 9: Late in the evening, the party has the misfortune of encountering a strange pack of worgs moving inland, as they are. Though the worgs take notice of the party, the wolf-things do not stop immediately. Farden hails the creatures, who immediately present a clear leader: a dark-colored worg who pauses to examine the party. After a brief (and thankfully polite) exchange, the "worg," whose name is Simrath, collects the names and titles of the curious but courteous humanoids along the river's edge, and - having fed quite well already, this evening - is content to go on his way. Farden later recalls the name Simrath, placing it as the name of a lord or general of the First Crusade. He and Brugard, who did of course detect the creature's distinct aura of evil, muse over the curiosity as they continue onward.
Day 10: A worg and seven wolves attack at noon, with both the party and the wolf-monsters catching each other by surprise as either party crests opposite hills along the river's edge. Rushing the party, the wolves score no little lasting damage before being handily defeated. The party interrogates the helpless worg after the battle, are forced to put it down before they can learn very much.
Twelve hours later, at midnight on the tenth day, three more worgs with eight wolves just behind them track their missing brothers east, up the river. Their path leads straight through the party's camp, naturally, and a terrible battle ensues as the worgs and wolves creep up on the party under cover of darkness. Sansara puts a dire hurting on half a dozen of the things before nearly succumbing to death by tooth and nail, and Farden fares no better. Glitch's spells fail her, and she spends much of the battle hiding under cover of invisibility while Brugard struggles to keep his allies standing, and to prevent the wolflike monsters from tearing out his downed allies' throats. Using invisibility, Farden's wand of infernal healing, and the potion of cure moderate wounds that the party lifted from Darla on the first day of their adventure, Glitch restores her allies to fighting shape and the party emerges from a harrowing battle with all parties accounted for.
Morning comes, and day eleven begins.
To be continued...
Daron Woodson
Abandoned Arts
Haven't forgotten about this! Updating the last session soon (and I've got another session tonight). Stay tuned.
Alrighty! Got a couple days of updates, here.
Campaign Journal: Sessions 2 and 3
Day 11: The party spots a lightly-armored ruffian running his horse full-stop in the direction of Zelkor's Ferry... and on the back of his horse is what appears to be a bundled body. After him is an entire cavalry patrol, and the party correctly surmises that the horseman is a fleeing bandit. Glitch topples his horse with grease, and as the cavalry patrol closes in, the bandit confesses that he was heading toward Zelkor's Ferry to see if "the necromancer" could revive his companion and fellow bandit (who is dead on the back of his horse). The bandit asks if the party will take his deceased female friend to the Ferry in his stead, even as the cavalry patrol arrives to put him down. After the impromptu execution (the penalty for banditry being death), the party elects to leave the bandits' bodies for the worgs - better the monsters eat the dead than the living. Even the paladin, in practicality, agrees.
After a brief interrogation by the cavalry patrol, the patrol escorts the party (who, after a run-in with the mysterious worg called Simrath, determine that leaving the road is too dangerous for now) back to the Lackthroat Road. The party elects to rest on the bridge, and encounters a merchant caravan in the evening. Farden (a merchant himself) attempts to flag down the caravan, but the untrusting merchants refuse to accommodate the party at all, forcing them off the road and passing on their way.
That night, the bridge came under attack by worgs and wolves - three of the former, this time, and nine of the latter. Farden goes down quick, but the party puts their back to the water's edge and keeps a tight formation to avoid much flanking. Sansara - earning the nickname "wolf-puncher" in jest, puts down quite a number of wolves. Glitch is no help, her spells having been exhausted in previous encounters, and Farden spends most of the battle unconscious. Still, Brugard and Sansara are both capable and lucky in this encounter, and win the fight without too much difficulty. Unfortunately, two of the three worgs are able to escape (injured badly, but alive). If the worgs in this region all report to Simrath, their next encounter with the apparent "worg lord" may be uglier. (Or, it may not; Simrath was somewhat inscrutable on the party's previous meeting.)
Day 12: The party spends all day and night at the northernmost bridge, waiting for a ferry to come along by chance.
Day 15: After three straight days of waiting, the party is bored out of their minds. Hardly a patrol has come by in the past few days, let alone anything more exciting. On the morning of the fifteenth day, the party elects to try their hand at a trek along the river again.
Day 18: By some small miracle, the party marches along the river's edge for three days without incident. That night, their lucky streak holds - the party encounters a patrol heading back to the road from Zelkor's Ferry. Farden convinces the patrol to agree to allow the party to ride with the knights back to the Ferry in the morning. To save time, the knights even agree to part ways with the river, heading through the open plains and hills for a time.
Day 19: In the morning, the party (and the patrol) encounter a strange (and large) iron door set into a stony hill. Brugard and Farden investigate, and hear movement and gruff conversation inside. Glitch translates the chatter into the Giant language, and the party wisely decides to leave this place alone for now. Farden marks the spot on his map, and the party continues on with their escort.
Day 20: Tragedy strikes. The party has developed a rope trick strategy for nighttime camping, and invites the patrolling knights to share the extradimensional shelter. While two of the knights take a sleeping shift in the rope trick, a group of seven shadows attack the remaining four knights and the sheriff, in the late evening. The party watches in silent horror as the shadows decimate the knights with great speed. Glitch stays Paladin Brugard's hand by explaining that he cannot harm the incorporeal creatures. Brugard prays for the soldiers' souls as they fight in vain against the undead shades. Knowing that he cannot harm the creatures (and that he can save the most lives by keeping secret the existence of the rope trick), Brugard can only watch as the slain sheriff and knights rise as shadows, themselves. Though the creatures may notice the dangling rope, none investigate. Rather, the shadows chase down fleeing knights (and their horses) before moving on. The party listens to the screams die down as the battle moves away from the rope trick's "window," and the badly-traumatized knights continue on toward Zelkor's Ferry in the morning.
Day 21: The party's travels rejoin the river.
Day 22: After all the waiting (and wandering through the wilderness), the party spots a merchant vessel heading for Zelkor's Ferry only hours before they arrive, themselves. The party meets Beoric the Whale and the crew of The Brawler, and spends all day exploring the seedy hamlet. After introducing themselves to everyone around town (including Rasmus Pye and the "necromancer" Ulman Dark), Farden arranges for the remaining knights to join the crew of The Brawler on a temporary basis, so that they can get safely back to the Lackthroat Road. The party gets directions to the Mouth of Doom, then finds a place to sleep (in a rope trick, of course - no sense in taking chances).
Day 23: In the morning, the party sets out for the Mouth of Doom, following up on the rumors they'd heard before heading out this way. The townsfolk begin to place bets on their return, and Farden wagers a silver on himself. The party, having been advised to seek it out, sets up their rope trick that evening in an abandoned cottage about an hour from the Mouth. In the night, and from the safety of their extradimensional shelter, PCs on watch spot about a dozen man-sized spiders passing through the cottage (with god knows how many crawling around outside). By the time the spell expires, the spiders are long gone.
Day 24: The party arrives at the Mouth of Doom in the morning. After descending the stairs set into the demon's "mouth," the party finds themselves inside the Chamber of Doors. A pithy warning from a magic mouth the northern door is promptly ignored, and Farden begins searching for traps. Finding several, the party has the insight to search the pit traps guarding the northeastern door (which turns out to be false) and the southwestern one. Farden finds the secret passage in the southwestern pit and explores part of it before reconsidering and heading back to rejoin the party. The PCs explore the northwestern door last, and promptly find and disarm the portcullis trap. Heading through, the party finds the "glue room" (and puzzles over the "glue-proof" gauntlet and boots outside of it). Farden, who notices the paste smeared all over the door and the floor in front of it, taps the door with a pole (which immediately sticks). The combined efforts of the entire party cannot pull the post free. Farden uses his only dose of alchemical solvent to retrieve his beloved, trap-springing ten-foot pole, and - after much, much deliberation - the party uses the (seemingly glue-immune) gauntlet to open the door, revealing the glue-covered room (and treasure chest) beyond. Brugard, hoping that his boots are immune to the glue's effects, too, steps onto the pasted floor and sticks there. After slipping off his own boots, he simply puts on the "glue-proof" boots instead and heads inside. Cautiously, Brugard retrieves a few hundred gold coins (and a single silver one) from the chest inside and returns to the party. After spotting a severed skeletal hand inside, the PCs surmise that someone, having entered previously, became stuck and must have amputated their own hand to get free.
After leaving the glue room, Farden heads northwest into an adjoining room just as a gelatinous cube enters the same room from another passage. Farden falls back and the party retreats while peppering the slow-moving cube with projectiles. After exhausting many of their ranged resources, the party backtracks into the Chamber of Doors and shuts the (injured but implacable) gelatinous cube out. Deciding to leave that area alone for now, the party heads through the southeastern "skull" door and begins to explore new passages. Heading south, the normally-cautious Farden misses a pit trap set into a side passage and falls in. The party hauls him out and explores a nearby cluster of rooms, including an abandoned firepit and a room where another group of adventurers seems to have died in their sleep. The party explores an abandoned barracks and a collapsed room before eventually finding their way down a winding hall and into a room filled with stone pillars and huge braziers filled green flames.
After exploring the Chapel of Green Flames, Farden and Brugard rouse an emerald-scaled serpent that had been lairing (and perhaps sleeping) in one of the braziers. The fortunately-poison-resistant Brugard was bitten in the ensuing encounter, but everyone else came through alright. Farden skinned the thing and resumed his search of the room. Hoping to find a passageway to the far side of the nearly-adjacent collapsed room, Farden explores the eastern wall of the strange little chapel and finds something else, instead - a giant leech in a passageway that seems to lead nowhere. The party dispatches the leech, and finds another secret passage inside the first, leading them to a tiny "room" in the base of what appears to be a pillar. Sliding aside a third hidden door, the party emerges from the base of a pedestal inside a room crawling with giant leeches. Sansara is bitten by one of the monsters, but the creature is dispatched before it can drain any blood from her. After cleaning up the leeches, the party notes a gigantic skeleton statue on the pedestal they emerged from, and a stairway down into some lower level, here. Ignoring it for now, the party heads east and discovers another pit trap - this one, with a shaft set into one wall. Iron rungs lead down into the dungeon's deeper levels, and the party marks this spot before moving on.
Here, the party finds the pitch-black chamber inhabited only by skeletal remains and Gelver the Lunatic, who screams bloody murder at the PC's entrance into his hideaway. The PCs quickly calm the madman and deduce that he has been locked inside this room (and eating his dead companions) for over a month now. Gelver explains that his party was ambushed by a large force of goblins (some of which he has also eaten), and begs the party to take him to the surface. Unfortunately, Gelver has burned all his lantern oil (and his wizard's spellbook and scrolls... and his allies' maps of this level of the dungeon), which seems to infuriate Glitch. Given that Gelver is prone to screaming, Glitch argues against taking Gelver along. The party won't leave him to die, however, and Gelver tags along. Gelver has spent a long time in the dark down here, and isn't really bothered by the darkness (this party is an all-darkvision team, remember, and carries no light sources). He's slowing the party down a bit, crazed and bumbling along behind them at half speed in the dark, but for now he is keeping quiet... desperately happy for a chance to escape the dungeon.
Moving north now, the party discovers a complex altar of sorts. Glitch identifies statues dedicated to former demon lords and other outsiders, all of whom have ties to themes and elements of chance, chaos, games, and luck. Detect magic turns up an overwhelmingly powerful, artifact-equivalent aura, and the party resolves to return here soon after researching the place later.
Another twist in the hallway or two later and the party is again heading north. Farden disables a trapped door and opens it, revealing a room full of rubbish and debris, and a pack of dire rats!
To be continued...
Daron Woodson
Abandoned Arts
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FYI: This campaign just got bumped up to two nights a week (some weeks). Expect slightly more frequent updates.
Excellent reading! I will be following your log.
Thanks.
Having a great time following, keep up the good work!
Awesome thread...keep it up, Daron!
Thanks, everyone. Things will get more interesting soon, and the dynamics of scouting and room exploration (as well as combat, actually) just got a whole lot different at the end of our most current session. I'll explain after this next post. Update time!
Campaign Journal: Session 4
Day 24 (continued): Ten dire rats seem overwhelming at first, but Sansara's hit-and-run Panther Style combos are perfect for picking off large groups of smaller creatures too dumb to forfeit their attacks of opportunity. The battle with the rats doesn't even last two rounds before the fearsome monk has killed every last rodent... but sudden sounds of squeaking, combat, and crunching bones sets Gelver over the edge. The lunatic screams at the top of his lungs. Farden patiently quiets him, but the party comes to decide then and there (speaking in Dwarven and Celestial) that Gelver must be incapacitated for his own safety (and theirs). Unfortunately, the party botches their initial attempt to knock Gelver out, and the lunatic makes a run for it before being dropped by a nonlethal attack of opportunity. Gelver will be waking up traumatized and a lot less trusting, but for now he's handled.
Continuing generally northward, the party discovers the Chamber of Magic Pools, and its five shallow reservoirs of water. Before Farden can do so much as poke a pool with his trusty ten-foot pole, a stirge buzzes out of the adjoining room. Glitch identifies the bloodsucker (and it's diseased, Constitution-damaging potential) and Brugard and Sansara round the corner to discover several nests of the things. After dispatching the first creature, priority number one becomes blasting as many stirges as possible with glitterdust, which, naturally, causes every stirge in the room to attack. Now facing fourteen more stirges, the party faces it's first truly serious encounter in the Mouth of Doom. Walking away with Con damage on both Brugard and, Glitch the party searches the nests (then destroys them) before returning their attentions to the Chamber of Magic Pools.
Because most of the pools radiate magic, they party begins to experiment with them. Drinking from the (clearer and abjurant) Pool of Prodigious Fortune blesses the party for a time, and the secret passageway under the "Pool" of Descent is discovered. Brugard - at Farden's direction - tastes the stagnant water in divination-radiating pool as well, and it is he that discovers the illusion within the Pool of Descent as he prepares to taste those "waters" too. Brugard elects not to drink from the necromantic pool or any other, after that.
The party has found quite a few ways down to the next level, now. Moving on, the party begins to complete the circuit that the main hall on this side of the "skull door" seems to make. Within a side passage, the party discovers a room with several stacked skulls - each featuring a hole bored into the top. As they prepare to leave this room, the more perceptive members of the team hear a nearby door open, followed by the sound of approaching footsteps. The party encounters a quartet of sly bandits, who lead the party (with carefully-chosen and mostly-true statements) to believe that they are adventurers separated from their "boss." Naturally, the bandits escort the party straight to "Tall" Jack Ratt, who is indeed tall (if not much else). Jack, surrounded by his bandit henchmen and orc bodyguards, makes a dramatic show of seating Farden for a talk before slipping the merchant-adventurer a folded "map," which turns out to be Tall Jack's wanted poster, of which he is very proud (despite an embarrassingly-low bounty). As Farden - who hopes to talk or trade information with Jack - opens negotiations, Jack gives a subtle order for his men to attack. Jack's theatrical cue - "Tonight, I'm afraid, it's your money and your life" - is also his last. Farden, seated on a bucket in front of the bandit's tent, slashes Jack Ratt's throat out with his conjured "claws" before the bandit captain can do more than gesture with his rapier.
Despite this first-round success, Farden is quickly surrounded and nearly gutted where he sits. Due mostly to orcish ferocity (and falchions), Sansara takes some serious damage as well. The fight turns around quickly, though, with Glitch dissolving into shadow, Sansara making a comeback, Brugard contributing slow-and-steady-like, and Farden fighting from the bucket that he is effectively pinned down on. By the end of the encounter, a handful of surviving bandits are fleeing for the secret doors that constitute the exits from this room. Brugard is fatigued, having exhausted his defensive stance, and Farden has seen better days. The last bandit escapes into the zombie room just east of the bandit's camp, but is put down by Brugard's chakram. The party regroups immediately inside the main camp room, and proceed to heal up and regroup as a mysterious "stone grinding on stone" sound emanates from the zombie room.
The party investigates the surrounding rooms and halls, then returns to the zombie room to determine the source of the noise. Hilariously, the party correctly surmises that the wall is designed to go up if enough weight is placed on it. So, at Farden's direction, they step on it. All together. At once.
Expecting something else to happen, probably, the party is simply trapped in the small, formerly-zombie-occupied side chamber. Good thing Farden brought rations and a mining pick! Before it comes to that, the party decides to rest in the seemingly-safe side chamber. Using a rope trick, the party witnesses some curious giant rats (a fortunate random encounter which happens to bring the sliding wall back down) explore the room as they rest. They subsequently spot one of the dungeon's other, rarer, inhabitants - giant ants - battle and destroy the rats poking around in the area. Meanwhile, Gelver wakes up and must be - with great difficulty - made to eat. Gelver now seems convinced that most of the party's members are cannibals who intend to eat him. Brugard makes a show of eating some of Gelver's rations, to demonstrate that Gelver's meal is not poisoned, and the madman is convinced to eat. Afterwards, he must be knocked out again. After the ant-and-rat show is over and their first mid-dungeon rest period ended, the party carries on.
The next order of business turns out to be finishing the exploration of the northwestern portion of the dungeon - the part that the gelatinous cube which they previously escaped from seems to call home. As the party finishes exploring a "secret door side passage" very close to cube territory, the ooze appears again. Still injured (and still full of shuriken and crossbow bolts), the cube presents no real threat and is dispatched on Farden's first attack.
To the south, the next significant discovery is the Room of Grim Fossils. After investigating the fossilized human(oid?) remains set into the walls, the party discovers yet another staircase to the south, leading down into deeper levels.
Our heroes have this level more or less mapped out by now, and begin to follow up on a very few unexplored doors and side-passages now, to include the Infested Mosiac. After inspecting the mural and dispatching five centipedes here, Farden, Sansara, and Glitch (riding piggyback on Farden's shoulders) make a sweep of the dungeon using Glitch's detect secret doors spell. Brugard waits in a safe room so as not to slow the party down, and the PCs turn up. A couple of secret doors they hadn't discovered before. The first leads into a large room whose ceiling is dripping with green slime. A collective vote of "nope" from the party leads the PCs straight out of there, and into a second side-passage to the southwest. This room contains a single chest and little else. Farden spots and disarms a "part of the ceiling falls on you and kills you" sort of trap, and drags the chest well out of the room with ropes just to be sure. After counting out thousands of copper and silver coins, hundreds of gold ones, and a magic dagger, the party returns to the far side of the "green slime" room, attempting to use a mining pick that Farden had the foresight to bring to mine into what seems to be a hallway on the far side of (and only otherwise accessable by) the green slime room. Mining through - though a noisy endeavor - fortunately does not attract any trouble and reveals that the hallway on the far side seems only to lead into another nearby room. Disappointed and somewhat confused about the green slime room and the strange block of rooms and halls at the center of the dungeon, the party seems finished mapping. Before descending deeper, the party elects to return to Zelkor's Ferry to spend a little of the treasure they've found. The PCs kill time in a formerly bandit-occupied room until daytime comes.
Day 25: The PCs head topside and trek back toward Zelkor's Ferry in the relative safety of daylight. In the late morning, the party spots almost a dozen corpses - mostly human - on the trail. Glitch scans the bodies with detect magic, and discovers a couple of auras on one of the fallen. As she approaches to investigate, the "corpses" - actually bandits - stand up and attack the now-surrounded party. Glitch - to no-one's surprise - vanishes. These bandits fight a little better than Tall Jack's did, but are ultimately dispatched or routed off. To the amusement of most, Gelver flies into an utterly ineffectual lunatic furor. Launching himself at the bandits, Gelver succeeds in nothing (until the last three bandits are in the process of surrendering to Brugard, at which point Gelver manages to put his longsword straight through one). Brugard advises the last two thieves to simply run (they do), while Farden convinces Gelver not to do that anymore, please.
At the end of the day's travels, the party finds themselves safely back in Zelkor's Ferry.
Character Updates
Some updates on our party, now that they're 5th level.
Brugard Duerdek; LG male dwarven paladin (stonelord) of Abadar 5
This is the game-changer. Paladin Brugard has gained the ability to call his stone servant: a small, celestial earth elemental. While combat-useful, the stone servant's real usefulness is in its earth glide ability, which allows it to supernaturally pass through earth and even stone (but not metal, or non-earthen barriers) without leaving a tunnel. While Brugard won't be able to treat the elemental as an expendable scout (it's an intelligent, living, Lawful Good servant, and - like a paladin's mount - Brugad will have to mourn the thing for one month or one character level if it dies), this creature can effectively both pass through walls and escape from almost any danger with ease. As you can imagine, we expect this to change the way the party approaches scouting.
Glitch; N female wayang illusionist 5
Third-level spells! Glitch can now do more than either "go invisible" or "blind everyone and then go invisible." Speaking of game-changers: Glitch now has access to fireball. While she selected evocation as one of her Spell Focuses mostly for the higher-level, non-damaging evocation spells... fireball is going to make encounters like the stirge battle a lot more manageable. Glitch also picked up Greater Spell Focus (conjuration) and Craft Wand, learned invisibility sphere (the entire party can now participate in scouting and stealth runs with a +20 Stealth bonus), and plans to buy additional scrolls in Zelkor's Ferry. "How?," you might ask. "Zelkor's Ferry is a hamlet and thus has a buy limit of 200 gp and access to only 2nd level spells," you might say.
Farden Lodovka; LN male human summoner (synthesist) 1/rogue (burglar) 4
This is how. Farden picked up his second (and maybe final) rogue talent this level. That talent is... black market connections. The remote location of Rappan Athuk and related locations is one of the more serious and "big picture" difficulties inherent to delving it. Farden's player is having none of that, and Zelkor's Ferry should now be functioning at a buy limit of over 1,000 gp for Farden (with access to 4th level spells). Farden's successes in the dungeon - while many and varied - have thus far amounted mostly to disarming traps and performing 2d6 sneak attacks with his claws. Those won't be useful on later levels, and it was never Farden's aim to be Captain Sneak Attack. Starting next level, Farden is branching out into the Noble Scion prestige class, and more or less abandoning all pretense of "roguishness" save for trapfinding. In fact... once Ultimate Campaign comes out next month, Farden fully intends to turn Zelkor's Ferry and whatever he can lay claim to into a functional adventuring hub, complete with the Noble Scion's ridiculous Leadership variant and all manner of tradesman and useful followers (to include the cohort-equivalent, NPC-classed "servitor" that a Noble Scion eventually gains).
Sansara-Sensei; LN female aasimar monk (drunken master, sensei) 5
Sansara picks up the drunken strength class feature this level, but does not otherwise gain anything noteworthy. Just kidding; she took gods-damned Panther Parry. From now on her "attacks of opportunity of opportunity" go off before the attacks that trigger them, not after (giving her the chance to drop opponents just for thinking about hitting her). In addition, survivors take penalties on their triggering attacks.
Keep them coming! These reports are awesome!
BTW, what did you mean by "Things will get more interesting soon, and the dynamics of scouting and room exploration (as well as combat, actually) just got a whole lot different at the end of our most current session"?? You left me curious.
Thanks, Carnestolendas! What I meant was: Brugard's got that damned earth-gliding elemental now, so tremorsense and the ability to walk through walls are about to seriously change the game as far as exploration and ambushes go. The party can now peek into rooms before they've opened the door, spot enemies around corners and through barriers, and so on. The concept of "walls" is no longer what it was, which is pretty significant in a dungeon!
As far as combat goes, fireball is on the table now, and Sansara's build gets more insane with each level... including this one.
Oh, THAT!
I had completely misunderstood your post. I was getting the idea that actually came up with another way of "running a dungeon", maybe the way it is suggested in "D&D next"´playtesting...
Indeed the earth-glinding elemental is going to change lots of things. Keep us up to date!
I have to admit, I've remained deliberately ignorant of the D&D Next Playtest. From what I took the time to read, it's a step up from 4e. Still not my cup of tea, though. No doubt I'll take a look at the finished product when it becomes available.
Daron Woodson
Abandoned Arts
I'm really enjoying this, I got Rappan Athuk for a buddy of mine for his birthday and this is really making want to play it. Is there anyway you can upload your players' character builds?
I was wondering when someone would ask for the character sheets.
I'll work on getting the PC's basic statblocks posted here after our next session.
Daron Woodson
Abandoned Arts
I'd especially like to see the monk. It sounds like that character has been extremely effective, something that monks sometime struggle to achieve.
Yeah the monk is getting pretty powerful, as is the Wizard (duh...can they do anything else?....die maybe)The Paladin is getting less and less likely to succumb to anything. To date I think hes taken like 14 HP in damage. (Soon to change thanks to me) You'll see why soon enough. While Farden, the glue that holds the team together, expert in the fields of using magic items and disarming traps, and known far and wide to all worg kind as freaking delicious....has just about topped off his personal in combat usefulness.
Farden, you quite often are useful in battle. You stay on the ground and let yourself be surrounded so that I have room to move around! Not even mentioning the time you killed that filthy bandit while sitting on a bucket! The Paladin will most certainly be there to help take some of the damage now and while I may get continuously more drunk, I can still serve up some pretty amazing advice to get you functioning like someone useful!
...Farden... known far and wide to all worg kind as freaking delicious...
Farden is kind of a jack-of-all-roles. All those times you spent rounds 2-5 eating the floor, I thought you were just tanking.
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Some of my players
are whining about the speed with which I'm updating the campaign journal. You'd think I was trying to run a third-party retail enterprise or something.
Campaign Journal: Session 5
Day 25 (continued): When we last left our "heroes" (do they count as heroes if only one of them is good-aligned?), they were heroically shopping at Zelkor's Ferry. Because the party managed to level up on the way back to the hamlet, this ends up being an extended stay while Glitch happily scribes no small number of spells into her spellbook. In the meantime, the party ditches Gelver (he hustles into town and actively avoids his rescuers for the duration of their stay), sells off treasure, and spends the three days Glitch needs to scribe spells by rolling Diplomacy checks around town to gather info on certain areas of the dungeon. Unfortunately, there isn't much information to gather. Farden asks around about the Altar of Chance, but learns nothing save it's proper name.
Day 28: By the end of the twenty-eighth day (their third day back in town), Glitch has added spiked pit, haste, and several lower-level spells to her repertoire, and Farden isn't really any better off as far as information-gathering goes. The party heads back to the Mouth of Doom on communal mounts (one of Glitch's new tricks), and gets there around noon.
Before delving into deeper levels, the party decides to wrap up a few loose ends. First stop: the infested mosaic. Upon their return to this room, the PCs are accosted by another handful of giant centipedes, which are easily dispatched. Brugard sends Aatos, his new celestial earth elemental companion, under the mosaic of glass tiles to peek at the empty space behind it. Aatos' tremorsense picks up a large number of creatures, and he quickly returns to the party. With an Intelligence score of 4, Aatos isn't good with numbers or details... but he does report that there are many, many creatures behind the mosaic. Farden, not content to leave any portion of the dungeon unexplored, produces his mining pick and sets about mining through the mosaic wall. Unbeknownst to the party, the noise eventually draws the attention of a pair of zombies, who slowly begin trudging toward the infested mosaic room. Before the slow-moving undead can arrive, Farden breaks through the glass-tiled wall, and all hell breaks loose.
Behind the wall are thirty-three more man-sized centipedes. Farden wins initiative and gets the hell out of there, but Sansara (and just about everyone else) is not so lucky. The centipedes flood the room, crawling up the walls where there's no room to stand, and absolutely swarming and surrounding Sansara, Glitch, and Brugard. Farden, from the relative safety of the hallway outside, apologizes politely.
Though the centipedes endanger Sansara more than the heavily-armored and highly poison-resistant Brugard, priority number one is getting Glitch out of the room. Aatos the elemental is able to clear a path for Glitch's egress into the hallway, but before her fireball can clear the room, Sansara ends up bitten and poisoned. Fortunately, the mindless creatures are helpless but to fall for her Panther Parry strategy, and she clears a path wide enough to allow her to position herself behind the now-broken mosaic and outside of fireball range. Glitch blasts the centipedes, who are all instantly incinerated. Unfortunately, she also - by necessity - blasts herself, and Brugard. The dwarf has hit points to spare, however, and emerges from the blast in good health. Glitch, less so.
The instant that the centipedes are slain, Brugard drops his weapons and moves to help Sansara recover from her poison. With the help of an unlikely Heal check, Sansara's poison is cured just as the previously-mentioned zombies smash the southern door open and attack. (It's a good thing she was drunk for all this.) Paladin Brugard and Sansara-Sensi kill the zombies quickly, and the party finally gets a moment to recover and heal up with Farden's wands. Farden discovers no treasure or valuables in the nesting space behind the mosaic.
Next stop: the Altar of Chance. Brugard insists that Farden is a fool for toying with altars of chance and chaos, but Farden considers the investigation of the extremely magical room to be an investment. Glitch and Sansara wait just outside the chamber, and Brugard heads in with Farden (lecturing him all the while), just in case something truly terrible happens.
Having correctly assessed the gold-painted "bowl" to be a sacrificial altar, and having listened to Glitch's careful identification of the figures depicted in each alcove (all outsiders and gods of chance, luck, games, and chaos), Farden deposits a substantial 30 platinum coins into the bowl. Not knowing what to expect, Farden places his hand into the hand-shaped indentation at the back of the central alcove. A glowing rune in the shape of a crescent moon appears before him, and Farden repeats the process in the alcoves to either side. Presented with a glowing, runic arrangement of "circle-moon-sword," Farden's platinum pieces vanish. Having begun to piece together the nature of the room - some sort of divine "slot machine" artifact chamber - Farden's curiosity is slated, for now.
Though the platinum pieces were his own, Farden's "investment" is criticized heavily by the rest of the party as a waste of wealth. As payoffs go, today is not a good day for poor Farden.
In any case, the PCs are content to call this level fully-explored for now. Heading down the Pool of Descent, the party finds themselves on another level of the dungeon. A "Demon's Gullet" beneath the "Mouth," if you will. Encountering nothing more interesting than a plain and linear hallway lined with doors, the party explores an empty room before Farden's trap sense picks up danger in the second. Carefully examining a barren room whose entire floor seems to be one giant pressure plate, Farden seems to disarm the trap (which proves more difficult and complex than any other so far). Curious about the empty (but well-trapped) room, the party marks this place for follow-up later and moves on.
The next room in the linear hall is filled with fungus, including three shriekers which screech loudly as soon as the door is open. This triggers an extended battle with eight zombies and three giant ants in the hall. While the PCs battle the monsters, Aatos begins destroying the defenseless shriekers. One long but unremarkable battle later, and the hallway is quiet again. Taking a westward bend in the hallway, the party encounters a strange room at the center of which sits a squat stone totem with a strange little face.
Farden prods the room with a pole and searches the foyer for traps, but finds none. The totem radiates a magical aura, but there's nothing much to learn from the doorway. Brugard and Farden enter first, and each is sprayed with a head of lukewarm steam. Farden manages to duck the blast aimed at him, but Brugard catches a spray of magical mist right in the face, and promptly vanishes. Though initially alarmed, the party is reassured when Brugard's disembodied voice assures them that he's not dead or gone - just invisible. Farden searches the little stone face for traps or mechanisms, but finds none. Whatever it is, it's independently magical and not - or not inherently, anyway - a trap, in the strictest sense of the word. As Glitch crosses the threshold, she takes a third blast of steam which causes her to shrink to a height of one foot for the better part of a minute. After blasting the wayang, the totem goes still, it's funny little face now wearing a frown. Nothing rouses the small statue, which now seems defunct. Puzzled, the party moves on, exploring yet another empty room adjacent this one before trying another door in the back wall, and coming face-to-face with the Statue of Wishes.
"What do you wish for?" asks the huge stone face. "Experience, or reawakening?"
Glitch's incredible Knowledge (dungeoneering) check actually identifies this creature, and the... capricious nature of it's wish-granting nature. Risking whatever twisted "experience" this creature is rumored to subject some wishers to, the party collectively wishes for experience, and is treated to a large sum of XP.
In an instant, a wealth of experiences is transferred into the minds of our heroes. In a heartbeat, Brugard learns what it might feel like to lead an army against the Gates of Hell. Glitch gets a taste of the Dissolution, and all it might reveal. Farden gains false but revealing memories of a mercantile campaign leading to an absolute merchant monopoly in Brevoy. Sansara gains the wisdom of the great masters, and insights into true mastery of the "drunken monk" style.
Character Updates
Level six! These guys are levelling fast. Never though I'd say this, but I hope the first couple levels of Rappan Athuk proper don't end up underwhelming them. I don't have builds for you yet (stay tuned), but here are this level's highlights:
Brugard Duerdek is the only guy with a full base attack bonus progression. Level six means two attacks on a full-attack action, and for a stonelord paladin, it also means increased DR and AC. Lay on hands improves this level, and Brugard picks up his first mercy. He chooses the ability to remove fatigue, which makes leaving his defensive stance mid-combat a much more viable option.
Glitch learns dispel magic and fly. Not exciting, maybe, but those are a couple of crucial spells.
Farden Lovodka picks up his first level in the Noble Scion prestige class. He gains the affluent class feature (each level-up now means a small windfall of gold), as well as proficiency with all martial weapons. [sarcasm]Farden's trading in his shortbow for a longbow... look out![/sarcasm]
Sansara-Sensei gains mystic wisdom (the ability to share certain monk class features with her allies) and her sensei "advice" ability improves. Nothing from drunken master this level, but 6th level increases her base attack bonus and all of her saving throws.
Glancing at Next Level
While I was writing my party's character updates, it occurred to me that next level is going to be a big deal.
Brugard actually doesn't get much next level, but feats are big deals for melee types.
Glitch will get fourth level spells. I don't think I need to say much more about that, except that one of them is bound to be an illusion spell (since she's got to spend one slot at each level on one). Have you looked at 4th-level illusion spells lately? Greater invisibility. Phantasmal killer. Shadow conjuration. Lesser simulacrum. Damn.
Farden will get a souped-up version of Leadership for free (from Noble Scion). His cohort will be 6th level, not 5th. Hello, healer. No big deal, just a fifth guy on the team for free.
Sansara will get a higher drunken ki cap, plus wholeness of body - meaning that she'll be able to heal herself for 7 points by spending 2 ki points... which she has plenty of, as a drunken master.
This group might just survive with some of the original membership intact. Or not, if you know much about Rappan Athuk's endgame.
At the rate we're levelling, we'll find out soon. Stay tuned.
Daron Woodson
Abandoned Arts
I'd especially like to see the monk. It sounds like that character has been extremely effective, something that monks sometime struggle to achieve.
Yes, they do. Especially at low levels.
Funny story. A couple of us (myself included) initially encouraged Sansara-Sensei's player to consider a more powerful class. Rappan Athuk isn't fooling around - that dungeon wants you dead - and this isn't the campaign to be messing around with class types that can't excel at all levels of play.
As it turns out, our concerns were unnecessary. To be fair, the party hasn't happened across anything truly awful yet, (well... except maybe Simrath the "worg"), but Sansara has so far excelled against everything the PCs have encountered. Panther Style is no joke.
I'll post stats sometime after our next session.
To be fair, the party hasn't happened across anything truly awful yet
This has been corrected......"Victory" has never smelled so sweet. (Or, Gods help me, tasted it)
Readers should look forward to the next update! The players have entered Rappan Athuk proper!!!!
Hi !
Just tuning in to show my appreciation for your work.
As I liked your style of play, I just perused through your publications. So, I guess that in a sort of way, you do work for the benefit of your business when you pen this journal... Keep on !
To be fair, the party hasn't happened across anything truly awful yetThis has been corrected......"Victory" has never smelled so sweet. (Or, Gods help me, tasted it)
Readers should look forward to the next update! The players have entered Rappan Athuk proper!!!!
Did s#~~ hit the fan ? <wink wink>
Have you looked at 4th-level illusion spells lately? Greater invisibility. Phantasmal killer. Shadow conjuration. Lesser simulacrum. Damn.
Have you looked at lesser simulacrum lately? The fact that you don't control the simulacrum takes a big chunk out of its usefulness. I guess you could combine it with charm monster or something.
Did s@+* hit the fan ? <wink wink>To be fair, the party hasn't happened across anything truly awful yetThis has been corrected......"Victory" has never smelled so sweet. (Or, Gods help me, tasted it)
Readers should look forward to the next update! The players have entered Rappan Athuk proper!!!!
S*@$ certainly hit the Farden!
Great stuff guys! Which advancement track do you use? Did you plan the characters in a group session? It seems they complement each other really well and work especially well for dungeon crawling. Can't wait to read more...
Great stuff guys! Which advancement track do you use? Did you plan the characters in a group session? It seems they complement each other really well and work especially well for dungeon crawling. Can't wait to read more...
Normal advancement, and no we were asked by one of the players several times what we were all going to play and we ignored him mostly. One of us, the monk, decided right away what she wanted to play. Shortly after that , the ignored guy, decided he was going to be a paladin. That left traps guy, wizard, and healer and only 2 players. Wizard was taken by the other player so I was left to build a trap/skill monkey/healer. We were told several times to not take this dungeon lightly (for very good reason) and optimization was not a bad thing. Gonna post my stats soon...if not tonight.
Oh and please ask more questions. I'll leave spoilers for the big guy but answer anything I can about our play style, characters stats, and rationalization behind why we(I make the bad decisions) have done things. Motives and whatnot(some may be withheld because the paladin can't know shhhh)
Who has 5 con, 9 dex, a lung filled with blood, A heart filled with hate (for bees...just because) and a mortal fear of every inanimate object? Find out after next update.
Hi !
Just tuning in to show my appreciation for your work.
As I liked your style of play, I just perused through your publications. So, I guess that in a sort of way, you do work for the benefit of your business when you pen this journal... Keep on !
Thanks, Smarnil! I'd be interested to know which items you bought, and what you thought of them.
Did s+** hit the fan ? <wink wink>
The fan sort of dove into it, actually. Stand by for updates...
Have you looked at 4th-level illusion spells lately? Greater invisibility. Phantasmal killer. Shadow conjuration. Lesser simulacrum. Damn.Have you looked at lesser simulacrum lately? The fact that you don't control the simulacrum takes a big chunk out of its usefulness. I guess you could combine it with charm monster or something.
Or one of Farden's DC 30-40ish Diplomacy checks. ; )
Great stuff guys! Which advancement track do you use? Did you plan the characters in a group session? It seems they complement each other really well and work especially well for dungeon crawling. Can't wait to read more...
As Farden said, we're on the medium advancement track. The characters were built with role coverage, synergy, and dungeon crawling in mind, and they knew they'd be taking on a notoriously killer megadungeon. Farden's player was effectively left with the roles nobody covered: trapfinding and healing. This wasn't a mistake; Farden's player is probably the best "builder" at our table.
Point-buy was 20. Starting wealth was standard (with some nonmagical, nonmasterwork freebies handed out above and beyond the standard wealth).
Campaign Journal: Sessions 6 and 7
Day 29: After backtracking to the Mouth of Doom post-wish, an extended rope trick rest (back-to-back castings of the now-12-hour spell) carries the players through day 28, right past day 29, and into day 30. At 1:30 AM, the party ventures back down into lower levels via the pit trap ladder well in the southern hall, this time. Finding themselves in another linear hallway, the PCs enter a strange room lit with self-lighting candles. A red carpet on the floor sets off red flags for trap sense and detect magic, and Farden carefully disables the trapped carpet - whatever it was. After moving the carpet aside, the party discovers a stone trap door underneath of it. Inside, a chest filled with coin. Moving north, the party discovers an even stranger room wherein the floor (three feet below the base of the door frame) is ablaze with fire. Several exits lead out of this room, and buttons on the walls next to each door cause platforms to extend across the flaming floor. Aatos the elemental is dispatched to press the button next to each door (except for one, which is a false exit perhaps designed to lure adventurers into messing with the fire floor). Safely passing through the walls, Aatos enables all the platforms and the party passes through this room safely.
Another set of rooms reveals a pair of crypts. After much careful searching and ten-foot-pole-prodding, Brugard begins prying rubies from the lids of the sarcophagi occupying the tomb. Aatos is bid to peek into the stone tombs, where he finds animate skeletons that try to claw him. In a third tomb, Aatos finds much worse than that: the elemental disturbs a shadow, which drains some of Aatos' strength before he can react. The shadow phases through the stone and attacks, but Brugard's magical stone strikes put it down before it can do any more harm.
Taking a different route through the fire-floor room, Farden spots an obvious pressure plate and disables what might have been a portcullis trap. A little exploration to the south finds a staircase leading back up a level. After consulting the map, it seemed that the stair should lead to the iron cobra statue room that the party discovered in the Mouth of Doom. Trekking the stairs to confirm reveals that it does, in fact. Unfortunately for Farden (who is in the lead on the stair run), the iron cobra at the top of the staircase animates and bites him, injecting him with black adder poison. (If you know anything about summoners and synthesists, you know that ability score damage is expensive and difficult to remove.) Deciding to press on a little while longer despite Farden's mild poisoning, the party comes across a room with a murky "reflecting pool" standing before a large statue of a dragon-riding knight. As Farden searches the pool for treasure, the knight's shield-emblem, a bat, animates and attacks. It is easily defeated (whereupon it instantly begins to regenerate at a rate slow enough to pose no immediate threat), and the party pulls some minor treasure (including a gem concealed within a boot heel) from the pool.
Another room further north bears signs of recent occupation. Before Farden can do much searching, Aatos' tremorsense picks up incoming movement, and the party begins to hear footsteps coming from the north and east. The room has several entrances, so the PCs put Glitch in a corner and form a defensive posture around her, ready for combat.
Moments later, a secret door opens - right behind Glitch - and gnolls begin to pour through it. At the same time, gnolls and hyenas burst into the room from two conventional points of entry. Unfortunately for the gnolls, who roll very poorly on initiative, Glitch is able to render her attackers unconscious with a color spray, and Sansara's panther style tears through the remainder like tissue paper.
After wrapping up the gnolls, the party takes a rest period in the formerly bandit-occupied room upstairs. During this time, six bandits happen by, looking for Jack. After putting together that Brugard and company have killed their boss, the bandits book it out of there and leave the party to wait out daybreak.
At dawn, the PCs head back to Zelkor's Ferry. After counting out their spoils from the Mouth of Doom (and below), the party decides to go someplace where the treasure is richer. Rather than bother with the iron door they'd found earlier or the so-far-disappointing deeper levels of the Mouth of Doom, the PCs decide to bite the bullet. Our heroes take the Ferry back to the Lackthroat Road and prepare communal mounts for a journey to Rappan Athuk proper...
Thanks, Smarnil! I'd be interested to know which items you bought, and what you thought of them.
For the moment, I am afraid none, but given your low price tag policy, I will soon get some from your Class Acts line if only to show my appreciation.
To be continued, later today!
THAT is called 'building expectations' !
Sorry for the delay, folks: update to come tomorrow.
Campaign Journal: Session 7 (continued)
Day 34: Determined to make their fortune somewhere wealthier than the Mouth of Doom, the party arrives at Rappan Athuk, the Dungeon of Graves. Backtracking a ways, the PCs rest before entering the next day.
Day 35: Or at least, that's the plan. There are some difficulties getting in.
The party doesn't spend any time exploring any of the graves or the extraneous mausoleums, heading straight for a dwarven statue on a stone block across the way from Rappan Athuk's green stone doors, where Farden locates a small hidden drawer or compartment in the block. Wondering if perhaps the "don't disturb my bones" message carved upon the block is meant to discourage one from fooling with the drawer, the group leaves the statue alone and approaches Rappan Athuk with detect magic up.
Detecting transmutation magic on the structure itself, the party closes to within 20 feet of the structure before eight green gargoyles animate and launch themselves skyward, preparing to dive. Glitch puts the party in an invisibility sphere, and the group moves up together while the gargoyles cackle, taunt, and hover, waiting for the party to reveal themselves. While Farden prepares to pick the locks on Rappan Athuk's great green doors, Aatos the elemental servant phases into the building proper and the gargoyles grow impatient, a few of them settling down onto the ground after overhearing some whispered conversation between invisible party members. Aatos is unable to open the doors from the inside, but Farden succeeds in picking the lock just as the gargoyles begin blindly attacking the spaces just in front of the doors.
Once inside, Farden begins searching the room's only real feature: a huge stone sarcophagus. Brugard and Glitch puzzle over the alarmingly evil-aura'ed black candles atop the sarcophagus, but before you can say "take 20 on Perception," Brugard becomes aware that the floor is moving toward the ceiling. Aatos begins shuffling around underground, looking for some kind of egress, while the rest of the party starts searching the sarcophagus, walls, and floor for a secret panel of some kind.
Upon investigating the sarcophagus, Aatos is clawed (and weakened!) by some kind of skeletal creature, which thereafter begins to cackle madly from inside the stone tomb.
As a desperate Farden attempts to pry the lid off of the sarcophagus, Aatos finally finds an empty space beneath the floor. Quick and consolidated searching efforts locate the secret door just south of the sarcophagus, and the party ducks in and climbs down with haste. Farden spares a moment to search the mouth of the pit before anyone descends, and finds some sort of panel, which he disables. Seconds after descending (he is the last to do so), some sort of device triggers the jammed panel, which simply bulges outward, stuck.
As the party descends the ladder beneath the secret door, the cackling of the dark-boned skeleton within the tomb echoes after them, and the grinding of the mechanical trap comes to an eventual halt.
Down in the depths the tunnel, the party finds a poorly-concealed trapdoor in a humble dirt pit, five feet deep. Descending further, the PCs pass through a reinforced door and set foot in the Lair of the Dung Monster.
The foul air sickens Sansara, and the first few rooms turn up little. Stripped coffins, a gooey rat corpse, a collapsed room, and a couple of obvious traps. The "poker room" is the source of much confusion, as the PCs poke and prod the skeleton and his poisoned poker deck. After a little backtracking, the PCs decide to send the earth-gliding Aatos through the rubble in the collapsed room to see what might lie beyond. Discovering a scroll of (among other things) enervation and a +1 keen short sword within the collapsed room, the PCs are already impressed with Rappan Athuk's treasure yield. Little do they know what lies in store around the corner...
After disabling an obvious pit trap, the party heads north along a hallway running north and south. Entering a room which seems to have recently been the scene of a skirmish, the PCs spot a secret door while examining the contents of an old desk (the only article of furniture still standing in the rough-hewn chamber). Investigation yields... a lavatory (and an especially foul stench). Since detect magic won't penetrate more than a foot or so of stone, Farden gets up close to cast his spell down the lavatory shafts (with Brugard at his side). Just as his spell registers the presence of magic within the area, the center-most lavatory seat transforms into a gooey, fecal nightmare-creature before his eyes.
Glitch, heavily invested in knowledge skills, knows that this must be the "unkillable" mimic-monster rumored to haunt Rappan Athuk. Fortunately, the monster isn't exactly what one would call hostile. Rather, the creature simply surges forward and casually begins to reach for Brugard's magical shield. When the alarmed party backpedals, keeping the shield out of reach, the monster simply follows along, idly but greedily reaching for Brugard's trusty shield.
Farden attempts to negotiate with the creature, who seems not to understand or care about what the nobleman has to say. The dung monster is slow, and follows the party through the adjacent hall, the secret door, and back into the rough-hewn chamber outside. During the almost casual retreat (no sudden movements, no attacking, no panicking...), Farden is able to discern that the creature itself is not radiating an aura of magic... which means that something inside the toilet's shaft must have been magical. Farden breaks away from the group, re-entering the lavatory hall while Brugard, Sansara, and Glitch continue to evade the slow-moving creature. As Farden uses detect magic to examine not one but three auras of significant power within the feces-covered pit, the dung monster becomes increasingly frustrated with Brugard's game of "keep away." The monster slams its tentacles and roars at Brugard while Farden, choosing the potential acquisition of great magic and wealth over his dignity and a grave affront to all five of his senses, descends into the lavatory pit.
As soon as Farden is down the shaft, he is overcome with nausea. His "economy of actions" less than halved, Farden begins retrieving those items which radiate an aura of magic. As his party shouts warnings that the dung monster, who has tired of chasing Brugard in a circle, is returning to the lavatory, Farden stuffs the items into his pack and desperately (but unsuccessfully) begins what turns out to be an arduous and disgusting attempt to climb out of the pit. Brugard buys a little time for Farden by offering the monster a +1 dagger in place of his shield, but a series of very, very poor Climb checks has Farden frustrated and desperate at the bottom of the pit. His dagger-bought time squandered, Glitch invisibly skirts by the monster in the hallway outside the lavatory. The monster seems to notice Glitch despite her invisibility, but makes no attempt to stop her as she rushes to Farden's aid with a recently-acquired scroll of levitate. Raising the demoralized Farden out of the pit, Farden skirts by, dropping and offering magical arrows and the like to the seemingly-greedy and increasingly irritated monster. The dung monster takes each offering, but agitatedly follows Glitch and Farden (who is terrified and absolutely dripping with feces and who knows what else at this point) down the hallway. Dashing through the secret door, the party slams the panel shut and Farden disables the mechanism just barely in time to trap the "dung-mimic" inside the lavatory hall. As the monster pounds on the door, the party makes a run for it, backtracking all the way out of the level, up the trap door, into the hallway below the mausoleum, then inside of a rope trick for good measure.
At the end of fifteen minutes, the party has been assailed by an overwhelming number of regenerating gargoyles, nearly crushed to death, accosted by a number of lesser traps, chased around by a legendary mimic. Aatos has strength damage (and is sitting out of most of these encounters, given his fragile hit point total), Glitch has used considerably more than fifteen minutes' worth of spells, Sansara is still sick to her stomach, Brugard is short a magic dagger, and Farden is covered in all manner of waste and filth. It's in his eyes. It's in his mouth. It's inside his synthesized eidolon. Inside his clothing. Under his fingernails. In his pack.
Sharing a rope trick with Farden is no picnic for anyone either, and Glitch prepares prestidigitation for the next day. In the meantime, the wayang wizard is able to identify Farden's hard-earned treasures. What the party has acquired puts all lamenting of the lost +1 arrows and +1 daggers out of everyone's minds. Farden has procured from the pit a type 1 bag of holding, an efreeti bottle, and a +3 dagger. With the +1 keen short sword and the scroll that the PCs found minutes earlier, the PC's most terrifying delve to date has also been their most lucrative by far.
The party rests inside the rope trick until later in the evening. Glitch gets Farden and all his gear cleaned up with prestidigitation, and the party heads cautiously south. Farden is on high-alert, believing every object to be a wrathful mimic. The PCs check on the jammed secret door... which now stands open. Beset by paranoia, Farden keeps his collapsible ten-foot pole handy and Brugard takes the formation lead, with Farden just behind (and the pole ahead of both of them).
The southern hall opens up into a large cave bisected by a slow-moving underground river no wider than five feet. Rats of various (and monstrous) sizes scurry about everywhere, and from the west, a shrill feminine voice cries out. The PCs' Sense Motive checks detect a ruse, and exploration continues for now. Dire rats corner our party in one of many dead-end side passages, but Sansara snaps so many of their necks in the first round that the remaining two retreat with quickness.
Thorough exploration turns up a helm of comprehend languages and read magic in one side passage, and a staircase (concealed by rubble) descending downward in another. Aatos scouts the latter, and reports many sets of footsteps in the passage beyond (damn it, tremorsense!). Spooking whatever laid in ambush, the PCs find another cache of treasure near the hidden staircase. One scroll of antimagic field and a pair of goggles of minute seeing richer, the party considers the safety of river travel, but elects to take the stairs for now.
Below the Lair of the Dung Monster, the party enters a disturbingly gore-soaked hallway. After a little poking around, the party enters a hallway haunted by a heavy "rolling" sound seeming to come from deeper within the dungeon. A little backtracking takes the party to a lidless stone tomb, which Farden inspects. Farden notices grubs within the stone tomb, but continues his search. It is only after the grubs suddenly burrow into Farden's flesh that the merchant-adventurer remembers to roll Knowledge (nature).
Rot grubs! Not good. Farden gets four of the little buggers into his flesh. Thinking fast, Farden is able to burn them out with a vial of alchemist's fire (unceremoniously applied to his own arm)... but not before taking a considerable amount of Constitution damage.
Scouting sucks, and Farden decides that's it for today. The PCs backtrack to the rubble room, using Astos' earth glide ability and their newly-acquired bag of holding to ferry themselves through the rubble. One party member hides in the bag while Aatos glides through the stone walls and deposits the party member on the other side. Rinse and repeat, until everyone is through!
One rope trick later, and it's morning.
Day 36: With twenty-four hours (the onset for many diseases) passed since Farden's fecal dive, it's time for a Fortitude save. With Farden's Con score destroyed by rot grubs, our nobleman-turned-adventurer contracts filth fever, and takes more Con damage (and Dex damage to boot). Farden's Con and Dex scores (or, more accurately, his eidolon's) are in the single-digits now... and cannot be healed naturally due to the nature of the eidolon. It's been a rough couple of days for Farden.
The party attempts to leave the dungeon through the mausoleum exit, but finds the shaft blocked by the crushing floor trap. A day later, and the trap is still engaged. Undaunted, the party uses Aatos to ferry them through the earth, emerging near the dwarf statue. Cresting the edge of the cross-shaped depression in which Rappan Athuk is settled, the PCs are alarmed to find over a hundred kobolds poised to attack. Leading the kobolds is an ogre named Vorlak, who promises that the party may leave with their horses (summoned mounts) and their armor if they lay down their packs and their weapons.
Farden attempts to negotiate, but Vorlak isn't having it. As Farden stalls, Glitch performs a headcount. A hundred and twelve kobolds bar their way, and talking is getting the party nowhere. All at once, combat erupts. Sansara is the only party member to win initiative, and she attempts to knock the flat-footed Glitch prone (the kobolds are armed with slings)... but rolls a 1 on the attempt. The kobolds, knowing well that magic-users must always be primary targets, use their slings to lay low one of the party's horses (to get a clear shot at Glitch) before pegging the wizard to half of her hit point total or so. Thinking the robe-wearing, unarmored Sansara to be a spellcaster as well, many more of the creatures waste their stones on the monk. Several more attack Brugard, whose damage reduction renders him invulnerable to the kobold's missiles. Brugard, with advice and assistance from Sansara, lays Vorlak low. Before Brugard delivers the killing blow, Vorlak makes a plea. Though dwarves and giants are hated foes... they are also honored foes (or so he says). Spare him, and Vorlak will share all he knows about the region. Brugard shrugs, and puts Vorlak down with the flat of his axe, instead of the edge. With Vorlak out for the count, all but two of the kobolds flee.
The remaining pair - Meepo and Draupnear - throw themselves at the mercy of the party. While the party grills Meepo about the location of their lair and the repercussions of Vorlak's defeat, Draupnear engages in a whispered conversation with Glitch, who he mistakes for some sort of kobold sorcerer. Draupnear seems to aspire to elevate Glitch to Vorlak's level within the tribe and the region... even asking Glitch if she could kill the other three adventurers if he helped out. Meanwhile, Meepo divulges the existance of a magical, golden spear at the lair - too large for the kobolds and too small for Vorlak, but highly magical and Vorlak's "badge of office" nonetheless.
The party plans to send Meepo back to claim leadership (and the spear) until the party can return to take up both. With Farden rapidly dying of filth fever, there's no time for a detour now. The kobolds are worth returning for, though; Farden has long held aspirations of establishing a bastion of civilization in the area, and kobold vassals could be a good start.
For now, Glitch humors Draupnear (or does she..?) as the kobold promises to get the golden spear (and leadership of the clan) into Glitch's hands. Farden (who overhears but pays no mind to the poorly-whispered conversation), sends Meepo and Draupnear back to the clan to announce Vorlak's defeat, with "bottled magic" (alchemist's fire) to secure Meepo's leadership on arrival. Draupnear promises to keep Meepo safe, but demands a "good job" within the clan, upon the PC's return.
In order to ensure that the kobolds return to their tribe alive (and ahead of their one-hundred-and-ten peers), Glitch turns over the last living mount to Meepo and Draupnear, and the party heads for the road on foot. On the way, Farden uses his wands to revive Vorlak. Hands tied, Vorlak is marched along with the party and interrogated for information. Vorlak reveals a great deal about several surrounding bandit outfits, and the party decides to take him to Zelkor's Ferry. Vorlak has a hard time promising not to eat anyone (which he very much wants to do), but agrees not to do so if the "pink people" do not poke him with weapons (which he fully expects that they will). With that settled, the party makes it out of the hills (safely and without any trouble, to everyone's surprise).
Back on the road, the PCs set out for Zelkor's Ferry.
This is great, thank you for sharing!
Ahem. Minor correction. I do believe I punched that foul ogre into submission (while shouting BOO! after coming out of invis) after he tried to run from Brugard (I mean who wouldn't run, he's practically invincible?!). And now we are lugging around TWO filthy monsters (that's right Farden, you still stink!). I wonder what more trouble you can find for us!
I believe Sansara staggered him with the invisi-punch, and Brugard finished him with the flat of his axe. I did note that Sansara assisted, though.
By the way, at the moment I think "character that the killer GM in me hates the most" has graduated from "Farden's ten-foot pole" to "Sansara" to "Brugard." Except it's not Brugard so much as a combination of Brugard's elemental servant and that bag of holding.
The more I think about it, the more I expect to really hate the "bag ferry" trick.
I still want that pole dead, though.
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Very nice. I love the narrative. I think the party I'll be running in Rappan Athuk will have lots fun.
I'm sure they will. Farden's having fun, for example. Aren't you, buddy?
Make sure they have trapfinding. Trapfinding and (preferably) trap sense. And a damn good Perception mod. And a ten foot pole.
Thank you for the write-up. It is great fun to read through. I now wish more than ever that I could find a Pathfinder group in Southern Orange County, CA. I guess RPGs are just not popular down here :(!
I'm sure they will. Farden's having fun, for example. Aren't you, buddy?
I have 5 CON, 9 DEX, I am afflicted with a disease, have a crispy arm with dead worms inside me, and several days before I can do anything about it......having a ball....You monster.