Just noting Con damage and current hit points.
Forgot
Lym can auto make that Perception check. After rereading the thread, I see that Rexil is obviously dead. Now there can be no retreat, only Zuul.
If Lym's Gust of Wind works and Aurora can see the battle field better and it's possible, she'll place her ice and fire balls (the blue circle) as Praxim said.
If Lym's Gust of Wind doesn't work or she can't place her fireballs where she wants, Aurora will go with Fear (the orange triangle).
Finding himself next to the overweight spellcaster in what seems like a flash, "Alright! Now it's time ta pay!" Thordak then unloads a barrage of attacks as he hovers in midair.
Praxim activates smite evil against the spellcaster, ignores the excessive glut of outsiders, and begins firing arrows at chubby.
The Gust of Wind forces the fog back violently. Heavier than air, the cloud roils back and sinks down below the floor into the pool of sewage.
Aurora's spells shatter the ice wall as well as the vrocks in the room, destroying both in convincing fashion.
Tomaru shifts himself and Thordak next to Jordimandus. The dwarf's fury is once again foiled by translucent images surrounding the mage. Yet his efforts are not in vain, because he does remove several of the images.
Praxim has more luck. Two of his shots strike home, causing severe damage.
The bone devil flies toards Praxim, casting another Ice Wall to block out Lym and Aurora.
The erinyes move to positions where they can fire at Tomaru.
Jordimandus pops out of existence exactly as Tomaru does, reappearing across the room. He casts a spell.
Thordak's Fly spell is erased, plunging him into the sewage! The obese wizard follows up with another spell, this time a thin green ray springs from his outstretched finger towards Tomaru.
As soon as the wall goes up, Lym launches into a droning chant, her voice reaching into distances unknown…
As soon as the wall goes up, Lym launches into a droning chant, her voice reaching into distances unknown…
"Aurora!" Lym snaps before she starts summoning. "Take the wall down! Quickly!"
Praxim switches to thistle arrows.
And one point of bleed on his turn, maybe disrupting casting, if he’s still alive.
If the Wizard goes down, Praxim doesn’t waste time with gloating and pivots smoothly to send the rest of the arrows at the bone devil (-4 to hit and -14 damage against it because of no smite evil).
Thordak curses vehemently in his own language as he works himself out of the sewage. "ALRIGHT, HUMONGOUS! OR WHATEVER YER BLASTED NAME IS! NOW YOU'VE PISSED ME OFF!" And with that, Morgrym heads straight for the gluttonous guardian, growing to twice his own size.
Tomaru pulls a scroll of Heal and casts it upon himself.
At first Aurora is about to blast the wall away again, then she thinks better of it. "First" Aurora casts Quickened Invisibility on Lym. "Now come along." Then she casts Dimension Door to get them both into the room.
Praxim's arrows are devastatingly effective. The first two are foiled by Jordimandus' images, but the last two are solid hits! And despite the fact that the demonic heart beating in his open chest absorbs the critical damage of the second arrow, the damage is enough to slay the Warden of Sloth.
The obese Jordimandus slumps in his floating throne, eyes staring lifelessly at the ceiling. With his demise, the devils remaining in the room disappear from the Prime Material Plane in a cloud of smoke and brimstone.
At the same time, the four sluices of colored liquid cease flowing into the main pool, last drops vanishing into the muck below.
All is quiet in the Festering Maze.
”Consign that to the Abyss,” Praxim comments as the outsiders vanish.
Praxim jumps through the cold area of the melted wall and rejoins the others, seemingly quite jolly.
”I don’t know about anybody else, but Thordak really needs a bath. C’mon Rex, they’re gone. It’s safe to get up now...”
He trails off as he sees how badly his cohort was injured. ”Oh, Rex. You can fix him, right Tomaru? Something about a diamond? I’ll pay.”
He shrugs off any consoling hands, then returns to the throne room to fly up and haul Tubby’s floating throne down to the ground. Once his body has been looted, Praxim will dump him face first into the rotting sewage.
"I definitely did not cover myself in glory this fight," Lym says, as she sighs and shakes her head. "Poor Rexil… We'll do for him what we can, of course."
[b]"Yes, but I won't be able to so until tomorrow. There are some preparations I need to make. Until then, let's make sure that this place is cleared and purified.
Jordimandus' corpse possesses a rod of absorption, a cloak of resistance +3, a handy haversack, a ring of protection +2, diamond dust worth 500gp, an ivory plaque worth 150 gp, and a silver mirror worth 1,000 gp.
Try as he might, Praxim cannot move the throne from it's floating position. Even with the death of Jordimandus, some magic is holding it aloft. As it turns out, the the throne rides upon two Immovable Rods, thrust into the six-ton throne's base.
On closer inspection, Aurora finds a hidden button on the arm of the throne. Depressing it causes a drawer to open on the right side of the throne's base. Hidden within are a scroll of planar ally, a scroll of teleport, and a scroll of stone to flesh. Also inside are several books, a manual of gainful exercise +2, and Jordimandus' spellbooks.
Perhaps more importantly, though, Jordimandus has scrawled on the inside cover of his largest spellbook a significant bit of information—his suspicion on what components would work best for the crafting of runeforged weapons. This information confirms what you already know, further cementing the wisdom of crafting your own weapons.
Jordimandus hoped someday to forge multiple runeforged weapons, arm summoned champions with them, and take over all of Runeforge—he’d done most of the research needed to make the weapons and frequently mentions these plans elsewhere in his spellbook, but, fortunately for Runeforge’s inhabitants, lacked the energy and drive to follow through on the plan. His notes include significant information on the other inhabitants of the Runeforge.
"Alright," Lym says. "Let's scour this stinkhole, then retreat somewhere a bit less … fragrant … heal up and study up. If Tomaru can resurrect Rexil in the morning, we can move on to the next area. Agreed?"
It should take two days for Tomaru to get everyone healed, cured, and raised. He'll be ready to go again on day three.
Which Runelords do we have left?
"Alright," Lym says. "Let's scour this stinkhole, then retreat somewhere a bit less … fragrant … heal up and study up. If Tomaru can resurrect Rexil in the morning, we can move on to the next area. Agreed?"
As Thordak has been busy cleaning the slime off of himself since the fight ended, "Works for me! I hate this blasted place. The sooner we get done... the better!" he complains with a harrumph as he flings more goo off of himself.
We'll confirm Envy's demise, then go for Gluttony. As I understand it, Wrath is our last stop.
Are we able to teleport to Castle Lym and back?
Are we able to teleport to Castle Lym and back?
"Let's get back to Greed and barricade ourselves in like we did last night," Lym suggests. "It seemed safe enough... Though we should increase our securities this time around. Wouldn't want the remaining area lords to shank us in the dead of night."
The dwarf catches himself staring at the middle lever, Must... resist... middle... lever... and shakes himself free of his mental trap. Shrugging, "Works for me. Let's go. Staying in here's gonna bring nothin' but trouble."
Two days pass. Rexil is brought back from the dead, markedly changed by the experience. No longer a bright eyed young giant, he is more sober about his daily dealings.
"Strategy meeting, ladies and gentlemen," Lym says once Rexil has recovered as much as is feasible.
"Our next targets are Envy, Gluttony and Wrath. In modern terms, that's Abjuration, Necromancy and Evocation; wards, undeath and big explosions."
The Wizard paces in front of the assembled party-members.
"Envy is probably going to be my weakness; it specializes in snapping the spells of others and banishing summoned creatures, as well as setting up barriers and traps. In the end, Envy will probably wind up being a match of power and endurance; us, breaking through all barriers. We may lose the use of some of our permanent spells when we go there. That cannot be helped.
Aurora, I think you will likely be our MVP there; any enemy Abjurers need to be tied up by your superior quantity of spells.
Gluttony is going to be hard on all of us. If we're going there, Tomaru and Praxim will likely have the heaviest burden to bear; the kind of unholy opponents that Gluttony raises from the grave will be weakest to your holy powers.
In addition, Tomaru, we're going to need to be able to use the Death Ward spell. Enervation and Energy drain are but two examples of the kind of Necromancy that can sap life and health to the point that we collapse into corpse-dust. I should like to avoid that fate.
Wrath is our final goal; it is there that we can find an exit from this place. It is also going to be where we will be in the most dire need of our own Abjurations; magic to ward off damage and keep us going. Again, endurance is going to be important at Wrath.
Thordak, Rexil and Praxim will be MVP when we go there. Aurora and I can run some interference by using counterspells. As always, we will be relying on Tomaru and Praxim to heal us and keep us alive.
As we saw very clearly in Sloth, I am ill-suited to the kind of close-up combat we can expect around here. My ideal place is in the rear guard, slinging spells from a distance. Regrettable, but a fact.
In order to contribute to the vanguard, I propose to Bind a powerful Outsider to help us in our upcoming fight. It would have the advantage of actually being present and not needing to be called in the middle of a fight.
Unless you all object, I will study the appropriate spell before we set out today and call upon the mightiest Celestial my magic can reach, then try to persuade it to assist us. This is not going to be for free, so I might need to borrow some money from you all."
Lym turns to Tomaru.
"If my suggesting to Summon and Bind finds favour, m'love, maybe I could request that you use the Cleric's equivalent and summon a Planar Ally? We can use all the help we can get."
Stroking his beard in thought, "Okay, just knock out a couple more places and we can finally be free of this place. The sooner the better if you ask me."
Praxim is there when Rexil’s eyes open. ”Hey there, kiddo. Take it slow getting up. You’ve been out for awhile.”
Rexil’s hands fly to his abdomen, relieved at finding it intact. ”I thought I was dying. That demon thing got me good.”
Praxim pauses, briefly considering something he knows to be wrong. He lays a hand on his shoulder before gently responding, ”There’s no easy was to say this, but that thing did get you as badly as you thought. I’m sorry I didn’t protect you better, kiddo.”
”Oh....so...”
”Yeah, you were dead. You’ve been dead for over a day until Tomaru could work his miracles to bring you back to us.”
Rexil falls silent and Praxim gives him some space.
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Lym spends some time perusing her spellbooks before the group sets out.
In the end, she settles on the following arsenal:
Lym proceeds to cast Mnemonic enhancer, and uses it to study an additional three Magic missiles for the day. (There being no such thing as having too many Magic missiles in your arsenal.)
With that done, the Wizard draws a complex diagram on the floor of the territory of Greed, the image of a Hand at its center, and starts a chant of ten minutes.
Arcane energies soon ripple outwards from the Wizard and the pattern she has created…
In the breathtaking mountainscape of Nirvana, the Movanic Deva paces, its mind oddly restless this day, its flaming sword to hand.
It has not received recent orders to travel to any of the Inner Planes, nor to the Material, and yet…
There is a strange thrilling at the edge of its senses. A thrilling that comes into sudden, sharp focus as lines of light carve a diagram on the pure bedrock before it.
And at the center of that pattern… a darkness, shaped like a hand.
An outstretched hand.
'Come,' a voice seems to whisper.
'Come.'
There are no orders. A mortal's working, then.
Mortals can be deplorably evil. This could be a trap.
The Movanic Deva sets foot upon the pattern of light and seizes the black hand in its own.
Traps exist to be sprung. Evil exists to be confronted.
Mortal magic seizes upon the Angel and draws it forth. As it rushes through a tunnel of light and darkness, the Angel is at perfect peace.
It is doing what it exists for, after all.
Tomaru will try to help Lym. He sits nearby on the floor with his legs crossed. He makes sure that his Desnan holy symbol is prominently displayed. There are several magic items arrayed on the floor in front of him. When the angel appears, he says in celestial. "Greetings soldier of righteousness. We seek your aid in vanquishing a great evil. Will you help us?"
”Indeed. We seek your aid to prevent the rise of an ancient evil: the Runelord of Greed Karzoug. In the short term, we seek your aid to help us cleanse this mini realm of its denizens. We are about to enter an area dedicated to necromantic magics, likely filled with powerful undead and ruled by a mortal wizard, likely some sort of lich or vampire. Would you aid us in this noble purpose?”
The ring of pure light is bright, almost painfully so, as the gate opened by Lym calls to the Outer Planes. The light grows, and a feeling of great power fills the room. Soon the light becomes too much to look at, the purest of whites, impossibly bright. A dark silhouette appears in the brilliance, and steps through...
The golden-skinned figure looks about it's surroundings, eyes narrowed, listening carefully.
"Where I come from, mortals, we usually begin with the pleasantries" she says with a nod to Tomaru. "Greetings child of Desna. And all of you: maui i anor míroiale bo in cín ambar"
"A great evil indeed. So tell me paladin of Erastil: why should I care?" The angel looks at each of you, holding your eyes in turn. "Why is this worth my time? The Runelords have been dead for ten thousand years. Are you trying to tell me that your treasure-hunting expedition in this...place...has anything to do with them?"
She frowns. "Karzoug espoused the Sin of Greed. Necromancy was not within his portfolio." Her voice has the sound of menace.