Way of the Wicked

Game Master Megan Robertson

Stopping in his tracks at the sight of the pendant, Malak frowned... this does seem far too easy...

Ware the pendant my brothers. My instincts say to ignore it and the clue on the door confirms my suspicions.

The priest strode into the chamber and cast his spell allowing him to see magical auras.

Cast Detect Magic

Sotha nodded, "Indeed, that does seem to be the message conveyed." Sotha said. He didn't bother to check for clues, instead proceeding to the staircase. He'd concluded based on the clues he'd seen so far that this was a religion of blind idiots, and that the priest had assumed that nothing hidden would be found, and so, made all the clues as painfully obvious as possible. He waited for the others to realize the same before he went up the stairs though. No sense in dying alone in case the next room emphasized teamwork.

Malak, your detect magic reveals that there is nothing magical in the room whatsoever, apart from that carried by party members. Not the pendant, not the stairs...

Sotha, you want to go straight for the stairs, yes? What do the rest of you want to do?

Malak shook his head when Sotha began climbing the stairs. To him the stairs were just as 'obvious' as the pendant on the pedestal but he'd reserve judgment until the elf's fate was evident. Instead the fat man wandered the room.

Where is everybody standing...? It's a 30' square room with a 3' high column in the middle. The stairs go up from the centre of the east wall. Imagine the room is divided horizontally - are you in the top (near the entrance) third, the middle third (with column and stairs) or the bottom third?

Are there other doors? Have we explored everywhere else? Tragen is by the entrance (so top 3rd).

Tragen looks around the room. "If that is not the goal of our quest, then we must continue to search. Would the stairs not be a means of egress rather than a continuation?"

Malak was wandering so I'll take bottom third

As Sotha steps on the stairs, there is an immediately metallic click and a heavy spiked ball almost ten feet across smashes down the stairs and across the room!

Sotha and anyone in the middle third of the chamber is at risk of being crushed. The podium is wrecked and the pendant's eyes are revealed as fragile glass. The ball bounces off the far wall and comes to rest in the northwest corner of the room.

Sotha (and anyone else at risk), please make a DC20 Reflex save.

"It seems the message of 'the fool' and 'stupidity' referred to more than just the pendant," he says as the spiked ball crashes against the wall. "Thus the stairs, as expected, are not the way deeper into our trials."

Looks like it's just Sotha, unless that timid NPC fellow followed him there (maybe hoping to get out too?)

Was this the last room that we could see an entrance for (thus to continue means finding a secret door)? I'm not really sure where we've been and what's left to do.

This is probably going to be bad. . .

Reflex: 1d20 + 3 ⇒ (19) + 3 = 22

Oh, sweet! Though now that I think about it, with the -1 dex, that should be a 21 instead of a 22, but I still made it!

Sotha saw the spiked ball just in time to dive out of the way, narrowly avoiding a flattened fate. As he picked himself up, he nodded in answer to Tragen's comment. "So it would seem."

with his pride somewhat hurt, Sotha took to looking around the room.

Perception: 1d20 + 5 ⇒ (8) + 5 = 13

With a rather remarkable and athletic leap, Sotha evades the spiked iron ball (Dammit!)

However, sudden danger seems to have heightened his senses, as he spots a secret door in the west wall.

Malak spun at the sound of what he saw was a large, spiked, iron ball crashing through the stairs...and so the warning was two fold... Thankfully it appeared that the elf was ok so the priest held his tongue despite a desire to say 'I told you so'.

'Nice reflexes Sotha. Does anyone see anything or have we found a dead end?'