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You know, I'm starting to be concerned about the attrition rate of PCs right now. I didn't THINK I was a killer GM...

Name: Countess Charlotte Medyved
Race: Human
Classes/levels: Bard 7
Adventure: Rivers Run Red
Location: Talonquake's Lair
Catalyst: Pool of green slime
The Gory Details:

Charlotte (or "Charlie" to friends) was the last active member of the original party that started this campaign, the rest having all either died or been religated to NPC status when players got bored of playing them/left the group. She was also rather impulsive.

And so it was, that impatient to finish exlporing the Talonquake's cave after slaying the beast, she ran ahead of the party and explored by herself. As any seasoned adventurer can tell you, this is a Bad Idea.

Anyway, she ended up exploring the thin passageway that leads between the Talonquake's room and the shambling mound's room, when the floor collapsed undeer her. She failed her reflex save, and tumbled 40ft into the slime at the base of the pit.

Having already taken some con damage from the Violet Fungi earlier (due to having charged ahead of the tanks to explore the room), she didnt last long in the slime (2 rounds, to be precise). The nearest party member was over 50 ft away, and arrived too late to save her, or indeed any trace of the body - for green slime converts organic matter into more green slime. And so it was that she who would be Queen passed rather ignominiously from this world.


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The party has finally finished off Rivers Run Red, but not without cost..

Name: Nikolai Volkov
Race: Human
Classes/levels: Wizard 1/Magus 6 (Some archetypes I forget the name of)
Adventure: Rivers Run Red
Location: Troll Lair
Catalyst: Friendly Fire
The Gory Details:

So the party finally faced old Hargulka. They were doing pretty well. The paladin was tanking and dealing blows, Nikolai the gunamagus was blasting away, our two wizards were throwing various spells at him.

Then one of the wizards throws a fireball. And Hargulka fails his save. And his necklace of fireballs fails ITS save.

Well.

The Paladin survived due to having enough hitpoints to not really care. Same with our tank/healer Oracle. Most of the rest of the party was far enough away they were not affected. But poor Nikolai was just a bit too close, and having already taken some damage in the fight (From Hargulka actually using one of his fireballs) he went past 0 hp and to about twice negative con. Ouch. So yeah, that's the first successful PK from a fellow PC in this campaign (But not my first with this group).

After defeating the troll king (The huge explosion at throat height helped), the party headed back to town to get Nikolai reincarnated, only to find the town wrecked by the Talonquake. Still, they managed to get him reincarnated pretty quickly.

Name: Nikolai Volkov
Race: Human
Classes/levels: Wizard 1/Magus 6 (Some archetypes I forget the name of)
Adventure: Rivers Run Red
Location: Talonquake's Lair
Catalyst: Talonquake's claw
The Gory Details:

After reincarnating our heroic gunmagus (As a gnome), the party gathered up and set out to track down the beast responsible for wrecking their town. They got past the mushroms and spiders at the entrance with only moderate difficulty, and found a sleeping Talonquake. So they buffed up and started to fight it.

It was going pretty well until Nikolai got caught out of position and inside the beast's reach. It wasn't actually focusing him, being more interested in the loud and dangerous paladin in its face, but he was in within its reach and could not easily get out. So he decides to just take his shots and tank the damage. He lifts his gun to fire and gets a claw to the face for his trouble, but he is still standing, and he fires a shot, doing moderate damage. He then reloads his gun. Its at this point that I started feeling guilty for having tampered with the Talonquake's statblock, and having given it Combat reflexes (In place of.... cleave? iirc?).

Suffice to say, whilst he could tank one hit from it, two was right out. He was slain once again, for the second time within as many sessions. He has asked not to be reincarnated this time. I think the pain is getting too much to bear.

So. They have some downtime ahead of them, then they are Going to be heading off to Varnhold. Should be fun.


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Once more, I list a fallen companion.
Name: Shadiroprojo
Race: Fetchling
Classes/levels: Arcane Trickster 6
Adventure: Rivers Run Red
Location: Ruined Keep
Catalyst: Being simultaneously too bad and too good at his job
The Gory Details:

Shadisomethingsomething was our latest acquisition, a shadowy (literally - the guy was a fetchling) Arcane Trickster rogue with a perchant for being absolutely, stupidly good at stealth. He had only recently joined the party (Played by the same guy who ran Illimaer, a previous death, but who had only just had time to come back to the group after an extended absence). The party was attempting to take on the Ruined Keep after hearing about it from several sources. Shadi decides to go ahead and scout things out.

So, first off he failed to notice, then failed to dodge, the falling portcullis, which smashes down onto him, and deals fairly nasty damage. But that's fine, he gets healed back up, and the party lifts the portcullis and all enter with him.

Then, he gets stealthy and sneaks off to explore more.

Now, Rigg is sitting around watching the PCs at this point. He fails to notice where Shadi went at first, but DOES notice him when he opens the door to Rigg's tower. Rigg, being right next to him, stabs the guy as his surprise round. Rigg then wins initiative, stabs Shadi again, and bounces off to hide elsewhere in the keep.

At this point, Shadi is fairly majorly hurt, and bleeding, but he's still got plenty of life in him. In order to make sure he will be fine, he casts invisiblity on himself so he is even harder to detect. It is around this point that the poison from Rigg's blade kicks in, and he falls unconscious.

Here's the thing. The party knows this guy is near impossible to see. They have no way or reason to know that he is unconscious, and just assume he is being sneaky. Due to being invisible and generally hard to see, Shadi has something like a +65 to steath right now. As such, none of the party notice him, at all. All the while, Shadi slowly, slowly, agonisingly slowly bleeds to death in the middle of the courtyard, un-noticed by any. I think it took about 15 rounds all told, and they STILL didn't kill Rigg by the time it was over.

(Note: I thought spells like invisibility wore off upon death, but my players themselves assured me this was not the case.

OOC, the players knew what was going on, but they are pretty good at keeping metaknowledge out of play, and the biggest proponent against metaknowledge being used was Shadi's player themselves)


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Got another one for you all.

Name: Lady Celestine
Race: Human
Classes/levels: Cavalier 5
Adventure: Rivers Run Red
Location: the Lonely Warrior's tomb
Catalyst: A certain +2 Feybane heavy flail

So the party had heard rumours that, somewhere in the hills, there was a barrow from which undead poured out each night. They had also gotten a map from the mad hermit showing the location of said barrow, and mention of a magical flail...

Now, Lady Celestine was very, very fond of flails. So of course, they head over to take a look. The breath of despair trap hits Celestine and the party bard, and they of course get swarmed by skeletons. However, having a cleric in the party with channel energy..... yeah, those skeletons got wiped out fast.

Emboldened by their easy victory, the party ventures further in to the tomb. And then they meet the Lonely Warrior. He starts calling them graverobbers, defilers, monsters etc, and though some in the party are calling for retreat (On the basis of having used several powerful spells already this day before remembering they had channel energy), Celestine notices the flail, and challenges the Warrior for it. As those who read the guy's backstory might have guessed, this is not something he appreciates.

Anyway, the fight initially looks like it is going the party's way. Between Lady Celestine and the cleric's animal companion, they get the Warrior down to about half health in a single round. However, they then proceed to miss him. On every attack. For 4 rounds. During this time, the Warrior is steadily whacking away at Lady Celestine, barely missing a single hit. And those negative levels start to add up....

The bard tries to dash past the Warrior to cast invisibility on Celestine, hoping it might save her, but takes an AoO (She was willing to eat the attack if it meant saving her friend). Unfortunately? It was a crit, and enough to (just) take the bard out of action. Then it's the warrior's turn again. And he crits again. And down falls Lady Celestine. Too many negative levels are bad for your health, it seems...

The truly sad part is that the animal companion finally manages to roll well the next turn, and the Warrior falls at last. if that had occured but one turn earlier....

And then to finish everything off, she cannot even rest in peace. Knowing that she would shortly rise against them, the party had no choice but to pretty much destroy her body as fast as possible before she rose as a Wight. There is no rest for Lady Celestine. Only oblivion...


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Name: Vivian Orlovsky
Race: Aasimar
Classes/levels: Cleric of Apsu (long story) 2
Adventure: Stolen Lands
Location: Northern Narlmarches
Catalyst: Overconfidence
The Gory Details: The party got ambushed at night by a random encounter with a bunch of bandits. This was still fairly early on, and the party were not yet known in the area, so the bandits made no special preparations before attacking them. A small amount of damage was done, but then the cavalier managed to mount her horse, and many Bandits were slain.

The few survivors a few turns later decide to leg it. Vivian, who had the travel domain and longstrider cast, (and who was thus really fast) decides to chase down one of the bandits as they flee. The rest of the party, figuring that she was going to be fine and that she was faster than them anyway, left her to it.

About 200 feet away from camp (In the dark, out of sight of everyone else), the bandit notices his pursuer, and realises he cannot outrun her. So he turns and makes a stand. One max damage attack roll later, and Vivian is at 0 HP. One successful will save from the bandit later (She tried to use a spell to stop him striking her again), and it's his turn again. He swings, and Vivian falls.

After looting the body, the bandit escaped and continued plaguing the party for some time to come (he got some class levels out of it) before being slain alongside his master when the Stag Lord's fort fell.

Name: Illimaer, Marshall of Sanctum
Race: Elf
Classes/levels: Ranger 4/ Barbarian 1 (iirc)
Adventure: River Runs Red
Location: Just north of the abandonesd ferry station in the southern greenbelt
Catalyst: Underestimating the wildlife.
The Gory Details: Rolled a random encounter in the hex as they were traveling through, looking for troll tracks (the unrest from the rumours was annoying them greatly). It rolls as 2d6 (River) Elk, and ends up as 9 Elk. Its a lot, but eh, its not like Elk are aggressive.

So I tell the party they find no tracks, but do see a nice herd of Elk. I figure this will just be a little flavourful encounter, something to liven up the world. The party goes "Oh, well we needed some food/exp/fun anyway" and go closer.

The leader of the herd, a big bull Elk, moves forwards as they approach, bugling a challenge to the party and warning them to back off. The cleric (A Vivian who had been arduously brought back via prolonged RPing and some lucky rolls) casts Animal Trance, catching the bull and one of the other males.

At this point, the herd is mainly just wary of the party. They dont even realise the cleric has done anything (after all, the bull is still standing there and all). Then the ranger (Ilimaer) pulls out his bow and starts shooting.

Now, Elk are not especially aggressive or brave, but hey, they are big, powerful creatures, and the damage done was not much. I make a morale save for them, and they decide to charge instead of flee from these annoying huntsmen.

After the elk charge deals moderate damage across the board, and noting that the elk seem more irritated by the minor damage from the arrow, the party wisely decides to run away. This works, and the elk do not pursue. Except for Ilimaer. He decides that instead of fleeing, he wishes to leap from his horse, and try to land on one of the elk. I believe he must have intended to then ride it away, in what would have been a pretty impressive maneuver. Sadly for him, the dice gods frowned that day, and a nat 3 on the acrobatics check later, and he is prone on the floor next to the elk.

At this point my head is in my hands, but he brought this upon himself.

The elk then mostly surround him, and slowly start to kick him to death. The party tries to save him (channel energy from a distance, a ride by attempt to pick him up, out of the elk herd) but it gets to his turn with him still stuck and partly surrounded.

Seeing little other option, he stands up, provoking 4 attacks. 2 hit, and one is a crit from the bull Elk. Goodbye, Illimaer. You will be remembered.