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So this ended up being a pretty crazy session- ending with 3 PCs petrified and the other two stepping through a portal into the Abyss. I decided to put the campaign on hold here. I had been looking for a place to wrap it up, and this seems as good as any, as I'd basically have to introduce 3 new party members next session (In the Abyss to boot), which I think would have felt like a new campaign starting anyhow.
Session #33 (Inside the Pyramid of Acererak, near TPP)
The session begins with the heroes being introduced to Naudo the Eladrin bladesinger. Naudo arrives on the scene just as the heroes are completing a short rest. The heroes are distrustful of the new comer, but he explains that he was investigating a mysterious green pyramid that he found in some ruins in the feywild. He suspected that the pyramid was causing the corruption in the area, and he stepped through the portal in its base, hoping that within he might find a means of destroying the pyramid and ending its corruption. He found himself in the same dungeon complex as the adventurers and has now stumbled upon them in his explorations. This suggests that more than one copy of the green pyramid exists in multiple planes of existence. After some discussion, Naudo joins forces with the rest of the adventures, and they venture through the stone doors to investigate rumours of the library that they had learned of from the mezzoloth guards they destroyed (see end of session #31). Beyond the doors, they find a short hall that leads to another set of doors. This hall proves to be trapped with a deadly series of swinging blades. Luckily, they are being cautious, and only Novo, who is acting as the primary scout, suffers some minor injuries from the blades. They disarm the trap by having Alistair twist and bend the poles supporting the blades before they can retract back into the slots in the walls they burst out of (go gauntlets of ogre power). They make it safely to the end of the hall and open the doors, which leads them into a large chamber that functions as both a library and a laboratory. The room has several exits, and within they spot another mezzoloth guard and three figures in exotic robes with heads that resemble jackals. Two of the three are busy in the lab area, while the third is conducting research in the library. They don’t seem surprised by the heroes, nor do they seemed overly threatened. Jove suspects that these creatures might be “arcanoloths.” Arcanoloths are are vile and evil fiends that are members of the Yugoloth race- daemons that fill a niche somewhere between devils and demons. He recalls that arcanoloths are known to be highly dangerous because they are all highly skilled arcane spell casters, who have had thousands of years to master the art. Fortunately, they don’t immediately attack. They seem hostile, but also somewhat curious about who the adventurers are, why they are here, where they came from etc… They start demanding answers to such questions, but they don’t seem eager to give the heroes answers to their own questions in return. This annoys Naudo, and he decides that he has little interest in being interrogated by fiends. Thus, he vanishes with a misty step spell, appearing directly in front of two of the arcanoloths. He starts to go into his blade dance, but they are ready for treachery and get off spells before he can attack. The chaos of battle erupts. Sariel rushes forward and cuts down the mezzoloth guard with her blazing greatsword before it can act, but that fiend is the least of their worries. Jove’s warning was accurate. The arcanoloths are skilled in the art, and suddenly spells like finger of death, disintegrate, chain lightning, and prismatic spray are being hurled at the party. Naudo is brutally blasted by a finger of death spell, and he’s forced to immediately retreat before attacking. A chain lightning spells blasts several of the adventurers and then a prismatic spray hits the entire party and nearly takes Naudo out. The rest of heroes are pretty much all seriously injured, and Sariel has the misfortunate of being petrified by the spary. Jove and Alistair blast at one of the arcanoloths with with spells and crossbow bolts, while Novo struggles to heal his companions with his staff of healing. A wall of fire appears among the heroes, and Naudo falls unconscious within it. Again Novo has to play medic, and he drags the dying bladesinger away from the flames before he’s incinerated. Jove and Alistair stay on offence, and they manage to destroy one of the fiends, but things are looking grim. Luckily destroying one of the fiends is enough to make the remaining two arcanoloths call for a parlay, which Jove is happy to oblige. While Jove converses with the arcanoloths, Novo stabilizes Naudo and helps him regain consciousness. He then tries to restore Sariel with a greater restoration scroll, but he is not overly skilled in divine magic, and he fails to cast the powerful spell. The arcanoloths claim that they have come to the complex in search of a magical cloak forged from the hide of a pit fiend. They believe that the cloak is hidden somewhere in the dungeon, and they were searching for clues regarding its whereabouts. Given that they were so busy conducting experiments in the lab, Jove is doubtful that this story is entirely true, but he doesn’t dispute it. They make him an offer. They say that if the adventurers find the cloak for them, they will show the adventures how to escape the dungeon. Once again, Jove doesn’t trust them, but he sees an opportunity for the heroes to escape the area without further violence, which will allow them to regroup and come up with a plan. Thus, he “agrees” to their terms. The adventures exit the library and make camp back in the chamber that led to it. They are hesitant to take an extended rest because of the life draining effects of the dungeon, but they feel that they have little choice other than to do so. The arcanoloths don’t disturb their rest, and when they have finished they decide that will go back and destroy the foul fiends. Before entering the library, Naudo convinces Jove to let him polymorph him into a giant ape. This will make Jove a formidable physical opponent, but while in this form he will sacrifice his spell casting and intellect. In retrospect, this may have been a terrible idea. They are also down a party member, as Sariel is still a stone statue. They burst into the library/laboratory ready for battle, but there is no sign of the arcanoloths. The library looks to be looted, and it seems that they have vanished. Jove, in his ape form, starts tearing the lab apart in frustration, while the rest of the party begins a more controlled search of the place. They find little of value left behind, but with the arcanoloths gone, it seems that they are free to explore some of the other halls and doors that branch off of the room. Jove Kong leads the way. They head down a short hall and soon come to two chambers of interest. One features a massive mural fresco that covers one of the walls of the room. It shows a vast, reddish desert landscape. A big area rug sits on the floor in front of the wall. Jove rushes into the room to check it out. He grabs a stone brazier in one of his massive ape hands and throws it at the mural. When it hits, the brazier vanishes, and an instant later it reappears as an object in the foreground of the mural. Before they contemplate the significance of this, Jove has stepped onto the big area rug. The rug suddenly transforms into a writhing swarm of green worms. The worms surge over Jove’s ape form, burrowing into his flesh. He bellows with pain and rage, and he rolls about on the floor smashing his fists and crushing the worms to pulp. However, it’s too late, and many have already burrowed their way inside of him and are starting to kill him from within. Meanwhile, Naudo has found another room of interest directly across the hall from the chamber that Jove is thrashing about in. In the middle of this room is a strange sight. There, rising up out of circular marble dais in the floor, is a hemisphere shaped hunk of smooth red stone. Carved into the stone are numerous eyes, and plunged into the top of the strange, stone hemisphere is a great sword. The sword calls out to Naudo begging him to free it. As Naudo takes this all in, Jove comes barreling into the room, yowling in pain, infected by the worms that are eating him from within. Naudo, Alistair and Novo are certain that no good can come from Jove banging around here, so they retreat back down the hall and let the angry ape have his moment. Jove rips the sword out of the stone, and this has an immediate effect. The stone turns into a thing of red, glistening, rubbery flesh, and the eyes that were carved into it are suddenly real. As soon as Jove sets his simian eyes on it, magic washes over him, and he feels that he is transforming into stone. The transformation isn’t instantaneous, and he tries to fight it off. He even finds the strength to smash the fleshy, eye covered hemisphere to a messy goo, but sadly he can’t fight off the potent magic, and he eventually succumbs. Before the transformation is complete, Naudo decides to investigate, hoping he can help Jove, but as soon as he sets eyes on the scene, he too is effected by the magical curse. Soon both Naudo and Jove are stone statues- of course, Jove is now a giant stone ape. This leaves three out of the five adventurers permanently petrified. Only Alistair and Novo are left, and they have no means of restoring any of their companions. Things are dire. The pair discuss their options. They conclude that the mural is in fact a magical portal of some kind and a potential escape from this terrible dungeon. Unfortunately, they have no idea where it exactly it goes other than an alien looking desert. They know they could keep exploring the dungeon, as there are a couple of more doors and such they could investigate, but with just the two of them, they doubt they could handle the level of danger they have been facing thus far. They decide to venture into the magic mural. They want to bring at least some of their companions in hopes of eventually restoring them, but dragging stone statues through a desert seems like a significant challenge. Furthermore, the statue of Jove in his ape form is too big and heavy to move. To deal with this, Novo uses his skills as a monk to smash the statue to pieces with his fists. This takes a couple of hours, but when he’s done, they stuff the pieces into Alistair’s bag of holding, which completely fills the bag. They hope that one day they might be able to somehow reassemble Jove and restore him. There is no room for Sariel and Naudo in the bag, and they don’t think they can handle dragging more than one stone statue through a desert. Since they don’t know Naudo so well, and because they kind of blame him for the whole mess, they decide to leave the petrified eladrin behind. The session (campaign?) ends with Alistair and Novo stepping through the enchanted mural, dragging the statue of Sariel with them, as well as carrying a bag of holding containing the stone remains of Jove. Here they find themselves in the inhospitable desert landscape of Pazunia- the first layer of the Abyss…
Sessions #32 (Inside the Pyramid of Acererak)
Session Summary: The heroes explore the room they have be magical dropped into (see last session). Novo first scouts out the chamber that has its entrance about 40’ up the wall of the chamber. He parkours up the wall and enters the hall. He finds it filled with a deadly toxic gas. Fortunately, his monk training has made him immune to poison, and he suffers no ill effects. The hall eventually leads to a small room, which features a large relief sculpture of a green, horned devil face with three eyes. The mouth is large and open. The inside of the mouth reveals the bare wall. The three eyes are interesting, in that each one has a small ovoid like recess in it that looks almost as though it is designed to hold an object the size of gem. There is an inscription carved above the wall, but it isn’t in a language that Novo can read. He inspects the room a little more, but finds nothing more of interest, though it is difficult to do a thorough search with the poison gas obscuring his vision. Novo returns to his companions and reports what he saw. The description of the green devil face reminds Jove of some of his past reading. He recalls hearing mention of an infamous necromancer that eventually became a lich. His name was Acererak, and he was known to have constructed various deadly tomb complexes on both the material plane and beyond. The imagery of the green devil face has for some reason been long associated with his name. Perhaps this place is somehow connected to being- a prospect that should be highly disconcerting to the party. They next conduct a thorough search of the walls around the sand pit and the ledge that surrounds it, but they find no sign of any secret doors. Thus, they head into the most obvious and accessible exit to the chamber- a hallway that opens up in a wall at the level of the ledge of the pit. They can see that at the far end of the hall is an elaborate set of stone doors.The place makes them paranoid, and they sense that it might be infested with deadly traps, so they take precautions and attach some rope to a pack. As they move forward, they toss the pack about ten feet ahead of them, hoping that it might trigger any traps. This tactic proves effective- somewhat. Towards the end of the hall they trigger a pressure plate, and a thick slab of stone descends from the ceiling near the entrance to the hall. They decide that this is a bad thing, so they try to get out before it seals them in. Jove, Sariel and Novo all have short range teleportation magic that they use to escape. Alistair is forced to rely on his natural athletic and acrobatic prowess, and he rolls under the falling stone slab just in time. Once they are safely out of the hall, which is access to is now blocked by the slab, they listen intently and hear what sounds like the grinding of heavy stone coming from the other side. They assume that either or the ceiling is lowering down to crush anyone that has the misfortune of being trapped in the hall or that the walls are closing in. Things are then quiet. Time passes, then there are more grinding noises, and eventually the stone slab resets itself back its original position in the ceiling. The hallway looks the same as before, suggesting that the trap has reset. They explore down the hallway, this time avoiding the pressure plate that triggered the trap. They reach the door at the end of the hall, and upon investigating it thoroughly, they find that it is a false door. The entire hall seems to be designed to lure explorers into a death trap. With no other obvious exits to the entry area left to investigate, they decide to search the sand floor more thoroughly. After a couple of hours of pushing sand around and investigating the flag stone floor beneath it, they find a shaft in the floor hidden covered by one of the flagstones. They investigate down the shaft, and it takes them to a hallway in a lower level of the dungeon. They decide to head to the right, and make their way through the dark, stone hall. Eventually, the hall widens. In this area the ceiling is much higher, and the walls becomes flanked with thick, soaring columns that support the vaulted ceiling above. At the end of the hall is another set of stone doors. They cautiously make their way down this new section of hall, continuing to toss the sack tied to the rope ahead of them. As they get closer to the end of the hall, Jove tosses the sack and suddenly it falls upward toward the ceiling instead of down to the floor. The rope goes taunt, as the rope is much shorter than the distance to the ceiling, and the sack is suspended in mid air. It seems as though there is some sort of reverse gravity effect up ahead. Novo decides to investigate it more thoroughly, counting on his ability to fall from great distances without taking injury to keep him safe. This plan doesn’t work out so well. When he steps into the reverse gravity zone, he falls up to the ceiling, except that instead of landing on the ceiling, he passes right through it. It seems to be an illusion. He continues to fall up into a shaft in the ceiling. Soon enough he lands, but he lands in pool of acid. The fall itself doesn’t hurt him, but the acid sure does. He flails around for only an instant before he centres his mind and shadow steps out of the pool, teleporting himself to just before set of doors at the end of the hall. The heroes eventually discover that the reverse gravity zone doesn’t quite extend to the walls of the hall, so if they stay against the wall they can make it to the doors without risking an upward fall into acid. Thus, they bypass the nasty trap without further incident. The doors open into a vast chamber. In the middle of this cavernous room, a huge marble plinth rises up out of the centre of a pit carved into the floor. A set of stone stairs leads from the floor of the chamber up to the top of the plinth. Sitting at the top is a big iron cauldron like brazier that burns with high flames. The heroes carefully move into the room to investigate. As they do, four giant skeletons the size of ogres step out from within the walls themselves- as if the walls weren’t even there (it is later discovered that illusion magic was hiding alcoves that they had been standing in). These skeletons are a little different than most of their kind in that green flame erupts from their pelvises and lick the inside of their rib cages. The two skeletons closest to the party start to close in with ogre-sized great axes. The two undead that are further back reach into the flames that burn within their skeletons and withdraw motes of fire that they hurl amongst the heroes. The motes of flame explode in deadly balls of fire scorching all those unfortunate enough to be caught within. The heroes do their best to shield themselves from the flames, but are still scorched. Before the skeletons can inflict any further damage, the adventurers strike back with all the power at their command. Sariel races up to an axe wielding skeleton and hews at it with her enchanted great sword that blazes with radiant energy. Alistair aids her by carefully targeting his crossbow bolts so as to knock the axes out of the hands of the closest giant skeletons. Novo finds that the blunt nature of his staff and unarmed attacks are particularly effective against the creatures, and he shatters bones with his powerful blows, causing skeletons to crumble. Jove contributes with lightning bolts and other offensive spells. It doesn’t take long for them to destroy the undead guardians. With the chamber secured, they go on to investigate it further. First they inspect the great cauldron on the top of the huge marble plinth. The flames it spews out are clearly magical, but they generate heat, much like a wall of fire spell. Jove decides to attempt to dispel the magic, and he uses a potent casting of a dispel magic spell. The spell does its job, removing the fire from cauldron. When they look inside, they discover that built into the bottom of the cauldron is a metal hatch cover. They decide to investigate, and, when they open the hatch, they find a narrow shaft that descends deeper down into the complex. Novo scouts and discovers a room at the bottom of shaft that is carpeted with the bones of a myriad of creatures. The only exit from the room, aside from the shaft in its ceiling, is a narrow circular tunnel that cuts through the middle of one of the stone walls. The tunnel is only about 1’ in diameter, making it impossible for a human-sized creature to move through without some kind of magical aid. This tiny tunnel appears to go on for about 20’ before it opens into another room of some kind. The rest of the heroes descend the shaft to help conduct a more thorough investigation. Among the bones strewn about the floor, Novo finds a mouldering leather satchel. Inside is a single ovoid topaz of substantial size. It vaguely resembles an eye, and Novo thinks it looks like an almost perfect fit to the indents he noticed in the pupils of the green devil face wall relief. He pockets the topaz, hoping that it will come in handy later. Novo also decides to use his shadow stepping abilities to teleport himself into the room at the end of the tiny tunnel. He steps through the shadows and succeeds in transporting himself to the next room. Here he finds the floor again carpeted with piles of bone, but mixed among the bones he sees large amounts of coin, gems and possibly other treasures. He doesn’t remain in the room long enough to loot it because it has a guardian. The guardian is a massive, floating, monstrous skull with a single central eye socket and several motes of light hovering above it- an Death Tyrant (aka undead beholder). Setting eyes on this horror is enough to give him incentive to get out, and he immediately shadow steps back to the room where his companions await him. They consider the idea of all teleporting in, and trying to face the Death Tyrant, but they decide instead to do some additional exploring. Thus, they climb back out of the chamber and follow the halls back to where the dungeon’s entrance chamber. This time they follow the hall to the west. After not too long, they come to another chamber. This one features a long rectangular shaped pool that appears to be filled with acid. A set of doors sits on a raised section at the far of end of the room. Wide stairs lead up to this balcony, and standing on it, guarding the doors, are two insectoid demons (Mezzoloth). As the heroes approach, the two guardians initiate telepathic communication. They ask the characters to identify themselves, and they inform them that they are to proceed no further, that the masters of the library are not to be disturbed. As soon as Jove hears the word “library” his interest is piqued, and the heroes refuse to heed the warnings of the daemons. The guardians do their best to fend off the adventurers, using their claws, tridents and spewing toxic gas. However, the heroes are powerful and have them outnumbered. It proves to be fairly easy for the adventurers to send the fiends chittering back to whatever lower plane they originated from. After this quick fight is done, they decide to take a short rest before they venture through the doors to investigate the rumoured library beyond. The session ends here.
Sessions #31 (The Hulmaster Crypts and the Floating Pyramid)
Summary: The heroes make their way down a dark, winding stone stair into the chambers beneath the White Tower. The first room they enter features heavy levers in the floor and elaborate, carved marble murals on the wall that depict the city of Hulburg at its height. At the far end of the room is a doorway, beyond which a ramp slopes steeply downward. Floki has been permanently drunk ever since he paid a wizard to make the skull of the Lord of Shackles into a magical tankard that constantly refills itself with mead. His attention span is limited and he starts fooling around with the levers. He soon discovers that by adjusting the levers he can make the ramp convert into a staircase. He and Jove start venturing down the stairs. Floki leads the way, and as he staggers downward, he carelessly steps on a pressure plate that causes the stairs to suddenly turn back into a ramp. Floki and Jove start sliding down the ramp, which empties into a pit filled with spikes. Fortunately they both catch onto the edge of the pit and avoid falling in. The pit currently has the corpses of two dead ice trolls in the bottom, impaled on spikes, and it seems that the heroes weren’t the first to trigger the trap. Beyond the pit, is a large room that has a huge set of heavy stone doors set into the middle of the wall at the far end. Standing in the middle of the room is an iron golem with a gigantic axe. Alistair and Novo use the levers to turn the ramp back into stairs; then Jove and Floki climb out. Floki casts a fly spell to get across the pit and Jove uses a misty step spell to cross. The golem raises its axe as if it is about to attack, but Jove presents the enchanted Hulmaster warding amulet (which he acquired last session), and the golem stops. Jove then orders it to return to its resting spot. Sariel, Alistair, Novo and Brandis all get across the pit, and they start investigating the room more carefully. Floki soon grows bored, disappointed that he didn’t get to fight the golem. He drunkenly starts banging his head on the stone doors at the end of the room, which immediately triggers a powerful warding glyph. The glyph detonates in an explosion of freezing frost. Only Alistair and Floki are in range of the glyph at the time. Fortunately, Floki’s armour is enchanted to resist cold, so the damage is mitigated. Alistair dives clear of the some of the blast, but still sustains a nasty frostburn. They find little else of interest in the room, so Jove commands the golem to push the doors open. The doors access the Hulmaster crypts. The crypts are quiet and free of undead. Eventually they discover the seams of what might be a secret door in the middle of an elaborate, marble relief mural at the back of the tomb. Initially, they can’t figure out how to open the door, but they had previously noticed a prominent statue of Londar Hulmaster in the main hall. The statue’s right arm was depicted clutching a staff, and his right arm was reaching out and pointing towards the entrance. On a hunch, Novo tries turning the statue so that it points toward the secret door. His idea pays off. The statue seems designed to be turned, and when he rotates it in such a manner a panel in the relief mural slides down into the floor to reveal a large opening- a secret door. The opening provides access to a stair that leads down deeper into the complex.
Novo sees Jove go through the wall of fire, and he risks going after him. He bravely leaps through the flames, and then slows falls to the bottom of the pit. Sariel comes crashing to the ground beside Novo, as a Flameskull hits her with a thundewave that sends her flying through the wall of fire and down into the pit. The damage is enough to knock her unconscious and leave her close to death. Novo aids both Jove and Sariel, but using his staff of healing. The healing magic is potent enough to revive Sariel, and she then uses her own divine powers to heal herself further. Up above, Alistair withdraws a ways up the stairs that led into the chamber. Two of the flame skulls pursue him, firing magic missiles and bolts of fire. He raises his crossbow and fires off several shots, bringing one down. Another one of the flameskulls flies over top of the pit and launches magic missiles down at Sariel. Jove retaliates with a lightning bolt. The lightning connects, but the skull is resistant to magic, and the spell’s power isn't enough to destroy the thing. Novo helps to destroy it by running up the wall of the pit and hurling magic stones up at it, and when it flies lower to attack with its flaming eye rays, he manages to push off the wall, leap through the air and land some flying melee strikes with his staff against the flame skull, shattering it. Floki finds himself facing three flame skulls alone. He fights heroically, resisting multiple attempts by the skulls to blast him through the wall of fire and into the pit with thunder wave spells. Floki’s skill with his enchanted shield also protects him against multiple rays of flame, and he throws up his shield spell to deflect at least one magic missile barrage. The flameskulls, for the most part, hover in the air out of the northman’s reach, except when they drop down to cast thunderwaves. Floki takes advantage of these opportunities to strike at them with his frost brand. He successfully destroys two of the bastards, but their magic has been taking a toll on him, and he collapses from his wounds before he can deal with the third. His wounds are serious, and his soul departs for Vahalla before his companions can come to his aid. The remainder of the party takes care of the final couple of flame skulls, thanks in a large part to Alistair’s skill with his crossbow. The battle has been costly; the heroes are badly wounded, and Floki and Brandis are dead. They recover some of Floki’s magic items, and say some prayers for him and Brandis. Fortunately, Floki died with his sword in his hand, and northmen believe that only those who die in battle with a blade in hand go to Valhalla, so they suspect that Floki is now feasting and brawling in the halls of Vulkur. They decide to make camp in the bottom of the pit, taking shelter in a Leomund’s Hut. The following day, the adventures investigate the strange floating pyramid. Jove discerns that the black hole in the base of the pyramid is actually a portal capable of transporting them beyond the material plane. There is surprisingly little hesitation about diving into a magic portal that could send them virtually anywhere, and the foolhardy adventures plunge headlong into the unknown. Upon entering the portal, they find themselves falling, and they land hard on a sand covered floor. Only Novo, with his ability to land gracefully from deadly falls, takes no damage, landing on his feet instead. Looking around they see themselves standing in a large square shaped pit with a sand covered floor. A stone ledge surrounds the pit, but it is 20’ feet up. There seems to be a hallway leading off from up on the ledge, but from down in the pit, they can’t make out much of it. The walls of the room soar up high into the air, and the ceiling is beyond the reach of their darkvision. However, part way up one of the walls, they can see a large opening that might lead into a room or hall. Mist wafts out of the opening. There is a much more immediate threat in the form of three giant scorpions carved from black obsidian. The constructs sit on the sand in the pit, waiting for adventures to plummet into it, and as soon as the new victims arrive, the scorpions start snapping their pincers together and scuttle towards the heroes, who are in the process of getting their bearings and recovering from the fall. The stinger’s on the creatures are poisonous and deadly, and their pincers are big enough to grab hold of man, and crush him while at the same time stinging him to death. Jove escapes the pit with a misty step spell. Novo finds his immunity to poison very handy when a scorpion construct stings him, but the stinger still hurts and their pincers are plenty dangerous. After taking some wounds, Novo follows Jove up onto the ledge by running up the wall. Alistair has no easy way of getting out, and he is brutally attacked. Sariel could escape with a misty step spell of her own, but she chooses to stay in the pit and fit beside Alistair. Jove casts spells at the constructs from the ledge, while Novo hurls magic stones down at them. Fighting is intense, and Sariel and Alistair suffer the bulk of the damage, with both of them coming close to being killed. Towards the end of the battle, Novo sees that the two are in serious trouble, and he leaps down into the pit to aid them. He unleashes a terrible flurry of blows that obliterates one of the scorpion constructs. Eventually, the adventurers destroy the deadly construct, but after this fight they are low on resources and in need of an extended rest. They make camp on the floor, and after many hours they are ready to continue exploring the strange place they have found themselves in. They have reason for concern because they noticed that over the course of their rest, that something about the place seems hostile towards life and it is slowly draining their life force. The session ends with the adventurers about to continue their explorations
This is a speech that Novo gave to his disciples at his dojo prior to setting out for the ruins of Hulburg Novo calls together all his disciples on the eve of his departure. He stands tall before his brethren fully revealed as a changeling. Connor, his right hand, is at his side still in the guise of a child. His clothes look simple but well made, now with the ability to wear whatever he likes there is no reason not for it to be nothing but the best. He understands that he has become a leader among his people, and many are following his example and revealing themselves to the populous, with the expected results. Of course, he already knew that they were distrusted and feared. That is to be expect with a race whose history is littered with assassins.
“Tomorrow, I will travel with my friends to defeat a dragon, but I wanted to take this moment to remind you why we are here before I left.” “When I was training to be a druid I learned many things about Nature, its structure and laws; the most basic of which is the relationship between Predator and Prey. For as long as we can remember, we have been neither. Instead living within other cultures as a parasite lives in a host. Of course, the only parasites we know of are those that tend to kill the bodies they live in.”
“When I started the Shifting Shadows I told you my intention. If those who feared us discovered this clan, they would see an army being raised in secret…and they would not be wrong. However, I did not train you and bring you together to be an army. In Nature the only way an animal becomes stronger is through the challenges it faces. So, we train, to make ourselves strong, to learn our limits and to overcome them and most importantly to become wiser than those who would call us enemy simply because of our race and inherent abilities.” “Those who came to me with the intent on taking revenge on another, I have turned away. Those that have used their training to bully people, escalating and seeking conflict instead of defending themselves, I have turned away. Those who seek to use their training with the intent to kill, I have turned away. Some have tried to lie to me, which comes second nature to us, but you cannot lie to me, I will know and If your wish is to become the monster that they think we are, you will not continue training under me. You will be turned away. I did not train you to be predators, but that doesn’t mean you are prey.” “In Nature there are more complex relationships, there are those that co-exist with others to gain strength that neither would have alone. This is called a symbiotic relationship and that has always been my goal. I seek to stand amongst the other races with pride, and for them to see us not as monsters; but as equals. To cease to distrust us, and abolish the prejudice in their minds; but we cannot do this hiding in the shadows.” “If I return…when I return…I will be opening the dojo to the public and taking in anyone who wishes to learn. If we wish to co-exist with the other races globally we must be able to co-exist with them here first. I will be offering my services and any who wish to join me, to the defense of the city and our home. If we are to be an army, let them see that we fight with them, and not against them. I will also, hopefully with the help of Floki, be starting a theater troupe; let them see that our abilities can be used in ways that are not malicious. I will not be offering my services nor those under me in assassination. I will no longer allow us to be murderers.” He takes a deep breath and looks at everyone the puts his hand on Connors shoulder.
““That is all I wished to say. Dismissed.”
Sessions #30 (Expedition to Hulburg)
Summary: It is Mirtul 1st, 1496 DR. With the coming of spring, Alistair and Sariel have returned to Thentia from Cormyr. Through the winter Jove has been busy with his arcane studies and settling in to Firefingers tower; Novo has occupied himself with the training the city’s changeling population in the ways of martial arts. The winter has been tough on Floki; he has grown bored of carousing and performing in the same inns and taverns each night. Everyday, for the past month, he has wandered down to the docks to see what ships have arrived, ever watchful for the return of Alistair of Sariel. Now that they are finally back, the heroes gather together in the Giant’s Axe tavern. It is the first time all five of them have been together in months. Spring has reopened the trade routes to Thentia and several rumours have reached the city: • Hillsfar has invaded Zhentil Keep, and its armies are taking control of the surrounding lands and villages. Since many of the warriors that served the Iron Ring were sell swords, they are happy to switch their allegiance over to Hillsfar and help the City State conquer the area. It appears that Hillsfar might be the final death blow to the Iron Ring organization. Of course, Hillsfar isn’t known as bastion of goodness, and they may well just take over the Iron Ring’s slaving operations. • Melvaunt continues to be a place of strife and disorder. It is short on food and other supplies, as few ship captains see the profit in trying to trade there, as it is too unstable and dangerous. Many folk have abandoned the city and refugees are starting to flock to Thentia. A camp has been established outside the city’s walls. Refugees tell horror stories of demons plaguing the streets at night and attacking citizens in their homes. The place is considered cursed. • The guard in Melvaunt is all but non-existent and without protection from the guard, and many of the outlying villages have become prey for raiders from the Thar (ogres, orcs etc…), as well as demons from Melvaunt. • Mulmaster is also said to be preparing for war, and has been increasing the ship building for its navy. •There are rumours that a powerful orc chief has risen in the Thar and is gathering tribes to his banner. Thentia fears this threat, though it is suspected that the orcs might first attack Melvaunt, as it is already weak due to civil strife. In the tavern, they talk and catch up. Jove introduces Alistair to a woman named Katrina Hulmaster. Her family once resided in the now ruined city of Hulburg, and her ancestor Londar Hulmaster was a powerful wizard who is considered one of the city’s founders. Jove has a map of Hulburg. It indicates the location of the Hulmaster family crypts below the “White Tower.” According to notes on the map, Londar hid much of his magical treasure and research in secret chambers connected to the crypts, including a staff of power. The notes also suggest that ancestors of Londar now living in Hulburg may be in possession of a warding amulet that will allow one to bypass the powerful guardian construct that protects the crypts. Jove had done some investigating into the Hulmaster family during the winter, and he has learned that Katrina’s father, Lord Emmet Hulmaster, wears such a warding amulet. Lord Emmet is eager to marry off his daughter to a member of the nobility, and he would be willing to part with the amulet as a dowery for Katrina. Jove can think of no better candidate for Katrina to marry than Alistair. Unfortunately, shortly after introducing Katrina to the Cormyrean noble, Jove learns that while Alistair was in Cormyr, he agreed to an arranged marriage with a Cormyean noble woman. The marriage isn’t to take place until the fall, but he is already betrothed. Katrina is disappointed, but she latches herself onto Brandis, who is Sariel’s new squire and the son of Lady Ulphor of Shadowdale (the heroes rescued Brandis from the dungeons of the Lord of Shackles). Jove, Alistair and Novo have a private discussion about how best to get the warding amulet, since it doesn't seem like Alistair marrying Katrina is going to be an option. Novo offers to steal it, and they concoct a plan to make a forgery of the amulet, so that Lord Hulmaster never knows its missing. While, they are having this discussion, Sariel is approached by a half drunken woman with a baby. The woman recognizes Sariel’s holy symbol of Hoar the god of vengeance. She explains to Sariel that she is a refugee from Melvaunt, and that her family was killed in the night by demons a ten day ago. It was only through the grace of the gods that she escaped with her baby. She begs Sariel to go to Melvaunt and slay the demons that have been preying on the people of the city. Sariel contemplates her offer, but makes no promises. Floki sends the woman on her way and reminds Sariel that they have another matter of vengeance to attend to- killing the dragon Rhime. Rhime killed Floki’s sister several years ago, and Sariel joined up with Floki to help him slay the dragon to avenge her death. They have tracked the dragon to the Moonsea and believe that it now makes its lair in the ruins of Hulburg. Sariel is in agreement with Floki, and although the troubles in Melvaunt seem to be dire, the heroes decide to continue with their plan to go to Hulburg. That night Novo uses his amazing stealth skills and ability to “shadow step” to sneak into Hulmaster manor. In Lord Hulmaster’s bed chambers, he finds the warding amulet in a box on his bedside table. He takes the amulet back to Jove’s tower and they make an imprint of it in clay. Novo then returns the amulet before Lord Hulmaster knows its missing. Over the course of the next several days, they make a forgery of the amulet. Then Novo again sneaks into the Hulmaster house in the night; this time he swaps the warding amulet for the fake, and he delivers the warding amulet to Jove. With that order of business complete the heroes make ready to head for Hulburg. Here Floki wishes to kill the white dragon Rhime and Jove hopes to claim the late Londar’s Hulmaster’s magical treasures. They charter a ship to take them up the coast of the Moosea. It drops them off in a cove about a day and half from Hulburg. The captain doesn’t wish to go much further, as he fears sailing his ship into the territory of a powerful white dragon. Thus, they will make the final portion of their journey on foot. They find a good campsite that night at the top of the craggy hill amongst the rubble of an old manor house. However, they are surprised to find a Leomund’s Tiny hut in the exact place where Jove planned to cast the same spell. Suddenly, a woman steps out of the hut. Jove recognizes her as Brida, a warrior woman from Norland that he encountered in both Phlan and Melvaunt. He fondly remembers a night of passionate love he had with her back at the Cracked Crown Inn in Phlan (Session #10). The pair chat for a little while, and Jove learns that she parted ways with her former companions Hitch and Targal when the pair decided to head south last fall. She is now in the employ of Thentian wizard named Gendrem. He has asked that she accompany him on an expedition to the Hulburg. Currently, they are on their way back to Thentia, as they were attacked by a large pack of trolls while exploring the city. Gendrem teleported her and and their ranger guide, Fenrith, away with the dimension door spell, but he was forced to leave the other sellswords behind, and she assumes that they died in battle. Clearly, she feels some shame and guilt for abandoning her fellow warriors and fleeing a battle, but she was hired to protect Gendrem and follow his orders, so she felt that she must obey his orders. Gendrem and Fenrith then emerge from the safety of the magical dome and join the conversation. Gendrem believes that the dragon has made his lair in the ruins of Hulburg’s castle, for the castle’s walls and keep are encased in ice. He also tells them that a tribe of ice trolls and several winter wolves serve the dragon, and that they dominate the northern part of the city. The southern portion is said to be ruled by a powerful two-headed troll “king.” He believes troll king and Rhime to be enemies, but they seem to have an uneasy truce of sorts at the moment. The heroes are grateful for the information, and they convince Gendrem to allow them to stay within his magical hut, so that Brida and Jove can share the one that Jove erects. Thus, Jove and Brida are able to enjoy another night of passion. The next morning, Brida, Fenrith and Gendrem continue on their way back to Phlan, while the heroes make their way towards Hulburg. As they get closer to the ruined city, they notice a dramatic change in the weather. It gets icy cold and the ground is covered in snow. It is as if winter has returned. Floki explains that it is the presence of the dragon that is most likely responsible for this change. Around mid day, they crest a rocky tor, and from their vantage point they have their first view of he ruins. The city is smothered by snow and clouds of icy mist linger in the white streets and alleys. Most of the structures are little more than heaps of snow covered rubble. The stone wall surrounding the city is damaged in many places, and there are numerous gaps that they could potentially use to to enter. The southern section of the city meets the Moonsea, while the northern half of the city is dominated by a large hill. Perched on the hill is the remains of a once mighty keep. That keep is now encased in gleaming ice. A wall extends west from the castle and attaches to a tall tower of white marble. This tower is marked on Jove’s map with an “X”, and Jove believes that within they will find access to the crypts, which he hopes will lead to Londar’s treasures. Jove convinces the party, that they should first go after the staff of power. Once that is in their possession, slaying the dragon will be a far easier task. Floki would prefer to kill the dragon, as he has waited so long for his revenge, but Novo and Alistair side with Jove, and Floki knows that he will need their help against the dragon. Thus, they enter the city and make their way towards the White Tower. Novo uses his shadow powers to place “pass without trace” magic upon magic on them. They move with stealth, among the ruins, avoiding the streets as much as possible and avoiding at least on patrol of ice trolls. Eventually they reach the White Tower. Tracks near the entrance suggest that winter wolves and ice trolls make regular use of the structure. There are now windows on the first floor, but Novo runs up the wall to a second floor window and peeks inside. The interior wooden floors have long since be claimed by time and decay, giving him a view to part of the ground floor below. He spots a winter wolf curled up on the cold stone tiles, and he reports back to his companions. The adventurers enter cautiously. Jove casts potent invisibility spell that makes all but Brandis and Novo invisible. Inside the central chamber of the tower they spot a 12’ high statue of Mystra that is surprisingly intact. Sleeping on the floor with their backs against the wall is a pair of ice trolls. Two winter wolves are curled up on the ground nearby. Jove gives them a rude awakening by conjuring a wall of fire on top of them. Then Alistair starts pumping crossbow bolts into the now burning and shrieking trolls. The poor ice trolls don’t stand a chance and die screaming in the flames. The two winter wolves are quicker to react and manage to flee the fire before they are consumed. They attack by expelling blasts of freezing cold at the heroes, which several of the adventurers now have resistance to, thanks to magic items. Sariel finishes one of the wolves off with her greatsword, which now blazes with radiant energy when she wields it. A third one enters the room, and she moves to engage it and the remaining fire scorched wolf. They savagely bite at her, but while the do so, Novo attacks one with his staff, while Jove hurls bolts of fire at them, and Alistair continues to shoot his crossbow. Floki stays out of this fight, remaining with Brandis by the entrance to keep watch; his eyes are alert of any sign of the dragon, but he doesn’t see any sign of his enemy. As dangerous as the winter wolves are, they stand little chance against the powerful heroes, and soon all three are dead on the ground. With the threat taken care of, the heroes take a short rest and explore the remainder of the floor. They discover a flight of stairs that leads down. This is where Jove wishes to lead them. Londar’s magical treasures await. The session ends, with the heroes about to explore below the White Tower.
Just finished running my group through "Shadows of Leningrad" for Call of Cthulhu, which was a lot of fun. It looks like we are back on tonight with this campaign.
The encounter with the stone juggernaut in 23a doesn't work for me. Its supposed to fill the entire hall and crush everything it rolls over, but if it filled the hall, how could it possible make a 90 degree turn round a corner, which it supposed to do. I'll change that part if my characters get there. One thing to note is that unless a few key secret doors are found, the characters can really progress in the adventure- areas 15 and 17, as well as the door in the bottom of the pit trap that connects links the hall by area 15-16 to the halls where areas 17-18 are. I think it is important to keep in mind that this was originally intended as a tournament adventure. It was assumed that most party's would become stuck and not make it through the entire dungeon. Only the groups that really take their time to inspect things super carefully (e.g searching for secret doors at the bottom of pit traps) are going to be able to navigate the dungeon to its conclusion. It think it's an easy dungeon for players to get frustrated with if the DM isn't careful about how they run it. I suggest giving them a wand of secrets to help out.
The roll20 version of Yawning Portal has all the maps set up in battle map form with tokens and such that are at large size, so they are way easier to navigate. I agree that the maps in the book are way too small in most cases. I've been running Tomb of Horrors on roll20, and I decided to have them use 9th level characters because there was nothing about it that really seemed like it required really high level characters, even though the DM advice suggests otherwise and they put it at the end. We've played three sessions. The group has been cautious and fairly smart about their exploration, and so far I have not yet killed a character- so I think that one is over-hyped in terms of difficulty, particularly in the 5e adaptation.
We have played a third session of this, which I'm hoping to get a journal up for soon, and it looks like we may fit a fourth session in this Friday.
I'm going to take a little break from this campaign to run a bit of Call of Cthulhu for my group, and then come back to this to run what I think will be the final adventure of the campaign for the time being. However, that won't start for a few weeks.
Sessions #28 and 29 (Beneath the Temple of Bane, Rescuing Pinky)
Summary: With their exit from the temple of Bane blocked, the heroes bar the door that accesses the sanctuary. Their priests and monks of Bane start trying to break it down, intent on killing the infidels that dared to assault their temple and slay the Grand Imperceptor. The heroes are too badly wounded and depleted of magic to risk entering another fight, so Jove decides to trick them into thinking that they have fled with magic. He sketches an almost accurate teleportation circle on the floor with chalk from his component pouch. While he does so, the other heroes head back downstairs to the under level of the temple. Just as the doors break open, Jove dimension doors downstairs, joining his companions and making it appear as though he just teleported away via the teleportation circle. The heroes the hide behind some large containers in the back of the coal storage room. Floki executes the priest of Bane they had left tied up in the room (last session), and Novo takes on his guise. They manage to take an extended rest, though a search party does look into the room. When they do, they see Novo (disguised as a priest of Bane) pretending to fetch coal. The rest of the party is well enough hidden that they aren’t noticed. The priest leading the guards asks him if he’s seen intruders, and Novo explains that he hasn’t. The priest, not realizing the man he is talking to is a changeling, then orders him to come with them, and he shows Novo that the the flesh golem guardians have been destroyed, and that the devil and hell hound guardians have all vanished. Clearly the intruders attempted to come down below. Novo suggests that perhaps guardians harmed them enough that they decided not to go any further and they went back upstairs without further exploring the dungeon level. The priest agrees that might be possible. He also tells Novo of the recent slaughter of the Lord Shackles in the sanctuary. Novo joins the patrol on a tour of the under level as they do a search to ensure that the intruders truly did leave using a teleportation circle spell. This allows Novo to get a good sense of the layout of the under level, which includes learning locations of the treasury, the armoury, and a room that contains a permanent teleportation circle. In order to maintain his disguise, he spends the night in the barracks chamber with the priests. Early the next morning, he sneaks away and rejoins companions in the coal storage room. With Jove having recouped his spells, the party uses invisibility magic to move through the under level in secret. The priests have mainly gone off to an emergency meeting above, and only a few acolytes remain below, saying prayers for the the dead priests and monks, who have all been laid out on the floor in the entry chamber. With the aid of the keys they acquired from the Lord of Shackles, they loot the treasury, and then visit the room with the teleportation circle. Jove takes time to copy it into his spell book in case they ever want to make use of it. Next, they pay a visit to the crypts, which they have finally located- thanks to Novo’s tour. Here they find a stairs that Novo believes will take them to the dungeons where Pinky is held. The priests hadn’t taken him down the stairs and were terrified to go below- they mentioned devils. However, access to the stairs proves to be guarded by one of Alistair’s ancestors, a man named Sir Keegan, whom was priest of Tyr that was corrupted and transformed long ago into a death knight by the clergy of Bane. They are forced to fight Sir Keegan, and he proves a deadly foe, especially with the aid of his summoned undead minions (wights), which emerge from various sarcophagi. It takes a great deal of effort to best the death knight, but the heroes prevail. They destroy the undead. Alistair claims the knight’s enchanted great sword and short sword (they are family heirlooms), and he offers the warrior’s enchanted adamantine plate armour to Sariel. They venture down the stairs into the dungeon level. At the bottom of the stairs, they find a short hall that leads to a set of doors, which access a large torture chamber. This room is infested by four bearded devils and two massive bone devils. Pinky is strapped to a torture rack at the far end of the room. The devils are eager for bloodshed, and don’t hesitate to engage the heroes in combat. Sariel and Floki take up position in the entrance while Jove, Alistair and Novo hang back to use ranged attacks. Sariel finds herself facing off against the bearded devils, while Floki has the misfortune of being attacked by a bone devil. The heroes soon learn how dangerous the poison stingers on the ends of the bone devil’s tails are, and Jove realizes that cutting their way through their enemies without at least some of them dying is unlikely. Thus, he teleports to Pinky with a dimension door spell, Novo accompanies him, using his ability to hop from shadow to shadow to make the jaunt. Jove reaches out, grabs Pinky by the wrist and dimension doors her back up to the crypts. With Pinky in their hands, the rest of heroes start a retreat. By this time, Floki is unconscious, and requires healing before he can flee. Novo shadow jumps to him and pours a potion down his throat, while Sariel covers them and holds off the devils. Then Novo, Alistair, Floki and Sariel withdraw up the stairs. Sariel is the slowest, due to her plate male, and she is the one forced to hold the devils at bay as she retreats, though truthfully the vengeful aasimar paladin probably wouldn’t have it any other way. This buys the rest of the party time to get to Jove, but in the process, Sariel sustains terrible wounds from the devils. As she fights her way up the stairs and finally reaches the top, the fiends cut her down, leaving her to bleed out, as they surge past her to hunt down the remaining heroes. The combat continues in the crypt, as Jove starts blasting them with the few spells he has left (lightning bolts and some magic missiles). Floki has had time to consume some of the healing potions they had previously looted from the temple, and he is reinvigorated enough to hold the devils at bay, while Alistair hammers at them with bolts from his enchanted crossbow. Now that Pinky is free, she uses a few of the prayers she has left, to heal herself and hurl magic missile spells into the fray. Novo takes advantage of the distracted devils to shadow jump behind them and then race over to Sariel. He finds that she still lives, and he feeds her a potent healing potion, which revives her. She heals herself some more with the last of her divine magic. She and Novo then rejoin the fight, and together the heroes somehow manage to find the strength to send all the devils screaming back to the Nine Hells with no losses of their own. However, it was by no means an easy battle, and the heroes are all spent on resources and suffering extensive wounds by the time the devils have been defeated. After the fight, Pinky indicates that Brandis, the son of the Lady of Shadowdale, is being held in one of the dungeon cells. They return to the dungeon, unlock the cell and rescue Brandis. Jove then pulls out a scroll with a teleportation circle spell that he acquired from a wyvern’s nest in a previous adventure. He teleports the heroes safely back to his tower in Thentia where they can take time to recover from their harrowing expedition. Over the next several months the heroes take some extended and much needed downtime. Jove focuses on his studies, and he works with Novo to craft a magic cloak that can take on the appearance of any outfit he needs it to and cannot easily be detected as magical. Novo also continues to train students in his secret dojo. Floki spends his days drinking, feasting and performing in the taverns of the city, doing what he can to spread word of the deeds of himself and his companions- particularly himself. Alistair takes an extended journey back to Cormyr, so that he can return the body of his dead brother back to his parents (he’s been paying to have gentle repose cast on the corpse for many ten days now). Pinky and Brandis accompany him. Alistair escorts the pair to Shadowdale, and then continues onto Cormyr in the company of a small merchant caravan. Sariel, well we aren’t really sure what Sariel gets up to during the long winter. With the coming of spring and the first merchant ships willing to brave the icy waters of the Moonsea, Alistair returns to rejoin his companions. By this time, Floki is going stir crazy and restless. He is reminded of his days as a youth in Rauthym and the long winters that he endured between raiding seasons. The heroes prepare themselves for adventure once more, and they being preparations for an expedition to the ruined city of Hulburg to the east. Here Floki hopes to avenge his sister’s death by slaying the dragon Rhime, whom he has been tracking for what feels like years. Here, Jove has heard of a dead mage named Londar Hulmaster, who, according to notes on a map he acquired in Melvaunt, had a secret lair beneath the family’s crypts that houses much of his accumulated arcane research and treasures, including a staff of power.
It was nice to make it through the second part of this! Hopefully, we'll be able to maintain the momentum and complete the campaign.
Session #2 DMs Notes: Boo, still no character deaths! A couple of close calls, but the players have been playing fairly smart and cautious, so it's been tricky. The Yawning Portal adventure seems to suggest that Tomb of Horrors is for high level PCs, and it's set as the final adventure in the series of adventures they selected. So far I haven't run into anything that has suggested the characters need to be particularly high level. Right now part of me wishes I'd had them start play with 7th level characters instead of 9th level- though the danger level does increase further in. We'll see what happens next, finding the entrance to the next section of the dungeon is tricky, so I'm not sure if they will be able to figure out how to proceed. We'll see. I mostly ran this session RAW. The only real change I made was in the chest room. In the adventure there is no chest that has shadowy magic tentacles that pull a victim into the chest. Instead, it releases a little swarm of poisonous snakes. That seemed a little dull to me, so I went for something a little different.
Tomb of Horrors (Session #2) Nudder (dwarf, rogue 1/battlerager barbarian 8)
The characters leave the tomb and make camp in a Leomund’s Tiny Hut conjured by Lolo. The next morning, another figure emerges from the mist- Flamma the genasi wizard. He sees the tiny hut sitting in front of the entrance to the tomb and recognizes it for what it is, so he knocks on the hemisphere. Lolo the gnome pops his head out with a mug of ale in hand. He, of course, recognizes the genasi as a member of the expedition and invites him in. While he is being introduced to the party, Nudder spends some time getting to know his new sword, which is a sentient item. The dwarf learns that it can communicate telepathically. He also learns that Red Mist is very “thirsty” and it tries to convince him to kill or injure one his companions so that it can drink its blood. Nudder decides to appease the blade by cutting Kull on the arm while the half orc is still sleeping. The damage isn’t major, but as the henchman’s arm begins to bleed, the blood forms into mist and floats to the sword, where it is seemingly absorbed into the blade. The rest of party witness this incident and are a little disturbed and concerned about the new weapon. Kull wakes up and is furious, but also terrified. His wound is minor and his boss Greyrat doesn’t seem willing to do anything to reprimand Nudder, and since Kull is no match for Nudder in combat, he has little recourse other than to suffer the humiliation. Flamma tries to convince Nudder to give him the blade, so that he can cast an identify spell on it to learn more about its properties, but Red Mist isn’t interested, and Nudder refuses to hand over his new weapon. Eventually, the adventurers stop worrying about the strange sword, and they decide to continue their exploration of the tomb. They begin by exploring the bronze chest they found sticking out of the wall of the first hall (area 3). Flamma takes a look at it closely and notes that it has a latch on the top, but it opens from the bottom. They inspect the latch and notice a needle trap in it. Grey Rat pulls out his thieves tools and takes care of it. They open the latch, and the bottom of the chest swings up, but nothing falls out. They all back away even further from the chest, and then Flamma calls an unseen servant and orders it to reach up inside the chest. Of course, since it is invisible, they can’t tell what it does, but suddenly a pit trap opens up below the chest. Fortunately, none of the characters are caught in the trap, but the unseen servant is destroyed. When they take a look into it, they see it is 30’ deep and filled with spikes. Nudder uses his slippers of spider climb to crawl down the pit and inspect the bottom, but he finds nothing of interest in this pit. The activation of the trap discourages any further investigation of the chest, so the adventurers move on. They return to the hall with murals of the hybrid animal men holding coloured orbs (area 10). They do some more investigation of the walls of the hall and discover some additional halls hidden behind illusionary sections of wall. The first hall they explore takes them to a room that has a statue of a four armed gargoyle (area 11), much like the one they previously encountered (in area 8). This one doesn’t animate and attack them, and one of its arms is broken off and is on the floor in front of it. They note that the palms of the hands of the three attached arms have small recesses in them, and they eventually learn that the recesses are perfectly sized to fit the gems on the collar of the gargoyle they had previously killed ( in area 8 during session 1). They experiment with putting some of the gems in the recesses, and discover that the hands crush them and turn them to dust. After having 4 of their gems crushed, they decide to not bother with anymore messing around with the weird statue. Next, they try opening a couple of the doors they spotted on the west wall of the orb mural hall, but these appear to be only false doors, and they activate spear traps when opened. Again the heroes are clever, and had tied rope to the handles of the door, so that they could pull them open without standing in front of them. Another section of illusionary hall takes them through a hall that they are forced to crawl through, and into a room with 3 chests (area 13). One chest is plated with gold, another silver, and the third one is oak. They inspect the chests, but see nothing amiss with them. Lolo pops the oak one open with a mage hand spell, which causes a giant skeleton to appear in the room. Lolo is standing in the room’s only doorway, Flamma is crouching behind him in the hall, and Greyrat, and Nudder are both near the chests. The giant skeleton is armoured and the size of a frost giant. In fact, it may once have been such a giant. Grey Rat is surprised, and the thing immediately starts slashing away at him with his scimitar. It nearly brings the rogue down. Fortunately, before it has a chance to finish him, Lolo reaches out, grabs his cloak and dimension doors him to safety in the orb mural hall. Here some magical healing can be administered. Flamma offers his aid by conjuring a magical bon fire under the thing’s crotch, and since the room isn’t overly large, it has little choice but to stand over the flames and be scorched. However, given that the creature is an undead skeleton, it doesn’t have any important bits to toast. Nudder goes into a rage and faces off against it with his new sentient magic sword (Red Mist). Red Mist complains about the creature having no blood to drink, and at first doesn’t prove overly effective, but eventually Nudder lands some of his attacks. Grey Rat, accompanied by Kull, rejoins the battle. Lolo lends support by inspiring them with offers of alcohol, and Flamma keeps blasting at the giant skeleton with scorching rays. The skeleton inflicts some pretty nasty damage on Nudder, and it slashes Kull across the stomach, which brings the half orc to the ground. He isn’t quite unconscious, but he decides to stay down and play possum. Finally, Kull sees that the creature is on the verge of being destroyed. He leaps to his feet and cleaves the horror down with his great axe; its animated bones plummet to the floor in heap. Kull makes sure to make it clear to Nudder that he was the one that destroyed the skeleton and not the dwarf. Red Mist is frustrated that his first combat in centuries didn’t provide him blood to drink, and he telepathically suggests to Nudder that they kill the half orc. When Nudder refuses, the sword tries to force his hand. Nudder fails to resist and lunges at Kull. He knocks the wounded half orc to the ground and then drives the blade into his stomach. Blood flows from the wound and again turns to mist, which the sword absorbs. Lolo heals him before he dies, and Nudder regains his senses before striking a final killing thrust. After some magical healing is administered, they continue to explore the chests. The oak chest appears empty. In the silver chest they find a small crystal box containing a ring of protection, which they liberate. Nudder opens the gold chest, and when does shadowy black tentacles burst out. They grab Nudder and pull him into the chest, as he is pulled into the chest, he has the misfortune of dropping Red Mist. The lid slams shut, and the chest starts to shake violently. Lolo quickly tosses the sword into his bag of holding. The adventurers open the lid of the chest to try to help Nudder. Inside Lolo see mostly shadowy blackness, but in it, the gnome catches glimpses of Nudder trying to free himself. Lolo prepares a spell, and when he suddenly sees Nudder’ hand thrust out of the black, the bard touches it and transfers an enlarge person spell to the dwarf. Nudder immediately grows to the size of an ogre, and bursts open the chest. He rolls out onto the floor, covered shadowy blackness. The blackness seems to have some sort of connection to the now broken chest because once it is out in the open and exposed to the light of Greyrat’s blazing rapier it fades away to nothingness. Nudder lays on the flag stones, alive, but hurting badly (extensive necrotic and pyschic damage). Nudder seems more upset about losing his magic sword than his wounds, but when he asks if his companions have seen it, they play dumb and claim they have no idea where it is. The dwarf senses that his telepathic bond with the blade is cut off (due to it being stored in an extra-dimensional space), and he soon gives up looking for it. Kull suggests that maybe he sat on it, and it went up his giant sized ass, which almost starts another fight between the two (Greyrat intervenes to keep the peace). The heroes take a short rest to tend wounds, and allow Nudder to attune to the ring of protection. Once they have recovered, they head on their way, continuing their exploration of the tomb. They return to the chapel room (area 14) and give it a more thorough examination. They continue to avoid the arch filled with orange vapours, but they find that the pews open up and inside they find plenty of coin. They are clever and use rope and pitons to open the pews from a distance. This pays off when they discover that the final pew contains a deadly gas trap, but because of their caution they avoid being caught in it. They also conduct a thorough examination of the walls of the room, and they note that their is a small, circular depression in the east wall that looks sized to hold a coin or gem. Lolo uses mage hand to load a coin into the slot, and it causes a heavy stone slab to lower down, revealing an opening in the wall. This leads them to the land of stairs that descends deeper into the tomb. Greyrat breaks out his ten fort pole and starts prodding the floor ahead of, while Nudder uses his slippers of spider climbing to move along the wall. Everyone else follows behind the pair. Soon they come to a series of doors. Nudder shoulders open the first door, and then Greyrat attaches a rope to his back pack and throws it on top of the area on the other side of the door, which triggers a pit trap. Like the pit they encountered in the entry hall, this pit is 30’ deep and filled with spikes. Over the course of the next few moments, they pass through a two more doors, and once again they find a spiked pit trap behind each door. After successfully avoiding the pit traps, they follow the hall around a corner and continue down another long stretch of hall. This hall ends at yet another door, though this door is different from the previous doors, as it locked with a series of complex locks (area 16). They hear a muffled sound of someone calling out in distress from the far side of the door. Greyrat inspects the door and picks the locks. The hall keeps going beyond the door, but it appears to come to an end at some sort of pit 50’ further up the hall. It is very hot in the hall, and the sounds they heard prior to opening the door continue. They can be heard more clearly now and seem to be coming from the pit at the end of the hall. Nudder spider climbs along the wall, Lolo remains near the door, and Flamma and Greyrat move forward along the hall with Greyrat prodding away with his 10’ pole. As the pair near the end of hall, something terrible happens. The floor of the hall suddenly tilts dramatically downward creating a ramp that seeks to dump the adventurers into the pit, which appears to drop into a pool of lava (the entire floor of this stretch of hall is on fulcrum and is like a giant see saw). Flamma and Greyrat slide towards the pit, but Nudder moves along the wall with his enchanted slippers and reaches out with his arms to grab Greyrat and Flamma and help them climb back up the ramp past the fulcrum, which results in the ramp tipping back to its original position. Nudder then climbs along the wall to the pit and investigates it, but he doesn't see any sign of anyone in the pit. He does see that it drops some 40’ down to lava, which radiates massive heat that even the dwarf can’t tolerate for long. It seems that this entire area is strictly some elaborate death trap. Nudder feels like they missed something, but he’s not sure what. They carefully inspect the walls of the hall as they make their way back to the chapel, but they don’t find any secret doors. At this point, they decide to return to the entry hall and investigate it some more since they haven’t explored it to it’s end. The session ends here.
I'm trying to run this fairly true to the adventure module. I made a few little changes- more as the evening went on. In the chapel room, I didn't really see any information about anything going on under the altar- but since the barbarian took all the trouble to push it out of the way (with a really high athletics check), I figured I'd reward him- so I on the fly made up the cubby and gas trap). Regarding the two urns in the chapel room, I couldn't find anything about there contents. However, there is supposed to be treasure hidden in some of the pews and some kind of gas trap, so I kind of moved the treasure from the pews into one of the urns, and the gas trap into the cubby that I made up under the altar.
Anyhow, so far the adventure has not been living up to the hype of being super deadly. There were only three level 9 characters, and there were no casualties, nor did anyone come that close to death- except the first level NPC half orc fighter. Hopefully, I'll see some casualties in the coming session.
just finished Session #1. Only 3 PCs tonight, but a 4th should be joining on Tuesday for session #2 Sadly, no deaths yet. Tomb of Horrors (Session #1) Nudder (dwarf, rogue 1/battlerager barbarian 8)
A large expedition sets out aboard a ship on the Lake of Unknown depths (Nyr Dyv) in the Flaness (Greyhawk Setting), following a chart discovered by Grey Rat. The chart is believed to lead to an island that holds the tomb of the legendary lich Acererak- a place of great danger, but also vast wealth. After several days at sea, they find the island. Boats are deployed and the expedition of a dozen or so bold adventurers sets out onto the island in search of the fabled tomb. As they get further inland, the party becomes enveloped in an unnatural mist. Several members of the expedition become separated from one another, but Grey Rat, Nudder, Lolo, and their servant Kull have the sense to tie themselves together, and eventually they emerge from the mist. They find themselves in an open area that is dominated by a large, barren flat topped hill. Mist surrounds the area, and whenever they venture back into it, they seem to remerge back in the clearing with the hill. It seems they are trapped. They investigate the hill, and around the north side they find a cliff face that has three depressions in its base. One to the west side, one in the middle and one to the east side. The depressions are filled with gravel and dirt. They decide to investigate the middle one first. Kull gets out his shovel and starts digging, as does Nudder. Lolo and Grey Rat sit back and watch. Eventually the two workers clear out enough gravel to discover a 20’ wide tunnel that makes its way south into the hill (area 3 of the tomb). They consider clearing out the other depressions, but both Nudder and Kull are a little tired of digging, so they begin exploring the hall. The floor is a bright coloured mosaic of tiles with a narrow red path of tiles winding its way into the darkness. The walls are covered in plaster frescoes, depicting a variety of images. Of note is an image of a pair of jackal headed men holding a bronze chest, though the chest is real and protrudes from the side of the wall. Another image of interest is a life sized picture of a door to a cell. Lolo summons dancing lights and an unseen servant. He orders the servant to investigate the bronze chest protruding from the wall, but it doesn’t have much luck manipulating it, so Grey Rat moves into the tomb holding his blazing flame tongue sword in one hand, and a 10’ pole in the other. The flame blade, does much to illuminate the dark hall. He taps the floor with his 10’ pole, but discovers no danger. He heads to the part of the wall that shows the door, and starts tapping that with his pole. The plaster falls away, revealing a secret door. They force open the door, which is stuck shut, and enter a short hall that ends at another door. Grey Rat opens this door, and it takes them into a room occupied by a four armed gargolye (area 8). Nudder rushes the thing and tackles it. The dwarf pins it and holds it down. It thrashes about, clawing and biting at him, while the rest of the party gang up on it and stab and hew at the thing while its prone. It doesn’t take long for them to kill the fiend, though Nudder takes some damage in the process. Afterwards they find a collar studded with 10 gems on its neck that they throw into Lolo’s bag of holding. From there they explore a bunch of tiny 10’ x 10’ rooms that are seemingly empty, but connect with one another by a series of doors. Eventually, they discover a secret door in one of them, which leads them through a network of small, rooms and halls, all of which are linked by secret doors (area 9- a kind of annoying and frustrating part of the dungeon IMO, so I more or less hand waved the party through it). Finally, their efforts allow them to access another wide hall with mosaic floor and frescoed walls (area 10) . The walls of this hall depict images of animal humanoid hybrid monstrosities holding coloured orbs. The adventurers wander down the hall, which eventually ends at an arch filled with mist. The key stone and two base stones of the arch start to glow with coloured light (russet, olive and citron) as soon as they approach. Grey Rat notices that the colours match some of the colour of the orbs depicted in the mural. He goes to stand before an olive coloured orb and examines it closely. He notices the wall kind of shimmers. He thrusts his pole at the wall and it passes right through it, suggesting it to be illusionary. The rogue then sticks his head through the illusionary wall and with the darkvision provided by his goggles of night, he sees a narrow passage with a 5’ high ceiling. In single file they explore this long, narrow winding hall. It eventually comes to a dead end. Here they discover another illusionary wall, which leads into a chapel room (area 14). It features rows of wooden pews, an altar made of strange stone that glows dimly with blue inner light, a wooden throne, a pair of big white urns, and an arch on the west wall that is filled with orange vapours. Lolo touches the altar, which sends a lightning bolt shooting down the aisle between the pews. Luckily no one is standing in the aisle. After that the altar turns to a reddish colour. Lolo touches it again, which triggers a fire ball that blasts the party (However, Grey Rat takes no damage due to evasion). Kull is badly scorched (half orc racial feature keeps him from dropping to 0 hp). Once the fireball has been triggered, the altar turns more of translucent grey, and stops glowing- it seems harmless now. Lolo gives Kull a little healing. Next, Nudder uses his great strength to push the altar along the floor, and he finds a secret cubby underneath of it. The cubby is covered by a stone lid, and when Nudder pries it open, poisonous gas spews out, causing him and Kull to choke and sputter (both take damage). They are both hearty and survive. In the cubby they find a bag of holding, and inside the bag of holding they find a wand with a gold framed, circular lense attached to the side of it. The lense appears to have been crafted out of a gem stone, and there are runes inscribing on the side of the wand that no one can read- so they toss it in the bag of holding. After this they check out the throne a little, and investigate the two big urns in the SE and SW corners of the room. Grey Rat opens one of the urns and finds that it is filled with coins, which they divide up into the two bags of holding they now possess. He then opens the second urn. This time, noxious black vapour spews out. The vapour forms into a frog demon (hezrou) that tries to tear them all apart. It’s bigger than the four armed gargolye, but Nudder goes into a rage and he manages the foul smelling horror. He holds it prone, while Kull and Grey Rat stab and hew it. It fights back and inflicts some damage on the heroes (mainly on Nudder), but it is out numbered, and Grey Rat’s flame tongue rapier is a deadly weapon, which, combined with his sneak attack skills, does a lot damage. Soon enough they send the demon back to the Abyss. They then hear a voice calling from the urn. Inside is a short sword, which Lolo levitates out of the urn with a mage hand spell. The sword is the source of the voice. It proves to be a sentient weapon, capable of speech. Lolo asks it a morale question about killing orphans, and the weapon responds that it would do so if its wielder commanded. This answer satisfies the gnome, and Nudder claims Red Mist as his own (he had been lacking a magic weapon). The session ends with the heroes returning to the entrance to the tomb, where Lolo casts a Leomund’s Tiny Hut spell, and they settle in for an extended rest.
It's mostly the traps that are super deadly, not the combats. Though obviously acererak is pretty dangerous, but I don't know if they'll even get to him. I'm probably going to give this 3 sessions and see where they get by then (maybe 1 more if really need be).
I got ahold of Tales from the Yawning Portal, and I thought I'd run my group through Tomb of Horrors. The adventure isn't really clear on what level they should be for this. It says "high" level, but I don't really see that much in it that requires one to be super high level, and the original was for around levels 10-12. So I've got the characters are starting at 9th level. They are are rolling stats- 3d6 in order. reroll lowest if you want, and swap 2 around. They are each making two characters and starting with whichever one they prefer. I'm also giving them a list of magic items to choose from to start with, and they each get a rare item, an uncommon item, and a couple of healing potions. Anyhow, it should be interesting. They are rolling up their sacrifices right now. So far I've got a gnome bard, a human rogue, and a dwarf barbarian.
This journal is all caught up now. The characters are in a bit of pickle since they have basically no resources left and are low on hp. Next session should be interesting.
Session #27 (Beneath the Temple of Bane)
Summary: After taking a short rest in the sanctuary of the Temple of Bane, the heroes venture down a set of stairs into the under level of the temple in hopes of finding and rescuing their former companion Pinky. The wide, stone stairs to lead them to a large landing with two flights of stairs continuing down to the floor of a cavernous chamber. When Floki steps onto the landing, he triggers a glyph of warding that blasts the party with lightning. This attracts the attention of a pair of flesh golem guardians and a pair of hell hounds. In addition, there is a balcony on the far side of the room. Hiding in the shadows, on the balcony, are three barbed devils that repeatedly conjure balls of fire into their hands which they hurl at the heroes. Despite being low on spells, the adventurers decide to fight their way through the guardians. It proves to be a tough battle, and although they destroy the golems and send the hell hounds and devils back to the lower planes, they are nearly completely out of spells and are pretty battered and fatigued by the end of the fight. There is no time for another rest, so they press on. They head to the right, following directions given to them by a priest they had interrogated (see session 26). They hope to find the catacombs, which are said to lead to the dungeon where Pinky is held. The hall they follow doesn’t immediately take them to any catacombs. Instead, they round a bend and spot a priest of Bane making his way down the hall, towards them. He is accompanied by another hell hound. The adventures easily destroy the hell hound, though not before it breaths a gout of fire at them, which Floki mostly blocks with his shield. Novo shadow jumps behind the priest and smacks him on the back of the head with his staff, knocking him out. They drag his unconscious body into a store room filled with coal. Here they revive him and do an interrogation. He gives them directions to a stair that he claims will lead them to the crypts and the dungeon. They bind him and leave him in the coal room. Then they follow his directions, making their way through the dark halls of the stairs. The stairs are guarded by a pair of hellhounds, but the heroes deal with the canine fiends with ease. They cautiously descend the stairs. The stairs open into a massive, chamber with a stone balcony wrapping around it and two rows of thick, stone columns that support a the high, vaulted ceiling above, creating an aisle up the middle of the room. Large, cauldron like braziers carved from black stone sit on the floor near the columns, blazing with flame and providing illumination to the chamber. The room is far from empty. Lining the balcony, are several animated skeletons carrying bows and wearing chain armour. A couple of gargoyles can also be spotted perched on the balcony on the opposite side of the room. Of much greater concern, a horrible aberration hovers at the back of the room above the balcony. Based on its distinctive appearance, the heroes suspect it is a beholder, and they recall from their knowledge of the church of Bane, that the faith has long had a strange relationship with these horrors, often allying with them and using them as advisors and oracles. They go still, remaining on the stair. Floki and Novo tap the others on the shoulders and motion for them to quietly go back up the stair. Thus, they decide to go no further. They creep back upstairs, leaving the room. They decide to leave the temple and return to the ruins of the old city where they plan to hide and take an extended rest. Unfortunately, when they are about to enter the temple sanctuary and head for the exit, they discover the sanctuary is swarming with priests and Iron Ring guards that have discovered the carnage left behind by the heroes. Their exit is blocked, and they have limited options. The session ends here. Memorable Moments:
• Flesh Golems hammering the crap out of Floki and him needing to make use of a potion of supreme healing taken from the Lord of Shackles.
Session #26 (The Lord of Shackles)
Summary: The heroes find themselves hiding among the rubble of some ruined buildings behind the Temple of Bane. They decide to jump a pair of priests of Bane who are standing near the temple with a stone mason looking at some architectural drawings and staring up at the damaged dome of the temple. The plan is to interrogate them for information about the lower level of the temple. Floki casts a hypnotic pattern that entrances them, allowing him and Novo to successfully get the drop on them. Floki kills the lowest ranking priest and the mason with his frost brand. They take the final priest captive and drag him and the two bodies back to the cover of the ruins. Here they interrogate the priest. His name is brother Tarmond, and they learn from him that the Lord of Shackles maintains a dungeon somewhere past the crypts of the temple’s under level. He claims only the Lord of Shackles has access to that part of the dungeon, and the priests rarely enter the crypts. Upon completing the interrogation, Floki kills the final priest. The party then forms a plan to get down to the crypts. Novo, uses his changeling powers to assume the guise of brother Tarmond (priest of Bane), and he uses his disguise kit to help Alistair take on the appearance of the acolyte that was with him. Jove then casts a potent invisibility spell. He makes himself, Floki and Sariel invisible. Novo uses pass without trace to make them more quiet. Then the heroes enter the temple, heading for the east wing where they hope to bluff their way past the Iron Mask guards and gain access to the stair that will take them to the under levels. Unfortunately, as soon as they enter the main sanctuary, they run into the Lord Shackles himself. The tiefling high priest of Bane is with several lesser priests, and they are looking up at the hole in the dome, clearly analyzing the progress of the repairs. Novo and Alistair, who are in disguise try to make their way through the sanctuary to the doors to the east wing where the stair into the dungeons is located, but the Lord Shackles spots them and calls Novo (Brother Tarmond) over. Novo obeys, and he and Alistair approach the Lord of Shackles. They are asked where the mason and his plans are, as they are needed immediately. Novo explains that there is a problem with a buckle on his armour and he needs to go repair it. This excuse doesn’t fly with the Lord of Shackles, and the tiefling demands that he go get the mason (who is dead thanks to Floki). Jove sees that Novo’s conversation with the Lord of Shackles isn’t going so well, so he decides to make a bold move. He is standing silently beside Novo, invisible. The Lord of Shackles, and the priests are all bunched together, so he casts cone of cold. The freezing blast doesn’t have a huge effect on the Lord of Shackles, but it nearly freezes all of the lesser priests to death. Upon casting the spell, he turns visible, and as one might expect, a huge battle erupts. The heroes take out the half frozen priests quickly, though the Lord Shackles has another potent priest with him, and the pair are formidable. The Lord Shackles retaliates against Jove with a harm spell that causes the wizard serious wounds. He then tries to separate the party with a blade barrier, while his second in command blasts them with a flame strike. To make matters worse, eight gargoyles swoop down from their perches high above to defend the temple. The heroes focus their attacks on the Lord of Shackles, and they kill him early in the battle. His second in command and the gargoyles continue to defend the temple, despite the death of their master. As the battle rages, the doors to the east wing open, and the six iron mask monks move to enter the sanctuary, but while they are still clustered in the hall, Jove hits them all with his second cone of cold spell. It doesn’t kill any of them, but it seriously weakens them, making it possible for the heroes to finish them off before the monks can take down any of the wounded heroes. The temple’s defenders are fanatical and fight to the death, but finally the battle comes to an end, and the heroes are victorious. The session ends with the heroes looting the body of the Lord Shackles and deciding on their next move. Memorable Moments Jove deciding to make the big opening move to attack the Lord of Shackles and his priests with cone of cold
Important Details:
Session #25 (Zhentil Keep)
Summary: The characters arrive in Zhentil Keep with the intention of rescuing Pinky from the Lord of Shackles and hopefully killing the Lord of Shackles in the process. They enter the city under the pretence that Alistair is a noble looking to buy slaves and that the rest of the party are his entourage. In Zhentil Keep, they meet an urchin named Anlow, who shows them around. They find lodgings at the city’s finest inn, the Silver Trumpet. The following day they head to the slave market. Here they try to find out if Pinky is being held in the massive slave warehouse nearby, and if they can perhaps purchase her. When Alistair indicates that he’s interested in buying a gnome slave, the auctioneer claims to have only a single gnome, and brings out an older male gnome- definitely not Pinky. They eventually goad him into revealing that he did recently have a young gnome woman at the warehouse, but the Lord of Shackles took her for himself. Alistair inquires about getting an audience with the Lord of Shackles, and the man tells him that The Lord of Shackles is also the High Imperceptor of Bane, and he can often be found at the Temple of Bane. They decide to purchase the gnome anyhow, and they discover his name is Gamble. They take him back to the Silver Trumpet and leave him in their chambers. They then pay a visit to the Temple of Bane. The temple is located in the large ruined area of the city, and the Lord of Shackles is in the process restoring the temple to its former glory. The dome is the main section of the temple that still needs repair, and workers are busy at this task. Alistair makes a donation the temple, and convinces the acolytes to let him and his companions in to tour the place. There is one wing of the temple that they can’t access, which catches their interest. Unfortunately they see no sign of the Lord of Shackles. After their visit to the temple, they decide to hide among some of the ruins along the road back from the temple to the intact portion of the city. Here they wait, hoping to ambush some acolytes returning to the city with the intent of interrogating them for more information and perhaps acquiring their vestments to use as disguises. Eventually such a party passes them, but it also consists of several labourers and Iron Ring guards. The heroes are worried they would have to kill the labourers in the process of taking down the acolytes, so they decide to abort the ambush. After dark they return to the temple, approach from ruins of the northern hillside. Novo does some stealthy scouting, climbing up the temple to its dome and peering down through the hole, but he doesn’t see or hear any sign of activity in the temple after dark. All is quiet. He reports back to the rest of the group, and Jove decides that he will try to dimension door himself and Floki into the one wing of the temple they were unable to visit during their earlier tour. Jove turns himself and Floki invisible as soon as they appear, and they discover a large room with a wide stair descending downward in the middle of it. Several Iron Mask monks meditate in the room. The monks hear them, but presumably can’t see them. Jove decides to cast another dimension door and teleport the pair back to the rest of the group. They return to the city proper and rest the night at the inn. The following day they gather up their gear and horses. They bring Gamble the gnome with them and exit through the northwest gate into the ruined portion of the city. They make their way towards the old gate, but after passing the temple hill they duck off the road into the ruins. They find the remains of a building to set up a camp. They explain to Gamble the truth who they are, and Jove uses a ritual to protect the gnome and their horses with a Leomund’s hut. They then head back to the temple hill to do a little more recon. The session ends with them spotting a pair of priests come around behind the temple with a stone mason. The group is looking at some architectural plans and pointing up towards the dome to examine its progress. The heroes need to decide if they want to try to grab one of the priests. The main complication is that Floki noticed 8 or so gargoyle statues in alcoves above the north doors. They can’t tell if they are just statues or real gargoyles, but they are worried that if they make a move the gargoyles will animate and attack. Important Details:
Memorable Moments:
I'm trying out a new format with the journals, to make them a little faster to right, but hopefully keep them interesting. Session #24 (Death of Delgar the Blade)
Summary: The characters escorted Delgar the blade, along with his most loyal mercenaries, a wizard named Rost, and some 50 Iron Ring guards to the site of the ambush where Jove froze the previous slaver raiding party with a cone of cold. Here, in the forest, just south of Voonlar, the Company of the Falcon once again staged an ambush, attacking the Iron Ring from the woods with bows while the heroes were “investigating” the scene of the previous attack. The heroes turned on the Iron Ring and helped the Company of the Falcon slaughter Delgar the Blade and his men. Important Details: • Delgar the Blade brought the imprisoned leader of the Company of the Falcons (Alagar Falconhand) with him as a hostage. Jove rescued him during the battle by using a dimension door spell to teleport him to safety. Alagar’s thumbs had been cut off by Delgar.
• Rost the wizard, claimed to serve another wizard named Elkennor, who is known to have close ties to the Lord of Shackles. Rost escaped the ambush. • Delgar the Blade was killed. Floki claimed his frost brand sword, Alistair claimed his gauntlets of ogre power, and the party gained a suite of +2 chainmail, as well as the Pinky’s dagger- Dancing Flame. Memorable Moments:
• Floki got rid of Rosa the wizard right at the start of the fight with a suggestion spell. He then spent the remainder of the battle facing Delgar the Blade. His liberal use of the shield spell helped save him from being cut down by Delgar. He also used a heat metal spell effectively to heat up Delgar’s frost brand, making it painful for him to wield and reducing Dlegar’s ability to fight (Delgar was stuck fighting with disadvantage for much of the combat). This also saved him from several potential hits, and eventually Delgar dropped the blade and started fighting with Dancing Flame. Towards the end of the fight Floki was forced to put up darkness spell to save himself. • Alistair spent much of the fight in the woods sniping with his bow. One of Delgar’s mercenaries found him and stabbed him good a few times with his rapier. Alistair eventually took him down with point blank shots from his crossbow. After dealing with this foe, he turned his attention on Delgar and did significant damage to the warrior. • Novo was disguised as a mercenary named Olstag, and he had to run into the forest to remove his armour before joining the battle. He then put his monk skillz to good use, taking down wounded Iron Mask monks, a number of Iron Ring guards, and finally helping to defeat Delgar. Unfortunately, he suffered his own share of wounds, and he was knocked unconscious towards the end of the fight. • Sariel was caught in the middle of the ambush with Floki, surrounded by enemies. Her plate mail armour came in handy, saving her from a number of injuries. She spent much of the fight battling Delgar’s mercenaries and cutting down guards. She eventually joined Floki who, by this time, was badly wounded and in need of healing. Sariel used her full lay on hands allotment for the day on him, keeping him alive. Then she and Floki together took on Delgar.
So, I had helped build the quest hook for this next part of the campaign with Malik's player as part of his character's backstory. In character, he worked real hard to convince the rest of the PCs to get on board with helping him on the quest, but now that they are starting, Malik's player had to leave the campaign due to a change in his schedule, which has caused him to be unable to attend the sessions anymore. Consequently, I ended up having to write Malik out of the adventure, just as the party is starting out on his quest. For this reason, I decided I needed to bring back Pinky as an NPC that I could use as a hook for the characters to keep them on the quest. The end goal for me here is to bring them into a final conflict with the Iron Ring organization. Ideally, I had hoped they would first follow a hook around a map they recovered back in Melvaunt that would take them to the ruins of Hulburg. Here they would confront the white dragon that Floki has been hunting (as part of his backstory) and they would have a chance to get their hands on a staff of power. Then they would go deal with the Iron Ring as a possible finale to the campaign. However, since they decided to follow Malik's quest first, it looks like the order will be reversed. Oh well.
Session #23 (Shadowdale and Voonlar)
After the heroes rest for a few days in Thentia, Malik finally convinces them to help him try to save the halflings from his village that were enslaved by the Iron Ring or if that isn’t possible- avenge them. Malik’s problem isn’t really that big of concern for the group, but since Malik was from the same village where Delilah was from (she was left as a baby on the doorstep of a halfling burrow, and the halflings adopted her as their own), and they wish to do right by Delilah, they agree. Jove, who’s magic has grown in power, opens a teleportation circle to the tower of his former master, a half elf mage named Finn Greencloak, who dwells near the Daleland town of Essembra. From Essembra they make a several day long overland journey through Mistledale and the great elven wood to the village of Shadowdale. Sadly, over the course of the journey, Malik’s health takes a turn for the worse. The halfling sorcerer had been quite old, and the journey to the Moonsea and adventure on the Infinite Stairs had been highly taxing. As the heroes follow the river Ashaba towards Shadowdale, his little heart gives out and the halfling passes on, leaving the rest of the party to finish the quest without him. The heroes give him a burial by the river and continue on to Shadowdale. Eventually, they arrive in the village of Shadowdale- home of the famous wizard Elminster. Here they spend the night at the famous Old Skull Inn where Floki there is much feasting and drinking. An attractive female halfling musician named Olive Ruskettle is performing that evening, and Floki engages her in a contest of bardic music that draws a large crowd to the inn. Floki wakes up the following morning with the halfing bard sharing his bed, Novo in his new guise as a dwarf (with the help of a recently acquired belt of dwarvenkind) passed out on the floor, and very fuzzy memories regarding the details of the night before. That morning, while the heroes take their breakfast in the common room, they chat with the inn keeper and learn that the Iron Ring slavers have been raiding homesteads in the northern part of the dale for a couple of months now. The slavers are known to be operating out a town to the north of the dale called Voonlar, a town that has historically been a rival and enemy of the people of Shadowdale. It is also known that the slavers are led by a mercenary warrior named Delgar the Blade. The heroes have already had dealings with Delgar from back in Phlan, and their former gnome companion Pinky had been wanting vengeance against him for killing her sister. In addition, they learn that a band of dalesmen calling themselves Company of the Falcon have taken up arms against the Iron Ring and have been waging a guerrilla style war against them from the forest. In fact, the innkeeper tells them that she heard that a member of the Company of the Falcon arrived in town the previous evening to report to Lady Ulphor, the dale’s ruler. The heroes ask where they can find this man and they are directed to one of the town’s most famous landmarks- the Twisted Tower. As they approach the Twisted Tower, they see a young man mounting a horse in front of the castle preparing to ride off. They intercept him, and after explaining who they are and dropping Delilah’s name, which the man recognizes, they gain his trust enough for him to talk to them. He introduces himself as Levin, and it seems he is a member of the Company of the Falcon. He explains that he has come to Shadowdale to report to Lady Ulphor that their secret camp had been discovered and attacked by the Iron Ring. A man named Alagar Falconhand is their leader, and Levin believes he was captured along with his son Brandis, who also happens to be the son of Lady Ulphor (the relationship between Lady Ulphor and Alagar is “complicated”). He also tells them that a gnome priestess of Mystra named Pinky had recently joined up with Company of the Falcon, and he believes that she too was taken. This is shocking news to most of the party, as Pinky is the former companion of Jove, Novo and Alistair. They knew she had gone south to report on events in the Moonsea to Harper contacts, but they haven’t heard from her in several ten days. Only about a dozen members of the Company survived the raid, fleeing into the woods before they were cut down or captured. The heroes decide that they would like to meet what is left of the Company of the Falcon, as they may be useful allies. Levin agrees to take the heroes to them. Thus, the adventurers travel north through the farmlands of the dale and again into the great elven wood. About three days after leaving Shadowdale village, they arrive at the entrance to stream side cave deep in the forest. Here they find the new camp of what remains of the Company of the Falcon. Levin introduces them to their current leader, a young dale’s man named Corrian. They forge an alliance with Corrian, and he agrees to give them the support of the Company of the Falcon in their efforts to free captives and bring Delgar the Blade to justice. The heroes decide they will go to Voonlar where they will pose as sell swords. They will try to learn more of their enemy and the location of any prisoners. From there they will come up with a plan to take out Delgar and rescue any slaves they can. The Company of the Falcon will camp in the woods near Voonlar, and with the aid of Alagar Falconhand’s falcon animal companion (Alagar is the leader of the Company of the Falcon, and he is currently thought to be a prisoner of Delgar the Blade), they will send messages back and forth. A couple of days later, the adventurers arrive at the gates of Voonlar. Voonlar is reasonably well fortified. The town itself is surrounded by a sturdy wood palisade wall. A steep hill dominates the southeastern quarter of the town and crouched on the hill top is a squat stone fortress known as Locktower Keep. Sharing the hill top with the castle is a temple of Bane. Their story of being sellswords gets them past the gates, and they find their way to the town’s most prominent inn- the Manticore’s Tail. Floki puts his bardic skills to good use and draws a large crowd to the inn to see him perform. Among the audience Jove, Alistair and Novo recognize some of Delgar’s most loyal mercenaries, men they had met previously in Phlan, including a belligerent northman named Olstag. The next day, as they take their breakfast, they are inquiring with the inn keeper how best to get mercenary work with Delgar, when Olstag enters the tavern and seeks them out. He was impressed by Floki’s talents as a skald, for it had been a long time since he had seen a skilled skald perform. He and Floki converse, and Floki learns that Olstag is also from the distant island Rauthym. Olstag has heard of Floki’s deceased older sister, who was great warrior and raider, and the two of them speak for some time. Floki explains that he and his companions wish to work as sell swords for Delgar the Blade, and they ask if he will help them get an audience with the mercenary. Olstag tells them that he thinks that Delgar would enjoy being entertained by Floki in his hall, and they should come to Locktower Keep that evening. So that evening heroes head for Locktower keep. In the great hall, they meet Delgar the Blade. He invites Floki to perform, and there is much drinking and feasting. During the feasting Olstag takes an interest in Sariel. The fallen aasimar has no interest in the brute and rebuffs his advances. However, by the end of the night, he passes out on top of the plate armoured woman. By this time Delgar has retired to his quarters, and the hall is filled mainly with those of his men that have passed out drunk. Sariel hefts the unconscious Olstag over her shoulder and carries him up a spiral staircase to the next floor. Here she considers doing some investigating, but she sees a couple of guards stationed here, so she instead dumps Olstag in a window alcove and returns to the hall. The next day Delgar agrees to sign the heroes on as mercenaries in his service. He orders them to return to the Manticore’s Tail and says that he will send word for them as soon as he is ready to put them to work. They spend a couple of days hanging about town, but soon enough they are given notice that Delgar wishes them to join his forces on a slave raid. That evening they make contact with the falcon and send a message to the Company of the Falcon that they have will be accompanying Delgar’s forces on a slave raid, and that the Company of the Falcon should prepare an ambush. The following morning, they gather in the bailey of Locktower Keep. Here they are introduced to a man named Barik who is Delgar’s most trusted soldier. Jove, Alistair and Novo recall having met Barik back in Phlan. Fortunately, their disguises hold up just fine, and he doesn’t recognize any of them. Barik is leading the raid with Olstag. He inspects each of the new warriors. It is is easy enough to see how the likes of Floki, Sariel and Alistair fit the description of mercenaries. Novo has assumed the form of a human that he calls Travis the Slaver, so he too makes a passable warrior, though the magic staff he carries and the lack of armour he wears makes him stand out as being different than a typical mercenary. Jove is the one that seems most out of place among all the warriors, and Barik asks what skills he offers. In response, Jove gives a minor demonstration of his magical prowess by sending a bolt of fire up into the air, revealing that he is a mage. Under Barik’s command, the adventurers, along with Olstag and twenty Iron Ring soldiers, ride out from Voonlar on a slave raid. The heroes stick near the rear of slavers forces. They ride through the farmland outside Voonlar. Soon they enter the elven wood. At this point the slavers become more alert and ready for danger. They haven’t gotten far when suddenly, arrows start to fly from the forest, taking down slavers, as the ambush begins. Before the slavers can do much to defend themselves, the heroes turn on them as well. Jove brings to bear a powerful new spell that he has recently learned- cone of cold. The cone of cold freezes nearly the entirety of the iron ring slavers and their mounts, leaving them standing in the road as frozen statues. After that it is easy enough to finish off the few that remain, including Barik and Olstag. After the slaughter, the heroes decide that it will look very suspicious if only they were to return alive from their first mission. Novo decides that he will take on the guise of Olstag, and he dons the warrior’s arms and armour, hiding his own gear away in the saddle bags of his horse. The heroes leave the Company of the Falcon and ride back to Voonlar. Back in Voonlar, they explain to Delgar that they were ambushed in the woods just outside of town, and that a powerful mage destroyed most of the raiders with ice magic. They only barely escaped with their lives. Delgar is clearly angered and upset by the death of his Barik, his closest companion. He is also suspicious of the adventurers’ story. It seems rather odd that on their very first mission they were ambushed and that the heroes were nearly the only survivors. Fortunately, “Olstag” survived. Delgar speaks privately with “Olstag", and Novo in the guise of the barbarian confirms the adventurers story. For the moment, this appeases Delgar. Still Delgar wants blood. He wants to finish off what remains of the Company of the Falcon. He mobilizes his men, and the session ends with heroes getting ready to go with Delgar to hunt down the remnants of the Company of the Falcon. They hope to try the same trick of ambush and betrayal again, but this time the plan is to take down Delgar.
@ Steven Dunham- thanks for checking it out. The demon spider was intended to be a conversion of a bebilith, but since I wanted it to be a solo monster I gave it legendary actions. I find creating a 5e monster is fairly easy, so I sometimes throw "new" stuff together, usually using previous edition stats as a reference. I'd say that so far this campaign has pretty much been entirely home-brew. I've used various sourcebooks as reference for location details, but the adventures have been home-brew. However, they're pretty straight forward so planning them hasn't been that much work. The main work has come from building maps and things like that on roll20 (I run this campaign using roll20, which is a virtual table top- in case you aren't familiar with it). I've been trying to make the campaign fairly sandboxy, and give players freedom to choose their own objectives and goals. I tend to put out some adventure hooks and see what they bite at and then plan in response to their actions. My sessions are fairly short (2.5-3 hrs), so I get time in between to think of how I'm going to respond to whatever choices they make. For instance, I hadn't really intended to do the Infinite Staircase adventure, but Floki decided that the wanted to try and find some adventuring work in Thentia, so I threw a quick quest idea together for him. I knew his player was a planscape fan and a warhammer fan, so I decided to kind of combine the two ideas.
Poor Connor, he really got wailed on last night. On the bright side, you get to chalk up another kill to your PC death tally.
DM's Notes: The fight with the demon spider was one of the first times I've run a solo encounter against a legendary creature, and the first time in this campaign. The legendary actions are handy, but can cause some confusion regarding the initiative order since such creatures constantly act off their turn. It gave the PCs a decent fight, but overall the encounter wasn't really that challenging for them. The heroes do enough damage that even with the extra actions, having all them focused on that single opponent made him go down fairly easily. I do have plans to use a few more legendary creatures before the end of the campaign, and I set up this encounter mainly to give those mechanics a test run. As I suspected would be the case, even legendary monsters need minion support. Thus, I doubt I'll have them face anymore legendary monsters without the support of minions.
Session #22 (A Tale from the Infinite Staircase)
The heroes have entered the mythical Infinite Staircase in an effort to help the wizard Fingol Firefingers find his way back to his home world. There they met a Lillend, one of the custodians of the stair. The lillend has offered them her aid in exchange for helping to remove a foul demon spider that has taken up residence on the stair (see session #21). Now the lillend leads them through the bewildering maze of stairs that defy the known laws of physics. After what feels like several hours of tough stair climbing, they reach a darkened portion of the stair that has become tainted and fouled by the evil of the abyss. At this point, she tells them that they have reached the entrance to its lair. Fingol, his apprentice Astrid and the lillend remain on the landing near the entrance to the tainted region, while the heroes gather their courage and descend down a steep stone stair. The strange ambient light of the stair case has vanished here, and Malik casts a light spell to produce a light source. At the bottom of the stair is a long but narrow landing. Several doors of varying size and style stand along the perimeter. There are no walls surrounding the landing, so the doors are supported only by their frames. A stone throne sized for a giant is opposite the bottom of the stair, and an ancient and dusty skeleton sits slumped on the throne. The heroes scan for signs of the demon spider. Nearby they notice that a pair of steep stairs running parallel to one another that leads down from the landing they have arrived at to another landing. Here signs of the fiend are evident in the form of a massive network of webbing that has been built between the flights of stairs. Floki’s devil sight allows him to see great distances in darkness, further than anyone else in the party. He spots the shadowy form of the demonic spider nested in its web. The horror is massive, much larger than even a horse (huge size). It notices the heroes and scuttles forward. As it comes into view, Malik unleashes a bolt of lightning that blasts it and damages its web. However, the fiend seems resistant to lightning and the attack isn’t overly harmful. Alistair has his enchanted crossbow ready, and he fires a barrage of bolts at it. Three of the four shots penetrate its chitin, and two of them embed themselves directly into its head, causing it terrible damage (2 crits.). It then teleports itself and appears among them. The combat immediately becomes far more dangerous as the creature incapacitates Alistair with a stream of webbing and then starts slashing at the heroes with its bladed fore legs and biting them with its deadly, poisonous mandibles. Yet as dangerous as their foe is, they have it outnumbered six to one. Jove, and Malik start blasting it with their spells, while Floki, Old Wan, and Sariel engage it in melee. The fiend continues to teleport about the landing, making it difficult to pin down, but since its offensive options are mainly its natural weapons, it never moves far from the heroes. It inflicts several nasty injuries on various party members, but before it can bring any of the adventurers down, Alistair is cut out of the webbing, and he puts it down with a final crossbow bolt. Its body then melts away into a pile of foul ooze as its essence is banished back to the abyss. The lillend is pleased with their efforts, and she promises to help them find the door that will take Fingol back to his homeworld. After a short rest to heal their wounds, they continue on their journey. More hours pass on the stair, and the heroes are growing weary. Finally they reach the top of a set of wide stairs and find themselves on a sprawling landing with many doors and many stairs branching out from it. On the landing is a large encampment, the first sign of civilization they have seen since arriving on the stair. The lillend calls it the Nowhere Inn. It appears to be a gathering of planar travellers, and here the adventures can see all manner of sentient races mingling with one another. Some are races that are familiar to them, but others are stranger creatures that they have never seen before. The camp is centred around a massive mead tent that appears to be run a half orc. Several smaller tents and merchant stalls have gathered around the central mead tent. An open common area in front of the mead tent has been made into a fighting circle, and the half orc, who claims to be a follower of a god called Kord, is overseeing some kind of unarmed fighting tournament. This catches Old Wan’s interest and he wanders over to observe the contest. He’s just in time to see a githerzai monk take down a warforged. However, he isn’t familiar with either of these races, but the skills of the githerzai monk impress him, and when the half orc asks for a new challenger, Old Wan steps into the ring. He notices that the monk is one of several githerzai watching the fight. The others are standing on the sidelines with their sifu, and Wan gets the sense that the one he is facing is a talented pupil, but not a true master in his discipline. The conflict is a tense one, and the githerzai holds his own well. However, Old Wan proves to be the more skilled warrior and in the end he defeats him. The heroes rest the in a Leomunds’ Tiny Hut, which Jove casts on the edge of the encampment. There is no real sense of day and night on the Infinite Staircase, but once they feel rested, they continue on their journey. The remainder of their trek on the stair is uneventful, and eventually they reach the landing that the Lilend claims holds the door to Fingol’s homeworld. As Fingol is about to step through the door, Astrid speaks up, and tells Fingol that she doesn’t wish to join him. He’s not pleased by this and tells her that as his apprentice, it is her duty to do as her master requests, but she argues that when she swore to serve him she hadn’t agreed to travel to an entire other world to do so. She thought she would be doing her apprenticeship in her home city of Thentia. The heroes are forced to intervene in the argument, and they managed to convince Fingol to release Astrid from his service. Thus, the wizard gives the heroes what money he still has and the key to his tower. He steps through the door on his own and presumably returns to his homeworld. The lilend escort the adventures to a door that will take them back to Faerun. However, the door they find proves not to be the door that leads back to Thentia. Instead it drops them in the basement of a tavern in the town of Arabel in Cormyr, not far from the lands of the McKormike family (Alistair’s kin). The heroes spend a couple of days in Arabel while Jove masters the teleportation circle spell. He then uses it to teleport them to Mantor’s library in Phlan, where there is another permanent teleportation circle that he knows of. From Phlan they make the lengthy overland journey along the northern coast of the Moonsea to Thentia.
Session #21 (Fingol Firefingers)
The heroes find themselves in the Giant’s Axe tavern in Thentia discussing their options when they are approached by an grizzled old halfling. He introduces himself to Alistair as Malik. He claims that he is from the village that Delilah was raised in (although Delilah was a half orc, she was abandoned as a baby on the doorstep of a halfling family in the halfling village of Babblebrook in Shadowdale. Thus, she was was raised by halflings). Malik goes onto share his story. He explains that Babblebrook was recently raided by slavers. The slavers were led by a savage warrior with a blade tinged in magical frost. Novo suspects the man might be Delgar the Blade, a dangerous mercenary they had a run in with back in Phlan many ten days earlier. Some halflings were killed defending the village, others managed to escape, but many were captured and taken north. Malik was among the halflings that escaped. Delilah had been in regular contact with her kin through a set of sending stones she had shared with her adopted halfling parents. Consequently, Malik knew that she had been in Melvaunt. He also knew that Delilah’s parents had lost contact with her and were concerned for her well being. He decided to travel north to seek out Delilah in hopes that she might help him battle the slavers and potentially free some of her kin. When Malik arrived in Melvaunt he met with Ublyn Blackulbuck, the halfling Harper. He learned that Delilah had been killed battling a demon cult. He also learned that Delilah’s surviving companions had travelled to Thentia. Malik decided to head for Thentia in hopes of recruiting Delilah’s friends to help him fight the slavers and free his kin. Alistair has spent much of the past 15 days drinking away his sorrows around the loss of his brother and three of his companions. He has also been making regular visits to the temple of Selune to check on his brother’s body, which he has been paying to have preserved with gentle repose spells until such a time that he can take it back to Cormry. He is somewhat drunk that evening at the Giant’s Axe, and upon hearing Malik’s plea, he is eager to take up arms on the halfling’s behalf. He staggers to his feet and heads for the door, ready to go that instant. The other heroes are less enthused about aiding a strange old halfling that they only just met. Jove is interested in making money to keep funding his arcane studies, and he sees no significant opportunities for wealth in this task, so he isn’t overly interested in helping the sorcerer. In fact, he even accuses him of being a coward for abandoning his kin and not staying around to try to rescue them. Floki has his own business in the area and isn’t in a hurry to suddenly head off to the Dalelands. In fact, he has a line on some potentially lucrative work for a local wizard that he had been in the midst of explaining to the heroes. Sariel is a follower of Hoar the god of vengeance. She is happy to aid the halfling in seeking revenge against the slavers and seems willing to go with him. Novo has just started putting down roots in Thentia. He’s started his dojo and made connections with the changeling enclave, so he isn’t eager to to pack up and trek hundreds of miles to the southwest. Malik pleas and pleas, trying to convince the heroes to help him. In the end, they convince Malik to join them in aiding the wizard, Fingol Firefingers, with the job he wants done. They explain to the halfling that Fingol Firefingers might be able to teleport them to the Dalelands after they finish the job for him, which would be much faster than travelling overland, and even if he can’t Jove may have access to the teleportation circle spell in the near future, which he could use to take them to his former master’s tower in Essembra, which would be quite a bit closer to Shadowdale than they currently are, and they could then help Malik deal with the slavers (presumably the Iron Ring). The following day the adventurers head north into the dangerous wilderness known as the Thar. Fingol Firefingers had demanded that they bring him proof that they are capable of handling themselves before he hires them, and to prove their skills they have decided to go on a giant hunt. A little west of Thentia is a river that leads north. Several small, fortified villages are built along the river. The river is broad, but shallow. In fact, the water level is exceptionally low even for the time of year (Elient- aka September). The land along the river is a little more fertile than rocky wastes that make up most of the Thar. Some stands of trees actually grow along the river, and the locals have found a few patches of ground where they can do some farming. They travel on foot with a single pack mule, leaving their horses in Thentia. As the day wears on, they pass a final village and enter into the true wilderness. It is around this time that they encounter a patrol of rothe riders out of Thentia riding back south towards the city. The riders intercept them, and the heroes explain that they are hunting for giants. The riders encourage them to keep following the river. They explain that it will eventually take them to Lake Thent. Lake Thent has several ogre settlements built along its northern coast. They also mention rumours of a vile hag lairing in a series of caves on the lake’s southern shore. The heroes thank the riders for the information and continue on their way. They make camp for the night in the wilderness. Jove protects them with Leomund’s Tiny Hut ritual. The next day, they continue their trek along the river. They pass by the ruins of several homesteads that failed to take root in these wild lands. On occasion, they see herds of wild rothe grazing in the distance. Late in the afternoon they find what they are looking for. A band of ogres, accompanied by a hill giant and a few worgs emerges from behind a small hillock. The heroes waste no time with parlay and attack. They focus their fire on the giant, bringing him down with spells and arrows before the massive brute can close in melee. The worgs are fast and race across the rocky ground to attack the lead heroes- Floki and Sariel. They engage Floki and Sariel, but the pair, with the aid of Novo make short work of the hulking wolves. Malik proves his capabilities by blasting several ogres with a magical lighting bolt and thunderous shatter spell. Jove finds his melf’s minute meteor spell effective, hurling several motes of flame into the ogres. The foul creatures hurl javelins as they try to close on the heroes, and they hit with a few of their attacks, causing some injuries. Unfortunately for the ogres, the magical might of heroes is devastating, and after the casters have wounded them with spells, the warriors in the party finish them off with ease. The heroes collect the ears for bounties and evidence to show to Fingol. They then make camp for the night. They briefly discuss the idea of continuing north in hopes of finding more giants to kill, but they soon decide that they have sufficient evidence to prove to Fingol they are up for the job he has in mind. The next day, they begin their journey back to Thentia. It takes them nearly two days, and they are weary when they finally make it to the city. They decide to head straight for Fingol’s tower. His tower is an imposing structure well suited to a wizard. It is hexagon shaped, 5 stories all and is made of dark granite. There are a few windows on the upper floors that look like they have metal shutters. There are no windows on the first two floors. It has a domed roof that is plated in copper. However, the roof can’t normally be seen because of an over-sized continual flame type enchantment that makes the entire top of the tower appear to radiate fire. Steps lead up to bronze double doors with a stone arch above them. The lintel of the arch features a key stone with an image of skull wreathed in flame, and the doors are hot to the touch. They feature heavy knockers. Fingol’s apprentice, Astrid, answers the door. She leads them through a foyer and into a sitting room on the ground floor. She provides them with wine, bread and cheese while they wait. Eventually, Fingol strides into the room. He’s tall, gaunt man with scarlet robes and wild orange hair and beard. The heroes show him the collection of ears, and although he isn’t overly impressed (perhaps because there is only a single set of giant ears), he decides that he will offer the job. As he explains the task he has in mind, Novo monitors him with his amulet of thoughts, scanning his surface thoughts for signs of deception. Fingol tells the heroes that he is not originally from Faerun. He claims to be from a city called Altdorf on a distant world on the material plane. He arrived in Faerun after a magically mishap on his home world shunted him to the astral plane. From the astral plane he gained access to a colour pool portal that returned him to the material plane. Unfortunately, he was not returned to his home world. Instead, he ended up in Faerun in the Moonsea region. Fingol has made a life for himself in Thentia, but he has always been searching for a means of returning home. Now he thinks, he has found a way. He does on to tell the heroes of the Infinite Staircase, a strange pocket dimension that provides access to doors that are in fact portals. The stair holds numerous, stairs, landings and portals, and such portals can take a traveller to almost any plane or world in the multiverse. It is place of infinite possibility. It is also a place of great potential danger, for nearly any manner of creature might be found on the stairs. Fingol goes onto explain that he believes he’s found a door to the Infinite Staircase in Thentia. He wants to hire the heroes to be his escort as he travels the stairs and to help him find the door that will take him to his homeworld. The heroes are intrigued by the job and agree to help. Fingol says he’s willing to pay them each 1000 gp, and he will give them his tower as part of the payment. Novo senses that Fingol is being mostly honest, except about the money. Novo doesn’t think that Fingol has a much money as he claims. The adventurers have a little chat, and Novo explains his concerns. Floki decides to get Fingol to show him the money before he takes the job. Fingol agrees and brings down a sack of coins. He estimates there are about 3000 gp in the sack, half the money that Fingol was promising. Fingol apologizes for the deception, but he informs them that the value of the tower will more than make up for the missing gold. The heroes agree this is the case, and accept the job offer. The next day, they meet Fingol at his tower. He and Astrid are ready to go. Fingol leads the heroes to the street known as Wizard’s alley. He takes them down a lonely narrow alley. Here, hidden behind some old barrels, he shows them a small wooden door. They move the barrels out of the way and open the door. A strange mist fills the doorway, and Fingol explains that he believes this door accesses the Infinite Staircase. One by one, the adventures pass through the door into the mist. When they emerge, they find themselves standing on a landing. A set of marble stairs leads upward into a misty grey “sky” with no visible means of support. Off in the distance it reaches another landing where more stairs branch off it, leading to other far off landings. It is by far, the strangest place any of them have ever seen before. There is no sign of a light source, yet the whole place is lit by a dim ambient light. The adventures begin climbing the stairs. As they go, Fingol teaches them a song from his homeland about an alliance between men and dwarves and their battles against the green skin races. He believes that singing the song will help them find the door to his homeworld faster. They climb the stairs for hours with no sign of another living soul. Finally, as they crest a landing, they see a being on the landing before them. It is a strange creature. It’s upper body is that of a beautiful elven woman, but her lower body is that of serpent with scintillating scales. A set of feathered angelic wings grow from her back and she carries a fine a harp. She addresses the heroes telepathically, introducing herself as a magical creature called a lillend. The lillend are custodians of the stairs and servants of Selune the Moon Maiden. She notices that Floki and Sariel both carry instruments, and she explains that she has a great appreciation for music and the arts. She asks if they would be willing to share a song with her. Floki is a gifted bard and more than happy to oblige. He plays a traditional northmen song and Sariel provides backup on her flute. The lillend is impressed with their performance, and offers to aid them finding Fingol’s way home- in exchange for a service. She tells them that a foul demon spider from the Abyss has taken up residence on a nearby portion of the staircase. She wants to see the fiend destroyed or banished, and for that she needs the aid of a capable band of adventurers. The heroes think it over for a couple of minutes and decide that earning the favour of the lillend and possibly Selune herself would be wise, so they agree. The session ends with the lillend leading the heroes towards the lair of the demon spider.
I'm not sure on this, but I think it would need to be an AP that doesn't have a major time factor attached to it. A lot of the APs seem to move at a fairly fast pace in terms of game time, and with the increased time needed for rests you'll want an AP where the passage of time is more leisurely. Consequently, I agree that an AP like S&S would be a good one.
I have the original AP in physical and pdf form. I'm considering running this AP. However, I'll likely be converting it to 5E D&D. If I were going to run it in Pathfinder, I'd definitely spring for the new version, but since I'd be running it in 5e, I'm wondering if people think it's worth it.
So my plan to bring the new characters together at the Pearl Necklace was a big flop/fail. Fortunately, the second attempt in the form of the kobold encounter was more successful. At any rate, new characters are now in place to replace those that died fighting the demons at the Pearl Necklace.
Session #20 (New beginnings)
After spending the night tending to their wounds and otherwise suffering from their ordeal at the Pearl Necklace, Jove, Alistair and Novo decide their next move. Novo has had enough of Melvaunt and is ready to leave immediately, but Jove really wants the gold they left behind in the vault of the Pearl Necklace. He insists they return and Novo grudgingly agrees. Thus, the trio returns to Pearl Necklace for what they hope will be a quick and final visit. Jove casts a potent invisibility spell that makes all three of them invisible, and Novo channels his shadow ki powers to cloak them in shadow and make them even more stealthy. Inside the Pearl Necklace, it is dark and quiet. The corpses of the guards they had previously killed are nowhere to be seen, but a trail of blood suggests that they were taken down to the basement. They move like whispers to the vault, and as they approach, they see that there are three figures gathered around the door. One is clearly a rogue type who is attempting to pick the door’s highly complex lock. The other two seem more like his muscle, one being a female clad in plate armour, and the other being a tall male northman. Jove and his crew wait silently, hoping that the three will get frustrated trying to pick the lock and be on their way. Novo decides to delve into the mind of the northman with his medallion of thoughts. He learns that the trio are fresh off the boat, having just arrived in the city that very morning aboard a merchant ship from Hillsfar. While aboard the ship, they had heard tales of the luxurious Pearl Necklace. When they found that the city was in a state of civil war, their rogue convinced them to go to the Pearl Necklace in hopes they might make an easy score of loot. This confirms for Novo that they aren’t demons or cultists in disguise, which is somewhat reassuring. However, the northman detects Novo’s mind probe, and he starts calling out for whoever is there to reveal themselves. The invisible wizard sighs and decides to converse. A long, awkward parlay ensues. Jove warns the would be thieves that the place is infested by a demon cult, and he tries to convince them to leave, but they seem equally intent on securing the contents of the vault. The wizard has seen enough violence in the past couple of days, and he really isn’t in the mood for a fight, so he offers to help them get into the vault in exchange for 60% of the wealth. The three thieves want a 50/50 cut, but Jove won’t have it. As the negotiations begin to break down, a third party arrives on the scene. A group of a dozen city guards enter the Pearl Necklace through the front doors. They see the northman and the armoured woman, but Jove, Alistair and Novo remain invisible, while the rogue is out of sight in the vault room where he is still busy trying to pick the lock. The guards ask them their business in the place, and the northman, who sounds like a chatty leprechaun, explains (lies) that he and his companions had encountered a demon in the streets and after wounding it they had chased it into the place. The deception is pretty far fetched, but the guard captain starts looking about nervously. Afterall, there have been reports of demons roaming the streets, and the Pearl Necklace has had some sinister rumours circulate about it, regarding its connections with demon cultists. Floki keeps the conversation going, trying to buy his rogue companion time to finish picking the lock. This pays off and the rogue finally beats the complex lock. He opens the door to the vault. He sees the magical darkness that fills the vault and steps inside. Suddenly, something bites him on the leg, two somethings in fact. He staggers out of the vault as poison courses through him. There is a set of puncture wounds that have pierced each of his boots and have sent burning poison streaking up his legs. He puts a hand out to grab the nearby table and nearly falls to the ground. Then he slams the door to the vault shut and staggers out of the room to join the Sariel and see what is going on with Floki and the guards. It seems that the guards aren’t looking for a fight, but are corrupt themselves and want to score some loot. They are in the midst of telling Floki and his crew to be on their way. Jove takes advantage of situation; he walks invisibly up to the vault, sticks the key that he previously found in vault door and opens it. He then whispers the pacification word and steps into the darkness. The iron cobra guardians lurking inside heed the magical command and leave him be, so he starts filling his pack with the sacks of gold coins the heroes had left behind. The rogue has keen ears and hears Jove’s whisper. He darts back into the room that accesses the vault and sees the door open. He hears the jingling sound of coin sacks. He again shuts the door, hoping that he can trap whoever is in there inside. Jove is resourceful. He swigs a potion of gaseous form he’d been saving and he and his pack full of gold turn to vapour. He flies out through the key hole and leaves the building. Meanwhile, Floki finally convinces the guards that he and his companions can help them break into the vault. He negotiates a 50/50 split with the guard captain. The rogue then goes to work on picking the lock for a second time. Eventually he succeeds and opens the door. Floki’s warlock pact allow him to see through magical darkness, and he can see the two iron cobras waiting in the vault. He also sees several sacks of coins (there’s still lots of silver in there). He says that since they took care of the lock the guard captain should go in and get the treasure. She is suspicious, so she sends in one of her lackeys. He immediately gets bitten by the iron cobras and falls dead inside the magical darkness. Instead of sending someone else in, Floki casts a cloud of daggers spell inside the vault. The iron cobras are programmed to remain in the vault and they make no effort to escape the spell. He keeps concentrating on the magic and eventually the swirling force daggers destroy them. With the guardians dealt with, the remainder of the treasure is easily looted. The guards take half, and Floki and his crew take the other half (3000 sp). Then both parties head on their way. Meanwhile, Jove reunites with his companions back at Ublyn’s swap shop. They load up their gold and purchase some travelling supplies. They put Alistair’s brother’s body in a rickshaw cart with a tarp covering it and head out of the city. Tully and Connor, the two changelings, join them and are charged with pulling the cart. Near the end of the day, they reach the village of Dunheath- the village they had previously helped rid of a wyvern problem. Here they rest for the night and claim their horses, which they had been stabling in the village. The following day, they set out for Thentia. They have six horses altogether, so they use two to pull a cart holding Dustin’s magically preserved body, which Connor drives, and the others ride the remaining horses. Floki and his two companions are also headed for Thentia, but they are travelling on foot. During the third day of travel, they are ambushed by a large band of kobolds. The kobolds attack from rocky slopes looming over either side of the trail. For the most part, the little buggers fire on the trio with slings, but a few spell casters are among them, and the most powerful of the lot drops a fireball on them, while his two apprentices bombard them with magic missile spells. Fortunately, Jove and is crew are also travelling the trail, and they recognize the three from the encounter in the Pearl Necklace a couple of days earlier. They arrive in time to save Floki and his companions from the ambush, and they even decide to help. Jove starts obliterating kobolds with minute meteors; Alistair picks them off with his crossbow, and Novo darts among them and takes them down with flurries of unarmed strikes and blows from his staff. The kobolds aren’t eager to die, and soon they scatter like cockroaches. Floki and his two allies have suffered signifiant injury, particularly from the kobold sorcerers. Novo generously helps heal them with his staff of healing. Floki thanks them and makes introductions. At no point do Jove and his friends bother to mention that they recognize them, but Sariel the paladin does think Jove’s voice is very familiar. The two groups agree to travel the remainder of the way to Thentia together. Early that evening they arrive. They stable their horses and find accommodations. That evening they all gather for a drink at the Giant’s Axe Tavern to celebrate their safe arrival in Thentia. It is also a chance for Jove, Alistair and Wan to finally properly toast their fallen companions. Alistair drinks more than his share, and seems to be the one that is suffering the most from the deaths of his friends. Over the course of the following days, the heroes attend to various items of personal business. Wan introduces himself to Oswald, the bar tender at the Giant’s Axe. Wan has heard that Oswald has connections to the changeling enclave in Thentia and that he’s the one to speak to about contacting the community. He, Connor and Tully all discreetly prove to Oswald that they are changelings and Oswald agrees to meet with them the next day and take them to the enclave. The following morning, Oswald makes good on his offer. The changeling enclave is essentially a cluster of shops and homes in the southwestern part of the city. Here Oswald introduces them to several of the changeling residents. Wan also explains to Oswald that he is looking to purchase real estate and start a fighting school where he can train changelings (and members of other races) how to fight in his special style. Oswald seems to think that the skills Wan has to offer would be a benefit to the community, and he shows him a series of interconnected cellars that join the buildings of the enclave together. Here he offers Wan a place to both stay and train students. Of course, only changelings would have access to the hidden dojo, but Wan is fine with that for the moment. Wan spends the next several days getting to know the people of the community, and recruiting pupils. He opens the hidden dojo and begins to take on more changeling students, which include both Connor and Tully. By the end of a ten day, he has 7 pupils training under him. Jove and some of the others pay a visit to a street called Wizard’s Alley, so named because it has a number of shops that all cater to wizards. Thentia is known as a city that is home to several capable mages, and this is where they come to buy their supplies. Here they learn of a few magic items available for sale, and here Jove purchases the supplies he needs to transcribe new spells into his spell book. He spends the next several days in his private inn chamber, adding new spells to his spell book. In addition to learning new spells, Jove also spends time analyzing the map that the heroes found in Melvaunt (dropped by fleeing wererats in an alley). He cracks the code used in the notes on that map, and he identifies it as a rough depiction of the ruined city of Hulburg. An “X” focuses on a place labeled the White Tower, which is attached to Hulburg castle. The notes say the following: “In the bottom of the White Tower is the entrance to the crypts of the Hulmaster family. Access to the crypts is said to be guarded by a powerful construct. Anyone wearing one of the Hulmaster family warding amulets can safely pass the guardian and open the magically sealed doors. Somewhere within the crypts is a secret door that accesses hidden chambers built by the wizard Londar Hulmaster. It is believed that these rooms hold many secrets including Londar’s arcane research and magical treasures. The most potent of these being his staff of power. Members of the Hulmaster family still reside in Thentia. It is possible one of the warding amulets is still in their possession.” Alistair takes time to bring his brother’s body to the temple of Selune. Here he pays to have it stored safely and to have gentle repose spells cast on it to preserve it until such a time that he can see it back to his homeland of Cormyr. During this time, he also pays to have a magical message sent to his homeland to inform his parents of his brother’s death. Sariel keeps mostly to herself during this time. She is a woman of few words with a strange accent that suggests she is from a distant land. The common tongue doesn’t seem to be her first language, and she isn’t the type to make friends quickly. Their rogue companion who helped them break into the vault has disappeared with his share of the silver, and seems to have no interest in following the path the Floki has planned. Floki is much more outgoing. He spends his days visiting the local inns and taverns where he earns room and board putting his skills as a skald to good use. However, he and Sariel have come to Thentia for a reason. Thentia is the closest settlement of note to the ruined city of Hulburg, and they have heard rumours that a white dragon has taken up residence in the ruins. Floki believes that this dragon is named Rhime and is the dragon responsible for the death of his sister. He and Sariel intend to slay this foul worm, but they know that if they are going to succeed they need to be prepared. To that end, Floki spends time hunting for rumours about Hulburg, hoping to gather any information that might help them. His hunt leads him to an adventurer named Tarl. Tarl has recently returned from Hulburg. He claims to have gone there in hopes of slaying the dragon. White dragons have a reputation for being fairly bestial and solitary creatures, and he and his companions were unprepared for the amount of minions the dragon had. Tarl explains that the dragon has established itself in the remains of Hulburg castle and that it has tribe of ice trolls serving it. He was the only one of the group to escape alive. Floki also meets a mage named Fingol Firefingers. He learns that Fingol is the most renowned mage in the city, and as it turns out he’s looking for a group of adventurers to do some bodyguard work for him. He doesn’t give a lot of details, but mentions needing capable and trustworthy individuals who can protect him on a potentially dangerous journey. A journey that he says won’t take very long, but it involves going very far away. Some negotiating ensues, and Floki convinces Fingol to pay his party 6000 gp. However, Fingol insists that they first demonstrate their commitment and competence. He tells them to bring him some evidence that they know their business- some giant hands or something comparable. The session end with the heroes gathering at the Giant’s Axe tavern to discuss how they wish to proceed. A lot of new adventure options stand before them.
So this was probably the toughest 5e fight I've run so far (including my last 5e campaign). It's been a while since I've had half the party die in a single combat. Fortunately, my players said that despite having their characters die they really enjoyed the session, and they were quick to start throwing out ideas for new PCs.
Session #19 (Showdown at the Pearl Necklace, Part #3)
The heroes have found their way into a series of crumbling catacombs beneath the basement of the Pearl Necklace. Here they have come across an secret chapel where a demon cult is in the midst of performing a profane ritual. Jove and Alistair stand at the bottom of a short flight of stairs, looking out on the scene. Before them is a pool of frothing liquid. Naked, drug addled cultists surround the pool where they engage in a perverse orgy. Four masked cultists beat on large drums, while vile succubus demons mingle with the cultists. Beyond the pool is an altar, and hovering just above the altar is a magical orb. The orb appears to channel psychic energy to the pool. A pair of babau demons gleefully monitor the orb. Jove and Alistair had just attacked the orb. Jove’s magic missile spell was reflected back at him, and Alistair missed with his crossbow (session #18). The babau demons look out towards the stairs and see the pair. One of the demons vanishes in a poof of black, oily smoke, reappearing in front of Alistair. The second babau stays near the orb. Ainara, who is at the top of the stairs, is quick to react. She darts down the stairs, stabs the lanky babau demon with Raven’s Warning and dances back up the stairs out of harm’s way. Alistair continues to fire at the orb with his crossbow. This time one of his bolts connects and seems to inflict damage on the orb, but it doesn’t destroy it. Delilah comes to her companions’ aid, striding into the chapel with her greataxe ready. She lays eyes on the scene for the first time and is a little overwhelmed. She raises her weapon to attack the demon, but she recalls that they tend to detonate in an acidic explosion when they are destroyed. She sees how wounded Jove is, so she orders him to get away from the thing before she strikes. Next Cade descends into the unholy room mounted on Toothless. The pair enter the combat, also attacking the babau demon. Toothless sinks its fangs into the demon’s leg and pulls it off its feet. Then Cade slashes it with his enchanted kukri and puts a hand crossbow bolt in its chest. The pain enrages the demon, but doesn’t destroy it. Just before Jove withdraws and Delilah can strike and finish the babau demon, the three succubus in the room focus their supernatural powers and try to charm Cade, Delilah and Alistair. Initially, Delilah and Alistair resist their charms. Cade is not so fortunate and he succumbs to one of the succubuses, and it establishes a telepathic link with him. Jove withdraws from combat and retreats up the short staircase. Wan then uses his shadow step powers to teleport into the chapel room. With Jove clear of the babau demon, Delilah cleaves the wounded fiend open with her axe. It detonates in a burst of acid, sending it back to the Abyss. The acid sprays hers, Cade and Alistair. The damage almost causes Cade to shake off the charm effect, almost. Instead, he shrieks at Alistair for looking at Delilah, shouting something to the effect of, “I saw you looking at her. She’s mine!” Much to the noble’s surprise, the savage little halfling suddenly starts attacking him. The four masked drummers continue to beat out a steady rhythm on their drums while the succubus queen chants and moans. All the while, the battle continues, and her minions expend great effort to destroy the adventurers. Jove conjures melf’s minute meteors and moves back down the stairs to get line of sight on the orb. He then launches a meteor at the vile sphere. Flames wash over the orb, but appear to have no affect on it. The babau demon that remained near the orb, casts a heat metal spell on Delilah’s armour, causing the half orc great pain. Ainara strikes at one of the succubuses, soon wounding it enough that it shifts into a ghostly form and vanishes from sight. Unfortunately, it’s not the one controlling Cade, and the halfling slashes at Alistair, wounding him. The remaining succubus that isn’t controlling Cade, then gains control of Alistair and orders him to start firing on his allies. Seeing this, the succubus controlling Cade has him turn his attention on Delilah, as Alistair is now their puppet, and there is no more need for Cade to be attacking him. Wan deftly makes his way through the drugged out cultists, crossing the chapel to reach the orb. Here attacks the babau demon guarding the orb. He lands some solid strikes on the demon, causing it to loose concentration on its heat metal spell, but it slashes back at him with its claws, leaving him with some nasty wounds. Wan tries to ignore the pain, and he smacks the orb with his staff, hoping to shatter it. He connects with a solid hit, and as he does so the orb unleashes a psychic blast that rends at his mind. He realizes he can’t continue to attack it without risking it destroying him. Thus, he retreats away from the orb and the demon. Unfortunately the demon pursues him and continues to slash at him with its claws. Wan weaves and dodges, avoiding some of the demon’s attacks, but others get through, leaving him bleeding profusely. Jove looks again at the frothing pool. He determines that the ritual appears to be on verge of reaching its climax. He sees a magical gate forming in the pool, a gate to the Abyss itself. He calls out to his companions, shouting that if they are going to stop the ritual it needs to happen in the next few seconds. Ainara darts back into the action. She notices that Wan’s attempt to destroy the orb has failed, so she tries a different tactic. She throws a dagger at the chanting succubus queen. The woman is too enthralled to notice her throw the weapon, and it embeds itself in her chest, just above a naked breast. The dagger is not enchanted, so it is not as deadly to the demoness as it could be, but it is well placed shot all the same. The demoness hisses at Ainara and glares at her, eyes burning with rage, then she turns her gaze back towards the pool and keeps on chanting. Delilah goes after one of the remaining succubus, hoping to destroy the fiend and free one his friend’s from magical control. The demonesses aren’t overly hearty, and with a great swing of her axe, she cuts the throat of one wide open, sending the b@#!~ back to the Abyss. Now, of the demons, only one succubus, one babau and the succubus queen remain. Destroying the succubus frees Alistair from her control, but Cade is still charmed and continues to attack Delilah. The little halfling has soon caused Delilah significant injury, which is really starting to piss her off. She starts smacking him, hoping to shake him out of the mind control. However, she is raging and has consumed a potion of fire giant strength, so a “smack” from Delilah really hurts. Cade’s face is soon a big purple bruise, and he has still failed to shake off the succubus’s enchantment. It’s starting to look as though the two friends are going to kill each other. With Alistair having regained his senses, he makes a final push to destroy the orb. He hastily loads a bolt and fires at it again. His bolt flies true, and he hits with a shot that shatters it! At this instant, the orb unleashes all the psychic energy trapped inside of it. The wave of psychic damage radiates outward. It washes over the cultists, killing them instantly. It also hammers, Ainara, Wan, and the surviving demons, but it just fails to reach the rest of the heroes. Ainara and the demons all survive, but Wan was already badly hurt, and the surge of psychic energy is enough cause the “old” monk to collapse to the ground unconscious and dying. He immediately transforms back to his true changeling form. The orb is destroyed. The pool immediately stops frothing, and the gate to the Abyss that was opening closes. The succubus queen shrieks in frustration. She turns her attention on Alistair and flies towards the nobleman. She attempts to charm him with her alluring gaze. Somehow, he manages to resist, and this enrages her even more. At about this time Delilah, with the aid of Toothless, finally manages to knock some sense into Cade, and he snaps out of the enchantment. It takes him a moment to figure out what is going on, but he soon realizes that the orb is destroyed. He also sees Novo unconscious on the ground. He rides over to the changeling and heals him with one of his final spells. Novo regains consciousness and gets to his feet. He looks at Cade, who is barely conscious himself and says, “We need to get out of here now!” He then uses his supernatural powers to shadow step out of the chapel and into the hall of the catacombs. Jove has already called for a retreat and started to flee. As soon as he saw the gate close, he realized it was time to go. With everyone so badly wounded, he is certain that trying to finish off the succubus queen and the remaining demons is a death sentence.
The furious succubus queen claws chunks out of Alistair. A horribly wounded Cade comes riding to his aid, but the babau demon is right behind him, and it pulls Cade off of Toothless. It tears into him, leaving him on the verge of death. Delilah, who is also near the pair, fends off the demon, grabs Cade off the ground and throws him over her shoulder. Alistair orders her to run, so she bounds up the stairs, carrying the halfling, with Toothless following along. By this time, Jove is already out of the catacombs and Novo isn’t far behind the wizard. The final succubus drains the last of Ainara’s life force and drops her withered husk of a body to the ground. She then flies across the chapel to join her queen. Alistair starts to follow Delilah, but he can’t move fast enough to escape the babau and the succubus queen. It looks like the noble is going to die as well. Suddenly, Cade regains consciousness (nat 20 on a death save, puts him at 1 hp). He sees Alistair is in trouble, and he can’t abide leaving one of his pack members behind. He demands Delilah put him down, and he rushes back with Toothless to help Alistair. Delilah can’t imagine leaving a halfling behind (she was raised by halflings), so she follows Cade (both only have 1 hp each). They engage the remaining demons and order Alistair to run. The noble, considers dying with them, but he doesn’t have any crossbow bolts left, and he sees no sense in their sacrifice being in vain. Thus he flees. Toothless, Cade and Delilah make a last stand against the demons, but their wounds are already so extensive that they only survive long enough to buy time for their companions to escape before being torn apart. Some time later Jove, Novo and Alistair rendezvous at Ublyn’s Swap Shop. The session ends with the survivors taking an extended rest in Ublyn’s attic.
Session #19 (Showdown at the Pearl Necklace, Part #3)
The heroes have found their way into a series of crumbling catacombs beneath the basement of the Pearl Necklace. Here they have come across an secret chapel where a demon cult is in the midst of performing a profane ritual. Jove and Alistair stand at the bottom of a short flight of stairs, looking out on the scene. Before them is a pool of frothing liquid. Naked, drug addled cultists surround the pool where they engage in a perverse orgy. Four masked cultists beat on large drums, while vile succubus demons mingle with the cultists. Beyond the pool is an altar, and hovering just above the altar is a magical orb. The orb appears to channel psychic energy to the pool. A pair of babau demons gleefully monitor the orb. Jove and Alistair had just attacked the orb. Jove’s magic missile spell was reflected back at him, and Alistair missed with his crossbow (session #18). The babau demons look out towards the stairs and see the pair. One of the demons vanishes in a poof of black, oily smoke, reappearing in front of Alistair. The second babau stays near the orb. Ainara, who is at the top of the stairs, is quick to react. She darts down the stairs, stabs the lanky babau demon with Raven’s Warning and dances back up the stairs out of harm’s way. Alistair continues to fire at the orb with his crossbow. This time one of his bolts connects and seems to inflict damage on the orb, but it doesn’t destroy it. Delilah comes to her companions’ aid, striding into the chapel with her greataxe ready. She lays eyes on the scene for the first time and is a little overwhelmed. She raises her weapon to attack the demon, but she recalls that they tend to detonate in an acidic explosion when they are destroyed. She sees how wounded Jove is, so she orders him to get away from the thing before she strikes. Next Cade descends into the unholy room mounted on Toothless. The pair enter the combat, also attacking the babau demon. Toothless sinks its fangs into the demon’s leg and pulls it off its feet. Then Cade slashes it with his enchanted kukri and puts a hand crossbow bolt in its chest. The pain enrages the demon, but doesn’t destroy it. Just before Jove withdraws and Delilah can strike and finish the babau demon, the three succubus in the room focus their supernatural powers and try to charm Cade, Delilah and Alistair. Initially, Delilah and Alistair resist their charms. Cade is not so fortunate and he succumbs to one of the succubuses, and it establishes a telepathic link with him. Jove withdraws from combat and retreats up the short staircase. Wan then uses his shadow step powers to teleport into the chapel room. With Jove clear of the babau demon, Delilah cleaves the wounded fiend open with her axe. It detonates in a burst of acid, sending it back to the Abyss. The acid sprays hers, Cade and Alistair. The damage almost causes Cade to shake off the charm effect, almost. Instead, he shrieks at Alistair for looking at Delilah, shouting something to the effect of, “I saw you looking at her. She’s mine!” Much to the noble’s surprise, the savage little halfling suddenly starts attacking him. The four masked drummers continue to beat out a steady rhythm on their drums while the succubus queen chants and moans. All the while, the battle continues, and her minions expend great effort to destroy the adventurers. Jove conjures melf’s minute meteors and moves back down the stairs to get line of sight on the orb. He then launches a meteor at the vile sphere. Flames wash over the orb, but appear to have no affect on it. The babau demon that remained near the orb, casts a heat metal spell on Delilah’s armour, causing the half orc great pain. Ainara strikes at one of the succubuses, soon wounding it enough that it shifts into a ghostly form and vanishes from sight. Unfortunately, it’s not the one controlling Cade, and the halfling slashes at Alistair, wounding him. The remaining succubus that isn’t controlling Cade, then gains control of Alistair and orders him to start firing on his allies. Seeing this, the succubus controlling Cade has him turn his attention on Delilah, as Alistair is now their puppet, and there is no more need for Cade to be attacking him. Wan deftly makes his way through the drugged out cultists, crossing the chapel to reach the orb. Here attacks the babau demon guarding the orb. He lands some solid strikes on the demon, causing it to loose concentration on its heat metal spell, but it slashes back at him with its claws, leaving him with some nasty wounds. Wan tries to ignore the pain, and he smacks the orb with his staff, hoping to shatter it. He connects with a solid hit, and as he does so the orb unleashes a psychic blast that rends at his mind. He realizes he can’t continue to attack it without risking it destroying him. Thus, he retreats away from the orb and the demon. Unfortunately the demon pursues him and continues to slash at him with its claws. Wan weaves and dodges, avoiding some of the demon’s attacks, but others get through, leaving him bleeding profusely. Jove looks again at the frothing pool. He determines that the ritual appears to be on verge of reaching its climax. He sees a magical gate forming in the pool, a gate to the Abyss itself. He calls out to his companions, shouting that if they are going to stop the ritual it needs to happen in the next few seconds. Ainara darts back into the action. She notices that Wan’s attempt to destroy the orb has failed, so she tries a different tactic. She throws a dagger at the chanting succubus queen. The woman is too enthralled to notice her throw the weapon, and it embeds itself in her chest, just above a naked breast. The dagger is not enchanted, so it is not as deadly to the demoness as it could be, but it is well placed shot all the same. The demoness hisses at Ainara and glares at her, eyes burning with rage, then she turns her gaze back towards the pool and keeps on chanting. Delilah goes after one of the remaining succubus, hoping to destroy the fiend and free one his friend’s from magical control. The demonesses aren’t overly hearty, and with a great swing of her axe, she cuts the throat of one wide open, sending the b+~~~ back to the Abyss. Now, of the demons, only one succubus, one babau and the succubus queen remain. Destroying the succubus frees Alistair from her control, but Cade is still charmed and continues to attack Delilah. The little halfling has soon caused Delilah significant injury, which is really starting to piss her off. She starts smacking him, hoping to shake him out of the mind control. However, she is raging and has consumed a potion of fire giant strength, so a “smack” from Delilah really hurts. Cade’s face is soon a big purple bruise, and he has still failed to shake off the succubus’s enchantment. It’s starting to look as though the two friends are going to kill each other. With Alistair having regained his senses, he makes a final push to destroy the orb. He hastily loads a bolt and fires at it again. His bolt flies true, and he hits with a shot that shatters it! At this instant, the orb unleashes all the psychic energy trapped inside of it. The wave of psychic damage radiates outward. It washes over the cultists, killing them instantly. It also hammers, Ainara, Wan, and the surviving demons, but it just fails to reach the rest of the heroes. Ainara and the demons all survive, but Wan was already badly hurt, and the surge of psychic energy is enough cause the “old” monk to collapse to the ground unconscious and dying. He immediately transforms back to his true changeling form. The orb is destroyed. The pool immediately stops frothing, and the gate to the Abyss that was opening closes. The succubus queen shrieks in frustration. She turns her attention on Alistair and flies towards the nobleman. She attempts to charm him with her alluring gaze. Somehow, he manages to resist, and this enrages her even more. At about this time Delilah, with the aid of Toothless, finally manages to knock some sense into Cade, and he snaps out of the enchantment. It takes him a moment to figure out what is going on, but he soon realizes that the orb is destroyed. He also sees Novo unconscious on the ground. He rides over to the changeling and heals him with one of his final spells. Novo regains consciousness and gets to his feet. He looks at Cade, who is barely conscious himself and says, “We need to get out of here now!” He then uses his supernatural powers to shadow step out of the chapel and into the hall of the catacombs. Jove has already called for a retreat and started to flee. As soon as he saw the gate close, he realized it was time to go. With everyone so badly wounded, he is certain that trying to finish off the succubus queen and the remaining demons is a death sentence.
The furious succubus queen claws chunks out of Alistair. A horribly wounded Cade comes riding to his aid, but the babau demon is right behind him, and it pulls Cade off of Toothless. It tears into him, leaving him on the verge of death. Delilah, who is also near the pair, fends off the demon, grabs Cade off the ground and throws him over her shoulder. Alistair orders her to run, so she bounds up the stairs, carrying the halfling, with Toothless following along. By this time, Jove is already out of the catacombs and Novo isn’t far behind the wizard. The final succubus drains the last of Ainara’s life force and drops her withered husk of a body to the ground. She then flies across the chapel to join her queen. Alistair starts to follow Delilah, but he can’t move fast enough to escape the babau and the succubus queen. It looks like the noble is going to die as well. Suddenly, Cade regains consciousness (nat 20 on a death save, puts him at 1 hp). He sees Alistair is in trouble, and he can’t abide leaving one of his pack members behind. He demands Delilah put him down, and he rushes back with Toothless to help Alistair. Delilah can’t imagine leaving a halfling behind (she was raised by halflings), so she follows Cade (both only have 1 hp each). They engage the remaining demons and order Alistair to run. The noble, considers dying with them, but he doesn’t have any crossbow bolts left, and he sees no sense in their sacrifice being in vain. Thus he flees. Toothless, Cade and Delilah make a last stand against the demons, but their wounds are already so extensive that they only survive long enough to buy time for their companions to escape before being torn apart. Some time later Jove, Novo and Alistair rendezvous at Ublyn’s Swap Shop. The session ends with the survivors taking an extended rest in Ublyn’s attic.
Session #19 (Showdown at the Pearl Necklace, Part #3)
The heroes have found their way into a series of crumbling catacombs beneath the basement of the Pearl Necklace. Here they have come across an secret chapel where a demon cult is in the midst of performing a profane ritual. Jove and Alistair stand at the bottom of a short flight of stairs, looking out on the scene. Before them is a pool of frothing liquid. Naked, drug addled cultists surround the pool where they engage in a perverse orgy. Four masked cultists beat on large drums, while vile succubus demons mingle with the cultists. Beyond the pool is an altar, and hovering just above the altar is a magical orb. The orb appears to channel psychic energy to the pool. A pair of babau demons gleefully monitor the orb. Jove and Alistair had just attacked the orb. Jove’s magic missile spell was reflected back at him, and Alistair missed with his crossbow (session #18). The babau demons look out towards the stairs and see the pair. One of the demons vanishes in a poof of black, oily smoke, reappearing in front of Alistair. The second babau stays near the orb. Ainara, who is at the top of the stairs, is quick to react. She darts down the stairs, stabs the lanky babau demon with Raven’s Warning and dances back up the stairs out of harm’s way. Alistair continues to fire at the orb with his crossbow. This time one of his bolts connects and seems to inflict damage on the orb, but it doesn’t destroy it. Delilah comes to her companions’ aid, striding into the chapel with her greataxe ready. She lays eyes on the scene for the first time and is a little overwhelmed. She raises her weapon to attack the demon, but she recalls that they tend to detonate in an acidic explosion when they are destroyed. She sees how wounded Jove is, so she orders him to get away from the thing before she strikes. Next Cade descends into the unholy room mounted on Toothless. The pair enter the combat, also attacking the babau demon. Toothless sinks its fangs into the demon’s leg and pulls it off its feet. Then Cade slashes it with his enchanted kukri and puts a hand crossbow bolt in its chest. The pain enrages the demon, but doesn’t destroy it. Just before Jove withdraws and Delilah can strike and finish the babau demon, the three succubus in the room focus their supernatural powers and try to charm Cade, Delilah and Alistair. Initially, Delilah and Alistair resist their charms. Cade is not so fortunate and he succumbs to one of the succubuses, and it establishes a telepathic link with him. Jove withdraws from combat and retreats up the short staircase. Wan then uses his shadow step powers to teleport into the chapel room. With Jove clear of the babau demon, Delilah cleaves the wounded fiend open with her axe. It detonates in a burst of acid, sending it back to the Abyss. The acid sprays hers, Cade and Alistair. The damage almost causes Cade to shake off the charm effect, almost. Instead, he shrieks at Alistair for looking at Delilah, shouting something to the effect of, “I saw you looking at her. She’s mine!” Much to the noble’s surprise, the savage little halfling suddenly starts attacking him. The four masked drummers continue to beat out a steady rhythm on their drums while the succubus queen chants and moans. All the while, the battle continues, and her minions expend great effort to destroy the adventurers. Jove conjures melf’s minute meteors and moves back down the stairs to get line of sight on the orb. He then launches a meteor at the vile sphere. Flames wash over the orb, but appear to have no affect on it. The babau demon that remained near the orb, casts a heat metal spell on Delilah’s armour, causing the half orc great pain. Ainara strikes at one of the succubuses, soon wounding it enough that it shifts into a ghostly form and vanishes from sight. Unfortunately, it’s not the one controlling Cade, and the halfling slashes at Alistair, wounding him. The remaining succubus that isn’t controlling Cade, then gains control of Alistair and orders him to start firing on his allies. Seeing this, the succubus controlling Cade has him turn his attention on Delilah, as Alistair is now their puppet, and there is no more need for Cade to be attacking him. Wan deftly makes his way through the drugged out cultists, crossing the chapel to reach the orb. Here attacks the babau demon guarding the orb. He lands some solid strikes on the demon, causing it to loose concentration on its heat metal spell, but it slashes back at him with its claws, leaving him with some nasty wounds. Wan tries to ignore the pain, and he smacks the orb with his staff, hoping to shatter it. He connects with a solid hit, and as he does so the orb unleashes a psychic blast that rends at his mind. He realizes he can’t continue to attack it without risking it destroying him. Thus, he retreats away from the orb and the demon. Unfortunately the demon pursues him and continues to slash at him with its claws. Wan weaves and dodges, avoiding some of the demon’s attacks, but others get through, leaving him bleeding profusely. Jove looks again at the frothing pool. He determines that the ritual appears to be on verge of reaching its climax. He sees a magical gate forming in the pool, a gate to the Abyss itself. He calls out to his companions, shouting that if they are going to stop the ritual it needs to happen in the next few seconds. Ainara darts back into the action. She notices that Wan’s attempt to destroy the orb has failed, so she tries a different tactic. She throws a dagger at the chanting succubus queen. The woman is too enthralled to notice her throw the weapon, and it embeds itself in her chest, just above a naked breast. The dagger is not enchanted, so it is not as deadly to the demoness as it could be, but it is well placed shot all the same. The demoness hisses at Ainara and glares at her, eyes burning with rage, then she turns her gaze back towards the pool and keeps on chanting. Delilah goes after one of the remaining succubus, hoping to destroy the fiend and free one his friend’s from magical control. The demonesses aren’t overly hearty, and with a great swing of her axe, she cuts the throat of one wide open, sending the b&$%+ back to the Abyss. Now, of the demons, only one succubus, one babau and the succubus queen remain. Destroying the succubus frees Alistair from her control, but Cade is still charmed and continues to attack Delilah. The little halfling has soon caused Delilah significant injury, which is really starting to piss her off. She starts smacking him, hoping to shake him out of the mind control. However, she is raging and has consumed a potion of fire giant strength, so a “smack” from Delilah really hurts. Cade’s face is soon a big purple bruise, and he has still failed to shake off the succubus’s enchantment. It’s starting to look as though the two friends are going to kill each other. With Alistair having regained his senses, he makes a final push to destroy the orb. He hastily loads a bolt and fires at it again. His bolt flies true, and he hits with a shot that shatters it! At this instant, the orb unleashes all the psychic energy trapped inside of it. The wave of psychic damage radiates outward. It washes over the cultists, killing them instantly. It also hammers, Ainara, Wan, and the surviving demons, but it just fails to reach the rest of the heroes. Ainara and the demons all survive, but Wan was already badly hurt, and the surge of psychic energy is enough cause the “old” monk to collapse to the ground unconscious and dying. He immediately transforms back to his true changeling form. The orb is destroyed. The pool immediately stops frothing, and the gate to the Abyss that was opening closes. The succubus queen shrieks in frustration. She turns her attention on Alistair and flies towards the nobleman. She attempts to charm him with her alluring gaze. Somehow, he manages to resist, and this enrages her even more. At about this time Delilah, with the aid of Toothless, finally manages to knock some sense into Cade, and he snaps out of the enchantment. It takes him a moment to figure out what is going on, but he soon realizes that the orb is destroyed. He also sees Novo unconscious on the ground. He rides over to the changeling and heals him with one of his final spells. Novo regains consciousness and gets to his feet. He looks at Cade, who is barely conscious himself and says, “We need to get out of here now!” He then uses his supernatural powers to shadow step out of the chapel and into the hall of the catacombs. Jove has already called for a retreat and started to flee. As soon as he saw the gate close, he realized it was time to go. With everyone so badly wounded, he is certain that trying to finish off the succubus queen and the remaining demons is a death sentence.
The furious succubus queen claws chunks out of Alistair. A horribly wounded Cade comes riding to his aid, but the babau demon is right behind him, and it pulls Cade off of Toothless. It tears into him, leaving him on the verge of death. Delilah, who is also near the pair, fends off the demon, grabs Cade off the ground and throws him over her shoulder. Alistair orders her to run, so she bounds up the stairs, carrying the halfling, with Toothless following along. By this time, Jove is already out of the catacombs and Novo isn’t far behind the wizard. The final succubus drains the last of Ainara’s life force and drops her withered husk of a body to the ground. She then flies across the chapel to join her queen. Alistair starts to follow Delilah, but he can’t move fast enough to escape the babau and the succubus queen. It looks like the noble is going to die as well. Suddenly, Cade regains consciousness (nat 20 on a death save, puts him at 1 hp). He sees Alistair is in trouble, and he can’t abide leaving one of his pack members behind. He demands Delilah put him down, and he rushes back with Toothless to help Alistair. Delilah can’t imagine leaving a halfling behind (she was raised by halflings), so she follows Cade (both only have 1 hp each). They engage the remaining demons and order Alistair to run. The noble, considers dying with them, but he doesn’t have any crossbow bolts left, and he sees no sense in their sacrifice being in vain. Thus he flees. Toothless, Cade and Delilah make a last stand against the demons, but their wounds are already so extensive that they only survive long enough to buy time for their companions to escape before being torn apart. Some time later Jove, Novo and Alistair rendezvous at Ublyn’s Swap Shop. The session ends with the survivors taking an extended rest in Ublyn’s attic.
Not investigating the upstairs shot the party in the foot a little. They missed out on the chance to search the Succubus matron's chambers and score a bunch of loot, potions, scrolls and a few other magic items including an iron flask, which is a very potent magic item that would have been very useful in the final battle that occurs next session.
Yeah it sucks when your opponent rolls a nat 1 and you still can't beat them (because you also rolled a nat 1).
Session #18 (Showdown at the Pearl Necklace, Part #2)
The heroes have decided to investigate the Pearl Necklace with the intention of destroying the demon cult they believe is operating out of the fest hall. They found evidence of demons when they were attacked by babau demons and a dangerous half demon. The fight left them low on spells and injured. Fortunately, they have just completed a short rest, and healed most of their wounds. Things are quiet in the Pearl Necklace. They set about doing a more thorough exploration of the main floor of the establishment. The kitchen has emptied out, and there is no sign of any of the staff they had seen. Near the kitchen, they find a stair case that leads to the second floor, but they decide to stay on the main floor and focus on finding a way down to the basement. They investigate the room that the cambion came out of and find that it is an office type room. Here they find a magical dark wood crossbow hidden under the desk that Alistair claims. On the desk, Jove finds a ring of keys and books of accounting records. He also discovers a hidden compartment in the drawer. The compartment holds a small velvet bag. Inside the bag is another larger key, and a small bone scroll tube about the size of his index finger. The scroll tube holds a tiny piece of parchment with a single word on it. The word is written in draconic and translates to “hold” in common. It doesn’t appear magical in any way. They soon find a door that looks like it might access the casino vault. The door is made of thick wood and bound in iron. It has a complex lock in the centre of it that consists of multiple interlocking gears. Ainara and Jove investigate the door, but it doesn’t appear trapped. Jove takes out the key he found and tries it in the lock. Just before he inserts the key he speaks the word he found on the pice of parchment. The key works, and the door unlocks with a loud click. They ease the door open. The room beyond is cloaked in magical darkness. Novo offers to investigate. He taps at the floor with his staff, and when nothing happens he steps inside. Suddenly something bites him on the leg. He staggers back out of the room. Two fang like puncture wounds drip blood and poison from his calf. The poison coursing through him has left him badly wounded (30+ damage), and he feels weak and dizzy. Luckily, the heroes recovered a container of Keoghtum’s magical ointment when they were exploring the slaver compound. He puts a dose of the ointment on the wound, which helps heal the injury and relieve the effects of the poison. Alistair fires a crossbow bolt into the room. He hears it hit the far wall, and there is a clinking sound of coins falling to the floor. Jove then tries the command word on the parchment a second time. He then steps into the darkness. This time nothing happens. He starts feeling around near the walls and finds shelves holding sacks of coins. It seems that Alistair’s crossbow bolt pierced one of them, and Jove feels coins under his feet. The wizard starts tossing the sacks out of the room. There are thousands of gold and silver coins and even some platinum (1000 sp, 600 gp and 15 pp each). The loot is too much to easily transport, so they put it back in the vault and lock the vault. The plan is to come back for it when they are leaving after they take down the cult. After a little more exploration, they discover a small room with a stair that leads down. Novo casts a pass without trace spell. Then Ainara creeps down the stairs to scout it out. The stair opens into a 15’ wide hall. The hall stretches for about 30’ where it ends at a set of double doors. Torches in brackets on the wall illuminate the hall with flickering light. Two more of the black skinned guards stand stoically on guard. The rest of the party stealths down the stairs with the aid of Novo’s magic. Ainara takes one of the guards by surprise with a thrown dagger that inflicts a grievous wound on the man. He pulls the blade out of his chest and tosses it to the ground. The two guards ready their tulwars and stride forward to cut down the thief. The rest of the heroes burst into action. Delilah decides it’s time to drink the potion of fire giant strength she’s been saving. Novo uses his shadow powers to teleport behind them, as Delilah jumps out into the hall with her great axe. She cuts down the injured guard, and dispatching the remaining guard is easy enough. Only minor injuries are sustained. They move up to the double doors. Novo uses his amulet of thought detection to scan beyond the doors. He discovers two sentient minds within range, and he decides to scan one of them. The surface thoughts indicate that the man is aware that there is trouble (from the heroes) beyond the doors. He seems to be waiting in ambush for someone to come through. Delving more deeply into his mind, Novo discovers that he is a seasoned warrior. He’s a violent man, but not necessarily evil. In fact, Novo senses he’s fallen under a magical compulsion. Delilah enters into another rage and with her fire giant strength still active, she kicks open the doors, shattering the bar holding them shut. The room beyond is a large one. It seems to be another gambling hall that has several tables in it, as well as a bar and a stage. Bronze braziers light the room. Several curtains hang in front of several openings in the walls that access additional areas. There is no sign of anyone in the room. Novo conjures a minor illusion of Delilah. He sends it running into the room and Delilah shouts a battle cry in an attempt to give the illusion sound. Suddenly several men burst out from behind the various curtains. There are four guards and three other men that look like professional gladiators. The gladiators wield shields and spears. A fight breaks out. Once again Delilah, Novo, Cade and Ainara find themselves in the main melee, while Jove and Alistair hang back. Jove conjures Melf’s minute meteors and Alistair tests out his new enchanted crossbow. The fighting is bloody and both sides take wounds. In particular, the gladiators are dangerous foes. Fortunately, Old Wan stuns one, briefly keeping him from attacking, allowing the monk’s allies to bring him down. Towards the end of the fight, one of the two remaining gladiators closes in on Jove. The wizard puts up a shield spell, which spares him from being impaled by a spear, but once the spell goes down the gladiator drives his weapon into Jove, causing him a nasty gut wound. His companions come to his aid, and cut the gladiator down before he can cause anymore harm to their precious wizard. The guards all seem to be under magical compulsion, and they fight to the death with no attempt to flee or surrender. The heroes survive, surrounded by the corpses of their dead foes, but they have plenty of wounds to show for the victory and are now nearly tapped out on healing and spells. They search the area and find a hall that leads to another room. This room has a fighting pit and several cages and torture racks. The curtains in the gambling hall all access alcoves covered with fine carpets, hookah pipes and silk pillows. In one of the alcoves, they find a rug that is slightly askew, revealing part of a wooden trap door in the floor. The heroes are pretty spent, but Delilah doesn’t want to rest, because if she does she will lose her fire giant strength. They press on, opening the trap door. It reveals a narrow stone staircase that leads down deeper beneath the Pearl Necklace. A foul stench wafts from below and Ainara hears the muffled sound of drums and chanting. The adventurers descend the stairs. They find themselves in a some sort of old catacomb. The stench is palpable, but its source is unclear. Alcoves off the hall of the catacomb hold stone sarcophagi, which the heroes leave alone. They follow the sound of the drumming and chanting. It leads to a ten foot wide stair that goes down further. Ainara and Old Wan scout down the stairs. The stairs are fairly short, and they open into a large room. The stench if even stronger here. A lot is going on in this chamber, and it is all terrifying. In the middle of the room is a twenty foot diameter, circular pool filled with an unknown bubbling, frothing liquid. Surrounding the pool are a couple of dozen naked cultists. Some of the cultists wear alabaster masks that hide their faces. Clothing is scattered around them, much of which appears to be quite expensive, suggesting that many of the individuals might be members of the aristocracy. The cultists are both men and women and they are a variety of ages. They are engaged in a massive orgy of sorts, and most of them seem to be drugged and not entirely aware of their surroundings. Four masked male cultists sit around the perimeter of the orgy beating on huge drums. In the midsts of the cultists are four naked females of incredible beauty. Bat wings protruding from the their backs suggest they might be some sort of foul demonesses. One of the four has big curving horns protruding from her forehead and a long sinuous tail. She is facing the pool and chanting; all the while, she erotically caresses her body with her hands. She seems oblivious to everything around her. The other three demon women mingle with the cultists. They don’t notice Ainara hiding in the shadows. She watches in horror as one of them kisses one of the cultists and the cultist’s body convulses and falls dead from the kiss. Beyond the pool is an altar. Hovering above the altar is a strange purple black orb. Bright blue energy surges from the orb to the pool. Two babau demons monitor the orb with fiendish glee. Ainara creeps back up the stairs and reports her findings. Jove decides that he needs to see it all first hand. He hopes he might be able to figure out what they are up to and how to stop it. He sneaks down the stairs, aided by Novo’s pass without trace spell. The wizard is highly knowledgeable of all matters arcane, but even he isn’t certain of exactly what is happening. He discerns the orb is obviously central to the ritual, and it seems to be channeling psychic energy into the pool. However, he doesn’t know what the end result is intended to be. He does sense the ritual is very close to reaching its climax, and he’s entirely certain that whatever it results will be horrific. Jove reports back to his allies, sharing his theories. He and Alistair decide to try to destroy to the orb. They creep back down the stairs. Alistair readies his enchanted crossbow and Jove prepares a magic missiles spell. They coordinate their attacks to fire at the same time. Alistair misses his mark, but the magic missiles steak unerringly to the orb. As they reach it, they are reflected back at Jove, and he’s forced to conjure a shield spell to save himself from being blasted by his own magic missiles. This event alerts the demons, and they spot Jove and Alistair lurking in the shadows at the bottom of the stairs. The session ends here. The heroes are tapped on resources and shit is about get real.
Session #17 (Showdown at the Pearl Necklace, Part #1)
Melvaunt is in chaos as the Nanther and Leiryaghon families battle it out with their private armies. The city guard is in disarray, and many guards have defected to join with the forces of the family they are most loyal to. Looters and criminals take advantage of the anarchy to settle scores and cause even more mayhem. The common folk with any sense have locked themselves in their homes and await order to be restored. The heroes have used the chaos to cover a raid on a compound belonging to the Iron Ring Slavers. The rescued slaves are taken back to Blackulbuck’s Swap Shop under the cover of darkness. Here, Ublyn Blackulbuck, a local Harper, and the halfling proprietor of the shop, has given them refuge in the basement. He plans to help them escape the city and get to Phlan where his ally, Kral the Bard, will aid them. The heroes take some time to help get them settled and alleviate some of their fears. As they go about this task, one of the former slaves starts discreetly whistling the secret recognition tune of the changelings. Novo/Old Wan recognizes the tune, and acknowledges it with another secret whistle. The pair then step into a private corner where they each reveal their true natures to one another. The changeling introduces himself as Tully and explains that he was suspicious of Old Wan’s true nature because he seemed uncannily spry and limber for such an old man. Tully goes on to tell Wan that he comes from a small family of nomadic “gypsy” changelings that wander the Moonsea Region. His parents were originally from a changeling enclave in Thentia. Old Wan had previously heard of the enclave, and he has been hoping to have a chance to visit it in the not too distant future. Tully claims that his family was captured on the road by Iron Ring slavers near the town of Teshwave. They were brought back to Zhentil Keep where they were separated. He has been careful to keep his true nature a secret, and he doesn’t believe that the Iron Ring is aware that he is actually a changeling. From Zhentil Keep, he was shipped to Melvaunt where he had expected to be sold on the slave market. Tully has no interest in going to Phlan with the other freed slaves. He wants to go to Thentia and join his kin there. He asks if Old Wan will help him, and Wan agrees to help him reach Thentia. Another matter to be dealt with is the death of Alistair’s brother, Dustin. Luckily, a priestess of Ilmater has recently started aiding Ublyn tend to the wounded civilians that he has been taking in. She knows a spell that will preserve Dustin’s body, and she is willing to cast it. Alistair accepts the offer, so Dustin’s body is preserved for the next several days. They leave it in the attic with a sheet over it. Alistair claims Dustin’s enchanted sword and mithril chain shirt, though he hates swords and hasn’t used one in years. The heroes rest the night in Ublyn’s attic. The following morning a youthful human messenger arrives with word that the Lieryaghon family gained the aid of the Bruil family and together they have breached Nanther Manor and defeated the Nanthers. The messenger isn’t sure what has become of the Nanther family members. Clearly many of the retainers have been slaughtered, but as for the Nanthers themselves- he doesn’t know their status. With the Nanthers defeated, it is likely that order will return to the city in the next few days. In addition, Old Wan receives a message from the sending stone that he recovered from the tiefling woman who appeared to be in charge of the Iron Ring Compound. The message arrives telepathically in his head and speaks the following words to him,
Novo replies to the message with a magical message of his own, which is channeled back to the unknown sender from his sending stone. He tells whoever is asking, “The compound was attacked, but the raid was repelled and all is well.” (I can’t recall the exact wording). Once this is done, the magic of the sending stone is useless until the next day. The heroes spend time discussing what to do next. They consider leaving Melvaunt, but they decide to stick around a little longer. Ublyn would like their help getting the slaves out of the city, and Jove encourages them to investigate the Pearl Necklace, as he is concerned by the threat posed by the demon cult rumoured to be operating from the place. Ainara and Delilah are both on board with destroying the cult. Old Wan wants to go to Thentia, Cade expresses an interest in travelling north to the town of Glister to seek out the yellow-eyed halfling named Pip Weebottom. He believes Pip may be the only living kin he has left, and he’d like to confirm whether this is the case. Alistair is far more distraught over his brother’s death than he expected to be, and he seems indifferent and okay to go along with whatever the group decides. Eventually, they decide that they will investigate the rumours of the demon cult. However, before they go to the Pearl Necklace, they first agree to escort Ublyn’s nephew Hob to the residence of a local fisherman named Faydrick, who helps Ublyn secretly move freed slaves out of the city in his fishing boat at night. Thus, the heroes set out towards the docks with Hob the halfling leading the way. They stick to the the dimly lit alleys to avoid gangs of looters, soldiers and mercenaries. As they get closer to the docks, the adventures round a bend and Ainara spots a trio of cloaked individuals huddled in the alley up ahead of them. She’s signals for her companions to halt, and she stays in the shadows. She sees that the individuals are not human. They have the heads of rats- wererats from the looks of things. They seem to be in the midst of dividing up some loot that they likely stole from some of the nearby shops or homes. The heroes move forward to approach the rat men, but as soon as the wererats see the heavily armed adventurers, they grab up the loot and run, vanishing around a corner. The party doesn’t bother chasing after them, but when they reach the spot where the wererats had been sorting their treasure, Jove notices a scroll case on the ground that presumably had been dropped in their haste to flee. He opens up the case and inside he finds a map. The map shows a sketch of an unknown city. There are markings, indicating a few locations of importance as well as text providing some information about the place. The text is in common, but it is coded in a cypher. Jove suspects he can crack the code given some time. For now he puts the map back in its case and tucks it in his satchel. They press on, and soon they reach the home of Ublyn’s contact Faydrick. He is suspicious of the heroes, but he knows Hob, and Hob vouches for them. Hob passes on the request to move a group of slaves, and Faydrick agrees to help, offering to move the slaves that night. However, his boat isn’t large enough to take all of them in one trip, so he will have to transport them in two shipments. With this task complete, they return to Ublyn’s shop and report the news. They then decide to pay a visit to the Pearl Necklace. The Pearl Necklace is a large establishment crafted from grey stone blocks. It features a blue slate tiled roof and several windows of multi-hued glass. Stairs lead up to a wide portico and sturdy, double wooden doors provide the main point of entry. It appears that someone has already attempted to break into the place because the front doors show signs that they have been hewed at with an axe. The heroes circle around the place and find a locked back door. Ainara gets out her thieves tools and sets to work. She handily picks the lock and eases the door open. Ainara, Cade and Novo are the stealthiest members of the party, so they sneak inside and start scouting. They find themselves in a short, hall that passes by a large kitchen. Sounds of activity emanate from the kitchen, and they notice a cook and a few serving girls working. They sneak past the kitchen and pass through a door that takes them behind a long bar. Peaking over the bar, they realize that they have entered the main gambling hall. A sprawling red carpeted room stretches out beyond them. Scanning the room, they see that it is nearly empty. There are no patrons, and it appears the place has shut down, probably due to all the troubles in the city. They do notice four guards sitting around one of the tables playing a dice game. The men are dark skinned southerners. They are muscular and shirtless. They wear only silk pantaloons and thick leather girdles that help protect their vital areas- not the style of dress normally seen in the region. Each man carries a large, curved tulwar. There are many doors branching off the gambling hall. The heroes have heard that the demon cult has an exclusive gambling hall in the basement, and finding access to the basement is their main goal. Ainara and Novo sneak across the gambling hall and duck behind a concierge desk area. The pair enter a door behind the desk and find a series of exotically furnished bed chambers. The chambers are currently all empty and hold little of interest. Meanwhile Jove, Delilah and Alistar sneak in and joins Cade behind the main bar. One of the serving girls in the kitchen hears them and comes over to investigate. She sees them crouching behind the bar. They try to be as charming as possible and convince her that they are merely looters looking for a score. She warns them that this place is very dangerous and that if they want to live to see another day they should get out now. She then heads back to kitchen. The heroes don’t get the sense that she is about to tell anyone of their presence. The adventurers reconvene, and they start a whispered conversation debating what to do next. Delilah thinks that they should approach the guards and try some sort of bluff, but no one else seems to think it would really work. Cade is impatient and quickly tires of the discussion. He mounts Toothless and the pair charge out from the bar to attack the guards. The men are shocked to see a halfling riding a wolf suddenly bearing down on them. They leap to their feet and draw weapons. The rest of the party follows close behind Cade. He, Novo and Delilah collide with the guards in melee. A fifth guard joins the action from elsewhere in the room. Then a well-dressed man with a great sword bursts out of a door to one of the adjoining rooms. He snarls and stalks confidently towards the melee. As he does, he transforms, turning from a man to a handsome bluish skinned, six-fingered cambion (half demon). He and Delilah face off, and he cleaves her with his massive, acid-dripping blade. Things get worse as three babau demons drop down from above. The “ceiling” is in fact a drop ceiling made of hanging tapestries, and the demons must have been hiding somewhere above them. One of the demons uses magic to heat up Delilah’s plate armour, causing it to burn her flesh. With demons aiding the guards, the fight gets tough for the heroes. Ainara darts in and out of the main fray stabbing guards with her enchanted rapier, Raven’s Warning. Novo in his guise as Old Wan also concentrates on taking down the guards, smacking them with his staff and sending them sprawling with kicks and head butts. Jove casts a melf’s minute meteor spell, and flaming spheres of fire begin orbiting his head. One by one he launches the orbs of flame out among his enemies, scorching the guards, and inflicting minor harm on the fire resistant demons. Alistair hangs back near Jove and sends deadly crossbow bolts into the melee. Two of the babau demons engage Alistair, while the third one moves to help the cambion against Delilah. As usual, Delilah finds herself in a deadly fight against the most powerful foe on the battlefield. The cambion deals horrific damage with his acid dripping blade, and, to make matters worse, Delilah’s armour continue to scald her. The half orc grits her teeth and tries to ignore the pain. She enters into a rage and cleaves away at the cambion with her enchanted axe. Pretty soon both of them are suffering from extensive injuries. The fight continues as the demons slash at them with their claws, and the surviving guards fight with tenacity using their tulwars. Old Wan has been monitoring the battle closely as he fights, and he sees that several of his companions are now badly wounded. He raises his staff of healing and uses it to cast a mass cure wounds spell, giving all his allies much needed health. This helps keeps Delilah up, and gives her chance to finally bring down the cambion with a tremendous blow from her axe that hews through the centre of his chest. The half-demon’s body immediately dissolves into a pool of acidic goo. With the cambion sent back to the Abyss, Wan, Ainara, and Delilah finish off the remaining couple of guards and one of the babau demons with relative ease. Only two babau demons remain, and they are focused on tearing apart Jove and Alistair. Alistair is still distraught over his brother’s death, and hasn’t been entirely focused. He has long had an aversion to blades, but he has sought fit to carry his dead brother’s magic longsword on his person. He knows his crossbow, which isn’t magical, isn’t overly effective against the demons, so he draws the enchanted sword. It’s the first time he’s used a sword since training with blades as a youth (and being beaten repeatedly with training swords by his older brothers). It is heavy and a little unwieldy for him, but his training comes back to him and he cuts a brutal slash across the demon, dropping it to the ground. The rest of the party hurries to the aid of the wizard and the noble, and they destroy the remaining two demons. The fight has taken a significant toll on the heroes. They are low on healing magic, and have spent many spells. Everyone has suffered injuries. The session ends with them, taking a short rest to tend their wounds.
That vine creature kicked my butt. I thought the +10 bonus from the grease spell would get me free of that grapple, but I couldn't roll worth shit to escape, so that was a bit rough.
Session #16 (Raid on the Iron Ring Slaver Compound in Melvaunt)
Blackulbuck’s Swap Shop in Melvaunt has become a makeshift hospital for civilians that have been wounded in the chaos that has befallen the city. Shelving units have been moved aside and the injured are laid out on the floor. Ublyn’s halfling kin dart about attending to the wounded. Ublyn seems pleased to see the heroes again. He quickly invites them into the back room to talk in private. Here they explain that they were out of the city dealing with the wyvern problem near Dunheath, but Ainara helped convince them to return to Melvaunt and help out. Ublyn inquires about Pinky, and they explain that Pinky decided to leave the party to head back south to bring word of the some of the goings on in the region to contacts in Shadowdale. There is some discussion about what to do next. The heroes are a little torn between raiding the Iron Ring slaver compound or visiting the Pearl Necklace and investigating rumours of the demon cult. Dustin McKormike (Alistair’s brother), gives them additional information about the Pearl Necklace. He tells them that he has been there a few times. However, only once did he get to go downstairs to the private, exclusive members area. In fact, that was the last time he visited the establishment, and he was in the company of Royce Lieryaghon when he went. Royce was a member and got him access to the lower lounge. Here, Dustin claims, can be found every vice and depravity you can imagine. He didn’t see any “demon worshipping” or “cultists,” but there were drugs, gambling, gorgeous and exotic prostitutes, pit fighting and other entertainment. On the night of his visit, he ended up in a high stakes card game with Royce and several other wealthy men, including Seth Nanther. Seth lost it all and bowed out. Seth wasn’t thrilled about losing, but Dustin knew him to be a fairly easy going fellow. Afterwards Seth went into one of the private chambers with one of the girls to work off his frustration. When he came out, he was far from calm. He marched over to Royce, who was still gambling, and challenged him to a duel. The pair ended up dueling in the club’s fight pit. Both men were talented swordsmen, but Seth was the winner. However, instead of letting Royce walk away, he ran his rapier through the noble’s throat, killing him. Then Seth and his entourage left. Royce was the eldest son of Lord Lieryaghon, and his death was the spark that initiated the civil war that is now ravaging the city. Sowing chaos and ruin is exactly the sort of thing a demon cult might get up to, so it seems like more than just a coincidence that this all happened at the Pearl Necklace. At any rate, the heroes decide they will deal with the slavers first. With the city in the state it is, they will be able to stage their raid without fear of the city guard coming the Iron Ring’s aid- after all slavery is perfectly legal in Melvaunt, so a raid against the Iron Ring would be a criminal act. It is unclear for how long the city will be in this condition, but Ublyn suspects that it won’t be too long before one of the families emerges victorious in the war and order is restored. He encourages them to make their move while things are still in turmoil. The heroes heed his words and set out for the compound. Dustin joins them, as he promised he would help. They find the slaver compound is protected by a fifteen foot high stone wall. A single, sturdy set of doors provides the only visible entrance to the place. Novo, in the form of Old Wan, decides to climb the east wall and get up on the roof of one of the buildings, which is built against the wall. Once on the roof, he sees that the place consists of four large single story, structures (including the one he is on). One of them is clearly a stable building and is made of wood, but the other three are made of stone and have peaked, slate shingled roofs. These structures abut the walls of the compound, leaving an open, cobblestone courtyard area in the middle. Old Wan spots a few guards down in the courtyard. The men wear chain hauberks and are armed with longswords and clubs. He tries to stealthily creep down the roof to get a better look at the nearest guard, thinking that he might use his racial powers to assume the guard’s identity. Unfortunately, one of the shingles comes loose and slides off the roof. The guard hears the noise and goes to investigate. He looks up and spots, Old Wan; the monk scampers off along the roof, escaping his line of sight. He hurries to where the roof of the building meets the northeast corner of the compound wall. There he hails his companions and lowers a rope to help get them up the wall onto the roof. As he gets to work, he hears the sounds of the guards shouting. Ainara comes up first; she dextrously scales up to the peak, peering over just in time to see a guard clamber up onto the roof. It seems the guards have found a ladder to put up. She ducks into the shadows and waits for him to crest the peak. As soon as he comes into view, she lunges with her shortsword and dagger, running the man through and killing him. Old Wan decides to take a bold move. He leaps down off the roof, landing in the courtyard near the gate. He darts past a couple of guards and reaches the doors. A heavy wooden bar holds them shut. The changeling is fast, but not strong. He suddenly starts to question his plan, as he isn’t sure that lifting the bar off the gate is possible. Guards draw their swords and close in on him. Adrenaline pumps through the monk, and he summons all his strength. He removes the bar and kicks the doors the open (natural 20 on his strength check- fortune favours the bold!). He shouts for his allies and they coming running to help. Before they can reach the open gates, Wan is swarmed by three guards and a pair of mastiffs. He defends himself with his magic staff (staff of healing), fending of several attacks, but a few sword slashes get through, causing him injury. Dustin, Delilah and Cade rush in to help the monk, giving him an opportunity to get out of the compound and join Jove and Alistair behind the meat shields. Delilah hates slavers, and she goes into a rage, hacking away at the first wave of guards with her great axe. Dustin proves a capable swordsmen and throws several flirtatious compliments Delilah’s way as he fights alongside her. Cade, who is mounted on Toothless, fights as ferociously as ever. More guards pour forth from various buildings and soon a bloody battle is raging at the gates. As usual, Alistair hangs back behind his allies firing his crossbow into the fray. All the while, he is taunted by his older brother for his reluctance to fight in melee like a “real man.” Ainara stays on the roof where she faces off against another guard that scales up the ladder. He doesn’t last long; as she dodges a sword swing, she feints at him and then drives her blade into his side. She follows with a quick kick that dislodges him from her sword and sends him off the edge of the roof to land on the hard cobblestone below. She then pulls out the crossbow slung across her back and aids her new companions by firing down at the guards. Jove conjures melf’s minute meteors. The balls of fire appear in the air just above him where they obediently orbit his head, awaiting to be directed to his enemies. One by one, he launches them into battle where they detonate among the guards. The Captain of the guards, proves to be a hardened warrior that is difficult to fell. He gives the heroes some trouble, and effectively maintains the morale of the slaver guards, even in the face of seeing their comrades cut down by the blood-thirsty adventurers. The heroes focus a lot of fire on him. He deflect several attacks with his shield, but eventually he sustains some serious injuries, and he withdraws into a nearby building. Not long into the fight, another threat emerges. A tiefling woman steps out of one of the buildings. She bears a strong resemblance to the tiefling warlock the heroes killed at the slaver compound in the wilderness weeks earlier, and the heroes suspect she might be his sister. She sees the heavy fighting at the gate and Ainara firing down from the roof. She decides to deal with the sniper. She vanishes in a poof of acrid smoke, reappearing on the roof, whereupon she blasts at Ainara with bolts of eldritch force. One of which connects, causing the genasi some injury. The tiefling has a dark skinned female companion who wields a rapier, and she runs across the courtyard to the ladder and deftly starts to scamper up to help the tiefling. Ainara has no interest in fighting the tiefling on her own, so she slings her crossbow and leaps off the roof to land in the courtyard. Here she joins her companions in battle by the gate. By this time, several slaver guards are dead. The ground is slick with blood and entrails. The party’s front line fighters are all injured, particularly Sir Dustin (who was still hurt prior to even arriving at the compound). Novo uses his staff of healing and casts a mass cure wounds spell, which grants himself and his companions some much needed healing. He then tumbles back into the thick of combat. The tiefling warlock leaps down from the roof and wades into the main melee. Her female bodyguard hops off the ladder and moves to aid her, but she’s intercepted by Old Wan, and the two face off against each other.
The bodies of the dead slavers are heaped in a pile, and the heroes shut and bar the gates to the compound. With the place secure they set about searching it. First they loot the corpses. The guards have little of interest, but on the dead tiefling they find a ring of protection and a magical rapier. They discover that one of the buildings has cells that are currently holding about a dozen slaves. They free the slaves and continue investigating the compound. Inside another building, they discover the tiefling’s private chambers. Here they find some coin, and a jar of Keoghtom’s Ointment. They also discover a trap door concealed under a rug that leads down to a secret store room. In the store room, they uncover two secret doors. One of the doors leads to a hidden chapel of Bane. The second opens into a tunnel that leads to a room with a permanent teleportation circle, which the heroes destroy. Another tunnel continues from this room and provides access to a secret trap door in the building that housed the slaves. The heroes are satisfied with their search of the compound, so they lead the slaves through the alleys, back to Blackulbuk’s Swap Shop. The session ends here.
I just downloaded the Yawning Portal for roll20.
Looking at the stat block for Acererak the infamous demilich from Tomb of Horrors in Tales of the Yawning Portal- he's rated CR 21. He has a AC 20 and 80 hp. He does has potent offensive abilities that can drop opponents to 0 hp if they fail a save or suck them into the soul gems that act as his teeth, but with only 80 this fight will come down to who wins initiative. Sure he has legendary actions, he could easily dropped before he gets to do much of anything. If anyone gets to playing through this adventure, I'd very much be interested in hearing how the adventure as a whole goes, and specifically how the final encounter with Acererak runs.
Session #15 (Wyvern Fight)
The heroes make it safely up the spiral stairs to the top of the shaft that cuts through the heart of the rock spire. Here the stairs end and open up onto the top of the great monolith. Delilah scans about. She sees the crumbling remains of several buildings that were probably once part of the strange monastery of Ilmater. She also notices that nearby there are three young wyverns. Two of them are busy squabbling and fighting. The third one seems to be picking at some bones. It notices the half orc and squawks loudly, alerting its siblings. The vicious wyverns attack, flying in at the heroes as they move up off the stairs onto the rocky top of the tor. Alistair is quick on the draw, and he immediately starts pounding them with heavy crossbow bolts. Jove conjures a Melf’s Minute Meteors spell and flings mots of deadly fire at the beasts. Pinky contributes by casting a bless spell on her companions. Delilah, Old Wan and Cade (mounted on Toothless) take on the wyverns in melee. It doesn’t take long for the heroes to kill one of the nasty lizards and injure the other two bad enough that they fly off. At about this time, the mommy and daddy wyvern arrive, swooping down to defend their young. The two adult wyverns attempt to snatch characters up in their talons, hoping to carry them out of the fight and drop them down the shaft. Unfortunately for the wyverns, the heroes slip their grasp. Even their deadly stingers rarely find their mark; they deflect off armour or are dodged. Only Cade takes a major sting wound, and the poison coursing through him does serious harm. The combined efforts of the heroes inflict devastating damage on the creatures. Delilah nearly cleaves one’s wing clear off. Old Wan pummels another with his staff, while Cade slashes it with his kukri and peppers it with hand crossbow bolts. Alistair's heavy bolts are as deadly as ever, and Pinky’s magic missile barrages, combined with Jove’s minute meteors, do even more damage. The fight doesn’t last long, maybe a minute at the most, and when the dust settles the two adult wyverns are dead. The adventurers have some wounds, but all things considered, they have faired well. They take a few moments to heal the worst of their injuries with magic, and then they clamber their way up a steep, rocky slope to the highest part of the tor. Here they find the wyverns’ nest, and here they find the two surviving young wyverns licking their wounds. Delilah is opposed to killing them, but Cade ignores her and charges in on Toothless. The halfling gets stung again, but the poison doesn’t stop him, and he and Toothless bring down one of the two wyverns. They are about to turn on the second, when Old Wan throws a pair of rocks he has enchanted with magic. The stones connect with its head and kill it. The wyverns are all dead. Their mission is complete. They set about looting through the nest and cutting the heads off the beasts to bring back as proof of their labours, so that they may collect the bounty offered in Melvaunt. Within the nest, they uncover a surprising amount of coin, as well as a few items of magical power. By far the most potent, is a staff of healing, which is claimed by Old Wan. In addition, Jove discovers a spell scroll that includes a “teleportation circle spell” and has a diagram of a teleportation circle on it. However, where the teleportation circle on the scroll is located is unknown. Finally, they find a potion of fire giant strength (given to Delilah) and a potion of gaseous form. It is late in the afternoon by the time the heroes make it back to the village of Dunheath where they had stabled their horses. The people of the village are those that have been most affected by the predations of the wyverns, and they are thrilled to see the adventurers return alive with Connor (Alistair’s changeling hireling/servant) dragging the wyvern heads (part of his strength training program). At the Goat’s Beard Inn, they find that there are now other concerns that overshadow their accomplishment. About thirty refugees from Melvaunt are in the common room, and the adventurers learn that the city has fallen into chaos and open warfare between the Nanther and Leiryaghon families. Other families have also joined in the fighting. Even the guard has split in factions, making it part of the problem instead of a force for restoring order. Gangs of looters roam the streets, taking advantage of the anarchy to break into homes and businesses. Of even greater concern, are darker rumours of demonic assassins prowling the streets, killing at will. The city’s common folk have been caught in the middle. Most have barricaded themselves in their homes, but some have fled the city to seek safety in the outlying villages. At the inn, the heroes are introduced to a strange woman (air genasi) named Airana. Airana is a member of the Harpers and has come looking for the heroes at the behest of Ublyn Blackulbuk (the halfling Harper that runs Blackulbuck’s Swap Shop in Melvaunt). She had been hoping to convince the heroes to take advantage of the disorder in Melvaunt to strike a blow against the Iron Ring slavers. The heroes had been planning on returning to the city to claim the bounty on the wyvern heads, but, given the news, it seems unlikely that getting paid is still a possibility. Still, they think that killing some more slavers sounds like fun (murder hobos), so they agree to return. They decide to continue to leave their horses stabled in Dunheath, and the local lord is more than happy to see them cared for, as thanks for the help that the heroes provided his village by killing the wyverns. That evening Pinky makes a surprising announcement. She has decided that it is time for her to report some of the information she has gathered regarding the various happenings in the Moonsea region to Harper contacts she has back in the Dalelands. The next day, she takes her leave of the heroes and begins the long journey south. At the same time the remainder of the party returns to Melvaunt. Dunheath is only about six miles outside the city, so the trip doesn’t take overly long. When they reach the gates, they find they are open and no one is guarding them. In fact, they find the corpses of three dead guards lying in pools of blood at the entrance. Cautiously, they enter the city. Evidence of the chaos is everywhere. The streets are mostly deserted, as anyone in their right mind has taken shelter. Here and there they see signs of looting and disorder. Carts are flipped over; shops have been broken into; the odd body is being picked over by rats. The city is in a dire state. Since the barracks of the guard, where the Lord of Keys has his office, is near the west gate, they head there first, hoping that perhaps there is still a chance that they can meet with him and get paid for their successful wyvern hunt. When they arrive at the walled compound, they find the gates are barred, and the guards on the walls have no plans to allow anyone in. They inform the heroes that the Lord of Keys is dead, and that they are probably best off leaving the city. Novo uses his new magical amulet to read the surface thoughts of the guard, and he confirms that he is speaking the truth about the demise of the Lord of Keys. The heroes don’t see any point in getting into a confrontation with the guards, so they decide to head elsewhere. Alistair decides that he wants to check in on his brother Sir Dustin and make sure he is okay. They make their next stop his townhouse. They decide to avoid the main streets and stick to the alleys. As they navigate the Melvaunt’s back alleys, they come across a trio of ruffians seemingly attempting to rape a young woman. This sets Delilah into a rage, and she charges the men with her axe. Cade is right behind her on Toothless and before anyone else in the party can do anything, the pair have cut the rapists down and saved the girl. Her home is nearby, so she hurries on her way, possibly terrified that the adventurers might suddenly decide to do something horrible to her. Eventually, they reach Dustin’s posh townhouse. They see that the door is partially open, and when they enter they find that it has been looted. There are signs of a struggle in the form of blood on the kitchen floor near the back door. Cade tracks the blood trail, and it leads them through several more alleys. The trail takes them to Dustin, and they find him unconscious and barely alive. Healing magic is applied, and the man is restored to a semblance of health. He explains that a group of what he thinks were Nanther soldiers jumped him as he was entering his home. He fought them off, but was badly wounded. He decided he wouldn’t be safe at home, so he started making his way through the alleys towards the Lieryaghon manor where he hoped to find help. Unfortunately, his injuries got the better of him and he passed out. Dustin decides to accompany them, as he isn’t sure what to do. They agree to make their way to Ublyn Blackulbuck’s Swap Shop in hopes that the halfling Harper will provide them with a place to rest and possibly information. The session ends with the heroes about to arrive at the Harper’s shop.
Session #14 (Cleansing the halls of Ilmater)
The heroes find themselves in the halls of an ancient monastery dedicated to Ilmater about to be swarmed by incorporeal undead (see end of session #13). The halls and chambers have been carved into the heart of a huge, natural rock monolith that stands in the Thar 12 miles to the north of Melvaunt. Jove and Anna watch as Cade rides past them on Toothless, fleeing from a dozen or so spectral undead. The undead are flying in fast, shrieking with hatred for the living, ready to drain the adventurers of their life force. Jove reacts equally fast, using a misty step spell to teleport himself away from the incoming undead. This leaves Anna vulnerable, and several of the spectres swarm her. They reach out with ghostly hands and grab at her. Their touch burns her very soul, and she sustains so much damage that she falls to the floor on the verge of death (2 hits +1 crit for over 40 damage). More spectres and two shadowy wraiths glide past her, closing in on Pinky and Delilah. Pinky and Delilah both sustain nasty necrotic wounds, though they manage to survive the initial attacks. Delilah begins cleaving at the undead with her enchanted axe. The magical weapon burns through them, causing their ghostly bodies shudder and explode into harmless mist. Alistair fires on them with his crossbow, and quickly learns that his non-magical bolts have no effect on the creatures. He resorts to using his valuable supply of silvered bolts, which seem to have some effect, though not as much as Delilah’s magical weapon. Still, he destroys a couple more spectres with his barrage of silver. Pinky stands her ground, and raises her holy symbol of Mystra. She channels her goddesses divine power and turns back the tide of death. Several of the spectres and one of the wraiths recoil from the power of Mystra and flee back into the the depths of the halls. Those that remain continue their assault on the living. They initially focus their wrath on Pinky, and the remaining spectres drain more of her life force. Like Anna, she falls unconscious and is near death. Delilah sees this and flies into a rage, slashing another spectre apart and damaging the wraith. The wraith then reaches out to Delilah. It puts its incorporeal hand through her breast plate and into her chest. It wraps around her very heart, freezing it and nearly killing her instantly (crit for 50+ damage). The half orc fighter falls, also on the verge of death (she forgot about her ability to stay at 1 hp, once per long rest). Thus, half the party is dying, but over half the spectres and one of the wraiths have been turned. Jove hurls magic missiles at the wraith, and Alistair targets it with his bolts. Through a miracle of the gods, Delilah’s heart starts beating again, and she even finds the strength to get back to her feet (rolls a 20 on her first death save). She takes a second wind and continues to cleave at the undead with her magic axe. The heroes manage to destroy the wraith and a few remaining spectres, clearing a path for Cade to get to Pinky and Anna. The halfling uses his primal magic to heal his companions, getting to them just in time to save their lives (Anna actually would have been dead if she hadn’t spent her point of inspiration to re-roll a death save). The heroes pull back out to the mouth of the tunnels. The entrance is at the top of a long flight of narrow stairs that is carved into the side of the great rock pillar. They know that the wyverns have built their nest on the top, and they fear being attacked while descending the stairs, so they leap off one by one. Jove casts featherfall spell on each of them as they jump, and the adventurers safely float to the ground. Here Jove uses his spell book to cast a Leomund’s Tiny Hut ritual, creating a dome of magical force to protect them. The dome is the same hue as the ground and it is opaque from the outside. His hope is that the wyverns won’t see it, but even if they do it should be invulnerable to their attacks. It is crowded inside the magical dome, but at least it is safe. They take an extended rest to recover from their harrowing battle with the undead. During the course of their rest, one of the wyverns takes notice of the dome. It flies down and lands on top of it, and pecks at it with its tail stinger. This, of course, has no effect, and it eventually gets bored of trying to figure out what the mysterious structure is and it flies away. The next day, the adventurers emerge, healed and ready for action. They decide to go back into the haunted halls to finish off the remaining wraith and spectres. This time they aren’t caught by surprise. Their second confrontation goes much better than the first. They face down the final wraith and several of its spectre minions. Pinky again divides the undead by turning a few of the spectres. The adventurers then focus on the wraith, Jove blasts at it with magic missiles, Alistair goes into melee beside Old Wan and Delilah with Dancing Flame (Pinky’s magic dagger). Cade fights with a combination of his magic kukri and silvered hand crossbow bolts. Together they overcome the wraith before it can cause any real harm. After that it doesn’t take them long to destroy the last few spectres, thus purging the halls of their corruption. The room that the undead were haunting features a massive stone statue of Ilmater sitting atop of a 15’ cube plinth. With the undead destroyed, it begins to return from freezing cold to a more normal temperature. The frozen bodies of several life drained soldiers from Melvaunt litter the floor, and may have been the source of many of the spectres. Also on the the floor is the remains of a long dead mage. On his corpse the heroes find some valuable magical treasure. They take a short rest to identify the treasures, and they discover they have come into possession of a cloak of displacement, which Cade claims, a medallion of thoughts, which Old Wan takes, and a circlet of blasting, which Jove takes. After taking time to attune to their new items, they continue their exploration. They discover a final chamber that is essentially a 30’ diameter, 200’ high cylindrical shaft that ascends upward through the heart of the rock monolith. It once probably had a roof above it, but that roof has long since fallen in, covering the floor with debris, and leaving the shaft open to the sky high above. A stair case clings to the interior wall of the shaft and spirals its way up. They follow the stairs upward, going single file. Delilah leads the way. About half way up she notices a section of stair that looks particularly unstable. She tries to jump across, but her plate mail holds her back and she lands directly on the unstable section. It gives way under her bulk. Luckily she catches onto the edge of the stairs, avoiding plummeting to her doom. She pulls herself up, and with the aid of some rope, the heroes bypass the collapsed portion of stair. They make it safely up to the top of the shaft. Here the stairs end and open up onto the top of the great monolith. Delilah scans about. She sees the crumbling remains of several buildings that were probably once part of the strange monastery of Ilmater. She also notices that nearby there are three young wyverns. Two of them are busy squabbling and play fighting. The third one seems to be picking at some bones. It notices her and squawks loudly, alerting its siblings. The session ends here, seemingly with battle about to ensure.
I like that they made giants huge, except that it does make minis a lot trickier. However since I pretty much game on roll20 these days that doesn't matter to me very much. Balors were large in 3e and huge in 4e. I have a huge balor mini and a large balor mini. I have large sized aboleth minis from 4e. I think in 3e they were huge. I have both a large and huge sized bulette mini. When I think about it, the increase in giant size is the only real change that I was really noticing, and I thought it was a good move. Previously ogre and hill giants basically seemed the same in terms of size (especially their minis), so it seemed weird that hill giants were generally so much tougher than ogres. Anyhow its not that hard to switch the sizes to how you want them, it's your game. Make the game work for you and your mini collection. It's easy to convert the HD from 10s to d12s or whatever you need to do.
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