SPOILER
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In Short what happened:
- Party did't managed to remove the scroll but they slew Bozal. Loris hat to free the Apostle himself with the aid of a wand.
- Final Combat started.
- The Apostle managed to free itself in the 3rd Round of Combat, before Auric and the Golems reached the party (only the Partys Wizards had attacked each other by ranged combat)
- As the worm appeared it startet to snatch the golems, which were directly around it.
- The Paladin mananged to stop Auric from attacking and explained (in short) what happend. Khellek and the Golems allied with the party while Raknian was commanding the Apostle to snatch Auric and to not bother with the golems or the others.
- Auric, not really realizing what was happening then charged the Apostle, together with the Partys Paladin of Pelor. The Party Barbarian and Monk did not intervene and tried to escape the area climbing its wall up to the ranks of the spectactors.
- Khellek and the party wizard were attacking the creature with spells.
- No one did stop Auric from attacking (so all had registered that some kind of "prophecy" will become fulfilled if Auric will be killed).
- It happend what had to happen: Auric got swallowed before he could land a single blow (he had not really a chance to escape the grapple). Still having some hitpoints, Auric trie(s) to get free but only has a masterwork dagger and he rolled really bad. after the rounds in "the belly of the beast" he just managed to to 9 hp of damage. he already has taken 10 pts. / CO-Damage but still hat approx. 40 hp left.
- The Ulgurstata took some serious damage. The Paladin with "Bless Weapon" and Smite Evil landed two Critical Hits. One of the two remaining Golems did another Crit and Khellek fired three Scorching Rays. Even the Barbarian had meanwhile charged into melee. The Creature suffered almost 190 hps and is almost dead.
- The Sorcerer failed to harm the creature, so decided (successfully) to capture Loris in a Otilukes Resilient Sphere.
This are going to get a litte confused:
Should I:
a) Be Kind. Let Auric survive and escape. Let the group slay the beast and capturing Loris. All will end fine...
b) Be not so kind. Let Auric die but slay the beast (what will happen then, is the prophecy still fulfilled...will Auric reappear as a spawn if the beast is slain before the transformations finished?)
c) What about Loris in the Sphere? I think this was quite a good idea...
The failure of the Rescue has great impact on the campaign i think. about 18000 wights running around in greyhawk will make the next few sessions turn off the adventure path, while the group has to "hack themselves" through the city. On the other hand, they let Auric charge into his doom, knowing (or at least fearing) what will happen.
Thanks a lot in advance! I' am eager to hear your thoughts about the situation.
Sorry for my bad english :( i am not a native speaker or somethin similar...
Your paladin did explain to Auric, that he should stay out of the fight, so why did he charge the monster, anyway? Why did you decide so? Did you roll diplomacy or were the paladin's arguments really bad? So maybe it is then your fault as a DM that Auric is in the monster's belly (in the end your PCs wanted to do the right thing), so rather be lenient (without the players knowing of course. The least thing you could do is: let the dice decide. You say the Ulgurstasta is nearly dead, maybe Auric survives and can cut himself out (40hp should keep him up for at least 1-2 rounds). Just my 2 cents.
PS: your English seems quite good to me, don't worry (although I am neither a native speaker).
My group managed almost the exact same scenario (though Rakinian did escape). I did fudge the numbers a little in the fight and they came within 5hp of disaster.
They should be heroes, and I would treat them as such by letting Auric survive, but barely. In my game he was so grateful for being saved from the belly of the beast he grandstanded for the party a bit, saying that they deserved the champions belt for what they did this day. It was all very cinematic and the group felt really really good.. which is good considering at the moment they are moments away from certain death inside Icosials tomb.
Your paladin did explain to Auric, that he should stay out of the fight, so why did he charge the monster, anyway? Why did you decide so? Did you roll diplomacy or were the paladin's arguments really bad? So maybe it is then your fault as a DM that Auric is in the monster's belly (in the end your PCs wanted to do the right thing)
...that's the problem:
- It seemed that they all realized that Auric will be the final target of the prophecy (after Raknian shouted it out).
- The Paladin (and no other PC either) did NOT tell Auric to stay out of the fight. I gave 'em another round time to do this as Auric first commanded the Golems to attack the Ulgurstata and then readied himself for the charge. The Paladin did some buffing on himself. The Barbarian and Monk tried "heroically" to escape from the Arena as fast as possible. Only the Monk managed to escape, the BRB failed his climb check and later joined the fight.
Even as Auric had joined the fight and Loris explicity commanded the worm to attack Auric (*hinthint*) no one did anything to remove Auric from the combat. So this was their fault not my failure. I just dont know why the didn't say anything to Auric...the situation was clear enough.
40 HP/s are enough to survive a while, while 1D8 CON-Damage per round will kill Auric faster.
Did anyone of u "let the Wights out"? It might be some "fun" to play this (like Guerilla Fighting in Greyhawk), however it will remove us for quite a while from the actual campaign and is of course a lot of work to do and plan for me as GM.
ciao, Mike
I don't recall - Is the the Ulgurstata an undead creature? Because, if so, the situation is more dire because undead can't be critted and the crit damage doesn't count.
At any rate, if you think the party can pull it out in a round or so, you can roll the dice for damage against Auric and fudge the con damage and hit point damage to minimum values. Let them pluck victory from the jaws of defeat by the skin of their teeth.
Personally, if my party screwed up, I would let them see the consequences of their actions (or lack thereof) with thousands of wights assaulting the city. Hero or Zero - half your party trying to escape from the arena when it was time to hero up means they are more zero than hero and they should see the fruits of their decisions. But I am a rat bastard DM...
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But I am a rat bastard DM...
Me too.
There are only so many opportunities to succeed a DM can give the PCs before the harsh realities have to come to bear. Two PCs running from the scene tells me that the players were conceding to the antagonists of the adventure. The paladin didn't attempt to stop Auric, instead buffing himself for the inevitable. Sounds like a concession as well. Auric is doomed. The PCs failed. Let the prologue to the Age of Worms begin here and now.
If your real concern is how much time it will take for the PCs to escape the chaos they've created, you need to take control of the situation. Go into narrative mode and tell the players a story of what their escape from the Free City was like. Set the mood and ambience of the situation and watch the realization of the events appear on the player's faces. Then you'll need to devise an "escape clause" that excludes the PCs from dwelling on the Undead Free City. Click on this sentence and see my contingency plan if the PCs fail. Throughout that thread people offer some good ideas to keep the campaign moving through the Adventure Path.
Let us know how it all goes after the next game. Best of luck!