Stats slightly nerfed down, a change to the energy drain attack going from 3.5 to Pathfinder, slightly different spell list and tactics.Oh, I only have the anniversary edition. The big mega book version. What were the changes made?A villain from the second book in the Rise of the Runelords AP, she had a reputation for being a party killer (until Paizo nerfed her in the anniversary edition).Is Hetuath the new Xanesha? :oWho dat
Also different class and PCs one level higher with more wealth.
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Also different class and PCs one level higher with more wealth.Stats slightly nerfed down, a change to the energy drain attack going from 3.5 to Pathfinder, slightly different spell list and tactics.Oh, I only have the anniversary edition. The big mega book version. What were the changes made?A villain from the second book in the Rise of the Runelords AP, she had a reputation for being a party killer (until Paizo nerfed her in the anniversary edition).Is Hetuath the new Xanesha? :oWho dat
So, not much. ;-P
I was enough to turn her from a TPK waiting to happen to something for the PCs to wipe the floor with.
Commander Herder, Human Gunslinger.
Death by medical drones in the Science Bay. I feel kinda bad because I put two medical drones instead of one in the Medical Lab since we have five players. One drone held the other players at bay, and the defender/fighter was neutralized because after drinking Numerian fluids, I gave him a phobia of constructs for 1d4 days. The other drone strapped Herder to one of the beds, and injected another syringe into his neck, "killing" him.
But that was not the end. For before the door to the medical bay closed (the entire party was outside in the hallway, fighting the other drone), the last thing the party saw of Herder was his body being scooped up by mechanical arms and putting it into a chute of some kind. When they opened the door again, his corpse was nowhere to be found...
Commander Herder
lol
Was Commander Herder going for Paragon or Renegade?
Paragon, even though I subtly hinted that his time as a member of the Technic League would have made even Renegade Shepard go "seriously man chill".
And yes, he deliberately chose that name.
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Well, we had our party's first death in Iron Gods tonight! Which means I get to write one of these again after the "successful" (read: ten-high pile of corpses) Jade Regent AP Obituary Thread! =D
(READ: I'm back, baby!)
Name: Sakit
Race: Android
Origin: ...Considering he's an android, I'm going to go with "Torch," because that's where our party first met him. Otherwise, Deneb? Maybe?
Adventure: Fires of Creation
Location: Black Hill Caves
What Done It: Offended the WRONG vegepygmy
A Note On Arretan Androids: Androids on Arret are not the "humans with subdermal circuit board tattoos replacing their bonus feat" that the Technology Guide wants us to believe; instead, they are humanoids made entirely out of chrome. Think the Persona from the Sega Genesis version of Shadowrun, and you're about there.
Anyway.
The Setup: Sakit was an android who claimed to have invented the arcanist class, and thus he saw himself and his companion android, Murphy (a cleric who multiclassed into impossible sorcerer for (no answer given)) as perfect companions to find out just what the hell happened to Torch's eerie purple column of ungodly halation. Joining them are:
*Tharja, a human brawler played by me. She had a decidedly crappy childhood growing up somewhere in Pellaos that was half orphanage and half Fight Club (minus the domestic terrorism.) I have to keep insisting that I'm playing a female character. Most definitely not dressed like her namesake from Fire Emblem: Awakening.
*Jag, son of Krong; a human barbarian played by my best friend who absolutely hates magic in every way shape and form. He had to be convinced that a +1 cloak of resistance was making him more resilient because it was a technological device and completely nonmagical.
*Mira, nicknamed Red; a human investigator played by Damien who fights with a rapier. For an investigator, she doesn't seem to do much investigating, but her skill with a rapier is... well, it's about as decent as a character with d8 Base Attack Bonus progression is gonna allow, but what can one do? Using Inspiration to boost attack rolls really sucks.
Machine (Lack of) Empathy: Besides the fact that Murphy isn't exactly the sharpest knife in the drawer, Sakit had a complete tendency to say anything on his mind. He was entirely emotionless until we came along, and that's not the best thing. Murphy taught Sakit that you can console any humanoid by patting their shoulder twice and saying "There there" completely unconvincingly, and so Sakit tried doing it on everybody whose lives we ruined.
Oh, I should mention that his favorite spell was Burning Hands, and his favorite (and only because he didn't live long enough to see third level) arcanist exploit was Potent Magic, preferring to use his arcane points to boost caster level.
Not So Alien Invasion: So as we explore the science deck and sickbay of the crashed alien ship (whose habitat dome gave me some serious Phantasy Star III and IV flashbacks) we come across vegepygmies! Seven of them! We give the usual "You're invading our land!! >=(" response with "Well, we come peacefully; maybe there's something we can do for you for safe passage and information." We get as far as "Wel-" before Sakit incinerates the entire lot of them with a CL 4 Burning Hands.
At this point, I ask Mike the DM, "Mike, just... how many of them did he catch in the blast?" Mike enthusiastically responds "Yes! =D"
Undeterred, we enter the hydroponics bay. And we meet the Papa Vegepygmy. He asks what happened, Sakit lies and says "I don't know, but I think they left," the vegepygmy goes to check.
Reap The Thunder~: So once the vegepygmy's done crying to whatever God they worship, he enters and accuses us of killing his children. Sakit (foolishly, wisely) says "Nope! They're nonmagical! I killed them with Burning Hands! =D"
The vegepygmy, Mike the DM tells us, is visibly holding back his extreme displeasure.
Sakit reaches out to him, pats him on the shoulder twice, and says "There there" fairly unconvincingly.
The vegepygmy caves in Sakit's head with a critical hit on his +1 warhammer, dropping him to -11 hit points.
Mira starts to search Sakit for a healing potion.
Jag tries to stop the fight.
Murphy casts Cure Light Wounds, recovering a meager 4 HP for Sakit.
The vegepygmy screams "I'm gonna make babies with YOUR CORPSE!!!" and coup de graces Sakit. (I don't do anything because I rolled poorly on my initiative roll.)
The party's survivors decide Sakit totally had his brutal death coming, and we make peace with the vegepygmy. (To the point where we traded Sakit's masterwork quarterstaff for that +1 warhammer.)
What Comes Next: Sakit's player was offered the chance to play Salvum Trett; after considering it, he politely declined and said he was gonna make a skald. Which is cool, because that'll pair nicely with Jag's barbarian rage and Tharja's Pummeling Style.
An Afterword: Jag decided the party should mourn Sakit's death; none of us seemed pretty eager to (and considering the bulk of the party is Chaotic Neutral, that should say how deserved it was.) Instead, Murphy decided, "Nah, we should! (pats Mira's shoulder twice) There there. (pats Jag's shoulder twice) There there. (starts to pat Tharja's shoulder; she parries it, so Murph pats her other shoulder twice) There there."
After the confrontation at Aldronard's Grave, the party Forgemaster of Torag shamed Captain Andalen into accompanying the party into Scrapwall, setting the stage for the first death of the Adventure Path.
Who: Captain Andalen
What: +1 human bane arrow fired by Birdfood, finished by an orc.
Where: Hawk Palace
The party snuck up to the palace and initiated combat against the three orcs on patrol. After a fashionable wait, Birdfood walked out of his throne room and took aim at the nearest human (Captain Andalen), one arrow dropped Andalen to negative, and the orc standing next to him took an attack of opportunity to perform a coup de grace.
Now the party is trying to find someone to cast resurrection. Because they don't want to spend their scroll on him...
Name: Lamina
Race: Lashunta (I wasn't entirely sold on it, but he wanted to be some sort of incognito alien man)
Classes/levels: Magus 2 (Card Caster)
Adventure: Fires of Creation
Location: Skulk Village
Catalyst: Numerian Fluids & Russet Mold
The Gory Details: Lamina had made the silly choice of becoming addicted to Numerian Fluids - a series of bad rolls and constitution damage had his system compromised enough that the weak strain of russet mold from Vrilledt managed to kill him - the ensuing surprise battle with the Lamina-vegepygmies almost killed another party member before they put them down.
Name: Korgoth
Race: Dwarf
Class/Levels: Barbarian 3
Adventure: Fires of Creation
Location: The Reactor
Catalyst: Lesser Confusion
Gory Details: I have 7 players, most of whom powergame - hard. So I added 2 Fanatics and a pair of ratfolk to the reactor core to give Meyanda a little backup. Those fanatics managed to plug up the barbarian in the doorway so Meyanda could do her spellcasting; she promptly casts Lesser Confusion on the barbarian, who fails his Will save (much to the horror of the entire party, as they had just dumped ALL of their STR and damage buffs onto him.)
I rolled a confusion check to see how he was going to react to things around him until his next turn rolled around - I informed the party that he was becoming visibly hostile towards them. The cleric decides to move on up to try and heal the person adjacent to the barbarian, prompting an AoO - Korgoth promptly drops the cleric into unconsciousness with one swing. The rest of the party scatters.
When the next round of combat began (confusion would end on Meyanda's round, this time about) Korgoth began to attack himself. He rolled maximum damage (well over 20 damage) and dropped himself; prompting his rage to wear off, which placed him dangerously close to dying. An orc promptly coup-de-graced him.
I give my players Hero Points, hoping they'll use them to do neat things - but most of them just hoard them to prevent dying, so Korgoth burned 2 to be unconscious but stable. The rest of the party, however, continued to fight in the area immediately surrounding his body - he died a second time a few rounds later to Meyanda's Sound Burst.
The party got him reincarnated soon after; I use this reincarnation chart, and he managed to roll Centaur. Since that would make things problematic in future dungeons (getting a horse down into a tunnel is a bit of an issue) he opted for me making a custom race for him. So that'll be neat. Right?
Name: Daren
Race: Human
Classes/levels: Gunslinger 2 (Pistolero)
Adventure: Fires of Creation
Location: Foundry Tavern
Catalyst: Sanvil Trett
The Gory Details: The party started to suspect Sanvil of hiding something and they showed him so, so Sanvil broke into the tavern under the cover of the night in order to steal some of the party's technological gear but the party managed to detect while he was about to leave the tavern. Daren didn't have his pistol with him because he has given it to father Joram Kyte for "upgrade" (make it +1) and unfortunately it was Daren who awoke so he tries to stop him from leaving and engages him in melee, in the first round Sanvil manages to cut Daren, while failing to cast mirror image, in the second round Sanvil manages to deliver a corrosive touch via his enhanced longsword and in one sweep blow manages to fell the aspiring gunslinger from Alkenstar.
Fortunately for our hero the party defeated Sanvil and called father Joram Kyte in order to use the resurrection scroll on their fallen comrade.
Adventure: Lords of Rust
Location: Aldronard's Grave
Catalyst: Gas Grenades
*Gory Details*: The party initially decided to try and send in only their android and the Ghoran paladin - both of whom are immune to disease - to assist the Smilers in curing the "dweaded pwague" they were infected with (having failed to pick up on the deceit.) The android managed to avoid the gate (opting to hop backwards OUT of the keep) but the Ghoran ended up pinned underneath it.
Cue three rounds of rocks being dropped/bullets being shot down at the party from the tops of the walls/towers as the party tries to pull the gate off of the paladin - once most of the party had moved up to try and help, Hatchet-hand dropped down one of his gas grenades - none of the party opted to move away, and all except for the Paladin and one other ended up nauseated.
Luckily for the paladin, he finally managed to pry the gate off of himself - and promptly urged everyone to charge into the keep to deal with the Smilers. Unluckily for everyone, the paladin became nauseated one round after - leaving only one player capable of taking standard actions for the next 5 rounds (the party had already been wounded - and had yet to bother to heal up from - a random encounter with a small gang of orcs and then a wyvern); that single player was quickly mobbed by Smilers and dropped.
What followed after that is best described as a "rogue-based meatgrinder". I'm still not entirely sure why they decided to charge in when everyone was nauseated.
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Name: Mira (Red)
Race: Human
Origin: Pellaos, our world's 'MURICA with guns.
Adventure: Lords of Rust
Location: The Excavator beneath the city of Scrapyard
What Done It: Hellion
Before we begin this one, there are a few things I need to point out about our group's run in Iron Gods:
- Mike the DM moved Kullgra (the half orc with the chainsaw) from her encounter in the Excavator to joining Hellgarth the troll in Scrapyard's arena, so we went into this fight one +1 chainsaw richer.
- We went to the arena after saving Whitefist because the Lords of Rust captured Mira (her player missed the game) and threatened to publicly execute her.
- What followed was probably one of the goriest battles I've ever seen in Pathfinder, where Jagg, son of Krung the Now-Properly-Spelled, and Tharja got thoroughly soaked in each others' (and Kullgra's) blood.
How Gory Was My Battle: Jagg took three hits from that damn chainsaw, I took one. With his barbarian-raging masterwork falchion and my Amulet of Mighty Fists-enhanced punching power, we took Kullgra down in a few rounds. Mike and I were describing all the gore that went all over the place. Meanwhile, Murph and Singer (our skald, a replacement for Sakit who died a couple posts up) were busy taking care of Hellgarth.
Defining "Taking Care Of": Singer got shot with an autograpple, then dragged ten feet as Hellgarth rode her mechanical chariot close enough to take a swing at Murph. Murph cast Forbid Action on the horses, bringing them to a sudden stop as he said "I forbid you to move!" Hellgarth found out how inertia works when she botched her Reflex save to stay in the chariot and got hurled ten feet over the horses' backs.
Singer: (realizing he's still attached to the autograpple that Hellgarth's still holding) Oh, $#+&!!! (gets dragged ten feet on his face)
Meanwhile, Tharja and Jagg are finishing off Kullgra. Kullgra dies, and one of the best lines we ever had at the table comes out.
Jagg's Player: Okay, standard action! I move over Kullgra's corpse! Move action, I pick up her chainsaw! Swift action! (mimics pulling the starter cord on a chainsaw) RENG-ENG-ENG-ENG-ENG! BzzzzZzzZZZZZzzzZZZ!!
Now that said, on to what got Mira put into this situation.
Rampancy Ain't Just a Halo Thing: As we return to the arena, Hellion starts taunting us and threatening us. I should note that Mike asked me to describe how he changed Hellion's appearance, as the book's picture of him sucked. So imagine something like the Master Control Program from TRON with Wheatley's personality and Max Headroom's com-computer gen-gener-nerated sw-sw-swagger, and you have our group's Hellion.
We fight our way down through the Excavator, fun things happen. Tharja gets impaled by a kobold with Spirited Charge (changed from the book, Mike thought the build was suboptimal, thanks a lot), Jagg drinks spent nuclear waste and the only ill effect he has is vomiting, we smash a bunch of expensive holographic emitters and monitors displaying Hellion's ugly mug. The usual murderhoboistry.
She'll Ram Her Ovipositor Down Your Throat and Lay Her Eggs In Your Chest. But She's Not An Alien: At the bottom, we meet the xill that's trapped in there. She offers us safe passage to Hellion's chamber if we'll remove the curse binding her down there. We debate this, I shout the bolded sentences from the start of this paragraph to the group. Murph seriously considers it, Jagg realizes that we're here to kill Hellion anyway, so he shouts out "Hey! Hellion! We're here to get you!"
Hellion marches out, the fight begins with the xill unable to do anything. (Murph also tried running away.) The battle didn't quite go as well as we planned.
I went down in a spray of blood while Singer was trying to cast Bull's Strength on Jagg. He had to abort that to pull my butt out of the sling.
Murphy failed a Will save, got confused for eight rounds.
Singer (eventually) went down as well, after taunting something with Divine Initiative to "BRING IIIIT." (Spoiler: He did. Twice.)
A critical hit from one of Hellion's claws winds up crushing Mira, bringing her down as her spleen ruptures, causing her to start internally bleeding. Meanwhile, Hellion and Jagg are in an endurance match to see whether Jagg can chainsaw through Hellion before Hellion can beat our barbarian to death.
For Want of a Nail: All Murphy needs to do is roll one successfully low roll on a confusion check to act naturally so he can channel and save Mira's life. Nope. All he kept getting were "hurt nearest creature" and "contemplate navel."
Mira proceeded to crap out on us.
Then, fortuitous events happen. One of Hellion's claws gets stuck in something thanks to a fumble, and he can't pull it out. (The curse of low rolls striketh us all...) Jagg proceeds to help him out-- first by chainsawing through the stuck claw arm, then the rest of Hellion's body, finishing off the artificial intelligence menace.
Now, the fun thing about Hellion: Once he drops to 0 or fewer HP, he autodestructs, and (amazingly) Tharja, Singer, and Jagg manage to survive the ensuing plasma-fueled explosion. (Hell, Jagg's the only one with more than 0 HP after it's all rolled out!) Murph starts channeling like all hell, we realize as we regain consciousness that Mira's not moving.
After talking/shaming Murphy out of using a scroll of Animate Dead to raise Mira as a skele-creature or whatever he was planning, we decide to pick her body up and make the long march back to town to get Raise Dead cast on her.
Jagg: (while Murph's Speak With Dead spell is still active on Mira) Red, you realize this is coming out of your share of the treasure!
Mira's Corpse: Yeah... =(
The Unusual Part: We realize that we were rewarded with a scroll of Resurrection back in Book One! So we all get our filthy filthy silverdiscs, Mira comes back from the dead (almost) good as new, and we're on to Book Three!
So, yeah. That's the first one of these I've ever written where the obituary's subject came back from the dead.
Don't look at me like that, I suggested that we should do what Shin Megami Tensei IV did and bribe Charon the ferryman into letting us come back to life.
...Oh, and not surprisingly, Hellion was a load-bearing boss, the xill realized that we weren't going to be setting her free at all.
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@Shisumo: He did-- he even specifically told us that he moved Kullgra to the arena just so Jagg could fight her and get into the Excavator with her chainsaw, and he told us (right before the session, no less) that he was replacing some of the mounted kobold's feats.
To be fair, we should have known something was up when he asked "Hey, Cory, Spirited Charge does triple damage if you're using a lance, right? What are the prereqs for it?"
And yes, he and the entire group know about these. Hell, I even got chided for forgetting that after Mira died, Jagg's player shouted at him "God damn it, Damien! I just finished painting her mini!!"
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@Snorb, sounds like you read the AP in advance yet are still a player.Actually, it sounds like his GM talked about some of the changes he made to the AP as written after the fact, likely because he knew Snorb was going to post here.
Speaking of players finding out about changes the DM has made to an AP before they've played it... :-P
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Speaking of players finding out about changes the DM has made to an AP before they've played it... :-P@Snorb, sounds like you read the AP in advance yet are still a player.Actually, it sounds like his GM talked about some of the changes he made to the AP as written after the fact, likely because he knew Snorb was going to post here.
I smell a history.
Anyways, yea, personally I can't play a campaign that I've read over before as it ruins the experience for myself as well as the others no matter now much separation of IC and OC.
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Every session my players continue to survive. They are about to finish the science section of the Habitat Module. Collector Robot almost got one and i was so excited. A few sessions ago the Paladin nearly died to Hetuath! Then i remembered just as we were doing damage smite gave him enough AC to dodge most of it.
Its so frustrating to have your players survive, any chance the Vegepygmy Chieftan will wipe them out?
Is it so much to ask for maybe just a handful of party deaths to make me feel better?
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That's almost disturbing, but don't worry, the collector robot(s) will do the trick! They can fly, they have high hardness, they can shoot at range, they are deadly...
So far only the Brawler can consistently get through Hardness 10, I'm really not sure WHY the hardness is that high at such a low level when hardness piercing options are scarce.
one arrow dropped Andalen to negative, and the orc standing next to him took an attack of opportunity to perform a coup de grace.
Now the party is trying to find someone to cast resurrection. Because they don't want to spend their scroll on him...
As I understand it, you cannot use an AOO to coup-de-grace.
Coup-de-Grace is a full-round action.|
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Speaking of players finding out about changes the DM has made to an AP before they've played it... :-P@Snorb, sounds like you read the AP in advance yet are still a player.Actually, it sounds like his GM talked about some of the changes he made to the AP as written after the fact, likely because he knew Snorb was going to post here.I smell a history.
Anyways, yea, personally I can't play a campaign that I've read over before as it ruins the experience for myself as well as the others no matter now much separation of IC and OC.
Full disclosure: he's playing in my IG game. He's been foaming at the mouth to play this AP literally from the first moment it was announced, so I'm sure it's been torture to have the story so close to him but left unread. Just giving him some good-natured ribbing. :)
Death #1 : During the fight with Kullgra, he tried to parry her chainsaw attack, but he got beaten on the roll by 2, so he suffered a huge amount of damage before getting killed by a super critical hit!
Result : Sliced in half
That is so terrifying, brutal, and kind of hilarious.
Morgan Obreth, human Ghost Wolf Fighter. Killed by Critical magus spellstrike.
After leading Sanvil Trett around in ruins below Black Hill (so he could ID technology for them) and making him stay back while they cleared the way, the party returned to him low on resources, wounded and winded. They also had lots of technology for him to have a look at. After doing so, they lead him past the now cleared desert and told him to wait outside of the malfunctioning bio-lock. They run through, he closes the door, they get zapped. The door opens and he blasts corrosive touch through his sword and scores a critical rolling high for damage and killing Morgan.
The look of just utter betrayal on the player's face... Sadly, they are now extremely touchy about NPCs following them around so the next bunch are gonna have to really pull some weight.
As an aside, they captured Sanvil but after restoring and speaking to Khonnir, they realized that it would be best if Sanvil never went before a magistrate. During their attempt to "due process him to death"(by summoning multiple venomous swarms into the storage room of the Garrison where the guard locked him up), Sanvil made his escape (spell recall within 24 hours of their fight, 2d6 pool acid strike on door lock, 2d6 pool fire strike on npc guard then vanish). This was foiled by the party happening to kick in the stable door as he was trying to go out of it, killing Sanvil in the ensuing melee. So they now they are hailed as paragons of justice for foiling a murderers escape.
PCs...
Name: Hugo Baine
Race: Human
Classes/levels: Bloodrager 5
Adventure: Lords of Rust
Location: Scrapwall Arena
Catalyst: Helskarg the troll
The Gory Details: The party accumulated enough scrap-worth, the lords of rust invited for "audition" in the arena.
Long story sort, the bloodrager tried moved close enough in order to hit the troll and unfortunately he succeeded. The next round when the troll's turn came, she dropped the autograpnel and went ahead to full attack the poor bloodrager. So the end came for the bloodrager which got shown his own guts before dying.
Welp, I'm back to playtesting and I'm onto Lords of Rust! So far its a blast playing my players' characters a few levels higher than they are right now (They're in the Engineering Deck, currently tangling with the Gearsman. The Goblin Monk/Brawler has it pinned.)
And of course, in my usual gory fashion, we have a death! Almost a TPK! And its from a surprise horror that, to be honest, upon first read of the book did not seem like a deadly encounter. Boy, I was wrong.
Name: Dahlia
Race: Human
Classes/levels: Sylvan Wildblooded Seeker Sorcerer 5
Adventure: Lords of Rust
Location: The Haunted Wreck
Catalyst: Poltergiests (Yep you heard me right)
The Gory Details: I'd like to first point out and say, the sorceress is the group's 'healer', utilizing heavy doses of Infernal Healing from a small stockpile of wands they bought. While a Nanite Hypogun is used for emergency-in combat healing, the IH Wands are used for slow out of combat healing. This being said, everyone in the group is carrying around at least 7 doses of Soothe to help their healing supplies.
So, after the players braved the insanity of the Smilers (nearly losing Groog to Marrow's dual lightning bolts), nearly lost Groog and Thisstle (The Goblin) to the Mutant Manticore (Apparently grappling a radioactive manticore was a bad idea) and finally heading to check out the haunted wreck, the group find themselves assaulted with an unknown assailant who throws bits of metal and gear at them. Luckily for the group, their Gunslinger has a racial spell-like ability to See Invisibility (Plumekith Aasimar), and he is able to spot the things attacking them, helping lead the group to their locations allowing them to swing wildly into what appears to be empty space with their magical weapons.
However, when the first poltergeist decides to telekinetically pick up a Concussion Grenade an throw it, is when things got hairy. The first grenade nearly knocks out the Goblin and deals half of the Sorceress's life in one hit. A few rounds later (as the group fumbles about trying to hit these damn things), another grenade goes off, knocking out the Sorceress this time. The goblin, thankfully, helps her wake up with a dose of Soothe (She doesn't get addicted). One more round later, the third and final concussion grenade goes off and, due to her rather fragile state, sitting at 2 hp, takes a full frontal blast, failing her save and taking 16 damage, dropping her well below her measily 10 Con threshold, killing her.
Her pet Tiger, Snow, immediately flees the wreck, never to be seen again, while the group finishes off the last Poltergiest and collects the loot thrown at them, collect her body, and run like hell back to Dinvaya. Unluckily for them, she is unable to help bring their dead friend back. Thus a replacement is needed..
I think I'll make an actual support character this time...
And well, my Lords of Rust playtest has had significantly less deaths than my Fires of Creation playtest, but then again, not only do the players have more resources, but I'm using a leveled-up version of my main group.
That being said.. we have a TPK at Hellion!
Name: Dahlia, Groog, Thisstle, Hoots
Race: Human, Orc, Goblin, Plumekith Aasimar
Classes/levels: Sylvan Wildblooded Seeker Sorcerer 6, Barbarian 6, Maneuver Master Monk 1/Strangler Brawler 5, Pistolero Gunslinger 6
Adventure: Lords of Rust
Location: Hellion's Domain
Catalyst: Hellion
So, foolishly enough, the group delved into Hellion's Domain and did not retreat to heal up at any point, fearing Hellion would bring in reinforcements somehow if they did. At the cost of Snow (The Sorceress's Tiger) thanks to Tatterface and the group nearly losing their lives to the Dark Stalker & co, the group decided one last push before they retreated.
Thankfully for them, Dahlia had saved the two Scrolls of Animate Dead she found on Marrow a ways back "For a rainy day". Well, with her trusty pet dead, now was the time. Using both of them, she animated Draigs, Kulgara, and the six Orcs into zombies. Because Groog wanted to continue using his +1 Keen Falchion instead of the +1 Chainsaw for the time being, Dahlia let Zombie-Kulgara use the Chainsaw and her Breastplate, while the various orcs and Draigs each used their previous gear.
By the time they got to Hellion, they had lost all six of the orcs (Zagmaander and the Wards), and Draigs had been injured a bit. This didn't phase them, however, and they felt their chances of finishing off whatever was in here was good.
Boy were they wrong.
Hellion, being a bad ass he is, is an absolute MONSTER at range. Every initiative-turn he gets (and he gets two per round!) Hellion fired off 3 plasma shots, each time dealing 2d6+9 per shot, at Touch AC, with fair accuracy. Draigs did not last long against the focused fire of Hellion - Groog and Co. focused their own efforts on quickly taking out the junkyard robots, which didn't last too long, despite getting a few hits in.
Thisstle ran in and foolishly tried to grapple Hellion (She's a grapple build), dodging his claw but failing to beat his CMD with her grapple. Kulgara-Zombie charged Hellion and was smashed to pieces by a claw. Next time Hellion's turn came up, he finished off Groog with a pair of laser shots and nearly did the same to dahlia - and, with but a single claw, struck Thisstle, grabbed her, and crushed her to death. Next round (Which happend right after Hoots brought out his EMP Pistol and hit Hellion with a single shot), he killed Dahlia with a pair of plasma shots and heavily wounded Hoots, considering he got to go twice before Hoots could go again. Hoots, with his final act of anger, fired 5 shots at Hellion (They were under the effects of Haste, he was using Rapid Shit) and Semi-automatic fire) dealing - a measily 25 damage over 4 hits. It APPEARS that Hellion lacks the vulnerability to Electricity damage most robots have - and thus his hardness severily weakened Hoots' attacks.
Next round, Hoots could do nothing as Hellion incinerated him with plasma fire.
And thus ends the playtest.. Hellion is a bad ass and don't let anyone tell you otherwise. If only the players had plugged in that Inhibitor Facet..
Name: Daren
Race: Human
Classes/levels: Gunslinger 6 (Pistolero)
Adventure: Lords of Rust
Location: Hellion's Domain
Catalyst: Kulgara and her chainsaw
The Gory Details: The party get to the second level (S floor) and was just outside of the excavator door, they start fighting the dark creepers and the android slayer gets blinded for 5 rounds from the first dark creeper who died and the party makes the dreaded mistake of waiting for the blinding effect to pass, that gave Hellion time to summon all of the forces in the S4 room, when the party decided to move on and open the door to S4 they see a raging Kulgara coming after them, the party decides to withdraw on the balcony outside of the excavator and use it as a choke point against Kulgara, the thing is that they didn't time their withdraw correct and Kulgara manages to get a full attack (one of them critted) on the poor gunslinger and killed him in one blow.
The party eventually defeated Kulgara and the rest of her forces.
The chainsaw is truly a formidable weapon in the hands of a barbarian.
I ended up giving the gunslinger's player a break and allowing him to survive by expending Serenrae's blessing that they gained when they helped Aldronard's ghost move on, mostly i did it because i just had introduced a new character into the game (the android slayer who replaced the bloodrager who died in the arena) and i really didn't want to go through the same thing again so soon.
I really feel that i should have included a scroll of raise dead (or maybe ressurection) somewhere in the loot.
cardioooo ampppp
I really feel that i should have included a scroll of raise dead (or maybe ressurection) somewhere in the loot.
Yes, i should have included a cardio amp.
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Name: Murphy
Race: Android
Origin: Depending on who you ask, either Torch, where he lived for who knows how long since Divinity "ran into a cumulogranite cloud" on Arret ten thousand years ago, or Deneb, where the ship and his kind were built.
Adventure: Valley of the Brain Collectors
Location: Some godforsaken cave in the Valley of the Brain Collectors.
What Done It: Cthulhu Mythos rejects, DM wanted to up the challenge, player had some spare PCs laying around and wanted to play another character anyway, put two and two together.
This Damn Valley: So after we kick a ghost's ass so hard he re-dies back in the Choking Tower, we ride on to the valley where this adventure takes place. Much fun was had summoning a fire elemental to walk across every square inch of a fungal cavern to incinerate all the fungus within, we deal with a deranged druid and his radioactive plants, we deal with some reverse-racist androids, and we kill a lot of robots. The reverse-racist androids tell us to stay away from the Swamp of Sidequestiness because we will die horribly, and for once in our lives we actually listen to the advice of random NPCs.
Instead, we go to an unnamed cave where an alien told us bad stuff was happening.
My +23 Swim Finally Comes In Handy: The cave in question has some narrow water-filled passages, and I go through them. That's how we find out this cave system has some mi-go in it. ...And that's apparently how I find out if Chrome has certain Cthulhu Mythos terms in it, I guess.
So we send the mi-go back to Cthulhu in very small mutilated pieces, and we push on through the caverns, trying to find Cassandalie's memory core. Instead, we find a damn priest of Cthulhu (I think; our DM never elaborated beyond "he's a mi-go and a cleric.") and his three mi-go lackies. We settle in for another reasonably easy fight.
Things Don't Go Smooth: Jagg chainsaws a mi-go clean in half when it tries to flank me, then proceeds to unleash raging chainsaw hell on a second mi-go while I beat the third one to death. The cleric gets his turn, and tries to confuse the entire group. I get confused, everyone else makes their Will saves, thanks a LOT, guys. The cleric then summons a mud elemental who starts wailing on Jagg. Singer (our skald) starts climbing after the cleric, who dimension doors over to another ledge.
And then two new champions enter the brawl! (These are two PCs another player made/found online, and were about our level; Mike the DM is starting to dislike the AP in general and one character in specific, so he decided to up the challenge and threw them in.)
Mike: Coming from this opening, you see two humanoid figures! They're covered in a sick amalgam of the black fungus covering the cave's floor and crudely attached technological bits!
Me: Ah, hell, I'm confused, I'll believe anything you tell me at this point!
HOLY CRAP: One of them is a rock thrower with a Bag of Holding full of rocks (and the ability to flurry throw them. And has Clustered Shots as an additional "F~++ YOU" to boot.) This bastard hurls rocks at lightning speed, and during the course of the combat, I'm nearly knocked out, Singer needs to change tactics in order to keep us going (including having to five foot shift away from me at one point while invisible because he didn't want to risk being the closest target to me on a bad Confusion roll), and one round after Cyborg Weeabo Rock Hurlan Magic guy enters, he proceeds to hurl enough rocks at Murphy to knock him into the -30s. Our android bites it on the spot.
THE OTHER GUY: The other guy is a monk with a ranseur who manages to do two impossible things: Disarm Jagg of his chainsaw through a locked gauntlet, and he actually managed to knock an Invulnerable Rager Barbarian into unconsciousness. I start seriously reconsidering if we'll be able to get through this fight with just Tharja (me, who started this fight with 120 HP and was down as low as 24 HP, so one flurry of rocks and I'd be joining Murphy) and Singer (who's doing awesomely in helping fight the good fight.)
They Win! But...: We do eventually beat the two big badasses Mike the DM threw at us.
Me: (Pummeling Striking the mi-go priest; I describe it as grabbing his head) This is for Murphy, you son of a b@@**! (Tharja proceeds TO CRUSH THE MI-GO'S SKULL IN HER BARE HANDS)
Singer: (finishes off the cybermonk) That's the wrong guy. He (points at the rock thrower) killed Murph.
Me: Whatever.
Jagg is revived and we burn through a hell of a lot of healing, but alack, it's too late for Murphy. Because his player lost his character sheet but remembered MOST of his combat capabilities, we're only allowed to loot his Bag of Holding, batteries, and collection of random keycards. The mind-boggling amount of wands he crafted/collected/bought are lost. (Damn.)
We are joined by Graeg the orc fighter, who helps us avenge Murphy's death by getting Cassandalie's memory core, and then we proceed to NUKE the Valley of the Brain Collectors. (That is not hyperbole; our giant psychic moth came by to collect us after we rigged a nuclear bomb that JUST HAPPENED to be there to blow up the Valley.)
On the plus side, with all the loot we managed to find, everybody got a cool 38000 gold each.
Moxy, ratfolk ranger. Stood in the path of a charging chainsaw-wielding orc to cover her allies' escape. Or because she didn't realize she was about to be cut in two. Not sure which.
Sylvanus, level 6 Dark Elf Monk killed by Hellion. Later had a mini-adventure just to get her rezzed. So she is back in action.
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Name: "Killswitch"
Race: Android
Classes/Levels: Swashbuckler 6 (Mysterious Avenger)
Adventure: The Choking Tower
Location: In the Aurora
Catalyst: Malfunctioning Door (assist by the bionanite swarm)
The Gory Details: After confirming to themselves that Illuras is the Technic League spy, they chase her to Old Skelton's farm, where they have a very brief fight by the well. Rather than turn her in, they decide to tie her up and investigate the well. While they discovered the glyph on the capstone and disarmed it, they were surprised by the bionanite swarm. Since it's resistant to fire, they had few ways to combat it other than rely on area effect spells by the wizard and oracle. During this time, though, Killswitch was getting chewed up by the nanites, and his 8 Wisdom caused him to do something foolish - leap through the doorway filled with arcing electricity. He failed his save, and the 9d6 rolled extremely well - it ended up doing nearly 40 damage to him.
Clearly, he should have used his surge protector.
Fortunately, they were able to use the scroll of resurrection to bring him back. They're a level behind due to party size, so the party cleric wasn't high enough to cast restoration, and while the 11th level priest of Erastil in Iadenveigh above could easily cast the spell, they (rightly) surmised there might be problems with having him cast this spell on an android.
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Name: Zinzin Jin
Race/Class: Tengu Sorceror
Adventure: Fires of Creation
Location: Central Reactor
Cause of Death: The final boss battle with Meyanda.
The fight didn't start off well as Zinzin pulled the pin out of a bang grenade and ran at the nefarious android priestess. He clearly wanted to die. The resulting explosion blinded the Tengu but Meyanda was relatively unfazed.
What followed was an endless torrent of negative energy as Meyanda took turns firing at the reactor and blasting the entire party with the evil energy of Hellion.
Of course, all Tengu have hollow bones and not even a sorcerer's will could protect Zinzin from the horrifying damage. He was still stuck in the channel radius when she let off her last 11 damage blast, shortly before being cut into pieces in the corner of the reactor.
Thankfully, Torch had a debt to repay, and the plucky bird was restored to relative health, though now with a heart full of vengeance for Hellion.
RPG Superstar 2012 Top 8
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This was my first TPK as GM, and much to my relief the players all seemed like they were still having fun.
Names: Hermia, Trynk, Sellen, and Barek
Race/Class: Android gunslinger, Gnome wizard (metal elementalist), Human cleric (Brigh), Human savage technologist (barbarian)
Adventure: Lords of Rust
Location: Hellion's Redoubt
Cause of Death: Hellion
This party did quite well all the way up to meeting Hellion's aggregate robot chassis. A few tactical missteps and unlucky rolls later, Hellion ordered his scrapyard robots to stand idle and watch while he finished destroying the brave, grappled, and confused adventurers with his claws and plasma beam.
Hellion hung their bodies on display in the arena, and the players opted to start new characters instead of a daring NPC mission to steal their bodies and get them raised. We’re starting book 3, The Choking Tower, with a new party in Iadenveigh as the town council convenes an open meeting to discuss some mysterious and troubling recent events.
Name: Hardad
Race: Human
Classes/levels: Pistolero Gunslinger 4
Adventure: Lords of Rust
Location: Hawk Palace
Catalyst: Birdfoot
The Gory Details:
For added insult, two of Birdfoots pets crit the (already wounded) paladin and dropped him to around -5hp. A successful Color Spray evened the odds fairly quickly, but it was very nearly a TPK.
Name: Naermora
Race/Class: Dwarven Rogue (Scavenger)
Adventure: Fires of Creation
Location: Central Reactor
Cause of Death: Battle with Meyanda
From the beginning, the fight did not go the way Meyanda had hoped. Several players got the better of her in initiative, which lead to her being disarmed and shot with her own gun.
Luckily for her, Naermora the dwarven rogue went last. She was able to use her spells and channeling to drop the dwarf down below zero. Thanks to a failed stabilization check and another chanel before the shaman could reach Naermora, the dwarf was off to the Bone Yard.
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Name: Zinzin Jin
Race/Class: Tengu Sorceror
Adventure: Lords of Rust
Location: Hellion's Chamber
Cause of Death: The final boss battle with Hellion.
The fight didn't start off well as Zinzin and company detonated a lump of cylex that barely scratched the fearsome Iron God.
What followed was an endless torrent of plasma bolts as Hellion took turns firing at the party wildly inaccurately, due to the inhibitor facet the party had installed. His dual initiative allowed him to close the gap however, to get in close and (comparatively) accurate with his claws.
Soon, he was upon our heroes. Of course, all Tengu have hollow bones and not even a sorcerer's will could protect Zinzin from the horrifying damage of being grabbed and constricted within a glaucite claw.
Zinzin was already dead by the time Hellion ignited the chamber with plasma for the last time.
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RPG Superstar 2012 Top 8
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Names: Alfonso Filare, Erwick Edenstone
Race/Class: Varisian human magus, Halfling bard
Adventure: The Choking Tower
Location: Furkas Xoud’s Bedroom
Cause of Death: Radiation!
Furkas Xoud prepared the deadly technology guide spell irradiate twice, and in his third and final confrontation with the party, he lasted long enough to cast both and deal a total of 11 Con drain to several PCs. That was enough to kill poor Erwick the halfling bard even though he’d avoided taking any hp damage in the fight. Alfonso the varisian magus would have survived if he hadn’t been injured by fire and lightning in the preceding rounds.