There are a couple of reasons I am combining these 2 episodes 1: lawschool takes a lot of time. 2: These are very closely entwined so it allows me to better discuss what was involved in the episodes. 3: It will help me catch up with where we are in the game.
I don't want to spend too much time getting into a lot of discussion this week, but I don want to let you know that I have decided to run my group through the Tomb of Horrors. They are the right level for it, they are a solid thinking party, and it just seemed like a good opportunity to play a module that has been elevated to the point of legend. Its a lot of fun, and I think the group is enjoying it just as much.
Episodes 23 &24
Things are going pretty well at this point in the game, Belfast has been beaten, Leanna has paid for her crimes, the Duke is alive, and its almost Christmas time! Things would really be going well if it wasn't for the fact that Ismana had been captured by some cruel wealthy lord and the fact that there is a Demon Lord about to tear open the fabric of reality between the Abyss and Proveria. So outside of those couple of things, you know, life is pretty good.
The party spends a couple of days celebrating christmas and having a little bit of festivity before they head out to find Ismana. Urz decided it was time to teach Wisthaven about one of his tribes traditional games: you walk as far onto the ice as you can before it breaks. Urz was fine, but 7 people lost their lives that Christmas day. Damone ended up getting drunk and woke up with... someone else- at some point we decided he was mildy bisexual, or at least accidentally so, so whenever he gets drunk there is a percent chance it will be one gender or the other.
When the party finally left the snow was deep and the whether was cold, so I modifed the way that the cold damage would be taken, rather than 1 save per hour I did 1 save per day that dealt CON damage. That was fun way to do it. Lina took about 6 points of CON damage on the way out to Osht (the half-way point between them and Lord Pelegrin).
Once they made it to Osht it was new years eve, Lina stayed in to heal up while the rest of the party went out to party. Urz once again introduced people to his game, this time he sunk under the ice, almost drowned, and then was dropped to about 3 total CON left by the time he got back to shore. Life can be exciting when you are a half-orc barbarian.
After spending a few days recovering and dodging some of the poor weather coming their way they made the last 4 days of travel down to Lord Pelegrins Estate. They were escorted below and met with him, and he had Ismana right there with him. He let them know he would exchange Ismana for either $75,000 or for 1 service. The service he requested was that they travel to an ancient tomb, the tomb where Nagaste-Tor and his apprentice Shay-Sek researched immortality. Inside of the Tomb, past layers of horrific traps, is a Silver Dragon Orb, the ancient and powerful artifact. If they can bring him this item, then Lord Pelegrin agreed to give them back Ismana.
Hesitantly the party agreed, after using spells and abilities to verify that he was telling the truth. They made their way down to the Tomb, using the only man who had ever gone in and come back out again as their guide. Once they arrived at the frozen swamp they spent a few days searching for the entrance. After a few false entrances had been found and Lina had disabled the traps they finally found the correct entrance way. The hall in front of them was long and had a winding mosaic path that led towards a 5 foot tall green demon head and to an archway with mist in it.
My party chose to completely bypass both of those when Urz smashed a chunk of the wall, set off a trap, and then accidentally found a secret door. Inside of that secret door was a four armed gargoyle that deal almost 90 points of damage to Urz in the first round. A few lucky rolls on the parties part and they barely managed to bring the gargoyle down before it killed any one. At this point Lina took the lead and with her insane Perception and Disable device checks, supported by Good Hope from Damone, she managed to work her way through a series of secret doors and dart traps.
On the other side of those secret doors the party set up camp. They woke and found themselves in another long hallway, this one had a number of orbs that were going up an down the hallway. The first took them to a 4 armed gargoyle statue and a puzzle that required them to destroy a number of gems and then earned them a gem of seeing. Further down the hallway another secret door led them into a room with a brain in a jar. It dominated Urz and when the party tried to destroy it Urz swung on Lina dealing about 50% of her total HP in damage. The brain was quickly destroyed and Urz was back to normal.
The next entrance they took led them to a large evil chapel. After setting off a poison trap, then a lightning bolt trap, then a fireball trap they finally managed to solve the secret door in the room and opened up to another hallway. A couple of put traps later they found that there was yet another secret door that led to another secret door and then into a room with 3 vats. The first vat was water, the second acid, and the last a gelatinous cube. Sam dumped acid into the cube vat and dissolved it. Once that was done they pulled 2 key halves out and moved on to the next room.
They then flew over a 30 foot long pit and somehow stumbled onto the most optimal route to get to a magically sealed door. This door required a DC 45 Disable Device check to unlock, which means that Lina would need a natural 20 to open it, unless they could solve the puzzle (I did not tell them this, they found out after). Lina rolled a natural 20. So into the next room they went! A huge chamber filled with columns and a strange soft orange glow from the other side of the room.
And that folks is where we left off this last week. I don't want to get into too much detail on this because they are still in the dungeon and there is a good amount left to deal with.
Until Next Time!
-Ubercroz
Tuesday, September 11, 2012
Sunday, September 2, 2012
Episode 22
The campaign has been moving along nicely. Really most everything I was wanting to happen the party has been doing. Which is nice. This was a very big week in regards to the over all story line of the adventure. It was actually an opportunity for there to be very big changes in the game and I was not exactly sure where things were going to go. Lots of fun to be had when you don't know what is about to happen. Very exciting.
EPISODE 22:
The party took time to finish up their preparations. It turned out that Tyhpus sword, Crissus, became sentient this last time that it was enchanted... as it turns out Crissus has belonged to the Paladin order of Tyr for centuries and it views itself as a defender of the faithful. I have decided to make a random chance for any item that receives an enchantment to become sentient. The idea is the process of making a magic item is somewhat.... volatile, and sometimes they wake up.
So the party took their new gear and headed into the blustery winds of mid December towards the Sunlight Keep. On their way south they ran into some of their old friends, Leanna the assassin and Athis the Graveknight. Those 2 were very interested in making the party dead. It was a tough fight, and it once again brought Urz to the edge of death. Once Athis fell Leanna tried to bargain for her life. She offered to trade freedom for secrets. I only about 25% expected that this was going to get the party to bite. Instead the took her down, bound her up, questioned her and killed her. I cannot entirely blame them- I did what I could to get her out of there but ultimately the party was just too interested in seeing her die for her crimes. She has been a foil to the group for some time and it was good for them to get some closure there.
From the clues she left they managed to put together that Belfast was completing a ritual that night to open up the seal that was holding back Nagaste-Tor. If Nagaste-Tor was unleashed than every person in Osht would die, more than 150,000 people. So they slipped past the Black Guard encampment, hurried into the secret tunnel and then ran into a few cultists at the bottom of the tunnel. These cultists were really causing some confusion for the group. They knew now that not all of the cultists were bad and yet here they were killing paladins of Tyr and trying to raise the most horrific scourge that the world had seen back into the open. This was really the effect I was hoping for, because things were about to be cleared up shortly. The cultists that they fought were also the exact same difficulty as the cultists they fought at the beginning of the game, a couple of level 2 guys, and a few level 1's. I thought it would be fun for them to see how far they had come.
Once they got downstairs they saw that Belfast was finishing up the ritual. And now he had a chance to provide a little exposition. Belfast informs the party that he became aware of rifts between Proveria and after researching what was happening and communing with Nergal realized that there was a Demon Lord that was trying to tear his way into their reality. He tried to find ways to stop it and with more study determined the only thing strong enough to stop the Demon Lord was the Arch-Lich Nagaste-Tor. He used Athis's money and resources as the Count of Pastan and then asked him for the ultimate sacrifice, become an evil undead monster to help save the world. And now Belfast is prepared to sacrifice the entire country so that the rest of the world will be saved from the demon invasion.
At this point the party had a decision to make, do they stand back and let Belfast kill 150,000 people that night and potentially the entire country to stop the Demon Lord, or do they stop Belfast and find a new way to prevent this Demon Lord from entering their world.
They chose to stop Belfast and save Osht. Another tough fight. This is the inherent problem with difficult encounters- they can be extremely volatile. Belfast had a few spells that boiled down to save or die- destruction and disintegrate. I hit 2 people in the party with those and they both saved, and still took a ton of damage. The whole fight took about 5, maybe 6 rounds. I would love for a boss fight like this to take 9, 10, or 11 rounds, but the nature of them is such that the party just cannot stand the damage output. The only reason that its a problem is that a Big Bad Evil Guy that has been built up from the start of the game ought to have, I don't know, something more.
That being said, Belfast was slain. The party arose victorious from the depths, freed the paladins who had been captured below and convinced the remaining Black Guard that they should follow Chara (the Black Guard priestess who helped them defeat a demon earlier). With that the adventure was basically over, they headed back up to Wisthaven and needed to find out what happened to Ismana.
Until Next Time!
-Ubercroz
EPISODE 22:
The party took time to finish up their preparations. It turned out that Tyhpus sword, Crissus, became sentient this last time that it was enchanted... as it turns out Crissus has belonged to the Paladin order of Tyr for centuries and it views itself as a defender of the faithful. I have decided to make a random chance for any item that receives an enchantment to become sentient. The idea is the process of making a magic item is somewhat.... volatile, and sometimes they wake up.
So the party took their new gear and headed into the blustery winds of mid December towards the Sunlight Keep. On their way south they ran into some of their old friends, Leanna the assassin and Athis the Graveknight. Those 2 were very interested in making the party dead. It was a tough fight, and it once again brought Urz to the edge of death. Once Athis fell Leanna tried to bargain for her life. She offered to trade freedom for secrets. I only about 25% expected that this was going to get the party to bite. Instead the took her down, bound her up, questioned her and killed her. I cannot entirely blame them- I did what I could to get her out of there but ultimately the party was just too interested in seeing her die for her crimes. She has been a foil to the group for some time and it was good for them to get some closure there.
From the clues she left they managed to put together that Belfast was completing a ritual that night to open up the seal that was holding back Nagaste-Tor. If Nagaste-Tor was unleashed than every person in Osht would die, more than 150,000 people. So they slipped past the Black Guard encampment, hurried into the secret tunnel and then ran into a few cultists at the bottom of the tunnel. These cultists were really causing some confusion for the group. They knew now that not all of the cultists were bad and yet here they were killing paladins of Tyr and trying to raise the most horrific scourge that the world had seen back into the open. This was really the effect I was hoping for, because things were about to be cleared up shortly. The cultists that they fought were also the exact same difficulty as the cultists they fought at the beginning of the game, a couple of level 2 guys, and a few level 1's. I thought it would be fun for them to see how far they had come.
Once they got downstairs they saw that Belfast was finishing up the ritual. And now he had a chance to provide a little exposition. Belfast informs the party that he became aware of rifts between Proveria and after researching what was happening and communing with Nergal realized that there was a Demon Lord that was trying to tear his way into their reality. He tried to find ways to stop it and with more study determined the only thing strong enough to stop the Demon Lord was the Arch-Lich Nagaste-Tor. He used Athis's money and resources as the Count of Pastan and then asked him for the ultimate sacrifice, become an evil undead monster to help save the world. And now Belfast is prepared to sacrifice the entire country so that the rest of the world will be saved from the demon invasion.
At this point the party had a decision to make, do they stand back and let Belfast kill 150,000 people that night and potentially the entire country to stop the Demon Lord, or do they stop Belfast and find a new way to prevent this Demon Lord from entering their world.
They chose to stop Belfast and save Osht. Another tough fight. This is the inherent problem with difficult encounters- they can be extremely volatile. Belfast had a few spells that boiled down to save or die- destruction and disintegrate. I hit 2 people in the party with those and they both saved, and still took a ton of damage. The whole fight took about 5, maybe 6 rounds. I would love for a boss fight like this to take 9, 10, or 11 rounds, but the nature of them is such that the party just cannot stand the damage output. The only reason that its a problem is that a Big Bad Evil Guy that has been built up from the start of the game ought to have, I don't know, something more.
That being said, Belfast was slain. The party arose victorious from the depths, freed the paladins who had been captured below and convinced the remaining Black Guard that they should follow Chara (the Black Guard priestess who helped them defeat a demon earlier). With that the adventure was basically over, they headed back up to Wisthaven and needed to find out what happened to Ismana.
Until Next Time!
-Ubercroz
Sunday, August 26, 2012
Episode 21
This was a short adventure night. Everyone hit level 9- so we had to spend some time letting the group level. Then we also got started a little late. While it was a short week I thought it would be a good chance to set some things up for the next week, where we would be able to go a little later. I knew 1 member of the group was going to be gone so originally I had planned on doing a 1-off where they got to play the badguys- while it would have been fun I was concerned it might take more time than we had, but not enough for 2 sessions. So I just fleshed out a few extra parts of the regular campaign and moved on.
Episode 21:
The party was left in Oberrons Grove with with Mal'Inia's heart in a Cold Iron box and the Anchor stone to close the dimensional rift. After talking with Oberron (the black unicorn lord of the good dark fey) they decided to leave the Anchor Stone with him. In the parties opinion it was not really there business whether the rift stayed open or not. So the Duke and Oberron would have to hash that out between each other. That seemed a little odd to me, if they leave the anchor stone with Oberron they are effectively saying it will stay open, because the Duke would have to go in and get it from the heart of Oberrons encampment... so while they did not "take a stance" they really only left 1 option on the table.
At this point they had to lean on Oberron's military forces 1 more time. Mal'Inia's forces were gathered near the rift to stop the party from getting through to the other side with their mistresses heart in tow. So the good dark fey would attack the evil ones while the party used Damones magic to get as close to the rift as possible. This of course was all done with Sam's corpse still along for the ride. They got in close and crossed a barrier near the rift that ended their invisibility. What waited for them were 4 of Mal'Inias elite guards- buffed to the 9's since the party had triggered a silent alarm a few rounds earlier.
The elite guards were 2 8th level fighters and 2 Eldritch Knights. Turns out an Eldritch Knight can be a massive bad ass. They were universalists, so they had hand of the apprentice. Which means they were flinging their long swords at 30 paces and slamming them with empowered magic missles as well. They were a lot more effective than I thought they would be, simply because it was so hard to engage them in melee, they could always scoot and blast with a +17 damage longsword toss. Well the fight took a few rounds and the party left through the rift once they saw that the Dark Fey army saw them and were headed their way in a hurry. The party went through the rift so fast that they forgot to loot the bad guys. And they had some decent gear.
On the other side of the rift it was snowing, it turns out the what seemed like 9 days to the party in the Twilight Kingdom was closer to 3 months back in Proveria. One they were on the other side of the rift Urz stabbed Mal'Inias heart with a Cold Iron dagger and a shockwave knocked them all to the ground. Mal'Inia was now dead.
Heading down the path they met back with the Dukes military commander, Colonel Christoph, who thought the heroes were dead, since they had been gone so long. Well word of the dukes recovery was spreading and the party was in a hurry to get back to Wisthaven so that they could ressurect Sam, before he had been dead too long. Nabbing some of the supplies at the camp they headed south to Wisthaven, and spoke with their friend Bertrand, the High Priest of Tyr. He agreed to resurrect Sam, for a nominal donation (16,000 for res and removing negative levels). The party agreed and as Sam was waking from the sleep of ages he was handed a magic item and asked to identify it.
As the party spent time in the city they found out that there had been insurgencies cropping up while the war with the Dark Fey was being fought. Specifically there was some trouble down at the sunlight keep. Realizing bad things were a foot they pooled their gold and prepared to drop some enchantments on things in order to ease their burden in the fights to come. Then they decided to see the Duke.
The ferry to the Dukes Island was closed for the day, so Sam cast fly on everyone and they jetted across the bay to go and meet with him. After some small talk the Duke mentioned the King never provided him aid in the conflict with the Dark Fey, he then asked if Urz and his tribe would be willing to lend him aid if war with the King was coming. Urz agreed- so long as he could get a few slaves out of the deal (he is a half-Orc). Then Urz decided to get flung out of a catapult, but he was okay- only took 20d6 of damage.
The next day they went to go check on Ismana and see what she had been up to for the past several months. It turns out she had been kidnapped by a man named Lord Pelegrin, the same name on a "magic vault" they had received from Ismana on their last mission for her. There was a note in her room that said "If you want to see her again, come find me". It also turns out that Ismana was constructing a deep water vessel from the materials the party had been collecting for her over the past several missions.
With that the night drew to a close, there was a lot to be done and a ton of loose ends that would eventually lead somewhere.... I hope.
Until Next Time!
-Ubercroz
Episode 21:
The party was left in Oberrons Grove with with Mal'Inia's heart in a Cold Iron box and the Anchor stone to close the dimensional rift. After talking with Oberron (the black unicorn lord of the good dark fey) they decided to leave the Anchor Stone with him. In the parties opinion it was not really there business whether the rift stayed open or not. So the Duke and Oberron would have to hash that out between each other. That seemed a little odd to me, if they leave the anchor stone with Oberron they are effectively saying it will stay open, because the Duke would have to go in and get it from the heart of Oberrons encampment... so while they did not "take a stance" they really only left 1 option on the table.
At this point they had to lean on Oberron's military forces 1 more time. Mal'Inia's forces were gathered near the rift to stop the party from getting through to the other side with their mistresses heart in tow. So the good dark fey would attack the evil ones while the party used Damones magic to get as close to the rift as possible. This of course was all done with Sam's corpse still along for the ride. They got in close and crossed a barrier near the rift that ended their invisibility. What waited for them were 4 of Mal'Inias elite guards- buffed to the 9's since the party had triggered a silent alarm a few rounds earlier.
The elite guards were 2 8th level fighters and 2 Eldritch Knights. Turns out an Eldritch Knight can be a massive bad ass. They were universalists, so they had hand of the apprentice. Which means they were flinging their long swords at 30 paces and slamming them with empowered magic missles as well. They were a lot more effective than I thought they would be, simply because it was so hard to engage them in melee, they could always scoot and blast with a +17 damage longsword toss. Well the fight took a few rounds and the party left through the rift once they saw that the Dark Fey army saw them and were headed their way in a hurry. The party went through the rift so fast that they forgot to loot the bad guys. And they had some decent gear.
On the other side of the rift it was snowing, it turns out the what seemed like 9 days to the party in the Twilight Kingdom was closer to 3 months back in Proveria. One they were on the other side of the rift Urz stabbed Mal'Inias heart with a Cold Iron dagger and a shockwave knocked them all to the ground. Mal'Inia was now dead.
Heading down the path they met back with the Dukes military commander, Colonel Christoph, who thought the heroes were dead, since they had been gone so long. Well word of the dukes recovery was spreading and the party was in a hurry to get back to Wisthaven so that they could ressurect Sam, before he had been dead too long. Nabbing some of the supplies at the camp they headed south to Wisthaven, and spoke with their friend Bertrand, the High Priest of Tyr. He agreed to resurrect Sam, for a nominal donation (16,000 for res and removing negative levels). The party agreed and as Sam was waking from the sleep of ages he was handed a magic item and asked to identify it.
As the party spent time in the city they found out that there had been insurgencies cropping up while the war with the Dark Fey was being fought. Specifically there was some trouble down at the sunlight keep. Realizing bad things were a foot they pooled their gold and prepared to drop some enchantments on things in order to ease their burden in the fights to come. Then they decided to see the Duke.
The ferry to the Dukes Island was closed for the day, so Sam cast fly on everyone and they jetted across the bay to go and meet with him. After some small talk the Duke mentioned the King never provided him aid in the conflict with the Dark Fey, he then asked if Urz and his tribe would be willing to lend him aid if war with the King was coming. Urz agreed- so long as he could get a few slaves out of the deal (he is a half-Orc). Then Urz decided to get flung out of a catapult, but he was okay- only took 20d6 of damage.
The next day they went to go check on Ismana and see what she had been up to for the past several months. It turns out she had been kidnapped by a man named Lord Pelegrin, the same name on a "magic vault" they had received from Ismana on their last mission for her. There was a note in her room that said "If you want to see her again, come find me". It also turns out that Ismana was constructing a deep water vessel from the materials the party had been collecting for her over the past several missions.
With that the night drew to a close, there was a lot to be done and a ton of loose ends that would eventually lead somewhere.... I hope.
Until Next Time!
-Ubercroz
Wednesday, August 22, 2012
Episode 20
A little late on delivery this week, sorry. This week we had a few funny things going on. I had 2 people who had joined us for 1 session not there (and unfortunately would not be able to keep coming in the future) and 1 new person who had not really ever played before. So I had to figure out how to get him into the game and get them out. Well I came up with something that was a little Deus ex Machina- but it worked out. This was a big week- featuring mayhem, triumph, and a little defeat.
Episode 20:
The party started off the night back in this little garden of Mal'Inia where they had fought off a Naied the week before with her water elemental minions. It was a tough fight, but they had a good time. This week they took some time and prepared listening at the door and trying to figure out what was up ahead. They made good rolls so I gave them a hint that these dark fey goblins had captured something. The group popped into the next room and started way-laying the bad guys. Within 3 rounds the encounter was over and the party was looking for clues.
The next room they went in to (with great care, I guess I have made this group a little paranoid... being a GM can be so rewarding) had 4 human ranger looking dudes in it, and their leader was in the room next to them (their leader was the new guy). At this point the two other folks who were not here "decided" to take the 4 rangers and try and keep the bad guys busy at the front while the rest of the party went on to fight Mal'Inia at the top of the tower.
As soon as the party left the room with the guards they ran straight into a very large scale battle. At this point there were something like 12 good guys for the party to control and this fight had 12 dark fey goblins, 2 satyr mauraders, 2 dark fey spellcasters, and a trap the party NEVER sprung.
I knew this fight would take a while, but I also know that I have couple of players who really like to play tactics games. So every now and then it is fun to let them play tactics with the guys they have with them. This was not the best example of that, since the guys they had were very limited, but in general I think that its fun to run a few guys and make their combat decisions.
It was a pretty long and difficult fight, that ultimately was brought to the last guy was invisible and the party was waiting to pounce on him when he was revealed. I was happy with the fight, and they got a healing fountain in exchange. The healing fountain was basically just a way for them to get some free healing- the rest of the tower should be tough enough to make this a fine choice and to reward them for exploring.
The party then went up to the next level of the tower and saw a still pool surrounded by statues and trees. The party used this opportunity to try and avoid any traps I might have laid for them. Instead they used an Unseen Servant spell and had him collect the water from the pond. The water was beneficial to them. It was infused with power from the shadow realm and would give anyone who drank it a +1 to saves vs Mal'Inia... that would be helpful very soon.
On the top floor the dark queen herself waited for them. She mentioned that some "Cleric" had told her that these heroes might visit her. The fight was easily the most challenging that the party had faced. Urz was immediately Baleful Polymorphed into a song bird, and Damone was dropped into a pit. Mal'Inia is highly mobile, but they pinned her down with silence spells and stinking cloud, which really would have ended the fight right there.... except that there were 3 gargoyles the party had not fought on the level below and 1 air elemental. These kept them busy until Mal'Inia got out of the stinking cloud. The party defeated her minions and crushed her illusory defenses. Mal'Inia was down to her last desperate act- a mazimized shadowfireball. Most everyone made the save, and those that did not were fine. Except for Sam. Sam died- he was dropped 1 point below his CON and was done for. Urz proceeded to cut Mal'Inia down now that he had been changed back to normal, and the girls panicked and tried to figure out how to make everything better for Sam.
They collected the gigantic Anchor Stone and placed Mal'Inia's heart in a cold iron box so they could eventually slay her.
With that the Heroes slipped out of the fortress using Oberron's army as a shield to get back to their Base camp. No one there was capable of raising Sam from the dead, and the party did not have a divine caster capable of casting that spell, so now the party has to sit and wait until they can cross the rift safely and try and patch up their loving companion.
Until Next Time!
-Ubercroz
Episode 20:
The party started off the night back in this little garden of Mal'Inia where they had fought off a Naied the week before with her water elemental minions. It was a tough fight, but they had a good time. This week they took some time and prepared listening at the door and trying to figure out what was up ahead. They made good rolls so I gave them a hint that these dark fey goblins had captured something. The group popped into the next room and started way-laying the bad guys. Within 3 rounds the encounter was over and the party was looking for clues.
The next room they went in to (with great care, I guess I have made this group a little paranoid... being a GM can be so rewarding) had 4 human ranger looking dudes in it, and their leader was in the room next to them (their leader was the new guy). At this point the two other folks who were not here "decided" to take the 4 rangers and try and keep the bad guys busy at the front while the rest of the party went on to fight Mal'Inia at the top of the tower.
As soon as the party left the room with the guards they ran straight into a very large scale battle. At this point there were something like 12 good guys for the party to control and this fight had 12 dark fey goblins, 2 satyr mauraders, 2 dark fey spellcasters, and a trap the party NEVER sprung.
I knew this fight would take a while, but I also know that I have couple of players who really like to play tactics games. So every now and then it is fun to let them play tactics with the guys they have with them. This was not the best example of that, since the guys they had were very limited, but in general I think that its fun to run a few guys and make their combat decisions.
It was a pretty long and difficult fight, that ultimately was brought to the last guy was invisible and the party was waiting to pounce on him when he was revealed. I was happy with the fight, and they got a healing fountain in exchange. The healing fountain was basically just a way for them to get some free healing- the rest of the tower should be tough enough to make this a fine choice and to reward them for exploring.
The party then went up to the next level of the tower and saw a still pool surrounded by statues and trees. The party used this opportunity to try and avoid any traps I might have laid for them. Instead they used an Unseen Servant spell and had him collect the water from the pond. The water was beneficial to them. It was infused with power from the shadow realm and would give anyone who drank it a +1 to saves vs Mal'Inia... that would be helpful very soon.
On the top floor the dark queen herself waited for them. She mentioned that some "Cleric" had told her that these heroes might visit her. The fight was easily the most challenging that the party had faced. Urz was immediately Baleful Polymorphed into a song bird, and Damone was dropped into a pit. Mal'Inia is highly mobile, but they pinned her down with silence spells and stinking cloud, which really would have ended the fight right there.... except that there were 3 gargoyles the party had not fought on the level below and 1 air elemental. These kept them busy until Mal'Inia got out of the stinking cloud. The party defeated her minions and crushed her illusory defenses. Mal'Inia was down to her last desperate act- a mazimized shadowfireball. Most everyone made the save, and those that did not were fine. Except for Sam. Sam died- he was dropped 1 point below his CON and was done for. Urz proceeded to cut Mal'Inia down now that he had been changed back to normal, and the girls panicked and tried to figure out how to make everything better for Sam.
They collected the gigantic Anchor Stone and placed Mal'Inia's heart in a cold iron box so they could eventually slay her.
With that the Heroes slipped out of the fortress using Oberron's army as a shield to get back to their Base camp. No one there was capable of raising Sam from the dead, and the party did not have a divine caster capable of casting that spell, so now the party has to sit and wait until they can cross the rift safely and try and patch up their loving companion.
Until Next Time!
-Ubercroz
Thursday, August 9, 2012
Episode 19
It was a large group at the Ubercroz residence this evening. We had a total of 7 players for this iteration, the difficulty being that 2 of them were only going to be there that evening, so I had to figure out a way that would make things work while not ruining the fun for the rest of the group. The good news is that when you have a group of players in their late 20's and early 30's it makes things easier, since no one gets too hung up on things.
These 2 were a couple, he was with us the week before and asked to bring his lady so that she could get to see how a game ran and so she could get some context if he ever started spouting inane gamer nonsense. I think it worked out, now it did leave me with a few interesting challenges for the next week, since the party is closing in on the BBEG and I now have 7 PC's for what I had designed to be a 5 PC fight....
Episode 19:
The party spent some time preparing for their journey up to find the druid who was supposed to have a secret way in to Mal'Inia's fortress. To find the way Oberron asked a guide named Moonflower Stardust (the girl) to guide them up to where the druid lived. It very quickly became apparent to the party that you could move Moonflowers name around and come up with all kinds of interesting names: Starflower Moondust, Moonstar Flowerdust, Starflower Dustmoon, etc. I think we as a group were more amused by that than she was... but maybe not.
So Stardust led the party up to the druids hut and on the way they were waylay-ed by a Quickwood- This was an encounter I thought would be real fun and it challenged the party because of how far away the monster can engage the group. It continued to grapple and pull them in towards its slobbering maw while the archer types blasted away at a distance. It didn't take long for the tree to fall, given its not that tough of a monster, but it was a fun fight regardless.
Afterwards they made it up to the druid who was about to explain how to get explain how to get into Mal'Inias lair (after some cajoling from the party) when they noticed a Quickling in the rafters and took off after it. At this point I had a chase set up using the rules in the Game Mastery Guide. At 8th level chases get a little difficult it seems. The skill disparity between characters is so high that you either play towards the high skill characters and leave the others behind or you try and figure out to let everyone win somehow.
I decided to play to the latter- at a certain card in the chase sequence there was no way for a couple of the characters to bypass it, so I made a secret perception roll on that card that would let them use survival to run a shortcut so they might be able to cut the quickling off. Well the way it worked out Typhus made the perception check and then the survival check easily and caught the quickling with no trouble (something I was a little worried about, but it was fine). The the new silver dragon in the party caught up quickly and caught the little fey in a mouth grapple (which sounds much better than it is I think). At this point one of Mal'Inia's main supporters, a 10th level fighter pure fey, was waiting to catch the PC's in an ambush with the quickling who was leading the party to him. Well the ambush didn't go off well because the quickling got caught. Then Typhus did a move and swing on Arbalest, the bad guy, and caught him with a critical. Since I use the crit cards Typhus pulled "decapitation" which meant Arbalest Saves or dies. Arbalest dies.
I had planned on this being a much more bad ass fat than it ended up being. Somehow I was not upset, it was just what happened. It seemed real great in a lot of ways, I had wanted the party to get an advantage if they caught that quickling and they caught him. It worked out really well. It made Typhus feel like a bad ass and the rest of the party felt good because they got to move on in the game with a clean victory.
They then headed back to the druid, Shalinia, who explained that they would need to travel through a myconid and troll infested cave to get to an underground waterway. At this waterway they would need to polymorph into a diminutive creature and swim for some distance to get into a pool in Mal'Inias courtyard.
Taking this information back to Oberron they planned their next move. On the parties signal Oberron would lead his forces to attack while the party slipped in the back. Once inside the good Dark Fey would provide a distraction so the party could get in and put Mal'Inia's heart into a cold iron box.
The party slipped into the cave and ran into a few trolls... and talked their way out of the fight. I was really hesitant to let this one go. It seems like it would be very hard to talk a troll into not wanting to eat you. They made the roll so I did not want to discredit that. The thing was it seemed really strange that these trolls who had been waiting to eat whatever came into their cave did not eat the party. I don't know, it was probably fine it just seemed a little strange.... to make it easier they used the bards fascinate and suggestion skill- which I was fine with, the diplomacy just seemed strange. After talking their way past the trolls they dove into the waterway and popped out in the courtyard of Mal'Inia.
In the courtyard an evil Neiad with a couple of water elemental servants fought the party. Finally a good fight! She was back in the water, so the group had to swim or fight at a distance... or enlarge. This would have been a better fight against 5 players, but 7 was still fun. It went pretty quickly but the party had fun and it made for a nice closeout on the night. Now this week I have another new player showing up who wants to play his own character, which I am fine with... I just have to figure out how to make it work...
I use to many ellipsis.
Until next time!
-Ubercroz
These 2 were a couple, he was with us the week before and asked to bring his lady so that she could get to see how a game ran and so she could get some context if he ever started spouting inane gamer nonsense. I think it worked out, now it did leave me with a few interesting challenges for the next week, since the party is closing in on the BBEG and I now have 7 PC's for what I had designed to be a 5 PC fight....
Episode 19:
The party spent some time preparing for their journey up to find the druid who was supposed to have a secret way in to Mal'Inia's fortress. To find the way Oberron asked a guide named Moonflower Stardust (the girl) to guide them up to where the druid lived. It very quickly became apparent to the party that you could move Moonflowers name around and come up with all kinds of interesting names: Starflower Moondust, Moonstar Flowerdust, Starflower Dustmoon, etc. I think we as a group were more amused by that than she was... but maybe not.
So Stardust led the party up to the druids hut and on the way they were waylay-ed by a Quickwood- This was an encounter I thought would be real fun and it challenged the party because of how far away the monster can engage the group. It continued to grapple and pull them in towards its slobbering maw while the archer types blasted away at a distance. It didn't take long for the tree to fall, given its not that tough of a monster, but it was a fun fight regardless.
Afterwards they made it up to the druid who was about to explain how to get explain how to get into Mal'Inias lair (after some cajoling from the party) when they noticed a Quickling in the rafters and took off after it. At this point I had a chase set up using the rules in the Game Mastery Guide. At 8th level chases get a little difficult it seems. The skill disparity between characters is so high that you either play towards the high skill characters and leave the others behind or you try and figure out to let everyone win somehow.
I decided to play to the latter- at a certain card in the chase sequence there was no way for a couple of the characters to bypass it, so I made a secret perception roll on that card that would let them use survival to run a shortcut so they might be able to cut the quickling off. Well the way it worked out Typhus made the perception check and then the survival check easily and caught the quickling with no trouble (something I was a little worried about, but it was fine). The the new silver dragon in the party caught up quickly and caught the little fey in a mouth grapple (which sounds much better than it is I think). At this point one of Mal'Inia's main supporters, a 10th level fighter pure fey, was waiting to catch the PC's in an ambush with the quickling who was leading the party to him. Well the ambush didn't go off well because the quickling got caught. Then Typhus did a move and swing on Arbalest, the bad guy, and caught him with a critical. Since I use the crit cards Typhus pulled "decapitation" which meant Arbalest Saves or dies. Arbalest dies.
 |
| This was going to be a really good fight. |
They then headed back to the druid, Shalinia, who explained that they would need to travel through a myconid and troll infested cave to get to an underground waterway. At this waterway they would need to polymorph into a diminutive creature and swim for some distance to get into a pool in Mal'Inias courtyard.
Taking this information back to Oberron they planned their next move. On the parties signal Oberron would lead his forces to attack while the party slipped in the back. Once inside the good Dark Fey would provide a distraction so the party could get in and put Mal'Inia's heart into a cold iron box.
 |
| The cave of Wonders! (or maybe just trolls and things) |
In the courtyard an evil Neiad with a couple of water elemental servants fought the party. Finally a good fight! She was back in the water, so the group had to swim or fight at a distance... or enlarge. This would have been a better fight against 5 players, but 7 was still fun. It went pretty quickly but the party had fun and it made for a nice closeout on the night. Now this week I have another new player showing up who wants to play his own character, which I am fine with... I just have to figure out how to make it work...
I use to many ellipsis.
Until next time!
-Ubercroz
Tuesday, July 31, 2012
Episode 18
Occasionally you have new people to add, or older people leave and that is certainly something that has to be addressed by the table. This week we had a guy that several of my players had met and a few had not. He is an experienced player and is involved in Pathfinder Society, so I was not worried about him in regards to rules. He was also in the right age range (aka: not a teenager), so it seemed like he would fit in well. But its not just up to me. We play at my, and my wife's, house but the game we play is everyone's. Turns out it was not a big deal, everyone was okay with it, so that's nice. What it did mean was that- since he will not be a regular- that I needed to have an NPC ready for him. I had been trying to figure out how I was going to work an angle later in the game and this presented a great opportunity for me. So he is playing I'Olethia, the Silver Dragon Paladin.... This ought to be good.
Oberron takes this opportunity to explain his plan. If they use this time to attack Mal'Inias' supply points they will pull her forces from her castle to protect her supplies so that she can continue her assault against the light world. Using this to their advantage they will pick Mal'Inia apart until she is left much less defended at her doorstep. Once that happens the heroes will attack her fortress, cut out Mal'Inia's heart, put it in a Cold Iron box, and then take it across the rift and kill her.
Episode 18:
The party spent a little time getting acclimated to the grove they were in, since I drew a map and had a few places they could nab some resources from it was a good opportunity. Afterwards (they really didn't care that much about the grove, but hopefully that will change in time) they went to meet with Oberron again. He introduced them to a new outsider who had joined them in the Twilight Kingdom, a Paladin named I'Oethia. She had slipped through the rift on her own and found the rebellious dark fey and wanted to assist them in their struggle against tyranny and evil.
Oberron takes this opportunity to explain his plan. If they use this time to attack Mal'Inias' supply points they will pull her forces from her castle to protect her supplies so that she can continue her assault against the light world. Using this to their advantage they will pick Mal'Inia apart until she is left much less defended at her doorstep. Once that happens the heroes will attack her fortress, cut out Mal'Inia's heart, put it in a Cold Iron box, and then take it across the rift and kill her.
The players agree to take a strike force up to the river supply point and batter their way into the complex and destroy the supplies. The fight itself was around a CR 9 (the APL is 9 as well, since there are 6 level 8 players). This was more of the same monsters they fought last week. I really don't like to over commit to a single type of monster, but it seemed reasonable that the most common monster would be here. There were a number of goblins, a couple of Satyrs, and 2 Ogres (these are modified Ogres... so they were slightly more challenging). This was really the first fight were the players got to stretch their legs as 8th level characters, so they got to do some fun stuff. The battle wrapped up fairly quickly and the players pulled back to get to the grove.
On their way back to the grove the party ran into a Juvenile Umbral Dragon. Yeah, immediately after the last fight they ran into a CR11-12 encounter- I love my job. The Dragon, Daranus, tracked the players by the smell of the silver dragon they had with them. Up until this point I'Olethia had not mentioned that she was a Silver Dragon, and at this point she changed shape from human to dragon form and flew right into combat.
This was a tough dragon, I maxed his HP, I buffed him for the fight, and he was prepared to do some damage. Somewhere around the 2nd round Sam hit a critical on scorching ray. I use the critical cards and the one he got was time vortex, which means that the Dragon disappeared for 4 rounds. Now there was some debate as to what happened there. Ultimately I decided that he was in an alternate timeline for 4 rounds, so he got to take some actions as well. The party formed up around him, then Daranus used his first action to take a AoO and flew far enough away to slam every member of the party with his negative energy breath weapon. 50 points of damage and 2 negative levels later I managed to nearly drop Sam, but to no avail. Mark my words, I am taking Sam out sometime...
So after another couple of rounds they manage to drop Daranus and make their way back to the Grove. They get patched up, the healers take care of their negative levels and they go to sleep out in the tent city. That night, while they are sleeping, Mal'Inia sends a Nightmare to the PC's.
They awake at the foot of her courtroom, fully rested and ready for combat. I then take an opportunity to let the 1st 4 rounds of combat run so the players can get an idea of what her tactics are. This was actually for a couple of reasons. Mal'Inia is going to be a very difficult fight, and my group has not done combat at this level very often, so I wanted them to have a chance to see what could happen. I also wanted to see what they would do, Mal'Inia is smart and if she has to fight the PC's she want's to know how to deal with them.
I nailed Urz and Sam with baleful polymorph, I trapped Damone with black tentacles, and the rest of the party was very quickly going to be in bad shape.
At that point the party was woken up from their Nightmare and were given an Amulet to hold back Mal'Inia's ability to use divination to track them. At this point we were getting late at night. The party agreed that they would prepare for the next phase the following week, but now recognized that dispel magic and the ability to detect invisibility would become critical if they were to survive Mal'Inia.
Another good week in gaming, some quick thinking only a little cheating on my part made for some nicely challenging encounters- hopefully the players had a good time.
Thanks for reading!
-Ubercroz
Sunday, July 29, 2012
Episode 17
This week I am beginning to lead my group on a little side jaunt. Its been several sessions since we had a multi-night adventure so I had been working on something that I thought would be good. I took some inspiration from Neil Spicer's Fellnight Queen Module. I have not read his actual module, but I did read a review, and I read his proposal. It certainly has my own twist on it, and I am using rules that don't exist... kinda.
Episode 17
The PC's took some time to prepare for the upcoming wedding of Duke Arlington and his new fiance. They got in to some fancy clothes, haggled people down on prices and in general made sure that they were ready to go be guests at a royal wedding.
As they arrived it was obvious that something bad was going to happen, because I drew a battle map. After the wedding as the reception was hitting a high point the windows broke open and inky black fog started pouring in.
As the fog rolled in dark grey skinned goblins and firey eyed satyrs with great axes began attacking the reception. These were a racial template that I made called Dark Fey. The main advantage they have is the can dimension step through the dark fog. They are very mobile, though not particularly strong. I gave the PC's control of the handful of guards in the room. As more goblins filled the room a Dark Fey elf named Abalest stepped in and declared that his mistress Mal'Inia sent her greetings. He then threw a swarm on the ground that immediately covered the Duke and poisoned him with an otherworldly source.
The Party fought off the goblins and then with the help of the High Priest of Tyr, Bertrand, that Typhus had been working with found that the source of the disease was a Fey Lord, in this case Mal'Inia. Doing some research the party found Mal'Inia had been sealed into a pocket dimension by the Dukes family centuries ago. Somehow her dimension had been breached and now she was preparing to wage war on the PC's dimension.
They headed to the Dukes estate and did some additional research, and during this time the hordes of Mal'Inia's Dark Fey had been attacking town along the northern mountains. The point of the breach had been determined as being near the village of Ebonhon. They also found that the only way to cure the Duke was to kill the Fey Lord who had infected him, and that you can't kill a Fey Lord in their own dimension. Not knowing what else to do they decided to head to the rift and see if they could find a way to eliminate Mal'Inia.
The village was small, around the same size as Durrisburg- the first village they spent time in. But the village had become occupied by the military. There were wizards there holding back the fog and patrols trying to contain the Dark Fey from coming down the cliff and invading their dimension.
With the assistance of a local guide they made their way up the cliff avoiding the staging ground of the Dark fey army. At the top of the cliff they found a a stone-henge like set of stones with 1 missing. From the center there was a large dark rift.
Once they enetered the rift they saw a host of dark goblins, satyrs, lesser fey, Ogres, and various assortments of other monstrosities. The PC's quickly slipped into the wilderness rather than facing the army head on. As they passed through the forest they ran into a group of good dark fey who were fighting a rebellion against Mal'Inia and were taking to the encampment in the woods and to their leader, the Dark Unicorn Oberron.
Episode 17
The PC's took some time to prepare for the upcoming wedding of Duke Arlington and his new fiance. They got in to some fancy clothes, haggled people down on prices and in general made sure that they were ready to go be guests at a royal wedding.
As the fog rolled in dark grey skinned goblins and firey eyed satyrs with great axes began attacking the reception. These were a racial template that I made called Dark Fey. The main advantage they have is the can dimension step through the dark fog. They are very mobile, though not particularly strong. I gave the PC's control of the handful of guards in the room. As more goblins filled the room a Dark Fey elf named Abalest stepped in and declared that his mistress Mal'Inia sent her greetings. He then threw a swarm on the ground that immediately covered the Duke and poisoned him with an otherworldly source.
The Party fought off the goblins and then with the help of the High Priest of Tyr, Bertrand, that Typhus had been working with found that the source of the disease was a Fey Lord, in this case Mal'Inia. Doing some research the party found Mal'Inia had been sealed into a pocket dimension by the Dukes family centuries ago. Somehow her dimension had been breached and now she was preparing to wage war on the PC's dimension.
They headed to the Dukes estate and did some additional research, and during this time the hordes of Mal'Inia's Dark Fey had been attacking town along the northern mountains. The point of the breach had been determined as being near the village of Ebonhon. They also found that the only way to cure the Duke was to kill the Fey Lord who had infected him, and that you can't kill a Fey Lord in their own dimension. Not knowing what else to do they decided to head to the rift and see if they could find a way to eliminate Mal'Inia.
The village was small, around the same size as Durrisburg- the first village they spent time in. But the village had become occupied by the military. There were wizards there holding back the fog and patrols trying to contain the Dark Fey from coming down the cliff and invading their dimension.
With the assistance of a local guide they made their way up the cliff avoiding the staging ground of the Dark fey army. At the top of the cliff they found a a stone-henge like set of stones with 1 missing. From the center there was a large dark rift.
Once they enetered the rift they saw a host of dark goblins, satyrs, lesser fey, Ogres, and various assortments of other monstrosities. The PC's quickly slipped into the wilderness rather than facing the army head on. As they passed through the forest they ran into a group of good dark fey who were fighting a rebellion against Mal'Inia and were taking to the encampment in the woods and to their leader, the Dark Unicorn Oberron.
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