Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Elsord0 02-01-08, 12:12 AM	Hey all. I thought I'd write up a little recap of my group's adventure using the DD1 Barrow of the Forgotten King. I know how much I love reading other peoples and how helpful they can be, I have the extra time on my hands so what the heck. Intro Three adventurers find themselves in the Coronet and Cabbage Inn in the sleepy town of Kingsholm. A lvl 2 human warblade, a lvl 2 gnome wizard and a lvl 1 Aasimar Cleric with the Courage and Dream domains. As it turns out the wizard, Grobblebob, was training under a kindly old sage, when suddenly and mysteriously, his master disappeared. Realizing that he could learn no more from his instructor, seeing that he was not present to teach him, Grobblebob has hired out the services of Dagmoor, the warblade, to help him seek out his missing teacher. Dagmoor, coming from a wealthy noble family, has trained his whole life at a well-reputed warrior's academy. Dagmoor seeks only his own glory, and sees Grobblebob as a simple means to that end. Why the cleric Alfor is with them is at this time unknown. The PCs are approached by the Innkeeper, the captain of the guard, and a wealthy dwarf noble. There is trouble up at the graveyard and the PCs are offered a job: Go into the mausoleum and discover the fates of a missing family and two sentinels (town guards). For 50gp the PCs agree. Dagmoor suggests the possibility that perhaps Grobblebob's magic instructor might be found in the mausoleum of this sleepy town. "Stranger things have happened" the diminutive wizard replies and they head up to the graveyard following the lead of Mia, the captain of the guard. Wolves at the Door Mia is a little chagrined that the gate to the graveyard is open but lets the PCs enter alone. Upon approaching the mausoleum I tell the PCs that they see two dead bodies lying at the entrance of the mausoleum. I then secretly roll spot checks for all the PCs. Before I can tell them that Grobblebob has spied out a hidden threat, Dagmoor announces that he rushes up to the bodies, Alfor states that he follows. I read the descriptions of the dead bodies then tell Grooblebob that he sees wolves lying in wait. He attempts to warn his comrades but the wolves are upon them before he calls out. Both wolves attack the nearest PCs, one goes for Alfor, and the other for Dagmoor. The wolves hit on their surprise round attacks. Dagmoor takes minor damage and is able to shake the beast from his leg, but Alfor doesn't fair as well. The wolf does 7 damage (leaving Alfor with 2hp) and drags him down to the ground. Grobblebob pops the wolf attacking Dagmoor with a crossbow bolt during the surprise round. Standing upon the stairs Dagmoor strikes down on the wolf and scores a telling blow. Alfor, realizing his dire strait, strikes at the beast but misses. He then attempts to avoid an attack of opportunity by rolling from his square. The wolf snaps at him as he retreats but it glances of his armor. At this point the wolf facing off with Dagmoor thinks better of it, and dashes off. Seeing its prey wounded and flailing about on the ground, the 2nd wolf pursues Alfor, but fortunately the cleric is able to ward off its snapping jaws. Grobblebob (impressing everyone) shows he is quite capable with his crossbow and hits the wolf mauling Alfor. At this point the Warg decides the moment has come to join the fray and enters the combat. Making a bee line towards the squishy caster it taunts, "I shall enjoy tasting your flesh, Gnome." At this point the party is primarily concerned with the possible death of their cleric. This in mind, Dagmoor attempts to push the wolf back a square to give Alfor some breathing room. He fails to do so, but the wolf misses its opportunity to bite at the opening in Dagmoor's defenses. At this point Alfor decides to cast defensively but is unable to maintain his concentration. The wolf has a difficult time scoring another hit due to Alfor's armor. Having had enough, Grobblebob steps back and scorches the area around the worg and the wolf with a blazing spout of flames, both are quick to jump aside and little damage is done. The worg then attacks the wizard but is unable to make any contact. The valiant-hearted warblade takes initiative and tumbles in between both foes; in one fluid motion strikes a downward chop first at the wolf, disjointing its head from the upper half of its torso, then using a flourishing maneuver, brings his sword back up and around 180 degrees and spits the worg through its chest with a deciding downward thrust. Promptly after getting up off the ground Alfor pummels the dead/dying wolf's head with his mace. After a about 15 minutes of deliberation the group decides not to attempt to tie up the worg and bring it with them into the mausoleum. So Dagmoor puts his longsword through the thing's eye and ends it. After the battle the group determines that these are the missing sentinels, they grab their "dog tags" to take back to town. Alfor makes heal checks on the bodies and determines that the cause of death was bludgeoning and arrow wounds. A little intrigued by this finding, the group ventures into the mausoleum. They find a disgusting scene: blood smeared everywhere. The battle must have been fought here and the bodies dragged out they deduce, but why would whoever did this drag them outside? This much the companions know, it was intelligent creatures, or at least creatures under the control of intelligent creatures who did this to the guards. After finding the keys hanging in the only other door the PCs decide that the only way to find out more is to delve deeper so they descend the stairs they find on the other side of the door. Lower Mausoleum The PCs quickly notice that this is some kind of preparation room for burying the deceased. Two of the bodies seem to be fresh and they approach the nearest of the two. Dagmoor is more cautious than before, but is still caught off guard when one of the bodies he is standing next to reaches out to hit him! A little disappointed at his ineptitude at killing wolves, Alfor seizes upon the opportunity and immediately pulls out his star-shaped holy symbol and channels positive energy in a burst around him and his allies. The zombies immediately flee to the corners of the room and cower in "fear". Dagmoor then walks up to the zombie nearest him and slashes at it with a fearsome cut. Grobblebob fires off another crossbow bolt, but misses. Then the skeletons arrive across the long room with rubble from some of the interment tables separating them from the party. Alfor helps Dagmoor finish off the first zombie then turns his attention to the skeletons. The wizard conjures an oily substance and greases the skeleton with a flaming arrow knocked in its bow, but the creature somehow manages to hold on to its weapon. Meanwhile, Dagmoor rushes over to the second zombie and makes quick work of it. The skeletons let fly their missiles but fail to hit anything, save the flame wielding bowman who sinks his arrow deep into Grobblebob's shoulder. Without delay, heroically, Alfor charges out into the debris and turns all the skeletons with his holy energy. Dagmoor runs out to aid his companion and the two are able to finish off the remaining skeletons without much trouble. It is at this time that Dagmoor and Alfor discover their gnome counterpart was no where to be found. After a moment of confusion they learn from the fully recovered gnome that after drinking a potion, Grobblebob remained hidden behind an interment table for the duration of the battle. After identifying the corpses as most of the missing family, the fellowship notices that one of the vaults is sealed shut. After knocking on it with a hammer they hear the cries of a young woman pleading for help. Grobblebob asks the girl to identify herself and when she doesn't he decides to leave the girl in the vault. Dagmoor thinks better of that and pries open the vault with his handy crowbar. The girl isn't much help to the party, since she is extremely shaken. They realize that they had accomplished all they were sent out to do so they head back to town with one scared little girl in tow. Intermisson: Back in Town After recapping their findings to the Innkeeper the companions collect their 50 gold pieces. They also accept an offer to track down whoever is responsible for these terrible events. Before leaving town they ask for any aid that might be given and are alloted one free cure light wounds potion by the town's halfling cleric. They rest for the night in the inn and interrogate the girl they rescued before they set out. She doesn't help them much, except to relay to them that she saw some horned monster thingies and a orangish skinned humanoid with nasty teeth and armor. Side Tomb After a quick respite the adventurers march back into the underground segment of the mausoleum. They proceed to explore the room adjacent to the one where they fought the undead. After searching the room they find a door, a stairway leading lower into the earth and that in similar fashion to the previous room, all the vaults have been raided and pillaged. Being the thorough dungeon delvers that they are, they decide to first explore behind the door. I think the door leading to the side tomb is supposed to be locked but i forgot about that and they were able to just open it up. Grobblebob, ever the self-surviving low level mage, elects to stay at the top of the doorway holding the torch, as Alfor and Dagmoor, undeterred by the fading din they hear after opening the door, descend into the room to check out the twin sarcophagi and what ever phat loot resided therein. This, of course, is when the clockwork menders decided to let their presence be known. The battle drags on for quite some time as both Dagmoor and Alfor have a hard time landing a blow against those pesky little wasps, especially as they flit back and forth, using the coffins as cover. The menders with their futility small stingers (1d2-4 damage) do very little real damage(1 dmg per hit) to either Alfor or Dagmoor. Also, as hearty fighter-types, they easily stave off the poison that attempts to seep into their blood time and time again. Fortunately, Dagmoor and Alfor find they are able to strike at the pesky little buggards when they enter their squares to attack them. Finally, Dagmoor is able to land a solid hit against a clockwork mender, not leaving much of it save some bits of scrap metal. After a lengthy battle Dagmoor and company are able to clear out all the constructs. With great effort Dagmoor is able to pry open the sarcofagi. Alfor refuses to help desecrate the resting place of these deceased souls. Much to Dagmoor's dismay, he finds only bones and no phat loot as was expected. Feeling gipped and a bit jaded, Alfor and Dagmoor rejoin the wizard in the corridor and proceeded to descend the stairs to the beholder room. *We played for about three hours and that is as far as we got. I was expecting them to get twice that far but they were entertaining themselves with role-play between battles.
Rizzen_Xiltyn 02-09-08, 08:41 AM	Hey there, would love to see more from this adventure! im currently running it and would love to see how u and ur group handled the encounters!
Elsord0 02-09-08, 05:35 PM	Beholder Room So Grobblebob, Dagmoor, and Alfor rejoin there Quest to bring some unknown, tomb-raiding villains to justice. Having really only one option left to them they descend the stairs that lead to a large door. All the characters are of good alignment so they easily see the cryptic engraving on the stone door. (I handed them a scanned print out of the door and they mulled it over for about 30min). Dagmoor was able to discern that the door was locked. Nobody could detect how to open the door as there were no apparent latches or doorknobs to gain entry. ( I had considered just having the door be slightly ajar but I felt like making the PCs work for it instead). Dagmoor had the initial idea to just press the center eye of the beholder to unlock the door. Being hesitant to meet a quick and untimely death, however, dissuaded him from actually pressing the eye. They quickly realized that the verses of the riddle corresponded to the pictures in the beholder's eyestalks, but it was very difficult for them to ascertain what each picture depicted. They erroneously thought that at least some of the pictures were not represented in in the corresponding riddle. (They all are, but some are unclear. They didn't realize "magic dies" corresponded with the center eye and "fear and mind" shared one comma which I think led them to believe should be counted as one, but anyway, somehow that's what they thought.) So they ended up pushing the 2 circular pictures that they thought were not represented in the riddle, but nothing happened. At this point Dagmoor just went with his first thought and pressed the central eye, and sure enough that was what it took to dispel the arcane lock and the door swung open. (In retrospect it might have been wiser for them to just find the door slightly ajar because it seemed kind of anticlimactic for them to puzzle over this door for so long and then realize that the riddle is really quite irrelevant to the door). Once they entered the Beholder room the whole room illuminated; they saw at once the center eye tile engraved on the floor. Alfor was able to determine that something was strangely similar between the shape of this room and the picture on the door. He immediately went to his left and found 4 images engraved into the stone floor. It came quickly to them that perhaps there needed to be some kind of rearranging in accordance to the pattern on the door. Alfor searched the tiles to see if they were movable. (I didn't want them to be able to tell the images were movable just by looking because that seemed kind of chintzy. I mean come on, who would create something like this and then totally give away the answer because the tiles that needed to be moved were easily identified just by the fact that some were movable and others weren't.) Alfor didn't find any of them were movable, so he reached out with his mace to touch one of the squares. Upon making contact with the square, the entire image rose out from the ground and and became a separate, movable tile. (It was a good thing they went left instead of right because tampering with the tiles in the right alcove could have meant certain death!). As they placed the final tile to accurately mirror the image on the door, a green ray shot from the ceiling and disintegrated a square of floor, revealing a secret passage leading deeper into the Barrow. Staircase After descending the ladder, Alfor thought it prudent to cast his light spell on Dagmoor's shield, instead of Grobblebob carrying a torch. So down they went. When suddenly on the second landing a seemingly harmless pile of bones animated beneath there feet! Two skeletal wolves were really no match for a cleric and his hardy adventurers. So having easily dispatched the two undead fiends, Dagmoor walks down the flight of stairs only to reveal with his light an hulking ogre zombie! ( I kept them moving in initiative so they kind of knew to expect something more.) The ogre zombie, immediately after being revealed by the light charges forward and lays into Dagmoor hard with a punishing blow from his greatclub. Alfor then turns the ogre zombie to give them some space. All three of the adventurers move down the stairs into close quarters with the undead monstrosity. (they soon came to realize that this was a mistake.) After a magic missile and a sapphire diamond strike, the ogre was ready to deal out some more unholy punishment. (First target: the cleric of course.) And as it was, the ogre apparently did not appreciate being "turned" so he promptly one-hit Alfor into negatives. Luckily Alfor self-stabilized. A few more rounds of trading blows left our hapless heros on the edge of total death. Dagmoor found himself at 8 HP and after Grobblebob got knocked to 0 hp, Dagmoor decided to beat a hasty retreat. Up the stairs he went followed only by Grobblebob's string of curses for leaving him in a corner with an Ogre Zombie's great club between himself and the exit. Having little choice but to provoke an attack of opportunity, Grobblebob limps over to the stairs as the Ogre Zombie, missing for the first time, is unable to cash in on his opportunity to make gnome pancakes. Taking cover around the corner of the staircase wall Grobblebob makes a swift action to draw his potion. Dagmoor at this point realizing his folly, shouts to Grobblebob to hang on, quaffs his potion, and moves next to Grobblebob. Unfortunatley he didnt have enough time to get between the ogre zombie and Gobblebob. Which left the poor wizard to cower behind his wall with partial cover, bracing himself for the ogre zombie's next assault. Which came and barely missed the cowering gnome. Not wasting anytime, Grobblebob retreats well behind Dagmoor. Dagmoor then rushes out to meet his towering foe head on! One ogre zombie attack latter and Dagmoor is left with negative hit points sprawled awkwardly at the bottom of the stairs. Grobblebob, at first pondering the value of a timely retreat, decides instead to be heroic. Swiftly drawing a potion (Potion belt {FRCS} ftw!) and moving to the defeated Dagmoor, Grobblebob pours his potion down his fallen ally's throat. Dagmoor awakens, finding himself on the ground with an ogre zombie about to finish the grisly job of wiping out him and his fellow adventurers. So with one final effort he swings his sword up from under the feet of his hulking foe, and brings the beast down. Sabotaged Bridge (I allowed Dagmoor and Grobblebob to level up before entering this room. All characters were again at full health.) After opening the door the PCs found a rope bride spanning out before them. The water below was dark but they were able to see it wasn't terribly deep when they shone their light towards it. Knowing the low level perils of rope bridges Dagmoor and Alfor tie themselves together as a safeguard. Dagmoor crosses first and alone. As he reaches five feet away the bridge snaps but he is able to make his fortitude save and he clings to the side of the drop off. He successfully climbs up. Alfor then pulls the rope bridge to his side of the crevice, unties his end of the rope from around his waist and ties it to the plank nearest to Dagmoor's side. He then ties one end of a different rope on the other side of the same plank. Before Dagmoor pulls the bridge back over to try to tie it back to its posts, Grobblebob uses his handyman profession skill to determine that the bridge was in fact tampered with. Once Dagmoor has the bridge back to in working order (I rolled hidden use rope checks, which he failed) he gives the okay for the rest of his companions to continue to cross. Alfor goes first but by time he gets halfway across one of the ropes that Dagmoor tied off is loosed. Alfor falls into the water (which I changed to being 10ft deep instead of 4ft), but he is able to grab onto the bridge that is still attached by one rope. Unfortunatley this is when the ooze attacks. Before Alfor can start working his way out of the water he is grabbed by something in the water and shouts out in alarm. Grobblebob readies his crossbow to fire if the enemy shows itself. It never does though, since the ooze is transparent and effectively invisible in those conditions. Alfor ends up losing multiple grapples and is pinned and dragged to the bottom of the pool. The ooze is also able to squeeze the air from his lungs and he begins to take drowning damage. All the while Dagmoor is quite confused and does everything he can to AVOID jumping into the water himself. First he cuts the other rope of the bridge so the bridge will sink down and Alfor has something to grab. Then he shoots a flaming arrow but misses. Still not sure what they are facing Grobblebob attempts a shot, he hits and is able to tell that the attacker is some sort of transparent ooze-like creature. Dagmoor at this point decides to fling a flask of holy water into the fracas, thinking that perhaps their foe is an invisible undead octopus. Grobblebob then ridicules Dagmoor for throwing water into more water and wishes sarcastically that they had a warrior in the party. All the while Alfor begins to fail his constitution checks for drowning. Having enough of this foolishness Grobblebob resorts to his newly acquired 2nd level spell scorching ray, and scores a solid hit against the ooze. Taking encouragement from Grobblebob's previous sharp rebuke, Dagmoor dives in sword point down and spears the unseen horror. Alfor suddenly realizes the ooze has let him go and tries to swim up but fails. Dagmoor quickly grabs his submerged friend , pushes up from the bottom and breaks the plane of the water with one sputtering, nearly drowned cleric in tow. (The ooze retreated, but what followed was pretty funny). Dagmoor swims to the side he came from and climbs up and out of the water. Alfor, however, can not make a climb or swim check to save his life. Grobblebob attempts to pull the severed rope bridge back towards him, with Alfor attached. With a zero bonus to strength it doesn't happen. Alfor then attempts to use the bridge as a ladder, he fails the check. Grobblebob, unfortunately, still holding on to the rope bridge at this point fails a counter strength check and is pulled into the water by the flailing cleric. After quite an ordeal, all three eventually make it to the other side of the crevice wet and slightly frustrated. (We had a fun little meta-game digression concerning the believability of some of the finer points of 3.5's swim check system. The guy playing Grobblebob was a little perturbed by the whole situation. Apparently, even though swim is a skill which can be used untrained, without putting any ranks into it, no one is guaranteed to actually be able to swim at any given moment. I suppose they could have taken 10, but being under duress, I made them make the checks. Anyways, I ended up just letting them walk along the bottom while holding their breath, :D )
mtbOgre 02-13-08, 08:06 PM	(We had a fun little meta-game digression concerning the believability of some of the finer points of 3.5's swim check system. The guy playing Grobblebob was a little perturbed by the whole situation. Apparently, even though swim is a skill which can be used untrained, without putting any ranks into it, no one is guaranteed to actually be able to swim at any given moment. I suppose they could have taken 10, but being under duress, I made them make the checks. Anyways, I ended up just letting them walk along the bottom while holding their breath, :D ) Swim is one of those skills that no one puts ranks in but when they need it they regret it. While it may seem inaccurate swimming while clothed is tough, with armor on is ridiculously tough. The bridge broke on our group too but we managed to keep everyone out of the water. The ooze grappled one of the characters as he crossed and but he was roped and there was a tug-o-war. The ooze lost out when I cast grease on the characters leg. Anyhow, sorry to interrupt your write up.
Elsord0 02-14-08, 10:27 PM	Yeah, I want to try and find a suit of armor and go swimming just to see how hard it is to swim with encumbrance. Or at least get a bunch of body weights and tie them and some pots and pans around me. I think it would be near impossible to swim, let alone stay afloat, but it would be a fun experience. Also, I know I've heard a lot of concern about the rune hound being too hard of an encounter, but my players seem to have skipped that area altogether for now. Central Hub After drying off a bit and resting the PCs decided that "going left is always best". Upon entering the room Dagmoor finds one of the statues interesting so approaches it. Out pops the zombie that is lying in wait from behind the nearest partitioning wall and a few rounds later the two varags join the fray. (I made little cardboard cutouts of the pictures of varags from mm3? since I couldn't find any minis to represent these uncommon goblinoids). Dagmoor using his newly acquired disarming strike maneuver relieves the zombie of its burdensome scimitar, Grobblebob jokes that the zombie probably didn't even know why it had one to begin with. (The Zombie had a good amount of hit point and the entire party seemed to focus all their efforts on the zombie.) Once the varags joined the fray they immediately started hitting the PCs with flanks and sneak attacks. Grobblebob brought down the zombie with an almost full damage scorching ray spell, but was promptly cut down to negatives by a spring attacking varag. Dagmoor then disarmed the dual wielding varag but suffered a crippling blow from behind and went down for the count. (This is where things got interesting). Alfor starts performing a fighting retreat to take cover in the doorway of the bridge room and is able to strike down the weaker of the 2 varags on his way. The other varag having only one weapon is still more than a match for Alfor at this point, however, with a very high AC. Luckily, Alfor also has a high AC and is able to hold out enough to retreat into the rope bridge room and cast light of lunia, allowing him to discharge a beam of light at a touch attack for the next two rounds. This helps him to bring The varags HP down a bit but after Alfor gets hit and dropped down to 3 Hp, things are stating to look very dire. Alfor realizes then that he needs to get his allies back in it. Grobblebob had stabilized, but Dagmoor was not looking good, and getting worse every second. By this point, Alfor is backed up against the water filled crevice (no bridge since they cut it) and decides to just take the Attack of Opportunity and retreats back into the room with his fallen allies, slamming the door behind him. This buys him some time as the varag is not expecting to be blocked with the door and take a few seconds to throw it back open. By then Alfor has healed Grobblebob back up to 0 hp. Grobblebob uses his first turn to scramble out of the immediate vicinity. The varag then bursts through the door and cuts Alfor down. Just as the varag turns to finish off the wounded mage he gets a face full of magic missile and hits the floor dead. After searching the room andgetting together all the loot the PCs decide to rest again on the cots that the varags had been using (usually I don't allow so much resting, but with 3 PCs I have to give them a chance). Canal After trying to go through the north door but finding it jammed, the PCs wander down into the canal room and find two dead varags. They are extremely surprised to find the cause of death is hypothermia. (One of the PCs asked me at this point what a person who dies of hypothermia looks like and I had to kind of make it up, "purplish and wet?") Well after noticing their own breath was visible in the air and that there was water running through the room, Dagmoor carefully approached the bridge crossing the canal. At this point a snake shaped water weird (one of my players said "kind of like in the movie abyss") emerges form the canal and warns the players to turn back. Dagmoor, thinking fast, says that he and his friends are here to honor the fallen warriors that this tomb was built to memorialize. Sensing that these people before him have goodly intentions, the water weird bids them to quickly pass and to kill those who previously escaped his grasp. Surprised by how diplomatic his warrior companion could be, the wizard Grobblebob leaves the room shaking his head in wonder. Hall of the Honored Upon entering this room the PCs first admire the 4 statues in the room and then strike out for the large stone door to their left. It is there that they surprise a wererat pondering at another stone door deeper in that room. The wererat hisses and immediately Dagmoor runs down and attacks with Alfor close on his heels. Unfortunatley for the PCs, every attack they score seems to instantly close up, and very little real damage seems to be done. Slashing with his sword the wererat starts tumbling through the player's squares in order to put himself in a position to retreat since he is obviously outnumbered. Although as the fight continues, Garuk the wererat, begins to think he might actually take these adventurers down, since none of them seem to have any silver weapons. Thats until Grobblebob unloads another huge scorching ray. Garuk then makes a final tumble past the wizard and is about to run off when Dagmoor comes up and strikes a critical hit. Finally doing some real damage Dagmoor is about to finish of the scraggly wererat when Garuk throws down his sword and pleads for his life. After the PCs interrogate the wererat, Garuk asks them to let him go. Dagmoor recalls that by Garuk's own account he partook in the slaying of the townfolk they were here to avenge. Garuk swears that he will reform his criminal ways if only they let him go. Seeing their hesitation, the wererat says he will throw in his cloak if they let him go. The PCs agree and he scuttles out of the room in such a hurry that he drops his 5 silver crossbow bolts on the way out. (I figure the PCs might need them in upcoming encounters.) After the encounter the players go down into the tomb and rather quickly figure out the riddle and open the door leading to the stone sarcophagi. They are VERY hesistant to loot this tomb, especially after their promise to the water weird so they almost proceed with out claiming all the phat loot inside. But (thankfully) after 20 minutes of discussion they decide to open the coffin, all the while supplicating to any spirit they might tick off in the process. After reading the note, Dagmoor decides that he wants to leave something with the sarcophagi in return for the things they took. So he tells Alfor to leave his old mace (I put a +1 mace in there for him instead of the rapier), which Alfor does saying "I could care less what happens to my old junk". Dagmoor leaves his share of the jewels they found on the dead varags by the canal (those being the very jewels that were looted from the buried townsfolk). Grobblebob ridicules dagmoor for leaving things unnecessarily in exchange for the treasure that was freely given and doesn't leave anything.
Elsord0 02-23-08, 07:59 PM	Having only three PCs facing a difficult module has been tough, but thankfully we found a 4th player so enter Valla the rogue. But, Before they could meet up with this mysterious ally, our heroes had to find their way through the locked door! Having let Garuk get away and not having a rogue currently in the party made things difficult to proceed. They turned back and started heading for the untried door way back in the sabotaged bridge room. but upon opening the door to the Canal they found that Garuk had met an untimely end at the watery hands of the ticked off water weird. Seeing Garuk's belongings strewn about on the stairs, but not wanting to share in like fate, Grobblebob was faced with an interesting dilemma. Use mage hand to grab the MW Crossbow, or the satchel that might very well contain a key to the next room. After much deliberation, Grobblebob decided it was best to grab the pouch and low n' behold there was a key. Dagmoor was curious as to what the key looked like and after a brief sarcastic description of what keys look like they headed for the next room. Inner Vault After some extremely cautious reconnaissance, Our heroes at last peeped around the corner of the partitioning walls to see a armored hobgoblin placing black onyxes in the heads of skeletons. As dagmoor began to creep back away from the wall his armor jingled and Krootad called out "Garuk, is that you?" After about a minute of no response, Krootad walked over to investigate only to find a Warblade and a Gnome with a caught look on their face. Initiative is rolled. Krootad starts the battle by dropping an onyx in the eyes of a minotaur skeleton that is laying there on the floor. Valla, jumping from the shadows makes a run for the jewels but is spotted and beats a hasty retreat mid-stride. The battle raged on for quite some time, as krootad animated the minotaur and then retread behind a newly animated wall of skeletons. Grobblebob eventually took out the skeletons with a burning hands spell and as Krootad charged across the room to make him pay, Vall jumped out of the shadows for a nice sneak attack AoO. That dropped Krootad, a round later Valla drove his kukri through the hobgoblins eye just to be sure. Meanwhile Alfor and Dagmoor had their hands full with this minotaur skeleton. After repeated turn check failures (thanks to the desecration aura on the statue) the two armored heroes are eventually both knocked into negatives. Having just finished off Krootad as this happened, Valla rushed over to give Alfor a healing potion. Alfor then tried to "heal" the skeleton but failed his defensive casting check. Grobblebob contemplated retreating, but instead started hurling his Cure light wounds potions like Molotov's cocktails. Eventually the minotaur was brought down, but not before almost all of the party's potions were expended. Dark Islands The rope navigations went by rather humorously. Although the players had pretty much had enough of rope encounters afterwards. The first island went by without a hitch. It was as they were climbing across to the third island that I had the monster attack. It opened up with 2 fear rays (which I would have made them jump off the cliff if they failed) but thanks to Alfor's Aura of Courage (Courage Domain) both Dagmoor and Alfor resisted. They were all able to make their saves against the rays and after a few well placed crossbow shots the floating eyeball strand fell into the water below. Then Alfor decided to strip off his armor so he could climb the next rope. He tried tossing his armor across to Dagmoor, which was working fine until Dagmoor botched a dex check and reflex save and dropped Alfor's leggings over the cliff. On the final rope, the detached one, Dagmoor pulled up the rope and jumped off the side and swung up to the other side. Then tied off the rope to the piton. Thats when the true comedy of errors began. Grobblebob while maneuvering the rope fails miserably on his check and plummeted 20ft to the floor (I rolled 2 6's for dmg). Next, Alfor decided to forgo the rope altogether and just make a jump for it. He proceeded to stumble over his feet and fall over the edge and on top of Grobblebob. Grobblebob is out for the count. Valla yelled out over the cliff, "At least it was the Cleric!" After they all climbed back up we had to end the session. (I increased the size of the final platform so that a portion of it is still lying in shadows. Once they venture near the rope ladder (to Labyrinth) that I have dangling right outside of the shadowy area, I am going to toss my beholder mini out on to the mat and let them freak out, then tell them that it looks dead.) The Labyrinth Although, my group has not yet actually encountered the Labyrinth at this time, I am going to lay out how I did it and then report next week on how it played out. I did away with the whole twisty turvy dead end room like they give you in the book. Basically every room will be a straight forward 15sq by 15sq room with a door in the middle of all four walls. The correct door will be determined randomly. The players will need to choose the correct door 5 times. Upon the 5th correct choice they will have exited the Labyrinth. Every time the players make a correct choice it will lead them to a room with a set encounter. The set encounters are in this order: Satyr, Salamander, Air Mephit, Xorn. Upon entering the set encounters the creature in that room will ask for an offering. If the Players offer an acceptable offering they will be shown the correct door. If they do not, then they will be attacked and have to guess. The correct offerings have something to do with the creatures involved. Satyr = wine, song, dance; Salamander = fire; Air Mephit = wind; Xorn = earth. I will be liberal with their attempts and if anything they give is remotely close to those things I will let them succeed. If at anytime the PCs make an incorrect choice when choosing a door they will be subjected to a random encounter from my random encounter chart when they enter that room. The Creatures must be defeated before the doors can be opened. I scraped the suggested random encounter list for one with a little more flavor. I based my choices on cool mini's I never got a chance to use yet. 01-05 Justice Archon - shows them the right door 06-16 2 Fiendish wolverines 17-27 Dracotaur 28-38 Gelatonous cube 39-49 5 Styrges 50-65 2 Lemures 66-80 Ethreal Marauder 81-90 2 Fiendish dire weasels 91-95 Fiendish monstrous scorpion 96-100 Protectar - Shows them the right door I'm probably looking forward to this more than any other encounter so far.
Zarith 02-24-08, 08:27 AM	What happened to the creature lurking amoung the islands? Did you decide not to use it?
Elsord0 02-24-08, 12:29 PM	sorry, I had to quit my write up before I was finished, but I edited in all the stuff I missed, so its up to date now. Thanks for reading!
Zarith 02-24-08, 12:36 PM	I was wondering about how the Lurking Strangler went for others, because my party blew through it as well. I changed the maze only a little. I used preprinted 20x20 rooms with 2,3 or 4 exits. It went well, better then I had expected.
kardock 02-27-08, 03:49 PM	I am going to toss my beholder mini out on to the mat and let them freak out, then tell them that it looks dead.) oh man that is soooo nasty! i like it! :D great telling, keep it up, i really enjoy this! thanks for sharing!
Elsord0 03-03-08, 06:10 PM	Yeah, they freaked out about the beholder. But quickly enough realized it was dead (even if one was not an expert in beholders, I would imagine a dead one is rather easy to tell). Surprisingly all they really got through in 3 hours was a role playing session in town and the labyrinth. I already laid out how I was doing the labyrinth so I will just briefly recap their experiences in it. Back to town Realizing how low the party was getting on healing supplies, it was decided that the best course was to retreat back to town. Going back through the canal, the party was careful not to tick off the water weird so they opted to encounter the swollen/stuck wooden door. A knock spell was enough to deal with that and they continued on to the sabotaged bridge, which was now really the utterly ruined bridge thanks to Dagmoor's previous handiwork. Giving the ooze that harried them last time only a momentary though, Dagmoor quickly trudged through the water to retrieve the immersed rope bridge. Only to find that the ooze that got away had found its way back and was ready for round 2. After failing countless grapple checks, Dagmoor found himself submerged and drowning as his allies scurried into the water and attempted to hit the all but transparent ooze without worsening the situation by hitting Dagmor instead. A magic missile and a few lucky strikes from Valla's kukri sent the ooze jettisoning back to the safety of its crack. Without any other snafus, the PCs found themselves back in Kingsholm ready for some routine buy and sell. Unfortunatley, nothing ever seems to be that easy for these guys. Everything was going fine as they sold the weapons and armor they picked up from off of their adversaries, although the clerk at the Arms dealership was lowballing them. That's when Grobblebob decided to sell some of the jewelry the party obtained from some of the slain tomb raiders. Eyeballing the proffered baubles, the clerk notices that one of the trinkets looks oddly familiar, sure enough he recognizes it as one of his grandfather's heirlooms. Immediately, the clerk starts raising a ruckus, accusing the adventurers as thieves and crypt-breakers taking advantage of the town's trusting nature by backstabbing them after they hired them to help put things back to normal. After a failed diplomacy check by Dagmoor, who tried to convince him it was a big misunderstanding and that they had meant to return the jewels and accidentally tried to sell them, the clerk runs for the door (getting pick pocketed by Valla in the process) and calls for the Sentinels. Mia responds to the distress call only to be convinced by a timely diplomacy check that it was in fact a misunderstanding. Mia, knowing the clerk as somewhat of a conspiracy theorist, takes the side of the PCs, chastens the clerk for rebel rousing and urges the PCs to get back into the tomb and bring the true robbers to justice. The Labyrinth It didn't take long for the PCs to figure out they were in some kind of a maze. It did take them awhile to figure out the nature of the place. They kept trying to make marks on the rooms they were in, but never were able to find them again, even when immediately backtracking from one room back to the previous one. They wandered around for a few rooms, encountering some summoned monsters until they finally got lucky and chose the randomly determined "correct" door. That is when they encountered the satyr who welcomed them to the labyrinth and asked them for a suitable offering. After much debate they offered it the strangely labeled bottle of wine they had found on Krootad (I placed the wine as loot on the cleric for two reasons: one, to give them something to offer the satyr; two, to give them a clue in the overarching storyline. The wine was labeled in undercommon and revealed it was brewed at the same tavern they will end up at in the sinister spire campaign. Unfortunatley, they never bothered to figure out the label). So the satyr accepted the wine with a laugh and beckoned the party to follow him through the "correct" door. Upon entering the next room the PCs encountered a Salamander. The Salamander spoke to them in a demanding voice, but in a language they could not understand. The party wasn't really able to figure out anything here as none of them spoke Ignan and they didn't think to make an offering to it. Grobblebob ended up making a little note that said "do you like us?" "circle y/n". The Salamander then attacked them and they beat it but got lost a little more as they wandered off through the wrong door again. It was at this point I noticed the party getting quite frustrated and almost down right mad. I think they felt utterly lost and really had no idea what was going on at all. Being the competitive-type people that they are I don't think they tolerated the random nature of the Labyrinth very well. It was a Labyrinth, so they were supposed to feel lost after all, but oh well. Anyway, They eventually made it to the air mephit, who "conveniently" (I am a DM with some measure of compassion) knew common. They decided to offer it a potion of levitate, although, they almost didn't because what would an air mephit actually need one of those for, but they went with it. Taking a whiff of the potion the mephit smiled, being reminded of its home plane, and shewed them the correct way of passage. They ended up offering the xorn a flask of water, which was not an appropriate offering and they had to fight it. After beating the xorn the PCs chose the right door and exited the labyrinth much to everyone's relief (mine included) .
Elsord0 03-05-08, 08:23 PM	Labyrinth Pool (Here falls Alfor, son of Courage) Gladly leaving the maddening snares of the magic labyrinth behind, our fearless heroes made their way to a strange underground pool. Edging very carefully around the out-skirting beach the group decided to send Valla out ahead. Not seeing the runes partially obscured beneath the pebbly gravel Valla unwittingly activated the water trap. Immediately, the room swelled with water and the PCs found themselves treading water around the small islands in the middle of the pool. Bad then became worse as a few swarms of blood sucking leeches roiled out of the depths joined by two monstrously large specimen of the same. Grobblebob was the only one to spot them coming and used his extra time to cry out a warning and adorn himself with magical armor. The armor hindered the leeches very little as a group of the smaller leeches swarmed over him and began draining his life blood. The other leech swarm made it over to Dagmoor and did the same. One of the Giant Leeches latched itself on to Alfor's face and promptly began feasting. Grobblebob was able to extracs himself from the swarm momentarily by scurrying up onto a near-by ledge and attempting to scorch the group with a scorching ray, but to no avail. The swarm immediately followed Grobblebob and the little gnome became overwhelmed by the putrid circumstances and began to vomit profusely. Valla, scurrying up to the same island as Grobblebob scored a few more cuts against the large leech she found herself facing. Dagmoor, realizing that Grobblebob was in dire circumstances, climbed up next to his friend and swung his flail in a risky, but effective downward stroke across Grobblebob's face and body clearing off many of the blood-suckers and dispersing the rest with a thunderous blow to the ground. He then turned and finished off the swarm that was pestering him, but not before taking 4 points of constitution damage. Valla, after trading another blow with the leech, was finally able to put it down. Meanwhile, Alfor did not fair so well against his adversary. After a few rounds of vainly attempting to pull the leech off his face, he lost too much blood and became unconscious and began to slowly sink to the bottom of the pool with the leech still attached. It was only then that the rest of the party realized Alfor's plight. Diving in as fast as she could, Valla braved the waters once again to recover the groups only source of healing. But alas, she was too late, the leech, having finished its meal, detached from Alfor and attacked the flailing Valla, who rolled repeated 1's on her swim checks. Not wanting to see another ally fall, Dagmoor reached down and plucked the squirming valla from the water, and deftly unglued the leech from her. The valiant warrior, leech in hand, was woe to find out that the leech wasn't picky and began to immediately suck him. Once Valla recovered, she swung her kukri out and killed the otherwise unharmed leech with one lucky blow to its leechy vitals. Stripping himself of his gear, Dagmoor dove to recover his fallen ally. After seeing that nothing could be done for Alfor, he kicked him back in the water, after relieving him of his potions and the group's wand of healing. Maze's End Down one man and everyone hurting from a loss of blood (and newly contracted diseases, unbeknown to them of course), the PCs staggered into the next room, unwilling to return to the Labyrinth in order to get back to town. It was there that a voice called out to them from a deep pit calling for aid. After a brief discussion, the party decided to at least find out who it was, although they were pretty sure it was a tomb robber. This in mind they sent Dagmoor to parlay with the man hoping to keep their true numbers hidden. After a brief conversation Dagmoor pulled Amos the Cleric up from his pit. With a little groveling and a few oaths, the group allowed Amos to join their party to help them thwart Amos' former employer. Knowing to expect possible trouble in the next room thanks to Amos' recount of prior events, the party cautiously ventured around the corner, narrowly avoiding another pit trap. Seeing the wreckage strewn about the room, Valla cautiously moved up to one of the statues saying "This must be where those constructs came..." And the two damaged hammerers (replacing the other constructs which I couldn't find in any MM) rolled out of the statues and began their assault. Dagmoor came rushing up to Valla's aid with a punishing blow with his flail that did about max damage to the automaton. Having its whole right side dented in the little hammerer wobbled over to take a swing but was knocked to the ground by a well placed crossbow bolt, courtesy of Grobblebob. Thats when the second Hammerer chugged over to Valla and one-hit her into negatives. The battle which seconds ago seemed to at last be one that would be won easily, quickly swung back to the pinnacle of disaster. Dagmoor quickly straddled the fallen halfling, and began exchanging blows with the construct. After a few rounds Dagmoor was about down to his last round when he finally struck a telling blow and put the pummeling machine out of commision. Surveying the battlefield the party then noticed Amos, cowering behind the corridor wall. Not having aided the party at all in the battle, Amos earned the nick name, Amos the Cowardly Cleric. Healing up as best they could, the party decided to hunkered down and rest amidst the rubble, hoping to regain some vitality and be ready to venture on next time...
Zarith 03-06-08, 06:06 AM	The only character in my group who could set off the runes (non-good) was the one who searched, saw them and avoided them. So they avoided that mess. Good place for a replacement character.
Elsord0 03-17-08, 08:48 PM	Robber Encampment After carefully climbing over the barricade, Valla quietly scouted out the next room. She was able to make a clutch spot check and discovered that there were caltrops in the straw that was strewn about the floor. She pulled away from the wall she was hiding against in order to pick up the caltrops and as she did crossbow bolts flew at her from across the room. Fortunately there was a statue in the way and the bolts caromed harmlessly away from her. The varags were lying in wait and two of them attacked with their scimitars as the leader tried to pick off the adventurers with his short bow. After a good fight, the PCs managed to KO the two goons, and had the leader backed up against the waterfall near the stairs leading to the cavern. That's when Valla decided to move into a flanking position, thinking she was hidden in the waterfall. But it was not to be, as the leader of the varags was able to spot her and take an AoO which brought her to the ground in critical condition. The water began to sweep her down the stairs, but Amos was able to grab her before she plummeted into a bottomless pit. Dagmoor and Grobblebob finished off the leader and the party moved on. Cliffside Waterfall Seeing the rope bolted to the slick cavern wall and a waterfall drenched ledge leading down, the PCs were none to happy. They performed well however, and were able to safely navigate the ledge to about halfway, when suddenly Sigur, the fossegrim, appeared. After demanding to know who was crossing his water fall and what purpose they had in doing so, Dagmoor spoke over Valla's head and declared that they were noble adventurers, who sought to apprehend vile tomb robbers and avenge the deaths of innocent civilians. Having determined that these were good hearted folk, Sigur aided them across his waterfall and warned them of the Tomb Spider lurking in the next room. After taking some time to buff with spells and potions, the group headed into the next room prepared for a vicious battle. False Tomb Entry Upon entering this chamber, the heroes heard a muffled cry sounding from beneath the web filled balcony. Dagmoor approached and found a dwarf in full battle gear wrapped up in a cocoon of webs. Dagmoor shouted out to the unfortunate dwarf "Lo,it seems you are wrapped up in those webs!" The taciturn dwarf replied, "Not the smartest one of the group are ye?" "I'm not the one wrapped up in webs good dwarf" Dagmoor replied, "But perhaps I could help you out, what is your name?" "The name's Torgo Brainbuster, Cleric of Moradin at your service, I'd be careful there is a nasty spider about." And right on cue a swarm of spiders scurried out from the webs under the balcony and a web mummy shambled out from behind a webbed statue. The swarm immediately attacked the dwarf, but he was able to resist the poison with his stout heart. The web mummy attacked Dagmoor but the warblade was able to repel its advances. Grobblebob then made quick work of the mummy with a well placed scorching ray. As the thing bursted into gouts of flame, another swarm of spiders fleeing the inferno, promptly crawled all over Grobblebob. Taking bites everywhere, the Gnome is somehow able to ward of the poison; and incinerate the swarm with a burning hands spell, after he retreated back into the waterfall cavern. By this time Torgo had recovered his wits and after first trying to body slam the swarm with his shield, was able to smash most of them with a few blows from his mighty warhammer. Balcony Immediately after the the swarms were dispersed, the tomb spider decided to let its presence be known. Keeping its height advantage, the spider spent all of its web uses ensnaring Torgo and Dagmoor. The Spider then decided to climb down and feast on its prey. But as the spider came down, Valla was waiting for it. She scored hit after hit upon the great arachnid, leaving small cuts and gashes all across its swollen bulk. Torgo would not suffer the same fate twice and with a great burst of strength was able to erupt from his webbing and stand toe to toe with the spider for several rounds, giving as good as he was getting. Grobblebob, being out of spells, began working the webs that ensnared Dagmoor with his dagger. Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, Dagmoor was able to break free from his bonds. Walking past Torgo who was just about to give his ground, Dagmoor unleashed a furious mountain strike and crushed the spider's head in like a can of beans. (I took away the DR from this creature so it wouldn't TPK the group and I'm glad I did or this could have very easily been the last battle of the campaign. Tomorrow night we play what should be the last night with this module.)
Elsord0 03-20-08, 11:46 AM	Treachery's Price Upon entering the next room, the party was treated to a little classic cinema. After descending the stairs, and viewing a second holograph story, the party decided to try the north door first. When they saw that there were four sarcophagi with portraits of people trying to escape them as if they were imprisoned, the first thing Torgo said was, "They aren't pictures of us are they? Cuz that would be a bad sign". After he went over to confirm that the images engraven on the sarcophagi were not portraits of them, he decided to look at the mirror. As he was doing that Valla was already prying off the rubies that were set into the coffin's lid. Torgo, as he looked into the mirror, saw an image of his greatest success. It was him in the mead hall of his clan's fortress. There he drank the rest of his clan under the table and was from that day known as the hardiest, and coolest dwarf of his clan. Torgo walked away from the mirror very inspired and tried to convince the rest of the party to look into the mirror as well. The rest of the party would not, however, preferring not to risk the capricious magic of long abandoned magical mirrors. The party was also more than a little scared to let Valla leave with the rubies. Torgo thought that those rubies might have kept some evil spirits imprisoned. But nothing happened as the party left the room. They tried the other door next and were confronted by two hideous looking undead, one a bloated abomination and another a shrouded figure in full plate mail. The battle didn't take long as Torgo channeled positive energy and made the two creatures cower in fear as the rest of the party dispatched them with relative ease. (I thought the heucuva might last the 10 rounds of the turning because of his Dr/10, but at about the 7th round Dagmoor used some crazy maneuver and laid down like 40 damage on the thing.) After they left that room the party witnessed another illusion depicting the betrayal of the king by the raven haired man and proceeded to the next room. Betrayer's Throne Valla was the first to enter the Betrayer's throne room. The betrayer asked who it was that disturbed the rest of the king. Valla moving forward with a "who farted" look on her face started stammering some kind of an answer. Dagmoor, the parties diplomat, stepped through the curtain and asked the man on the throne who he was and what he was doing here. the Betrayer responded by saying "I asked you a question first, perhaps it would be polite for you to answer that before questioning me, and also come closer to the throne, and tell your friends to stop hiding and come forth." The party reluctantly all stepped near the dais. After a bit more questioning, the Betrayer didn't really reveal much other than that a group had in fact snuck past him and that he would show them the secret door to follow them. As he got up from the throne Torgo asked if the man was carrying his weapons. When he noticed that he was they all got sense motive checks and everyone except Dagmoor realized the Betrayer's deceitful intent. The betrayer then attacked, summoning his Undead minions as well. Torgo led off with a turn attempt, but the creature did not run in fear as Torgo expected, but instead took some damage. This caused the dwarf cleric to yell out "What sort of thing be you!" Grobblebob shouted that it was possible that he was not truly undead. He had heard of rumors from Baldur's Gate that there were creatures cursed to live forever, but were not in fact undead. Valla confirmed this fact as she moved into a flanking position and hit him in a vital area. Grobblebob shot the betrayer with a lightening bolt and then moved near Dagmoor who had moved to corner one of the mounted skeletons. The betrayer then called Dagmoor to betray his party and the warblade turned around and whacked Grobblebob with his flail. Fortunately Dagmoor regained his senses and turned to attack the mounted skeleton instead of finishing the job on Grobblebob. Grobblebob moved away from Dagmoor in an attempt to find somewhere safe on the battlefield. That is when the other skeletal rider broke away from Torgo and charged Grobblebob with his lance. Grobblebob went down in the negatives. Torgo then entered heal mode and started quaffing potions and using his wand of CLW. Dagmoor, after retreating to drink his own potion only to be hit again by the skeltal rider, was low on hp. He was able to land a few blows on the rider and finish it off. By this time Valla had taken a few hits from the betrayer and Torgo was having a hard time keeping up with the healing. So he turned the other mounted skeleton which fled into the room from whence it came. This allowed the party to use there advantage of numbers to good effect and the betrayer was brought down by a mighty swing from Dagmoor. After the Party finished off the cowering skeletal rider they looted the room and found the secret door from where they heard a clamor and shouting voices. They healed up and advanced to what they only assumed to be the final encounter. They did so warily because almost all their spells had been spent.