Author Topic: Sunless Citadel Adventure Path - Campaign Journal  (Read 45172 times)

Offline ksbsnowowl

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Sunless Citadel Adventure Path - Campaign Journal
« on: July 10, 2014, 05:11:51 PM »
Note, there will be a LOT of spoilers for The Sunless Citadel and the other 3.0 adventures in this campaign journal

So I started a second gaming group.  It consists of three people so far:
  • One of the long-time members of my 20th level Gestalt group
  • My cousin, who played in my Gestalt campaign over a summer when they were 9th-10th level, and also is playing with them now, at 20th level
  • A new player who has played 2nd ed and 4th ed, but had never played 3rd
There were two main impetuses for starting this second game.  The first was that the 20th level gestalt game was starting to burn me out as a DM.  The game just gets crazy nuts at that level, and it was starting to no longer be fun for me to run (when all your PC's are Mind Blanked and Superior Invisible…); since starting this Sunless Citadel campaign, we have actually decided to take a break from the high level gestalt viking campaign, and I will soon be taking them on a romp through Eberron, starting with Whispers of the Vampire's Blade.  Second, my cousin's first real experience playing was in a 9th level gestalt game.  He played a Scout//Archivist.  It's hard to get a firm foundation of the rules when coming in at that level, so I wanted to give him a chance to better learn the basics without all the trappings of abilities to overwhelm his senses.  The fact there is another "new" player just helps that goal even more.

The character creation guidelines were pretty simple, and since this is primarily the original 3.0 adventure path that I'll be running them through, I cut way back on the power level compared to my other campaign.  They are non-gestalt, 28-point-buy first level characters.  They have access to anything that isn't a separate campaign setting (i.e. - no Forgotten Realms or Eberron), but for races I did (at least initially) restrict them to PHB races, or +0 LA variants thereof.

The setting is generally assumed to be Greyhawk or a parallel of it (PHB deities, "Brown Book" PrC's/organizations, etc), though we aren't using Greyhawk maps or politics.  There likely won't be a need for maps of continents, because as I said, I'm primarily running the 3.0 adventure path (though I will be using Expedition to the Demonweb Pits in the level 9-13 range, and the Penumbra Press adventure Beyond the Veil either before or after Demonweb Pits).

See HERE for some more info on my planned alterations to the adventure path.

I ended up with the following party:
  • Belack* the Human Druid.  He took the Protection Devotion and Animal Devotion feats.  My cousin plays this character.
  • Urolph the Unwanted the Dwarven Barbarian.  He's CN and he believes the whole world belongs to him, he just hasn't claimed everything in it yet.  He's very strong (Str 17), but only has a Con of 11.  He uses a Dwarven Urgrosh.  This is the new player.
  • Veri Able the Elven Rogue.  He's planning on going Rogue/Warlock.  This is my long-time player.
*By sheer coincidence, the BBEG of The Sunless Citadel is a Human Druid named Belak.  It took all my restraint for my jaw not to hit the floor at the start of the first session.

I did my prep work and have a text document with fully-updated 3.5 stats on all the monsters in the module, though the occasional skill DC reference has tripped me up from time to time (Jump changed dramatically between revisions).

So, we started the game three weeks ago, and it's gone pretty well so far.  The Sunless Citadel has three potential hooks listed in the beginning of the module, and with three players… I pulled each of them aside and gave them each a different hook.  In quick summary, they are:
1) You're an adventurer! There's a site called the Sunless Citadel.
2) Rumors of magical fruit has lead you to Oakhurst.
3) You've been contracted by the Hucrele merchant family to find their missing family members; they went to investigate the Sunless Citadel about a month ago.

The PC's arrive in town individually on June 1st, and stop in at the Ol' Boar Inn, where they start talking over a few cups of ale.  They hear stories of what's going on around town:
  • The ashen field along the road outside of town was burned to ash generations ago by a dragon (the Dwarf wonders why it hasn't grown back yet; the DM secretly wonders this too).
  • Every year soon after mid-summer, some local goblins come and sell a magical fruit to the townsfolk.  The fruit can heal any ailment.
  • The townsfolk have tried planting the seeds of this fruit, so they can grow their own magical fruit-bearing tree.  Every time it is tried, once the sapling reaches about 3 feet in height, the goblins steal the sapling.  It happened just last week, in fact.
  • The Old Road out of town fell out of use due to goblin banditry.  The goblins don't bother the town, but travelers on that road are sometimes accosted.
  • Local cattle have been slaughtered and exsanguinated, leaving wounds from needle-like claws.
  • There is an old ruin called the Sunless Citadel outside town along the Old Road, two members of the Hucrele family went to investigate the place along with a local Ranger, and a knight, Sir Braford.
The hints to go investigate down the Old Road are perhaps a bit heavy-handed, as Veri's player noted after about the third mention of an adventure location/goblins/banditry/slain cattle down that direction.  It is what it is, welcome to first-level D&D.

On a side note, Urolph thinks the town is racist, because there are only ~28 dwarves there (the town has 900 people in it).

The PC's go inspect the location where the latest sapling had been stolen from, and question the woman in the nearest house (she happens to be the constable).  Urolph is quite rude to several people in town; the constable was close to having him cool his heels in the jail for an evening.  Since I hadn't yet realized that the Druid was wearing Hide armor (which would slow him down), I encouraged them to head out toward the Sunless Citadel that afternoon (an unencumbered Human could make the trip in about 2.5 hours).  They hem and haw, finally deciding to head out AFTER Vari the rogue already paid for a night at the inn…

They pass three working farms, and stop to ask about the slain cattle.  Urolph convinces a farmer to promise him payment of milk if they discover what is killing the cattle and end the threat.  He of course does this in a rude fashion.  They come to an abandoned farm, and the first thing Urolph does is use the spear-tip of his urgrosh to carve a large, crude "U" in the door.  "Mine," he says.

They continue down the road, and find the pillars near the edge of the cavern down toward the Citadel.  They only give the area a cursory look, noting the knotted rope tied to the pillars and descending into the darkness below.  Urolph wants to take the rope as his, but the other two counsel him that it will serve them better to leave it where it is.  With that, they return to Urolph's new farm to sleep for the night.

They set up watches, Urolph first, Belack second, and Vari third.  During Belack's watch, his wolf, which is sleeping out on the porch, begins to growl.  Belack yells a warning to his new companions, and heads out the door, seeing two twiggy plant creatures advancing toward his wolf.

The stats of the Twig Blights in Sunless Citadel are slightly different than those in the MMII (which get altered again with the 3.5 update booklet).  Those in the adventure have a poison that deals 1 extra point of damage on a failed DC 16 Fortitude save.  The correctly updated ones deal 1 point of Strength damage on a failed DC 11 Fortitude save.  I am using the correctly updated stats.

Belack and his wolf attack the twig blights, having a hard time hitting, and with his sickle and Strength of 10, Belack is not dealing much damage.  You have a -10 to Listen while sleeping, and intervening walls up the DC as well.  The first round Urolph doesn't hear Belack's cries for help (he had settled down into one of the back rooms), though Vari does.  Vari gets up and tries to open a window so he can sneak around the side of the house.  The window is stuck, and he fails at the Strength check to open it.

Belack gets hit, and takes a point of Strength damage.  His wolf also gets hit, and he's starting to panic a bit.  His wolf continues to miss, but his sickle strikes a meager blow.  Urolph finally wakes up, grabs his urgrosh, and steps into the hall, and Vari gets the window open and slips outside.

The twig blights full attack on Belack and his wolf, gaining two claw attacks each.  Both are hit, but save versus the poison.  Urolph makes it out to the front door with a double move, and Vari also comes around the side of the house, but doesn't have time to attack.

I forget who was attacked by the twig blights after that, but over the next two rounds Vari learns the twig blights can't be sneak attacked, and Urolph's urgrosh splinters the two twig blights into jumbles of kindling, feeling quite proud of himself.  My cousin, the player of Belack, learned all about Concentration checks for casting in melee and 5-foot-stepping to avoid AoO's while casting during this fight.  Good, it seems my goals are being met; he is better learning the system.

The next morning Urolph wanted to take the bundle of sticks to the farmer and claim his milk.  The farmer doesn't believe that a pile of kindling is what did it and tells him to come back when he's really solved the problem.  Urolph is rude (surprise surprise), and the farmer has to cock a crossbow to get him to leave.  The PC's then set out for the pillars once again, and this time do a bit better job of looking around the area.  They find the remnants of old fire pits, though it's likely been a half a year since any of them were used.

They pull up the rope and lower Belack's wolf, then proceed slowly down the rope.  Only Belack has any chance of failing the DC 0 Climb check, and not by enough that he would risk falling, so long as he takes his time.

I messed up here.  There are three dire rats in the rubble of the landing 50 feet down from the top of the canyon.  They are supposed to attack the first thing down.  I had forgotten this, so they didn't appear until everyone was already down the rope, and the PC's actually beat them at initiative, so they were skewered quite easily.  From reading on-line it seems that the intended set-up is quite deadly; several writers indicated having killed the first PC down the rope.

This is where we ended the first session.

The second session begins right where we left off, and the PC's carefully take the crude stairs down to a small courtyard in front of a cylindrical tower.  They notice rats crawling carefully among the rubble field to either side, but ignore them for the time being.  I draw the courtyard on the battle map and Vari the Rogue says he moves forward to search the door, and moves his miniature to stand in the exact square that is a trap door, between 5 and 10 feet out from the door.

It never crossed my mind while reading the adventure how devious the placement of this trap was.  Vari's player has never played a Rogue before, and he was just expecting to go check the door…  He failed his Reflex save, fell into the 10-foot-deep pit, and took 3 points of damage (he has no Con bonus, so only has 6 hit points).  At the bottom of this pit is a dire rat who had been trapped here the last time the trap went off (it had followed the goblin down to munch on him, then the door reset after about a minute or two).  Neither Vari nor I thought to have him roll a Tumble check to change the damage to non-lethal, but that's life; this is my experienced player, after all.  So Vari is laying there prone in the same square as the rat (the pit is 5x5x10 deep), without any weapons in his hand, and the rat wins initiative, biting him for 3 damage.

Vari is in a very bad situation right now.  He's at 0 hit points and disabled, doesn't have a weapon in his hand, and there is a hostile rat basically sitting on his chest.  He's also 10 feet below his party mates, down a relatively narrow pit.  I forget what actually got him into the negatives.  It was either him trying to attack the rat, or the rat just bit him again next round; I think it was the latter.  Urolph chucked a throwing axe down at the rat, missing terribly, and Belack was quite unsure of what to do.  None of them had reach weapons so that they could stab the rat from the top of the pit.

Vari falls into the negatives, somewhere around –3 from rat bites.  Belack has a good idea, and makes use of his Animal Devotion feat to gain a fly speed (with average maneuverability) for 10 rounds.  But with average maneuverability he can't hover in place, which is what he would need to do to just hang out 5-feet down in the pit.  So he acts in a series of dipping into and out of the pit.  Move in and down, attack, then next round attack, then fly up and out, maintaining his minimum forward speed.  (I was purposefully ignoring the requirement of max upward angle of 60 degrees; the situation was hard enough as it was.)

Urolph and Belack can't roll over a 10 to save their lives (or rather, to save Vari's life), and the dire rat is getting AoO's on Belack each time he flies up and away from the rat.  The rat is rolling over 15 every single time.  Urolph, after he decided to do more than ask Vari's unconscious bleeding form to return his throwing axe ("Sorry, I'm busy dying…") finally leaps down the pit.  He attacks the rat with his urgrosh… and misses.  He ends up in the same square as the dire rat, meaning he provoked an AoO as he entered the rat's square, and he gets damaged a fair amount.  He also contracts Filth Fever, which takes two or three days to incubate.

Vari slowly bleeds each round for six rounds.  Vari bleeds to –9, then Belack finally swings the killing blow on the rat… but has no actions left with which to cast a curative spell.  Urolph can't heal Vari, and on Vari's turn he fails the final stabilization check, and he dies.  Vari Able didn't actually seem to be very able...

They haven't even entered the front door, and I just killed a PC.  My DM blood-lust is momentarily sated.  (I'm mostly kidding; I'm not intentionally a killer DM.)

Belack and Urolph cram down into the pit to figure out how to get the corpse out… when the trap door resets and snaps shut above them.  The look of "oh shit" on their faces was priceless.  Lucky for them, Belack had taught his wolf to "come," so after a few rounds of calling the canine, the trap door is sprung once again, and Belack's final round of Animal Devotion flight gets him up the pit.  They loot Vari's body of many of its items, and pile rubble over his corpse, then head back to Oakhurst.

In town they meet up with another elf.  His name is Værï Able.  :rolleyes (Hmmm... the smilies aren't working...)  He's also a rogue.  They don't stick around in town very long, and head back out to the Urolph's farm.  The night passes uneventfully.

They descend once again to the Citadel and warn Værï of the trap door.  They actually make it inside this time, finding a round room strewn with rubble and goblin bodies.  This hollow tower is missing any upper floors, there are two other doors (located at approximate thirds around the round room), and one of the dead goblins is skewered to the far wall.

Værï begins to carefully search the room, finding a secret door.  He opens it and finds three skeletons inside what was once an archer's guard alcove, with rubble-filled arrow slits.  They are decorated with the trappings of archers, and the adventure specifically says they do not animate until they or their gear are touched.  They are touched, the three skeletons animate, and a valiant fight ensues.  The wolf actually gets the killing blow on two of them, making for a happy wolf.  The party finds one still-usable longbow (Værï is very happy about that) though it needs a new bowstring, and a few +1 arrows.  They also pull the spear out of the wall, and as the goblin corpse drops they find some runes (or "picture talking" as Urolph calls it).  Værï knows Draconic and reads the word "Ashardalon."  A DM reminder is required for them to remember that was the name of the dragon rumored to have created the ashen plain outside Oakhurst.

They decide to head back to town to rest up, and they want to sell and/or refurbish the three longbows they found with the skeletons.  In town they learn that two of the bows are rubbish, but one of them is still serviceable, and Værï buys a new bowstring for it. (Interestingly enough, Værï's player had no idea that you could actually unstring a bow. I just found that very interesting.)
They rest in town for the evening, and Urolph seeks out the services of Dem "Corkie" Nackle, the town priest and healer.  He wants her to look at the bite wound from the rat, but he doesn't feel like paying the going rate for magical healing.  So Dem cleans the wound and puts on a poultice for a few silver pieces.  She didn't roll well on the Heal check, so it didn't help him avoid any instances of ability damage.  The party stayed the night in town, and after seeing the prices for Dem Nackle's curative magic, had Belack heal them up in the morning.

Late that next day they head back out, spending the night at Urolph's farm.  They encounter another twig blight that evening, and Værï learns of this menace first hand.

When they get back to the Citadel they find the large circular room just as they had left it.  They go investigate the door in the southwest, and find a long room that extends to the south.  In the western wall there is a large stone door carved with a dragon relief and a keyhole in the dragon's mouth.  The wolf starts to growl toward the far southern end of the room.  The southern wall has collapsed, and will provide egress to the cavern and rubble field.  The PC's can't see it, but there is a dire rat in the rubble.  Urolph decides to abandon the others and check out the door to the northwest of the circular room, so they back out of the room and follow the dwarf.  They find a hallway leading west, with a western door at the far end, and doors to the north and south about half-way down the hall.

That's where we left off at the end of the second session.  I'll update with last night's session either tonight or tomorrow.

Edit:  A very important note on CR's for a DM looking to run the Sunless Citadel in 3.5.  Goblins' and Kobolds' CR's were changed between 3.0 and 3.5.  In 3.0 Goblins had a CR of 1/4; in 3.5 their CR was upped to 1/3.  In 3.0 Kobolds had a CR of 1/6; in 3.5 their CR was upped to 1/4.  Nothing about the monsters' stats were changed, merely their assumed challenge level was reevaluated and altered accordingly.  This change in CR can have a very large impact on XP awards.  If you use the 3.5 CR's for calculating XP, then your party will likely reach 4th level by the end of the module, whereas the module writers assumed PC's would only reach 3rd level by the module's conclusion.

Just know that, and decide if you want your PC's to gain power faster than the module intended (using 3.5 CR numbers), or if you would like them to level "as intended," in which case just use the 3.0 CR numbers when calculating XP for this adventure.
« Last Edit: July 08, 2017, 04:34:10 PM by ksbsnowowl »

Offline ksbsnowowl

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Re: Sunless Citadel Adventure Path - Campaign Journal
« Reply #1 on: July 10, 2014, 11:25:10 PM »
We pick up for the third session right where we left off, in the hallway to the northwest of the large cylindrical tower (the tower is room 4).

Speaking of which, this journal will work much better with pictures:



Room 3 is the courtyard where Vari died at the bottom of a pit trap.  Room 5 is the one that held the three skeletons, and room 6 is the one with the stone door in the west wall that is carved with a dragon.

So the PC's are in the unnumbered hallway adjacent to room 14.  Urolph starts to feel ill; the Filth Fever is beginning to take its toll, and he takes 1 point of Dex damage (from 15 to 14) and 2 points of Con damage (11 -> 9).

Værï searches the door to the north, and they open it up, finding an empty room littered with rubble chunks that fell out of the ceiling as the Citadel sunk into the earth.  At the suggestion of opening the stone door to the south, Urolph says its not worth it, "these side rooms are pointless."  So Urolph opens the door at the end of the hall (to room 15).

Inside the irregularly-shaped room they see a large cage to the south, broken open.  In front of it is a bench covered with a cloth, and small items on it, much like an altar.  The remnants of a bonfire are located in the approximate center of the room.  They hear a whimpering noise, and Urolph heads over to the west side of the altar where he sees a kobold wrapped in a bed roll, crying to himself.  He raises his urgrosh…

Those of you who have played this adventure will recognize the memorable Meepo.  An NPC beloved enough by D&D players that he was given his own mini, and given a few articles in D&D Fight Club and whatnot advancing him up as a Dragon Disciple.

…Værï and Belack quickly caution Urolph not to kill the kobold.  "Why not?"  Well, he could give us some information, and he's not threatening us…

Although everyone in the party has a Charisma of 6 or 8, Værï plays the part of the face and starts talking with the now-frightened Meepo.  Meepo doesn't know the answers to the party's first several questions, but mentions that Yasdrul might know.  But when Værï asks about the cage, Meepo excitedly cries about the goblins stealing their dragon!  Perhaps Yasdrul will give them a reward if they can bring back the dragon?

They travel through the halls with Meepo, and he takes them to a long hall lined with columns (room 19).  They are encountered by a group of kobold guards, but Meepo and Værï explain they are headed to see Yasdrul, and the guards accompany them.  At the end of the hall there is an alcove with an altar (room 21).  Bricks have been arranged in front of the altar to make a throne, with the dragon-carved front of the altar making an impressive back rising above Yasdrul's shoulder.  There are several more guards here as well.  In the mouth of the dragon carving is a key, and there look to be scrolls and other items of interest on top of the altar.  Værï immediately asks about the key, but in such a way that he points out the dragon door the party found before (in room 6).  Yasdrul gets a thoughtful look on her face…

Knowing how to speak in draconic, Værï speaks with Yasdrul and learns that the goblins did indeed steal the kobold tribe's mascot dragon, and Yasdrul offers a reward if they return it.  The PC's immediately asks about the key.  She replies that the key could be a reward, or some of the other items…

The party also asks about the other group of adventurers that had been here before.  Yasdrul says that they went to fight the goblins, and then never returned.  Yasdrul tells the party that Meepo will be their guide, leading them toward the goblin area.

With that the party heads off back through the room in which they’d found Meepo (room 15), to a door in the northeast corner.  This leads them to long but bending passage, which ends and an abandoned room (25).  Everyone in the party searched the room, and both Værï and Belack noticed signs of relatively recent foot passage through the area.  They were made by human-sized boots.  Værï searches the north door and finds nothing, so the party enters room 26.

There is a wide hallway leading north, a door in the west wall, and a large marble fountain on the east wall.  The fountain has some dragon-themed carvings on it, and a successful search by Urolph (at Værï’s surprise of the barbarian’s Search ranks, I replied “how else is the barbarian going to find the plunder?”) finds more “picture talking,” and Værï notes some draconic runes, worn and barely visible, carved on the front of the dry marble basin.  I tell him the inscription and that it translates as "Let there be fire." He does not read the inscription aloud.  Urolph touches his torch to the fountain, nothing of note happens, to a bit of disappointment.

Then Værï searches the door to the west, finding another Draconic inscription above the door ("Channel good, open the way"), and a slot through which a blade will extend and cut someone attempting to open the door.  The player asks me again to make sure that a badly-failed disable device check will spring the trap; I reaffirm that this is the case.  He decides to leave well enough alone, and after trying to debate what the inscription means (note, I've not ever had a player in any of my Kansas City groups play a cleric) they continue on toward the north.  Down a short hall they find a wide room whose eastern wall has collapsed, and a door off to the west.  They investigate the door and head through into the room marked 25 (yes, a second room 25; it’s description is almost identical to the first one), and at this point Urolph is getting tired of taking things slow.  As Værï begins to search every single square for a trap, Urolph just walks diagonally across the room to the door in the northwest corner.

As people are setting their minis in the room I’ve just drawn on the mat, Urolph decides to kick in the door to room 31.  This door was trapped with a warning bell, that clangs loudly after Urolph kicked in the door.  Værï’s player groans.  I call for initiative…

A 10-foot-wide hallway extends north about 20 feet.  At that point there is a low crenelated wall separating the hall from the room beyond.  The wall is crudely made, but it is mortared together, and it’s 3 feet high.  The hallway is also densely littered with caltrops.

The goblins win initiative, and one stands up on the other side of the wall.  The module grants the goblins a +7 cover bonus to AC, but for 3.5 this would just be converted to “improved cover” and grant a +8 cover bonus.  Due to the way the PC’s minis were arranged on the map, Urolph was enough out of the way as to be standing beside the door opening, not in it, but Belack the druid was right in line with the hallway about 10 feet back into room 25.  He got pegged by a goblin javelin.  Then another goblin stepped in from the side, also throwing a javelin at the druid.

Rather than pull back, Belack decided to dive right in, casting Lesser Vigor on himself and moving into the caltrop-filled hall (moving slowly to avoid damage).  Well, now they were committed, so everyone else started moving into the hallway.  Urolph’s throwing axe bounces off the crenelated wall, and Værï tries to shoot at the goblins with his new bow, but the cover also causes him to miss.  Another pair of javelins are thrown at the party, one hitting Urolph, one not, and the party continues to advance.  Belack even calls his wolf right up to the front.

Urolph decides to try and jump over the wall.  The module calls for a DC 14* Jump check, but on a failure it allows an additional move action to climb the wall.  I didn’t notice that last bit (which isn’t a normal rule), so the following ensued.  Urolph moves from about 10 feet out, moving into the wolf’s square, where he makes a Jump check to get over the wall; he gets an 11.  Because he failed, his movement stopped; if your movement stops in an occupied square, you fall prone in that square.  So now Urolph is prone.  He still has a move action, but he can’t stand, and crawling is a full-round action.  So his turn ends.  At some point during the next round I notice the above underlined note about having been able to spend an extra move action on a failure to climb over the wall.  I mention it them, and there are some verbal protestations.  I ask Urolph’s player if he would like to have climbed the wall instead (the DC for doing so should be 10; base DC of 15, then -5 for having a corner wall to brace against), and he smirks and says no, he would prefer to stay prone (and have basically total cover from the goblins.)

*
(click to show/hide)

Belack realizes the tactical mistake of having his wolf in the front row, and calls it off.  Værï moves right up to the wall, then hesitates to shoot at the goblin he is looming over, until I remind him that cover prevents someone from threatening you, thus no AoO for firing his bow.  Even with me dropping the goblin’s cover bonus to +2 (the wall only comes up to Værï’s belly, and he’s firing right into the goblin’s face), he still misses.

Urolph stands and tries to swing his urgrosh over the wall, missing.  Meepo makes use of a sling to chuck sling bullets into the fray, fishing for natural 20’s.  He gets a 19, but that doesn’t cut it.  At least there’s no chance of hitting friendly cover in 3.5…

I forget who finally strikes a blow on one of the two goblins, but one of them is injured for 4, down to 1 hit point.  In the goblin’s final of three javelin volleys Urolph was hit again.  The dwarf normally has only 12 hit points (Con of 11), and with his two points of Con damage, he’s down to 11.  Then he was hit twice with javelins, each time for 4 damage.  So he’s now sitting at 3 hit points.  Belack spent two rounds giving Urolph a Lesser Vigor and a Virtue spell.

With things starting to turn bad, one of the goblins moves to the west and through the door into 33, yelling an alert.  After another round of failed blows from the party, the injured goblin also retreats that direction.

The players then debate pressing on or retreating for the day (the two Lesser Vigors had been cast, and that’s all the healing that the party has.)  Belack wants to press on.  He’s back to full health, and still has 5 or 6 rounds remaining on his Lesser Vigor; he’d also activated his Protection Devotion feat on the party, so he wanted to get milage out of it.  Urolph wanted to hang back for 8 rounds to let his Lesser Vigor heal him up.

Belack activates his Animal Devotion feat to gain a fly speed, gets himself and his wolf over the low wall, and Værï gets over the wall after two tries (again, Climb DC 10 so long as you are next to a side wall).  They press forward while Meepo gets over the wall (on the first try; go Meepo!) and head south into room 33.  Belack’s wolf is the first to turn the corner into the main part of room 33, and he gets hit by three javelins (out of five total thrown), for 7 damage (of 13 hp’s total… I just realized that the wolf was the beefiest party member… having even more hit points than the Barbarian.)

Urolf stays back in room 31 for a few rounds to heal a bit more.  I should take this time to note that this is the weirdest Barbarian I’ve ever seen in play.  He’s a dwarf with a Con of 11.  He only wears padded armor, which with his Dex only gives him an AC of 13.  Something tells me he’s not going to survive this entire campaign…

Right after Belack’s wolf is skewered the druid acts.  He peeks around the corner to look north; he sees five goblin faces looking at him over the top of another wall 15 feet away, and he sees the wounded goblin trying to climb over the wall.  Belack doesn’t have any really effective ranged weapons (he probably didn’t realize that his club can be thrown), so he asks me if he can grab any of the javelins that had missed his wolf.  I tell him he can, but that they are rather small, and he’ll take a –2 to attack with it.  He doesn’t care; he drops his sickle and picks up one of the javelins and launches it at the climbing goblin, burying the small spear into the vermin’s back.  There was much rejoicing.

Due to where Belack is standing, he gets improved cover from several of the goblins, and normal cover from the two furthest to the west.  Two javelins are thrown his way, but Belack has the highest AC in the party (Dex of 14, Hide armor, light shield, protection devotion), so he survives unscathed, and his wolf finished its previous action by moving back behind cover.  The party just sat there delaying for two rounds.  On the first of those two rounds one javelin was thrown at Belack (he stayed there to draw their fire, hoping they would run out of javelins), but the second round no javelins were thrown.

By this point Urolph had picked up his throwing axe and climbed over the wall to rejoin the party.  He decided to end the stalemate and moved around the corner.  Five readied javelin attacks came his way; not a single one hit him.  THAT invigorated the party, and they all started moving toward the crenelated wall, bringing the fight to the goblins.  Værï continued to fire down upon the goblins that he was towering over, thankful that the low wall’s cover was preventing AoO’s against him.  He didn’t hit often, but he did nail one for 6 damage, dropping it to –1 hp.

Belack made use of his flight to get over the wall, and strike down upon the goblins with his club, gaining a +1 to attack for higher ground.  Urolph raged.  It did cause him to get hit once or twice more, but he landed some good hits despite the cover; he even got a nat 20 (though couldn’t confirm it).  While raging he was averaging 11.5 damage per hit, which more than takes care of a goblin warrior.

Meepo continued to fish for 20’s from the back row, and actually got one, dealing a single point of damage, but it made the players respect the little lizard more.  As the goblins started to take losses, one of them retreated to go tell the goblin guards in room 39.  Out of javelins, the goblins were taking swings at the party with morningstars, suffering for the cover the PC’s were now also gaining.  So the goblins stepped back and readied to attack any PC’s climbing over the wall.  One of them did hit Urolph as he climbed over, but Belack didn’t have to worry about that, and Værï did just fine from the south side of the wall with his bow.  As the goblins continued to fall, Værï did finally climb over the wall, as did Meepo.

One goblin remained, and he withdrew back through the north door into hallway 35 (I think it was after the goblin withdrew that Værï climbed over the wall).  No one succeeded in killing the goblin that round, so the goblin started banging on the door to room 36.  At this point the PC’s decided it would be best to retreat.  Urolph, Belack, and Meepo all cross back over the wall and move south to turn the corner.  Værï fails the climb check.  Being at full health yet, and seeing one lone PC left behind while his party was retreating, the remaining goblin got bold.  He walked right up to Værï and nailed him with his morningstar for 6 damage.  Since the last session, Værï’s player had reworked him a bit.  He decided he was going to head for Unseen Seer, so made Charisma his dump stat, and actually had a Con of 12, so he has a total of 7 hit points.  So he’s still doing alright, but is quite frightened now at 1 hit point.  The rest of the party comes back and climbs back over the wall again.  Værï can’t try to climb; it would be suicide at this point.  So he attacks the goblin, but misses.  Belack gives Værï a Virtue spell, Urolph dispatches the goblin, and then the door to room 36 opens.

They see several goblins through the doorway, but none of them are armed yet.  The door slams shut and the PC’s can hear the clang of weapons being drawn.  The party beats a hasty retreat.  They rest the day and night in Meepo’s room (15), and the next morning Belack heals Værï with a Lesser Vigor right off the bat.  Urolph healed back his 1 point of Dex damage over night, and one of his two points of Con damage, but this morning he fails his save again, once again taking 1 Dex and 2 Con damage.  His Con is now sitting at 8, and he’s wondering how to fix this problem.

Discussion was given to how to magically heal his malady, and that Belack cannot yet cast Lesser Restoration.  Mundane healing care can be given, though that didn't seem to help much last time.  (DM thought - if only there were a magical piece of fruit that will be disgorged by a magic tree in about two weeks… fruit that can heal any malady…)

I don't recall why, but I think Belack had to heal a second person this next morning, so they were starting out with all their first level spells expended.  They debated heading back to town, but ended up deciding to continue investigating down another side passage, into the hallway marked 28.  Belack also realized he had left his sickle on the floor in room 33; he wasn't happy about that...

They start to creep down the hall, noting all the doors to the side rooms are slightly ajar, and Urolph immediately kicks open the door to 28a.  Værï's player throws up his hands, but Urolph was okay; the room was empty of any threats.  They search and find a nice handful of treasure (each of these rooms, 28a-f, contain 2d6 silver pieces, 1d6 gold pieces, and 1d4 gems worth 5 gp each) littered in the old abandoned rat nest.  This prompts Urolph to barge right into 28d, which is also free of any danger.

Inexplicably, after this Urolph settles down and starts listening at doors.  He opens the door to 28b, and beats the inhabiting dire rat's initiative check, slaying it with a single stroke.  The other PC's like this idea; since Urolph is already infected with Filth Fever, they feel he should handle the rats in these rooms.  Urolph does kill another (28c), but then balks that he is the only one doing dangerous work.  So Belack opens the door to 28e and fights with the dire rat there for a round or two.  He made use of his Protection Devotion feat, because he is actually quite scared of contracting the rats' disease.  Finally Urolph tells him to get out of the way, and the dwarf slays the rat.  They then enjoy looting all the small rooms.

When they get down to room 29 they notice both of the marked pit traps already open, with iron spikes nailed into the walls to prevent the pit traps from closing shut again.  They also find another dry fountain against the north wall.  Værï can't find any inscriptions, but Urolph points out another one on the front of the bowl.  Again, I tell Værï what it says (translates to "Let there be death"), but he does not say the inscription aloud.

They look over at the ajar door to the west, and reach around the pit to push it open.  They notice a large (i.e. - Medium) rat inside, as well as a second dire rat of a smaller size.  Belack moves forward, maneuvering around the pit to stand in the doorway… where the two dire rats waiting with readied actions bite at him from flanking on either side of the door.  A look of panic appears on the player's face, and he swings at one of the rats with his club, missing.

Værï fires his bow at the large "mama" rat, taking penalties for firing into melee, and the rat got soft cover from Belack.  Værï's player then questions having both apply (they do; firing into melee that is granting your target cover results in a net -8 to hit), then questions why one is a cover bonus to AC, and the other is a penalty to the attack roll; "why not make them the same?"  Because they aren't…

Nearly a round is spent ineffectively shuffling around, but the Mama rat is killed before too long, Belack 5-foot steps out of being flanked, and the other initially-visible rat climbed on the wall and around the door frame, biting at Urolph and getting killed by Urolph's axe.  Urolph steps into the fray, helping Belack slaughter the one rat that is yet near him, and then one-shotting the final rat on the next round.

The battle was hard-fought, but Belack avoided being infected with Filth Fever, and as they search the large nest, they note a human carcas and a few goblin carcasses, which seem much older.  They loot the human's body, and find a gold ring engraved with the name "Karakas;" this is the ranger that came to the Sunless Citadel with the Hucrele duo.

They make plans to head back to town, and we end the session there.
« Last Edit: July 14, 2014, 03:58:40 PM by ksbsnowowl »

Offline ksbsnowowl

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Re: Sunless Citadel Adventure Path - Campaign Journal
« Reply #2 on: July 17, 2014, 02:54:53 AM »
Note: I edited in additional information into the previous post over the course of a few days.  Check it for more info if you haven't read it since I first posted it.

We had our fourth session tonight.  After the last session, both Belack and Urolph had plenty of XP to level; Værï was short 2 XP.

We spent the first half-hour or so helping Belack's and Urolph's players level up their characters to 2nd level.  Although you or I could do it in 3 minutes, it takes quite a bit of time when someone is learning the system.  But as I said, that's part of what this campaign is all about.

After they have leveled their character sheets*, we pick up where we left off, with them having just defeated a large nest of dire rats, and having found Karakas' carcass.  They leave the Citadel and head back to town, taking 3.5 hours to do so, thanks to Belack's slow speed.  They have accumulated a bit more than 200 gold pieces' worth of coin and gems thus far, and they have picked up the gear from Karakas, including his studded leather armor, a shortbow, and a magical potion (which they as of yet cannot identify).  They sell off a lot of gear, and Belack gets rid of his hide armor and small shield in preference for leather armor and a heavy shield (same AC, less encumbrance); even so, Belack is at a medium load, and still moves quite slow (he only has a Strength of 10), but it cuts down on his ACP.  Urolph starts wearing the studded leather armor, which helps his AC quite a bit.  He also started wearing the dire rat heads as a necklace, and because the Mama Rat's head was too large, he starts wearing it as a pauldron on his left shoulder.  Mind you, it's not the skulls, but rather the heads, still covered in rotting flesh.

Urolph also visited "Corkie" the healer again, and this time she did a much better job of applying a poultice to the infected wound; Urolph won't be losing any ability points the next time he saves against the disease.  The party uses some of their newfound wealth to purchase some alchemist's fire and flasks of acid (this was done after the DM mentioned to Værï the Rogue that such items would allow him to potentially sneak attack as a touch attack); they bought three of each, at a total cost of 90 gp.

They then sit down to a late lunch at the Ol' Boar Inn, and discuss uses for pints of oil while drinking pints of ale.  Garon the innkeeper asks them how things are going, and commiserates with Belack and Urolph again about the loss of Vari.  Belack, while recalculating him encumbrance, noticed that he had 8 pints of oil, and tells the party how these can be used much like alchemist's fire (it takes time to set up the wick and light it, and only has a 50% chance of actually exploding in fire, but it does work).  They devise some kind of plan to dump oil on any goblins behind the walls, and light them on fire.  Not a bad idea.

As their meal is drawing to a close, the matron of the Hucrele family enters the inn and approaches their table.  Belack and Værï's Sense Motive checks note the well-concealed scowl she gives at the sight of Urolph's rotting trophies.  She voices sympathy to Belack and Urolph on the death of Vari, at which point Urolph interjects that Karakas is dead.  Kerowyn Hucrele notes the information, but otherwise ignores Urolph, and mentions that she had previously had an arrangement with Vari.  Urolph started being quite rude (at some point in this conversation there was out of character voiced ponderings about "taking her right here on this table..."  :nonono :puke), and she proceeds to ignore him, and turns to present her offer to Belack and Værï, but NOT Urolph.  She explains the situation of how Talgen and Sharwyn Hucrele went missing after heading to the Sunless Citadel, and tells them she will extend the same offer to the two of them.  For the return of her young family members, or at least the return of their signet rings, should the worst have befallen them, she will pay each of them 125 gp, for each ring or family member recovered.  Urolph then interjects, asking if she'll pay more if they bring them back alive.  The adventure does indeed call for her to double the payment if they are brought back safe and whole, but this is not information that is given to the players (and is actually quite pointless, since they are both already dead or mutilated).  Belack and Værï gladly accept this offer, and Kerowyn departs.

After lunch they leave Oakhurst and head back to Urolph's farm, arriving after the sun has already touched the horizon.  They set up watches, and early in the morning (fourth watch) Belack's wolf starts growling at the approach of another pair of twig blights.  The PC's all chose to sleep in the front room this evening, so they would better be able to hear any yelled warnings to awaken.  Belack yells for them to wake, and then cracks a sunrod against the floor, illuminating the approach of two plant monsters.

Værï wins initiative, but is disappointed that all he can do is stand and draw his bow, losing out on a sneak attack while the plant creatures are flat-footed (he forgot that plants are immune to crits; I had no intention of reminding him of that).  Belack's wolf charged at one of the twig blights, but missed, and Belack missed with a thrown short spear (he bought several of those in town).  The twig blights each full attacked the wolf, hitting twice, but not inflicting any poison damage.  Urolph grabbed his urgrosh as he stood, and exited the house's front door.

Værï, still not remembering that he can't sneak attack the plant creatures, Hides inside the house (Belack and his sunrod are positioned such that little of the light would enter through the door), and fires out at the twig blights, taking a -4 penalty because they are in melee with the wolf, and the twig blights gaining +4 soft cover bonuses to AC.  He misses, then recalls that plants can't be critted.  The twig blights full attack the wolf again, hitting twice, but again not dealing any poison damage.  Belack and his wolf both miss, but Urolph moves forward and destroys one of the twig blights, dropping it into the negatives.

Værï misses again with his bow, and the twig blight also misses.  The wolf then bites for six damage, dropping the twig blight into the negatives as well.  Although XP wasn't actually calculated at this point, enough would be awarded for Værï to level, so he is allowed to level in the morning along with everyone else.

*I always require PC's to rest for the night before they officially level up the next morning.  However, if you get enough XP to level "mid-story," (i.e. - the previous session ended and XP was awarded, but you're in the middle of an adventuring day) you automatically get the hit points from your new level immediately, and you count as a creature of one higher HD immediately (so, Belack and Urolph both counted as 2 HD creatures while in town and while fighting the twig blights; this becomes important for the effects of some spells in the higher levels).  But, you don't get anything else (feats, skills, class features, BAB increase) until you've had a chance to rest for the night.

So they level up in the morning.  The party is now composed of:
Urolph the Rat Slayer: Dwarf Barbarian 2
Belack: Human Druid 2
Værï Able: Elf Rogue 1/Warblade 1

Værï chose Sapphire Nightmare Blade, Moment of Perfect Mind, Steel Wind, and Punishing Stance as his maneuvers.  Sadly, he didn't use a single one of them all night...

They decide to spend the day mostly resting and recuperating.  Belack prepares his spells, selecting Delay Disease and Healthful Rest to assist Urolph's healing (cue metagame discussion about how Delay Disease allows Urolph to naturally heal back Con to get rid of his negative Con modifier before making his next Fort save vs Filth Fever).  He also wants to collect berries to cast Goodberry, and start "stocking up" on healing for their next foray into the Citadel, and he wants to have his wolf backtrack the twig blights from the night before, as everyone is wondering where those are coming from...

The wolf succeeds at the first DC 16 survival check (to track by scent, 3 hours after the tracks were made), following the tracks for a mile, before he fails the second check.  I explain it takes an hour to pick up the scent again, but the wolf fails the now-DC 18 check.  Belack calls off the search, but they plan to back-track the twig blights immediately the next time the party is attacked at night.

Urolph makes the most of the Healthful Rest spell Belack gave him, and lounges around all day.  He even convinces Belack to walk into town and buy him ale.  Belack buys a gallon, which comes in a large clay tankard.  Their two players immediately look at each other, give each other high fives across the table, and start chattering about filling the clay tankard with 4 or 5 pints of oil for their assault on the goblins.

The party sits around for another day, and Urolph makes his first successful save against his Filth Fever infection (but recall that "Corkie's" successful Heal check would have covered him, regardless).  Belack casts three Goodberry spells, creating 17 healing berries, which he splits with the party, 5/5/7.  The evening passes uneventfully.

With that, I am going to head to bed.  I'll cover their return to the Citadel in the next day or two.

The party heads back to the Citadel and meets back up with Meepo.  I mention as they pass the stone door (room 14) that they have yet to open.  Urolph says that it's trapped and they should ignore it, so they do (Urolph has never searched the door, he has just constantly dismissed it out of hand).  Urolph keeps (intentionally) butchering Meepo's name (Beebop, etc), and Meepo calls him out on it.  This does no good, and Urolph continues to butcher his name.  If there is ever an opportunity for Meepo to stab an injured Urolph in the back, it just became much more likely to happen…

They get back to room 25, just before the caltrop-lined hallway (31), and Værï searches the closed door, finding that it has once again been rigged with a bell alarm.  He attempts to disarm it, failing miserably (but he of course thinks that he did disarm it).  I let him roll the checks, but I clamp down hard on metagaming from knowing your roll.  He did decide to search again for any other traps; this seemed reasonable, since the first time he was really looking for the alarm that he knew about.  He finds nothing on this second search.

Urolph stands before the door with his new shortbow, readying to fire at the first goblin he sees on the other side, and Værï opens the door from the side.  The bell jingles like the door chime of an old country store, and a goblin head poles above the crenelated wall.  Urolph looses his arrow, but misses.

Værï wins initiative, but decides to delay (why a Rogue who won initiative would want to delay is beyond me, but whatever).  Then the goblins go, another one steps around the corner and both chuck javelins at Urolph.  Urolph goes, again using his short bow, then stepping carefully forward.  Værï decides to come in here, moves forward, then shoots, knowing it is a long shot, due to cover.

There's no need to go round-by round again, since they've basically fought this fight once before.  But they end up killing both goblins, but not before the goblins scream a warning to the ones in the other room.  Værï starts collecting caltrops, but abandons it after clearing the first square, because Belack has used both Protection Devotion and Animal Devotion, and wants to press on before those run out.

They gather in the hall before they turn into the main part of room 33, and one javelin is thrown at Belack while he still has cover; it misses.  Belack has pre-assembled two oil flasks with wicks, and he pulls one out as he flies around the corner, he is then attacked by four more readied javelins, getting hit once.  Belack finishes his action by lighting the wick.

Urolph then comes around the corner, and chucks the clay tankard of 4 pints of oil at a goblin in the middle of the north portion of room 33.  Like any splash weapon, he makes a touch attack, but misses.  The tankard still smashes, and covers 5 squares with oil (I was being generous); the random rolls covered the three north-most squares along the north wall (no goblin standing there), as well as squares containing two goblins.  Værï shoots and misses.

Belack flies forward and chucks the improvised molotov cocktail at the same target goblin, but also misses.  The pint makes the 50% roll to actually light, so the targeted goblin still took one point of splash damage, and the oil was all alight for two rounds, dealing 1d3 damage to those standing in it.

Urolph uses his urgrosh to smash heads over the wall, and he's on fire, rolling 16's, 18's, and 19's on the die round after round.  The one goblin who threw the first javelin retreats through a door to the west, and the party kills the remaining goblins over the course of a few rounds.  Belack learned that foes threaten into three dimensions, as he had flown directly over one goblin, then his next turn he wanted to 5-foot step and cast.  I explained how that couldn't happen, and he would have to cast defensively; he failed the check, and his Lesser Vigor spell fizzled.  Værï didn't successfully attack anyone the whole night; his player was pissed.  Meepo's sling attacks likewise all failed.

That's where the fourth session ended.  They killed a few more goblins, but didn't actually progress any deeper into the Citadel.
« Last Edit: July 17, 2014, 02:36:56 PM by ksbsnowowl »

Offline ksbsnowowl

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Re: Sunless Citadel Adventure Path - Campaign Journal
« Reply #3 on: July 24, 2014, 02:07:11 AM »
Tonight we picked up in the north section of room 33, just as the PC's had finished killing all the goblins located there... except the one who got away.  Urolph looked through the door to the west (into room 38 and beyond), seeing a store-room packed full with barrels and boxes, and seeing down into room 39, a long hall with columns.  At the far end he saw the fleeing goblin open the door to room 40.  He pulls out his bow and wings an arrow that direction, missing.  The goblin closes the door and goes about his business.

The PC's are worried about goblins coming to retaliate, so they just do a quick recon of room 38 (I call for Spot checks in place of Search checks).  They note barrels of brackish water, as well as barrels marked "Elf Pudding" in Goblin.  The elven rogue is the only one who can speak goblin, and he chuckles.  I insist that it really is elf pudding; he still chuckles.

They pull back down to the southern portion of room 33, and I finally remember to mention that there are target dummies with javelins stuck out of them along the southern wall.  The party finally decides to try opening the door to room 34, and it takes several attempts by Værï.  Before he gets it open, a band of three goblins tries to sneak in through room 38.  Værï and Belack hear them as they approach (when I called for listen checks, Urolph says "I didn't hear them; I was talking"), and they both beat the goblins in initiative.  Værï moves forward to the crenelated wall, and Belack, who was already near it, lifts his wolf back over to the north side of the wall.  This is a surprise round, so everyone only gets to act once, so the goblins merely file into the northern area from Room 38.

Værï draws and fires, injuring a goblin for 1 point of damage; this exasperated the player.  I mentioned that every little bit is important.  Urolph was positioned to get a 20-foot running start, and leapt over the low wall quite easily, and having covered only 30 feet, buried his axe in the injured goblin's face, dropping it to -1 hit points.  Værï was ecstatic that his 1 point of damage made a difference.  Belack misses with his short spear (firing into melee), and his wolf misses as well.

Værï climbs over the wall on his first try, then draws and attacks with his rapier (I allowed them to climb over as part of movement, eating about 10 feet of movement in the process), missing.  Urolph kills a goblin with his next swing, and Belack's wolf injures another.  Unable to retreat, it takes a swipe at Urolph, seeing him as the biggest threat.  He missed the dwarf, but he was right.  On Urolph's next turn, he split the goblin's skull.

The party searches all the goblins (those killed last week, and those just killed tonight), and find 56 sp and 4 gp amongst all of them.  Værï then returns to the locked door leading toward Room 34, and eventually gets it open.  Inside, their sunrod pushes back the gloom, and they see three kobolds tied to a stake in the floor, all shielding their eyes from the bright light.  There are manacles about the walls, some holding skeletons, and in the back of the room they can see a small, cramped cage with a gnome in it.

The PC's ask him his name and a few basic questions, such as how did he end up here, and Erky Timbers replies, though he seems dazed.  His mind is having trouble processing the fact that he's actually being freed.  Værï tries to pick the lock, failing several times.  With two attempts, Urolph bends the bars and frees the captive gnome.  He tells the party that a year ago he was traveling the world to seek his fortune, and decided to take the Old Road shortcut.  Well, goblin bandits set upon him and took him prisoner.  After Værï's incredulous exclamation that Erky had been stuck here for a year, he asked why the goblins would have kept him around that long.  Erky (and the DM) have no idea.  Erky, still quite mentally dazed, slowly exits the cage and stretches.  I, acting as Erky, then took my head in my hands and cracked my neck, playing up the effort, and relief, that Erky is finding in his newfound freedom to move about.

Throughout this conversation, Værï (and the rest of the PC's taking Værï's lead) are in quite the hurry, trying to speed Erky along.  This of course causes me to exaggerate Erky's slowness (I know no more goblins will be coming for a while).  In their haste to leave, the PC's didn't loot the goblin bodies of their weapons and armor, and thus don't have any gear with which to equip Erky, aside from a single Small-sized javelin that Belack had kept from a session or two ago.  Despite their hurry, they take the time to collect another two bags'-worth of caltrops from the floor of room 31.  :rolleyes

I've been playing up Erky's condition as worse than the module indicates (the module writers didn't realize that magical healing couldn't make up for starving to death), and regaling them with his meager survival on rotting and putrid scraps of food occasionally provided by the goblins, and then purified via purify food and drink.   How although he could create water each day, he had no vessel to create it in, so all he has drunk the last year is magically-created water that he has mopped up off the floor of his cage with his own shirt, and rung into his mouth...  Because of all this, the party decides it would be a good idea to retreat back to town, and Erky is more that ready for that to happen.  The Kobold captives take off to find their own way back to their tribe.

On their way out of the Citadel, they pass back through room 26.  Urolph mentions the fountain every time they move through here, trying to remember if this is the one that has to do with fire or not.  Every time they travel through here, I mention that the Draconic word "Nainarya" is carved on the fountain, and that it is indeed the one that has to do with fire.  I say the word Nainarya every. single. time. they pass through the room.  Værï has yet to say the word aloud.  Too bad for him; if he would say the damn word, the fountain would produce liquid equivalent to a potion of fire breath.  Their loss.

They do reexamine the Draconic inscription above the door to Room 27, however.  Værï asks Erky if he understands what the translated inscription means ("Channel good, open the way").  I roll a mock Intelligence check to see if Erky can figure it out.  He holds out his hand and Turns Undead, failing his check.  He tries again, and succeeds; the door glows blue and swings open.  (It didn't occur to me until a bit later that Erky likely didn't have a holy symbol, and thus couldn't turn undead.  Oh well, I hand waived it.  Garl Glittergold's holy symbol is a gold nugget; Erky had it hidden in a special place, if you know what I mean...  ;))

I describe the room, filled with five sarcophagi lining the north and south walls, and an altar against the west wall.  There is a lit candle on the altar, to which Værï and Belack both exclaim about who lit it?  Before anyone enters the room, Belack casts detect magic, sensing three magical auras on top of the small altar shrine.  Værï begins searching the floor for traps, inching his way along.  When the way to the altar has been declared clear, Urolph takes the items on the altar... which triggers the encounter!

The sarcophagi all swing open, and the PC's roll initiative.  Værï goes first, drawing his rapier and using Steel Wind to attack both the skeletons in the northwest and north central sarcophagi; I give the north central one cover, because it is still in the sarcophagus, and Værï is attacking it from an angle, not straight-on.  Værï misses both times.  (Keep in mind that he doesn't have Weapon Finesse yet, so he'll get better in melee once they reach third level).  The skeletons then all go.  Værï is standing before the one to the northwest, Belack is before the one to the northeast, Belack's wolf is to the northeast of the one in the southeast, and Urolph is standing before the one to the southwest.  Erky and Meepo are still standing in the doorway.

Most of the skeletons can't exit their sarcophagi, so they each attack with two claws.  I hit a fair amount, but probably only about 1/3 of the time throughout the whole combat.  I hit Værï once from the skeleton in front of him.  The skeleton in the north central sarcophagus steps out, also attacking Værï with two claws, hitting once.  The southeast skeleton steps out, but two claws against Belack's wolf miss, and one of two claws draws blood from the druid.  Urolph is also hit once.

Belack strikes with his short spear, hitting, but dealing no damage due to the DR.  As soon as he hits and I start to describe the result, he exclaims that such an attack was dumb; it's hard to stab a skeleton...  His wolf misses.  Urolph swings at the free-roaming skeleton, but misses.  He then asks what else he can do (you can tell he wants to attack twice, as Værï did with Steel Wind), and I mention he still has a move action and could 5-foot step.  He gets a bright gleam in his eye, and he says he shuts the sarcophagus in front of him.  I call for a strength check (eyeball it at DC 10), and he gets it closed.

Erky then rolls a turning check, rolling a total of 11, thus able to turn some skeletons.  I roll his turning damage, and... I just now realized I totally gipped the party.  I only had one skeleton flee; Erky's lowest possible turning damage is 4.  I'm a terrible, no-good DM (who has rarely ever used Turn Undead...)  I'll have to give them some bonus XP for that...

Erky finished out the round, so Værï attacked the free-roaming skeleton that he and Belack were flanking, hitting, but having all his damage negated by the skeleton's DR.  He uses his swift action to recover his maneuvers.  I mention to him at that point that he could enter Punishing Stance, and then his Rapier would deal 2d6 damage, and this would help him to possibly overcome the skeletons' Damage Reduction.  He likes this idea and starts reading over his stance (I have printed out all the maneuver cards, so he's just reading that).

Another round of attacks from the skeletons.  The two skeletons threatening Værï both attack him and hit, a total of three or four times.  Værï is getting quite beat up.  Belack gets hit again by the skeleton in the sarcophagus he is standing in front of.  The one near the wolf is the one that I had get turned, so it fled, taking an AoO from Belack's wolf.  It hit, and due to bite attacks dealing all three types of damage simultaneously (B/P/S), it damages the freely-roaming skeleton for 6 points of damage, bypassing all its DR. It takes another AoO as it tries to enter and pass through Urolph's space; the dwarf smashes it to bits.  The final skeleton uses a move action to open its sarcophagus again ("hey, what about its strength check?"  "It has magic on its side..." /DM cop-out), only getting to claw Urolph once.

Belack drops his spear, defensively casts Lesser Vigor, then draws his club.  Urolph smacks the free-roaming skeleton with his urgrosh, dealing 7 points of damage after DR.  He then gripes that axes should be bludgeoning...  Also, these must be super skeletons, because the room info lists them as having 9 hit points each (that's a total of 15 extra hit points across all five of them, compared to an average of 6 hp each).  Which reminds me... I've noticed that most of the named NPC's in this module have been given max or near-max hit points.  I just find it interesting.

Erky tries to turn undead again, but rolls a natural 1.  Værï enters Punishing Stance, and punishes only himself.  He misses, and his AC is now lowered by 2; he takes more damage from the skeletons.  He's now in really bad shape (something like 1 hit point...)  I forget what skeletons damaged whom this turn, but on Belack's next turn he 5-foot steps to the southwest... and fails his Concentration check to cast Lesser Vigor on Værï.  Erky yells for someone to "clear the way;" Urolph swings, rolling nicely on the damage, but not able to take down the skeleton, due to its DR.  So, with no open path to Værï, Erky delays.

Værï is in REALLY bad shape.  Seriously, he has 1 hit point.  He ends his stance (yea no penalty to AC), and tumbles southeast through Belack's square, then east to meet up with Erky (who is still standing just inside the door).  Værï fails the first Tumble check, followed by severe groaning from the player.  But, the skeleton misses its AoO, and Værï succeeded at the second Tumble check (this one at DC 17 for being against the second threatening foe).  He escapes, and Erky converts a spell into a Cure Light Wounds, healing him for 4 points of damage.  Erky then informs them that he's spent, and the javelin he's holding sure doesn't seem like it's going to do much good.

The remainder of this combat's details are beginning to fade at this late hour, but the combat went on for a LONG time.  It took a total of 8 or 9 rounds for them to kill the skeletons, Værï and Urolph both shoving Goodberries into their mouths by the handful whenever they got a chance.  There was a point when Urolph was staggered at 0 hit points, and there was a point at which Belack was staggered at 0 hit points (though on his next turn his Lesser Vigor brought him back up to 1 hp, so he could act normally).

When all was said and done, they looted the room of the three magic items, and Værï took 20 on a search check, finding a hidden compartment with a small chest holding six 10-gp peridot gems.  With that, they stopped back in to give the kobold queen an update.  The rescued kobold prisoners were already informing her of the things they had seen.  She asked about the dragon, and Værï said they were working on it.

The party heads back to Oakhurst with Erky, and along the way Erky asks about going back into the Citadel with them; he has some revenge to exact on the goblins...

Alright, that's enough typing for this evening.  I'll add more to this in the next few days.
« Last Edit: August 05, 2014, 01:14:33 AM by ksbsnowowl »

Offline ksbsnowowl

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Re: Sunless Citadel Adventure Path - Campaign Journal
« Reply #4 on: August 05, 2014, 02:12:39 AM »
This post will initially be short, finishing up the happenings from last session.  But then I'll likely add to it in an edit after this Wednesday's game.

The party travels back to Oakhurst with Erky Timbers, and they chat about what things Erky had experienced and heard over the last year.  After Erky gets a bath and a warm meal, the party really starts to ask him about things pertinent to the party's goals.  They learn that the magic fruit the goblins sell is from the Gulthias Tree, which is located below the Citadel, in a place called the Twilight Grove, and that the grove is tended by an evil druid named Belak.  (At this revelation, the player of Belack the Druid has quite the startling reaction, something akin to "hey, that's my name..." which causes Erky to become suspicious of the PC druid for a short time.)  I'm pretty sure they also learned that the twig monsters live in the level below, and I know they also learned that Talgen and Sharwyn Hucrele, as well as Sir Braford, were captured by the goblins, and imprisoned in the room with Erky for about a week; the last he had heard was that Belak wanted them, and they were taken away.

Deciding to sleep the night in town, for Erky's sake, the PC's proceed to drink and enjoy themselves.  Urolph also succeeds on his second consecutive saving throw against Filth Fever, and he has now fought off the disease, and will fully heal.  In the morning, Erky patches up the party's remaining hurts, and the PC's fork out some money to equip Erky with leather armor, a heavy wooden shield, and a battleaxe.  They also get the town blacksmith to translate the inscription on one of the magic items from the Skeleton-Sarcauphogus room.  The magical whistle has Azan-gund inscribed on it in Dwarven, which translates as "Night Caller."  Urolph blows the whistle, and nothing happens (it has to be blown over the grave of a dead corpse).

The party plus Erky then head back out to Urolph's farm.  Belack collects several berries along the way, and at the end of the day he casts Goodberry several times (see, he's learning; casting it at the end of the day instead of in the morning means they last "longer").  They are of course accosted by two more twig blights during the night.  Nothing in the scent ability alters the rules about Track requiring an hour to find the trail again after you fail a Survival check to Track; their attempt to track these two twig blights merely leads to the corpse of a fox, and not much beyond that.

After a night where they wasted several hours fruitlessly attempting to track the twig blights, the party decided to sleep in, aside from Erky and Belack, who had to prep spells at dawn.  They returned to the Citadel, Erky eager to help them slay some goblins, stopping to pick up Meepo along the way.  They were careful at approaching hallway 31 this time.  Værï disabled the bell, and they were surprised to see that there were no goblins stationed at the other end of the hall, beyond the wall.  They crept around the hallway into room 33, and encountered one goblin on the north side of the wall in that room.  The goblin immediately ran west through room 38, but Belack's wolf and Urolph brought him to a grisly end after chasing him into room 39.  Room 39 is hazy with smoke from an over-abundance of torches, and this provides a 10% miss chance from concealment; the concealment played a very small part in the lone goblin's survival, but ultimately it could not save him.

Værï decides to try the door from hall 39 to room 37, finding it locked.  He sets about picking the lock, and Urolph decides to go exploring off on his own, heading around to hall 35, and immediately proceeding to trigger and fall into the trap-door pit in the west end of that hall.  Værï succeeds in unlocking the southern door to room 37, and Belack helps Urolph out of the pit.

That's where we ended the last session.  They have killed a total of 15 goblins, and as evidenced by the weak watch posted during this last outing, they are starting to wear the goblins a bit thin.
« Last Edit: August 05, 2014, 03:09:46 AM by ksbsnowowl »

Offline ksbsnowowl

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Re: Sunless Citadel Adventure Path - Campaign Journal
« Reply #5 on: August 11, 2014, 12:18:35 PM »
Just a repeat of the same map, so you don't have to scroll as much  ;)



A side note about this session... There was a really bad storm this night, and the power went out about 2 minutes after my first player showed up.  I hung a Surefire-style LED flashlight (on 50 lumen low setting, with a diffuser to spread the light) from the ceiling fan in my game room, and we played by flashlight.  Less than 5 minutes after my players left at the end of the night, the power came back on.  :rolleyes

We pick up right where we left off, and Værï comes around to hallway 35.  He balances across the small ledge on the edge of the pit trap, and discovers that this door is also locked.  It takes two or three tries, but he gets it unlocked.  He opens the door to room 37, and I read the room description (Værï assumes correctly that the other door he can see in the room is the one he unlocked last session).  The room description notes the room is full of smashed furniture and trophy cases, and has many heads on the walls.  There is a spike with a broken chain anchored to the floor, and patches of ice are noted on the floor and walls.  Værï moves into the room, succeeding on the DC 15 Balance check to not slip on the ice.  No one else really wants to follow, so they push Meepo the Kobold in behind Værï, and then Urolph steps in just behind Meepo.

Værï approaches toward a partly-smashed table that I've drawn on the mat, and then a blast of chill cold erupts from beneath the table; Calcryx the White Dragon Wyrmling deals four points of cold damage to Værï and Meepo.  Værï saved, taking only two, but Meepo was knocked unconscious (he only has 2 hit points).  The dragon flies out from beneath the table, using his tight turning-radius from average maneuverability to reach and latch onto an icy patch high on the wall.  Initiative is called, and Værï is the first PC to act.  Værï is quite excited, thinking that the dragon is climbing, and thus denied his Dex, meaning sneak attack applies.  I have to burst that hopeful bubble, informing him that ice walking, like spider climb, allows the dragon to retain his Dex to AC, but Værï still attacks with his bow, striking the dragon with a high attack roll and inflicting 3 points of damage.  The player, who has had a run of bad luck with the dice lately, is ecstatic about this.

Urolph had his bow out and shoots at the dragon, missing.  He takes a 5-foot step further into the room, and makes the balance check to remain upright, and now standing in the same square in which Meepo is prone (which the rules allow).  Erky Timbers makes a balance check to enter the room, and casts Cure Minor Wounds on Meepo, stabilizing the kobold, who was at –2 hp.  Having rolled a one on his breath weapon recharge, the dragon uses flyby attack to strafe the party, hitting Værï, Urolph, and the unconscious Meepo with his breath weapon, dealing only one point of damage, and again perching high on the wall, on a patch of ice.  Though the core rules are a bit vague as to if rolling a 1 means the dragon can use its breath weapon again the very next round, or if a one means he must wait and not use it for one turn, the sidebar on page 22 of the Draconomicon makes explicitly clear that a 1 means it can be used in back-to-back rounds.  Belack, who is back in the hallway, makes a balance check to skirt the open pit, and stands in the doorway; I can't recall what he did with his standard action at this point.

As an aside, it is important to note that I didn't review the Balance rules before this encounter (I really should have, as I knew that's where the session would start), and just relied upon what the encounter information for the room told me, which was just that PC's needed to make a DC 15 Balance check or fall.  I'm seeing now that this should have translated into either a DC 15, and rolling less than 11 means you fall, and rolling 11–14 means you can't move, or it should have meant a DC 19, with less than a 15 meaning you fall, and 16–19 means you can't move.  But, it's probably for the best that I just did a flat DC 15 to stay standing.  Something to note for the future.

Værï pulls out another arrow and shoots it at the dragon, resulting in another hit; this one for seven points of damage!  Dare I say, it appears the player's string of bad luck is perhaps finished?  Urolph again shoots at the dragon, once again missing.  Erky uses a full round action to convert an orison into a cure minor wounds to once again stabilize Meepo.  The dragon rolled a three for his breath weapon recharge last round, so he needed to spend a few rounds attacking some other way.  Tiny dragon wyrmlings, at least in 3.5, still threaten at 5 feet with their bite attack.  Unlike what is mentioned in the adventure, this allows the dragon to attack without provoking an AoO for entering someone's square.  However, this didn't much matter, as the dragon saw two foes holding only ranged weapons; he used flyby-attack to fly across the room, swooping down to bite Værï, at which point Belack activates his Protection Devotion feat, but Værï is still injured.  The dragon finishes his flight path, returning to his first wall perch, on a patch of ice about 15 feet in the air.  Belack finished out the round by balancing five feet into the room, grabbing hold of Meepo, and dragging him out of the room, ending his turn balancing on the 4-inch ledge beside the pit trap.

Værï strikes the dragon with yet another arrow, but only for one point of damage.  He's now inflicted damage equal to over 1/3 of the dragon's 31 hit points, and he's the only one to have injured the dragon thus far.  Urolph draws and fires, also hitting the dragon for three points of damage, followed by Erky attacking with the goblin javelin he got from Belack, inflicting 5 points of damage.  The dragon is now sitting at 12 hit points, and starting to get a bit worried.  The DM is getting worried too; Meepo was knocked unconscious with the first breath weapon that started the encounter, so never had an opportunity to remind the PC's that they are supposed to capture and return the dragon to the kobolds, not kill it.  The dragon does stick around for another round however, and performs a flyby bite against Urolph, missing, and returning to his second perch, high on the north wall.  Belack balanced with Meepo, dragging him back out into the safe section of hallway 35, east of the pit trap, dropping him, then using a second move action to make it back just inside the door to room 37.

Værï tries to move (perhaps to open the door to room 39), failing his balance check, and falling down, while Urolph nails the dragon with another arrow for 4 points of damage.  Erky casts Bless on the party, but forgets to draw a melee weapon.  Calcryx decides it is time to beat a hasty retreat.  He has a nice hefty 150 foot fly speed, and the maneuverability to make use of it in the tight spaces of the Citadel.  His breath weapon is back, so he uses that on the party as he flies past, then eats an attack of opportunity from Belack, who is standing just inside the door, holding a scimitar.  The damage Belack inflicts leaves the dragon with a mere 3 hit points, but now he is past all the PC's... but Belack's wolf has been sitting in the hallway this whole time.  I couldn't find any mention in the adventure for how high ceilings were in the Citadel, so I just went with 10 feet high for the hallways.  This means that the dragon had to fly right above the wolf, who gets an AoO, dealing 6 points of damage and bringing the dragon down to –3 hit points.

The PC's fiddled around for two rounds doing something ridiculously unimportant while the dragon slowly bled to death, but Belack got his act together and stabilized the dragon, bringing its hit points up from –5 to –4.  Once healed back to consciousness, Meepo is quite happy that they caught the dragon, and the dragon is tied up and wrapped in a blanket for delivery to the Kobold Queen.

Meepo and the party retreat with the dragon, and arrive in the Kobold Queen's throne room carrying their prey.  Then Urolph gets an idea... "why don't we feed the dragon some of these goodberries, then we can let it go to kill the kobolds, and we get more loot!" ... was the basic gist of what he said.  Værï liked this idea, and after a moment's hesitation, Belack did too...  They ask how many kobolds there are, and I reply that there are nine kobold warriors in addition to the queen (they don't know, but she is a 3rd level sorcerer).

In the heat of the moment I just chose a suitably-high number at random; there are actually six kobold warriors listed in addition to the sorcerer, but several other groups of three kobolds about the complex (and the PC's rescued three kobolds when they rescued Erky, so the kobold numbers would have grown, anyway).  That number got the PC's to rethink their impromptu blitz attack before they started it (thank God!), which is good, because I wasn't looking forward to slaughtering them tonight...  They'd just captured a dragon, and expended a large chunk of their resources, and now, playing to their chaotic natures (I think all of them are CN, actually...) they wanted to give it a go at HEALING that dragon back to consciousness (yeah, he won't have a grudge, not at all...) and taking on a fairly sizable force of kobolds...  Sometimes PC's can be a bit baffling in the logic department...

So they finally decide amongst themselves that they want the key they see in the mouth of the dragon on the back of Yasdrul's throne, and the exchange is make peacefully.  The characters head back toward the large round room at the start of the complex (room 4), with the intension of going to use the key immediately in room 6.  But along the way I again point out the stone door that leads to room 14, and that they have yet to open it.  Perhaps to just be contrarian, Urolph says they should open this door, and act as though he had never said they should ignore it previously...

Værï works to unlock the door, and inside they find a 10 x 10 foot room carved out of the stone, and a rusty metal barrel with a large bung in the lid.  They remove the bung, exposing the gaping bung hole (yes, many jokes were made), and a trapped water mephit springs out and breathes a nasty acidic breath weapon on them.

I know this is a horrible place to stop, but I'm dozing off for the evening...

Initiatives were rolled, Erky swung his axe, dealing 5 damage, which was all resisted by damage reduction, and they had to come up with another plan.  They decided to make use of a few vials of alchemist's fire that they had purchased.  I think it was Urolph who had the flasks, and he throws the flask from point-blank range, suffering an AoO for his effort, BUT, he does succeed in striking the water mephit, and setting it on fire. (Which is silly, since you can't really set water on fire, but whatever.)  A few more strikes from the PC's doing minimal damage, and on its turn the mephit accepts two AoO's to jump back down into the water tank, dousing the fire and allowing it to gain fast healing for a round.  It continues with its movement to come back up through the bung hole to breath on the PC's once again.  Well, Urolph had readied an action to nail it once again with alchemist's fire...

Urolph successfully sets it on fire with this second batch of alchemist's fire.  The Mephit's plan at this point is to escape, but it must extinguish the flames so that it doesn't die.  It attempts to roll on the ground in the hallway to put out the flames, but still fails the reflex save.  Being prone, the PC's get some good attacks on it, and Værï overcomes the damage reduction with Punishing Stance and some flanking for sneak attack.  I think he even succeeded in hitting with Sapphire Nightmare Blade (I know he succeeded on the Concentration check, but can't recall if he hit or not, nor do I remember which round that happened in.)  The mephit never stood up again, and the PC's reveled in its death.

At this point they decided they were too beat up to continue for the day, and they returned to Oakhurst, buying more alchemist's fire, before heading back to Urolph's farm to sleep for the evening.  They dealt with two more twig blights, and again failed to backtrack them very far.  So far they have NO idea where the twig blights are coming from, aside from learning from Erky that there are more twig blights in the Twilight Grove.

That's where we ended for the night.
« Last Edit: August 14, 2014, 12:59:43 AM by ksbsnowowl »

Offline ksbsnowowl

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Re: Sunless Citadel Adventure Path - Campaign Journal
« Reply #6 on: August 14, 2014, 01:49:17 AM »
Tonight was the seventh session, and the PC's headed back to the Citadel.  I realized after the session was over that at the end of the previous session (when the PC's went to town and slept at Urolph's farm), Belack's player had prepared and cast Goodberry three or so times at the end of that day, but he just wrote a note to himself to roll 6d4 goodberries at the start of tonight's session, and that never happened.  I reminded him of this when I sent out the XP email after the session was over; hopefully he remembers next time.

They return to the Citadel, and head straight to room 6, where they can make use of the key they got from Yasdrul as a reward for reclaiming the dragon for the kobold tribe.  There was a dire rat at the southern end of the room, and they dealt with it without issue.  They used the key to open the door, and this is where the fun began...  Room 7 has four pedestals, three hold remnants of broken crystal globes, while the south one still holds a blue-glowing crystal globe that tinkles with the notes of a melancholy melody.

Remember how Urolph thinks all the world is his, he just hasn't claimed it yet?  Well, after Værï searches the floor space just inside the door, Urolph walks right over to the tinkling globe, but before he can touch it, his proximity sets off the globe to swell its music louder.  The music fills the room and extends about 20 feet out through the door, and it is mind-affecting.  I call for Will saves, and Urolph, Værï, and Belack's wolf all fail, being mentally compelled to move out to the courtyard in area 3.  Belack's wolf sets off the pit trap there, and I call for intelligence checks from Værï and Urolph to see if they remember the pit trap is there (a little ad libbing on my part).  They both forget, and Urolph falls into the pit, though Værï makes his reflex save to avoid it.

In area 3 the wolf is howling, and the other two are clamping their ears and screaming for it to stop.  About the same time that ends (10 rounds) and they come to their senses, Erky and Belack have to make a save (once every minutes of exposure), both failing and heading out to the courtyard.  As they return they stuff their ears with rags cut from a blanket (+2 bonus on the save), and they want to try the dragon-shaped whistle they found in room 27, but before they can enter the room again, Urolph (who has the whistle) fails his save and goes running back out to the courtyard (no danger of forgetting the pit trap any more).  Værï and Belack make their saves, and in deciding what to do about the loudly-chiming orb, they decide that breaking it is a good idea.

Værï shoots it with an arrow, inflicting 3 points of damage after hardness (it has hardness 4, and 10 hit points).  Immediately upon being touched, the orb starts screeching its tune even louder.  The Will DC goes up to 23, and the save must now be made every round.  Værï fails and runs out the door.  Belack resists for one round, but is soon following Værï.  They stand around trying to decide what to do (they don't know the globe will go back to near silence again after 5 minutes), and I hint/fast forward to the 5 minute mark, letting them know the globe quiets down.  They then get the idea to all attack it simultaneously with bow and arrow, thrown club, spear, javelin, or axe.  The do it, inflicting a total of 1 extra point of damage... and setting off the loud screeching music again.  Five minutes later they try again... and five minutes later they try once more...  It took them four or five tries to finally shatter that damn orb, having to wait five minutes between each try.  If only someone were attacking them during that time... it feels like a wasted opportunity  :smirk

Værï searches the door to room 8, and finding no traps, he opens the door.  He searches the hall beyond, finding a pressure plate trap, and disabling it.  These good rolls brought a big smile to his face.  They then opened the door to room 9, and after a quick search of the floor inside the door, they entered.  Urolph walked right up to the large marble statue of a dragon, and the statue spoke to them, posing a riddle.  Urolph of course thinks the statue can actually hold a conversation, and is disappointed when it won't answer his questions.  Værï and Belack mentally latch on to the idea that the parchment they found in the White dragon's room is somehow tied to the answer of whatever is in this room.  After the start to stall out a bit, I have Erky walk next to the statue, and it again triggers the magic mouth, restating the riddle.  The are surprised it repeated the message, and Urolph steps back and forth several times, causing me to repeat the riddle again, and again, and again.

Værï searches the room, finding the secret door in the west wall (all he sees is the seam), and then is constantly searching for a way to open it.  Further search checks are unsuccessful, turning up nothing, and attempts to use a crowbar to pry the door open did not work either.  Nor did Urolph's axe attack...

I'm sure it was a normal length of time for them to solve the riddle, but to me (who knew the answer), it seemed like it took them forever to even piece together that this was a riddle they should verbally answer.  Eventually Belack actually listens to the statue's message, and answers the riddle.  The secret door immediately opens.

That's not where we finished for the night, but that's where I'm finishing for tonight.

The secret door rumbles open, and they look through into a fifty-foot-long hall heading toward the west.  Værï searches the first square inside the door, and then proceeds to search the statues in the three alcoves along the north wall.  No one searches the statues along the south wall (center and eastern alcoves; the west alcove is empty), but they do take the time to search the empty southwestern alcove... several times...  :lmao

They see a sickly green light from the open archway leading to the west, and beyond the pit that marks the end of this room, they can make out a large, dragon-carved sarcophagus laid in state in Room 12.  Urolph asks if he could set his grappling hook on the stone coffin, and I state that he can.  He does so, and Værï shimmies across the rope to the other side.  I had forgotten to read thoroughly through this encounter before the evening started, so in the moment I missed that Jot the Quasit was supposed to try and bull rush the first PC into the pit; missing this detail doesn't bother me, as it is an insanely stupid tactic on the part of the quasit, who would take a -9 on the bull rush attempt, given his Tiny size and 8 Strength.  Instead, he swipes at Værï's head, clawing him across the face, and inflicting one point of Dex damage.

Initiative is rolled and Belack activates his Animal Devotion feat to gain an average fly speed for 10 rounds.  He crosses the pit and attacks the quasit, missing.  Værï also misses attacking the fiend in his own square.  Erky chucks his one javelin at the fiend, but misses too (Jot has the highest AC of anything they've fought yet, with an AC of 18; add in firing into melee and there is little hope for the PC's on the east side of the pit.)  Made bold by all the missing, Jot claws Værï in the face once again, though he makes his Fort save vs. poison this time, and then Jot 5-foot steps into Belack's space, provoking an AoO from the druid.  The flashing scimitar deals 6 points of damage... five of which is negated by Jot's damage reduction.  The quasit then inflicted another claw wound and a point of Dex damage on Belack.

Urolph backs up, enough to get a 20-foot running start, and has just enough movement to jump over the pit and pass through his party members' squares to end his double-move on the west side of them.  Belack attacks and misses, but then Værï goes, hitting Jot with his rapier + Punishing Stance for 9 damage, of which Jot only took 4.

Erky is stuck on the east side of the pit, and has no more ranged weapons.  Seeing the difficulty his compatriots are having hitting the demon, he casts bless.  Jot heals two points, attacking Belack three times, but an immediate Protection Devotion, as well as some poor rolls, keep him from hitting.  Urolph steps forward and nails Jot with his axe, dealing 11 points of damage, but only 6 after DR.  At this point I recall that Jot is supposed to leave, not fight to the death...  I read aloud his reaction, "You broke the binding; my watch over the dragonpriest is over!"  The PC's all ask me to repeat what he said, and I refuse... I really hope Jot makes it out of here, but at only 9 hit points, I'm not sure he will.

Over the next round, Jot gets damaged once more for four damage (meaning it was 9 damage inflicted); I don't recall for sure, but due to the numbers it had to be Værï who did it.  Unable to do anything else, Erky casts protection from evil, and once Jot's turn comes around once more, he wants to get the hell out of Dodge.  There's just one problem... He has no ranks in Concentration.  It would be great to turn invisible right now, but that would provoke an AoO from each of three people... which would likely ruin his attempt to become invisible.  He's held up pretty well to attacks so far, so I take a chance...  He heals two hit points at the start of the round (now at 7 HP), and then he flies east.  He avoids taking any damage from a total of 4 AoO's, though I can't recall if some of the PC's hit and their damage was just negated by Jot's DR 5/cold iron or good.  Regardless, he was now free to use his standard action to use his invisibility SLA, and he disappeared.  Værï assumed he had teleported away, which was just fine by me; that meant they didn't try to attack him where he disappeared.

Belack uses the last couple of rounds of his Animal Devotion feat to shuttle Erky across the pit, and the party takes stock of what they see in this tomb.  There is a green-flamed torch on the wall in the southeast corner (it is an everburning torch), and there is a very large sarcophagus.  It takes Urolph several attempts to get all the six rusted clamps off of the sarcophagus, but he does get them off.  The PC's then shove the lid off toward the back, and a flash of green light inside indicates the end of whatever magic was present inside (a temporal stasis spell).  The creature inside immediately claws at Urolph, missing, but Værï's player is aghast when I lay a troll mini down on the table (he's been playing in my viking game for years, so knows all about trolls).  The troll is weakened, and though still listed as CR 5, it can't rend, and by the book only has Regeneration 3 (which likely has more to do with the fact this adventure was probably written simultaneously with the 3.0 Monster Manual, so Regen 3 is probably a reflection of 2nd edition trolls regenerating 3 hit points per round.)

The stats for this troll priest are a mess, and don't follow any logical thought process.  The creature was a former 10th-level cleric who was entombed alive for the "crime" of polymorphing himself into a troll's form (this of course was written assuming 3.0 permanent-duration Polymorph Other).  The centuries of entombment have made the creature weakened and insane, and have stripped him of his clerical abilities.  He's supposed to have been 10th level, but of course the monster stats only have a troll's normal 6 HD, with weakened Strength, Dex, Intelligence, and Wisdom, and an inability to rend (and the previously-mentioned Regen 3 instead of Regen 5).  Of course, very little aside from Shapechange, and the rounds/level Troll Shape spells would grant a troll's regeneration in 3.5 (or 3.0, for that matter).  In an attempt to have all of that make mechanical sense, I just completely rebuilt the Dragonpriest.

Given the odd regeneration value, and the inability for polymorph any object (the only polymorph spell that could keep him in this form this long) to grant regeneration, I changed the historically elf priest into a human, and made use of the Troll-Blooded feat (from a Dragon Magazine; I've used this feat for years in my viking game to give regeneration 1 to some "trolls" that my PC's have faced).  So, he still has a lowered amount of regeneration, but does still have it.  I also decided to actually give him 10 HD, as ex-cleric HD.  This did up his claw and bite attacks to +8 and +3, nearly those of a normal troll, after accounting for his weakened stats.  But, he still can't rend, and I gave him hit points based upon 2 hp's per HD roll, and a Con modifier of +2 (since via polymorph his HP's shouldn't change from his base Human shape); add in the Toughness prerequisite for Troll-Blooded, and he ended up with 43 hit points (the one published in the adventure had 42 hp's).  I also gave him a now-completely-useless Empower Spell feat for his 9th HD, otherwise effectively giving him the normal feats for a troll (iron will and track; who cares about Alertness?)

So the PC's lay into the prone troll a bit, inflicting 14 points of damage with three attacks (all converted to non-lethal) before the troll went at the last spot in the initiative order.  The troll heals a point of nonlethal damage and stands, but everyone misses on the AoO.  The troll strikes Urolph with a nasty claw strike.  Værï has tumbled his way around the sarcophagus so that he is flanking the troll, who has yet to take a step out yet.  The elf stikes with Punishing Stance and Sapphire Nightmare Blade while flanking... he deals 4d6 damage to the troll and inflicts 14 points of damage.  The troll gets him back with a full attack that drops Værï into negative hit points, and takes a five-foot step, placing one foot on the ground outside of his stone prison.  Værï's player has already lost one character to this campaign, and fear begins to tinge his voice...

Urolph cuts the troll for 8 damage, and Belack lights him up with some alchemist's fire.  Erky spends his round maneuvering around to Værï while avoiding the troll's reach.  The troll heals a bit and gets one more set of attacks in, this time on Urolph, injuring him somewhat, but the PC's win the day, nailing him with another alchemist's fire, and another round of attacks.  Værï is healed by Erky.  Just as the burning alchemist's fire goes out, the troll falls back into his stone coffin, and Urolph immediately pours lamp oil on it.  I call for Spot checks, and Belack notices there are gold coins and scrolls in the bottom of the sarcophagus.  They convince Urolph to wait on the fire until they can get the scrolls out.  Urolph continues to beat on the troll for a few rounds, and then once everyone is satisfied that flammable loot has been removed from newly-minted tub of oil, that troll is lit up.

In the end the party recovers several hundred gold and silver coins (with the details of the coin faces dulled by the heat of the fire), and has gotten four magic scrolls, as well as a masterwork dagger (that now needs its burned handle replaced).  They pack everything up and decide to head back to the farm for the night.  Urolph starts to climb up to the top of the ravine first, and after he has ascended 20 feet, the rope starts to vibrate.  Looks of "oh no!" pass amongst the players... the rope snaps, Urolph takes 2d6 points of falling damage, and Jot appears at the top of the ravine, 50 feet up, cackling maniacally before he turns invisible and disappears.

Undeterred, Urolph pulls out his trusty rope and grappling hook.  I have him roll the Use Rope check to set the hook and... he fails it by more than 4, which means the hook will come loose after 1d4 rounds of weight being applied.  I rolled 4 rounds...  So at the end of round 4, Urolph falls 30 feet, and is nocked down to -2 hit points.  Erky stabilizes him with a Cure Minor Wounds, but says he would prefer to not use the last cure spell he has to awaken the dwarf at 0 hit points; Erky would prefer a few hours of peaceful quiet...  But the PC's decide to go spend the night with the kobolds, so Erky does heal Urolph back up to 0 hp's.  The PC's head back down and open the door to Meepo's dragon room (room 15), and immediately get breathed on by the white dragon that is again locked in the cage there.  Only Belack or Værï got injured; I forget which.  Instead, they decide to camp in the empty room opposite room 14, and that's where we ended the session.
« Last Edit: August 21, 2014, 01:37:10 AM by ksbsnowowl »

Offline ksbsnowowl

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Re: Sunless Citadel Adventure Path - Campaign Journal
« Reply #7 on: August 21, 2014, 02:43:52 AM »
Tonight was the eighth session of this campaign, and Urolph and Belack had both earned enough XP to level to 3rd.  Værï was about 40 XP shy once again (pesky dying and being behind...)  Since the PC's were going to be spending their first long stretch of time in the Citadel (they needed to wait for the next morning, so Belack could use Animal Devotion once again to gain a fly speed for 10 rounds, and fly up to secure a new rope at the top of the ravine), I for the first time made use of the wandering monster table, which calls for one check every 12 hours the PC's spend in the Citadel.  I rolled for 3 hobgoblins to assault them; since this would eat into the meager forces remaining in this level of the Citadel, I decided to scale it back to one hobgoblin and one goblin.  That would provide enough XP during the night encounter that Værï could also level that next morning.

Just like last time... Værï showed up with a leveled-up character sheet in addition to his 2nd level one, and both Belack and Urolph weren't done leveling.  So we spent a smidge over half an hour getting them leveled up before we started (again, I encourage my players to make a new sheet each level; this is helpful for any future level loss situations, where you can pull out the old sheet with ease).  Urolph took a level of Fighter, and after talking him through some feat options, he ended up taking Cleave and Improved Bull Rush (in preparation for Shock Trooper).  Belack took Fiery Burst, which is probably the best 3rd level Druid feat, ever.  Druid's have at least one fire spell at every spell level (though 3rd level is the most lean, containing only Fire Wings), making the feat optimally-useful at pretty much all levels.  It certainly was useful this evening...

We also took care of some book-keeping from two sessions ago.  We had ended with Belack stating he was casting Goodberry 3 times.  He wrote a note to himself to roll the 6d4 berries the next session, and forgot to do so.  Thus, they started with 17 additional Goodberries this session (they would have still been viable, time-wise).

The party took care of the hobgoblin and the goblin night-raiders within two rounds, though there was some initial confusion due to a complete lack of light sources in the room with them ("oh, you mean it's pitch black, and there's no light in the hallway?"), which ate up Værï's first round in order to crack a sun rod against the wall and light things up.  The everburning torch they got last session... stuffed in Urolph's pocket, doing no one any good.

With that, all three PC's leveled in the morning, giving us:
Urolph the Goblin Slayer:  Dwarf Barbarian 2/Fighter 1
Belack the Neutral*:  Human Druid 3
Værï Able:  Elf Rogue 1/Warblade 1/Wizard (Diviner) 1

*As opposed to the BBEG Druid named Belak, whom the party have started referring to as Belak the Evil.  Sometimes Belack will refer to himself as Belack the Good, despite the fact he is Chaotic Neutral (or is it Lawful Neutral...?)

The session took a while to get into the groove of things tonight, and it seemed like we spent the next hour not getting anywhere.  The PC's left the Citadel; Belack using Animal Devotion to fly up with a rope and secure it.  They head back to Oakhurst, stopping at the farm along the way, so Belack can cast Read Magic and study the scrolls they had recovered from the Dragonpriest Troll's tomb.  When they got to Oakhurst they sold a crap-ton of stuff, including the everburning candle (from the room w/ skeletons) for 50 gp, and two unidentified potions for 25 gp each.  They nearly buy out the Hucrele merchant shop of all their acid and alchemist's fire.  They don't want to dally around (in game), so they head back to the farm (this mean they've spent ~6.5 hours walking on foot today), and decide that gosh darn it, they REALLY want to know where the twig monsters are coming from.  So they head back to where they lost the trail last time, and set up camp, thinking they will be accosted, and can then backtrack the twig blights even further.  This is true, but by this point the twig blights have reached self-sustaining levels in the surrounding wild, so it won't lead them to the root cause (HA!), which is the Sunless Citadel.  There is a 60% chance each night that camping PC's will be accosted by twig blights... I rolled 97% tonight, so no twig blights came.  This was a minor annoyance to my players, but it is what it is.

They finally head back to the Citadel, and they skirt their way past the captured dragon (Belack suffered a bit distracting the dragon, then the rest of the party ran past while its breath weapon was recharging).  They head back to the familiar battlefield that is the javelin practice range, with its crenelated wall.  There is one goblin manning the wall, and some good rolls have Urolph watching him unseen (and he sees the goblin pick its nose and eat the booger...  :D).  Værï gets a surprise attack to start off the combat, nailing the goblin with a lesser acid orb, despite the improved cover it has behind the wall (he got a 22 on the touch attack); unfortunately, it only did 4 points of damage (and this included sneak attack).  Still, the party dispatched the lone goblin very quickly.

As they are all filing out of room 33 into the hallway north of there (35), I have Belack make a Spot check as he leaves the area.  The doors between here and the far end of room 39 are open, so he notices a touch of purplish light from room 40 just as that door closes.  (Getting low on man-power, the goblins in room 40 had kept the door open, and were watching down that way for the lone goblin sentry; when they noticed the torchlight from the PC's, and saw the goblin sentry die, they knew to prepare themselves.)

Given the sighting of activity at the west end of room 39, the PC's decide that is where they will head.  As Værï approaches the door, he can hear guttural goblin voices on the other side.  Urolph enthusiastically kicks in the door, and I describe a large room filled with over two dozen goblins (the PC's freaked out at that statement...) and lit by phosphorescent fungus (the source of the purple light).  The PC's all back away from the door, setting up to the side and readying actions to attack the goblins and hobgoblins as they come through...  They don't yet realize that only 5 of the dozens of goblins are actually any sort of threat.  A long pause occurs, as the goblins are also readying actions, waiting for the PC's to enter.

So, Urolph steps right in, and the waiting hobgoblins take their readied attacks, failing miserably.  Belack makes fantastic use of Fiery Burst, downing a goblin and a hobgoblin with his first strike.  Erky casts bless on the party, and between Urolph's cleaves, and Belack's Fiery Burst, they have slain the goblin defenders in a handful or rounds.  They attempt to talk with the noncombatants, but they are too terrified to be of much help.  When the PC's ask about Belak, they just point toward room 41.

I'll have to write up the battle against Durnn tomorrow.
« Last Edit: September 02, 2014, 11:14:41 PM by ksbsnowowl »

Offline Nanshork

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Re: Sunless Citadel Adventure Path - Campaign Journal
« Reply #8 on: August 21, 2014, 10:49:33 AM »
I can't stop being amused that you have a player who named two successive characters Variable.

Offline ketaro

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Re: Sunless Citadel Adventure Path - Campaign Journal
« Reply #9 on: August 21, 2014, 08:49:37 PM »
Quote
(though 3rd level is the most lean, containing only Fire Wings)

*cough*Wreath of Flames*cough*  :D

Offline ksbsnowowl

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Re: Sunless Citadel Adventure Path - Campaign Journal
« Reply #10 on: August 21, 2014, 11:25:26 PM »
Quote
(though 3rd level is the most lean, containing only Fire Wings)

*cough*Wreath of Flames*cough*  :D
That would have to do with me not owning Dragon Magic.   ;)   :shakefist

So, picking up where I left off, the PC's head straight into Room 41.  The sounds of combat from dealing with the goblins and hobgoblins in room 40 had alerted the leader and his guards in room 41, so there are three goblins and three hobgoblins waiting to attack near the door from room 40.  Urolph barges in, and the 1 HD foes are no match; not a single one hits the dwarf.  Urolph takes his attack after the readied actions, and drops a goblin to -5 hit points.  He then gleefully makes use of his Cleave feat to damage a hobgoblin down to 0 hp's.  At this point I called for initiative checks, and the first to act is the single twig blight that is potted next to Durnn's (the leader) throne.  It uproots itself and advances across the room.  The goblin cleric also goes at this point, casting Bane to dispel Erky's Bless; the Bless only had about one round remaining, so it wasn't any big deal.

Erky Timbers is the next to go; I think he cast protection from evil, but at this point I can't recall exactly what he did.  Værï tumbles into the room, moving through Urolph's space, and succeeding on three tumble checks at DC's 15, 17, and 19 to avoid AoO's, standing in the space of the unconscious goblin.  He lashes out at two goblins using Steel Wind, hitting once and wounding a goblin for three points.  The hobgoblins go, being quite ineffective, and one of them holding back so as not to force himself into negative hit points.  Belack goes at this point, making use of Fiery Burst to take out two goblins.

The one remaining goblin strikes back at Værï, hitting, but doing pitiful damage.  Urolph then slays a Hobgoblin outright, dealing 16 points of damage, dropping it to -10.  Finally, the boss of this first level of the Citadel, Durnn, gets to act.  He stands from his throne and fires an arrow from his shortbow at someone in the party (I honestly don't recall whom).

The twig blight makes it into melee range at this point, and claws at Værï, hitting for two damage, but Værï saved versus the poison.  Erky went at this point, but with the doorway still quite congested, the best he could do was go fishing for 20's by throwing a javelin through the door.  Værï struck the twig blight for 6 damage and reset his maneuvers, followed by the remaining hobgoblin mook failing to wound Urolph.  Belack unleashed another Fiery Burst, taking down the final goblin, and his wolf was finally able to enter the room, and demolished the Twig Blight with a bite attack.  Urolph slew the last hobgoblin mook, then started moving toward Durnn the hobgoblin chief.  Durnn fired an arrow at Urolph, hitting, then dropping his shortbow and drawing his sword as he moved.

Grenl the goblin cleric follows after Durnn, and Erky threw another javelin.  Værï started to move around the north side of the large hole in the middle of the floor, and I've completely forgotten what Belack did this turn.  Urolph closed with Durnn, striking the Hobgoblin for 5 damage.  At this point, Grenl should have given Durnn a cure light wounds spell (at least, according to the tactics in the module), but it appears I didn't have her do so.  Honestly, I may have completely forgotten to have her go this turn; I can't think of any other reason why Durnn never had his hit points go up...

Værï finished coming around the north side of the shaft down into the depths, and he skewered Grenl for 11 damage (which I think was the result of a successful Sapphire Nightmare Blade, but it could have just been a good roll using only punishing stance), dropping her.  Urolph then proceeded to kill Durnn, dealing 12 damage and knocking him unconscious.

The party immediately rushes to the locked chest that makes the footstool of Durnn's throne.  Værï noticed the chest was trapped, but blundered the disable device check, and set off the trap, subjecting himself to some diluted wyvern poison.  Urolph then makes fairly short work of the chest with his crowbar, snapping the internal mechanisms of the lock, and they find a fair amount of treasure inside, including a scroll of knock (what an appropriate place for such a scroll, inside a locked chest...)  Then the party decides to search Durnn, where they find the key for the now-ruined chest.  :lmao

With all the active foes dead, Urolph then started a discussion about slaying all the "helpless" goblins in the little community in room 40.  The entire party is CN, with the exception of Erky the NPC, who is Chaotic Good.  But, since the goblins held him captive for a year... Erky decided he was going to inspect Durnn's throne, and ignore whatever screams came from room 40 while Urolph took care of business.

That's where we ended for the evening.
« Last Edit: August 26, 2014, 08:01:12 PM by ksbsnowowl »

Offline ksbsnowowl

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Re: Sunless Citadel Adventure Path - Campaign Journal
« Reply #11 on: August 28, 2014, 03:04:24 AM »
Tonight was the ninth session of this campaign.  But before I delve into that, I wanted to expound upon something that I've noticed.  When planning out this entire campaign, I had planned to write my own adventure to fill in the 5th – 7th level range, as I did not want to use Speaker in Dreams.  However, I don't think I'll need to do much of anything to fill in that gap, because the PC's are leveling faster than normal, because there are only three of them, not four.

The Sunless Citadel states that PC's will cover first and second level through the course of the adventure, and advance to 3rd level just before the finale against Belak the Outcast.  Well, my PC's reached third level before facing the first "mini-boss," Durnn the Hobgoblin, who guards the entrance to the lower level of the Citadel.  I looked at all the remaining encounters in the adventure, and they should award enough XP to get all my PC's to fourth level after the defeat of the BBEG.  This will put them at 4th level going into The Forge of Fury; that's fine, since a 4th level party of three is roughly equal in power to a 3rd level party of four.  But it does mean they are likely to reach 6th level by the end of The Forge of Fury.  Since The Standing Stone is designed for 7th level, I'll not have a lot of a gap to bridge in the mean time; I can probably just run a session of cross-country travel with "random" encounters to pump up their XP piles a bit, then dive into The Standing Stone.  Then again, a three-person party should be running adventures about one level lower.  I'll just have to look at it more closely as I approach the end of the Forge of Fury, and better know exactly where they sit regarding their XP.

Okay, back to the adventure at hand.  After recapping last week's session for the players, they discussed for a short while if they wanted to kill the goblins or not.  They decided not to do so just yet, and then explored down the hallway leading east from room 41, learning that it was just a back way to the columned hall of room 39.  Despite the fairly sizable force they had just slaughtered, and Erky being nearly out of spells (he had three cure minor wounds remaining), they decided to heal up and head down the vine-laced shaft in the center of room 41.  Belack cast lesser restoration to heal Værï's Con damage from the trapped strongbox, and he cast a cure light wounds on Urolph, rolling exactly enough to heal all of the dwarf's wounds.

The vines provide enough of a handhold as to count as knotted rope, and since it is against a wall, that lowers the Climb DC to 0, meaning that so long as they take their time, none of the PC's will fall the 80 feet to the bottom (Belack has only a –2 ACP now, so could not fail by 5 or more, meaning no chance to fall, so long as he didn't rush).  Thus they enter the lower level:



The shaft opens into the middle of the ceiling of room 42.  Though the module doesn't state as such, I had the vines continue free-hanging the last 15 feet below the ceiling, and root into the loamy soil in the middle of the room.  The large square room is covered in a thick layer of compost, and two robed figures (skeletons) shovel compost into a rusted wheelbarrow in the southeast quadrant of the room.  Not yet realizing the figures are skeletons, though somewhat wary of the fact they haven't reacted to the party, Belack calls out a greeting.  The skeletons still don't react, so Belack moves over toward their front, then seeing the truth of their form.

The players roll initiative; the skeletons, as well as the two twig blights that are rooted into the compost of the room, roll poorly and will go last (since they've not yet uprooted themselves, the PC don't initially recognize them as threats).  Belack goes first, using Fiery Burst on one of the skeletons, but rolling poorly and dealing only three points of damage.  His wolf advances on the other skeleton and bites for 6 damage; he forgets to trip, and by third level I'm not going to remind him of it any more.  Urolph notices the bone leg in the wolf's mouth, so he steps forward and draws his club, then proceeds to smash the skeleton to bits, sad that he is too far removed from the other skeleton to use his Cleave feat.

Værï goes next, moving up to the remaining skeleton, drawing a club, and he attempts to use Sapphire Nightmare Blade, but fails (I've always been leery of SNB, because of the penalty imposed if you fail the Concentration check; that personal caution seems to have borne out, as it has negatively affected Værï quite a few times).  Erky then goes, and holds forth his holy symbol (which my players now refer to as his golden ass-nugget), rolling a natural 20 on his turning check; since his minimum turning damage is 4, I don't even have to roll, and since the skeleton goes next, it flees away from Erky, reaching the door in the southeast corner, then opening the door.  Værï got an AoO as the skeleton fled, dealing only 3 damage with his 2d6 damage roll.

Now the twig blights uproot themselves and advance on the party, approaching from the west.  They attack Værï and Urolph each once, missing the dwarf, but striking Værï for 1 point of damage, though he saved versus the poison lacing its claws.  Belack again relies on Fiery Burst to attack one of the twig blights, but it makes its save, and ends up taking only one point of damage.  Around this point in the fight I happen to actually refer to the twig blights as "twig blights," which is met with "oh, that's what they're called?  We were close, calling them 'twig monsters.'"

Belack's wolf chases down the skeleton, missing the undead.  Urolph drops his club and draws his axe, swinging at the twig blight before remembering to reposition to gain flanking from Erky, and missing because of it.  He then asks if he can move, and since he drew a weapon, all he can do is take a 5-foot step, which he uses to move into flanking with Erky.  Then everyone realizes he should have flanked before he attacked, but what's done is done, and I hold him to his actions.

Værï attacks his twig blight (the one previously burned for one damage), and deals 5 damage with his 2d6 damage roll.  He may have reset his maneuvers at this point, but I ask why he did not 5-foot step and make use of Steel Wind to attack both twig blights. "Because I didn't feel like it," he says as he brushes off the potential mis-step.  This is of no matter to me, as it let Erky shine for a moment, drawing his battleaxe (which Urolph refers to as a hatchet...) and strikes the twig blight for 5 damage, thanks to the flanking bonus provided by Urolph  ;)

The twig blights go, missing Urolph twice, but striking Værï once; again the elf saves against the poison.  The skeleton continues its attempt to flee, and Belack's wolf bites with his AoO, dealing 5 damage and tripping the skeleton.  Since it is once again Belack's turn, the wolf finishes the job against the prone skeleton, breaking the bones apart, destroying the menace.  Belack throws down with the Fiery Burst once more; this time the plant fails its save, and the druid deals 9 points of damage, frying it.  Urolph misses against the twig blight, but Værï hits, dealing only 2 damage.  Erky shines once again, "stealing Urolph's kill" as he trims the poisonous weed down to size with his battleaxe.

Around this time, three rounds into their fight, is when a bugbear hunter from room 43 is supposed to enter the fray, along with his two "hounds" (dire rats).  But Balsag the bugbear is only in his cavern 75% of the time, and I rolled a 79... he's out hunting in the Underdark, so the PC's escape his wrath for now.

Since there is already one door open, the party decides to investigate to the south first.  Urolph searches the hallway for traps before continuing down its length, and he specifically watches the ceiling as he advances (my guess is he's been attacked by way too many piercers in the past).  They walk down to the rent in the earth that is area 44, though they immediately go check out the hall where it continues after the rift's shifted break.  They are quite cautious as they travel down that hallway, searching for traps time and time again.  They get to the door to room 46, and Værï searches it for traps and to see if it is locked.  It's not trapped or locked, but it is stuck shut.  Værï points out this is the perfect sort of job for Urolph.  Always the contrarian, the dwarf refuses to open the door.  Then Belack does the greatest thing I've seen in the last few months of gaming... he turns to Urolph and says, "Urolph, this door just said you can't open it."  To which Urolph responds, "Fuck you door, I'll show you!"  :lmao
We about died laughing, and I awarded Belack 10 bonus XP.

After a handful of attempts, Urolph finally gets the door open, and inside the find a 30 ft x 30 ft room with an iron pedestal shaped like a dragon with a platter in its mouth at the center of the room.  Urolph pulls out the dragon-shaped whistle from room 27 (they've never figured out how it works) and blows it.  He actually blew it back in room 42 as well, and in the rift.  Then he gathers up cracked tiles from the floor and places them on the platter.  Since this provoked no response, Værï brushes off the tile pieces, then places the whistle on the platter.  Still nothing happens.

They place lamp oil in the platter, then light it.  After that produces no unusual reaction, Urolph pushes over the statue, which clangs against the ground, and spills still-burning oil across the floor.  After the flames gutter out, Værï sets to searching the room.  Everyone starts rolling and calling out their results.  "You find broken tiles."  "You find dust."  "You find an iron statue that has been tipped over."  "You find remnants of burned lamp oil."  They don't give up; they keep searching.  "You find a note that says 'you're an idiot.'"  Urolph asks if he too can understand it, since he's illiterate (technically not true any longer, thanks to his Fighter level), and I reply that the note had a magic mouth on it, and it literally said "you're an idiot."  There was much laughter.  Oh, and Urolph wants the statue for his farm house...

The party heads back to room 42, then inspects the door to hall 47.  I roll again to see if Balsag the bugbear has returned, but give him only a 1% chance, given the short period of time that has elapsed; he is not yet back.  Værï quietly opens the door to hall 47, and I describe its contents, which include columns, phosphorescent fungus, and work tables covered with mortars and pestles, bowls with mushrooms and crushed leaves, etc.  No goblins are present in the hall, but it is a work area for Belak the Outcast's concoctions and studies in growing plants underground.

Værï listens at the door to 47a, and hears snoring.  They sneak in and coup de grace both goblins sleeping inside, killing both outright, preventing them from raising an alarm.  Then they listen at the door to 47b, hearing some sort of work going on inside.  They open the door, and find two goblins working a mash-tun filled with a root-like vegetable.  The room also has strainers and ten 2-gallon casks of foul-tasting alcohol (I described it as worse than the worst vodka they've ever tasted, because of course Urolph tastes it later...)  Urolph charges in, missing due to the +2 cover I gave the goblins due to the mash-tun (I treated them as otherwise unarmored).  Værï moves in, dealing 12 damage and downing one of the goblins.  Belack's wolf leaps into the mash-tun, missing with his bite.  Belack uses Fiery Burst on the last goblin, but it makes its save, staying upright with 3 hit points.  Erky stands in the doorway and throws a javelin, missing despite his racial bonus to attack goblins.

The goblin goes, and standing there unarmed and unarmored, does the only thing it can; it tries to flee.  It is being threatened by Belack's wolf and Værï, and they both miss on their AoO's as he gets out of the mash-tun.  Since Værï has no AoO remaining, the goblin skirts past him and reaches the door to the room, but Erky the gnome stands in his way, and he must stop.  Urolph kills it where it stands, but not until after it has screamed a warning to the other goblins in this section.

The party decides to hole up in this room, and they lay out two bags of caltrops, filling the squares on either side of the doorway, so any entering would have to pass through two caltrop-covered squares.  They ready actions, waiting what seems like a long time.  There were two other goblins next door in 47d, and another two across the hall in 47c patching up armor.  Room 47e is stocked with weapons, so the goblins hastily donned armor and armed themselves before investigating.

Two goblins come to the doorway. Værï looses an arrow, missing, and Belack throws down a readied Fiery Burst.  Both goblins fail their saves, and Belack rolls 12 damage, dropping both of them.  The party continues to listen, and Værï can hear two other goblin voices talking, not enthusiastic about approaching the door and getting blown up with a fireball.  Urolph then hears one of them walk away toward the east, and after a few moments he motions to the party to follow him, and he moves out into the hall (moving slowly through the caltrops to avoid injuring himself), drawing a throwing axe and pegging the sole remaining goblin for 9 damage at 20 feet.

They then inspect room 47d, which has a dire rat strapped down to a bench.  The rat is covered in tumors that are "vaguely woody and fruit-like."  This description brings about groans of disgust as the players think this is the source of the magical fruit the goblins have been selling to the townsfolk of Oakhurst.  I distinctly recall a disgusted "but people eat that" coming from Belack's lips.  Then Urolph does the unthinkable... he cuts out one of the tumors... and takes a bite.  :puke

I describe it as tough and woody, with a metallic tang due to the blood that still covers it.  It has no noticeable effect.  I forget why, but Urolph cuts out a second tumor (maybe it was to save for later? I honestly don't recall...)  The room also has a fine crystal flask on a small table.  They place it in the party loot (which Urolph carries, since both the others have strength scores of 10).

They head over to inspect 47c, finding tailoring accouterments for fixing armor, and upon leaving this room, they are confronted by a bugbear and the goblin who had left, returning through the door to 47e.  The goblins win initiative, and the bugbear charges Værï.  I roll an 18 on the die, and explain that scythes have a 20/x4 crit (for a moment, Værï thought it was 18-20/x2).  He only deals ~7 damage.  The goblin throws his javelin at Urolph, but misses.  Urolph proceeds to gut the goblin, and Værï makes his Concentration check for Sapphire Nightmare Blade against the bugbear (only because its AC was lowered, due to charging), but then he fails to hit with the attack roll.  The bugbear is damaged by Belack's Fiery Burst and his wolf.  After the bugbear's second turn, Værï kills him outright, dealing 15 points of damage with a sneak attack from flanking.

The party checks room 47f, noting the hole in the wall, and wondering if it leads to the rift they saw before.  Then then look in 47e, finding over 20 javelins (most of small size), and a few short swords (most had been used by the goblins they just slew).  Værï starts griping that there isn't enough treasure in this dungeon, and I double-check, and here is where I make note of the alcohol in the mash-tun room (a total of 20 gallons), and when Belack searches the main hall, he finds a poultice that seems useful (listed 10 gp value; provides +2 on a heal check).  I also roll for the silver the goblins have amongst them (11 sp), but forget to roll for the bugbear (should be a handful of gold and silver).  The reason they haven't found much of value yet on this level, is that they've so far missed Balsag, who has a +1 Morningstar...

Still pushing on (keep in mind, this is all still the same day that they fought the battle against Durnn), they find a door in the back of 47e, and enter the southern room 48.  The bugbear they already killed was stationed in rooms 48 (he moved around), which is why the goblin went to get him for help.  The area is now empty, but they find gardening tools, and a flask of specialized fertilizer at a work table.  They go check out room 49b, which is filled with fungus of many varieties, but they note that the fungus is blackened and burned in several spots.  They notice odd 1-foot-diameter holes in the floor as they look around the room.  Then Værï sees one hole that glows orange... right before a Thoqqua charges him.  Værï hasn't healed from the hit he took from the bugbear... the thoqqua deals 1d6+3 bludgeoning damage, plus 2d6 fire, and has a chance to set fire to anyone it hits with its slam...
I deal 8 points of bludgeoning and 12 points of fire damage... Værï is dropped to –7 hit points with one hit.  And he failed his Reflex save, so he's on fire...

The thoqqua has a pretty high AC of 18, and no one in the party had any cold magic of any sort.  Urolph steps forward, but fails to hit the elemental worm.  Erky pulls out his waterskin and dumps it on Værï, allowing a second saving throw, which Værï succeeds at (mechanics-wise this could have been done many ways; I chose to give Værï a second reflex save to smother the fire, even though he was unconscious).  Værï's turn comes, and he loses one hit point.  Belack comes to Værï's aid, casting a Lesser Vigor on him, and telling his wolf to attack the fire worm.  The wolf does so... and fails to get through its natural armor, but it does touch it... meaning the wolf takes fire damage, and I rolled high; 10 or 11 points.  My players are starting to worry...  The thoqqua attacks Urolph (more because he's wearing studded leather, than because he hurt it), but thankfully misses.

Urolph swings again, nailing the thoqqua for 10 damage.  Erky doesn't want to approach the fiery monster, and seeing Værï already being tended to, he throws a javelin, failing miserably, since the thoqqua was in melee.  Værï continued to heal, and Belack tells the wolf to guard Værï (basically, it will ready an attack for if the thoqqua attacks Værï, minimizing the wolf's chances of getting burned), and he steps forward, missing with his scimitar.  The thoqqua decides to continue persuing Urolph, hitting for something like 5 damage plus 6 fire; Urolph saved and did not catch on fire.

Urolph misses,  Værï is stable and gaining hit points, so Erky decides to join in the fray, landing a blow with his battleaxe, lowering the thoqqua to 1 hit point.  The worm fails to strike anyone again, and Urolph brings it down.

NOW the players REALLY want to rest.  Værï heals up to 6 hit points after the lesser vigor and Erky's last cure minor wounds.  He also downs the one cure potion they have, rolling max and healing 9 hit points.  They still don't want to go all the way back topside, so they debate where to sleep for the night.  Initial thoughts are to stay right in this large octagonal room, or the hallway 48, but those ideas are abandoned as being too likely to be accosted during the night.  After more discussion that doesn't seem to be going anywhere constructive, I ask for intelligence checks.  Belack gets a 19, and I point out that the room with the iron dragon statue/pillar (room 46) seemed out of the way, and undisturbed for the past several years.  They decide that would make a pretty good defensive position, and they hole up in there for the night, placing caltrops across the inside of the door.

Thus ended this action-packed day of adventuring.  Soon I'll update with the random encounter they had during the last watch, and their further exploration of the arboretum (rooms 49).
« Last Edit: August 28, 2014, 05:29:04 AM by ksbsnowowl »

Offline Braininthejar

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Re: Sunless Citadel Adventure Path - Campaign Journal
« Reply #12 on: August 31, 2014, 10:39:20 AM »
Ah, thoqquas, such underrated monsters  :D

Offline ksbsnowowl

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Re: Sunless Citadel Adventure Path - Campaign Journal
« Reply #13 on: September 03, 2014, 01:04:04 AM »
A quick aside; Værï's player found this lower level to be 'much more of a dungeon crawl, and more boring.'  I just find it to be an interesting observation.  It's true to a large extent.  For various reasons, the goblins don't have near as many opportunities to call upon reinforcements, but part of that feeling may have been largely my fault...

Picking up in the middle of last session, the PC's retreat for the day to Room 46, which prior to their arrival there earlier in the day, did not appear to have been disturbed in many years.  Given the relatively short amount of time since they'd last been through area 42, I didn't make a big deal about what path they took.  But, here's where I unwittingly broke verisimilitude...

I merely rolled for a random encounter during the night (one roll per 12 hours the PC's are there), and did accost them with a lone goblin.  But here's the thing... When Balsag the Bugbear returns from his hunting trip, he might notice the remnants of the scuffle in room 42; for sure he would notice the skeletons are no longer busy in that chamber (they primarily stayed in room 42, turning the compost that covers the entire floor).  Even more egregious, room 47a contained 16 sleeping pallets (two occupied)... all the rooms of area 47 contained 8 goblins, then there are 4 more goblins in 49a, and another 4 in area 54...  Since this is a sleeping area, the other goblins would have returned to their bed chamber at some point in those ~22 hours, and an alarm of sorts should have been raised.  Instead, I moronically just had a single goblin blunder into the PC's room.  It's like we're playing 1st edition Caves of Chaos again...

Oh well, a DM can't be perfect, can he?  During one of the night watches, a lone goblin comes to check the room where the PC's are sleeping.  IIRC, Belack the Neutral was on watch at the time.  He heard the goblin approach, woke everyone, and readied a fiery burst, which dealt 12 damage to the goblin, who failed his reflex save.  The remainder of the party's period of resting passed uneventfully; Værï and the others were able to heal up quite well.

By this point the party had only investigated as far as the southern area 48, and into Room 49b.  Since Balsag the Bugbear would absolutely have returned to his room by now, I ask the PC's what way they want to go to get back to area 48 from their hideout in area 46.  They wisely chose to travel northeast along the length of the rift, which brought them to room 47f (where they had previously noted the collapsed wall).  They escape Balsag's wrath for a little while longer yet.

They arrive in area 48, and decide to open the north door, to the northern area 48.  Seeing that the halls are largely similar, they open the door to 49c expecting a fight.  Inside the see a large room filled with cave fungus, and see two skeletons tending the dirt with shovels.  The PC's do not enter the room, and thus the skeletons do not react to them in any way.  Seeing the skeletons as a diversion that will slow them down in reaching their goal of locating 'Belak the Evil,' they simply shut the door.  Then they retrace their steps, heading south to room 49a.  Værï invariably checked for traps and locks (neither are present) and they open the door, finding a work crew of four goblins inside.  I treat them as unarmored, just mentally reducing their AC's on the fly, and only giving them javelins, and one morningstar between them; that's okay, they died quickly anyhow.

Belack catches two of them in a Fiery Burst, dealing 7 damage, knocking one down, and badly wounding the other (who saved).  At this point I forget who killed whom in what order, but the three goblins still standing take 12 damage, 7 damage, and 8 damage, respectively, and all fall unconscious.  Surprise, goblin warriors aren't much of a challenge for 3rd level characters  ;)

After looting the goblin's bodies for a handful of silver pieces, the party heads north to check out 49d.  They open the door, finding another Bugbear gardener using a scythe to clear out burned fungal crops (the thoqqua that nearly killed Værï is the one responsible for the fire damage).  Before the bugbear even gets to act, Belack damages him for 11 points with Fiery Burst.  Due to the way the party filed into the room, Belack was basically standing in the door, and the other characters had fanned out to the sides, providing the bugbear with a straight charge line toward the PC Druid.  Erky did threaten along that line, though.  The bugbear didn't care; he saw his impending doom, and he wanted to die with his scythe puncturing Belack's bowels.

The bugbear howls as he charges past Erky.  The gnome lands a blow, but only deals 4 damage, leaving the bugbear with 1 hit point remaining.  He swung well, and damaged Belack, but Erky's turn was right after the bugbear's, and the gnome felled the big goblinoid with his swing.  They loot the bugbear's body (and I remember for him to have a coin pouch...), then notice that unlike the other octagonal rooms they've been in, this one has a second door.  They open the door and cautiously walk down the hallway to room 50.

The western end of this room has a curved wall, and there is an impressive marble statue of a dragon filling that end of the room.  Its glowing eyes fill the room with a red light.  There is also a circular redstone tile in the floor in front of the statue; the tile has Draconic writing upon it.  This room holds very little danger if you are just passing through, but if you approach within 5 feet of the redstone tile, or start exploring behind the statue, a Shadow attacks from the inky darkness on the back side of the statue.  Someone (Belack?) casts detect magic, and notes that the tile and the statue both radiate transmutation magic.

The statue and tile are a wonderful little magical location boon, and I'm wondering if the party is going to actually gain any benefit from it, since they have yet to get the benefit from the magical fountain in room 26 (though they have also avoided the trapped fountain in room 29).  Værï decides he is going to investigate the writing on the redstone tile, and as soon as he approaches it, a shadow emerges through the right wing of the dragon statue, initiative is rolled, and the shadow continues its attack, as it goes first.

Værï is very easily touched, and takes 4 points of Strength damage.  He attempts to return the favor, doing a good job of not metagaming, and swinging at the incorporeal undead with his mundane rapier.  Belack strikes with Fiery Burst; it's magical, and thus can hurt the shadow.  Sadly, the percentile dice are not with the PC's tonight, and the Fiery Burst does not appear to have any effect.  Erky pulls out his ass-nugget and turns undead... getting another natural 20.  His minimum turn damage is enough to turn the shadow, and it flees into the west wall at the first opportunity.

The PC's don't retreat at this point, and they just hang out, readying actions to attack, and stepping away from the walls.  Ever the devious DM, once the turning had expired, the Shadow decided to take a little vengeance against Erky; it attacked up through the floor.  It succeeds in attacking Erky, dealing 3 points of Strength damage.  Værï ended up attacking it with a Lesser Orb of Acid spell, and also failed to damage the shadow, due to the 50% chance to ignore damage from corporeal sources.  At this point the party retreated to room 49d, and Erky readied to turn again, but the shadow did not pursue them.  Belack offered to heal Erky's Strength damage, but a successful Knowledge (Religion) check on the part of Erky* allowed him to recommend healing Værï's Strength damage first (he normally only has a Str of 10).

That's where we ended for the evening, and IIRC, they were ready to go back to the farm and rest up (let Erky level to 3rd, and allow Belack to make Goodberries).

*The official stats for Erky don't have ranks in Kn (Religion); his skills are also completely wrong, so I redid them so they are legal as far as skill points spent on class skills versus cross-class skills.  In doing so, I gave him one rank in Knowledge (Religion).

Hmmm.... typing up that encounter with the Shadow caused me to think of something... instantaneous Conjuration (creation) spells are only assembled through magic, then the magic is gone, and the conjured substance (acid, in this case) is non-magical and persists without magic.  They are even able to exist and be fired into an Antimagic Field...  Doesn't this mean they would NOT count as a magical source of damage against incorporeal undead, and thus have 0% chance of dealing damage to them...?  I'm going to make a separate thread about that later...

Offline ksbsnowowl

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Re: Sunless Citadel Adventure Path - Campaign Journal
« Reply #14 on: September 04, 2014, 06:09:06 PM »
Last night was the tenth session for The Sunless Citadel.  We left off with the PC's having retreated away from the shadow in room 50, and were waiting in room 49d.  The party decided they wanted to retreat back to Oakhurst, where they could hopefully learn how to defeat the shadow, which as of yet the PC's had failed to injure.

This is where I got a little devious…  Not liking having failed to alter the goblins' behavior after the PC's slaughtered the goblins in area 47, and given that the PC's had been in the Citadel for about 22 hours since that time, I altered Balsag the Bugbear's tactics.  Having come back from an Underdark hunt, and eventually having found the slaughtered goblins in area 47, he went looking for answers.  He climbed up the shaft to area 41, and found Durnn and his retinue slain.  He questioned the goblin community in room 40, learning of the PC's, and that they had not yet returned from the depths.

So Balsag decided to set a trap of sorts for the PC's.  He would wait in area 41, and then attack the PC's as they climbed up the vines lining the shaft.  His dire rat "hounds" have climb speeds, so they could assault the PC's as they attempt to climb; the PC's would lose their Dex to AC, while the rats would not.

So the PC's are climbing up the shaft, and when they get 30 feet from the top (the fall from the top is 80 feet), Balsag appears at the top, taunts the PC's, saying they'll be meeting his cook pot in the near future, and skewers Erky with a javelin, dropping his hit points from 12 to 5.  Thankfully the Climb DC is only 0, and Erky hangs on.  Then we roll initiative: Balsag, Værï, (Rats), Urolph, Belack, Erky.  I was intending to have the rats just go on Balsag's turn, but I forgot to have them act until after Værï's turn.

Balsag throws another javelin at Erky, but misses.  Værï climbs, but since a climb check as a move action only allows you to move 1/4 your speed… that gets rounded down to 5 feet.  Then I explain the ability to accelerated climb (move half your speed by taking a –5 penalty on the check), and Værï does that with the second half of his action.  This places him 10 feet from the top, so next turn he can get up to the top with a single accelerated climb.

A little description of the shaft.  It is 10-feet wide, which would just be four squares to cover its area.  I depicted it as if I'd laid a tube on its side, cut it open along its length, and then opened it up and laid it flat.  So, flat on the table it is depicted as an area 20 feet wide, and 80 feet long.  If your mini was on the right edge, you could still move right, which would put you on the left edge, since this shaft is really a cylinder.  This also means that no matter where you are in the shaft, if you are at approximately the same height as a foe, both you and the foe threaten each other.

Balsag calls for Grip and Fang to attack, and the rats climb down the vines, and both bite at Værï, only one hitting (Værï saves against the disease, and succeeds at the Climb check to not fall).  Urolph then does a fast climb to reach the rats, and he decides to something unusual, but brilliant.  He grapples the rat.  The rat gets an AoO, and does bit Urolph, but the dwarf doesn't fall, and succeeds on his Fort save against disease.  He then successfully grapples the rat.

Belack injures the ungrappled rat with a Fiery Burst by centering it against the wall of the shaft opposite Urolph; he then activates Animal Devotion to gain a fly speed, and I explain how his average maneuverability will allow him to ascend, but only in tight spirals around the shaft, which slows his ascent quite a bit (I also just realized he didn't do a good job of reading his feats… he'd thought it gave him a fly speed equal to his land speed [20 feet], but it actually gives you a speed equal to overland flight, [40 feet, or 30 feet if encumbered, which Belack is)].  The Fiery Burst doesn't kill the dire rat, but it does hurt it.  Erky spends his full round converting a spell into a cure light wounds, but only rolls a 1, healing 2 points.

Balsag throws another javelin, rolling poorly and missing once again.  Værï pulls out his rapier, but misses the rat above him.  The rat bites back, and Belack activates Protection Devotion, then the rat 5-foot steps up (go climb speed!)  The second rat can't get out of the grapple with Urolph, and Urolph asks if he can drop the rat… I allow it with a successful grapple check.  He succeeds, and one of the rats falls; it fails the Reflex save to catch itself in the vines, and splats about 70 feet below.

Thinking back, I should probably have required Urolph to pin the dire rat before being able to drop it, but whatever, that's basically semantics.  Once a foe has been pinned, you can voluntarily release him as a free action.  He succeeded at a grapple check, so he basically pinned him.

I forget what Belack did this round, but Erky slowly climbs another 5 feet.  Balsag throws another javelin at Urolph, again missing, then draws his morningstar.  Værï fails to kill the lone dire rat remaining, and the rat returns the favor.  Urolph speedily climbs up to the top of the shaft, taking AoO's from both the dire rat and Balsag; the protection devotion almost saved him from Balsag (the bugbear's +1 bonus for being on higher ground is what allowed him to just match Urolph's AC).  Urolph soaks the damage, stands at the top of the shaft, and grapples the Bugbear.  This was a good option; it kept Balsag from doing much for a few rounds.

Belack used another burst of fire to knock the sole remaining dire rat unconscious, and continued his slow corkscrew ascent.  Erky also continued his slow ascent, climbing 10 feet with two move actions.  Balsag fails to escape the grapple.

Værï accelerates up the shaft, then moves around the hole in the floor, ending his move next to the grappling pair.  Urolph wants to use a grapple to move the bugbear over the hole and drop him, much like he did with the dire rat.  Though they are in the midst of grappling, I have him perform this as a Bull Rush, which works to his advantage, as he took the Improved Bull Rush feat just this level.  I mention that this is a strength check, and Urolph asks if Raging helps.  When I tell him that it does, he rages, and beats the bugbear's strength check by 3.  I misremembered the Bull Rush rules on the fly, though, thinking that you only pushed a foe back 5 feet for every 5 points by which you beat his result.  I feel a little guilty about this now, but at the same time, I'm allowing him to do things the rules don't technically allow you to do (drop someone down a shaft with a grapple check, bull rush someone while you are grappling them, etc), so a small mistake in my favor… eh, whatever.

So Urolph only pushed the bugbear a little toward the edge.  Belack continued his ascent, and starts worrying about his wolf.  Oh, I should have mentioned his wolf… it is tied up in a blanket, and hanging from Urolph's belt.  Really, I should have imposed some sort of penalty to Urolph's Climb checks and grapple checks (many of which occurred while the wolf was still hanging 5-feet below and behind the dwarf, putting 50 pounds of weight pulling back toward the pit).  Somewhere along the line, the dangling wolf attempted a bite against one of the dire rats, but it missed.  IIRC, Belack actually double moved this turn, so ended his turn at the top of the shaft (but still hovering over the hole).  Erky continued his slow ascent.

Balsag finally succeeded at a grapple check, exited the grapple, and 5-foot stepped back.  Værï attempts to tumble around the bugbear, but fails and Balsag rolls a natural 20.  Værï groans that he's going to die… but the confirmation roll fails, and he only takes about 7 damage.  Værï finishes his tumble and striks at Balsag with his rapier, using Sapphire Nightmare Blade and Punishing Stance to deal 10 damage.  Urolph steps up to Balsag and fails to hit.  With the bugbear flanked, Belack can't use Fiery Burst, so he moves to his wolf and starts to untie it.  A discussion ensues about how long it will take to untie the wolf.  Tying a knot takes a full-round action that provokes an AoO; so I say it will take at least that long (I had it take 3 move actions).  When it is mentioned that cutting the wolf free would only take a standard action, Urolph vehemently tells Belack not to cut his rope.  Since Balsag had already used his AoO against Værï, Belack is fine this round, and starts untying.  Erky finishes climbing out of the shaft.

Balsag attacks Værï, hitting hard enough to drop the elf to negative hit points.  The bugbear then 5-foot stepped back to Værï's side; after doing so I remembered I wanted to stay where I was so that I could get an AoO on Belack as he untied the wolf, but oh well.  Værï actually stabilizes on his turn, rolling 10%.  Urolph follows after the bugbear, again missing; Værï makes a joke about the bad luck having now found the dwarf instead of Værï's player.  Belack continues to untie the wolf, and hits Balsag with a Fiery Burst; he only rolls 7 for damage, and the Bugbear makes his save.  Erky steps forward with his battleaxe, but misses the large goblinoid.

There is another round of combat, with someone dealing 6 points of damage against Balsag.  The round after that Urolph hits mightily, flanking and power attacking for –3/+6; it is his last round of rage, and he deals 20 points of damage, felling the bugbear. 

Belack heals Værï with a lesser vigor, and they loot Balsag's corpse, getting a descent little purse of gold and silver, along with his scalemail armor, and a fabulous morningstar.  Thinking only that it is masterwork, Urolph is quite happy, and proceeds to dump the corpse down the hole, and throws his club down after it, opting to carry the morningstar instead.  Urolph and Værï go into the room full of goblin non-combatants, and Værï attempts to intimidate them, but fails.  Urolph does a better job, despite not knowing Goblin.  Via Værï, Urolph demands to know if there are any other goblin combatants.  The one he's yelling at doesn't respond, so he buries his axe in its head.  The other goblins scatter, and swear there are no other combatants (there are actually 3, but they aren't going to be raising arms against the PC's unless forced to; they are playing weak for now).

Thinking there are no other foes to deal with up in the first level, the PC's head back to the farm and camp there for the night.  Belack heals Værï and Erky of their Strength damage in the morning.  Erky also leveled at this point, becoming a Fighter 1/Cleric 2; having seen the effectiveness of Belack's Animal Devotion feat, he choses that for himself (and he has turning attempts to power it a second time per day).  Then they head back to Oakhurst, and a good hour or more of role-play and goofing around ensues.  Urolph visits Rurik the dwarven blacksmith, asking about the morningstar.  Rurik says it appears to have been made by a master smith.  Knowing the next adventure is the Forgotten Forge, I have him find a smith mark, though he doesn't know who it is.  The PC's are told that they might be able to research who it is at a larger city (what city? how far away?  I don't know... two days away?  I purposefully am not using a continent map for this game.)  They also ask Rurik about fighting the Shadow (though they don't yet know specifically that it is a "Shadow").  The blacksmith knows nothing that will help them, but mentions that "Corkie" might know.  So they head over to visit with the gnome healer.  She rolls a 17 on the die for a Knowledge (Religion) check based upon their description, and the fact it weakened Værï and Erky.  She mentions that magic can hurt it, but is not always successful, but force effects will always work.  Excellent, they have in-character reasons to know how to fight it.

They then go buy more rope as well as block and tackle, with plans to haul up that iron dragon pedestal, which Urolph wants to put in the front yard of his farm.  I mention that he wants to have a white trash yard, to which he replies "white trash" is dwaren for "dwarven barbarian."  This player has brought a lot of silly enjoyment to this campaign...  They also end up buying a donkey to haul it all (250 feet of hemp rope is 50 pounds...)

After buying the supplies, Urolph heads into the Ol' Boar Inn, and Garron welcomes them back.  Urolph lightly insults Garron, giving him crap about claiming no one has ever come back from the Sunless Citadel; the PC's have been there and back several times, so Garron is lying...  Anyway, they start discussing the things they've seen and done in the Citadel, and it comes out that they were helping kobolds.  Garron speaks disparagingly about the PC's helping such foul creatures, but Urolph clarifies that it was more out of working against the goblins.  Garron can appreciate that, and offers Urolph a drink on the house.  Urolph has him fill the fine crystal flask... you know, the one containing the woody tumor disease...  He does, and Urolph drinks it.  I force him to save against the disease again, but he succeeds.

As they continue discussing their adventure, and that they fought a dragon, a crowd starts forming to listen.  In thanks for keeping the other patrons entertained, and buying drinks, Garron nonchalantly hands each of the PC's a free drink.  As the PC's are leaving town, they stop by "Corkie's" shop again, and she mentions she'd thought of something else.  Holy water could help against the undead, but it would have to be sprinkled on it.  They ask how holy water is made, and she says that "he could do it," pointing at Erky, with a bit of a scowl on her lips (Erky worships Garl Glittergold, while Dem "Corkie" Nackle worships Pelor).  She mentions that she does have three flasks available, and the PC's ask to buy them.

Having never figured out what the "dragon whistle" does, Urolph asks her to inspect it to see if she can discover its uses.  She casts detect magic, confirming it is magical, but doesn't know what it does.  However, she also notices that Urolph morningstar is magical, and mentions it.  This information blows the players away; I guess they weren't expecting a magic weapon to show up yet  ;)

They head back to the farm, and despite me mentioning that they could make it back to the Citadel before dark, they opt to sleep at the farm, as Belack has prepared several goodberry spells.  He ended up creating 14 of them, and divided them amongst the party.  A single twig blight attacked in the middle of the night, though Urolph and the wolf both noticed it as it approached.  Urolph wanted to destroy it with his new magical morningstar, but he missed with his first swing, and the wolf felled it with its first bite.

A little later, I'll regale you with their return to the Citadel, and their fight with the Shadow.
« Last Edit: September 04, 2014, 10:31:35 PM by ksbsnowowl »

Offline ksbsnowowl

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Re: Sunless Citadel Adventure Path - Campaign Journal
« Reply #15 on: September 11, 2014, 02:54:38 AM »
I'll edit the battle against the Shadow into the end of the previous post, but tonight was the climactic battle against Belak the Outcast, and I want to type that up while it is still fresh in my mind.

Also, here's a repeat of the lower level map:


After defeating the Shadow in Room 50, the PC's at the end of the previous session had examined the room, and when I read the Draconic inscription on the redstone tile in the floor (translated as: "Let the sorcerous power illuminate my mind"), Værï again failed to read it aloud.  Instead, they cast light on the dragon statue's head.  When we started this session, in recapping where we ended the time before, I once again read the Draconic inscription, and gave the translation.  No attempt by Værï to read the words aloud...  They've missed out on quite a few magical aids due to their failure to realize this.  I just find it interesting.

Værï searches the door to Room 51, and the enter without issue.  They find what was once a library, with collapsed shelves, and books and papers scattered in the corners of the room, an obvious path leading to the door on the north wall.  They search the room well, finding arcane scrolls of pyrotechnics and Melf's acid arrow, as well as a book about dragons, written in Draconic, which will provide a +1 bonus on knowledge rolls for information about dragons.

The search and open the north door, and find a short hallway that quickly turns left, then descends down some stairs, about 15 feet, and passes 40 feet east, before rising once again.  Værï very carefully searches the stairs and hall; I call for 5 search checks (though there is nothing to find aside from water seepage having damaged the walls of the low portion), and they proceed up the other side, then cautiously peek around the corner, peer southward down a long hallway.

Being an elf, Værï has low-light vision, and a torch illuminates with shadowy light out to 80 feet for him, so he can just make out the door to Room 53.  They sneak down that way, rolling 5 more checks to search for traps along the way, and noting the second door, and the end of the hall.  Værï checks the door for traps, then tries to open the door to Room 53, finding it locked.  He tries three times to Open the DC 25 Lock, even getting a 24, but failing to get it open.  Urolph then pulls out his crowbar, and beats the DC 18 Strength check to break the door open.  Inside, they find Belak's personal library.  They start searching around, finding several scrolls (later identified as entangle and delay poison.  Urolph specifically checks the desk, finding a large tome on it.  Neither he nor Belack the druid can read the title, but Værï can read the Draconic script.  So he opens the book, and gets hit with a fire trap, but saves to take only 2 damage.  They also find a tome written in Druidic, that similarly grants a +1 bonus on Knowledge (Nature) checks.

Still having never learned the use of the dragon-shaped whistle that they found, Urolph continues his habit of blowing it in every room.  The goblins in room 54 succeed in hearing this, so they very shortly come to investigate.  I actually messed up a little bit... the door from 54 to 53 should also have been locked, and Belak the Outcast (BBEG) has the key, but forgot this, and had the goblins enter directly from room 54.  No great loss in the end; it's hard to keep all the little details straight.

The goblins open the door, and initiative is called.  Erky goes first, followed by Urolph, then Værï; the goblins ended up beating Belack and his wolf.  Erky strides forward, drawing his battleaxe and cutting a hefty chunk out of the first goblin, though not felling it.  Urolph decides to make use of his Improved Bull rush feat, and remove the bottleneck that is the doorway.  He moves through Erky's square, then succeeds in pushing the goblin back 10 feet.  The second and third goblin foes were flanking the door-opener, except back 5 feet, so when Urolph continued for that second 5-feet of bull rushing, they would have gotten AoO's, except they were flat-footed.  This made Værï happy, as it removed his need to tumble after entering Room 54.  He only moved just inside the door, then to the left, and started to attack.  I mention that he can move farther if he wants (5 more feet would allow him to flank with Urolph), and after a moment he understands what I'm getting at, and does so.  He attacks with Sapphire Nightmare Blade, succeeding at the Concentration check, and... failing to hit with the attack roll.  I continue to be justified in my dislike of that maneuver...

The goblins both attack Urolph, whom they are flanking, then each 5-foot step clockwise, getting the eastern one out of the flanking between Urolph and Værï, but maintaining flanking for later.  The goblin that had been bull rushed strikes at Urolph, missing, then 5-foot steps back from the dwarf.  A fourth goblin moves in from across the room, striking Urolph for a small bit of damage.

That fourth goblin and the one Værï attacked are now side by side, and Belack blasts them with Fiery Burst, though both save, and take only 3 points of damage.  With Belack standing just inside the door, his wolf moves in and off to the right, provoking an AoO from the western-most goblin, who gets a natural 20, and confirms it with another natural 20.  The instant death rule is not in play, so the wolf only takes 4 points from the 2d6 damage of the crit.  The wolf fails to hit.

Erky makes use of the fact the goblin just used its AoO, and moves through Belack's space, then attacks the closest goblin, dealing 3 damage.  Urolph is positioned to make use of his Cleave feat, but misses on his attack.  Værï maneuvers around to flank with Urolph again, and guts him with 3d6 damage, all while resetting his maneuvers.  One of the goblins lands a blow on Værï, but the other two remaining goblins miss their targets.  Belack's wolf hits its goblin foe, and trips it, and Belack slays the first goblin hurt by Erky, using his trusty Fiery Burst.

Erky damages a goblin, and then Urolph slays the other with 12 points of damage.  After its ineffectual turn, the final goblin is killed by another burst of fire from Belack.  Finally having a chance to take in their surroundings, I describe the cavern that opens up from the collapsed southern wall, and mention the briars and other plants that fill it starting about 10 feet beyond where the room's wall should be.  Belack walks over to check it out, and I describe that the briars have thorns, and that although Belack the druid could move through just fine, his other Medium-sized companions would have trouble, and would probably take damage.  This talk of damage produces a strong aversion in the other players, which gets a bit ridiculous later on.  Værï can see well even at a distance, given the phosphorescent fungus growing all over the ceiling of the Twilight Grove, combined with his low-light vision, and he notices 20-foot high walls about 130 feet away.

At mention of the difficulty the others would have moving through the briars, Belack pulls out his scimitar, and starts hacking away at the briars.  It takes him 6 rounds to clear a 5-foot section (1d4+3 rounds).  This hacking also immediately notifies the ten twig blights roaming the briar patch that the PC's are here.  I have the PC's make listen checks, and they can hear something moving toward them.  Belack readies an action to use Fiery Burst on the first thing that comes out, so he damages the first twig blight for 5 points, after which it attacks Urolph, hitting for 1 damage, but the dwarf saved against the poison.  Two twig blights then arrived every round thereafter, though the PC's and Erky dealth with them well.  There was only one point when there were three conscious twig blights engaging the PC's, and I only had a chance to get 2 or 3 full attacks out of a total of 10 twig blights.  This was a little bit of a tedious fight, simply because the twig blights weren't doing much of anything to the PC's, and a lot of the PC's were having trouble hitting their AC's of 15, or getting through their DR 5/Bludgeoning or Slashing (Værï had forgotten about the DR, and was still using his rapier).

In the span of about six rounds, the PC's were victorious.  The idea of trudging through that briar patch still made Urolph very wary, and he was insistent that there must be some other way to access the other side of the grove.  So, I sketch out a crude map of the level, pointing out the entrance to area 43, which they have yet to investigate, and pointing out they have not yet delved the full length of the rift (area 44).  The investigate the blood-soaked area 43, finding some putrid bedding and rats' nests.  This is where Balsag the Bugbear had lived.  They search the area, finding 30 silver and 32 gold pieces, as well as a "great coat of patchy black fur," which Urolph immediately dons.  They search the narrow tunnel beyond, finding a larger crossing tunnel about 50 feet off the map.  They explore ~400 feet in either direction, realizing it doesn't connect back to the grove, and then returning to the Citadel.

They enter the rift, and I remind them of the sulfurous smell and the holes tunneled in the rock.  They freak out at the thought of fighting another thoqqua, and proceed VERY carefully into area 45.  They note a glowing hole, avoid it like the plague, and not wanting to slow the pace of the evening down, I ignore the fact the thoqqua has tremorsense, and could feel their presence before they even entered the room.

At this point they give up trying to find another entrance to the grove, and decide to rest for the night, again in room 46.  Again, I could have easily given them an encounter with the remaining thoqqua, but didn't want to mess with the flow of the evening (we end at 10 pm, and they slayed Belak at 9:59, so I did it right).

The next morning they decide to have Belack take a rope and tie it up to the 20-foot walls (the part with the tower, around the tree), so they can shimmy across the cavern, over the briars.  Belack could use Animal Devotion to fly the rope up there, but it will sag from its own weight (let alone the PC's), and they don't have an especially good way to anchor the other end of the rope on the north end of the grove.  Not wanting to use up his Animal Devotion yet, Belack realizes he can walk through the briars just fine, and decides to just walk the rope over there.  But rather than take the rope with him and uncoil it as he goes, the party decides it would be best to keep the rope pile near the others, and Belack will just take the end of the rope and pull it after him as he walks through the briar patch.  Dragging a rope (actually from knotted-together 50-foot sections) through a thorny briar patch doesn't work too well, and after about 50 feet I start to require Strength checks to pull it every 5 feet.  Since Erky is Small, he can slowly make his way through the briar patch just fine (a sidebar explains all this), so Belack enlists his help.  After only dragging the rope another 15 feet or so, they give up.

Belack notices another twig blight approaching, and burns it twice with his Fiery Burst; since he dropped it to exactly 0 hit points, it ran away.  Værï commented about how that was unusual (I'd never had them flee before).  With the twig blight gone, and seeing no other options, Urolph pulls out his urgrosh and starts hacking his way through the briars.  It takes 5 rounds for the first 5-foot section.  Urolph's player then asks me how long 5 rounds is.  "Thirty seconds," I tell him.  To which he exasperatingly says they should have just done that from the beginning; that's not a long time.  I think to myself "yep.."

The Fiery Burst and the ~13 minutes of hacking their way through the briar patch has of course alerted Belak the Outcast, so by the time the PC's arrive, he and his minions are ready.  He has also armored himself with a shield (his stats in the book leave him unarmored, with an AC of 12...)  Had I really given it thought, he would have had plenty of time to go get some armor and truly prepare himself, but oh well.

Belak the Outcast's animal companion, a Medium tree frog, as well as a transformed Sir Braford and three twig blights form a defensive line at the front, while Belak and a transformed Sharwyn Hucrele stand in the back. (Their transformed states were caused by the evil Gulthias Tree, at Belak's direction; they have barklike skin, and are basically automatons.)  The PC's finish hacking their way through (the briars don't extend into the courtyard), but lurk just outside the ruined walls of the courtyard.  They start to spread out a bit, with Værï sneaking through the tower, and Urolph sneaking the other way.  Belak the Outcast notices Urolph as he peers around a corner, and I tell him that Belak is looking right at him.  This is when Belack the PC Druid blasts the tree frog and a twig blight with his Fiery Burst.  This was the perfect opening for Belak, as scripted, to entreat the PC's to hold off the attack, so that he may discuss the situation with them.  Based upon the things posed by the PC's, Belak tells them that the Gulthias Tree is the result of someone having staked a vampire to the earth with a still-living branch, which took root and grew.  He also has time to tell the PC's that he was purposefully trying to colonize the surface with twig blights, that the PC's will make great servants after he makes them "supplicants" of the tree, just as he did to Sharwyn and Sir Braford, and that the druidic order had expelled him.  At that point, Belack the Neutral said that he'd heard enough, at which point he peeked around a corner and fried Sharwyn and Belak with a Fiery Burst.  They both failed their reflex saves, and the 10 points of damage was plenty to drop Sharwyn to –3 hit points.

At this point Belak the Outcast stopped talking (which is somewhat of a shame, as there was still much to learn...), and having won initiative, used his wand of entangle to catch Belack the Neutral and Erky Timbers outside the walls, and positioned such that they could not see him (or attack him) for the entire fight.  :plotting
Belack's wolf made the save though, and escaped the entangled area at the first opportunity (which is good, as it allowed Belack's player to still be involved in the battle).

After Belak the Outcast, Urolph stepped forward with his urgrosh and slew the damaged twig blight, and having positioned himself well, cleaved at the giant tree frog, but missed.  Værï, having snuck through the tower seemingly unnoticed while Urolph and Belak were talking, and seeing that his movement would place him 5-feet short of being able to attack the evil druid... he let loose a magic missile, inflicting 3 points of damage on the BBEG.  Belack remained stuck in Belak's entangle after failing his Strength check, but his wolf moved free of the magical impediment, and moved in to attack the middle twig blight, dealing 8 damage, and destroying the creature.

Finally, Sir Braford's turn came.  Specializing in sundering (the specific magic weapon Shatterspike in the 3.5 DMG is basically an exact copy of his sword from this module), and seeing only one foe with a weapon, he moved around the back of the defensive line, attacking Urolph's urgrosh, dealing 12 points of damage; after accounting for hardness, he was only 3 points shy of breaking the dwarf's weapon... :smirk

Erky then ineffectually tried to extricate himself from the entangle, followed by the one remaining twig blight stepping over to attack the wolf.  Belak the Outcast then cast flaming sphere, using it to attack Urolph, but the dwarf made his save.  Urolph responded by dropping his damaged urgrosh, drawing his magical morningstar, and slaying the evil druid's frog companion with a 13-point swing.  Værï, still perturbed that he can't even charge at the BBEG (yeah, that happens when you ended your last turn by remaining behind cover...), he draws his bow and looses an arrow at Belak, hitting for 8 points (which effectively negated the 8 bonus HP's he had for having buffed with bear's endurance, which I had forgotten about until that point).  Belack decided to just sit tight in the entangle, calling down a Fiery Burst upon Sir Braford, who he could now see from his position just behind a wall.  Thankfully, the reserve feats are supernatural abilities, and thus never require concentration checks.  Braford failed his reflex save, and the fire brought him down to 1 hit point, but he was able to hang on for several more rounds of weapon-attacking fun (well, sort of...)  Belack's wolf bit the twig blight for 5 damage (dropping it to 0), and tripped it.

Sir Braford now had a shiny new target for his sundering attempts, and my request for Urolph to make an opposed attack roll brought a look of perturbed consternation.  Lucky for my player, Sir Braford managed to roll a natural 1...
Erky continued to tug helplessly at his natural bindings, and the twig blight clawed twice at the wolf from prone (which I just realized should have caused it to drop to –1 after the first attack), missing both times.  Belak used his move action to attack Urolph with the flaming sphere, this time inflicting 11 points of fire damage, and then healing Sharwyn back to consciousness with a CLW spell.

Since Sharwyn had been knocked unconscious by Belack's (second) opening assault, she had not yet rolled initiative.  I rolled at this point, and her initiative fell one point below Belak's.  Since he had just healed her, she stood up, and attacked the only obvious foe in sight, Urolph, dealing a measly 2 damage with a magic missile.  Urolph attacked Sir Braford, failing to 5-foot step into flanking with the Wolf first, and his attack roll of 18 missed Sir Braford's AC by... 2  :evillaugh

I forget what Værï did at this point, but it was completely ineffective, whatever it was.  Belack had now activated Animal Devotion to give himself a +2 sacred bonus to Strength, but was still failing to get himself free.  The wolf finishes off the twig blight at its feet.  Sir Braford took another sundering swing at Urolph's pretty new magic weapon... and again rolled a natural 1.  Seeing Belack having used Animal Devotion to get strong, Erky, who had leveled and chosen Animal Devotion himself, did the same, but still couldn't get himself free.

Beginning to have success, Belak the Outcast attacked Urolph once again with the flaming sphere, but the dwarf saved again this time.  So, he followed that up by casting heat metal on Urolph's armor, but the now-raging barbarian beat the Will save DC by 4.  Sadly, I forgot to have Sharwyn act here...  Still in flanking with the wolf, Urolph slew Sir Braford outright with an 11 point hit, dropping the fallen paladin to exactly –10 hit points.  (Good thing he was flanking this time, as he only hit due to the flanking bonus.)  Værï looses an arrow at Sharwyn, hitting and just barely dropping her unconscious once again. (At which point I remembered I forgot to have her act; oh well.)

Now realizing that Escape Artist attempts would be statistically better off for himself, Belack tries that, but is still stuck.  His wolf moves to attack Belak, but botches and misses the weakly-armored druid.  Erky continues to try and pull his way out, but cannot.  Belak the Outcast attacks Belack's wolf with his sickle, dealing 4 points of damage, and 5-foot stepping back.  Being too far removed and poorly positioned, Urolph just double moves to threaten Belack.  Still unable to move and attack the evil druid, Værï sighs and double moves to also threaten Belak, flanking with Urolph.

Belack remains stuck in the entangle, and his wolf fails to hit Belak the Outcast.  Erky is also still stuck.  Belak the Outcast attacks Værï, hitting and dealing 6 damage, then 5-foot steps diagonally next to Værï, to prevent the easy flank.  Urolph steps forward and nails the Outcast for 11 damage (placing the BBEG's hp's at 12).  Værï then has an opportunity to end the combat like a mother-fucking hero.  He attempts to tumble back into flanking, failing by 1, but not getting hit by Belak's AoO.  Værï then decides to go all out: Sneak Attack, Punishing Stance, and Sapphire Nightmare Blade.  He succeeds on the Concentration check, and... botches the attack roll.

Belack and Erky remain stuck, but the wolf bites the BBEG for 6 damage. Then Belak the Outcast withdraws.  Probably not the most memorable way for a BBEG to meet his end, but it seemed prudent at the time.  Urolph then moves to the side, only not getting in the way of Værï's charge because Værï's player griped at him and told him to keep moving, out of Værï's way.  The dwarf's arrow missed its mark, but then Værï charged, and his rapier plus punishing stance was enough to drop Belak the Outcast to –2 hit points, cursing the PC's as he fell.
« Last Edit: September 11, 2014, 03:16:38 AM by ksbsnowowl »

Offline ksbsnowowl

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Re: Sunless Citadel Adventure Path - Campaign Journal
« Reply #16 on: September 16, 2014, 04:08:41 AM »
Tonight was the twelfth session of my Sunless Citadel campaign.  Normally my gestalt Viking game meets on Mondays, but two players were out of town on business, and the two that remained are also in the Sunless Citadel campaign.  With the third player willing and able to have a second game this week, we met and started to transition into the next adventure in the series: The Forge of Fury.

As I said, this was a transitional session, with LOTS of role-play, and almost no combat.  Although I didn't mention it before, the previous session actually ended with the PC's looting the unconscious form of Sharwyn, and the corpses of Sir Braford and Belak the Outcast.  They also plucked the bright red fruit exuding from the Gulthias tree like a cyst, then decided to try and save Sharwyn by chopping it up and feeding it to her.  Since the module allows the healing fruit to have its full effect on up to four people (by cutting it into quarters), I just said the first spoonful was about 1/4 of the diced fruit pieces, and Sharwyn (who the PC's smartly tied up) awoke fully healed of damage (as the fruit acts as a heal spell).  However, it did not rid her of what the Gulthias tree had done to her.  In a vain attempt to heal her back to her former self, the PC's feed her another 1/4 of the fruit pieces.  It still does not heal her back to normal (the adventure flat out says that she and Sir Braford are beyond saving).

Thus began tonight.  The PC's also had earned enough XP to reach 4th level, so they're actually about a level ahead right now, compared to the expected levels of the modules.  That's just fine, since there are only three of them, and the XP awards will automatically throttle back a bit since they are higher level Actually, that's not true; I just put an XP calculation into the d20srd calculator, and they each would get 267 xp instead of 225 xp if there were four 3rd level characters.  So they might still level faster... But, that's still less than the 300 xp they'd each get if they were 3rd level.  Anyway, we spent the first 20 minutes or so helping people finalize level-up changes, and I answered a lot of questions about animal companions and bonus HD, recalculating attack bonuses, and helping the Rog/Wiz/Warblade make the final decision on his new maneuver (he chose Mountain Hammer, which is great, though does have the requirement of you standing on "the ground" to use it).

When we finally pick the story back up, I recap that they'd looted the bodies, and Værï does another search of the area, not rolling exceptionally well (only like an 11).  This does allow him to notice once again that there are human-shaped depressions in the trunk of the Gulthias Tree.  They had noticed these last week during the combat, and at the end Belack the Neutral had thought they should place Sharwyn into one of these depressions.  Tonight he had thought better of it, worried it would only make her worse.  They decide to knock her out for the trip back home, leaving it to her family to attempt to heal her back to her former self (which I love as a DM; first opportunity she gets, she's breaking free to come serve the Gulthias Tree, which, without Belak shepherding it, means she'll cut down the tree, so Gulthias the vampire can be freed... since he shows up in a later adventure).  They also discuss burning down or chopping down the Tree, but decide not to yet, as they could harvest fruit from it again in the future...

Urolph grabs the unconscious Sharwyn by the ankle and drags her through the briar patch (along the trail they had cut) like a cave man...  They get back around to the room with the redstone tile and the dragon statue (the one where they fought the Shadow... which I haven't written about yet...) and I once again read the Draconic phrase aloud, then also give the translation (since Værï knows Draconic).  Knowing that they're missing something (the tile and the statue detect as magical), Værï searches the room once again, getting a good result of around 25, with which he finds a loose stone in the wall behind the statue.  In it they find a pouch with 34 gp, and two flasks of alchemist's fire.  They continue to ponder how to solve the puzzle ("Let the sorcerous power illuminate my mind.") and voice ideas of placing the alchemist's fire flasks in the eyes of the statue, casting faerie fire (they tried light last week), etc.  Eventually they give up, and head back to area 48.  I point out that Room 49c is the room where they left skeletons, and they decide not to waste time killing them.  I have Erky open the door and turn them.  He gets a result of 13, which is enough to do cleric level +1 HD; since he is a 2nd level cleric, he can turn 3 HD.  Oh look, there are three 1 HD skeletons.  Oh, and Erky's cleric level is double that of each skeleton.  Boom; they are destroyed.

Urolph steals the wheelbarrow from room 42, and hauls it up the shaft, followed by the unconscious Sharwyn, and Belack's wolf, all while the other three are slowly climbing.  They head around through the north hallway, to avoid the noncombatant goblins in room 40 (though there was talk of slaying them all, once again), then head back to room 38, where there were barrels of elf pudding, which Urolph sticks in his wheel barrow.  Then they recall that there seemed to be some room they may not have looked in yet (true, Room 36 south of Hall 39, and Room 36 west of Room 40).  They investigate the one south of hall 39, finding it empty (there are technically still 3 goblin combatants left alive, but they are just blending in with the noncombatants unless faced with certain death), and continue into the trapped hallway 24, though Værï finds the trap.  Urolph then kicks in the door leading to the columned hall 19, the sound of which brings a group of three kobold guards.  Belack didn't note my reference to sounds of "yipping speech," and readied a Fiery Burst, but Værï told him it was kobolds speaking draconic, so Belack backed down.

When the guards recognized them, Værï said they had slain many goblins, and the druid down below, and so at the PC's prodding, the guards lead them back down the hall to the "dragon throne," where the kobold leader had magic items.  I give them credit for trying to eke out every dime they could.  Værï pulls off a sufficiently diplomatic bit of role play, and convinces Yusdrayl that they have done the bulk of the heavy lifting on killing the goblins.  Yusdrayl is quite happy, and feels confident that her kobold warriors can kill the remaining goblins, and she acquiesces to Værï's implication that their work deserves another reward.  She lets them pick one other item, and Belack and Værï confer, agreeing that the scroll of spider climb will be the most useful.

Lastly, the PC's head back to Room 26, in an attempt to figure out the puzzle there.  Once again I read the draconic text aloud when they get there.  Still no attempt by the PC's to say the words aloud...  They pour two pints of lamp oil into the fountain and light it on fire.  Nothing happens.  Urolph blows the dragon-whistle.  Nothing happens.  Urolph blows the dragon whistle while fire is touching the fountain.  Nothing happens...  They give up and leave the citadel, making use of the block and tackle they set up last time to haul up the wheelbarrow and those who couldn't climb by themselves.  Up top they find their donkey, which has been tied to a pillar for two and half days with no water...  a discussion ensues about hirelings for such things as tending animals outside while the PC's explore the depths of a dungeon, and porters and teamsters to move the other items of the dungeon back to Urolph's house (most of them are in the realm of 1 - 3 silver pieces a day).  At mention of the prices, the PC's are wondering why the hell they haven't had hirelings all along...

They take the donkey back to the farm, and tie it up with a large bucket of water, as it needs to recover, and they intend to head back to Oakhurst before night falls.  They get back to town with the unconscious Sharwyn, and meet with Matron Hucrele, returning the two signet rings, as well as Sharwyn.  They explain that she isn't of sound mind, to which Kerowyn Hucrele replies that she doesn't look of sound body, either.  Even so, she gives Belack and Værï each 300 gp (which is 50 gp more than agreed upon, because they did bring Sharwyn back, sort of).  After selling Kerowyn one of their two Gulthias seeds (which they never did learn will grown into a twig blight), Urolph got his rude jabs in, they left the Hucrele house.  Urolph went to Rurik the dwarven blacksmith, where he nearly traded away Shatterspike for 315 gp, as Rurik recognized the fine craftsmanship, but couldn't confirm for himself if it was indeed magical.  Værï talked Urolph out of this, and my heavily laid hints that they should head to the larger town 3 days' walk west before selling were slowly heeded.

Værï and Belack struck some deals with Rurik, trading a masterwork shortbow plus a normal longbow for a masterwork longbow, and trading Belak the Outcast's masterwork sickle plus a scimitar and 50 gp for a masterwork scimitar (which Rurik will have to make, as he doesn't have one on hand).  Since the party had burned the troll Dragonpriest before they looted him or is sarcophagus, they needed to get a new handle on the masterwork dagger the troll had held, and Urolph needed a new haft on his urgrosh, since Sir Braford had nearly chopped it in half.  Urolph had actually cut a limb from the Gulthias Tree, and gave that to Rurik to repair the urgrosh; there was enough wood for him to use that for the new dagger handle, too... I can't wait to mess with them for using "evil wood" on their weapons  :plotting  Værï also finagled a masterwork rapier out of the dealings, and then they went to talk to Garon the Innkeep, as well as the Mayor.  Despite Værï's best efforts at dropping a hint, the mayor did not offer any sort of reward to them for solving the menace of the twig blights.  (Unbeknownst to the PC's they haven't actually completely resolved that issue; though removing Belak from the equation, and nearly ensuring the destruction of the goblin clan, will hinder their spread.)

The best the mayor will do is have Garon prepare a feast for the PC's, which Værï accepts graciously.  The next morning they decide to head out to the large town three days' walk west of Oakhurst.*  Pellak is a fortified large town with nearly 3,000 people, and it is run by a Baron Althon (enter Forge of Fury hook...)  As I've said before, I'm treating this campaign as "Greyhawk Lite."  I don't really see a need to make or use an entire continent map, but I will steal town names, etc, when needed.  Pellak is such a name, stolen from Greyhawk.  Having no horses yet, the PC's walked three days to get to Pellak, arriving near evening.  Urolph primarily wants to buy a mithril chain shirt, and I also had him roll an intelligence check, after which I reminded him of the as-yet-unidentified smith mark on the head of his morningstar.  He rolls quite well on his gather information check on where he might buy mithril armor, and though it does take 5 hours (of asking around in bars and brothels...) he does learn that Joric the Short, the dwarven smith who works for the Baron, might have such an item.

Trying to show-boat, Urolph toots his unidentified magical dragon whistle while in one of the taverns, and he says that it is magical.  Well this of course calls for pick-pocket encounter, in a seedy tavern after you just announced to the world that this small, palm-able object is magical...

Værï was off screen tracking down a magic shop to sell a few of the scrolls they'd found so he could fund adding some other spells from Sharwyn's spellbook into his own.  So Belack is left to babysit Urolph in the taverns and brothels.  I ask for spot checks from both Urolph and Belack.  My ad hoc thief rolled a 15 on the die, which I mentally made a 20 with Dex and ranks, meaning he succeeded in lifting the whistle off of Urolph's person.  Urolph utterly failed the Spot check, but Belack got a 26, so he took off after the thief as he was trying to move out the door.  Knowing the weight of his own gear was slowing him down, Belack made use of Animal Devotion to get a 40 foot fly speed, catching up and whacking the thief on the head with his club for 1 damage.

Urolph also starts to follow out into the street, and a back-and-forth chase ensues.  Belack used Fiery Burst the next round, rolling only 3 damage, though the thief did fail his save.  The thief ran away, provoking an AoO somewhere along the way, but it missed.  Basically the thief continued to run, I made use of the evasion and chase rules, which Urolph lost every single round.  Since the animal devotion fly speed doesn't allow you to run, Belack was getting left behind, but he started winging sling stones.  First round at a -2 penalty for distance, and I was giving the thief cover from the crowd in the street. Miss. Second round at -4; miss. Third round, and the thief is about to get away with a nice big payday... Belack attacks at -6, and hits for 2 damage; the thief starts to stumble (staggered at 0 HP).  Urolph then catches up by charging and dealing 10 points of damage with the +1 morningstar (which hadn't yet been identified beyond being magic).  Well, that killed the thief outright, and there were witnesses...

Belack catches up and pulls the corpse and Urolph into an alleyway.  He overhears people saying things like "he just murdered that man..." and he's trying to get Urolph to flee the area.  No, Urolph wants to loot the body...  :banghead
He convinces the dwarf to only do a quick search; all he finds is a normal dagger in a scabbard at his waist.  I rolled percentile dice for any of the witnesses to have had darkvision or low-light vision, and one of them did.  He did well on his Spot roll, too.  There will be a wanted poster making the rounds in town before too many days pass...

Urolph decides the best way to lay low is to find a tavern filled with a high density of dwarves, and buy several of them drinks... and he just wants to pay for common lodging, which is a spot on the floor of the common room near the fire...
By now Værï has finished his perusal of Ye Ol' Magic Shop, and Belack finds him and brings him back to the inn, where Værï buys a private room for himself and Belack.  Værï intends to spend the next 32 hours studying and copying a spell into his spellbook (though I forget which spell, actually, I don't recall seeing a Spellcraft check on that...)

Having already learned of Joric the Short, in the morning Belack and Urolph head to the keep in the center of town, and talk their way in for business with Joric.  They are disarmed, which Urolph isn't happy about, and a pair of guards carry in the two magic weapons, as the PC's need Joric to inspect them.  Upon meeting, Urolph and Joric have a friendly conversation in Dwarven, and Joric notices the smith mark, and starts asking about where Urolph found it.  He mentions the Baron might be interested, and he sends someone to notify the Baron.  Talk turns to mithril shirts, and a tentative deal is laid out to trade Shatterspike for the mithril shirt plus a fair amount of coin (totaling ~2,300 gp in value, as Joric is an 11th level expert, and activated a wand of detect magic via UMD, so knew the longsword was worth at least that much).

Joric does a bit of fitting with the mithril chain shirt he had available, and says he'll have to make a slight adjustment that will only take a day or so (Urolph's strength just increased to 18; I said Joric needed to add about two rows of rings to the arms to accommodate the girth of Urolph's arms) and after about a half-hour Baron Althon arrives.  After learning that the morningstar not only bears the smith mark of Durgeddin the Black, but it is also magical, the Baron offers to pay them 500 gp over market value for it, and says he may have an errand for them to run.  Urolph's careless tongue nearly gets that offer rescinded, however, though Belack's soothing role played diplomacy keeps things on track.  Baron Althon invites them up to a sitting room, and has his wizard identify the morningstar to ensure what he should offer to pay.  While they are waiting for that to happen, Baron Althon shows Belack and Urolph a broken sword, bearing the smith mark of Drugeddin on what remained of the blade, just above the hilt. 

The Baron goes on to explain the plot hook, that last year someone found this broken blade on the slopes of a hill called the Stone Tooth, which lies north of the mining town called Blasingdell, some 12 days' ride north of Pellak.  He bought it from a merchant several months ago, complete with the detail of roughly where it was found.  Being a collector of fine weapons, the Baron is hoping there might be more of Durgeddin's blades to be found near the Stone Tooth.  He'll also pay 500 gp over market value for those blades, if any are to be found.

Fenrick the Wizard returns, informing the Baron that the moringstar carries only the most basic enhancement, and his offer is made to Urolph to buy it on the spot for 2,500 gp, plus the Baron would outfit them with horses for their journey.  Urolph is actually more partial to the morningstar than Shatterspike, so he doesn't take Baron Althon up on his offer, but the offer will stand if he wants to sell it later.  During the previous conversation, Belack pointed out that they had a third companion, and the Baron is amenable to them conversing with him before making any final decisions.  The PC's depart, with plans to return the next day.

By noon the next day Værï has finished his spell scribing, and the others explain the situation and the job offer.  They return to the keep, and the offers are discussed in more detail.  The party accepts the job offer, but no agreements come to pass on selling the two magical weapons; Værï wants to identify the longsword first.  They do agree to come back in the morning to get horses (though they'll have to buy them out of their own coin if they don't take the Baron up on his offer to buy the Durgeddin-marked morningstar).

By this point we were nearing the end of the session, and we quickly had Værï buy a pair of 100 gp pearls, and the next morning he prepared and cast Identify twice, learning the name, properties, and value of Shatterspike, as well as the dragon whistle that had nearly been stolen from them.  Belack's eyes get large at the thought of using the whistle to make a zombie bear... to which I reply that undead are an unnatural abomination, and willfully corrupting a natural creature like that probably wouldn't bode too well on his XP earnings...  I basically said that Belack doing it would be BAD, but even being in a party with others who used the whistle would give him a –1 per game-day xp penalty... which he said would be worth it...  which would have been fine with me.
In the end though, after they learned the whistle was worth 3,000 gp, they decided to sell it.

We'll actually complete the item selling next time, but I'll give them 2,000 gp for the whistle, and Joric will give them 2,500 gp plus the Mithril chain shirt for Shatterspike (which is valued at 4,315 gp).  Even with the generous percentages, the PC's are below 4th level wealth, but that's okay, since the adventure is for third level anyway.

*Did you notice what the PC's left behind?  That donkey is absolutely going to be dead by the time they return...
« Last Edit: September 16, 2014, 09:34:41 AM by ksbsnowowl »

Offline ksbsnowowl

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Re: Sunless Citadel Adventure Path - Campaign Journal
« Reply #17 on: September 18, 2014, 03:22:50 PM »
Last night was the thirteenth session of the campaign.  Due to one player getting there late due to a conflict, lots of goofing around, and ending early because another player was getting overly tired, we didn't actually get a lot done tonight.  Oh well, it happens.

Oh, a quick recap of the characters, now that they are 4th level:
Urolph the Cleaver:  Dwarf Barbarian 3/Fighter 1
Belack the Neutral:  Human Druid 4
Værï Able:  Elf Rogue 1/Warblade 2/Wizard (Diviner) 1

While waiting on the third player to show up, Urolph and Værï started working through the selling that had been discussed previously.  As I described above, Urolph got the Mithril chain shirt he wanted, kept the magical morningstar, and the party got 4,500 gp.  They took advantage of being in a large town, and bought a fair amount of magical gear.  They bought three Belts of Healing, got Urolph an Iron Ward Diamond augment crystal for his armor, and got him some Brute Gauntlets.  I think they also got a Pearl of Power for Værï and Belack to share between them.  Also, they had to buy horses, since they didn't take Baron Althon up on his offer to buy the morningstar.

By this point Belack's player had showed up, and so the party split up for a bit while still in the town of Pellak.  Værï wanted to find a library to research about Durgeddin the Black, and Urolph wanted to find a temple of Kord.  I pointed Værï toward the temple of Baccob, where he made an untrained Knowledge check with a small bonus to locate information, and when that failed with a terrible die roll, he made a gather information check that wasn't that good either (~13).  He didn't find anything, but I knew he'd be getting more information very easily as they travelled closer to Blasingdell.  Urolph, along with his babysitter Belack, visited the temple of Kord, asked around about Durgeddin while engaging in some arm wrestling matches and such, also learning very little aside from already-known information that Durgeddin was a weaponsmith. Well, I guess the info that Durgeddin was a Dwarf was news to Værï (though the rotted scroll they found before said it was a dwarven stronghold…)

Upon leaving the temple of Baccob, Værï sees someone nailing up a notice seeking a dwarf for murder.  It describes the events, and has a decent description of Urolph.  Time to leave town...

Finally, they head back to Oakhurst to get the items that Rurik had been working on.  It is at this point that the topic of the donkey comes up, and I laughingly tell them that, yep, that donkey is still tied up back at their farm.  Sorrowful laughter erupts, as they know that poor thing is a goner.  "How fast can we get back?"  "Well, it took three days to walk to Pellak, and you've spent almost three days there.  It'll still take two days to get back to Oakhurst, and the farm is beyond that…"

Upon returning to town, Urolph makes a point of having his horse take a crap in front of the Hucrele shop…  Then they visit Rurik and get Urolph's fixed urgrosh, and the masterwork dagger that needed a new handle; the blacksmith isn't yet finished making the masterwork scimitar for Belack.  Belack asks about how the dagger feels, with the Gulthias wood handle.  "It feels fine."  "It doesn't feel evil?"  "Nope." … or does it? :plotting

Urolph demands for a letter from the Mayor forcing the farmer neighbor to give him milk (a silly desire from several weeks ago).  The mayor will do no such thing, so Urolph decides to march on out to the farm and demand his milk.  He gets to the neighbor's farm in the late afternoon and knocks.  No answer.  He opens the door and calls out.  No answer.  He looks around the house.  No answer.  In answer to if it looks like there was a struggle (there wasn't), he ransacks the house, just because.  Still no sign of the neighbor.  He heads out to the barn to get his own milk, and finds the cow dead… It sure looks like it was from a twig blight.  Now the party is worried that they didn't solve the twig blight problem (which they didn't, but the adventure doesn't plan on them eliminating all the twig blights anyway.)

They all head back to Urolph's farm and sleep the night.  They were sad that the donkey had been dead too long to turn into jerky.  The next morning they mount up and head out for Blasingdell.  I try to zip through this part quickly, but goofing and joking slow things way down, and it probably takes a half hour.  I just wanted to give them a sense of how many and what kinds of towns they travel through on the way to Blasingdell, and I also described the Traveler's Rest buildings maintained by the church of Fharlanghn, which they slept at twice on their 12-day travel to Blasingdell (this structure is described in the first encounter of Expedition to the Demonweb Pits, and since I plan to run that super module later in this campaign, I decided to introduce them now.)  Værï is also insistent on asking at more temples of Baccob along the way about Durgeddin and the Glitterhame.  He rolled well, and I said I'd give him some info shortly...

I read the boxed text, which includes lots of information about increasingly hearing legends and rumors about Durgeddin the farther north they travelled.  They finally get to Blasingdell and get a sense of the Large Town the first night they are there.  They visit the tavern and the dry goods/outfitter shop, and Belack buys some mining equipment.  They debate heading out by horse, or stabling the horses and traveling by foot.  In the end they decide to ride, and buy a week's worth of feed for their horses, and they are amazed at how heavy it is (10 pounds per day).

They head out in the morning after getting directed toward the Stone Tooth, and it takes them two days by horse to traverse the 30 miles in increasingly mountainous terrain.  Along the way, they are assaulted by a winter wolf, and they learn the perils of getting caught in an ambush while mounted on horses that aren't trained for war…

It's heavily forested terrain, and I roll 40 feet for the encounter distance.  All three of them hear the winter wolf approaching, and Værï and Belack see it as well.  Værï wins initiative, and failing his quick dismount check, merely dismounts and casts Mage Armor, groaning about how much of a threat this winter wolf will be.  Belack goes next, pulling out his wand of Entangle, centering it a bit beyond the Winter Wolf, so that the PC's don't get caught in it too.  The Winter Wolf makes its save and moves forward, its 50 foot speed allowing it to get within breath weapon range despite only moving at half speed.  Its rear is still within the area of the entangle, but it unleashes a frigid north wind against Urolph and his mount, dealing 18 points of cold damage.  Urolph saved for half damage, but his horse did not, meaning the horse now had only one hit point…
With his horse now panicking due to the attack, Urolph has to control his mount with a DC 20 Ride check.  He pulls off a clutch roll, getting a 21, but then fails the Ride check to quick dismount, so gets down as a move action, then draws his morningstar, still out of reach from the Large canine.

Værï draws his bow while backing away and looses an arrow at the Winter Wolf, missing.  Belack now has to fight his panicking horse, and fails his ride check, so spends the round attempting to control his horse.  His wolf moves over to engage the Winter Wolf, biting, but failing to trip the larger wolf.  The Winter Wolf saves again versus the wand-cast entangle, and returns the favor, biting the wolf, dealing 11 damage, plus 6 points of cold, but failing to trip.  Urolph's horse runs down the path, out of danger, and the dwarf moves in to engage the winter wolf from the side… Værï's side.  The dwarf hits for a good chunk of damage.

Værï looses another arrow, and starts to really experience why being a non-dedicated archer in a party with melee buddies doesn't work out so well… the Winter Wolf gains cover from the dwarf, and Værï takes a –4 penalty for firing into melee… missing.  In exasperation he starts to move toward the melee, drawing his sword.  Belack's wolf goes next, biting the Winter Wolf, and succeeds in tripping the large beast.  Belack decides to abandon dealing with his horse, using a swift action to activate his Animal Devotion feat to gain a fly speed.  His horse sprints out from beneath his legs, and he flies over toward the melee, ending his movement above his wolf, and makes use of his Belt of Healing to cure his injured companion.

The Winter Wolf attacks Urolph from prone, and Belack activates his Protection Devotion feat, causing the magical beast to miss.  Urolph takes advantage of the Winter Wolf's prone position, and power attacks for 3, also making use of his brute gauntlets.  he hits, dealing 19 points of damage, and getting the Winter Wolf down into single digits.

Værï continues to move toward the melee, not quite getting there, only because he moved away the first round he fired… Belack then decides to end this fight… in a very different way than I was expecting.  Since everyone has Belts of Healing, he can experiment with more spells each day.  He whips out a mass snake's swiftness, granting his wolf and Urolph a bonus attack against the winter wolf.  This is the point at which he realizes that the spell doesn't help Værï, who is holding a melee weapon, and isn't threatening the wolf.  "Oh, I'm glad I used this now, so I learned that!"  Yep, actual play experience does a much better job of teaching the game.

Urolph is still in power attack mode, and slaughters the prone winter wolf with the magically-quickened swing of this morningstar.  Værï is demoralized that he didn't hit once the whole combat…  Urolph skins the Winter Wolf, and with a modified Survival check from Belack (it really should be Craft, so I cut his Survival modifier in half) Urolph learns how to tan the hide.  Værï says something about how Urolph only gets the skin, not the X, or the Y, or the brains.  "Uh… he'd need the brain to tan the hide."  Værï's player didn't believe me that to tan a hide you boil the brain into a broth, and brush that on the stretched skin.  Everybody learns something new.  However, the time input to cure the hide will likely prevent them from doing so, but I think Urolph is still hanging onto the hide.

I ask if Belack and his wolf want to backtrack the Winter Wolf (I start "flashing" my hands above my head, saying "HINT, HINT, HINT.") and he does so, following the trail back about a mile and finding a hollow in a tree that holds a small scattering of coins (amounting to 10 gp) and a potion vial (bull's strength).

We then continue on, arriving at the Stone Tooth, where Urolph spots a trail switchbacking up the slope.  As the approach, he realizes it was constructed in a way that it would have been nearly invisible from afar, but time has worn on it enough that the clever construction no longer succeeds in hiding its presence.  So, they travel right on up the mountain with their horses.  When they get to the last switchback, they notice a pair of Orcs on watch, and I give the PC's a chance to try and hide before I roll the spot checks for the Orcs (which is at a –4, due to them being lazy and inattentive), but the PC's don't do anything, because logistically there's not much they can do (they are riding on three horses, on a 10-foot wide path, about 100 feet from the Orcs).  Basically they just dismounted.  I think Belack had been walking his horse, so he casts produce flame (ensue discussion of why he can't immediately attack with it, because it isn't technically a touch range spell).

The Mountain Door:

The first two orcs are in Area 1, marked in spots O and O, while the PC's start at the X.

One of the two orcs rolls well on his Spot check, and here's where my poor preparations had me failing to follow the orc tactics noted in the module (I read the module and updated all that stats to 3.5, but I read this first part about two months ago, and failed to reread it this last week… tsk, tsk).  Having spotted the PC's, the orcs should have yelled a warning to the orcs in area 4 (they could have heard through the arrow slits) and started running up toward the door (Area 2).  Instead, after Værï and Urolph delay, I had the front orc charge the front character, which was actually Belack's wolf.  It hit hard, dealing 10 damage with its greataxe.  Urolph then comes in, moving to bull rush the orc off the ledge of the switchback.  He easily succeeds, and the orc drops 30 feet to the path below.  However, I roll poorly on the falling damage, and it lands at the bottom with 1 hit point remaining.

With the path now clear of its companion, the second orc charges Urolph, but misses.  I forget who killed the orc, but it died with one hit, and Belack heals his wolf with his healing belt.  The nearly dead orc down below bellows out a warning about intruders, and is then dispatched by Værï.

So, the PC's hurry up to the landing where the orcs had been keeping watch, and turn the corner, seeing steps leading up into a crevice of the mountain.  They decide to wait there for the orcs they expect to billow out of the mountain… They wait there for a round or two before Belack notices the arrow slits lining the walkway, and they see movement behind the slits.  So they hurry up to area 2.  I messed up here, too, as the archers should have gotten at least a round of attacks against them as they climbed the stairs, and the orc in area 4a should have been pelting Belack for a few rounds as he stayed below the southern arrow slit from area 4.  I totally botched that.  Oh well, I'll just shift the orc from 4a to the east half of area 3, so there will be another defender to deal with there.

But, the PC's delay along the way up to area 2, then finally head up and turn the corner into area 2.  Well, one of the orc archers had had time to move around from area 4 to close the door, which was ajar.  Urolph sees the door swinging shut, and decides to bull rush the door open.  With the added weight of the door, and its inertia already moving toward closing, I require him to beat the orc's resisting strength check by five.  Urolph doesn't win by five, but he does beat the orc's check, so he keeps the door from closing all the way.

Værï runs up to assist, and he gets a 19 on his strength check, providing Urolph a +2 on his strength checks for the next round.  Belack is right now hanging out on the north side of area 2, and I should have been pelting him with arrows…  Since there is no room for him to help Urolph, he hangs back, and pelts the guy in the arrow slit above him with his produce flame.  I totally botched this, too, thinking this arrow slit was only about 8 feet high in this area (the module says they are 15 feet up, but given the stairs rising to this area, it probably was technically about right for this one arrow slit).  Belack flings his produce flame blindly, right into the arrow slit, so I don't give the orc cover, but I do give him total concealment, since it's basically a blind throw into a window directly over his head.  Belack nails it, killing that archer.

The orc closing the door fails to beat Urolph on a Strength check.  Urolph then fails his straight-up opposed Strength check, and Værï fails to assist for the following round, and draws out a crowbar to jam in the door.  Belack then readies an action to use Fiery Burst as soon as the door is open, and the orc fails to get the door closed.  Finally, Urolph blows the orc away on his strength check, he shoves the door open, and Belack kills the orc with a Fiery Burst.

That's where we ended for the evening.  Next time they will learn what awaits them on the other side of the door… (Hint, readied arrow attacks from those on the east side of Area 3…)
« Last Edit: September 23, 2014, 11:00:50 AM by ksbsnowowl »

Offline ksbsnowowl

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Re: Sunless Citadel Adventure Path - Campaign Journal
« Reply #18 on: September 23, 2014, 02:10:52 AM »
Tonight was a great flurry of orc battles, and we picked up a fourth player, at least temporarily.  Again, Monday isn't our normal game night for this campaign, but one of my regular Monday players is still out of town, and what we have remaining in that campaign means that the next session will likely be the last, at least for a while, as they are battling and will likely kill the BBEG.  So, I convinced my Wednesday group to play, and invited the third player from my normal Monday game to join us as well.  It was fortuitous that I was just getting ready to start running them in a 4th level Eberron game; since my Sunless Citadel characters all just reached 4th level, I just had him bring the Eberron character (a Hexblade/Barbarian) so he could join in tonight.

Since I had forgotten to bring up the topic in the town of Blasingdell last time, I told the PC's that they would have heard of a local bounty on orcs; 25 gold pieces for each one captured or proved dead.  My PC's ended up doing quite a bit of scalping by the end of the evening...  But, this also gave an easy way to introduce the new character; just as Urolph burst the door down, another elf comes jogging up the stairs into area 2.  He quickly introduces himself as Silar, a man hunting orc scalps, and joins in the fun.

I describe the scene, with a 10-foot deep ledge just inside the door, with a pair of braziers illuminating the entryway.  Although Belack can just barely see the other side of the pit, Urolph and the two elves can fairly easily see that there are orcs with bows on the other side of the crevasse... and I'm an idiot.  I just realized that for much of this combat the PC's with low-light vision were relying on the light from the braziers to see... they should have been having a 20% miss chance for that whole time (low-light vision would double the bright range to 40 feet, which is the distance from the braziers to the far edge of the pit...)  Oh well...  Really, it only would have made a difference for a round or two, since they had a sunrod, and would have used it once the miss chance caused them to miss.

Since we had really just ended the previous session with Urolph opening the door, and Belack having used a readied action on the orc attempting to close the door, I just put them at the end of the initiative order, and had Silar, Værï, and the orcs roll initiative.  Værï won, followed by Silar ... and honestly, I'm not going to describe all this round by round.  For one, I can't remember it, since no one's positions ever really changed, and two, there was just a heck of a lot of bow shots missing.  Værï was the first to go in, and I had him make a spot check to notice the door on the east end of the hall just finishing to close, which he did notice.  I also rolled the secret Search check for him to notice the secret door he was standing next to... he didn't notice it.  Arrows were sent back and forth for several rounds, with the PC's quickly killing the one extra orc I'd added, since it didn't have a good position with cover.  Initially during the first round or two, there was talk of Urolph attempting to cross the rope bridge, but when he learned how slowly that would go, he just decided to start attacking with his shortbow.

Throughout much of this encounter, Belack couldn't actually see any of the orcs, as they were beyond even the shadowy illumination that his human eyes could pick up.  He "wasted" several attacks from his Produce Flame to send momentary flares across the chasm, just so he had an idea of where to otherwise attack.

After about 3 rounds, a group of four orc reinforcements showed up, coming from the direction of area 5.  By this time one of the original three orcs had died, and two others were injured.  The one with a single hit point remaining shot a last arrow in the direction of the PC's, then retreated down the hall to area 5, and ducked north around the corner.  After several more rounds of attacking each other with bows, the PC's killed the four orc reinforcements, one of them with a critical from Urolph, and then the PC's started to make preparations to cross the rope bridge.  Silar and Urolph each spent their turn digging out their rope out of their packs, and though confused as to why I was still having them act in turns, Værï deftly Balanced his way 25 feet across the bridge (so still 5 feet from the far side).  Then the "orcs" went, and Værï heard someone coming from the direction of area 5; the light from the braziers reached just far enough for Værï to see the front half of The Great Ulfe, an ogre, appear at the edge of his low-light vision.  He didn't know enough to even identify is as an ogre; all he saw was that is was big, it had an axe, and it was coming his way.  On his next turn he turned and scurried back the way he had come, succeeding on the DC 8 Balance check to not fall.

The Ogre chief and four more orcs arrive.  Really, I used them inefficiently, as they were supposed to make a stand in area 5, but I just figured it would be a nice visual for the ogre to come chop the bridge down, and end the PC's assault, at least for now.  But he was cocky, so he moved to the side behind one of the pillars, at least initially, so his orc reinforcements could get decent shots at the PC's.  Still several misses (it's hard when your attack roll is only at +1), and I even recall one round where three orcs shot at Værï (whose AC is 17 when he's not in his stance), and every one of them got a 16 total on his attack roll...

At least twice, the PC's summoned some critters to attack their foes, and each time, Værï and Belack were struck with an arrow during the long casting time.  Both made their Concentration checks like champs.  Which brings us to the Great Ulfe's end...

The ogre had finally had enough, having been shot with several arrows, including a critical hit for 13 which dropped his HP's to 16; he stepped out to chop down the bridge, which he does with a single swipe of his Large greataxe.  However, this was during the round in which Belack was summoning a wolf to attack the orc defenders.  The wolf appears and only has to five-foot step to reach the Ogre, so no AoO.  It misses, and on his turn, the Ogre plans to slaughter it and then retreat back down the hall (the DM wants to heal him up to fight the PC's again in a land battle more suited to his strengths...)  The Ogre hits and... deals crap damage; 3d6+7, and he only deals 12 damage, so the wolf isn't destroyed.  Well, not wanting to risk the AoO, the Ogre doesn't retreat, which means he's wide open to attack for another round.  The PC's start to nickle and dime him to death.  An arrow drops his hit points to 13, then 8, and finally 2.  Belack's summoned wolf gets to attack another time, hitting for 3 damage, and just barely knocking the ogre unconscious.

At this point there are still three orcs remaining.  They were firing from back in the hallway, and they fire a last volley at the PC's (and one destroys the summoned wolf), and they move up, grabbing the ogre as if to drag him away.  The fight is now on to kill the orcs before they can drag the ogre back behind the doors.  Silar pegs one with an arrow, but only deals 1 point of damage.  Since the range on Fiery Burst prevents it from being useful for this fight, Belack casts his Flaming Sphere, and puts it to great use, burning the same orc for 3 damage.  Værï misses, and Urolph only hits for 2.  The orcs drag the ogre 10 feet toward the door.  Silar misses, and the orc saves vs the second attack by the Flaming Sphere.  But, Belack still has a standard action, and he uses it to bean the orc upside the head with his sling, dealing 4 damage and knocking him out.  (The big ball of rolling fire seemed sufficient to light up the enemies for Belack's weak human eyes  :P)  The two remaining orcs drag the ogre another ten feet, but an arrow hitting for 8 damage, and another critical for 11 damage slays both of them.

The PC's listen, and hearing no one else approaching, they decided to loot what they can.  Værï makes use of the spider climb scroll they found in the Sunless Citadel, casting it on Belack, who climbs on the wall north of the crevasse, and makes several trips with weapons and scalps.  It was only at this point that I realized several of these orcs should only have had javelins for ranged weapons, but since I was treating them as attacking with longbows, and since the PC's are a bit short on wealth anyways, I let that stand.  They ended up with 12 longbows, a total of 14 melee weapons (mostly battleaxes, heavy flails, and shortswords), and 13 scalps (well, 14 if you include the ogre's).

Knowing how much money that will be, they mention heading back to Blasingdell, but Silar convinces them to just rest in the area, and with a prompted Survival check, I tell Belack that there is no problem finding a well-hidden and defensible campsite.  They rest and return to the Mountain Door, and again I've found a part that I screwed up.  The adventure states that if the PC's defeat the ogre chieftain and at least 13 of the orcs (they killed 14), then the remaining orcs will abandon the stronghold as soon as the PC's give them an opening to do so.  Of course this notation is made under the entry for room 12 (the ogre's room), but I don't see it, because the ogre has come to area 5...

Anyway, the PC's move cautiously up to the door again the next day, but Urolph only rolls a 7 on his move silently check.  This alerts the two remaining archers in area 4, who start shooting, placing an arrow in Belack's arm.  At which Urolph asks "Belack, has that stick always been growing out of your arm?"  I call for initiatives, and Urolph and Værï go first, scampering up to get around the corner to area 2.  The archers take aim at Belack and Silar, getting a critical against Belack, and rolling a nat 1 against the newcomer.  The PC's make it around to the door, finding it shut and barred.  Værï takes out a scroll of knock, and the bar on the door clatters to the ground.  At this point Silar has been hanging back, hoping to get a shot on the archers behind the arrow slits (one of which rolled a crit on Belack's wolf as it crossed to the door).  The whole time the PC's had missed the Spot check to notice the southern arrow slit, and an adept had moved in there to reinforce the archers, and tried to hit Belack with a sleep spell, failing.  Silar then spent several turns to fire at the caster, who had improved cover due to the arrow slit.  The only damage she took was from a retaliatory Fiery Burst from Belack.

All the PC's gave up on the archers and moved back into area 3.  All was quiet, and though the bodies had been removed, there was no other sign of activity.  The bridge was still cut, dangling yet from the west end, and the braziers had burned out.  Belack made use of his Animal Devotion feat to fly across the chasm and take 10 on use rope checks to reattach the cut bridge with some of the party's rope.

The party makes it across the chasm and into area 5 unmolested.  There, they encounter two human captives who are held behind wooden bars in area 6.  They also investigate the fire burning in area 7, and find lots of dry goods in area 5 (it specifies that there is about 20 gp worth of items, such as nails, bags of flour, etc, weighing several hundred pounds in total).  They leave the captives locked up for now, and find the secret doorway to room 9.  Since Burdug the adept had been redeployed to one of the archer alcoves, all they found here were two orc females, which Belack immediately slew with a readied Fiery Burst.  They searched the room, finding a small bit of treasure, and then opened the door to room 10.

That's where we called it a night.

I must point out, in the entirety of the archery fight, neither Silar nor Urolph got close enough to the secret doors to trigger the free secret search check to notice them, and Værï only did it that one time.  Just interesting, given how small that ledge is, in the grand scheme of things.
« Last Edit: October 01, 2014, 04:41:52 PM by ksbsnowowl »

Offline ksbsnowowl

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Re: Sunless Citadel Adventure Path - Campaign Journal
« Reply #19 on: September 25, 2014, 01:55:04 AM »
First, let me apologize for my spelling errors.  I typically type these up after midnight on the nights we game.  I'm tired enough that a few of the same typos show up repeatedly.  Most noticeable to me has been truncating "they" into "the."  I try to fix them later when I reread what I wrote the next day, but sometimes I still miss them.  Anyway, onto the main attraction...

Tonight was the fifteenth session of the campaign.  The fourth player, running Silar the Hexblade/Barbarian, has decided to keep playing with us on Wednesdays for a few weeks while his wife is visiting her family back in Europe.  I never mind having a table of four players, even if it is only short term.

So the PC's opened the door from room 9 into room 10.  After describing the hall, and the grand stairway that heads downward toward the south, Værï moves forward very carefully, checking for traps every five feet.  Belack, his wolf, and Silar follow not far behind, while Urolph lags toward the back.  Around the time Værï reaches the rusty gate that leads to area 8, Belack leans over the edge of the stairway, sunrod in hand, to look down into the depths.  The bright light catches the attention of four stirges, which fly up out of the underground stair.  The stirges roll well on initiative, beating everyone except Værï.  The elf moves to the stairs and down a few steps (5 feet), and skewers the first stirge with his rapier, successfully inflicting rapier, punishing stance, sapphire nightmare blade, and sneak attack damage.  While he flicks his wrist to get the large dying bug off of his sword, the first of the three remaining stirges moves in to attack him, but Værï's AoO as the tiny magical beast enters his square also drops that one.  Another heads over to latch onto Belack, and the fourth one attaches to Silar.

Belack clubs the one on his arm, but not with enough force to kill it; his wolf helps him out and ends that bug threat.  Silar misses his own, but Urolph comes over and destroys the bug before it can hurt Silar.  The danger done, Værï continues his search of the room's perimeter, looking at the floor for trap plates.  The party also inspects the skeletons in the room, noting their rusted armor shows signs of fire damage.  They smartly ask if the burns seem to be only from one side; no, they encompass all parts of the armor, as if whatever burned them engulfed them entirely.  Værï continues his square-by-square search.  He was rolling WELL initially, then as he got to the shaded area, where he might find the holes in the wall through which nozzles will fire out alchemist's fire... he failed to make the Search DC the whole way 'round.  As soon as he stepped away from the wall and was looking at the floor... he beat the DC again.

Urolph then breaks open the rusted-shut gate to area 8, which has been stuffed with pallets and straw, finding boxes and barrels filled with supplies, and then noticing that the corridor continues past the pile into area 8.  The party decides to investigate the north door of room 10 before moving on, however.  Convinced by the burned bodies that there must be some sort of trap here, Værï goes to search the door again.  This time he nails the Search check, and notices the small holes in the stone relief.  He describes stuffing the holes with pieces of wool blanket that he cuts up (they found one in area 8), and with a successful Disable Device check, he succeeds in delaying the onset of the alchemist's fire spray such that when he opens the north door, the alchemical fire is delayed, and smokes the wool wadding in warning, until he can get safely out of the way.

Alchemist's fire spews into the shaded region on the map, and the characters all watch from afar.  While they wait for the alchemist's fire to die out on the floor (it will burn a character for up to 10 rounds), the door's counter-weight causes the door to close after two rounds.  After this the trap only has enough juice for one full-powered eruption, and if the PC's had blocked the door open, they could harvest the chemical components to later make up to 3d4 flasks of alchemist's fire.  Since my description of the floor yet burning did slow them down from getting to the door, I allowed for a bit more to remain, as treasure.  But, they had to get the door open once again.  Another Disable Device check, with a bonus, allows the PC's to open the door and wedge the door open with the rusty axe heads found with the burned bodies, and escape the fiery eruption unscathed.

Inside the room they find two copper drums, nearly empty, each containing two halves of the alchemist's fire (it is presuming it is like epoxy; add together and watch it react).  Værï gets the drums open, and sees there is just enough to make about 4 batches of alchemist's fire (rolled well on a 1d4).  But, that is for later... For now, we must investigate down the stairs, into the depths.  That's really too bad, as there was some good loot to be had yet, in rooms 11, 12, and 14...

So, the party descends the stairs into the Glitterhame:




They step over a gushing stream of water, and continue down the stairs toward area 16.  Belack is still proudly proffering that sunrod, and Belack notices four more stirges hanging from the ceiling.  Belack does actually go first in the surprise round, but his Fiery Burst isn't enough to kill one of the stirges.  The monstrous bugs descend to attack, one attaching to Belack, who missed his AoO, another attaching to his wolf, the third attaching to Værï, and the fourth one rolling a nat 1, missing Silar.

Værï goes first, successfully attacking his stirge, but only dealing 6 damage, leaving it attached at 1 hit point.  Too bad he realized much later that this attack should have been a crit threat...  You need to pay attention in the moment.  Belack has his wolf attack Belack's stirge, but it misses.  He then attacks the one attached to his wolf, dealing 4 damage with his club, but not killing it.  The stirges then drain blood, sucking 3 points of Con each from Værï and Belack, and dealing two Con damage to the wolf.  The fourth stirge attaches to Silar, but is killed on Urolph's next action.  Silar then moves to forward on the stairs to pass Belack and his wolf, stopping to kill the stirge attached to Belack.  Værï slays his stirge, and Belack batters the last one off of his wolf.

After healing up a bit (Belack still had some damage from those arrows he took while reentering the Mountain Door; he also cast Lesser Restoration on Værï, removing all his Con damage) they continue down to the floor of the cavern, and investigate area 16.  They find bird-like tracks, and follow them to area 21.  Belack's wolf can smell something up ahead (troglodyte musk is pungent), but they advance anyway.  Once again, the sunrod announced their presence (as well as botched Move Silently checks by Silar and Urolph), so the two Troglodytes in area 21 were ready for the PC's.  Belack just notices the western troglodyte (marked "t" on the map) as Værï is walking to that corner.  The druid even ekes out winning initiative against the lizard man, five-foot steps, and blasts him with a Fiery Burst as his action in the surprise round; it fails its save, taking 8 damage.  He then sends his wolf to attack, and misses.

I just realized I forgot to inflict the Stench saves and possibly sickened condition on the PC's... oh well.  There's always next time.  The western troglodyte then five-foot steps back, throwing a javelin at Værï, but rolling minimum damage.  Værï then moves forward, striking with Mountain Hammer, dealing 16 points of damage, and slaying the troglodyte outright.  With that foe dead, Belack and his wolf move into the center of the cavern, and spot the eastern troglodyte, standing beside an open wooden cage door that had been blocking an arm of the cave system.  The wolf continues up to the troglodyte, missing with his bite.  The troglodyte smacks the wolf with its club, but fails to bite or claw the canine.  Then the troglodyte's ace in the hole makes its appearance.  A Large bear emerges from the cave, rushing past Belack's wolf (and just tanking the 5 points of bite damage), and attacks Belack, hitting, then succeeding in grappling the druid.

After the Con damage, and seeing the bear inflict 16 points of damage, then grapple him, Belack says "it's been nice knowing you all..." At this point he had 5 hit points left (normally max of 29, reduced to 21 due to Con damage), but the day was not yet over.  Urolph charges the bear, power attacking for 3.  He hits well, dealing 20 damage to the animal mauling his friend.  But the bear isn't done for yet.  Silar moves forward, but unable to reach the grappling bear, instead fires at the remaining troglodyte, hitting for 2 damage.

Værï moves around to flank the bear with Urolph, and plans to hit hard. Pushing Stance? Check.  Sneak Attack? Check.  Sapphire Nightmare Blade? Check.  He succeeds on the concentration check OVERLY well... and then botches on the attack roll.  Once again demonstrating why I don't like Sapphire Nightmare Blade.

Belack activates the last charge on his Belt of Healing, rolling well and healing 11 points, putting him back at 16 (thank goodness magic items can be activated in a grapple without needing a successful grapple check...)  Belack's wolf five-foot steps away from the troglodyte, attacking the bear that is mauling its master, dealing 6 damage.  The bear is weakening, now only sitting at 12 hit points.  The troglodyte decides to attack the elf that just shot it, missing horribly with its javelin.  The bear succeeds on another grapple check, only getting a 20, but that still beats Belack's 15; but it only rolls 10 damage.  The healing belt has kept Belack safe a little longer.

Urolph debates whether or not to rage.  I prompt him that he is seeing his friend get mauled to death... He rages, he's flanking, and he rolls a nat 20.  Critical hit for over 30 damage... the bear collapses, dead.  Attacks are concentrated on the lone troglodyte, and Silar starts pulling the druid out from underneath the bear corpse.  Urolph proudly and patiently takes the half hour to skin the bear; this will go well with his Winter Wolf pelt...

The party investigates the cage, and quickly realizes their idea that the two troglodytes lived here is wrong (they live in areas 17– 18).  They notice the northern passage is carved rather than natural, and they follow it.  It quickly begins rising in elevation, and after a few hundred feet, they find themselves outside, on the slope of the Stone Tooth.  They like that they found another way in, so they can avoid the orc archers in the future (little do they know the orcs will be leaving soon), and after determining this is indeed rather distant from the Mountain Door, they debate heading back to camp and going to get the horses.

In the end they decide to search around a bit more.  They walk past the entrance to area 22...
Quote
... A golden-brown carpet of mold covers an old skeleton in rusted mail in the southern part of the room, and a narrow passageway leads to another small room beyond this one. A surprisingly bright sword gleams in the skeleton’s bony grasp.
Can anyone guess what Urolph did?  Anyone?  Anyone?

Belack tries to stop him, but that only means he's close enough to get caught in the spore cloud when Urolph marches in to claim the sword.  Urolph rolls a nat 1 on the initial Fort save, taking 4 points of Con damage (keep in mind, he's a feeble dwarf, having a Con of only 11); Belack takes another 3 points of Con damage, putting him at 8.  With the first instance of disturbing the yellow mold, I was going to allow Urolph to get the sword and get back to safety...  After he has the sword in hand, I ask if he's planning to leave, or if he wants to spend more time searching the skeleton.  At first he was planning to drag the mold-covered skeleton back into the hall...  After shouts from the other players, he just spends another round searching.  Another round, another instance of poison from the mold.  He makes his save only because dwarves get a racial bonus against poison...

He gets back into the hall, and inspects the sword, noting that it does indeed bear the smith mark of Durgeddin the Black.  After that fun little adventure, they decide it is time to get out of here and rest for the night.  As they are walking back across the cavern to their newly-discovered exit, I call for Belack's save vs the secondary Con damage.  He fails, and I pick up two d6's... fear widens his eyes... and I only roll 3 or 4.  Belack will live.  Urolph makes the secondary save against the first instance of mold poison, but not the second.  Eight Constitution damage; he keels over, dead.

The player isn't mad or sad about this; he knew the way he played Urolph was likely to lead to something like this.  He's glad he died doing something stupid, rather than in combat.  "That's the way it should be."  So, the party loots Urolph's body, and they bury him under a pile of stones on the mountain's slope.  They head back to Blasingdell, and we call the night early at that point, waiting to role play back at town until Urolph's player has had time to make his new character.  Discussions ensued about divvying up Urolph's gear, as well as what he plans to play next (a LG Cleric 2/Crusader 2 "paladin" type; he didn't know what god or race - I told him to check out Ruby Knight Vindicator).  They run the math and I award them money for selling longbows, orc scalps, and Urolph's mundane gear they didn't want to keep.  In total they got 972 gold.  Scant discussion was had about attempting to find someone to raise Urolph from the dead; the cleric in Blasingdell isn't capable of such a feat.

So, the party will be gone from the mountain for four days.  This will give the two orc patrols time to return, and all the surviving orcs (Burdug the Adept, Old Yarrick the 3rd level warrior, and three orc archers) time to abandon the location and flee to the surrounding hills.  But they will also have time to take valuables with them.  Too bad... The Great Ulfe's room had a +1 Rapier in a chest.  And there was lots of gold, and a few potions.  Oh well, I asked them (HINT, HINT, HINT) if they wanted to finish clearing out this level before they headed down that staircase...
« Last Edit: May 20, 2016, 02:56:41 PM by ksbsnowowl »