Help planning the climax of a demon rift massive battle

[ksbsnowowl]

By the start of the last session, several of the party members are running low on spells.  I made one mistake going into this whole massive battle.  I told them it would take 4 or 5 game sessions.  I told them this knowing that when I played through Red Hand of Doom, we took four sessions to play through the massive battle (1. Giants attacking the walls;  2. Abithriax the Red Dragon;  3. The Streets of Blood; 4. The Sniper Assassin and the Final Battle with Kharn).  I figured it would probably take a whole extra session for the wave of demons to be fought too.

Well, rather than being the strike force to be ordered to the weak spots to shore them up, the party has taken upon themselves to just go where I describe things happening in the distance.  The have engaged in the following extra encounters:
1. Initial Wall Assault - this one didn't really cost them too much in resources.
2. Half-Fiend fly-by of the wall - this one cost them a few spells; maybe 3 or 4.
3. Nycaloth grappling and falling with a specific Hathran - spent several spells here, most bouncing right off the fiend's SR.
4. Attacking the summoned Nycaloth - this used up several spells, many of which also bounced off the fiend's SR.

All of this has lead to the game sessions being broken down this way:
1. Initial Wall Assault, Half-Fiend fly-by, Nycaloth falling with a Hathran, Giants attacking the Walls
2. Killing the summoned Nycaloth
3. Killing the real Nycaloth
4. Starting the "Streets of Blood." (Two of four waves).

I've had to assure them several times in emails that they should do fine.  They'll want to be conservative with their remaining spells, but two of them have a reserve feat (acidic splatter for the Rog//Wiz, and fiery burst for the Druid//Sorcerer), the Barb//Beguiler has been better about conserving his spells, and had only used one Rage of three, and the Druid//Sorcerer's buffs will last a long time, and he has at least two wildshapes remaining. They also still have all seven charges on their Staff of Life, and the Rog//Wiz started the battle with a brand new wand of Cure Moderate Wounds.  This battle is going to end up forcing them to use their characters in ways they don't normally think about, and that prospect is starting to piss them off a bit, I think.

So, the Barb//Beguiler entered this game session wanting to not use any spells, and the Druid//Sorcerer was wanting to act in a similar manner.  They did a pretty good job of that, each using maybe one spell.

Prior to dealing with the nycaloth, the walls had been breached in two places, though those had been plugged by a Wall of Stone and a Wall of Thorns.  The army had then over-topped the walls with more than 60 castings of Dark Way, moving several hundred tanarukk and various hags and half-trolls up onto the wall.  With the added help of two dozen half-fiend trolls and half-fiend ice trolls, they were able to secure the wall, and started bringing the fight down to the ground inside the wall, though the defenders seem to be holding a defensive line fairly well.

After slaying the Nycaloth, the party had a few rounds to catch their breath, though they wanted to get right into the action at the wall, so I obliged them, having a mental message from the Hathran scouting in owl form that the horde seemed to be making some progress as the breach plugged by the Wall of Thorns.  The defenders there were being overcome.  I remind the party that they have all eight of their higher-level NPC allies to call upon, and they gather them up along the way.  I then give them 10 minutes at the table to plan and arrange their allies, which are composed of:
One 5th level Ice Troll Berserker "Captain"
Five 2nd level Ice Troll Berserkers (down from ten, due to them losing in one of the "crisis points" scenarios)
Six 3rd level Barbarian//Scout Geats
Four 6th level Barbarians (Wolf Berserker Lodge trippers)
Four 8th level Geat Scout 5/Berserk 3//Barbarian 4/Fist of the Forest 1/Ranger 1/Fighter 2's

They place most of the lower-level folk in the back, and place themselves right in front and about 15 feet back from the "brier patch" plugging the wall.  The Wolf Lodge Berserkers and the Geat Berserks flank the hole, creating a small box to attack the foes in.

After 10 minutes of discussion, the wall of thorns began to peel away, and a successful spellcraft check by the Wizard learns that it is the effect of an Antimagic Field.  The party have readied actions, though some are abandoned due to the antimagic field making them irrelevant.  The party does a good job of plugging up the hole and making it difficult for the "ferried" foes to emerge from their bubble of protection within the wall of thorns.  A few of the winter wolves in front squeeze into the space outside the antimagic field and use their breath weapons, which are ineffective as the PC's have Cold Resistance 20.

Full attacks from the tiger-form druid and the Barbarian//Beguiler, as well as a Mortal Bane empowered Hideous Blow from the Barbarian//Warlock drop two of the winter wolves in short order, and the third is grappled by one of the tiger animal companions on an AoO as it tries to move past.  The Wizard//Rogue shoots his MW shortbow at one of the Tanarukk high-Archivists who are working as ferrymen with their antimagic fields (the AMF's are cast from scrolls created by one of their members who is actually a Ur-Priest).  An Ice Troll and two Half-Troll Marzanna Hags move forward out of the antimagic field, and someone else hits the same archivist again for 14 points of damage [was probably the Druid//Ranger/Scout DMPC who has giants as a favored enemy, and an enemy spirit pouch] before the two archivists back away, pulling back into the wall of thorns.

The two Marzanna Hags laid down two walls of ice, perpendicular to the Wall, about 30 feet apart, flanking the 20-foot breach in the wall, blocking off several of the allies to the sides.  Two ogre mages fly in, laying down two Cones of Cold for 9d6 cold each, one focused at the party, the other focused directly down the length of one of the Walls of Ice, hitting the 8th level Geats on the side with the party, and hitting several low-level barbarians on the other side of the wall.

The party takes the fight to the Ice Troll and the Half-Troll Marzanna Hags, missing several times against their respective AC's of 23 and 25.  The Druid//Sorcerer's tiger animal companion does a good job of hitting several times, but fails to initiate a grapple.  She retaliates by making a concentration check and using her Dreadful Gaze on the animal companion.  It fails the initial Will save, but succeeds at the secondary Fort save versus death.  The players asks what would have happened if he'd failed the save, and I tell him.  Now he REALLY wants to kill the hag.  Regardless, on its next action, the animal companion is panicked for 10 rounds, and runs off.

During the next round the Druid//Sorcerer mauls one of the hags, but doesn't yet kill her, and I think he actually failed to grapple her.  Several of the 8th level Geats gets in on the action, and they keep missing by one or two.  I forget the details  now, a week later, but several of the party members got a hit or two in amongst the three remaining foes.  The third winter wolf, being grappled by the DMPC's animal companion, unleashes a breath weapon at the tiger, but it does nothing after the Cold Resistance 20.  One of the hags tries to use a Bestow Curse, but the PC made his will save.  The Ice Troll fails to hit anyone.

The foes really start to drop at this point.  The last winter wolf is raked to death, someone starts using fire against the Ice Troll, and one or both of the hags go down.  I rolled 1d4+2 to see how many rounds they had until the next wave hit, and I rolled 5.

The Druid//Sorcerer stuck around to burn the Ice Troll to death with Fiery Burst, but the Barbarian//Beguiler decided to go after the archivists with the antimagic fields.  He flew out to the end of the wall of thorns (roughly 30 feet or so) and noticed a pair of tanarukk in robes walking away from the "brier patch" and with a spot check noticed the Spike Stones were being suppressed around them. He also noticed another patch of the wall of thorns just closing up, as if more antimagic fields had just entered it.  He either cast Freedom of Movement, or already had it up and running, so he decided to get in front of this new batch.  He was able to move freely through the thorns, but still took 5 points of damage each round (lessened to 3 due to his DR 2/-).  He moved toward where he expected the on-comers to be, and saw that the whole area of the antimagic fields full of trolls (and the two tanarukk archivists).

And I need to hit the road, so I'll add the story of the second wave later.

Edit:  And I return.

I need to explain just a bit more about how the area was set up.  From the player's perspective inside the wall, the wall extended in both directions, to the left and the right.  On the right side, about twenty feet right of the breach, was a stairway sticking out perpendicular to the wall.  It came down at a 45-degree angle, so the bottom portion stuck out 20 feet from the wall.  Ten feet left of that, between the stairs and the hole in the wall, was a Wall of Ice put in place by one of the hags.  She doubled the height to 20 feet near the stairway, but further out kept it at 10 feet high, and it extended ~70 feet back, placing the PC's inside an icy hallway with the second wall of ice thirty-five feet to the left, on the other side of the brier-plugged breach.

Prior to the first wave, the PC's had positioned several people up on the portion of the wall that had a stairway, and placed several on the stairs as well, all with bows.  The DMPC Druid//Ranger/Scout/Wiz/MotYW was standing at the broken edge, overlooking the broken hole in the wall, the wall of thorns, and the killing field below.  Because the wall of ice from the first wave blocked their ability to fight the foes coming through the breach, most of those individuals moved down the stairs to move around the 'back' end of the wall.  The DMPC archer stayed on his perch, however, still getting good shots in on the foes below him.

At this point, five rounds after dropping the last of the foes from the first wave, a group of Tanarukk Berserkers comes running down the length of the wall.  I put four of the eight on the map, and gave them a surprise round action (they ran out of a field of magical darkness, so the PC's didn't see them coming).  The first one charges 20 feet, Leap Attacking to hit the DMPC.  The Druid//archer uses his last Abrupt Jaunt for the day, teleporting down inside the wall 10 feet, and then falling the remaining 10 feet, but succeeding on the tumble check to not take damage.

The second tanarukk leaps the distance from the wall, over the Wall of Ice, to attack the Rogue//Wizard in mid-air.  That may have been a cheat on the jump rules to finish his charge in mid air and sunder the Rog//Wiz's MW bow, then get a sundering cleave on him, but so be it.  His next turn would entail falling to the ground.  I think this sundering of his bow actually really angered the player, even though it was only a MW bow.

The third tanarukk leaped from the wall to the stairway, and sundered the weapon of the young Geat standing there, then cleaves into him, killing the Geat.  If I remember correctly, the other one leaped toward the other young geats on the ground, and may have actually closed the distance (all these berserkers were under the effects of the Jump spell), getting a hard strike against one of the others.

Initiative is rolled, and the party rolls well.  All the PC's, as well as all the NPC's except one group (the young Geats, the ones closest to the on-coming tanarukk) goes before the tanarukk berserkers.  The Rogue//Wizard 5-foot steps back and lays into the tanarukk with an Acidic Splatter, dealing 12 points of damage, and he thinks toward the Barbarian Beguiler (who is a Mindbender, and is keeping is telepathic communication line 'open') that he REALLY needs to get back here, and not screw around with whatever is in the brier patch at the moment.  The Barbarian//Beguiler hurries back, taking a bit more damage from the thorns, and rages, hitting the mid-leap tanarukk for 25 points of damage.

The 8th level Geats and move to attack the leaping tanarukk when he falls, and the Wolf Lodge Berserkers move around the wall of ice to help the young Geats who are falling to the tanarukk.  The DMPC archer moves twenty feet to activate Improved Skirmish, then wings an arrow at the air-borne tanarukk above him, hitting for 36 points of damage (tanrukk in my game are Troll-blooded, not Orc-blooded, and thus Favored Enemy: Giants and a Giantbane longbow hurt a lot against them).  On its next turn the tanarukk would fall, taking sufficient damage to drop it into negative hit points.

The tiger-form Druid//Sorcerer had buffed himself with his scroll of Air Walk, and so he charged up toward the first tanarukk up on the edge of the wall (the one that tried to hit the Abrupt Jaunting archer).  He was also under the effects of Girallon's Blessing, and he used a swift action to activate his Bracers of Lightning to give all his natural attacks the Shocking property for one round.  He dealt 70 points of damage on his charge, and the players were astounded that this didn't kill the tanarukk (they have 77 hp's, though I just realized they should have had 95 hp's because they were raging...).  He did successfully start a grapple, however, and pulled the tanarukk into his razor-sharp embrace.

The Barbarian//Warlock DMPC struck the tanarukk on the stairs, and then it was the tanarukks' turn.  The first tanarukk tried to get out of the grapple with the Druid, but it didn't work.  The second one fell, and as I stated previously, the fall dealt enough damage to knock him unconscious; he was soon thereafter pummeled to death by the experienced Geats.  The third ate an AoO from the Barb//Warlock, and leaped off the stairs, sundering the weapon of another Geat youngling, and nearly killing him with the cleave.  The fourth one used Momentum Swing to seriously hurt another NPC, and then whiffed on the second attack.

The second batch of four tanarukk berserkers arrived along the top of the wall, and the first one charged the grappling Druid//Sorcerer, hitting for 41 points of damage.  All the players' eyes got wide at that.  Someone made a snarky remark about what their CR was, and I told them each was a CR 5.  More wide eyes.  The sixth tanarukk started moving down the steps, and the last two leaped straight toward the NPC's at the base of the stairway.

Finally the Geat younglings were able to act, though they didn't accomplish too much.  They did get a few hits in, and with the skirmish damage from being 3rd level Scouts, they made a couple small dents in the bad guys.

Top of the round, and Kimi the Rogue//Wizard lays out some area acid spell, dealing 51 points of damage to the three that failed their save, and 25 to the two that made it.  The Barbarian//Beguiler must have moved and struck something this round (most of their AC's were sitting around 6), but I can't decipher which he hit.  Maybe he tried to hit the one using momentum swing and actually missed the darn thing (which is hard, considering their raging AC is like 15).

More NPC flunky attacks.  The surviving Geat younglings hit for small amounts of damage, and the wolf lodge berserkers get on scene and try to trip, and every single one of them fails the opposed Strength checks.  The DMPC Druid//Scout casts Air Walk on himself, and walks up to "perch" upon the 20-foot tall peak of the wall of ice, so next round he'll have a good view of the tanrukk below him.

The Druid//Sorcerer drops the grappled tanarukk (which deals 6 damage, bringing it to 1 hp), 5-foot steps back from the tanarukk that just charged him for over 40 damage, and notes that the tanarukk that charged him, the one on the stairs, and three of them clustered to the players' right of the bottom of the stairs are all in a line.  He breaks out Arc of Lightning, dealing 22 points of electricity damage (no SR) to the four that made their saves for half, and outright killing on that had been dropped into single digits by the Wizard's acid area of effect spell.

The Barb//Warlock character got into the fray once again, hideous blowing one of the tanarukk into oblivion.  The tanarukk at the base of the stairs struck at whomever they could, killing another young Geat or two, and injuring one of the Wolf Berserker trippers.  The one on the stairs leaped to attack the Druid//Archer, striking for 47 points of damage.

Another round of attacks from the Good Guys brought an early end to the tanarukk berserkers.  Although I now realize I'd cheated them each out of 18 rage-induced hit points, it was likely for the best.  They hit hard, and I might have actually started sundering magical PC gear, which would have pissed people off quite a bit.

We ended the session there, and I informed them that we only got through about half of the waves I had planned, which means more sessions than I had initially indicated.  So, in chatting some after the game, and in the email I send out afterward, I apologized for incorrectly estimating how many sessions it would be, and instead decided to tell them how many encounters it would be.  Roughly 18 total, of which the party had now gotten through four planned encounters, and four extra encounters that they had taken upon themselves to seek out.

This... did not make them happy.  I had pointed out that of the remaining dozen or so encounters, about ten of them were going to be when the demon waves start coming.  I also mentioned that several of them will be below their party level, some at their party level, and a few above their party level.  The Rogue//Wizard's player was also testy about how little XP they earned from this session (only like 200 or so), but that was in large part due to the fact they had so many NPC's on their side.  At the end of the session they had acknowledged how important the NPC mooks were, even if only to serve as alternate targets for the bad guys' aggressions.

It's interesting to see their take on things, and their reaction to this battle.  I think I can safely say it is much larger than they had anticipated it being.

[ksbsnowowl]

The next session started with a few rounds for the party to heal up before the next wave hit.  They weren't  expecting that long a time until the next wave of trolls came, because the Barbarian//Beguiler had seen the group of trolls being ferried through the wall of thorns.  What they didn't know is that was only half of that wave.  With 10 trolls coming, it took a total of four of the high archivists to get them there.

The trolls I used for this wave were modified Bladerager Trolls from the MMV.  I never liked the concept of the Bladerager Trolls, but I was wanting to make tougher Feral Trolls, but Feral can't be applied to Giants.  But Ithamar pointed me toward the Bladerager and caused me to give them a second look.  I took away their plate armor, gave them a chain shirt, took away their death throws and immunity to mind affecting/tortured mind, and thereby dropped their CR by 1.  It ended up giving me exactly what I wanted, though my PC's did a good job of preventing them from being able to use their pounce ability.

The party saw the archivists with the antimagic fields as the lynchpins of this assault, and the Barb//Beguiler in particular wanted to take them out, utilizing his freedom of movement to attack them from the side.  The party had several readied actions for when the first troll emerged, and were bunched up near the edge of the wall of thorns, to prevent them invading trolls from being able to move inside the walls.  The thorns again started to peal away and the Wizard's readied Acidic Splatter goes off, dealing 15 points of damage.  Most of the other readied attacks missed, as each "feral" troll also had been equipped with a talisman of Shield of Faith and a talisman of Shield, bringing their AC's to 28.

On the first full round, the Druid//Sorcerer charged the one troll who had exited the antimagic field, dropping a spell into arcane strike to up his attacks and damage.  With Girallon's Blessing up and running, he charges for six attacks at +14 and one bite at +9, plus rend, before the bonuses from arcane strike.  He strikes several times, dealing 48 damage all told.  Someone else hit for 12 damage, dropping the first troll unconscious.

With the first troll out of the way, I point out that the void within the wall of thorns was larger, and was holding about ten trolls, as well as a total of four archivists.  The Barb//Beguiler player apparently wasn't paying attention when I said that, because his first action was to fly down from the top of the wall, right into the Wall of Thorns (he was under Freedom of Movement), taking 3 points of damage for every 5 feet of movement.  He struck for over 20 damage, but then was full attacked by the troll, taking two claws and the rend.  Then one of the rear archivists, which the player missed me pointing out, moved toward him with two of the "feral" trolls.  The Barb//Beguiler was enveloped into the antimagic field, and struck twice more.

A few more trolls started taking heavy damage from the other PC's, as they had figured out the trolls had buffing spells on them.  Keep them from exiting the antimagic fields, and they are easier to hit with weapon attacks (though the Druid can't attack them in Wildshape).  Still, the trolls did start filing out of the AMF, though the PC's did a good job of preventing them from moving much of anywhere, and didn't give them room to charge anyone.  The Druid air walked above the trolls, and let loose with a greater fireburst, dealing 40 points of fire damage to three of them, with a fourth one saving for half.

By this point the Barbarian//Beguiler realized that he had perhaps made a mistake forging ahead on his own, and decided it was time to Rage for a little padding of his HP total.  Unable to immediately fly (due to being inside the antimagic field), and realizing the trolls' reach was going to have him get attacked regardless of if he tried to withdraw, he moved back, allowing a few attacks of opportunity to strike him, and then he activated his Belt of Healing to give him emergency hit points.  By this point I'm forgetting if there was another round of attacks from the trolls.  I know the archivist and the two trolls did wander out that way to attack him some more, which he was not expecting (I pulled back, they'll leave me alone...), but their speed was slower, which I think prevented them from actually getting to him.

Regardless, the Barb//Beguiler soon found himself in a precarious situation of being in single-digit hit points.  He couldn't rage to give himself more hit points, he had used all the charges on his healing belt, another round of attacks from the pursuing trolls would likely kill him, and trying to just fly out of the wall of thorns would kill him too (as he took damage for every 5 feet he moved through the thorns).

Then came the DMPC Druid//Scout/Wizard's turn.  I glanced over the DMPC's character sheet; what spells could he possibly use to solve this?  He's got nothing... nothing... nothing.  But wait!  The third level spell he had just added to his spellbook: Dimension Step from the PHB2.  Casting that would allow the Barb//Beguiler to teleport up to his speed!

I'm sure I actually cheated a bit, as 15 feet of wall of thorns probably should have blocked line of sight to target the Barb//Beguiler, but that didn't even cross my mind at the time.  The DMPC air walked over to the wall above the imperiled character and teleported him up to the top of the wall.  At the first opportunity, the Rogue//Wizard flew over with the Staff of Life, and on the Druid//Scout's next turn, the Barbarian was healed.  My player was actually scared his character was going to die, and that's a good thing.  I'm glad I found a way to save him within the abilities of the DMPC, because my goal was not to kill him, but I do not fudge dice to save characters.

Some more pain was brought down on the trolls who had exited the antimagic fields, and most of them were brought down and eventually coup de graced by the Wizard's sneak attack-empowered Acidic Splatter feat.  On the fifth round the four archivists and three of the "feral" trolls actually ended up retreating, seeing the breach as a lost cause, since the trolls didn't have the space to be effective.

There was one more wave to contend with, however.

[ksbsnowowl]

The last wave to strike at this section of the wall didn't actually need to try and come through the breach.  The tanarukk archivists and "feral" trolls began to retreat, and though the Barbarian//Beguiler did want to follow after and kill them, he thought better of it, having just barely escaped death.

And so the last wave advanced; a group of two Tanarukk Wizards under the effects of fly, and three Beasts of Malar in bat form.  The party had only ever succeeded in killing one of the Beasts of Malar by drowning it after having beat it into unconsciousness, though they had learned some of their secrets when the Beguiler successfully charmed Malar the shadow creature red abishai.  The party had specifically obtained about a dozen flasks of holy water just for this possibility.

As a DM, I flubbed one thing... I forgot to have the tanarukk wizards' buffs up, and describe them as being under the effects of mirror image, et al.  So, the first round of combat had several of the PC's doing a quick bout of healing or minor buffing, while the Druid//Sorcerer air walked himself right up to one of the wizards in a pouncing charge, hitting with all attacks and dealing over 60 points of damage, killing the wizard outright.  The second tanarukk got off one fireball, but it didn't do too much, as the PC's and most of the NPC mooks had Fire Resistance 20.  The Beasts of Malar alighted upon the wall, two on the west (side with the stairs), and one on the east.  They began their transformation, which takes a full round.  One on the west landed on the stairway, while another landed down the wall from the breach, such that he would be able to charge the PC's still up on the wall.

The second wizard likewise died in a spectacular flurry of claws, but the Beasts of Malar were tougher.  Non of the NPC's had the means to overcome their DR 10/+1 and silver (nor did the PC's for that matter), and the NPC's also did not have the means to overcome the BoM's regeneration (overcome by good-aligned weapons and divine magic [I count holy water in that]).

The PC's started getting hits in on the Beasts of Malar, and they debated around the table about having the Rogue//Wizard go invisible to start tagging them with holy-water sneak attacks.  They decided to just beat them down, and then have the Barbarian//Beguiler just coup de grace them with his good-aligned greatsword (thank you, lesser fiend-slaying crystal).  The Beast on the east wall transformed into claw slayer form, and climbed right down the wall, while the other two beasts transformed into panther forms, and started chasing after the NPC's that were over on that side of the walls of ice that were still up.  There were a few hit landed against PC's and NPC's alike, but by the end of the fifth round, all the Beasts of Malar had been beaten into unconsciousness, and the PC's went about mopping up their corpses.

The next game session started with me narrating that the PC's had stayed on at the wall for a time, helping defeat a few minor incursions off the wall, but the army of defenders seemed to be doing a decent job of holding their defensive line.  The call then came from the Iron Lord that some archer was destroying several of the witches' mirror images, and then his voice cut off.  Just like Lord Jarmath in RHoD, he had taken an arrow laced with a powerful poison, which knocked his strength to 0, paralyzing him.  One of the other telepathically linked Hathran informed the PC's that the attacks were coming from one of the field hospitals, and the PC's hurried in that direction.  Everyone had cleared out around the southern field hospital, a two-story stone building a bit more than 400 feet from the southern wall (and 200 feet from the Niflhenge).

The PC's approached from "behind," as the doorway faced toward the Niflhenge.  They started to skirt around the eastern side of the building, and the Barbarian//Beguiler who was leading the way took an arrow laced with purple worm poison in the chest.  This dealt him at least 4 points of Strength damage, though I forget how much exactly (DC 24, 1d6 Str/2d6 Str).  Initiatives were rolled, and the Barb//Beguiler went first, racing ahead to get in the doorway.  As soon as he started to push back the heavy curtain serving as a door, he took a readied fireball to the face.  It actually worked to their advantage that it happened this way, as it prevented multiple people from being hit with the spell.  He continued his move and entered the room, seeing two tanarukk wizards at the far end near the stairs, one of them now under the effects of Mirror Image.

Unbeknownst to the PC's, Skapti, the tanarukk Rogue 2/Assassin 10 then took his turn, casting Rope Trick from a scroll, and started scurrying up into his new extra-dimensional perch.  He left his tanarukk mook "assistant" down in the upper room as a decoy.  The Geat Berserks double-moved forward and into the room, crossing its length and placing themselves right between the two tanarukk mages (and leaving a clear pathway for others to charge).

The DMPC Druid//Scout/Wizard and the Wizard//Rogue then flew and air walked up to the arrow slit windows of the second floor to see what was inside.  After pushing aside curtains on the windows, they found they could not see much (Skapti had cast Darkness on two pebbles, filling the room with a shadowy illumination, while he was under the affects of Ebon Eyes).  The Druid//Sorcerer, and his animal companion, moved around to the front of the building and in through the front doorway.  The Barb//Warlock DMPC also moved into the room.

The Barb//Beguiler charged the tanarukk wizard who was mirror imaged, and hit him for 12 damage.  The tanarukk wizards then both cast defensively, the previous round's fireballer cast mirror image, and the other Web, locking everyone down inside the room.  Skapti the Assassin finished his climb up into the Rope Trick, and pulled up the rope.  The Geat Berserks that were already next to the wizards started to assail them, whittling away at their images and a small chunk of hit points, while the other Geats who had not yet entered were stuck trying to force their way through the web.

Not being able to see what exactly was inside the upper room, the DMPC Druid//Scout/Wiz decided to cast Murderous Mist into the room.  He warned everyone to stay back and not enter, and the party soon heard the screaming curses of the tanarukk mook decoy that was still in the upper room.  He had taken the untyped steam damage, and failed his reflex save, and was now blinded.  I forget what the Wizard//Rogue did at this point; I think he just delayed, as he was planning to use his boots of short teleporting (I forget which item it is he has from the MIC) to enter the room.

Lots of strength checks ensued to try and move through the web spell, many of them failing.  The Barb//Beguiler continued to whittle away at mirror images and hit points, while someone laid a big sack of hurt upon the as-yet-undamaged tanarukk wizard, dealing 45 points of damage in their turn.  It must have been the Druid//Sorcerer, though I can't recall how.  Perhaps it was a crit by the Barb//Beguiler; he was still under the affects of freedom of movement, so could still move unhindered by the web.

One of the tanarukk lashed out with a Lightning Bolt, while the other made ineffective use of a flaming sphere, then tried to escape up the steps.  Unfortunately, he ran up into the Murderous Mist that was headed his way, and stopped on the stairway, cut off.  Skapti the Assassin sat up in his extra-dimensional perch, and started buffing himself to deal with the PC's; the first spell he cast was Sniper's Eye, which would allow him to make a Death Attack with a ranged weapon.

Lots of fighting the web by the Geat NPC's, and then the DMPC uses a Dimension Step spell to move him and the Rogue//Wizard into the upper room through the arrow slits, as the murderous mist had started moving away from their position, opening up part of the room.  The tanarukk mook was still in the cloud, and they could hear him howling in pain again as he took a second instance of steam damage.

The flaming sphere below was starting to burn out a web-free area down below, and several of the good guys were now able to move more freely and engage the two injured wizards.  The DMPC Barb//Warlock got close enough to strike with a Hideous Blow through his Longspear, killing one of them, and the other soon met his end as well.  Meanwhile, Skapti cast Find the Gap, allowing his first attack each round to be a touch attack.

The tanarukk wizards were mopped up, and the murderous mist moved away, providing a clear shot for the Druid//Scout/Wizard archer.  His +1 Giantbane longbow (tanarukk have Troll Blood, not Orc Blood, in my campaign), plus his favored enemy damage dealt a hefty 30 points of damage, and then the Wizard//Rogue finished it off.  The party started exploring the two floors, still being cut off from each other by the murderous mist.  Downstairs they found several dead Ethran and warriors laid out on palates, all burned (killed when Skapti and the wizards dimension doored in, and used Fiery Burst to kill everyone).  Upstairs they also found dead and burned bodies.  Over by a window they found several empty vials that previously held poison.  The dead blinded tanarukk upstairs had a masterwork bow, as well as a quiver full of arrows.  They spent three rounds searching the corpse and the room; Skapti spent three rounds studying the DMPC Druid//Scout.

The mist finally moved beyond the far wall, clearing and allowing those below to come upstairs.  Just as they did so, Skapti cast vital strike as a swift action (which causes the next attack to be a sneak attack, regardless of denied Dex, etc), and attacked the Druid//Scout, who was studying the body directly below the rope trick.  Death Attack DC 24, and the DMPC rolled a 2, for a grand total of 12 on his Fortitude save.  The party hears the DMPC grunt in pain and see him fall to the ground.  They are completely confused where the attack came from, and the Beguiler casts see invisibility; there is nothing invisible to see.  They inspect the body and see the arrow struck just above the collar bone, in a downward angle.  Skapti then drops out of the rope trick, and attacks.

Skapti activates his Belt of Battle, giving him an extra move action, which he uses to feint the Druid//Sorcerer, but fails to beat his sense motive check.  The party scrambles and starts attacking, landing a few hits on him (Skapti's combat expertise AC is 32), while the Barbarian//Beguiler activates the Daylight function on his Dastana, defeating the magical shadows in the room.  Skapti replies by activating his Belt of Battle once again, performing a Group Fake-Out skill trick, but not doing well on his bluff check.  He did succeed in sneak attacking someone, but rolled poorly on his damage.  More damage to Skapti by the party, taking him down to 10 hit points.  Skapti spent his swift action to activate his Vampiric Torc, then feinted the Druid//Sorcerer, sneak attacking him and healing half the damage he dealt, which got his hit points back up to 37.  However, by that point the end was in sight, and Skapti died before he was able to act again.

I was somewhat disappointed that he was unable to successfully feint the whole party, but those are the breaks.  The party killed him, and shortly thereafter, the Barb//Beguiler heard the mental call that the ritual's peak had arrived, and their skill would be needed at the Niflhenge.

We actually played through the first three waves the PC's faced that same night they fought Skapti, but I'll tell of them in the next post, along with all the other demons waves.