Adventures in Fallcrest - IC - Part 2 [4E]

[Toric]

Zyrr'delin - HP 17/47 (bloodied), AC 23, Fort 16, Dex 20, Will 18

After the Reaper falls, Zyrr looks up at his companion... and shakes his head in frustration. Plant truly does beat rock to reduce this proven warrior to snatching at imaginary butterflies. With a shrug he turns and runs between the raised platform and the now-unmanned catapault, skidding to a stop in front of the Speaker and its army of saplings. He picks up another dead vine and performs the same trick as before, slinging a tendril of shadowstuff at the tangled mass of the Speaker's branches. Upon contact, the shade quickly loses form and drips down to the shadow on the ground.... which immediately broils as shadow-forms rise. They take the shape of hands holding axes, and hack into the Speaker's roots before subsiding.

While the Speaker is distracted, Zyrr drops the useless vine and snaps the fingers of his shield-hand. Across the battlefield, the Watcher becomes illuminated with a purple aura.

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Moving to R7. Using both Assassin's Shroud and Executioner's Noose on the Arboreal Speaker, invoking the shrouds with this attack.
Attack - (1d20+10)[13] vs Fort. On a hit, the Speaker is pulled to O5 and slowed until the end of Zyrr's next turn.
Damage - (1d6+5)[11]
Guaranteed shrouds - (2d6)[5]
Shroud on hit - (1d6)[5]

Then using Darkfire on the Watcher.
Attack - (1d20+10)[28] vs Reflex. On a hit, until the end of Zyrr's next turn, all attacks against the Watcher have combat advantage, and the Watcher cannot benefit from invisibility or concealment.

[dariathalon]

Pavick - Gnome Wizard
HP 33/42, AC 18, Fort 16, Reflex 19, Will 20
(Invisible until end of current turn.)

Pavick glances back to his ball of flame rolling uselessly at the edge of the battle. With a quick nod, he decides it is time to bring it back into play. He sends the ball rolling up next to Eltain. "I hope he can withstand the heat of the flames, but it will hurt the tree people much worse than him," he thinks.

As the ball slides into place, tongues of flame leap from its surface into the branches of the arborean speaker, threatening to light him aflame.

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Move: send sphere to M5
Standard: Attack vs. Reflex - (1d20+10)[22] vs. speaker. On hit Fire Damage - (2d6+6)[11]. Any creature starting its action next to the flames takes Fire Damage - (1d4+6)[8] (Sorry Nai!)
Minor: Sustain sphere

[Mando Knight]

Aramil
HP: 26/64 Surges 9/10 (16)
AC 24, Fort 16, Ref 18, Will 18

Aramil slips further into the fray, stabbing his blade into the ground as he does so. Rather than fire, a wave of force blasts out against the small forest around him. Finally, as he pulls his sword from the ground, he regenerates the sigil about the Speaker's head, which had faded from the aftershock of Eltain's mighty strike. "Now, now, Eltain. You can't have them all to yourself."

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Move: Move to M7. Take the opportunity and perish, Oh ye of barklike skin.
Standard: Sword Burst against all three Saplings, the Speaker, and the Reaper. Attacks vs Reflex.
vs L7 - (1d20+10)[29]
vs M6 - (1d20+10)[27]
vs N8 - (1d20+10)[23]
vs Speaker - (1d20+10)[29]
vs Reaper - (1d20+10)[23]
Hit: Force Damage - (1d6+8)[9]
Minor: Aegis of Assault on the Speaker. Note the order: Move, attack, then mark. Speaker gets hurt for taking the OA, too.

[Hzurr]

DM Post

Shep is still unable to shake off the effect of the spores, and with his health dwindling, is soon in danger of wandering strawberry fields forever. Zyrr's shadow vine once again proves ineffectual, but some of the shadows still bite the Arborean. Across the field, a purple shimmer appears around the Watcher.

Eltain's cursed luck finally runs out, and with a flash, his blade digs deep into the Speaker, sending him to his knees, as divine power spreads out in a burst.

As Aramil moves, the two Saplings both attack him, but the Reaper, having just tasted the Paladin's wrath, wisely holds his step. One Sapling swings wide, but the second manages to make contact (5 damage) The shockwave from Aramil's attack sends the Saplings flying back in shards of splinters. The Speaker and Reaver are also slammed by the attack, but the Speaker manages to stay standing, although his appearance is more and more resembling a tree about to fall. The Saplings leave a cloud of the thick green spores as they die, irritating the skin of Eltain and Aramil. (burst 1 around each dead Sapling takes a -2 to defense).

Lucan's song takes a sour note, and the Watcher easily resists with a cackle.

With a nod from Pavick, the flaming sphere again travels across the battlefield, and with a flare causes the bark-like skin on the Arborean to burst into flames. The Speaker completely collapses, and begins doing an impressive impersonation of a campfire.

As the Speaker's body lays on the ground, a spark from the flaming sphere ignights it, and a sickly green smoke rises. Even as it does, the spores stop pouring out from his body, allowing the party to breath freely again.

One of the newly created Saplings immediately catches on fire, and collapses. The only other remaining Sapling makes one additional thorn attack against Lucan.

The Watcher, seeing his leader fall, backs up and his leaves begin shimmering. Even as he goes invisible, the purple light that Zyrr created continues to float around him. The purple-outlined tree pauses, curses as he realizes his situation, and in a last-ditch effort, charges the Paladin, but his attack cannot penetrate the defenses of the Half-eladrin.

The Remaining Reaper, still recovering from Lucan's song, scrambles back from the fire, but feels the divine pull of Eltain, and with a groan makes an attack against the Paladin. He fairs better than his remaining companions, and his scythe manages to swing in between a chink in Eltain's armor (14 damage)

MAP:

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Initiative:
Zyrr - Bloodied – T9
Shep - Bloodied – S10 (still taking ongoing damage)
Eltain – I4 (14 damage + 9 fire at the start of your turn)
Aramil - Bloodied – M7 (5 damage)
Lucan – J6
Pavick - I1

Arborean Sapling - F10
Arborean Watcher – K4 (56 damage - bloodied)
Arborean Reaper – K6 (61 damage - bloodied)


Rolls:

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Sapling attacks
N6 OA vs. Aramil's AC (1d20+11)[14]
M9 OA vs. Aramil's AC (1d20+11)[29]
F10 vs. Lucan's Ref (1d20+11)[14]
Damage: 5

Watcher Attack
vs. Eltain's AC (1d20+14)[19]
Damage: (2d6+5)[11]

Reaper's scythe attack
vs. Eltain's AC (1d20+14)[30]
Damage: (1d10+5)[14] + marked

[Nai_Calus]

Eltain - 24/53 - 22/16/17/17
Eltain turns his attention to the creature who wounded him.

"I see you finally learned some semblance of sense. Too bad it won't do you any good."

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Energizing Strike: (1d20+12)[30]
On hit: (1d8+5)[13] and Aramil gets 7 temp HP

[Toric]

Zyrr'delin - HP 17/47 (bloodied), AC 23, Fort 16, Dex 20, Will 18

The party hears a cackle of laughter when the Watcher realizes what has just happened to him. The drow gleefully runs up to the fountain and jumps onto the lip, balancing his way to the Watcher. "Sorry. I'm the only one allowed that trick." he quips before jumping off and plunging his blade into the tree man.

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Moving to L4 Acrobatics - (1d20+13)[29], Shrouding him, and using Shadow Storm while invoking the single shroud.

Attack - (1d20+15)[32]
Damage - (1d6+12)[17]
3 damage from the shroud. Total damage: 20

[Hzurr]

DM Post

OOC: Zyrr's attack will drop the Watcher - since he's first in init, I figured It'd make things easier on everyone else to already know that

[Mando Knight]

Aramil
HP: 21+7/64 Surges 9/10 (16)
AC 24, Fort 16, Ref 18, Will 18

Aramil walks around the edge of the dais and jumps down, swinging at the remaining Reaper with his flaming sword. "Someone needs to see to Shep. He's in pretty bad condition from those spores, and I can't do anything about it."

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Move: to J7, avoiding OAs.
Minor: Aegis of Assault on the Reaper. (Eltain's mark ran out anyway, and he didn't refresh it by any means)

Standard: Booming Blade on the same.
Attack vs AC - (1d20+15)[19] (including CA from flank)
Fire Damage - (1d8+10)[11], and the Reaper is pushed to L6. If forced movement or whatever causes the Reaper to start its turn adjacent to Aramil and it decides to run, it takes Thunder Fire Damage - (1d6+8)[9]

[Haberdashery]

The Shepherd - HP 0/56 (unconscious), AC 23, Fort 18, Ref 20, Will 18

Out of the corner of his eye, the Shepherd spots something very peculiar. There is a little white rabbit in a waistcoat hopping along hurriedly, muttering "Oh dear! Oh dear! I shall be too late!"

How very strange. The Shepherd can't help but find this absolutely fascinating; what on earth could he be late for? The Shepherd feels oddly compelled to follow the little creature, he stumbles after him through the underbrush. The thicket grows far too thick for him to see where he is going, and his footfalls are clumsy and shaky. Blinded by the overgrowth, he does not see what is before him; the Shepherd falls down the rabbit hole.

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Death Saving Throw: (1d20)[15]

[dariathalon]

Pavick - Gnome Wizard
HP 33/42, AC 18, Fort 16, Reflex 19, Will 20

Seeing that his allies have the remaining nearby enemies firmly under control, Pavick sends his bouncing ball of fire rolling and hopping across the battlefield after the remaining sapling.

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Move: Send orb to G10.
Standard: Attack vs. Reflex - (1d20+10)[30] on sapling doing Fire Damage - (2d6+6)[11]. Even if it misses he'll take Fire Damage - (1d4+6)[9] so either way he's going down.
Minor: Sustain flaming sphere

[Hzurr]

DM Post

As Zyrr does a flip inside the fountain, the Watcher turns to face this new threat, only to find the assassin's blade already through his midsection. The creature tries to give one last laugh, but collapses into a pile of twigs.

Shep finally succumbs to the poison, and collapses on the ground. Ironically, the force of his body collapsing dislodges the last of the spores from his throat.

Eltain, invigorated by his last attack, swings again, and the Reaper twitches, then falls like a chopped down tree.

Aramil loses the need to attack the Reaper, and instead can spend time admiring the lovely bas-relief images of pheasants on the dais.

With a casual flick, Pavick turns the last Sapling into kindle, and the silence of the forest returns, with the exception of the pile of brambles still burning.

[Nai_Calus]

Eltain runs over to Shep and tries to bring him back to consciousness.

Heal: (1d20+4)[21]

[Mando Knight]

Aramil investigates the gate. "This is definitely the Pheasant's Gate. Unfortunately, if the legends of its unreliability still hold true, we can't follow Rex this way yet."

Suddenly, he coughs, and he realizes that there's blood flowing down his arm. "Oh, bother. I seem to have gotten a bit injured."

[Hzurr]

DM Post

With a cough, Shep regains consciousness, and the strange dreams and visions he was having seem to fade away.

OOC: You're out of combat, so everyone can spend healing surges as needed

[dariathalon]

Pavick - Gnome Wizard

Pavick glances around the battlefield one more time, making sure all the enemies were dead. Then he allows the crackling ball of flame to burn itself out with one final woosh of flame.

He produces a handkerchief from his pocket and blows his nose to clear his nose of any spores remaining there. It is a noisy affair. "We should take a moment to rest," he says. "Shep was acting more Sheppy than usual for most of that fight before toppling over. Several of us are wounded, but I would think a few minutes to tend to those wounds will help a lot."

Pavick moves up the the dais and examines everything there very carefully, before sitting down to have a good think about it all. He takes the classic "Thinker"'s position sitting on the top step and resting his chin on his hand.

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Now that he's had a closer examination, here are a few rolls that might reveal something. I figure it couldn't hurt to attempt anyway.
Arcana - (1d20+16)[36]
History - (1d20+12)[17]
Nature - (1d20+10)[20]
And spend a healing surge to get back up to full.

[DSCrankshaw]

Lucan - Half-elf bard

Lucan uses his remaining majestic word on the most injured member of their party (probably Shep). He then takes a few moments to care for himself.

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Shep (unless someone else heals him first) gets surge + (1d6+4)[5] hp

Everyone gets an extra 4 hp per surge for song of rest

Spend one healing surge to bring himself to 49/51 hp

[Nai_Calus]

Eltain, having tended to Shep, examines the dais and gate as well, though looking for different things.

Religion: (1d20+9)[20]
Perception: (1d20+4)[9]

[Hzurr]

DM Post

As Pavick checks the gate, from all appearances it is now completely inert, and there is no clear way to re-activate it. The damage done during the war is evident, and you can see how this once reliable gate has become so damage.

However, Pavick catches something out of the corner of his eye. It's becoming more and more evident that Oedipus used this gate, most likely with the power of the Flame of Fortune. However, a small trace of the power still resides in the air, and Pavick can see the remnant of the arcane flows used to re-activate it.

Had you not arrived so soon after Oedipus used the gate, or had Pavick's magical skill not been so precise, you doubt if you would have noticed it at all. It is possible that you may be able to use the remaining energy and re-open the gate, but it could be difficult, unpredictable, and possibly verydangerous. The other option would be to try and find a different gate into the feywild, then journey back here and track Oedipus.

[Toric]

"Just what I remember seeing." Zyrr remarks cheerfully as he gives the Watcher a victory kick. "Reckless, impulsive, with priority on keeping people on their feet insofar as they can help with the fighting. I've seen the first two many, many times but the latter pulls it all together so nicely." He walks across the firewood left by their opposition and offers the Shepherd a smile and an arm to take. "Welcome back. Wherever you were, it looked like fun."

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Zyrr will use two healing surges. 11+4=15. 15X2=30, which brings him up to full.

[DSCrankshaw]

Lucan - Half-elf bard

Lucan's own knowledge of arcane is half instinct and half art, so he doubts he can add much to what Pavick's discovered. What he can do is investigate the area around the gate, looking for tracks and other leavings which might indicate what sort of ritual Oedipus performed, and thus give them insight into how to use the energy.

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Perception - (1d20+13)[21]

[Hzurr]

DM Post

Lucan finds a spot on the dais where the grass looks a bit more worn down, and there are scorch marks on the grass and rocks that don't appear to have been from any of the fire damage that you all did.

[DSCrankshaw]

Lucan - Half-elf bard

Lucan points out the area to the others.

[Haberdashery]

"I've come back from a land where twas brillig, and the slithy toves did gyre and gimble in the wabe: all mimsy were the borogoves, and the mome raths outgrabe." The Shepherd replies without hesitation, as if he firmly believes in the nonsense that is coming from his mouth. He nods astutely.

"Things may not be what we perceive they are. I must think carefully on this."

[dariathalon]

Pavick - Gnome Wizard

Pavick stands up bolt straight. "It might still be possible. If I do a little... then I...!" he is talking more to himself than any of the others. The very exciteable gnome paces back and forth on the dais muttering to himself.

Finally, he turns to the others. "I think I might be able to reopen it. It'll be very risky and I can't be at all certain of the consequences, but the magic flow is still here from Oedipus's use of the gate. Still I can't help but think this will give us a better chance of catching up to him than seeking out some other gate. What do you think? Should I give it a try?"

[Nai_Calus]

Eltain grimaces. "I don't know that it's such a good idea when we're as beaten up as we are... But I don't really see that we have much of a choice. I don't know of any passages to the Feywild in this area." He kneels. "Corellon, watch over us and guide us. Shield us from harm and help us stop this madman before he does more damage."

[Hzurr]

DM Post

OOC:
In order to try and activate the portal, you'll need 3 arcana checks. My recommendation is to choose one person to make the checks, and have everyone else try to aid. Characters not trained in arcana can try to make history, perception, or endurance checks to aid instead (although these will only give a +1 to aid instead of the +2). Everyone is allowed to aid, but only 1 secondary check per person per arcana check. Failure, depending on the severity, could result in the following:

- the portal works, but your arrival location is offset
- the portal works, but your arrival time is offset
- the portal works, but your bodies are drained (loss of surges/powers)
- the portal doesn't work
- the portal does work, but doesn't take you to the feywild
- the portal doesn't work, and you are drained of surges/HP/powers
- The portal is destroyed
- drymouth
- Death.

[Toric]

"I agree with the boy. It would be different if we knew of another gate, but as it stands we could spend months searching for a way in." Zyrr paces beside the arch, looking it up and down, trying his best to remember anything he'd read in his youth about elven rituals Unfortunately, the drow have never shown much interest in rituals more complicated than lighting a campfire that don't require skulls or blood sacrifices.

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Aiding Pavick (or whoever performs the primary roll): History - (1d20+3)[15]

[DSCrankshaw]

Lucan - Half-elf bard

Self-taught though he is, Lucan knows enough magic to help. Indeed, he hears the melody of the magic particularly clearly in this place right now.

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Aid another (Pavick, I assume)
Arcana - (1d20+7)[24]

[Nai_Calus]

Eltain attempts to help, but is apparently still rattled from the events of previous days, and despite his training is unable to feel out anything of use in the area.

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Aiding with arcana: (1d20+13)[14]

[DSCrankshaw]

Lucan - Half-elf bard

Lucan helps again, and then he helps some more. He's a helper.

He is, however, beginning to run out of steam, and his assistance is less than helpful the third time.

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Two more aid anothers (again with arcana):
Arcana - (1d20+7)[27]
Arcana - (1d20+7)[11]