Exile: World as Dungeon [3.5]

[Zireael]

That sorcerer... _._

[Telok]

Gotta say, I've been enjoying your campaign log, and I think you've made quite an interesting story/setting, but your players... I get the feeling they are either not interested in paying attention to the game and just want it as background to social activity, or they don't understand their actions have consequences. Especially the sorcerer. I am amazed he has stayed alive so long. Are they always like this?

Thanks. Really it's only the sorcerer who's like that. He's a good chap but he gets really bored outside of combat and has had issues transitioning from EQ/WoW to tabletop roleplaying. And the sorcerer is his longest surviving character ever so far. You can generally depend on him to play a blaster sorcerer or a ninja, usually a female drow, and you can lead him around by the nose by dangling initative boosting magic items is front of him.

The rest of them, encouraged by the sorcerer's player, just have issues with preparing for... well, anything. The intelligent and prepared ones tend to take a back seat role in directing the party so the ADD types will bounce the party from thread to thread leaving knots, tangles, and unfinished business behind them. In a semi-sandbox setting, which this is, it leads to complications and more fights. But really that's OK because the fights keep the sorcerer happy and the complications keep things interesting for everyone else.

[Telok]

Well the good news is that my players aren't total nitwit murder hobos.

They got to Cotra and accepted the mayor's rebukes surprisingly well and went off to Formello like good little adventurers. Granted they wanted to go with a military caravan (part way, just to Dunvo) which meant that it took them longer, I suppose that the Nephil raids and ambushes were getting to them.

Up in the Formello cave they came within a hair's breadth of slaughtering an entire extended family. Formello is the site of a developing social conflict. Wealthy landowners have everything outside the town and run plantation style farming with indebited tenant farmers policed by "farmhands" who are really just thugs. When hassled by four level 3 toughs my players will gleefully start plotting the extermination of entire families based only on a thug's bragging. Eventually cooler heads prevailed, the lady playing the ranger is a wonderful steadying influence on these guys.

In Formello proper they discovered that the town is having troubles, the mayor can't access the treasury, guards are deserting because they haven't been paid, etc. etc. etc. They agreed to help the mayor get the mayoral necklace back and were promised the royal token and some bars of mixed mithril and adamantite from the treasury. Some people still have trouble listening when NPCs speak and the old priestess, Mother Claudette, berated them for being deaf. Still I'm pretty sure that at least two people caught the bit about her being willing to raise some of them from the dead.

The Nephil castle is about 45 miles cross-country (ok, through tunnels without roads or trails) from Formello. They covered the first thirty miles in a day, with the fire-hippogriff "scouting" above them. Needless to say they encountered nothing because all the gnolls saw them coming from miles away. Now I've previously stressed that the major tribe of gnolls (the Nephil) are bloodthirsty, barbaric, united, and organized. Now over a week ago about 100 miles south of the castle a group of adventurers, exactly matching the PCs description, beat four raiding parties (the archer gnolls have hide and move silently as trained skills, there were survivors from every fight). So the gnolls know to watch out for a party with a flaming hipogriff flying around and to not attack it with less than overwhelming force. The warlock got a smart idea and went scouting invisibily just before the party rounded the last bend to the bridge (map again, Formello is 54 and the Nephil castle is 55) only to find about eighty gnolls with a heavy emphasis on shamen and archers guarding it. Pretty much the bridge guards, three scouting encounters, and some nearby reinforcements. Thankfully the party decided to back off, other wise that would have been a pain of a combat to run. They backtracked a couple hours to the next tunnel that meet the river (oh look, the sorcerer failed a Con check and is fatigued with six subdual damage), spent twenty minutes arguing about hiding the sorcerer's familiar before settling on Darkness and Ebon Eyes as a temporary fix. Then they swam/floated across the wide, slow river and made an important spot check. The ranger saw a concealed campfire from the squad guarding the back door. One short fight later they were discussing food philosophy with a gnoll prisoner (dead is meat, meat is food, dead is food) and learned about the back door.

We left off at a break in combat. They got in (and left the hippogriff outside) and promptly started a two way fight that the beguiler managed with the most effective and helpful use of the open/close cantrip I've ever seen. So it's September 15th or 16th and the party is in an extended fight with a castle full of gnolls. While it's mostly low threat mooks there are a few surprises around and they'll eventually face Anastasia (priestess of Makhleb with two staching smite abilities and a pet demon) and the gnoll chiefs.

[Telok]

Sorry for the delay, after the latest session my cold came back and laid me flat for a couple days.

No real big developments to report. They pretty much just ground through the first floor of the castle in a counter clockwise direction. The swordsage flind twins battered themsleves against the lockdown fighter. The main floor chieftain had to solo a Voor while taking arrows from the ranger and never even got into melee with the PCs. The sorcerer was pasted with arrows and almost killed once. Fairly normal stuff.

A shaman and two warriors stabilized in the negatives and will survive if left alone. Three badly hurt mooks manages to hide in a storeroom on the west side with 17+ rolls to beat spot checks with. One last mook was let go "to pull more" by the sorcerer, he went upstairs and so the top floor is alerted and preparing to assault downstairs. Of course our heroes don't know that, they just watched him run off around a corner.

The beguiler is already downstairs using Disguise Self and Glibness to impersonate an elderly gnoll shaman. Following the sorcerer's directions to get more enemies he has alerted the downstairs to the presence of adventurers. So they're going to get the drake (re-skinned flightless dragonne) and then advance up the stairs.

The guys have about two minutes before the entire remainder of the castle comes at them from two directions.

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Upstairs: Anastasia, a chieftain, six archers, four warriors, an ogre, and five mooks will come down. Three shaman and two mooks will remain in the upstairs temple. Downstairs: four warriors, two archers, four mooks, and two more shaman following a drgaonne.

[Zireael]

Uh oh. This won't be nice...

[Telok]

I blame myself for not keeping better notes. I low-balled the the dragonne fight by only using two each of warriors and archers, then I low-balled the Anastasia party by only using her, the chieftain, and two each of archers, warriors, and mooks. Plus an ogre with a single level of warrior, but he smooshed too fast to do anything. I made up for it later by upping the eight ghouls in the "Hall of the Honored Dead" to twelve ghasts. But let's be real, two HD ghouls versus 8th level PCs wasn't a fight anyways. The ghast fight ended up being almost more comedy than threat anyways.

So four gnolls and the Vow of Nonviolence beguiler disguised as an elderly gnoll shaman followed the dragonne upstairs. It got a couple of good bites in before dying and becoming a make shift barricade at the top of the stairs. The lockdown fighter with mage slayer feats jumped and tumbled halfway down the stairs into the gnolls and started to target the "shaman." By the time the real gnolls were dead and illusions were sorted out the mooks from downstais had gone up the back stairs and brought Anastasia's group down. The ogre they had in front has a level of warrior just for armor proficency and to justify his large iron two handed sword. He got squicked before getting to attack from PC action advantage. Anastasia summoned her demon (babau) and Shattered the fighter's duom before needing to retreat. She wasn't a high AC/HP cleric type and once the fighter got over to her and tripped her she had to fall back to stacking two smite abilities and a magic dagger. But even prone and down to 10 hp she was swinging +14 to hit and 1d4+5d6+8 damage, enough to slag off 2/3rds of the fighters hit points in two hits. The chieftain wasn't as effective as he could have been because I didn't roll over a 9 for most of his attacks, excapt for one critical hit AoO for 24 damage. The demon was downed by a ranger with favored enemy: demon, plus a summoned celestial buffalo smite evil, and the NPC cleric casting True Strike with a Holy Demon Bane heavy crossbow bolt. I don't think it hit anything at all, still couldn't roll over a 9.

Lets see, the warlock was down to five hit points from archers during that fight. The curse on the ranger's sword finally got to activate. Then after the fight the elf auto-search finally (after four rolls) noticed a secret door to a secret gnolls armory. Nothing big in there except for 20 silver arrows and the Dragon Scale Shield (heavy dragon hide shield, resist fire 20 and DR 2/dragon bane). Apparently nobody thinks shields are valuable so they just tossed it to the NPC cleric after noticing that it was magical. After the fun in the Hall of Honored Dead he isn't going to give it up. They spent fifteen minutes after the fighting stopped to check every room on the ground level with Detect Magic. Missing four 500gp furs covering a throne. Another ten minutes was lost arguing over the warlock's scroll of Locate Object, and not using it. Finally they went down to the basement.

Without the dragonne and gnolls the basement isn't interesting except for the Hall of Honored Dead. That's a brick wall with a handleless bronze door inset into it and bearing a plaque that says "Hall of Honored Dead. Remember to bring sacrifices." The door and wall are enchanted, but nobody checked, they were all busy semi-panicking over the plaque. After another ten minutes of argument, fruitless search rolls and strength checks, ineffective banging on the door with weapons (hardness 20, 240 hp, 38 str DC), before the sorcerer used the Open cantrip. The fighter and sorcerer walked in and halfway across the room before the ghasts burst from the wall crypts and swarmed them. It could have ended badly but the ranger drew two cards from her Nemelex deck, Flame and Herd. A 10d6 Fireball roasted the entire party and all but three of the ghasts, I think that only the beguiler and warlock made their saves but I only rolled 26 damage. Still several people ended up under half hit points and the NPC cleric has a deathgrip on that shield now. Now mind that the ghasts only have 29 hit points. The next round the Herd card called up three tigers for fifteen rounds. Because the ranger is a nature oriented class the Herd card (for her) does not have the 50% chance of being an uncontrolled hostile summons that other summoning cards have (it's Herd=animals, Pentagram=demons, Circle=elementals, Grave=undead, 50% hostile unless the card user is "similar" eg a naturalist, diabolist, elementalist, or necromancer). Any way, the cats killed the last of the ghasts.

They got a suit of magic bronze plate armor, 600 silver, and actually debated taking the 20 pound ceremonial vase with depictions of gnoll orgies and human sacrifices on it. Then they tried to "rest for eight hours in the dragonne lair because it's defensible." The NPC cleric (cloistered variant) has the Fate, Knowledge, and Oracle domains, so his second level domain spell is always Augury and he can't convert domain spells to healing. When people started talking about "rest" he remembed that the other half ot the gnoll tribe is camped a few hundred yards outside the castle gate and checked if this was a good idea. Then he informed the party that if they were going to rest here than he was going to leave them here and start walking back to Formello, alone. If any of them survived sleeping in the basement of a hostile gnoll castle he'd see them in Formello. His third level domain spell is Divination (via the Oracle domain) and people were discussing having him cast that, but we had to break off for the night.

So the party has been in the castle for about 45 minutes... Yes I'm counting, why do you ask? Hehehehehee. I'm just going to have to see what they do next week. The only real opposition left is two mooks and three shaman in the upper temple, and a vrock if they mess with the altar up there. Loot is various non-magic valuable goods a Cobra Amulet, Formello mayor's necklace, and Anastasia's scrolls and demonology books. Oh, and that armor is masterwork Called bronze +1 full plate of Heavy Fortification that I'm not sure any of them will want to ever use.

[Telok]

I haven't mentioned the psychic warrior is the last few weeks because the player flew down to the lower 48s and helped a friend, who used to be a member of our gaming group, move back up by driving the Alcan (not something you want to do solo in winter). They got back last week and now I'm up to seven players and a NPC cleric. He's doing a fighter/psychic warrior-> pyrokineticist build using Greater Psionic Shot to up his damage. I ought to review his character sheet to see what else he can do so I can plan for stuff and not inadvertently hose him, but a decade of gaming with him makes me sure that his character is solid and legal.

We figured that the psi-war had met an old friend (the pyro) in Formello and that they had gotten schnockered and slept off the hangovers when everyone else left to attack the Nephil castle. They found the backdoor to the castle by spotting the flaming hipogriff familiar from a few miles away. So those two came in at the same time that the main party came up from the basement. Then the gnollish search and rescue team found them all and attacked. Once that was over the party trooped upstairs. They found the chieftain's rooms, the room the ogre warrior lived in, some Nephar slaves (the Nephar are a different, less violent, and non-wicked demon-god worshipping tribe of gnolls), Anastasia's room, and the room above the front entrance to the castle. Nothing in those rooms detected of magic, so they threw some pocket change to the slaves and told them to get lost. The ranger did swipe Anastasia's nice fur blanket as a cloak for the ogre pack mule and the beguiler found the hidden door behind Anastasia's solid wood desk (a lead sheet was attached to the back of the desk). They gave all the scrolls to the NPC cleric despite haveing two people fully capable of UMDing them.

Then they entered the trophy room. I described it, a big room with stuffed heads and assorted weapons and armor on the walls. There's the heads of a hydra (8), a dragon head, a demon head, a purple worm stinger, a couple of human and slitherazi heads. Amongst the weapons was also a gold starburst medallion on a brass chain with a raised F on it. The beguiler snagged that last one right off, then the warlock detected for magic in the room. Finding nothing magical except for themselves, they left.

What did they miss? A bag of gems under the ogre's bed (1000 gp), hacksilver jewelry in a cabinet in the cheif's room (1500 gp), and the fine fur blankets from that same room (750 gp, same as the one in Anastasia's room). The room above the front gate has four big copper pots with lids and about 20 gallons of alchemical acid in each pot. They also didn't explore about one third of the level, paticularly the temple.

You see, in the game that I've adapted into this setting there were three gold necklaces in this castle. One fake (plated bronze), one of real gold, and the mayor's necklace. Furthermore you couldn't tell the difference untill you got back to town and ID'ed them at the sage. For my game there's only one fake necklace (but it is real gold). I told them that the necklace they are looking for is a starburst medallion on a gold chain. It has sixteen equally spaced rays and a raised F. It's also magical (+2 diplomacy, sense motive, bluff, wisdom, will saves, and continuous counterspell: detect thoughts). The one they got is on a brass chain and has fourteen rays, seven on the left side, one on the median, and six on the right side. It does have the F, but isn't magical.

So they left the castle, crossed the river, and hid themselves (good roll by the ranger, lousy roll from gnoll scouts) to rest for a while. Except for the sorcerer, he used his last two spells for Resist Fire and flew the fifty miles to Formello. In town the mayor simply held the necklace up to the local priestess who cast Detect Magic. "Go back and try again." And there was much moaning and whining.

The sorcerer took a short nap, recharged his spells, and flew back. The party saw the flying bonfire from about six miles away (hint hint guys, big hint!) and sent up a dancing lights spell that the familiar saw. You know the tier system? This is a low T3 sorcerer. If orbs of acid and summoned critters can't solve a problem then he's useless. So they hiked a couple of miles back to the river and crossed it again. They didn't bother to try and hide the familiar this time.

Back inside they found some mooks on guard and then had to fight everyone on the main floor. There were a couple of escapees, one went upstairs and the other fell opening the front door and trying to escape that way. Since it's been about 12 hours since they left (the mage-slayer/tripper had some ability damage the cleric needed to cure and a Make Whole spell for his duom) the gnolls have some new leadership and have cleaned out the corpses. There were also about four gnolls who had escaped and hidden themselves and another six or seven who had stabilized in the negative HPs and were rescued. So the gnolls are on the alert for adventurers, plus the fact that the flaming familiar was seen crossing the river again by the guards on the bridge some five miles away.

We left off there. The party is going to jam the front door to prevent the rest of the tribe from mobilizing and flooding the fort. Unfortunately the light from the front door was seen (it's in heavy use while the tribe sorts out who get to sleep in the castle and who has to live in a tent) and there's a task force moving to set up outside the backdoor. In five minutes there are going to be gnolls outside the front door, in ten minutes they will have stonecutting chisels opening a couple of arrow slits into doors, in fifteen minutes there's going to be twenty gnolls outside the backdoor, in thirty minutes there will be thirty gnolls set up in ambush outside the backdoor. It is September the 18th.

[Zireael]

Uh oh, again.

[Telok]

I haven't updated this in three weeks and my browser crashed after typing this the first time. Grr, arrgh.

Week 1: It was my wife's birthday so I couldn't game. The guys played a one shot at 10th level. The next week I was welcomed with, "I died three times!" "I rolled a one on my Fort save and died!" "I didn't die!" "You were a coward and ran away on the second round!" "That green slaad raped us!" I did not ask for details.

Week 2: Back at the Nephil Fortress everyone except the beguiler went upstairs. The beguiler played with a gnoll patrol using low level illusions untill reinforcements came to open up some of the arrow slits into doorways. Then he went upstairs too. There were only two encounters upstairs, the room above the gate (barrels of acid) and the temple. The heroes made enough noise that they had to bash down the doors both times. A tipped over barrel of acid did decent damage but didn't get to dissolve any magic boots. The three shamen in the temple fell to Mass Whelm and Confusion (casters can dominate a fight if they want to blow out spell slots or the enemies are weak on a targeted save). The Vrock that showed up when the sorcerer fooled with the evil altar turned out to be a real threat though. With nothing but a single Mirror Image and it's melee attacks it did serious damage and took five rounds to take down. I totally forgot the spore's ongoing effect too, another 10d4 missed out on for two characters.

Again the players ignored any loot except the magic stuff. Just another Cobra Amulet and an Aquatic Charge Breaking Vermin Bane Large Scourge (+3 weapon, wrong size for PCs) in addition to the real Formello necklace. Then they buggered off.

So I didn't get to ambush them with a bunch of gnolls packing alchemical frost grenades. Anyways they made it back to Formello a couple days later. Got rewarded with the royal token so they can get into the castle and see the king, four 30 pound ingots of mixed adamantium and mithril, and a shrine to Jiyva. The lockdown mage-slayer fighter is worshipping Jiyva and they actually managed to bring back a stone chest (ogre packmule FTW!) containing an ice slime (grey ooze changed from acid to cold) and get it installed and consecrated in the Formello temple. Then the fighter sacrificed the scourge to his god. And yes this is how he gets piety points. Now the ingots are worth 30,000 gp in theory. In practice there isn't an alloy of mithril and adamantium so these are pretty useless unless separated and if the smith flubs that roll then all you end up with is worthless slag. There was inconclusive discusion about this.

In the end they stayed in town a couple days resting and (divine version) Identifying loot. The party decided to head west through the tunnels to the river on the far side of spider territory (PC map) and boat down to near Almaria and go to the Castle. They made the understandable mistake of thinking that they could get there via the Nephil lands because the words on the map obscure tha fact that Nephil lands don't connect to the arachnid area (DM map). Plus the warlock (taking the pack-ogre loot bag, NPC cleric, and the ranger who couldn't make it to game, plus one of the four reward ingots) decided to walk to Almaria.

"Are you sure?"
"Yes."
"Are you really sure?"
"Yes."
"You're going to be bored. Are you still sure?"
"Yes."
"Really?"
"YES!"
"Ok, your choice."

Week 3 (last week): The warlock was bored, it's a two week trip through pretty civilized territory. The ranger's player is working lots of overtime ar her job and couldn't make it again. But everyone else had fun.

Before they left (actually last week but I forgot to mention it) a Sending spell contacted the Psy-war and sorcerer from Solberg. It told them that he had located the blade of Demonslayer and that they should contact him to get a map. The Sending spell allows a response and this is what Solberg got; Psy-war "Ummm......", sorcerer "Dude, don't bother. I dropped the hilt in lava when the demons were chasing me." This made me have to stat up Solberg so I could see what he could summon/bind. Then our heroes left blindly trusting the government map of hostile semi-explored Nephil territory.

Invisibility (for the sorcerer's familiar), illusions, and Glibness got them across the bridge into gnoll lands and then back out again when the found out that it didn't connect. They then ended up in Fort Draco where Boutell is. Boutell is important because he's A) the only master smith in Exile, B) looking to get his anvil enchanted by an 11th+ level caster, C) in one of two places in Exile that can work steel, mithril, and adamantine, and D) once his anvil is enchanted he can make and repair magic weapons and armor. Anyway he smelted the mithril from the adamantium easily for a bargin price (he wants them to find him wizard to do the enchanting) and now the mage slayer has an adamantine duom with a mithril haft while the beguiler has an adamantine mace.

They crossed into spider territory. First up was dead and burned huge spiders. They didn't examine the bodies closely so they missed some clues. But they made up for it by throwing out an illusion of a chitrach ahead of them to "spring 'Int -' traps." What it got them was an escort of Giant Intelligent Friendly Talking Spiders (in chibi voices "You're cute!" "My name is Spider!" "Tee hee hee!" "Will you have my babies?"). After some consideration that it might almost be better if they were hostile and a mention of magic loot reward the party decided to go rescue some GIFTS's from the Areana.

I use standard Areana modified as follows:
Drop the shapechanging stuff as there's already enough to do.
Add three sorcerer levels to get normal Areana because 3HD isn't a threat to this party any more.
Add three more sorcerer levels to get Elder Areana, they use Phantasmal Killer to give the illusion of being a threat.
Choose Martial Study: Sudden Leap for all of them, because it's cool and useful.
Replace "sorcerer" with "swordsage," drop the poison, and up the physical stats to get a GIFT. This includes the innate spellcasting becoming innate martial maneuvering. Oh, and fix the skill set from caster to skirmisher.
Blammo! Easy spider enemies and allies that the players can respect.

And respect they do. Only one GIFTS will accompany them into Areana territory as a guide, that's to make things easy on me. The first encounter was a simple "from the ceiling" ambush by four large spiders, three areana, and one areana elder. The webs and Ray of Exhaustion combo really harshes on PCs without totally screwing them over and makes them hittable by stuff with +7ish attack bonuses. I dislike having to use lots of 25 Str and/or Wraithstrike enemies just to be able to hit and threaten a character. Plus the debuffing and Mirror Image, Blur, Displacement makes AC 14 to 18 enemies not a pathetic joke. Any way, the heroes wasted the encounter pretty well. Once the areana try to run the Sudden Leap and base 50 move works well but isn't an auto escape. And the mage slayer went down to Phantasmal Killer but piety brought him back, he rolled really really badly to die and only lost as much piety as he had gained for his actions in Formello.

The second fight was at the entrance to the areana lair. The spiders were waiting for them (flying bonfire beacon familiar) and the ambush soaked off a fair bit of resources, lots of spells spent. One Areana escaped into the lair so they waited ten minutes for the Ray of Exhaustion effects to wear off, then went in. If they had gone east (the lair is a big donut cave, mostly) there were two encounters with good loot before the back end of the cave with the imprisoned GIFTS. They went west, which is where I took the reinforcements for the front door ambush from, and there's really nothing in this half of the torus untill the prison bit. But they didn't get that far.

See there are these concealed 3 1/2' diameter tunnels at ceiling height and lined with webs, they lead to a central chamber with three Elder Areana and three Imps. The imps act as messengers and scouts while the elders never leave the chamber because they are the sort of "breeding core" of the colony. Plus the colony webby spellbook is um... web drawn? Drawn with webs? On the ceiling of this central chamber. Someone noticed one of the little tunnels and they sent the sorcerer in because he's the only one who wouldn't be squeezing in there. He encountered an imp and ran away. So the pyrokineticist went in and started fighting, and eventually everyone went in (sorcerer last). Surprisingly the imps did real damage, because of failed saves the pyro lost 7 points of Dex to poison. Then when everyone came out into the central chamber the Elder Areana exhausted and webbed him, the psy-war, and the mage slayer. The allied GIFTS webbed two of the Elder Areana and missed with all his maneuver attacks while the beguiler ran himself almost out of spells. The sorcerer wandered off to explore another tunnel towards the west side.

We left off there. People were destroying the web spellbook on the ceiling. The Elder that went down to a Whelm spell was killed, but the one that stabilized at -6 hp is still alive and unexamined. The mage slayer lockdown fighter is using his adamantine duom to cut blocks out of the wall and stop up the entrances so they can rest "safely." All four entrances and the only ways in or out of this chamber. In a dungeon with smart web slingers. I need to buff up on the suffocation rules, dungeoneering and survival skills, and effects of oxygen starvation.

Plus I need to stat a really really big trapdoor spider. They were warned about not going down that passageway (shortest path between Areana and GIFTS lairs) but... you know... players.

Ooh, and a song. Solberg is going to send a Deva to deliver a singing telegram to the party. The party lost part of the most powerful anti-demon weapon in six planes and they lost it to demons. The Deva is almost more upset than Solberg is. It's not going to be a very nice telegram.

[The Glyphstone]

G.I.F.T.S.! Woohoo!

And really...the sorcerer lets a mook go 'to pull more mobs'? Does he also wait until the second turn of combat to attack so he won't get aggro, and yell 'HEAL PLZ' when he's injured?

[Telok]

I've been putting off posting this update. You'll see why.

I've statted up Solberg, his familiar, and his tower. Solberg (like many other high level NPC casters) uses Limited Wish to both extend his life and emulate Psychic Reformation when he needs a different skill/spell/feat set.

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Solberg, L15 human sorcerer [spec necromancy, ban illusion & fire]. s10 d14 c14 i16 w14 c20, hp90, bab+7, F7 R7 W11, Cast 0:3, 1:5, 2:6, 3:7, 4:7, 5:6, 6:6, 7:4. Know 0:9, 1:5, 2:5, 3:4, 4:4, 5:4, 6:3, 7:2.
Spells

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Always known: 7:Limited wish, one necromancy, 6:Imbue Familiar with Spell Ability, one necromancy, 5:Greater Blink, Private Sanctum, one necromancy, 4:Resilient Sphere, Detect Scrying, one necromancy, 3:Dispel Magic, Gaseous Form, Vampritic Touch, 2:Familiar Pocket, Blind-sight, False Life, Blindness, 1:Know Protections, Grease, Shield. Often Known: 7:Waves of Exhaustion, Sword of Darkness, Summon Undead XII, 6: Undeath to Death, Eyebite, Prismatic Eye, Greater Dispel, Planar Binding, 5:Fleshshiver, Cyclonic Blast, Sending, Contact Other Plane, Freezing Fog, 4:Wrack, Enervation, Scrying, 3:Enhance Familiar, Arcane Sight, Nondetection, 2:Hideous Laughter, See Invisible, Glitterdust, 1:Truestrike, Empathy, Obscuring Mist, Protection from Evil.

Feats: Improved Toughness, Improved Familiar(B), Stitched Flesh Familiar, Spell-Linked Familiar, Bonded Familiar. Swap Feats:Shield Proficiency, Combat Casting, Shielded Casting, *or* any three crafting or metamagic feats.
Skills: Concentration 20, one Craft 20, Arcana 21, Spellcraft 21, Planes 12, Religion, 12, Dungeoneering 12, Sense Motive 11.

Familiar

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Evolved Necropolitan Spellwarped Cat. 45hp, s9 d17 c- i13 w12 c7, ac26, F5 R8 W10, bab+7 grap-2, SR26, improved evasion, share spells, deliver touch spell, move 30, lowlight, scent, fast healing 3, weapon finesse, improved turn resistance (=21hd), if SR negates a spell then 5x SL temp hp or x2 move or resist energy 10, 1/day cloudkill CL15 DC 13, 1/day transfer killing hit damage if in 30' of Solberg. Skills: Balance 11, Climb 9, Hide 17, Jump 13, Listen 6, Sneak 9, Spot 6. Spells: [CL 7] 3 cantrips, Shield, Grease, False Life, [CL 15] Feeblemind, Resilient Sphere, Enhance Familiar, False life, Greater Mage Armor.

Tower

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40' diameter, 80' high, flat top. One door (wooden hardness 5, 20 hp, break dc 35, wizard lock dispel check 26), no windows. Enchanted hewn stone basalt walls 3' thick (hardness 16, 1080 hp, climb dc 25, break dc 70, saves +9).

Forbiddance inside and within 10' of the walls (but on 2' above the top), so no teleportation, plane shifting, or summoning. Minor Creation a 25" high platform on the roof for calling spells.

Permanent False Vision shows the tower abandoned and empty to all scrying attempts. In the vision there are stairs in the tower.

The first floor is druid Hallowed. Giving Freedom of Movement to anyone who worships Sif Muna on that level and Magic Circle vs Dark alignment (non-Light summoned creatures cannot enter [SR 28+ ignores], everyone is immune to mental control, and everyone has +2 AC and saves vs Dark aligned attacks and spells.

Each floor has an Illusionary Wall spell that seems to be a staircase going to the other floors.

First floor: Wood paneled walls and ceilings, a couple of wooden closets with travel clothes, a large table in the middle of the room with six chairs, a decent couch upholstered in green lizard leather against one wall, and a Continual Flame lamp hanging on a chain from the center of the ceiling. The ceiling is a permanent Minor Creation wood panel 1/2" thick. On the stone ceiling (same as the tower walls) are inscribed Symbol of Weakness (Necro, save no, SR yes, 3d6 Str dmg), Symbol of Sleep (Ench, compulsion, mind affecting, Wneg20, SR yes, <10HD sleep for 3d6*10 min), Symbol of Pain (Necro, dark, Fneg20, SR yes, -4 attacks skills ability checks for 1 hour), Symbol of Persuasion (Ench, charm, mind affecting, Wneg21, SR yes, charmed for 15 hours), Symbol of Fear (Necro, fear, mind affecting, Wneg21, SR yes, up to 150hp of targets panicked for 15 rounds). There is a Glyph of Warding on the Continual Flame lamp hanging from the ceiling, it will cast Dispel Magic on the false ceiling if there is an attack made within 30 feet by anyone other than Solberg or his familiar.

Second floor: A nice big four poster bed, a kitchenette, a big easy-chair, a table piled with books, and the same lighting fixture as the first floor. The Symbols are on the walls here and the dispelling Glyph is on the bed posts, the trigger remains the same.

Third floor: Bookshelves line the walls and five tables with books and magical paraphernalia on them clutter the room. The Symbols of Weakness, Sleep, and Pain are on the ceiling, while the Symbols of Persuasion, Fear, and a second Weakness are on the floor. These Symbols are not covered and will activate if anyone but Solberg or his familiar enter the room.

The rooms are 12' tall with 3' thick ceilings/floors. In an 80' high tower this leaves a 30' high 'attic' waiting to be filled. It's empty except for some stone chests with huge bones in them (three complete hill giant skeletons in six chests and one 11 headed hydra skeleton in four chests). The Symbols are on the ceiling five feet from the wall and spaced equidistantly. These Symbols are not covered and will activate if anyone but Solberg or his familiar enter the room.

Movement between floors is by means of Gaseous Form through S-shaped pencil sized holes in the ceiling/floor. The holes are spaced five feet apart around the circumference of the rooms. The first and second floor holes are concealed behind carved wooden molding at the join between the wall and ceiling or floor. On the third floor the holes are hidden behind the floor to ceiling bookshelves. The holes in the ceiling of the 'attic' lead outside two feet below the top of the tower.

The party noticed that the air kept getting blocked off and the pyrokineticist wasn't feeling up to holding off the areana for eight hours on his own. They opted to continue with the killing after an hour or so of back and forthing.

The last three fights weren't terribly hard, more damage, more webs and exhaustions. But they pulled through and got Bloodslash and the Crystal Chainmail for it. They also rescued the GIFTS's egg sack that the areana had stolen. Outside they met the Deva and I could tell that several of them wanted to attack and kill it. I ditched the singing telegram idea, it was good but I wasn't up to doing the lyrics, so the Deva just ranted at them a bit. They did take badly to Solberg telling them to fix what they screwed up. Now two of them (psy-war and sorcerer) want to kill Solberg claiming that "nobody tells us what to do" and "he's just like the Empire." Eventually they agreed to get back the hilt of Demonslayer.

They spent a good fifteen minutes debating going to the GIFTS's cave by the long or short route. The short route was twenty miles less but had a giant spider in there. The GIFTS took the egg sack back the long (safe) way, the party took the short path. It was just a huge trapdoor spider with the Str and Dex swapped. The party was spread out and the people with decent spot checks were pretty far back so the spider struck when it only had one person next to it's trapdoor and within it's 60' tremor sense. It grabbed the sorcerer and shut the lid. The fighter and psy-war rushed over and began hacking, the beguiler cast Open. We all forgot that Open has a weight limit. The lid flipped, the psy-war fell in (distracting the spider, releasing three spider swarms, and saving the sorcerer from bitey death), and that was pretty much it. They got a grand in coin and a couple small gems and finished the trip dragging the half paralyzed bleeding sorcerer. At the GIFTS's they got the rod (flame extinguishing), amulet (fireflower from MIC) and leveled up to 9th. This was a really easy dungeon with already decent loot so I'm going to put the green crystal mace somewhere else. [Aside: Glibness got used to convince the GIFTS that the sorcerer wanted to have their babies while the sorcerer was sleeping. I take absolutely no responsibility for the player rolling randomly and deciding that the character enjoyed it and wanted more. Unfortunately this may become a running joke for us, ala the "boobs of law" bad handwriting treasure list. Also not my fault.]

The next day they went to the river west of the spiders and headed downstream. Not much happened until they hit the peninsula that just out into the river. There's an old billboard there half sunk into the swamp. It says "Too much gold? Come to Silverlocke. Buy big magic. West of the Castle." with the bits in italics missing. They immediately abandoned the boats to head west in search of "gold and silver." The sorcerer picked up a mass Phantom Steed spell and swapped one of his 3rd level spells for Fireball (he also dropped Ebon Eyes because seeing through magical darkness ins't "good enough" for a first level spell). Doing a bit of math we found that every 10' of movement translates into 1 mile per hour (1.136 more precisely, but that's without stopping for anything). So the sorcerer can summon swamp and quicksand ignoring spell-mounts that move 180' (40mph at double moves, 81mph if they can run) tirelessly for nine hours. Of course the sorcerer's familiar maxes out at a flying run of 400' so if they go more than 45mph for too long he/she has to go back and find his familiar to regain spells. Any ways they passed some Black Puddings, sent the pyrokineticist (on the familiar) to investigate some drumming (giants use drums for long distance comm and they throw rocks really far) where we found that the familiar's stats hand't been updated in three levels so he barely survived and they just avoided the giants, then they hit the river and headed downstream. Solberg had scried out the location of the slith temple where the blade of Demonslayer was and sent along a rough map.

This is when we discovered that the phantom steeds don't have strength scores or any swimming skill. Since swimming in calm water is DC 10 and I don't let Int 0 or Int-- things take 10 (unless there's a special rule like spiders have for climbing) they went down the bank (and through a pair of chuul) until they got to the end of the cave. Then they decided to swim the steeds even though they fail the check half the time, this cuts them down to 4 miles an hour (plus current but any useful current will increase the swim DC). As an added bonus horse-like critters don't swim quietly and the party still has the sorcerer's flying bonfire familiar circling overhead. All this on a dark still lake in slitherazi territory. The party splashed noisily and well lit into the northern slith territory lake and headed southwest to the circular island with the temple on it. The island has 700' cliffs and the temple is halfway up the inside edge, plus a slith semaphore post on the eastern most cliff top. The temple was on alert but they (and I) didn't expect the beguiler to use most of his 2nd levels spells on Spider Climb so the big welcoming party was down at the docks below the temple. Via the fighter's adamantine duom they chopped through the outer dome of the temple (failing all planes, history, religion, and local checks because they have no ranks in any of them, there's a statue of Grah-Hoth the demon lord on top of the temple holding a broken sword) and started walking around on top of the inner dome while the psy-war used Ectoplasmic Form to flow in through one of the carved serpent mouths. He surprised the high priest and used three maxed out Hostile Empathic Transfers to kill him and the holy snake (the 16HD snake make two will saves and the 9HD +11 will save priest failed one), grabbed the Blade, sucked down the eye ray of the nerfed Retriever, and escaped using a second casting of Ectoplasmic Form. This left him with about two power points so he simply flew off and let everyone else deal with the aftermath. The temple guards burst in, more appeared on top of the temple complex and headed towards the dome, the guards from the front door started heading around the side, and the Retriever lost 90hp going out through the door of the inner dome. That's because the doorway is a Prismatic Wall covered by an illusion of a flowing wall of blood, there's a password (Grah-Hoth) and the carving over the doorway says "Bless your soul to god and enter." There was a brief fighting retreat where the sorcerer distracted the enemies (he took five Fireballs to kill two 5HD mages and a 6HD priest) while the beguiler burned higher and higher level spell slots on Invisibility for everyone else.

Eventually they were back the outside base of the cliffs. Everyone except the beguiler and pyrokineticist had less then half HP. They sent the previous phantom mounts back north with a sunrod tied to one of them and headed south on a new set that used up the last greater-than-1st-level spell of the sorcerer. One of the three slith patrol boats headed their way fell for that. Of the other two one rolled ones and twos on the four Spot and Listen checks the slith got, the other fell for an illusion from the beguiler (his last greater-than-1st-level spell) for a while. They landed on the nearest island, about two miles from another slith fort, and immediately made a cold camp while the beguiler made Hide checks to conceal each of them. The sorcerer's familiar is still circling above their heads, but it's half a mile up so that it only gives away their general position instead of the exact position. Finally after nine hours of half hourly checks, a slith patrol with +10 Spot rolled well enough to find them. The party won the brief fight easily but the mage managed to get a Lightning Bolt off and send a Scorching Ray into the air as a signal. The sorcerer summoned more mounts and the party rode northeast straight into a small force of slith warriors (two combined patrols) coming from the fort. That fight left half the party with single digit HP, the psy-war out of power, and the mounts dispelled. More mounts and the guys gut started bloody well running away. Unfortunately the party has now annoyed an entire well organized and militaristic society with an effective rapid communication system. I also never rolled a 1 on the hourly d4 (it's a d4 if you're swimming and a d12 if you're in a boat) that indicates an encounter with the giant pikes which inhabit the slith territory. That unpleasant surprise is still to come.

During all this time the warlock and ranger (plus NPC cleric and follower ogre) made it down to the Tower of the Magi, did a bit of trading, enchanted some arrows (23 holy iron, 23 holy silver, 4 holy iron bolts) and a demon bane longsword, and headed to the Castle to meet the party. Still at 8th level (the NPC is 7th but at caster level 6 due to a prestige class) they clobbered a Hellcat, Babau, and four Imps. I mean clobbered, they were at 1/2 HP and the cleric only used one each of first and second level spells during the whole thing. The Hellcat and two Imps got away with single digit HP while the NPC used a Mass and two Lesser Vigors to bring everyone back to full. Neither lady has See Invisible but they are both good enough to use terrain and circumstances (water, mud, and heavy brush) to full advantage. They got 9th and made it to the castle the day before the guys did.

At this point the party was reunited at the Castle, and couldn't remember why they had thought it so important to be there. Then someone remembered Rone, the 100-something-ish wizard who had been an apprentice during the early days of Exile and specifically was at the fall of Akronath. The letter of introduction they got in Formello gets them entry to the Castle and an audience with the king. In the Castle, in front of the castellion and pages, they said "let's skip the king, he's no use to us anyways." That's a direct quote. So they went to the Exile national archives, ignored Benth the priest(archivist) of Sif Muna and asked Rone about Akronath. The information they got was that it had been the location of Grah-Hoth's palace-fortress, a bit about the unstable gate and how it could be stabilized, and that Grah-Hoth had only been imprisoned instead of killed (getting one failed save was easier than killing him with the forces the Exiles had left when they got to him).They also learned that the royal treasury runs a safety deposit box business for adventurers so they opened an account and dropped off the blade of Demonslayer. Then they left.

In short the party treated the center of political power and largest non-magic focused library, populated with Exile's highest level divine caster and second highest level arcane caster, as a low end info kiosk.

Back on the phantom steeds they transversed the distance to the Tower of the Magi in about six or seven hours. The demon group now in the Steaming Valley is ambushing caravans and small groups, not seven people an ogre and a flying bonfire going 40mph. At the Tower they identified and sold both the Crystal Chainmail (non-metal, immediately expend psionic focus for +4AC and take 10 on saves until the start of your next turn) and Bloodslash (scimitar that grants the quickdraw feat, on drawing gain Truestrike with Bloodslash, two minute recharge), the Fireflower amulet was kept (mage slayer fighter) and the Rod of Flame Extinguishing wasn't identified because the beguiler's player wasn't there to kick them. Then they bought a bunch of srolls and potions (but passed up the Bless Weapon oils because they "don't have any weapons that threaten on less than natural 20s, so they can't use the automatic critical confirmation"). The sorcerer went to talk to X to get a Limited Wish -> Psychic Reformation to change his feats. I think that plethora of monster stats he was keeping up with got to him, he moved away from summoning feats and to empower, arcane thesis fireball, easy metamagic empower, energy substitution, and spell focus evocation. Finally the party told X about Boutell in Fort Draco after months (in and out of game) of knowing that X was looking for a large steel anvil to enchant and Boutell was looking for a mage to enchant his large steel anvil. X will now spend the next couple of months in Draco spraying spells around like the half-crazed genius that he is. There was a caravan getting ready outside the Tower with most of the duskblade guards from the Tower and a couple of mages joining them. The players declined to join them and left to assault Akronath.

This time they followed the cavern wall over to the lava fields, bypassing the lake and clouds of steam. The guys remembered the path across the lava pretty well and the phantom steeds have a pretty huge jump check so all the rolling was bypassed. Most of the potions and scrolls of Endure Elements were used up and the beguiler was coerced into using all his first level spells for See Invisible for everybody. This is wen they noticed the imps flying in and out about every fifteen or twenty minutes (it's a message relay between Akronath and the demons in the Steaming Valley that also doubles as an early warning system). So the entire party stopped two miles from Akronath, in the middle of the lava fields, and sent the warlock in to scout. They gave her half an hour before they would come in to "rescue" her. The scouting went well until she tried to pickpocket the Arcanoloth.

She survived because she had borrowed the ranger's Cloak of the Mountebank. At this point the half hour was up and the rest of the party started in towards Akronath, the warlock met them coming out. After about five minutes of talking the party attacked. The patrols of Hellcats and Bearded Devils were loitering five hundred feet away on either side of the closest gap in the huge obsidian wall surrounding the place and there was a new 20' high masonry wall in the gap with a Chain Devil, Babau, and two Bearded Devils working on making it higher. There were also a few imps around to run messages. The players killed an imp, bearded devil and the chain devil before the others teleported out (the imps flew off after the first round). A string of amusing failures failed to jump the phantom steeds over the wall and the guys determined that it would take too long to deconstruct a five foot thick wall. They formed up on the inside and, lights shining brightly, advanced into the darkened killing zone between the outer walls and the gate complex. The arcanoloth (flying 80 feet up in the darkness) started playing with them using it's at-will telekinesis for a few rounds before the babau and three chain devils easily ambushed them in the ruins. They were ineffective against the arcanoloth (four Arc Lightnings!) until the beguiler managed to dispell the Lesser Globe of Invulnerability three times and then get the Fly SLA off the next round. The beguiler is now very low on spells. The mage-slayer fighter got rid of the last of the arcanoloth's magical defenses but couldn't do any damage through the DR 20/magic and good or confirm either of his critical threats. They also had a pretty hard time with the chain devil's regeneration because the only silver or good weapons they had were the limited number of holy arrows that the ranger had asked the NPC cleric to make for them.

However they did eventually prevail and loot anything the detected as magical, the hilt of Demonslayer, wand of cure serious that the warlock palmed, and four silver spikes. The spikes use a combination of Meld into Stone and Vampritic Touch imprison the soul of a victim in a magic structure in order to defray the cost of making the magic item. They are, however, only temporary unless a Permancy is cast on them after the victim is imprisoned. They have a couple of other restrictions that prevent them from working well on animals, unintelligent monsters, or outsiders. It's a pity they aren't going to take the arcanoloth's spell component pouch, that has a couple thousand gold in diamond dust and another couple thousand in spell foci and tools.

That's where we left off. There's debate as to whether or not to finish the "last few" demons further in. I'm pretty sure they have no idea that the fight at the wall was too easy because the demons were letting them in to spring an ambush on the way out. Also they were talking about destroying the work done on the gate so far, which is mainly a single 10' x 15' pillar that is 25' high (roughly 2,700 hp to chop through it). Yeah, that will take enough time for the messenger imps to go back and forth between the last commanding demon and the ambush force at the wall. Getting caught in that double assault will kill them. What's left in Akronath is two succubi, a eyrine, and two chain devils commanded by a bone devil plus two hellcats and six bearded devils commanded by a babau at the wall. Plus the twenty or so imps running around but they aren't going to fight after what happened to them the last time this party came through here.

I'm going on vacation so all this will resume in April.

[Telok]

It lives!

We picked up where we left off, sans the lockdown fighter who was a bit tired of the Demonslayer stuff (which is over for a while now).

They hung around the partially built portal for ten minutes and then went further in, into the ruined palace of Grah-Hoth. Unfortuantely they've been taking so long that there's no way for the demons to not be at least somewhat prepared for the party. So the one eyreine was 100 feet up above in the darkness (overwatch via True Seeing and Telepathy, plus archery), the succubi were in nubile-damsel-in-distress-mud-wrestling mode, and two of the three chain devils were hiding behind chunks or wrecked wall. Highlights include: The eyreine and pyromancer both getting 30+ damage longbow cirtical hits on each other in the same round. The psy-war being trapped in an Ice Wall hemisphere with the three chain devils for five rounds. And the pre-buffed (See Invis and Fly) Bone Devil chasing the single digit HP warlock through the air for several rounds.

Eventually they offed all the demons except the chain devils (Regen 2 beaten by silver or good gives our heros fits) who bargained for their freedom once the bone devil was down. The price of their freedom was, aside from not fighting, where the treasure was. So the players Detected Magic on the mud pit and looked for only magical loot. The succubi were not just out of the pit but back in it doing some frenching and wrestling with the beguiler. I only got one level and kiss suggestion on him before he wised up and cast Death Ward on himself. Then there was another half hour of demon shagging while everyone else looked for secret passages to kill time. The succubi were told that they could come with the beguiler as long as they didn't try to hurt him or drain the other party members, but that the sorcerer would try to kill them if he/she could.

Then they walked out and into a trap. The whole reason that they got in so easily was because demons let them in. Some token resistance at the wall, beat on them at the portal, and ambush them on the way out. So the patrols of hellcats and bearded devils were congregated just outside the big walls where the party entered. Any scouting or just leaving via a different route would have gotten them out without a fight. As it was one succubi died and another escaped to the etherial (they attacked the sorcerer and were caught in an AoE confusion from the beguiler, which also got the psy-war who spent the whole fight nutso or fleeing), one hellcat and one bearded devil escaped. Except for the warlock the party was out of spells, burned half a Cure Serious wand, and was just happy to escape.

Loot for this whole thing is the hilt of DemonSlayer, a Life Shield, an adamantine card with three heraldic symbols on it, and the stuff off of the characters who died there last time (keen ghost touch short sword, grey bag of tricks, half full cure critical wand, etc).

[Telok]

Our perilous heroes decamped from Akronath and rested a day on the shores of the lake. People healed, the NPC cleric identified the loot, and the sorcerer went to "Turn in his demon heart quest for the fire resist saddle."

Now the old PC cleric (replaced by the duom lockdown fighter) had gotten an offer of one salamander spear (metallic aluminum oxide) for eight demon hearts back at the end of August. It is now the 4th of October and demons have been roaming the Steaming Valley and ambushing caravans for almost three weeks now. Since our heroes didn't have any interest in making the roads safe to travel the local NPCs had to do it, although more slowly and with a greater loss of life. The Tower of the Magi had sent a warband of duskblades and generic fighters disguised as a caravan and then divined the time of the next ambush. The mages then contacted the salamanders and let them know the decoy caravan's rate of travel and the time of the demon ambush. So the demon threat in the Steaming Valley was ended and the salamanders got demon bits, and a Chain Devil. Chain Devils regenerate (R2/light or silver) but are not resistant to fire.

Needless to say, when a semi-incoherent gnome asking for a fire resistant saddle and waving salted demon hearts around the salamanders were a bit confused. See, the salamanders trade with the Tower of the Magi for cedar, cinnamon, ambergis, and silver to use in their "Great Work." In exchange they give the Tower sulfur, gems, and the occasional aluminum object. Demon bits (like angel bits, dragon bits, mummy bits, etc.) can be used as special ingredients for making magic items. But the salamanders don't make magic items, they make the "Great Work" and it took the sorcerer several tries to figure this out. So the sorcerer, having no immediate use for 11 demon hearts (value about 4400 gp), gave the salamanders the hearts as a gift and left. The fact that leather made from the hide of a fire immune monster would be the perfect thing to make a fire resistane saddle from has apparently not crossed anyone's mind. Nor has the fact that there are magical research libraries, sages, or even a decent Kn:Arcana (the sorcerer does not have any points knowledge skills) roll to consult.

The party reunited, dropped off the hilt and the Royal Seal at the Castle saftey deposit boxes, and the warlock yakked with Rone and Benth. At this point they learned that the Castle has a gong of at-will Sending in the Exile National Archives, that a powerful witch named Silverlocke sells potions from a hut west of the Castle, and that Solberg was spending a week in compos mentas due to a botched Contact Other Plane spell. The sorcerer and psy-war were greatly tempted to go to Solberg's tower and try to kill him. Eventually they decided to go to Patrick's tower to ask him some questions about liches (they know that a lich has the tip of DemonSlayer but not where) and then on to Fort Remote.

Silverlocke is indeed a powerful witch, who makes "potions." Technically Brew Potion can't do that so she uses Craft Wonderous Item to make "elixers" that function exactly the same. She has a few 4th to 6th level spell elixers, elixers that do the same thing as the +stat tomes, gives 20% off if you pay in silver and 10% off if you pay in magic item ingredients. Having eschewed money in favor of magic items the party couldn't pay for anything.

Patrick's Tower was never anything more than a plot and exposition place with a background research library. Patrick is a powerful mage, one of the first Exiles, and uses his 7th level spell slot to keep his wife from dying from a magical disease. Of course if he misses out on using Limited Wish to no are every month then he'll die of old age, so his wife gets just a little bit worse every month. Anyway they talked to a couple or researchers, found out about greymold (plot item: magical disease cure and alternate ingredient for Raise Dead type spells), nobody knows about any liches running around, and insulted Patrick by asking if he'd tried casting Cure Disease. They also found out that a party of adventurers had been eaten by the cave drake, a big bloody lizard in the tunnels west of Fort Remote. The two survivors of the group... Well, nobody was interested in them or the information that they had.

The players breezed through Fort Remote barely saying three sentences the whole time and ignoring as many NPCs as they could. They did "spend the night" but apparently left without saying anything to anyone. They had a rough map of some of the tunnels west of Remote that they bought in Almaria (now they'd rather swim the river instead of use the toll bridge) so it was only one dead end before they found the general area. Instead of trying to find a lair or setting a trap they circled the local watering hole and debated tracking or whether the drake could be underwater. Which was when the fire drake snuck up on them.

So for fire drakes I use salamanders with half Int and the spear changed to a bite. Big drakes are noble salamanders with no SLAs except the Fireball whixh is turned into a 60' cone breath weapon. I can use cold and water drakes by simply changing the fire element to cold or acid. And it turns out that noble salamanders have a +15 sneak modifier. The party got a nasty surprise when 10d6 Rhalf said hello. The beguiler landed a rage spell that forced the drake to attack him, combined with a cold Fireball from the sorcerer that got him killed (he didn't expect it to have reach and improved grab with it's tail). Piety saved him from extinction, for now. Eventually they located the lair in the northern wall and the sorcerer went in alone "to pull." Down the right hand tunnel of a 4-way junction the first set of drakes he encountered killed him in one round but not so hard that piety couldn't save him this time. He would have been eaten (and hence dead beyond easy revival) but his fleeing familiar alerted the rest of the party. The whole gang worked through the drakes and then split up wandering through the caves.

And I must make scones. More to come.

[Telok]

Wandering in the caves... Actually I kept them in combat time because the NPC cleric had spent a Mass Lesser Vigor on almost everyone and the beguiler and sorcerer were invisible in a corner flagellating themselves with Healing Belts. Plus the cave drake was only 200 feet away and waiting for them.

The fight with the cave drake killed the warlock (caught in a Fireball: e-sub cold from the sorcerer) and beguiler (fire drake crit with a bite), downed the cleric (Close Wounds and the fast healing barely saved him), and ran the psy-war out of power points and HP (four 9PP powers, Precog Def and three Hostile Empathic Transfers). The pyrokineticist actually got the kill by spamming the Bag of Tricks and getting two rhinos plus two bears that blocked tunnels and soaked attacks. I think the best part was when I had the cave drake Power Attack for 22 on an improved trip attack. Several people looked ready to crap their pants.

It ended with two dead and everyone but the pyrokineticist in single digit HP and almost totally out of spells. We had to stop before looting, but maybe the break will give them time to think and they will look beyond just magic items this time. Loot to be: 2500 silver, Smite (giant slaying), Gleaming Shield (reflects gaze attacks and weighs 65lbs plus it's lightly cursed), Bracers (blast barrier and entangling blast plus AC3), Dimples (small adamantine flail with bonus damage), and a high value trash armor intended for sacrifice. It is still Oct 6th and there is a 7th level Favored Soul of Elyvilon with the Renewal domain and the Versatile Spellcaster feat at Fort Remote. I'll let them choose which (AD&D or 3.5) Reincarnation table to use. Of course they could go the Dharmon, the Castle, Patrick's Tower, or the Tower of the Magi too. It's not like there aren't people around who can do this, it's just a question of what it's worth to the PCs and the NPCs.

[Telok]

Last time we left off the party was cleaning up after a blind rush into a drake's lair. They grabbed the magic loot, left the DC 15 Search check non-magic loot, cut some chunks off the drakes, and skedaddled with their dead. They camped two miles away, two fire drakes tracked them down after about 6 hours and the beguiler was replaced with a crusader who came in during that fight. Since the ladies were running late this session the ranger was "off somewhere" and the warlock stayed dead for a while. The NPC cleric identified items and threw down a Gentle Repose on the warlock's corpse then the party decided to explore the tunnels to the north.

After running through several dead ends and scaring a few lizards they came to the "lair" of Sulfras. The quarter mile high and wide obsidian wall blocking the tunnel was impressive, the two hundred foot high doors with handles the size of oxen were imposing, and the Nalfeshnee on a giant fishhook being used as a door knocker actually had them being respectful. Sulfras is colossal*2 and keeps his treasure pile out in the open, the PCs were less... there was less greed twitching than I expected from a treasure pile including things like a Staff of Power and Robes of the Archmagi. Any way they left after asking about any nearby liches and "can we do anything for you?", so they know that Sulfras wants the Onyx Scepter. See, they've heard about the Onyx Scepter before but they don't remember it because Solberg is the one who mentioned it back in September(real time)/June(game time) and their memories of Solberg have been overwritten by the Akronath incident. This is probably why they also have a firm belief that the lich holding the tip or Demonslayer is on the west wall of the Great Cave (Solberg said near, but not in the Great Cave).

They finished exploring the caves past Fort Remote by finding one of the six or seven blocked exits out of Exile (the only open one is past Sulfras). They plan on coming back to open it up someday, forgetting that someone had to scry and collapse it first and could have a warning system in place to detect re-opening attempts. Then they went back to Fort Remote, the ranger decided to take her 9th level feat as Leadership also (the crusader has it too, this is getting to be too much) and picked up the priest from the fort as her cohort. The warlock got Reincarnated as a black bear (I allow them to choose which edition's Reincarnate table to use and they always choose the AD&D table) with the HD waived because a non-humanoid form is penalty enough. They spent a day exploring the western walls of the Great Cave still looking for a lich, were warned about the local bandits (who aren't interested in attacking 40mph phantom steed adventurers, no lootable/clue including encounters for you!), and ended up in Dharmon. They flopped around there, getting the bandit stash by force and intimidation, and being directed to a guy in Blosk if they wanted to "strike a blow against the Empire." They still complained about the traps on the bandit stash, both the DC 19 mechanical trap on the door and the demon summoning Glyphs on the ceiling three feet above the tops of the unlocked treasure chests. Frankly I don't think that not having someone with Trapfinding is any excuse for chronic inability to take any safety precautions at all. Of course they also have an NPC cleric with bardic lore and Augury + Divination as domain spells whom they regularly fail to consult for any hints at all. I've never screwed them on divinations because those are a wonderful DM tool for helping the PCs to follow the plot and not DIE ALL THE TIME.

Any how, loot ended up being Boots of Striding and Springing and 900 lbs of iron and bronze bars plus a reward of about 2000$. They slapped an acid slime Babau into the crates of fine linen and furs which lost them another two grand. We stopped there for the night and that was the week that GITP was down.

The next session started with everyone present [psy-war, archer-pyrokineticist, crusader, boom-sorcerer, bear-warlock, ranger, NPC cleric(warlock), NPC dragon shaman(crusader), NPC favored soul9ranger)]. They went up to Fort Saffron, goobed around a bit and trotted off to Blosk. They offloaded the metal and drake bits for cash and started to get involved in the Blosk plot. That's a convoluted plot involving nine NPCs, insurance fraud, theft, arson, and two murders. Some of them were trying, some said "no ranks in investigation skills, pass", and the sorcerer just goofed off. So I cut it short by bringing in the Scimitar agent (secret pro-Exile trans-legal organization people) whom they had completely forgotten about and setting them off towards Spire and the Abyss.

In Fort Saffron (they missed the bandit stuff at 40mph again) I had all three NPCs mention that they were worried about crossing the Abyss. There's a negative energy rift/node in there with Screamers, aggressive undead that are attracted to bright lights and sounds near the Abyss. The PCs questioned a bandit prisoner in the fort lock-up and learned that there was a wizard's tower nobody went near west of Spire town (still after the lich in the wrong places) and that she got back across the Abyss by "sleeping in a stone circle on the northeast rim." While she didn't lie there are holes in that information that you could drive an aircraft carrier through. The PCs just accepted the testimony of a hostile prisoner as gospel. They went north along the road (missing gremlins and the bandits again at 40mph, no loot or clues here!) and came to the anti-plant, anti-animal obelisks along the border of the Abyss. They didn't investigate beyond reading the signs saying "Beware of Screamers. Dim all lights and no loud noises or you will die." So they gave the on-fire large-size hippogriff a potion of Hide from Undead and started to cross the three mile long (ten foot wide, three foot railings) stone bridge leading to Fort Spire. In the conversion from AD&D to 3.5 banshees went from 9HD to 26HD...

They all saved vs the DC 11 Will Negates of the potion, they easily saw a large flying bonfire in the pitch black. I figured that half would bother to investigate and already knew how long it would take them to get there. I gave it a DC 20 Int check to plot an intercept course between the banshee's fly speed and the party's speed, only one made it although two others got close enough that they could have turned up a minute later. The hippogriff was 100' in front of the party except for the warlock who was right underneath it on her phantom steed... Lets just say that the party saw an incorporeal undead and stopped to buff in preparation for a fight. On the first round the warlock and hippogriff died (so the sorcerer lost his spells for the day). By the third round the crusader was dead so the psy-war and sorcerer went back to "rescue his loot" from the incorporeal monster. On the fifth round the psy-war was down from Charisma drain. On the seventh round the sorcerer was dead and the pyro was down to 2 Charisma.

In the end only the warlock, sorcerer, and crusader died. Heroic action from the pyro (and a potion of Lesser Restoration, gravity, and the Ectoplasmic Form power) saved the psy-war. Everyone who ran in the first round(ranger, NPCs) got away unharmed. The other survivors all failed the DC 26 Fort save and lost Str, Dex, and Con from looking at the banshee. The crusader's loot went into the chasm because he was using Boots of Levitation to fight over the railing, but he dropped Smite onto the bridge. The sorcerer will be Reincarnated (using the last of the NPC favored soul's spell components) as a Slyth (Underdark p17) because he rolled DM's choice, and I'm going to change his familiar because he's getting people killed again with this flying bonfire idiocy. I'm not sure what the warlock and crusader are going to do. But the pyro and two NPCs are in Fort Saffron, everyone else (except the deaders) is in Fort Spire under lock-down mode. It's October 16th (I think, have to check my notes) and the party has just lost money, reputation, and the good will of local soldiers.

[Telok]

About that wizard tower west of Spire and the party looking for a lich? I statted up Erika Redmark and her tower. It's a good thing that she's a non-lethal NPC.

The primary guide bit. It has small errors in Erika that have been fixed in the full write up.

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Location: 50 miles due W of Fort Spire.
Near Skarragath there is a witch's hut with a hag that asks the players to get some purple fungus from around the cave for her, in return she'll tell you to check for illusions in Erika's tower.
The front door is a permanent circular wall of fire facing inward (CL30) but inside is a nice little bed & breakfast place with a couple unseen servants to keep it tidy. On the E wall is a door with a plaque "One goblin tells the truth, the other lies. Pierce the lies to get the prize." Inside is a square room with two goblin soulbows (marble blocks to the knee, marble statue to the waist, normal above that, small table w/ playing cards) against the center of the N wall and a door on either side of them. The doors lead to nightingale floored hallways that end in doors with waiting hellcats behind them. The illusionary wall behind the goblins (they both lie like crazy) leads to darkness trap/ward and then a mated pair of basilisks. The wall the darkness ward is on is a secret door to a wide hallway. After you pass the 4 flesh golems and 4 wights in the hallway there is a smaller hall with two doors, the S door leads back to the B&B (covered with an illusion on that side) and the E door leads to the "garden". There is a door on the N wall covered by another bloody illusion, that one just leads to Erika's work/living areas. The garden has 6 giant lizards and a dozen violet fungi around it. Erika Redmark is an important plot NPC and the higest level Exile caster barring the great dragons.

Erika is a Wizard12/Archmage4 (spec Enchantment, banned Conj(create) and Evocation) and at least has...
Ring of Arcane Might, Robe of Arcane Might, Vials of the Last Gasp, Mystic Surge (PH2), Spell Enhancer (SC), Consumptive Field (Clr 4 - SC), Earth Spell, Earth Sense, Heighten Spell, Easy Metamagic, Archmage Spell Power x4, Limited Wish. Which is a 27 caster level before Consumptive Field gets used.

Goblin Liars: Small Psychic Goblinoid. HD:6d10+6 (40 hp). Init: +1. Speed: 0. AC:14 (+1size, +1Dex, +2nat), t:12, f:14, s:11. B/A/G: +5/+6/+2. Attack: mindblade +8 1d6+2+1d8 19x2, mindarrow +8 1d8+1+1d8 20x3. Special: Darkvision 60 ft, psychic strike (move action, living only, mind-affecting). Saves: F+2, R+1, W+5. Stats: S12, D13, C12, I18, W9, C6. Skills: Listen+10, Spot+10, Concen+10, Cardsharp+16. Feats: Alertness, SF:cardsharp, precise shot.

Her and her tower.

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Tower 80' diameter, 160' high, flat top, no windows. Stone Shape/ Wall of Stone/ Hardening(Eb p112)/ Stone Metamorphosis(Und p61) basalt walls (hardness 21, 1500hp/5', climb dc 25). Forbiddance inside and within 10' of the exterior walls, so no teleportation, plane shifting, or summoning. Erika commonly uses Passwall to open a room for summoning or teleportation. The tower is druid Hallowed. Giving Magic Circle vs Dark alignment (non-Light summoned creatures cannot enter [SR 32+ ignores], everyone is immune to mental control, and everyone has +2 AC and saves vs Dark aligned attacks and spells. Permanent False Vision shows the tower abandoned and empty to all scrying attempts. Permanent Mirage Arcana starts in the entry way and disguises the fact that the corridor slopes downward and spirals to the left, the entire above ground structure is solid stone (Permanent False Vision!). All interior doors have a lead sheet in them and an Alarm spell trap(dc26) on the back that tells Erika which door was opened. If the intruders never turn around and check the back of the door they'll never know that these exist.

Erika Redmark wizard 13, archmage 3, Ashenzari worshipper (piety 22), +Ench -Evoc -ConjCreate
s9 d14 c13 i24 w16 c20, Init+11(nerveskitter & items), 58hp 16hd, ac20, F9 R10 W17.
Ring of Arcane Might, Robe of Arcane Might, Vials of the Last Gasp(5), Bracers of Blinding Strike, Eager Warning punching dagger, Ring of Wizardry(2nd level), Lesser Rod of Metamagic Quicken, +3 Vest of Resistance, 4kgp perfect star sapphire necklace.
Feats: Earth Sense, Earth Spell, Heighten Spell, Easy Metamagic(Heighten), Extend Spell, Easy Metamagic(Extend Spell), Spell Focus & Greater Spell Focus(Enchantment), Spell Mastery. All spells prepared with Heighten*2 and Extend. 19 skill ranks in Concentrate, Arcana, Spellcraft, Decipher, Nobility, Local. 1/2 in UMD, History, Local, Planes, Architecture.

Her base caster level is 22, using Limited Wish(Comsumptive Field) and a Vial will get her to a max of CL32.
8:Scintillating Pattern, Mass Charm Monster(dc29), expended spell [Mind Blank, divination, or custom spell]
7:Limited Wish x2, Heightened Confusion(dc28, CL25), expended spell
6:Greater Heroisim, Summon Monster VI(large elemental 44rnds), Open Slot, expended spell
5:Greater Blink, Feeblemind(dc26), Passwall(needed for Summon), expended spell
4:Spell Enhancer, Mystic Surge, Lesser Globe of Invulnerability, expended spell x2
3:Dispel Magic x2, Protection from Energy(120), Displacement, expended spell
2:Invisibility, Mirror Image(d4+7), Nerveskitter, Hideous Laughter(dc23) x3, Resist Energy (30), expended spell x3
1:Shield, Charm Person(dc22) x2, expended spell x2

Erika's apartments are separated from the lizard enclosure by a 5' stone wall with an invisible 10x5 section for a window (hard 9, 1200hp per 5'sq) as a window and a permanent illusion of a porticullus next to it. The real door is stone and five feet further over (illusion dc19). The floor is smooth-ish natural stone and lighting is provided by hundreds of magic symbols on the ceiling (glowing visible arcane marks). 45 feet from the NE corner is the center of a Energy Transformation Field linked to a Rejuvination Cocoon spell(cl30). A further 50 feet to the SW of that are two Symbols hidden in plain sight among all the others, Spell Loss(dc35, trigger saying "boom" or attacking Erikas) and Weakness(trigger saying "blammo" or attacking Erikas). The room has furniture and shelves of books (all books Fire Trap cl20, dc21) to funnel people under the Symbols. Given ANY warning Erika's Simulacrum will be at a table 15 feet north of the Symbols reading, while Erika herself is in the NE corner invisible and illusioned up as a stone golem. Given a minute or more Erika will have Greater Arcane Sight, See Invisible, and Shield up, with a Transfix spell (dc29 duration 48hr) centered at the Symbols. She has a Contingency (I know she banned evocation but she has scrolls) for "Anything that would kill me" to activate a cl33 extended heightened Magic Jar (dc29 and equal to a 10th level spell).

Spellbooks(like 12 total): Mostly all 1st to 4th level spells, all 5th level PH spells, all non-banned 6th and 7th level PH spells plus Teleport Object. All 8th level PH enchantment, abjutation, divination, summoning, calling, teleportation, illusion, and a custom Teleport Object To Me. Disjunction, Teleport Circle, Summon IX, Dominate Monster, Power Word Kill.

Other bits: Potions; cure moderate*2, less restore*3, remove paralysis*2, spiderclimb*3, neut poison*2, remove curse, remove disease*2, water walk*3, good hope*4. Scrolls; detect undead*6, unseen servant*2, [d]augury*5, detect thoughts*2, rope trick, silence*2, glibness, vampritic touch*3, [d]deathward*2, [d]divination*4, [d]spike stones, teleport*3, black tentacles, [d]mark of justice. About 1k gold, 3k arcane reagents, 5k silver, and lots of really nice clothes.

[Telok]

Guess what the PCs did the past two weeks. They died!
So the first week we were short people, vacations, sickness, new jobs. We had the sorcerer, psi-war, and the warlock was replaced by a monk. Since the person playing the 'lock is still pretty inexperienced I had offered to help with character creation. What showed up at game was a core-only no-op human monk with an Amulet of Natural Armor +2 and 8000$ (two feats of Extra Stunning Fist)...

After they got chewed out by the captain of Fort Spire and rested/healed it was time to travel to the town of Spire. This was slower (no mass phantom steed any more) but uneventful because everyone threatened to kill the sorcerer again if he summoned his familiar before they crossed the rest of the bridge. There isn't much to do in Spire if you aren't self motivated. The town is mostly run by street gangs (our heroes killed the East Gate gang just getting into town) but if you don't care about downtrodden and abused town-folk then civic improvement is off the table. After that there is exactly Meena and the arena to interest people. Meena is the "mayor" by dint of money, thuggery, and possession of a decently powerful magic item (a plot point to solve one of the major end game quests, only hints at this point if you don't know what you're looking for). The arena has a PrC NPC running it and ogres as employees admission is 15gp a seat. They hold a monster vs monster fight every few days unless someone volunteers to fight a monster. The fight purses are 500, 1500, and 4500 gold. The party showed some interest and went down to inspect the monsters. They saw the giant two-headed snake, Tink the gremlin, the mage-bred warbeast giant lizard (not actually a fight, you get a cold drake [4 Int cold salamander] instead), and the locked and barred solid bronze door of the third monster. The psi-war went to investigate by using Ectoplasmic Form which, as it turns out, does not protect you from being turned into stone by a 12hd basilisk. They asked Meena for help and were instantly insulted, but she did say that she could get it reversed for 4000gp or 3000sp. Since they couldn't pay (the sorcerer gives all his money away because he can't buy one or more Belts of Battle) and didn't notice that there must be someone nearby who could help them the sorcerer, under very careful coaching, bummed a Darkness off of the sage/fence in town and flew back across the Abyss (Ebon Eyes and very very careful coaching) and then all the way to the Tower of the Magi to buy a scroll of Break Enchantment. This took 18 hours one-way, used all his daily spells on fire resistance, and passed at least six NPCs who were able to help him. He paid a +25% mark up for his obvious desperation and was convinced to buy a scroll of Darkness so that he didn't die on the return trip. During the two days he was gone the monk fought the two-headed snake in the arena. Long ago there was a write-up of a two-headed snake in Dragon magazine, it was interesting and I remembered it. But I like simple stats for monsters so I took the huge Centipede, doubled it's HP, added +2 to the attacks, saves, and poison DC, and gave it two independent bite attacks. Plus it's an animal instead of a bug. I pegged it at about CR6 although it should be easier because you get half a day to prepare and you know when the fight is going to start. It still nearly creamed the monk even after I 'forgot' that Stunning Fist was only once a round. After the payout she hunkered down outside the town walls to wait with the statue and was visited by Twink (who is an escape artist extrordinare) from whom she learned about the old tunnels/cracks under the town. Once the psychic warrior was back he memorized that info with Autohypnosis, and he wrote it down too, which is even better. Then they left for Bargha. Another 6000gp they'll probably never see.

In Bargha I rolled a 1 for the one in six chance of a giant attack so there were random boulders falling on the town. They talked to Ethridge and were vastly excited by her side quest (defeat a bunch of slitherazi ghosts and get a Belt of Battle) only to balk at an estimated two dozen ghosts to fight. They bothered the priestess, Prynne, in the middle of healing wounded soldiers about anti-ghost spells. Ignored the local sage and caster who does necromancy research. Then they decided the show what great heroes they were by defeating the giant attack. NPC:"They do this every week. Just toss a few arrows at them and in a hour they get bored and go home." They take a look and the opposition is 8 hill giants and two giant shaman (9hd of giant and 6hd of Favored Soul of Vehumet) a bit over 400 feet away. The sorcerer stayed back on the town wall while the Ectoplasmic Form psi-war and the monk charged. After four Fireballs, two Hostile Empathic Transfers, and a Wholeness of Body there were four dead giants, one dead giant shaman, one dead monk (ran back to 'Flurry of Misses' Mr.2d8+10 when she had 19hp), and the sorcerer was under a Silence spell for the next 6 minutes.

We wrapped up there. I offered, again, to help with character creation. And now the date was October 16th, I was off last time.

This last week we had the sorcerer, psi-war, ranger with her cohort (healing focused Favored Soul), and a rogue... A core-only no-op rogue (no skills at max ranks and Weapon Proficency Longbow "because it does more damage"). I did mention possibly changing the feats to Combat Expertise, Improved Feint, and Bow Feint (and I'd seriously let her bow feint as a move action with Crossbow Sniper too, and in my game all crossbows are simple weapons). She declined, I hope she's learning. Gods know it took the guy playing the sorcerer almost two years to figure out AoOs for casting in combat.

They made a frontal assault on the Giant Castle. There's no way to put this gently, they got clobbered.

The giant castle is kinda easy too. If you sneak in under the bridge there are three DC10 spot checks to notice the "secret" entrance and two DC10 checks to spot the trap under the bridge. If you try to cross the bridge then 250 lbs. on the castle end causes it to collapse and dump you 60 feet into the moat with all the DC10 spot checks. I do give them credit for at least trying to sneak in. The rogue snuck close enough to dash across the bridge in one round, the psi-war used Ectoplasmic Form to get up under the castle end of the bridge (and failed all 5 spot checks with his +3 bonus, blinded by the dice), and the sorcerer used Enlarge Person and Disguise Self off of a scroll to fake hauling in the ranger and cohort as captives. And it worked right up to the point where the sorcerer tried to cross the bridge before the porticullis was up and the bridge was secured. When the giants on the walls yelled at him to stop... he dropped his 'captives' and charged. The psi-war and rogue ended up in the gatehouse, the ranger and healer outside across the moat, and the sorcerer in the moat where he died from being pelted in the head with rocks while he tried to summon something. The rogue and psi-war ended up in the moat from Improved Bull Rush while the ranger traded shots with the six giants on the battlements. While the psi-war went back up (he loves that Ectoplasmic Form, so useful) the rogue and sorcerer (no piety left at all now) went into the lower "secret" entrance. The castle basement is unlit because giants and ogres have darkvision, they lit torches and summoned a howler. The sorcerer died for good when he took a crit boulder to the head (16 - 32 = -16 = DEAD) and the rogue sucked it after trying to melee a giant. There was a door between her and the giant with the sorcerer's blood and brains oozing out under it, I gave her a Wis check (DC10:success) and told her that it might be a good idea to hide in the dungeon cells or flee. After death she didn't get a piety check because she worshipped Xom, who was amused enough to cast (dice rolls, dice rolls) Hold Person on the giant after she was dead. Eventually the psi-war realized futility and used Ectoplasmic Form to flee. He did however stop by the basement to scare one last wounded giant and get his team mates bodies before escaping with 1/2 hp and one remaining power point.

So now it's October 17th and the remains of the party have regrouped a couple miles south of the Giant Castle (four dead giants, six dead ogres, from 30 of each). The young lady is talking about a pixie warlock for "survivability" and the sorcerer is being replaced by a goliath psychic warrior aimed at pumping Vapritic Blade with Expansion and a goliath greathammer (something about the "awesome crit multiplier" or some such). I'll give advice and we'll see what happens.

[Agent 451]

I have no idea why, but in my head the first paragraph in your last post was narrated by Waylon Jennings, Dukes of Hazzard style. And that's when I knew I was in for some extra awesome.

[Telok]

Experimenting with posting from my wife's Nook between classes. I am finally going back to finish my degree and the homework has harshed on my posting schedule.

The sorcerer rerolled as a goliath psychic warrior and the player of the crusader came back form visiting family and rolled a dwarf scout... deep hunter I think. I saw the prc on his sheet but I do not recall the exact class. It gives him improved stone cunning and something else. It is a useful but not omg powerful character, so I'll give him some good loot to keep up with the others.

The psiwar went back to town after stripping his friends' bodies and leaving them to rot. He visited the npc archer for a bit more info on giants and the area, recruited two goons, and headed back to the Giant Castle. There was a night at the inn somewhere in there too.

They managed to sneak into the castle by climbing down into the moat at one corner and stealthing to the secret door. Even the goliath with a -3 on his rolls managed it. Distance penalties and lazy giants not being awesome spotters. They discovered the survivor of a previous adventuring party in the cells and freed him. He told them a few things about the giants and exited the same way that the heroes got in. We then discovered that coup de gra with Smite on a sleeping giant is brutally, messily, horribly effective. Four giants and twelve ogres died in thier sleep while the guys grinned and chortled. They took turns murderizing rooms of sleeping giants.

They fought the two giant shamen in the lab, found the secret room with magic scrolls and very nearly missed the body of an Imperial soldier in the meat locker. They discovered a nearly ruined set of orders but couldn't make out more than disconnected words. It has the soldiers blood and guts all over it plus the ink has run and there is a simple dc10 code to decipher.

They also found the secret chambers with the demon, book, and loot. The demon was just a hellcat but it couldn't hit anyone but the goliath. Not because of ac but because I could not roll over an 8 to hit anyone else. But the dice were fair, only the goliath could roll high enough to hit the hellcat after the first round. Goliath took over 120 damage but between Vigor and a hostile transfer he didn't end up badly hurt. The book covers some demonology and evil rituals, I actually called for a speak languages check because abyssal grammer held a hint as to the respective power of the demon in the Tower of Magi vs Grah Hoth vs run of the mill demons. The loot kicked an 8d6 lightning bolt and was money, something, and a set of bone armor with hammerblock and SR13. Expensive armor, but not really worth it.

We left off there. The lass who died twice in two sessions should be back next week with a pixie warlock. I will have to work to keep that character useful. It is October 18th and our heroes are preparing to ascend to the central keep og the castle. I need to adapt the pirate king song from Pirates of Penzance for him. I will not miss the chance to sing "It is it is a glorious thing to be a giant king." at my victims. It fits because he has six levels of swordsage.

[Telok]

To this tune

KING. Away to the cheating world go you,
Where giants all are stupid-do;
But I'll be true to the song I sing,
And live and die a Giant King.
For I am a Giant King!
And it is, it is a glorious thing
To be a Giant King!
For I am a Giant King!
ALL. You are!
Hurrah for the Giant King!
KING. And it is, it is a glorious thing
To be a Giant King.
ALL. It is!
Hurrah for the Giant King!

KING. When I sally forth to seek my prey
I help myself in a royal way.
I bash a few more heads, it's true,
Than a well-bred monarch ought to do;
But many a king on a first-class throne,
If he wants to call his crown his own,
Must manage somehow to get through
More dirty work than ever I do,
For I am a Giant King!
And it is, it is a glorious thing
To be a Giant King!
For I am a Giant King!
ALL. You are!
Hurrah for the Giant King!
KING. And it is, it is a glorious thing
To be a Giant King.
ALL. It is!
Hurrah for the Giant King!

[The Glyphstone]

At least the players are taking their repeated deaths in stride. Most players I've been familiar with would have been shrieking 'KILLER DM" to the high heavens after the first few deaths.

[Telok]

In the beginning I made it quite clear that this was on open-ish, sandbox style, setting with some higher leveled areas. There's no meta-game penalty for leaving and going back for reinforcements or for taking the time to do research, planning, or set up. Plus the piety system and my rolling where the players can see the dice make it pretty obvious that I'm not intentionally going for character deaths.

Our ages range from 20s to 40s and the players are really aware that most deaths have occured due to lack of preparation and dumb stunts. So we are a pretty mature bunch. Plus we've all known each other for years and years so there is quite a deep trust in this group.

[Telok]

Ok, that "mature players" thing is a little bit off.

Well we got our pixie warlock. I looked over the character sheet and then moved a bunch of skill ranks out of Heal and Climb, that maxxed out UMD. Starting gear was a Chasuble of Fell Power, Spellsight Spectacles, Hair Shirt of Suffering enchanted with Dragondodger (because: 53 HP), Healing (2d8+3) and a +1 armor bonus, ten potions (why are they all Lesser Restoration? WTF?), five scrolls (up to 3rd level), two 10-charge wands (up to 2nd level), and a 1st level eternal wand. The son of the guy playing the goliath psy-war (previously the sorcerer) joined us as a straight human ranger, he's ten years old and will probably be with us for three of four games. He gets the simple number boosting stuff that I discourage the more mature players from getting, Gloves of Dex, a Seeking Collision longbow, Bracers of Armor +4, a magic knife, some healing potions, a large monstrous spider animal companion. He paid in Natural Bond and "Vermin Animal Companion" feats, plus it's not like he's going to power game or break any encounters or plots he's just being awesome.

Unfortunately the pixie and ranger immediately hit off on a "my character can kill your character" thing. I tried to tone it down because they need to show up pretty early in the session and probably together. So the ranger has a $5000 bet with someone in Silvar that he can adventure with the (live) pixie for three months while she has been tasked by the leader of the fairy grove to go out and find good booze. The fairies need something strong enough to drink that they can believe their own illusions. This hearkens all they way back to the very first session and the Crystal Cave quest that the PCs are never going to do. It's just a magical location that they are totally uninterested in.

Ok, so, two characters late to the party caught up to the psy-war, goliath, and scout. They all went upstairs using the east staircase. This dumped them straight into the main hall of the castle. The giant king sang his song, there was a little sneaking but the king saw them and that cued the start of combat. The king downed the psi-war with a Emerald Razor - Power Attack - Burning Blade combo (large double flaming falcion 2d6+10, +2d6 fire, +1d6+12 fire, +20PA), and then missed with every single one of his attacks for the rest of the fight. The giant shaman in the room Glitterdusted the invisible eldrich blast source, and then she flew through four AoOs to try and heal the psy-war. The new ranger did really well, he did OK damage, got kill shots on the giant king and two other giants, and had his spider web-then-reel-in the bleeding to death pixie. The scout tripped four giants with Lash, the magic whip. He didn't do much damage but tripping giants without Improved Trip was pretty cool, and it kept two giants out of the melee for several rounds. After they finished everything off I threw Goggles of Foe Finding and Third Eye of Freedom in to beef up the 14 pounds of gold nuggets the giants had.

They kicked in the door to the quarry and forge area next. Six ogres count as a disposable mook squad at this point, but the unarmored giant mason killed the goliath with a crit from the Spazzhammer. The goliath lost all his piety coming back and the psy-war critted the mason with Smite for 70+ damage of the mason's last 20 HP. The party neither questioned where the giants were getting all these one pound gold nuggets or how the giant mason got eight attacks in a row on a critical (plus he hit himself every time he missed the goliath). I think they were mis-remembering the Lightning Mace / Blood in the Water build I worked up for another player in a previous campaign. We didn't use the Aptitude kukri thing because that is obvious cheesing of a not-well-written enhancement.

After that they split up and checked the other side doors, finding empty bedrooms, the north set of stairs, and the little temple with it's altar to Vehumet. The side room off of that had two giant shaman who had heard the fighting and decided to lay an ambush. The scout ran back to the main hall with single digit hit points while the shaman cast Invisibility on themselves and Silence 15' around the doorway. The party got a little paranoid from this, there were two spell casting giants that they couldn't see or hear. The goliath had a really good idea though, he got the partial torso from the dead giant mason in the quarry and started slinging it around to splatter invisible foes with blood. Which worked really well on the pixie, the giants smote the psy-war down that round were visible anyways. This brings up the old "it's on me so it should be invisible" argument/whine again, if you follow that logic far enough then the flour bag trick and Glitterdust shouldn't reveal invisible creatures. I use a rule of thumb from another game called Bloodshadows (old Masterbook system). They had a build-your-own-spell magic system and addressed the problem of people using handcuffs, doors, and other people's body armor as expendable spell components. Their way was to say that a spell component had to be "in your power" and not something that was impeding you or having an effect on you. It's a good rule of thumb and I use it to adjudicate certain magical effects like invisibility, if a substance has been applied to you by an outside force it is affecting you and will not be invisible. The simple way around this is to refresh your invisibility via spell, SLA, or whatever. Once you take action to start affecting the substance or otherwise bring it under your power, then it becomes invisible with the rest of you.

Anyways they defeated the shaman, the pixie and psy-war were returned to positive hit points, loot was a Lightning Tome that the scout found and another couple pounds of gold nuggets. There was a minute of lightning bolts being called down randomly but they didn't hit anyone. We wrapped up there for the night. It's looking like they'll leave the Spazzhammer behind and probably try to fight their way out through the front gate. Which may be iffy because both psychic warriors are down to less than five power points and all the Healing Belts are used up (they have about ten of them). On the plus side there are only seven giants left and they are all across the courtyard guarding the castle wall and gate house. We'll see what happens.

[Telok]

Just the psy-war, goliath, and scout this time. Summer up here plays merry hob with with sedentary indoor hobbies like gaming. They went and offed the six giants and four ogres who were the last inhabitants of the castle. After the slaughter there was a more leisurely and thorough search of the main floor (not including the gate, wall, or barracks though) that found the gold seam in the quarry and passed over Spazzhammer again. There was some discussion about starting a mining operation or selling the rights to the castle until they realized that they were almost 100 miles from the nearest Exile fort and Bharga isn't exactly a bustling metropolis. In the end they hobbled back to Bharga to be hailed as heroes, eat free food, sleep in the nice beds in the inn for free, and then leave. Everyone also leveled up to 10.

The aftermath of this is that the forty or so bodies in the castle will putrefy and nobody will go in there a couple months except for a few adventurers, one of whom will end up with Spazzhammer. Giant attacks on Bharga will decrease by about half and someone or something will take over the castle eventually, probably more giants. I think they believe that there isn't really anything more up in this area, they've heard of some giant fishing camps but have no interest in them. So I think they will miss Pyrog, Lost Bahssikava, greymold (Patrick's Tower), an Empire outpost, several groups of Empire soldiers, and map item H. Map item H is a small house defended by two pairs of rope and mud golems backed up by a shadesteel golem (the first two are cheap, for golems, and all are easy to repair) and home to a married couple who are powerful casters who are hiding out. The wife is an artificer, the only NPC artificer in the setting, and rather high level. The Empire soldiers are kill teams looking for them, hence the golem defenses. And of course it's also a big hint that there's another way down to (and from!) Exile.

Our heroes left Bharga with pockets full of unidentified magic (Sage? What sage? we never bought scrolls from anyone in Bharga. Right?) and went rafting. Actually they decided to go visit Erika's Tower and wanted to boat down the river instead of walking south and crossing at a ford, they saved about a day of travel time. This also missed the old witch (Simulacrum of Erika with permanent Alter Self and Disguise Self) who could have told them to check for illusions at Erika's Tower. So they went in the front door, yes the front door that's a CL25 Wall of Fire. After they slept in the guest rooms to recover from the twenty hour boat trip and some second degree burns it was time to go see Erika. They fought the hellcats and the goblin liars by standing around and trading full attacks, except for the scout (Hear the Unseen) they still have no way to deal with invisible creatures. They dealt with the basilisks in the darkness spell by standing around and trading full attacks. When I found out that I didn't have flesh golem stats in my beastiary I subbed in one stone golem for the four flesh golems, and they walked in the room, into it's reach, and traded full attacks with it and the four wights. When they faced the garden with two behir and a bunch of violet fungi... The psychic warrior went ectoplasmic and tried to just pass by but one behir kept swallowing him (and he kept coming out it's nose), the window is an invisible wall, and the obvious door out is an illusion. The goliath had used Expansion to increase his size to huge and was squeezing through the 10*10 hallway and having real troubles with the normal sized door from the hallway to the garden. Shenanigans between him, the door, and the scout ended up putting the scout in the garden right in front of the other behir. It took five rounds for the behir to kill the scout (I could have done it in two) and only on the fifth round did the goliath actually start effectively attacking the behir, he had spent the rest of the time using his goliath greathammer as a one handed improvised weapon to poke the behir through the doorway. One round later both behir were dead.

And we had to end there. We'll start next week right where we left off because I think that the scout had all the magic loot on him and his body is in the stomach of a giant lizard taking 8 acid damage a round. Plus Erika can get him back from the dead by using Limited Wish to Revenance/Revivify him, if they cut him out in time.

[Telok]

There was a funeral, it was not for this thread.
We now return you to your regularly scheduled programming.

The two psychic warriors decided to return to the guest rooms and rest for about twelve hours. Needless to say Erika and her simulacrum did some house cleaning in the mean time, the behir bodies (and the scout and his loot bag) were gone and Erika was warming up some behir eggs to replace the dead ones. The ranger-on-a-spider and pixie warlock made it this time and joined in the "exploration" of the tower. Nobody bothered to search or examine the last room so they didn't find the door to Erika's study. Stumped, they left.

They walked back towards Spire and met the old witch simulacrum of Erika who warned them about illusions (too late) and mocked them for failing to meet Erika. Note to DMs: if you want your players to investigate something (and be really twitchy and paranoid) put a full human scale gingerbread house out in the middle of the wilderness. It can be carved or Stone Shaped and painted instead of real bread, but you can be sure they'll stop and check it out.

The party ended up skipping Spire and crossing the Abyss through Fort Spire. On the way to Fort Saffron they were attacked by bandits, a set of encounters that they avoided by using Phantom Steeds going 40 mph last time. They beat the bandits and the ranger tracked them back to the lair. Since the bandits were all 5th level mooks except for the leader (8th level ranger) and the second in command (deep cover 7th level Empire Slayer operative) the party pretty well dominated the defensive fight at the entrance. However that allowed the remaining bandits to pull back and set up an ambush deeper in the cave. Everyone waited while the pixie went scouting and opened a door that she heard quiet shuffling noises behind, letting the Slayer stab her with purple worm poison (Blind Fighting is really useful on people who can't see invisible). She made it back to the party before being fully paralyzed by strength damage, but those ten Lesser Restoration potions worked out in her favor (she thought that they were healing potions when she bought them off the d20SRD). The party ended up engaging half the bandits in a huge semi-ambush situation that ended with (after fireballs, inhaled poison, sneak attacks, and hexblade curses) the psi-war making a piety roll and burning 20 piety to up his manifester level by 2 for one round. The AoE Hostile Empathic Transfer killed most of the mooks and the goliath psychic warrior ("Oops!" was an understatement). We mopped up the stragglers (one rogue escaped via smoke-sticks and running) and we ended there for the week.

When we next played they healed a bit and looted. Well, they detected for magic, looted bodies, and took any valuables laying out in plain sight in the caves. By not searching they missed the hidden panel with the Slayer's stash of Imperial papers, poisons, and money. Then they took a canoe across the little underground lake (the giant cave fish (shark) failed to do anything) and fought the mhorg in the stash area. Good fight and they got some magic loot including a Tome of Protection plus the letters between the bandit leader, Meena (Spire mayor), and her mage who manages the cross-Abyss transport. Unfortunately the letters are loosely stuck into an old harlequin romance and since it wasn't magic it got tossed. So they'll never know about Meena and her necromancer cohort being the driving force behind the bandit problem and since the bandit issue will never go away now the party loses out on fame, money, and a quest finish (xp). I had also decided to integrate the bandit bypass (of Fort Saffron) into this dungeon, by making the lake have a stream going out several miles to the small lake near Blosk. They decided not to go that way which is another clue missed.

They went to Fort Saffron. Characters were switched out and brought in: The goliath has been replaced by a dwarf duskblade, the ranger-on-a-spider retired and was replaced with a rogue (the kid's 11, we're lenient with him), and the scout has been replaced by a warforged artificer (with built in Artificer's Monocole). The excuse is that the duskblade and rogue were part of an adventuring party that found an old First Expedition Imperial exploration party death site with some incorporeal undead between Spire and Bharga. They escaped with an inert Imperial warforged as 'loot' and had made it back to Fort Saffron. Anyways, loot was split and the party went to Blosk to sell what they didn't want immediately. They left Blosk, avoided Gnass (a pity, that's an interesting place), and passed through Fort Emerald. Literally, "passed through Fort Emerald." They practically ignored the giant magic/psychic emerald that increased the power of your spells and powers if you meditated near it, didn't talk to anyone but a single mage, and didn't even blink when the soldier who let them out said "Watch out for the trenches."

You see Fort Emerald is the main front of the Exile/Slitherazi war. The slith have set up some trenches about a third of a mile from the fort (a bit out of Enlarged Fireball range) and killed off all the glow mushrooms nearby, there's also a road to the slith fortifications that is also fully darkened. The party walked into the darkened area (about half have darkvision 60') and almost stumbled straight into the trenches. The only warning was a couple of them having 20+ listen checks to hear the slith waiting for them (darkvision 90' and having seen them come across the no-man's land). So there was a fight. Since this is a WW I style trench with an active and organized military manning it I decided that there would be reinforcements every 12 rounds from alternating ends of the trenches. We left off after 23 rounds and will start there next week. Only one character (the 11 year old rogue) has crossed the trenches, because he's the only one who bothered to. The slith aren't blocking them, they just want to stay and kill everything that shows up.

Currently the party is mostly at about half health and power, the enemy casters are down to Faith Healing spells and a few 3rd level arcane scrolls, and the warriors are out of maneuvers. The party tends to kill about half the slith of every wave. The next wave is 6 braves, 2 warriors, 2 mages, a priest, and a high priest. Same as the last wave except that one had a high mage instead of a high priest, and the same as the original troops who had two priests instead of a high anything. Since there are about 600 slith in these trenches it'll be interesting to see how long the guys take to get the hint that just standing in one place and fighting everything to the death isn't a good solution.

[Telok]

I guess I'll update this thing again, mostly so that I know what's going on.
Cast: Human psychic warrior, dwarven duskblade, pixie warlock, human rogue, warforged artificer (NPC'ed)

We picked up where we had left off, the middle of a muddled and directionless fight in some WWI style trenches. Two rounds after that some more enemy reinforcements showed up. A couple lightning bolts and javelins were launched at the people in the light radius (a dropped sunrod) but the enemy remained bunched in the darkness for a slitherazi high priest to cast Shield of Faith, Legion. Then it took two more rounds for them to cross the area and get into combat. During this time the artificer (his player couldn't make it so I took over) got across and away by simply popping two smokes sticks and doing untrained stealth checks. Ten more rounds later the pixie and rogue were unconscious in the trenches (the throwing dagger rogue went to help in a stand-up fight and the pixie became visible to flank with him), the duskblade and psi-war were down to 0 level spells, 5 power points, and both were bloodied. Which of course is when more slith arrived, this time from the nearer edge of the trenches. The duskblade made a heroic last ditch effort and Healing Belted them conscious before falling unconscious himself to an AoO. The psi-war covered their escape for two rounds and realized that he couldn't take the duskblade with him in Ectoplasmic Form, so he killed his ally and took the body back. Two slith mages had lightning bolts left and blasted them along his line of retreat, he made both saves and ended up in single digit HP, "Serpentine! Serpentine!"

They limped back to Fort Emerald. The pixie never reappeared, the dwarf stayed dead, the warforged was missing, and they suggested that the fortress soldiers (who had just beaten back a raid yesterday) go attack the slith lines because they'd killed almost 25 slith (mainly 4HD braves). The soldiers made snarky comments about leaving the fort undefended to attack an entrenched enemy position at 1 to 4 odds. The dwarf was never raised (despite local NPC priest, Hodgson, being 9th level plus another priest in nearby Gnass of that level) because there wasn't a high enough level cleric around.

DM: "Did you ask anyone?"
PCs: "No."

And they still didn't ask. So the dwarf duskblade was replaced by an female elf ninja, not an unexpected development. The pixie was replaced with a human pyromancer sorcerer with a fire mephit. I offered hell hounds, medium fire elementals, and flamebrother salamanders but if she couldn't have a red dragon wyrmling then it was a mephit. Ah well, at least the party's light source issue is solved when it's alive.

So a day of healing and they left to fort, this time stealthily and keeping to the cavern wall to try and avoid the trenches. I figured that with a 10th level rogue and ninja they could manage that easily. One day of walking brought them near the Slith Fortifications and two miles of distance penalties and mentioning trying to be stealthy got them past that without problems. A second day got them over to the Gremlin Cave. Gremlins are just modified Blues; purple, propeller beanies, sling and knitting needle, Demoralize, Entangling Goo, Inertial Armor, and Psionic Evasion instead of Psionic Dodge (which I feel justified in because they are just nuisance creatures, like AD&D kobolds). I should probably explain gremlin knitting, I got it from Brian Froud and the actual reference can be found here: http://www.crazyattic.com/tgl/gc/plate17.htm. The needles do 1d4(small), threaten on a 21, and have a x5 multiplier in addition to being exotic and having a -1 to hit from the extra barbs and hooks welded on them.

The psi-war walked up and started talking to the gremlins (opening with a knock knock joke helped) but failed the untrained Sense Motive vs the untrained Bluff check. Nobody else wanted to talk to gremlins (apathy, not roleplaying) so the sorceress just Fireballed them. Three fireballs later (the 18 Wis ninja failed three DC 14 Will saves and became panicked) the gremlins sued for a contest of champions. A knitting contest, something I've been planning since before this campaign started. Turns out the sorceress had craft:knitting on her sheet. Not Kn:Arcana, not Bluff, not cross classing something useful, but knitting which will come up exactly twice (if they hit the other gremlin cave too, unlikely) in this whole campaign. Well she only has a +8 and the 2 HD gremlin knitting champion has a +6 so on with the contest. The contest was simple DC 10 Dex check or knitting roll to complete a stitch and failure grants you opponent a coup de grace attack on you, auto hit but no Fort save needed. So the gremlin did (1d4-2)*5 and the sorceress did 1 (she insisted on using a normal knitting needle, size 4 if you're wondering), she still won but only had 8 HP left. When she saw that the reward was a big basket of humanoid-hair yarn she fireballed the place again.

DM: "Are you sure?"
PC: "Yes, Fireball."
DM: "Roll damage and a reflex save."

First, the yard had a clue in it, near the bottom were two balls of wool with labels and Imperial tax stamps (the whole reason they're here is because there's a secret Empire base hidden in the same cave, this is not the first clue they have missed in this dungeon). Second, the room she was in wasn't big enough. Luckily she had taken some advice and took the Bonded Familiar feat, so the damage was transferred to the familiar and it died. We left off there.

It is October 28th in game. The sorceress has 8 HP, no spells, and is being chased by 30 angry gremlins. Everyone else is in the mouth of the gremlin cave talking, about 30 feet from the concealed entrance to the Empire secret base. Said base is very well alerted to the PCs presence and is planning on killing them. This is gonna get ugly.

[Telok]

This isn't an adventuring party. It's a suicide cult!

The Imperials were four Empire Soldiers, two Empire Archers, one Mage Officer (transmuter, CL7), and an Imperial Slayer. That was a good fight, it hurt the PCs and frustrated them when the NPCs used decent tactics and tried a fighting retreat behind a shield wall in a 10 foot wide corridor. There was no taking of prisoners, quarter was not offered and captives for questioning were apparently unimportant. They looted the kitchen like good food was major magic items (I do play up the yuck of weak mushroom beer and greasy fried lizard meat), grabbed a batch of coded messages (DC15 Decipher Script or a coerced captive, they had neither), and found the booby-trapped crystal ball. They didn't actually bother to inspect or fool with anything, just loot-and-go. During the fight the ninja had gone Ethereal in the hideout. Because I revamped the planes (and provided detailed info the the go-ethereal guy on this exact matter) the Ethereal is no longer a LOL-imma-ghost thing, it's now a real distince plane of existence. Because the hideout was less than 200 years old it didn't exist on the Ethereal plane, the ninja had just plane shifted into a solid rock. He only took about 4d6 damage.

After a short trip to drop off the coded messages at Fort Emerald** they headed back up past the trenches, around the Slith Fortifications, and down the east branch of the tunnel. When they found the beach of the southern slith lake it was "Oh carp, not more swimming." Then they spied the supply depot. This is where supplies and troops from the Slith Castle come to on barges before going to the war. The warforged artificer simply walked down alone and started talking to the slith. This was a novelty as the last time the slith had any records of a warforged was during the First Expedition and those warforged were with humans and never spoke, they just fought under human command. So the slith wrote them off as just another type of golem. Anyway the slith casters and officers had a nice hour long chat with the warforged, during which the rogue and ninja stole a barge. If they had stolen a small boat or tried to swim Phantom Mounts again they would have met several giant catfish (huge shark stats).

Their boat trip mostly followed the south wall and the found the swamp. By forgetting to write down the directions they had received they wandered the swamp for a day and a half before finding the Crypt of Drath. Now when Solberg sent the message telling our "heroes" where to find the lich he also mentioned that Drath was a nasty Imperial high mage and they needed to be careful. The artificer, dating from the First Expedition, remembered Drath and that he experimented with custom necromancy. Drath managed to apple the Vampire Spawn template to eagles, the Wight or Ghast templates to Owlbears, and was working on undead elementals. Because the First Expedition lost so many powerful magic items (and was an enormously embarrassing fiasco) people are very interested in it, especially adventurers and mages. Mages run all the libraries and almost all of the sages in towns are spellcasting ex-adventurers. Plus there's a mural in the entryway of the Tower of the Magi depicting famous moments in the history of magic, Drath is in that painting. So any research would turn up that Drath was an Enchanter who practiced necromancy as a hobby, summoned demons, and always had at least two golems for bodyguards.

Our woefully unprepared and unsuspecting party just walked into the entryway and sent the rogue and ninja scouting in different directions. While the rogue strolled past the two sealed crypts with specters in them and returned safely the ninja found the sealed crypt with the vampire slith warrior in it. He went Ethereal to try to bypass the door and ended up in solid rock again. This time the nearest open space on the Ethereal was back in the entryway, 80 feet away. 16d6 killed him as he was pushed face first through solid rock and the rock didn't break. Eventually the party realized that the horrible mess that materialized in their midst was the ninja and decided not to screw with the crypts, because they're obviously trapped. This brought them to the dark pit (80' across, dripping water, no discernible ceiling of floor) with a wet 3 foot wide stone bridge across it. While everyone else was arguing the psychic warrior started walking across it.

We left off there because some of us had to work the next day. It is November 2nd and a Living Spell Scintillating Pattern is about to drop onto him. The pit drops him 300 feet into the dark lake with an Evolved Vampire Giant Octopus in it. Yeah, totally unprepared. They just had issues dealing with some half optimized defensive mooks five levels lower than they were, more deaders a-coming.

** Remember that the secret Blades of Exile sent the PCs to the Empire hideout because they already knew that there were Imperial agents there and wanted to know where they were coming from and what they were doing. King Micah and the Exile government are busy fighting a war with the slith. It's stalemate for now, but Fort Dranlon will fall about two weeks after Grah-Hoth is released from his prison. That will open Cotra(fish), Silvar(wood), and Almaria(route to everything not in the Great Cave with the Castle) to attacks as well as threatening the trade from Formello(food) and Fort Draco(65% of all metal in Exile). Exile will have to drain all spare resources to secure the new front in the war. Plus Fort Remote will be razed by demons too. In short Exile will be far too busy to do anything about Imperial infiltrators beyond basic spy checking and anti-sabotage measures. In short the players just gave the Ark of the Covenant to the U.S. government.

[Telok]

I reduced the Living Spell from Scintillating Pattern to Prismatic Spray, this dropped it's spell level by one, caster level by two, and overall lethality by 20% to 30%. It still killed the psychic warrior outright, drove the artificer insane, and royally screwed the party. See, the rogue lassoed the psi-war's unconscious body (LifeShield reduced to a +3 shield saving his life) and was going to pull it back along the bridge but the sorceress grabbed the rope and yanked sending him and his dropped Okawaru relic mace into the pit. The rogue got him up and used a healing belt on him, but the mace was gone. The sorceress sucked some hits and Con damage by moving and casting within the Living Spell's reach, transferred the damage to her familiar and lost her powers again because that killed it. The artificer's blast rod and a single digit HPs psi-war finally killed it. The artificer's last sanr action was to Inflict Moderate Damage on himself and render himself inert.

Three rounds after the fight (healing belts) the psi-war manifested Ectoplasmic Form and went into the chasm after his mace. Nobody else had the ability or the will to follow. Several hundred feet down he entered the lake on the lower level of the crypt and activated his Spellsight Spectacles, spending five rounds to locate and home in on his mace. This is when the Evolved Vampire Giant Octopus showed up. It missed with it's first attack and the psi-war delayed to let it grapple him so he could Hostile Empathic Transfer (he still had less than half his total HP). Obviously he didn't know that it was undead. Four tentacles hit, he lost eight levels and took 2 to 9 damage each time after the ectoplasmic form's DR. He died, and stayed dead because he has Smite out instead of the LifeShield. Not that it would have done him any good.

In death he took both loot and knowledge away from the party. Here's the list.

Spoiler

Show

Money: 28,446 Exile dollars, 59,065 gold, 37,285 silver, 18 pounds of adamantite, 8 pounds of gold nuggets.
Poisons: fire elemental essence, 19 shadow essences, 19 black adder venom, 2 vargouille poison, 2 medium spider venom, 4 oil of taggit, one insanity mist, and 2 unidentified giant wasp poison.
Potions: 17 Mage Armor, Swimming, Shield of Faith (+3), Water Breathing, Energy Resistance (fire 10), 8 Lesser Restoration, Remove Paralysis, 5 Cure Moderate, 4 See Invisible, Bear's Endurance.
Armors: +1 Called bronze full plate or Heavy Fortifiaction, LifeShield (heavy +3 Deathward & Revifiy), +3 Called battleplate, half-plate or Displacement & Mindarmor & Speed, Fire Shield (buckler with resist fire 20 and 5 charges a day).
Weapons: Blessed Mace of Okawaru (1/day Spiritual Weapon CL 5, 3/day GMW [+4, 4rounds]), Crystal Bow (stores 5 psionic power points, when fired it will activate Force Screen at ML 5 if Force Screen isn't already up), Blurstrike sai, Bloodstone short sword, Smite (anti-giant minor artifact), large Lucky deepcrystal Goliath greathammer.
Augmentation Crystals: Greater Fiendslayer, 3 Lesser Arrow Deflections, Greater Screening, Greater Lifekeeping.
Other: Boot of Agile Leaping, adamantine hacksaw, 7 Belts of Healing, Ring of the Ram, Toxic Gloves, Cobra Necklace (+2 natural armor and poison related d20 rolls and casts Neutralize Poison once a day), Spellsight Spectacles, Eternal Wand of Ebon Eyes, maps, letter of Mayoral favor (pass into the Castle to see the king), Glow Globe (like a runestaff for light spells), Dragon Tooth Knife (non-magic 1d4+5 base damage and 20 x3 criticals), Piercing Crystal (CL 20 Dispel Magic Barrier/Wall).

He's been looting dead party members and hoarding stuff (even worse he wasn't using it!). Now it's lost.

The remaining two members argued and fought and got lost (the psi-war had the compass and maps, plus they couldn't remember which way they came until I relented and had them roll Int checks) for a week before they got back to Fort Emerald. They waited four days for a supply wagon going back to the Castle (forty miles by road at 1/3rd normal speed and they couldn't get in without a letter of recommendation from a city mayor or fort commander), then they bought a hand cart and hoofed it through Almaria to the Tower of the Magi. It was November 20th by the time they got the artificer healed and restored. Then they went to Mertis to visit the psi-war's friend, the original gnome sorcerer. That sorcerer is now a 6 HD centaur sorcerer due do deaths and reincarnations, so he's retired. This was a good time to bring in replacements so I decided he was running an adventurer's half-way house. Two adventurers were recruited and the gnome-turned-centaur offered to help the party if they brought back the psychic warrior's body.

The new recruits are a spellthief/wizard/human paragon/unseen seer/something else build with Master Spellthief, the Acid Splatter reserve feat, who has Sniper's Shot and Listening Lorecall memorized and a Dread Necromancer 8/Devotee of Kikubaaqudgha 2 (human). The spellthief is from the player of the psi-war, since he was our DM for years before this campaign started and this character isn't an arrogant bastard (his description) he's going to play it smart. I have high hopes for this to curb the constant meatgrinder that this game has become because of the total lack of character I.Q. and self preservation instincts. He's also the only person in the group with access to darkvision now. The DN on the other hand... It's the gnome sorcerer all over again only with necromancy. Devotee of Kikubaaqudgha requires sacrifices of people with character levels three times a year (May 23rd, Aug 26th, Nov 2nd) and every time you go up a level. The sacrifices must be performed at a consecrated altar and there's a DC 15 Kn:Religion check to correctly pronounce the god's name. It does have d10 HD and full BAB, 3/5 casting advancement, and a few nice necro goodies. It's also going to be a problem for him because there are laws against undead (not against necromancy, against undead) in Exile. Still, if he makes it three more levels the Erinye Death Knight is a fun bonus.

Everyone is human now except for the warforged artificer. He promptly took command and decreed a test dungeon to get everyone used to each other. The nearest thing was for them to go into the Honeycomb and look for the lair of Athron, which they proceeded to do. Since they didn't have the psi-war's partial map of the Honeycomb maze it took them almost a week to find the place. They have currently performed mostly badly against five fire drakes (half Int standard salamanders with a non-reach bite) encountered singly or in pairs. The rogue used the Imperial Crystal Ball in combat (don't ask) and flubbed the password (naturally, they gave those coded documents to the commander of Fort Emerald last month) which resulted in a Babau showing up in the middle of combat. Luckily the rogue had evasion and the artificer had fire resistance because the sorceress used four fireballs to kill it.

We had to stop there. There's still a few light defenses and a Wall of Force before they meet Athron, who I have to stat up now because they may be stupid enough to attack her. It's the 27th of November now, people bitten by salamanders include the spellthief (once, but he got a double sneak attack out of it), rogue (thrice, and he's supposed to be ranged), artificer (once), the DN's medium earth necromental cohort (five times), and the sorceresses fire mephit familiar (twice). Tactics. Need. Work.

Edit: To illustrate the loss of knowledge and maps thier "mapping update" that I do has gone from this

to this

[JBPuffin]

With the loot-identifying abilities of a blind billionaire and the tactical genius of the Dukes of Hazard, it's no wonder that this suicide cultbunch of idiots "adventuring party" still has even a shred of its origins left.

Still, yo have a nice backdrop to hang their antics on; tat has to count for something...right?

[Telok]

I can't decide if these guys want to play the Keystone Kops or Three Stooges. We have a fire sorceress, a dread necromancer, a warforged artificer, and the spellthief/wizard/human paragon/unseen seer/arcane trickster build. The rogue had to clean his room this week.

The dread necro lost his necromental cohort to to a large fire drake (noble salamander with the serial numbers filed off, 1/2 Int and spells replaced with a breath weapon) before the party found the Wall of Force. The spellthief skipped past it with a spell and found the secret passage around it from the other side. They hemmed and hawed about the big statues at the end until the spellthief got bored and just walked past them and triggered the fight. Paired Shield Guardians are decently tough but not a big threat because they don't do much damage. They didn't talk to Athron before leaving.

They stopped at the Tower of the Magi on the way to Almaria. Ignored the libraries, ignored the staff, never mentioned Drath, just a beeline to the magic items. They bought some scrolls, the artificer made some scrolls and an undead-bane heavy repeating crossbow for the sorceress. While they were there I started pointing out some things to people. I told the necro that the sorceress was trying to kill him, the the spellthief that the necro was going to get them in trouble by bringing undead into town, the artificer that the spellthief wanted to steal his scrolls, and the sorceress that the spellthief want to steal her spells because he thought the he could use them more wisely (this is actually true). It didn't take too long for them to cotton onto the fact that this was telepathic influence. Demonic telepathic influence. They departed for Almaria.

They passed through Almaria without incident then went upstream to buy a boat off a farmer. A day and a half later they got back to the crypt. This time they started opening the sealed crypts on the first level. The first crypt was one of the two with a specter in it. The spellthief opened the sarcophagi while everyone else waited outside the door, about 20 feet away.... One standard CR7 specter ended up taking two levels off the sorceress and spellthief before it killed the necro with negative levels. They finished off their potions of Lesser Restoration and cleared the second crypt in four rounds without getting hit. There were several instances of "friendly fire" by the sorceress.

When they opened the burial chamber with the vampire slitherazi in it I discovered that the Nook (my electronic documents backup, especially with me printer futzed out) didn't like the format of that particular file and had to sub in the MM standard vampire (I traded in his spiked chain for a bastard sword though). It turns out that a 5HD fighter vamp is about what they needed here, a 7HD slith vamp with a splash of ToB could have done serious damage to a party that is this disorganized. After they zeroed it's HP the vampire turned into mist and fled through a rotting plaster wall with loose brickwork behind it. The party searched the sarcophagus (which is the vampire's coffin but he has two hours before he needs to be in it and is smart enough to not go in helpless while adventurers are present) and the wall but all the loot is on the vampire.

We ended there for the night. The party can discover the hidden passage behind the rotted plaster walls and bypass the horrible pit, if they do pretty much anything at all. It's now the 19th of December, two days to winter solstice. I hope they don't try to go down or through the pit, it's such an obvious trap. Of course that didn't stop them last time.

I also have a timeline and Athron's stats ready.

Spoiler

Show

get exiled: Apr 3rd
Bandit Fort cleared: Apr 6th
wandering Nephil, meet first Slith: t+4
under construction fort: Apr 8th, 2 dead, lose
under construction fort again: Apr 16th, win
Silvar raid and rescue: Apr 22nd, draw
Nephil Fort: Apr 22nd, 2 dead, lose
Nephil Fort, detour/abandon rescue: Apr 22nd, win
Dark Spiral Pit, dark maze: May 2nd
Dark Spiral Pit: May 6th, 1 dead, win
**** Dead PCs return someday ****
Tower of the Magi: May 15th
Solberg's message, giant slug, Formello: May 29th
Ancient Crypt: June 1st, 1 dead, draw
Ancient Crypt (win), Motrax, Fort Draco: June 7th
**** Loot from Motrax cave to NPCs ****
Solberg, Formello, Cotra: June 13th, missed multiple quests
Lost on lake, Island Fort: June 14th, Island Fort timer starts
Fort Dranlon, Swamp City: June 19th
Swamp City: June 19th, win fight & fail quest
Slith City repeat: June 21st
Slith City (belated win), Empty Island Fort: June 30th
Dranlon 50% casualties, Cotra and Crab: July 9th, win, 1 dead
**** Eastern Front weakened, almost 10% Exile army dead ****
Almaria, basilisk, Tower of the Magi: Aug 12th, 2 stoned
Murder Hobo Rampage!!!: Aug 15th
Ring of Fire's Friend: Aug 17th
Ogre Cave, cursed swords: Aug 23rd, win
Salamanders, Akronath: Aug 30th
Akronath: Aug 30, 3 dead, stupidity caused failure
**** Lost part of Demonslayer, sep 7 = contact plane, sep 12 = arcanoloth ****
**** sep 14 = start repairs, sep 20 = start demon raids, sep 30 = slith silver delivery ****
Tower of the Magi, Silvar, Cotra: Sep 7th
Formello, Nephil Castle: Sep 15th
Nephil Castle, Formello: Sep 18th, wrong necklace = lose
Nephil Castle, Formello, Sep 20th, right necklace = win
Fort Draco, GIFTS, areana: Sep 22nd
Angry Deva, Slith Temple, Castle, Akronath: Sep 24th
**** Recovered Demonslayer part ****
Silverlocke, Patric's Tower, Fort Remote, Cave Drake: Sep 27th, win, 2 dead,
Sulfras, Dharmon: Sep 30th, win
Blosk, Fort Saffron, banshees: Oct 2nd, 2 dead
Fort Spire, Spire: Oct 7th, 1 stoned
Bharga: Oct 16th, 1 dead
Giant Castle: Oct 17th, 2 dead, lose
Giant Castle: Oct 18th, not dying
Giant King: Oct 18th, win but left Spazzhammer behind
**** oct 25 = giant bug carrion eat buffet, nov 2 = NPC gets spazzhammer ****
**** nov 9 = NPC IDs spazzhammer, nov 17 = Pyrog dead via spazzhammer ****
**** nov 24 = NPC is a hero in abyss, dec 5 = NPC is hero in exile ****
Erika's Tower: Oct 20th, 1 dead, lose
Fort Spire, Bandit Bypass: Oct 21, 1 dead, win and lose at the same time (missed bypass)
**** Meena's necromancer active nearby, transit abyss and inhabit/undeads, nov 5 ****
Fort Saffron, Fort Emerald, Trenches: Oct 25, 1 dead
Trenches, Gremlins, Empire Hideout: Oct 28th
Crypt of Drath: Nov 5th, 2 dead, suicide cult PCs
**** Bandit Bypass now undead lair, necromancer will return home soon ****
**** Pyrog dead and looted, NPC hero in abyss, news reaches PC current area about dec 14 ****
Tower of the Magi, Mertis, Athron's lair: Nov 27th, cohort dead
Tower of the Magi, crafting, Almaria, Crypt of Drath: Dec 19th, 1 dead

Athron the great dragon.

Spoiler

Show

Athron: 48hd (939hp), s47 d12 c33 i32 w33 c32, move 40, swim 50, fly 30(poor), B/A/G 48/67/83, F/R/W 35/25/35, breath 26d12 Rhalf 48, AC:44[48] F:43[48] T:3 S:2, DR/adamant 25, energy resist 40, fortification 75%, darkvision 120, blindsense 60, immune sleep paralysis polymorph, casting as an 20th level favored soul (dragon, force, luck, knowledge). Colossal 30'space/20'reach(30'bite): Full attack = Bite +67 4d8+18, Claw*2 +66 4d6+9, Tail +66 4d6+27. Single = Bite or Tail +68 4d6+27 (PA*2). Knowledges(all) 62, appraise 62, concentrate 62, decipher 62, listen 62, search 62, spot 62, spellcraft 30, UMD 30. Blind-Fight (reroll miss), Tunnel Fighting (no squeeze penalties), WF:claw-tail, Multiattack, Power Crit:claw-tail (+4 to confirm), Power Attack, Craft Construct, Augment Summoning[B], Martial Study: Counter Charge (counter:oppose str check + size mods win=move charger 10 feet any dir), Rapid Counter (counter: extra attack on AoO), Emerald Razor (attack = touch, normal damage), Greater Insightful Strike (normal attack, damage = Concentration check *2), Improved Toughness, Improved Initiative[5].
Spell [10/lev = 7hr & 50min][close=130, med=580, lng=2320]
1[dc22]8: cause fear, mage armor**, entropic shield[20%], detect doors
2[23]9: death knell, magic missile[5], aid, detect thoughts
3[24]9: bestow curse, blast of force, prot from energy[120], clairvoyance
4[25]8: lesser planar ally, resilient sphere, freedom of movement, divination
5[26]8: slay living, wall of force, break enchantment, true seeing
6[27]8: planar ally, repulsion, mislead, find the path
7[28]8: blasphemy, forcecage, spell turning, legend lore
8[29]6: greater planar ally, telekinetic sphere, moment prescience[+25]**, discern location
9[30]5: gate, crushing hand, miracle, foresight[+2ac&sv]**
1/day reroll one d20 and keep it
1/day reroll one damage roll and keep the better roll
divination at +1 CL

loot = 60,000 assorted coins, cursed scroll:miracle, ring of regeneration, large shield (+4 animated speed ghostward), greater bracers of archery.