Campaign Journal: Ragesian Incursion

[SleepyShadow]

We had a new player join our group join our group this week. Hopefully, she'll be a regular addition to the team.

Spoiler: Hurricane Hullabaloo

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As the PCs were leaving Lee Sidonia's abandoned house, they encountered a bemused lizardfolk who looked like a giant axolotl. This was Zeke, a local shaman sent by the green dragon Naxilla to figure out why there was a hurricane in Sapphire at the end of May. The party quickly accepted the strange lizardfolk into their ranks, due to equal amounts of metagaming and being on decent terms with Naxilla, and set out to find Lee.

"So, this is a control weather spell causing the hurricane, right?" Saorise asked. "I mean, we know Lee is a druid ... unless 'hydromancer' is a class I need to know about."
"Hydromancer is a title, and magic is a likely cause for the storm," I said.
"Wouldn't he need line of sight for the spell to work?" Ashlyn asked.
"I think so," Saorise said.
"I'll try to track him," Flint said as he proceeded to roll a 2. "Crap ..."
"Is there anywhere that would give Lee a good line of sight?" Jasaad asked.
"Roll a history check," I said with a shrug, content to let the players noodle out their own ideas.

There wasn't a particular DC needed, since I don't let plot get stopped by bad dice rolls. Rather, the two PCs that rolled highest (Ashlyn and Zeke, I think it was) knew the Tomb of the Pyromancer would offer an unparalleled view of the harbor and would be the perfect spot to use control weather. Of course, I didn't tell them that Master Sidonia was definitely not high enough level to cast 8th level spells; he was acting as a scrying point for the person responsible for the spell.

With their destination determined, the PCs and Eva set off for the tomb. As they travelled across the harbor, everyone except Saorise (because of Indomitability's boon) and Ashlyn (because she had the Tidereaver's Tears) got battered by hurricane winds and struggled to make any headway. Flint, of course, still refused to accept that the Tears might actually be a useful item.

Once there, the PCs ran into a small group of Ragesians who were trying to fortify the tomb and turn it into a forward operating base. As they hacked their way through the Ragesians and there monstrous minions, the party came across the dead body of a Ragesian rebel tucked into one of the storage rooms. A quick Medicine check determined she had been garrotted with a leather cord, rather than the usual metal wire, to ensure her strangulation was unnecessarily slow and painful. They also found her locket, which was a magic amulet paired with another amulet. Separated, the necklace did nothing, but when the two necklaces were near one another the wearers could cast warding bond on each other. The amulet also served as a locket, and had a picture of the dead woman and another Ragesian girl. The PCs thought it was odd, so they stuffed the whole body in their bag of holding and kept going.

"Eva, do you know these girls?" Saorise asked.
"Just because I'm Ragesian doesn't mean I know them all," Eva replied irritably.
"That's not what I meant!" Saorise said quickly.
"It's okay, Eva, I know how you feel," Flint said sadly. "'Massah' thinks I know all the rangers out there."
"She also thinks you're a charlatan," Jasaad chimed in.
"It's his character background!" Saorise stammered.
"Don't forget the lockpicking," Ashlyn added.
"Yeah, just because I'm black doesn't mean I'm an urban ranger," Flint said defiantly.
"I never said that," Saorise sighed.
"This is one of those times where mammals get sad, right?" Zeke asked. "I know how to do that. Look, see? AH-HAHAHAHAHAHA!"
"That emotion," Jasaad said, "I do not think it means what you think it means."

And thus the rest of the party thinks Saorise is racist. Anyway, after the PCs cleared out the upper floor of Ragesians, including capturing a pair of rookie gishes, and hacked their way through the two dozen lemures somebody had stuffed into one particular room, the party headed down to the second floor and found a door warded by a river of lava.

"Pyromancer's tomb," Jasaad commented. "Makes sense."
"I'm immune to nonmagical fire," Saorise said. "Think I'll be able to get to that door?"
"I think I've got an extra character sheet if you're wrong," Flint replied.

Wisely deciding not to wade into the lava, the party opted to instead use floating disk to get to the door that didn't have a river of lava coming out of it. The PCs had a brief battle with a half-dozen 1st level wizards that got to magic missile Flint for a bunch of damage before dying horribly; once the encounter was clear, the party kept going in search of Lee Sidonia. Instead, they came across a Ragesian inquisitor torturing Naoko for information while the master spy and his three underlings waited around impatiently for something useful to be gleaned. The party, particularly Saorise, were all too ready for a rematch with the spellthief.

The battle was pretty rough at first, since the level 7 PCs had to run a lot of interference to make sure the two level 5s didn't get blasted into oblivion by the inquisitor spamming fireball after casting guardian spirit right on top of the group. The spy underlings weren't too much of a threat; they got in a couple hits now and then, but mostly they just ate up attacks from Ashlyn. Still, they were admirable hp speed bumps. The spymaster once again proved to be a pain in the butt, starting off by stealing Saorise's last 4th level spell and proceeding to wallop anyone he thought might have spell slots left. The fight ended in dramatic fashion when, after the underlings and inquisitor were slain, the spymaster was shoved into the river of lava and consumed by the divine fire.

"Never underestimate Chekhov's gun," Ashlyn laughed.

The party rescued Naoko, who was relieved they were still alive, and hustled out of the collapsing tomb still wondering where Lee had gotten off to. He had been perched on top of the tomb the whole time, meditating and allowing the storm to wreak havoc both on the city and the dark elf blockade. Once back outside, the PCs were alerted to his presence by a bolt of lightning to Saorise's face.

"Hold and go no further, laymen," Lee called out to them from his perch.
"Lee! So it was you!" Saorise cried. "Why are you doing this?"
"To maintain balance," he replied. "I do not wish to see Sapphire fall into Ragesian hands, nor do I wish to see it ally with other world powers."
"You led the Ragesians here?" Flint asked.
Lee nodded. "Yes. They wanted a FOB, so I played the part of helpful quisling and told them of the tomb. It was secret and secure, but I knew it would be demolished by the coming storm."
"Your storm is hurting innocent people!" Ashlyn shouted.
"It matters not in the end," Lee replied. "This world will be neither unified nor conquered."
"Your draining my dragon friend's swamp!" Zeke snapped. "I'll eat your fingers!"
Lee struck a dramatic pose and prepared for combat as his two gargoyles and his giant crab animal companion surfaced from the ocean. "If you wish to stop the hurricane, you must weather the storm of my fury!"

The fight with Lee was pretty intense, and the difficulty was amplified since the party had not had a chance to rest. Lee Sidonia (a druid/monk) was also aided by the choppy water battering the party and the occasional hurricane-generated lightning strike that would target PCs at random. He had plenty of spells to throw at the party, so he pelted them with magic while waiting for someone to engage him in melee. The aquatic gargoyles weren't much of a threat to the party, but they were very durable and just accurate enough with their claw attacks that Flint and Ashlyn had to take them down. Eva and Lulu the crab into a hilariously awkward duel where neither of them could roll above 10. Once the gargoyles were defeated, Naoko and Flint braved the hurricane winds to face Lee directly while the others stayed back, either to help poor Eva with the giant crab or to pepper Lee with spells from afar. When the hydromancer was at last defeated, the hurricane coalesced into an annihilating cyclone directly where he had fallen. Naoko and Flint both tried to sacrifice themselves to save the other, and in doing so managed to get both of them safely away from the tornado.

A few moments later, as the cyclone receded back into the sky and the storm began to fade away, the sound of approaching wings put the exhausted party on edge for another fight. Thankfully, it was an ally: Takasi, Laurabec's giant eagle companion. The golden bird carried a halberd in his beak, and once he landed he solemnly placed it on the ground in front of the party.

"Wait, where's Laurabec?" Ashlyn asked.
"She and I braved the storm together, and rescued many sailors from drowning," the giant eagle replied, "but the hurricane was too strong. She was swept off my back, and I could not save her. Her weapon was all that I was able to recover."
"I'm so sorry, Takasi," Ashlyn said.
"Why?" Flint asked. "I thought you didn't like her."
"She was kind of annoying, but she was a good person," Ashlyn admonished.
"Who's Laurabec?" Zeke asked.
"She was a paladin of freedom that didn't want to be leader of the refugee camps because bossing people around went against her oath or something," Saorise informed the lizardfolk.
"I'd like you to have her weapon," Takasi said to the group. "I'm sure it would bring a smile to Laurabec's sweet face to know it was in the hands of such righteous people."
"Thank you," Ashlyn said. "What will you do now?"
"I'm off to join her in death," Takasi replied.
"What?! You can't do that!" Saorise said. "Why not join us instead?"
Takasi held up one wing and shook his head. "No, no, I'd best go find something evil and way above my pay grade so I may die in glorious combat."
"What if we found you a new paladin to partner up with?" Ashlyn asked.
"I don't know," Takasi said, "they would have to be a champion of freedom and righteousness, an ally to the common folk and a friend to all."
"Ashlyn is chaotic good," Flint said. "Does that count?"
"Flint! Don't do this to me!" Ashlyn hissed. "I'm way different than Laurabec! Just because we had the same alignment doesn't mean -"
"A chaotic good paladin? Splendid!" Takasi cried happily. "I will gladly take you under my wing, ho-ho-ho, as my new paladin partner! Evil tyrants shall tremble before our righteous freedom!"
"Epic mount! Epic mount!" Flint and Jasaad chanted.
"Call upon me anytime you need aid!" Takasi said. "Until we meet again ... partner!"

The giant eagle flew off into the rising sun, and the session ended with loot division and lamentations of having to deal with an uptight giant eagle.

TL;DR: Druids make good boss fights, and NPCs do stuff when you aren't looking.

[AllHailthed4]

At long last, my player update! Grad school is hard on the writing process :P

Spoiler: A Brush with Death

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Dearest Father,

Mac Lir’s blessing upon you and the rest of our family. I eagerly await your next letter, though I realize that the distance and events between us guarantee its delay.

To begin, I have a question for mother. There is a pyromancer here who is making quite a name for herself. We dueled not too long ago, and she defeated me quite soundly. For my part, it was an attempt to coerce her into revealing herself as the spy amongst us. It all added up. The scrying attempts began almost immediately after she joined us and I, like a fool, have been carrying her staff around since then. What better focus point? But when she won, she just smiled, helped me up, and chastised me for losing an opportunity to win the crowd over to our party. Maybe her interest really only extends to improving the Opposition’s image. I still have a hard time trusting her, but I think this is because of her similarity to mother’s side of the family: tall with red hair, amber eyes, and a knack for arcane magic and mischief in equal measure. Is their any chance we are related to the Dawnrights (specifically Katerina)?

Since I last wrote, Eva and I have started to reach an understanding. I am learning that her more appalling suggestions are meant to get a rise out of anyone gullible enough to believe them—nothing more. In turn, she is starting to listen to me, although, she is prone to nitpicking plans’ weaknesses. Then again, I am starting to welcome the extra set of eyes given how much has happened. I do not know that we will ever be friends, but, in the end, I have come to trust her almost as much as Ashlin or Flint.

Aside from that, two new members have joined our band. While we were out in a hurricane trying to track a rogue druid (more on that later), a giant lizard accosted us. At least, I think she’s a lizard. At any rate, Zeke joined us on the search and has proven herself a capable wielder of wild magic. She seems to have taken a liking to us (it is hard to tell sometimes, but at least she has been laughing a lot) and will likely travel with us on our future missions. Quite fortunately, in light of our recent loss. The second is a nobleman called Jassad. His family owns a large spice-trading business, the same one that our tavern has been buying from for years, in fact. As the youngest son, he doesn’t seem to have much ambition or responsibility with regard to the family business, but it is nice to have another fellow Zonan around.

Otherwise, the war continues on. Two more assassination attempts were launched at at the resistance. The second one was… unnervingly creative. One of the Wayfarer Circus performers has badgered everyone here for weeks with tickets for the performance. You see, the group performs on a teleporting ship (as befits their theme). Rather than shooting the targets from the stage or quietly killing them from the audience, the performer just set the ship to teleport straight up. Fortunately, the controls are meant to be used with ease and thus we were able to deduce how to cancel the spell. Meanwhile, the Ragesians had established a secret base in the nearby cliffs, which we captured. Then, the druid we sought, one Lee Sidonia, revealed that he had betrayed both the resistance and the Ragesians, the former by scrying us and reporting our movements to Ragesia, and the latter by advising them to build their base in the nearby cliffs, an area unstable enough to be destroyed by a large storm (which he then provided.) Our “spy” turned out to be Naoko, who Sidonia had approached with an offer before we left for the North. He had promised to track us through her and provide aid when possible. I cannot blame her. One begins to wonder who to trust in all this. I guess I am lucky, in that regard, to in a party that can trust each other implicitly when all else fails.

The Ragesians have also started sending more skilled soldiers. For instance, they have Inquisitors—bear-masked clerics tasked with stamping out magic that is arcane in nature or originates from a deity other than Zaruhi Orlaith. Despite the fact that their queen is a false god at best, they are surprisingly powerful—a testament to the strength of their belief. Ragesia has also graced us with what they call spell thieves, which are skirmishers capable of draining magical energy from their victims and turning it to their own use. Their skills should be outlawed! There are few actions more demeaning than theirs. I urge you and the others to keep your heads down should Ragesia invade the village. They would like nothing better than to wipe out a family “heretics” like ours, and are now well-equipped to do so.

I still do not know when

Ashlin said the funniest thing

Tell my siblings that

Father, there is one more thing you must know. I met Mac Lir the night after the duel, at a dirty street corner, on the end of spell thief’s rapier. Flint and Ashlin were in trouble on the far side of the town, and I overestimated my ability to effectively fight without my chief weapon. Virion died too. I understand that my continued presence in this world subverts the very cycle of life and death we revere. But there’s so much left to do in this war. How could I possibly rest while my companions are left to continue on in this struggle? Caught between the two principles I hold most dear, I accepted a resurrection. Mac Lir just smiled when I told him my intent. Of course, you and I both understand what my choice means, and what I must do when the war is finished. I am at peace with the consequences, but I worry the others will not be so accepting. Nonetheless, until then, I recommit to my faith. I have already ensured that my killer was met with divine retribution. Now, I will use my borrowed time to do everything in my power to protect my home and end the tyranny of Zaruhi Orlaith. Then, I will return to my rest. I hope that you can forgive my choices, and will remember me always as

Your loving daughter,

Saoirse

[SleepyShadow]

Sorry for the delay. It's been a busy week

Spoiler: Breaking in the Rookies

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With the unexpected loss of power brought on by having two level 5 characters join the team, and since Simon gave the party a week of downtime, the PCs opted to ask around town for some local adventuring jobs needing to be done. In other words, it was sidequest time. After a bit of information gathering, the party learned of three tasks:

a) During the hurricane, several of the dark elf sailors had been kidnapped by the Sable Drake, a pirate ship crewed by goblins notorious for ransoming valuable prisoners. Although the dark elf quartermaster had not yet been able to confirm the rumor, it was suspected that one of the goblins' prisoners was Princess Shalo'ha.

b) According to the local thieves' guild, some Ragesians had been spotted at a supposedly abandoned warehouse. They were attempting to broker trade with "really pale elves in spiked leather". The thieves' guild thought it wise to stop whatever alliance the Ragesians were trying to make and, if possible, convince the strange "elves" to side with Sapphire instead.

c) With the invasion in full swing, the Ragesians had started bringing in spelljammer ships to act as an air force to provide backup for their ground troops. The gnomes of Meltis wanted the PCs to help them capture a Ragesian spelljammer so it could be studied and replicated, since Seldarin griffon riders and Zounan wyvern knights would stand little chance against such airships.

The party also learned from Simon that Kosuta No Ken, the island nation off the east coast of the mainland, had sided with Ragesia and welcomed them with open arms. According to the head mage, the Kenjin viewed the Ragesians as their divine ancestors and saw it as a sign of Kosuta No Ken's imminent ascension to power. The party took it better than I expected.

"Oh well, those island folk are always up to no good," Flint said. "Right, Captain?"
"Why am I the lightning rod for racism?" Saorise asked irritably.

The PCs decided rescuing the princess would be a good start to the day, so they headed down to the docks to borrow a ship and go rescue Shalo'ha. They also gave Naoko and Eva some time off, since killing their own countrymen had started to take a toll on their morale. The dark elf quartermaster reluctantly handed over one of the few remaining functional steam powered ironclads, The Xiphias, and after some difficulty getting the hang of controlling the unwieldy craft (Saorise accidentally plowed through a fishing boat), the PCs headed out onto the high seas to track down the The Sable Drake. Saorise was at the helm, Flint was on lookout on the ship's deck, a half dozen volunteer dark elf sailors handled the rigging, and the rest of the PCs idled about on the ship.

Unfortunately, The Sable Drake struck first.

The goblin pirates, led by Captain Naki (a wererat goblin druid), were cunning adversaries. They waited until well after dark, then came up alongside The Xiphias and quietly affixed grappling hooks and boarding planks to the ironclad. Flint heard the noise, but since he didn't have darkvision he couldn't see what was going on. He also didn't bother to light a lantern to investigate. He merely shouted down to Saorise that "something weird was going on" and then he got stabbed in the back by a trio of goblin pirates.

Combat was hectic as the PCs rushed up the ladder to defend the deck, then scrambled about in the dark since less than half the group could see the twenty or so goblins streaming aboard their ship. Saorise ordered the dark elf sailors to stay below deck and man the ship, since she didn't want any of them to die during the fight. The fight took a while due to the sheer number of pirates, but only Captain Naki and her first mate were an actual threat to the PCs. Zeke and Jasaad struggled a bit, but once Ashlyn was able to get to their position she was able to bail them out. The fight ended with the party down several spell slots but otherwise coming out on top.

With the goblins defeated, the PCs decided to board The Sable Drake and search for prisoners. Down below deck, they ran afoul of the Daughters of Mahogra, a trio of Howling Hags who had been looking at purchasing some of the lower ranking prisoners to eat. The hags proved more of a challenge than the goblins did, though admittedly most of the damage the hags were able to deal was because of the 25 ft. aura of psychic damage each of them had. Regardless, the party came out on top, even after Saorise cast hold person on something they had already identified as fey. As it turned out, Princess Shalo'ha was not among the prisoners. Rather, her disguised handmaiden had let herself be captured to allow the princess to escape. The PCs were both glad for her safety and disappointed that the main reason they had even come out here turned out to be nothing more than a case of mistaken identity. The PCs got the rescued dark elves aboard The Xiphias, hitched The Sabled Drake to the back of their ironclad, and towed the pirate ship back to Sapphire as a trophy.

Once back at port, the PCs collected a tidy sum for their efforts and hired some local shipwrights to rebuild The Sable Drake into a ship usable by medium-sized creatures. Things began to break down from there.

"What should we tackle next?" Saorise asked. "Should we strengthen relations with the gnomes, or stop the alliance between Ragesia and those weird elves."
"I think they're shadar-kai," Jasaad said after a successful knowledge check. "Edgelords from the Shadowfell."
"So you want to go stop them?" Saorise asked.
"He just doesn't like magitech," Flint said.
"So?" Jasaad argued. "I don't think magic and machines should mix, so I want to put off dealing with spelljammers for as long as possible. Also, gnomes are annoying."
"But we could have a magic flying airship!" Ashlyn said excitedly.
"Keep your sci-fi out of my fantasy!" Jasaad pouted.
"Let's go down to the warehouse and check out the edgelord faeries, then," Flint said with a shrug.
"I get it," Zeke said. "You call them edgelords because they were spikes. It is a joke, and therefore what you mammals call funny. I know the appropriate reaction to this. AH-HAHAHAHAHA!"

With that settled, the PCs headed off to the warehouse.

TL;DR: Sidequests will continue until morale improves (or the lvl 5s catch up a bit).

[SleepyShadow]

My players have a real knack for seeing an interesting battlefield and finding the safest, flattest, most boring parts to fight on

Spoiler: Off to the Shadowfell

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Following the lead from the local thieves' guild, the party headed off to the allegedly abandoned warehouse where the Ragesians were spotted trying to broker a deal with the Shadar-Kai. The PCs had a brief scuffle with a few Ragesians outside the warehouse, and kicked the door open. Inside, they found the Shadar-Kai were waiting for them. They had coated part of the entrance with doomspores, a type of mushroom innocuous to creatures native to the Shadowfell but poisonous to creatures from the Prime. There were also four very edgy shadar-kai mages on the other side of the mushrooms.

Turns out a bunch of cloud of daggers stacked in a tight room can cause problems for even mid-level characters

Once the mages were dealt with, the PCs ate some poison damage from the mushrooms and hurried farther into the warehouse. In the main part, they came upon a group of Ragesians arguing with a couple shadar-kai about the price they were being charged for whatever services the shadar-kai were offering. Flint took the opportunity to shoot the Ragesian inquisitor down to a quarter of her health. The fight was a lot rougher than it should've been, mostly because the baddies were rolling crazy well. The inquisitor only got off one fireball before she died, but had she rolled one more point of damage she would've outright killed Jasaad. The three warblades were in heaven getting to fight a bunch of casters in spaces too tight for the PCs to use most of their better AoE spells, and even the two shadar-kai managed to showcase that shadowcasters aren't completely useless. The PCs won in the end, but they had to pull back and rest before they could keep going.

Once the party had finished resting inside Saorise's tiny hut, they found a visitor calmly waiting for them: a parrot squawking for them to follow it.

"Sorry little guy, our druid is already dead," Flint said.
"I think it might be a familiar," Saorise said. "Should we check it out?"
"What if it's a trap?" Ashlyn asked.
"I think we should go," Flint said cheerily. "The last time we met up with a complete stranger in an unknown location, they tried to kill me and it was fine."
"I was there, too," Ashlyn sighed.
"It was fine for you two," Saorise grumbled. "I'll send my familiar to check it out before we go."

The party decided that was a fine idea, and so Lucas the bat was sent to follow the parrot. When Saorise's familiar reported a hooded figure clad in red pirate garb sitting on a crate. After a bit more deliberating, the PCs took the bait and went to meet the stranger. The fellow introduced himself as Lumol Kildantel, and offered them his assistance as a sort of trial run. He then pulled back his hood, revealing his identity as a mind flayer.

"You have ten seconds to explain yourself," Saorise said.
"I'm an emissary from the Ashen Compact," Lumol replied calmly. "Surfacers are not the only ones at war. Those of us below also fight against the incursion."
"Oh yeah, we found one of your guys crucified a long while back," Flint said. "Why do they hate mind flayers more than the rest of us do? Did you guys do something bad?"
"We once enslaved their entire race ... or perhaps I should say we will," Lumol replied. "The way you humans view time is too linear for me to explain."
"We need to get out of here," Ashlyn said quietly. "I have a bad feeling about this."
"I like him," Flint said. "You wanna hang out?"

-Lumol Kildantel has joined the party!-

The PCs were understandably suspicious of Lumol, but nobody explained to Flint why trusting a mind flayer from a secret organization might be a bad idea. Regardless, the party headed back to the warehouse and found most of the stuff was gone. All that was left were a few Ragesians loading a couple of crates through a shadowy portal while an inquisitor argued vehemently with a peculiar looking halfling (which the party later identified as a dark creeper). The fight was brief; the Ragesians only managed to get off a couple volleys of spells before getting cut down by the PCs superior damage output. The creeper, meanwhile, escaped through the portal during the fight. Once the Ragesians were slain and looted, the party set off headlong through the mysterious portal.

It was at that point I realized I'd never be able to run Tomb of Horrors for these guys

The party found themselves just outside a massive military encampment near a volcano on the Shadowfell, but there was no sign of where the dark creeper had run off to. The party split up into pairs to ask around the base camp for information and found out the base camp belonged to a massive mercenary company led by a shadar-kai named Sarshan, a legendary soldier renowned across the Shadowfell. The PCs also learned that the Ragesians had hired Sarshan's substantial army to supplement their own limited forces, and they had paid handsomely for his aid.

Once the PCs reconvened to exchange what they had learned, the group was approached by platinum blonde shadar-kai woman named Leena. She told the group that she used to be allies with the dark creeper they were pursuing, but when she learned that Modra was planning to betray Sarshan, she turned her back on her friend. She offered to help the party in their diplomacy with Sarshan if they would stop Modra from completing her sabotage of the foundry. The party thought this was a fair deal and readily agreed. However, as they were heading to the foundry, the PCs ran afoul of a group of Ragesians who recognized them and rushed to the attack.

The enemy squad (two lvl 5 crusaders, two lvl 5 warblades, and a lvl 5 paladin/favored soul) proved quite the challenge for the group. At one point in the fight, Saorise was the only PC conscious. They managed to pull through in the end, but the fight was far more challenging than it should've been given the level discrepancy between the two groups. After the battle, the party limped onward to the foundry just as a massive contingent of mercenary soldiers marched through an open portal in the center of the base camp. The PCs took the opportunity to slip past the guards and sneak inside. The foundry was harnessing a stream of laval from the nearby volcano to power its forge and five mysterious vats, and the PCs came upon Modra and her lemure goons attempting to redirect the lava flow toward Sarshan's tower. The party got the drop on Modra, killed a couple of her henchmen and reduced her to half hp before initiative was even rolled.

"You don't understand what you're dealing with here!" Modra shouted desperately.
"You're right, I don't," Flint replied as he shot her again.
"They're using this place to create ... the ultimate bio-weapon!" Modra screamed as she pulled a lever on one of the vats.

Out of the vat slithered a bio-organic weaponized monstrosity the likes of which the party had never seen before. It rampaged across the battlefield, flinging Flint all over the place (since he was the only one that went into melee with the thing), but ultimately it proved rather underwhelming beyond how much hp it had. The party handily slew the B.O.W., Modra, and all the goons without too much difficulty. While they were looting the room, they stumbled upon a secret door that led from the foundry directly to Sarshan's tower.

We ended the session with the party preparing to head through the secret tunnel.

TL;DR: I like Metal Gear and Resident Evil.

[SleepyShadow]

Sometimes players do the darndest things ...

Spoiler: Hello Darkness, My Old Friend

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Things started off in our usual fashion. The PCs headed through the secret tunnel leading from the foundry to Sarshan's tower, and along the way, they triggered a trap - a fairly innocuous dart trap that missed everyone in the group except Zeke and Lumol. The secret tunnel led to the backside of a bookcase which was a secret door in the tower's library. A small number of guards (a shadowcaster, two ogre warriors, and an inquisitor) were met and dealt with by the PCs with little fanfare. They searched the library, picked it clean of valuable or interesting bits, and pressed on to the adjoining chamber where there were a couple of doors. Like usual, they searched for traps, checked for locks, and agreed on a door to open first.

Except, Jasaad didn't like the door the rest of the group picked. So he opened the other one.

In each of the two rooms now open to the party were two mixed groups of Ragesians and shadar-kai who had heard the scuffle in the library and had prepared themselves for combat. One group also had a devil-woman with them. Essentially, the fight went from a 4-on-6 battle in favor of the party to an 8-on-6 battle in favor of the baddies. Poor initiative rolls also meant only Flint and Ashlyn were able to act before the enemies, and neither of them were able to prevent the two groups of baddies from sandwiching the party in an unexpected pincer maneuver and withering them with repeated AoE attacks. The demoness was able to teleport into the library behind the party and clog up the escape route with summoned mooks.

Saorise and Zeke acted as healers for the entire battle, tending to anyone who went down until they themselves were felled. Ashlyn used misty step to engage the demoness in melee and quickly take her down, but the Ragesian mages blasted her into unconsciousness. Lumol went down swinging, but inevitably died in the AoE crossfire. Jasaad had some fairly bad luck, never able to really get any offense going. He bled to death on the floor in the corner of the room. Flint was the last one standing, and managed to take down two more enemies before he finally fell to their concentrated firepower. The PCs fought valiantly, but Jasaad's rash decision proved too costly to overcome.

We ended the session there, shaking our heads, berating Jasaad's player, and wondering what could be done to salvage the campaign.

TL;DR: Keep a tight leash on your loose cannons. You never know when they'll get the whole group wiped out.

[SleepyShadow]

Just a quick update. The campaign isn't dead and neither is the journal. I just needed some extra time to figure out where to go with the campaign. The PCs are now prisoners of war attempting an escape from a mad mage's dungeon on the Shadowfell. I'll make a full entry on Monday following this weekend's session.

[SleepyShadow]

Spoiler: Glacial Escape

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The party started off in separate cells after three days of being questioned by a blind woman who called herself the White Speaker. A couple of quick knowledge checks from Saorise informed the PCs that the White Speaker was a bit of an urban legend in shadar-kai society - a mysterious and seemingly immortal entity whose only motive seemed to be learning secrets. Anyway, after a quick bit of dialogue, the White Speaker left to go deal with some intruders attempting to break into the complex. Shortly after she teleported away, the PCs were freed from their cells by an NPC I never thought I'd have cause to use again: Sarika Veluth, the Al-Hassan princess kidnapped by the now-defunct Team Evil. She told the party that her cell had been damaged by some fighting earlier, and if they were going to escape now was the only chance they'd have. She suggested outfitting themselves with some gear left behind by the guards who had gone to reinforce the entrance. Since the PCs were bereft of their normal equipment, they agreed that was a good idea.

This might've been the last time the party agreed on much of anything.

Saorise started things off by berating Jasaad (the shadar-kai had rezzed him with the notion of ransoming him off) for opening the door that led to the technical TPK. This ensured a healthy camaraderie necessary for escaping a mad mage's dungeon. After poking around a bit, Flint found a locked door.

"It's lock is complex," I told him. "You'll likely need a key. The door itself is emblazoned with a shield symbol ..."
"Does a 25 unlock it?" Flint asked.
"Is that with disadvantage since you don't have your thieves' tools?"
"Yep!"
I sighed. "You wiggle your fingers at the lock until it opens up ..."

They headed through the door, clowned their way past an otyugh, and found several doors. Only one was unlocked, and Saorise was glad since this would prevent Jasaad from running around the room throwing open doors and turning paintings sideways. The PCs went through the unlocked door, clowned a few gibberlings (basically hairy goblins with a weak fear effect), and set off several traps while looting the next couple of rooms. One trap they set off was an alarm spell set to alert the two golems in a separate part of the dungeon. So a few rounds after they finished looting the rooms, the two lesser clay golems rolled up and started wailing on the PCs. The golems were basically sacks of hp without their damage resistance, but they held up against the party fairly well.

One of the bits of loot the party had collected was a golden wire key that Saorise identified as a portal activation key. Ashlyn correctly surmised there must be a portal somewhere in the dungeon. The PCs poked around a bit more, fought another batch of gibberlings, and found the portal two rooms over from where they found the key. Being the obvious exit, Flint didn't want to go through it. They hadn't found their original equipment, and Flint was quite insistent on finding it before they left the dungeon. Since both Ashlyn and Jasaad dearly missed their cloaks of charisma, they agreed. Saorise was sure the White Speaker had her spellbook, and thus wanted to find their captor as quickly as possible. Zeke, for her part, was content with the gear they had collected from the dungeon, since a druid with natural armor really didn't need anything.

After a rigorous debate, the party headed back into the dungeon to clear it out and find their missing equipment. Instead, they found little more than groups of roaming gibberlings and the occasional smoke mephit. They thought they were on the right track when they ran into an ogre mage with a level of monk, but she turned out to be little more than a mini-boss. They kept collecting gear as they went, even finding a few bits of magical gear along the way, and eventually found a smithy run by a group of ill-tempered duegar.

"This has to be where our stuff is at," Flint said excitedly.
"Ach, this is where your escape comes to an end," the lead duegar shouted. "At em, lads! Illych and his boys'll stop ye!"

The evil dwarves lasted maybe two rounds.

However, the party's gear was nowhere to be found. They consoled themselves by looting the room and surmising their gear must also be with the White Speaker. Still, there were two doors left to check and nobody to stop them. Behind one room was a whole bunch of mephits and a magic sword, and beyond the other was a very pretty half-demon encased in a magic sphere.

"What's her charisma?" Ashlyn asked immediately.
"She has a haunting and unearthly beauty," I replied.
"So .. like a twenty?"
"It's a twenty-four, actually."
"Guys, we have to help her!"

The party chatted with the cambion marquis (named Marchessa) and got a sob story about how she had been imprisoned for six months by the White Speaker while the mage tried to convince the demoness to assassinate "some high up Prime wizard". Marchessa also told them a little of the Blood War, and said the PCs stank of the Baatezu. When asked what that meant, she clarified that Baatezu were devils and the Tanar'ri were demons like her.

"Last time we dealt with a fiend, she tried to kill us," Saorise warned.
"Yeah, but she asked me out on a date and was super nice," Flint replied.
"Come on, we have to free her," Ashlyn said. "She's so pretty!"
"Do it," Jasaad whispered. "You know you want to."

Ashlyn pulled the switch on the wall to deactivate the magical sphere, at which point Marchessa thanked them and teleported away with the ominous promise of seeing them later. The PCs shrugged it off and, since there was nothing else to find in the dungeon, they headed for the portal in hopes of finding their escape. Before they went through, they decided to lock themselves in a dead end room and rest up "just in case" they had to fight the White Speaker.

"You guys sure have some kind of courage to sleep in this place," Sarika said after a successful long rest. "I would've run screaming a dozen times over if you guys weren't here."
"Oh my god," Jasaad sighed.
"That's nice, don't care," Flint said. "Let's go."
"Oh ..." Sarika said quietly.

TL;DR: Gotta find dat loot, and mistakes were made.

[SleepyShadow]

No update this week. I'm out of town and thus cannot run the campaign. Your regularly scheduled clusterfakk campaign journal will resume as soon as possible

[normal name]

Due to wonky schedules and such character diaries were kinda pout on hold, but I have some free time today so it looks like another installment of the Flynt Files is in order!

Spoiler

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I was surprised to wake up again to be honest. After watching the rest of my friends fall in combat, I was sure they would loot our bodies and take my cool hat.
Luckily, they spared us and allowed us to recoup in some spare cells in some sort of jail. I'd been in the big house once before for a crime I didn't know i was
committing and vowed to never return. While that appears to not be the case, I'm glad our captors are apparently as merciful to us as we try to be towards them.

It's impossible too know exactly how long has passed in here since there are no windows, but if our visitor's appearances have been any indication, i'd say about 3
days have gone by. This mysterious woman makes he rounds to each of our cells and tries to pump us for information about our forces and the security of our allies.
Luckily for us, we know nothing and just follow orders blindly so I've been answering as honestly as possible. Shortly after the most recent bout of 20 questions with
our new friend, we heard sounds of battle and destruction. This prompted our host to leave us, but we were not alone for long. A plucky girl the likes of which I've
never seen before crept into our cell block and freed us. She claimed to be from the South and is named Sirika.

Sirika warned us that our only chance at escape would be now so we all followed her into the room she appeared from. There were tables and cabinets containing basic
weapons and armor so we quickly equipped ourselves and moved to what we hoped would be a way out of this prison. I encountered a locked door, but with Saorise
conjuring me some tools to pick it with, I made short work of the ward. Upon entering the next chamber, we were greeted with a terrible stench and a garbage monster.
It seems we found the waste pit of this compound. Due to our overwhelming numbers, we dispatched with the creature and encountered 3 more doors. 2 doors were
locked in a similar fashion as the first door, with slightly different key hole shapes and the third door was unlocked. We chose the unlocked door first and progressed
down a hallway. We encountered a group of small, hairy, chattering men and they jumped us. Luckily they went down without much resistance but the danger was not
clear yet. Apparently this prison is heavily trapped, which we discovered when Ashlyn stepped on several pressure plates and got speared for it. I suggested we use old
school techniques such as probing for traps with a spear or pole. I must've been too quite. As soon as she recovered from the spear traps, she entered an adjoined
room and went to check a chest for traps, triggering the floor traps on the way over

It was the mysterious woman's room from what we could tell and we were able to get some better armor and weapons from her personal stash. I sound some nifty
studded leather armor under her bed, but the captain wouldn't let me keep it for some reason. I think she just wanted it for herself, along with the whip and handcuffs.
We also found a port key that would allow us to hopefully escape, but not knowing where we are makes that a risky move. I suggest finding our normal gear so we
have the best chance of survival as possible. The group agreed and we returned to the 2 locked doors. Again with the conjured picks I was able to open the
door and we fought through some more henchmen. The more we fought, the more empowered we became. all the practice picking locks was really starting to
pay off and i could feel my skills growing (we leveled up halfway through this part of the prison break.)

Eventually we reached a library and searched for Saorise's spell book, but came up with nothing. We continued further and came upon an oddly placed blacksmith
crew who attacked us on sight unfortunately. After a short battle, we were finally running low on energy and were looking for a good place to rest. Checking one
room, we found a seductress who was trapped in some sort of arcane bubble, much like Naoko was found in. Ashlyn wanted to free her and hang out but I suggested
we do that after a rest so we were at full power. Checking the last door on the floor we could find, we cleared it out of the chattering creatures and i locked the door.
Be fore we rested we destroyed what appeared to be a summoning circle which was painted on the floor and found a magic great sword run through a corpse.
Saorise identified the magic gear we found and we drifted off to sleep.

I couldn't help but think about if this was all my life was about as i faded away. Are my remaining days destined to be plagued with near death encounters everyday?
What's the point of fighting if you never get to stop and enjoy the peace or spoils of your victories with your loved ones? Is this what the South is always doing?
Fighting wars and losing their sense of adventuring for adventure sake? Maybe I just need some time to clear my head, but first i have to make sure all my friends
make it out safe, and Sirika too.

[SleepyShadow]

After a short hiatus and a long delay, things look to be back on track with the campaign journal. The campaign itself is another matter ...

Spoiler: A Rock and a Hard Case

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The party trekked to the second floor of the dungeon and immediately encountered a violet-haired man named Mirokuji, who claimed to be a fellow prisoner and asked to join the group. He informed the PCs he was a bounty hunter from a world called Oilyx, and was unsure where they were or why they were here. After claiming he could dance on the head of a pin, the party reluctantly allowed him to join the group until they were able to free themselves.

The PCs pressed on, clowned their way through a horde of mephits, and came upon an Avatar of Zarouhi trashing a room filled with cloning vats. Ashlyn attempted to negotiate, but Zarouhi was berserk. Unfortunately, bad rolls on my part meant what should have been a challenging fight was little more than a footnote in the evening. This string of bad luck would plague the rest of the session. While they were looting the room, Flint found a scroll and wanted to immediately stash it. Jasaad objected, naturally, and snatched the scroll away from him. The warlock immediately opened the scroll and was afflicted with a debilitating curse.

"I told you!" Flint laughed. "Everything in here is a trap!"
"Who traps a scroll?!" Jasaad whined.
"Why didn't either of you have the scroll identified?" Saoirse asked.
"Nobody has identify prepared," Flint replied.
"I do ..." Sarika said quietly.
"Nobody asked you," Flint retorted.

The party finished leveling up and pressed on. After a couple of unremarkable encounters with more gibberlings and mephits, they came across a large room with tracks of multi colored tiles guarded by a pair of duergar archers. The archers themselves proved little challenge to the group, but during the fight the PCs accidentally discovered that each of the lengths of colored tiles were associated with different spell traps. During the fight, the magic missile and cone of cold traps were triggered repeatedly. Good times It also became apparent Mirokuji's trap-laying abilities were never going to be utilized by the party, since his pleas for cooperation were repeatedly ignored.

The PCs disabled the traps, trekked across the hall, killed a vampire, and were very disappointed she didn't have any loot. Farther down the hall, the party slaughtered another group of gibberlings and duergar, and eventually came upon an old man trapped in a glass cell. The old man said his name was Frenedan, and that the White Speaker had been keeping him here to experiment on. Saoirse and Ashlyn were quick to set the old man free, Flint and Jasaad didn't trust him, and Zeke took the opportunity to harvest some fingers from the duergar.

They made their way down the last unexplored passageway and were beset by a trio of Ragesian swordsages who looked winded from a recent fight. Saoirse and Ashlyn were relieved to run into a known enemy.

"What's going on?" Saoirse asked.
"We're here to collect you," one of the swordsages replied. "We're taking you back to our prison camp. Come quietly and nobody gets hurt."
"This isn't your prison? Aren't you guys working with the White Speaker?"
"She betrayed us! She and her minions attacked one of our transport caravans and made off with several of our prisoners, including you lot!"
"Figures the Ragesians are too incompetent to keep hold of their own prisoners," Flint snorted as he drew his bow and rolled for initiative.

The battle was short but rough for all parties involved. Desert Wind focused swordsages can put out a remarkable amount of damage when not fighting enemies with fire resistance. Luckily for the Ragesians, nobody in the party has that. The old man also revealed himself to be a doppelganger and began to lay into the back line of the PCs. Even so, it was a four-on-seven battle in the party's favor. The swordsages got some solid hits in, but went down too quickly to keep up the pressure for long. Frenedan went down last, but only because Zeke and Sarika were the only ones bothering to fight him. Loot was collected, and freedom was theirs!

The White Speaker was waiting for them outside, and she was none too happy to see her prisoners making a break for it. She fought the party to the bitter end, but even a half-dragon monk with over 300 hp wasn't enough to take down a single PC. The party congratulated themselves on a job well done, mocked Mirokuji for rolling four fumbles in a row, and went to the tavern to sleep off the battle.

After a well deserved long rest, the party pawned off the vendor trash they had picked up along the way and bought themselves a planeshift back home. Of course, they went with the cheap option, so they ended up over two hundred miles away from Sapphire. After a long trek back to town, they got Jasaad uncursed by their friendly neighborhood Healer, ditched Mirokuji at the snow cone stand, and went to talk to Headmaster Simon. He was surprised to see them, and explained that he thought they had died.

"You can read your obituaries if you like," he said with a nervous laugh.
"We found Princess Sarika," Saoirse said. "We were hoping you could get her home to Al-Hassan. Her parents must be worried sick."
"Of course, I'll arrange for an escort."
"How have things been while we were gone?"
"The gnomes are very unhappy with us," Simon explained. "They feel we didn't give them the aid they were due. Sterich has also broken out into civil war in absence of your diplomatic presence. I was forced to send Naoko and Evalyn to hopefully smooth things over. You also got a letter from a dwarven paladin named Kalad. Says he knows you. He'd like your help as soon as possible."
"We're gonna go look for pirate treasure," Flint said.
"What?" Simon croaked, his face growing pale.
"Yeah, we found a map on those goblin pirates a while ago. We're going to go look for pirate treasure on Shatterhull Island."
"We'll be back!" Ashlyn said with a smile.
"Um, okay ..." Simon sighed.

The PCs left Sarika in the Headmaster's care, hopped on their restructured pirate ship, and sailed off in search of a plot thread I had all but forgotten about.

TL;DR: The PCs broke out of prison and have now decided pirate gold is more important than the fate of the world.

[SleepyShadow]

Whoo boy, okay, let's try to crack through this shall we?

Spoiler: The Arrows, The Gangs, and The Mines

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The PCs sailed off to Shatterhull Island in search of treasure based on a map they had looted from goblin pirates many months ago. However, they had lost the map during their incarceration in The White Speaker's dungeon. A few quick geography checks allowed them to roughly navigate their way and they sailed off to forget their troubles and cares. After an uneventful voyage, the party arrived at Shatterhull Island to find their troubles had beat them to the punch. A small group of Ragesians had followed the map they had looted from the PCs in search of the treasure themselves. The PCs found a few of them on the beach, leaped out of their ship, and killed the front guard within two rounds of combat.

"I'm so sick of these guys!" Flint shouted. "We came here to not deal with them!"
"It's a global invasion," Saoirse said with a shrug. "Let's just clear the place out and be done with it."

I died a little on the inside

The party headed inside the giant conch shell structure on the center of the small island and slaughtered a few more Ragesians and their sahagun allies. As they hacked their way through the small compound, they did take three prisoners and sent them back to the ship to be held by the sailors. The first surrendered as the last survivor of a particularly lopsided encounter, and the other two the party managed to ambush while the two scouts were taking lunch. Deeper inside the conch shell structure, the PCs finally had their first encounter with a Duthka'Rag - a fiendish half dragon Ragesian. In this case, she was a psychic warrior using her psicrystal for the vigor/share pain combo trick. She was backed by a handful of low ranking subordinates who performed speed bump duty for the actual threat. On top of her rather cheesy combo, she was also a glaive wielding attack of opportunity build with mage slayer. Needless to say, she was a bit of a problem for the PCs to deal with, especially since they chose to fight her in a narrow doorway. Eventually they triumphed, and all agreed that psionics were by and large awful to deal with. One of the Ragesians had been knocked out by a sleep spell and the party was debating who would take her back to the ship, but while everyone else was looting the dead, Jasaad took it upon himself to coup de grace the unconscious scout. The rest of the group objected to the execution of the helpless captive, but no action was actually taken.

Yet.

The final chamber in the complex was where the leader of the outpost was, along with a dozen or so bodyguards. The leader was a duthka'rag ardent with all manner of retributive damage and crowd control effects. The combat went on for several rounds, and by the end of it only one Ragesian (a ranger 1/sorcerer 1 who was there to spam magic missiles and provide flanking) was standing, and half the party was unconscious. The lone Ragesian dropped her sword and ran, but Flint and Jasaad chased after her while Zeke was left to heal up Saoirse and Ashlyn. Flint was faster, and shot the fleeing girl in the back just before she could make it to the beach. He then used his second attack to shoot Jasaad, with the warning of "We don't kill unarmed prisoners."

I was left wondering if Flint's player was being intentionally hypocritical.

Regardless, the party scooped up the spoils of war and sailed back to Sapphire to sell the booty collected from the Ragesians. No pirate treasure could be found, but the loot more than made up for it. The PCs then decided to find out what their old friend Kalad wanted their help with. The dwarven paladin asked them to help him clear out the old Southern Lode mine down by the border between Meltis and Al-Hassan in the Thornewaste.

"Sure, but let's check on Sarika first," Saoirse suggested.
"Why?" Flint asked. "Don't we have Simon covering that?"
"Yeah, but if we're gonna head south anyway, we might as well escort her to the border. We can contact Hassan authorities and meet with someone to take her the rest of the way."
"I guess that works."
"Are we not mentioning the fact Flint shot me?!" Jasaad screeched.
Flint gave a small shrug. "It's your word against mine. I shot the girl because she shot you first. No witnesses to the contrary."

The PCs headed down to the tavern to find Princess Sarika making her final preparations to leave for home. Hired to accompany her were Mirokuji the bounty hunter and none other than the long-away eyepatch wearing knight Imiza Ermentrude! However, her reappearance would be quite brief. Team Good told her and Mirokuji to kindly GTFO, took Sarika, and headed for the border. They sent a sending spell to Al-Hassan to inform the authorities of the situation and arranged for a contingent of Hassanian soldiers to meet them near the border to make the drop-off.

The travel to the border was long and uneventful save for a brief trip into a town near the desert. The town was being torn apart by two warring gangs who were each looking for a leg up on the other to drive out the competition and be the only business around. The villagers begged the PCs for help, but they blew through the little village and left the gangs to their own devices. The justification was that dropping off Sarika was for the greater good. They met with the Hassanian soldiers a few days later, tossed Sarika out of the group (though Ashlyn did give her a fond hug farewell), and trekked west to the location of the Southern Lode.

A few days of hiking through the Thornewaste later, the PCs realized they were being followed by a suspicious looking man dressed in a wide brimmed hat and black trenchcoat. Jasaad hailed him with a cantrip, and the man introduced himself as Mog Blackthorn, hunter of the Thornewaste and disciple of the Ghost Lord.

"Ghost Lord?" Ashlyn asked. "Does he have anything to do with an old dwarven mine?"
"No ma'am," Mog replied. "If you need directions to the old mine, there's a village not far from here. I could show you the way. Perhaps the locals could point you in the right direction."
"We've got a map," Flint replied.
"Ahh, a fellow ranger!" Mog said excitedly. "Our quarry may differ, but I wish you success on your hunt, brother. Let me know sometime if you wish to engage in jolly cooperation."

The PCs bid farewell to Mog and pressed on toward the Southern Lode.

[SleepyShadow]

I'm sorry for letting the campaign journal fall by the wayside for so long. Two of the players (Flint and Ashlyn) had to move on relatively short notice, so I had to truncate the campaign A LOT to get a satisfactory ending out of it. But we did finish the campaign! I just haven't finished the journal yet. I'll get the last few sessions up soon, since it wouldn't be fair to let a finished campaign go without a finished journal.

Spoiler: Kalad's Huge Lode

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Not too much to say here. The mines turned out to be a three session dungeon crawl with a lot of small fun bits and little in the way of narrative growth. Then again, it's a dungeon crawl, so I'm not sure what I expected. Anyway, rather than giving a blow-by-blow of the various combat encounters throughout the mine, I'll just give a list of highlights.

• Some javelin throwing desert troglodytes made Zeke decide "penetration" was not what he thought it would be like.
• A guest player (a friend of ours from the local game store) charged down a hallway and got clowned by a bunch of low-level bandits.
• Saorise hates being on full time ambulance mode.
• Flint took "Dragon" as his second favored enemy, and made quick work of the blue dragon mid-dungeon.
• Even in big groups, chokers mean nothing past level 5.
• Ashlyn got pinned to the floor by a javelin, spent four turns stuck and getting pelted with projectiles, and Saorise set her on fire.
• "A big and interesting room? Quick! Lure the monsters out into the boring hallway!"
• Ashlyn confessed her love to Saorise, and promised not to ditch her at the first sign of a higher charisma.
• Zeke and Jasaad conspired to write smutty fanfiction about Ashlyn and Saorise.
• Saorise learned how to summon a water elemental and used it to fistfight a fire elemental "Real Steel" style.
• A delusional naga had taken over the mines, and the party even humored her and let her monologue for a bit.
• Jasaad took the dead naga's magic ring that made the wearer count as an elemental, since nobody thought it would be useful.
• A dwarven lich was laid to rest once the party gave him back his magic slippers.

Once outside the mine, the party ran across a small number of Zene nomads traveling through the Thornwaste. Their group consisted of a half-dozen teenagers and their parental guardian (a mid-level barbarian/druid following the kids around while wild shaped as a bear). Flint shot the bear until it turned into a man, and promptly told the druid off about how he was a terrible mentor. The rest of the party exchanged weird looks when Flint decided to forcefully adopt the six kids (keep in mind, Flint was maybe three years older than the Zene teens).

Regardless of poor life choices, the party struck out farther into the desert and headed for the city of Al-Hassan to pawn off the literal wagonload of vendor trash they had acquired in the mine.

[SleepyShadow]

Spoiler: The Calm Lands

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The party dropped off the half-dozen nomad kids in Al-Hassan, and were soon escorted into the palace by some local guards. Sultana Sarissa gave the party her personal thanks for rescuing Princess Sarika (whether Flint wanted to or not) and asked for their help with another matter. The promise of several thousand gold was enough to sway the PCs to her cause. Another group of adventurers (one led by their old pal Silvarus) had been sent out to investigate the Monastery of Two Winds, since divination magic had revealed the monastery had the secret to bypassing the firestorm protecting the heart of the dead goddess. However, Al-Hassan had lost contact with the first adventuring group, and the sultana was becoming increasingly concerned something had happened to them. The party agreed to investigate, since it was the most solid lead they had to put an end to the Ragesian Incursion. Sultana Sarissa introduced the party to a Zene named Weeping Raven (Monk 4/Psychic Warrior 5), who offered to guide the PCs to the monastery, since she had friendly dealings with the monks there in the past. The sultana offered them a day's rest, and the next day her palace wizard teleported them to the town closest to the monastery in Tularus.

The teleport spell went awry thanks to a magical pillar in the capital city of Tularus; the pillar acted like a lightning rod, changing the destination of any teleport spell targeted or cast within a mile of it. The party got teleported to the base of the pillar, which was surrounded by a lead cage and guarded by a half dozen archers. After a brief exchange with the guard captain, the party was released with apologies. The party even thought having such a defense was a good idea, since a large part of the Ragesian army had dimension door as a racial ability. The PCs met with the Khan of Tularus, who offered the party passage through his land and horses to ride upon. He also offered them a night's stay with his harem, which all but Jasaad declined.

The next few days passed by uneventfully as the party travelled through the steppes. They chatted with Weeping Raven a while, who told them a little about psionics and philosophy (I'd say more, but Raven's philosophy was a touch long winded and makes for dull reading). The PCs had a short encounter with some Ragesian scouts accompanied by a worg riding goblin sorcerer. The fight was brutal but short. Jasaad tried to 3v1 an inquisitor and a pair of swordsages (went poorly for him), Zeke and Raven worked together to handle the warblades trying to go after the back line, Saorise and Flint contributed damage wherever on the battlefield they felt like, and the goblin sorcerer got off one good volley of spells before Ashlyn closed the gap and spanked him with her magic resistance. A failed saving throw against a slow spell meant the sorcerer was practically worthless by round three and dead by round five.

After the battle, the party headed up to the top of the plateau where the Monastery of Two Winds was hidden. Surrounding the town built around the monastery was an entire battalion of Ragesian soldiers. However, rather than attack the party en masse, the guards at the rear dispondantly told the party to "go away."

"You're not attacking?" Ashlyn asked.
"Too much work," the guard replied.
"What are you doing, then?"
"Sieging the city, but that's a lot of work, too. So we're taking a break until General Irmentrude gets back. We were supposed to be at the monastery gates yesterday, but that's hard."
"General Irmentrude?"
"Yeah, she went to get reinforcements or something. I don't really care. Lieutenant Jahara is in charge right now, but she's drunk like the rest of us. The general will probably execute her, but she doesn't care."
"Can you come down from your watch tower?"
"Sure, it's easier than being up here ..."
"Easiest diplomatic encounter ever," Jasaad chuckled.

The party took the guard's weapons and left him tied up at the edge of the Ragesian encampment. He thanked them for the break. The party then nervously walked through the army's encampment, but the closest thing to resistance they got were a few sleepy calls of "hey, don't do that". Once inside the town, things were much the same as they were in the encampment. Townsfolk milled aimlessly in the streets, or slept in the streets, or just lay on the ground staring up at the sky. Raven suggested going to the tavern, since her old master was the barkeep and he might have more information. The party agreed, and inside the tavern they found more townsfolk, and a handful of Ragesians, sitting around quietly drinking. The barkeep seemed unaffected by the strange malaise, but he was clearly on edge. He smiled warmly at the party when he realized they weren't affected. The barkeep didn't know what the strange calm was all about, but he told the PCs it started shortly after the Ragesians began their attack on the town. At first he suspected them until he saw the calm had taken hold of them as well. When asked about Silvarus and the other adventuring party, the barkeep said he had seen them both before and after the attack. They had been trying to gain access to the monastery, but had been denied several times. The last he saw of them was most of their group heading up to the monastery once more, though he did notice one of the elves in the group was missing.

After the PCs left the tavern, they all had to roll Wisdom saves. Except for Jasaad, since he was wearing the ring from the lode that made him count as an elemental. Most of the party passed, but Ashlyn botched her save and dreamily followed the rest of the group around wondering aloud why they were working so hard. Dragging her along with them, the party headed up the winding cliff-side pass to the monastery. They passed by a bald monk woman who tried to wave them over, but the group ignored her and made a beeline up the mountain path.

[SleepyShadow]

Spoiler: A Desperate Assault

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The party headed up to the monastery, fought off a couple air elementals, and got turned away at the front gate by a grumpy elven woman named Cai Lee Tzu. She told the PCs that all access to the Monastery of Two Winds was denied until the supernatural calm was resolved. Disappointed, the party headed back to town and found the calm was already starting to fracture. Townsfolk who had been sleeping in the streets were now furiously attacking inanimate objects. A group of Ragesian soldiers had also snapped, screaming nonsensical orders at each other as they lashed out at random, attacking whomever came too close to their group with brutal ferocity.

The PCs butchered them like dogs.

Soon after the encounter, the town baker rushed up to the PCs and told them his guest had to speak with them. The party followed the baker back to his shop and met with an elven man named Shalen Lendar. The elf told the PCs about coming to the town with Silvarus and the other members of their group, and that they had been denied access to the monastery before the calm hit. When the Ragesians started their assault on the village, the strange calm fell over the entire region. Shalen struggled to remember the next few weeks, but he recalled getting an invitation from the monastery. He remembered the others leaving, but he couldn't bring himself to crawl out of bed and follow them. He didn't know how long they had been gone before he had been snapped out of the calm by accidentally spilling hot coffee on himself. Ever since then, he's been searching the town for his missing friends. He told the PCs how he cut his arms to keep himself awake. A quick Medicine check revealed he hadn't slept in several days.

"Are we sure this guy isn't a shadar-kai?" Jasaad laughed.
"Be nice to the poor man," Weeping Raven admonished.

They spent the night at the bakery, and the next day a messenger from the local healing house arrived on-scene and invited the PCs over, stating that one of their patients had urgently requested to speak with them. After a few jokes about how popular they were becoming, the PCs followed the priest over to the house of healing. There, on a cot in the back room, was the same bald woman who had tried to get their attention the day prior. Her form shifted between that of a woman, that of a man, and that of a smokey dragon. The strange being gave the group a faint smile.

"My name is Balance," the entity said weakly. "You have encountered my kind before, on less than pleasant terms. I am a trillith."
"Hey guys, a dream elemental not trying to eat us," Flint said. "I'm going to go out on a limb here and guess you have something to do with this?"
"The calm is my doing, yes," Balance answered.
"Why are you doing this?" Saoirse asked.
"I love this village," Balance replied. "It is has been my home only a short while, but I love this place. I wanted to protect it the only way I knew how. But I can't keep going any longer."

She died screaming a few moments later, and that's when all hell broke loose. The Ragesian reinforcements had arrived, led by General Imiza Irmentrude, and it was time to purge! However, since the most of the actual Ragesians were still hung over from the weeks long calm effect, and the town's entire population consisted of monks either retired or in-training, Imiza's victory was not exactly guaranteed. Most of the attacking force consisted of dirtbag mercenaries and gnolls, with only perhaps a dozen actual Ragesians forming a sort of central command. Naturally, the PCs leapt to the defense of the village and made their stand outside of the tavern (I'm assuming for easy access to beer and pretzels in-between fighting). Wave after wave of mercenaries crashed upon the party, but the heroes stood firm and utterly annihilated whatever came their way. After the cannon fodder had gotten torn to pieces by the party, Imiza and her elite squad arrived on scene.

Imiza and her squad proved a fairly difficult challenge. She was a 12th level Marshal by this point, and was backed by a half dozen Ragesians of various classes. She was a pretty terrifying combatant as she rode around on her upgraded destrachan mount, using her aura buffs to make even the low-level Ragesians into actual threats. Still, the PCs weren't quite out of resources by this point, and they recognized Imiza for what she was: a lynchpin. So the party focused all of their damage on her, completely ignoring the rank-and-file despite the significant damage the PCs were taking in return. About two rounds into the fight, Weeping Raven was killed after falling unconscious. This let the party know that there weren't going to be any prisoners taken this time. The Ragesians were playing for keeps. Six rounds of combat later, General Irmentrude fell. With their commander defeated, the captain accompanying Imiza's squad held up one hand and shouted a single command.

"Retreat!"

The party was completely out of gas by now, and didn't bother pursuing the fleeing soldiers. They collected the bodies of Raven and Imiza, and took them both back to the house of healing for a Raise Dead, some R&R, and the hope of getting Imiza to tell them what the hell was going on.

[SleepyShadow]

Spoiler: Fog Before Sunrise

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The PCs were able to smooth talk Imiza into telling them what was going on by bribing her with real food. She was sick of eating sugary Ragesian rations, and sold her countryfolk out for a plate of bacon. Imiza told the PCs after her failure to capture and hold Princess Sarika, she had attempted to leave the war behind her. She had assumed Empress Zarouhi would have her imprisoned lover executed for the failure. She had wandered from place to place, never really finding acceptance anywhere, and ended up in Sapphire after hearing about the refugee camp there. By chance, she happened upon the party, noting dryly that she had tried to join their ranks. Unfortunately for her, somebody in Sapphire contacted the Ragesian army and told them where she was (Imiza assumed it was one of the refugees, but in actuality it was Katarina who ratted her out). As punishment for Imiza's attempted betrayal, a biomancer used flesh-warping magic to turn her beloved hippogriff mount into a wretched destrachan. Imiza was then forced back to the front lines, with orders given to sack the mountain village as retribution for the Monastery of Two Winds betraying them.

"The Monastery betrayed you?" Saoirse asked. "How?"
"One of the two leaders, a man named Pilus, offered us a way to bypass the firestorm protecting the heart of the dead goddess," Imiza replied. "The firestorm has resisted all of our attempts to bypass it, so we were forced to turn to outside aid. Pilus took the substantial payment and never contacted us again. My army came to attack, but we were afflicted by the calm. I'm sure you know the rest."
"Sounds like Pilus is the one we need to talk to," Jasaad said.
"We still need to investigate the valley below the Monastery," Saoirse reminded him. "That's the most likely place for Silvarus and his group to have gone."

Before the point could be argued, the sound of Weeping Raven's screams from the other room quickly drew their attention. The PCs rushed in to find her being attacked by ... something. Raven was obviously trying to fend off multiple attackers, and reacted to the pummeling blows she was receiving, but in her weakened state from just being brought back from the dead, there was little she could do against her unseen assailants. Confused, the party moved in to fight ... whatever was attacking her.

Welcome to the wonderful world of fighting invisible stalkers.

Most of the fight was spend just trying to locate where the monsters were at while simultaneously keeping them from dragging Weeping Raven away. Thankfully, the invisible stalkers quickly fell once they had been pinpointed. As soon as the battle was over, Saoirse and Ashlyn stormed back over to Imiza while Zeke tended to Raven's injuries. The boys poked around the hideout for more invisible monsters, but were unable to find any.

"Were those monsters yours?" Saoirse asked.
"I use soldiers, not monsters," Imiza scoffed. "Besides, if I was trying to escape I would've simply done so by now."
"Oh yeah, dimension door..."
"If my people think I'm dead then I'm free to do as I please."
"Do you know who sent the wind monsters?" Ashlyn asked. "Wait, duh, I just answered my own question."
"Yeah, the temple," Saoirse replied. "Pilus, maybe?"
"Either him, or his henchwoman," Imiza said. "Ashlyn, you look remarkably similar to her."
"Well, you look like ... all the other ... tall blonde people with eyepatches," Ashlyn retorted.
"If you're going after her, I want to come with you," Imiza said. "She's the one that turned poor Friedrick into that monster."
"No tricks?" Saoirse asked suspiciously.
"No tricks."

I knew the addition of a 12th level Marshal into a group of 9th level adventurers would tip the scales dramatically in the party's favor, but it was our second to last session and wouldn't really matter in the long run. The party cautiously returned Imiza's equipment and headed off to the Forbidden Valley. They brought Weeping Raven along with them, promising to do their best to keep her out of harm's way. Along the path up the mountain, the party was attacked by a group of eight monks from the monastery. Now, I'm not sure who thought a handful of monks (even when backed by a half-dragon manticore) would be a match for any group of 9th level adventurers, but suffice to say even in 5th edition they weren't going to stand a chance. The monks were butchered in short order, and the half-dragon manticore went down soon thereafter. The party collected the loot and trekked down into the valley.

Shortly after they reached the valley, the PCs came across what seemed to be a tower. In reality, it was an illusion covering a pit where the entrance to the underground biomancy lab was. Ashlyn tumbled through the illusory tower, hit the ground hard, and was swiftly attacked by fleshy abominations covered in ice. To the party's dismay, the monstrosities were quite clearly the remains of Silvarus and his group of adventurers. The rest of the party scrambled down the cliff to aid Ashlyn, and together they laid their friends to rest. Spurred on by their desire for revenge, the party rested up and plunged into the biomancy lab.

After an uneventful encounter with a half-elemental minotaur (they killed the damned thing in two rounds ), the party made it to the final chamber of the laboratory, where they found a study with a desk, piles of paper, and familiar elf girl tied up in the corner. It was Silvarus's daughter.

"That explains why they came here unprepared," Saoirse said.
"Yeah, but we haven't found anything strong enough to take them down," Ashlyn replied nervously. "So what happened to them?"
"I killed them," a voice said just before a lightning bolt ripped through the party.

Cai Lei Wsu, the gatekeeper from the monastery (Monk 5/Cleric 2/Sorcerer 8) tore into the party, expositing as she did so. The rug in the center of the room was also a mimic, and it did its best to help Cai Lei, though it wasn't much of a threat to the PCs. Cai Lei was every bit the terror I had hoped she would be. Even with Ashlyn cutting magic damage in half with her paladin aura, Cai Lei played basketball with the PCs. At one point during the battle, she made an offer to Ashlyn.

"Join me, Ashlyn," she said, "and we can rule this new world ... together!"
"Why would I ever join you?!" Ashlyn shouted.
"Ashlyn, I am your mother!"
"That can't be true! My mother is supposed to be a good person!"
"Search your feelings! You know it to be true!"

The battle took a solid hour to complete, and by the end Cai Lei Wsu was dead, Ashlyn was in tears, and nobody had any resources left. The party collected the dead body, and the little elf girl, but before they could do anything else, a red light began to pulse throughout the complex as a wailing siren accompanied a deep rumbling. The PCs hauled it toward the exit as the entire building began to collapse around them.

Because of course it does

They managed to make it almost to the exit before tragedy struck. Ashlyn botched a Dex save and was knocked prone by falling debris. She was too far away from the exit to make it before the building would collapse. She was out of spells and couldn't misty step. The rest of the party was at the exit and was too far to help. Imiza grit her teeth, used her racial dimension door ability, and hurled Ashlyn clear of the building just before the ceiling collapsed on top of her. Imiza was dead and gone.

The party had no time to mourn, as six tornadoes were bearing down on their location. They scrambled up the cliff side and sprinted away from the lab just before the tornadoes converged on the spot and annihilated every trace of the lab.

TL;DR - We're in the end game now.

[SleepyShadow]

Since my players have been bugging me to finish this up, I suppose it's only fair to do so before I start a new campaign.

Spoiler: The End

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The party spoke with Longinus and Pilus (they didn't trust Pilus, but didn't have anyone else to turn to) and were given a magic orb to let them pass through the firestorm. Unfortunately, it created a safe zone with a mile radius, so it was likely the Ragesians would try to follow the party inside. As a show of good faith, Pilus offered two additional favors to the party (I believe I roleplayed him like a Deep South preacher). He gave Jasaad a magic earring (boosted saving throws but also allowed Pilus to speak with him directly; the two quickly hatched a plot to steal the heart of the dead goddess for themselves), and he teleported the party just outside the area of the firestorm. He also teleported them directly into a Ragesian ambush. Le Gasp!

The Ragesians threw the best they had at the PCs, including a half dozen psychic warriors utilizing the Vigor/Share Pain combo, and Major Rosalie Carcano! For hilariously contrived reasons of petty revenge, Saoirse's old captain from her navy days was also there to attack the party. As expected, the single class fighter was underwhelming in battle. The highlight of the fight was when Ashlyn teleported above Rosalie and gave her a stratospheric People's Elbow. Everyone cheered and made wrestling jokes for about five minutes. It was great

Once the battle was complete, the PCs hurried inside the castle where the Heart was hidden away. Since they knew it was kept at the top of the tallest tower, the party didn't explore the castle at all and brute forced their way onto the magic elevator. Said elevator had traps and guardians at every floor that could've been avoided or disabled by various gizmos found throughout the castle, but the PCs managed to plow through all of them - including a permanent Wall of Force at the top intended to squish the PCs flat. With their trial complete, the PCs ventured forth into the top of the tower.

Inside was the barren heart of the long dead goddess, and many obscure texts and clues scrawled along the floor (these would've made sense farther into the campaign, but alas it was not to be). There was also a nifty magic flying chariot, but we'll come back to that in a bit. Before the party could destroy the Heart and end the Ragesian incursion once and for all, there was one final challenger to face down. Coming up the elevator shaft behind them was Zarouhi Orlaith, Empress of Ragesia!

Well, it was just another avatar, but it was the one leading the bulk of the ground forces so it was good enough for us.

The battle was quite climactic, and the party had to use everything at their disposal in order to defeat Zarouhi and her crushing energy chains. Perhaps it would've been more memorable had Jasaad not sprung his betrayal immediately after the battle. As soon as Zarouhi was down, Jasaad used Enemies Abound on Flint, causing him to go berserk and start shooting Saoirse. Jasaad then grabbed the Heart and made a break for the elevator shaft. Unfortunately for him, Ashlyn still had one use of Misty Step left, and thanks to being a Wayfarer Cirquelist, she brought Weeping Raven along with her as she teleported in front of Jasaad. As the lovable coward that he is, he handed over the Heart without a fuss. Flint passed the save on the spell soon after, and all was right with the world.

The party destroyed the Heart, and as soon as they did the firestorm outside the castle ceased. The PCs piled into that nifty flying chariot, crashed through a big stained glass window, and flew off into the sunset ... until they saw Princess Shalo'ha being abducted by Ragesian wyvern knights! The party raced to her rescue, catching her in the flying chariot as she flung herself off the wyvern. They sped off into the sunset for real this time, only briefly considering pushing Jasaad out of the chariot while traveling at mach speed.

The PCs went their separate ways after that. Flint started an owl mail service in Sterich, and spent much of his time training owls and sending mean letters to Princess Sarika. Ashlyn moved to Erelhai-Cinlu to act as Shalo'ha's advisor and liaison with the surface elves (she also kept the magic chariot). Saoirse moved to Sapphire permanently and stayed on as part of the Mage Council (along with Katarina, much to her chagrin). Jasaad and Zeke wrote trashy romance novels, competing with one another in an already crowded market. Zeke won the popularity contest worldwide, but Jasaad started peddling his books in Sigil, and thus reached a wider audience overall. Weeping Raven established a small monastery of her own, teaching her own brand of psychic martial arts.

And somewhere far away, a one-eyed knight, presumed dead by all who knew her, continued her quest to rescue her lover.

TL;DR: My players won D&D.