November 20th, 2016
The Return to the Castle in the Sky
The
Return to the Castle in the Sky. But how much time is left before the teleporter stops working again? And have the party members been paying attention to the passage of time? And if they are stuck in the Castle, and the rations run out, who gets eaten first? Will we learn this answer?
From
my left:
Chris
playing the elven spellsword Valandil the Untouchable who always
seems to avoid combat damage
Sarai
playing the elven fighter Desorna the Eternally Damaged who seems to
soak all the damage that Valandil misses
Nick
playing the human chinchilla-loving fighter Merrick the Eternally
Questing, because Eternally Questioning took too long to write
Nilo
playing the halfling cleric Arden the Prompt for inexplicably showing
up comparatively early and getting a few rerolls along the way for
that
Hunter
playing the elven magic-user Strix the Unwashed because the rest of
the party chooses to keep her downwind
Zackery
playing the elven magic-user Ahri the Many-Spells because she can
memorize most of her spellbook a day
and
Catherine's half-elven thief character Ydee the Pay-For-Play being
played by the incomparably not-crude of thought or speech DM
The
party started back in the town of Ruinheath trying to rest up and get
healed up overnight so that they could make it back into the Castle
before the standing stones teleporter became inactive until the next
new moon (yes, it was originally full moon, but my original notes
said differently so this is what it is now. Shush.). While in town
the party members tried to take care of some outstanding business,
with Desorna trying to see if the local constabulary had managed to
run to earth the ruffian who robbed her blind. Unfortunately he had
not yet been located, but the guard sergeant promised that they would
keep looking, and would keep the younger brothers locked up until
they caught the eldest.
Valandil took some items to the Curio Shop in town and sold them for a nice amount of coins before browsing through the wares. After rolling an 08 on % dice, he discovered a somewhat tattered and ancient booklet that seemed to have been sent out to prospective parents of students at Black Fortune Castle (the original name of the Castle in the Sky). After purchasing it for 20 gold coins, he read it. Though most of the information it gave was already somewhat familiar to the elven spellsword, there were a few tidbits of information to be gleaned from its pages.
Some of the party paid moderate sums of gold to the local temple for healing spells to get back into their best shape, and after a good night's sleep and a good morning's meal they returned to the circle of standing stones.
After teleporting to the tower top the party descended down the stairs in search of the amulets that would give them passage to the Proving Grounds, as those amulets were enspelled to return to their storage chest after so long or when the teleporter was used by their wearers. They were ambushed by a group of four creatures that resembled spider monkeys crossed with elves, and these creatures' razor-sharp claws tore through Desorna's skin three times before the last of the creatures was killed. After retrieving their amulets the party descended lower until they arrived at the ornate door to the Proving Grounds.
Opening the door with an amulet, they entered the Proving Grounds. They proceeded along the path they had taken before, except they went through the north door at the end of the east hallway to explore new grounds.
The first room down the hallway was opened violently by Desorna, whose charge put her directly within range of the tentacles of the corpsegrinder that was attached to the wall over the door. Three tentacles hit, and the unlucky elf failed two saving throws and collapsed, paralyzed, on the floor. Merrick lopped off one of the dangling tentacles while Valandil ran in and hacked into the 'grinder. Ahri's magic missiles killed the beast ending the threat, and Ahri cast a floating disk to carry the paralyzed fighter.
At this point it was decided that the party should go and check the bugbear room again and see if anything was there. A quick check back showed that the bugbear room was now completely empty and barren (which might have been a warning...), so the party returned to the north again.
After the previously-explored room and a dangerous dead end with a pit trap that the party managed to discern and avoid, the party found their way into a large room shaped roughly like a cross. In the center of the room was a raised dais, raised about a foot off of the floor and also cross shaped like the room. A small fire, like that of a campfire, seemed to be burning in the center of the dais, but as Merrick approached the flames leapt up into the air and resolved themselves into a foursome of fire bats. The burning bats managed to do significant damage to several party members before dying, and they also killed Strix's pet rat Stinky, consuming it in the fire of their bodies. A grouping of five gems was found on the center of the dais where the bats had been huddling, and these were quickly claimed by the party.
Proceeding south out of the room of the cross, the party quickly followed the short hall to a dead end with a door in each side wall. Moving to the west first, they entered a room that seemed somewhat misty and had the faint smell of soot in the air. It was only when Strix prostrated herself on the floor that she realized that there was an irregular network of cracks there with a slight draft rising through them Though the party had some concerns, they decided that they were basically groundless and moved on through the door opposite the one they entered through.
This room was small and a dead end, but it also contained a group of seven hobgoblins who attacked the party immediately. Though the hobgoblins did some damage, the party managed to kill them fairly easily in spite of Strix casting a fairly weak sleep spell. With nowhere further to go from here, the party returned to the end of the short south hall from the cross room and continued through the east door. This door led to a twisting passageway that quickly came to a dead end with a door on the right hand southern wall at the end of the hall.
Strix opened this door and noted that the door's handle felt damp. The room itself was singularly uninteresting, so the party searched until they discovered an odd network of cracks in a wall stone opposite the door in; cracks that roughly outlined a circle about the size of Merrick's outstretched hand. Not much could be done with or to it, though the party tried a variety of things, until Merrick took the tip of the blade of his dagger and tried to wedge it in and move it around the circle. Some dust and small debris came out from his efforts, and when Merrick pushed on the circle again it sank in slightly with a click noise, then returned to its original place. Nothing seemed to have changed in the room, so after a while the party decided to move along and see what came next.
Returning to the room of the cross the party left down the east hall this time. It only went ten feet before it came to an end at a north-south hallway. The south hallway only went ten feet before reaching a dead end, but the north led into a medium sized chamber with a single door in the center of the west wall. This door had a lock plate and was locked. Ydee failed her pick locks roll, so Ahri simply cast a knock spell and the door opened. Beyond was revealed a stairway leading down, but after a quick discussion the decision was made to explore this level further rather than descend.
With the east hall options expended,the party returned to the cross room and proceeded north. After twenty feet this led them into another medium sized chamber with a single door, this time on the east wall. The room, like most of the other rooms without occupants, seemed very barren, even without trash or dust along the walls. This struck the party as odd, but they just figured that there was some magic at work.
The eastern door led to a twenty foot long hall that opened into another chamber, this one a dead end, and potentially adding a serious element of dead to that! The gelatinous cube that was responsible for the clean rooms elsewhere on the level attacked a surprised Merrick and hit him, but did not paralyze him. The rest of the front line fighter types and cleric in the party moved to attack. Some significant damage was done before the cube managed to envelop Desorna, who made her save against the paralyzation but who was being devoured slowly and painfully by the acidic nature of the cube. The rest of the party managed to quickly kill the ooze before the elven fighter could be killed and after hacking away at the cube's corpse Merrick could reach in and grab her to pull her to safety.
Having exhausted all obvious passageways out of the cross room, the party returned to the original four way intersection where Valandil noticed something odd about the floor. There were a series of five pock marks at the north side of the intersection; four of which seemed to be in the pattern of a diamond with the fifth pock mark off of the south point of the diamond and closer to the center of the intersection. Interpreting these as an arrow, Valandil led the party north. After 30 feet a T intersection was reached with a door on the left just before the intersection. Valandil searched the floor for more pock marks and found some pointing down the west corridor. Ignoring the right hand rule, the party went west following the spellsword. After thirty more feet a passage left to the north with a door in the south wall across from the north passage, and the original hall continued west. A quick search showed that there were pocks outside the south door pointing to it, so the party opened the door.
Upon opening the door some of the party discerned some movement inside, but could see nothing that would have caused that. Desorna entered the room and suddenly found herself attacked and damaged by three daggers that seemed to come out of nowhere to cut at her before vanishing again with a slight visual of a ripple, as if of something moving at high speed. The rest of the party entered to see what was attacking and to try to kill them. The creatures were damned hard to hit as once their location was, for the moment, discovered the creature had probably moved past, but in time, and with the aid of the magic missile spell, the creatures were slain.
Once they died the creatures slowly returned to visibility, each looking like a greatly emaciated halfling that had been addicted to some seriously hard drugs like speed (hint, hint). They had some treasure on their bodies, and their oddly shaped but interesting daggers. Once the bodies had been searched, the floor was searched and another arrow of pock marks was found in the southwest corner of the room, pointing at the blank wall.
With this clue the secret door was fairly easy to find and open, and the room beyond revealed. It was a 20x20 room with its only feature being what looked like a standard stone birdbath with a fountain spout about a foot high standing in the center of the bath. The basin of the bath appeared to be bone dry and dusty, as was the rest of the fountain. Some serious time was spent exploring this curiosity before the cleric was encouraged to cast an augury spell. Arden learned that the fountain had some importance to the party, but continued exploration was for naught. It was then decided that Merrick, Desorna, and Arden would return to the room in the southeast corner of the known dungeon where Merrick had pushed the 'button' before. Along the way there was a random encounter and an ogre and two hobgoblins rounded the corner and all but ran into the party. During combat Desorna was dropped to zero by a hobgoblin's thrown spear, and Merrick was teetering at one hit point when he managed to kill the huge beast. After the ogre, the hobgoblins were relatively easy to mop up, and the trio did so with no real difficulties. Pressing the button did nothing to or for the fountain, so the players decided to pause the action with the party gathered together back in the fountain room.
Valandil took some items to the Curio Shop in town and sold them for a nice amount of coins before browsing through the wares. After rolling an 08 on % dice, he discovered a somewhat tattered and ancient booklet that seemed to have been sent out to prospective parents of students at Black Fortune Castle (the original name of the Castle in the Sky). After purchasing it for 20 gold coins, he read it. Though most of the information it gave was already somewhat familiar to the elven spellsword, there were a few tidbits of information to be gleaned from its pages.
Some of the party paid moderate sums of gold to the local temple for healing spells to get back into their best shape, and after a good night's sleep and a good morning's meal they returned to the circle of standing stones.
After teleporting to the tower top the party descended down the stairs in search of the amulets that would give them passage to the Proving Grounds, as those amulets were enspelled to return to their storage chest after so long or when the teleporter was used by their wearers. They were ambushed by a group of four creatures that resembled spider monkeys crossed with elves, and these creatures' razor-sharp claws tore through Desorna's skin three times before the last of the creatures was killed. After retrieving their amulets the party descended lower until they arrived at the ornate door to the Proving Grounds.
Opening the door with an amulet, they entered the Proving Grounds. They proceeded along the path they had taken before, except they went through the north door at the end of the east hallway to explore new grounds.
The first room down the hallway was opened violently by Desorna, whose charge put her directly within range of the tentacles of the corpsegrinder that was attached to the wall over the door. Three tentacles hit, and the unlucky elf failed two saving throws and collapsed, paralyzed, on the floor. Merrick lopped off one of the dangling tentacles while Valandil ran in and hacked into the 'grinder. Ahri's magic missiles killed the beast ending the threat, and Ahri cast a floating disk to carry the paralyzed fighter.
At this point it was decided that the party should go and check the bugbear room again and see if anything was there. A quick check back showed that the bugbear room was now completely empty and barren (which might have been a warning...), so the party returned to the north again.
After the previously-explored room and a dangerous dead end with a pit trap that the party managed to discern and avoid, the party found their way into a large room shaped roughly like a cross. In the center of the room was a raised dais, raised about a foot off of the floor and also cross shaped like the room. A small fire, like that of a campfire, seemed to be burning in the center of the dais, but as Merrick approached the flames leapt up into the air and resolved themselves into a foursome of fire bats. The burning bats managed to do significant damage to several party members before dying, and they also killed Strix's pet rat Stinky, consuming it in the fire of their bodies. A grouping of five gems was found on the center of the dais where the bats had been huddling, and these were quickly claimed by the party.
Proceeding south out of the room of the cross, the party quickly followed the short hall to a dead end with a door in each side wall. Moving to the west first, they entered a room that seemed somewhat misty and had the faint smell of soot in the air. It was only when Strix prostrated herself on the floor that she realized that there was an irregular network of cracks there with a slight draft rising through them Though the party had some concerns, they decided that they were basically groundless and moved on through the door opposite the one they entered through.
This room was small and a dead end, but it also contained a group of seven hobgoblins who attacked the party immediately. Though the hobgoblins did some damage, the party managed to kill them fairly easily in spite of Strix casting a fairly weak sleep spell. With nowhere further to go from here, the party returned to the end of the short south hall from the cross room and continued through the east door. This door led to a twisting passageway that quickly came to a dead end with a door on the right hand southern wall at the end of the hall.
Strix opened this door and noted that the door's handle felt damp. The room itself was singularly uninteresting, so the party searched until they discovered an odd network of cracks in a wall stone opposite the door in; cracks that roughly outlined a circle about the size of Merrick's outstretched hand. Not much could be done with or to it, though the party tried a variety of things, until Merrick took the tip of the blade of his dagger and tried to wedge it in and move it around the circle. Some dust and small debris came out from his efforts, and when Merrick pushed on the circle again it sank in slightly with a click noise, then returned to its original place. Nothing seemed to have changed in the room, so after a while the party decided to move along and see what came next.
Returning to the room of the cross the party left down the east hall this time. It only went ten feet before it came to an end at a north-south hallway. The south hallway only went ten feet before reaching a dead end, but the north led into a medium sized chamber with a single door in the center of the west wall. This door had a lock plate and was locked. Ydee failed her pick locks roll, so Ahri simply cast a knock spell and the door opened. Beyond was revealed a stairway leading down, but after a quick discussion the decision was made to explore this level further rather than descend.
With the east hall options expended,the party returned to the cross room and proceeded north. After twenty feet this led them into another medium sized chamber with a single door, this time on the east wall. The room, like most of the other rooms without occupants, seemed very barren, even without trash or dust along the walls. This struck the party as odd, but they just figured that there was some magic at work.
The eastern door led to a twenty foot long hall that opened into another chamber, this one a dead end, and potentially adding a serious element of dead to that! The gelatinous cube that was responsible for the clean rooms elsewhere on the level attacked a surprised Merrick and hit him, but did not paralyze him. The rest of the front line fighter types and cleric in the party moved to attack. Some significant damage was done before the cube managed to envelop Desorna, who made her save against the paralyzation but who was being devoured slowly and painfully by the acidic nature of the cube. The rest of the party managed to quickly kill the ooze before the elven fighter could be killed and after hacking away at the cube's corpse Merrick could reach in and grab her to pull her to safety.
Having exhausted all obvious passageways out of the cross room, the party returned to the original four way intersection where Valandil noticed something odd about the floor. There were a series of five pock marks at the north side of the intersection; four of which seemed to be in the pattern of a diamond with the fifth pock mark off of the south point of the diamond and closer to the center of the intersection. Interpreting these as an arrow, Valandil led the party north. After 30 feet a T intersection was reached with a door on the left just before the intersection. Valandil searched the floor for more pock marks and found some pointing down the west corridor. Ignoring the right hand rule, the party went west following the spellsword. After thirty more feet a passage left to the north with a door in the south wall across from the north passage, and the original hall continued west. A quick search showed that there were pocks outside the south door pointing to it, so the party opened the door.
Upon opening the door some of the party discerned some movement inside, but could see nothing that would have caused that. Desorna entered the room and suddenly found herself attacked and damaged by three daggers that seemed to come out of nowhere to cut at her before vanishing again with a slight visual of a ripple, as if of something moving at high speed. The rest of the party entered to see what was attacking and to try to kill them. The creatures were damned hard to hit as once their location was, for the moment, discovered the creature had probably moved past, but in time, and with the aid of the magic missile spell, the creatures were slain.
Once they died the creatures slowly returned to visibility, each looking like a greatly emaciated halfling that had been addicted to some seriously hard drugs like speed (hint, hint). They had some treasure on their bodies, and their oddly shaped but interesting daggers. Once the bodies had been searched, the floor was searched and another arrow of pock marks was found in the southwest corner of the room, pointing at the blank wall.
With this clue the secret door was fairly easy to find and open, and the room beyond revealed. It was a 20x20 room with its only feature being what looked like a standard stone birdbath with a fountain spout about a foot high standing in the center of the bath. The basin of the bath appeared to be bone dry and dusty, as was the rest of the fountain. Some serious time was spent exploring this curiosity before the cleric was encouraged to cast an augury spell. Arden learned that the fountain had some importance to the party, but continued exploration was for naught. It was then decided that Merrick, Desorna, and Arden would return to the room in the southeast corner of the known dungeon where Merrick had pushed the 'button' before. Along the way there was a random encounter and an ogre and two hobgoblins rounded the corner and all but ran into the party. During combat Desorna was dropped to zero by a hobgoblin's thrown spear, and Merrick was teetering at one hit point when he managed to kill the huge beast. After the ogre, the hobgoblins were relatively easy to mop up, and the trio did so with no real difficulties. Pressing the button did nothing to or for the fountain, so the players decided to pause the action with the party gathered together back in the fountain room.
The
party isn't at a place where their experience points can accrue to
any benefit (Sorry, Zack), but if they find a place where they can
rest for eight hours then it will accrue because it is more than the
60 Ahri needs to level.
The
question that is there to concern the party is this: When does the
week of activity for the teleporter end? And will they be able to use
it to return to the town below if the week is up? Next week may
provide the answers, or we may just go to a different campaign and
leave everyone hanging.
Okay,
Zack,the total was 604 xp for everyone who was there and 302 for
Ydee. Can't get even the basic benefits til you sleep for the night,
but you're there.
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