May 28th, 2017

The Tomb and the Proving Grounds

Because it was family birthday weekend I was late to the game, so Nick started with Tomb of Horrors which continued after I showed up with us finding and clearing the (false) tomb of its monster. Whee-hawken! And we'll be back again for the later part perhaps. Maybe.

The Proving Grounds

From my left:
Zack playing LaVeya the human druid

Sarai playing Desorna the elven axe-maiden fighter

Hunter playing Strix the elven magic-user

Matt playing Mirin the human spellsword

Chris of the Crown playing Deckard the Human ex-fighter thief, and

the Most Munificent DM playing Ydee, Catherine's half-elven thief

We then returned to the low level Lloringhold party who were stuck on the fourth floor of the Proving Grounds. Because of DM kindness, the fourth level map was oriented properly so the party mapper wouldn't have to have half a dozen maps on half a dozen different pieces of scrap paper and could know where they were in relation to where they had been before. This was not really comforting as they were on the west edge of the map and the chimes that allowed them to teleport off the level are on the east edge of the map. Now to figure how they were going to get from here to there.

But first, how to get the ribbon for this floor that would allow them to delve deeper into the Proving Grounds? They had found the triangular room with the statue that could sink viewers into a stupor, and behind it the ever enterprising Deckard had found an impression shaped like a hand. After fitting his hand into it his palm and fingers were blue where they had touched the imprint. The coloration didn't wipe off, so the party figured it had to be part of the ribbon test. Thus they went in search of a place to use Deckard's discolored hand. Oh, and treasure too.

Speaking of treasure, Deckard activated the wand of treasure finding and it determined that there was a large portion of treasure to the east. Wending their way through the halls back to the room they had appeared in, the party went north down a long hallway and through the east door at the end of it. They came into the corner of a hallway that went east and south. Going south the hall quickly turned east again and after a short walk they were at a door that was locked but not trapped. Deckard picked the lock and the party entered the room beyond.

They were in the northwest corner of a twenty foot by twenty foot room with two doors in each wall meaning they had seven potential exits to choose from other than the door they had entered from. The wand of treasure finding said treasure was to the south so Deckard and Ydee examined the southern doors. Neither was trapped, but both were locked and the locks appeared jammed in some way and impossible to open. Exploring the other doors in the room they determined that all the ones other than the one they had entered through were not trapped but were locked, and the locks of them all were jammed. Deckard went back to the hallway corner where they had entered and found that the east hallway quickly turned south and ended in a door that obviously led into the northwest corner of the room of many doors. Since there was no knock spell available, the party grew grumpy and decided to explore the south hall out of the original entry room.

The hallway went a ways south before dead-ending in a door that, once opened by Strix the Magic Crowbar, revealed a blank wall beyond and fired a spear into Strix's chest! Luckily it deflected off of one of her exposed ribs only doing a single point of damage. Secret doors were checked for and one was found in the west wall a little ways up the hall from the dead end. It was opened revealing another passage heading south which curved around the end of the trapped hallway and headed north again. This hallway dead-ended with two doors visible: one on the north wall and one on the east wall. The east door was easiest to open and the party went down a short hallway before it opened into a twenty foot wide by thirty foot deep chamber, with the party entering the room in the southwest corner. In the center of the northern wall was an abstract statue that ran from floor to ceiling. The statue seemed to be of spiraling streamers of smoke rising from floor to ceiling though on closer examination it seemed different (though modern students recognized it as very much like the double helix of DNA, that meant nothing to their characters). The statue was standing on a base of blue stone, and when Deckard touched the stone with his blue hand, his skin returned to normal color again and Strix saw something out of the corner of her eye. As she turned to look it seemed to be a solid looking fog that coalesced into a tall faceless humanoid figure with pink and red and white striations around parts of it. Then the figure turned gray and moved to attack, battering Strix badly. The party attacked it and took significant damage during the battle, with Desorna the elven axemaiden being reduced to just a couple of hit points. Finally Ydee struck a blow that laid the figure low and as it lay there motionless it was noticed that the palm of Ydee's hand was now red, much like Deckard's had been blue. Quick observation confirmed that the ceiling at the top of the statue was a red circle, and so Ydee climbed up the double helix to touch the red circle. As she did, things went black (by virtue of ALL the players, all FIVE of them, rolling natural 1s for saving throws. Such amazing failures must be admired.).

The party was blinded and they soon after felt . . . things skittering over their feet and legs. LaVeya and Mirin realized that their lower legs and feet were stuck in place. The party began flailing around and attempting to crush and kill the whatevers that were everywhere. Desorna and Strix shook off the effects of the blindness first and found to their horror that solid gray spider-things were scrambling over every surface and trying to enmesh the party. Strix, in her standard panic mode response, turned into gaseous form leaving Desorna to be the only one fighting these spider things. Strix's panic increased as she slowly tried to wend her way toward the short hall out. The spider-things had blocked it with webbing and now began wrapping webbing around the gaseous form, which seemed to make Strix feel more solid and completely trapped until she was back in her usual form and cocooned inside a web-shell. In the meantime the battle had continued with the spiders spitting digestive juices on the party which did minimal but still fairly significant damage over time. Finally though the party did enough damage to end the monstrosity of arachnids, all of whom seemed to collapse and begin to dissolve. Soon it was discovered that Ydee had a green ribbon around her neck, meaning that the adventurers now had each of the three ribbons between them. Now came the time to find their way to the chimes, and then the deeper levels.

But first the quest for treasure continued. Coming back out west into the hallway the party tried the north door next with Ydee successfully picking the lock when Deckard couldn't. The room beyond was 'L' shaped, bending around the top of the DNA statue room. As the party moved up to look around the corner they saw something that looked like a floor to ceiling heat mirage between them and the far wall. Mirin threw a sling stone at it and the gelatinous cube moved to the attack. Mirin (as might be considered normal for one of Matt's characters) was hit and paralyzed by the cube which started to try to pull Mirin into it while the rest of the party continued with their attacks. Strix ran to the rescue and managed to pull Mirin away to safety while the remainder of the party quickly killed the monstrosity.

After burning the gelatinous cube the party was able to find some equipment and quite a lot of coins in the cube's interior. Carefully puling them free and scooping them up, the party prepared to think of where they might go next. Searching around, a secret door was found on the northern wall, but since the hour was growing late we paused there for the night.

Experience points for those who want them:

LaVeya: 1818

Desorna: 1818

Strix: 1818

Mirin: 1818

Deckard: 1818

Ydee: 909

For the massively spectacular fail of 5 natural 1s for the same save vs. blindness the party was granted a 25% bonus to their xp because, wow, just wow.