June 4th, 2017

The Proving Grounds and Excess Pain and Suffering

Last weekend was birthday weekend in my family, but this weekend was birthday weekend for both Matt and myself. So CAKE was to be had, and the diet starts tomorrow for me. -sigh-

The Proving Grounds

From my left:

Nilo playing Kag the human magic-user

Matt playing Mirin the human spellsword

Chris playing Deckard the human ex-fighter thief

Sarai playing Desorna the elven axe-maiden

Hunter playing Strix the elven magic-user

Zack playing LaVeya the human druid

the Most Kind and Generous DM playing Ydee, Catherine's half-elven thief

The party started in the 'L' shaped room with the smoldering corpse of the gelatinous cube and lots of black smoke hanging near the ceiling. The secret door in the north wall that they had discovered at the end of last session beckoned, so after there were no traps detected on it, they attempted to open it and pass through. There was no way to open it by pressure, so time was spent searching the room before Ydee found a place in the wall in the northeast corner that released the door allowing it to open. Preparing their battered selves, the party entered the room.

The room behind the secret door was a simple 30' wide by 20' deep room with a single door on the west wall in the northwest corner. Across from the entry the center of the north wall was a painting of some sort, though what it was of was obscured by some dirt and mold that clung to the wall. Strix used her sleeve to clear off a section revealing some painted runes underneath, though the writing was not in a language that any of the party spoke. Desorna was adamantly against further cleaning of the painting, instead insisting that the party proceed through the door in the west wall. After some minor effort, the door was opened and a short hallway was revealed on the far side.

This hallway extended ten feet to the north and the south from the other side of the door and each end of the hallway was unremarkable except for the large symbol engraved on it; a star to the north and a crescent moon to the south. Further investigation showed that these were like the other symbols found earlier; a three foot wide by three foot high area of the wall was indented a few inches but the symbol protruded from this indention out to where the wall once was. It was learned that touching the sigil caused the person touching it to vanish, and the party split as the individuals decided to touch either one or the other instead of all going together. So the DM sighed a bit to himself and handled things as best as he could.

Each party found themselves in a pitch black area facing four faintly luminous featureless humanoid figures, each of which raised a hand toward a target and shot a beam of phosphorescence at a target. Those who were hit took a bit of damage and prepared to attack their opponents. Each figure only took one hit before vanishing, but they did a small amount of backlash damage to the one who struck them, not matter if the attack was in close combat, ranged combat, or by spell effect. Once the figures were vanquished each group found themselves back in a recognizable environment, not the hall where they had been, but in a twenty by twenty room with no obvious exits and a fountain in the center of it that had a thin stream of water flowing in it. The unconscious members of the group had water from the fountain of healing forced down their throats to get them back to functional status, and the others took a drink as well. As the majority of the party had been damaged, this seemed a wise course of action, and the decision was made to sleep in the fountain room for the night rather than to try to return to Ivy's the next floor down.

During the first watch of the night Deckard was on alert while the rest of the party slept as best as they could. With LaVeya and Kag in the magical bedrolls they were going to be fully rested in the morning while the others would have to make do. Midwayish through Deckards watch he heard a sound like a box of tin plates being dropped to the ground outside the secret door. Curious, he waited to see if he would hear more. When no further sounds were forthcoming he opened the door to see two piles of metal shards on the floor of the next room. As he watched these shards of metal began to move, each swirling into a metallic tornado of blades. Deckard quickly shut the secret door again before they things could close to attack him, and after a few moments of relative silence outside he once again heard the clatter as the metal dropped to the floor again.

Later in his watch Deckard heard sounds of a different sort from the room beyond. Opening the door beyond Deckard noticed that the piles of metal were gone, but there was a troll standing in the room instead. It heard the door open and lumbered to the attack. Deckard shouted for help, but only Ydee was wakeful enough to stand and help. As Deckard took the troll's attacks, Ydee kicked Desorna in the ribs and woke her up too. Desorna grabbed her axe and moved to attack the troll with Deckard slipping back to use his bow. Desorna took some damage before the troll was slain, and then it was quickly searched for valuables before Deckard burned it to a crisp in the next room, closing the secret door on the disgusting smell of burning troll after the fire was well lit. Desorna's watch began and Deckard was happy to lie down and rest.

During Desorna's watch she heard a rustling sound which took a bit to locate, but it seemed to be coming from Desorna's backpack. Reaching into grab whatever was there the elven fighter was instead bitten on the hand by the gremlin that popped out, its arms loaded down with the elf's rations which it was busily cramming into its mouth as fast as it could swallow. As Desorna grabbed her axe the gremlin snapped his fingers and vanished, taking the last of Desorna's food with it. As Desorna had been carrying food for about half the party, this left the group in dire straits. There were no other incidents in the night and morning(?) came peacefully enough, though the decrease of rations was a problem.

The next morning(?) the party was determined to rest for the day and then try to sleep again. LaVeya could use the time to burn through her spell points and heal everyone before resting again. The day spent quietly and in reflection allowed the adventurers to take stock of the things that they had learned and discovered about themselves over the recent adventures (i.e. in out-of-game terms those who had enough experience points to level could gain the automatic benefits of a day's reflection: additional hit points, spell points, and/or improved saving throws). Once that was done and their druid had more spell points to heal with, they would be better able to take on the challenges ahead, or so they hoped. Unfortunately Ydee, who had been critically injured in the battle against the troll (i.e. reduced below zero hit points) wasn't really suited for adventuring further until she could recover appropriately. The party was torn between further explorations and returning to Ruinheath to give Ydee a chance to recover fully. In the end the decision was made to explore further, against common sense and good judgment, once the party had taken another rest.

During the next night's(?) rest, Deckard felt air movement and looked around for the source. A mirage seemed to be wrapped around Desorna's neck, and the elven axe-maiden stirred uneasily in her sleep. Deckard drew his dagger and moved close to possibly attack whatever the distortion was hiding, only to have Desorna awaken and jump in surprise to see Deckard with a blade at her throat. She was slightly nicked by the dagger as she jerked, and the mirage slipped away and began to move. Deckard stuck an arrow in the phase serpent and it either died and became insubstantial or phased away, badly injured. Desorna felt horribly ill and unsteady as she awakened and realized that she had unknowingly lost eleven hit points to the serpent's anesthetic venom, plus an additional point to the dagger's blade. She failed one of three saving throws and felt very weak and woozy. Deckard told her to sleep and took most of her watch as well where, luckily, nothing else happened. Mirin was wakened for her watch and told of the situation with Desorna and to keep an eye out for mirages.

The remainder of the night passed relatively uneventfully and the bedraggled and slowed party moved on the next day.

A trip to visit Ivy lead to some information gained, but among the more important and worrisome bits was that the venom of the phase serpent could be very lethal over time. Desorna's physical ability scores had been dropping to where they were giving penalties instead of benefits. The adventurers decided that maybe the caduceus symbol they had found previously might be of help since that was a symbol of healers. So the party returned to the fourth level and went to touch the caduceus.

The party found themselves at one end of a twenty foot wide by fifty foot long room. At the 20 and 40 foot marks on each side were tall windows with an arched top that were made of leaded glass. Sunlight seemed to be streaming through them into the room. At the far end was a raised dais with an altar on it. As the party approached the altar and stepped onto the dais three figures appeared behind the altar, all human, a woman on the left and then two men, wearing white robes. “Welcome to the Temple of Cant. How may we help you?” The central figure asked. Desorna, feeling even weaker than before, asked if they could remove the poison. The reply was “Do you wish healing?” When given a hesitant yes answer, they announced that the price would be 500 gold. The party discussed using their found gold for the healing and were swayed by Deckard's point that they had found more than that already. The gold was paid and there was a “Murmur, chant, pary, Invoke!” and Desorna was well again, fully healed as if by a heal spell. This was widely considered worth it, so Ydee paid 50 platinum pieces and was also fully healed and ready to go. If asked if there was anyone else whowanted help, Kag, being witty, asked to get away from the maniacs he was adventuring with and promptly vanished. This led to some startlement among the party, though they were told that if they were done they should say they were done. In turn, with some hesitation, those in the temple announced that they were done, and when they said so they found themselves back in the room with the fountain, but without Kag. Where was he?
Kag at this point was floating in space in pitch blackness, though after a few moments he could see pinpricks of light like stars all around him in the extreme distance. After testing the effects of gravity by pulling a sling stone out of his pouch and letting it go to see it hovering there, he heard a voice in his head that revealed itself to be the voice of Cant. And from this point an interesting discussion began. During the conversation Cant said he was the deity of everything, but outside of the cosmology of the world Kag knew. He also provided some hints and observations in answer to Kag's questions before sending Kag back to rejoin his companions. When he arrived, Kag's left shoulder had a burning sensation on the front of it, and when Kag looked he saw that there was a single three inch high gothic-style and ornate capital 'C' on his skin in black, red, white, and silver. This being odd but kind of cool, Kag was happy if still confused and the fully healed party continued on.

The party decided to try to use the crown symbol to see where it led, but as they moved up towards it Kag heard a voice like Cant's in his head that said “Don't”. So with that information given, the party followed the other hint that had been given to Kag by Cant as Kag floated in space: the room with the eight doors.

Along the way a pair of trolls were encountered and killed, though the battle was difficult and the party took some damage, especially Ydee whose bad luck with bowstrings continued leaving her no option other than to draw her dagger of evisceration and leap into combat. Once the battle was done and goods collected from the corpses the party continued on to the room of eight doors.

Upon arrival some time was spent trying to open any of the other doors without success. Finally the additional hint that Kag had received was deciphered as meaning that only one door could be unlocked at a time. This was discovered only after the party spent time trying to open the other jammed locks in the room. The entry door was locked and then the thieves in the party could unlock another door. First they tried the north door in the northeast corner of the room and revealed a hallway that went ten feet forward before turning east. They closed and locked that door again remembering that the wand of treasure finding had pointed south from this room. The south door in the southeast corner was opened next and behind it was a hallway leading east. The party decided to follow this and came to a turn to the north after fifty or so feet. The north hall went twenty feet further before dead-ending and there was a door in each side wall ten feet before the dead end. The right hand rule took effect and the party opened the east door.

The party found themselves in the northwest corner of a 20' deep by 30' wide room. In the southwest and northeast corners stood two eight foot tall statues of archers facing each other, bows drawn. In the southeast corner there was a door in the east wall. After some discussion and general distrust of the statues someone threw a sling stone between them. An arc of energy flashed between the two statues and the stone vanished. This alarmed the party, but further tests were done. It was determined that the arc went from bow to bow and scorched the ceiling but not the floor. Several experiments with thrown sling stones, bullets, and arrows showed that there was a four inch space under the arc that was safe. LaVeya shapechanged into the form of a garden snake and wiggled underneath and resumed her normal form on the other side. Having done that she decided that exploring beyond the far door all by herself was a wise choice. And she did so, opening the door and discovering that she was standing in the center of a 50 long north-south hallway. At the south end of the hall there was a door in the south wall, and at the north end of the hall there was a door in the east wall. She opened the east door at the north end of the hall and found that she was in the northwest corner of a 20' by 20' room. A door was in the south wall in the southwest corner. She returned back to the archers room to tell the others what she had found, and the party began the task of figuring out how to get around the arc.

Climbing over the statue and making sure not to pass in front of the bow was the wisest choice, though it was a narrow squeeze that couldn't be done while in armor. Plus it had risks all its own. While Ydee was climbing over she failed a climb check with a natural '1' and fell into the arc. The resulting damage left her one point away from death, but luckily LaVeya had one spell remaining and healed Ydee so she survived. Strix cast gaseous form on other members of the party, sometimes against their wishes, so they could seep behind the statue to safety on the other side. Luckily for Strix, Desorna only holds grudges for five thousand years.

Once the party was safely on the other side, the next concern was in escaping safely since Ydee was in horrible shape and barely able to stagger. The party went north down the hall, east into the room LaVeya had discovered, and then through the south door. After ten feet the hallway turned east, and after another ten feet it opened into the center of a large room, thirty feet across and fifty feet from north to south, with a hallway exiting from the opposite side of the room. Unfortunately the four juvenile trolls in the room were looking for dinner. Since Desorna had been on point, the four rushed her and as she screamed for help Strix moved forward to provide the kind of aid she herself preferred: she turned Desorna into a gaseous form cloud again, infuriating Desorna. This unfortunately left Strix as the only remaining target for the trolls and they tore her up, reducing her to zero hit point from full.

Kag returned to the tactic he had used against the earlier pair of trolls and used a web spell to hold these four in place. None of the four made their initial strength checks to break free and those members of the party who were able moved in to attack the front two. Even Ydee, who had been given a torch, moved forward to try to singe the trolls. Strix's limp form was dragged free of the webbing, and the carnage began. One of the trolls managed to tear free of the webs but was dropped before doing too much damage. The others were attacked with flaming arrows and just torches as well as regular weapons until all four were dead and burning. Ydee fed Strix a potion of healing allowing Strix to stand and walk again, and the party moved down the short hallway on the other side of the room and opened the door into another north-south hallway. This was thankfully one they had been to before, and to the south was the chimes room that would allow them to teleport to the first level and hopefully make their way out again.

And there we ended for the night.

Experience points for the party:

Kag: 1524

Mirin: 1224

Deckard: 1224

Desorna: 1224

Strix: 1224

LaVeya: 1224

Ydee: 612

Kag gets extra because of the contact. Everyone got a bonus for figuring some things out and for taking a hint for once.