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Party at the start:
Mace Blackstar (Mike D.; Human Fighter)
Wilbered The Silent (Bob S.; Human Cleric)
Castor Bean (Steve B.; Human Bard)
Trygvie (Steve G.; Elven Wizard)
Kane (NPC(normally Al G.); Human Monk)
Geia (NPC; Human Fighter)
and Malus Thunderhammer (Chris L.; Dwarf Ranger)
It was around 1:00pm on the
25th of the month of Sept.
The session resumed with our seven dauntless heroes in the water
filled tunnels somewhere beneath the mountains of Asthar Rho.
When the cleric discovered that none of his comrades had been
making a map he roundly cursed their foolishness and got out sodden
paper and pen and started scribbling. With some effort they
rolled the capsized canoe over and got most of the water out of it and
continued rowing upstream through the maze of tunnels. They
entered a larger water filled cave with Kane and
the dwarf in the lead canoe. Off in the dim shadows at the far
end
of the cave they could see a shore with two canoes pulled up upon it.
Suddenly the first canoe was bit in half by the massive jaws of a huge
crocodile hiding beneath the water. Kane and the Dwarf fell into
the water and the monster attacked, wounding the dwarf severely with
his
biting attacks. The dwarf began to swim for shore as the monk
attacked
the beast, but Kane's attacks were severely hampered by the dark,
swirling
water and the croc managed to bite the dwarf again. Apparently
the
crocodile liked the taste of dwarf.
Wilbered cast a light spell to allow his comrades to see and
another spell which allowed his comrades to walk upon the water.
Mace leapt out of the canoe and with two mighty blows half
severed the head of the monster, killing it almost instantly. His
comrades dragged the canoes to shore and used a rope to help the dwarf
retrieve his sunken armor and the rest of the equipment that had been
lost in the water. Mace dragged the monster's carcass to shore, intent
upon having some boots made of it's hide, but once he had managed this
he lost interest in the project
and left the carcass on the shore, near the canoes.
They found themselves on the shore of the water cave. A few
canoes had been pulled up on the beach and a 5' wide narrow tunnel led
east to a stout wooden door. After emptying water out of their
boots and
shoes and the dwarf wrung the water out of his beard and donned his
armor.
With Mace in the lead, they went off to check out the door.
Mace
pressed his ear to the door and was able to hear gruff voices on the
other
side but was unable to tell what they were saying. Trygvie
pressed
his ear against the door but was unable to hear a thing; apparently his
ears were still full of water.
Mace attempted to tear open the door and failed. The dwarf
attempted to tear open the door and failed. Wilbered cast Bull's
Strength on Gaia and she ripped the door open, revealing a 20x30
room. Six
bugbears were hiding behind a barricade of furniture in the center of
the
room. The bugbears began pelting the party with throwing axes and
defending behind their barricade with glaives, but after just a few
rounds
four of the six bugbears had been cut down and two wounded bugbears had
fled from the room through a door in the opposite wall.
The dwarf and Mace chased the bugbears down this narrow hall and caught
them returning with reinforcements. Mace single handedly
destroyed the bugbears since they could not bring their greater numbers
to bear (no pun intended) in the narrow hall. Trygvie searched
the room where they had first encountered the bugbears for secret doors
and failed to find any. The dwarf found a narrow hall leading
north to a door. Opening the door, he saw a large and empty room.
After debating whether to go north, through the door or east,
where the bugbears , they decided to go
north, through the door.
Entering the 40x60 room, the players saw a stone door in the north wall
and iron rungs, like monkeybars, leading up the east and west walls and
across the ceiling. A wooden chest was sitting on the ceiling 30
feet
above the floor. Wilbered boldly hid in the hall while Kane
nimbly
climbed the rungs to investigate the chest. About halfway across
the
ceiling, one of the rungs pulled loose and Kane fell to the floor.
His
"kung fu" was good enough that he landed like a cat and went right back
up again, reaching the chest in the center of the room.
Kane discovered that he could "push" the chest along the ceiling -- it
was not fastened in place but behaved as if gravity were reversed for
it. The party proceeded to spend a lot of time trying to figure
out how to get the chest off of the ceiling and down where they could
work on it. The dwarf threw up a rope and all together they tried
pulling it down but they were not strong enough. Finally, after
having scooted it
over to the wall, Mace climbed the rungs and used a dagger to forcibly
pop
the lock open. A large brass key fell out and was snatched up by
the
eager cleric of Cuthbert.
No one was too surprised when the brass key unlocked the stone door in
the north wall and allowed access into one of the now familiar five
foot wide hallways. This led a short distance to a series of
roughly carved tunnels that led along, more than two hundred feet with
a branchin or two, to a large chamber with a sandy floor. The
walls of this cavernous room were covered in vines and creepers and the
room itself was filled
with daylight -- the ceiling opened up, hundreds of feet above, to the
sky. Apparently the room was actually the bottom of a large pit.
Near the center of the room was a blacksmithing setup, with
several
anvils, a pile of hammers and other tools, two work benches, a large
firepit
and a large sationary bellows. Two humans were slumped against
the
side of the bellows, apparently too weak to move. The party could
see that the humans were dressed in rags and had chains binding them to
their
workstation (and you thought that cubicle was bad!).
Wilbered bravely volunteered Castor to enter and explore the room.
Trygvie cast an invisibility spell on the bard and the
bard went over to
check out the humans slumped by the firepit. They seemed pretty
badly
off and nearly unconscious. He took a quick glance around the
smithy
and saw a pile of shortswords on one workbench and more tools on the
other.
He then moved over to the vine covered walls. As he
approached
the vines he saw a small creature, slender and less than four feet
tall,
covered in smooth brown fur and armed with a bow hiding in the vines.
This
creature had long fingers and toes (appearing to be a very agile
climber)
and seemed to be watching the enterance to the chamber where the rest
of
the party was lurking. Castor the Bard decided to attack the
"monkeyman"
as he decided to call it, and, after struggling to recall the
activation
word on his firespear, finally recalled the word, and, shouting,
"Agni!",
with spear blazing, thrust at the monkeyman and missed completely.
Suddenly arrows began firing out of the canopy of vines at the bard and
at Mace who had been hiding in the doorway. Some of the arrows
seemed to be coming from a place in the vines 30 feet above the cavern
floor on the opposite wall. A creature up in the vines hurled a
glob of some sort of an acid-like substance at the bard. The
party charged into
the room and began hacking up the monkeymen. Trygvie cast a sleep
spell up towards the spot in the vines where he believed the monkeyman
archers
and the acid-glob hurler were hiding. Suddenly three of the
monkeymen
fell from above, going splat on the floor of the cave and the
missile
fire ceased. Wilbered followed it up with a Soundburst
spell
and Trygvie followed it up for good measure with a Flaming Sphere,
hoping to cook whomever or whatever had lobbed the acid at Castor.
After sending up Trygvie's owl as a scout, half the party climbed up
the vines to the hidden ledge and found the bodies of three of
the monkeymen, apparently slain by the cleric's soundburst. A
lively debate then broke out, with Wilbered and Mace arguing they
should press on and leave the humans chained in the smithy where they
were (Wilbered saying they chould unlock the chains and leave them food
and water). Kane and Gaia argued that to leave these poor
wretches to an almost certain death in the tunnels was unconscionable.
Gaia, in particular, was quite insistent on this point.
When Wilbered dug through his pack to find out if he had any food, he
discovered that all of his rations had been soaked in the water and
ruined. Other heroes who had also fallen in the water or had
their gear immersed discovered the same thing.
The session ended here.
Character
|
class/race
|
player
|
xp at start
|
xp at end
|
|
Geia
|
human fighter
lvl 3
|
npc
|
3989
|
4475
|
|
Mace
|
Human fighter
lvl 5
|
Mike D.
|
16476
|
17449
|
|
Wilbered
|
Human Cleric
lvl 6
|
Bob S.
|
15055
|
16028
|
|
Castor Bean
|
Human Bard
level 5
|
Steve B.
|
12061
|
13034
|
|
Trygvie
|
Elven Wizard
level 5
|
Steve G.
|
12828
|
13801
|
|
Kane
|
Human Monk
level 6
|
npc
|
15176
|
15662
|
|
Malus
|
Dwarf Ranger
Level 4
|
Chris
|
8944
|
9917
|
|