Weeble1000
Villager
Sorry about the delay in responding. My group has gone to a bi-monthly long session instead of a shorter weekly session.
Last session my group tackled the Church of Berez. With the typical friendly BSing, players screwing around, and plenty of combat, the church was all we got through, but we were able to do it start to finish in one session.
The party Long Rested in the circle of Menhirs across the Luna River. They did a bit of exploring ahead of this as they had plenty of daylight remaining. Picked through a few of the remaining cottages, talked with Lazlo, excavated the mansion's cellar, etc.
During their Long Rest, Baba Lysaga visited the Church and gave her 'granddaughters', the two Necrolytes, a head's up about the party and their likely forthcoming visit. The Necroytes' goal was to delay the party as long as possible so as to expose them to as much of the mentally exhausting effects of the Heavy Heart as possible. They quickly installed a false wall blocking the hallway to the stairs and prepared to use their alarming beauty and apparently living appearance to delay the heroes. Other than that there wasn't much preparation to do. Lysaga was close to tapped on spells and severely injured, so she flew her skull to Old Bonegrinder to pay a call on the Hags and begin working on her plan B for reclaiming the gem and destroying the PCs.
At first light the party frustratingly cast Water Walk again and made their way to the Church, worried about a possible attack by a fully rested Baba Lysaga and geared up to deal with the Will-o'-Wisp(s) that were obviously still lurking in the Church.
They crept into the bell tower and the pall of anguish and despair radiating from the Heavy Heart settled onto them. Everybody passed their initial round of low DC Sanity saves, and they proceeded down the spiral stairs into the Attic.
[One save when entering a new level, one additional save every 10 minutes; Bell Tower DC 10, Attic DC 13, Loft DC 15, Nave DC 18; Failure causes 1 Level of Exhaustion and temporary Madness; A Paladin with Aura of Courage can expend a Spell Slot to remove 1 level of Exhaustion and the attendant Madness for each spell level from a target within the Aura.]
In the Attic they found a confusing jumble of crates, barrels, and sacks stacked and organized to break up the space into semi-private nooks and crannies, with ropes strung between hung with old blankets, swatches of burlap, and bits of clothing. The floor was thick with rude, improvised sleeping pallets. The party correctly guessed that this was the result of the villagers who had taken refuge in the Church, though the lack of bodies, and the apparently complete lack of molds or fungus (despite the damp atmosphere) was concerning. They all passed their slightly more difficult Sanity saves. So far, so good.
The party crept carefully through the cluttered attic and was attacked by a group of Shadows as they approached the densest part of the clutter. Although not terribly dangerous, the Shadows managed to do decent damage to some of the characters' Strength Attributes, and they were loath to attempt a Short Rest in the midst of the crushing despair suffusing the church.
Once the Sorcerer opened the trap door to the next level down things started to get much worse. The Sorcerer failed her now DC 15 Sanity Save, lost the ability to cast spells for 8 minutes, and took 1 Level of Exhaustion. The Cleric attempted to jump down through the trap door, critically failed a Dexterity (Acrobatics) check, and twisted an ankle. Then two more Shadows attacked. The Cleric critically failed an attack roll and dropped his weapon, which went clattering 1D10 feet in a random direction, bouncing into the darkness of the balcony, but luckily not plunging into the flooded Nave.
After causing some more Strength damage the Shadows were dispatched, and the Paladin cleared up the Sorcerer's madness. The slow drain of critical resources had begun in ernest.
The party collected into a tight knot around the Paladin, keeping within his Aura of Courage, but this of course placed a great deal of weight onto rickety and sodden balcony. After a broken board almost dropped the Sorcerer into the black waters of the Nave, they party spread themselves out. They discovered a dining room in reasonably good repair, though the pantry was stocked with a collection of polished human skulls. The Fighter pressed them to move quickly, but his reasonable pleas for cautious haste went unheeded by his curious companions, who found themselves in a door-lined, dead end hallway.
They all biffed their Perception checks to spot the false wall, and explored a comfortable-looking library with no other doors. The Fighter immediately began searching for a secret door whilst the others explored the remaining rooms. Opening the first door they found a modest bedroom... occupied by a lovely, and quite nude, woman, the Necrolyte Isabella.
Isabella greeted them genially and asked their business. The Paladin determined that she was Undead, but our wonderful Cleric critically failed his Religion check and was convinced she was a living being. Isabella kept the party talking for several minutes while the Fighter frantically searched in vain for a secret door, although he did discover a hollow space behind one wall.
While the Cleric conversed with Isabella, and the Sorcerer attempted to end the conversation, the Paladin checked the remaining rooms, finding three more bedrooms and Katarina, twin sister to Isabella, right down to her startlingly pale birthday suit. He also failed to notice the suspiciously new and hastily constructed false wall. perhaps it was Katarina's charm.
The Fighter again urged haste, which was an excellent time to hit the party with another DC 15 Sanity save. And with the party so spread out, none of them were within the Paladin's Aura of Courage...
Everyone passed but the unlucky Cleric, who, unable to bear up against the soul-crushing despair of the Church, retreated into his happy place. Isabella seized the opportunity, quickly dragging him into her bedroom and barring the door with the strength of the undead.
Cleric catatonic and trapped in a boudoir of evil, Fighter frantically pulling books from the shelves of a library to find a non-existent secret door, Sorcerer struggling to open a door held fast by one thrice her diminished strength, and Paladin at the opposite end of murky corridor, about to be entangled with an undead monster. And as planned by the sisters and their spectral progenitor, this is when the Caller in Darkness phased through the back wall of the Library and plunged the area into magical darkness. Ya-hoo!
With pluck, daring-doo, and well-honed strategy our heroes nevertheless prevailed.
The Paladin, of course, was instrumental. He disengaged from Katarina and felt along the wall until he found our Sorcerer, now struggling with a strength-sucking shadow instead of the door. He drew the plant-hating axe recovered from the Golthias Tree, imbued it with holy fire, and pulled a 'Here's Johnny' on Isabella's door (I figured that given how stupid this item is in general, he might as well get the extra D8 against the door - I'm also a rule-of-cool DM). Not inclined to put up with Isabella attempting to chew his face off, he tagged her with a nat 20 Smite and poor, Radiant vulnerable Isabella instantly crumbled to dust under the righteous flare of holy light and the vengeful edge of our Paladin's axe. RSVP Isabella.
The Caller worked some serious damage on the Fighter, who also got the business from Katarina and a second Shadow. The Sorcerer dispelled the magical darkness, revealing the hideous form of the caller, upon which the Sorcerer and the Fighter began to unload, (conveniently?) setting fire to the hollow wall of the library in the process. The Paladin's bracing aura snapped the Cleric out of his fugue, and the we-have-the-best-saves-against-your-BS duo promptly engaged the Caller while the Fighter and the Sorcerer polished off Katarina and the Shadows.
Out of immediate danger, the party doused the burning Library and made their way through the ruined wall into a narrow hallway, finally noticing the false wall that they were now on the other side of. This led to a staircase and one more inviting doorway...
Again failing to heed the Fighter's desperate pleas for haste, the curious adventurers explored the dusty master suite once inhabited by Brother Grigor, Thus provoking a new round of Sanity Saves, rapidly followed by another round of DC 18 saves when the party started down the stairs. With the Sorcerer and the Fighter failing at least one of these, the Paladin was getting pretty close to tapped out.
The party crept into the flooded Nave, still (frustratingly) imbued with the power of their Water Walk spell, rousing the ire of the zombies and Drowned Maiden lurking in the waters around the altar, upon which sat a black human heart oozing a tenebrous mist.
The Cleric destroyed most of the zombies by means of a brace of Turn Undead, but was then grappled by the J-Horror hair of the Drowned Maiden. Far too weak to escape the lashing tentacles, he was dragged him inexorably toward the Maiden and her beating heart. The Sorcerer was grabbed by a remaining zombie and dragged into the water, beginning to suffocate while the Fighter poured damage into the Maiden, who soaked it up like a sponge. The Paladin tried in vain to destroy the heart, which proved impervious to physical harm. Marina's spirit pleaded with the Cleric to take her heart before starting a soul-sucking makeout session.
Out came the Paladin's Wand of Magic Missiles, which rescued the Sorcerer, and with the party clued in on what they must do, they began trying to lift the Heavy Heart off the altar. Attempting to touch the Heart provoked another DC 18 Sanity Save (no longer required once successful) and a DC 20 Strength check to lift the Heart free (see previous strength-draining encounters). The Fighter and the Cleric failed their Sanity saves, which the Paladin removed with his last remaining spell slots. With liberal use of Inspiration, the party managed to pass their Sanity saves, and working together finally succeeding in wrenching the Heavy Heart free of the altar.
Unbeknownst to the party, two of the three invisible Will-o-Wisps had been Turned by the Cleric, and the third one took the opportunity to skedaddle, so the party wasn't assaulted by a trio flying, lighting shooting, soul-sucking undead who had planned to pounce at the most advantageous moment.
With the Heavy Heart lifted from the altar, the church rose out of the mire, and the first rays of pure, natural sunlight the adventurers had seen in Barovia folded the now-hallowed edifice in its warm embrace. Marina's spirit was put to rest, and the Heavy Heart became a (creepy & gross) but exceedingly useful relic.
The characters leveled up to 7, and there the session ended.
Heavy Heart (requires attunement by a good-aligned humanoid) - This warm, continually moist human heart exudes a palpable sense of hope and determination despite its grisly appearance. The bearer of the Heart has Advantage on Sanity saves. The Heart has 6 charges, which can be used to cast the following spells, and regains 1d3 +1 charges at dawn:
Calm Emotions (1 Charge); Heroism (1 Charge/Spell Level); Sickening Radiance (3 Charges); Greater Restoration (6 Charges).
Pretty freaking good, but there's a lot of situations in CoS in which a Greater Restoration would really move the story along, and few opportunities to collect the necessary material components. I can counterbalance the awesomeness a bit by giving it a little harder to the PCs in future encounters.
The Heart is also an intelligent item, containing Marina's spirit, so it has some potential storyline-nudging drawbacks that the characters aren't yet aware of.
Last session my group tackled the Church of Berez. With the typical friendly BSing, players screwing around, and plenty of combat, the church was all we got through, but we were able to do it start to finish in one session.
The party Long Rested in the circle of Menhirs across the Luna River. They did a bit of exploring ahead of this as they had plenty of daylight remaining. Picked through a few of the remaining cottages, talked with Lazlo, excavated the mansion's cellar, etc.
During their Long Rest, Baba Lysaga visited the Church and gave her 'granddaughters', the two Necrolytes, a head's up about the party and their likely forthcoming visit. The Necroytes' goal was to delay the party as long as possible so as to expose them to as much of the mentally exhausting effects of the Heavy Heart as possible. They quickly installed a false wall blocking the hallway to the stairs and prepared to use their alarming beauty and apparently living appearance to delay the heroes. Other than that there wasn't much preparation to do. Lysaga was close to tapped on spells and severely injured, so she flew her skull to Old Bonegrinder to pay a call on the Hags and begin working on her plan B for reclaiming the gem and destroying the PCs.
At first light the party frustratingly cast Water Walk again and made their way to the Church, worried about a possible attack by a fully rested Baba Lysaga and geared up to deal with the Will-o'-Wisp(s) that were obviously still lurking in the Church.
They crept into the bell tower and the pall of anguish and despair radiating from the Heavy Heart settled onto them. Everybody passed their initial round of low DC Sanity saves, and they proceeded down the spiral stairs into the Attic.
[One save when entering a new level, one additional save every 10 minutes; Bell Tower DC 10, Attic DC 13, Loft DC 15, Nave DC 18; Failure causes 1 Level of Exhaustion and temporary Madness; A Paladin with Aura of Courage can expend a Spell Slot to remove 1 level of Exhaustion and the attendant Madness for each spell level from a target within the Aura.]
In the Attic they found a confusing jumble of crates, barrels, and sacks stacked and organized to break up the space into semi-private nooks and crannies, with ropes strung between hung with old blankets, swatches of burlap, and bits of clothing. The floor was thick with rude, improvised sleeping pallets. The party correctly guessed that this was the result of the villagers who had taken refuge in the Church, though the lack of bodies, and the apparently complete lack of molds or fungus (despite the damp atmosphere) was concerning. They all passed their slightly more difficult Sanity saves. So far, so good.
The party crept carefully through the cluttered attic and was attacked by a group of Shadows as they approached the densest part of the clutter. Although not terribly dangerous, the Shadows managed to do decent damage to some of the characters' Strength Attributes, and they were loath to attempt a Short Rest in the midst of the crushing despair suffusing the church.
Once the Sorcerer opened the trap door to the next level down things started to get much worse. The Sorcerer failed her now DC 15 Sanity Save, lost the ability to cast spells for 8 minutes, and took 1 Level of Exhaustion. The Cleric attempted to jump down through the trap door, critically failed a Dexterity (Acrobatics) check, and twisted an ankle. Then two more Shadows attacked. The Cleric critically failed an attack roll and dropped his weapon, which went clattering 1D10 feet in a random direction, bouncing into the darkness of the balcony, but luckily not plunging into the flooded Nave.
After causing some more Strength damage the Shadows were dispatched, and the Paladin cleared up the Sorcerer's madness. The slow drain of critical resources had begun in ernest.
The party collected into a tight knot around the Paladin, keeping within his Aura of Courage, but this of course placed a great deal of weight onto rickety and sodden balcony. After a broken board almost dropped the Sorcerer into the black waters of the Nave, they party spread themselves out. They discovered a dining room in reasonably good repair, though the pantry was stocked with a collection of polished human skulls. The Fighter pressed them to move quickly, but his reasonable pleas for cautious haste went unheeded by his curious companions, who found themselves in a door-lined, dead end hallway.
They all biffed their Perception checks to spot the false wall, and explored a comfortable-looking library with no other doors. The Fighter immediately began searching for a secret door whilst the others explored the remaining rooms. Opening the first door they found a modest bedroom... occupied by a lovely, and quite nude, woman, the Necrolyte Isabella.
Isabella greeted them genially and asked their business. The Paladin determined that she was Undead, but our wonderful Cleric critically failed his Religion check and was convinced she was a living being. Isabella kept the party talking for several minutes while the Fighter frantically searched in vain for a secret door, although he did discover a hollow space behind one wall.
While the Cleric conversed with Isabella, and the Sorcerer attempted to end the conversation, the Paladin checked the remaining rooms, finding three more bedrooms and Katarina, twin sister to Isabella, right down to her startlingly pale birthday suit. He also failed to notice the suspiciously new and hastily constructed false wall. perhaps it was Katarina's charm.
The Fighter again urged haste, which was an excellent time to hit the party with another DC 15 Sanity save. And with the party so spread out, none of them were within the Paladin's Aura of Courage...
Everyone passed but the unlucky Cleric, who, unable to bear up against the soul-crushing despair of the Church, retreated into his happy place. Isabella seized the opportunity, quickly dragging him into her bedroom and barring the door with the strength of the undead.
Cleric catatonic and trapped in a boudoir of evil, Fighter frantically pulling books from the shelves of a library to find a non-existent secret door, Sorcerer struggling to open a door held fast by one thrice her diminished strength, and Paladin at the opposite end of murky corridor, about to be entangled with an undead monster. And as planned by the sisters and their spectral progenitor, this is when the Caller in Darkness phased through the back wall of the Library and plunged the area into magical darkness. Ya-hoo!
With pluck, daring-doo, and well-honed strategy our heroes nevertheless prevailed.
The Paladin, of course, was instrumental. He disengaged from Katarina and felt along the wall until he found our Sorcerer, now struggling with a strength-sucking shadow instead of the door. He drew the plant-hating axe recovered from the Golthias Tree, imbued it with holy fire, and pulled a 'Here's Johnny' on Isabella's door (I figured that given how stupid this item is in general, he might as well get the extra D8 against the door - I'm also a rule-of-cool DM). Not inclined to put up with Isabella attempting to chew his face off, he tagged her with a nat 20 Smite and poor, Radiant vulnerable Isabella instantly crumbled to dust under the righteous flare of holy light and the vengeful edge of our Paladin's axe. RSVP Isabella.
The Caller worked some serious damage on the Fighter, who also got the business from Katarina and a second Shadow. The Sorcerer dispelled the magical darkness, revealing the hideous form of the caller, upon which the Sorcerer and the Fighter began to unload, (conveniently?) setting fire to the hollow wall of the library in the process. The Paladin's bracing aura snapped the Cleric out of his fugue, and the we-have-the-best-saves-against-your-BS duo promptly engaged the Caller while the Fighter and the Sorcerer polished off Katarina and the Shadows.
Out of immediate danger, the party doused the burning Library and made their way through the ruined wall into a narrow hallway, finally noticing the false wall that they were now on the other side of. This led to a staircase and one more inviting doorway...
Again failing to heed the Fighter's desperate pleas for haste, the curious adventurers explored the dusty master suite once inhabited by Brother Grigor, Thus provoking a new round of Sanity Saves, rapidly followed by another round of DC 18 saves when the party started down the stairs. With the Sorcerer and the Fighter failing at least one of these, the Paladin was getting pretty close to tapped out.
The party crept into the flooded Nave, still (frustratingly) imbued with the power of their Water Walk spell, rousing the ire of the zombies and Drowned Maiden lurking in the waters around the altar, upon which sat a black human heart oozing a tenebrous mist.
The Cleric destroyed most of the zombies by means of a brace of Turn Undead, but was then grappled by the J-Horror hair of the Drowned Maiden. Far too weak to escape the lashing tentacles, he was dragged him inexorably toward the Maiden and her beating heart. The Sorcerer was grabbed by a remaining zombie and dragged into the water, beginning to suffocate while the Fighter poured damage into the Maiden, who soaked it up like a sponge. The Paladin tried in vain to destroy the heart, which proved impervious to physical harm. Marina's spirit pleaded with the Cleric to take her heart before starting a soul-sucking makeout session.
Out came the Paladin's Wand of Magic Missiles, which rescued the Sorcerer, and with the party clued in on what they must do, they began trying to lift the Heavy Heart off the altar. Attempting to touch the Heart provoked another DC 18 Sanity Save (no longer required once successful) and a DC 20 Strength check to lift the Heart free (see previous strength-draining encounters). The Fighter and the Cleric failed their Sanity saves, which the Paladin removed with his last remaining spell slots. With liberal use of Inspiration, the party managed to pass their Sanity saves, and working together finally succeeding in wrenching the Heavy Heart free of the altar.
Unbeknownst to the party, two of the three invisible Will-o-Wisps had been Turned by the Cleric, and the third one took the opportunity to skedaddle, so the party wasn't assaulted by a trio flying, lighting shooting, soul-sucking undead who had planned to pounce at the most advantageous moment.
With the Heavy Heart lifted from the altar, the church rose out of the mire, and the first rays of pure, natural sunlight the adventurers had seen in Barovia folded the now-hallowed edifice in its warm embrace. Marina's spirit was put to rest, and the Heavy Heart became a (creepy & gross) but exceedingly useful relic.
The characters leveled up to 7, and there the session ended.
Heavy Heart (requires attunement by a good-aligned humanoid) - This warm, continually moist human heart exudes a palpable sense of hope and determination despite its grisly appearance. The bearer of the Heart has Advantage on Sanity saves. The Heart has 6 charges, which can be used to cast the following spells, and regains 1d3 +1 charges at dawn:
Calm Emotions (1 Charge); Heroism (1 Charge/Spell Level); Sickening Radiance (3 Charges); Greater Restoration (6 Charges).
Pretty freaking good, but there's a lot of situations in CoS in which a Greater Restoration would really move the story along, and few opportunities to collect the necessary material components. I can counterbalance the awesomeness a bit by giving it a little harder to the PCs in future encounters.
The Heart is also an intelligent item, containing Marina's spirit, so it has some potential storyline-nudging drawbacks that the characters aren't yet aware of.
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