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"Retake the Island" - Concluded!
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<blockquote data-quote="Silver Moon" data-source="post: 2825292" data-attributes="member: 8530"><p><em>Thanks Sabriel, the crash wasn't a problem as I've been simultaneously posting both here and over on the dragonsfoot.org board, so just had to copy the posts over from there. </em></p><p><em></em></p><p><em>You'll have to wait another chapter or two of the next ship escape, this chapter is back with the high-level group up in the mountain top city. When I ran this module I was actually surprised that the players decided to spend several game nights playing out escape attempts by the captured NPC's. I had assumed they would just concentrate on the high-level characters and let them initaite rescue missions. </em> </p><p></p><p></p><p><strong>Chapter Seventeen, “The Ziggurat Battle”, August 7th, 1018, 3:00 P.M.</strong></p><p></p><p>Back in the City, Luekia successfully leads the group at the tunnel entrance back, avoiding traveling where the hobgoblins atop these two buildings can see, as well as avoiding traveling patrols. The combined group of sixteen characters then have another lengthy debate, this time on assault strategy. At long last, over two hours after the initial group first reached this location, a plan is launched. </p><p></p><p>Both Immy and Blip stay by the building, and throw up illusions east of the building to keep those at the building across town from being able to see what is really happening. The others pile into the three bags of holding, which Luekia and Lannon each take. While climbing into the bags Guice makes the comment “We’ve spent so much time in these bags we should fix them up inside.” Timothy comments “Just don’t put in a window”.</p><p></p><p>By this time, Kale has reached the top of the mountain, discovering that the mountain is an extinct volcano, with a city within its crater a hundred yards below the rim. From this lookout point by this rim, he observed a group of around 40 hobgoblins surrounding a marsh with dozens armed bullywug. Elsewhere in the city, small patrols of hobgoblins wandered about. He examined the different methods for entering the city. On the crater rim, about 200 yards east of him were vines leading down to the city. They looked to be sturdy, but traveling down them would clearly be seen by the hobgoblins below. At the center opposite side of the crater rim he saw a huge tree, whose uppermost branches reach out to above the crater. Also on the opposite end of the crater, in the eastern corner of the city, was a cave, but he had no way of knowing where on the mountain the entrance of this cave was located.</p><p></p><p>Lannon and Luekia invisibly approach the building from its west end, and scale each floor, keeping as far from the hobgoblin guards as possible. The windows on the 3rd and 4th floors are shut, but from sounds heard it is apparent that there are people inside. They reach the roof, seeing two hobgoblin lookouts lying on it. Like the goblins in the other part of the city, these lookouts are both wearing clothing and are partially covered by blankets which are the exact same color as the roof, essentially camouflaging them from distant observation from above. </p><p></p><p>The hobgoblins are looking eastward, towards the other building that Luekia had spotted. In front of them are signal mirrors and flags. Lannon and Luekia begin to approach the two, getting halfway across when Lannon stumbles, making noise loud enough to be heard. They both stop, and wait before proceeding. Lannon stumbles again, this time alerting the hobgoblin closest to Luekia. The hobgoblin begins to react, until she knocks him unconscious. Her doing this catches the attention of the other hobgoblin, so Lannon makes a diving leap towards him, sword extended. Landing with a loud thud, Lannon slays the creature. </p><p></p><p>Luekia and Lannon both now hear hurried movement in the room below, and realize that the element of surprise has been lost. They each start to quickly emptying their bags of holding, the first three dumped out being Serita, Luekia and Timothy. Luekia drops the bag in order to retrieve the flags and mirrors, before they accidentally fall to the hobgoblins below on the first floor roof, who are still unaware of what is transpiring above. As others are dumped out, sounds from the room below cease. Serita grabs the dropped bag, and begins to dump occupants as well.</p><p></p><p>By now, several fighters have emerged from the bags, with Kruk, Guice and Narg heading directly to the trapdoor leading to the fireman’s pole down. They see nobody on the fourth floor, and slide down the pole to the 3rd floor, where an armed enemy fighter awaits them. The enemy fighter engages Narg in battle, with Kruk moving up directly behind him. Guice and Lannon also slide down to that level while Mojo decides to slide all the way down to the first floor, and Adrianna checks out the 4th floor. </p><p></p><p>Narg and Kruk combined manage to bring down the fighter, without taking any hits in the process (and the DM curses his dice, which never exceeded an eight, out of ten attack rolls). As the characters look around the rooms for the possible location of the prisoners. The group still up on the roof now notices lots of activity on the second floor of the distant building, in spite of the spell by the illusionists, which makes them think the enemy mage had teleported to that other location. “Uh oh,” Timothy exclaims.</p><p></p><p>The cleric’s intuition proves to be correct as a massive fireball then explodes from within the 3rd floor of the Ziggurat. The fire pours out of all 3rd story windows, and through a hole in the roof atop the 4th floor. On the 3rd floor Guice, Kruk, Lannon and Narg are all caught directly within the seventy-two point blast (and thankfully all make their saves). A few of the others take small amounts of damage from the ancillary burst of heat. </p><p></p><p>The rest of the party start sliding down the pole. Most go to the ground floor, where Mojo has declared to be temporarily safe. Luekia and Freyland both decide to stop atop the second floor, and battle the many hobgoblins now coming into that floor from outside on the first floor roof. Luekia drops three, and Freyland dishes out some damage on his own, before they decide to retreat. At the first floor they regroup, and exit from the eastern door of the building. They grab up their two illusionists and head east through the city. Shortly thereafter, the hobgoblins start to exit the same building, the ones in front then being struck down by a Flame Strike from Serita’s staff. This causes the other hobgoblins to pull back to within the building itself. </p><p></p><p>Above, on the northern ridge of the crater, while Kale had been debating his next move, two things occurred. In the opposite western end of the city, atop a tall ziggurat-style building, a massive fireball exploded from within the structure. Fire pours out of all 3rd story windows, and through a hole in the roof atop the 4th floor. He then notices movement atop that roof. His eyes are then drawn to movement much closer to him, as what he assumes is an enemy orc lookout moves from a hiding point near the vines 200 yards away from him. He immediately finds cover to avoid being seen. This well-armed and well-armored orc then rushes to the mouth of a cave about 75 feet behind him. </p><p></p><p>Within a few rounds, a group of thirteen humanoids exit this cave, this group being comprised mostly of monsters. He sees that they are led by a well-armed and well-armored male human fighter and a male drow elf dressed in robes. With them are six armed lizard men with shields and partial armor, a well-armed and well-armored bugbear, and the previously seen orc. Four of the lizard men are wearing very full backpacks. </p><p></p><p>These creatures appear to have three prisoners with them. Two of the prisoners are barely clothed human males, with their mouths gagged, hands tied behind their backs, with ropes around their waists linked to the bugbear guard. The other prisoner is a young human girl, around seven or eight years of age not restrained but closely guarded by the lizard men, the closest lizard man to her carrying a loaded crossbow. She wears simple cloth clothing, and he is surprised to see that she has a sheathed longsword slung through her belt. </p><p></p><p>Kale assumes that the orc/drow/lizard men group is enemies with silver moon prisoners. As such, he wishes to determine where they are going so that he can inform the Silver Moon when he meets up with them. They start to head east, away from Kale, making a path around the crater and slightly down the mountain. Kale follows the group at a distance, staying near the rim, in order to still see down into the city. In the city below he sees around a dozen adventurers exit the ziggurat, and rush east through a main street of the city. Shortly thereafter, hobgoblins start to exit the same building, the lead ones being struck down by a Flame Strike. </p><p></p><p>Kale decides to continue to move clockwise along the rim of the crater, with the tree on the opposite side being his destination. He also continues to keep an eye on the departing group of thirteen, continue clockwise downward along the mountain, with them eventually heading below the tree line and out of his visual range. </p><p></p><p>In the city below, the group quickly covers the next quarter-mile distance through the city. Immy casts an Improved Phantasmal Force spell, creating a group of illusionary adventurers who are the mirror images of the party. He has this group charge the other line of hobgoblins exiting the other building. A fierce battle breaks out between hobgoblins and the illusionary adventurers. Meanwhile, the rest of the party uses this distraction to make their way around to the same destination, traveling behind other buildings and out of sight of the lookouts on the second floor of the building that they are heading to.</p><p></p><p>A fireball then envelops the illusionary group of adventurers. It drops their hobgoblin attackers, and Immy has the adventurers appear to be hurt. Wounded, they then engage another group of hobgoblins who now close on them, only to be hit by another fireball. These hobgoblins also fall, and Immy has a few of the illusionary adventurers retreat, the majority still pressing onward.</p><p></p><p>While this is going on the hobgoblins by the marsh watching the bullywugs break off from guard duty, heading towards the melee. The hobgoblins from the ziggurat have also regrouped, and are now charging down the main road towards the melee.</p><p></p><p>The real adventurers round the corner of the adjacent building, and storm their destination. In the front are Adrianna, Krug, Mojo and Narg, who attack the three hobgoblins guarding the southwestern door of the building. These four adventurers are then hit by another fireball, which they all save from, but still take thirty-seven points of damage. Kruk sees the mage who cast the spell on the roof, and uses his boots of leaping and striding to get up there to attack the man. He takes two leaps, landing atop the 2nd floor room, and runs to the wall that the Mage disappeared behind, only to discover that the man is literally gone, and not just invisible.</p><p></p><p>Immy ceases his spell of the illusionary adventurers, which will cause them to vanish after a few round. He then casts a Confusion spell into the open second floor window, assuming this is where the enemy is (not realizing allies are also in that room). He next casts up an illusion of a Red Dragon to make a strafing run at the hobgoblins moving in from the ziggurat, which causes them to disperse. At this point the group illusion of adventurers fades out, just as an invisible enemy mage is watching them. This alerts him to the fact that there is illusionary magic running, which he had originally suspected of the giant red dragon. Immy has the dragon now turn, and starts to fly towards the other group of hobgoblins, coming from the direction of the marsh. The enemy mage targets the dragon, striking it with a Dispel Magic just as it flies past, causing it to blink out of existence. </p><p></p><p>Narg and Kruk have now made their way into the building, finding a group of four hobgoblins on the other side of the door. Meanwhile, Luekia and Lannon both scale the wall of the building, arriving on the roof to the attention of the hobgoblins atop it. </p><p></p><p>Lannon and Luekia are rushed at by hobgoblin foes on the second floor roof. Lannon drops him. Luekia manages to toss her foe off of the roof, him landing directly beside Guice. Guice yells to Narg “Leave the ones inside alone, it’s raining hobgoblins out here!” He then adds “It’s a good thing we’re wearing the spiked helmets we got at that German garage sale.” </p><p></p><p>The next one that Luekia tosses off the roof barely misses Adrianna. She tells Guice “You’re right, it is raining hobgoblins” which he answers with an “I told you so.” She and Guice make sure both of these fallen hobgoblins do not get up, being watchful for more from above. Inside the building, Kruk and Narg finish off their four foes, as Adrianna and Guice enter the building through the door. They are then rushed by five hobgoblins that were guarding the other door at the opposite end of the room. </p><p></p><p>Meanwhile, the “Confusion” spell has taken effect in the room where Immy had targeted it towards, with unintended results. Immy had assumed the room to be filled with enemies. It turns out that this is only partially true, as it contains three armed hobgoblins who are guarding the four tied and bound prisoners lying on the floor that the Mage had dumped after he teleported in from the Ziggurat. Everyone in the room is affected by the spell except for one of the hobgoblins.</p><p></p><p>The confusion causes most to just act bewildered during the first round, except for Lono who feels compelled to attack one of the guards. The guard is confused also, so does not react to Lono’s feeble kick at him. During the next round, both confused hobgoblins are also compelled to attack. One attacks Narg’s butler Hobbson, but misses. Thankfully for the party, the other chooses to attack the hobgoblin not affected by the spell. In the following round Hobbson is compelled to attack the hobgoblin that went after him, missing terribly. The confused hobgoblin attacking his ally strikes again, killing the other one. This hobgoblin and Hobbson are both then compelled to run away, and exit the room, the hobgoblin descending down the stairs, Hobbson crawling out of the room and hiding in a corner near the staircase. At this point the other confused hobgoblin is compelled to attack Furynick, sticking him once and reducing him to a single hit point.</p><p></p><p>As the hobgoblin begins to swing his axe again into Furynick for what will probably be a fatal blow, Lannon arrives at the window and backstabs the monster. Lannon and Luekia enter the room, seeing Furynick, Aradyn and Lono in their dazed and confused state. The spell finally wears off. The players then lecture Immy’s player to never again cast that spell somewhere unknown. The DM comments that it could have easily proved fatal for all four of the prisoners, and probably would have if the dice roll came up for the first hobgoblin to attack his enemies rather than his partner. They find Hobbson out in the hallway, as he comments about maybe looking for a new line of work.</p><p></p><p>In the room below, Kruk, Narg, Guice and Adrianna drop their five foes after a surprisingly long fight (real bad dice rolls from the players). They then notice that the room is covered with straw that has been soaked in fuel for Alton’s vehicles. Realizing the potential danger, they head up the staircase, finding the other six. Adrianna, Lannon, Kruk, and Guice each assist a prisoner down the staircase and out of the building by the southwestern door. Narg and Luekia quickly check the other rooms on the first floor, but choose not to open the oak door separating them from the next part of the building. They remember back when they first checked out the city nine years earlier the middle section of this particular building had been set up without windows and with only a few well-made doors, so it was probably originally used as either a vault or prison.</p><p></p><p>The hobgoblins have now begun to approach the party from around the distant ends of the building. The group decides that an archer-ranger would be a useful addition to keep these monsters at bay, so Timothy casts cures on the just-now-rescued Aradyn to bring him up in points. Aradyn is then given the bow and extra arrows that had been obtained from Vallessa’s house. The group of Aradyn, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Lannon, and Serita take up position near the southwestern corner of the building, to hold back any foes from around the northern corner. The group of Adrianna, Blip, Freyland, Guice, Kruk, Luekia, Mojo and Narg proceed eastward alongside the long 280-foot wall of the building. Fiona, Razou and Timothy assist the very weak Furynick, Lono and Hobbson into the large building immediately west of where Aradyn and his group has taken up guard.</p><p></p><p>Out on the main street, a group of over a dozen hobgoblins decide to charge Aradyn and his four allies. They barrel around the building, yelling and brandishing their weapons, still over forty feet away. Immy is alone inside the northeastern corner of the next building, and sees this group rushing outside of the window, casting a Fear spell on them. Meanwhile, Aradyn lets loose two arrows into the one who he assumes is the hobgoblin’s leader. Both arrows hit, knocking the foe off his feet, landing very dead in the midst of the others charging, just as the Fear spell takes effect, encompassing all but one of the other hobgoblins (who fails morale). Watching the hobgoblins all turn and flee, and unaware of Immy’s spell, Aradyn’s ego swells, and he comments “I’m baaaack”. </p><p></p><p>To the east, the other group lets loose a few arrows to deter the few hobgoblins that poke their heads around the southeast corner of the building. Blip notices movement at the canvas shade covering one of only two windows in that section of this building. Blip alerts the others to this, and Luekia goes back through a window in the western part of the building, to head in this direction. When the window shade moves again, Guice and Adrianna both let loose arrows into it, as Kruk uses his magic boots to leap into the room. Narg and Mojo soon follow him.</p><p></p><p>The now wounded invisible person inside is tackled. Luekia opens the oak door into the adjacent section of the building, only to be struck by magic missiles, reducing her to a single hit point. She quickly rushes through the doorway into the room where Kruk, Narg and Mojo now are, Narg using his Decanter of Endless water to soak the foe, the water outlining the body. Once there, she gets out her sack of flour to cover the person, dumping it onto the wet invisible foe, making the outline even clearer. Narg then draws his rope of climbing to bind the person, who they can now tell is female. Guice catches enough of her hand movement to tell that she is holding a dagger, and strikes her into unconsciousness. A darkness spell then appears covering the hallway outside of the room.</p><p></p><p>Recognizing that she is too weakened to proceed, Luekia has Guice and Freyland escort her to the building west for healing. They debate what to do with the prisoner. Kruk and Adrianna are then told to carry her to the building to the west, where Razou and Fiona can keep an eye on her. They exit, Adrianna firing arrows at a small group of hobgoblins further east, dropping two and causing the others to retreat behind the building. They soon reach the building to the west. </p><p></p><p>Kale has watched the happenings in the city below. While watching the illusionary dragon, he lost sight of the group of twice-fireballed adventurers, and assumes that they have entered a building, the dragon apparently an illusion to cover their retreat. At this point, he sees that the rooftop battle is over with the adventurers exiting the building, carrying wounded. Most of them retreat to a large building west of that, with a few remaining in the street to deter the other hobgoblins from getting closer. A group of eight adventurers then head further down the stormed building, climbing through a window near the middle of the structure.</p><p></p><p>By now, Kale is nearing the tree, and begins to evaluate the best way to descend while still remaining hidden. While he is doing this he sees a trio of characters, one apparently wounded, exit the building window they had climbed in and head to the building west of it. Soon, another group also exits for the building west, this group having two adventurers carrying the body of a third. A different pair of adventurers then head back to the window from the building west. </p><p></p><p>Kale checks out several large branches overhanging the cliff. He next sees a short person exits the window, flying on a broom quickly to the building west, and then returning to the window. He also notices that the approximately fifty remaining hobgoblins have organized together, and are circling around to come in behind the building to the west where most of the adventurers are now inside. Kale finds an overhanging limb to climb onto which will support his weight, and begins to make his way very carefully across it, the branch swaying heavily by the wind.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Silver Moon, post: 2825292, member: 8530"] [I]Thanks Sabriel, the crash wasn't a problem as I've been simultaneously posting both here and over on the dragonsfoot.org board, so just had to copy the posts over from there. You'll have to wait another chapter or two of the next ship escape, this chapter is back with the high-level group up in the mountain top city. When I ran this module I was actually surprised that the players decided to spend several game nights playing out escape attempts by the captured NPC's. I had assumed they would just concentrate on the high-level characters and let them initaite rescue missions. [/I] [B]Chapter Seventeen, “The Ziggurat Battle”, August 7th, 1018, 3:00 P.M.[/B] Back in the City, Luekia successfully leads the group at the tunnel entrance back, avoiding traveling where the hobgoblins atop these two buildings can see, as well as avoiding traveling patrols. The combined group of sixteen characters then have another lengthy debate, this time on assault strategy. At long last, over two hours after the initial group first reached this location, a plan is launched. Both Immy and Blip stay by the building, and throw up illusions east of the building to keep those at the building across town from being able to see what is really happening. The others pile into the three bags of holding, which Luekia and Lannon each take. While climbing into the bags Guice makes the comment “We’ve spent so much time in these bags we should fix them up inside.” Timothy comments “Just don’t put in a window”. By this time, Kale has reached the top of the mountain, discovering that the mountain is an extinct volcano, with a city within its crater a hundred yards below the rim. From this lookout point by this rim, he observed a group of around 40 hobgoblins surrounding a marsh with dozens armed bullywug. Elsewhere in the city, small patrols of hobgoblins wandered about. He examined the different methods for entering the city. On the crater rim, about 200 yards east of him were vines leading down to the city. They looked to be sturdy, but traveling down them would clearly be seen by the hobgoblins below. At the center opposite side of the crater rim he saw a huge tree, whose uppermost branches reach out to above the crater. Also on the opposite end of the crater, in the eastern corner of the city, was a cave, but he had no way of knowing where on the mountain the entrance of this cave was located. Lannon and Luekia invisibly approach the building from its west end, and scale each floor, keeping as far from the hobgoblin guards as possible. The windows on the 3rd and 4th floors are shut, but from sounds heard it is apparent that there are people inside. They reach the roof, seeing two hobgoblin lookouts lying on it. Like the goblins in the other part of the city, these lookouts are both wearing clothing and are partially covered by blankets which are the exact same color as the roof, essentially camouflaging them from distant observation from above. The hobgoblins are looking eastward, towards the other building that Luekia had spotted. In front of them are signal mirrors and flags. Lannon and Luekia begin to approach the two, getting halfway across when Lannon stumbles, making noise loud enough to be heard. They both stop, and wait before proceeding. Lannon stumbles again, this time alerting the hobgoblin closest to Luekia. The hobgoblin begins to react, until she knocks him unconscious. Her doing this catches the attention of the other hobgoblin, so Lannon makes a diving leap towards him, sword extended. Landing with a loud thud, Lannon slays the creature. Luekia and Lannon both now hear hurried movement in the room below, and realize that the element of surprise has been lost. They each start to quickly emptying their bags of holding, the first three dumped out being Serita, Luekia and Timothy. Luekia drops the bag in order to retrieve the flags and mirrors, before they accidentally fall to the hobgoblins below on the first floor roof, who are still unaware of what is transpiring above. As others are dumped out, sounds from the room below cease. Serita grabs the dropped bag, and begins to dump occupants as well. By now, several fighters have emerged from the bags, with Kruk, Guice and Narg heading directly to the trapdoor leading to the fireman’s pole down. They see nobody on the fourth floor, and slide down the pole to the 3rd floor, where an armed enemy fighter awaits them. The enemy fighter engages Narg in battle, with Kruk moving up directly behind him. Guice and Lannon also slide down to that level while Mojo decides to slide all the way down to the first floor, and Adrianna checks out the 4th floor. Narg and Kruk combined manage to bring down the fighter, without taking any hits in the process (and the DM curses his dice, which never exceeded an eight, out of ten attack rolls). As the characters look around the rooms for the possible location of the prisoners. The group still up on the roof now notices lots of activity on the second floor of the distant building, in spite of the spell by the illusionists, which makes them think the enemy mage had teleported to that other location. “Uh oh,” Timothy exclaims. The cleric’s intuition proves to be correct as a massive fireball then explodes from within the 3rd floor of the Ziggurat. The fire pours out of all 3rd story windows, and through a hole in the roof atop the 4th floor. On the 3rd floor Guice, Kruk, Lannon and Narg are all caught directly within the seventy-two point blast (and thankfully all make their saves). A few of the others take small amounts of damage from the ancillary burst of heat. The rest of the party start sliding down the pole. Most go to the ground floor, where Mojo has declared to be temporarily safe. Luekia and Freyland both decide to stop atop the second floor, and battle the many hobgoblins now coming into that floor from outside on the first floor roof. Luekia drops three, and Freyland dishes out some damage on his own, before they decide to retreat. At the first floor they regroup, and exit from the eastern door of the building. They grab up their two illusionists and head east through the city. Shortly thereafter, the hobgoblins start to exit the same building, the ones in front then being struck down by a Flame Strike from Serita’s staff. This causes the other hobgoblins to pull back to within the building itself. Above, on the northern ridge of the crater, while Kale had been debating his next move, two things occurred. In the opposite western end of the city, atop a tall ziggurat-style building, a massive fireball exploded from within the structure. Fire pours out of all 3rd story windows, and through a hole in the roof atop the 4th floor. He then notices movement atop that roof. His eyes are then drawn to movement much closer to him, as what he assumes is an enemy orc lookout moves from a hiding point near the vines 200 yards away from him. He immediately finds cover to avoid being seen. This well-armed and well-armored orc then rushes to the mouth of a cave about 75 feet behind him. Within a few rounds, a group of thirteen humanoids exit this cave, this group being comprised mostly of monsters. He sees that they are led by a well-armed and well-armored male human fighter and a male drow elf dressed in robes. With them are six armed lizard men with shields and partial armor, a well-armed and well-armored bugbear, and the previously seen orc. Four of the lizard men are wearing very full backpacks. These creatures appear to have three prisoners with them. Two of the prisoners are barely clothed human males, with their mouths gagged, hands tied behind their backs, with ropes around their waists linked to the bugbear guard. The other prisoner is a young human girl, around seven or eight years of age not restrained but closely guarded by the lizard men, the closest lizard man to her carrying a loaded crossbow. She wears simple cloth clothing, and he is surprised to see that she has a sheathed longsword slung through her belt. Kale assumes that the orc/drow/lizard men group is enemies with silver moon prisoners. As such, he wishes to determine where they are going so that he can inform the Silver Moon when he meets up with them. They start to head east, away from Kale, making a path around the crater and slightly down the mountain. Kale follows the group at a distance, staying near the rim, in order to still see down into the city. In the city below he sees around a dozen adventurers exit the ziggurat, and rush east through a main street of the city. Shortly thereafter, hobgoblins start to exit the same building, the lead ones being struck down by a Flame Strike. Kale decides to continue to move clockwise along the rim of the crater, with the tree on the opposite side being his destination. He also continues to keep an eye on the departing group of thirteen, continue clockwise downward along the mountain, with them eventually heading below the tree line and out of his visual range. In the city below, the group quickly covers the next quarter-mile distance through the city. Immy casts an Improved Phantasmal Force spell, creating a group of illusionary adventurers who are the mirror images of the party. He has this group charge the other line of hobgoblins exiting the other building. A fierce battle breaks out between hobgoblins and the illusionary adventurers. Meanwhile, the rest of the party uses this distraction to make their way around to the same destination, traveling behind other buildings and out of sight of the lookouts on the second floor of the building that they are heading to. A fireball then envelops the illusionary group of adventurers. It drops their hobgoblin attackers, and Immy has the adventurers appear to be hurt. Wounded, they then engage another group of hobgoblins who now close on them, only to be hit by another fireball. These hobgoblins also fall, and Immy has a few of the illusionary adventurers retreat, the majority still pressing onward. While this is going on the hobgoblins by the marsh watching the bullywugs break off from guard duty, heading towards the melee. The hobgoblins from the ziggurat have also regrouped, and are now charging down the main road towards the melee. The real adventurers round the corner of the adjacent building, and storm their destination. In the front are Adrianna, Krug, Mojo and Narg, who attack the three hobgoblins guarding the southwestern door of the building. These four adventurers are then hit by another fireball, which they all save from, but still take thirty-seven points of damage. Kruk sees the mage who cast the spell on the roof, and uses his boots of leaping and striding to get up there to attack the man. He takes two leaps, landing atop the 2nd floor room, and runs to the wall that the Mage disappeared behind, only to discover that the man is literally gone, and not just invisible. Immy ceases his spell of the illusionary adventurers, which will cause them to vanish after a few round. He then casts a Confusion spell into the open second floor window, assuming this is where the enemy is (not realizing allies are also in that room). He next casts up an illusion of a Red Dragon to make a strafing run at the hobgoblins moving in from the ziggurat, which causes them to disperse. At this point the group illusion of adventurers fades out, just as an invisible enemy mage is watching them. This alerts him to the fact that there is illusionary magic running, which he had originally suspected of the giant red dragon. Immy has the dragon now turn, and starts to fly towards the other group of hobgoblins, coming from the direction of the marsh. The enemy mage targets the dragon, striking it with a Dispel Magic just as it flies past, causing it to blink out of existence. Narg and Kruk have now made their way into the building, finding a group of four hobgoblins on the other side of the door. Meanwhile, Luekia and Lannon both scale the wall of the building, arriving on the roof to the attention of the hobgoblins atop it. Lannon and Luekia are rushed at by hobgoblin foes on the second floor roof. Lannon drops him. Luekia manages to toss her foe off of the roof, him landing directly beside Guice. Guice yells to Narg “Leave the ones inside alone, it’s raining hobgoblins out here!” He then adds “It’s a good thing we’re wearing the spiked helmets we got at that German garage sale.” The next one that Luekia tosses off the roof barely misses Adrianna. She tells Guice “You’re right, it is raining hobgoblins” which he answers with an “I told you so.” She and Guice make sure both of these fallen hobgoblins do not get up, being watchful for more from above. Inside the building, Kruk and Narg finish off their four foes, as Adrianna and Guice enter the building through the door. They are then rushed by five hobgoblins that were guarding the other door at the opposite end of the room. Meanwhile, the “Confusion” spell has taken effect in the room where Immy had targeted it towards, with unintended results. Immy had assumed the room to be filled with enemies. It turns out that this is only partially true, as it contains three armed hobgoblins who are guarding the four tied and bound prisoners lying on the floor that the Mage had dumped after he teleported in from the Ziggurat. Everyone in the room is affected by the spell except for one of the hobgoblins. The confusion causes most to just act bewildered during the first round, except for Lono who feels compelled to attack one of the guards. The guard is confused also, so does not react to Lono’s feeble kick at him. During the next round, both confused hobgoblins are also compelled to attack. One attacks Narg’s butler Hobbson, but misses. Thankfully for the party, the other chooses to attack the hobgoblin not affected by the spell. In the following round Hobbson is compelled to attack the hobgoblin that went after him, missing terribly. The confused hobgoblin attacking his ally strikes again, killing the other one. This hobgoblin and Hobbson are both then compelled to run away, and exit the room, the hobgoblin descending down the stairs, Hobbson crawling out of the room and hiding in a corner near the staircase. At this point the other confused hobgoblin is compelled to attack Furynick, sticking him once and reducing him to a single hit point. As the hobgoblin begins to swing his axe again into Furynick for what will probably be a fatal blow, Lannon arrives at the window and backstabs the monster. Lannon and Luekia enter the room, seeing Furynick, Aradyn and Lono in their dazed and confused state. The spell finally wears off. The players then lecture Immy’s player to never again cast that spell somewhere unknown. The DM comments that it could have easily proved fatal for all four of the prisoners, and probably would have if the dice roll came up for the first hobgoblin to attack his enemies rather than his partner. They find Hobbson out in the hallway, as he comments about maybe looking for a new line of work. In the room below, Kruk, Narg, Guice and Adrianna drop their five foes after a surprisingly long fight (real bad dice rolls from the players). They then notice that the room is covered with straw that has been soaked in fuel for Alton’s vehicles. Realizing the potential danger, they head up the staircase, finding the other six. Adrianna, Lannon, Kruk, and Guice each assist a prisoner down the staircase and out of the building by the southwestern door. Narg and Luekia quickly check the other rooms on the first floor, but choose not to open the oak door separating them from the next part of the building. They remember back when they first checked out the city nine years earlier the middle section of this particular building had been set up without windows and with only a few well-made doors, so it was probably originally used as either a vault or prison. The hobgoblins have now begun to approach the party from around the distant ends of the building. The group decides that an archer-ranger would be a useful addition to keep these monsters at bay, so Timothy casts cures on the just-now-rescued Aradyn to bring him up in points. Aradyn is then given the bow and extra arrows that had been obtained from Vallessa’s house. The group of Aradyn, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Lannon, and Serita take up position near the southwestern corner of the building, to hold back any foes from around the northern corner. The group of Adrianna, Blip, Freyland, Guice, Kruk, Luekia, Mojo and Narg proceed eastward alongside the long 280-foot wall of the building. Fiona, Razou and Timothy assist the very weak Furynick, Lono and Hobbson into the large building immediately west of where Aradyn and his group has taken up guard. Out on the main street, a group of over a dozen hobgoblins decide to charge Aradyn and his four allies. They barrel around the building, yelling and brandishing their weapons, still over forty feet away. Immy is alone inside the northeastern corner of the next building, and sees this group rushing outside of the window, casting a Fear spell on them. Meanwhile, Aradyn lets loose two arrows into the one who he assumes is the hobgoblin’s leader. Both arrows hit, knocking the foe off his feet, landing very dead in the midst of the others charging, just as the Fear spell takes effect, encompassing all but one of the other hobgoblins (who fails morale). Watching the hobgoblins all turn and flee, and unaware of Immy’s spell, Aradyn’s ego swells, and he comments “I’m baaaack”. To the east, the other group lets loose a few arrows to deter the few hobgoblins that poke their heads around the southeast corner of the building. Blip notices movement at the canvas shade covering one of only two windows in that section of this building. Blip alerts the others to this, and Luekia goes back through a window in the western part of the building, to head in this direction. When the window shade moves again, Guice and Adrianna both let loose arrows into it, as Kruk uses his magic boots to leap into the room. Narg and Mojo soon follow him. The now wounded invisible person inside is tackled. Luekia opens the oak door into the adjacent section of the building, only to be struck by magic missiles, reducing her to a single hit point. She quickly rushes through the doorway into the room where Kruk, Narg and Mojo now are, Narg using his Decanter of Endless water to soak the foe, the water outlining the body. Once there, she gets out her sack of flour to cover the person, dumping it onto the wet invisible foe, making the outline even clearer. Narg then draws his rope of climbing to bind the person, who they can now tell is female. Guice catches enough of her hand movement to tell that she is holding a dagger, and strikes her into unconsciousness. A darkness spell then appears covering the hallway outside of the room. Recognizing that she is too weakened to proceed, Luekia has Guice and Freyland escort her to the building west for healing. They debate what to do with the prisoner. Kruk and Adrianna are then told to carry her to the building to the west, where Razou and Fiona can keep an eye on her. They exit, Adrianna firing arrows at a small group of hobgoblins further east, dropping two and causing the others to retreat behind the building. They soon reach the building to the west. Kale has watched the happenings in the city below. While watching the illusionary dragon, he lost sight of the group of twice-fireballed adventurers, and assumes that they have entered a building, the dragon apparently an illusion to cover their retreat. At this point, he sees that the rooftop battle is over with the adventurers exiting the building, carrying wounded. Most of them retreat to a large building west of that, with a few remaining in the street to deter the other hobgoblins from getting closer. A group of eight adventurers then head further down the stormed building, climbing through a window near the middle of the structure. By now, Kale is nearing the tree, and begins to evaluate the best way to descend while still remaining hidden. While he is doing this he sees a trio of characters, one apparently wounded, exit the building window they had climbed in and head to the building west of it. Soon, another group also exits for the building west, this group having two adventurers carrying the body of a third. A different pair of adventurers then head back to the window from the building west. Kale checks out several large branches overhanging the cliff. He next sees a short person exits the window, flying on a broom quickly to the building west, and then returning to the window. He also notices that the approximately fifty remaining hobgoblins have organized together, and are circling around to come in behind the building to the west where most of the adventurers are now inside. Kale finds an overhanging limb to climb onto which will support his weight, and begins to make his way very carefully across it, the branch swaying heavily by the wind. [/QUOTE]
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