And on to the Tartarean Depths!
After wrapping up the Children of Inner Light , the party was next manipulated into cleaning out the Tartarean Depths of the Xill Master.
There goal was to find and free any and all Duergar slaves ( i replaced any deep dwarves, etc... with duergar), to capture or kill any derro, to stop the production of TrueSilver and to find out what Chtrax was up to and stop him.
They were down a man after "THEE" Paladin disappeared fighting an Anti-Paladin, so the party consisted of :
Cavalier 18
Kensai 19
Cleric / Bard 15/18
Cleric / Ranger 15/14
MU 16 , earth mage
MU 15, alchemist
Ranger / MU 11/13
Fighter / Thief 11/13
Cleric 15
Paladin 13
After fighting against demons and demon princes, going toe to toe w. derro was a bit of a let down. However, the derro used good tactics ( aiming for unprotected heads) and the Stone Golems Slow proved VERY effective.
They first scouted the north and south tunnels to the extent of their abilities ( no divination above 2nd level worked) , and then cleared both of those mines out quite easily (freeing duergar, killing derro & Xill )-- they did a meet & greet with the Myrmarch in the northern mines and agreed to clear out any Xill they found in return for the Formians staying out of combat.
They cleared out Taliq and the Stone Giants after the reaction was "not so positive" , but were able to interrogate any survivors w. ESP and charms.
Next they cleared the Forge area, where the Formians made themselves scarce prior to their attack. They killed derro, freed duergar.
The kensai, rangers and thieves scouted out the Great Hall, remaining in the deep shadows to avoid detection. After getting a good idea of what was going on, and locating Chtrax's headquarters, they made a plan to create a diversion by using Rock to Mud on the ballistae positions, and to Disintegrate the support structure of the Bore.
After gaining access to Chtrax's HQ, they had the hammer drop on them -- Chtrax dropped several pretty powerful spells on them - bypassing their Globes of Invulnerability & even the MR of the Paladin's Holy Avenger. When that didnt kill them, he assessed the situation and fled with the Phylactery.
After he fled, while the Cleric & Paladin cured disease on the captives and the Cleric/Bard was translating the journal, the Cleric/Ranger summoned an Aerial Servant to retrieve the Phylactery.
Learning about the Tarrasque, they used Limited Wishes to Commune and Contact Other Planes to figure out what it was and how to defeat it. This garnered the attention of an Argenach Rilmani, who Gated in to discover why Wishes were being used.
Seeing the Great Hall in disarray, they followed the tunnels to the deeper mines. The kensai, rangers and thieves scouted out the lab and the nexus area, where Chtrax had fled and was organizing his defenses. Staying in the shadows, moving silently , and covered by the noise & dust generated by the Tarrasque, they were able to circuit that area and developed a plan.
They approached Korus, who was generally nice at first, but grew progressively more & more belligerent, eventually exploding and attacking.
Once he saw his spells weren't killing them, he assessed the situation and fled to the nexus area.
The party searched the lab, freed the duergar and located the Collar and Shackles, which the Bard Legend Lored. Before moving down the tunnel to an expected "UN-Welcoming Party", the Clerics Conjured Animals and summoned Giant Insects and the Bard cast Animal Summoning II (I allow insects to be conjured/summoned ) as well as Sticks to Snakes by all the Clerics.
Chtrax had arrayed his forces behind a wall of Duergar slaves with picks -- Grimlocks and their basiliks & cockatrices / Formians on their Gorgons & Chimeras, the Myrmarch & Task Masters and then Chtrax & Korus. Rroliq was completely mad and ignored any and all entreaties to bring the Tarrasque to bear.
According to the text, this should be a very complicated and pitched battle. I agree. The party MUs targeted the leadership & spell casters, the clerics targeted spellcasters , and the warrior types did what they do.
Two events changed the battle -- The Myrmarch uttered his DICTUM, which took out the ants, rats, bats, centipedes, etc.. that the party had summoned, but also devastated the derro, grimlocks, chimera & gorgons.
Then the Aerial Servant showed up and forcibly removed the Phylactery from Chtrax, turning the Formians from allies to enemies REALLY quickly.
After that, things went downhill -- Chtrax used a Fireball on the ceiling and Korus unleashed his Greater Shout to attempt a cave-in. Chtrax Plane Shifted away, his plans ruined. Korus died crying.
Dealing with Rroliq and the Tarrasque were quite easy, all things considered. They read a scroll of Temporal Stasis on Rroliq, then the MUs each cast Sepia Snake Symbol until they hit the big brute -- the text says it will ignore EVERYTHING and keep digging. Oh well. Scratch one tango.
After that, it was just a matter of clean up. They used another Limited Wish to restore the Hive Queen to life. This garnered the attention of an Argenach Rilmani, who Gated in to discover why Wishes were being used.
So it took nearly a year to go through the Children of Inner Light, mainly because we also included parts of 2nd edition "Paladin in Hell" , including nearly 3 months to finish the fight against Orcus.
The Tartarean Depths took most of a weekend.
On to the Pyrefaust!!! That should be the last adventures in the WLD for us.