WotBS Aggression At The Gates of Castle Korstull (serious spoilers)

[Bill T.]

Hi, everyone,

I seem to have put myself in a bit of an odd corner: One of the PCs has the ability to detect trillith and detected one near the entrance to Castle Korstull. The detection ability is pretty limited -- it only lets you know if there is a trillith within 60 feet -- but it wouldn't be that hard to trilaterate the position of the trillith. Said PC also had the clever idea of beating up all the skeletons lying out front of the castle. That leaves me in an awkward position -- if they do identify the trillith in their midst and decide to attack it, it's not going to have anything to use the gem it's carrying. Aside from making things "too easy", it likely will deprive the heroes of the exciting battle with Syana. On the other hand, I hate to do some sort of deus ex in order to force them into an encounter, especially if they're taking advantage of their abilities to identify and deal with threats on their own terms.

So, any suggestions? It seems like a toned-down Syana or something similar would be an appropriate encounter if they go this route, but I'm still stuck with the fact that Syana's on the top floor and the heroes are, er, not.

Thanks,
Bill

 

[Tormyr]

Interesting, how did detect trillith come up? The trillith stays at the back, so it would not be too hard to just stay out of range for the most part. In my game, the trillith "died" with the blood golems and faded into the background to reappear later.

 

[RangerWickett]

A savvy Deception figures out the PCs have some weird magic that threatens its scheme, so it uses magic of its own to misdirect - maybe something like Misdirection – d20PFSRD

All of a sudden the PCs' tricks stop working, and they no longer detect any trillith. Now they're suspicious, and they can try other tricks to figure out what the trillith is, and they can suspect the trillith is onto them. Paranoia is great.

 

[Bill T.]

Interesting, how did detect trillith come up? The trillith stays at the back, so it would not be too hard to just stay out of range for the most part. In my game, the trillith "died" with the blood golems and faded into the background to reappear later.

I panicked at the stone golems and had Jorrina arrange an orderly tactical withdrawal, so everybody got relatively clustered together -- and, so of course, that's when detect trillith comes out. The power, incidentally, is from the Slayer prestige class in 3.5 -- not nearly as detailed as the normal detect series.

I'm pondering your suggestion, @RangerWickett. Trying to decide if I should make the trillith detect as a rock, or if I should make one of the party's pets detect as the trillith. Maybe both!

Edit to add: Or one of the horses!

 

[Tormyr]

Edit to add: Or one of the horses!

Yes, please.

 

[Bill T.]

Just to follow up on what transpired -- Dämmek checked once more for trillith after getting into the great foyer, detected nothing, and never followed up beyond that. So, I guess they won't go on a horse-killing rampage anytime soon.

To quickly summarize the last session: After a difficult fight to clear out the barracks (Reddengot came through from the elevator shaft into the great foyer, saw the heroes, and then raced to the barracks to rouse the troops and then fled when Seda tried to use the Song of Forms to recorporeate him) and a good night's sleep, the heroes eventually made their to the doors of the chapel before we paused for the night. Two of the heroes succumbed to the mist in the hall of the pantheon. A minute later two of the heroes were compelled to donate to the gods and got minor benefits (Basel the wizard got a bonus to arcane knowledge checks, much to his dismay, but Dämmek got a bonus to strength checks -- and, as a bull rusher and tripper, she makes a lot of those), and Three Weeping Ravens voluntarily made a donation at the feet of the statue of Wee Jas.

Edit: Remove not-so-smart question about the CR of the mist in the hall of the pantheon. It's inferior to a ''touch of idiocy'' trap, which is CR 3, so no experience points.