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Message: <blockquote data-quote="LordVyreth" data-source="post: 1941006" data-attributes="member: 9626">TIE's Trap: The Battle of the Salamander ArmadaThe party, who Danae had wisely chosen to keep enchanting with fire immunity as long as they were in this plane, quickly dashed to the deck, to see what they were up against.  It looked bad.  Among the fleet, from what they could see, there were four smaller scout ships, two strange floating creatures with a number of tentacles and red scales, a dragon that appeared to be made out of pure fire, an older red dragon, and a massive battleship that seemed to lead the fleet, but mercifully was also the farthest ship away from the group.    Silrine, who had followed the party up to the deck, gasped.  “Our ship will be destroyed!”    Tal, however, suddenly looked up, and had a big grin on his face.  “Oh, I wouldn’t worry about that,” he said, and dashed back to his room.  Half a minute later, he found what he was looking for: his Lyre of Building, which worked fine for protecting his last ship, so it should be fine here!  One strum of its strings later, the Volatile was safe from any damage from this battle.    Of course, the crew, including the party, was another story, and they sprang into action to deal with it.  While Tal dashed below deck, Wong prepared to lead the charge on the nearest scout ship.  He used a pair of magic wings and took off.  Robin began to follow, but he paused a little way in.  You know, he thought, those ships aren’t that far away.  Maybe it would be better to just shoot from here…    Meanwhile, Danae used her magic to become a silver dragon, and took off to begin raining magical destruction on the ships.  Err also took off, but he was going no where near the enemies!  Instead he flew towards a cluster of floating, formerly molten rocks, and began to push one towards one of the ships, apparently hoping he could make it crash into the rock.  “That boy has no sense of distance, does he?” Scythe muttered, bitterly.  He was apparently a little jealous, however, since he lacked both flying ability and a long-range attack, and had to wait on the deck and prepare for the enemy to reach him.    Robin, meanwhile, was having the best luck at the start.  The scout ships weren’t very big nor, and as he soon learned, very durable.  In fact, the first arrow he fired at a ship went through the front of the ship, and then crashed through the back as well, leaving potent acid along the entire hull!  Three arrows later, and the first scout ship had a massive hole through it, and began to crack apart!  Robin smiled, and began to work on the second ship.    However, though the ship was destroyed, its crew wasn’t done.  Before the ship could be totally destroyed, three Salamander officers drank potions, and then flew out the hole and right at the ship.  This didn’t help the remaining Salamander crew, who plummeted screaming into the endless flames below, but a few seconds later, after Robin finished off the second ship, the officers in that ship also took flight, but they grabbed a few of the Salamander crew to save them before their ship and the remaining crew were lost as well.  The small unit of flying Salamanders continued flying towards the ship, and though Danae was able to take out a few of them, the rest were relentlessly flying towards the ship, with nothing but Wong to stop them!    Of course, Wong laughed at this threat.  He flew towards the group, causing two of them to break off and confront him while the rest flew on.  His laughing was abruptly cut short, however, as the two immediately flanked him while keeping him at bay with his massive, super-hot spears.  He wasn’t able to get near one of them without having the other one poking him at his back, and both seemed to be experts at attacking vulnerable spots.  Before long, though he managed to get a few good hits in, he was bleeding from a number of serious wounds, and realized he had to escape.  He channeled his inner ki, summoning his inherent knowledge that space is illusion, and shifted his personal reality back into the ship for some healing!    Meanwhile, Tal had returned to the ship’s deck, and decided to deal with the odd, red-scaled masses of tentacles and eyes.  Considering the odd environment, he realized he had the perfect spell to deal with these freaks.  He pointed a finger at the nearest creature, and channeled his magical energies into the creature’s body, numbing its nerves and locking its muscles into one held position.  The creature suddenly stopped, and was unable to continue flying.  It plummeted downward, and whether it finally crashed into dry land or it finally recovered from the spell miles later was irrelevant.  It was out of this fight either way.  Tal, shocked at how well that went, tried it again on the second creature, and this one also immediately froze up and free-fell into the depths of the plane!    However, about this point, things got tricky, for both the surviving Salamanders and dragons were about to reach the Volatile and her crew!  Realizing the danger, Danae landed on the group and asked, “Does anyone want to come with me?”  Tal nodded in agreement, but Scythe and Robin chose to stay behind and fight the invaders with Silrine’s crew.  Danae nodded and took off, only for the red dragon to see the enemy dragon, and fly right at her!  Meanwhile, Err finally gave up on the rock thing and flew towards the ship again, causing the fire elemental dragon to fly towards him!    Meanwhile, Wong healed himself a bit using his ki, and then set off to look for a more specialized healer to finish the job.  He remembered that Silrine had an official cleric among her crew, and sought out Wellby.  When he found the Halfling cleric, however, Wong found him stuffing as much of the hard-earned treasure party stole from the Salamanders into an escape ship!  “What are you doing?” a shocked Wong asked.    Without any seeming regret or concern, Wellby replied, “I’m getting the hell out of here, what does it look?”    “How dare you?  How could you betray your captain just when I-she needs you most?”    Wellby shrugged slightly, “I never cared about her or her ship.  I was just waiting for her to make a big and bold enough score that I can use it to rat her out to the Salamanders, get money from them, steal as much of the haul as I can, and be set for life!”  He then turned to Wong.  “And I won’t let you ruin things so close to my victory!”  Unaware or uncaring that a few of the less experienced crew have heard the shouting and got close enough to hear his whole confession, he prepared to engage Wong, starting with a spells designed to suck the very life force out of him.    Wong, however, had his righteous fury raised at this violation of oaths and breaking of trusts, and his ki negated the spell easily.  He was so furious at this false priest that he prepared to utilize one of the secret arts only the masters of his combat form have learned.  He slammed an open palm straight at Wellby’s heart, striking with so much force that it not only went through his armor, but crushed the crucial veins and arteries around the heart.  Wellby looked down with a shocked look on face, uttered only one surprised squeak, and then fell over, dead!    Meanwhile, despite a valiant effort, the fight on the deck was a lost cause.  Even with the help of Torgith the monk and Hanim the sorcerer, Robin, Scythe and the crew couldn’t disperse the advancing hordes of Salamanders, especially now that the other two scout ships were nearing as well.  They dashed underground, relying on the currently indestructible doorways and hoping that the enemy would be repelled well before the power of Tal’s Lyre ended.  As they dashed down the stairs, they met a triumphant-looking Wong waiting for them.  Before Scythe could heal Wong, however, another threat appeared.  A small fountain of magma poured into the ship from a small hole, and soon formed into a massive hill of lava with the image of a glowing, dead sailor in the center.  Hanim gasped, “It’s a Molten, one of the deadliest spirits to haunt the fire seas!”    Back outside of the ship, Err had managed to make short work of the elemental dragon, while Danae was holding off the red dragon with Tal’s help.  Once Err finished off the fire dragon, he flew in to help Danae deal with the other dragon, and not even the might wyrm could withstand Err’s mighty attacks.  Full of confidence, Err flew on while Danae focused on the remaining scout ships.  Err knew that there was only one place he could go to find a worthy challenge: the Salamander’s flagship, where the admiral of this fleet would be waiting!    Meanwhile, the Molten had set its sights on Wong and Robin.  Growing massive blades of lava and magma tentacles, it oozed towards them, while spewing a cone of magma.  Of course, it had no effect on the group due to Danae’s magic, and meanwhile, Scythe moved up to the creature.  He quickly summoned the strength of his god to create a spell of ultimate holy healing, which would of course be almost deadly to an undead monstrosity like this.  Sure enough, the merest touch of Scythe’s hand caused the creature to scream in pain, and Hanim finished off the beast with a few magic missiles.  The group then prepared for the final part of this long battle.  “I can take you to the main battleship of the Salamanders if you want,” Hanim offered, and Wong nodded his agreement.  However, Scythe and Robin had another idea.  “I think we can take this ship back now,” Scythe suggested, “Once I heal us up.  You go ahead, and we’ll liberate the deck.”  They prepared for another battle on top of the ship, while Hanim was about to cast his spell.  Before he could leave, Silrine burst in.  “I had Tul-Wel take the wheel.  I want to go to.  I want to see the admiral myself!”  Hanim agreed, and soon he, Wong, and Silrine were ready to join the fight on the battleship.Before they arrived, however, Err managed to reach the ship, where both the admiral, a Noble Salamander trained to deal with both the wilds of the fire seas and to specifically hunt humanoids named Kral-Geath, and his head officers were waiting for him.  No sooner did Err land than he was surrounded by Kral, a strange three-headed, three-armed, and three-legged demon of fire, and more of the Salamanders of the same rank as the once that attacked Wong!  Danae, having finished off the ships, flew in to help, and soon Silrine’s group was there as well.  But it was too late.  As both groups arrived, they both witnessed Err being beaten down by the admiral’s twin blades, two of the demon’s swords, and the swords of the officers.  Finally, unable to stand after so many wounds, Err finally collapsed to the floor, dead!Back on the Volatile, things were going just as badly.  Scythe and Robin didn’t know that the survivors of the remaining two scout ships arrived while they were under the deck, and by the time they realized it, it was too late.  They were surrounded by dozens of powerful Salamanders.  Soon a worn Scythe was too slow to dodge from the killing thrust of a spear longer than he was tall, and he was impaled right through the chest, and casually flung into the mast!However, after watching the brutal death of their comrade, Err’s comrades struck back with a vengeance.  While Kral bound off to do battle with Silrine as soon as he recognized her, Wong charged the fire demon, and after a few brutal and enraged punches, Wong had crushed its tri-facial skull, stopping it forever.  Meanwhile, Danae and Tal flooded the other officers and the ship’s wizard backups with magic and even Danae’s new dragon breath weapon, which frozen the fiery creatures easily, killing many of them.However, they still had to defeat the admiral, and soon, for not only was Robin still in danger back on the Volatile, but Silrine was losing badly against her opponent.  In the end, though, it was Kral’s single-minded determination to defeat the pirate that humiliated his empire so often that was his undoing.  For while pursed the evasive lamia across the deck, he was quickly surrounded by Wong, Tal, Danae, and Hanim, and after being beaten almost to death, he finally accepted the inevitable.  His fleet was destroyed, his beasts of war and dragons were dead or at least lost, and his first mate and officers were all slain.  “Very well,” he said sadly.  “I surrender.”Seconds later, the flag of surrender was raised on the flagship, and as soon as they saw it, the invaders of the Volatile hissed one last time, and fled back to the battleship, leaving a panting and barely alive Robin counting his blessings.An agreement was soon made with Kral and his surviving crew.  They would have their lives spared, but they will lose all of their magical gear, almost all of their weapons, and can only retain enough supplies to reach the nearest port.  Kral was clearly enraged to the point of madness by all of this, but he was a Salamander of his word, and did not betray the Silrine or the party further as they gathered his equipment and left as quickly as they could.  After all, even if Kral remains honest, reinforcements could always arrive, including those creepy eye/tentacle creatures!However, the rest of the trip home to a safe port was uneventful.  The party reached the port, a massive floating rock capable of supporting a small country and possessing its own safe atmosphere and water supply, and then split up the treasure earned both from the portal and taken from Kral and his minions.  After resting for a few days and giving a friendly farewell to Silrine and her crew, they prepared, knowing that TIE would soon be ready for their next, and hopefully their last, test.  As they rested, though something strange happened.  They couldn’t put a finger on what happened exactly, but Danae said she sensed a slight change to the magic weave, and Robin in particular began to behave slightly differently.  It was as if the very fabric of the universe changed.OOC Notes:  And that’s my subtle way of saying that I finally incorporated 3.5 rules into the game!  Well, it was closer to 3.25, since I kept some stuff from 3.0, but if you take a look of the last few games and noticed how much heal and disintegrate, not to mention the omnipresent haste, affected the game, I can’t say I can complain too much.Ugh, I was hoping I could do all of this update over the past week, since I was off the whole time, but I got sick last Monday and am still in recovery.  Sorry about that, but sometimes real life interferes with these things.Anyway, this was the longest battle we had to date, and it took up the entirety of two game sessions!  It was pretty nuts, and after the first session (about when Wong had to retreat,) I was afraid I made this one too hard.  I did end up killing 1/3 of the party anyway, and it could have been more if the admiral didn’t surrender when he did.  Still, it felt good to know that I could still threaten the party when I had to.</blockquote>

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