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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Demetrios1453" data-source="post: 9517473" data-attributes="member: 6801060">Curse of the Azure Bonds (Part 24): Dracandros' Tower (Part 5)That last battle again gave us some good XP:[ATTACH=full]387048[/ATTACH]We're still in relatively good shape, as Akabar moves steadily closer to leveling...[ATTACH=full]387049[/ATTACH]Done with the fighting, let's explore this level a bit...We move forward through a door, then left, and then through yet another door.[ATTACH=full]387050[/ATTACH]That seems interesting, so yes we do.[ATTACH=full]387051[/ATTACH]Nothing bad has every happened to someone reaching into a murky pool, right?[ATTACH=full]387053[/ATTACH]Gross and sorta creepy, but let's see what it is.It actually doesn't give us any further info on it, and that's it for that room. (Hint: It's the black dragon egg that Silk asked us to get a while back. She actually asked for a black dragon heart, but she'll be OK with this)That room explored, we head back out and go to the next door in the corridor...[ATTACH=full]387054[/ATTACH]Our choice here is to loot, and let the random encounters reset, or just ignore it and continue on. We decide to loot - that's more XP![ATTACH=full]387057[/ATTACH]Let's see what we got:[ATTACH=full]387058[/ATTACH]The platinum is too heavy to carry around, so we'll just take the gems and jewelry.[ATTACH=full]387059[/ATTACH]Oh, interesting! Magical shields have been rare so far this game.[ATTACH=full]387060[/ATTACH] We'll give that to Bant...[ATTACH=full]387061[/ATTACH]That improves his AC by 1. All done here, we head back out the door, turn right, and right there are the stairs to level 1.[ATTACH=full]387062[/ATTACH]We head downwards... and to a nasty surprise![ATTACH=full]387063[/ATTACH]Ouch again! And the irritating part is that the warning about this trap were destroyed by the explosive runes earlier. If you don't get extremely lucky there, there's no way to avoid taking damage twice as a result...Buffy and, especially, Akabar are now in bad shape. Well, back up to the roof we go, I guess! And the fun part is that the random patrols have been reset, although they really haven't been that exceptionally challenging, thankfully...[ATTACH=full]387064[/ATTACH]And so we turn around and start heading back up again. We actually get to the steps back up to level 3 without incident![ATTACH=full]387066[/ATTACH]But only one step into level 3, and we meet some foes...[ATTACH=full]387067[/ATTACH][ATTACH=full]387068[/ATTACH]Three salamanders aren't that hard for us. In fact, them being lined up makes it easy for when Brin casts a spell![ATTACH=full]387069[/ATTACH]My melee get a few hits in while she's casting, and then she unleashes a good amount of damage![ATTACH=full]387070[/ATTACH]All but one are dead quickly, and Akabar finishes it off...[ATTACH=full]387071[/ATTACH][ATTACH=full]387072[/ATTACH]I happened to be looking through inventory, and saw that I can give Buffy a useful ranged weapon when attacking salamanders, who are immune to non-magical weapon damage. That makes all my arrows useless, but...[ATTACH=full]387073[/ATTACH]Damage from a magical staff sling will hit them just fine...We barely get around the corner when more salamanders appear...[ATTACH=full]387074[/ATTACH]Just three again, and, in order to save everyone's time, I'll just briefly run through any further patrol encounters, as we've seen them multiple times before (unless something different and exciting happens). In this case,  their position didn't set them up well for cones of cold, so this time, Brin and Akabar just cast ice storm (Bragir is having poor luck with his initiative, it seems. Finally, Buffy, with her staff sling, gets the killing blow on the last one...[ATTACH=full]387075[/ATTACH]We head onward, but only manage to get through the door when yet another patrol appears...[ATTACH=full]387076[/ATTACH]Drow give it a bit of variety compared to the last two patrols, but they have a magic user with them that we will need to deal with quickly.[ATTACH=full]387082[/ATTACH]Brother Baltor tries something different...[ATTACH=full]387083[/ATTACH]That actually works![ATTACH=full]387084[/ATTACH]He also got the fighter in front of the mage as well! So this battle goes quickly. We take down the actually dangerous, non-held fighters quickly, and soon the battle is done...[ATTACH=full]387086[/ATTACH]We continue on, go around the corner... and bump into another patrol right at the stairs up! That's 4 patrols so far just on this level![ATTACH=full]387087[/ATTACH]Four drow, one of which is a mage. Not too hard, as long as we take out that magic user quickly![ATTACH=full]387088[/ATTACH]Brin damages him with her bow, and he just runs up and gets taken right down...[ATTACH=full]387089[/ATTACH]And the battle is quickly over after that...[ATTACH=full]387090[/ATTACH]Up to level 4! And only one random patrol to take out before we exhaust them again...We rapidly run into salamander again.[ATTACH=full]387091[/ATTACH]Pinned up against a wall, they are prime targets for a cone of cold...[ATTACH=full]387092[/ATTACH]And after they are killed or badly damaged, the last goes down quickly...[ATTACH=full]387093[/ATTACH]With that, we run through level 4 and make it to the stairs to the roof. Whew![ATTACH=full]387094[/ATTACH][ATTACH=full]387095[/ATTACH]We rest up, heal, and memorize spells! Akabar is irritatingly close to leveling.[ATTACH=full]387096[/ATTACH]The good news is that we'll get that last sliver of XP soon enough. We'll head back down to level 1, which should be a quick and easy trip now that the patrols are cleared again. We'll pick up there next time!(As I'll be traveling this week for Thanksgiving, I can't guarantee an update next Sunday. I'll do my best, but I might just not have the time)</blockquote>

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