=Also, it really showed some of 4e's strengths, like speed of combat, player's durability and the removal of the 15 minute work day. The party is 8th level, and at a certain point, they took 5 n+1 and 1 n+3 combat in a row, several of them back to back, without getting even encounter powers back.
Two high points stand out for me, at least combat-wise. One was when an elite cave-troll picked up the cleric and bitch-slapped the fighter with him. The look on their face, especially when he action-pointed and killed (well, sending him below 0 HP) the cleric by beating on fighter, was priceless.
The other was towards the end. They had infiltrated Honor Hold (greatly modified ofc, but still duergar) and had just lost a runner across the westernmost bridge. They knew they would be overrun soon. The cleric, who worships Kord, was dead tired (slightly wounded and zero surges), and all the others felt it was better to leave and rest. The cleric then said: "It's time to be brave, it's time to be strong, and we have some slavers to kill" and then they prepared for the coming onslaught.
That is significantly awesome.
I am also jazzed for my game. Last session was a blast.
[sblock=Allow me to gush about my game]The PCs are kicking in the door to a volcano. Some volcano worshipers are sacrificing "children" (according to the "person" that asked them for the help) to their God, in order to give him great power. The first battle, at the mouth of the volcano's entrance cave, was N, and they obliterated it. The next battle, the barbarian critted 4 times IN A ROW. He just decimated everything in the room.
So, next session. They enter the main sacrificial chamber, a huge area overlooking a river of lava, as the High Priest is about to shove a wicker basket into the lava. And the Wizard fires off a sleep. The priest and his minions are hit. He gets off ONE spell before he's taken down with sleep, and subsequently carved to pieces by the barb.
The Volcano God (A reskinned Orc Bloodrager) and its sentient lava flow (a reskinned Gelatinous Cube) lept from the lava and declared that it was on.
Two skirmishers pop out of the lava (Modified monsters; they have a recharge move power that lets them move 8, and any square they enter during the move is set on fire until the end of their next round; the square blocks line of sight, and anyone entering/starting in that square takes damage). They kept half the PCs boxed in.
The battle ensued. There were several great moments. The Bard had selected an Artificer at-will as his half-elf dilettante power. It boosted AC of an ally while hitting and pushing an adjacent foe; he used this on the barbarian, while the barb was
inside the gelatinous cube. The resulting push of the cube freed the Barb. The rogue ran up the basket, discovered there were large Eggs inside the basket (Uhoh!), so he hid them behind the altar, picked up the empty basket, and RAN for it, bluffing the God the whole way. One of the PCs summoned a River Spirit who they have been making deals with, and had the river spirit begin pumping water into the lava to defuse the VG's power (I ruled that because of this, the Volcano would not erupt when the VG died).
The fight took the entire session, and
it's not over! The session ended with everything but the VG dead. The VG is surrounded by PCs who are utterly dry of any abilities (except the Warlord and Rogue). He's barely bloodied, and he can't hit anyone because the Paladin's Enfeebling Strike and the Bard's Vicious mockery are wittling his +11 vs. AC down to +7 vs. the Paladin's high AC, or +
5 vs. anyone else. (Subsequently, I need to think of a way to make the end-game a little more exciting than several rounds of whittling a fat HP monster down while it flails uselessly).
So 6 PCs at 3rd level fought four 2nd level minions, two 4th level Skirmishers, a 5th level controller (reskinned Urwol, Master Smith from Thunderspire Labyrinth), a 5th level elite, a 7th level elite. Almost an N+4 encounter. And while 4 of the 6 characters are bloodied, no one has went down at all.
Talk about an EPIC battle!
(Interesting sidenote: I only have 2 players at the moment. They're jugglign 3 PCs, which is too much for one player and just fine for the other.)[/sblock]
Ahem. THat was a mouthfull. Glad you had a rocking time too.
We now return you to our regularly scheduled Den of the Destroyer conversation.
