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Message: <blockquote data-quote="JamesonCourage" data-source="post: 6504996" data-attributes="member: 6668292">Alright, so we played again yesterday, totaling about four hours. I'll dive right in.[sblock]So, we ended last session with the players walking into a cultist compound, finding the elemental wind chained to the wall, and being confronted by an undead beholder. In between this session and last session, I occasionally told the players that I couldn't wait for the fight, and party wipe number three! (The first they stood no chance, since they decided to fight the death knight at level 4, I think, and he was a level 13 solo. That's when the party's gnome was stolen, the death knight brought them back, and the wilden Scout woke up in a pile of bodies with the other PCs. The second party wipe was against the twisted aberrant copies of themselves, and the Knight returned as a vampire and dragged their corpses to be raised.)So, the fight was on. It lasted just over two hours, our longest yet (but it had the most HP of anything they'd ever fought), but it kept the tension high the entire fight, and was quite epic. The fight took place over a broken up room: there was a large platform that the PCs started on (about 70 feet wide by 30 feet long), but then the room extended out into a "bottomless" pit, with pillars (about 5 feet wide) every 10-15 or so scattered throughout the room (which extended about 80 feet or so), with the elemental chained with magical chains to the back wall (with no pillars near it).The beholder started about fifteen feet off the ground and about ten feet out, and began to pelt the party with rays (it got a free random ray attack against any party member within 5 squares of it at the start of that PCs turn, though the knight was making use of his free attacks to good effect), using his central eye to slow the Knight and eliminate his resistances (his artifact armor gave him 10 resist to necrotic and psychic, the main damage sources for the beholder). The wilden Scout made many knowledge checks in the first couple of rounds of the fight, identifying the different beholder ray attacks and shouting them to the party. After a round of standing back shooting (and the PCs attacking fairly impotently against it in the air, save for the Elementalists savage blast), it moved down to ten feet above them, hovering over the platform. The Knight asked if he could jump and attack it, and I told him I'd let him on an Athletics check, sure. He hit a Hard DC (he has pretty good Athletics) and attacked it, hit it with his lightning craghammer, and used slid it down one square (Mark of Storm feat -a blessing from Kord, in-game), and used Power Strike to throw more damage on and immobilize it for one round. This put it within reach of the Scout, who started to open up on it with with dual wielding.While the positioning was suddenly very nice for the party (they were dreading having to venture out onto the pillars to fight it), the Warpriest player was complaining very loudly that now that it was so close, his healing couldn't keep up with 6 rays/turn (2 on its turn, and 1 against each PC on their turn). He used his smite undead on it, hit, and knocked it back 7 squares. It flew back, bouncing across the pillars and settling well out of melee range. The Knight and Scout didn't like his decision, but the Warpriest wasn't sorry.The beholder pelted them for a turn from far out, while the Scout shot at it with his bow. He ran over and asked for the magical key from the dwarven Knight (he'd been awarded a key: daily magic item use, roll Thievery at +20 against any lock), as the Scout wanted to make his way to the wind elemental to release him for help against the beholder. The Warpriest identified the chains, and knew it was a DC 33 Thievery to open, so doable only with the key, or DC 20 when if the beholder was dead. The knight gave the key to the Scout on his turn, then jumped off the platform, failed his Athletics, and was now alone, grasping the side of a pillar ten feet away. The elementalist continued to stand back and blast, landing 30+ damage hits (they're all level 10 right now).The beholder neared the Knight, then used its central eye to slow the Scout. The PCs realized they'd been shouting their plan out loud, and that the beholder might be trying to stop the Scout (who had the key). The beholder continued to pelt the party with rays, and the Warpriest healed what he could. However, the add-on effects of the beholder was really annoying the PCs. The slowing (petrifying ray), the dazing of bloodied creatures (the death ray), the entombing ray (I altered this one prior to play; it was now basically 'if the PC drops to 0, it rises as a ghoul for 1 round that the beholder can control on its turn. Then it drops again, and begins to die as normal.'), the withering ray (ongoing necrotic damage), etc.The Scout used an encounter power to take two bow shots at the beholder (crit with one), and ended his turn. The Knight climbed up his pillar, hit the beholder, and slid it down one square to his level. The elementalist landed another good hit, while the Warpriest didn't do much, with both staying out of that 5 range, though the beholder was taking shots against the elementalist on its turn, and had hit her with a death ray (dazed, on failed dazed/weakened, on failed dead).The Scout jumped to a nearby pillar, failed his Athletics, and grabbed onto the side. The Knight kept pounding on the beholder, the Warpriest stayed near the Elementalist (he gives a +1 power bonus to nearby allies' saves), but the Elementalist failed her final save, and died. The beholder kept the Scout slowed with his central eye, and began to attack him and the Knight. The next round, the Scout failed his Athletics to climb, and fell into the bottomless pit... and I moved onto the next PCs turn. The Warpriest didn't know what to do, basically chalking this fight up as lost. He was out of ranged heals, and his Athletics sucked, so trying to jump to the Knight didn't seem like a good option.The beholder and Knight started trading blows, and when the Scout's turn rolled around, I described what happened to him. He had fallen thirty feet before everything in his vision went black, almost magically. He'd fallen another 20 or so feet, landing in a pile of something squishy and wet. He used his Perception to locate the pillar he'd fallen from (he passively hits a Hard DC, so he's good at that, even in darkness), used an encounter fly power to move 25 feet up, and then switched to his Spider Stance to start to climb out. He made it another 15 feet out, putting him in view of the other PCs. He was covered in blood and had some guts on him (what he'd fallen into), but he was doing alright. The PCs were delighted to see him, but it got the beholder ranting in deep speech (which the Scout understood) in anger.The fight raged on, with the Scout climbing up and shooting at the beholder while the knight hammered it (literally). He also had it marked with his Paladin of Kord power, dealing 14 radiant to it once per round when it attacked someone else (since it was vulnerable 10 to radiant). Eventually the Scout dropped to the negatives, and he rose as a ghoul for 1 round. The beholder commanded him, simply, to "die!" in deep speech, but the command was just to dive off the pillar. The Warpriest, who didn't have much to do, rode his skeletal warhorse to the edge of the pit and dived in after the Scout. He found his body in the magical darkness on a successful Perception, and used a Cure Moderate Wounds on him. The Scout took a shot at where the beholder had been (he missed, but the random arrow out of the darkness made four eye stalks suddenly swerve to study where the attack had come from), and had to spend his next turn and a half climbing out to continue shooting. The Warpriest basically spent the remainder of the combat wading through the squick, finding a pillar, and deciding to climb out slowly (his Athletics sucks).When the Knight later dropped, the beholder commanded him to "stop", which was a simple command to throw his hammer as far away as possible (by this point, the beholder had given up on using his free attacks within 5 power, as the Knight had been hurting him too much for it). The Scout rolled an Athletics to jump to the Knight's pillar, then used Heal to bring him back up. He took a couple attacks with his swords (finally not his bow), but the beholder rolled away to another pillar. The Knight jumped to a new pillar, attacking the beholder, but couldn't swivel it towards the Scout's reach with his Mark of Storm since he didn't have his lightning craghammer. The Scout was impatient, and jumped to the beholder's pillar, clinging onto the side with a successful Athletics (there was no room up top with the beholder there). He finally got another attack in (though I ruled him 'prone' for clinging onto the side)... and dropped the beholder!The PCs had won! They were beaten down, dead, or in the squick, but they'd done it. The Knight was obsessed with getting his craghammer back right away (it was somewhere in the darkness and squick), but the Scout wanted to release the wind elemental right away. Since he'd already used his daily magic item power during the fight, the Scout asked the Knight to climb over there and unlock the elemental, offering to look for the hammer himself. The Knight agreed, but while climbing up, 5 ghostly copies of cultists appeared (that they hadn't seen before), visible only to the knight, and the first attack dropped him (he only had 4 HP left).The player of the Knight complained that he'd thought they'd healed, but I said that no, they hadn't, which was backed up by the other players. The Scout had been in a hurry to unlock the elemental, and so they started in on that right away. Now the PCs were separated, with the Knight making death saves in the far side of the squick. The Scout and Warpriest dived into the squick (they'd been back on the platform), rushing to the Knight. They found him and revived him, and he told them about the ghosts. The Scout took shots at the tops of each of the pillars, taking out the ghostly cultists one by one with his bow (they were minions).After checking to make sure they were really gone, the Scout then climbed the wall himself, deciding to use his untrained Thievery (+9, I think) to release the elemental. He got a natural 20, and was immediately pushed off the rock wall when the elemental flew off. It pushed him down into the squick, then scooped him and the other two PCs up and took them back to the platform. It dropped them off, shot back to the beholder and knocked it off its pillar into the squick, and came back, lifting the wilden Scout up and moving around. It said something in primordial, but the living PCs couldn't understand it (the Elementalist could, but she was dead).The PCs asked it to wait (hoping it understood), took a short rest to heal the Knight, and moved the Knight and the Scout's owlbear companion (Fey Beast Tamer theme) to the door to block it, and waited for an extended rest. About four hours in, they heard pounding and then shouting on the outside of the door, but it quieted down after about thirty minutes. After the six hours, the Warpriest raised the Elementalist, who said "you're a little late, but thanks for the help" to the Warpriest. They filled her in on what happened, and she started acting as translator to the wind elemental.It was very thankful, expressing a kind of "thank you for rescuing me" word, according to the Elementalist. It planned to kill the cultists, and the party offered to help it. It basically said "if you can keep up" and then shot under the door (screams and thumps were heard immediately on the other side of the door). They PCs tried opening the door to go after it but found it magically locked. They quickly used the magical key to open it and opened the door. They saw dozens of cultists caught in a whirlwind, with the wind elemental circling the room at an ever-increasing speed. It kept this up for a about fifteen second, building speed, then suddenly stopped. The cultists slammed into the rock wall of the interior of their compound, and many cracks were heard as they dropped lifeless to the ground.The elemental shot outside, and the Elementalist and Knight started to loot. The wind elemental came back inside with more bodies, adding them to the pile, and waited while they looted (2 potions, 200 gold). They decided to move on, and head back to their castle (they really wanted it to look after their castle). It shot off suddenly, and the party continued on for about five hours before it returned in a whirlwind filled with debris. It stopped in front of them, depositing the debris, indicating that it was theirs. They PCs sorted through it (with the elemental occasionally pushing dirt and rocks and sticks off to the side with wind), and counted 20,000 gold pieces and 22 healing potions.The players were very happy. The Elementalist asked where it'd all come from, and the wind elemental described it as "a forced tithe from nearby nobility." The PCs calculated that 10,000 gold would fit in their bag of holding, and were trying to figure out how to carry the rest. The elemental left again without warning, and the Warpriest rode alone back to the compound (his skeletal mount was the fastest in the party), gathering clothes to use as makeshift bags. He returned and they set up camp while bagging the gold. A couple of hours later, the wind elemental returned, this time depositing a single bag with the mark of Kord on it. The Warpriest identified it as a bag that converts money into platinum, and recognized it as from the monastery of Kord where they'd stopped at some time ago. They decided to split the money five ways (4,000 gold to each PC, 4,000 gold to the party fund).The wind elemental thanks the wilden Scout, saying that it wouldn't have been released if not for his people. It said it would leave a gift, and flew into the Scout's lungs (this was incredibly uncomfortable to the Scout, who suddenly couldn't breathe). It came out after a moment, and said that it'd left a portion of its power, and that they were now connected. It wished them all well and flew away.The PCs arrived back at the dwarven castle, taking the permanent teleportation circle to their frost giant castle. Since the monastery had once offered to sell the magical bag for them for 1,000 gold pieces, they decided to send them the gold (through the elementals that guarded both their castle and the monastery of Kord) from the party fund, so as not to cause bad blood. Here they waited for a month, settling in. They ordered work projects with their money. The wilden Scout wanted an arboretum in the castle, while the Warpriest wanted a temple built for The Raven Queen. The Knight started having an area built for Kord and sport.I also had them level up, explaining that they'd finally mastered their art during this time. The Warpriest's challenge in the afterlife had let him become a Soul Reaper for The Raven Queen; the Knight's challenge against the storm giant allowed him to become a Wind Rider; the Scout freeing the wind elemental allowed him to become the Spirit Wind's Ally; the cold Elementalist studing the remains of the frost giant and the castle itself allowed her to become a Blizzard Mage. We'd entered Paragon.After this month, while all the PCs were gathered for a meal, blackflame appeared, and a death knight stepped through. The Warpriest immediately threatened him, but the death knight remained calm, as always. Though he seemed confident and honorable (from a Hard Insight from the Warpriest), he looked physically guarded, whereas in the past he'd always been relaxed around them. He looked ready to actually defend himself, as if the party might actually be a threat now.He said that was here because it had been nearly a year and a half since Dawn, the former PC gnome Monk, had been taken. He said that her conversion was complete, and he wanted to know if the PCs wanted to come try to get her. The Knight said that if she could be converted one way, she could be converted back. The PCs thought it might be a trick, but the death knight swore to them that he was only coming to them because of the bravery they showed when they fought to the death to protect her. He said that this was their last chance to rescue her before it was irreversible. He said honor was important to him, and he's telling them this out of respect "from one warrior to another, from one dwarf to another." The Knight and Warpriest (dwarf and mul -or surface dwarf in this campaign) were surprised to find out he was a dwarf, since he's over seven feet tall.The death knight said if they were interested, he'd let them come try to get her. He said they could step into the blackflame. He would then await them in his citadel, and if they could make it passed him, they could bring Dawn back with them... if she wanted to go. The PCs decided that Dawn was worth the risk, and entered the blackflame. And we called session.[/sblock]All in all, good times were had by all. The long, epic fight was long and epic. I think it will be remembered by all the players for a long time, and it was well worth the couple of hours we put into it. It was the gatekeeper fight before they entered Paragon, and it had a lot of memorable moments for them (hanging onto pillars, falling or diving into the squick, the PC death, the arrow from darkness that got the beholder's eyestalks to look, etc.).I'm looking forward to Paragon, and looking forward to throwing cash at them and seeing what they do with the money. Their decisions with it will give me some inspiration for treasure, hopefully. Maybe that'll help for a while on that front. Anyway, thanks for reading another rambling play report! Hope it wasn't too boring <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /></blockquote>

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