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Message: <blockquote data-quote="mikeawmids" data-source="post: 6332617" data-attributes="member: 6776411">Rise of the Runelords (Season 3) – 27/02/2014 (Hook Mountain Massacre) By the time the heroes reach the top of Skull Crossing, the Kreeg ogres have slain the trolls inhabiting the ancient dam and set to demolishing the crumbling stonework. “I told you we shouldn’t have stopped for ice cream!” Ben Kotek chastises Grogg, as the half-orc wipes a smear of raspberry ripple off his chin. The party must wade through rushing water to reach the ogres. Karrack fumbles his Agility roll and is swept away. The plummeting lizardman manages to drive his staff into a deep crack in the face of the dam. He dangles there for a while, admiring the view. Two ogres are killed before the others even notice that they are under attack. Most of them are wielding huge hammers/flails, but a couple begin throwing large clay vessels imaginatively called boomjars (because they go boom!). Ben Kotek mislikes the notion of ogres tossing explosives around and casts Entangle to prevent further munitions from being lobbed. Unfortunately, the muscular brutes are rolling d12+3 to break free, so they do not stay entangled for long. Solaris takes careful aim and shoots an ogre as he is picking up another boomjar. The clumsy monster drops the clay vessel, setting off a chain reaction that detonates the rest of the explosives. KABOOM! Fred (Grogg’s pet ogre) is vaporised in the subsequent firestorm, while the rest of the party are pelted with chunks of smoking masonry. Picking themselves up, the heroes soon realise that the explosion has blocked the entrance to the dam with smouldering rubble. “Oh, well done, Solaris.” While the others mock the elven monk, Rast siphons blood from the few ogres not completely char-grilled in the explosion. The dwarven alchemist notes that several ogres are missing their eyeballs. Ben Kotek whistles nonchalantly, pockets bulging. Far below, Karrack notices that the cracks spreading across the face of the dam have opened an alternative route inside. The rest of the heroes abseil down to the lizardman’s position. Grogg struggles to squeeze his girth through the narrow crevasse. “You’re stuck, aren’t you?” Karrack asks, after a few, uncomfortable moments. “No.” Grogg lies, “It’s just a bit tight.” “You shouldn’t have eaten all that ice cream!” Ben says smugly. “Get Rast down here!” Karrack calls. Rast coats Grogg in an alchemical lubricant distilled from tentamort fat. The half-orc emerges from the crevasse slippery and stinking of squid. The heroes make haste to the control room, searching for the mechanism to open the floodgates and avert the imminent calamity. They soon discover that the flood gates are powered by the life force of two ancient demons, trapped for aeons within a pair of magical circles. The first is barely alive and the other has been reduced to dust (which Rast scoops up) the last time the device was activated. The surviving fiend stirs and introduces itself as Avaxial, promising eternal servitude if the party release him from his prison. “A vacancy has just opened up….” Grogg muses, lamenting the loss of his pet ogre. The rest of the party pile on top of him, before he can scuff out the magical circle trapping the demon. With time running out, the party waste precious minutes bickering among themselves. Nobody wants to risk being reduced to dust, just to save the people of Turtleback Ferry. “We could draw straws?” Karrack suggests. “Arm-wrestling!” roars Grogg. “How about a beauty contest!” counters Solaris, looking simply fabulous. Ultimately, the groups three magic-users work together to channel their arcane energy into the empty circle, which (they hope) will fool the device into believing there is a living being in each one. Surprisingly, this actually works! Rast throws the huge levers, opening the floodgates. Turtleback Ferry is saved! There is much cheering and clapping of backs. Avaxial is vaporised of course, but that’s his problem. The groups revelry is cut short when a siren wails, deafeningly loud. By flooding the magic circles with power, the party have overcharged the device! The power is building to perilous levels! If the party can’t find a way to stabilise the circles, the dam may still be destroyed! “There’s got to be something we can do!” Ben says, “I know! We can run away!” Karrack and Grogg race after the cowardly ranger, dodging falling rubble as the dam continues to break asunder. Rast and Solaris stay behind, determined to delay the explosion long enough for their friends to escape the blast radius. (This sequence was treated as a Dramatic Task. They managed to accumulate nine of the ten successes required to avert disaster). “It was nice knowing you.” Solaris says to Rast, as the energy reaches critical levels. Suddenly, Steve (Solaris’ player) decides to play the Malfunction adventure card – and the deadly arcane energy dissipates harmlessly into the surrounding stone. Rast and Solaris share a sigh of relief (otherwise, they would have both taken 3d10 = 27 damage in the resultant explosion). Triumphant, the heroes return to Fort Rannick, where the refugees from Turtleback Ferry are being housed until the floodwaters subside. Now that he has the Repair skill (d4), Rast repairs his makeshift glider (making a couple of modifications to the design) and comforts his wife, who is not enjoying her honeymoon as much as she’d hoped. She had been expecting more candles and fewer ogres. Karrack persuades Mayor Shreed to allow several goblins to shadow the human stone-masons sent to repair the (extensive) damage to Skull Crossing. Grogg paddles down to the flooded village to recover several of Black Maga’s heads. He stacks this gristly totem in the castle courtyard and poses beside it, while a goblin artist paints his portrait. From the window of his chamber, Ben Kotek gazes avidly at the six, huge eyes staring lifelessly from the hydra’s three severed heads. How magnificent they would look in his collection! He begins to gibber and drool, scrawling unknowable glyphs onto the walls. Vale Temros (one of the three rangers whom the party rescued from the Graul farmstead) approaches Grogg and convinces him to participate in a daring raid on the Kreeg clanhold, high on Hook Mountain. When Grogg tries to sell the others on this course of action, it begins to sound less like a daring raid and more like a suicide mission. Vale had intended to assault the main entrance of the clanhold head-on. Ben Kotek scouts the rocky foothills and locates a network of caves, which he believes will enable the group to sneak into the ogre stronghold from below. These natural tunnels lead into the Kreeg’s mining operation beneath Hook Mountain. The heroes immediately begin slaughtering the fatigued miners (so much for the stealthy approach!). To be continued….</blockquote>

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