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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Rel" data-source="post: 1683228" data-attributes="member: 99">Marcus shoved his fingers into a thin crack in the stone and felt pain on his raw knuckles.  He looked over his shoulder and saw the debris-strewn floor of the sinkhole some 70 feet below.  From this height even the bodies of the stinger-dragon and the giant looked small.  He said a small prayer to St. Cuthbert and continued to climb.  Despite Lazarius’ spell that he’d been assured would let him “climb like a spider”, the warrior-priest knew that he wouldn’t feel secure until his feet were on solid and horizontal ground.  He looked over to his right and saw Cathal and Marius and could read similar thoughts on their faces.Somewhere behind and below him Lazarius was supposedly circling the sinkhole on wobbly wings that had magically sprouted from his back.  No one could be certain of where the Wizard really was because he was invisible.  As for Speaks, he’d not even left the safety of their burrow yet.  Marcus hoped that the Druid was doing what he said that he would.He moved forward as quietly as he could in his armor and was doing a surprisingly good job of it.  His silent movement was so successful that he could very distinctly hear the loud pops that rang out from the stone just before it began to disintegrate under his hands.  One whole side of the lip of the sinkhole came loose and began to tumble down into the hole, permanently entombing the dead foes they had left there and very nearly sealing Speaks With Stone into the confines of their hideaway.In a scrambling panic Marcus thrust his hands through the crumbling stone seeking a firm handhold.  He caught a protruding corner of a boulder, firmly stuck in the earth around it, and managed to hold on as large chunks of earth and stone tumbled past.  He looked desperately over toward Cathal and Marius to see if they’d fallen to their almost certain deaths.The Brigante had two hands thrust through the loose earth that poured around him and clenched his eyes shut against the dust and dirt that poured over him.  He needed a bath (all of them did really) but he was holding on well.  Marius looked for a moment as if the avalanche would take him down into the pit as he backslid nearly 20 feet but somehow, miraculously found the most tenuous of holds and hung on.(I must interject a GM note here.  Marius’ player was not there that night and his PC was being run by someone else.  He easily had the highest Reflex save bonus in the party by a good margin.  But the dice were unkind and he failed the roll.  I hauled out a small pile of d6’s and started to roll some of the most brutal falling damage I’ve ever seen.  As the numbers began to add up it seemed very obvious that Marius was about to be very dead.Suddenly one of the other players called out, “Wait!  Can he chip it?”  We use a sort of “Hero Point” mechanic represented by poker chips awarded when players say and do things that add to the game in some outstanding or humorous manner.  Marius’ player is one of the funniest people I’ve ever met and thus had built up a nice backlog of three “chips” that could be spent to re-roll any single die roll.I let the player running the character spend one of Marius’ chips to re-roll the Reflex save.  He rolled horribly AGAIN and so spent another chip.  The die bounced to a halt showing a third result less than 5 in as many rolls.  A nervous look passed between the players as they spent Marius’ third and final chip and rolled the associated d20.  They finally got a decent result and Marius survived the first die roll of the night.His player gave the others no end of grief about this upon his return but admitted that he’d rather have no chips than no Marius.)As the last bits of dirt and gravel trickled past the trio of warriors, they knew that the jig was up and their attempted ambush had been thwarted.  They hastened to the top of the hole to attempt to bring battle to their enemies before more magic was leveled at them while they climbed.Marcus was the first to gain the top and was immediately lunged at by one of the wolves, its white coat nearly camouflaging it against the snow.  Its teeth tried to find purchase on his armor but failed.  The other white wolf circled the rim of the pit and breathed an icy cone of cold air on Marcus and Marius, who still clung to the wall some 30 feet below (did I say “Dire Wolves”?  I meant “Dire Winter Wolves”).Marius scrambled further up the side of the sinkhole wishing he was anywhere but trapped, clinging to this infernal wall and exposed to danger with no ability to fight back.  Cathal had the same feelings and was closer to the top.  He scrambled to his feet and took a moment to call on the his inner power to Shield him from his enemies’ blows.  (Cathal’s hodge podge of multiclassing had now expanded to include Sorcerer.  But wait, it gets better)Marcus and Cathal started to look about to see where they might best engage the enemy when the enemy saved them the trouble.  A giant charged each of them, not as they expected them to with clubs swinging, but instead simply bashing roughly into them with the enormous weight of their bodies.Marius could see that he was one quick sprint from the top of the hole and reached out to grab his next handhold when he heard the bellowing of the giants.  He heard the clatter of armor from above the lip of the sinkhole and looked up in horror to see both Marcus and Cathal fly backwards over the edge and fall helplessly past him.</blockquote>

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