Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="(contact)" data-source="post: 426094" data-attributes="member: 41">Just make it a command word I can remember . . .Sixteen:  The Way Things Work Here in Wonderville(or, “DC Thirty -Five?  Are you f--king kidding me?”)With an emptied staff of the elements in hand, and a naked conjurer, the party feels up for anything.  The next morning, Anton generously offers Jespo the use of his spell books to memorize some spells.  Jespo picks up a couple of spells the two mages actually have in common, and a small strike force sets out to recharge their newly won staff.Jespo, Anton, Egil and Heydricus accost the elementals guarding the earth temple on level one.  After proving to themselves once again that they’re just not tough enough to go toe to toe with 12 HD monsters, the party manages to trap one of the elementals into the staff and power its Elemental Earth aspect, before fleeing.They return for a quick trial-run at Zuggtomoy’s temple, and start a fight with some animated suits of mail.  Anton, wielding the staff, enjoys the once-a-round crystalbrittle so much that his cackles seem sure to bring all wandering-monsterdom  down on the PC’s heads.  The strike force hastily returns to base before something does come to investigate.Jespo announces to the party that he must soon set out for Greyhawk City to retrieve his other set of spellbooks, but before he leaves . . . Never a group known for their cowardice (or good sense), the whole party gathers together and decides to solve the mystery of the purple stones.As they travel to the Temple of Fungal Evil  (magic-resistant DC 19 Jock Itch!  Where’s my lucky dice?), the party spots a pair of trolls investigating the ruined access doors.  Anton, reveling in his new-found power, traps the beasts up to their waists in a rock to mud, and after a suggestion by Pris that the trolls should touch their toes, followed by a quick dispel magic, the mighty trolls become just another speed bump.Aside:  Perhaps an observant player can read the look of horror on a DMs face when his fearsome encounters are blithely brushed aside.  Perhaps this, itself, should be a form of foreshadowing for those who understand The Way Things Work Here in Wonderville.Our heroes carefully examine the throne of Zuggtomoy, covered from base to tip in gems and jewels of  high quality, and the three obelisks of precious metal that sit in the antechamber:  solid silver, gold and platinum.  Guessing that anything that looks too good to be true probably is, the PCs wisely refrain from hauling all the wealth off to their base. A thorough search of the rest of Zuggtomoy’s temple turning up nothing further of interest, our heroes face the Enigmatic Purple Stones of Death.  Pris and Jespo summon extraplanar allies, and 7 formian workers later, the party has deduced the following facts:  1)    The left-most stone instantly severs the hand of anyone touching it,2)    The left-center stone spews a field of (apparently limitless) green slime into the area in front of the stones,3)    The right-center stone fires an unavoidable brace of poisoned darts at  anyone touching it,4)    The right-most stone triggers a massive lightning bolt of frightening proportion, 5)    These effects happen regardless of the order in which the stones are touched, and6)    If any being sweeps all the stones off the shelf at once, no harmful effects are incurred,     and a secret niche opens up behind the shelf.  In the secret space behind the stones is a scroll case, a small wooden box, and a small metal cube, all of which radiate magic.  The formian who swept the stones is instructed to retrieve the objects (just to be safe, of course) and brings them into the obelisk room.Jespo casts read magic and informs the party that the scroll is arcane magic, and includes one third level spell, two of the sixth, and two of the eighth!  The wooden box contains several potions, and the cube has a name inscribed into one of its sides.  Jespo recognizes the name, and thinking out loud, mutters “Daern? . . .”Suddenly, the cube transforms into a iron fortress!  Twenty feet to a side, the square tower reaches thirty feet in height, complete with battlements!  Jespo, completely stunned,  finds himself in the center of a plain room, composed entirely of iron with arrow slits giving a 360’ view of the surrounding area.  As he notices that he can’t see any of his friends from the arrow slits, Jespo opens the door to find his friends sprawled all over the room in various states of injury.  As the iron fortress instantly expanded it magically transposed Jespo into its interior, but hit the rest of the party like a size-H freight train.  The PCs were thrown in all directions, and survived, save for Anton, who was smashed into the stone floor and dragged, totally obliterating both his mortal shell, and his staff of the elements.Jespo, looking on in horror, slowly begins to realize that the unrecognizable object in front of him is what remains of his oldest adventuring companion.  As his voice chokes in his throat, and he is forced to suppress the urge to vomit, a mocking feline voice resounds in his mind:  “It should have been you, Jespo”.</blockquote>

Verification