Summary of run #12:
I'll be writing this up, because apparently Sagiro is too obsessed with some bizarre fantasy hobby to do so; he's organizing imaginary "heroes" into some sort of "team" that uses numbers and statistics to fight imaginary, structured combats. Pretty weird if you ask me. Yep, it's Fantasy Baseball Draft season.
Our guest this session was the inimitable Spyscribe, who was visiting before flying back to LA in a few weeks.
Doctor Caldwell rejoined the group, and they split up treasure. The lizardmen had 120 gp on them and two magic items: a bitterly sharp dagger with a stone hilt and a metal blade, and a suit of leather armor made out of lizardskin. A small gecko tail grew off the side of the armor and dangled suggestively. Cobalt picked up the dagger and found it wanting to please him in combat. He couldn't get it to do anything ("be stabby!"), but Logan took it and it immediately shifted into a long sword. He tried to change it again, and could feel it trying to but not sure how yet. (This is a +2 dynamic dagger from AV, which can change into a different weapon once per encounter.) Cobalt also tried on the armor, then gave it to Eli Caldwell to try. He plucked off the hanging gecko tail... and instantly compacted down into the form of a small, rat-sized lizard. He could feel his body trying to return to human shape. After scuttling around for a bit, he allowed it to, and returned to normal size. (This was +1 leather armor of rat-form from AV, changed to lizard form for flavor. Normally it can only be +2 or higher, but I changed that.) Both items were given to Dr. Caldwell. This didn't seem to buoy his mood much, though. He seemed depressed about having lost his personal possessions to the teleporting rope. Something about running around in a dead man's boots can do that to you.
The group continued on. I asked for a single skill check in each of several categories, with assistance allowed: perception (would they be able to spot any threats or allies?), stealth (would they be noticed?), athletics (could they get in and out of the boat without tipping it to drag it over shallow areas?), endurance (could they continue to pole it?), and nature (how likely were they to get lost?). This was part of an ongoing skill challenge that would determine how quickly and effectively the group found the lizardman base in the Bubbling Fens. Sadly, only the perception check was successful. By the time night fell, with buzzing mosquitos and night frogs singing in their ears, they were lost in trackless swamp and had no idea how to proceed.
They spotted a campfire, though, and the rogues snuck out to find a lone elderly halfling sitting on a hillock and grilling a fish. The group's medic Yiddin Longplank (played by Spyscribe) remembered - after a streetwise roll - that this was probably the eccentric local trapper Hobble Tuckfish Weedlark Dimfire III. Apparently, he lives in the swamp and traps valuable animals named dracoons. The group approached him in the darkness. A DC 34 diplomacy check from Yiddin immediately reminded crazy old Hobble that they knew one another, and Hobble welcomed them into his camp for the night. He also ripped up their map, declaring it grievously inadequate if it got them this lost.
The ritual protection from vermin kept away mosquitos and leeches for the night.
After a breakfast of alligator steaks ("First, go kill me an alligator!") they set off to the Bubbling Fens, Hobble navigating. He found evidence of incoming and outgoing lizardmen. Hobb left them once they got close, saying he'd wait to see if they came out alive from that cursed place. They noted and passed an alarm warding, with no visible effect. Closing in, Toiva felt as if she was entering a profane area.
The Bubbling Fens were a clearing in the weedy swamp made from mats of weeds that had been trampled down. Huge belches of sulfurous gas puffed the weeds up at irregular intervals. Chunks of stone, carved to have ledges, emerged from the swamp like broken teeth. An old, sturdy hut on stilts stood across the open knee-deep water (difficult terrain). A gargoyle, or something that looked like one, sat motionless on the roof. The rogues sneaked closer. That's when the weeds rose up around them into a 15' long screaming face made out of swamp grass, which attacked by shooting sharpened vines into Cobalt. It followed up by using vines to restrain and try to strangle both rogues.
Luckily, you can still sneak attack while restrained. The fight was touch and go for Cobalt and Logan until the rest of the group closed. Strontium's fire was particularly effective against the monster, who at various points also looked like a viney crocodile and an immense weedy hand. Big, powerful and dangerous. Once destroyed, it sank down into the swamp and was reabsorbed.
The "gargoyle" didn't attack during this time. It did, however, start a slow dramatic clapping once the PCs won. They spoke to it, and it turned out to be a summoned devil that was serving against its will. It explained that they had just fought a guardian Weed of Sklar, He Who Waits Beneath the Weeds (possibly an offshoot cult of the nature goddess), also bound there by Aline. It tried to tempt them into selling their souls, and it tried to convince them that it now served them, since they beat the other guardian. They tried to convince it that they would free it from bondage if it let them pass. Apparently finding a loophole in its instructions ("I must attack anyone I see entering this building"), we ended with them entering the hut.
Tactical notes:
- Total playing time: 3 hours. Two major roleplaying encounters, a skill challenge, and a fight against a solo monster.
- The group got three treasure parcels from the previous game: one in the form of alchemical supplies, two magic items, and a handful of gold since one of the items was lvl 3 instead of the normal lvl 4.
- The knee-deep water was difficult terrain.
- In the Bubbling Fens, I simulated the effect of swamp gas billowing up through the mat of reeds: 3 square blast in a different location each round, DC 15 acrobatics check to not fall prone, 2d8 dmg on a failed check, half on a successful one. Caused anyone in area to gain vulnerability: fire 5.
- The Weed of Sklar was a lvl 5 vine horror beefed up into a lvl 7 solo (against six lvl 3 PCs.) It could dominate a PC for one round (which was never successful, sadly), attack up to five people in a 2 square reach, do the normal vine horror's vicious vines attack, and calve off viney minions. It had 268 hit points.
- Combat took 4.5 rounds, and in real time lasted just over an hour. The PCs inflicted 270 hp of damage in this time.
- This was the fight for missing or hitting by just one point. The PCs missed the monster 3 times by one point; the monster missed PCs three times by one point as well.
- Dr. Caldwell rolled two criticals, one with the new magic dagger.
- Bards rock (even if they give Dr. Caldwell an inferiority complex now that he's superseded as best healer.) Cobalt dropped to 5 hit points from full after just one round of combat; Yiddin managed to patch him up nicely using improved majestic word and a bard daily that grants hit points every time you hit the target.
- Stron the wizard missed with sleep. Again. That's 0 for 3. Stupid dice.
- The difficult terrain really made closing with the monster tough. The ranger in particular had a hard time getting close enough to really be effective.
- Cobalt drank two healing potions. I'm not sure if anyone else did.
