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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Lazybones" data-source="post: 1617128" data-attributes="member: 143">Heh, I can't help it; when building characters, I get caught up in all the RP/plot possibilities, at the expense of butt-kickingness.  I was the same way in PnP; I played in an all-monsters campaign where almost all races were allowed and ECL was only cursorily applied.  While the others had bugbears, drow, lizardfolk, and other powergaming choices, my characters were a goblin rogue and a meglomaniac kobold necromancer.  Though the goblin did have an ungodly hide/MS score.  <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f609.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=";)" title="Wink    ;)"  data-smilie="2"data-shortname=";)" /> Often, though, my storyhour characters eventually end up kicking butt despite starting with suboptimal builds.  Although I think Dannel's a decent alternative AA build, and Arun, of course, is fairly good at laying on the smite, if we can only get him a decent weapon  <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f600.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":D" title="Big grin    :D"  data-smilie="8"data-shortname=":D" /> * * * * * Chapter 162Zenna woke with a sense of clarity that was so stark, it was nearly painful.  It was a sensation directed inward rather than outward; in fact she did not at first register the switch from subconscious to conscious perception, or that she was lying in her bedroll, looking up at the curving surface of the ancient pipe above her. Excitement pulsed in her veins as awareness filled her.  Yes, it’s so simple, she thought.  The clear meaning of what Esbar Tolerathkas had tried to tell her had suddenly become fully evident to her... that the two powers she wielded, the arcane lyrics of magic contained in her spellbook, and the divine rituals she drew upon through her meditations... two sides of the same coin, anchored together in the oneness that was her being, her perception...She finally looked to the side, saw Hodge keeping watch, a short distance away.  That meant that there were at least a few hours of rest left, but despite the weariness of her physical body, her mental side was too flush with anticipation for sleep to reclaim her.  Instead she lay there, running down corridors in her mind that had been shadowy, unknown before, but which now gleamed brightly with the shining light of revelation. Finally, silently, she rose.  Leaving her spellbook for now, she instead knelt and began her meditations.  Her suspicions were confirmed as new avenues of power opened up before her. Zenna had taken the first step down the path of the mystic theurge. * * * * * No hostile creatures emerged to threaten them during their rest in the dark fastness of the underground tunnel-pipe.  Nonetheless, their rest was uneasy, due in no small part to the noise. They had first detected the sound the previous day, on their second hour of trudging through the dark passage of the pipe.  The pipe seemed to descend into the very depths of the earth, occasionally branching into side-corridors that they avoided, following the crude markings on the silver plate map.  The sound was faint at first, a whistling through the corridors from very far away.  It came and went with regularity, lasting a few minutes each time, and each time it grew just a bit louder, as they pressed on through the subterranean tunnels. “Vaprak’s Voice, I’d presume,” Dannel had commented, upon one incidence of the sound. “He doesn’t sound like he’s happy we’re visiting,” Mole had replied. By the time they’d paused to set camp, the sound was a constant presence, loud enough to force them to raise their voices to speak when it came.  They adapted to it, though, weariness giving them the ability to sleep through the disturbing phenomenon.The next day they pressed onward, with Morgan’s sword drawn to give those without darkvision sufficient light to see by.  The sound continued to grow louder as they progressed, until they could not speak at all during the minutes it filled the pipe with its echo.  Finally, they saw a light up ahead, a pinprick in the distance that grew larger as they approached, until it was clear that they’d reached the end of the tunnel. Just as they reached the opening, the loud wailing sound started up again, and for a full minute they huddled in the sides of the tunnel, barraged by the full force of Vaprak’s Voice.  It was clear that the sound originated in the movement of winds through the pipes, and the large canyon that stretched out before them, but that did not reduce the supernatural horror inherent in the terrible cacophony.  Mole, with her sensitive gnomish ears, was the worst affected, and she huddled against the side of the corridor for almost a minute after the sound faded, clutching her ears.  “Mole, maybe it would be best if you plugged up your ears with something,” Zenna suggested. “No, it’s all right, I can handle it,” Mole replied.  “I don’t want the first warning we have of bad guys creeping up on us to be a sword stuck through someone’s gut.”She moved up to the lip of the pipe, joining Dannel and Morgan who were already scanning what lay ahead.  The dwarves, who both seemed a bit more cautious of heights, remained a short distance back from the uneven edge. The pipe opened at the edge of a long, broad canyon that stretched out ahead of them in wide terraces that generally rose up to a crest far in the distance.  The terraces were like steps sized for titans, promising a difficult course if they were to progress in that direction.  The pipe jutted from a cliff wall some forty feet above the canyon floor; a narrow, treacherous path led down along the cliff to their right.  Almost directly belong them they could see a pool full of thick, bubbling liquid.  Noxious fumes rose from the pool, making them light-headed even this far up.  “Ugh, for once I am not grateful for having the gnomish gift of good hearing and smelling,” Mole said, holding her nose. “That path doesn’t look all too safe,” Dannel said.  “We’d better get a rope, and take our time.”“The paladin may be in dire danger,” Morgan reminded him.  “We cannot afford excessive delay.”“Well, if you slip and fall into the pool, you won’t be helping him much,” Dannel said plainly.  The point was too sensible to argue, so the cleric subsided.  It took them nearly a half-hour to navigate the difficult path down to the canyon floor, but their caution was rewarded as several of them stumbled and would have taken the quick way down but for the guide rope that Dannel and Mole strung along the route, attaching it to sturdier boulders along the way.  The Voice came and went again during their trip, but they simply waited it out, continuing once the winds had died down.  There was a loud whistle from the pool below during their descent, but it was apparently another trick of sound, for nothing hostile emerged to trouble them. With the noise, stench, and the need to focus on their descent, none of them noticed the small creature that crept out of the pool and flew up toward the western wall of the canyon opposite them. Dannel reached the bottom of the steeply descending path first, and after securing the rope to a nearby pillar of rock, he slipped out into the canyon, scanning the area for any signs of danger.  “Ah,” he said to himself almost immediately, drawing back to await the others.  Once they had all gathered safely, and Mole had reclaimed her rope, the elf reported what he’d seen.  “It looks like our foes may be expecting guests after all,” he told them, directing their attention to the far side of the canyon.  There was a breach in the cliff walls there, a crevice that ran several dozen yards into the rock beyond.  There, at the point where the breach began to narrow, they could see a huge iron portcullis blocking a corridor that appeared to lead deeper into the mountain beyond.  The massive construct stood nearly twenty feet tall and eight feet wide, and while it did not look to be of exceptional quality in its manufacture, its sheer bulk made it a considerable obstacle. Warily, the companions crossed the canyon, staying close to the cliff walls when they could, until they had reached the entrance of the breach.  “No guards,” Hodge said, looking around as though he expected enemies to burst from the stones at any moment. “None that we can see,” Morgan corrected him.  “Look,” Mole said, drawing their attention upward.  “There’s a little hole up there.”They saw that she was right; a small opening, maybe a pace across, was visible a short distance above the top of the portcullis.  “A spy-hole,” Dannel suggested, drawing back the arrow he held in his bow, as if testing the potential for a shot. “Well, if there’s bad guys beyond there, they already know we’re here,” Mole said, with a slight undertone of excitement that Zenna immediately recognized as a sign that the gnome had a plan brewing.  Her suspicion was confirmed a moment later as Mole went on, “I suppose there’s only one way for us to find out...”The elf caught on quickly too; he’d been around Mole long enough to know her ways.  Shaking his head slightly, he opened his pouch and pulled out the magical slippers he carried therein.  Mole was already taking off her boots. “Just a quick look,” Zenna cautioned sternly.  “Don’t risk yourself; we won’t be able to help you if there’s trouble.”Mole put on a long-suffering look and nodded.  “Yes, Mother.  Don’t worry, I’ll just take a look, maybe see if there’s a counterweight for the portcullis.”  Her eyes brightened, as though something had just occurred to her.  “You know, I’d probably have a much better chance, if I was invisible...”Zenna had to work to conceal her grin as she focused her thoughts on the incantation needed to invoke the spell. With the others waiting in at least slight cover amidst a pile of boulders near the canyon wall, the invisible rogue spider climbed her way up the rugged cliff face.  The surface was uneven and dangerous with loose stones half-buried in the sheer ascent, but Mole was light and a veteran climber, and the magical slippers she’d borrowed from Dannel made the climb a matter of child’s play for her.  Soon she’d reached the small opening, which on close examination looked a bit snug even for her.  Luckily she was fairly good at getting through small spaces, so after making sure her gear was secured and out of the way she crawled through. And looked up into the face of trouble. Oh, dear, she thought.</blockquote>

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