D&D 5E Survivor Core Classes- Fighter Wins!

[BoldItalic]

Cholmondeley took immediate command. He first turned to the head druid. "Gentlemen, I apologise for interrupting your meal, but we are all under threat."

"Sorry lad, but we're old school druids, true neutral. We don't get involved."

Cholmondeley pointed up to the roof of the single-storey building. It was thatch, supported by oak beams. "See that? Oak beams? Don't you just hate the abuse of sacred oaks?"

"Well, yes, if you put it that way, it's an abomination. Should never be allowed."

"Then remove the whole roof. Go ahead. Whatever spells you have, use them to get rid of it completely right now and let the good honest sunshine in. Can you do it?"

"Now you're talking," said the head druid grimly. "Come on lads, wands out!"

Meanwhile, Foghorn had lifted down Mr Choppy Chop from its place above the bar and was swishing it about, rather dangerously if the truth be told, getting the feel of its power. He hadn't used it in earnest since Thor had 'improved' it.

Sister Jericho stayed behind the bar, preparing bandages and mentally rehearsing a few spells that might be useful against evil dwarves popping up out of the ground. If push came to shove she was invulnerable herself, so she could draw the duergar attacks and protect her friends that way. Meanwhile, she cast Beacon of Hope as a warm-up.

Gucci and ze goblinz offered to join in. The liked a good scrap, as long as it went their way and involved a lot of dodging. Cholmondeley told them to upturn the tables around the outside of the room and hide behind them, ready to jump out and ambush any duergar that came their way.

Ronni, Keyes and Knife were nowhere to be seen. There hadn't been time to raise Knife, so she was still dead and couldn't be killed again; Cholmondeley had to assume that the other two could look after themselves, or at least keep out of trouble if need be.

Char-Ging spoke to the Duke. "Looks like I'm not going to make it the meeting after all. I can cast Move Earth if it helps?" Cholmondeley thought quickly and asked her to keep it ready and wait for his command. He wasn't sure, yet, how many duergar miners to expect in the first wave but he would need to deal with them quickly before they could call in reinforcements. If he sealed the opening too soon he wouldn't know what was going on underground but if he waited too long they could be overwhelmed by sheer numbers. He consulted Pur-Ging. "How many and how deep?" But before Pur-Ging had time to reply, the middle of the floor collapsed and a mighty voice boomed out: ROLL FOR INITIATIVE!

 

[rgoodbb]

ROLL FOR INITIATIVE!

So the DM didn't have to, Gucci sorted the Goblin's initiative.

Freedo what did you get

9

Greedo what did you get

11

Meedo what did you get

A natural 3

Bleedo what did you get

N'N'N'N'19

Speedo what did you get

14

Fleado what did you get

-1

Sk....What? Fleado?

-1

You dumped Dex seriously

Uh....yep

But....that's.....the super-stat and you aren't wearing heavy armour. Why would you do that?

...................Roleplaying choices...................

Rolep.....WTF! Fleado. You are a goblin. What choices

.....................................I want to be an actor...............I took the actor Feat

...............wh..................huh.......................uhm..........................WHY!!!!!!!

I want to be on the big stage. to perform in front of thousands. to inspire...

The Actor Fe....

What's my motivation boss?

you f**king tell me Fleado

Uhm. OK! I am surrounded by evil Dwarfs or is it Dwarves? I can never work that one out. They have my man hostage....

Your man?......

I'm an actor. Go with it.....

WHAT does this have to do with initiative??????????

I ACT LAST. and the last act will be me ending this mess.

you sure?

Well......yes.

OK. Let's see how this clusterf*%k pans out........

 

[BoldItalic]

Here's what I've got for initiative, rolling and assigning plausible Dex adjustments:

Keyes > Ronni > Knife > Char-Ging > Sister Jericho > Bleedo >
Duergar (15) >
Speedo > Cholmondley > Gucci > Greedo > Freedo > Druids > Foghorn > Pur-Ging > Meedo > Fleado

---

There was a moment's pause, and then a grey head popped up out of the hole wearing a hard hat with a dwarf-rune on it. The head blinked, looked around and shouted something to someone below. Only Pur-Ging understood what the shouting meant. It was something along the lines of "WTF? We've broken through! What's wrong with your f'ing map?" Then the head bobbed down again and the sound of voices was heard below, though what they were saying was unclear. Cholmondeley guessed that there were two of them; the head and one other. "Hold your fire!" he commanded. "Too late," said the head druid, as they roof vanished and daylight came streaming in. And the rain. It was still raining. An inarticulate shout came from down below as the daylight fell through the hole, followed by the raised voices of two duergar arguing angrily together.

"They are arguing about who's fault it is," reported Pur-Ging. "One is accusing the other of holding the map upside down. The language is colourful, even for duergar."

Behind one of the tables, Fleado struck an attitude and declaimed "Forsooth!"

Someone else came up out of the hole. It was Keyes. Quite how she got there, no-one else could explain, but there she was, scrambling up the broken floorboards and up into the room. She was carrying the hard hat that the first duergar had just recently been wearing, and a pouch of gemstones that she had lifted from his belt. The voices were still arguing below and it didn't seem as if the duergar had realised yet that he had been robbed. Ronni helped her up and they both slipped behind a curtain that was fluttering somewhat in the breeze. With no roof, it was quite draughty in the Druid Shed.

 

[rgoodbb]

"Should we wait brothers and sisters? Should we still our arms and stow our legs? I say thee nay. If the tempestuous battle be fought within thyne shed of druid here on this day. This very day. We will not be stifled or styned by the trammeled pestilence from below, we will not hanker or hake when the time cometh. No fair green folk no, we will muster the bluster and vex our very blood so that those after us will remember, Oh they will remember. Then let us verily play the game of war! for Gucci and for gold!!!!!"

"For Gucci/Me and for gold!!!!" Cried all the little green folk as one.

And with that. Since everyone else seemed to be holding their turns, Fleado and a roused rabble of goblins charged screaming straight down into the hole.......

 

[Lanefan]

Sorry guys, I can't give out 'laugh' tokens fast enough!

==============================================
Fleado and a roused rabble of goblins charged screaming straight down into the hole.......

...and gravity did its thing, and down went most of the goblins at an unplanned and highly unfortunate rate of speed until stopping very suddenly - and very messily - several dozen feet below. Only Freedo and Gucci had enough foresight to look for - and then use - the ladder that the duergar had put in place.

"Freedo. Do you 'ave ze fire?" asked Gucci, the beginnings of an idea forming in his head.
"Errr...yeah boss, right here!" and he pulled out a very short Wand of Firefinger otherwise and more commonly known as a Zippo lighter.
"Zat ees pairfect! Make ze fire, zen when I zay drop eet, you drop eet", and Gucci - who still had his very nice wine - poured it down the hole. "Drop eet!"

And when the little wand met the very fine and unexpectedly potent wine it produced a very fine blast of fire down the hole which had three immediate effects: it singed the feet of the two remaining goblins, it took out most of the rest of the ladder below them leaving them clinging to the hole's wall, and it generated quite a bit of screaming from below as some previously-unseen duergar lost some of their skin and most of their hair.

"Ropes!" called Cholmondley above. "Ropes, and we will verily put the foe to flight!" He hadn't understood a word Fleado had said before his jump-to-a-conclusion into the hole, but it sure sounded inspiring - almost noble. Very odd, coming from a goblin. As he thought these things, various ropes were thrown his way from somewhere (this was Ronni's doing) and Foghorn started nailing one end of each of them to the floor.

Meanwhile Sister Jericho, not entirely trusting these Druids to be of any use at all thus leaving herself as the only reliable healing source, cast Sanctuary on herself; while the Druids - in an uncanny imitation of the Australian synchronized swimming team - all started shapeshifting in perfect unison.....

 

[BoldItalic]

Sorry guys, I can't give out 'laugh' tokens fast enough!

If you refresh the page in your browser ...

 

[BoldItalic]

The was the sound of shouting down below, then the sound of running feet receding into the distance. Ronni and Keyes put on their wings and flew down the hole supporting Knife between them who, if you recall, weighed nothing so she was easy to carry. It was going to be dark down in the tunnels, so Sister Jericho cast Light on a spoon she found on the floor, and clambered down after them. She saw the three girls ahead of her, moving carefully down a low tunnel that was shored up with stone lintels. A shovel and a discarded map lay nearby.

"Shall we follow?" asked Cholmondeley. Foghorn nodded and they did, though mainly to get out of the rain which was starting to get quite heavy. "Are we defending the dukedom yet?" asked Cholmondeley's sword Incalcular, "Only, if we are, I'm allowed to glow brightly in the presence of enemies." Cholmondeley reassured it that they were. He called up to the druids "Can you do something about the rain?" but the druids giant frogs decided it was someone else's problem and didn't.

"That's interesting," commented Pur-Ging, picking up the discarded map and studying it knowledgeably. "This bit of cross-hatching to denote geolite has been drawn upside down. That's the symbol for 'Here Be Diamonds' but it shouldn't be there. I'll correct it. Now, at the end of this tunnel ..."

 

[Lanefan]

"....it looks like there should be the first bit of geolite we'll see...or diamonds, or we'll need to mind the gap, depending which way up you read this hopeless map", Pur-Ging snorted in mounting frustration.

About now something occurred to Foghorn - something very bad - and he stopped in his tracks. "This is all wrong! Those uncouth herders of nerfs! They've tricked us!" And sure enough the joke was on the brave adventurers, as the four new owners of the Druid Shed - Jericho, Foghorn, Ronni and Keyes - had all just gone down into a hole and left their tavern unguarded; a hole that was even now being closed off by the Stone Shape spells of a chortling Char-Ging and the suddenly-reverted-to-normal-form Druids!

A very satisfied "Taxes collected! Well done, boys!" were the last words heard from above, as Char-Ging's devious plan came to fruition.

Meanwhile a subdued Foghorn called "Keyes, Ronni: might as well come back - it's all a set-up. We've been had by that no-good tax collector."

On hearing this, Cholmondley nearly exploded with righteous wrath. "She can't do that! I'm the Duke! I tell her what taxes to collect, and from who, and when! I >sputter< I'll have her removed from office! >sputter< I'll rip out...I'll find...I'll..." at this point his sputtering overrode his coherency.

"Sire" said Ronni quietly, "it doesn't matter that you're the Duke. Your duchy is up there, and we're down here."

And Pur-Ging, showing more emotion than anyone had yet seen from the usually-stoic Monk, was crestfallen. "I'm so sorry, all of you. She's my sister, and of all people alive I'm the one who should have seen this coming. I let you down. Please tell me how I can help make it right."

Sister Jericho, herself somewhat dumbfounded by this turn of events, still had enough sense to realize something: "Keyes, if you still have that diamond I can at least revive your friend. I've a feeling we'll be safe here for a while".........

So who's down here?

Sister Jericho
Foghorn
Cholmondley
Ronni
Keyes
Knife-as-corpse
Gucci (with sore feet)
Freedo (with sore feet)
Pur-Ging

did I miss anyone?

 

[Redthistle]

" ... We will not be stifled or styned (Edit: s/b "R.L. Stined". Let's give credit to the Great Old One.) by the trammeled pestilence from below, we will not hanker or hake when the time cometh. ... "

Tsk, tsk, tsk.

 

[rgoodbb]

2 dead duergar lay at their feet. Two more a little further down the tunnel, and just as it cornered, the feet of another were observable. Pur-Ging, Ronni and Keyes snook ahead while the Cleric cast revive. It was easier to say than revivify because If she wasn't careful she could get caught up in all the V's, mess the spell up, and just sound very cold.

As Life energy began to renew around and through Knife, the sneakies came across a T junction in the tunnel. On a plaque written in undercommon (which everyone could read because it sounds cool) it read:

"To the East, cracked and dusty steps curl around and down into the unknown. There is an element of heat and dryness coming up from down there as if the devils themselves gave breath to this breeze. To the West, the steepening steps climb forever into darkness and you are not quite sure but you think you can just about make out the sound of a snuffle and snort of a creature. Which path do you take?"

.................It was a large plaque.................