DF Whiterock Session 31: Underground River

Date:

2018-12-14

Weather:

Unseasonably warm, melting snow

Player Characters:

Garreth (Zuljita), Half-Orc Fighter, 294 points
Ibizaber (Demented Avenger), Human Thief, 287 points
Polly (Kalzazz), Wood Elf Archer, 271 points
Seépravir (Archon Shiva), High-Elf Wizard, 305 points

Significant NPCs:

Iolas, Elf Musical Craftswoman

Vulgaris, Minyad Druid

5 Derro

4 Cave Fishers

After a hard week of training, everyone except Elias (who had church duty) met at the Inn of the Slumbering Drake in Cillamar, to recap their week.  Seépravir had tried researching a Druidic planar gate in the mushroom forest, and found tales of a "great forest" with gates to it from other forests, but nothing specifically underground or under Castle Whiterock.  Zaber had started using Propaganda skill to spread nasty rumors about Lord Flitwick, who was still out of town, wintering somewhere to the south.  Polly had purchased a whole lot of arrows, after some fungal rot had somehow gotten into her quiver during last session's fight in the mushroom farm.

Polly remembered that they still needed to finish the jade harp, to match the jade flute and jade drum and possibly free the air elemental trapped in the organ.  So everyone went to see Iolas, the only maker of musical instruments on the Street of Craftsmen, to commission her to make a harp, using the magical jade harp strings they had found in the baby red dragon's hoard.  Iolas was happy for the business, asked a few questions about the type of harp they wanted, took half the money up front, and told them to come back in a week.  Unfortunately none of the PCs actually know how to play a harp.  They looked for Brie the bard, who sometimes plays lute in the Inn, but she wasn't around.

Having done everything they could think of doing in town, the group headed for Castle Whiterock.  It was an unseasonably warm day for winter, with a lot of the recent snow starting to melt.  They did not make great time hiking through the slush, but nothing bothered them.

Once they reached the castle, Seépravir cast a bunch of buffing spells, and the group headed back down through the dungeon to the level where they defeated the mushroom farmer and her brood of elementals last time.  When they got there, she spotted them, and held up her hands and asked to parley.  They had a long conversation, where they established that her name was Vulgaris, that she was a minyad (kind of like a dryad but with underground crystal veins instead of above ground trees), that the fight was a horrible misunderstanding because the group had trespassed on her territory and her guard elementals weren't that smart, that she was thankful that they had spared her life, that she would like her edged rapier back, and that she'd be happy to trade various fungus with the PCs, in exchange for green slime or possibly other things.   Seépravir let her know diplomatically that she wasn't getting her sword back, and made a very pursuasive argument, so Vulgaris agreed to shut up about getting her rapier back but expressed interest in trading for another one like it.  She also mentioned that there were crazy people to the west.  Upon further questioning, she said they were derro, which are a species of small insane underground humanoids.  Zaber tried hitting on the minyid (who was quite beautiful in an inhuman way) but she either didn't notice or pretended not to.

Not having any green slime or spare edged rapiers to trade, and wanting to get Zaber away from Vulgaris and her mushrooms, the group decided to go west and see about the derro.  Zaber and Polly moved west down a natural-looking tunnel, into a cave that contained a large basket suspended by cables, and a large wheel connected to the cables.  It looked like an elevator going up, maybe the bottom end of the same elevator they had found months ago, in the secret room occupied by a duergar, on the slaver orcs' level.  But before they had time to play with the elevator, they spotted a small humanoid with a crossbow to the north, who spotted them in return and ran away to the north while yelling gibberish.  Polly tried to yell something friendly, to no effect.

Zaber and Polly rejoined Seépravir and Garreth, and Seépravir cast Missile Shield on Polly.   Polly advanced again, this time with much less fear of crossbow bolts, while Zaber climbed the wall to see if that gave him a better view.  It let him see an underground river to the north, with three skiffs beached on it, but the derro was now out of sight, either hiding behind something or beyond Dark Vision range.  Polly moved forward enough to see three little guys with crossbows and mail, spread out into a skirmish line.  She kept moving forward fearlessly, and stepped onto an unseen patch of magical Grease, but didn't slip.

Eventually one of the waiting enemies cackled insanely and ran out of patience and fired at Polly, and automatically missed because of the Missile Shield.  At that point Polly started shooting back, Garreth started running forward holding the magical returning spear that they'd taken from a dead troglodyte, and Seépravir readied a Concussion spell.  The derro were over 30 yards away, pretty long range for a dungeon battle, so everyone had pretty big hit penalties.  Polly didn't particularly care, as she's really good with a bow, and got some hits in.  Seépravir didn't really care either, because she just had to get her Concussion within 10 yards of some enemies to have a chance to stun them, which she managed, stunning one and totally deafening another.  Garreth got a bit closer before attacking.

The derro might have been smart enough to figure out the Missile Shield (the PCs couldn't be sure as they didn't understand whatever language the derro spoke), as they concentrated their crossbow fire on Garreth rather than Polly.  Garreth is good at dodging, though, and wasn't hit.  Polly started showing off by aiming at eyes, choosing a stunned derro first.  He failed to dodge, the arrow blew through the eye into the brain, and did massive damage.  Somehow the derro survived several death checks, but the major wound check on a brain hit is at -10, and he was knocked unconscious.

By this point the Garreth and Polly had advanced far enough to see two more derro on the flanks, for a total of five (with four still standing).  One of them appeared to Concentrate on a spell, which immediately drew Polly's attention, and she started aiming her arrows that way.  Seépravir lobbed another Concussion into an area with three of the four standing derro, and stunned another one.  (The one that had been totally deafened by critically failing its first HT check against Concussion actually benefitted from its deafness, with +5 to its roll against this one.)  Garreth got close enough to lob his spear at the easternmost derro, but it dodged.  The derro kept firing their crossbows, quite quickly, but missed a lot and had the few accurate shots dodged.

Garreth ran forward as his spear returned to him, and caught it out of the air.  By this point he was pretty close to his target, so he decided to Slam rather than use the spear.  I told him that he could slam with a spear in his hands, though it's a two-minute penalty for cross-checking.  Garreth rolled a critical hit on the slam, and the derro was knocked both prone and backwards, and dropped its weapon.

The derro spellcaster cast Daze on Polly, but it was far enough away that the range penalty caused the spell to fail.  Garreth fast-drew his katana and killed the prone derro with it.  Polly shot one stunned derro in the eye, knocking it out.  She then fired at the derro caster, who rolled a critical fail on his dodge, freezing and watching the arrow fly into his eye, and knocking him out too.  At that point all the derro were knocked out or killed, and the fight was over.

Zaber started looting bodies, finding some nice repeating crossbows (where did these crazy guys get those?) and mail armor and a few coins.  Garreth made sure all the unconscious derro were dead, though that probably would have happened on its own pretty soon, seeing how they all had blood pouring out of their brains through their eye sockets.  Everyone saw a small save to the west, and a waterfall up to the northwest, flowing into the underground river.  Seépravir climbed into one of the boats beached along the shore to rest, while Polly and Zaber went to check out the cave, and Garreth kept an eye on Seépravir.

The cave contained some small bedrolls, a stone table surrounded by rocks that might have been makeshift chairs, a cask surrounded by tankards on the ground, and a chest.  Like any proper PC, Zaber immediately made a beeline for the chest.  It had three locks, one of which featured a poison needle trap, which he found and disarmed.  He then picked all three locks and triumphantly opened the chest, which had nothing inside.  Not believing this, a lot of looking for invisible contents and false bottoms and things hidden behind the chest ensued, to no avail.  Apparently one of the derro was trolling his killers from the grave.

After they finally gave up on the chest, the group started on the cask, which was half-full of some kind of ale.  This made Zaber feel a bit better about the empty chest, and he decided to start swilling directly from the cask.  It was some kind of dwarf ale with mushrooms, not too bad.  But, also, there was a thump, like there was something solid inside the cask.  Polly didn't really want to drink from a dirty tankard, and so carried one over to the river to wash it.  Garreth heard there was ale and so abandoned his wizard guard duty to come get some, and also keep Zaber from drinking too much of it and impairing his thief abilities.  After they finished drinking, they opened up the cask and found a stoppered bottle inside, which contained a note, with apparently three words in a language nobody knew.  So they kept that and kept searching.

After a few minutes, Seépravir was done resting, so she walked up and cast Seek Magic.  Which pointed to something magic under one of the stone chairs.  Zaber searched under the chair and found a dark wood box and a pouch.  The pouch contained some coins and green gems.  The box was magic.  Much playing with the box ensued, none of it working.  Seépravir cast Lockmaster on the box, and it briefly popped open, showing that it was bigger on the inside than the outside, then snapped shut again.  Polly thought it might be a folding boat, and dipped it in the river, but this didn't make it open.  At that point the group decided that the box could wait until they were back in town, and decided to play with the elevator instead.

The elevator basket was attached to the wheel by cables wound through pulleys.  Polly turned the wheel to the left, and the elevator went up.  She turned the wheel to the right, and the elevator went back down.  Having figured out this advanced technology, Polly and Zaber got in the basket, and Garreth started spinning the wheel.  After a while, Polly and Zaber reached the secret room several levels up where they killed the ogre elevator operator.  That room had its own wheel, and now contained two elevator baskets.  They searched the secret room for evidence that it had been disturbed recently.  They found no evidence that it had, so they left their wheelbarrow full of assorted stuff up there, and took the elevator back down.

With a bit of time left in the session, everyone piled into one of the skiffs.  Seépravir cast Levitate and floated just above the skiff rather than actually riding in it, just in case.  Garreth actually had Boating skill (!), so he took charge of rowing the boat.  The water from the waterfall caused a current at their backs, so the boat moved easily down the underground river.  At the first fork, the group had a chance of turning right toward some rocks or left toward no rocks, and chose no rocks.  At the second fork, they again had a chance of right for rocks or left for no rocks, and again chose no rocks.

And, then, they were just rowing along, minding their own business, when some Cave Fishers in a cave 40' up decided to go fishing for PCs.  The Cave Fishers rolled a 6 on their surprise roll.  Luckily for the PCs, Zaber (keeping watch in the front of the boat) rolled a 5 against his crazy-high Perception, so no surprise happened.  The Cave Fishers were basically giant lobsters with 20-yard filaments designed to stick to prey and then lift it up in the air to its doom.

But without surprise, the PCs had a decent chance to dodge the filaments.  And Polly was faster than the Fishers so she got to go first.  She shot one, hitting it hard enough to stun it, so it didn't get to attack that turn.  Zaber grabbed a pole so he could steady the boat while Garreth fought.  Garreth readied his returning spear.

Seépravir dodged a filament, with her Levitate giving her freedom of movement to retreat beyond the boat without splashing.  Then she cast Concussion.  Zaber judo-parried a filament, and it didn't stick to him.  He then dodged a second one.  Polly shot the same Fisher again.  Garreth threw his spear at one, but missed.  Zaber tried using a judo throw to pull a Fisher out of its cave high above and make it spash into the water, but it was more than twice as strong as him, so this move had no chance.  He then used his Escape skill to detach from the filament.

The Fishers tried some more fishing.  Seépravir dodged again, but one of them got Polly with a critical hit, causing her to drop her bow.  (It had a lanyard, the best $1 item in GURPS, so she could get it back.)  Another one tried to grab Seépravir, and rolled a critical hit, but she used Luck to make it reroll, and it didn't succeed again.  Seépravir threw her Concussion up to the Fisher cave, stunning one of them.

Garreth decided not to catch his returning spear, and fast-drew his Katana instead, then chopped the filament holding Polly in half.  Polly fell into the boat, made her Acrobatics roll, and landed fine.  Garreth then chopped another filament for good measure.  Polly used the lanyard to recover her dropped bow, and rolled a critical success, so I ruled that she'd flipped it into her hand so deftly that she could take a shot this turn.  (She has Extra Attack plus Heroic Archer, so normally she fires two arrows per second.)  She put another arrow into the stunned Fisher.

Zaber held the boat steady with his pole.  Another Fisher grabbed Polly with a filament, and rolled another critical hit.  She was grabbed again, but at least this time didn't drop her bow.  Another one tried to grab Garreth, and he parried it with his katana.  For once, a monster's weapon didn't count as a striker, so Garreth's parry counted as aggressive and he got a free hit on the filament, which shortened it again.

At this point Seépravir started spamming Death Vision at one of the Fishers, giving it a vision of being boiled in a gigantic fungus pot, and stunning it with no resistance roll.  Garreth rapid struck two more filaments, the one holding Polly and one other, making them too short to reach the boat.  (The filaments were 20 yards long and the boat was about 13 yards below the cave, so each chop-through took off about 7 yards, so two chops were enough to make the filament too short to be useful until the victims got closer.)  Polly put a couple more arrows into a Fisher, hurting it badly.  Garreth chopped the last filament in reach in two, and then there was nothing left in range for him to chop.  Polly kept shooting, until the last couple of very wounded Fishers retreated away from the cave opening, out of line of sight from the skiff below.

Seépravir cast Levitate on Polly, so she could zoom up and keep shooting Fishers.  Then she cast it on Garreth so he could fly up and chop them.  Zaber started talking about climbing up the cliff toward the Fishers.  But at that point I just called the battle.  It was late, and the enemies were all below 0 HP, with no means of healing, so they were all going to pass out sooner or later.  And if the PCs were smart enough to have Polly just keep shooting them from mid-air, beyond (shortened) filament range, the fishers had no chance.

With the battle over, Garreth took Zaber's rope and used it to haul the skiff up behind him.  Everyone Levitated or climbed up the cliff to the Fishers' cave, which contained 4 dead and/or unconscious giant lobsters, and a pile of debris.  Zaber searched the debris, and found some coins and a fire opal.  Seépravir cast Seek Magic, and found a wand that Zaber had missed.  A few lobster bits were removed for eating on the trip home, and everyone headed back down to the water then rowed back upstream to the beach, then went up the elevator to the top level of the dungeon, then walked back to Cillamar.

GM's Comments:

This session was basically a parley, two fights, some playing with boats and elevators, and some searching for treasure. 

The parley went okay.  Vulgaris didn't really want to fight the PCs again, since they defeated her last week with her elemental allies, so she was unlikely to win the same fight without them.  The PCs didn't really want to fight her again either.  At this point they seem to have an uneasy truce.

The derro weren't friendly but weren't really a match for the PCs either.  They got a few crossbow shots and spells off, and took a bunch of arrows and katana chops and Concussion spells in return.  It would have been more fun to have this fight in mid-air from elevator baskets, with the prospect of lethal falling damage, but the party took the long way down, and earned a lot of character points on the way.

The cave fishers were a neat fight, but really needed surprise to hit 4 PCs at once.  Without surprise, Garreth was able to chop whichever filament grabbed someone, while Polly kept a steady stream of arrows flying, and Seépravir kept stunning the fishers.  Zaber's role in this fight was pretty simple: hold the boat steady so that Garreth was free to use his katana to chop filaments.

Finding the bottom of the elevator whose top they found long ago was a fun bit of closure.  The players had discussed going down the elevator a few times, but hadn't ever gotten around to it.  Now it provides a multi-level shortcut, avoiding hiking through three dungeon levels, which probably matters to the PCs more than to the players, since we mostly fast-forward through that stuff unless there's a wandering monster encounter.

Overall it was a profitable trip, with the Folding Boat, the wand, several repeating crossbows and suits of derro-sized mail, and a bunch of coins and gems found.

The other accomplishment this session was figuring out how to share the skiff-full-of-PCs token among all players, so whoever was rowing the boat could just push one token in roll20, without everyone else having to constantly maintain their position in the boat.  We may decide to use this technique in the future to keep everyone in formation on dry land.  Or maybe not, if everyone needing to drag their token around is more fun.

DF Whiterock Session 30: Undead and Elementals

Date:

2018-12-07

Weather:

Freezing, light snow

Player Characters:

Elias (Wiggles), Wood Elf Cleric, 244 points
Garreth (Zuljita), Half-Orc Fighter, 289 points
Ibizaber (Demented Avenger), Human Thief, 282 points
Polly (Kalzazz), Wood Elf Archer, 266 points
Seépravir (Archon Shiva), High-Elf Wizard, 300 points

Significant NPCs:

Ghast

6 Skeletons

Petrified Dark Elfish looking female mushroom farmer

Minor Xorn

2 Small Earth Elementals

Swarm of Tiny Earth Elementals

Earth Elemental

Water Elemental

5 Mudmen

We started on the lower troglodyte/ant level of Castle Whiterock, in a hidden ruined temple of some evil frog/toad god, right after opening a secret door into combat with some waiting undead.  The undead turned out to be a ghast leader (though most of the PCs couldn't identify it as such) with a weird two-hex scythe, flanked by 6 skeletons with sickles.  The undead strategy was to hold the door and keep the PCs from swarming in.  This turned out to be a bad strategy, because it allowed Polly to fire arrows into the room.  When the other side has a heroic archer and you don't, sitting back is typically a bad idea.

Polly shot a lot of skeletons.  Garreth sliced some skeletons with his katana.  Elias bashed some skeletons with his flail and this worked extra-well.  Meanwhile the skeletons came through the door and attacked with their sickles, but got dodged or blocked or parried.  

Eventually, the ghast leader figured out that he and his minions should back up into their secret room, try to get out of line of sight of the archer, and hope to swarm any PCs that came in.  Unfortunately for them, by then there were only a couple of skeletons left.  Also, Garreth's sacrificial parry allowed him to protect Polly as she ran into the room and kept filling undead with arrows.  So, it wasn't much of a fight, though it took a while because of the number of enemies.  Eventually the ghast and all 7 skeletons went from undead to just dead.

Besides his scythe, the ghast was wearing a jade holy symbol of the Toadfiend Bobugbulilz, He Whose Name Cannot Be Spelled or Pronounced Correctly.  (Elias was vaguely familiar of this evil toad god from his theological studies, but didn't know the exact name.)  There was also a desk and a couple of chairs in the corner.  Zaber searched the desk, and found a drawer with some coins and black onyx gems, and a keyring with 5 keys on it.  He searched it harder, with some help from a See Secrets spell from Seépravir, and found a secret compartment.  Inside the compartment was a nice jade box with a glass lid.  Inside the box was some slimy stuff.  The group decided not to mess with the slimy stuff until they got back to town.

After some more searching of the ruined evil template area found nothing but rubble, the group decided they were done with this level, and should go down.  So they all swam through the underwater tunnel from the evil temple to the main part of the level one last time, with weapons wrapped in oilskins for protection, then used some magical fire to dry off a bit before Seépravir stopped maintaining Warmth spells on everybody.  (She kept her own though, because she doesn't like getting all bundled up in winter clothing.)

After going down the sloping twisting passage for a while, Zaber saw a big cave ahead, with what looked like several giant flowerpots arranged in neat rows, except full of mushrooms instead of flowers.  The room also featured a long vein of purple crystal against one wall.  But before he had a chance to investigate the room in more detail, Zaber spotted some kind of rock creature (a small earth elemental) on the other side of the cave, which then saw him and started running over.  After a couple of seconds, Zaber warned his friends, and then all gathered to watch the creature.  Polly tried talking to it, but it didn't respond, so when it got close enough to attack soon, she started filling it with arrows.  When it stopped coming, Zaber snuck out of the passage into the cave to look around, and saw another rock creature, and also a small trilaterally-symmetrical beast (a xorn, like the one previous encountered in the Gnome museum except smaller) and also a swarm of flying dirt, coming right at him.

While everyone else fought the second earth elemental and the xorn, Zaber got chewed up a bit by flying debris hitting his skin.  Garreth didn't want to swing his katana at it and possibly hit Zaber, so he told Zaber to run and try to separate himself from the swarm.  Polly wasn't as skittish and fired several arrows at the swarm, somehow managing not to hit Zaber.  Zaber got a final stab in on the swarm, and it dissipated.  With the earth elementals and the xorn and the swarm all defeated, Zaber checked out an exit to the east, where there was another large cave, this one mostly full of mushrooms growing on the ground, with an occasional clear path between the toadstools.  And running down the paths, toward the PCs, were a larger rock creature and a wall of water.

Everyone formed up to fight the additional elementals, and Seépravir cast Great Haste on first Garreth then Polly, while Zaber scouted back to the west side of the cave, making sure nothing else was sneaking up on the group through the other exit he'd spotted over there.  Polly started shooting arrows at the earth elemental, lots and lots of arrows.  It was big and tough and rocky and not obviously possessing any vital organs and so ridiculously hard to kill with arrows, though she did eventually manage to slow it down, giving more time to fill it with arrows before it reached her friends.  The water elemental was faster, and came sloshing down the path at the party.  Meanwhile a bunch more enemies appeared, some small beings made out of mud, which had excellent camouflage against the surrounding mud that had been caused by a water elemental flowing down a dirt path, so were very hard to see.

The PCs were all bottled up on a narrow path, kind of worried to step off it into the mushroom farm proper.  Garreth did step there once, and had to make a DX-2 check, which succeeded.  Then Zaber got bored and decided to poke a mushroom with his knife.  Oops.  There was a big cloud of spores, and everyone nearby had to make a HT check.  Fortunately everyone made it, so nobody decided to punish Zaber for his excessive curiousity.

Seépravir decided to cast See Invisible to get a better look at the mud creatures that she'd barely spotted, and also saw behind them something that looked like a beautiful dark elf female, with stony skin, waving a wand.  Apparently the wand wasn't working correctly anymore, because she threw it on the ground and started casting spells.  Seépravir didn't have any good long-distance attacks handy, so she started casting another See Invisible on Polly.

It took a long time to wear down the super-tough earth elemental and the diffuse and hard-to-hurt water elemental.  Meanwhile the mudmen started throwing mud balls at the PCs, and managed to hit Polly with one, sticking her to the ground.  Unfortunately for them, she could keep firing arrows.  And the stony dark elf looking woman managed to lob a Concussion spell into the group of PCs.  (This counted as an attack and dispelled her Invisibility.)  Unfortunately for her, all the PCs except Seépravir made their HT-3 rolls to resist stunning, but one of her elemental allies was stunned, so it wasn't a great trade.

Eventually Polly managed to unstick herself from the mud, then used her Jumping skill to jump across a mushroom patch, from one trail to another, and ran up to the stony dark elf to fill her with arrows.  Unfortunately for Polly, her first arrow turned around and came right back at her -- the enemy had cast Reverse Missiles.  Polly dodged the arrow, stopped firing more, and, having nothing better to do, tried to Slam the wizard.  This had no great effect.

Something happened to the mudmen, and they all dissipated.  The group finally ground down the earth elemental and water elemental.  And Garreth got into katana range of the enemy wizardess, as she drew an edged rapier.  She yelled some anti-orcish insults at Garreth, which was a mistake, as this alerted Seépravir that she spoke Common, and then Seépravir got off a Rapier Wit in response, stunning her.  She managed to defend herself against his rapidly striking katana a few times, but then failed and was knocked unconscious.  After a quick debate, the group decided to tie up their prisoner and bring her back to town.

She woke up, and informed them that she would die if taken away from her crystal vein.  The PCs thought she was bluffing, and kept marching her up stairs toward the exit.  Three levels up, the unknown dark-elfish-looking woman passed out.  At that point the group believed her, and a debate ensued as to whether they should bring her back anyway and possibly kill her, leave her there tied up, let her go, or just kill her.  Surprisingly, they decided to let her go, untying her and heading back to town.

GM's Comments:

This session was basically two big fights.  The first one, against the undead, was never much of a challenge because of the undead's subpar tactics and lack of armor.  Their goal was to hold the door, but holding the door doesn't really work when facing heroic archers.  The skeletons also took double damage from crushing attacks, which turned Elias into a complete wrecker against them.  And the ghast leader couldn't last too long against multiple attackers.  He fought with his scythe instead of his claws and teeth, so never even managed to paralyze anyone.  In hindsight, I probably should have modified their pre-programmed tactics to increase the challenge level of the fight, though the undead were doomed in any case.

The second fight, against the petrified-looking vaguely-dark-elvish woman and her hordes of summoned elementals, was more challenging.  She had the good sense to be Invisible, always wise when in the same room as Polly.  And she had a nice collection of elemental allies: earth elementals in three sizes, a small xorn, a big tough water elemental, and a pack of mudmen.  The environment also added to the challenge, with everyone bottled up on a narrow path, because stepping off the path into the mushrooms risked kickup up spores, that possibly did something bad.  (The players don't know exactly what, because the one time that Zaber stabbed a mushroom, everyone made their HT roll.)

There was an interesting final moral dilemma when the creature appeared to not be able to survive away from her crystal vein.  I expected Garreth or Polly to murderate her, but somehow everyone made their Bloodlust checks and decided to let her go.  So we'll see what that leads to, next time the group revisits that level.

DF Whiterock Session 29: Swimming With Frogs

Date:

2018-11-30

Weather:

Freezing, clear

Player Characters:

Elias (Wiggles), Wood Elf Cleric, 239 points
Garreth (Zuljita), Half-Orc Fighter, 284 points
Ibizaber (Demented Avenger), Human Thief, 277 points
Polly (Kalzazz), Wood Elf Archer, 261 points
Seépravir (Archon Shiva), High-Elf Wizard, 298 points

Significant NPCs:

Carlia, Human Farmer
Jath, Human Child
Clem, Human Farmer
2 Giant Demon Frogs or Possibly Toads
2 Giant Frog or Possibly Toad Skeletons


We started at Carlia's farm in the hamlet of Grainwand, east of Castle Whiterock, on the other side of the mountains from Cillamar.  The PCs (minus Garreth) had escorted Carlia and Jath there after rescuing them from the demon frogs.  The PCs were concerned about safety of the hamlet, only about 6 miles from the newly discovered stream entrance to the Castle Whiterock.  Zaber asked to talk to whoever was in charge, so Carlia sent Jath to fetch her Uncle Clem.

After some discussion over a meal, Clem agreed to try to keep a watch over Grainwand in case more monsters attacked.  Seépravir decided to magically close the stream entrance to make it harder for raiders to go that way.  Polly thought it made more sense to just kill every evil monster.  The PCs then left to return to the caves, with the farmers' thanks.  Seépravir sealed the stream entrance with some Shape Earth spells.  Polly and Zaber looked for more monsters to kill in the area, but didn't find any.  They grabbed some scant leftover treasure from the last visit (the heads of 3 Miner Stonebore Ants, and a couple of spears with a maker's mark that indicated they probably weren't made by troglodytes) and went back to Cillamar to get Garreth.

Garreth had spent some time in jail for allegedly being drunk and disorderly in public, though he maintained his innocence.  Lady Chauntessa had used her influence to get him out.  So when the others returned to town, he was in a foul mood and wanted to go back to the dungeon and kill stuff.  The others agreed, but Seépravir first wanted a bit of time to do some research about the secret Sleep of Ages spell in the Hall of Worms.  She didn't find anything.

The group hiked back to the castle again, and resumed searching the troglodyte and ant level.  Scouting ahead, Zaber and Polly found an underground stream, leading in an unknown direction.  They went back to get their friends, and Zaber asked Seépravir to lend him the Ring of Water Breathing and cast a Warmth spell on him.  (Swimming in winter is no fun without one.)  She agreed, and also cast Invisibility and Mage-Stealth.  Zaber left his best knife and lockpicks behind to avoid getting them wet, then swam down the tunnel.  About 10 yards in, he heard some splashes, then saw a couple of giant frogs or maybe toads swimming toward him.  He decided to flatten himself against the side of the tunnel and hope to out-stealth them, since there was no way he could out-swim them.  This worked; the frogs never noticed him, continued to the end of the tunnel, and hopped out of the water.

Fortunately for the frogs, they gained surprise.  Unfortunately for the frogs, they were outmatched.  Polly got bit a little, but her armor reduced the damage.  Then all the PCs made their rolls to recover from mental stun, and it was a 4-on-2 battle.  Garreth chopped up frogs, Polly shot arrows at frogs, and Elias was annoyed that the frogs were down before he had a chance to flail them.  By the time Zaber came out of the water to help, the battle was over, so he told his friends (who couldn't see him) that he was okay, then swam back into the tunnel again.

This time, he made it to the end of the tunnel and emerged into a dry room.  It contained some mosaics featuring a giant frog-toad-demon thing smashing Cillamar, a big water-filled pool, a big mostly-dry pit, an iron door, and a couple of giant frog (or possibly toad) skeletons.  Zaber watched the skeletons for a while, and thought he saw one of them move.  He snuck past them, and tried to pick the lock on the iron door with his backup lockpicks, but failed.  He then snuck back to confer with the others.

With 5 PCs and only one Ring of Water Breathing, everyone else was going to have to hold their breath and swim fast.  Not wanting them damaged by water, Polly and Elias left their bow and crossbow behind.  Seépravir cast Warmth and Dark Vision on everyone who didn't already have them, and then the group went down the tunnel together, with Garreth shepherding Elias (in case he had problems climbing up the steep slippery far side) and Seépravir bringing up the rear, ready to cast Levitation on anyone who passed out.

Everyone made it in reasonable shape, but the frog skeletons saw them coming, and moved to attack.  Fortunately for the skeletons, Polly didn't have her bow.  Unfortunately for the skeletons, this time it was 5 vs. 2.  Elias's Flaming Flail had somehow remained Flaming all the way through the swim.  He shield bashed a frog skeleton to the ground, then flailed it to re-death, while it chewed on Polly a bit, temporarily reducing her HT.  Meanwhile Garreth hit the other one hard with his katana, knocking it into the pool.  Zaber, probably foolishly, decided to jump in after it and backstab.  This didn't do quite enough damage to finish it, and now Zaber was underwater and visible, facing an opponent that didn't need to breathe.  Fortunately, the pool was shallow enough that Garreth could hit the skeleton frog from the shore with his katana, and the reduced hit chance and damage from swinging into water weren't enough to keep him from re-killing it.

Everyone did some searching, but then Polly got antsy away from her bow, and decided to swim back to it.  Garreth followed her to keep her from being alone.  Elias had noticed that the room had reduced sanctity, possibly due to the unholy frog demon mosaics, and did some extensive destruction with his Flaming Flail.  (It possibly made him feel better, but didn't fix the sanctity level.)  Zaber did some more searching, and managed to pick the lock on the iron door with his fine lockpicks.  But then Zaber and Elias and Seépravir decided to swim back and join the others, rather than opening the door without their friends.

With Polly not wanting to go into the water again without her bow, the group decided to take a sloping passage down to a new level.  Unfortunately, technical difficulties ensued with the next level's map.  Roll20 had lost my last set of changes, including all the line of sight blockers, so the players could see through walls.  Polly let me know, and I moved everyone back upstairs and announced we had to stop early, since there was only an hour left in the session and it would take me most of that to fix the map.  Someone suggested that they instead go back to Cillamar and try to buy some oilskins to protect bows from water.  Everyone agreed that made sense, so everyone hiked to Cillamar again.  They made their availability roll and were able to find some expensive, weapons-grade oilskins.  Polly and Garreth each bought some, and then everyone walked back to the castle again.  (This session set a new record for Hiking rolls, though the last couple weren't really needed since I was secretly skipping the wandering monster rolls that the Hiking rolls influence, due to the extra trip being needed only because of technical difficulties.)

The group went down the underwater tunnel again, this time with Polly's bow and Garreth's katana waterproofed, and with Seépravir rather than Zaber having the Ring of Water Breathing.  Everyone made it across okay, and then weapons were unpacked, and the iron door opened.  It opened to a vestibule, containing some rotten robes and rotten whips and another iron door.  Elias thought the robes and whips looked unholy, and wanted to burn everything.  Seépravir pointed out that burning needed to wait until after searching for treasure, but nobody found any.  Zaber picked the lock on the second door, which was easier than the first one.

The door opened into a chamber featuring a lot of rubble on one end, and a shallow pool with an evil-looking frog statue and a couple of low pedestals on the other end.  The sanctity level was even lower here, feeling to Elias like an evil place.  Garreth eventually decided to approach the statue.  Predictably, it was trapped.  Three different supernatural traps went off.  Somehow, he dodged two of them and resisted the other, and was not affected.  He knocked the statue over into the water, then went looking at the pedestals.  There was dried blood on the walls behind both of them, and an old article of clothing (identified by Elias as a tabard of Justicia) and a reed doll behind one of them.  Garreth looked around for a while, then borrowed Elias's flail to bash the statue some more.  The traps had apparently reset, and he had to dodge two and resist a third, again.  He made all three rolls, again, and then spent a couple of minutes reducing the statue to rubble.

Zaber searched all around the pool, but didn't find anything else.  Polly also searched all around, and found a secret door that Zaber had somehow missed.  (It was really well hidden, and he rolled a 17.)  Nobody could figure out how to open the door (and Zaber insisted that was because it wasn't a door just a normal crack in the wall), until Seépravir cast See Secrets on Polly.  This let her see the three catches that were used to open the door.  Three PCs each moved a catch in unison, the secret door swung open, and we were out of time.

I revealed that something nasty and undead was behind the door, that they didn't have time to fight it, and we would start next session with the combat.  So, tune in next time to see what's trying to kill them.

GM's Comments:

Most of our game sessions start and end in Cillamar, usually with about 30 minutes in town, then a hike to the dungeon, then 3.5 hours of dungeon, and finishing with an offscreen hike back at the end.   (The players have figured out that I don't roll for wandering monsters on the way back to town if we're out of time.)  This one was a little different due to extra roleplaying time in Grainwand, then extra travel, first from the hamlet of Grainwand back to Cillamar to get Garreth, and then another trip to Cillamar to buy oilskins.  There was also quite a bit of messing around underwater.  So this session was a bit light on combat and a lot light on treasure, though the PCs still made good progress.

I had spent a bunch of time in Roll20 mapping the next level down and placing monsters, and apparently the last bit of that work was totally lost.  Implicit save means you never really know if your save happened, unless you exit all the way out and recheck from scratch, and I forgot to.  I was mildly annoyed to lose about half an hour of work, and super-annoyed that I didn't discover it until during play.  But the suggestion to go get oilskins and re-try the area at the far side of the underwater tunnel worked out, so the technical difficulties didn't really cost us much play time.

Seépravir's decision to cast Invisibility on Zaber before he went down the underwater tunnel alone probably saved his life.  On land, those two frogs were not much of a match for the other four PCs.  But in the water, against just Zaber?  He probably would have been eaten.  But the combination of Invisibility, Mage-Stealth, a good Stealth roll versus the frog's Perception (even if they couldn't see or hear him, they still got a chance to smell him), and his wise decision to hide rather than backstab as they went by meant he was totally fine.  Splitting the party is always scary.

I asked the group twice when they were in town if they needed to do anything with any items, and they still forgot about the jade drum they found last time, until after they were back in the dungeon and it was too late.  (Well, they could have taken another trip back to town, but there was enough hiking in this session already.)  They've been carrying around jade harp strings forever, but didn't bother to make them into a harp before, because they didn't have the drum.  It's often sound economics to postpone expenses as long as possible, but it can also make sense to do things when you remember, because you might forget later.