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.