DF Whiterock Session 93: The Unundeath of Gora-khan

Date:

2020-05-01

Weather:

Cool, session entirely underground

Player Characters:

Garreth (Zuljita), Half-Orc Fighter, 484 points
Ibizaber (Demented Avenger), Human Thief, 484 points
Polly (Kalzazz), Wood Elf Archer, 478 points
Seépravir (Archon Shiva), High Elf Wizard, 489 points

Significant NPCs:

Elias (player not present), Wood Elf Cleric
Gora-khan, Hobgoblin Vampire
Duergar Guards
Duergar Wizard
Giant Flesh Golem


We started just after the PCs broke into a new level of the duergar fortress of Narborg, and defeated a large group of guards.  Gora-khan the hobgoblin vampire had escaped in gaseous form, but Seépravir had cast a Soul Rider spell on him, so was able to track his movements.

After a few minutes of rest, the group headed east, then found a room to the north, with a door leaving to the north and a secret door (easily found using See Secrets) to the east, but they bypassed those and continued east, to another secret door on the south side of the passage.  That looked like it might be the right way, so Zaber tried opening it, but it was tricky enough that he couldn't quite get it.  Seépravir helped, and together they were able to get it open.

Beyond the secret door was a room containing an armor dummy, a statue of a woman with fangs, and a stone sarcophagus on a raised platform.  Polly was suspicious of the statue, so shot an arrow into it.  Seépravir looked through the vampire's eyes, and saw the bottom of a stone coffin lid, and a greatsword in the vampire's hands, ready to attack whoever opened that lid.

Despite the threat, Garreth used Power Blow to increase his strength, and then he and Elias knocked the lid off the coffin.  The vampire tried chopping off Elias's head, but Elias blocked.  Polly ran around Elias to get a clear shot, then shot three arrows, all of which were dodged.  Garreth fast-drew his katana then managed to land one cut, for enough damage to slow Gora.  Elias followed up with a heavy flail smash for serious damage, and then Seépravir with a Slow spell.

With the vampire's dodge reduced, Polly hit him with two arrows.  Garreth followed up with a cut to the leg and another to the neck.  As Gora prepared to assume gaseous form and flee, Elias clouted him with his blessed flail, and the damage caused the vampire to dissolve.

After enjoying their victory for about a second, Garreth asked if the greatsword was cursed.  Elias thought it just looked magic, not cursed, but Garreth picked it up to test it and got burned.  Seépravir said "You have to be evil.  Lemme try." but it burned her too.  After some discussion of the best way to carry the sword, Seépravir just cast Apportation and flew it behind her.  The vampire also had enchanted studded leather armor and a necklace, shaped like a muscular dwarf, with "Gora-khan the Indominatable [sic],  Bleak Theater Fall Champion,  8-0, 3 One-Shot Kills" engraved in Undercommon.

After they finished whining about the cursed sword, Polly and Zaber resumed looting.  Polly found some bumps in the coffin, which turned out to be gems sewn under the lining.  Elias wanted to destroy the evil coffin and exorcise the evil room, after everyone was done taking stuff.  Zaber said they were done, so Elias bashed the coffin repeatedly with his flail, and found some more gems that Polly and Zaber had missed.  He then exorcised the dais until the aura of vampire was gone.

The group continued down a hallway and went through a couple of doors, after Zaber listened didn't hear anything.  They found a hall full of crafts rooms: a tannery, a glassblower, a forge, and a trap factory.  After pocketing any tools that looked light and valuable, they doubled back to the secret door they'd ignored before.  It turned out to open to a small room with a trap door in the floor, right above the Thane's dining room table.  They decided not to drop down, and continued exploring north.

At the end of the hallway was a door, and behind it was some yelling in Dwarven.  Everyone formed up, and then Zaber unlocked and opened the door.  Inside were a huge flesh golem and a bunch of duergar, in a tall room with a vaulted ceiling and a balcony leading to another level above.  The PCs achieved surprise, so which Polly took advantage of to shoot a duergar in the eye.  Garreth tried throwing a sai, but he fumbled and it turned in his hand and he decided to just drop it.  Seépravir Great Hasted Elias and yelled "Use your Heroic Feats!"

All the duergar, and even the golem, recovered from surprise quickly.  Polly ran around behind one and shot him in the skull for the knockout.  She then tried shooting the duergar with the staff and no shield in the vitals, but he Blinked away, with a critical success.  Elias shield rushed the duergar with the pick, rolled an 18, used Luck, and bounced off his shield.  He followed that up with two flail blows, which were parried.  Seépravir got mad at Elias for not using Heroic Might and Heroic Grace.

The duergar with the pick told Elias, in Common, that it was time to open up the tin can.  Then he did it, smashing Elias with a pick hard enough to go through his plate armor and do some solid damage.  However, his pick was stuck in Elias.  The golem punched Elias, for some damage and some knockback.  The knockback caused a tug-of-war over the pick, and Elias won, so the duergar was disarmed.  Zaber flew invisibly behind the wizard.

Polly flew behind a duergar, shot him in the skull, and knocked him out.  She then flew behind the duergar with no pick, and shot him in the head too.  He used Luck to make his first dodge, but failed his second, and then fell down, stunned.  Garreth rapid-struck a duergar with his katana, connecting once, hard enough to slow his target but not stun him.

Elias made his consciousness check and then activated Heroic Might (+10 ST) and Heroic Grace (+7 DX), then All-Out Defended.  Seépravir used Rapier Wit to stun a duergar.  The duergar wizard cast a couple of spells and cackled.  The huge golem tried punching Polly, but Elias sacrificially blocked for her.  Zaber eye-stabbed the wizard for a one-shot fatality, but the wizard managed to get a scream off as he died, alerting the others to the now-visible thief behind them. 

Polly then lined up three more duergar, shot them all in the brain, and knocked them all out.  At that point only the golem remained.  Elias smashed it in the foot for major damage, which failed to knock the golem over, but did make it go Berserk.  It chose Zaber as the recipient of three deadly punches, all of which he dodged.  Polly shot the golem in the back of the head three times, but unlike the duergar it didn't have any brains there to take quadruple damage and cause knockouts.   Garreth chopped its leg, hard, but it didn't fall down.  Finally, Elias smashed the huge golem for 39 points of damage plus 2 points of bonus Flaming Weapon damage, which was just enough to put the golem at -HP, which was enough to automatically finish it.

Elias slurped down several healing potions.  Zaber flew up to check out the level above, hit a No Mana Zone, lost his Flight spell, and crashed back down into the ground.  He made his Acrobatics roll to reduce falling damage, but still hit hard.  After recovering, he started looting the duergar and got some magic bracers and a magic staff from the wizard.

Polly thought the platform that the golem had been standing on might be important, so tried dancing on it.  This did nothing useful, but she didn't slip in the golem guts either, so that was good.  Next she convinced Garreth to help her try to move the platform in case there was something under it, but there was not.

The group decided to keep exploring.  They went through some doors to the west, and found a butcher shop.  They then turned right and started up a hallway with lots of doors on both sides.  They found a couple of apartments with nothing useful inside, and a couple of storerooms with a few minor valuables (a few coins in a sack, and a silvered mirror).  At that point we were out of time, so we stopped for the evening, with the PCs staying in the dungeon again.

GM's Comments:

The fourth time was the charm for Gora-khan, who finally stuck around long enough to die.  Gora-khan's misspelled arena champion necklace was an homage to Brad Marchand's "Stanley Cup Champians" tattoo.

The golem was very strong and very tough but didn't have a weapon, so his attacks were merely massively damaging rather than instantly lethal.  The rest of the duergar made the mistake of having brains and eyes, which were targets for Polly and Zaber to one-shot them.

I thought the funniest moment of the night was Zaber flying right into a No Fly Zone.  These players are usually pretty cautious, but once in a while...

Next time, we'll see if the group manages to find the Thane of Narborg, so Garreth lets them go back to town.