DF Whiterock Session 100: Finishing the Thane

Date:

2020-06-19

Weather:

Hot, session entirely underground

Player Characters:

Elias (Wiggles), Wood Elf Cleric, 436 points
Garreth (Zuljita), Half-Orc Fighter, 498 points
Ibizaber (Demented Avenger), Human Thief, 498 points
Polly (Kalzazz), Wood Elf Archer, 492 points
Seépravir (Archon Shiva), High Elf Wizard, 500 points

Significant NPCs:

Rolf, Possessed Human Cultist
Hrolad, Duergar Thane of Narborg
The Grand Devotee, Duergar-Werebat Cleric
2 Ebuul Lizards
Vulgaris, Minyad Druid
Several Young Stone Giants
Elweiss, Ghost Squire



The battle resumed, deep within the Duergar fortress of Narborg.  The dire bats and known giant lizards were dead, so it was just Thane Hrolad and the Werebat Grand Devotee against the PCs.

Elias enabled Heroic Might and Heroic Grace and got +6 ST and +9 DX.  Rolf Great Hasted Elias, and then tried Charming the cleric, which was doomed to failure.  Garreth attacked the Thane's leg with a Rapid Strike, but his attacks were blocked and parried.  The cleric healed the Thane.  Another giant lizard crawled out of the water and scurried toward the battle.  Zaber ran around the Thane and tried stabbing him in the back with a poisoned knife, but the just-healed Thane managed to dodge.

The Thane tried chopping Polly with his axe.  She acrobatically dodged, but it required Luck to reroll a 15.  She then shot a couple of arrows at the cleric.  He dodged both, and Garreth, on the other side, had to use Luck to parry one of them.  Polly then reconsidered and used her last arrow on the lizard, first successfully guessing where its vitals were.  This wounded it badly enough to slow its movement, but failed to stun it.

Elias, now fully buffed, went after the cleric with a couple of extremely deceptive flail strikes.  He managed to dodge the first, and the second just missed.  Realizing Elias was also cheating with Holy powers, in what should have been a No Sanctity Zone for good, the cleric said "Your powers should not work here, heretic.  Must be the lizards.  I'll have them killed later." 

Garreth attacked the Thane twice.  The first was parried, but the second went through the Thane's heavy plate torso armor for serious damage, slowing the Thane again.  Rolf tried Death Vision on the Thane, but were was no effect.  Rolf then tried Death Vision on the giant lizard, which sunk to the ground and went into camouflage mode in response, trying to hide from the fatal arrow shot that it knew was coming.  Garreth asked the werebat cleric his name, and he replied "Your future ruler!" and then told Garreth that he'd look cute with wings.  Garreth responded that he had dibs on knocking over the altar.

The Grand Devotee told Elias to get his tree-loving god out of his caves, and then charged up a spell and tried biting Elias on the neck.  Elias needed Luck to make his block roll.  Zaber spun and stabbed the scared lizard in the eye, fatally.  It had been so terrified of arrows it never saw the knife coming.  However, as he finished one lizard, Zaber spotted another one approaching from the west.

The Thane prepared to attack, when suddenly he missed his consciousness check and passed out.  The cleric, in his rage to kill Elias, had accidentally left his back facing Polly, which meant she could shoot him in the back of the skull with no defense possible (unless he had Peripheral Vision).  She rolled a critical hit, making the facing irrelevant.  The werebat rolled poorly on his stun roll, and a brain hit imposes -10.  He failed by more than 5, for a knockout.  And just that quickly, the battle was over.  Polly kept shooting though, just in case, putting a couple more arrows in his brain.  And then Elias joined in the overkill, bashing his skull in with his flail.

Except for the one remaining lizard that Zaber had just spotted, but 5 PCs versus a giant lizard wasn't much of a fight.  Garreth flew over to take care of the lizard, but somehow missed with both swings of a rapid strike.  Meanwhile, the Thane's beard was on fire for some reason.  Rolf used Extinguish Fire to put it out.  As he did so, he noticed that the Thane's crown was magical.

The giant lizard finally revealed its attack, breathing poison at Garreth.  The cone was wide enough that he couldn't get out of it -- but Garreth is highly resistance to poison, so it hardly mattered.  He made his resistance roll easily, and remarked that the breath might make a decent hot sauce.  Polly flew over and shot the lizard three times, with the final arrow knocking it out.  A few seconds later, Garreth had to make another HT check against delayed poison effects, but that didn't do anything to him either.

The Thane's head caught on fire again, with Rolf suspecting the crown was up to something.  Zaber knocked the crown off the Thane's head with his sai, and got a few points of curse damage for indirectly touching the crown.  Garreth worried that his chi might have been disrupted by the poison, so he tried kiai on Polly, which stunned her.  He then apologized for the headache.

After recovering from stun, Polly shot the Thane in both eyes to finish him off.  Rolf tried Apportation on the crown, but it resisted.  She kept spamming the spell until it eventually worked.  Meanwhile Zaber drank some healing potion, and then looted the Thane of his axe and horn and heavy plate armor.  He tried blowing the horn, but nothing happened.  He then jumped in the water and searched for more loot, but didn't find anything.  Garreth removed the Thane's head and took it for some reason.

Elias was very tired, and not able to regain FP because he was so offended by the Low Sanctity Zone.  Polly led him northwest until the aura was less vile, then he could rest.  He sipped a bit of healing potion.  Polly went south and started digging a tunnel, to try to make a path back to the rest of the level that didn't require going through the temple.  Garreth went into the temple and started wrecking stuff.  He broke all 7 statues of the Evil Duergar Septych over the altar, then used Power Blow to get enough strength to roll the altar over.  By then Elias was rested enough to come over and help, using Exorcism to try to reduce the level of evil.  The combined effect of their Evil Temple Improvement got it from no sancity to very low sanctity, which meant they could walk through it without losing all cleric spells.

Garreth piled up all the bat corpses and asked Rolf to burn them.  Rolf rolled an 18 on Control Fire and accidentally burned his face a little.  (Seépravir didn't bother using Luck; she's kind of hard on her Possessed enemies.)  Elias smashed the altar some more with his blessed flail.  On the way back out of the temple, Garreth told Polly she could stop digging.

On the second pass through the room, Zaber remembered to loot the Grand Devotee, which yielded a mace on a chain lanyard, mail armor, a large shield, and a black holy symbol of something evil.  Elias immediately wanted to smash the holy symbol, but Garreth grabbed it and dodged.  Elias then turned his attention to wanting to destroy the crown, but Garreth pointed out that it might zap his flail.  Elias didn't listen, smashed the crown, and got zapped for curse damage.  He then stopped trying to destroy the crown, for the moment.

Garreth remembered they should recover Koborth's bones and take them back to his tomb and the ghost of his squire Elweiss.  Polly said they should go back and destroy the evil wall instead, because there was a duergar next to it with loot that needed to be recovered.  Elias tried exorcising the crown, but it failed to do much except shock him for more curse damage.  Polly suggested some Bless spells, so a lot of Elias casting Bless and then resting happened.  (The immediate area seemed clear of enemies.)

The group headed back toward the wall, with Rolf stopping to appraise a dire bearskin rug on the way.  (Valuable but very big and heavy.)  The group filed through the arrow slit that Elias had widened into a doorway, and then headed north into the cave level.  After running around in the wrong direction for a while, they finally found the derro potion seller and his minotaur bodyguard.  Garreth showed the derro the Thane's head, and the derro said "Cheap ass duergar maybe still alive if had more healing potions."  Garreth asked why light wasn't allowed.  The derro said no light was allowed near the wall, Thane's orders.  Then he said "Guess Thane makes no orders now!  Derro own this level now!" and started cackling.  Not needing to buy any potions, the group backed away from the derro toward the wall.

As they approached the wall, Polly noticed that the duergar they'd knocked out previously wasn't there any more, and got very angry at the wall for stealing their loot.  The wall used a Fear effect to make them run away.  Polly, Garreth, and Elias all failed.  Zaber also failed, but used Luck to succeed.  Everyone regrouped around the corner, where the scared people stopped running.  Rolf cast Bravery on everyone to make them immune to fear for an hour -- but with the danger of needing an IQ roll to be able to run away.  Zaber suggested not messing with the wall, but nobody listened to him.

Everyone flew up to the wall again, and this time it cast an attraction spell to try to make everyone charge into melee range.  Garreth rolled a 17 and had to close; the others made their checks and could move as they wished.  Garreth fast-drew a vial of Alchemist's Fire.  Polly shot some Bodkins of Light at the wall, hoping it was vulnerable.   The wall parried the first two with tentacles of darkness, and Polly rolled a 17 on the third attack, somehow missing the broad side of a wall.  

Garreth ran closer, and lobbed the grenade at the wall, which smacked it aside, leaving a pool of fire on the ground.  Rolf reached into his pocket and found a coin, then cast Continual Light on it, rolling a 4 for a critical success and getting a super bright light.  Elias charged forward.  The wall punched Garreth twice.  He tried a retreating dodge, but trying to retreat from the wall gave him -4 to DX.  He still managed to dodge both tentacles.  Polly fired three regular bodkins at the wall, which parried the first two.  The third one was a critical hit for solid damage, punching a small hole in the darkness.  Garreth fast-drew his katana and rapidly struck the wall, with one blow getting through.  

Rolf used Fast-Draw (potion) to pull the glowing coin out of his pocket, and ran toward the wall.  The wall, seeing the super bright light leaking out of Rolf's hand, tried a Fear attack to make Rolf run away, but Rolf resisted.  It then pummeled Garreth, who barely dodged.  Zaber yelled for everyone to run away.  Polly ignored him and kept firing arrows.  Garreth also decided that running away was a good idea, and made his IQ roll to be allowed to, but took a copule more swings at the wall and hit it hard once.  Rolf threw the coin and made really bright light right next to the wall, which didn't seem to damage it.

The wall tried Fear again, but those with Bravery were immune, so only Rolf and Zaber had to roll, and they both made it.  The wall then zapped the glowing coin and destroyed it, ruining that plan.  Zaber kept encouraging everyone to run away.  Garreth agreed and started running, but Polly refused, and put more arrows into the wall.  Elias also reached the wall, and critically hit it with his flail, damaging the nearby tentacle.  Garreth, seeing Polly and Elias were not running, turned back around to fight the wall again.  The wall attacked both Garreth and Elias, but Garreth parried and Elias was missed.

Garreth went for another rapid strike, and connected with the wall twice, for a lot of damage, tearing out a chunk of darkness.  Elias missed.  The wall went after Garreth twice, seeing him as the greatest threat, but he defended.  Polly launched a volley of arrows but all were parried.  Garreth went for another rapid strike, hit with the first, but then dropped his sword to his duergar chain lanyard.  Elias smashed the wall once, and defended from its counterattack.

Polly fired another group of arrows, hitting with one.  Elias went for a rapid strike with his flail, and hit once, which was the last blow needed to break the wall.  The room started shaking.  Everyone backed away from the wall, which collapsed upon itself into a pile of rubble, with a wide opening in the center.

Zaber checked out what was on the other side, and found a stairway down to the left, and a wide passage going on as far as he could see to the right.  Polly looked for the duergar, but couldn't find him.

The PCs picked up as much loot as they could carry, then headed up a couple levels to the stone giants, and showed them the Thane's head.  None were willing to carry treasure back to Cillamar, though.  They then went up a level to visit Vulgaris, and showed her the head too.  Then Garreth remembered he wanted to take Koborth's bones back to his tomb, so they went back down a couple of levels.  The ghost of Koborth's squire Elweiss again asked for his spear back.  Garreth gave him his spear (which disappeared and was replaced with the ghostly image of itself in Elweiss's spectral hand), and also the contract from the Company of the Black Osprey.  With these items restored, Elweiss's memory recovered, and he started to talk about Koborth.  But Garreth didn't have time to listen, interrupted him, and asked if he could use Koborth's hand to try something with the scabbard in Koborth's tomb.  Elweiss did not object, and the hand drew out a broadsword, with several gems on the blade and a guard shaped like dragon's wings.  Garreth took the sword, clearly disappointed that it was one-handed.  (He thought it was going to be a greatsword.)  Elweiss went back to his body in its glass coffin and disappeared.

At that point the PCs went all the way up to ground level, then flew back to Cillamar, for the first time in what felt like forever.  (But was actually less than a day.)

GM's Comments:

Session 100.  Sounds like a lot, but if you play every week, it's under 2 years.  (We've missed a few weeks but not many.)

No Sanctity Zones affect cleric spells but not holy powers.  So Elias was able to use Heroic Might and Grace even right next to the unholy temple of the evil Septych.

Both duergar bosses had Unfazeable, making them immune to Death Vision since they feared nothing.  I faked a resistance roll to try to avoid giving this away, but when the players pointed out that the spell couldn't be resisted, it was clear what was going on.  

The Grand Devotee leaving his back facing Polly was a GM tactical error.  It happens.  Didn't matter, though, because Polly rolled a critical hit, so even if he had the ability to defend, he couldn't have stopped that one.  Skull hits are just nasty -- quadruple damage after DR, -10 to the stun roll, and if you miss by 5 you're knocked out.

I mistakenly gave a hint that Koborth's sword was a greatsword, but it's actually a broadsword.  You just can't trust rumors sometimes.

It's been a lot of sessions since the PCs went back to town, so there will be a lot of decisions about spending points and trying to shop for gear before the next adventure.

House Rules about PC Names

Here are some completely meta, non-power-affecting, house rules about player character names that I'm thinking about for future RPG campaigns I run.

One hard rule is going to be "no accent marks."  I don't measure the exact amount of time I spend writing game recaps, but I suspect it's about 1/3 actual writing, 1/3 reviewing Roll20 logs for details I can't remember well enough to keep one of my players from pointing out an error later, and 1/3 putting the accent mark in Seépravir's name.  So future names in games I run will be rendered with only plain ASCII characters.  (Now, it's entirely possible that in the original Elvish or Dwarven or Chinese or Vilani or Klingon or whatever language the character's name comes from, the character's preferred spelling has accent marks or runes or emoji or heiroglyphics or non-Latin letters or space holograms.  And that's totally fine.  I'm just saying that when I render it into English for use at the mostly-English-speaking gaming table, I will stick to ASCII so I can type it faster.)

The corollary is that if your character has a long name, we will end up abbreviating it and using the short version most of the time.  So players should put some thought into the short version of their name, that their companions will actually use most of the time.  Maybe that's their full legal name; maybe it's just their nickname.  They can write a longer version on their character sheet if they want.  (Sometimes there's just no time to say "Look out, Helgevottir Hirgebottom, rocks are falling.")  Note that this has real world parallels in groups like the military and hockey teams: it's just more convenient to have a short nickname when you need to yell orders or warnings quickly.

The final rule is "only one PC with the same first initial at the same time."  Just because being able to refer to people with one letter is convenient.  (For example, when maintaining a text box of active spells, being able to type "Flight: Z, P, G" is awesome.)  Obviously this limits games to 26 characters at a time.  Which is also a good rule.  (I prefer 4 or 5, but 27 is right out.)

DF Whiterock Session 99: The Grand Devotee

Date:

2020-06-12

Weather:

Warm, session entirely underground

Player Characters:

Elias (Wiggles), Wood Elf Cleric, 436 points
Garreth (Zuljita), Half-Orc Fighter, 496 points
Ibizaber (Demented Avenger), Human Thief, 496 points
Polly (Kalzazz), Wood Elf Archer, 490 points
Seépravir (Archon Shiva), High Elf Wizard, 500 points

Significant NPCs:

Rolf, Possessed Human Cultist
The Grand Devotee, Duergar-Bat Cleric
10 Dire Bats
2 Giant Lizards
Hrolad, Duergar Thane of Narborg


We resumed in mid-battle, as Garreth flew through a hole in a wall, into some kind of shrine of the Septych of 7 Evil Duergar Gods, and a waiting Duergar-Bat hybrid on the other side cast a spell at him.  It turned out to be Dispel Magic, and, thanks to Garreth's recent visit to a No Mana Zone, the only wizard spell he had active was Flight, which resisted being dispelled.  However, the room was also a No Sanctity Zone (at least for the version of sanctity that Elias's spells used) and Garreth's Bless went away.  A couple of huge bats tried biting Garreth, but he parried both attacks.

Zaber dove through the hole after Garreth and landed on his feet, but he was invisible so nobody noticed.  Polly dove through right after him, and fired some arrows at where she hoped a dire bat's vitals were, but she wasn't really that familiar with dire bat anatomy and hit the torso instead, not that it really mattered, because she knocked the bat down anyway.

Garreth started Rapid Striking dire bats and knocked another one down.  Seépravir, still Possessing Rolf, Great Hasted herself.  The Duergar-Bat cast Missile Shield on himself.  (The players didn't know what he cast.)  Garreth rolled versus Bloodlust, made his self-control roll, and told the others to take the Duergar-Bat alive so he could tell them where the Thane was.  A bunch of bats moved in to surround the 3 PCs in the room.  Elias approached the room, and noticed its lack of Sanctity.  It was surely Evil.  Zaber's Danger Sense buzzed and told him his Bless was gone and he should be careful.

Polly lined up a dire bat and the Duergar-Bat and took 3 shots at the full-bat, but didn't hit either.  Garreth knocked out another bat, and told the Duergar-Bat to surrender to keep the from desecrating his shrine.  Seépravir cast Flight on Elias.  The Duergar-Bat threw a purple bolt at Garreth, which was undodgeable and ignored DR but only did 3 HP of damage.  A bat bit Polly and she failed to dodge, but Garreth sacrificially parried for her.

Zaber, not having spotted the Thane, put away the potion of Agility that he was preparing to drink, and pulled out a sai, not wanting to waste the wyvern poison on his good knife on a mere underling.  Polly shot down another bat and then tried hitting the duergar-bat but he blocked and dodged.  Garreth wrecked another bat.  Elias, finally entering the evil shrine, saw his Flaming Weapon go out.  Fortunately he could still see using the light from Garreth's glow vial, and shield slammed a giant bat.  The duergar-bat threw more purple light at Garreth, doing 11 HP this time.  Elias blocked a bat bite.  A bat found Zaber despite his invisibility (using sonar) and tried biting him, but Garreth parried for him, as Zaber dodged.

Polly flew around behind the duergar-bat and shot an arrow, which was dodged (impressively, with superhuman speed), and which then almost hit Garreth, but he parried it.  (Parrying arrows requires Parry Missile Weapons, which he of course has.)  He rolled a critical success on the parry but narrowly avoided deflecting the arrow right into a bat.  Garreth charged forward and attempted a slam, but missed.  Elias tried a shield rush, but it was blocked.  The duergar-bat then talked some smack, in Elvish, telling Elias that the altar would enjoy his blood.  Garreth didn't understand what it said, but replied with an insult in Orcish.  In response, the bat-duergar told Garreth that he was going to look really ugly with bat wings.

Rolf advanced into the room, holding Seépravir's Beetle-Staff like a broadsword.  The duergar-bat tried casting a spell, rolled an 18, used Luck (it's not just for PCs), rerolled, charged up Deathtouch, and zapped Elias through his armor.  Several bats tried to bite Zaber and Rolf, and failed to hurt them.  Zaber smacked a bat with his blunt sai, still saving his poisoned knife for the Thane.

Polly snuck behind the Bat-Duergar and shot three more arrows, all dodged.  Garreth tried Rapier Wit, which wasn't funny, then a couple of katana cuts, which were blocked and parried.  Rolf smacked a bat twice with the beetle staff, knocking it back and out.  Elias all-out defended, so the Duerbar-Bat went after Garreth instead, who had to use Luck to prevent a hit.  The last three bats went for Zaber and Rolf, but failed to hurt them.

Zaber knocked down another bat with a blunt sai.  Polly, perhaps suspecting Missile Shield, fast-drew her edged rapier and tried cutting the duergar-bat, but he dodged.  Garreth tried Kiai, which didn't work.  Elias went for another shield slam, but the duergar-bat dodged, using Luck again.  (It was back.)  Garreth smacked another dire bat and knocked it out.  The duergar-bat charged up another melee spell, then tried smashing Elias with his mace, but Elias critically succeeded on his dodge and caused the bat-duergar to drop his mace.  (He had a lanyard though, so it didn't go far.)

The last bat went after Zaber, who dodged it then smacked the bat with his sai.  Polly tried some extremely deceptive attacks on the bat-duergar and finally managed to scratch it.  She thought she hit a second time, but when she looked again, she had somehow missed.

Garreth went after the duergar-bat but it blocked then dodged, retreating straight up as it flapped its bat wings.  Elias went after the flying duergar-bat with his flail, but it dodged.  Rolf tried casting Hinder, but it was resisted.  The followup was Death Vision, which has no resistance roll, but it somehow failed.  However, the surrounded bat-duergar started flying away to the southwest.

The last surviving bat attacked Zaber, who dodged it and attacked back with his sai, knocking it out.  Polly chased the bat-duergar to the southwest, firing arrows, but failed to connect.  Garreth passed Elias a healing potion then started chasing the others.  Rolf tried another Hinder, which was resisted.  The duergar-bat reached a corner, then spun around to face his pursuers.  Rolf spotted a big, camouflaged lizard, hiding under the bat-duergar.

Polly shot another arrow at the bat-duergar's wing and rolled a critical hit, which missed.  That made it clear that Missile Shield was in use.  She switched to shooting the lizard, which dodged.  Elias drank the Derro healing potion, and it turned out to be an actual healing potion, not poison.  Rolf tried Charm on the duergar-bat, who resisted, and then cast a healing spell on itself.

Zaber got close enough to peek around the corner, and saw a duergar waiting in ambush, wearing a crown of bones.  They had finally caught up with the Thane.  Polly shot the lizard a few more times, using Luck to reroll a critical failure, and knocked it out with a brain shot.  Rolf tried another Charm on the bat-duergar cleric, who laughed and made a rude comment.  But the followup was Dispel Magic, which actually seemed to work and dispel something.

The bat-duergar, still without its mace ready, bit Polly for significant damage and a HT check to resist something.  Polly made the HT check.  The Thane pointed his weapon at Polly and shot a beam attack at Polly, which inflicted some sonic damage.  She made a HT check to avoid being deafened, and then fired some arrows at the Thane, who blocked and dodged them.  Garreth then stepped up and landed a solid hit on the Thane, that penetrated his heavy plate armor.  The Thane then asked the duergar-bat to "Kill that orc for me please."  And then he asked if the wizard was dead, but the bat-duergar responded "It's in the human."

The duergar-bat followed orders and changed targets to Garreth, firing some purple missiles out of its wing at Garreth, who took some unavoidable damage.  Zaber fast-drew and chugged a Strength potion.  The Thane tried a chop to Garreth's neck with his odd axe-bladed pole weapon, but missed.  Polly tried shooting the Thane in the vitals, but he rolled a 3 on his dodge and dipped under it.  He dodged the second arrow too, but not the third, which slowed him.

Garreth drank a healing potion, then thanked the Thane for allowing the Derro to sell potions.  The Thane told the cleric to call his lizards.  Rolf Great Hasted Garreth, then Hindered the bat-duergar, rolling a critical success.  The bat-duergar fired more purple missiles at Garreth for minor damage, while the Thane yelled at him for not killing any of the PCs, and said it was time to switch to the next god in the rotation.  Polly suggested Ildavir, but the Thane said that he wasn't the type to have relations with trees.

The Thane pointed the tip of his rod at Rolf and unlesed a pink beam, which Rolf dodged.  Garreth yelled some more smack about figuring out the fake Thane because he had the wrong crown.  The Thane responded by yelling at the elves that the orc was smarter than them.  While they bantered, Polly shot another lizard in the skull for a knockout, then shot the Thane in the skull.  However, his crown of bones seemed to not like that, and dissolved the incoming arrow.  She shot him in the vitals instead, for more damage.

We ran out of time and stopped for the night there, with the entire session being taken up by one battle.  The Thane was badly wounded, all the dire bats and two giant lizards were knocked out, and the duergar-bat cleric still seemed fine.  Meanwhile several PCs had been wounded but a couple had managed to drink some healing potions.

GM's Comments:

The battle isn't over yet.  The duergar-bat cleric appears to be very hard to hit and very hard to affect with spells, but he hasn't done massive damage to any PCs.  The Thane seems a bit easier to hit.  The giant bats and giant lizards didn't do much.  We'll see if the PCs finally manage to defeat the Thane next time.

DF Whiterock Session 98: Hunting for the Thane

Date:

2020-06-05

Weather:

Warm, session entirely underground

Player Characters:

Elias (Wiggles), Wood Elf Cleric, 436 points
Garreth (Zuljita), Half-Orc Fighter, 494 points
Ibizaber (Demented Avenger), Human Thief, 494 points
Polly (Kalzazz), Wood Elf Archer, 488 points
Seépravir (Archon Shiva), High Elf Wizard, 498 points

Significant NPCs:

Rolf, Possessed Human Cultist
4 Duergar Warriors
Gibbering Mouther
Derro Decanter
Derro Potion Master
Moruut, Minotaur Bodyguard
Duergar Gate Guard
Huge Black Animated Gate



We resumed in the duergar fortress of Narborg, with Thane Hrolad having escaped through a wall using some kind of magic.  Elias described what he'd seen to the others.  Zaber had never heard of such a spell, and didn't see a secret door.  Seépravir though it might be Dimension Door, a spell she'd heard rumors about but never actually seen.  She cast Seeker, looking for the Thane, and saw a vision of him walking quickly through a natural cave with a pool of water, a bit to the west of their current position.

Garreth decided that they didn't have time to dig through the wall here, and should instead double back to the south.  Unfortunately going that way required digging through some rubble from the collapsed ceiling trap that the duergar had dropped on Polly.  While Garreth dug, Zaber checked out some doors in the vicinity.  One let to a room, empty but for an amateurish picture of a dwarf smashing an elf low on one wall.  Another led to a room with a table and chairs and an empty cabinet, with round marks in the dust showing that it used to hold bottles but they were gone.  This greatly saddened Zaber.

Heading south and west, the group reached the arrow slits they'd seen recently, which had what looked like natural caves on the other side.  Polly and Zaber managed to squeeze through an arrow slit (an Escape-6 roll) to check them out, but found no sign of the Thane, or any water.  They squeezed back through the arrow slits to rejoin the others, then headed west.

Seépravir needed rest, so Polly and Zaber scouted ahead.  They went up a flight of stairs, through a No Mana Zone.  There were several closed doors there, but Zaber decided not to open them with only Polly for backup.  They found a second set of stairs down further north, and Polly verified with a Cornucopia arrow that the No Mana Zone between floors extended to this stairway as well.

Seépravir had rested enough to cast Seek Magic.  The nearest unknown magic was about 50 to 100 yards to the northeast, but it was almost drowned out by really strong magic further north.  Garreth was pretty sure that was the cavern on the other side of the arrow slits, and the strong magic might be the Thane's crown.  Zaber and Polly eventually found their way back, and the group went back to the arrow slits.  This time Zaber, Polly, and Garreth all squeezed through.  Seépravir stayed behind to recover FP, and Elias took the pickaxe and started trying to enlarge an arrow slit for easier passage.

Heading north, Zaber noticed some green sea salt on the floor of the cavern.  He then heard some heavy footsteps to the northeast, around a corner.  Polly went to investigate, and saw four duergar, carrying a large jar and what appeared to be the corpse of a fifth duergar.  The duergar saw her, and put down their burdens, while she started shooting arrows.  The first batch were blocked or dodged.

Garreth and Zaber, both invisible, starting flying toward the fight, as Polly ran and shot.  She noticed the clay pot had a crack in it, where the duergar had dropped it.  She also noticed the duergar had their ears plugged with cloth.  She shot three duergar in the skull, knocking all three out, leaving only one still active.  Garreth fast-drew his katana and rolled a critical success, generating a cool Schwing! noise that the duergar couldn't hear because of his earplugs.

The remaining duergar all-out attacked Polly in a rage, and she critically failed her acrobatics roll, resulting in a faceplant.  However, Garreth was in range to sacrificially parry for her, and critically succeeded, resulting in the surprised duergar dropping his mace.  Polly gave thanks to the Great Tree.  The duergar started cursing about elves and wizards.  From the ground, Polly shot the duergar in the eye, knocking him out.  Garreth dropped his sword so it was hanging by the lanyard, and grabbed Polly, to help her get away from the jar, which was visibly cracking open.

The jar burst open, and a hideous creature emerged from it, and made a horrible sound.  Everyone had to make a Fright Check, but they all succeeded.  Polly, carried by Garreth, fired more arrows, and wounded the creature.  Carrying a violent archer caused Garreth's Invisibility spell to be dispelled.  Garreth and Zaber flew northeast away from the monster, while Polly kept shooting it.  Eventually it died, with 6 cutting arrows sticking out of its corpse.

Zaber looked for tracks, but didn't find any that he didn't think belonged to the duergar they'd just met.  However, while looking for tracks, he did accidentally find a pouch, which contained a ring and some yellowish gems.  The ring vibrated when he put it on.  Further east, they found some kind of crevasse.  Garreth's underground survival skill told him that they should avoid falling into it as they might get stuck.

Meanwhile, far to the south, Elias finished breaking through an arrow slit, having created a new way into the cave that didn't require an Escape roll.  But the three in front didn't go back to rejoin the two in back.  Instead, they continued north, looking for the Thane.  Instead, they found a small building, with a counter out front.  On the counter were some potions, and behind the counter were a derro and a minotaur.  Polly asked if they had seen the Thane.  The derro said "No, you want to buy some healing potions?  They are good for not dying."  Surprisingly, the party did want to buy some healing potions.  They were disappointed at the rather high price, and the fact that they were only sold in batches of 5, but bought a bunch of Minor Healing and Major Healing potions anyway.

Continuing north rather than waiting for the others, they saw a huge wall ahead, blocking the entire cavern.  The wall was black, and featured some metal bands and gems carved into the shape of skulls.  There was a single duergar with a spear standing in front of the wall.  Polly's immediate response was to prepare to attack, but Garreth tried talking first, to get information about the Thane.  The duergar was skeptical that they were permitted, and eventually asked for a password.  Garreth drew a bastard sword and threw it at the duergar.  But the duergar critically succeeded on his parry, and flicked the flying sword back over his head toward the wall, which absorbed and apparently destroyed it.  The duergar then yelled for reinforcements in Dwarven.

Polly, having managed to hold her fire for several seconds while Garreth unsuccessfully talked to the duergar, started shooting.  A black tentacle came out of the wall and parried her first arrow, and the duergar dodged the others.  The duergar flicked his wrist, and a wand popped out of his bracer into his hand.  He pointed it at Garreth, and rolled a critical success.  Garreth was affected by a Darkness spell, which extinguished his glow vial.

The wall activated some kind of fear effect, but all three heroes resisted it.  Zaber could no longer see without Garreth's light, so he took off his Invisibility Ring, which caused his own glow vial's light to become visible.  Polly launched another volley of arrows at the duergar, but once again he dodged two and the wall tentacle-parried the other for him.  Garreth stepped out of the darkness, but his glow vial was still out.  However, he could now see using Zaber's light.

The duergar yelled "You should have run away" in Undercommon, then dropped his spear, flicked his other bracer, and had a wand pop into his other hand.  He critically hit with this one too, but this time Garreth used Luck to force a reroll, then dodged the pink beam that came out of the wand.

Polly shot the duergar in the vitals, and this time rolled a crit.  No defense for that shot, and the duergar rolled a 17 on this stun check, falling unconscious.  She launched her other arrows at the wall, which parried one, but was struck by the other, which made a small dent.  Garreth wanted to retreat, as he didn't want to lose any more swords.  But Polly wanted to keep shooting the wall.

There were some steps up to the west, leading to a door.  Zaber flew up to check it out.  Meanwhile Polly shot more arrows at the wall, and achieved another critical hit.  This time, instead of telling Polly to run away, the wall tried compelling her to come closer.  She resisted, barely, needing the help of her Cloak of Resistance.  But discovering the wall could do that made Garreth and Zaber want to leave.  Polly rolled to see if she could resist her Bloodlust and rolled an 18, a clear indication that she needed to stand her ground and keep shooting the wall.  She landed a third critical hit.

The wall tried its repulsion attack again, trying to make them all run away.  Everyone resisted.  Polly continued firing arrows, but she rolled an 18 for a maximum critical failure, and dropped her bow.  The wall saw an unattended bow, and tried zapping it with some kind of beam.  The bow initially failed its resistance roll, but Polly used her Luck to reroll, and managed to kick it out of the way.  That was enough to convince Polly that running away was the best option, for now, and they could come back and destroy the wall later, preferably bringing a ballista.

The wall did not pursue.  The group made it back to the derro potion seller.  Garreth asked if he could buy a glow vial.  The derro said that he'd check with the potion master.  Returning a minute later, he said that selling glow vials was banned by order of the Thane.  Garreth offered 50 times the usual price for a glow vial.  The decanter excused himself to use the bathroom, and came back a few minutes later with a bottle labeled "DARKNESS NOT LIGHT no sun here" which Garreth paid the ridiculous markup for.  They also bought a few more Major Healing potions, and Polly asked the minotaur's name, which was Moruut.

The group headed back south.  On the way they searched the dead duergar, and took a bottle of green salt, but decided not to take their gross used earplugs.  Continuing south, they reunited with Seépravir and Elias, who had enlarged an arrow slit to door size.

Deciding this was the wrong way, the heroes went all the way back to where they'd seen the Thane, and Garreth started digging a hole through the wall.  While he dug, Zaber searched some more rooms.  On a desk in a study, he found a paper in Dwarven, labeled "Murder options."  It gave details of their group and the order in which they should be killed, along with amounts of bounties for each, some tactical hints, and which should be taken dead versus alive.  (All the elves and Zaber were to be killed; "Gor-Ath" and the duergar traitor Wolfrik were to be taken alive.)  It also listed three groups: The Order of the Ashen Heart, the Soulgrave Slayers, and the Pack of the Night Wolf.  The first two were crossed out.

Zaber returned to the others and told them about the note.  But his Danger Sense gave him a bad feeling about the hole Garreth was digging.  They decided to go get a ballista and finish the hole from a distance.  This actually worked, though Zaber had to use Luck on his penalized crossbow roll to figure out how to work the ballista, and then it took two shots to punch through.

The hole was big enough any of them to fit through, but only in prone position.  Garreth flew through.  He briefly spotted an area with an altar, a bunch of statues of evil dwarf gods, a bunch of huge bats, and some kind of half-duergar half-bat hybrid, casting a spell on him.

We were out of time, so we stopped for the evening on that cliff-hanger.

GM's Comments:

Seeker is one try per week.  So you can use it once to get an idea of where your target is, but you can't keep pinging to triangulate.  Seek Magic can be cast more often, but it just finds the closest magic you didn't exclude, so isn't as good unless the person you're looking for has the only magic in the area.

The group explored a whole lot of places they bypassed earlier, but didn't manage to find the Thane, which was all they really wanted.

After this session, Seépravir hit 500 points.  (Though spending points requires going back to town, which they haven't done in forever.)  That's twice what a stock DFRPG character starts with.  This game started at 150 points, so these characters have come a long way.

DF Whiterock Session 97: The Thane

Date:

2020-05-29

Weather:

Warm, session entirely underground

Player Characters:

Elias (Wiggles), Wood Elf Cleric, 433 points
Garreth (Zuljita), Half-Orc Fighter, 492 points
Ibizaber (Demented Avenger), Human Thief, 492 points
Polly (Kalzazz), Wood Elf Archer, 486 points
Seépravir (Archon Shiva), High Elf Wizard, 496 points

Significant NPCs:

Rolf, Possessed Human Cultist
13 Duergar Clansmen
Zahd, Fake Thane of Narborg
Thane Hrolad of Narborg
5 Summoned Grimlock Barbarians



We resumed with the PCs having just defeated the skeleton of the famed warrior Koborth.  The battle had left several of them badly wounded, and so they started with healing.  First Zaber brought the Wineskin of Healing Potions to Elias and had to drink until his HP were above zero, to avoid inconvenient unconsciousness.  Garreth tried following up with Esoteric Medicine (Chi), but his chakra did not align properly.  Elias had some Universal Scrolls of Major Healing stashed away, and Garreth and Zaber read them over him until he was mostly healed.  After recovering some FP (with help from Seépravir's Lend Energy), Garreth also read a scroll of Bless for Elias, to replace the one that had saved Elias from a potentially fatal head wound.

With Elias fixed, the passed the wineskin to Polly, who drank a couple of healing potions and was fine.  (She heals very well thanks to having over 20 HP.)  While lying on a dire bearskin rug and trying to regain FP, Zaber heard some falling rock to the west.  He eventually dragged himself over to take a look, and saw that the tunnel through the rubble that they had dug had collapsed.  After some discussion, Garreth and Zaber decided to press on forward rather than re-dig an escape route.

Zaber picked a lock on the iron door to the north that Koborth had been guarding, then pushed it open.  Behind was a large room, with tapestries on both sides: one featuring duergar making a deal with a red dragon; the other featuring duergar killing drow.  Straight ahead was a throne, with a crowned duergar sitting on it, flanked by three more duergar.  In front of the throne was a pile of coins.

The duergar on the throne tried to parley.  He offered to let them keep the pile of coins if they'd leave and not come back.  Garreth immediately rejected the deal.  The duergar then said they could kill him, if they left his people unharmed.  Polly rejected that, saying that 4 minions wasn't nearly enough and she wanted to know where the rest were.  The duergar asked who sent them -- was it the Mountain King?  Was it House Ereluc?  Garreth said it was because the duergar kept sending slavers.  Polly again asked the duergar to call more lackeys to have a more interesting fight, but he said that this was all that he had left.

At some point Seépravir noted that the guy on the throne might not be the actual Thane.  Garreth checked out his crown, which appeared to be made of gold and gems, not bones.  He decided it was time to stop talking, fast-drew a bastard sword, and threw it at the alleged Thane.  He blocked it, then yelled "Enlarge!" to the other duergar.  There was some more yelling of insults, but at that point the combat was on.

As all the duergar Enlarged, Zaber fast-drew his knife and flew forward.  Polly flew forward with her bow ready, as the fake Thane said "no bows in my throne room!"  She tried shooting him three times, but one arrow was blocked and two were dodged.  Garreth flew forward, as Seépravir cast Great Haste on Elias, and Elias activated Heroic Might and Heroic Grace, for +9 to ST and DX. 

Polly flew behind the thane, and shot him in the back of the head until he failed to dodge and fell down unconscious.  She plinked another duergar too, with a critical hit leading to hideous scarring.  Garreth stepped up and tried a rapid strike with his katana, but was blocked and parried.  Seépravir stepped up and used Rapier Wit on a duergar, causing mental stun.  Elias shield slammed a duergar, then went for a rapid strike and badly wounded him with his flaming flail.

And then, with all the PCs in the room, the duergar sprung their trap.  Behind each of the two illusionary tapestries on the sides of the room were 5 duergar with crossbows.  The 5 on the east side shot Garreth in the rear, while the 5 on the west side shot Seépravir/Rolf in the side.  Unable to defend, Garreth was hit by 5 bodkin bolts, but his armor took much of the damage, so he was only wounded to -2 HP.  Seépravir dodged most of the bolts, needing Luck once, so only took minor damage.  A couple more duergar piled onto Garreth, but he could see those ones coming, and parried their axes.

Zaber flew up behind a duergar invisibly and backstabbed his skull through chinks in his helmet, for a kill.  Meanwhile Polly kept flying behind duergar and plugging them from their non-shield sides.  Garreth passed a consciousness check, fast-drew a healing potion, and chugged it to get back above 0 HP.  Seépravir, tired of being shot at, cast Missile Shield.  Elias tried setting the tapestry on fire, but it wouldn't burn, as his flail passed right through it.

Zaber, seeing this, declared that he didn't believe in the tapestry, and managed to see the duergar behind it.  Polly followed his lead, disbelieved the tapestry, and started shooting duergar behind it, though since their shields were pointing at her, they blocked and dodged.  Elias belatedly figured out the tapestry wasn't real and managed to start flailing the duergar behind it.  He killed one and badly wounded two more.

With the illusions revealed, the duergar in the alcoves came out to fight with the axes and shields that they had readied after dropping their crossbows.  They had numbers (the fight started at 14 to 5), but the PCs had Flight and Luck and Elias with Great Haste and Heroic Might and Heroic Grace and Polly able to fly behind enemies and shoot them in the back of the head, so after their crossbow ambush failed, the battle went like a lot of the battles against the duergar.  Elias and Garreth wore them down frontally, while Polly and Zaber got behind them.  The last few tried mobbing Garreth with All-Out Attacks, but he managed to stop them, and then they died.

Nobody believed that was the real Thane, so Zaber asked Seépravir for See Secrets.  There were no secret doors in the main room, but he found one in the western alcove, behind the illusory tapestry.  He found a short passage, leading to a room containing some crates, some barrels, and a bald duergar with a crown of bones.  As Zaber entered the room, the Thane blew a horn, and several grimlocks appeared.  Zaber flew right back out of the room to alert his friends.  Seépravir said she had plans for the Thane and wanted him alive.

Polly flew in and started shooting at grimlocks, but they blocked and dodged.  Garreth also ran in.  The Thane pulled out a large magical rod with an axe head, pointed it at Polly, and said "Boom!"  A beam came out at Polly, but she dodged it.  Zaber poisoned his knife with wyvern venom.  With the fight at close quarters, Polly drew her rapier and stabbed a grimlock, for a nasty double damage critical hit.  Garreth tried rapid striking a grimlock, but was blocked, and his Rapier Wit had no effect.  Seépravir gave Garreth a Great Haste, though it took Luck to succeed.

Elias found a gap in the line of grimlocks and charged through to the Thane.  The Thane didn't like this, and touched his magic rod to the wall behind him.  A spot on the wall opened up and pulled him through, then closed behind him.  Elias tried following him through, but just bumped his face into the wall.  The Thane had escaped!

There were still grimlocks to deal with.  Seépravir cast Mass Daze on a clump of 4 of them, succeeding against 2.  Zaber tripped one from behind using Judo, then Garreth finished him.  Polly stabbed a wounded one fatally, and then killed another one.  And the fight was done.  Seépravir examined the wall where the Thane had escaped, but saw no tunnel.  She suspected he'd used some kind of magical door through the wall.

The group quickly voted, and decided to keep hunting the Thane rather than returning to town.  We'll see if they manage to find him, next time.

GM's Comments:

The fake Thane didn't fool everyone.  He needed a more convincing crown.  There was no way the PCs were going to negotiate with the duergar anyway.

The duergar crossbow ambush did fool everyone, but only one PC (Garreth) had his back to one of the tapestries, and he has a lot of DR and HP, so it wasn't as effective as it could have been.  Maybe if Seépravir had been in her own squishy body she could have been in trouble, but she was possessing Rolf, and he has armor and HP.