Date:
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.
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