[3.5] An Eberron-flavored Red Hand of Doom Campaign Journal

[Eldariel]

I really like the Solar-scene. Quite a vivid image, and really impressive as it should be. So, you kind of made it a Seraphim? I like that. Nice touches with Lady Kaal all around. I'm sure she'll be calling on her favors should the PCs triumph yet?

Also, I really love what you did to the environment here; it definitely feels like Eberron. Really, it all fits in perfectly. And a bittersweet return to Drellin's Ferry. At the same time they see what they are fighting for, and what happens if they fail.


The fights sound interesting; I personally love using Devils (and Evil Outsiders in general) since they have such an excellent escape rate and are so hard to deal with due to the teleportation and magical augmentation. Legion Devils are just lovely, though they are really vulnerable to multitarget spells (in spite of their HP pool) which ended up being their bane here too.

I like to advance them with two-three Rogue-levels just for that reason, and 'cause of how perfectly Sneak Attack works with their default flanking tactics. I would've definitely had them all try to summon an extra when the PCs were detected though; every additional Legion Devil is such a pain you can never have too many :smallbiggrin:

And it's kinda cool the Devil accepted Holden's challenge. Goes to show that they have a concept of honor too.

[AslanCross]

Which demon battle was most fun to run against them?

The Narzugon/Merregon one was more fun since it kept the players guessing. The Barbazu one was a bit frustrating due to the summoning, but they spent more time moving around than actually hurting the PCs.




I really like the Solar-scene. Quite a vivid image, and really impressive as it should be. So, you kind of made it a Seraphim? I like that. Nice touches with Lady Kaal all around. I'm sure she'll be calling on her favors should the PCs triumph yet?

Yep, I had the Seraphim in mind. I thought the shiny bald guy wasn't as memorable.



Also, I really love what you did to the environment here; it definitely feels like Eberron. Really, it all fits in perfectly. And a bittersweet return to Drellin's Ferry. At the same time they see what they are fighting for, and what happens if they fail.

Thanks. This entire campaign has really been a learning experience for me, and I like what I've learned so far.



The fights sound interesting; I personally love using Devils (and Evil Outsiders in general) since they have such an excellent escape rate and are so hard to deal with due to the teleportation and magical augmentation. Legion Devils are just lovely, though they are really vulnerable to multitarget spells (in spite of their HP pool) which ended up being their bane here too.

I like to advance them with two-three Rogue-levels just for that reason, and 'cause of how perfectly Sneak Attack works with their default flanking tactics. I would've definitely had them all try to summon an extra when the PCs were detected though; every additional Legion Devil is such a pain you can never have too many :smallbiggrin:

Yep, it's a big break from simply fighting more hobgoblins. I'm glad the adventure recognizes that you can only fight humanoids so much. Humanoids with equal CR wouldn't be as hard to deal with for their CR. Maybe next time I'll throw in class levels. :smallamused:



And it's kinda cool the Devil accepted Holden's challenge. Goes to show that they have a concept of honor too.

Yeah, that's what it says in FC2; Narzugons are particularly honorable among devils. They'd rather go one-on-one if they can help it.

[Kol Korran]

wow! i missed since session 17?!? hhhmmmm...
anyway, great sessions. Holden and Linny live! looking forward for the rest.

i liked the description of the outpost encounter. sounds like a challanging encounter, and a fun one.

long time haven't posted here, just wanted to say i keep on reading, and thanks for the updates.

hmmm... Lady Kaal's arrangement as a hook for a future adventure? you have plans allready?

are you going to involve mroe Rakashasa in the fane?

[AslanCross]

wow! i missed since session 17?!? hhhmmmm...
anyway, great sessions. Holden and Linny live! looking forward for the rest.

i liked the description of the outpost encounter. sounds like a challanging encounter, and a fun one.

long time haven't posted here, just wanted to say i keep on reading, and thanks for the updates.

hmmm... Lady Kaal's arrangement as a hook for a future adventure? you have plans allready?

are you going to involve mroe Rakashasa in the fane?

Well, the Lady Kaal thing is meant to bring a level of intrigue into the campaign. I MIGHT give it a twist, but it depends on what the PCs want to do with it.

And yes, the Talons of Tiamat are working with Azarr Kul.

[AslanCross]

Due to unfortunate circumstances, Lyka's player was still absent and Kikkeni's player, who has been the most consistent in terms of attendance, suddenly couldn't make it either. I couldn't contact Nox's player, but he had informed me beforehand that he'd be late.

Only Linny's player and Holden's player arrived. I was worried about splitting the subbed characters between the two of them, but eventually we got so bored that we figured we might as well go ahead. Holden's player handled Nox, while Linny's player boldly handled Kikkeni, Linny and Lyka.

We ran into some difficulty with reading Kikkeni's power sheets (which had been printed on a dot matrix printer), but we somehow managed. Anyway, without further ado:

Day 51:
The Onrushing Storm

The PCs get up at 6 AM and begin the treacherous 2 hour journey down the pass that descends the cliff face. They notice that the weather over the canyon hasn't changed; it has been cloudy since yesterday, and thunder periodically rumbles through the cloud cover. Although there is no wind and rain, the dark sky is foreboding.

Linny notices that the bridge below is a chain suspension bridge held up by crackling electric rings at intervals; these look very similar to the air elemental rings used in airships. Their close proximity to each other causes a sort of resonance that is likely responsible for the bad weather.

At about 8 AM they arrive at the foot of the bridge. They do the smart thing and tie themselves by the waist onto the handrail chains, and slowly begin the quarter-mile walk across the swaying bridge.

About 200 feet from the other end, the five-headed statue of Tiamat that looms over the bridge begins to speak.

"Who dares approach the Fane of Tiamat?"
"Priest Captain Holden Magroen of the Silver Flame."

Lyka states her rank and complete name as well.

While the voice echoes throughout the canyon and clearly sounds like five different voices, the PCs make their will saves versus the ventriloquism. Lyka is able to pinpoint the source of the voice in the Tiamat statue's blue dragon head.

Linny asks if it's possible to shatter the dragon head. It certainly is, but given the scale of the statue, they're going to have to deal a lot of damage to it.

(For some reason, Holden's player was under the impression that the statue was only human-sized until here; only now does he realize that it's more like Mount Rushmore.)

The statue continues: "I do not know what your business here is. Leave an offering for Tiamat and depart from here, and I might spare you."

Holden replies: "Well, moving toward the statue counts as 'departing from here', doesn't it?" He slings the maul over his shoulder and continues walking down the path. The others follow. Nox drinks a potion of invisiibility.

Almost immediately, the blue dragon Tyrgarun, the guardian of the Fane and father of Azarr Kul, jumps out of the maw of the blue dragon head and dives, landing with a thunderous tremor on the ledge.

Cue BGM. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vds5cJ_RnAU)

"I am Tyrgarun, the Onrushing Storm and father of Azarr Kul! I shall not allow you to obstruct his plans! Dare you come against me?"

Kikkeni raises her Inertial Armor, while Linny casts Mass Shield of Faith. Lyka activates her Siberys Armor, spreading her dragonmark wings, and takes to the air. Holden drinks a potion of Fly and likewise moves closer to the dragon.

Immediately the dragon flies off the path and takes a position 65 feet away from the bridge, to the left of the PCs. Only Linny and Lyka succeed on their Frightful Presence saves---everyone else gets nailed. Tyrgarun lights up Holden and Lyka with his breath weapon. Both fail their saves and get blasted with 43 damage.

Kikkeni once more attempts to blast Tyrgarun, but she begins a long string of failures to breach SR. It would have been much better if she used electricity, since it gets a bonus to breaching resistance, but unfortunately the dragon is completely immune to it.

Lyka and Holden each drink potions of Enlarge Person and try to catch up with the dragon. Linny attempts in vain to blast Tyrgarun with Sound Lance, but she likewise fails miserably to breach his spell resistance.

Holden closes in, but before he even manages to get close enough to swing, Tyrgarun does a sharp turn and buzzes Holden, who misses on his AOO. The dragon instead sets upon Kikkeni, goring her with his horn. He attempts to throw her off the bridge, but she makes her reflex save and escapes with a graze. Nox misses yet again, but due to his hide check and the dragon still can't spot him. (Okay I messed up; there was nowhere to hide. It really wouldn't have mattered much in the end because...well, read till the end.)

Kikkeni fires yet another energy ball which simply dissipates against the dragon's body. Linny likewise fails to get any more damage out of her second Sound Lance.

Lyka and Holden struggle to catch up with Tyrgarun, but he's just too fast and his AC's just too high. The dragon makes a wingover and comes straight back at Holden, goring him with his horn. Holden is able to make the reflex save to avoid the Awesome Blow, but he's completely unable to dent Tyrgarun for now. Nox whiffs his shot yet again.

Kikkeni keeps up her bombardment, but to no effect. Out of Sound Lances, Linny instead takes up her Wand of Ice Knife---the only spell she has that can actually hit the dragon---and fails to breach SR.

Now within range, Holden smites Tyrgarun with Divine Surge, scoring a hefty 56 damage. The dragon makes his massive damage save, but Lyka circles and flanks him, dropping a Soaring Raptor Strike on him from behind. For the first time, the dragon roars in pain.

The angered dragon roars: "Oh, you shouldn't have done that."

"What, slept with your wife?" snarls Holden.

The dragon extends his wings and beats down hard, checking Lyka and Holden with the wind, and opens up a savage attack. The bite and first claw hits Holden, while the second claw hits Lyka. Lucky for her, the tail misses. Freaked out by the dragon's savagery, Nox messes up his shot.

At this point Kikkeni stops trying to shoot and instead uses the Horn of Abithriax to use Psionic Fly on herself, and concentrates into Psionic Focus. Linny tries her Wand of Ice Knife once more, but the projectile fizzles ineffectually on the dragon's hide.

Holden smites Tyrgarun once more, smashing him in the face with Bonecrusher. The dragon's horn cracks down the middle. Lyka follows up with a Death From Above, stabbing deep into the dragon's back.

This time Tyrgarun lets out an agonized wail.

"That's what your wife said," says Holden.

The furious dragon punches it, flying straight up to 90 feet above Lyka and Holden (who both whiff their AOOs), then soaring across the bridge once more to a position about 95 feet away from the bridge.

Nox calibrates his crossbow and uses the Pythagorean theorem to calculate the dragon's position! He takes a single step to close the distance a bit!

And misses. Ho hum.

Kikkeni takes off, breaking away from Linny and Nox, while Linny tries her Ice Knife one more time. This time she rolls a natural 20 and breaches Tyrgarun's SR, but fails to confirm her critical. The mighty shard of ice plunges into the dragon for an impressive 8 damage.

Lyka and Holden try their best to pursue the dragon, but don't even make it halfway.

The dragon uses his Wand of Fireball and sears Linny (she makes her save) and then flies back to a position straight above the bridge, hovering above one of the lightning rings. The PCs don't realize his plan---he intends to dive onto the bridge (sending the chain bridge quivering like a rubber band) and fire off his maximized breath weapon.

The two frontliners close in, but Nox composes himself and takes his shot. The confirmed critical hit plunges straight into Tyrgarun's eye. He deals over 53 damage with his sneak, but the critical hit would have been enough to kill him at this point. (Which is why it didn't matter if he was hidden or not.)

"You...cannot...stop...my son."

Dying in mid-flight, Tyrgarun's massive corpse crashes onto the air elemental ring. Draconic blood reacts with powerful magic, and a brilliant blue-white flash lights up the entire canyon. The impact sends the bridge swaying wildly, but Nox and Linny are able to hold on.

Realizing the dragon had just died, the PCs begin rejoicing.

Lyka then ruins the mood by asking Holden: "So, sir...did you really sleep with the dragon's wife?"

"..."

The Dragon's Hoard

Linny's player complains that he's tired and would rather call it off, while Holden's player says that he'd like to see what the dragon's hoard was. Just then, Nox's player arrives (apparently held captive by a series of six Statistics tests). We inform him of his character's accomplishment, to which he glumly shakes his head. He lights up at the mention of treasure, however, so he and Holden's player vote to push on. Linny's player gives in, and hands over control of Kikkeni and Nox to Nox's player.

They investigate the blue dragon head's maw and find the alcoves in which the four other dragons had dwelt. They realize that the scents and furniture of the areas are obvious clues to what types of dragons had lived there, and come to the conclusion that these were indeed the nests of the slain dragons. They spot Ozzyrandion's obsessive stacks of bones, Regiarix's messy apartment where a small, chair and bed still stand, Varanthian's intricately carved shrine to Tiamat, and Abithriax's sulfurous alcove, decorated with skulls mounted into the rock face, which had been glassed by fiery breath.
Finally, they come to the end of the chamber, where they see an enormous treasure trove. The pile of gold is inviting, but three weapons call their attention: a giant hammer the size of a small tree, an enormous crossbow, and a bone white, dragonshard-mounted staff covered in glyphs.

The adamantine hammer shrinks to fit Holden's size as he touches it, and Linny identifies it as "Kumbhakarna's Penance," the personal weapon of one of Xen'Drik's titan lords who had repented of his deeds as the giant empire fell. A dragon who witnessed the dying Titan's repentance purified the weapon, and it now bears the inscription "By my hand my own people fell; by my fist shall your people stand." Penance is a blessed weapon and as such breaches DR/good, and also has the power to send a shockwave rippling through the ground.

The crossbow is nowhere near as ancient, but is no less impressive: It's a Tzanthus Gastrophetes, a state-of-the-art crossbow designed by the gnomes of Zilargo as a special assassination weapon for members of the Trust. The weapon is actually Large, but its compensation systems allow Medium and Small characters to use it without much problems, albeit the weapon needs to be calibrated every morning. It can also produce its own special ammunition and collapse into a compact, highly concealable but unusable form for storage.

Linny's staff is a Quill of Aureon, a staff that gives some skill bonuses and has a couple of per-day utility spells, as well as Blast of Force and Thunderlance, twice and once per day, respectively. As a relic of Aureon, the staff can also be transformed into a Minor Schema of a divine spell or arcane spell (though activating it for arcane spells can fail).

The PCs debate on what to do with the gold, but decide to leave it for now. They fly back down to the entrance.

Dynamic Entry

The players mess around a bit, not realizing the peril of the door. Nox fails to notice any traps and calls it clear, so they start saying "WE BREAK THE DOOR FOR DYNAMIC ENTRY!"

They then start talking about the value of large stone doors, and in the end decide to just push it open.

The whine of arcane energy building up fills the air around them, and the dragon heads in the doorframe let loose a massive blast of energy. Everyone fails their saves, and get whacked with a solid 45 damage.
Needless to say, they spend more time healing after the trap than they do after the dragon.

Nox finally disables the trap, and the party, now trap-scared, enters.

They mess around in the hallway for about 20 minutes as Nox pores over every nook and cranny trying to find a trap. They don't find any, and enter the foyer.

Two blue abishai and their pet zombie wyverns greet them.

Kikkeni throws Lyka at one of the Abishai in its alcove, but misses. The shifter thuds against the wall, but gets up and faces the fiend. Nox readies a shot (He makes use of Deadeye Shot when there are no sniping spots), while the second Abishai flies up and towards the ceiling above the doorway.

Holden enters and is immediately (well, in a manner of speaking) set upon by the two zombie wyverns. Eventually, Holden explodes one of the wyverns while the second is incinerated by Linny with her Wand of Scorching Ray.

It's the abishai that are extremely annoying due to their DR and regeneration.

The two Abishai deal some notable damage with their stings (IF they connect), but for the most part they don't really threaten the PCs; eventually, Linny casts Align Weapon on Nox snipes one and busts its chest open. Kikkeni, frustrated by the Abishai's numerous immunities and resistances, resorts to using sonic energy missiles, but it's not long before the two fiends regenerate the damage away. Nox finishes off the Abishai that attacks him. Lyka beats one of them into submission, applies an Oil of Bless Weapon, and then decapitates it.

Thoughts

-I honestly didn't think they'd make it. Two players were able to take down the single most formidable monster they've met so far---and that was considering that Lyka's player hasn't even leveled up her character. It was also great how their lousy luck took a turn for the better; once they got over the hump, they started beating Tyrgarun senseless.

-I really enjoyed creating the ultimate weapons. Getting something that had a lot of MIC properties wasn't enough, really. I really wanted the players to walk home with iconic items that are both useful and memorable.

-They're going to have to pace themselves now. I made the Fane a lot more dangerous than it is in the book, and all of the devils inside have telepathy. It's also best that they find a good place to rest, but at the same time they shouldn't linger too long--the clock is ticking.

-The Big Reveal on what exactly is going on and how much time the PCs have left should be next session. I hope they do it right.

[GreyMantle]

[Insert all the standard, "Dude, your campaign journal is amazing" comments that everyone is making because you do actually deserve it]

Regarding Nox's hiding in the dragon battle, I've always found the rule of needing cover to hide being a kind of silly one. I mean, there have to have been times when you've been looking for something only to realize it's been right in front of you and you just never noticed it. I'm assuming that your glasses don't have the Hide in Plain Sight ability, right?

And plus, Nox is what, level 10 or 11? That means he's probably one of the most powerful adventurers in all of Khorvaire. But he still needs a rock to hide behind? Can't he just not be really really still and use his innate awesomeness to win at stealth?

I just give any character with at least 6 ranks in Hide the Hide in Plain Sight ability. I've found it really makes the game play better.

(Okay, I'll stop trying to tell you how to play your game now.)

[AslanCross]

Thanks for the support.

About the hiding thing--well, I'm still not too keen on that. Nox's hide checks are OVER 9000, so letting him hide anywhere kinda breaks the game. He'll have more opportunities inside the Fane.

[Draz74]

Realizing the dragon had just died, the PCs begin rejoicing.

Lyka then ruins the mood by asking Holden: "So, sir...did you really sleep with the dragon's wife?"

I just want to say that Lyka is 90% of the reason I read this Journal.

[Eldariel]

Thanks for the support.

About the hiding thing--well, I'm still not too keen on that. Nox's hide checks are OVER 9000, so letting him hide anywhere kinda breaks the game. He'll have more opportunities inside the Fane.

Yeah, besides, there's an ability specifically to enable hiding in plain sight; giving it to everyone kinda makes Ranger/Scout/Shadowdancer less special.

[GreyMantle]

The Ranger gets Hide in Plain Sight at what, 17th level or something? And doesn't it only apply when it "natural" terrain, aka terrain that would most likely have some sort of cover anyway?

(As for the Scout, I no longer have access to my copy of complete adventurer, and I've never used the Shadowdancer or had a player choose it)

I guess, when I look at "needing cover" in order to hide, I just see another version of FCGNT. The wizard or beguiler can just cast invisibility and poof!, but the rogue needs to find a rock to hide behind... and and a-and

Gaah, I'll just quote Frank Trollman.



Hiding in 3.5 D&D is Dumb

OK, we all know that it makes us feel kind of bad when the Rogue sneaks up on people and stabs them in the face without them ever seeing who did it. But you know what? People totally do that crap all the time. It's not even an uncommon occurrence, and there's really no cause to get excited about. The 3.5 rules for hiding, where you need cover or concealment to hide, are retarded. That makes Rogues run around with tower shields so that they can hide themselves and their equipment behind the cover of the tower shield (including the tower shield itself, which makes my brain hurt). Yes, you can totally hide when there are no intervening objects between you and the victim. It's called "sneaking up behind people" and in a game with no facing it's handled with a hide check opposed by spot.

If you attempt to hide in a combat setting, you are under a number of restrictions:

-A character who has been attacked automatically can guess what square you are in. You may retain your invisibility, but that's just Full Concealment, and they could very plausibly hit you.

-There is a -20 penalty to Hide for attempting to fight while hidden. The distance penalties on Spot are pretty amazing, but most people can't hide at a -20 penalty.

-Once they see you, they see you. If an opponent successfully spots you even once (and they get to try every round while in combat), they just plain see you until you manage to get all the way out of their field of view (generally requiring you to leave the scene or make bluff checks or something).

-Spot Bonuses can get quite large. A spotter who knows what he's looking for gets a +4 bonus, and a spotter who is extremely familiar with the target gets a +10 bonus – these bonuses are weirdly listed under the Disguise skill, but they still apply (so if someone says "There's a halfling Ninja over there!" every other Guard gets a +4 bonus).

But you can do it. Hiding in combat is hard, but it's a thing that powerful characters may be able to do against some opponents. Some of the D&D authors have an outdated idea that Rogues should be forced to "hide in shadows" or something. But this is D&D, and most enemies have Darkvision. There are no shadows. Attempting to force Rogues to hide only in areas that they could plausibly hide in if a suspicious person was looking right at them and knew what they were looking for is incredibly cruel. In any kind of stressful situation that isn't an accurate picture of what is going on.


(Also, just as a bit of personal experience, a homebrewed ninja in my current Eberron campaign currently has stealthy checks of around +29. At level 5. And it's never really broken the game. His player is able to do totally awesome things, but he still can't hide and make a full attack in the same round. And he still can run into things like tripwires and traps and magical sensors, so it's not like, out of combat, nobody will ever evar detect him. But whatever.)

[AslanCross]

Just to put things into perspective: Nox has gotten Hide checks of as high as 80. Okay, so he had drunk a potion of Invisibility then, which gives a massive bonus on hide checks when not moving. He was still able to get a 60something in the Tyrgarun battle,which Tyrgarun's +27 modifier (maxing out at 47 assuming a natural 20) could not beat no matter what he did. That's not even counting the range penalty. The only time Tyrgarun detected him was when he buzzed Kikkeni (Nox was right behind her, so he was well within the Blindsense range).

The tower shield thing is just idiotic; that's not going to work here. However, I think it makes much more sense to still have to hide behind cover.Standing out in the open in bright sunlight and waving your hands to become invisible is even more ridiculous than the Tower Shield trick.

[AslanCross]

Day 51: 5 Rhaan, 998
The Fane of Tiamat
8:30 am

Nox's player was absent, so I had another guy sub for him. Lyka's player unfortunately was still not around (for the previous weeks her mom was campaigning for the local elections, and today they went on a family adventure). Hopefully the last two sessions (at least that's my projection) we'll have complete attendance. I'd like to finish everything before the school year starts.

Thankfully, this was a very, very productive session.

The Elsir Fane's Guardian

Before we started, we fixed some level-up related discrepancies. Lyka was missing her level 11 maneuver and skill points. Kikkeni likewise fixed up the Psicrystal she got after taking the Psicrystal Affinity feat that she was supposed to have gotten at Lv 10.

While we weren't able to meet for about a month due to various problems plus my graduate studies, I polled the players and asked which of the doors they wanted to open. The previous session they had stopped in the Fane's foyer and wondered which of the three doors they should open. "Center"---the double doors leading to the main corridor--won.

Before opening the doors, Holden leans over to them to listen. He didn't even have to make a check--the doors were vibrating rhythmically, in time to the sound of heavy metallic footsteps.

Poom. Poom. Poom. Poom.

"I told you we should have gone through the left!"

Nox volunteers to peek. He pulls the iron door ajar and spies the source of the noise--a 12-foot tall metal monstrosity with a stylized draconic head and claws the size of greatswords patrolling the corridor. It was simply walking repeatedly up and down the hall.

He reports this to Linny, who identifies it as an Iron Golem, obviously fashioned by dragons or dragon-related creatures. The party debates a bit on what to do, then finally agrees to let Nox scout first as the golem moves to the far end of the Fane.

Before anything else, Linny buffs Holden with Bull's Strength,

The sniper barely gets into the doorway when what looks like another Tiamat chandelier hanging 40 feet down the hall flares to life and rotates its black dragon head toward Nox and unleashes a beam of crackling black necroenergy. He barely dodges the spell, which Linny identifies as enervation.

At this point, the golem turns on its heel and begins walking toward the party. While they're terrified of the Spell Turret, they figure that dealing with the implacable construct and the trap now will save them a lot of headaches later. Kikkeni gets into psionic focus while Linny, knowing her magic is useless against the golem, attempts to shatter the spell turret with sound lance. A valiant effort, but it simply doesn't deal enough damage to destroy it.

Holden and Lyka charge the golem, striking it hard--however, only Holden's maul seems to do anything. As mighty as Lyka's Vaanon'Gan is, it barely makes a scratch on the iron plating.

The mighty construct lashes out at Holden with its claws, shaving off about half his HP in one round; it's only his Steely Resolve damage pool that prevents this from really messing him up.
Shocked at how powerful the guardian is, the party begins thinking twice.

The spell turret turns to its blue dragon head and unleashes an orb of electricity on Holden. It doesn't deal as much damage as the one that had killed him previously did, but it still gives him a nasty zap.

Nox runs back into the foyer. Kikkeni, feeling completely useless, uses psionic fly from the Horn of Abithriax to allow Nox to reach the killer chandelier.

Lyka and Holden keep up their assault. Lyka leaps into the air and drives her blade into the golem using Soaring Raptor Strike. Despite the force of the blow, she ultimately doesn't deal enough damage to significantly hurt the golem---despite the density of her byeshk sword, it isn't hard enough to crack the dense armor plate.

Holden pulls Elder Mountain Hammer and cracks the golem in the groin, shattering some of the plating and chainmail cowling there, but the machine keeps moving, shanking Lyka and Holden each for upwards of 20 damage. 6 feet of cold steel tend to do that to an adventurer's body.

Linny uses her last Wand of Magic Missile charge to shoot the deadly furniture, but only succeeds in chipping the finishing. The machine continues menacing the two frontliners. Meanwhile, Nox flies up to the trap and attempts to disarm it. He fails spectacularly, however.

The machine turns to its green dragon head and blasts Nox, Lyka and Holden with confusion. All of them make it their saves and breathe a huge sigh of relief when I tell them what the spell was.

At this point, Kikkeni's player asks me how big the spell turret is. I tell them it was just about the size of the chandelier in my living room: about 1.5 feet in diameter. The players then ask if it's possible to cover the trap with cloth. I rule that doing so would block its line of sight and thus cause it to stop firing. Nox comes up with the solution: a tent pulled from the survival pouch.

As hilarious as the idea was, I assured them that it would work as long as they securely fastened the tent to the ceiling using pitons.

Kikkeni attempts to slow down the golem by dropping psionic grease around it, but the golem amazingly makes its reflex save. It continues shredding Holden, who is by now in the red. He tries using Revitalizing Strike, but his strike skids off the construct's armor.

Lyka uses Death from Above, gashing the golem's chest plate. Understandably, the golem turns on her and slices her up. Linny rushes to Holden's aid to heal him, while Nox succeeds in covering up the spell turret from his floating position and hangs onto one of the necks by his legs as he starts driving in pitons.

The golem, however, has other plans---the dragon head opens up and blasts Lyka, Holden and Linny with toxic gas. All of them make their saves, though Holden has to reroll his with Zealous Surge. Not through with them, the golem wailed into the dwarf again, dropping him to dangerously low HP.

Holden drops a final Divine Surge on the golem, busting a huge hole in its chest. Said hole allows Lyka easy access to the golem's innards, which she promptly destroys.
The machine goes into a seizure, babbling random words in Draconic, and finally shuts down.

Nox finishes nailing the canvas into place. The other players wonder how guards would react if they saw a TENT nailed to the ceiling, so someone came up with the brilliant suggestion of writing "Out of Order" in Infernal. However, we agreed that such a phrase was not characteristically fiendish, so Linny wrote "This Pathetic Machine Is Useless" instead.

Kikkeni levels up from the encounter, so she picks two new powers: psionic disintegrate and retrieve.

We break for lunch. The party continues planning their next move.

Lebensraum

Nox obsessively goes over all of the doors, making sure none of them are trapped, and the party enters what used to be the kitchen. I threw that out because I figured the crack element wasn't as funny as the writers thought it was, and it assumed the players were going to have to leave with the night hag.

As such, I replaced it with a plush bedroom where one of Azarr Kul's rakshasas stayed.

They entered the room and saw that there the furnishings were predominantly red, green and gold: colors that are appealing to the eyes of fiends. They also saw that the table still had food on it: bread, cheese, and raw, bloody meat. Whoever had been occupying the room had left in a hurry.

Nox opened a door to the side: a closet. It was filled with a wardrobe of wildly varying outfits and styles---peasant clothes, scholar's outfits, aristocratic attire, for both genders and for various body shapes. It was easy to guess that whoever lived in this room was a shapechanger--either a changeling, or, more likely, a rakshasa. Finding nothing of interest no matter where they looked, they continued looking around.

They were so paranoid that they didn't want to open the door leading out the other side to the point that Kikkeni of all people got up and went through the side passage and opened it just to prove that there wasn't much to be afraid of. The party then went out the other door and into the corridor, then tried out the door to the cleric quarters (checking for traps all the way, of course).

Inside the clerics' quarters, they saw that all of the ten cells were identical: bed, cabinet, shrine to Tiamat. At the far end of the room, across it from the entrance, there was another door (this one I had added): the door was barred, chained, and padlocked. Holden tried to listen once more, while Kikkeni and Linny set about defacing the small Tiamat shrines.

Before long, they heard the telltale sound of a switch being pulled. An enormous, purple mass of slime came falling out of a trap door in the ceiling. The ooze was so big that it couldn't really even fit in the room's narrow passages, but it could squeeze through them just fine.

Linny identified it as a Mind Abolisher, a living weapon created by the giants of Xen'Drik to fight Quori. It was kind of like a psionic black hole, sucking in psionic power points while being immune to almost any magic. (This is an anti-psionic version of the Arcane Ooze in MM3)

Holden and Lyka immediately began beating on the blob, while Nox, Kikkeni and Linny tried to stay as far from they could.

Before Kikkeni could do anything, her already paltry power point total took a massive hit of 13 PP. Since the ooze needed line of effect to her to drain PP, Linny advised her to hide in one of the cells first.

However, this wasn't the only threat---someone had pulled the switch. A bolt of energy shoots out of nowhere, striking Holden. He took 2 Strength damage from the shot---it had come from a cleric of Tiamat on the other side of the room from the ooze. Half the party then felt their minds being assailed, though they made their saves. It was another cleric of Tiamat who had cast confusion on them! The two clerics--properly Doom Hand Confessors-- had been invisible and were hiding in the farthest cells until the party, and now they had the party trapped between them and the ooze.

Lyka and Holden dealt significant damage to the ooze, which languidly lashed out at them but failed. The ooze then began crawling away and back up the far wall of the chamber. Fearing that it would climb across the ceiling and fall on them, they decided to get the hell out from under it and began beating the two clerics instead.

As soon as Lyka begins attacking the clerics, they realize that she's holding the sword of Wyrmlord Kharn.

"Why are you holding Vaanon'Gan, defilers?! That's Wyrmlord Kharn's sword!"
"We killed him," remarks Lyka nonchalantly.

The clerics simply look at each other in disbelief. They continue missing with their flails, despite them channelling their debuff spells into their attacks and repeatedly using Smite. Lyka takes a few swipes at the clerics, feeding her sword with some of their blood.

Nox is trapped too close to the clerics to use his crossbow, so he instead draws a dagger out of his Gauntlet of Infinite Blades and begins throwing them at point-blank range (rather ineffectually).

One of the clerics successfully bashes Nox with his smite attack and yells "Our training is better than your pitiful human training! It's what allowed us to kill so many of your men at Brindol!"
Holden says, "Well our training allowed us to kill your dragon!"
"And how did you get past Tyrgarun?!"
"We had a rough time with him," says Linny.
"Well, I had a rough time with his wife," says Holden.
Lyka gives him a sidelong glance and pauses.
"...so you DID sleep with a hobgoblin!"
"SHUT UP AND KEEP FIGHTING!"

Linny tries backing away from the clerics, but the ooze stops going up the wall and instead crawls back toward Linny and smacks her hard, swallowing her. "UGH! THE ACID! MY SKIN!"

The ooze constricts Linny, bringing her very close to death, so Holden does his best to rush back and save Linny by activating her Belt of Healing. He then executes a full Power Attack on the ooze, knowing he can't possibly miss, plus Divine Surge. Despite the massive 72 damage that does, the ooze was still intact. Lyka rushes in, finishing it off with a Soaring Raptor Strike and activating Vaanon'Gan. The ooze explodes.

With the ooze dead, Kikkeni steps out of her hiding place and psionic greases the clerics, causing them to slip and fall.

Lyka and Holden then begin conversing with Linny, completely ignoring the clerics.

"HEY! We're still alive!"

As Kikkeni and Nox wear the clerics down (rather slowly and ineffectually due to the primary attackers trying to save Linny), the clerics begin spouting slightly nonsensical lines thanks to the pinpricks of Kikkeni's dorje and Nox's dagger:

"How dare you enter the temple of Tiamat and defile our sacred shrines! And now you torture us!"
"This is just revenge for trying to siphon my psionic power," Kikkeni says. She points at Holden "And his beard, and her (pointing to Linny) skin!"
"Thanks to your people, I died, and now my beard HAS NO BODY!" (Recall that Holden's beard had a permanent feather fall effect on it)

Linny screams "MY SKIN!" and casts deific vengeance on one of the clerics. Since Aureon is the god of knowledge, I rule that the spell fills the target's mind with unfathomable knowledge and incomprehensible math calculations.

"AH! TRIGONOMETRY! ALGEBRA!" the Confessor cries, as he crumples to the ground. He drops to 0 HP and is disabled.

The other looks down at his disabled partner and says "I'm going to keep fighting for as long as I live!...which is admittedly not going to be a very long time."

Lyka tumbles past him into the alcove he was standing beside, stands up, grins, and cuts him down.

The disabled cleric, his mind still in agony, says "You're never going to stop Azarr Kul" and cuts himself across the throat with his finger while casting inflict light wounds. He collapses onto the floor and bleeds to death.

Linny divests them of their scrolls. Holden finds the key to the padlocks on the barred door and listens again. Nothing. He cracks the door open.

Beyond the Locked Door

The sight inside is breathtaking---a large room with a ceiling over 70 feet high, and glorious stained glass windows decorating the far end. The windows depict scenes of demons fighting dragons, as well as scenes of Tiamat being imprisoned.

A huge rose window depicting the five heads of Tiamat---fettered around the necks with thick chains-- inscribed within a pentagram dominates the upper portions of the wall.

In the middle of the room is a 15x15 foot dais, upon which rests a large Khyber dragonshard the size of a human. It's obviously cracked, and a purple mist seeps out of the crack. The room is filled with an unnatural chill.

Linny recalls that Khyber dragonshards are often used in the imprisonment of elementals and outsiders.

In front of the dais, in pieces on the floor, is what would have been a magnificent marble statue of a dragon. The PCs ask what kind of dragon it is, but I tell them it's unlike any of the typical dragons. After a few history, lore and knowledge checks, they're able to determine that this was a statue of none other than Bahamut, and that from the markings on the dais, the statue used to be on top of it and that the shard was a recent addition.

As such, the players begin thinking that this chapel was actually the prison of Tiamat. I quickly tell them that Tiamat is the most powerful of the demon overlords, and that to imprison her would take a Khyber dragonshard the size of a city, and that her prison is actually in Argonnessen, in the Pit of Five Sorrows.

Holden asks if Bahamut was a good god, and after he learns that he is one, he goes forward and drops a few sprinkles of silver powder on the shattered statue.

Then the shard speaks.

The Voice in the Shard

"I sense that someone has entered my domain," says a calm, slightly sleepy-sounding voice. The voice itself seems pleasant enough, but while listening to it, everyone notices that the voice seems to have a background sound--laughter.
The laughter of children at first, then lapsing into psychotic laughter, and back.

The PCs are stunned.

"You have the smell of blood on you. Hobgoblin blood...did you enjoy slaughtering the clerics guarding this door?"
"I enjoy doing good," says Holden.
"We only did what had to be done," offers Lyka.

"Ah, I see..." replies the voice. "My senses seem to have grown dull; it is only because of their haphazard imprisonment of me that I can actually sense and converse with you. Maybe it's about time I got out."

Linny asks "What can you tell us about this place?"

"This, dear friends, is part of the system that powers Tiamat's prison."

The PCs look at each other in stunned silence.

"The hobgoblins you slew are interlopers who have dealt with the original guardians of this complex."
"How did they get past the guards?" asks Holden.

"Isn't it obvious, my friend? They had a dragon with them. Whoever was living here was slaughtered rather unceremoniously. They are quite powerful."

"They also lack a basic knowledge of hygiene," remarks the dwarf. "How does one even LIVE here without a bathroom?"

"...that's what they use the ooze for," replies the voice.

A collective groan from the group, and a shriek from Linny.

"Eeeeew! I was IN that thing!"

"I feel for you, my dear," says the voice.

"Anyway," Holden says, getting back on topic. "Why are you here? How did this happen to you?"

"The cult high priest, Azarr Kul, is planning to disrupt the prison of Tiamat by pulling the plane of Shavarath into coterminous with the Material Plane. I assume you've encountered some of the baatezu he's employing as you entered this complex?"

"Yes."

"Those were the fiends he summoned to work for him as the boundaries between the planes weakened."

"So why aren't you working for him?" prods Holden.

"I didn't want to. He couldn't make me bow to his will, so he imprisoned me. In any case, if you could set me free I could offer you a deal that might help you."

"How exactly do we set you free?" Holden asks suspiciously.

"It's simple. My prison is failing. Shatter the shard and I will be free."

"...who are you? WHAT are you?"

"I have many names..." replies the voice.

"Such as?"

Linny interrupts the exchange and whispers into Holden's ear. "I think it's a demon. A powerful one at that. I don't think Azarr Kul would have imprisoned it here if he could bend it to his will."

"Names are not important right now," says the voice.

"What are you, then?"

"I am a free agent. I specialize in making deals. "

More suspicious than ever, Holden asks. "Whose side are you on, anyway?"

"I am on my own side. But again, I offer you a simple way of defeating everyone here and accomplishing your quest. A simple favor in exchange for another."

"What proof do you have of everything you've told us?"

"Seek out Azarr Kul's council room. Since he has sent out his army, it has fallen into disuse. I assume that if you're here, you've already defeated them. Am I correct?"

"Yes."

"And what of the lesser Wyrmlords?"

"They're all dead."

"Then the room will indeed be mostly abandoned. It's a simple matter of getting in. You will find the room off to the side of the main hallway. It's behind the double doors."

The party then leaves the shard, conferring along the way.

The Big Reveal

Holden and Linny are mostly convinced that freeing the Voice is not really a good idea---Azarr Kul wouldn't have imprisoned it if it were something he could control. Nox also agrees that it might not be a good idea to make yet another deal--they've made too many as it is.

Kikkeni alone says that she feels rather sorry for it and suggests that setting it free might not be as bad an idea as it seems.

The party arrives at the council room door. Nox finds no traps on the door. Holden peeks inside.

The room is completely dark, but thanks to his darkvision he's able to make out the details inside: A large table dominates the center of the room. Eight large, cushioned chairs surround the table. The chair at the far end has a much taller back and is ornately carved in Tiamat motifs. However, beside this, tucked in a corner, is another, much larger throne---big enough to seat a creature at least as big as an ogre. The party enters. They puzzle over the giant chair, wondering if that belongs to Azarr Kul. However, they have no reason to believe that the cult leader is of a larger size than usual.

Nox once more searches for traps and immediately detects a trap on the Tiamat-carved chair--likely triggered to go off if anyone sits in it. The party gives it a wide berth--Holden suggests that maybe the council room is fake, but they realize that the table is covered in documents---books, journals, and most importantly a map almost as big as the table, pinned in place by daggers.

http://eberronrhod.files.wordpress.com/2010/05/azarrkulsmap.jpg

Linny immediately sets about deciphering the map.

The circle of Draconic runes reads "By the Power of the Planes is Tiamat Bound."
The five symbols are the sigils that represent the planes of Eberron. Clockwise from top:
Mabar, the Endless Night--a realm that devours the life of anyone who enters.
Fernia, the Sea of Fire--a nightmarish firestorm in which the most powerful of fire elementals, demons and devils dwell.
Risia, the Plain of Ice--a frozen, barren land of permanent winter.
Lammania, the Twilight Forest---a land of nature unleashed and unbound, unfettered by any civilization.
Shavarath, the Battleground---the plane that Azarr Kul is pulling out of its orbit--a land of eternal war, the ultimate clash between law and chaos, evil and good.

I leave the players to draw their conclusions at first, and they do get the picture---this is the seal that binds Tiamat---a magical prison so vast that it overlaps with three continents.

After Linny skims through the books, she realizes that an important one is a treatise on Demon Overlord imprisonment, which says that the Khyber Dragonshard that contains Tiamat is so vast that it can only be held stable by the power of the orbits of five planes. The movement of the planes around the Material Plane acts like a magical circuit, making an arcane current flow through the seal to sustain it. Each of the five points of the seal is a focal point for one of the five planes---a Fane.

Two of the points are deep underwater---the Dragonreach Fane and an unnamed benthic Fane in the sea between the continents of Argonnessen and Xen'Drik. A third fane is located deep in the jungles of Xen'Drik, near the mouth of the mighty Hydra River. The fourth, labeled the "Elsir Fane," is the very building they are in---turns out it's not a temple to Tiamat after all, but a relay station for the seal---and the final Fane is Tiamat's prison itself: the Pit of Five Sorrows deep in the heart of Argonnessen, the nation of dragons.

The PCs who can read Draconic quickly pore over the other books, until someone finds Azarr Kul's campaign journal.

The notebook contains various objectives, many of them crossed out with red ink. They also spot the names of the Wyrmlords, all crudely crossed out. The only lines of text that remain unblotted are rather chilling.



5 Barrakas 998

-Began the Planar Manipulation. Estimated date of completion within one month. Might run into problems sustaining power for realignment.

The PCs realize that today is 5 Rhaan 998--exactly one month later.

"He's been ahead of us all this time."

They wonder under their breath if they're too late, but since they aren't swimming in fiends yet, Azarr Kul might have run into some delays. They have 3 days lead time at most.

When Shadows Can Cut

Exhausted from their day and almost out of spells, they decide to rest. However, Kikkeni brings up the subject of shattering the Dragonshard once more. She asks Holden what the doctrine of the Silver Flame is regarding outsiders.

He recalls that slaying outsiders is priority, and that an imprisoned demon is still a demon out of place on Eberron.

"We have bigger barrels to booze from at the moment," he says dismissively.

The PCs argue a bit over where to sleep---the former Wyrmlord quarters near the entrance might not be a very good sleeping place, since it requires them to be separate. They then decide to stay inside the large bedroom that belonged to the rakshasa.

They lock the doors to be sure. Linny flops onto the bed. Kikkeni sits down and meditates, while Nox leans against the closet door, examining his crossbow. Lyka sleeps with her head down on the table, while Holden stays awake, sitting fitfully near Lyka.

Before they even finish sleeping---about 4 hours into their rest--a loud banging sound on the door adjacent to the main corridor wakes them all.

"Hey!" calls a gruff hobgoblin voice. "Open up! We know you're in there!"

Nox tries to bluff. "Of course you do! We're guards here!"

"What's taking you so long?!"

"We're just checking things out!"

"...what's the password?"

"THERE IS NO PASSWORD!"

"You've given yourself away, you fool! You sound like a human!"

"But I'm speaking in goblin!"

"You have a human accent!"

Holden then volunteers to remedy the situation.

"Move along. We're just checking things out here. We work together!"

"...and YOU. YOU sound like a dwarf!"

"...that's the WORST INSULT I'VE EVER HEARD!" Holden cries with hobgoblin-like indignation.

"That's it! I'm coming in!"

The door continues banging. Nox tries to slip out the other side, but before he even gets into the corridor, an arrow comes whistling out of the darkness and into his leg. Kikkeni immediately pulls the hamstrung rogue in while Lyka bars the door with the table.

A softer knock on the door this time, followed by a voice that sounds like a deep, hissing growl.

"Mmm....I can smell your blood. I shot your friend. I hope he enjoys his limp. Hehehehehe."

Silence.

The harsh knock again.

"How's the bed?" asks the gruff hobgoblin voice.

"Pretty comfy," Linny says.

Silence.

The shadows cast by the headboard of the bed warp and twist, and a lean, feline figure clad in a dark scarf and chainmail appears, carrying two short, surved swords. The black, panther-like head gives the beast away---it's a rakshasa. Linny identifies it as a Naztharune Rakshasa, a shapechanging fiend adept at infiltration and assassination that usually works for higher-level fiends. However, she doesn't roll high enough to recall any of its weaknesses. Before she can even speak, the rakshasa stabs her with an envenomed sword, severely injuring her.

BGM: The Talons of Sorrow (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PLVrxto4krE )

"Get out of the way, Linny!" roars Holden. "I HATE Rakshasas! I'm going to ram this maul down its throat so far it comes out the other end!"

"Oh, I'd like to see you try. It's not going to be easy---definitely not as easy as killing your wife was!" The fiend then erupts into psychotic laughter.

"...the rakshasa is MINE!"

From this point onward, Holden is a frothing bundle of armor-plated anger. He is incoherent and single-minded in his desire to slay the fiend.

Kikkeni immediately fires Ego Whip, trying to conserve her PP, but the fiend's metaphysical barriers stop the power cold. Knowing what she cast on him, the rakshasa taunts her: "Oh, my fragile ego is so bruised by your assault? How painful---HAH! That was pathetic! I KNOW how you took down the dragons! It's not going to work on me!"

One by one, more devils begin teleporting into the room--first an excruciarch--a spiked chain-toting leather-clad fiend with metal plates bolted over its mouth, then a barbazu with its giant, saw-toothed glaive. They both teleport onto the bed around the cleric.

"Damnit! They're going to tear Linny apart!"

Nox delays to snipe at a creature that gets hit in melee, while Lyka sprints onto the bed, whirling Vaanon'Gan in a great arc and cutting into the Barbazu and the Excruciarch. Nox shoots the Excruciarch in the head-- a massive blow. The fiend pulls out the bolt, shrieking "PAIN! GLORIOUS PAIN! You might enjoy the work I do, boy!"

Now Nox wasn't being Rped by his regular player, and this guy's a bit loopy, so Nox was mostly OOC for the entire session.

"You don't know pain until you've worn a corset!"

Everyone stops--even the devils--and together they give Nox weird looks.

A second Excruciarch and Barbazu pair teleports in, cornering Nox.

Linny, however, gingerly steps away before the devil can do anything, and summons the wrath of Aureon on the injured baatezu with devil blight. The pain devil implodes, its soul sent shrieking back to Shavarath.

Holden runs straight for the rakshasa and tries to crush its head with Elder Mountain Hammer, but the fiend ducks. The adamantine head of his weapon crunches into the wall, sending bits of masonry everywhere. The rakshasa, whose name was Afrasiyab, leaps off the bed, tumbling out of Holden's and Linny's reach, putting the cleric between him and the barbazu. He then stabs Linny once more, dropping her to dangerously low HP. The fiend twirls his blades and sheathes them behind his back, hands ready on the hilts. Lyka identifies this as the Assassin's Stance, a deadly dirty fighting technique.

Kikkeni turns on the fiends near Nox and blasts them with electric energy missiles, but both make their saves and take very little damage. The excruciarch unleashes its hell scourge, whipping Nox and Kikkeni, but only succeeds in hitting Nox. He makes his save versus the surge of pain, but the barbazu follows up with a full attack as well, sending Nox down to critical HP.

Nox panics and begins weighing his options---does he heal himself or does he help everyone with mass shield of faith? He decides on helping the party and UMDs his scroll, raising everyone's AC. Lyka continues dueling the barbazu beside her, dealing more and more damage.

Linny backs away, casting light of Venya, filling the room with the pearly glow of the spell.

Holden rushes at the rakshasa once more, but Afrasiyab gingerly parries it away. The crusader, still in a rage, moves into his Thicket of Blades stance, twirling his maul about.

The rakshasa whips out his blades, striking them together to spark them---and a small fire elemental materializes behind Holden. Holden, distracted by the flare, takes a massive full attack from the assassin. Only two of the attacks hit, however, Afrasiyab takes a low swing and rips the tendons in the joint of Holden's leg. The painful injury slows him down even more.

Kikkeni blasts the devils again, frying one of the barbazu but completely failing to hurt Afrasiyab, who is simply far too nimble to pin down.

Nox is finally able to trigger his Healing Belt, and takes aim once more at Lyka's victims. The other excruciarch falls, leaving one barbazu. Afrasiyab, however, remains strong.

The rakshasa assassin breaks away from Holden, takes a glancing blow from Holden's AOO, and tumbles past Lyka. In one fluid motion, he plunges both his blades into her flesh, severely injuring her. In retaliation, Kikkeni incinerates the last Barbazu with a powered-up energy missile, knowing that Afrasiyab is pretty much immune to her attacks. The rakshasa dodges low as the missiles fly past him.

Nox delays once more, waiting for Lyka's opening. Her Death From Above strike connects, but Nox's deadeye shot just narrowly misses---the rakshasa twists his head out of the way as the bolt whistles past.

Linny screams as she unleashes her light of Venya, sending burning shafts of light straight through the fiend's body.

"YOU'RE GOING TO REGRET DOING THAT, GIRL!" roars Afrasiyab.

Holden, meanwhile limps up to Linny for healing---he's pretty much useless if he can't keep up with the Rakshasa.

Afrasiyab sheathes his blades and closes his eyes briefly as he steps away. Kikkeni tries to shoot him one last time, but once more fails to score any significant damage as the assassin dances between her bolts.

Nox whips out another scroll---bands of steel---and fires it off. While Afrasiyab manages to dodge the binding effect, the loose coils still entangle him. This time, it's Afrasiyab who is slowed down. Lyka takes another swing, but she might as well have struck the fiend with a flimsy twig.

Linny finally gets around to healing Holden, and he pounds furiously after the dying Rakshasa. His weapon erupts with silver light dancing around the heavy black metal head.

"Remember what I swore to do? Well, I'M DOING IT NOW!"

He rams the heavy maul into the fiend's maw. The divine surge of argent fire ravages the fiend's body and it bursts open, charred and smouldering.

All throughout the process, Afrasiyab screamed and screamed.

"Finally..." says Holden as he drops to his knees. "Justice."

Holden and Linny finally level up---now, everyone's at Lv 11. They also decide to loot and leave the Fane once more to avoid getting cornered.

Thoughts

-This keeps getting better and better. Lots of exposition today, but I guess this session is proof that plot and action are not mutually exclusive, even in D&D.
-I was afraid the golem and spell turret would maul them, but they actually did really well by improvising with the tent.
-I'm sure you're wondering what's inside the shard. Any guesses? Spoiler answers please. :D
-I'm relieved they didn't carelessly wander into the council room and set off the throne trap. Incinerating plot documents is real punishment for carelessness, but it would lack the drama of discovering just what Big AK is up to.
-I honestly didn't know how to run the Afrasiyab encounter. Had I put them in the room such that they were surprised by the PCs entering, it would not really give the PCs a sense of him being a competent assassin. One option I had was leaving him out altogether, but I really wanted to tie up the loose ends of Holden's character hook. One option I had was Afrasiyab pretending to be Captain Sorannah who SOMEHOW manages to get to the Fane, but that just strains credulity. I was so happy that the players practically gave me the scenario for the battle. I really didn't want them to get away with sleeping inside the Fane. Besides, Linny can only get her spells once every 24 hours.
-It looks like we're about two sessions from finishing depending on what the players do.

[Eldariel]

Lots of epic quotes this session. The corset has to win it all though. Also, nice progression. The encounters sound like they're actually doing their job rather well in making for tough fights without just plain blasting the party into oblivion.

[AslanCross]

I was afraid that the encounters would all be too easy---the cleric/ooze one was actually a bit of a breeze--but thankfully all of the encounters proved to be threatening in one way or another.

I'm really happy with their RPing, though. I can't wait for Lyka's original player to come back, though. She said she's going to be free for the last two sessions.

[Myshlaevsky]

I really, really enjoyed reading this session report. Thanks for posting it.

[AslanCross]

Thanks. I know the summary was kinda long this time, so I'm glad you took the time to read it.

So, does anyone have any guesses as to what the Voice in the shard is?

[Greenish]

Thanks. I know the summary was kinda long this timeNot long enough. We want more!

[Kol Korran]

that was excellent. i'm glad Holden got closure. i really like what you did with the Seal of Tiamat, that was a lovely touch. it's nice that your group actually keeps up tracking the calander. my groups hadn't.

[Zanticor]

Greetings from far away to the valiant players in the beautiful Philippines!
I have been following your exploits in the RHOD for a long time and want to egg you all on towards the end. My group finished our fane of Tiamat a bit quicker then you and I'm still not over the end game. I won't give it away but suffice to say that my halfling bard didn't leave it alive (instant death).

Now for my prediction: I hope its not a...:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v648/lightersideofthesnow/Ultroloth.jpg
Ultraloths are very bad!

Zanticor

[AslanCross]

Greetings from far away to the valiant players in the beautiful Philippines!
I have been following your exploits in the RHOD for a long time and want to egg you all on towards the end. My group finished our fane of Tiamat a bit quicker then you and I'm still not over the end game. I won't give it away but suffice to say that my halfling bard didn't leave it alive (instant death).

Now for my prediction: I hope its not a...:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v648/lightersideofthesnow/Ultroloth.jpg
Ultraloths are very bad!

Zanticor


Thanks for your support! Indeed I'd like them to move a bit faster, but I did add a little more challenge to it since I basically swapped out majority of the monstrous humanoid guards for outsiders instead to drive home the "Azarr Kul is summoning a devil legion" plot point.

On your guess:
Ultroloth is close, but not quite. Same CR bracket, though.

[Dusk Eclipse]

I bow before you AslanCross, your journal has given me excellent pointers on how to run the RHoD and also saved me from dying of bore (I was grounded yesterday) I read it all in one sitting and again I am impressed.

[Myshlaevsky]

I'll take a guess, then:

http://i871.photobucket.com/albums/ab273/Kologotov/Glabrezu.jpg
Glabrezu are also very bad.

[Fcannon]

Great update. I grinned at the cleverness of covering the turret with a tent, but I was cracking up when they thought to write Out of Order on it :smallbiggrin:

[Greenish]

(I was grounded yesterday)Can't be too careful with lightning.

I'll take a guess, then:

<picture>
Glabrezu are also very bad.Is that PF art I see there?

[Myshlaevsky]

Can't be too careful with lightning.
Is that PF art I see there?

I'm afraid it is. I was lazy enough to just grab it off of google images and I hate the picture in the manual.


Great update. I grinned at the cleverness of covering the turret with a tent, but I was cracking up when they thought to write Out of Order on it :smallbiggrin:

I think you mean (*ahem*, best fiendish voice...): "This pathetic machine is USELESS!"

[AslanCross]

I'll take a guess, then:

http://i871.photobucket.com/albums/ab273/Kologotov/Glabrezu.jpg
Glabrezu are also very bad.


Ding ding ding! It is indeed a glabrezu.

[Schylerwalker]

As usual, enjoying the journal immensely, and hoping we get an update soon! The duel with the naztharune was extremely intense.

[AslanCross]

Day 51. 5th Rhaan 998 YK

So...Holden's player is indisposed this time. Due to inclement weather, Nox's regular player couldn't make it. Lyka's player was supposed to make it, but she'd just had her wisdom teeth taken out and wasn't allowed by her parents. Oh well.

They kept in touch through Skype, but for the most part, Linny's player handled Holden and Lyka. One of the backup players showed up, so he handled Nox instead. Kikkeni was handled by her regular player.

Deadly Memories

We began where we left off. The PCs had just avenged Holden's wife by slaying the rakshasa assassin Afrasiyab, and had decided to leave the Fane to recover their daily abilities.

They decide to finally try to disable the spell turret, since they figured that someone would remove the covering while they were asleep. They didn't want the trap to slow them down again when they made their way back in.

Kikkeni pulls off a patch from her robe of useful items[/u]---a 24-foot ladder--and has Nox use this to climb up to the trap. As soon as he pulls off the tent, though, he fails his disable device check. The turret's red dragon head blasts the assassin with [i]phantasmal killer. He fails both saves and falls to the floor 20 feet below, quite dead.

Hearing the clatter of the falling ladder and the thump of Nox's falling body, Linny runs to his aid and immediately casts revivify on him. I warn the players that any deaths from now on are seriously difficult to remedy, and that if they get TPKed, it is a game over.

Sobered by the thought of their mortality, the players decide that they've had enough of the Fane for now and that further risking their lives to shut down the turret is pointless. They make a break for it, closing the central door behind them.

A Fitful Sleep

The PCs run across the bridge and climb back up the far side of the canyon, and rest in the hollow of the crashed Lyrandar airship. They nurse Nox back to working order, and get back in the next day.

Day 52
6th Rhaan 998 YK
The Charnel House

The PCs rush back in, and this time give the main hallway a wide berth. They decide to go for the left door, as they haven't opened that yet.

It takes them through a narrow passage with a side storeroom, but after seeing nothing of value in it, they press on and open the door at the other end. When Holden opens the door, a shocking sight greets him.

The room is pitch black. In front of the door is a large wooden mess table, with a thick layer of congealed blood smeared across the top. The constant sound of dripping liquid draws his gaze up, where a grisly sight greets him---a young bronze dragon, only about 15 feet long, hangs unceremoniously from meat hooks attached to the ceiling. Its belly is torn open and its entrails hang out, decaying and filling the room with a nauseating stench. Two other dragons of similar size, also bronze, hang from more chains around the room.

A huge pile of beds and tables--a barricade of some sort--blocks of almost the entire northern end of the chamber. At that moment, the chains above the PCs' heads jangle---something is hiding there. A chain-shrouded humanoid figure is hanging from the chains.

Linny identifies it as a kyton, a chain devil. While it's not immune to fire like baatezu are, it's instead immune to cold and uses chains as its primary method of attack. Before they're able to start opening fire on it, though, legion devils begin teleporting in around Lyka and begin attacking her, and once the PCs start thinking it the legion devils aren't so bad, whatever it is behind the barricade casts a spell on the area: cloudkill. Of course, the legion devils, being baatezu, are immune to the damage. The toxic gas begins taking its toll on the PCs. The chain devil then begins animating the meat hook chains and attacking Linny, but not before she drops devil blight on one of the legion devils.

Again the significant drawback of the legion devils bites: Holden smashes a single one with Divine Surge and all of them die. However, there's still the chain devil, which is clinging to the chains 20 feet above the PCs, and whatever it is hiding behind the barricade.

Lyka attempts to push the pile of furniture down, but fumbles. Linny dispels the cloudkill, but another casting takes its place. By now the PCs are hacking and coughing.

Nox, unable to do much damage to the chain devil (and not having the requisite anti-regeneration weapons), pulls out a scroll of recitation and buffs the party. Holden tears down part of the barricade, and Linny finally identifies the creature---a mezzoloth. After I'm done enumerating the long list of resistances and immunities, Kikkeni decides to trash the rest of the barrier.

A huge pile of beds and tables falls onto the mezzoloth, but it quickly picks itself up and dispels their buffs. Lyka, Nox and Holden close in on the fiend while the casters move out of the way of the rolling cloud of toxic gas.

Lyka's swings don't deal full damage to the yugoloth due to its DR, but Holden is able to crush it quickly enough. The chain devil is left, and its superior reach has already severely injured Linny, who retreats to just outside of the reach of the dancing chains. It attempts to use its unnerving visage on everyone, but they all make their saves.

Kikkeni decides to end it quickly. She asks Holden to drop Kumbhakarna's Penance, and then throws the maul along with Lyka at the chain devil. Amusingly enough, she crits with the hammer, which melts a large hole in the fiend's side, but misses with the thrown shifter. Lyka manages to land on the rotting dragon corpse.

Nox takes his shot, knocking out the fiend. Lyka picks up Holden's maul and crushes the fiend's head. The kyton breaks apart in a mass of rusty, crumbling chains.

The PCs realize that there are two more doors that lead out of the room. Nox pulls away the bed that's blocking one of them and realizes it opens out into the main corridor. He then decides to open the other door.

The Torture Chamber

Nox is unable to see inside, so Kikkeni hands him one of the darklights. What he sees inside sends chills down his spine.

Standing in the darkness is a 12-foot tall monstrosity that looks like a horribly distorted skeleton. Its long, distended skull sprouts twisted, antelope-like horns. A pair of shredded wings and a long, bony tail pokes out of the long, leather coat that it wears. In its hands it holds a long glaive that seems to be carved out of bone tipped a saw-toothed blade that emits a foul-smelling gray energy.

"A bone devil," says Linny---"a devil commonly employed as a torturer by devil lords." She also recalls that they possess powerful spell abilities that make them masters of battlefield control.

Instead of attacking them, however, the bone devil beckons.

"Ah, you have arrived. Do come in. You have nothing to fear. I have no intention of hurting you...yet. I was wondering if you could do a favor for me."

Holden shoves his way to the front of the line.

"What do ye want?"

"In the room at the other end of the complex is a nuisance that needs to be dealt with. You will find trapped inside a Khyber dragonshard a demon named Shabririv. I want you to slay it."

The party is silent.

"In exchange I am going to supply you with all the information you need to defeat Azarr Kul's plans."

They look at each other and eye the baatezu warily.

"You might be asking why I don't go and deal with it myself. The damaged dragonshard prison is going to suck me in. I would rather not be trapped in a prison with an enemy of mine for all eternity."

The party excuses themselves and deliberates on what to do. Nox is wary of the plans, but Holden and Lyka agree that stopping the Red Hand cult is the primary goal right now and that if disposing of a demon is going to help them, getting through to the end will be much easier. Kikkeni agrees as well, thinking that going blind into the lower fane is suicidal.

Holden goes up to Terilanyx and asks him what guarantee they have of his word, and the devil offers to draw up a contract signed in blood. Ultimately, Holden says that he has more in common with a lawful devil than a chaotic demon, and they negotiate on terms. Holden wants Terilanyx to avoid attacking them, but Terilanyx stipulates that neither of them is allowed to harm or in any way hinder the other party, and that any hostile actions will automatically void the contract. If the party brings Terilanyx the skull of Shabririv, then he will show them the quickest route through the rest of the Fane and give them detailed information on what awaits them later.

After a last-minute debate, Holden signs the contract.

The Power of Chaos

As a show of good faith, Terilanyx informs them that Shabririv is a glabrezu--a fiend of about his level in terms of power. He tells them that glabrezu are masters of subversion and corruption, but that they are equally as dangerous in physical and magical combat.

The party arrives at Shabririv's prison. At once the demon senses their presence and asks them if they've considered his offer. Holden bluffs, saying that they've decided to set him free, but the demon merely says that Holden's a very bad liar. Holden and Lyka take their positions beside the dais the shard is on, while Linny, Kikkeni and Nox stand apart close to the doorway.

Holden shatters the prison, and the PCs are surprised to realize just how big Shabririv is. The exploding shard knocks Holden and Lyka off the dais as the others look on.

"You're going to regret this. I shall feast on your innards!"

Lyka immediately pushes her way into the demon's space (as he snugly fits the dais), and jumps over the demon, attempting to cleave him with her sword. Vaanon'gan cleaves into demonic flesh, but the fiend is still more than capable.

Kikkeni picks up the head of the shattered Bahamut statue with her telekinetic thrust and flings it at Shabririv's head. He almost bats it away with his pincer, but Kikkeni is able to spin it just enough to send it crashing home.

Before Holden is able to hit with his own attack, though (his slow speed is once more his downfall), Shabririv sends Kikkeni spiralling into the ceiling with reverse gravity. She immediately activates her catfall power, preventing herself from being smashed into a gory paste on the ceiling.

Linny fires off a sound lance, but fails to penetrate the fiend's metaphysical defenses.

Kikkeni greases the spot underneath Shabririv's feet, sending the demon sprawling.
The two warriors try to attack, but Lyka misses her swing, and before Holden can do anything, Shabririv also blasts them with reverse gravity, then gets back up on his feet.
Unable to hold onto anything, the two warriors fall 70 feet up into the carved stone ceiling. Holden's Boots of Landing help him land gingerly upside-down on the ceiling (albeit still taking some damage), while Lyka gets smashed pretty badly.

Linny posits that if they leave the gravity field, they'd be able to get back into regular gravity. She then begins casting her favorite fiendbuster spell, Light of Venya. Lyka leaps out of the field, tumbling to reduce her falling damage and to avoid Shabririv's AOO, but she fails her last check. The demon plucks her right out of the air with his pincer, and she takes damage from the sudden stop to boot. He then begins to crush the life out of Lyka.

Holden tries to find a way to get down, but due to his weight with the new maul, Kikkeni could no longer afford the PP cost to fling him. Nox finally takes his shot against the still flat-footed fiend, and just before Shabririv snaps Lyka like a twig, Linny vaporizes the fiend's physical form with her Light of Venya. Shabririv's skull falls onto the ground with a heavy thud as the rest crumbles to dust.

Holden and Kikkeni are then dumped unceremoniously to the floor.

After some healing, they drag the fiend's head back to Terilanyx.

To the Next Stage

After the baatezu torturer sees proof of his tanar'ri rival's demise, Terilanyx fulfills his end of the bargain.

He explains that one of the cells in his lair has a secret passage that leads straight to the lower Fane. The first area they will arrive in is the great hall that Azarr Kul holds worship ceremonies in honor of Tiamat. He notes that Azarr Kul's pet abyssal drake is kept here, along with its mezzoloth handlers.

A secret door from there leads on into the great cavern that was once the home of the ancient bronze dragon that once guarded this Fane. Its children, too young to know the original purpose of the complex, were easily slain by the Red Hand cultists and their dragons as they invaded. Now the cavern is home to the greatest of Azarr Kul's dragonspawn.

Even deeper in is the Outer Sanctum, heavily guarded and populated by cultists who are supporting Azarr Kul's main ritual. A secret door here would lead to Azarr Kul's private quarters and his treasury.

The PCs will find Azarr Kul and his planar orrery in the inner sanctum.

The fiend asks the PCs if they have any more questions, and simply vanishes, telling them it was a pleasure doing business with them.

The Great Temple of Tiamat
The PCs take the secret passageway and enter the cavernous temple. Before they're able to make any preparations, they notice that everything was indeed as Terilanyx had said: two mezzoloths were standing in the alcoves at the far end of the room, and in the largest alcove, behind the altar, was an enormous, black scaled wyvern with fiery red eyes. The abyssal drake stirs and takes to the air.

Four heavyset, eyeless doglike creatures encased in armor---canoloths---lunge strait for the PCs.

Almost immediately one of the mezzoloths drops a cloudkill on the PCs, and the canoloths make a beeline for them. Although the canoloths have blindsight, the foul-smelling cloudkill vapors prevent them from fighting at their full ability. The drake flies overhead and blasts everyone with its unholy fire breath, but Kikkeni manages to activate her Intellect Fortress and helps the party avoid being crisped. The blast, however, incinerates one of the canoloths.

The PCs try to get out of the cloudkill as fast as they can, while the Canoloths pursue. The other mezzoloth uses its produce flame ability to continuously bombard the PCs with thrown flaming projectiles.

Kikkeni, wanting to avoid any more trouble from the drake, attempts something: she extends the full force of her psionic power and fires off a psychic crush on the abyssal drake---which fails its save. The massive beast crumples onto the wooden pews, splintering them as it falls. Heartened by the drake's demise, the rest of the party continues to fight the Canoloths.

The yugoloth attack dogs aren't able to do much against the PCs, though Lyka and Linny do get snagged by their adhesive tongues. Nobody fails the paralysis saves, however.

Kikkeni and Nox take cover in the double doorway; the sniper taunts one of the mezzoloths into attacking him. The fiend teleports right behind the two of them and begins lunging at Nox with its trident. Nox draws a bane dagger from his gauntlet of infinite blades and feints; the mezzoloth falls for it, and the rogue shanks the fiend.

Lyka and Holden take down the last of the canoloths as Kikkeni attempts to distance herself from the mezzoloth that just teleported behind them. The other mezzoloth, still on the alcove, continues to bombard the PCs with its thrown projectiles. Lyka and Nox decide to take down the injured mezzoloth quickly, while Kikkeni throws Holden at the flame-producing mezzoloth. As the dwarf sails through the air, though, he notices that very close to the fiend's alcove is a secret door hidden in the wall.

Nox sneaks his mezzoloth, killing it, and Kikkeni throws Lyka at the last one. The two Silver Flamers take down the last fiend.

Thoughts
-I really enjoyed the Shabririv encounter, as short as it was. I found it a bit amusing how easy it was to frustrate the tanks by simply putting them on the ceiling (or having the monsters on the ceiling).
-I had a feeling they'd just kill both Shabririv and Terilanyx, but apparently they decided to let him off without any real difficulty. I'd boosted Terilanyx with a few swordsage levels, so he was actually the same CR as Shabririv, but I guess they found Shabririv's size a lot more intimidating.
-The players now really, really hate Cloudkill. I'm amazed at how effective it is, considering nobody ever failed their saves against it.
-I had expected the Abyssal Drake to die relatively quickly, but not THAT quickly.

Sorry for the late post; I've transferred to a new job and I'm still in the process of adjusting. We had our final session yesterday; expect the last update within a few hours.

[Greenish]

Holy smelly grey energy, batman!

[Eldariel]

Cloudkill: Ignoring successful saves since 2000! Yeah, it's a great spell for tough guys; always does something (except against Druids) without actually insta-gibbing folk.

Quite the combat marathon, as is to be expected with the Fane. What exactly did they do with the Turret in the end? Did they just ignore it or something?

[AslanCross]

Eldariel> They just went around it using Terilanyx's secret passage.

Anyway, I'm sorry if this post is a bit of a cliffhanger. Leaving for church in a bit, so here's the first half of the entry for the final session.


Everyone is able to make it this time, and they're mostly able to bargain with their parents to let them stay until about 5:30 pm. The only exception is Lyka's player, who still had to leave early as she was simply hitching a ride. No matter; we're all here and this is the final session, and I sure hope you enjoy it as we did.

The Fury of the Storm


"After this, I'm gonna need a vacation," Holden grumbles.

In the temple of Tiamat, the party debates about whether they should rest or not. For some reason they forget exactly what Terilanyx says about the rest of the dungeon, despite Linny's player taking down notes. Thanks to JRPGs, he assumes that the big double doors that lead out of the worship chamber lead to "the boss battle." ~_~

Thus, they check the secret door. To their surprise, it opens into inky darkness. The only sound is the vague whistling of wind from somewhere. Kikkeni brings out her darklight and reveals that they had just entered a vast, vaulted cavern even larger than the temple chamber---it soars to over 175 feet high, but the interior is uneven: half way across the chamber from them is a vast cliff that goes up at least 150 feet, and a rickety scaffolding supports what looks like a hastily-built staircase.

Uneasy about exploring the rest of the cavern, Holden mentions they should rest first. Kikkeni wants to check the other door.

Wanting to scout before they retreat, Nox drinks his potion of invisibility, but since going up will take over a minute, he asks for a Psionic Fly from Kikkeni's staff instead. He heads up on his own. As he goes up, he notices that an enormous network of webbing is anchored to the scaffolding and is on level with the top of the cliff. He picks out a campfire from his Survival Pouch once more and sets fire to the web, which begins burning rapidly. Soon after, he hears a piercing, chittering shriek----and the sound of a very long, large sword being drawn.

"I TOLD YOU WE SHOULD'VE GONE TO SLEEP FIRST!" whispers Holden.
"Dibs on the sword," Lyka replies.

However, Holden tells Lyka that they have to go up, but she refuses. "Sir, I believe this qualifies as sending a subordinate to her death! When we get back to Thrane, I am so filing a complaint!"

As the web barrier burns away, Nox spots the monsters above: a monstrous, black spider the size of a full-grown bull, with a distorted, draconic head and distinctive forward-curving horns: a blackspawn gloomweaver. The other creature worries everyone: a 20-foot tall, musclebound humanoid figure wielding a gigantic bastard sword that crackles with electricity.

"It's a bluespawn godslayer," says Linny.

Holden and Lyka fly up slowly, halfway up between Nox and the ground.

Nox tells the others to stay low while he tries to snipe the godslayer. He's confident that the monsters can't reach far enough to attack him, so he goes up alone and takes the shot.

He scores a solid hit on the godslayer, but the brute simply yanks out the bolt in its chest and---horror of horrors---runs toward him and jumps a solid FORTY FEET across empty space towards Nox. It makes a touch attack, grabbing him right out of the air, and they fall to the floor 150 feet below.

Nox lands on the cave floor with a sickening crunch, at 1 HP. The godslayer, damaged by the fall, sets its sights on Linny and Kikkeni, who are isolated on the cave floor.

Holden and Lyka look at each other, wondering why this is even happening, as the party had agreed that they didn't want to go up. Lyka sees the blade, however, and says "Dibs on the blade!" once more.
"But ye can't even wield it!"
"It will look good on my roof."

Linny fires off a Sound Lance, but rolls rather poorly and the beast saves against it. Kikkeni, attempting to end the encounter quickly, manifests Death Urge, but the godslayer shrugs it off.

The Gloomweaver sprints across the cliff shelf and lands 10 feet away from Linny and Kikkeni.

Holden and Lyka charge the godslayer, but only Holden is able to deal any significant damage to the furious creature.

Nox, still on the ground, realizes that any movements he make will be met with a massive, electrically-charged sword to the face, so he delays his turn.

The godslayer angrily roars, drops its shield, and swings its sword in an enormous arc across Holden and Lyka, dealing enormous damage to both of them. Lyka decides it's time to end this, and cuts it in half with Soaring Raptor Strike.

The Gloomweaver charges and gores Linny with its horns, but the two tanks come in and take it down quickly.

The party decides they've had enough for the day, and make a break for their resting place outside the Fane.

Lyka and Nox finally level up to 12. Lyka takes her last level in Warblade, picks Stormguard Warrior as her Lv 12 feat and takes the maneuver Rabid Bear Strike, while Nox takes one level of Swordsage.

Day 53. 7th Rhaan 998 YK.

The Avatar of Rage (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oQLUXVa5CwE)

It's dangerously close to the secret time limit that I've set (Day 55), but the PCs (and the players) are determined to finish this once and for all--they've gotten this far.

They enter the Fane a third time and find that it is eerily empty. The remaining clerics and personnel have all boarded themselves up within the Outer Sanctum, and are all functioning off Lesser Restoration spells to avoid the effects of fatigue. The ritual must be completed.

The PCs reach the large cavern without any resistance, and begin climbing up. Nox goes up the stairs first, and sees the bright light spilling out of the carved hallway at the upper end of the cavern. The party manages to sneak close to the entrance of the Outer Sanctum without being heard---even Holden manages to roll high. The two frontliners take up positions on either side of the Sanctum, while Linny, Nox and Kikkeni position themselves as far as they could from the entrance of the hallway, outside the darkness.

The light clearly illuminates seven figures inside: in a circular room stand five hobgoblin clerics, wearing the relatively simple outfits that the low-level clerics the party had been fighting since the start wore. They have their hands outstretched upwards, and the Tiamat heads in the dais they stand on spew multicolored energy into the ceiling above. Two larger hobgoblins stand closer to the hallway, one in ornate robes and a breastplate, the other in full plate wielding a greatsword.

Nox decides to open up with the trinket he pulled off Kharn's corpse: The Dhakaani Siege diadem. An enormous fireball lights up the interior of the cul-de-sac at the end of the hallway, and the five clerics die instantly.

Seemingly unaffected, the figure in robes turns around, and its form changes: it grows to at least 12 feet tall, its burly arms swelling with muscle. Its head morphs into the black-furred, tiger-like head of a Naityan rakshasa, but instead of orange stripes it has twisted, bronze-colored stripes fashioned like dragonmarks. Six horns jut out of its head and jaws, and a pair of bronze-colored wings extends from its back. In its hands, it holds an enormous chain of black metal that looks like it could be used to tether an elephant.

Linny recalls that as Tiamat is a demon overlord, she is served by her own cadre of rakshasa agents. Particularly skilled and successful rakshasa are given the chance to undergo a ritual that bestows upon them the power of dragons. This one is probably the ringleader of the rakshasa cell.

"I've been waiting. It's time for you to die."

Kikkeni blasts the greatsword-wielding crusader and the rakshasa with a fiery energy line, badly scorching the already injured crusader. However, the rakshasa is completely unscathed by this as well. Nox takes a shot against the still flat-footed crusader, severely injuring him, but the crusader breaks the bolt in his chest and gets back up, declaring that he would serve Indravan until his death.

Linny casts Sound Lance on the crusader, killing him.

Nox uses a wand of sniper's shot and readies to snipe the rakshasa, while Kikkeni blasts it one more time, again to no effect. Lyka readies to attack anything that gets into her range, while Holden decides to charge in.

The rakshasa swings at him with his spiked chain, bashing Holden as he comes in, but the crusader isn't stopped. He rolls an impressive 35 on his attack roll, and he thinks his blow strikes home, but the rakshasa simply snaps his chain tight and stops Holden's maul dead cold.

At this point the party is shocked that such a high roll didn't make the target's AC.

The rakshasa holds up a fist, and a ring on his finger glows with fell power. A pair of large greatswords--each over 9 feet long--unsheathe themselves from the scabbards on the rakshasa's back.

"I am Indravan-Yagna, the avatar of rage!"

The two greatswords burst into flames.

Indravan sprints for the cavern, and while Holden swings at him thanks to Thicket of Blades, he misses badly. Just as Indravan is about to pass Lyka, who is still hidden at the lip of the hallway, the rakshasa lord vanishes in a cloud of shadowy motes---and reappears right in front of Nox, Linny and Kikkeni, practically pinning them against the cavern wall.

Imagine looking up at a 12-foot tall, 800-pound, musclebound tiger-dragon-fiend wielding a spiked chain made of the hardest metal in existence, with two flaming bits of metal taller than you hovering around him.

The players realize just then that this encounter isn't going to be easy.

[ka_bna]

Anyway, I'm sorry if this post is a bit of a cliffhanger. [...] No matter; we're all here and this is the final session, and I sure hope you enjoy it as we did.

If?! Well, it is, and I hope to enjoy it just a little more when I read the conclusion!:smallbiggrin:

[Myshlaevsky]

Been looking forward to this update. Looking forward to the final conclusion even more!

[Eldariel]

Gonna be an epic fight. Though he's severely outnumbered.

[Zephyros]

Excellent job really... (also I'd like to see Indravan's stat-block he seems inpired :P )

[Barbarian MD]

Come on, man! We're on the edge of our seats!

[AslanCross]

The Avatar of Rage, continued


Nox tumbles between the rakshasa lord's feet and runs the hell away, going as far into the sanctum hallway as he can--provoking AOOs from such a big target is just insane.

Despite the terror she faces, Lyka charges at Indravan, attempting to distract him long enough for the others to get away. She gets whacked by the rakshasa's chain, and simply bounces off his leg as she swings Vaanon'Gan. Kikkeni senses the opening and teleports herself and Linny onto the dais in the sanctum, leaving Lyka to face the fiend alone. Linny fires of a Dispel Magic at Indravan, disenchanting the swords, which pierce the ground with a solid "thunk."

"It's just you and me, little puppy," growls Indravan. "And I can use this more than once."
His ring glows oncemore, and the blades reanimate.
"I'm more of a kitten than a puppy," manages Lyka before the Grand Talon of Tiamat throttles her with his chain. Lyka gets smacked by the first hit. The second hit catches her off balance, throwing her to the ground, and Indravan's follow-up injures her severely.

Then come the greatswords. Lyka is able to roll out of the way for one, but the other sears a horrible wound into her flesh. On the ground and in great pain, Lyka thinks fast, and so do the other party members as they look on the shifter's valiant but foolhardy attempt to save the softies.

Holden decides to stand his ground, and Lyka yells at him, calling him a coward for earlier sending her to her death and now not coming to her rescue when she needs it. He says "I'm being tactical!" as the others roll their eyes and consolidate their new battle line.

Kikkeni pulls in Lyka with Telekinetic Thrust (I know it's not necessarily a valid use for Telekinetic Thrust, an attack power, but I let her do it anyway), who sails up past Holden and into the rear where Linny can heal her. Linny brings her back up to decent HP.

Just when they thought they had the advantage of position, Indravan changes form---his face morphs to that of a large, snarling hound with a fiery aura--and snaps his wings mightily, closing the distance between him and the party in one leap. He flies over Holden's head, and although Holden tries to take a swipe, it just doesn't do anything.

Indravan lands in the center of the party's line, separating the casters from the frontliners. Much swearing erupts once more around the table.
Nox pores over his scrolls quickly and pulls out the only thing he can use effectively--Web.

The sticky gunk immediately starts burning as it makes contact with Indravan's greatswords, and Indravan succeeds on his reflex (in fact he doesn't fail a single save the entire encounter), but the entangled condition takes effect and takes his lofty AC and attack bonus a notch or two. Nox then runs away, making sure not to get smacked. Unfortunately, the web entangles Lyka as well, which leaves her in a pinch. Her AC is penalized, she's entangled, and the web is on fire (though she doesn't take any damage thanks to her Dragonhide bracers).

With the rakshasa lord entangled, Kikkeni teleports with both Lyka and Linny to the relative safety of the cavern, leaving Holden alone. Lyka gets herself back up with her Healing Belt and now laughs at Holden, who is left to face Indravan on his own. Her laughter doesn't last long, however, as Indravan's searing aura goes from heat haze to blast furnace. The flame leaps onto his chain, and in an elegant demonstration of grace and power despite his size, Indravan unleashes his wrath on Holden.

The first chain swing rips hard into his chest and is enough to fill up Holden's damage pool and then some. The second misses, but the third tears a huge gash across his face. Both of the swords rise above Holden's head and each impale the dwarf diagonally through his clavicles. The blades magically extricate themselves from the crusader's body, and he dies before he hits the flagstones.

The players look at each other in stunned silence. The tanks, one of whom has just died, are useless, the sniper can't get a good shot, and the casters can't do much. There's just no way Linny can get to Holden's body in time to Revivify him on her own power. Kikkeni then realizes that since her turn comes right before Linny's she can teleport him half the way---though she still has to stand within Indravan's mighty 20-foot reach.

Nox makes a run for the rakshasa, and when the others ask him if he's out of his mind, he says grimly: "You need a distraction, right?"

Conjuring up his newfound swordsage powers, Nox snaps a Shadow Garrotte at the rakshasa's neck and slices through his fur and skin, injuring the now furious fiend for the first time.

Lyka hangs back, while Kikkeni teleports with Linny to within touch range of Holden, and then runs as far as she can go away from Indravan's whirling chain. Linny manages to make the check to cast her Revivify spell on Holden.

The tiger fiend, seeing everyone lined up, unleashes his lightning breath weapon on Kikkeni, Nox and Linny. Nox withdraws and readies a deadeye shot, and Kikkeni drops an Energy Ball on Indravan (taking care not to fry the newly-revived Holden). However, he saves successfully and his fire resistance (from Flame's Blessing stance), so the party begins assuming he actually has immunity. Linny risks the AOO and blasts Indravan with a Sound Lance, visibly damaging his chest and tattering his robes.

Before the rakshasa lord is able to get off another attack, Holden draws a Divine Surge, spins his maul along its haft, and smashes Indravan in the chest.

In a spray of gore and in an enormous explosion of silver fire, Indravan's body is shattered and his spirit is sucked shrieking back to Khyber.

The party eagerly looks over the loot, but unfortunately they realize that everything is one size too big to use effectively in the final battle. Nox, however, picks up Indravan's ring of dancing swords and the two greatswords.

The Treasury

Going by Terilanyx's word, Nox examines the walls for the secret door and finds it after taking 20.

They enter the hallway and first try the summoning room (enlarged on my map, since it was far too small in the book's map to accommodate creatures of Shabririv's and the godslayer's size). As Linny explains the purpose of the circle, Holden decides to break it to prevent any further summonings.

They then take the door to Azarr Kul's quarters.

Azarr Kul's Erinyes concubines, already alerted by the tremor caused by Indravan's death, see the interlopers, and immediately teleport away.

"...crap," the party says in unison, forgetting that Indravan's rather spectacular death would have alerted everyone in the Fane anyway.

They examine the rich furnishings of the chamber, and take particular interest in Azarr Kul's ornate Tiamat hookah.

OOC, Nox's player tells Holden's player:
"Dude, it's a bong."
"...dibs on the bong."

The girls wonder why on earth Holden's going to take a 50-pound (How big IS that thing?) bong all the way back to Thrane, but the dwarf says he's going to keep it so he can urinate on it.

Nox finds the five keys hidden within Azarr Kul's bed, then recalls Terilanyx's info on the hidden treasury. After a further 20 minutes, he finds the entrance, and they walk right into the chamber, guarded by a barbed devil and a nycaloth.

At this point, Lyka's player had to go home, so Linny's player handled her for the rest of the fight.

The PCs rush the two fiends, but Lyka triggers the trap. The party doesn't have much trouble with the fiends, though--although Lyka gets grappled (Is it a furry thing? I don't know. She always seems to be the first to get grappled---maybe because she's always faster than Holden). Kikkeni manages to grease the Nycaloth, and since it stays on the ground to avoid the blast trap, Nox is able to sneak attack it with Indravan's flaming greatswords, using up the ring's last daily charge.

With the fiends dead, Nox attempts to disarm the blast trap, almost killing himself in the process by failing once. He succeeds a second time, though, and haphazardly opens the rest of the chests without bothering to disarm the traps---he saves successfully each time, avoiding the damage.

The party assesses the contents of the chests and determines that there's nothing they really need immediately except for the massive potion stash in the green chest. I regretfully inform them that I forgot to change the contents of the blue chest, and that its current contents consist of vendor trash.

Understanding my place and accepting my apology, the group decides to push on. They burn up all their last wand charges to heal back up to full.

Into the Inner Sanctum

Seeing that the only way up is through the shaft in the Outer Sanctum, the party decides to use Kikkeni's Psionic Fly from the Horn of Abithriax.

The party ascends as one, gulping down potions along the way. As they crest the lip of the shaft, the awesome sight of the Inner Sanctum greets them.

The large, oval-shaped chamber is over 50 feet high in the center, and it floor is decorated with a grisly sight---hundreds of fossilized dragon bones. Thousands upon thousands of candles in Tiamat's five colors are perched on every conceivable nook and cranny, but their light is eclipsed by three things: the glaring colors of the enormous aberrant dragonmarks etched all over the dome, the energy arcs pouring from the five 15-foot tall dragon heads centered around the dais, and the glow of the portal itself.

Azarr Kul's Planar Orrery, made of polished black adamantine and composed of numerous arms, gears, and glowing magical spheres, hangs from the middle of the ceiling like some kind of monstrous chandelier. The portal, surrounded by glowing, twisted versions of the 12 Dragonmarks, yawns in the center of the Orrery.

The Erinyes the party had seen earlier stand with their bows at the ready on the 20-foot high balcony.

Azarr Kul, in all his glory, stands before them in the center of the dais, standing even taller than Kharn. His armor and robes are an immaculate white, contrasting sharply with his blue scales, and he holds in one hand an enormous mace capped with five dragon heads facing in three directions. A large shield hovers around him.

"I knew you would come," says the high priest calmly.

The party falls silent.

"You've slaughtered everyone in your way. Anyone who opposed you was crushed and defeated---just like what I did to those who stood in my way. What makes you any different from me?"

"I just want to help people," says Linny.
"I only do what I have to," replies Nox.
Holden offers perhaps the most solid reply of all: "F***. YOU."

"If we are all ready to kill, then there is only one thing we need to do from hereon."

Hexagrammaton (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pfI3KWr8XPU )

Lyka leads the charge, soaring over the steps of the dais and cleaving straight through the cleric's armor. The figment dissolves as Azarr Kul's chuckle echoes around the entire chamber. Holden swears and flies around, and so do the others. Kikkeni raises her Inertial Armor first, then flies to the balcony.

All the while, the Erinyes open fire, attempting in vain to shoot Kikkeni. (I knew I should have given them a couple of Fighter levels) The PCs take positions on the balcony in an attempt to engage the Erinyes until Kikkeni manages to activate her Psionic True Seeing. She spies Azarr Kul on the ledge, casting spells.

Holden immediately attempts to charge in his direction, but he smashes against an impenetrable barrier: Antilife Shell. Seeing that it's impossible to get close enough, Kikkeni suggests that the party begin breaking down the statues on the ledge for her to use as Telekinetic Thrust ammunition.

Before Holden is able to move, though, Azarr Kul stretches his scepter toward Holden, and Holden feels a powerful assault on his mind. He rolls once, sees that the roll was low, and uses Zealous Surge to immediately reroll---coming up with the exact same result.

I announce to the party that Holden has just been dominated, drawing gasps from everyone.

The party debates quickly what to do---Kikkeni can use Psionic Dominate through the Horn of Abithriax, but I rule that she has to make a Psicraft check to oppose Azarr Kul's Spellcraft check to see which command takes precedence. Since Kikkeni had few ranks in Psicraft, her player decides against it and decides to blast the Erinyes instead.

Holden hears a voice in his head telling him to gain great glory for the Silver Flame, to embark on an epic crusade and slaughter fiends of untold number. The voice tells him to journey to Shavarath---and that it's as simple as stepping through the portal. The dwarf begins hovering toward the portal, stopping right before the entrance.

Linny, with nothing left to do, casts Wall of Force on the same plane as the portal, blocking it.

Nox does battle with the Erinyes, meanwhile, attacking one with Shadow Garrotte.

Kikkeni wonders what would happen if she disintegrates the portal, since Psionic disintegrate automatically destroys 10 cu. Ft of nonliving matter, but her knowledge checks tell her that doing so will probably set off a chain reaction that will at the very least kill all of them in a massive explosion, at worst, will destroy the entire Shard Seal. She instead fires off an energy ball at Azarr Kul, injuring him slightly, but she notes that her PP total is already critical.

The party is unable to do much despite Kikkeni knowing where Azarr Kul is, and decide to go about breaking statues. Nox and Linny attack the two Erinyes, while Holden and Lyka dislodge the statues for Kikkeni to throw.

This strategy proves fruitless as well---Kikkeni wastes more PP throwing the statues, which Azarr Kul's shield blocks effortlessly.

Azarr Kul casts Visage of the Deity, completing his buffs, so Kikkeni tells Lyka to go dispel him---her only option now is an area dispel, since she can't target him. Linny fires off her final Dispel Magic for the day, and Azarr Kul's Visage of the Deity spell is torn asunder.

The players begin to wonder when Azarr Kul will attack, and at this point the fight has gone on for several rounds (we lost count) already.

Nox takes down the two devils along with Lyka, but the high priest finally attacks---making a beeline for Linny and bashing hard clean across the face. Holden, seeing the Antilife Shell is down, runs to Linny's aid. Lyka cleaves the last statue off its mounting, and Kikkeni uses her quickly dwindling energy to hurl it at Azarr Kul, again to no effect.

Linny stumble-hovers away and sacrifices her prepared Cometfall spell to unlock her staff's ultimate power: The Quill of Aureon enables her to tap the entire metaphysical library of magic in Eberron, and she does it to just get the one spell she really needs: Greater Dispel Magic.

The powerful abjuration shatters all of Azarr Kul's wards and buffs, returning him to his normal state. With all his hard work gone, the cleric curses Linny and angrily smites her out of the air---ironically enough, with his own Cometfall.

A 400-lb icy boulder smashes Linny, tossing her like a rag doll. The cleric hits the floor hard and breathes her last.

Lyka flies into a rage at the death of her friend, and shifts as well. She and Holden charge Azarr Kul together, easily making his now lowered-AC. (Nox misses his readied shot, though) The cleric, however, has Divine Justice enabled, and answers Holden's strike with his own crushing blow.

Completely out of PP, Kikkeni hangs back and reverts to using her Dorje of Energy Ray.

Holden, however, is able to get in an extremely lucky shot---White Raven Strike. With the cleric unable to act, Nox and Lyka cut him down.

"That was too easy," they think.

And they are right. Azarr Kul's Fortunate Fate spell triggers.

Death Dragon

At this point, in real life, a tremendous thunderstorm breaks out over the city, adding awesome atmosphere to the session.

The five dragon heads' energy arcs link to form a massive pentagram of light, and this mass collapses and leaps into the high priest's ruined body.

"Tiamat's plans are not so easily sundered," he says as he stands up, drawing a scroll.

As the priest invokes the scroll's words of fell power, a vortex of negative energy rises up around Azarr Kul, wreathing him in blackness. The fossilized dragon bones embedded in the floor come loose, and spiral into the field of necro-energy. Azarr Kul has just cast Death Dragon (although the players don't know this as Linny is dead).

Now encased in a powersuit of fossilized dragonbone and negative energy, Azarr Kul flies up to engage his assailants.

His AC has now risen to a massive 39, and only the most spirited blows can get past his defenses. Azarr Kul attacks Lyka first, his mere touch rupturing her skin and blood vessels all over. She angrily responds with a Rabid Bear Strike, supplements it with Vaanon'Gan's bloodfeeding power, and cleaves off more than a third of AK's HP.

Nox is henceforth unable to make any shots get through, and attempts to get his Shadow Garrotte back.
Holden attacks Azarr Kul with all his fury, but nothing gets through. The cleric rolls a natural 20, confirms it with ANOTHER natural 20. He grabs Holden by the neck, and with a single word, practically exsanguinates him.

Holden, now in the negatives, falls from the air, and in our minds---to his death.

However, thanks to his Diehard feat (Crusader FTW) and his Boots of Landing, he takes NO damage from the fall and lands just fine and dandy at -3 HP, still able to act. He quickly activates his Belt of Healing to absorb the damage from his damage pool, and Kikkeni rushes to help him out. She force-feeds him one of the remaining potions.

Azarr Kul addresses Holden: "You have seen the face of death. What did you see?"
"I've seen it before, alright. And I'm not afraid of it anymore."

The cleric smites Lyka this time, but she's able to save against the Inflict Critical Wounds, and continues her attacks---using up the last of her action points, she's able to make her shots count this time.

Kikkeni is able to deal humble but still helpful damage with her Dorje, and finally, Holden lands a Bonecrusher.

Azarr Kul's armor shatters, and his body flies backward and into the wall of the balcony.

Slumped against the wall, with all of his internal organs shattered, Azarr Kul weakly lifts his head and speaks one last time.

"Tiamat...my lady...you have heard my prayers."

The cleric's eyes close and he dies with a smile on his face. The remaining energy from his body is sucked toward the portal. The portal glows brightly once, and then everything in the room goes pitch black.

Manifest

Soft light begins creeping back into the room---the candles are coming back on, one by one, but their flames each begin to twist into strange shapes---dragonmarks. Before long, the entire sanctum is illuminated by ten thousand glowing dragonmarks, pulsing with the colors of Tiamat.

The Hymn of Tiamat Triumphant (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_nYwHXJY-7s)

The portal flares back to life, and the orrery spins rapidly out of control. The scenes on the other side of the portal shift rapidly between planes until the PCs notice that they're now looking at the continents of Eberron.

The image in the portal dissolves into a horrifying sight: a great deep pit, surrounded with the Tiamat dragon heads, but this time the heads are at least four hundred feet tall. All around the pit is a mighty army of dragons, beginning to gather.

The image shifts one last time, diving into the pit, and finally the PCs are face-to-face with their arch-nemesis: Tiamat, now stirring within her prison.

The Daughter of Khyber looks straight at them through the portal, and begins to smash through the portal.

Crash. Crash. Crash.

CRASH.

The claw pierces through the portal, finally, and the orrery and the ceiling disintegrate in a brilliant flash of energy as the talon crashes into the dais.

The PCs now have a clear view of the night sky above, and it's on fire with vast auroras scintillating in two straight lines---presumably the lines of the great Prison Seal---and in a miles-wide halo right above them.

However, with the orrery shattered and its energy expended, the portal slams shut, cutting off Tiamat's arm.

The limb falls to the floor of the chamber and begins to change shape into---guess what? A five-headed dragon.

Sadly, this battle is anticlimactic since I just used the stock stats. Kikkeni greases the ground beneath the Aspect's feet, and everybody gets to swing once before she's able to get off a full attack.

She sprays Nox and Kikkeni with her fire breath, but they save. Kikkeni, now in Pearl of Black Doubt, gets boosted AC from the first two missed hits, and only gets mildly injured.

Lyka finally cleaves the Aspect of Tiamat in two across the chest.

The gaping wounds of the Aspect do not spray blood, but a ghastly, garish light. The Aspect speaks:

"I am eternal. I am immortal. Your victory will be short-lived. The plans of the Daughter of Khyber are rarely sundered so easily."

The Aspect slowly dissolves into massive currents of energy that are sucked back into the aurora halo above them.

With a tremendous explosion that lights up the night sky like day for miles, the Great Prison Seal resets.

Eberron is safe for now.


Final Thoughts

To close this journal, I'd like to leave with a few final thoughts:

1. I'm really happy my group enjoyed this as much as I did, and I think I was able to meet their expectations of an epic war story. It's awesome how in the end, everyone had their moments of glory, and that nobody left the table feeling that they didn't do anything.
2. Some spells are vastly underrated. I never thought Death Dragon would be this good, but a CL 13 at-will Inflict Critical Wounds with a 7th-level spell save DC still deals massive damage.
3. I'm just so happy that everything turned out in the end, and I thank all of you for your support. I don't think I'd have had the drive to finish this without you guys.
4. There are actually plot hooks left open: Shabririv wants revenge, Terilanyx is loose, and Nox still has that contract to fulfill. Who knows, we might have a sequel someday.
5. I actually owe my players an epilogue, but that will have to wait.
6. I'm planning on converting all of this to an actual story (like the first entry) eventually, but that will be a project that will take some time. See my Wordpress for this at eberronrhod.wordpress.com. I would appreciate your comments.

[Eldariel]

Wow. Nice Greater Dispel, there. Really came at the clutch moment. I'm kinda surprised Indravan went down so "easily"; having only taken one round's worth of damage - but then again, that was a lot of hits over the round. I predicted being so outnumbered would be his downfall!

Azarr Kul fight was very nice overall; it's amazing they were able to take him down so spent. Too bad about the Aspect of Tiamat; that could've been epic but c'est la vie. And if you pulled off the stops, it would've probably been too much, what with all their resources spent already.


Will be looking forward to the epilogue...and even the possible sequel. We'll see. They are, as far as Eberron goes, worldshaking in terms of power now. That could be interesting.

As for the story...I'll get to that another time. Was a pleasure reading all this; glad you got it to a satisfying finale!

[AslanCross]

They were having difficulty getting up to Indravan's AC of 38, but he only has about 139 HP. They've dealt far more than that in one round before, so it's understandable. My log shows he only took four hits: Shadow Garrote, Divine Surge, and at least one Sound Lance, probably two---I do remember narrating that his robes got ripped up once, then ripped up more, but I can't remember when Linny did the second Sound Lance.

As for Azarr Kul, I gave him an extra 2 cleric levels and applied the Prodigy (Wisdom) trait to him from DMG2. He was much stronger in this form and had far more options. He had about 183 HP in his first form and 159 in his Death Dragon form.

[Barbarian MD]

Bravo! *claps*

[d13]

*Slowclap*
*More comments about how this journal is/was awesome, and all that jazz*

I'm saving this journal for posterity, hope you don't mind :smallsmile:

And this weekend, I'm, for the third time, trying to start the RHoD in Eberron with my own group, so this is going to be extremely helpful.
I might even steal an idea, or three =P

Once again, thank you for sharing this with us, Aslan =)

[Fizban]

Awesome journal is awesome. The final, or third final I suppose, fight had an effective dramatic death, made even more effective by the fact that it was the cleric that died. They've already had multiple resurrections so I wouldn't expect it to be permanent if they still had the cleric, with nearly two weeks to find a big enough diamond. But without the cleric they need to find a diamond and a person who can cast the spell. Follow up adventure?

[AslanCross]

*Slowclap*
*More comments about how this journal is/was awesome, and all that jazz*

I'm saving this journal for posterity, hope you don't mind :smallsmile:

And this weekend, I'm, for the third time, trying to start the RHoD in Eberron with my own group, so this is going to be extremely helpful.
I might even steal an idea, or three =P

Once again, thank you for sharing this with us, Aslan =)

No problem, and thanks everyone. I wish you good speed in your efforts.


Awesome journal is awesome. The final, or third final I suppose, fight had an effective dramatic death, made even more effective by the fact that it was the cleric that died. They've already had multiple resurrections so I wouldn't expect it to be permanent if they still had the cleric, with nearly two weeks to find a big enough diamond. But without the cleric they need to find a diamond and a person who can cast the spell. Follow up adventure?

Well, Azarr Kul's treasury actually contains a 5000 GP diamond, so they can get a Raise Dead. Finding someone who will do it is another story. After a day of rest, Kikkeni can teleport them all to Thrane.

Linny's player has gotten so attached to her that in his version of the story, Jaela Daran raises her for "free" (but honestly I don't see the Silver Flame letting a cleric of another religion get a free rez without forcing her to convert or something---as much as I like the Silver Flame and believe that it's got good people too). She's gotten a free rez as it is.

Nox's player wants his character to be an agent of the Chamber, which is an interesting twist and is more conducive to a later adventure than Linny's, but it'll take a bit more work.

[Kerothulhu]

This comes a tad late but for completeness' sake I shall put it up.

During the Godslayer battle, after the giant electrified lizard landed and smashed Nox into the ground, Linny hit it with a Sound Lance. Then the tanks proceeded to beat (or try to beat) the stuffing out of the lizard. The Gloomweaver jumped down from the highest ledge but could do nothing more. Since the tanks were flying above the ground, Linny cast Earth Reaver and hit both Godslayer and Gloomweaver. Soon after, Lyka was able to cut the Godslayer in two and the Gloomweaver was crushed to bits by Holden's epic maul.

During the Indravan battle, Linny didn't Sound Lance the Crusader. In her first turn she used Assay Spell Resistance to get the +10 Caster Level check on the tiger-dragon lug. Nox's sneak killed the Crusi. In the proceeding turn, Linny hits Indravan with a Sound Lance while the rest of the party struggle to hit the brute. Then Indravan does the Shadow Leap thing and scares the ship out of the softies. Lyka takes the AOO and the Full-round while casters Psionic Teleport and Nox uses a maneuver to get away. Then the rest is as sir describes it. (For once Lyka is useless in a combat encounter.)

In the fight with Azarr Kul, Lyka finds out Mr. Big Bad is invisible and the party splits up between attacking the two Erinyes while Kikkeni and Linny try to find the cleric and dispel his invisibility. This is when Holden is dominated and flies up to the lip of the portal. Linny fires off the Wall of Force to save the dwarf from a painful death on a different plane. The party continues to try to get rid of the Erinyes and when Holden's turn comes, he's ordered to go to sleep but finally manages to break the domination. Then it was Lyka who found out the AK had Anti-life Shell on him when she moved towards him after cutting an Erinyes in two. After finding that out, the party shifted their attentions to the remaining Erinyes for the time being. After getting rid of her the tanks started lopping off statues for Kikkeni to throw. Lyka doesn't Rage and Shift when AK kills Linny though. She's able to get past his defenses rather easily even after he had that necro-energy field around him.

Lyka does Rage and Shift when the Aspect appeared though. At which point the party killed it rather quickly. And yes, the Aspect battle was anticlimactic but that gauntlet of encounters had us all tired out and Holden's and Lyka's players had already left for home by then.

Call me a nit-picker but I just couldn't stand to see some of the happenings in the last session to be inaccurate, so there. >_>

Sincerely, Linny, AKA The Pokedex.

P.S. Can I please be raised by Jaella? It doesn't have to be free, a special request from Holden and Lyka and that 5000 gp diamond maybe? Heck the party has AK's dad's dragon hoard AND everything in AK's treasury for leverage, not to mention SAVING ALL OF EBERRON (for now). >_< I need to get back to the Material Plane and start writing new books.

[AslanCross]

Thanks for the corrections; it's really difficult to keep track of everything happening and then writing about it after a stressful week of work. I'm amazed I remember anything at all.

Edit: I just remebered that Holden was able to shake off the domination after Azarr Kul ordered him to go home. Not finishing his job was against his nature, so he saved against that.

[Myshlaevsky]

That was pretty sweet. Thanks a lot for doing this journal AslanCross, I'd say it's my favourite of all the ones I've read on GitP.

Maybe you'll consider doing another sometime. :smalltongue:

All around just really enjoyed reading this, I was very impressed.

[Eldariel]

Btw, something I intended to mention, but forgot:
Multiple Mental Control Effects (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/magicOverview/castingSpells.htm#combiningMagicalEffects)
"Sometimes magical effects that establish mental control render each other irrelevant, such as a spell that removes the subjects ability to act. Mental controls that don’t remove the recipient’s ability to act usually do not interfere with each other. If a creature is under the mental control of two or more creatures, it tends to obey each to the best of its ability, and to the extent of the control each effect allows. If the controlled creature receives conflicting orders simultaneously, the competing controllers must make opposed Charisma checks to determine which one the creature obeys."

So...in case you run across the case again later on... Then again, the result would've probably been the same since I'm betting Kikkeni's charisma is nothing to write home about.

[Rising Phoenix]

Thank you so much for completing this AslanCross. It helped me improve my experience of RHoD though unfortunately we never finished it.

I look forward to reading about your future advetures!

D.

[AslanCross]

Thanks for following me. Again if I hadn't received any comments expressing interest in this journal, I probably wouldn't have followed through till the end.

Eldariel> Ah, thanks for that info. Azarr Kul would most likely have beaten Kikkeni every time, indeed.

[Zanticor]

The best story hour in a very long time for me! I used to go to Enworld for my story needs but since they went all 4th edition, I much more likely to be on this forum. My party finished RHOD a couple of months ago so it was really good to see all the Eberron modifications you did to it. Quite a treat and I hope you and other DM's will post their stories on this forum in the future. I might even try my hand on one myself.
I'm still really interested in the epilogue. What rewards did you give the heroes after their return? My paladin was given a young bronze dragon (the child of the one hanging in the dining room) as a paladin mount. Might not work for every one but I'm a halfling so it fits. Hope your rewards are as epic.

Zanticor

[AslanCross]

Well, Linny really wants a raise, so that will do, I guess---and her discovery AND proof of the existence of the Tiamat Prison Seal will pretty much cement her place in the upper echelons of Aureon's Paragnostic Society.
Holden will probably receive a massive field promotion in the Silver Flame---after all, the original intention behind this campaign was how Holden became a war hero, with Lyka by his side.
Not sure about the others yet.