Drakevarg
2011-11-13, 11:32 PM
Well, that was interesting. About three weeks ago I mentioned the concerns of trying to transport a pot full of highly volatile magic (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=220018) through a forest so that we could blow it up and see what happens. Well today we finally got to set the damn thing off. Thought I'd share the results.
To recap for those who don't pay attention to my threads (almost all of you, I would assume), we'd spent the last several sessions dealing with some goblins that had been raiding a small town. The first two nights were spent on defense, first against the raiding party (which we wiped out), and the second against an entire army sent out of vengeance (which we wiped out).
I'll skim over the details on that because they're brought up in the link above, but suffice to say we ended up with a massive cauldron full of highly volatile magic. We had no idea what it would do, only that it would do it on a considerable scale. Obviously, we had to set it off and see.
So it was time to go on the offense. Using several scrolls of floating disc (I remove "whoever's" from the spell names out of habit), which the DM allowed to work despite the cauldron weighing far more than 100 lbs (possibly because he had neglected to mention that the cauldrons were the size of a small room until I was about to move it), we began moving towards the goblin lair.
The obligatory shenanigans occurred along the way, including encounters with a Phantom Fungus and a Bugbear. Also, the party ranger wound up inventing cocaine by using plants shi'd (pronoun: long story) found, and was promptly made phobic about the idea of experimental drugs when the Dread Necro decided to use cause fear on hir while shi was under the effects of said drug, sending hir running straight into the aforementioned bugbear. ...So that was interesting.
Anyway, we finally reached the Aranea's territory, where she told us that the goblin lair was an ancient fortress located inside a cave. Continuing on our way, we were ambushed by goblins, the last of which fled into the cave and was promptly eaten by a hydra. After killing that, we buried the cauldron nearby and set an alarm spell on it, heading inside. While the temptation was to simply blow the damn thing and head home, the goblins had hostages and at the very least I was obligated to save them, being a Paladin.
Oddly enough, the place was largely abandoned. Save for two barracks full of goblins and a few worgs, the lair was nearly empty. Apparently we had simply massacred everyone else beforehand. Meeting little-to-no resistance on our way through, we reached the treasury, which contained entirely too much loot (the DM houseruled that rolling 100 on a d% would make the loot go up one table... this happened several times).
Included amongst the loot was a Helm of Brilliance, largely burned out but still very potent. We were initially tempted to use it to amplify the cauldron's explosion, but we were explicitly told that doing so would delete the universe. We also got a Bag of Holding (Type II), which the Dread Necro stashed most of his loot into. Bunch of the usual stuff, potions, wands, coins. To me, the most interesting was a golden tube with a diamond affixed to one end and a lens on the other. Looked like a kaleidoscope.
Unfortunately I couldn't see into it properly with the greathelm I was wearing and, not wanting to reveal what was under it to the rest of the party, I went outside to use the tube-thing. When I held it up to my eye I felt a sharp pain and lost vision in that eye, which passed after a moment. The diamond was missing, the word "Gemini" now visibly inscribed on the inside of the tube. Feeling a sensation of power, I concentrated and promptly shot a laser into a nearby wall. I now had the ability to use the searing light spell as essentially a breath weapon located in my eye. Unfortunately it was limited in scope, since it was cast as a 1st level spell at all times, meaning it only dealt 1d8 under all conditions.
Anyway, loot aside we also found a box that was clearly a MacGuffin, so we pocketed it for later use. Continuing on our way, we found the hostages at last, opening their cells but asking them to stay put until we made sure no one was being kept deeper inside. Heading into a fancy-looking door that practically screamed "Boss Fight," we found ourselves in a small metal room with another, slightly fancier door on the other side. We never did figure out what that room was for, but our goal lay just beyond.
Inside was a large, dramatic looking room of obvious importance. The far end was protected by magical darkness, so I used detect evil to scout. I wound up getting a massive migraine as a direct result and we went back into the metal room and shut the door upon hearing a goblin muttering a spell. The door was promptly vaporized and the magical darkness lifted, revealing our foes: the Goblin Adept in charge of the tribe we had been fighting, and a Rutterkin who had been commanding him.
No words were exchanged. After seeing the demon, I promptly laser eye'd him and the fight began. It was a bit chaotic and I'll admit I only paid attention to my own turns, which went as followed:
Turn 1: Laser the demon, march toward him. Druid casts bull's strength on me.
Turn 2: Keep marching, cast eagle's splendor on myself through a wand.
Turn 3: Demon summons some Dretch. Stab the one in my way and laser the demon again.
Turn 4: Kill Dretch, march toward demon again.
Turn 5: Charge demon, using both Smite Evil and Smite Evil Outsider. Crit, killing the demon in one slice.
The Goblin Adept was slain a round later and promptly disintegrated, leaving a small black gem. The Ranger picked it up, finding hirself compelled to protect it at all costs. At the same time, a rift began to open over the bloody altar at the end of the room with a voice whispering in Abyssal. I spoke to it in Celestial saying "You who would speak with the voice of the enemy, hold your forked tongue behind your teeth before I remove it." In retort, a fiery whip lashed out at the Dread Necro, who was attempting to take the gem from the Ranger.
Next we heard a muttering coming from the rift, the Dread Necro identifying it as a summoning spell. I laser'd the rift, halting the spell momentarily and getting a whip for my troubles. We quickly decided that the only option was to destroy the gem, which was acting as a focus for the rift. After they knocked the ranger out, I prepared to destroy the gem, using both a cold iron sword and Smite Evil Outsider to assist in destroying the demonic artifact. While preparing, the rift summoned six Dretch, two of which attacked me and, after I impaled the gem, two more whips lashed out knocking me unconscious.
My allies quickly healed me, but the gem wasn't yet destroyed. Striking it again I finally shattered it, closing the rift and causing the Dretch to vanish. I stumbled back to the prisoners, healing myself as I went. Leading them outside, I had the Ranger (who announced hir desire to retire) take them to the Aranea's territory for protection while we finally set off the cauldron.
Unburying it, we set it at the front door of the keep, positioning an unseen servant with an alchemist fire just over it, and ran like hell. We were given 30 seconds to reach minimum safe distance, which apparently we did. Naturally, we pulled up the Death Star run on YouTube while the DM narrated the moments before the explosion.
The detonation could best be described as a Sonic Rainboom. The trees within the explosion radius were instantly turned to stone, and each of us were struck with a magical effect.
-The Dread Necro's shovel (actually a greataxe) was turned into cold iron and given a "+1 Spite Bonus" from his god, Cas. Meaning he got +1 Atk/Dmg against any target that had already attacked him.
-The Druid was given a natural armor bonus and his animal companion (a Viper) became one size larger.
-The Monk's bladed gauntlet (same as a normal gauntlet except deals slashing damage) got a +1 enchantment.
-A single diamond on the Vampire Spawn's Helm of Brilliance was relit.
-And my laser eye was upgraded to act as a proper searing light spell, including scaling with my level.
Next, a portal opened up in front of us leading, interestingly enough, to the campaign I had been running immediately prior to retiring from DMing. The Ranger's character from that campaign, a Warforged Barbarian, was pulled through the portal and joined the party.
And finally, the big one. The thing I spent this entire post just to give some context to. The ground began to rumble beneath out feet. Turning to watch the show, we saw a metallic spike shoot from the earth around the keep and bend down to touch ground. Then another. Then another. Then another. Until eight spikes erupted forth and the entire keep burst out from what was left of the hillside. We had awoken something big, in the form of a 200-foot-tall, vaguely steampunkish spider-thing with a castle build into it. Just to confirm my suspicions, I cast detect evil on it and was greeted with a migraine.
Thankfully the thing began to walk away from the town, heading south. Unfortunately it then displayed exactly what it was capable of as it promptly vaporized a mountain when it got in its way. Out of curiosity, we headed to the crater the thing used to occupy, looking down. Below us was nothing but blackness. Just as I was about to go investigate, a silver leg stepped out from the darkness, much like the ones on the thing that had just wandered off, but this one "only" as thick around as the Warforged. We decided to leave promptly.
And so we headed back to the Aranea's lair, deciding to camp for the night and head to town in the morning. I spent the night praying to Bahamut, begging forgiveness for unleashing... that upon the world.
To recap for those who don't pay attention to my threads (almost all of you, I would assume), we'd spent the last several sessions dealing with some goblins that had been raiding a small town. The first two nights were spent on defense, first against the raiding party (which we wiped out), and the second against an entire army sent out of vengeance (which we wiped out).
I'll skim over the details on that because they're brought up in the link above, but suffice to say we ended up with a massive cauldron full of highly volatile magic. We had no idea what it would do, only that it would do it on a considerable scale. Obviously, we had to set it off and see.
So it was time to go on the offense. Using several scrolls of floating disc (I remove "whoever's" from the spell names out of habit), which the DM allowed to work despite the cauldron weighing far more than 100 lbs (possibly because he had neglected to mention that the cauldrons were the size of a small room until I was about to move it), we began moving towards the goblin lair.
The obligatory shenanigans occurred along the way, including encounters with a Phantom Fungus and a Bugbear. Also, the party ranger wound up inventing cocaine by using plants shi'd (pronoun: long story) found, and was promptly made phobic about the idea of experimental drugs when the Dread Necro decided to use cause fear on hir while shi was under the effects of said drug, sending hir running straight into the aforementioned bugbear. ...So that was interesting.
Anyway, we finally reached the Aranea's territory, where she told us that the goblin lair was an ancient fortress located inside a cave. Continuing on our way, we were ambushed by goblins, the last of which fled into the cave and was promptly eaten by a hydra. After killing that, we buried the cauldron nearby and set an alarm spell on it, heading inside. While the temptation was to simply blow the damn thing and head home, the goblins had hostages and at the very least I was obligated to save them, being a Paladin.
Oddly enough, the place was largely abandoned. Save for two barracks full of goblins and a few worgs, the lair was nearly empty. Apparently we had simply massacred everyone else beforehand. Meeting little-to-no resistance on our way through, we reached the treasury, which contained entirely too much loot (the DM houseruled that rolling 100 on a d% would make the loot go up one table... this happened several times).
Included amongst the loot was a Helm of Brilliance, largely burned out but still very potent. We were initially tempted to use it to amplify the cauldron's explosion, but we were explicitly told that doing so would delete the universe. We also got a Bag of Holding (Type II), which the Dread Necro stashed most of his loot into. Bunch of the usual stuff, potions, wands, coins. To me, the most interesting was a golden tube with a diamond affixed to one end and a lens on the other. Looked like a kaleidoscope.
Unfortunately I couldn't see into it properly with the greathelm I was wearing and, not wanting to reveal what was under it to the rest of the party, I went outside to use the tube-thing. When I held it up to my eye I felt a sharp pain and lost vision in that eye, which passed after a moment. The diamond was missing, the word "Gemini" now visibly inscribed on the inside of the tube. Feeling a sensation of power, I concentrated and promptly shot a laser into a nearby wall. I now had the ability to use the searing light spell as essentially a breath weapon located in my eye. Unfortunately it was limited in scope, since it was cast as a 1st level spell at all times, meaning it only dealt 1d8 under all conditions.
Anyway, loot aside we also found a box that was clearly a MacGuffin, so we pocketed it for later use. Continuing on our way, we found the hostages at last, opening their cells but asking them to stay put until we made sure no one was being kept deeper inside. Heading into a fancy-looking door that practically screamed "Boss Fight," we found ourselves in a small metal room with another, slightly fancier door on the other side. We never did figure out what that room was for, but our goal lay just beyond.
Inside was a large, dramatic looking room of obvious importance. The far end was protected by magical darkness, so I used detect evil to scout. I wound up getting a massive migraine as a direct result and we went back into the metal room and shut the door upon hearing a goblin muttering a spell. The door was promptly vaporized and the magical darkness lifted, revealing our foes: the Goblin Adept in charge of the tribe we had been fighting, and a Rutterkin who had been commanding him.
No words were exchanged. After seeing the demon, I promptly laser eye'd him and the fight began. It was a bit chaotic and I'll admit I only paid attention to my own turns, which went as followed:
Turn 1: Laser the demon, march toward him. Druid casts bull's strength on me.
Turn 2: Keep marching, cast eagle's splendor on myself through a wand.
Turn 3: Demon summons some Dretch. Stab the one in my way and laser the demon again.
Turn 4: Kill Dretch, march toward demon again.
Turn 5: Charge demon, using both Smite Evil and Smite Evil Outsider. Crit, killing the demon in one slice.
The Goblin Adept was slain a round later and promptly disintegrated, leaving a small black gem. The Ranger picked it up, finding hirself compelled to protect it at all costs. At the same time, a rift began to open over the bloody altar at the end of the room with a voice whispering in Abyssal. I spoke to it in Celestial saying "You who would speak with the voice of the enemy, hold your forked tongue behind your teeth before I remove it." In retort, a fiery whip lashed out at the Dread Necro, who was attempting to take the gem from the Ranger.
Next we heard a muttering coming from the rift, the Dread Necro identifying it as a summoning spell. I laser'd the rift, halting the spell momentarily and getting a whip for my troubles. We quickly decided that the only option was to destroy the gem, which was acting as a focus for the rift. After they knocked the ranger out, I prepared to destroy the gem, using both a cold iron sword and Smite Evil Outsider to assist in destroying the demonic artifact. While preparing, the rift summoned six Dretch, two of which attacked me and, after I impaled the gem, two more whips lashed out knocking me unconscious.
My allies quickly healed me, but the gem wasn't yet destroyed. Striking it again I finally shattered it, closing the rift and causing the Dretch to vanish. I stumbled back to the prisoners, healing myself as I went. Leading them outside, I had the Ranger (who announced hir desire to retire) take them to the Aranea's territory for protection while we finally set off the cauldron.
Unburying it, we set it at the front door of the keep, positioning an unseen servant with an alchemist fire just over it, and ran like hell. We were given 30 seconds to reach minimum safe distance, which apparently we did. Naturally, we pulled up the Death Star run on YouTube while the DM narrated the moments before the explosion.
The detonation could best be described as a Sonic Rainboom. The trees within the explosion radius were instantly turned to stone, and each of us were struck with a magical effect.
-The Dread Necro's shovel (actually a greataxe) was turned into cold iron and given a "+1 Spite Bonus" from his god, Cas. Meaning he got +1 Atk/Dmg against any target that had already attacked him.
-The Druid was given a natural armor bonus and his animal companion (a Viper) became one size larger.
-The Monk's bladed gauntlet (same as a normal gauntlet except deals slashing damage) got a +1 enchantment.
-A single diamond on the Vampire Spawn's Helm of Brilliance was relit.
-And my laser eye was upgraded to act as a proper searing light spell, including scaling with my level.
Next, a portal opened up in front of us leading, interestingly enough, to the campaign I had been running immediately prior to retiring from DMing. The Ranger's character from that campaign, a Warforged Barbarian, was pulled through the portal and joined the party.
And finally, the big one. The thing I spent this entire post just to give some context to. The ground began to rumble beneath out feet. Turning to watch the show, we saw a metallic spike shoot from the earth around the keep and bend down to touch ground. Then another. Then another. Then another. Until eight spikes erupted forth and the entire keep burst out from what was left of the hillside. We had awoken something big, in the form of a 200-foot-tall, vaguely steampunkish spider-thing with a castle build into it. Just to confirm my suspicions, I cast detect evil on it and was greeted with a migraine.
Thankfully the thing began to walk away from the town, heading south. Unfortunately it then displayed exactly what it was capable of as it promptly vaporized a mountain when it got in its way. Out of curiosity, we headed to the crater the thing used to occupy, looking down. Below us was nothing but blackness. Just as I was about to go investigate, a silver leg stepped out from the darkness, much like the ones on the thing that had just wandered off, but this one "only" as thick around as the Warforged. We decided to leave promptly.
And so we headed back to the Aranea's lair, deciding to camp for the night and head to town in the morning. I spent the night praying to Bahamut, begging forgiveness for unleashing... that upon the world.