Tonight, we finish Death House. Or it finishes us. (Spoilers)

[jaappleton]

We're all level 2.

Moon Druid (Me)
Hand XBow Fighter
TWF Fighter (Dex)
Rogue
Monk
Dragon Sorc (Ice)

I don't think we can 'appease' the House, there's nothing to appease it with. Unless... Well, I don't dislike the Rogue THAT much :smallbiggrin:

Meaning we'll have to face the in the basement.

We did manage to , so that's good. But I know that if the House isn't appeased, and we run, it could be just as deadly (if not deadlier) than just facing the creature.

I'm personally hoping we fight it, but I love a challenge in combat. I'm just not certain its winnable. I'd be the Tank and the Healer, and I can't do both at once. We do have some potions of healing, we haven't used any yet.

If we fight it, my plan was to cast Faerie Fire before Wild Shaping into a Bear to try to tank it. That's about the extent of my plan.

Thoughts?

[JackPhoenix]

The final boss is really easy. It's slow, it's big, it has no ranged attacks, the area has a lots of narrow tunnels, which means it'll be even slower when squeezing into them, and you have ranged attacks and level 2 rogue. You can easily kill it without it ever touching you.

Of course, you can let it beat the crap out of you in fair combat, but why would you?

[Ganymede]

The final boss is really easy. It's slow, it's big, it has no ranged attacks, the area has a lots of narrow tunnels, which means it'll be even slower when squeezing into them, and you have ranged attacks and level 2 rogue. You can easily kill it without it ever touching you.

Of course, you can let it beat the crap out of you in fair combat, but why would you?

This shambling mound is not slowed when it squeezes through the narrow tunnels.

Also, the start of combat can be tricky as the PCs might be scattered about in an arena filled with difficult terrain that the mound can ignore (it has a swim speed); it is very possible that a PC or two could be put in a bad spot early, especially since the framing of the encounter leaves them no time to formulate a specific plan beforehand.

[ChampionWiggles]

We're all level 2.

Moon Druid (Me)
Hand XBow Fighter
TWF Fighter (Dex)
Rogue
Monk
Dragon Sorc (Ice)

I don't think we can 'appease' the House, there's nothing to appease it with. Unless... Well, I don't dislike the Rogue THAT much

Meaning we'll have to face the in the basement.

We did manage to , so that's good. But I know that if the House isn't appeased, and we run, it could be just as deadly (if not deadlier) than just facing the creature.

I'm personally hoping we fight it, but I love a challenge in combat. I'm just not certain its winnable. I'd be the Tank and the Healer, and I can't do both at once. We do have some potions of healing, we haven't used any yet.

If we fight it, my plan was to cast Faerie Fire before Wild Shaping into a Bear to try to tank it. That's about the extent of my plan.

Thoughts?


I'm not sure if you know this from having ran Curse of Strahd yourself or from having done this part of the campaign before with a different DM, so...


The book says you have to escape/fight the house whether your defeat the Shambling Mound or not. You denied the cult a sacrifice either way, so the house demands blood. So fighting the Shambling Mound is actually more deadly, because you face that and then have to deal with escaping the house.

Wild Shape tanking isn't a bad idea, provided you Wild Shape into a Large creature so you don't run the risk of it engulfing you. That being said, it's Slam does an average of 13 damage and can attack twice per turn. CR 1 monster with the highest HP is Giant Octopus, which could take 4 attacks from it (assuming average damage). Fearie Fire isn't a bad idea, since it's Dex save is garbage, but you'd be better off kiting it with ranged attacks since it's movement is slower than small creatures anyway. You run minimal risk of being grappled or engulfed by it by kiting. The Advantage of Faerire Fire would still take effect. The only risk is your non-magic characters running out of ranged attack ammunition.

[jaappleton]

We finished it last night.

I did Faerie Fire, and Wild Shaped into a Bear, and got in its face before it could leave its little hole in the wall.

Everyone used ranged attacks on it, to great effect (THREE crits) except the Monk, who ran up to it and punched. The Monk was knocked out quickly, but I used my last spell slot to Healing Word him after the fight. It only managed to attack twice; once for the Monk and once against myself, before it died. I was pretty surprised at how easy it was.

Escaping the House was... not as easy. We managed to escape by having me in Bear form basically wedge my fat bear butt into the doorways and crouch down so scythes would get me once, yes, but wouldn't have the momentum so swing back again. (The DM described them as being pendulums) By having me block the scythes, party members could climb over me and get through the doorways safely.

Unfortunately I ran out of wild shapes and temp HP by the last doorway, the Monk failed a Con saving throw against poison gas along the way and my Dragonborn Druid somehow still has the highest Strength in my normal form. I threw him over my shoulder and pleaded to Rose & Thorn to help guide me against the final pendulum scythe, to have their will fight the House for just a brief moment as to perhaps disrupt the flow of the scythes, so that I could get the Monk out unscathed.

DM gave me inspiration for that. Unfortunately I rolled a 2 and a 3. :smalltongue:

But we did make it out, with everyone alive.

[djreynolds]

Its a great adventure, I'm so jealous because you can only play it once.

And druid is a great choice, just the exploring aspect of druid is awesome, its often a better scout and you can cast detect magic first.

And you have sky-high wisdom saves, so this should be a benefit to you.

And there is nothing wrong with barkskin, if needed, to help out tanking. But I really like moon beam, and then wildshaping.