I think so, although I don't know if they will go for it or not.

Session 30: 8/20/2022
DM notes: We are losing Rivkah (bard)’s player due to college classes. I had to help the newer players identify a couple of options they had from class features. This session lasted about 3 hours – 1 hr of planning and 2 hours of battle. The battle is paused after, I think, 4 rounds? To resume next time.

The band of four plot right away to attack the Temple of Tlaloc, the rain god. They pick up the Revenant Aaracokra, and make their approach. Saqwam the warlock uses Scrying to observe the moat around the temple, making it a valid target for his 14th level Fathomless 1 mile teleport feature. He then turns himself, Teador the paladin, Troudar the fighter, and one of the revenants invisible, and they fly to within 1 mile of the temple. The other two revenants are visible, but are at least Aaracokra when seen from a distance.

Ratel, meanwhile, borrows Teador’s summoned gryphon, and flies high above cloud level, then drops down onto the temple. The clouds thicken around him as he falls, and the last 2000’ of the fall are spent dodging lightning strikes once a round. He lands next to the altar, his Skyfall boots damaging it and the two closest Aaracokra (20d6 thunder damage, Dex DC 12 half). He immediately stabs Ssword into the altar, where the blade starts to drain power from it, and initiative is rolled.

Saqwam, the one who’s teleporting everyone else to the battle site, is dead last. Two Slayers (4x shortsword attacks for 1d6+14 each at +12 to hit) leap from the doors to engage him, and he eats several cantrips and spells. Luckily, “thunder and lightning” as a theme involves a lot of AOEs that have to be carefully targeted to avoid friendly fire, and he’s nearly surrounded, so he doesn’t go down.

The party teleports in at the edge of the temple and starts to disperse. There were 4 PCs, 3 NPC allies, and about 10 different enemies in a couple of different areas.

Every round on initiative 20, a 30’ diameter circle of enemies is hit with 4d8 lightning, Dex DC 16 half. The thunderstorm reduces visibility to 40’ and causes disadvantage on perception checks. The ground is also soon going to be muddy and difficult terrain, but that hasn’t kicked in yet (DM judgement). The altar also casts an upcast Ice Storm for 5d6+4d8 damage once per round, but the altar got Ssworded early, so that only went off once.

Two of the Aarcokra revenants tie up a senior priest and an air elemental off to the side. They have magic weapons and are doing okay, but the only reason they are still up is the “regenerate 10hp/rd if not damaged by radiant.”

Ratel initially stunned both Aaracokra slayers, but they passed their saves the following turn, downed him, and then stabbed him when he was down until dead. He’s immune to crits (adamantine skeleton), so it took 3 hits to kill him when he was at 0hp. The Aaracokra aren’t messing around and are really going for kills now. Teador (hasted) revivified him the following round, but Ratel went down again when the High Priestess hit most of the party with Horrid Wilting. Teador then stepped over his unconscious body and kicked him for 50hp of Lay on Hands before killing the remaining living Slayer.

Teador spent his time being the healer and also handing out a lot of smite damage. One of the revenants was with him and targeting mostly the same targets.

Troudar missed his second turn due to a failed save against Banishment, but Teador was able to break the Concentration on that pretty soon thereafter. He stood and delivered a solid 20+ damage per hit for a lot of hits, that’s what high level fighters do.

Saqwam used, if I recall correctly, Counterspell (blocked a 70hp heal), Soulcage (now self-healing himself as a bonus action), Eldritch Blast once, Synaptic Static, and Blight. He’s attuned to the Anyspell Tome and will be using that to Wish-teleport the party out when they are done.

There was a brief discussion of teleporting out after the altar was dead, but a religion check revealed that leaving the High Priestess alive makes rebuilding a lot easier. She’s now 50’ up on a wall, and they can’t quite see where she is, so we still have a couple of rounds of combat left. Other enemies still standing include 2 Ahuitzotls, 2 damaged Air Elementals, and two Senior Priests of Tlaloc.

DM note: I I think I’m going to drop most reactions from enemy Aaracokra. Too many things going on to remember them. This is the first character kill in quite a while, although it certainly hasn’t stuck. There’s a lot of AOE damage that’s stacking up over time, and more reinforcements are inbound. The weather-related spells are all AOEs and the Aaracokra are just now free to target the party with them without hitting a lot of their own. Whirlwind is a junky spell for the level it’s cast at, but Cone of Cold and Freezing Sphere will be incoming. Of course, the casters have lost most of their melee screen, and reinforcements are slow and mostly more priests. When seconds count, help is only minutes away…