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

[AslanCross]

Firstly, you have done an amazing job both in preparing the adventure and transcribing it eloquently. Bravo on both counts. I think I've learned a lot from merely reading what you have done and I look forward to putting it into practice.

Secondly, I have an idea regarding your PC deaths. I will preface my thoughts by mentioning that I've never read the module itself and my familiarity with Eberron is shamefully low.

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The Red Hand is not a small organization by any means. In addition, it's got to be able to count on a certain amount of Divine (or, I suppose, Infernal) guidance. With these two things in mind...

The Wyrmlords were paragons of their kind. They seemed to be incredibly important to the structure of the hoard; likely to their morale as well. While I'm certain that Evil likes to punish those who fail it, losing valuable pawns is something that should be factored in. If I were the Red Hand leadership, I would look for a way to return the Wyrmlords to life. Possibly even the Dragons, though I think that would skew the difficulty a bit much. It would be boring to merely bring them back via normal magic spells. I thought it would be entertaining to offer a side adventure that might tie up this desire by the Red Hand and your PC deaths.

Create a side adventure where the Red Hand has located an ancient Magi-Tech laboratory. To make it more interesting and to not mess up XP have the adventuring party that goes to find this place as the Lions accompanied by some named NPC's that have a great debt to the PC's (And at this point in the adventure EVERYONE owes the PC's, from the Elves to the townsfolk of both towns to the Wereboar. Nothing says "Thank you for saving my portion of the world" like risking your life to save someone else's.

As to the specifics of the adventure itself? I'm afraid I have little actually worked out. I would consider making the Ghostlord a figure central to this quest (perhaps he has recently began dabbling in ways to return Ghosts to flesh and blood?) as you've spent much time working on him already and making him a fantastic character, it would be a shame to never see him again. Perhaps Lady Kaal can offer this bit of obscure knowledge as her grudging way of thanking the PC's for saving her life without actually thanking them (Or, if she could even offer this in return for future favors by the Lions).

There should be a price for this. The PC's might reconsider raising their dead if they know that the Wyrmlords will return if they activate the equipment. Or perhaps the Wyrmlords have already returned and there's only one or two people that can be returned to life with the remaining abilities of the equipment. Or perhaps one or more of the Lions gives their life to resurrect their mentors.

Of course, this is only a suggestion and it diverts a good bit from the module. Anything you do, I'm certain, will turn out amazing. I eagerly await further word of your groups' doings. Best of luck, and thank you for posting this.

Thanks for the suggestions, and sorry for the late reply. Between work and graduate studies, things have become really quite heavy for me lately; the school year ended with my brain left in the doldrums. Also, there's the Starcraft 2 beta to blame.

Anyway:

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Players keep out!

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That means you too, asphenfox.

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The deal here is that High Wyrmlord Azarr Kul's Red Hand "horde" is only the vanguard of a vast fiendish army he is summoning from the battle-plane of Shavarath (originally Baator in the module; devils in Eberron come from Shavarath instead). The last chapter of the module is about the PCs taking the fight to the High Wyrmlord's headquarters--the Fane of Tiamat--up in the mountains.

There are a few reasons why I don't want to bring the other wyrmlords back:
1. A couple of them aren't actually that important. Wyrmlord Koth was the newbie, and while his failure was an inconvenience to Kharn (the military commander), he was ultimately not that relevant. Besides, it's his failure that allowed the PCs to catch on to the Red Hand's plans.

2. Saarvith was assigned backwater duty because of his perceived weakness. He understood (correctly) that the Big Blue Man only kept him around because Saarvith's black dragon companion was an asset. With Regiarix dead, Kul doesn't need Saarvith anymore.

3. Ulwai and Kharn were far more important, and indeed Kharn was a good friend of Azarr Kul, but Azarr Kul is far more concerned with clinching the victory now instead of struggling to regroup the Horde from all over Elsir Vale.

4. Azarr Kul has still got a couple more powerful allies, but I'd rather not post those here right now.

5. I do have a plan for the PCs' return now. I've already told the players that getting new PCs altogether will not make sense as they'll be too high a level to just be wandering around the countryside; as such I'm encouraging them to take the offer that they will be getting soon.

6. I have very bad experiences with side adventures. My first campaign ended up with the players confused because they couldn't see how the stories tied together. They were always "Whatever happened to those cultists of Bane we thought were the bad guys in the very first part?! Who are all these new guys?!" Given how cohesive the plot has been up to this point, I'd rather stick to the story I've put together so far:

Since simply filing off the serial numbers is rather boring, I decided to raise the stakes and bring more of Eberron's fluff into this.

1. The Fane of Tiamat is actually not a temple dedicated to Tiamat. It was originally a complex dedicated to the maintenance of a giant (and I mean continents-wide) planar seal that keeps Tiamat, the daughter of Khyber, safe in her prison in Argonnessen. The PCs will discover several clues in the final chapter that hint at this. The current trappings of a Tiamat-worshiping cult were far more recent renovations.

2. The Fane is so far away from Argonnessen because it is only one of the points on a massive pentagram-shaped matrix of energy that powers Tiamat's actual prison---the Pit of Five Sorrows---in the center of Argonnessen. The Elsir Fane is one point; the Pit of Five Sorrows is another. There are two more points in Xen'Drik, and the fifth is deep underwater in the Dragonreach. While Tiamat was imprisoned approximately a hundred thousand years ago, the planar seal system is much newer, having fashioned by the dragons a little after the fall of Xen'Drik about 39,000 years ago (the Quori invasion weakened Tiamat's prison; the dragons harnessed the energy released by Xen'Drik's destruction to reinforce the shard she's imprisoned in).

3. Azarr Kul has constructed a giant planar orrery that he's using to manipulate planar energy. By aligning the plane of Shavarath, he's going to get both an infernal army AND weaken Tiamat's prison.

4. If Azarr Kul successfully disrupts this seal, he plans to conquer the neighboring nations and seize national and Dragonmarked House assets in order to facilitate the disruption of the other seals. What he fails to see is that Argonnessen is bound to catch on and will get ready to act should Tiamat's seal begin to fail.

[Eldariel]

Anyway:

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Players keep out!

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That means you too, asphenfox.

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The deal here is that High Wyrmlord Azarr Kul's Red Hand "horde" is only the vanguard of a vast fiendish army he is summoning from the battle-plane of Shavarath (originally Baator in the module; devils in Eberron come from Shavarath instead). The last chapter of the module is about the PCs taking the fight to the High Wyrmlord's headquarters--the Fane of Tiamat--up in the mountains.

There are a few reasons why I don't want to bring the other wyrmlords back:
1. A couple of them aren't actually that important. Wyrmlord Koth was the newbie, and while his failure was an inconvenience to Kharn (the military commander), he was ultimately not that relevant. Besides, it's his failure that allowed the PCs to catch on to the Red Hand's plans.

2. Saarvith was assigned backwater duty because of his perceived weakness. He understood (correctly) that the Big Blue Man only kept him around because Saarvith's black dragon companion was an asset. With Regiarix dead, Kul doesn't need Saarvith anymore.

3. Ulwai and Kharn were far more important, and indeed Kharn was a good friend of Azarr Kul, but Azarr Kul is far more concerned with clinching the victory now instead of struggling to regroup the Horde from all over Elsir Vale.

4. Azarr Kul has still got a couple more powerful allies, but I'd rather not post those here right now.

5. I do have a plan for the PCs' return now. I've already told the players that getting new PCs altogether will not make sense as they'll be too high a level to just be wandering around the countryside; as such I'm encouraging them to take the offer that they will be getting soon.

6. I have very bad experiences with side adventures. My first campaign ended up with the players confused because they couldn't see how the stories tied together. They were always "Whatever happened to those cultists of Bane we thought were the bad guys in the very first part?! Who are all these new guys?!" Given how cohesive the plot has been up to this point, I'd rather stick to the story I've put together so far:

Since simply filing off the serial numbers is rather boring, I decided to raise the stakes and bring more of Eberron's fluff into this.

1. The Fane of Tiamat is actually not a temple dedicated to Tiamat. It was originally a complex dedicated to the maintenance of a giant (and I mean continents-wide) planar seal that keeps Tiamat, the daughter of Khyber, safe in her prison in Argonnessen. The PCs will discover several clues in the final chapter that hint at this. The current trappings of a Tiamat-worshiping cult were far more recent renovations.

2. The Fane is so far away from Argonnessen because it is only one of the points on a massive pentagram-shaped matrix of energy that powers Tiamat's actual prison---the Pit of Five Sorrows---in the center of Argonnessen. The Elsir Fane is one point; the Pit of Five Sorrows is another. There are two more points in Xen'Drik, and the fifth is deep underwater in the Dragonreach. While Tiamat was imprisoned approximately a hundred thousand years ago, the planar seal system is much newer, having fashioned by the dragons a little after the fall of Xen'Drik about 39,000 years ago (the Quori invasion weakened Tiamat's prison; the dragons harnessed the energy released by Xen'Drik's destruction to reinforce the shard she's imprisoned in).

3. Azarr Kul has constructed a giant planar orrery that he's using to manipulate planar energy. By aligning the plane of Shavarath, he's going to get both an infernal army AND weaken Tiamat's prison.

4. If Azarr Kul successfully disrupts this seal, he plans to conquer the neighboring nations and seize national and Dragonmarked House assets in order to facilitate the disruption of the other seals. What he fails to see is that Argonnessen is bound to catch on and will get ready to act should Tiamat's seal begin to fail.

Slowclap. Job. Well. Done. Now then, let the games begin

[iamstillwater]

Just finished reading all 9 pages of this today, after I did a search for Aslan's name on the forums.

This is the campaign he was talking to me about yesterday before our class started, and I'm actually excited to see how it plays out. :)

I was hoping to sit in on their session, but I might have other things to attend to, so I'm hoping he puts up the next installment soon! :D

[AslanCross]

Hey everyone, it's been a while.

Since it's been a while since our last session, we had a rather slow start.

We started out at the end of the Battle of Brindol. Kharn's rage drake had just been taken down.

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Wyrmlord Kharn himself stands up, clutching his chest. With a grin on his face, he roars.

"It's not...it's FAR from over!"

Kikkeni orders the elves to open fire. Kharn gets turned into a pincushion. A beam of brilliant light shoots out of the dead Wyrmlord's eyes and mouth, straight up into the midnight sky. His body then dissolves into a pile of black goo.

The remaining hobgoblins run for their lives as the Horde breaks apart. The Red Hand has been defeated. Brindol is saved.

Jarmaath tells the PCs to take the rest that they've earned. After taking the ruined bodies of Linny and Holden into the Cathedral, they loot the bodies of Kharn and Ulwai.

The Next Morning

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Day 49 (3 Rhann 998 YK) 7:00 AM
The PCs wake up at the Stone Wyvern Inn (sans Wyvern) and are greeted by Delora Zann and Captain Soranna, who both survived the battle albeit with heavy injuries. Delora reports that she actually took the wyvern out for a spin during the battle, although she had a bad fall. The wyvern survived without much problems and was waiting outside.

Soranna then tells the PCs that Jarmaath was waiting for them at Brindol Keep, saying he has a message that he wanted them to hear personally.

It's Far From Over

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At Brindol Keep, Jarmaath introduces the PCs to Sheen, a changeling spy who was able to infiltrate Kharn's camp. She bluntly tells the PCs the problem: The hobgoblin horde was only the advance guard.

Much swearing all around.

She informs them that the High Wyrmlord, Azarr Kul, is summoning an army of devils from the plane of Shavarath, and that if that gets through, there'll be not enough military power in the Five Nations to stop them. She explains the Planar Orrery that Azarr Kul is using to realign the planes.

The PCs wonder about how this army of devils is related to Tiamat, but Sheen can't answer that question. All she knows is that the Wyrmsmokes are already crawling with devils and that when she tried to infiltrate the Fane of Tiamat itself, Azarr Kul's Erinyes chased her away.

Sheen marks the location of the Fane on the PCs' map. The PCs turn to leave, but a soldier in a battered tabard enters. He says that he has a message for Sheen and approaches her---and subsequently stabs her in the throat with a short sword, saying "High Wyrmlord Azarr Kul and Grand Talon Indravan-Yagna would like to say 'That's enough.'" The soldier then jumps into the shadow of Jarmaath's desk and vanishes.

Gathering the last of her strength, Sheen manages to write a few words in her own blood: "Beware Azarr Kul's fa---------"
The last word is scrawled out into a line, as Sheen goes limp and dies.

Shaken, Jarmaath tells the PCs that they should go and investigate the Wyrmsmokes at once, or else all the sacrifices will be in vain. He could not, however, offer any solutions to the PCs' predicament---they're two men down.

An Offer They Couldn't Refuse

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The PCs leave Brindol keep and encounter a carpenter (part of the rebuilding effort) passing by. The carpenter drops a crumpled piece of paper and nods at the PCs, and goes on his way.

The message reads: "I have a gift for you. See me. -- Lady Kaal"

The PCs decide that it might not be a good idea to turn down the gift, so they proceed to Kaal Manor.

When they get there, the guards usher the PCs into a large, plush audience room. Lady Kaal soon enters with a long, thin casket. She says that before she shows them what's in the case, the PCs have to agree that they wouldn't be telling Jarmaath anything about this. Nox tries to convince her to reveal something more by bluffing, but doesn't get any results. He then has her put it into writing first. Lady Kaal agrees. She goes on saying that Jarmaath is a small man in the greater scheme of things and as such wouldn't understand.

She opens her case to reveal the contents: a silk-wrapped rod on a cushion--a Candle of Invocation tied to Lawful Good.

The PCs ask what she wants in return. Lady Kaal furnishes them with a contract that says:

We, ____________, hereby receive the payment of one Candle of Invocation from Lady Verassa ir'Kaal in exchange for any future service that she might require. In the event that we do not perform the duty she requires, we grant her the lawful duty to execute the appropriate punishment in whatever measure she might deem necessary.

Signed,"

Nox tells the others that he's got a lot of experience with contracts, and as such knows when to be wary. However, in their desperation, the group decides to sign it.

Lady Kaal smiles, saying she knew that the PCs would be sensible. She hands them the case and says that she has another gift. Immerstal enters, muttering to himself.
"Mr. Immerstal here can bring you most of the way."
"Look, Lady Kaal, I don't--"
"You don't have any more words to say, Immerstal."
The wizard throws his hands up and sighs. "Fine. I have enough preparations of the teleport spell to bring all of you as far as Drellin's Ferry. I am not going to risk teleporting straight to the Fane. If we encounter a mishap, we might just end up getting torn apart by fiends."
Lady Kaal nods. The wizard continues: "I suggest you pick up provisions for the Wyrmsmokes---you do know what the Wyrmsmokes are like, don't you?"

The PCs stare at each other for a while, but Linny tells them: The Wyrmsmokes are a desolate volcanic region to the West of the Elsir Vale region. Immerstal nods, but continues to explain that small Fernia (elemental plane of Fire) manifest zones wink in and out of existence throughout the Wyrmsmokes, usually coinciding with areas of unnaturally high volcanic activity. The manifest zones are even hotter than the rest of the badlands, and sometimes storms that rain fire appear in the skies over these zones. The PCs also have to bring their own food and water.

The PCs discuss their provisions and determine that they wouldn't need to bring so much due to their spells and magic items. Immerstal tells them to visit him after they get their friends back so they can begin the teleportation relay.

Credits to Eldariel for the idea, btw.

Resurrection

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The PCs discreetly return to the Cathedral, where Tredora has preserved the scorched corpse of Holden and what's left of Linny with gentle repose. Kikkeni presents the Candle to her. Tredora, bemused, asks where they got it, but the PCs say nothing. The cleric decides it doesn't matter, sends out the other acolytes, and sets up the summoning.

A stark white light washes out the windows of the Cathedral, and a brief but violent quake follows. The gate opens above the altar, and a terrifying vision of celestial glory descends---six wings covered in eyes, metallic skin, opalescent eyes, and snow-white hair upon which verses of holy writ flow in elegant script---a Solar. An enormous fiery greatsword whirls about around it. (No, I'm not a fan of the bald angels in the MM, nor the faceless angels in 4E)

"Ye shall name thyselves, mortals," it calls out in a voice that sounds like both the crashing of waves and the booming of thunder. " And the reason thou calleth me from my Battle Eternal."

The PCs made a big mistake---they forgot to figure out what to say. Tredora fills in for them. "These champions of righteousness have fallen in service of their gods, but their quest is not yet complete."

The Solar gestures with its hands, and the bodies of Holden and Linny begin to reform and heal.

"Arise, ye champions. Ye shall yet struggle, and struggle mightily, for thy great enemy yet stands."

The bodies of Holden and Linny rise up into the air, and the Solar exhales upon them. Bluish-white energy glows softly on their wounds, and their flesh begins to knit. Broken bones snap back into place. Their eyes open, glowing fiercely with the same blue-white light, and their mouths open in an incessant stream of words in multiple languages. The tongues cease, and then the two of them speak once more, along with the Solar, in the Solar's voice.

"Ye shall yet struggle, and struggle mightily, for thy great enemy yet stands."

" I take my leave of thee."

The fabric of the planes distorts once more, and the Solar vanishes with a thunderous bang.

"...that was AWESOME," says Lyka.

The Ruins of Drellin's Ferry

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<The PCs do some retroactive shopping and get the donations from Jarmaath.>

Immerstal tells the PCs that Drellin's Ferry is the furthest he can take them, as he grew up there. He teleports the PCs to the burnt-out husk of a town that is Drellin's Ferry. Immerstal laments the fate of his hometown, then excuses himself , teleporting back to Brindol.

The scene is apocalyptic. The town had been put to the torch as the PCs had seen much earlier, and now the wind howls through the ruins. However, the eerie calm is shattered by the sound of arguing---deep voices speaking in Giant, and two human-like voices. The argument escalates into a shouting match, followed by two screams that seem to be approaching them. The PCs hide in the trees along the path.

A Kalashtar and a Warforged covered with crystals run toward the PCs, with four skullcrusher ogres, a hobgoblin dirgedancer and two whitespawn berserkers hot on their trial.

The PCs leap out of the trees. Kikkeni drops an energy ballon the monsters, and Lyka makes a beeline for the ogres. Unfortunately, nobody else is able to match her speed because of the trees---she's stuck in the middle of the bad guys, alone. Every single monster attacks her, thrashing her down to -2 HP in the course of one round from full HP (That's exactly 100 damage; I rolled really lucky on the attack rolls.) Lyka stabilizes herself with an action point.

The PCs immediately try to rush to Lyka's rescue, with Holden and Kikkeni leading the charge. Nox attempts to sneak attack one of the berserkers with a scroll of ice lance and crits, but unfortunately it makes its save and doesn't get stunned and thanks to Uncanny Dodge is unaffected by Sneak Attack.

The Kalashtar and the psiforged thank the PCs and try to fight back; the psiforged charges up his deep crystal bastard sword while the Kalashtar reveals something interesting---concealed under his sleeve is a mechanical arm much like a warforged. He tells the PCs to hold the monsters off as he begins to infuse his arm. The NPCs' efforts aren't necessary---the remaining PCs finish them off in short order, except for the dirgedancer, who is left at 0 HP.

The kalashtar introduces himself as Tharkhad, a wandering psionic artificer looking for a way back to Sharn. He doesn't know what's been happening in Elsir Vale, and says that he and his companion Synapse came from Darguun. The PCs break the news, and Tharkhad simply tells his friend flatly---"Told you we were going the wrong way."

Tharkhad and Synapse thank the PCs profusely, but then Tharkhad notices the red dragon horn that Kikkeni is carrying, saying that if she had killed a dragon, part of its spirit might have fractured off and trapped in the horn; Tharkhad's hypothesis is further strengthened by Kikkeni's explanation of how they took down the dragon. Her ego whip, which damaged the dragon's Charisma enough to shut down his spellcasting, could have forced more than a small bit of the dragon's personality into dormancy. Its death would have then released the "sealed" part, which would escape into any little remainder of the dragons' body---in this case, its horn.

Tharkhad says that he could craft the horn of Abithriax into a weapon if the PCs have a Siberys Dragonshard to act as a focus for Kikkeni's Quori spirit. Kikkeni gladly lets him do so, as she'd been looking for a way to use the horn. She also tells him about the Quori embedded components she salvaged from Ulwai's backpack. While she has her surgery, Holden attempts to do a Jack Bauer on the Dirgedancer. Nox, being a man of the appropriate profession, aids him. Unfortunately, she knows nothing about the current state of the Red Hand and if there are any remaining camps along the Dawn Way. Nox coup de graces her.

The party finishes early and lets Kikkeni know they're going to go ahead to Vraath Keep to scout. Kikkeni waves them on, and surprisingly enough gets there before they do thanks to psionic teleport.

The PCs then strike out for the Wyrmsmokes.

The Fiery Death Mountains

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Immerstal was not kidding. An hour into the foothills of the Wyrmsmokes, the PCs are attacked by a spellwarped dragonne in a canyon.

Linny pulls out her lore, as usual, figuring that this monster is of the spellwarped variety and as such gets stronger when spells bounce off its SR. A brief discussion over the monster's lame name comes up. Is it a "drag-own"? A "dragonnay?" The party decides to think of a new name for it.

Lyka advances again, making a jump check high enough to clear 40 feet of rubble along the canyon floor. Much snickering about the effeminate nature of the name comes to a sudden halt when the dragonne pounces on Lyka. Holden drops his maul, moves a bit forward and tries out his bow. Once the beast drops down beside Lyka, however, he decides to just go in for the kill.

Kikkeni offers to toss Holden. The dwarf grumbles, saying that he'd rather walk, but the opportunity is too good to pass up, as he'd have to double back to pick up his maul. Kikkeni throws Holden AT the Dragonne, busting it up pretty badly, and then throws his weapon after him (barely missing him). Holden falls prone in the monster's space, and then dispatches it with a solid critical Elder Mountain Hammer punch with his gauntlet.

<Kikkeni> ...so, what do we call the dragonne?
<Nox> "Dead."

The PCs then journey forth, but stop at the edge of a particularly large Fernia Manifest zone. No way they're camping in that hellish area overnight.

The players spend the rest of the session retroactively buying gear since we discovered how much money they actually had (about 13k GP)

Thoughts

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1. It was a pretty slow day, honestly, but I'm not surprised. It's been a long time since we last played.
2. Even though I made the Wyrmsmokes significantly more dangerous thanks to the environmental hazards, the PCs seem to be taking it pretty well.
3. It's a shame they won't be seeing more of Tharkhad anytime soon. I thought the opportunity to add a Renegade Mastermaker who can actually make stuff for them was too good to pass up, considering that Kikkeni just had no way of getting her Quori components to work .
4. Any suggestions on what gear to buy? I think everyone's mostly going to buy a few potions of endure elements, but they want other things to do with their gear. Nothing worth more than 16k, as that's the Brindol GP limit.

[AslanCross]

Session 18

Hack and slash session this time. The Wyrmsmokes were rightly billed as a dangerous place, and one does not simply walk into Mordor.

Journey Through the Wyrmsmokes, Continued
The PCs get up on the morning of Day 50 after camping on the edge of the Fernia manifest zone. They drink their potions of Endure Elements and set out on their way.

It's not long before they encounter a group of fiendish enemies.

A Certain Psionic Railgun

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The PCs arrive in the center of a Fernia manifest zone in the middle of active volcanic scabland and spot an ominous reddish glow in the distance crossing the road. Nox takes another potion of invisibility and sneaks ahead to investigate.

Nox's rolls are really high, and the fiends don't even hear him as he approaches them from the volcanic scab rock. He goes back to the party and describes the appearance of the fiends--about as tall as a man, hunched over and heavily built, with glowing red eyes, shredded, useless wings, long writhing beards, and upward curving horns. The three of them wield massive, saw-toothed glaives. Linny identifies them as barbazu.

Nox, still invisible, climbs up the scab basalt along the other side of the road and takes up a sniping position. Before he does so, he empties his pack of all his scrolls, spreading them out all over the ground. He then takes his shot, severely injuring one of the devils. The other PCs attempt to blitz the barbazu and catch them off guard, but the plan backfires--the devils hear them coming.

Kikkeni takes the high ground on top of the basalt scab along with Linny. Lyka runs along the path instead. Two of the devils teleport to confront Kikkeni while the third teleports into Lyka's path. Although Linny was able to identify their weaknesses and defenses as devils, she didn't roll high enough to determine their exact abilities.

The devil taunts Lyka, saying that the strong faith of Purified like her make their souls good eating. Lyka replies "My blades taste good too."

Holden moves too slowly to help Kikkeni, so Kikkeni once more throws Holden at one of the Barbazu using telekinetic thrust.
Linny fires off a Sound Burst on the two devils, but it barely grazes them. Kikkeni tries to back away, but due to their teleportation and reach weapons, the devils are too hard to shake.
Nox takes another shot at the already bleeding devil, which Holden dispatches with his maul.

The remaining devil pursuing Kikkeni bites into its finger, saying it's not that easy to kill them, and summons another Barbazu. Much swearing around the table.

Linny keeps up her blasting while Lyka tears into the devil that accosted her. The badly injured devil takes a step back, bites into its arm and scatters blood all over the ground. The black blood crawls around the warblade and begins coalescing into a dozen Lemures---all around Lyka. More swearing.
Linny identifies the Lemures as "entry-level devils," and Kikkeni's player says "...so they're call center agents?"
I reply: "If you think in terms of infernal bureaucracy, I don't think the truth would be very far from that."

Kikkeni Energy Pushes the two devils near her into each other, but the recently-summoned one teleports to Linny in the back, slashing Linny with a devastating critical hit.

Nox drops a Black Tentacles centered on Lyka, disabling the Lemures---and Lyka. Ironically, the devil with 1 HP gets away. (More snickering about how Lyka---and her player's characters--are ALWAYS in compromising situations---grappled by tentacles and surrounded by devils.)

Eventually, Lyka gets out of the tentacles, and Kikkeni pulls her out by throwing her at one of the other devils. Holden finishes off the last Barbazu. The tentacles crush the remaining lemures into gruesome black mush, and the PCs press on.

Wyvern attack

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The road snakes through deeply fissured ground with a lot of rock spires scattered about. The spires make great roosts for wyverns, and a pair are nesting in this area.

Nox once more drinks a potion of Invisibility, getting close. He immediately expresses interest in retrieving the wyvern stings for use as poison, and tries to snipe one. He damages the wyvern, which immediately attacks Lyka (again---she's always in front). The Wyvern successfully grabs Lyka and attempts to pull her up, but she's able to break free.

Kikkeni once more flings her favorite Dwarven projectile, crushing the wyvern's ribcage. The wyvern bleeds to death from Nox's shot.

The second wyvern buzzes Linny, stinging her, but she makes her save. She tries to back away while Holden and Lyka try to hit the wyvern (Nox scoring a sneak by using Deadeye Shot), but the dragon thrashes Linny down to 5 HP. The PCs take down the wyvern and continue on their journey.

They later encounter a flamestorm, but they're able to find cover in time under a rock shelf.

They continue marching for 4 more hours than they usually do in a day, and fatigue begins setting in. Ironically, while Lyka fails two checks, Holden fails one and Nox fails all four forced march checks, Linny gets fine well enough. They make camp, scarcely a day's march away from the Fane.

Last Legs

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They at last come to a place where the ground drops away dramatically into the large central canyon of the Wyrmsmokes. The lip of the canyon is guarded by a small outpost of elite troops---four legion devils (probably the most complex CR 3 monster EVER), a Narzugon and its nightmare mount, and a 15-foot tall, two-ton monstrosity: a Mountain Troll.

The outpost is built among the ruins of a crashed Lyrandar airship, and a couple of Ballista bunkers are scattered about the area.

The party is spotted by the guards long before the party sees them, so the Narzugon and his troops immediately form ranks.

The Narzugon and its nightmare prove very hard to pin down thanks to the mount's at-will Etherealness. It phases through the ground, while the mountain troll charges. Kikkeni activates her True Seeing, and Lyka draws Vaanon'Gan, the greatsword she got from Kharn.

The PCs try to take up covered positions behind the crashed airship, while Nox, once more invisible, tries to get into a bunker behind the troll. He dumps his oil of Dolorous Blow onto the ballista bolt and waits for an opportunity to shoot.

The legion devils, in the meantime, move up to a place behind another hull section. (These guys are pretty scary, being able to teleport to locations close to other legion devils as a move action).

The Narzugon phases up out of the ground beside Kikkeni, fills the area with smoke, but misses his attacks. The nightmare goes ethereal once more.
Nox tries to attack the mountain troll, but misses due to nonproficiency penalties, and wastes a very good opportunity.

Lyka runs up to the troll and uses Death from Above, but the beast smacks her with its greatclub for half her HP. Lyka, being a natural magnet for devils, once again gets surrounded by teleporting legion devils, who begin wailing on her (only one hits, though, despite their massive bonuses).

Holden challenges the Narzugon to single combat, which telepathically accepts. Kikkeni points out the Narzugon's location, but Holden misses due to not seeing his target. Instead of rushing in to attack him, the Narzugon flies behind Linny and shoots Holden with its triple scorching ray.

Lyka uses Mithral Tornado to slash the legion devils, significantly damaging their collective HP, then tumbles out of the mass and the troll's reach, after which the cleric gets up to her to heal her with CureCrit. Nox takes another shot at the troll, this time with his crossbow, and finally gets in some decent damage.

Kikkeni then blasts the troll and the legion devils with a powerfully-augmented Energy Missile: Fire (failing to remember that the legion devils are immune to it). Although she deals damage to the troll, the legion devils are unscathed.

Linny then drops an Earth Reaver on the legion devils and the troll, who make their collective saves but get blasted into oblivion by the flying rocks. After getting healed, Lyka activates her lesser Siberys armor, sprouting glowing dragonmark wings, and flies up to the troll once more, and uses Soaring Raptor Strike and Vaanon'Gan's bloodfeeding power. As she leaps out of the sunlight, she plunges the greatsword into the troll's chest, and the vicious weapon shreds the troll with its extending spines. The troll collapses.

The Narzugon attacks Holden but misses again, and Holden smites the devil with a Divine Surge, disintegrating it in a column of silver fire. Its rider dead, the nightmare goes ethereal and flies off.

As Lyka turns her back on the troll, however, it gets back up and whacks her again with its club. Nox finishes it off with a headshot. Two tons of troll hit the dirt, the sound of the impact reverberating off the canyon walls.

As the PCs walk up to the edge of the cliff, the view sends shivers down their spine.

A treacherous winding path (the last two hours of the trip) descends the cliff face below them, and crosses a long, narrow stone bridge to the other side. And there, at the end of the bridge, is the most impressive door any of them has ever seen:



The five stone heads of the Tiamat statue gaze tyrannically across the canyon.

Thoughts

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-While I thought it was rather boring to run hack and slash the whole day, it was pretty cool to throw fiends of various natures at the PCs. The encounters didn't really draw much blood apart from the last one, but they sure had a fun time trying to match wits with the devils.

-Nox managed to level up to 11 at the end of the encounter (technically, so does Lyka as she's never died and thus should have the most XP. We spend about an hour trying to account for disparate XP totals and decide that Nox has the most accurate count, so I set Lyka's XP to his.)

-Nox really wanted to make those wyvern stings into poison, but we underestimated the difficulty of crafting something overnight, so he gave up on them (he'd unfortunately invested all of his Lv 11 skill points into Craft:Poisonmaking). I let him use the stings as single-use, improvised weapons.

-We discovered that Kikkeni was lacking 2 powers she was supposed to get at Lv 10, and then realize that she completely forgot to level up. @_@

-Now that they've got two Lv 11 characters, I'll have to raise some of the smaller encounters in the Fane. There's still a fair amount of difficulty in getting around the Fane due to its defensive mechanisms and its small size (hard to escape monsters in the corridors).

-The Psionic Dwarf Railgun thing is getting to be really powerful. It allows Holden to bypass his inherent slowness, feeds his damage pool, AND deals damage to the enemy. It might be harder to use in the close quarters of the Fane, though.

-They made good time thanks to that forced march. It's the end of Day 51, so they've got four days to beat the Fane before the Orrery completes its alignment.

[Barbarian MD]

Two updates in two days!? It's like Christmas!

[AslanCross]

Nah, I was really busy last week so I wasn't able to finish last week's session in time.

[Barbarian MD]

But I don't know that.

[AslanCross]

Well, I hope you enjoyed them, regardless. :D

There was a funny discussion with Lyka's player afterwards (she was absent, so Linny's player handled her).

<Me> The group sees the entrance to the Fane. *displays Tiamat's Fane picture*
<Her> D: D: D: Does it COME ALIVE?!
<Me> Nah. You should meet the doorkeeper, though.
<Her> D: D: D: Villains tend to be a lot worse than their doorways let on. It's a great welcome mat. You can totally expect the people inside to nice, upright, peaceloving vegans who don't have any taste for kalashtar, dwarven, shifter, or human meat. I'd hate to meet the doorkeeper....OR THE BUTLER.

[Starbuck_II]

Which demon battle was most fun to run against them?

[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

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

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.

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?

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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

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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.

"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

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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

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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

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-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

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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

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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

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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

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"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

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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.

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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

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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

"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

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-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 time

Not 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...:

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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...:

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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:

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Ultroloth is close, but not quite. Same CR bracket, though.